Greetings all and thanks for reviewing. Replies are at the end, as per usual. Maybe I should stop saying that, oh well who cares? Onwards to chapter 13.
Chapter 13: The breaking of necks
More stairs.
Lugging a heavy firearm up a seemingly endless flight of stairs when you're battle weary is far from fun let me assure you. Being thirsty in such situations isn't fun either.
Now that there was nothing in a mile long radius that was trying to kill me, my mind found itself entertaining other thoughts, such as why a bunch of sentinels had descended upon Zion. To the best of my somewhat sketchy knowledge there was supposed to have been peace between the machines and humanity. Deciding that I was unlikely to receive an answer any time soon, I stowed the thought and breathed a sigh of relief as the stairs ended and I found myself in a large room filled with what looked like numerous computer screens. All of which seemed to be displaying maps. What they were maps of I was uncertain, but that isn't really the point of the story.
In the distance I saw Locke conversing with a woman who looked almost as tired as I did. I couldn't help but feel slightly annoyed when I noticed Meridian walking towards him. Locke didn't rank high on my list of favourite people.
*******************************************************************
The door smashed open and a stream of gunfire poured in from the hallway. Digitally enhanced reflexes, (is that a pun? Is that accurate? My digital self? Ah who cares?) Anyway, that and unspeakable luck sent everyone crashing to the floor before they could be cut in half by machine gun fire.
The Oracle's receptionist or whoever he was wasted no time in drawing two handguns of his own and emptying their contents into the open door. This was followed a second later by the thud of a falling body.
'Nice.' I remember thinking.
I pulled myself to my feet just as a second figure smashed through the wall behind me. An unusual entrance, but it was effective in sending us to the floor again, mostly to protect ourselves from flying shrapnel and the.
How the second figure had managed to barge through the wall I never found out. But anyway, I was the closest one to him, and upon pulling myself off of the floor for the second time in ten seconds, I found myself evading and blocking numerous blows with limited success.
Hawk provided a rather unexpected solution to the problem.
*******************************************************************
"You were told to wait in your cabin."
I gave Locke the most contemptuous glare that my weary features could muster.
"Would you rather I sat idly by whilst everyone around me got ripped to dust?"
"What I'd like is for fighting to be carried out by military personnel and for civilians to keep out of the way."
I remained silent for a few moments, though I was loathed to admit it, he did have something of a point. In my defence though, I didn't do too badly during the battle, in my opinion, one life saved, 3 downed sentinels, but I digress. I didn't feel like proclaiming my own accomplishments so I instead said,
"It might be my imagination Commander, but it seems like you have more important things to deal with then me."
Locke grunted and walked away from me towards another one of the machines.
"I think he likes you" Meridian said over my shoulder.
"I dread to think what he does to people he hates."
*******************************************************************
Hake removed her teeth from the man's neck and turned to give me a creepy, blood soaked grin. I tried as best as I could to give an amused facial expression but was too disturbed by her choice of dinner, or perhaps it was because I was getting more used to seeing death around me, to give anything more then a somewhat nervous grin.
"What?" She said, "I missed breakfast."
"It's the evening Hawk." I replied, mustering enough self control to make my voice dignified.
A lot more flooded in from both the hallway and the hole in the wall after that. Some were obviously demons, others looked, more or less, human; they were dressed in fancy, black leather attire however, much like myself and the rest of the ascended ones.
I smashed the face of a nearby demon to paste and quickly found myself blocking punches from one of the other enemies. Their fighting style was slightly more sophisticated then that of the Demons. It was harder to reply with some punches of my own.
I eventually succeeded in landing a punch to the guy's face, which was followed up by a somewhat harder punch to the stomach. He crouched slightly with his hands wrapped around his chest as a kick from me sent him into the far wall.
Through the chaos, I noticed two things, one we seemed to be winning. Demons and the mystery enemies were falling left right and centre. I remember referring to them as 'amateurs' before it occurred to me that I'd only done this twice before.
Anyway, the second thing was that someone else had apparently joined the fight, on our side. I examined the newcomer, Black, bald, a bit on the podgy side, he seemed to be holding his own well enough however.
My thought processes were stopped dead in their tracks by a Demon that went for my throat with what looked like a bread knife. I dodged the first swing before snatching the knife from his hands, and slashing it across his ribs.
He screamed and fell to the floor; strange, the cut wasn't even that deep. After that, the anonymous Asian guy and Hydra took down the rest with a few well placed bullets.
There was silence for a few moments as everyone examined the group's handiwork. I think I was feeling a mixture of triumph, and worry because I felt good about slicing and pulverising people. This was soon banished however as I heard the door behind me open, and an elderly looking black woman stepped into the room.
"20 down, 4000 to go."
To be continued
Right, now for replies.
Angel-of-lightness: I hope your misfortune flies from you soon. Thanks to you I now look upon shelves with unnatural fear. Stupid dreams. Driving a motorised tricycle on a motorway is not a good idea.
Agent-Josie: No, I don't read Calvin and Hobbs. I've never even heard of them actually. I would have answered that question earlier but I, uh, forgot. Sorry.
Rhian: The eating of chocolate can also be described as the ingestion of milk, lased with rust.
Tai Wilson: It's not that strange, Rama Kandra or whatever the hell he's called went to see the Oracle about Sati, apparently, and he was also a rogue program. Anyway, thanks for reviewing. The sentinel answer approaches.
blueval and Followthewhitering: They didn't actually review but they've randomly shoved me on their favourite author and/or author alert things. Anyway, thanks to you both.
Chapter 13: The breaking of necks
More stairs.
Lugging a heavy firearm up a seemingly endless flight of stairs when you're battle weary is far from fun let me assure you. Being thirsty in such situations isn't fun either.
Now that there was nothing in a mile long radius that was trying to kill me, my mind found itself entertaining other thoughts, such as why a bunch of sentinels had descended upon Zion. To the best of my somewhat sketchy knowledge there was supposed to have been peace between the machines and humanity. Deciding that I was unlikely to receive an answer any time soon, I stowed the thought and breathed a sigh of relief as the stairs ended and I found myself in a large room filled with what looked like numerous computer screens. All of which seemed to be displaying maps. What they were maps of I was uncertain, but that isn't really the point of the story.
In the distance I saw Locke conversing with a woman who looked almost as tired as I did. I couldn't help but feel slightly annoyed when I noticed Meridian walking towards him. Locke didn't rank high on my list of favourite people.
*******************************************************************
The door smashed open and a stream of gunfire poured in from the hallway. Digitally enhanced reflexes, (is that a pun? Is that accurate? My digital self? Ah who cares?) Anyway, that and unspeakable luck sent everyone crashing to the floor before they could be cut in half by machine gun fire.
The Oracle's receptionist or whoever he was wasted no time in drawing two handguns of his own and emptying their contents into the open door. This was followed a second later by the thud of a falling body.
'Nice.' I remember thinking.
I pulled myself to my feet just as a second figure smashed through the wall behind me. An unusual entrance, but it was effective in sending us to the floor again, mostly to protect ourselves from flying shrapnel and the.
How the second figure had managed to barge through the wall I never found out. But anyway, I was the closest one to him, and upon pulling myself off of the floor for the second time in ten seconds, I found myself evading and blocking numerous blows with limited success.
Hawk provided a rather unexpected solution to the problem.
*******************************************************************
"You were told to wait in your cabin."
I gave Locke the most contemptuous glare that my weary features could muster.
"Would you rather I sat idly by whilst everyone around me got ripped to dust?"
"What I'd like is for fighting to be carried out by military personnel and for civilians to keep out of the way."
I remained silent for a few moments, though I was loathed to admit it, he did have something of a point. In my defence though, I didn't do too badly during the battle, in my opinion, one life saved, 3 downed sentinels, but I digress. I didn't feel like proclaiming my own accomplishments so I instead said,
"It might be my imagination Commander, but it seems like you have more important things to deal with then me."
Locke grunted and walked away from me towards another one of the machines.
"I think he likes you" Meridian said over my shoulder.
"I dread to think what he does to people he hates."
*******************************************************************
Hake removed her teeth from the man's neck and turned to give me a creepy, blood soaked grin. I tried as best as I could to give an amused facial expression but was too disturbed by her choice of dinner, or perhaps it was because I was getting more used to seeing death around me, to give anything more then a somewhat nervous grin.
"What?" She said, "I missed breakfast."
"It's the evening Hawk." I replied, mustering enough self control to make my voice dignified.
A lot more flooded in from both the hallway and the hole in the wall after that. Some were obviously demons, others looked, more or less, human; they were dressed in fancy, black leather attire however, much like myself and the rest of the ascended ones.
I smashed the face of a nearby demon to paste and quickly found myself blocking punches from one of the other enemies. Their fighting style was slightly more sophisticated then that of the Demons. It was harder to reply with some punches of my own.
I eventually succeeded in landing a punch to the guy's face, which was followed up by a somewhat harder punch to the stomach. He crouched slightly with his hands wrapped around his chest as a kick from me sent him into the far wall.
Through the chaos, I noticed two things, one we seemed to be winning. Demons and the mystery enemies were falling left right and centre. I remember referring to them as 'amateurs' before it occurred to me that I'd only done this twice before.
Anyway, the second thing was that someone else had apparently joined the fight, on our side. I examined the newcomer, Black, bald, a bit on the podgy side, he seemed to be holding his own well enough however.
My thought processes were stopped dead in their tracks by a Demon that went for my throat with what looked like a bread knife. I dodged the first swing before snatching the knife from his hands, and slashing it across his ribs.
He screamed and fell to the floor; strange, the cut wasn't even that deep. After that, the anonymous Asian guy and Hydra took down the rest with a few well placed bullets.
There was silence for a few moments as everyone examined the group's handiwork. I think I was feeling a mixture of triumph, and worry because I felt good about slicing and pulverising people. This was soon banished however as I heard the door behind me open, and an elderly looking black woman stepped into the room.
"20 down, 4000 to go."
To be continued
Right, now for replies.
Angel-of-lightness: I hope your misfortune flies from you soon. Thanks to you I now look upon shelves with unnatural fear. Stupid dreams. Driving a motorised tricycle on a motorway is not a good idea.
Agent-Josie: No, I don't read Calvin and Hobbs. I've never even heard of them actually. I would have answered that question earlier but I, uh, forgot. Sorry.
Rhian: The eating of chocolate can also be described as the ingestion of milk, lased with rust.
Tai Wilson: It's not that strange, Rama Kandra or whatever the hell he's called went to see the Oracle about Sati, apparently, and he was also a rogue program. Anyway, thanks for reviewing. The sentinel answer approaches.
blueval and Followthewhitering: They didn't actually review but they've randomly shoved me on their favourite author and/or author alert things. Anyway, thanks to you both.