An original story of massive porportions! You've never seen anything like this before, unless you're a massively huge Otaku who does nothing but sit at home and watch anime! I present to you, my completely original story:
Disclaimer: I pretty much own ANYTHING except for references to existing movies, video games or books. The characters are mine, as are any fictional companies, names, etc.
Part of Me
Prologue
The stable economy of the United States of America was made so because of a corporation. This corporation had - within the recent decade - shot up in the ranks of the world by producing some of the most potent healing medicines in the world. Diseases such as cancer, Multiple Sclerosis, diabetes and even leprosy had been miraculously cured by this corporation. Its financial power was only equalled by its political and medicinal power.
The corporation, known as Gaia Medicinal, held offices in 78 different countries, and supplied medicines and other healing products to all 152 counties in the world. 152 countries, you ask? In the year 2013, Gaia M., as they were liked to be called, bought and cultivated the southern island Isla Sorna, and no, it didn't house dinosaurs, only research facilities and homes for its employees, as well as any wealthy immigrant that wanted a taste of utopia.
It seemed as if they could do no wrong.
With heavy financial backing, Gaia M. brought the United States of America out of its many war debts. They helped save many soldiers' lives during Iraq, Iran and the now-finished war between the United Kingdom and Russia. Their influence with the current president Alfred Banner was immense, and one could say that they had him in their pockets.
Occasionally, there would be news of strange happenings that occured near or at Gaia research facilities. Civilians who had homes nearby would sometimes report strange noises coming from behind the concrete walls that ran around the large buildings. Reports of howling animals, minor explosions and perhaps the strangest of all, screams from humans would be reported to the local police stations.
At first, the police waved them off, recieving letters from Gaia M. that the strange noises that had been heard were merely happenstance noises caused by machinery or their experiments. Gaia M. vehemently denied any testing on live test subjects, something they prided themselves on. And so, the matter was ignored for a few more years.
Oh, how we should have seen it coming.
Soon, similar reports of the strange noises began to pop up around the globe, and since each one was so consistant with the other, there was a forced facility inspection in the United States, with President Banner protesting against it. Though they found nothing out of the ordinary, the inspection teams noticed the nervous, even scared looks on Gaia M.'s employees' faces. That should have been their first sign that something was wrong.
Soon, reports of missing people began to spring up. Slowly, but surely, the United States was losing people at a rate of 15 per day.
In each state.
It started off with homeless people being picked up off of the street. Civilians had noticed that the hobos that usually milled around their areas had mysteriously dissapeared, and homeless shelters confirmed it. An investigation was held, but nothing showed up.
Then, normal people started dissapearing. Men, women, children, even the elderly began to be lost and soon it came to such a point that national curfews were instated, prohibiting anyone from leaving their house after dusk. It worked for a while, but then the dissapearances began again.
It wasn't until a highly publicised kidnapping that the United States Army became involved.
And this is where his story began.
-----
Dante Leone was your typical college student.
Oh, no wait, he wasn't. He was underweight, not particularly muscular, wore thick rimmed glasses and pretty much got into college based on pure luck, or bribary. Yes, it had to be bribary. The young man was a complete mockery to the word 'education'. He joined no fraternities, no sports teams or extracurricular activities. He showed no interest in his studies (criminal forensics) and certainly didn't hold any of his professors in his heart, or he, they.
He enjoyed video games. He currently owned a Playstation 3, soon to be replaced by a Playstation 4-Omega that was going to be replaced soon. He was an avid Final Fantasy fan, having even bought a $750 cellphone just so he could play Final Fantasy XIII Agito. He had an interest in powerful gaming computers, souped up cars and anything else that would be classified as 'nerdy'.
For lo and behold: he was a nerd.
He had few friends, more like aquaintences. And even still, he didn't like them. They clung to him like leeches, trying to bask in his company for his father's fame. His father was a big shot owner of the Gaia M. facility in Miami. Edwardo Leone was a very powerful man politically-wise. He practically owned the mayor.
You'd think Dante would have all the popularity because of this.
Well, he didn't. He was a nerd, remember.
Females sniffed disdainfully at him. Lacking muscle, he weighed in at a measly 140lbs, and was fairly thin. The only muscles he could have been proud of were the thin, wiry ones he gained in cross training. Other than that, he could be creamed flat by any of the jerkoff jocks in school. He had short, mousy brown hair that wouldn't look good no matter what he did to it. He was average-looking as well, not ugly, not handsome but certainly nothing special.
Perhaps the only redeeming quality about him were his eyes.
They were greener than that damn green light your computer monitor is blinking at you at the moment. You know which green I'm talking about, if you don't then sorry, your computer monitor is wierd.
His eyes were passed down to him from his recently deceased mother, Maria Leone, who had died of a rare sickness that his father's wonderful company couldn't cure. It was odd, she had been the picture of health not two months ago, and suddenly she had upped and died after taking a tour at her husband's facility.
Anyways, shoving the fact that Dante is a pathetically stringy loser, we shall now get on with it and see what he's up to now.
-----
Dante looked around lazily. He was currently at the mall, sitting at the food court while drinking from his soda cup casually. He had just returned from the Electronics Boutique after putting down the required $1300 deposit to pre-order a PS4O. His father was rich enough - and stupid enough, mind you - to toss Dante his own trust account, with nearly unlimited fund to do whatever the hell he wanted. Literally, his father was that rich.
Craning his neck, he glanced at the holographic projection that loomed over the food court, projecting television commercials as if they were right next to you. It was currently showing an advertisement for some new elixer that Gaia M. had developed.
"The Archos serum will provide scuba divers an unprecidented amount of hydrogen-oxygen diffusion, allowing them to not only discard their heavy scuba gear, but breathe underwater!" a bubbly female voice chattered. The projection showed some smarmy idiot grinning widely as he swam around in the Pacific, swallowing water and then breathing it back out without drowning. "The diffusion method allows divers to intake water into their lungs, and the serum seperates the oxygen molecules from the hydrogen molecules, naturally expelling the hydrogen as the diver breathes outward, but using the oxygen for the body. Another revolutionary product from Gaia Medicinal!"
Dante snorted. Idiot surfers and divers alike would be swarming to the new, expensive product. People nowadays had far too much money to throw away. Gaia M. had also developed things such as flame-resistant sprays for firemen, bullet-proof cream for cops, and even some sort of serum that could allow people to regenerate body parts! His father had created that last one, the high-riding moron.
Yes, Dante didn't care much for his father. The man had been riding you youth's back ever since he was a kid, telling Dante that he had better grow up to be a scientist like him, so he could join his father at the ranks of Gaia. The man never appreciated his wife either, and she seemed more like a child-bearer to the Italian than anything else.
In fact, the same greedy looks his father shot Dante nowadays were the same ones he gave his mother before she died...
Dante shook his head. Best not to think like that! he chided himself. I'm being way too paranoid. Paranoid movie-style.
He glanced at his Omega watch. It was nearing 8:00 and he should get home. Glancing around as he tossed his cup into the bin, he saw a group of football jocks with their girlfriends approach him. Oh great.
"Check it out Phil, it's fanboy Leone!" the fattest one, Lance Carter laughed. He was the linebacker, since his giant rolls of fat weren't much use anywhere else on the team. He was stupid as he was fat, which was saying something since the fool weighed over 300lbs.
"I see de foo," Phil Carpenter laughed. He was a tall, menacing black quarterback that had rippling muscles Dante knew all too well. After all, they were used to kick his ass several times too many.
Phil's posse (including his fellow jocks, Jason Veras, Ryan Whitewood, Whitney Reddings and Carl Johnson along with their respective bimbo girlfriends) laughed uproariously at some unknown joke.
Dante raised an eyebrow. Oh well, it's not as if jocks were smart. And he hardly had to explain the blonde slut that hung off of Phil's arm. Tanya Erricson, the world's biggest dumpsterslut with equally gigantic funbags (also known as breasts to the less cynical) could only be described as a perfect match for the QB. Dante was damn sure they shared and created several STDs.
"Charming as always Phillip, your wit is undyingly refreshing," Dante commented, with a disarming smile. "And Lance! Why, I haven't seen you in ages, it seems like only yesterday that you took the Obesity Potion, and yet you look like you need it again?"
The Obesity Potion was another concoction from Gaia M., it regulated a fat-ass's weight so they wouldn't die of being such fat fuckups like most overweight Americans were.
Dante's quirky response drew the ire of the male group.
"At least our boys got into college with skills, unlike you," Tanya simpered, preening Phil's arm. "You probably bribed your way in, that's the only way you could've gotten this far!"
Dante wasn't fazed. "But of course my dear Tanya, how else can I flaunt my financial status if I'm not around you broke-ass peasants all the time?" he asked innocently.
Phil threw his STD container off his arm. "You skinny little shit, I'll beat yo olive ass down!" he yelled, drawing the attention of passerbys.
Dante waved his hand carelessly. "Oh please Phillip, that may have worked in high school, but if you touch me again I'll have my father fire your father and it's off to the cotton farms with you!"
Low blow. Ouch. Dante wasn't afraid to do it. Phil was turning red in the face, quite an accomplishment for an African-American.
"You got balls only cuz yo dad is the bigshot of this city!" Phil snarled. "Any other guy, I'd have beat you down already!"
"Yeah, we'd kill you!" Lance added helpfully.
Dante rolled his eyes. "Oh please Lance, you'd think with all that fat on your body, your brain would be a recipient of some," he drawled, leaning against the bin. "Sadly, it appears not."
This time, someone laughed. It was Sara Conner, one of the girls in Tanya's 'clique'. She was another stereotypical gorgeous 20 year old, minus the dumpsterslut prefixture. She was willowly thin, like a waif almost but it added to her petite beauty. She had a pale heart-shaped face that was framed with silky raven hair that fell to her hips. Even more captivating than her straight, wavy hair were her ruby lips or her ocean blue eyes. She was quite stunning in a sort of girl-next-door kind of way, but her soft-spoken personality was the real winner with people.
Anyways, before he creamed himself thinking of those succulent tiny breasts (Sara was known as a 'late bloomer') Dante forced himself back to what was currently happening.
Wait.
Rewind.
Sara Conner laughing at one of his jokes?
Hit Menu and play the DVD from the beginning. Sara Conner... aknowledged him? As... As a living being, and not that human-shaped lump at the back of class?
Apparently, her friends were staring at her in confusion as well. She flushed under the attention.
"What?" she asked nervously. Her voice was very soft, and breathy. "I thought it was funny..."
"Girl, no one likes this cumstain!" Phil snapped, turning back to Dante. "Listen you stupid shit -"
Whatever Phil was going to say next was interrupted as the glass ceiling over the food court shattered, raining glass on everyone under it. Screams were heard as paracords dropped down, with black figures sliding down them.
Dante took cover near his garbage bin and watched as heavily armed soldiers with assault rifles (he recognized the SCAR L carbines from Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter 2) equipped with grenade launchers. These soldiers were decked out in urban black gear, complete with enclosed tactical helmets with fiber-optic optical lenses, which allowed the soldiers to see in the dark and in infrared.
About 16 hand landed, and were forming up 4 squads, fanning out and searching the area for something. Phil's posse was still standing near them, too dumbfounded to do a thing. Then, the unthinkable happened.
Jason, Sara's sort-of-but-not-really-well-maybe boyfriend stepped forward and yelled, "What the fuck is going on here?"
His answer was a three round burst to his forehead, dropping him to the ground in a spray of blood. The screams began.
Dante saw Sara's horror-stricken look as she was bathed in the blood of her sort-of... boyfriend. The soldier who had executed Jason raised his rifle at her. Dante's thought processes stopped as he saw this happen.
Almost, as if on its own accord his body was moving, everything was in slow motion like in those kick-ass action movies or games. Dante could see the soldier's finger start to squeeze the trigger on his carbine, and he knew it was too late, he was too far away...
And suddenly, he was there! Dante's surprise was shorter than the soldier's, and he quickly heaved the garbage bin he unknowingly picked up at the soldier's face, crushing the optical lenses on his helmet, rendering him blind until he took it off. Not finished, Dante pounded the heavy steel can into the soldier's back, dropping him to the floor. A burning pain filled his lungs and he dropped to the ground in agony.
Sara Conner screamed, sitting on the ground in shock as Dante gurgled painfully, the bullet wounds in his back spewing out blood as his lungs filled with his life liquid...
"Run!" Dante managed to scream, the blood in his throat making his voice sound sickly raspy. "G-go Sara!"
Her eyes, those beautiful crystal eyes never left his electric green ones as she scrambled to her feet, before turning around and running away. It would be the last time Dante would see her for many months...
As he began to lose consciousness, the soldiers surrended him, staring at his crumpled body.
"This is the one alright," one of them said, his voice sounding robotic through the helmet's speaker.
"Did you see him move?" another asked, gripping his SCAR tightly. "Took down Jenkins in the blink of an eye!"
A new figure came into Dante's view, but this one was clad in a white bio-suit, his fading eyes could make that out at least.
"He'll do nicely for our new... project," it spoke.
The voice sounded... familiar to Dante... Too... famil...