(A/N: And here's the last chapter of the day guys, I hope you all like the previous two chapters, now as I said things are going to slow down for a little while but I'll try to make sure you don't get board by adding comedy to them. Alright let's jump in to this people.)
Chapter 23: The fallen Monarch
"Please be okay, please god please let him be okay!" I pleaded as I bore witness to my father's ship coming down toward us, I scrambled to the shield controls and quickly shut down the shield to prevent the Monarch from crashing into the shield.
"What are you doing?" Vicki queried as she caught me pushing buttons on the panel.
"I'm not going to let my dad die, I'm going to temporarily shut down the shield to let the Monarch pass through." I replied as I completed the shutdown of the shield.
"Cody it doesn't matter." Trevor retorted as he put his pad on my shoulder. "Your just prolonging the inevitable, as soon as his ship crashes it's all over."
"No it's not." Shakrimi objected as she summoned her biotics. "Everyone give me room to work." Everyone just exchanged a confused look, I then asked her.
"What are you going to do?" I asked completely unaware of what she was about to do.
She looked back at me and said. "Settle my debt." She lifted her hands over her head and used her biotics to reach out and take hold of the Monarch, I took notice that it actually started to slow down as it got closer to us. I heard Shakrimi growl as she tried to maintain focus on her task which slowly evolved into yelling as the ship came to a halt and she set it down atop an already crumbled building with the grace of a hummingbird. She then hit the ground not moving.
"Shakrimi!" I cried as I ran to her side to see if she was okay.
"Don't worry about me kid…" She panted, she was officially out of steam. "I'll be…okay, I just…need a quick…breather…oh goddess…that…was hard to pull off." If she didn't have my respect before she sure as hell did now. "Now…go save your damn dad."
"Thank you Shakrimi, you have no idea how grateful I am." I replied with sincerity.
"How's this…you buy me a beer…and we'll call it…even." She panted as she just laid there completely exhausted.
I just chuckled and said. "If that's what it takes." I got up and headed toward the ship. "We'll need to work fast, god only knows how stable the core is at this point and if we don't get the survivors before the ship blows then they're all dead." I spoke with both fear and sincerity. "I'll need as many small mammals as I can get to come with me, I don't want to risk the floor giving way to us if their unstable." Four members of my squad volunteered to come with me. An otter, a red panda, a Tasmanian devil, and an ocelot, all the small mammals that I needed.
"I'm going too Cody." Alice tried to volunteer too but I was quick to deny her.
"No, I need you to stay out here where it's safe."
"But Cody…" She Talked back.
But a replied in a stern voice. "That is an order Private Burrows." She shed a tear, not out of sadness but out of fear and worry that I was going to my death. I gave her one last hug before going inside to reassure her that I'd be okay. "I'm coming back, I promise you…" I kissed her once before heading in. We shot up a grappling hook and climbed the rope to the airlock of the ship connecting to the bridge. We had to cut through the locking mechanism in order to open the door and get inside, the door slid open and we ran inside. "Oh dear god…" The pilot of the ship was sitting in the cockpit…dead. Impaled by fallen scaffolding of the ship through the back of the helmsman's chair. "What a waste." I said as I knelt down and saw that the pilots eyes were still open, wide with fear as he died. I closed my eyes and prayed aloud. "Oh hail Marry, full of grace, blessed are you among women, oh Marry merciful mother of god, pray for us sinners now and upon the hour of our deaths, amen." I wave my paw over his face and closed his eyes to his eternal sleep. "Okay, let's get searching everyone, comb over every deck and every room, leave no stone unturned, we do not leave this ship until we find all survivors."
"Acknowledged Sargent Blaze." We all jumped at the sound of my geth bodyguard's voice from behind us as we didn't expect him to follow us.
"What the hell are you doing in here?" I yelled in its face, face plate? Whatever you call it I yelled in it.
"It is this ones duty to keep you safe Sargent Blaze, there for we had to follow you to provide assistance in the search for survivors." He responded, to which I quickly retorted.
"I know what I'm about to ask you is irrelevant to a machine but are you nuts? You're way too heavy you could cause the floor to collapse in on itself."
But Angel was quick to counter my pervious statement. "False, this platform is made from a lightweight material which weighs only a quarter of all of your combined weight even in this form, there for this chassis will not cause any structural damage or collapse to the downed space craft."
I rolled my eyes and groaned. "Fine, just don't startle us again."
"Acknowledged sargent Blaze, would you like us to go through the ships surveillance cameras to detect any and all survivors to decrease the time of the search?" It asked with what I guess is an apologetic tone for these guys.
I didn't realize that he could do something like that, but he was a machine so I guess it was obvious. I just nodded my head and said. "Yes do it, the sooner we find them the better."
Angel then plugged its finger into a USB port on the control panel and started to make a lot of electronic buzzing and clicking noises. Then it unplugged itself from the port then turned back to us. "We have found eight survivors in total, one is on this deck as we speak over there." It pointed to some debris, we all rushed over to help the crewman trapped under the wreckage. It was…my dad.
"DAD!" I shouted with shock, fear and relief. "Get him out of there NOW!" I shouted to everyone, but before my squad mates could do anything Angel dug my dad out of the wreckage and helped set him up right.
"Admiral Blaze…can you hear us?" Angel asked in…you know what fuck it he just asked him if he was okay so let's just leave it at that.
My dad hissed in pain as he tried to talk. "Wh-wh-where…am I?" He asked as he opened his eyes, he looked around to see his surroundings then stopped when he saw my face filled with tears. "S…S…S…Sargent…you'd better have a damn good reason for why you're out here in that armor and not in the bunker like you were supposed to be." He said trying to sound angry but failed in his weakened state.
I just hugged him thankful he was alive. "We came out here to save our home you crazy bastard." I said with a lump in my throat, I felt him wrap his arms around me to return the hug.
"I'll be honest, I had a feeling you'd disobey me." He spoke with a tired voice.
I sniffled a bit. "And it's a good thing I did, we almost…" I replied before he cut me off.
"I know, believe me I know…to be honest I'd be disappointed if you didn't, you're too much like me to sit out of a fight like this." He said just before he started to cough a little bit.
"Is that why you bought me a geth for an early birth day present?" I joked; he looked up at my bodyguard and gave a weak chuckle.
"I thought…you were supposed to stay in the shadows." He said in response.
"Due to certain circumstances we calculated that breaking cover to protect your offspring was necessary in order to maintain our agreement with the admiral, we hope you understand." Angel quickly justified.
"Angel, send us the locations of all the other survivors on the ship and get my dad to the medics outside and have them ready for the rest." I ordered to the mech as it held my dad.
He nodded his head and said plainly. "Acknowledged, we will send you their locations now…done."
"So you gave it a name huh?" Dad chuckled as he coughed up a little blood, which of course made me worry so I booted up my omni-tool and administered a dose of meda-gel.
"Here, this should help ease the pain." I said as I administered the drug.
"You know son…this reminds me of when I got you that gecko for your eighth birthday, you named him…god what did you name him?" He said as he began to drift off from the drugs.
I chose to remind him just in case this turned out to be the last time I'd speak to my dad. "Mr. slim, that's what I named him."
"Ah yes, whatever happened to that thing anyway?" He asked as his eyes began to grow heavy.
"I…I forgot to feed him…for a whole week…and he died." The very thought that death might have a chance to take my dad from me and just bringing it up made me feel uneasy.
"Oh…right. Sorry, didn't mean to re…open…old…wounds." He finally passed out from the drugs.
"You need not worry Sargent Blaze; our biometric scanners are functioning at full capacity and we can detect if your father is in any kind of distress, currently…he is not." Angel reassured me as it stood up carefully holding my dad as to not damage him anymore than he already was. "We will keep a close watch over his vital signs."
"Thank you, okay gang let's start looking for the rest of the survivors." I pulled up the information on my omni-tool and began to survey the area, there were seven pings on the map of the ship two were in the cargo hold, one in engineering and four in the mess hall. We went to the mess hall first, we didn't take the elevator as it may have been unstable. So we took the emergency tunnels to get to the lower levels, when we got to the mess hall we found the survivors, one of them, a tapir if I recall correctly had a broken leg so his friends helped him put a splint on it.
"Oh thank god, we thought we were goners." He said as he winced in pain from his broken leg.
"Please tell me you guys have some meda-gel, Joe broke his leg and he won't make it without it." One of the other crew pleaded, he was a horse.
"Don't worry; I've got plenty on tap." I replied as I booted up my omni-tool and gave the poor guy some of my meda-gel.
"Oh thank you…that feels way better." The tapir thanked with clear appreciation in his voice.
I nodded with a half smile and said. "No problem dude, you just rest now, everyone head up through the tunnels from where we just came from, you should be okay." Just then a red flashing light began to lite up on the ceiling and a siren began to sound with an automated voice following.
"ALERT, ALERT, EEZO CORE CRITICAL, IMMEDIATE EVACUATION IS RECOMMENDED!" The message just kept on repeating over and over.
"Oh that's not good." I worried aloud.
"The cores having a meltdown, we've got to get out of here." The horse cried.
"You guys go ahead, we'll get the remaining crew, I'll head down to engineering while you get the two in the cargo hold." I ordered to my squad who reluctantly agreed to my order, they didn't like the idea that I was going down to the engineering room by myself, but it was just one guy, and I'm pretty sure I already knew who it was, and sure enough I was right. The engine room was filled with smoke and wires were torn from the walls and sparking all over the place. I could barely hear the painfilled groans of Chuck over the sound of the sirens. "Chuck, where are you?" I cried out to him, he lifted a paw out of the wreckage and cried out in a weak voice.
"I'm…obah heeyah." His Cajun accent was unmistakable, I ran over to him and threw the wreckage off of him and I just gasped at the sight I saw, he had been impaled by a pipe through his stomach.
I walked over to him trying to keep him calm. The last thing I needed was for him to go into shock. "Chuck…Chuck listen to me. Your hurt bad I've got to…"
He interrupted me by raising his paw and coughed before saying. "Don badah kid…I con see id in yow eyes…am a goonaw." He shed a single tear knowing that these were his final moments alive.
I didn't want to accept it, not even for a second but even though I knew it was his time I still tried to deny it. "No-no-no-no I promise you you're…" He started to cough heavily, blood spewed out onto his fist.
"Don be makon promosise you con't keep." He then started to dig into his pocket and pulled out a small locket, then he handed it to me. "Give dat…to…muh wife…dell hur…I'm sowy dat I won't bah home…for…dinnah."
I took it in my paw and held it close to my chest then I said in a very mournful tone. "I'm…sorry…sorry for what I said about the way you talk the first time we met, it was rude and uncalled for and you had every right to be angry…"
"Oh stob dat…" He cut me off. "You dinut mean noten bah id, id waz juss a joke." He chuckled a bit. "Bud…if id make you feel beduh…I fowgive ya. Juss promos muh dat…you get dat…back…to…" He let out his final breath, his eyes just went dead, and he slumped over, I knew in that moment…he was gone.
I shed a small tear on his behalf just before I said. "I promise you, I will get this back to your wife, or I'll die trying." I waved my paw over his face and closed his eyes then I prayed another hail Marry prayer on his behalf. I then got up and started to leave the engine room, I took one last look at the poor soul who I'd tried in vain to save before leaving his body to its fate. As I made my way back to the tunnel to get back up to the bridge the ship suddenly shifted to one side causing me to loose my balance. Then the crashing of wreckage came down the tunnel blocking my path back up. "Oh fuck me!" I cursed as I tried to move the wreckage, it didn't do any good as it was too heavy. I was trapped. "This is Sargent Blaze, I'm trapped in engineering and I have no other means of escape can anyone assist me?" I called over the radio and was greeted only with bad news.
"We can't send anyone else back in there kid, the ships airlock is blocked by a wall and we have no other way to get to you, sorry Cody but you're on your own." Chergg replied in a sad tone.
"You've got to be kidding me there has to be another way out." I panicked as I searched for another way to escape, I looked out a nearby window and saw that I was just above the hanger bay, I pulled out my pistol and shot out the glass then I looked down to see how far of a fall I'd be dealing with, it was pretty high up for me. "Shit!" I looked around and saw a fire hose to be used in case of a fire locked behind glass, an idea formed in my head and I used the hose as a make shift climbing rope, after I disconnected it from the wheel it was on I wrapped it around the wheel and used it as an anchor to support myself as I made my way down to the hanger. Once I got inside I made a beeline right for the hanger door and found the control panel to open it. I pushed the button to open the door but was only greeted with a red flashing message, door mechanism jammed. "Oh for fuck sake you've got to be kidding me right now!" I then looked over to the side of the door and saw the emergency manual override, I ran over to it broke the glass and started to pull on it with all my might, no luck. "Come on come ON!" I desperately tried in vain to open the door until I just gave up, I was trapped yet again, and I was out of time.
"Cody…Cody do you read me?" Alice's voice cracked over my com.
I had a feeling that this was going to be the last time I'd ever speak to her so I chose to come clean. "I'm sorry carrots…I'm still trapped in hear. I thought maybe I could get out through the hanger bay door but it's jammed tight, not even the manual override is working." I answered in a defeated tone.
"What…what are you saying?" I heard her voice croak a bit.
"I'm saying that…you'll have to find another date to Trevor and Vic's wedding…because I won't be able to take you." I shed a tear as I put my back to the wall and just slid down to the floor. This was it for me, this is how I was going to die, but at least I saved the colony, that's all that really matters.
"No, no you promised me you'd come back to me you promised you would..." I heard her start to cry slightly.
"I know…I'm sorry I couldn't keep that promise babe." I replied as I felt the pain of both our hearts breaking all over again, only this time there would be no chance of us getting back together, this was it for the two of us, the end of something beautiful and wonderful.
"You can't do this to me…you can't leave me like this. You just can't…" She began to sob; it was clear as day in her voice.
I just let out a sad chuckle and said. "You bunnies, so emotional." I closed my eyes and just imagined for one last time that I was holding Alice in my arms, inhaling her sent, kissing her, and whispering in her ear ever so tenderly those three little words that it took me so long to say, I love you. But I was quickly brought out of my fantasy by one voice.
"Sargent Blaze we have calculated a last resort option to rescue you." Angel interrupted my final moment of life, but with something that restored my hope.
"What do you got Angel?" I asked eager to know if I still had a chance.
"We have been tracking you through your heart rate monitor installed in your suit throughout the entirety of this battle, we have been doing so throughout the time you've been aboard the Monarch, if you could attach your monitor to the main door engine we could use our sniper rifle to free you." It replied as it laid out the plan, I was a little skeptical that it would work but at this point I was willing to try anything.
"Okay, if you think this will work." I said as I got up off the floor.
"We have calculated that this plan has an 86% of success. The odds of survival are reasonably high." Well that's a lot better than what I had a minute ago. I looked up to the ceiling and saw the engine in control of the door. I started to remove my heart rate monitor and began to look for a way to get up to the engine. Bingo, I saw a maintenance ladder leading up to the engine, I had to climb on top of some boxes and jump to it as it was broken off just a little higher than I'd like it to be. Once I made my way over to the engine I placed my monitor on the engine and signaled to Angel that it could start shooting.
"Okay Angel I've placed my monitor on the engine as soon as…" Before I could say another word a sniper shot pierced through the door and hit the engine releasing the door and giving me a chance to get out, and tare Angel a new one, that being a relative term of course. I marched over to my geth bodyguard and just let it have it. "What the hell Angel?! You just fucking shot at me, aren't you supposed to keep me alive?!" I drilled all of my anger at it so it'd know I was not pleased with him one bit. "I mean for real?! I wasn't even close to clear from the engine before you fired you stupid tin can!"
I know he wasn't trying to piss me off, but on a day like today where everything isn't going quite as great as I'd like it to be the next thing he said just enraged me. "Observation error, this one is not made of tin but a diamondized steel alloy commonly found in…" It began to 'correct me' before I cut it off.
"I DON'T CARE WHAT YOUR MADE OF YOU DUMB SON OF A QUARRIAN!" I bellowed as I threw my gun at its face.
Then it 'corrected me' yet again and managed to piss me off even more. "Observation error, geth aren't typically known as sons or daughters as no geth is…"
"I didn't mean…oh forget it just DON'T shoot at me again you dumb bastard, or at the very least WAIT until I tell you to shoot. GOT IT!" I shouted right in its face.
"Acknowledged, we will adjust and correct this error in our judgement software…done." I'm not sure how but I think this thing just pissed me off even more at this point, just by being annoying.
"Cody!" I turned around fast to see an overjoyed Alice Burrows running right for me with tears in her amethyst eyes, I opened my arms wide to embrace her, with the built-up speed and momentum she knocked me to the ground and started kissing me as tears of joy fell onto my face. "Don't you ever do anything that stupid again you hear me?" She scolded with a smile.
I just smiled up at her and said. "Good to see you too beautiful." I pulled her close for another kiss.
This was ruined when Angel asked. "Sargent Blaze, this mammal who has attacked you, should we terminate?"
I looked up at it and just glared before saying. "You even think about it and I'll turn you into scrap metal."
To which it objected by saying. "She is clearly a hostile. She is a threat to your safety."
I just growled as I sat up with Alice still in my arms and said. "No, she's my girlfriend, and if you hurt her I'll kick your metallic ass."
It then knelt down and got right in Alice's face before saying. "Please state name, species of mammal and rank for authorization records."
Alice just looked so confused but she went with it anyway. "Uh…Alice Burrows, I'm a rabbit and I'm a private and the official pilot of the Eden prime militia."
Angel then started making more buzzing and clicking noises like before then said. "Please keep still and open your eyes as wide as possible." She did just as Angel instructed as it then let a flash of light pop out of its eye lense much like that of a camera.
"Ow, my eyes." Alice complained as she rubbed her now stinging eyes.
"Authorization record completed, designation Alice Burrows, rabbit, private, pilot, Eden prime militia, we recognize you as an ally rather than a threat." It said as it stood back up, Alice and I just exchanged a very confused look.
"Cody…" A voice called out, I looked up and saw it belonged to Trevor. "Your dads' awake." Alice quickly got off of me so I could go and see him, I ran over to see him sitting up as one of our medics looked after him.
"For the last time I don't have a concussion, now let me up." He complained, he never liked doctors anyway.
"Not happening sir, not until I've given you a proper checkup." The medic objected, she was a hippopotamus.
"Damn it I'm an alliance admiral and I order you to…" He retorted until she cut him off.
"Sir with all due respect in the event of a medical emergency, I out rank everyone." She said plainly.
He groaned as he looked over to me. "She's your squad mate, talk some sense into her."
I just chuckled and said. "Oh no, I'm not going to argue with a hippo." Just then the ship exploded causing everyone to duck down and cover their heads.
My dad then began to try and stand on his own only to fall back to his knees, I caught him and helped him up letting him lean on me as a crutch. He just looked on in sorrow as if he'd just lost a friend. "The Monarch…has fallen." He said in a saddened tone. He looked at the ground slightly and shed a tear.
"I'm really sorry dad, truly I am." I tried to comfort him as best I could also trying to figure out why he was so upset over the loss of a ship when he should be thankful he was alive.
"You know I've made a lot of history on that ship son. It's where your mother and I had our first date, where we got married and had our honey moon, it was even where you were born." I turned toward him surprised by the revelation.
"Really? I didn't know that." I said feeling interested at this new information.
"Oh yeah, your mother and I…well I was ordered to chart a course for one of our colonies in the terminus systems to deal with a pirate gang and your mother, the little nix decided to sneak back on board while we were making preparations to go, her plan was just to sneak on board long enough to tell me the good news." He said closing his eyes as he remembered that day, he couldn't help but smile. "She was pregnant with you son, of course she could've done this over our com channel I'd set up for us but she said it was too important and had to be done face to face, but just as she had we had already taken off and she was trapped on the ship with us until we could return to Eden prime, she was with us even after you were born, for a whole three months even. They were the best three months of my life, just having my wife and first-born son so close that I didn't want you to leave, but I had no choice unfortunately." The smile on my dad's face was probably the most genuine I'd seen in a long time. I guess he truly saw this ship as a second home to him.
"So when did Samson turn rogue?" I asked sort of on easily.
Then he looked at me with shock. "You…how did you know about Sam?" He asked with a dumbfounded expression.
"He was here Josh…" Shakrimi announced still sounding a bit tired from her recent rescue of the ship, but not enough that she couldn't walk over to see how my dad was doing. "He told him…well just about everything really."
He just sighed before saying. "Damn, well I suppose I couldn't keep it from you forever."
"So it's true, he really is my god father." I added feeling sick to my stomach.
"No, Samson Rockies was your father, whatever is left of him is replaced by the monster known as the reaper, and letting him live was my biggest mistake. It seems out of all the things I'm good at making mistakes is what I do best." He said with a sad expression.
"So why did you let him live?" I asked with both confusion and curiosity.
He just sighed and said. "Because I couldn't do it. Even though he'd become a monster, even though he was no longer my best friend I just couldn't bring myself to do it. If I'd just chosen to accept that Sam was too far gone to save at the time I would've just finished him right then and there and save everyone all of this trouble."
"But if you had then none of what we would've done would've happened." I quickly objected, he just looked at me with confusion.
"Well I think that would've been for the better to be far." He replied to which I just chuckled and said.
"You don't get it dad, I don't mean the militia I mean the support group, if it wasn't for Crystal I never would've had the courage to Share my first real kiss with Alice…" I gestured over to her. "And Viki would've never found the strength to go on a date in public with Trevor…" I gestured to them next. "Hell none of this would've been possible if it hadn't been for what the reaper had done. Sure he's done a lot of bad stuff but it was because of him that we all found our courage to be who we are and be proud of it, so in a way dad, the reaper did something good for a change and helped us show everyone that it's okay to be who we are."
He smiled and chuckled a bit before jokingly asking. "When did you get so good at speeches?"
"After our semi-formal actually." An alarm began to sound on the shield generator, we all turned around and saw a red flashing light as a signal to everyone that there was something wrong with the generator. I quickly called Kyle to see what was going on. "Kyle, somethings going on with the generator." I was getting nervous, I didn't know what was about to happen.
"What's wrong, what do you see?" He asked sounding a bit frantic.
"There's this red flashing light and an alarm going off too. I don't know what's happening but I don't think…" I elaborated but then Kyle cut me off by shouting.
"GET AWAY FROM THE GENERATOR NOW; IT'S USING TOO MUCH POWER AT ONCE IT'S GOING TO EXPLODE!" Too much power, but I thought we'd…oh no.
I'd just remembered that I'd turned down the power draw from the eezo dampener in order to get the shield up faster. "Admiral Blaze we detect multiple enemy shuttles coming in through the atmosphere, we recommend regrouping at a more defensible position." Angel voiced while we were trying to figure out what to do. I knew without that shield we were as good as dead, so in an equally desperate attempt like before I ran over to the generator and tried to save the shield from going down for what would be the final time.
"Cody, get back here the generator will blow any second!" My dad bellowed as I ran to save the shield. "Sargent get back here now that's an order!" I just ignored him as I got to the control panel. I turned the nob on the dampener back to 60% but before it could take effect the generator started to rumble and shake like mad. I stepped back a few feet, realizing that there was nothing I could do at this point I shouted to everyone.
"GET CLEAR!" Everyone started running away as far as they could get, but just as I was getting away I saw Alice trip over a rock and fall on her knee, she quickly started holding it as she winced in pain. "Alice I'm coming!" I called out to her as I ran right for her, I slid right over to her and made the attempt to pick her up and carry her. That's when I heard The popping of bolts and the venting of steam from the generator, I knew we wouldn't get clear in time and I knew Alice wouldn't stand a chance without a shield. So I did what anyone would do for the person they loved, I sacrificed myself for her.
"What are you doing?" She asked as I curled myself around her making sure that every single vital place on her body was covered.
"I love you." I said as I kissed her cheek one last time. That's when the deafening sound of the generator exploding filled the air, I braced myself for the impact of the shrapnel, but it never came. I noticed that something was glowing right behind us, I turned around and saw Angel had come to my rescue again and it would appear that it had dropped its ballistics shield in front of us.
"You are safe now Sargent." It said as it lowered its shield, Alice and I got up and dusted ourselves off while I said to my savior.
"Thanks angel, you really are…" Before I could finish another explosion from the generator burst out sending a piece of hyper eezo right for Alice, I quickly jumped in front of her and just as I did it hit me in the back of the head burying itself it my flesh, it burned my skin and fur, the smell was so potent that it filled my nose, I screamed in pain as I fell to the ground holding my burning wound.
"CODY!" Alice shrieked with fear as she fell to my side.
"Private Burrows, we need you to hold him down so we may remove the shrapnel." Angel voiced as it rolled me over on my stomach, Alice did as asked with tears in her eyes as she held me down with all her weight. I barely felt Angel's fingers over the burning pain of the radiation and heat in my skin as it reached into my open wound to fish out the eezo chunk, once I felt it leave my flesh I began to relax a bit, but not by much as I was still in a great deal of pain.
"Cody are you okay?" Alice asked as she rolled me back over so she could see my face.
I forced myself to speak through the pain as I held my still stinging wound in the back of my head. "Ah, god…damn that hurt."
"Sargent Blaze, we would recommend that you allow us to disinfect your wound as…" Angels voice began to fade as did my vision, and my strength as I fell on the flat of my back, I no longer felt the pain, I no longer felt anything. I saw Alice screaming my name as I laid on the ground, she began to shake me but I was unresponsive, even though I was still conscious I couldn't hear her, I could barely see her, my dad must've seen what had happened as I saw him come into focus too, he looked worried and scared, I could see him screaming to the side.
I imagine it was for a medic to come to my aid, he looked down at me tears in his eyes as he spoke to me, I could barely read his lips but I could understand what he was saying just fine. Just hold on son, please hold on. That was the last thing I remember seeing as my whole world just went black. I was in and out of consciousness if I recall correctly, seeing bits of combat from my fellow squad mates, being carried by someone into a medical transport, seeing and hearing my mother, my little brother, and my girlfriend hugging as they all sobbed on my behalf with the fear that I may not make it and then…nothing. I felt disconnected from everything as my mind just went a drift, I didn't dream, I didn't think, I didn't do anything really except sleep. Eventually I regained consciousness and was blinded by bright white lights. Wait…a light? Was this heaven?
"Doctor, I think he's waking up." A voice spoke off to the side of the room, I tried to turn my head but I was too weak to do that, my whole body felt like Jell-O.
"Already? Oh keela that's not good, ready the sedative just in case." Another voice, a woman this time, but it sounded robotic and disguised. Oh no…oh no oh no oh no please tell me…tell me I wasn't captured by the black hearts!
Just then the owner of this voice came into view. I began to relax when I saw that she wasn't a black heart, but to my surprise she was a quarrian, she wore a light green suit with a hood that covered the top of her head but what caught my attention was her mask, she didn't wear a typical surgical mask if that's what you're thinking, no this mask was more like a kind of gas mask almost, it was a glass dome like shape that covered her entire face with a circular mouth piece with a bright purple light that flashed whenever she said a word. "Cody, can you hear me?" She asked in a calm voice as she shined a flash light pen in my eyes.
"Could you…not…shine that…in my eyes please…hurts…a lot." I responded as best I could, I felt so weak I was struggling to find my words.
"I see, you have a migraine from the radiation poisoning, that's to be expected." She reached up to the surgical lights over my head and turned them off, that felt so much better. "Nurse, get me some sheelosha jelly and an ice pack for our patient please." She then went over to the window and closed the blinds.
"What exactly…is she-whatever you told her to get me doc?" I asked as I tried in vain to sit up.
She came back to me and replied in a hushed tone of voice. "It's a painkiller that we quarrians use for migraines, but don't worry it won't hurt you in any way."
"Where am I?" I asked as I felt my head throbbing.
I had to ask in order to get my bearings. "You're in the Tali Zorah memorial hospital on Rannoch the best place in the galaxy to receive treatment for radiation poisoning these days." The quarrian home world? I'm on the quarrian home world? Holy shit this is big.
(A/N: Whoa Cody's on another planet, what do you thinks gonna happen next huh? Well you just gonna have to stick around find out. Alright on to the spoiler. In the next chapter of ZME Cody gets tracked down by the black hearts but little does his assassin know that he has a little surprise waiting for them, also Jacob meet's his new geth bodyguard and Shakrimi pays Cody a little visit. Alright that's all for today everyone hope you enjoyed, peace out.)