The Manhattan Incident
The man was startled awake as an explosion rattled the pod he sat in. His senses were blurred and distorted, not being able to make out much happening around him as he struggled to find his bearings. He started to stand up, gripping onto the sides of the pod's open door before another blast shocked his pod and forced him back into his seat. "The hell," he murmured, trying to figure just what was going on.
His vision began to return to him, but with this brought only more questions than answers, as his eyes laid upon a swirling blue mass of energy in the sky. As his hearing unmuffled he started to hear the sounds of metal on metal, gunshots through the air, explosions shaking the ground, and the screams of rage, of pain, of dying. He figured he was on a battlefield, though he couldn't answer how or why he knew he needed to act fast in order to stay alive. He debated staying in the pod, but staying in the pod meant certain death if he was found, so he decided to once more grip the sides of the pod and jump out.
What greeted him was a hellscape. As he landed on the ground he gave witness to hundreds if not thousands of individuals all fighting on a city street with no real order or direction. Many of them abandoned their weapons on to the ground, deciding to blindly swing at their opponents in hopes of hitting them. Others used their weapons, but with no real knowledge on how they worked, they used guns as clubs and swords as javelins. What astounded the man the most was the sheer diversity among the fighters, from medieval knights all the way to heavily armored space marines, all in the midst of this mass chaos.
All of the man's senses seemed overloaded as he couldn't truly process the chaos happening around him. He looked over blankly at a split-lipped alien charging at him before a massive hulking creature slammed it into a car, this woke him up as he realized he needed to run. Adrenaline rushing through his system he pushed past whoever was in his way of safety, dodging any swings coming after him whether they were intended for him or not he didn't care. Running through the crowd he made a sharp turn down an alleyway and clumsily scrambled over a chain link fence separating the two sides before running out onto the next street.
The man looked up and down this next street, seeing no one but the dead he let himself come to a rest and regain his thoughts. The only thing that went through his mind is why: why was he here, why was this happening, and why were all of those people attacking each other. "I just need to get out of here," the man said to himself. "I just need a place to hide, wait for this all to die down, and then let someone come find and rescue me."
His breathing started to quicken, trying to prevent himself from panicking he closed his eyes and just tried to focus. The sounds of battle were drowned out by the surrounding buildings, leaving a well-received quietness in the surrounding area. As he began to calm the sound of mechanical creaking started to reverberate down the street. Confused, he turned around and stared wide-eyed with terror as a four-legged mechanical beast lumbered around the corner. He froze, not really knowing what to do but when the head of the beast turned towards him he saw cannons. Cannons that were starting to heat with red energy.
Just realizing what was about to happen, the man started his legs to work as fast as they could running down the street. Right as he left the spot he felt superheated plasma behind him as he was nearly thrown off his feet from the shockwave. Not seeing any obvious way to get out of its line of sight he continued down the street, attempting to zigzag and dodge as many of the energy blasts as he could. His legs grew weary, his lungs burned, and his eyes started to droop from exhaustion but he knew slowing down would mean instant death as he heard the mechanical walker quickly gaining ground on him.
Making a fatal mistake in turning too slow, the man was blasted off his feet by superheated plasma directly to his right. The shockwave from the explosion sent him flying through the air before crashing through a window, as he landed among the broken glass his vision blacked out.
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The one thing the man knew he felt when he woke up was pain. Pain from the explosion, pain from the shockwave, pain from the landing, and pain from the glass he was lying in. He tried to pick himself off the ground but found out that the glass covered ground was more comfortable than standing up. Turning over, he came face to face with a… shark? No time to think his eyes quickly darted to a handgun in front of him, hastily lunging for it and aiming at the shark. The shark in return let out a surprised yelp and tumbled off the opposite side of the counter it was lying on.
The man sat there for some of the most agonizingly long seconds, wondering that if this shark was going to be the death of him. "Are you gonna try and shoot me," he heard someone call out. "Because if you are I'm afraid I'm going to shoot you first!"
"W-what," the man stuttered. "Who?"
"Oh, you know who," he heard the voice call out again. "The shark that you so rudely pointed your gun at that's who!"
The man didn't even know what to think. How was this shark speaking to him, why was there a talking shark he thought. Before he could think further he heard almost the rustling of leaves as a head peaked over the counter, the barrel of a gun pointing straight at him. They sat there far longer than he thought they should have, the shark obviously awaiting an answer. "Oh, uh, no… I'm not going to shoot you," the man practically questioned.
The shark, seeming somewhat satisfied with the answer, climbed on top of the counter of what the man could now see was a pastry shop. "Well then, I guess that makes us not shoot at each other buddies," the shark said with a toothy grin. "I mean, you haven't tried to kill me like everyone else has so that makes you alright in my book."
The man nodded his head, using this time to get a look at just who he was talking to. It was a gray shark alright, two beady black eyes on his round head with white teeth jutting out from his mouth and he appeared to be wearing a ghillie suit. "You look… weird," the man managed to let out.
"Look weird," he scoffed, obviously offended. "Well to me you look weirder, what's with the helmet, too afraid to show your face?"
"Huh?"
"The helmet your wearing," he said. "Do you not know you are wearing a helmet?"
The man reached his hands up to his head only to realize that he had actually been wearing a helmet. Letting out a quick apology he managed to pry it off his head. He looked at the helmet, seeing that it was obviously military with the style, he turned it around to get a good look at it seeing a name inscribed on the back.
"By the way who are you," the shark asked, his eyes darting over all the different bits of equipment found on his body. "My names Forest and you will not call me by any other name."
That was a good question, just who exactly was he the man thought. He couldn't remember who he was, what he did, where he was from, hell he couldn't even remember his own name. Knowing that Forest wouldn't take that as an answer he took another look at the name carved into the back of the helmet. "Nate," he said. "My name is Nate."
"Well… nice to meet you, Nate." Forest said, muttering how stupid his name was under his breath.
Rolling his eyes, Nate looked at a glass counter, seeing his own two blue eyes staring back at him. His blonde hair was messed with sweat and the armor pads covering his blue jumpsuit were scratched and dirty. Before Nate could think further he heard the thundering of footsteps coming from the back of the shop. Reacting fast he held up the handgun to the doorway just as a figure came running into the room gun drawn, Forest let out another surprised yelp and fell towards Nate's side of the counter. The stranger was dressed in full military garb, at least from what Nate knew, with an added brown Aussie hat and shoulder cape to boot. His face was completely covered by a cloth mask and goggles. Both Nate and the stranger quickly came to the understanding that they weren't going to hurt one another and lowered their guns.
"Who are you," Nate asked, ignoring Forest complaining about being knocked off his counter.
"Hey man," the stranger let out robotically, holding up a hand in a wave. His head scanned the room, looking for any signs of additional danger before settling down.
"Hey, are you deficient," he heard Forest call out. "We asked who you are not for a hey man."
The stranger looked at Forest, Nate could almost see annoyance through the masked face. "I spotted an enemy infantry," he said.
Nate whipped around faster than he ever thought he could, scanning over the broken glass window frame. Only to see nothing. He gave the stranger another confused look. "What," he said, was he trying to pull a prank?
"I spotted an enemy infantry," he stated as if was obvious.
Forest turned around, just to see if maybe this magical enemy would suddenly appear, it didn't. He leaned over to Nate. "I think this guy is crazy," he whispered.
Nate shook his head, now remembering where they were and the situation that they were in. He looked up into the skyline to see a massive spiraling pillar of energy that seemed to form the portal that stretched over the city. This thing had a source he thought, and if there was a source. "You see that spiral of energy Forest," he said. "I'm thinking that there might be a way to stop all of this."
"Might I ask why we would do that," he asked. "We are perfectly safe in here, no ones come to bother us except this guy and we have unlimited pastries." He gestured to the counter of pastries safely protected by a glass covering.
"What about the other people being affected by this, the people that aren't afflicted with some madness that makes them kill everything," Nate asked back. "The same people hiding in a shop of their own, wondering if this is ever going to end." He heard the stranger say an affirmative to that statement.
"Well, I'll stay here then," he said defiantly. His eyes darted nervously around the room. "I'll stick around here with crazy while you go off and play hero." He hopped back on top of the counter, fully committed to staying.
However, the stranger walked over and stood next to Nate, standing nearly a head taller than Nate did, in silent support. The two of them both looked over at Forest as if trying to guilt him into coming. "Let's get moving," the stranger beckoned.
"You too," Forest cried out. He didn't want to be left alone, he had just found some people that didn't want to shoot him in the face for once and now they were leaving to go play hero. As much as he hated to admit it, this place could very easily kill him and he needed all the help he could get. He sighed, he didn't like it but he knew what the safest choice was. "Fine, I'll go with you but on one condition," he stated, two pairs of eyes looked curiously at him. He pointed at the stranger, "His name is now Charles."
"Uhh," Nate didn't know what to say, he looked over at the now named Charles as he just shrugged his shoulders and nodded in acceptance. Nate nodded back, "Well that settles that, let's get moving the longer we wait here the more deadly this is going to get."
As they walked out the door Nate took inventory of everything he had: A handgun, revolver, grappling hooks on each arm, some kind of explosive, grenades, something attached to his back that he couldn't quite make out, and lastly the helmet he wore. He took a look at it in his hands, it's military design was eroded from years of use, the visor was made of two vertical lines with a horizontal line going through the top and a single line stretching out from each of the vertical lines, yet it somehow didn't restrict his vision. Putting it on he quickly caught up with the others, walking straight back into the hellscape.
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Nate managed to fire off a quick panic shot through his revolver at the head of the now dubbed 'madmen.' The bullet hit its mark, as Nate moved to the left to avoid being tackled by the momentum of the now dead body.
They found out that they had to adapt quickly in order to push through the streets of the city. The three of them figuring out that, at the very least, they were half-decent shots. The group had come up with a simple but effective strategy: Charles would go in first, distracting the madmen and holding them off with a riot shield, Nate would follow in supporting him and making sure no one broke through his defense, and lastly Forest would sit back and pick off anyone attempting to blindside them or any stragglers. They continued onward this way, fighting madmen of all different shapes and sizes, but one thing was consistent: they were unrelenting.
As Nate looked at the madman's corpse he wondered if there really was anyone else like them out there, not afflicted with this madness. Everyone that fell out of the portal in the sky fell with a blue aura, once they hit the ground the blue aura faded and they got up as if they received no damage and moved to attack the closest living thing. No matter who they encountered they would simply charge straight at the group in a blind rage. Nate couldn't figure out why the three of them weren't affected with it, he tried to piece together some common story between them but none of them came together.
Forest hopped over to Nate, using his fins to push himself off the ground and move forward a fair distance. Nate honestly thought it looked ridiculous, but then he thought about him being an aquatic animal out of water and that was as normal as he was going to look. "You alright," Forest asked, a rare look of concern over his face.
"Yeah… just," Nate sighed, shaking his head. "I'm just trying to piece all of this together." Charles walked over, having just finished off the most recent group of madmen.
"Well, do you remember anything from before you came here," Forest wondered. "Cause I don't remember anything, just everything that has happened here." His tail twitched in agitation.
"Wait, so you guys don't remember anything," Nate exasperated.
"Nah."
"Negative."
Great, just great he thought. Nate was hoping that through them he could find something out but they were apparently just as clueless as he was. They could all remember basic information, but any memories, specific events in their life, or anything about where they are from was just gone. This was becoming an increasingly hopeless situation as even if they did stop this nightmare, where would they go? Then again, even if they did know they were from they seemed to have been flung through the space-time continuum. Either way, it wasn't good.
"Right now we need to focus on one thing," Nate said pointing to the spiral of energy. "Stopping this insanity, we can worry about everything else later."
They both, albeit reluctantly, nodded in agreement. The promise of no reward for all of this did not sit well in their minds, but they knew it was their best chance of survival. For separation or failure would mean certain death.
The trio continued onwards, but the closer they got to the epicenter of it all the worse it got. Enemies seemingly multiplied and they started encountering large beasts and machines that too were affected by the madness. Forest suggested that they take back alley routes on their way to the source, while it would be slower it was getting exhausting for the group to continue fighting each group of madmen they find on the street. Nate hastily agreed with the plan while Charles seemed to just play along, not really affected by exhaustion.
The more horrifying part of this living nightmare came in the form of the dead. While bodies sporadically littered the streets of the city at first, but the further the three pushed through, more and more bodies appeared; It almost created mounds of them. While they could often see the bodies of soldiers or warriors, the most common type seemed to be normal people in normal clothes. Whoever or whatever caused this was going to pay Nate thought, staring out among the carnage.
After several hours the group reached the end of an alley leading out onto the plaza that held whatever was causing this. A massive skyscraper nearly touched the clouds, standing tall and proud. "The One World Trade Center," Nate muttered, reading the name of the building above the entryway. But, what stood before them was a sea of chaos and destruction, a never-ending battle that would never stop without the looming portal's collapse.
"I spotted an enemy infantry," Charles said.
"Yeah, we see a lot of enemy infantry now don't we," Forest mocked, glaring at him.
"Now's not the time to be arguing guys," Nate needed to keep the peace, they couldn't turn on each other now, not when they were this close.
"Well in case you haven't realized there are several hundred feet of wide open ground with a giant ass battle happening all across it, face it we're screwed," Forest let his face dig into the ground, defeated.
Nate looked over at Charles, behind that mask he could still see the fiery determination that was inside himself, they could come up with a plan, but they needed everyone to be on board. He took off his helmet, despite wanting to portray himself as a beacon of hope that everything would be alright he knew he couldn't. They have been at this for several hours now, fighting and seeing the carnage only get worse and worse as time went on. Nonetheless, they were this close now, only a couple hundred feet and an elevator ride would likely bring an end to all of this.
Nate crouched down next to Forest. "Hey," Nate said, nudging him. If Forest heard him he didn't care, he continued to lie there face down in the dirt. Nate sighed, though he only knew Forest for a few hours now, he knew the one thing to get his attention. "Is this really what you want to be remembered for?"
Nate let the question sit on Forest for a little before he looked up. "What did you say," he asked menacingly, glaring up at him.
Nate smiled, it was working. "I was just thinking that, when we survive this and me and Charles go and save the city, do you want to be remembered for giving up when you were right next to it," he replied, seeing the agitation start to grow on Forest's face.
"Oh, no no no no no," Nate heard him say. Forest pointed an accusing fin at him, "You're trying to appeal to my pride aren't you, well it ain't going to work." He shook his round head stubbornly, crossing his fins.
Nate looked up at Charles for support, he gestured for him to keep pushing the issue. "Maybe we will get a reward from the nations of this world for bravely doing what few would actually do," Nate said. "Maybe money, a house, some pastr-"
"Alright alright alright I'll go with you," Forest cut off. "I'd better be getting my fair share of the award at the end."
"Affirmative," Charles promised, gesturing his gun over to the problem at hand.
"So," Forest began. "Does anyone have any bright ideas?" Nate looked out onto the battlefield, searching for some way to break through and reach the skyscraper. Finally, he came up with a plan.
The plan was simple, Nate and Charles would both take a large object or shield to block any incoming attacks from their sides while Forest would ride atop one of their shoulders and clear the way ahead of them. Nate found a wooden pallet, it would easily break if anything deadly came at him, but it would get the job done. Forest climbed on top of Charles' shoulder, muttering how disgraceful this was for him. They got ready, Nate on the left and Charles on the right and Forest in the middle. Nate held up three fingers, then two, then one, and closed it down into a fist and they charged.
Nate heard Forests sniper fire off at a faster pace than ever before, taking out anyone foolish enough to get within their path. The only relief from the shots was a quick break to reload. Nate struggled to keep up with Charles unstoppable pace, stumbling over bodies and wincing at blows taken to his makeshift shield. Those several hundred feet turned into a few hundred, then into a hundred and finally, fifty feet from the door, Charles broke into a full-on sprint, shield in front and smashed through the glass doors.
Nate rushed in after Charles, dropping the now broken piece of wood at the entryway and rushed into an elevator with the two, pressing the highest floor they could go to. The trio let a sigh of relief as the elevators closed in on the deserted lobby.
"Alright, when we get up there we are going to attempt to diffuse or disable whatever is causing this, do not destroy it," Nate ordered, his eyes moving between the two of them.
"If I may ask why can't we just destroy whatever this is," Forest questioned, Charles looked at Nate as well curious about his orders.
"Whatever this thing is puts off a lot of energy," Nate explained. "If we just decide to destroy whatever this is it could unleash a shockwave or blast that could kill all three of us." Nate had a preference of wanting to see this thing come to an end. "Besides," he added as the elevator doors opened. "It's not like there is going to be anyone up here." How he would eat those words.
The moment they stepped out they faced the back of a gray-skinned woman in an orange trench coat and a traffic cone on her head. To be honest, that was one of the more normal things he saw that day. Forest, being the irrational shark he was, pulled out his sniper and shot directly into her back. Nate was expecting to see the woman collapse and having to scold him for attacking some random person, what he didn't expect was to see a runic sword flash into her hand and her whipping around and deflecting the shot off of her sword. They stared at each other in a long silence, Nate managed to catch a glimpse of a staircase to their left before giving the order to run.
As the group ran Nate knew was that something about her was off and they certainly couldn't face her, not now. He pushed open the door to the stairwell, having Charles with Forest riding on his shoulder shooting back at the woman in before Charles slammed the door shut with his riot shield. He heard several loud and heavy slams against the door as it nudged Charles back a few inches.
"Go and end all of this," Nate heard Forest yell at him. "We'll hold her off now go!" He gestured for him to hurry up the stairs.
Giving them a two finger salute, Nate ran up two flights of stairs before he could go no further. Seeing the roof access door he slammed the door open before coming to face with a machine shooting up a pillar of spiraling energy. He looked across the horizon, still hearing the sounds of battle down below, at what appeared to be the edge massive triangular ship coming out through the portal, knowing that would cause unprecedented damage if it came fully through he got to work.
He ran over to the control panel of the machine in an effort to find some way to turn it off. While it was all in English, none of the control could be activated as it required some kind of passcode. Muttering a curse he looked for an external power source, seeing none he crouched down under the panel seeing a removable plate on the device. Pulling out his knife he managed to pry the plate loose from the machine and was greeted with a mess of wires and motherboards. Nate had thought he could just cut a red wire and cut off the power cycling through the machine but it appeared that this wasn't going to happen.
He heard the roof access door slam open behind him, he turned around seeing Forest and Charles running through the door. "I spotted an enemy infantry, I spotted an enemy infantry," he cried out pointing down towards the roof, with Forest yelling about someone else.
"What do you mean an enemy infan-," Nate was cut off as the roof exploded outwards as two figures jumped through the hole. It was the same woman Forest shot at downstairs along with a near identical copy of her but in dark gray and black where orange would be. The copy of the woman wielded a midnight black blade that clashed with the woman's own runic sword. Forest and Charles moved in to try and keep them off Nate. Backed into a corner and out of time Nate pulled the remote explosive off his belt and attached it to the exposed wiring, arming it.
"Back up, back up, back up," Nate yelled, pulling out the detonator he dived to the ground and pressed down on it.
The explosion shook the roof they stood on as it sent dust and debris Nate's way. The massive portal that had loomed over the city for several hours now began to quickly dissipate as its power source was now gone. A chunk of the building came off the roof, along with the machine, and went tumbling down towards the plaza below. There was a brief moment of silence, even down below the fighting seemed to just stop. However, before the device hit the ground it sent out a massive shockwave disabling Nate's electronic equipment before quickly turning back on. He almost let out a sigh of relief, but before he could he looked right at the now bridgeless triangular starship on a crash course with the base of the building.
"Hold onto something guys," Nate warned, but it fell on deaf ears as the ship crashed into the foundation and began the collapse of the skyscraper. The building shook violently as Charles and the two women were sent tumbling off the side of the building. With no time to grieve for his friend's fate, he latched onto a handrail and looked for any safe way off the collapsing skyscraper.
"No no no no, help me," Forest called out, trying to prevent himself from sliding off the side of the building. Nate launched a grappling hook towards him, it wrapped around his midsection and he recalled the line. The building shook once more and began to rapidly tip over, with no time left to spare he quickly came up with a plan. He let go of the handrail and started to fall. Ignoring the vulgarities being launched at him by Forest, he let loose another grappling hook at the far side of the building. Pulling his arm back he used the momentum from the swing to launch the two of them of the building.
They quickly fell into a free fall, Forest screaming even more vulgarities as Nate attempted to not have a panic attack in mid-air. They were falling and falling fast, Nate could feel the rush of wind throughout his body and was able to shoot out one last grappling hook at an adjacent building, just barely latching onto it. He used the momentum of the fall to swing across the building and put himself parallel to its roof. With all his speed gone, gravity quickly overcame him as he fell and smashed into the side of the building. He was alive, his whole body hurt like hell but he was alive.
The line of the grapple quickly retracted back into the wrist-mounted device on Nate's arm. At the end of the line he grabbed onto the edge of the building and hauled both himself and Forest on top of the roof. He looked over the edge of the building just in time to see the collapse of the once proud skyscraper into rubble as a massive dust cloud filled the streets of the city.
Nate started to think about Charles, how the poor bastard rolled off the side of the building. He tried to reason with himself that Charles could have been saved if only he reacted fast enough to pull him out like he did Forest. He laid on his back, now looking upon the bright blue and peaceful sky that he could pull from his shattered memories. In the corner of his eye he saw a dark shape as it slowly came over his vision, he realized it was someone in a parachute.
The figure landed on the roof and turned to meet them. "Hey man," Charles waved at them. Nate couldn't believe his eyes.
"Your alive," Nate said in shock, getting up and ignoring the pain he gave Charles a bro hug. He seemed perplexed by the action but repeated it himself. "How are you ali-," he cut himself off, realizing how dumb a question it was seeing it right in front of him.
Forest groaned, shook his round head then realizing who stood before him. "Charles, my dude," Forest shouted and propelled himself into his chest, in a sort of hug. Charles returned the gesture and seemed to glow with the attention that he was receiving. Nate smiled as he thought maybe, just maybe there could be a happy ending to all of this.
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The three friends waited for the dust cloud to settle before moving off the roof of the building. Nate sat there with a thoughtful look on his face, while he did see the two women fall off the edge of the building he highly doubted that they were dead. They both seemed to possess strength that far surpassed anything he saw down there, their reflexes seemed to be unmatched. To have himself, Forest and Charles survived the collapse he believed that they most certainly would have as well. Not only that, he believed that one of the two women held the key to who caused this living nightmare.
Forest scanned the ground level for anything interesting to happen. As the dust cloud settled he realized that the ground level was practically deserted, the collapse probably scared them all off he thought. Then something caught his eye, he moved his scope over to a brief spot of orange with a humanoid shape. "Uh, guys," he called out, turning back towards them. "I think I found one of our mystery women."
Nate and Charles walked over as Forest pointed with a fin at the location. Sure enough, they could see her lying amongst the rubble of the collapse. Nate turned to the others, "Well, let us go see if we can find some answers."
Nate repelled down the wall of the building with his grappling hook while Charles grabbed Forest and parachuted down. They moved slowly, with two in the front and one in the back to make sure they didn't get jumped as they approached the girl. The group came across her as she was getting up from the ground, Nate silently motioned them to aim at her. "Put your hands in the air where I can see them and turn around, slowly," he ordered her. She froze, not really knowing what to do, eventually, she obeyed the order and turned around.
She wasn't human, that was for sure, her skin was light gray and while she had some human characteristics, there was something distinctly alien about her. Besides the cone she wore, she dressed professionally in a trench coat that protected her body along with boots for her feet. Her face held a mark of maturity that was absent from the group's younger faces. Her expression seemed surprised and almost amused by the situation. "Who are all of you exac-."
"Ap ap ap ap ap," Forest cut her off. "Who has the guns pointed at their face, you, we ask the questions here." He nudged the gun slightly in her direction, she seemed to be faintly holding back laughter.
"Alright then, humor me," she said. "Ask away."
"What is your name and who do you work for," Nate asked, his eyes glaring through the helmet.
"I'm the High Templar, I work as an agent of an… interdimensional peacekeeping force."
Nate raised an eyebrow at this, interdimensional peacekeeping force? The High Templar? That could explain why she was here, but what was with the name was it a title? He shook his head, he needed to focus on more pressing matters. "Do you know why all of this happened, the portal in the sky and… everything else," Nate asked.
She sighed as she looked away. "This was an act of interdimensional terrorism, it was supposed to create chaos and disorder for this dimension in the hopes of collapsing it into anarchy," she explained. "A terror group is responsible for what happened here, I was sent to put a stop to it."
"What terror group," Forest called out before Nate could. "Was it that chick in black clothing that looked exactly like yours the leader?" They had all noticed the similarities between the two, it was almost as if they were related.
The Templar winced. "She was a failed clone experiment that was done on me, she had… a different belief structure than most of us and sought to enforce it."
"What kind of belief structure enforces this," Nate practically screamed gesturing around the destroyed city and the corpses that lined the streets. "What kind of monster does all of this, that would destroy millions of peoples' lives! And you certainly did a whole lot standing right underneath the whole damn thing!" Nate was pissed, and he was certain the others shared his feelings. He understood why she attacked them, Forest had shot first after all, but how could this woman be part of a force meant to supposedly protect the multiverse but take god knows how long to even identify what was going on.
"Look, I know that you are angry," she said, stating the obvious. "But I had only recently arrived here, I probably knew less than you three did when I got here, it takes a while to try and identify and track just when and where these incidents are happening."
Nate sighed as he lowered his gun, his irrational side argued with himself to still be angry but he knew that it wasn't right. Forest lowered his rifle, also begrudgingly accepting the answer, but Charles still had his raised. "Lower the gun Charles," Nate said. "Enough death has been caused here today, let us try and prevent one more." He looked back, he wanted to argue but he couldn't and lowered his rifle as well.
The High Templar walked over standing a couple of feet in front of the trio, a sad look on her face. "The best I can do for you three is send you back to your home dimensions," she offered. "I can't reverse what happened here."
"Well, there is going to be a slight problem with that," Forest said, the other two nodding in agreement. "We can't remember anything from before we fell out of that portal."
"Huh," she muttered, a thoughtful look on her face. She seemed to gaze out into the destruction before her face lit up with an idea. She lifted a hand up to one of her ears, "Hello? Yes. Request transfer of three other individuals with me back to base." This caught the attention of the group. "Look I know it breaks protocol, but just trust me on this one," she pleaded.
"Alright, thanks I owe you one," she cut off the call. She looked over now seeing three pairs of eyes on her. "So, I have a question to ask you three. How would you like to join me in hunting down this terror group," she asked.
Nate, Forest, and Charles wore looks of surprise upon their faces, they certainly hadn't expected her to ask them that. "I need a ride," Charles said, not really thinking. The Templar raised an eyebrow at that.
"He can't really talk, but why us," Nate questioned.
"I thought it would have been obvious," she said. "You three managed to come together in all this chaos, navigate a portion of the city close to the epicenter of the portal, and in the end manage to destroy it."
"So, is there anything in it for us," Forest asked with interest seeping from his voice.
"If you manage to take down the group and restore peace to the multiverse, more than you can imagine," she replied with a smile. The group seemed to like that idea but they had one concern.
"What about the people here in the city," Nate asked. "Shouldn't we take care of the madmen in the city?"
She wore a confused look on her face before realizing what he was talking about. "A... much larger force will come in to deal with them, I'm more special forces," she explained. "So, with that out of the way I'll ask you once more," she said, pressing a few buttons on a device on her wrist before a blue beam of energy shot out and expanded into a portal. "You coming or not?"
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And that's a wrap from me. I created this fic as a short story but in reality, it is the beginning of a much larger story that I may one day finish. I just didn't want the pressure of trying to finish a story right now, it was more a test of my writing skills and this was the idea I had in my head.
You might be curious as to why this is a fanfic without any real absolute tie into another universe. It's meant to be my own little world where I take ideas, concepts, and stuff from other worlds and add it to this.
Nate's equipment is based on the Titanfall universe for example.
I'll appreciate any thoughts and criticisms on the story and writing. I enjoyed making this and hope to write other stories.