Prologue: Tribulations of Men
…
These days were his worst days ever, of all time, he decided.
He'd been standing guard over one of the crossover tubes before the alarms went off.
He'd been there when those things began slamming on the quarantine seals.
He'd not been there when the power failed and they began pouring in the Public Sector.
He' also just been talking to Gabe before his wife, Lexine, called him, and had left the married couple (soon to be parents), he'd met Lexine, and for reasons beyond him, he'd talking to care for her as his own little sister.
Lexine would often stare at nothing, cringing at sound only she could hear, but he never told Gabe, if his wife wasn't comfortable with him knowing, who he to probably cause their first marital arguments was.
And now, standing guarding with a pulse rifle as some civilians got into emergency shuttles, he chose to reflect on his life.
He remembered other times. Happier times, before all this madness came.
And squashed them as soon as they came, as they wouldn't serve any purpose but to get him killed.
One didn't spent 20 years in the military and not been changed at all.
But still… it saddened him as he saw another shuttle crashing back unto the Sprawl due the thrice damned anti-ship turrets that fool Tiedemann had activated.
Or maybe one of his foot-licking marker-heads, who knew.
His onyx eyes briefly scanned the crow, and located another one with a sick-looking gash on her shoulder, barely covering it with her hand, it went unnoticed to those around her that the alien-necrosis-thing had begun taking over.
There is no way that thing isn't alien. He'd thought of telling his superior, but he went against the idea, they would never listen to him.
He'd never known.
It'd been roughly a few hours, yet it felt like days.
Now here he was, back in the Government Sector, the fool Tiedemann had issued that they scrubbed the hospital, but he knew better than to try to kill someone on the middle of this situation.
He knew he was right when he'd found that girl- no woman bleeding out in there.
She'd dragged herself out of somewhere; her RIG looked like one of those fancy prototypes with automatic Somatic Gel dispensers from built-in containers… Although those were prone to failing if shaken enough, just like her case. Problem was that the indicators failed too and stayed full despite how life threatening injures were.
He'd used some spare MedPacks on her before looking around… waiting for something.
He'd found one of the refurbished plasma cutters that CEC had deemed that could be hold onto by their owners after some upgrading. He'd given it to his female companion, who still limped and most likely had a broken rib or two despite the Level 4 Prototype Engineering RIG she wore. Her helmet was lost thought; she'd said it'd been too heavy for her to carry with all her injuries.
Frankly, he didn't care; he would find something to make up for it. He just didn't want to be alone in all this mess.
"So, whoever you are… thanks for the save back there… I thought… there was no one left…" she'd said, her hazel eyes sincere despite being cautious.
"Reycall" he'd answered, not turning back, looking at a blocked door.
"Yeah?"
"My name is Edward Reycall"
"Oh, mine is Norton, Karrie Norton"
He'd gotten an idea from seeing the Plasma Cutter, and asked Karrie if it was feasible.
"It might be possible that the Sprawl's CEC building has some shuttles left, but there is also the possibility of them being already taken by those in there…"
Reycall had hoped she was wrong, but it was better to have a clear objective than none at all.
"Holy Hannah…"
"You got that right…"
Here the pair was, looking at the jewel of planetary mining; the thought destroyed, yet still here, the motherfrakking USG ISHIMURA.
They looked at each other. They smiled at each other.
They had their ticket out of this mess.
"Karrie! Someone's just activated the gravity centrifuge!" Reycall shouted over his shoulders, quickly loading another magazine into his pulse rifle and aiming at the Necromorphs' joints.
"Let 'em help us! Cover me while I lock on the Singularity Core!" She simply used a few tools she had on her, not the best, but she wasn't picked for the Unitologist mission for her pretty face alone.
"Got it!" he took another rifle nearby and used a crate as a makeshift tripod, firing one while he reloaded the other, a trick from his days during the Resource Wars. "How much longer?"
"Just a few… DONE! Let's head for the bridge!" she shouted as she pulled out her Plasma Cutter and helped Reycall.
Reycall threw her a Javelin gun when she ran out or batteries, while he dropped one of the rifles and reloaded the other.
Running as fast as they could in their RIGs, they made it to the tram station on the medical deck, just as an alert of gravity tethers being used (along with a quite noticeable shudder from the ship). They however, didn't make it to reach whoever it was that used the ship's systems, but hey, that someone had just left them a space-ready ship filled with stuff (and Necromorphs) that could get them away from the station.
Reaching the captains nest, the duo switched the controls over using the Executive override so they could pilot the Ishimura without needing to use the bigger (and most vulnerable) bridge. This way they were safe and also could pilot quite well for such overly simplistic controls.
However, there were gravity tethers keeping the ship docked, so as soon as they could, they disengaged the tethers and reoriented them, then reversing their effect. The ship gave a shudder as they used the gravity tethers to push the Ishimura away from the dock, but it held, the CEC dock… not so much.
"Karrie, let's shock back to earth and…" Reycall trailed off, as he stared hard enough at the console in front of him.
"And what?" Karrie was about to engage the autopilot to reach a safe distance from the Sprawl when she noted her partners silence.
"Sorry, got a transmitter, a gunship, it seems, it came out from the TMMC (Titan Memorial Medical Center), so there's got to be someone there… let me try and contact it…"
"NO! What if they're Unitologists! You know what they did! Everything happening it's their fault!" she vehemently shouted, Tyler's betrayal still stung, after considering a friend and ally. She refused to hand over the only person she trusted (for now) to them.
"Karrie…" he reached over to her, it pained him to look at someone so strong growing so desperate. She'd told him about everything the church had made her do… a guilt she'd be carrying for a long time, it seemed. So he did the same thing he'd done with his sister all those years ago, he hugged her (despite how uncomfortable it was due their RIGs). Damara had always calmed down when he did that. "Don't worry… we'll be alright… if those inside the shuttle are simply innocents… well, we might just get a bit of forgiveness for our actions… and IF they are Unitologists, we'll toss them out the airlock, ok?"
"*Sigh* fine…"
Reycall went over the comms panel "This is USG Ishimura to EarthGov Gunship, Identify, yourself, over" Silence answered him, so he tried again "EarthGov Gunship, This is USG Ishimura, Identify yourself or you'll be fired upon, I repeat, this is USG Ishimura, Identify yourself or you'll be fired upon, over"
More silence answered him while Karrie opened a holoscreen with the closest ADS to the gunship, and overrode the controls so she could fire on it if proven hostile. Which was unnecessary after hearing from the gunship.
"Hey, HEY! This Is Lexine Weller aboard EarthGov Gunship, hold your fire, please!"
Lexine's day had gone to hell in a less than a day. It all began when she went to the Hospital for her fertility sessions, then Gabe had called her with new that they were back.
Then one of Gabe's co-workers had tried to kill her, then another group of freaks like Warren had tried to kidnap her…
Her and Gabe's child.
Then that bastard killed Gabe.
She'd spent the last minutes crying… wondering why the heck did those things always had to come and take away those she loved.
First Sam.
Nathan too.
Then Gabe.
But not her child.
She'd make sure of it.
The auto pilot was about to shock back to earth when the comms came online. And with it, an impossible signal came too.
"This is USG Ishimura to EarthGov Gunship, Identify yourself, over"
There was no way it was back.
As it played, she looked at the window to her right, and saw…
The beginning of her nightmare. Where she'd suffered so much… and lost someone she'd come to love before she fell for Gabe.
"EarthGov Gunship, This is USG Ishimura, Identify yourself or you'll be fired upon, I repeat, this is USG Ishimura, Identify yourself or you'll be fired upon, over"
Scrambling to the ship's controls, she raised the comms to answer. "Hey, HEY! This Is Lexine Weller aboard EarthGov Gunship, hold your fire, please!" she shouted, hoping that unlike last time, she was heard.
She stood nervously awaiting response. She was thoroughly confused when it wasn't the same male voice, but a distinctly feminine one.
"Eh… why is it me…? Oh comms' online? Right, Miss Weller, this is Van-Sorry, this is Karrie Norton aboard the USG Ishimura… uh… you're not Unitologist… are you?"
Shaking her head, she hurried to answer "What? No! I'm not one of them! I don't care about whatever they think about those things, but I'm not getting my child near those monsters if I can help it!"
"… Ok, fine. Look, Miss Weller, my friend here wants to know if you worked with EarthGov on any of its projects… or something like that…"
"My husband was in security, does that count?"
"Yeah… is he there with you? My friend would like to speak with him…"
"…He didn't make it…"
"Oh… sorry… Look, we're going back to earth in a few minutes, you want to join us? I don't think that that shuttle has a shockdrive, does it?"
Lexine checked, and no, it didn't have one. "No…"
"Ok, why don't you get to the flight deck and dock there? We'll come and get you. Just don't come out your shuttle… I think there are still some of those things around… wait for us"
She considered…
And initiated docking maneuvers.
"So what now, we come to the rescue?" exclaimed a nervous Karrie. Part of her was hopeful that at least she'd saved someone… and the other part was nervous that she'd have to go through the damn ship again to get her.
"Not yet, we have to…" Reycall interrupted himself. "Shit! Massive energy spike! The Shard's reactors must be about to explode!"
"Impossible! I fixed the cores myself!"
"Somehow they must be overheating… Tiedemann, that bastard! He must have set them to detonate!"
"Why would he… I mean, what reason would he have to?"
"Dunno, I asked myself the same about the orders for the hospital… is our guest here yet?"
"Her shuttle just finished docking"
"Alright…Lexine, don't come out your shuttle, we're shocking to earth now! The whole Sprawl is set to blow!" he didn't wait for Weller to respond, he locked down the magnetic clamps and shut off the airlocks, along with life support in all areas but the flight deck and the bridge.
::All Hands, Shock out to Earth space in 3… 2… 1…::
They knew no more after that.
…
Unknown to them, the gates of fate had opened once again.
All those aboard the Ishimura were keys, whether they knew it or not.
One, the Wanderer, lost forever, never establishing true roots.
The second, the Lamb, unknowingly sacrificed, blind to the truth before he eyes opened.
The third, the Keeper, carrier of the Ambrosia, partner of the last of the first touched.
These ones, using a 'touched' vessel, they began a voyage.
A quest to stop the seven hells that await earth.
They are hungry, we're their cattle.
But no more.
As the Killer, the Rider and the Warrior began their final fates…
The Wanderer, the Lamb and the Keeper began their own tales.
These six would meet.
As ancient tales spoke of.