A Day to Remember

WARNING: This story is dedicated to what happened on 9/11. I made this story to honor all the people (not going to mention names because I don't know anyone from there) who had passed away on this day. If you don't want to read this chapter, it's fine. You are entitled to your own opinions and I will respect that. This chapter has nothing to do with the plot or anything and doesn't feature Kori, so this chapter isn't going to affect anything with my story. But it does introduce some characters that I may use in future chapters. But anyways, like I said, you don't have to read this chapter if you don't want to. Thanks a lot and God bless you all and have a good day =)

TRANSMISSION BEGIN:

It was around 6 in the morning. The sun was shining over my face. I was tossing and turning in my bed, wanting a few more minutes to sleep in before I was going to go to work. Today, marks 10 years, 10 years ago was we all can recall as A Day to Remember.

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

I hit the alarm button, swinging my arm at it and accidently smashing it…again.

"Damnit! I broke another one?" I opened my eyes and threw the alarm to the growing pile of alarm clocks, which probably ranged from 15 to 20 a month. "New record?" I got up from my bed and walked towards the pile. "22…I thought so."

I walked towards the bathroom, took a shower and got ready. I put on my uniform along with my ribbons and went out the door of my apartment. My partner was leaning on the wall across from the door, looking very impatient.

"So Jax, you've finally woke up." The woman had said. She was also in a Uniform, such as mine, but she was a lower rank than me. I was a Major in the Special Forces, she was a Lieutenant.

"Yeah, yeah. I didn't expect you to be up before me, Sonya." I said with a grumpy voice. I didn't want to be up this early, but a job's a job, but we got to do it.

"Pfft, it should have been the other way around. You being up before me, it makes you look bad honestly." She said in a cocky tone.

"Heh, let's just get this show on the road and get it over with. This day's very important and we're just standing here like the ceremony's going to happen in the middle of this hotel hallway." I started to walk towards the stairs.

"Right behind you, partner." She followed behind me.

As soon as we went down stairs, we met up with 2 local Police Officers; one was your average Cop, while the other one was part of S.W.A.T., more like a one-man S.W.A.T. team.

"Morning, Major Briggs." The S.W.A.T. member had said.

I looked at the man. "Morning."

Sonya looked at the man. "And I thought I was up and ready early, Stryker."

"Looks like I win, you owe me a cup of coffee. Remember our deal." Stryker grinned a little, but in a jokingly way.

Last week, Sonya and Stryker had made a deal to see who would be outside first on this day. The loser will have to pay for breakfast, lunch, and maybe dinner. I was aware of this but it had drifted away from my mind for some time now. I'm going to hear it later from her I bet.

"Well guess who didn't wake up on time." She started staring at me. "It's all your fault, Jax!" I take that back, I'm getting lectured right now…

"Hey! It ain't my fault that it's my job to watch over the portal to the other realms and get to bed around 4 in the morning while you go to bed around 2!" I got a little upset at her for bringing that up. I mean, C'mon! A guy needs his sleep too!

"Relax, Briggs." Stryker put his hand on my shoulder. "Now, let's go and grab some coffee before there's a crowd at the coffee shop."

"Fine…" That's the only thing I could say.

Sonya started walking past me towards the shop. Stryker and the Police officer followed behind her, I decided to do the same since it would be stupid to stay here and argue.

We arrived at the shop. Surprisingly, there were about twenty people already in the shop, watching T.V., talking with one another, or eating doughnuts or drinking coffee. At least there isn't anyone in line since it's still early.

Sonya went up to the cashier and a lady came there.

"Hello, big day isn't it? The lady smiled as she noticed that Sonya had her badge on. "How may I help you?"

"Yes, yes it is…"Sonya seemed uncomfortable. "Can I have…" She looked at Stryker. "What do you want?"

"Hmm…" He looked at the menu. "Mocha, you should know this by now."

She grinned at him and turned back to the cashier.

"Can I get a Mocha, a Java, and…" Sonya shifted her face towards me.

Before she could ask me, I replied to her because I knew what she was going to say.

"An Armeto sounds good." I yawned and looked at my watch. It was about 7 A.M.

She turned her head to the cashier again and asked for an Armeto.

"Is that all you want?" The Cashier had said.

Sonya turned back around and noticed the cop was gone…? Oh well, sucks for him.

She turned back to the lady. "Yes, that's all."

"That'll be $5.21." Sonya had given her the cash and grabbed the coffees.

We left the Coffee Shop and had our coffees to-go. I took a sip from it. Mmm… I don't know what's in this stuff, but it's really good today! Not like it hasn't been before.

We waked into the busy streets of New York. It was rather populated than it normally is. I don't see why it shouldn't be. The only things I can hear in these streets are car engines and footsteps, lots of footsteps. No one was talking at all; everyone was as quiet as a tree that isn't getting blown by any wind. Many of those people were holding picture frames, ranging from wallet-sized pictures to text book-sized frames with a photo of someone in there. It's really sad and depressing to see the faces of these people…

Sonya gave out a small sigh.

"I wish we could have helped these poor people…" She said, with a frown spreading down her face.

I put my robotic hand onto her right shoulder.

"The only thing we could do is wish for them the best. It's not like we could invent a portal that can take us into the past and stop this from happening" I looked up at the area where the "towers" stood.

Then it hit me. I felt like I went back in time. I was at my office, filing some paper work I had received from my boss. I then turned my head towards the window and saw something hit one of the towers, but a bird flew in the way of my vision so I couldn't tell what it was. Suddenly, I saw something touch the tower again, this time…I saw it crashing down. A huge cloud of ash came riding "our" way…The last thing I heard were screams…

"Jax! Stop daydreaming and snap back into reality!" Sonya yelled at me. "You spilled your coffee all over your shoe!"

I shook my head and saw how I was holding my coffee. Great… this isn't my day, is it?

"Haha!" Stryker started to laugh at my failure.

"Shut it!" I grinned at him.

"Hey hey, don't get started here you two. Jax, you can clean your shoe when we get into the building." Sonya put a hand at both of our faces to stop us from engaging into kombat.

"Ugh fine!" I looked up again, this time; it was the office I worked at. "At least it wasn't far."

It was like a walk in, walk out thing. I went in the office to switch my coffee stained shoes, to a nice, shiny, clean pair of shoes. Once I switched them, I left for the event that was waiting for us all morning- afternoon now.

It seems like time flew for us so quickly. It was around 3 P.M. now and we had gotten a ride from the Special Forces Kombat Vehicle (a.k.a. SFKV and also to get in there in style). Once we set foot off the truck, I grabbed my speech that I had in my folder from the office. We walked behind a curtain so no one could see us.

Sonya looked at me and put her hand on my shoulder.

"Are you ready for this?" She spoke firmly.

"Yeah, bring it on!" I felt determined, but also wanted someone else to do it. But it's not like I had a choice in the matter if I wanted to make the speech or not.

"Good luck, Briggs." Stryker had said as he opened the curtain that blinded me for a moment because of the sun's rays.

There must have been thousands of people sitting outside in the hot, burning sun. It was around 99 degrees and I have to stand out here in the sun. Blegh!

I walked up to the podium stand as everyone shifted their faces towards me. I seriously wish I had a fan blowing in my direction right now; it should have cooled down by now! I took a deep breath and put my papers on the podium. I guess I just have to get through it to get it over with. I began to clear my throat.

"Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Major Jackson Briggs. I am a part of the Special Forces team. On this day, ten years ago, we were doing our jobs, running errands for our bosses or co-workers. We were unprepared for what was going to happen on this very day ten years ago. Some of our airplanes had been hi-jacked and were sent on a crash course to our most valuable buildings in the United States of America. Some hit their designated target, some failed. During the crash course, we lost many American lives, men and woman, brothers and sisters, kids and adults. Our police officers and firefighters tried our best to save the lives that we could, but it wasn't enough to save every life. This doesn't mean we didn't try hard enough or at all. This just means that we, as Americans, aren't giving up the fact that we can't forget this day, ten years ago. This speech is to honor all those who had passed away during the attack of 9/11. We as Americans, don't give up our hope. We as Americans, don't give up on the fact that we have lost lives. We as Americans should rise together and be strong, both mentally and inside each and every one of our hearts. We as Americans support the loses of our loved ones. We as Americans stand together in this nation that is rebuilding together as we speak. As we know, it won't be easy but we can handle it because we are Americans and we GIVE IT ALL! Thank you all, and have a blessed day."

I left the podium and the last thing I heard were cheers from the audience, people crying, and as I looked back at the crowd, I saw that they had their fists in the air, as one by one they raised their fists together. This gives me hope that this nation and the others will be fixed and together again as it should be. We are the Special Forces. This is Major Jackson Briggs, signing out now.

END TRANSMISSION

Nice, I finished the story with 1995 words (Available for your home in 1995, only on the Nintendo ULTRA 64! Killer Instinct! XDD Who remembers that?)

Ah, this side story was a PAIN in the rear to make! I originally started this on August 27th and finished it on this very day (ironically). I had so many writer's blocks on this. About the coffee parts in the story, I had to ask MiracleHeart what her favorite one was (Mocha), my friend Alex (Java) and my friend Soo (Armeto) because I don't know the coffee names honestly D=. I feel as if I didn't play the characters correctly but I tried my best to imitate them to how they would sound if it would really happen. So if I could do a better job, just tell me what I could change on it the next time I (may) work with these kinds of characters.

Also, thank you for the few comments I got on my 1st chapter of Life of Kori =)

Ps: I'm sorry if I offended anyone with this story, but I really wanted to make a story like this since it was coming up. I tried my best to NOT into a lot of detail of the event in my story but I suppose I put enough to make us remember it. God Bless everyone who had relatives or knew someone who had been in 9/11. My heart goes out to all of you.