Major Thorn ducked his head as an explosion rocked his gun pit. Screaming seemed to emanate from all directions; every now and then he could make out words or sentences from the chaos. "Fall back! Get outa' here now!" Thorn, a veteran from the first Tiberian War, was the oldest soldier on the field, 45 and a few days. Thorn never thought he would see the same horror again, the sight of seeing his best friend with no legs screaming for his mother stayed with him his whole life. He remembered d-day 2 as if it were yesterday. Slowly the heart staking sound of lapping waves returned to his ears, he could feel the rocking motion of the transport craft and he could smell the distinct stench of army equipment and the puke on the deck of the transport. "OK men! This is it! We gotta move fast because they don't know were coming, but when they find out, they're gonna be on us like a ton o' bricks." Sergeant Thorn was eighteen, strong and too scared to take a drink from his water bottle. He didn't know much about this war, all he did know was the fact that a Huge group of terrorists with an army 50 times larger than G.D.I had taken over Europe, and we were going to try to win using "superior tactics". He tried to look through the fog but the destination was as obscure as the thoughts of the people on the transport. Some men were deep in thought, some were sobbing and others were trying to look brave but their eyes gave away they're fear. "Sir! Lieutenant Wood! What's the ETA? Sir." Wood looked at him and replied "Sergeant, we got about seven minutes!" Private Frost looked in Wood's direction "Sir? How's about some Intel now? Sir." Wood looked down at his watch and replied. "Men listen up! This here is a strong point for us, right at the tip of Italy, after we capture this point we can quite safely move north to take most of Italy. We expect this place to have quite a few machine guns and once we hit the beach air support will be readily available, and kee-" wood's voice was interrupted by the pilot of the transport boat. "Get ready to land! ETA 30 seconds!" Wood took an anxious look around. "Positions everyone!" the boat stopped and the sound of lapping waves seemed to amplify. The pilot started to count down. "Ten, nine, eight, seven," Wood yelled his final motivation speech "Men! God bless you all!" "Three, two, one!" the pilot pulled the lever and for a second time stood still, then hell began.
The first sound Thorn heard sounded something like half a scream and half a yell as Wood was railed through with bullets and as he looked forward most of the men were falling in pain from being hit, two had made it to the beach and found cover. After the first bullet whizzed into the boat Thorn instinctively lay down on the deck and pulled down Frost, his best mate, with him. Bullet holes were hitting the back of the transport now and all the men were either dead or lying down. Thorn looked back and saw the pilot with blood oozing out of his sockets along with a series of holes in his head. Frost was throwing up again. "Don't worry man, we'll get outa this one! Jeez I wonder what the others are doing" Thorn dared himself to stand and look over the edge of the boat, he quickly got back and lay down again. "They're going over the sides!" someone up front heard him, looked back and yelled "Sergeant! You still alive?" Thorn looked up at him, fear plainly shown in the soldier's face. "Don't worry Graham, were gonna make it!" Graham started crawling towards them. "Ok here's the plan on the count of three we all jump over the side, got it?" Graham came back with a "Yes Sergeant!" while Frost nodded. "One, two, thr-" "I can't do it!" Frost cut in "I just can't!" suddenly then a horde of bullets broke loose around them "Fuck this shit!" Graham screamed as he grabbed his rifle and pointed it straight at Frost "Now you will jump or I will throw you over" Frost started sobbing and it was apparent that he was attempting some form of speech. "Jump god damn it!" Yelled Graham. Frost wailed and started openly crying. "Shit!" was Graham's last word; he then threw his rifle over the side and jumped.
"Ok Frost, I have a new plan. I can hear phase two coming up, when we hear the doors open, we'll start running, ok?" Frost, with a pale face, looked up at him "what makes you think you'll make it?" "Trust me, with twenty five boats and a platoon in each, do you think they'll shoot at two little unnoticeable men?" Frost smiled weakly at him, Thorn could now hear the words "eight, seven, six" as he was readying himself to start running. Thorn could now hear the dreadful whirring noise as the ramps dropped. Thorn stood up while Frost didn't budge "come on Frost!" Frost stared at him, not seeing him. Thorn could now hear the similar yelling, screaming, firing and dying he heard minutes before; he grabbed Frost's collar "Come on Frosty! Let's move, move, move!" Frost got to his feet and jauntily started running. "Go, Go, Go!" Thorn was ready to yell more motivation until he saw it; his vision was obscured with a single colour. It wasn't the blue sky, it wasn't the yellow sand, it was the red. The deep crimson was every where; even the sea had a bloody hue. Thorn looked around to find Graham but he was no where to be seen, but the red! He was drawn to it, he needed to embrace it, to hold it so he could stay inside it and never come out. He heard what seemed to be a human voice "arge eh ow" he looked around to see a man running at him "ooh u ear eeh" suddenly he felt some pressure on his chest and a flat surface against his back. "Sarge? Do you hear me?" Thorn looked up at Private Eloy, who was holding him against the ground "yes I heard you Private" "you were standing here just waiting for a smoking third eye!" Thorn looked around to Frost who was peering at him in concern. "Do you have a plan Sarge?" asked Eloy "Yes I do! We get to that ridge over there and we'll see what happens next!" "Yes Sarge" "Private you run right hook, Frosty you go left and I'll do centre, got it?" both soldiers nodded "Ok, now!" all three did a quick dash. As Thorn was running an explosion near his left brought him to the ground, he watched on as Eloy made it to the ridge, he could not see Frost anywhere, then he knew.
"Peter! Peter!" Thorn turned to see Frost screaming to him, as he crawled towards Frost's lying figure he saw the damage caused by the explosion, Frost no longer had legs. "Thorn, it hurts." A spurt of crimson red trickled down Frost's chin. "Try not to talk man, were gonna make it." Frost started sobbing "you are, don't lie to me." A new wave of pain ran up his legs and through his spine. "Oh god it hurts! I don't wanna die!" Frost was now screaming, Thorn grabbed his jerking head and said quietly, calmly "your not gonna die!" Frost looked away "I want my mom." Thorn slowly let go of Frost's head while he kept repeating the same words to himself "Thorn get your butt up here now!" Thorn turned towards the ridge to see plenty more soldiers lined up and Eloy was motioning him to get to the ridge quickly. Thorn turned to leave when Frost grabbed his collar. "Don't go! Please!" Frost attempted another sentence but his words were filtered out by sobs. Thorn couldn't stand it any longer, without a word he started half-stumbling and half running to the ridge while behind his back he could hear frost screaming.
"Sarge, glad you could make it!" Thorn gave Eloy an icy cold stare. "Who's the commanding officer here?" He asked. A soldier down the line turned and called back "that's me, Captain Pinigger!" "Sir! Do you have access to a radio, Sir?" Pinigger turned his whole body towards Thorn. "Do you know proper rai-tel procedure Sergeant?" "Sir! Yes I do, sir!" "Finally! Come on down Sergeant!" Thorn ducked down and started running along the ridge until he reached Pinigger then threw himself against the ridge; he saluted and yelled "Sergeant Thorn reporting for duty sir". Pinnigar threw him a quick salute back. "Ok Sergeant, here's the story. We can't air strike the machine gunners because they have small hatches they can hide in to protect them from the strikes. Before the smoke clears they all have assumed they're positions, what we do now is make them think that an air strike is coming but we don't know how." Thorn looked at him in surprise. "Why don't you simply call for a fly-by?" "We tried that but the bastards have obviously tapped into the radio frequency!" Thorn thought for a moment. "You said you didn't know proper rai-tel?" Pinigger shook his head "do you know the term 'ion strike?'" Pinigger again shook his head "what's that?" Thorn looked up at him. "It is a term used in this exact kind of position" Thorn took the handset "Thorn! You are the life saver!" He nodded and spoke into the handset. "Alpha Zulu, this is sierra one, over." Thorn listened intently into the earpiece; he heard some static and a recognisable human voice. "Sierra one, this is Alpha Zulu, loud and distorted, over." Thorn looked around, no wonder it was distorted; enough background noise could be heard to drive a man insane. "Ok men quiet down" Thorn spoke again into the piece "Alpha Zulu, this is Sierra one, request ion strike on confirmation of sunray minor Pinigger, over." "Sierra one, this is Alpha Zulu, affirmative, over." "Alpha Zulu, this is Sierra one, loud and clear, out." Thorn put down the handset and snuck a peek over the ridge. "Thorn use these." Pinigger handed him a pair of binoculars and signalled for the men to get ready. Thorn looked over the machine gunners with the binoculars. "Six guns in all, two gunners already been killed." Thorn nodded to Piniggar's comment. "Ok they're all in let's go before the planes fly past." as the soldiers ran up the ridge towards the guns the sound of planes could be heard in the distance. Thorn looked up but the crafts he saw in the sky resembled anything but planes. "Sir! What are those Sir?" Pinigger turned his head for a second and turned back "Those are called 'Orcas' Thorn now move it!" The men had taken over the machine guns and waited for the enemy soldiers to climb out of the hatch, when the first one appeared he found himself face to face with three soldiers pointing rifles at him "get out of the shelter slowly with your hands up!" The Noddy soldier unfortunately didn't share his views, he pulled out a pistol as fast as he could, he didn't even have half a chance. Thorn had secured himself one of the two machine guns in which the soldier had been killed before hand. He allowed himself to sit down and have a swig of water from his canteen, to himself at least he thought he deserved it.
The battle was going well and the explosive crew was rigging the wall behind the machine guns with C-4. Every now and then a squad of noddy troops would be sent around but they were quickly dispatched. Just when Thorn thought nothing could stop them from victory he heard a large explosion, then another and another! He turned to see what was happening and saw that the wall was being blown from the other side, a chain of explosives were being systematically blown and the chain was heading straight for him! Thorn quickly jumped down into the hatch and closed the lid, after a few seconds the explosions ceased. He opened the hatch and the small chamber filled with intoxicating smoke, he quickly climbed out and manned the machine gun but the smoke hung so heavily he didn't know which way were the walls and which way was the beach. He instinctively ducked his head at the sound of firing, he saw flashing lights through the thick smoke but no solid shapes formed. He heard a nearby yell as out of the smoke he saw a Nod soldier running straight towards him, and also towards the machine gun. Thorn mowed him down; the soldier managed to fire two single shots into the air before he hit the ground. Thorn's first thought was "oh my god!" this man lying on the ground spluttering and choking on his blood was killed because of him! He then smirked, because he had killed this man he saved the lives of two, five or probably more G.D.I, he obviously saved his own. Now Thorn saw the good side of it and whispered to the now dead terrorist "Go back to Toyland, Noddy!".Then he realised that he left his rifle on the deck of the transport boat! He quickly grabbed the Nod soldiers rifle and transacted the magazines from the dead mans webbing into his own. The smoke was clearing now and to Thorn's horror over five hundred Nod soldiers could be seen running towards the remnants of the wall. He quickly grabbed the handset and attempted a proper rai-tel manner of requesting extraction from the battle; the pressure and the stuttering became too much. "Get us the hell outa here!" He was screaming. "Just get us the fuck outa here please!" Thorn found himself sobbing; he didn't want to die! He was only eighteen, why him? Damn Nod! Damn GDI! Damn this whole fucking war! Thorn heard a voice on the hand set. "Your message is extremely distorted, say again." He attempted to muster his calmest, quietest voice. "Requesting extraction from India beach, they are fucking killing us!" The calm voice on the end replied. "This is Alpha Zulu, that is affirm-" Thorn didn't bother listening to the rest, they were coming for him and that was all that mattered. He grabbed his rifle and started running to join the pack, Pinigger saw him and shouted. "Glad you could make it Sergeant! Now you can die with honour like the rest of us!" Thorn glared at him "Why's that?" Pinniger smiled while firing his rifle at the mass of enemy soldiers, plenty GDI soldiers had already fallen since his arrival. "Because today is a great day to die!" Thorn shook his head while shooting at a Nod soldier who had found some pretty good cover. "That is a negative! They're coming for us!" Pinigger nearly dropped his rifle in his excitement, he looked at Thorn for a second to see if he was joking, he then turned back around and yelled "Everyone! Fall back! They're coming for us!" The group of people, which now was reduced to 34 men, started running back to the beach, some stopped every few steps to turn and fire a few pot shots but most who stopped were mowed down by a volley of bullets! As Thorn ran towards the beach he saw that strange type of helicopters, were positioned with the doors opened. "Sir? What are those, Sir?" "Those are 'Orca' transports now move it Sergeant!" But as they were running towards the beach the inevitable occurred, the group had run straight into an unexploded mine field! For Thorn it was like running through an air strike, the first few were a little far from him and did no effect, but an explosion a few feet behind him brought him down. Pinigger, who was in front of Thorn turned around and saw him face down in the sand, he ran back and helped Thorn limp back to the Orca. They jumped in and just when Pinniger was about to shut the door, a hail of bullets smashed against the tough Orca hide, but the ones that past themselves through the door buried themselves in Pinigger's limp carcass. "NO!" Thorn crawled to Pinigger's body "no, god no!" It was all he was capable of at this moment, but he knew that now he was safe, he lived, from 460 men, only 15 made it back, alive, so much for "superior tactics". Major Thorn awoke from his daydreaming when he heard a voice on his headset. "Battalions 124, 126 and 130 report to Barracks." Thorn stood up as low as his old body could muster. The battle at the front was now dying down but the sound of firing was still rather heavy, Thorn managed to run back behind the lines to the Orca Transports waiting there. As Thorn was being flown back to barracks he was deep in thought. He had survived so much since the age of eighteen, it would be rather anticlimactic if he tripped and died getting out of the Orca, it wouldn't be fair if he died like that. But life had a tendency of not being fair.
The first sound Thorn heard sounded something like half a scream and half a yell as Wood was railed through with bullets and as he looked forward most of the men were falling in pain from being hit, two had made it to the beach and found cover. After the first bullet whizzed into the boat Thorn instinctively lay down on the deck and pulled down Frost, his best mate, with him. Bullet holes were hitting the back of the transport now and all the men were either dead or lying down. Thorn looked back and saw the pilot with blood oozing out of his sockets along with a series of holes in his head. Frost was throwing up again. "Don't worry man, we'll get outa this one! Jeez I wonder what the others are doing" Thorn dared himself to stand and look over the edge of the boat, he quickly got back and lay down again. "They're going over the sides!" someone up front heard him, looked back and yelled "Sergeant! You still alive?" Thorn looked up at him, fear plainly shown in the soldier's face. "Don't worry Graham, were gonna make it!" Graham started crawling towards them. "Ok here's the plan on the count of three we all jump over the side, got it?" Graham came back with a "Yes Sergeant!" while Frost nodded. "One, two, thr-" "I can't do it!" Frost cut in "I just can't!" suddenly then a horde of bullets broke loose around them "Fuck this shit!" Graham screamed as he grabbed his rifle and pointed it straight at Frost "Now you will jump or I will throw you over" Frost started sobbing and it was apparent that he was attempting some form of speech. "Jump god damn it!" Yelled Graham. Frost wailed and started openly crying. "Shit!" was Graham's last word; he then threw his rifle over the side and jumped.
"Ok Frost, I have a new plan. I can hear phase two coming up, when we hear the doors open, we'll start running, ok?" Frost, with a pale face, looked up at him "what makes you think you'll make it?" "Trust me, with twenty five boats and a platoon in each, do you think they'll shoot at two little unnoticeable men?" Frost smiled weakly at him, Thorn could now hear the words "eight, seven, six" as he was readying himself to start running. Thorn could now hear the dreadful whirring noise as the ramps dropped. Thorn stood up while Frost didn't budge "come on Frost!" Frost stared at him, not seeing him. Thorn could now hear the similar yelling, screaming, firing and dying he heard minutes before; he grabbed Frost's collar "Come on Frosty! Let's move, move, move!" Frost got to his feet and jauntily started running. "Go, Go, Go!" Thorn was ready to yell more motivation until he saw it; his vision was obscured with a single colour. It wasn't the blue sky, it wasn't the yellow sand, it was the red. The deep crimson was every where; even the sea had a bloody hue. Thorn looked around to find Graham but he was no where to be seen, but the red! He was drawn to it, he needed to embrace it, to hold it so he could stay inside it and never come out. He heard what seemed to be a human voice "arge eh ow" he looked around to see a man running at him "ooh u ear eeh" suddenly he felt some pressure on his chest and a flat surface against his back. "Sarge? Do you hear me?" Thorn looked up at Private Eloy, who was holding him against the ground "yes I heard you Private" "you were standing here just waiting for a smoking third eye!" Thorn looked around to Frost who was peering at him in concern. "Do you have a plan Sarge?" asked Eloy "Yes I do! We get to that ridge over there and we'll see what happens next!" "Yes Sarge" "Private you run right hook, Frosty you go left and I'll do centre, got it?" both soldiers nodded "Ok, now!" all three did a quick dash. As Thorn was running an explosion near his left brought him to the ground, he watched on as Eloy made it to the ridge, he could not see Frost anywhere, then he knew.
"Peter! Peter!" Thorn turned to see Frost screaming to him, as he crawled towards Frost's lying figure he saw the damage caused by the explosion, Frost no longer had legs. "Thorn, it hurts." A spurt of crimson red trickled down Frost's chin. "Try not to talk man, were gonna make it." Frost started sobbing "you are, don't lie to me." A new wave of pain ran up his legs and through his spine. "Oh god it hurts! I don't wanna die!" Frost was now screaming, Thorn grabbed his jerking head and said quietly, calmly "your not gonna die!" Frost looked away "I want my mom." Thorn slowly let go of Frost's head while he kept repeating the same words to himself "Thorn get your butt up here now!" Thorn turned towards the ridge to see plenty more soldiers lined up and Eloy was motioning him to get to the ridge quickly. Thorn turned to leave when Frost grabbed his collar. "Don't go! Please!" Frost attempted another sentence but his words were filtered out by sobs. Thorn couldn't stand it any longer, without a word he started half-stumbling and half running to the ridge while behind his back he could hear frost screaming.
"Sarge, glad you could make it!" Thorn gave Eloy an icy cold stare. "Who's the commanding officer here?" He asked. A soldier down the line turned and called back "that's me, Captain Pinigger!" "Sir! Do you have access to a radio, Sir?" Pinigger turned his whole body towards Thorn. "Do you know proper rai-tel procedure Sergeant?" "Sir! Yes I do, sir!" "Finally! Come on down Sergeant!" Thorn ducked down and started running along the ridge until he reached Pinigger then threw himself against the ridge; he saluted and yelled "Sergeant Thorn reporting for duty sir". Pinnigar threw him a quick salute back. "Ok Sergeant, here's the story. We can't air strike the machine gunners because they have small hatches they can hide in to protect them from the strikes. Before the smoke clears they all have assumed they're positions, what we do now is make them think that an air strike is coming but we don't know how." Thorn looked at him in surprise. "Why don't you simply call for a fly-by?" "We tried that but the bastards have obviously tapped into the radio frequency!" Thorn thought for a moment. "You said you didn't know proper rai-tel?" Pinigger shook his head "do you know the term 'ion strike?'" Pinigger again shook his head "what's that?" Thorn looked up at him. "It is a term used in this exact kind of position" Thorn took the handset "Thorn! You are the life saver!" He nodded and spoke into the handset. "Alpha Zulu, this is sierra one, over." Thorn listened intently into the earpiece; he heard some static and a recognisable human voice. "Sierra one, this is Alpha Zulu, loud and distorted, over." Thorn looked around, no wonder it was distorted; enough background noise could be heard to drive a man insane. "Ok men quiet down" Thorn spoke again into the piece "Alpha Zulu, this is Sierra one, request ion strike on confirmation of sunray minor Pinigger, over." "Sierra one, this is Alpha Zulu, affirmative, over." "Alpha Zulu, this is Sierra one, loud and clear, out." Thorn put down the handset and snuck a peek over the ridge. "Thorn use these." Pinigger handed him a pair of binoculars and signalled for the men to get ready. Thorn looked over the machine gunners with the binoculars. "Six guns in all, two gunners already been killed." Thorn nodded to Piniggar's comment. "Ok they're all in let's go before the planes fly past." as the soldiers ran up the ridge towards the guns the sound of planes could be heard in the distance. Thorn looked up but the crafts he saw in the sky resembled anything but planes. "Sir! What are those Sir?" Pinigger turned his head for a second and turned back "Those are called 'Orcas' Thorn now move it!" The men had taken over the machine guns and waited for the enemy soldiers to climb out of the hatch, when the first one appeared he found himself face to face with three soldiers pointing rifles at him "get out of the shelter slowly with your hands up!" The Noddy soldier unfortunately didn't share his views, he pulled out a pistol as fast as he could, he didn't even have half a chance. Thorn had secured himself one of the two machine guns in which the soldier had been killed before hand. He allowed himself to sit down and have a swig of water from his canteen, to himself at least he thought he deserved it.
The battle was going well and the explosive crew was rigging the wall behind the machine guns with C-4. Every now and then a squad of noddy troops would be sent around but they were quickly dispatched. Just when Thorn thought nothing could stop them from victory he heard a large explosion, then another and another! He turned to see what was happening and saw that the wall was being blown from the other side, a chain of explosives were being systematically blown and the chain was heading straight for him! Thorn quickly jumped down into the hatch and closed the lid, after a few seconds the explosions ceased. He opened the hatch and the small chamber filled with intoxicating smoke, he quickly climbed out and manned the machine gun but the smoke hung so heavily he didn't know which way were the walls and which way was the beach. He instinctively ducked his head at the sound of firing, he saw flashing lights through the thick smoke but no solid shapes formed. He heard a nearby yell as out of the smoke he saw a Nod soldier running straight towards him, and also towards the machine gun. Thorn mowed him down; the soldier managed to fire two single shots into the air before he hit the ground. Thorn's first thought was "oh my god!" this man lying on the ground spluttering and choking on his blood was killed because of him! He then smirked, because he had killed this man he saved the lives of two, five or probably more G.D.I, he obviously saved his own. Now Thorn saw the good side of it and whispered to the now dead terrorist "Go back to Toyland, Noddy!".Then he realised that he left his rifle on the deck of the transport boat! He quickly grabbed the Nod soldiers rifle and transacted the magazines from the dead mans webbing into his own. The smoke was clearing now and to Thorn's horror over five hundred Nod soldiers could be seen running towards the remnants of the wall. He quickly grabbed the handset and attempted a proper rai-tel manner of requesting extraction from the battle; the pressure and the stuttering became too much. "Get us the hell outa here!" He was screaming. "Just get us the fuck outa here please!" Thorn found himself sobbing; he didn't want to die! He was only eighteen, why him? Damn Nod! Damn GDI! Damn this whole fucking war! Thorn heard a voice on the hand set. "Your message is extremely distorted, say again." He attempted to muster his calmest, quietest voice. "Requesting extraction from India beach, they are fucking killing us!" The calm voice on the end replied. "This is Alpha Zulu, that is affirm-" Thorn didn't bother listening to the rest, they were coming for him and that was all that mattered. He grabbed his rifle and started running to join the pack, Pinigger saw him and shouted. "Glad you could make it Sergeant! Now you can die with honour like the rest of us!" Thorn glared at him "Why's that?" Pinniger smiled while firing his rifle at the mass of enemy soldiers, plenty GDI soldiers had already fallen since his arrival. "Because today is a great day to die!" Thorn shook his head while shooting at a Nod soldier who had found some pretty good cover. "That is a negative! They're coming for us!" Pinigger nearly dropped his rifle in his excitement, he looked at Thorn for a second to see if he was joking, he then turned back around and yelled "Everyone! Fall back! They're coming for us!" The group of people, which now was reduced to 34 men, started running back to the beach, some stopped every few steps to turn and fire a few pot shots but most who stopped were mowed down by a volley of bullets! As Thorn ran towards the beach he saw that strange type of helicopters, were positioned with the doors opened. "Sir? What are those, Sir?" "Those are 'Orca' transports now move it Sergeant!" But as they were running towards the beach the inevitable occurred, the group had run straight into an unexploded mine field! For Thorn it was like running through an air strike, the first few were a little far from him and did no effect, but an explosion a few feet behind him brought him down. Pinigger, who was in front of Thorn turned around and saw him face down in the sand, he ran back and helped Thorn limp back to the Orca. They jumped in and just when Pinniger was about to shut the door, a hail of bullets smashed against the tough Orca hide, but the ones that past themselves through the door buried themselves in Pinigger's limp carcass. "NO!" Thorn crawled to Pinigger's body "no, god no!" It was all he was capable of at this moment, but he knew that now he was safe, he lived, from 460 men, only 15 made it back, alive, so much for "superior tactics". Major Thorn awoke from his daydreaming when he heard a voice on his headset. "Battalions 124, 126 and 130 report to Barracks." Thorn stood up as low as his old body could muster. The battle at the front was now dying down but the sound of firing was still rather heavy, Thorn managed to run back behind the lines to the Orca Transports waiting there. As Thorn was being flown back to barracks he was deep in thought. He had survived so much since the age of eighteen, it would be rather anticlimactic if he tripped and died getting out of the Orca, it wouldn't be fair if he died like that. But life had a tendency of not being fair.