I am re-tweaking the first two chapters of my story, here is the first one.
Chapter 1: On Stormy Seas
It's a weird feeling, dying that is, I never really thought much about it, but all in all I'd rather not go through with it if it were up to me, surprisingly it wasn't as the hastening darkness clearly indicated; but even as this was happening that tell-tale voice at the back of my mind came creeping out as it always did in times of stress.
"Time to go to sleep Toddy." it softly whispered into his brain as the clinging claws of unconsciousness dug into the corners of the man's mind's eye.
"Time to die." and he let it as this unmistakable feeling slowly slid out from his core as decompression turned its final corner and headed towards its final destination.
"Wake-up Commander Shepard!" suddenly shouted a voice that cut through the dusky dawn that surrounded the forlorn figure.
"I said wake up!" roared the unseen speaker for a second time, the remark quickly accompanied by a savage slap to the face which dragged the man back into the waking world; banishing faded memories back into the oblivion from whence they came.
"I heard you the first time" muttered Toddy Shepherd as a coppery flavour permeated throughout his mouth as he flexed ever so slightly in the stainless steel dental chair, which along with himself was bolted firmly to the concrete floor.
"I know." retorted the shrouded figure as the sound of footsteps echoed off the surrounding walls. "I just wanted to continue our little chat without any interruptions." unsurprisingly this particular comment did not go down so well with the restrained man, who desperately attempted to turn his head in the speakers' general direction."I wouldn't do that if I were you." calmly stated the unseen voice as it walked in front of the prisoner, which didn't really improve the image in Shepard's mind as all he could see was a relatively tall man in an Armani suit, unfortunately the individuals face was hidden from view by the surrounding gloom.
"I would hate for you to hurt yourself." the sarcasm was unmistakable and was quickly responded to with a short, sharp insult which cut through the air."Really Commander, how unbecoming." calmly commented the interrogator as he planted a savage right hook into the unguarded face of the prisoner. "I was hoping to have more of a productive interview than the one we had yesterday." the sound of squeaking wheels quickly followed as the man pulled a desk chair directly in front of the captive "Why don't we start from the beginning?"
"Who are you again?" quietly demand the convict as he felt himself being moved into a more upright position.
"Smith, Mr Smith." replied the figure as he leaned forward to wipe the bright crimson from the commanders face.
"Well, that's original." Shepard muttered.
"And you would be Andrew Toddy Shepherd correct?" the pointed question generated a cold stare from the prisoner, who spat the foul contents of his mouth onto the man's immaculate shoes.
"My name is Toddy, Toddy Shepard, get it right." the man took silent note of this before continuing his questioning.
"Ok Commander, before we start I just want you to know that I've seen your personnel records, so lying will be not only a waste of your time but of mine, are we clear?" there was a steely undercurrent to the comment that didn't go unnoticed.
"As turian vodka." quietly growled the detainee as he dragged his tongue over blood stained teeth.
"Good, very good." calmly replied the interrogator as he let a cold smile spread across his face.
"I think we'll start from the beginning, I hope you don't mind." asked the man in professional tones.
"Like I have a choice." whispered the marine as he allowed his eyelids to fall shut as a heavily wall of memories came flooding back.
"Ok let's start with some basic questions shall we, your age." it was more of a statement than a question.
"I'm thirty one years old." replied the prisoner wearily, as if he'd said this a dozen times before.
"Which means that you were born in twenty one fifty four correct?" the interrogator watched as the restrained figure nodded his head in silent agreement."Good, moving on, the record states that you were delivered on the eleventh of August is that right?" moments later Mr Smith found himself being interrupted as his reluctant colleague erupted into a fit of sad laughter as the words drifted around the narrow space. "What's so funny Commander?" calmly enquired the man as he watched his charge's sudden with peaked interest
"I was found, found on the eleventh." the shadowy individual made a correction to his notes.
"My apologies please continue." the polite demand rang out in the Commander's mind as he started to explain his childhood to a waiting audience.
"I was found in a waste disposal unit, outside of London's international spaceport, the other kids at the orphanage always used to tease me by saying that my parents probably didn't want to pay the excess luggage fees; after being discovered I was taken to a local metropolitan police station and from there onto a state run orphanage, it was called "The Happy Home Orphanage" if I recall correctly." As the man said this a disgusted snort slowly slipped from his mouth. "It was a total pig sty and I was long gone by the time I turned ten " the listener decided to interrupt at that exact moment by raising his hand.
"Was it really that bad?" the interrogator quietly enquired, unsurprisingly the storyteller didn't take this too well as the burning gaze clearly indicated.
"Alright, alright I get it, it was a bad place can we please get back on track?" he waited patiently as the unwilling guest began his monologue once more.
"I ran around on my own for nearly a year before joining up with the Tenth Street Red's, got caught stealing from one of their hideouts' if my memory serves me right, fortunately for my young self, Sweeny Joe, who ran the gang at the time thought that I showed real promise and allowed me to escape with only a weak beating, weak from his point of view, it took me two weeks until I could walk again."
Mr Smith looked up from his smouldering cigarette to glance over at the restrained prisoner who was systematically becoming darker with every passing moment.
"And?" the man enquired as he watched an almost unreadable expression spread slowly across the restrained figures face.
"And I stayed with the Reds for the next five years, working my way up the mired ranks until I was one of the leaders most trusted lieutenants" but as the words left Shepard's mouth a hint of emotion seemed to creep into each syllable.
"I take it from the way your acting" said the interrogator evenly "That this is where the story really starts" the statement generated a withering glare from the detainee, who apparently didn't like his life narrative being told by someone else.
"You have no idea" angrily muttered the soldier as he allowed himself to drifted softly backwards into the swirling mass of memories; the man in black wisely waited as the silent minutes slowly ticked by, after an age there came the almost miscible exhaling of breath as the explanation got back on track.
"You have to understand something." softly stated the commander as he slowly flexed his neck in a vain attempt to drive out the painful stiffness that was becoming, with every passing moment more and more uncomfortable.
"By the time I was promoted there was already a new leader called Caesar running the show and that's where all the trouble started." the restrained individual looked down at the white object in Mr Smith's hand.
"Can I have one of those?" wearily asked the prisoner.
"Ah yes, sorry about that. I didn't think you smoked." politely replied the interrogator as he carefully slipped the cylinder into the man's mouth.
"I hope you don't mind, the salarians can't fight to save their lives but they sure do know how to make a packet of smokes" the individual added.
"Just light the damn thing." muttered Shepherd as desperately attempted to stop crushing the filter in between his teeth in frustration, which quickly evaporated as one end burst into life. "As I was saying." stated the prisoner as he inhaled the narcotic gladly. "Caesar was an expansionist, in every sense of the word, in the two years that she'd lead the Reds they had grown from a small street gang with links to the underworld to a budding criminal organisation, with its sights set squarely on the future; unfortunately Caesar was not the kind of person who like to take things slow, and she wasn't one for subtlety either." as he said this a almost misty look seemed to flow seamlessly across his vision. "I remember her coming back to the hideout one night, completely drunk off her ass, shouting how we'd hit the big time." a flash of anger seem to materialise from thin air as memories began creeping back. "Some big shot had paid a mountain of credits for us to raid a Synthetic's Insights warehouse on the city outskirts." this particular statement seemed to attract unwanted attention from his interrogator, who lent silently forward as he heard it.
"Any idea who hired you?" asked Mr Smith firmly, but the prisoner's silent response was all the answer he needed. "Go on."
"The job went perfectly, the target only had a half a dozen security personnel and even with weapons and kinetic barriers they weren't expecting thirty of us, poor sods, didn't know what hit them, metaphorically speaking anyway. Did you know that if you're within two feet of someone their shields can't come up fast enough to stop the bullet?" Shepherd chuckled quietly to himself as he said this. "We grabbed everything we could and hightailed it back into the docks where we had our main base at the time." but before the story could continue it was interrupted once more by his unwanted companion, who at that exact moment thought it would be a good idea to disrupt him for a third time.
"What was in the crates?" he calmly enquired as his hand made rapid movements onto the electronic notepad.
"High end tech mostly, some bleeding edge stuff, didn't know it at the time though and a boat load of augmentation units to; legs and arms mostly." this seemed to please his enraptured audience because moments later there came an all too familiar signal to continue. "As I was saying before being interrupted again." the commander inwardly smirked as he caught the slightest hint of frustration from his captor. "We made it back to the hideout with little difficulty and settled down to wait for the payoff." the story started to slow as the memories began flooding back ever quicker. "But it didn't go as planned" he quietly muttered.
"Toddy!" screamed Caesar as a round ripped its way through her shoulder, I remember watching as the concussion grenade went off at the girl's feet, she flew a good eight feet backwards, unfortunately for me the fun had only just begun because moments later the front door caved in as the Synthetic Insights PSC's stormed the building, all I could hear was the sound of fighting and the screams of my fellow gang members being overwhelmed; the first goon that ran into me as I vaulted downstairs received a steel capped boot to the face that sent a fountain of blood splashing over my shirt, the second took a crowbar to the jaw resounding in a satisfying crack, the world began to slow at that point, the adrenaline was well and truly pumping through my veins and the battle rage had me in its grip. Only an act of God could bring me down.
"Take that little shit down!" bellowed someone as an angry knot of people came rushing towards me, shock batons at the ready.
"Okay, time for round two." I remember whispering as the first of them impaled himself on the end of my combat knife, and old school KA-BAR. The next two were just as quickly dispatched when I managed to get the soft spots between their plates, unfortunately a few seconds later someone thought it would be a nice idea to smash an armoured fist into my face, sending blood coursing down my face; but even this didn't seem to slow me down as I lashed out left and right with a vengeance until the only one left standing was the slender boy with the wickedly sharp knives clasped tightly in each hand.
"I will live forever." I heard myself shout in a pain fuelled rage, unluckily it was not meant to be, for as the words fell from my lips there came a short, sharp sensation that seemed to spread like morning frost throughout my body and even as the world began to fade from view, all that I could think about was the fact that I'd been shot; the world warped once more as time itself seemed to come to a grounding halt all around me and the only thing that moved was the shadowy figure that strode purposefully through the sprawling chaos around it.
"No one lives forever Todd." said the voice that seemingly appeared from nowhere in the back of my mind.
"Especially someone like you!" it whispered as the revenant reached out a cold hand towards him and the world went black.
"I found out later on that all the R&D equipment that had been stolen by us was nano chipped and even before we left the warehouse a private rapid response unit was already en route." regretfully stated Shepard as he slow gazed up at the ceiling tiles above him
"Standard practice for big companies, I was surprised that you didn't know about it at the time." calmly replied Mr Smith as he removed the smouldering cigarette end from his guest's mouth.
"Here, have a fresh one." the prisoner quietly nodded in silent thanks as he gently bit down on the other end.
"I was sixteen at the time, I was smart, but not that smart. Shit at that point I hadn't even gotten laid." retorted the marine as he gratefully puffed away.
"Fair enough, so what happened next." enquired the interrogator as he lowed himself back down into his chair.
"I woke up." came the reply.
"It's time to wake up Toddy, wake up and smell the ashes." coldly whispered the voice that leaked in through bruised eardrums; reality came rushing back with a vengeance, crimson memories flashed across my fumbling mind as I mentally dragged myself into a white world of bright lights and unwanted attention.
"Nice to see that you can follow orders at least." chuckled the blurry figure as my vision worked itself into some aspect of a feasible function, the room around me was pristinely clean, crisp and white; the only things that looked out of place amongst the pale surroundings was me in my underwear and the smartly dressed gentleman who was standing a few feet away.
"I wouldn't move around too much if I were you, the sedatives tend to take longer to wear off on the muscles than is generally expected." but the man's warning came too late as he watched as I fall awkwardly off of the well-made bed and onto the cold floor below.
"Told you so." sarcastically stated the figure as he adjusted the sleeve of his dark blue suit.
"Where am I?" I remember shouting hoarsely, but the only answer that I received was a quiet laugh which sent shivers down my spine.
"You're not really in a position to demand anything Mr Shepard." calmly stated the individual as he walked quietly crossed the room towards me. "But you're a smart man." he politely demanded.
"Synthetic Insights" came the defeated tone, which unsurprisingly was the thing that the man had been waiting for.
"I'm glad to see that the after action report about you was correct after all." as the businessman said this he allowed himself to kneel down in front of my broken and bandaged form. "You have caused the company a great deal of trouble young man and I have a habit of removing things that cause the company trouble" the individual slowly rose to his feet as he continued talking. "But on this particular occasion I'm willing to make an exception." as the words drifted through the air they seemed to linger all too heavily in my unwavering mind.
"What is it that you want?" I forcefully demanded as the feeling quietly returned to my legs.
"I don't want anything young man. I'm simply offering you an opportunity"
"What opportunity?" the question seemed to please the shadowy businessman, who walked back towards an unseen door that was set into the far wall.
"Synthetic Insights runs a scholarship program for children that helps develop their natural talent's into something useful that can be used to benefit society." this particular statement didn't wash well with me as my disbelieving glare clearly indicated. "And by society I mean the company."
"I thought as much." I grudgingly muttered, but I'd already figured out that my current situation was unwinnable and if he wanted to there was nothing stopping the figure in front of me from simply snuffing out the light of my life; the minutes ticked by as I made up my mind, the individual didn't seem to take offence as he calmly took a swig from a hip flask to pass the time.
"What do I have to do?" the question only seemed to bring a smile to the man's face as he vanished out the door, moments later a chuckling reply came echoing back down the room towards me.
"Nothing, absolutely nothing"
I hope you liked this story, please leave a comment or review.
thank you.
Gods-own.