What does it mean to be a soldier? Is it to blindly follow orders? Is it to be a killing machine? Or is it to protect others so that they can be at peace? I am not sure. I am part of a military family. My father, Daniel Brooks, 5'10" Caucasian male with brown hair and brown eyes was an Army Ranger and my mother, Samantha Brooks, also 5'10" Caucasian female with black hair and blue eyes was a Navy Seal. My grandfather, Calico Jack Brooks, 5'11 Caucasian male with brown hair and brown eyes, fought as a marine during the Vietnam War. When I asked them this question, they all gave me the same answer. That being a soldier is being a part of something greater and fighting to ensure that you complete your mission and to come home with the rest of you team alive.
Oh I almost forgot. My name is Vincent Brooks, I'm 17 year old Caucasian boy with short black spiky hair and blue eyes just like my mother. I am born into a military family. I'm not sure if I want to be a soldier but the idea has always been appealing to me. They have access to a load of weapons so badass that it's practically envious. I've also played a lot of video games surrounding the military for entertainment. Some are more realistic than others. I especially like the more futuristic games like Halo and Mass effect. Both of them have great storylines and a myriad of characters that I find to be interesting.
Though Mass effect was unique in the sense that it was an RPG, role playing game. With the main character of the game, Commander Shepard, I could decide the outcome of events and see where it took me. I could choose which gender that Shepard was as well as background. I always chose male with spacer and war hero background. Choosing these lead to an increase of points for the paragon path. You can say that this was the good choice path. Everything I did in the game was under the Paragon options. I saved many lives with that and recruited a series of allies against the great enemy that came in waves in Mass Effect 3.
The Reapers. A highly-advanced machine race of synthetic-organic starships. The Reapers reside in dark space: the vast, mostly starless space between galaxies. They hibernate there, dormant for fifty thousand years at a time, before returning to the galaxy. They were created to find a way to stop the killing between human and synthetics. This was a mistake. They killed most of their creators and went to kill off many other civilizations until they went into a deep sleep. They were the ones that created the mass relays in preparation for their return. Every fifty thousand years, they would return and wipe out those who were more advanced than others. One Reaper can take down a planet. That's how dangerous they were.
What kinda ticked me off was the ending choices of the game. To destroy, to control and to synthesize. Now each of these choices sound good in some way depending what you picked. However, in the end Shepard dies. I didn't like that. In the destroy ending, there was a chance that Shepard was alive but there was no confirmation of that was the case. All we get was a fast forward several years or centuries into the future where Shepard is a legendary figure that fought against the universes greatest threat and won. It's a nice sentiment but I prefer to know what happened to my Shepard and his crew after those events.
I also liked the romance options. The dialogue and loyalty missions were truly something I always looked forward too. I loved all of the females that were in the game. Especially Liara. To be honest I have a thing for hit alien chicks. Truly one of the best game franchises I have ever played.
Halo is another one. I mean who doesn't want to be Master Chief. The guy single handedly took down legions of the Covenant forces without even a scratch and saved the universe from a rogue Forerunner named the Didact. However, the one thing that kept him centered was his personal AI and friend, Cortana. She was created by Dr. Halsey so that she could ensure that he was psychologically stable. She succeeded in her mission but she was breaking down. AIs like her don't last long and soon enough she sacrificed herself to save Chief from dying and defeated the Didact. She then came back as the villain in the last game which I didn't really like. It just didn't feel right to me about that character change. She was in love in the Chief and helped protected humanity. Now she has become the villain that she helped fight against. It's a shame really but what could I do. I'm not a writer for the gaming industry.
Anyway, back to the present. I'm currently with my parents in the car to go to a nice restaurant. This is one of the few times that my parents actually have some time off from their jobs. They said that they will be discharged soon but I know that they enjoy the fight. It makes them feel alive in a way. I guess I can understand that.
We are about to make the turn to the area where the restaurant is located until a black Cadillac stops in front of us. Four men with automatic assault rifles aim right at us. I know what's going to happen. I've seen enough movies to know this type of situation. My parents must've pissed someone off during their time overseas and they must've had enough resources to find out where they were. My Dad is about to make an evasive maneuver while Mom takes out her handgun. It was futile. They fired their guns at us.
A barrage of bullets come flying at our direction. My parents die instantly. I was shot several times but didn't die. I guess I got lucky but then again I doubt that I would survive this.
I'm in excruciating pain. The bullets passed through me, hitting one of my lungs, kidney, liver and spleen. I'm surprised that a bullet wasn't lucky enough to hit my heart. I try to get out of the car but one of the shooters open the car door and just looks at me. I can see the righteousness in his eyes for what he and his team did. Even if I wasn't a target, I'm just necessary collateral. The last of my bloodline. The shooter raises his gun to my head to finish the job he was set out to do.
I look at the barrel of the gun and I'm reminded of a poem that helped Nelson Mandela through times of great struggle which was said beautifully by Morgan Freeman. I can see the gunman squeezing the trigger and I recite the poem in a weak voice that only I can hear.
"Out of the night that covers me, Black as the pit from pole to pole" my life starts to flash before me.
"I thank whatever gods may be. For my unconquerable soul." I'm with my grandfather teaching me how to play baseball while my parents are overseas. He even bought me ice cream once we were done.
"In the fell clutch of circumstance I have not winced nor cried aloud." I'm at my grandfathers funeral. Didn't shed a tear because we don't mourn the dead. We rejoice the life he had.
"Under the bludgeonings of chance, My head is bloody, but unbowed." The shooters killing my parents in front of me and fatally wounding me in the process.
"Beyond this place of wrath and tears Looms but the Horror of the shade, And yet the menace of the years Finds and shall find me unafraid." I'm at church for the first time in years with my entire family. Remembering that death is not the end but another journey that we all must take.
"It matters not how strait the gate, How charged with punishments the scroll, I am the master of my fate" I'm with my parents together on a boat sailing around the Hawaiian Islands.
"I am the captain of my soul." My parents and I watching a movie together on the couch and eating popcorn with smiles on our faces. Good memories to have at a moment like this.
BANG!!
The gunman finally pulls the trigger as I finish the poem. Everything goes blank. The first thing I noticed was that there was no pain. I guess it was more painless than I thought it would be. The second was that I was laying on a smooth warm surface which is strange since I was in the back of a car covered in my own blood. And the last...was the loud hum of some kind of machinery.
I cracked my eyes open slowly, blurred vision slowly coming into focus as I looked around my environment.
I had to blink a few times to see if this was a dream or some kind of an afterlife. I look around and see what looked like a room made entirely of metal with long beacons of light running through the walls, ceiling and floor. I sit up and look more closely at the room, the humming sound coming from all around me. This place looks familiar. I start to feel cold and I realize that I'm completely naked but I have no bullet holes on my body. That's a plus I guess. I continue to look around.
"What is this place?" I ask myself. Not thinking that anyone would answer. I was wrong.
"All will be answered soon, young one."
I whipped around hearing the faint voice that seemed to echo through this place and my mind at the same time.
"What?..." I looked left and right but didn't see anyone. That voice. Why does it seem familiar? Where could I have heard it before?
"This way. And all will be explained." the voice echoed again and long corridor appears in front of me. Not suspicious at all.
I felt hesitant for a few moments before I decided what the hell. I'm already dead, what else could kill me. I walked all the way to the end where a door slid apart. The room beyond was twice the size of the one I woke up in, but the center was divided by a large crevice that lead downward into pitch darkness.
Looking around, I see a palm sized device hovering in the air at the edge of the drop. A glowing green button in the center of the device seemed to call to him. Reaching out, I pressed it...
The device closed up before vanishing in a burst of light. When it faded, a bridge made of pure light connected the two sides of the room over the dark abyss below.
"Holy shit. This is a light bridge from Halo but this can't be" I said with shock but I keep walking down the bridge to guide me to where I need to be.
I made my way across to another door on the other side. When I stood in-front of it, it parted letting blinding light into the room making me cover my eyes.
When the light faded a little, I looked up and I was amazed.
The doorway lead to a large balcony that overlooked a massive expance of open air. Crystal clear blue skies and white clouds were everywhere, but the thing that really got his attention where the large buildings that floated in the air beyond.
Each structure had several parts that shifted on their own accord giving the hint that the buildings themselves were alive in some way.
"So this is where I'll be staying. It's very beautiful" I say admiring the landscape of the place.
"You have died, young one. But you are not completely gone from the land of the living." My focus snapped to a bright light coming from the clouds above that descended to the balcony he was standing on. When the light reached the edge it faded to reveal a being the likes of which he had never seen before. Holy shit it's the Librarian from the Halo franchise. But she can't be real.
She smiles at my shocked expression and continues to speak "Where one journey has ended, another has revealed itself to you, Vincent Brooks."
"The Librarian? B-But this can't be possible. You are just a character from a video game. A fiction" I reasoned while on the verge of panic.
"Calm yourself child. I assure you that this is no illusion. I truely exist, as does many other things you are not aware of." The Librarian said to me.
"If you're real, then that means that there's a reason why I am here. Am I correct?" I deduced to her. She gives me an impressed look.
"Very impressive Mr. Brooks. You are indeed correct. There is a reason for why you are hear. You are a part of something far greater than anything ever asked of any being in this universe or any other. A destiny that has been mapped out since before you were born" she told me.
"Destiny? What Destiny? I'm a nobody. Are you sure that you picked the right person?" I ask her.
"That is where you are wrong, Mr. Brooks. You see I have been watching many universes for long time. Observing them to find someone worthy of the gifts that I bestow upon them to stop a great catastrophe." She said to me.
"You mean like what you did to the Master Chief. You said that he was a culmination of a lifetime of planning. You activated dormant genes to evolve him to survive the threat of the Didact" I mentioned to her. She smiles at that.
"You are indeed knowledgeable of my history and the universe I come from. The Chief, as you call him, is one of two worthy to be the one to protect humanity from its greatest threat. The other one is you" she said to me.
"Hold up? What do you mean I'm worthy to protect humanity? I'm just a kid that was killed because his parents did things to protect their country. I'm a casualty of war. Not a hero" I reasoned with her in shock in what she was saying.
"You really think so little of yourself. Your destiny wasn't to protect humanity from your world but from another. Those "video games" you loved to play will help you along the way in your journey. In this new life you will work with another, who I'm sure you know very well, to stop a great threat coming." She said to me.
"And what is this place that I'm going to?" I ask her.
"The universe you will go to is known by yours as Mass Effect" she tells me. I'm just blown away from her answer.
"Mass effect" I repeated. I'm going to be working with Shepard and the crew to stop the Reapers from destroying every advanced species in the galaxy. Oh man this is exciting.
"Yes. This world could use someone like you. You have a good heart. Even though you didn't follow your parents path of a soldier yet, I believe that with the gifts you would be given, you can be someone great." She says to me. I was uncertain if I was going to be a soldier in my life but in honor of them, I will be a soldier in the next life.
"Very well. When do we get started?" I ask her.
"In a few moments you will be reborn into your new life and your body will be genetically evolved to make you a stronger than you ever were. You would also be given some tools to help you on your mission. I wish you luck Mr. Brooks. Mankind's survival is in your hands" the Librarian tells me as she disappears. Suddenly I'm surrounded by a blinding white light. Everything goes blank for a second time.
Next thing I know, my eyes open up to a white room. But this room looks to be a hospital of some kind but very advanced in technology. My body feels strange. I feel small. I try to move but I'm surrounded by what looks like blankets. I try to talk but no words come out only sounds. My hands are small and so is my body.
Holy shit I'm a baby. I look around and see that I'm surrounded by other babies. Some of them are not human. Oh my God. I'm actually here. I'm actually in the Mass effect universe.
Pretty soon a nurse comes. She's a Turian. Wow they look so fucking awesome in real life. She looks nervous. She must be new to taking care of babies because a good amount of them are crying out of fear of her appearance. She finished walking towards me. I guess she was tasked to pick me up. Fear seems to consume her facial and body expressions. I think she expects me to cry out of fear. She starts to pick me up.
"H-Hi there little one. I-I'm going to t-take you to your parents now" the turian nurse says nervously. I feel so bad for her so I do something she doesn't expect. I giggle. She is shocked at this and I giggle some more and it turns to downright laughter. It seems to be infectious because she soon starts to laugh too.
"At least you are more open minded of people who are different than you." She said to me as I give her a smile to which she smiles in return. She holds me close and then leads me to a hospital room where my parents are. The door in front of us slides open and reveals two familiar figures.
"Mr and Mrs. Brooks, your son is here" the turian nurse says to them as she places me in my mother's arms. These people look exactly like my parents in my old world and they even have the same name. The Librarian must've added them in here for me. It looks like they don't have the memories of what happened to them so that's a great mercy for them. I want to cry in happiness but I don't want to make people sad so I stick to smiling.
"Hello Vincent. It's an honor to meet you" said my mother. Jesus she even sounds the same.
"You look so much like your mother" said my dad. I just smile and laugh because I am on the verge of being a teary mess. This is getting really emotional right now. I didn't even have the moment to mourn them when they died and now they are here, alive and well. It's so surreal.
My dad starts to hold me and take me to a window. He shows me the outside and all I see is space. Vast and beautiful in its image.
"Welcome Vincent to the space colony Prometheus. This is our home. We achieved the impossible. We are living amongst the stars and have met life on other planets. You will be one of many to explore this galaxy and beyond to help expand our presence to many. I see great things for you my son. I know that one day, you will see the countless worlds that await you and help ensure the mankind perseveres" my dad says to me with a smile on his face. I'm a spacer just like Shepard assuming that's the storyline he or she is in at the moment. I don't know but I'm sure in a few years I'll find out.
I'm finally here. I can help Shepard assemble a rad tag group of misfits and outcasts to fight against the greates enemy we will ever face. There is so much to do and so little time. This is exciting. It's good that my family is back with me. I hope that they live longer than they did in my world. I'll make sure that it happens that way.
The Librarian believed me to be the one to help protect humanity. I'm not sure if she is right. I am a nobody not a chosen hero but I'll do my best regardless because I know the story and I'll be damned if I don't get myself involved.
A war is coming. A war that will decide the fate of many civilizations and species across the galaxy. I don't know if I'll succeed but I'll sure as shit try. Maybe my destiny is to die to make sure Shepard finishes the job. If that's the case I only have one thing to say:
I am the master of my fate. I am the captain of my soul.
Whew. Ok this took me a bit to do. As you can see this is a Mass Effect story with elements of Halo mixed in. The main character Vincent is an OC created by Stigma13 with some changes I made myself to include into the story. Vincent will be joining Shepard on the missions played in the game series.
Since my works are harem, this won't be an exception. I already have a list.
Liara, Ashley, Tali, Miranda, Samara, and Aria
This is the list so far. If you want to add someone let me know and I'll consider it.
I hope this was an interesting introduction to the story. I hope it was entertaining and well written enough for you guys. Enjoy everyone. This is me signing out.