A/N: Back with more. WARNING POSSIBLE TRIGGER, SELF-HARM and DISFIGURATION.
The mild snowstorm did little to disrupt the rather smooth flying of the Pelican. The frost covered the armored exterior and the freezing winds tried to enter as well. This bird is air tight, nothing gets through the exterior unless it's blown wide open. And few things in this universe could do something like that, maybe some plastic explosives, or a well-placed rocket and something as radical as a plasma… ball…
Eddy smacked his helmet in frustration. Forgetting about the destroyed Pelican with all those injured marines in it is going to be difficult. The screams he heard while the flesh of those human beings were being burned off, it's, something he may never forget. Something that would haunt his every dream, something that would more than likely be the worst scene he has ever come across in his 8 years of fighting the Covenant.
That wasn't what was bugging him the most though. Here he was, sitting in the holding area of the Pelican. His hands placed on the helmet where his temples were located and staring at the floor like he was seeing the metal for the first time in his life. Slightly shaking with eyes wide, Eddy knew what was going to happen any minute now. The judging was about to begin and with the critical accident of the Pelican, she was not going to take it easy on him much longer. 'I can't take this much longer' Eddy thought to himself as the idea of more 'punishment' swirled in his head like a rabid disease.
The kill count has gone back up from the deaths of the 30 brave soldiers. 1,546. How much longer could he do this for? Eddy found his eye sight shift to the right, his slightly dilated pupils found the grip of his M6D pistol, sticking out of his right boot. It was tantalizing to him, calling out to him in a way. Telling him to just put an end to it right now. Get out of this, out of the war, out of his pain filled life and out of this living hell.
Before his hand could even move off of his helmet and ponder his new found plan, the eerie cold returned. Quickly looking up from the floor he found another person sitting on the other side of the Pelican. The little girl was sitting there in the same outfit, it never changed from the snow white night gown. Her head, acting like his a moment ago, staring at the metal floor and her long black hair covering her face. Eddy suddenly jumped back, hoping that he could get farther away from the girl, but his hopes were crushed when he felt the wall of the bird hit his armored back. Sweat poured down his body like a running faucet and now his suit was spewing out cold air to stop the seemingly out of nowhere heat to cease.
The cold air did little to nothing against the sweat. The girl sitting across from him sat in silence, probably the most frightening part as usually she was always talking. It was too much to handle, Sergeant Hernandez's suit sent a warning to his HUD telling him that his heart rate is spiking to dangerous levels.
"Cl-Claire?"
Eddy again jumped slightly, this time at the sound of his own voice. He was never this on edge during one of his judging's, but he knew this one was going to be different for sure.
"You're worthless". The girl, known as Claire, stood slowly from her seat. She walked forward slowly towards Sergeant Hernandez each step becoming slower and slower.
Eddy's throat started to dry up and he was in desperate need for some water and a cold shower. Each step closer to him made his breaths shorter and shorter. This effect she had on him is literally insane, a top sniper in the Navy is currently cowering away from an 8 year old girl. To others maybe that would seem to be comical or simply put an embarrassment. Those people didn't know anything about Claire, if they knew they would understand.
The 8 year old girl reached her destination, right in front of the cowering ODST. "How could you possibly be getting any weaker?" the little girls voice was cold and mature with just the right amount of authoritative tone set to it, "You watched like a helpless BITCH! While those people were burned and killed. Then you have the audacity to beg for where and when I judge you?"
Her head shot up at the end of her small rant and Eddy found himself cringe, like he always did. Claire's right eye was dangling out of its socket, the eye still attached, holding on by a thread. Splatters of bruises and blood lined her mouth, neck and fore head. The cherry on top of the cake was the large hole in her fore head, giving clear view to her scorched brain. Eddy still could net get used to the way she looked, the horrors this girl has seen is something no one her age should go through, it's too late for that unfortunately.
"What's wrong daddy?" a giggle escaped her bloody lips, some red liquid dropping to the floor. "You don't like the way I look still."
He hated hearing those words, "You're not my daughter" he retaliated, getting slight confidence back "Not anymore."
Almost immediately splitting pain ruptured through Eddy's brain as the thought of screaming out to the world came to mind. The pilot would definitely hear his cries of pain and that would mean trouble, no one should know about this and Eddy will do whatever is necessary to keep it a secret, and he means anything.
Claire smirked and continued to administer the pain to her weak and pathetic daddy. "You can't even save yourself let alone those poor, poor people on board the Pelican. You're talking back will be put into account with your punishment".
The head splitting pain stopped and in what seemed like years, Eddy was able to take a long inhale of some much needed oxygen. He started to cough up the flem in his throat while dropping to his knees, the idea of taking off his helmet glanced across his thoughts but the even slightest thought of Claire seeing his face diminished that idiotic idea to the back of his head. He more than likely looked like a wreck and the last thing he wanted was for Claire to taunt him about something else.
"It seems fit that 32 seemingly deep marks are to be made for this mishap, 30 for the deaths of 30 innocent and defenseless marines and 2 for the back talking."
His heart beat started to increase more upon hearing what his future punishment would be. It's impossible! How was he supposed to shoot the Covenant with weakened arms, especially after 32, it's insane. It's almost like she was doing this on purpose, trying to milk as much pain and misery out of him before the end of all of this. 'Not anymore'
With speed that would rival a Spartans, Eddy stood to his feet and tore off his helmet, forcefully pushing the barrel of the silenced magnum to his right temple. He expected some sort of reaction from Claire, like an eye of disgust or some more of the brain pulsating headache to stop him from shooting himself but he got neither. No what he got was something far worse, something that would without a doubt scar him for the rest of his short life.
"Go ahead" Claire had a wicked grin as she spoke with cruelty in her tone. "Shoot yourself. Blow your fucking brains out all over the interior. Cover the seats with your own filthy life juices." Eddy felt his arm start to shake as he took in the words from his once daughter. "Well! Go on! End it already! That's what you want right? To end everything and forget about the past, forget all the people you watched die from the hands of the Covenant and end the torment from me. You could kill yourself and finish this off. But. I'll let you know right now Sergeant Hernandez, if you decide to kill yourself now, I will make you wish that you stayed alive and fought the Covenant. You think this is bad? No, it's not, imagine me haunting your every second. Because there is now way in the pits of hell that I will let your soul rest without completing the task I provided with you."
This is too much. Eddy's arm was shaking and the gun felt a thousand times heavier then it usually felt. His every second being haunted in the afterlife? There's no way, she has to be bluffing, it's impossible for her to do anything to me once I'm dead. She's lying.
But…
What if she's not? What if Claire could really torment his soul for all of eternity or something like that? No one knows what happens after you pass on from this world. Is there actually a Heaven? A Hell? Do people just die and that's that? You never see the loved ones that passed on before you, just darkness for ever and ever? Thinking about it like that made Eddy start to feel heavily depressed, he hoped that one day he would be able to see people that he no longer can see in this world.
Eddy released his grip on the pistol. The barrel leaving an unsightly red ring on his pale temple, which would surely fade in an hour or two. The side arm made contact with the metal floor, followed quickly by two armored knees.
Back on the ground, Eddy looked up at Claire. "It seems you have made your choice daddy. Now you will either comply or I can make this punishment a whole lot fun for me." A twinge of head pain came back for a mili second.
"No Claire." Eddy put a forced smile on his face as the angst started eating away at him. "I will act out my punishment once I get back on the 'Heaven on Earth'. So please you don't have to baby over me for any longer today."
Claire seemed pleased with that answer, so pleased that she genuinely smirked. With a roll of her eyes she answered while starting to fade away. "Very good Sergeant. But first what I really need you to do is wake up. And don't forget about what we talked about, if you don't want to have a repeat at this get stronger. Or else it's not going to be pretty if I bring in you know who…"
Eddy didn't move a muscle out of fear. If 'she' was involved then the idea of being tormented by just Claire for an eternity was starting to sound like a god send. But getting a little off topic what did she mean by wake up?
Just before her entire body disappeared the Pelican started to shake uncontrollably and the severe deathly pain made another appearance as this time Eddy wasn't able to hold in the blood curdling scream. He started to bang his fists on the ground as suddenly droplets of blood began to roll off his face, coming from his ears, mouth and even eyes. A small puddle started to form around his knees.
The cabin temperature suddenly decreased by 30 degrees as the ramp began to open, allowing the cold snowstorm inside. Eddy's life juices started to roll down towards the opened ramp as the Pelican started to ascend supposedly into the atmosphere. It kept getting higher and higher. Sergeant Hernandez was going to be forcefully thrown out of the bird if this increase in height continued, what the hell is the pilot thinking?
Eddy carefully stood, the grave pain from before no longer claiming him, and allowed his knees to regain their feeling before slowly making his way to the cockpit. Every step he took got increasingly harder as the Pelican continued to angle itself higher. Was the pilot trying to kill him?
By the time he reached the closed door of the cockpit the Pelican was completely flying upwards at a 90 degree angle. Holding on to the side of one of the seats he was about to shove open the metal door and yell at the dumb asshole flying when the unexpected happened. The entire front of the Pelican erupted in a fiery explosion, no doubt claiming the life of the pilot. The immense force behind the explosion rocked Sergeant Hernandez's core and sent him backwards.
He panicked as his hand reached for anything to latch onto as the opened ramp got closer and closer. Over and over he tried to grab a seat, handlebar or anything that could save his life. Sergeant Hernandez didn't grab anything.
His body flew out into the cold storm and like a ton of bricks, picked up speed as it broke through atmosphere. Eddy yelled and screamed as the rush of wind surrounded him and seemed to take control of his flailing body. The Pelican seemed to continue its journey into space and Sergeant Hernandez merely held out his hand, not wanting to die of falling. If he was to die then let it be in combat, fighting against the Covenant war machine, to be remembered why and how he died.
Like a helpless child he kept closing his fingers around the outline of the pelican as it flew farther and farther away. Wishing that it would come back and catch him or something, anything to save his life. The frost started to cover his armor and freeze his joints in place. His legs went first as he stopped kicking around, then his torso and arms no longer being able to outstretch his hand.
The frost etched the corners of his VISR and continued its fast coverage. In a matter of seconds the cold took the entire helmet and the only thing Eddy could see was a bright white.
…
…
"SERGEANT HERNANDEZ!"
With a startle the veteran sniper's eye lids flew open, followed by increased laboring breathing, almost like he was wheezing after running a few kilometers. He was breathing that's a good sign, Checking his hands and giving them a tight test squeeze he came to a conclusion that he was in fact still alive. Was it all a dream?
The judging was without a doubt not fake but seeing as though he was sitting in the Pelican still and not free falling towards the planet like a meteor, he must have dozed off slightly. His job never includes such things as resting or sleeping, staying up a few days straight never hurt anybody, and you never know when a target could be stubborn in his safety building and or tent. Hiding out for a few days before making the move outside, only to receive a well-placed bullet to the head.
"Sergeant!" Eddy shook his head of any thoughts regarding his dream or Claire. It was time to get serious again. "I've got Captain Langford on the horn, says it's important." Standing from the hard metal seat Sergeant Hernandez walked into the cockpit to see the pilot fiddling with a few switches.
"Bring him through". Another switch was flipped and a console on the dashboard lit up blue as a figure stood there, non-other than the Captain of the UNSC Heaven on Earth.
"Good to see you in piece Sergeant". Eddy snickered at his superiors comment. When it came to things such as respect and following orders of men and women of higher rank, you could say that Sergeant Hernandez was more on the insubordinate side. Feeling that this war between the Humans and Covenant isn't won by Captains and Admirals either sitting on ships or Orbital Defense Stations, no, he believes it's won by the soldiers on the ground. Even if the percentage of ground victories is unfathomably low. None the less you would never find him following orders from a high ranking official that sits on the sidelines. Knowing damn well that he could be court martialed and potentially kicked out of the UNSC, but Eddy wasn't stupid. He is without a doubt a big asset to the war, kicking him out of the fight would be the dumbest idea any Admiral could think of. Sergeant Hernandez knew he holds all the cards, for now at least, no one knows what the future holds.
Though when it involved Captain Langford. He is the only Captain in the UNSC that Sergeant Hernandez would follow orders from. A fairly well built man that is both comical at times and strict when necessary. Commanding the men and women of his ship with the right amount of hard will and laid back attitude, as well as the track record. Once a highly decorated ODST Captain turned Captain of his own ship 3 years ago after being offered by Admiral Mikhailovich. Dozens of battles and thousands of kills is the right type of man to make Captain of any vast amount of people.
The hologram of Captain Langford swayed slightly as the man lost his balance, "It looks as though you're ship is no longer in one piece, sir."
"You know" Langford fixed his officers cap from sliding off the side of his head before re balancing himself in front of the veteran sniper. "You got some real funny jokes at times Sergeant, but unfortunately the stage and microphone are both unavailable at the time."
"New orders sir?" If there was already new orders then that either means more assassinations or another colony was attacked by the Covenant. Eddy really hoped for the first choice.
"I wouldn't say orders Sergeant, more like a warning to you and your pilot." At the sound of this not only Eddy perked up but so did the lone pilot. "The Heaven on Earth is under major Covenant attack."
"Casualties sir?"
"Minimal, Covie bastards hit us with our eyes shut and got one of the engines. We were sitting ducks out in space, sent banshees and phantoms in to take out our defenses. Dumb bastards must've forgotten about the longswords, fly boys mopped up the trash and the MAC gun swept up the cruiser. A few pilots and engineers working in the engine bay were killed. Should be safe to enter the docking bay now."
Sergeant Hernandez nodded his head in approval as he looked out the view port to see the large Human cruiser floating in the darkness of space. "Pelican you are cleared for landing welcome home".
"Thank you Captain."
Eddy believed the chat to be over and turned away from the console, "One more thing Sergeant. I wish to see you in the medical wing after you land."
Eddy froze in his tracks. No, no, no the last thing he needed was the medical wing. They would find evidence of what he is doing. They would call him crazy and unfit for duty. Probably send him off to some insane asylum to live out the rest of his days. No way was that going to happen, he needed to tell off the Captain.
"Sir I-"
"Slip space rupture detected."
The voice of an A.I broke through the conversation as three CCS Covenant battlecruisers and one Flag ship emerged from Slip space. "Holy shit" the pilot breathed out as the docking bay of the Heaven on Earth was getting closer.
"Darby get those MAC's warmed up again and I want all pilots in their longswords out there to protect us while we get repaired, we're bringing the ship up to defense code Alpha, let's go move-" Captain Langford cut out.
Hundreds of Covenant air craft bellowed out of the hangars and headed straight for the lone human ship. Two banshees were following their brothers when a lone human ship caught their eyes. Flying rather slowly and towards the damaged vessel. They pressed down on their thrusters and cruised right for the ship. Locking on and firing away.
It came as less of a surprise as it should've when the Pelican started rocking back and forth from multiple plasma hits. Eddy held on to the threshold of the door between the cockpits and holding area just as an explosion almost caused the Pelican to do a barrel roll.
"Fuck! That was the right engine and thruster." The pilot held onto the shaking control stick as the metal bird started to lose control. The docking bay was so close less than half a kilometer away. The defense cannons should have picked up the two enemy heat signatures trailing the friendly bird by now. Even if the amount of hostile air craft was a little overwhelming.
Another explosion rocked the ship this time sending Eddy to the floor and the pilot to smack his face into the dash board in front of him, blood started dripping out of his forehead and mouth. "The left engine is fried, we're going down!"
The Pilot started to freak out. He barely had any sort of control over the Pelican, the metal bird started to perform barrel rolls over and over again. The only sort of control the pilot had was to slightly tilt the direction of the Pelican towards the docking bay. Trying to at least crash land inside the ship instead of his body being taken by the void of space.
Eddy simply stayed on the floor before flying to the ceiling and then flying back to the floor, repeating once, twice, three times and maybe even until his 13th time when it stopped.
Longsword pilots began to take off, one by one entering the battle to defend their ship. As the deck crew started to notice the number of Longsword's decrease meaning almost all of them were currently in battle, they looked out into space.
Watching as a few of their brothers in arms successfully took down Covenant air craft, each time soliciting a 'Hooray' from the crew hands. Praying for their friends safety, one in particular searching for the Longsword that had large blue numbers of '001' representing the first model on board the Heaven on Earth and the best long sword pilot on board.
He wasn't able to locate it, but he was able to locate was something else more dire. It looked like a Pelican and it seemed to be barrel rolling continuously. More importantly it was headed right for the entrance of the docking bay, with the back part on fire. Putting two and two together caused panic.
"Everyone watch out!"
Now everyone looked closely and witnessed the Pelican coming right for them. Running in all different directions to what could possibly be either protection or solitude. 30 seconds later the pelican flew through the bay opening and started to screech along the floor at an excess speed of 80 MPH, heading right in the direction of a young male crew hand, sliding right over the top of him killing him almost instantly and without scream.
The Pelican hit a loading station and was flipped over onto the top and continued its death slide, claiming two more people in a fiery/crushing phase before hitting the back wall of the docking bay. Sending a large rupture throughout the ship.
Well it was one hell of an entrance.
A/N: More coming soon
