The Battle of Freedom
By: Alexandria Di Angelo
Prologue
Long ago, before 2100, Earth was in its happiest and most prosperous times. A global "Pax Romana," if you will. There was peace and unity with all of the countries in the world, as there once was long before our time. The population had reached a reasonable birth and death rate, the lifespan of the average human had increased to 130 years, and the world was ruled by one government that controlled all things with righteousness. Everything was as it should have been; but history grew murky after twenty-seven years of records only showing prosperity, leaving no sign of trouble for anyone to question. Near the end of this period, an airborne pathogen unknown to forensic scientists spread and left its victims with symptoms of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. The public grew frightened and demanded answers, which couldn't be given while no powerful entity was in office, so the call for a new government rang out across the globe. As a result of the gradual weakening of government during the golden times, a political party called Sector 16 emerged to take up the yoke of ruling the nations of the world with an iron fist. The group was composed of the oldest and ugliest boogers you could imagine from each Sanctuary on the globe, but no one ever saw the people who made up our new government, except for those on Death Row. Shortly after their inauguration, the word had gotten around about a biochemical terrorist being responsible for the outbreak of CCJD. Ironically, a group called Hexxa emerged two months later and claimed to be the biochemical terrorist group that Sector 16 had told us about, allowing an increase of mass panic and chaos to ensue. To paint themselves as the saviors in our darkest times, Sector 16 officially declared war on Hexxa to the public in 2109, ensuring that they would be solely responsible for "finishing what the enemy started." Surprisingly, recruits came flooding in for Hexxa, due to its diplomats falsely advertising benefits against the side effects of the war that would ensue for both themselves and their families. Once the amount of followers of Hexxa was deemed uncontrollable by Sector 16 alone, a group of active soldiers and veterans was called upon to help bring order to the different Sanctuaries in Sector 16's power. This group's members were later named The Cleansers, as they were called upon to "cleanse" the Sanctuaries of their biochemical plagues.
The war lasted seven years, I was told. When the war began, the concept of keeping track of time proved to be more of a nuisance than a benefit to my schedule of wiping out Hexxa and training in my free time. I trained harder than anyone that I knew, including my commanding officer, Colonel Nicholas (or "Colonel A" to the greenhorns in my regiment). I knew that I wasn't normal, though, because I was isolated from my comrades in the first year of us fighting together. I didn't fatigue as fast as others did during training and I ran faster, pertained more information, had more insight on potential battle strategies, invented new techniques of stealth, and cared more about defeating the enemy to protect everyone that I could save than everyone of the men and women among The Cleansers. After falling into a schedule of training, running, studying, and sparring to keep myself busy, I lost track of how long we were in the war after three years.
After surpassing all limits set for officers in my regiment, I was promoted to commanding an elite group of The Cleansers, a handful of soldiers who exceeded all of my father and Sector 16's expectations. With my regiment, I felt more at ease with being the soldier I was, because they were like me: faster, stronger, wiser, and stealthier than those around them. After a while, I alone was sent to provide aid to a weakening force overseas, which was child's play once I stepped onto the field. I wiped out the enemy located there in one fell swoop, then was shipped back home to my original post. After my return, I was informed upon my orders to train with my soldiers that they were dead, murdered in an old camp for Hexxa's prisoners and test subjects. I almost believed the lies that I had been told when the news finally registered. Then, Colonel A told me that the government had led them to the camp as part of Operation Nightingale, which was a classified assignment to test out new stealth neurotechnology. Once they were electrocuted by the backfire of their equipment, the Forensics department of Sector 16 was ordered to capture them and run tests on their dead corpses. It turns out that my soldiers had a rare fungus growing over their brains that had enhanced their physical and mental functions, which explained their excellency in everything that they did. Apparently, the government feared that they might join Hexxa or rebel against them, so they had my men murdered like pigs in a slaughterhouse.
I took the loss lightly. I couldn't afford to let it get in the way and affect me in a way that might jeopardize someone's life, so I became apathetic about it and moved on. I didn't want to drown myself in sorrow for what their lives might have been had they not died; it's unhealthy for a person to do such things to themselves, and it brings dishonor to the deceased's memory. I moved on and made their legacy live on by fighting for them after their funerals. I ended up defeating Hexxa at its roots when I killed their leader on a mission almost a year ago, and I spent the rest of that year overseeing the containment and demise of the followers that still remained. On April 11th of 2116, Sector 16 announced the demise of Hexxa to the public and declared that the war, which had plagued us and taken our freedom away for far too long, was finally over.
I live in a two-story house that used to be a mansion before the war corrupted the surface of the grand establishment. My father had used it as a base about six years ago, right when the war started getting ugly, but he gave me the house as a reward for accomplishing several missions that violated at least twenty-seven of the codes (in over sixteen countries alone) that I had sworn to uphold as the Commander of the only elite force on our (-err, the government's) side. I had invited my bunk-mate and combat partner Hannah to stay with me, since it was a big house and it had tons of room, and we've lived there ever since. We got back in it ten months ago after we had been sent overseas to a Sanctuary that required assistance in strengthening its defense, and repaired the disarray the house had gone into the day that we got home. We fixed up some things that had gone astray in our absence, such as the dishwasher, the security system, the garage turned training arena, and so on. In about three months' time, the house had returned to its originally glorious state and has remained that way to this day. A fellow fire-team member named Collin came by three weeks ago and interviewed me about the struggles of going through the war as the Commander of the elite force and the supposed "savior of the world". He published the book he had been writing during the war two days ago, and I received an autographed copy in the daily post. I'd been reading it ever since I first took hold of it. I went to bed and read it with my flashlight last night until about three in the morning, so I had been sleeping pretty soundly until I began to dream of a past battle that still brought tears to my eyes.
I was in a airship with my fire-team, gearing up and loading my pistols as the clatter of the loose objects inside the cabin gave me a headache. Hannah, the medic of my team at the time, was humming a little tune we had made up in boot camp a few years after the war started. I smiled and hummed along with her as we prepared for battle. I remembered about something of mine that she had and asked, "Hannah, can you toss me my earbuds?" She groaned and said, "Would it kill you to fight these buggers without music for once?" I shook my head, saying, "Yes! Besides, instead of listening to them scream bloody murder, I can listen to my new playlist on my iPod!" She scoffed jokingly and threw my earbuds across the cabin, which I caught without even looking up from checking my equipment. As I plugged them in, I finished gearing up and put on my earbuds before grabbing my helmet and loading my guns. I stood next to Connor, the heavy of my team, and asked, "Ready to claim another territory back?" Peter, the strategist, scoffed in distaste and stuffily replied, "Why do you sound so cheery about it? You do realize that this isn't a game, right? The people in this territory you're so desperate to claim are too sick for us to help and you're acting like you're a kid waking up on Christmas day. Doesn't that, I don't know, make you question the reason why you're still alive?" I huffed at his saucy attitude, "This is war. I don't know if you've been paying attention to the news lately, but there's no longer anyone in this territory that can be cured. To avoid another outbreak, we have to put them down before we have hell to pay for it. You have to understand that one side can't have a flawless victory. Besides, who put a twist in your pannies, sweetheart?" Quiet chuckles escaped from the rest of our fire-team, and I smirked a little at my own boldness.
Suddenly, the aircraft shook as Peter went to retaliate my biting exposition. I hit my head against the wall of the cabin and groaned before fumbling around for the comm on the wall. I finally found it amidst my dizziness and shouted, "Captain, what's going on up there?!" in the mic. I heard an unearthly snarl on the other end and froze in fear as gunshots rang out while someone cried, "The captain's dead, sir! Infected breached our cabin, and now I'm the only one left!" I gained control of myself and asked, "Can you at least get us somewhat down near the battlefield?" The pilot sighed and said, "I'm not making any promises that it'll be a smooth landing, but I can try to get you down closer." I nodded and replied, "That'll do. Keep your eyes out for any other Infected; we still need a ride home, soldier." He shouted, "I'll do my best, sir!" as a set of steel doors to my left creaked open.
The foul, intoxicated air whipped around us and made me gag at the smell of dementia-inducing chemicals, my head spinning as my nausea worsened. "Helmets on!" I screamed as I fought the urge to heave on the cabin floor, my helmet creating a barrier of fresh air to breathe as I slipped it on. My fireteam followed suit, their helmets lighting up green when they were secure. After my vertigo had faded away, I reached around on my person and clicked "Play" on my iPod, "Bangerang" by Skrillex starting as an automatic voice blared over the PA system in the cabin, "You are now hovering over the drop zone." I walked up to the doors, my steel-covered toes hanging off the edge of the floor, and turned around to my team. As I looked at each one's face, I grinned and said, "Let's get our game on!" before I leaned and fell backwards out of the ship, the wind racing through my hair as I dove into the battlefield.
After falling for a minute or so, I watched as Hannah hovered by my side and gave me a sign that showed she was ready to fight, then saw Peter and Connor do the same. I decided I had fallen freely long enough and activated the jetpack on my battle suit, motioning for my companions to do the same. Soon, my fireteam and I were in a diamond formation as we caught sight of what we were up against. Thousands of Infected were scrambling around, their boil-covered arms and bleeding bodies mashing against each other as they mindlessly moved. I shouted, "Break formation!" and watched as we all rocketed off in four different directions, my body still rushing forward to the mass of the chemically-deranged crowd. I rolled as I came in for a landing and stood up, the mass of Infected surrounding me still trying to process what had just happened. I pulled out two blasters and felt a rush of adrenaline course through my body as I said, "Let's dance, freaks."
I jumped up and shot three Infected down, enraging the crowd and starting a chain reaction as I wiped out five more. After two minutes of fighting, I had taken down fifty-three or so Infected, which was saying something for working alone. Hannah leapt in and jumped on one of the Infected, using its monstrous head as a cushion for her landing. She whipped her red hair back and said, "I've killed forty-eight so far. How many have you gotten?" as she dodged an attack from a skinny Infected called a Scout. I shouted "Fifty- four! Watch out!" as a bloated one rushed forward while Hannah unleashed a whip made out of copper wire and cracked it on the Infected as she jumped up, her whip slicing an arm off of the corpulent beast as she hovered above it with her jet pack. "You know you have a lot more range up here, right?" she shouted as one leapt up and she dove to attack it. I jumped up, slipped my leg around the bloated Infected's neck, and replied, "Yeah, I know! I just like for things to feel a little personal when I fight!" As I asphyxiated the monster, it reached its remaining arm up at me as it lost consciousness and fell, shaking the ground as I landed on its stomach. The flesh burst, sending blood and other liquids flying, and the wipers on my helmet struggled to eradicate the sticky yellow and red stains on the glass. I groaned as Hannah laughed and said, "Yep, can't get much more personal than that." I stuck my tongue out at her and shook like a dog, flinging some of the liquids on my suit onto her by accident. She groaned and shouted, "I just cleaned my suit this morning!" I chuckled at her whining until I heard Peter's voice shout in my helmet, "Alex, Connor's down! His suit's been breached!"
As Hannah and I zoomed through the crowd of Infected surrounding our teammates, I body-slammed into a trio of the freaks and rolled into the circle of fire that Peter had started to keep most of the monsters at bay. I leaned next to Connor, who was laying on his back, and said, "How bad is it?" He turned over and showed the point of his breach, a gaping hole that dripped with poisoned blood as the toxic air around us married with the opening on his neck. He wheezed, "I'm sorry. I endangered the mission. Leave me behind, I'm useless now." I shook my head and said, "We make our stand here and now, and none of us are leaving you," standing and pressing my blasters together to make a set of modified compound bow and arrow. I raised my bow in the air and shot two arrows, their tips igniting as they soared through the air. When they collided, an explosion of purple and black permeated the sky, hovering right over our location for our pilot to come rescue us. After ten minutes of combat, we were almost overwhelmed by the mass of Infected and low on ammunition. I threw my bow down in anger, slipped on a pair of brass knuckles with spikes, and shouted, "Don't stop! Keep fighting!" As I prepared to defend my teammate until the very end, a bright light shone in the sky and blinded us, driving the throb of Infected away.
A helicopter landed in the new clearing in front of us and men in metal hazmat suits rushed forward, pushing through our circle of defense to see Connor's condition. He twitched and thrashed around, the toxins in his system making him turn into one of the enemy's pawns. The men backed away as a primal growl escaped Connor's lips, his eyes swelling and bulging as he went rogue. He leapt on top of Hannah and madly swiped around her suit, trying to create an opening to contaminate her as well. She screamed out loud as he pinned her arms down and went to deliver the final blow until a bullet went straight through his helmet and out his forehead. I watched in shock as Connor fell to the ground, his body slumping forward as he died. Hannah met Peter's gaze as I realized he was the one responsible for killing our teammate, his hands shaking as he held his gun out. The hazmat team came back and pried the gun from his hands as they took him and Hannah into the helicopter, the words, "I'm sorry, old friend," echoing in the air as I was left alone. I slumped to the ground and turned Connor over, cradling his Infected head in my hands as I felt a single tear run down my face. I looked at Connor and said, "Get up, soldier." His unresponsive body angered me and I screamed, "GET UP!" I sobbed and continued to shout at him as I felt myself shake uncontrollably. Suddenly, I watched everything fade away and gasped as I continued to shake.