The Institute
Nisha felt great as she cruised down the stark white corridors of the Institute. The squad of coursers had been completed ahead of schedule and were even able to complete their task within a reasonable time table. Nothing made her grin wider than the thought of the Institute making progress in changing the world to her image.
She stopped suddenly when she approached the door to the Synth Retention Bureau. Something felt….
….off.
She couldn't quite figure it out, but she felt as if something were going on within its doors; something that slowed the Institute's plans.
She quickly strode through the gun-metaled doors. Scientists, Gen-1 synths, and coursers alike were rushing with all possible speed to various stations, computer terminals, and offices. This was normal, since the Institute was on the war path, they couldn't waste a second with breaches in security.
Still, that feeling, if she could even call it that, was still stinging at the back of her mind. Something still seemed out of place. Scanning the room once more, she found one room that was particularly lacking in activity: the Monitoring Room.
She took off again, this time being watchful of the various people scramming across the already cramped room. Walking through the door, she found the Monitoring Room in a mess. Papers were scattered as if someone put the room into a blender. Institute ration wrappers could also be found overflowing the garbage can and spilling onto the floor. To make the messy room complete, Joel Holloway was fast asleep at his post.
'Not again, Holloway' Nisha subconsciously groaned.
Nisha slowly approached the chair that Joel slept on; careful not to step on the various piles of garbage and wake him. Once close, with lightning speed, she grabbed the man's shoulders and shook him violently, as if she was reenacting a vertibird crash using Joel as a test dummy. The sleeping figure awoke with a shout, nearly jumping into the ceiling as he got up. He scanned quickly left and right until Nisha began to giggle. It has been a long time since she done such a prank, probably since her college years.
"What the hell was that for!" Joel panicked.
"Relax Joel." Nisha replied once she found a way to stop her laughter. "You fell asleep again and I just couldn't resist."
"Okay, but don't do that again." he uttered.
Nisha warmly smiled. While she knew that being the Director of the Institute's various departments required much discipline and authority, it didn't mean that she couldn't treat her colleagues like family and have fun with it. Since finding the Institute and joining its ranks, she found the people that lived within it to be family.
"Noted." the Director promised before dropping into a serious tone. "Do you have anything for me?"
"Yes, as a matter of fact. I do!"
Joel bounded back into his seat and hammered away at the keyboard that controlled the various monitors. After a few minutes of typing, a video recording appeared on the closest one.
"Take a look at this."
The video that began to play was from an airborne RAVEN camera. It was shaky, but Nisha was still able to understand what she was seeing. The RAVEN was flying near the Minutemen stronghold: the Castle. A clear view into the dusty courtyard showed a heavy presence of both Minutemen and Brotherhood soldiers, all of them heavily armed. However, that wasn't the focus of the video.
"Look." Joel advised.
He paused the video and pointed at one end of the courtyard. At first, Nisha couldn't understand what she was looking for. However, she did find Piper, a former friend and companion of hers. She did look different from the last time she met the Diamond City reporter. She had bits and pieces of armor attached to her reporter's jacket. She even had a Pip-Boy strapped to her arm.
"Alright, Joel. I give up." Nisha told the scientist. "I only see Piper in an upgraded reporter's jacket."
"Oh no no! Not the reporter. Look next to the reporter.." Joel urged.
Nisha strained at the still image and found out what Joel was seeing. Standing next to Piper, was another soldier from another world; similar to the one in the Institute's prison cells.
"God damnit." she cursed.
"Oh wait." said Joel, "It gets worse."
Joel advanced the video a few seconds and paused it once more. A vertibird was now in the courtyar; carrying an injured soldier from the looks of it.
'Wait…. That can't be!' raged her mind.
A makeshift stretcher was being wheeled across the dirty courtyard. On that stretcher was yet another soldier like the one in the cell.
"You have got to be KIDDING me!" Nisha exclaimed as she jumped out of the seat.
She wanted to slam someone's skull in. If the enemy had TWO of these extraterrestrial soldiers, combined with the force of the Brotherhood and the confidence of the Minutemen, the Institute was truly at a disadvantage.
She began to pace back and forth in panic; something she hasn't done since she came into the wasteland from Vault 111, something that plagued her life since the bombs dropped, something that stung her when Kellogg shot her husband.
"Are you okay, Director?" Joel asked worryingly.
Nisha couldn't answer that question. Ever since she agreed to join the Institute, she promised herself that she wouldn't crack under pressure. When Shaun died, she held her emotions back until she could find a quiet spot outside of anyone's ears to do so. She couldn't have anyone see her break down again, not now, not while she had everyone in the Institute on the line.
"I'm fine." she replied after regaining her composure.
"What should we do?" wondered Joel.
"We do what we can do." Nisha replied with the roughness of sandpaper. "We work from the shadows and plan a way to take down these rebels."
She then stormed out of the Monitoring Room with absolute fury.
'So much for my perfect day' Nisha mentally stormed.
Jackson's vision swam. He couldn't find the strength to stand up and free himself from the freezing floor. It was as if someone took a vacuum and sucked all possible strength from his muscles. A quick look found that someone had stripped him of his ODST BDU and replaced it with a simple white t-shirt and pants. A sharp sting was still present in his neck from before he blacked out. Jackson swiftly rubbed his neck to find a tranquil dart.
"Ugh!" he groaned loudly. "Note to self: don't drink so much before a deployment."
"Sargent?" said a voice.
Jackson stopped and analyzed the voice that had just called out to him. Only one voice had that timidness; only one voice knew to only call him out by his rank rather than tease him with his nickname.
"Monty?" Jackson called out.
"Sargent!" the voice called out once more. "Over here!"
Jackson swung his head toward around his cell. To his left, only a wall could be found. To his right, however, a small window was carved in the cell wall.
In that window, was Monty Sanford.
"Monty!" Jackson joyfully cried. "You're alive!"
"You are too, Sargent." he casually replied.
The two UNSC soldiers rushed toward the window that separated them, only for the both of them to nearly break the reinforced glass. At a closer glance, a few holes could be seen along the glass. That's how Jackson could hear Monty in the first place.
"How did you get here? How are you even alive?" Jackson quickly asked, not pausing between each question.
"Hold on, hold the phone!" Monty deadpanned. "Let me explain."
Jackson then sat on the cold floor as Monty began to tell the story.
"Okay, so remember that slipspace rupture?" he began.
"Yea, sure." Jackson reluctantly replied. "How could I forget? And how does that fit in with this?"
"Wait! I'm getting to that part." said Monty. "Whenever I woke up, I was actually already here."
"What do you mean by 'here'?"
"I mean as in here. In this cell." Monty exclaimed as if it were to mean something to Jackson.
"Okay, I can get behind that if I knew where here was!" Jackson shot back, slightly annoyed by the lack of answers from his squad mate.
"Apparently, we're in a place called 'The Institute'." Monty answered with a sort of wonder that only can come from a scientist.
Jackson sat and wondered for a few minutes. If this Institute sent the people that captured him, then he needed to escape. Or, at least, have a little chat with their management.
"What's the matter, Sargent?" Monty asked after he noticed Jackson's zoned-out expression. "Having a hard time believing this place, too? Well, when I woke up here, I was in a matter of shock! It was as if I had died and gone to heaven. Even from these cell walls I can catch of glimpse of all the technology that they have here! I hope I ca-"
"Monty." Jackson began with a serious tone. He hated when the nerd went into little talks like this. Mainly because it bugged the hell out of him. He would never stayed focus on the task at hand! Give him a five minute walk, and he'll make it worse than the sex talk with your parents.
"Yea." he answered after he stopped his little lecture.
"We need to get out of here."
A look of horror spread across the nerd's face. "What? Why! Why would you want to leave a place like this! Look at all of the technology that they have here! We could make a living out of this! We won't have to work for the UNSC, or ONI, or do any of that no morals bullshit that they make us do!"
"These people aren't much better, Monty, and you know that." Jackson replied.
"HOW THEN!" he raged. "How do you think that they aren't better than the UNSC or anyone else! Huh, tell me!"
Jackson stopped and thought about his options. He could tell him about how they tranquilized him in order to get him here. That would put some negativity towards this organization. But he did have to admit, if this Institute had all the technology that Monty claimed to have, then they could get home. However, another thought struck his mind: the world that he woke up to. He remembered the scorched earth next to his pod. He remembered the mutant creatures that he fought. He remembered the sky that had been ravaged by whatever apocalypse came through. And these people were hoarding it for themselves.
"These people are hoarders." Jackson began softly. "When I woke up in my pod, I didn't recognize the landscape before me. Monty, there was no way that the world I woke up too is the one that this Institute is trying to help. You should've seen the wreckage. There were cars, torched and burned on the cracked pavement of what remained of the roads. There were creatures that are way stronger than Brutes! Trust me, I fought them. The only help that I received from this dammed Institute was when they decide to come up and tranquilize me without answering any of my questions. Tell me how this is better than ONI, or the UNSC."
When he was finished, Monty looked somewhat crestfallen. Although he didn't look completely defeated, he understand his reasoning to a point.
"What you're describing, Sargent, is the aftermath of an atomic apocalypse." Monty finally responded. "I don't know if I can believe you based on the facts you've given me until I see the outside world, but, I still trust you."
Jackson cracked a small smile at that remark. He knew that Monty, although he loves this place for its technology, he can still understand Jackson's reasoning.
The moment was interrupted by a loud thud on the door to both of the cells. The squad mates quickly looked away from the window and scooted away, in order to fool the guards that they weren't communicating with one another. ;
"You there." the guard pointed at Jackson. "Come with us."
Jackson stared at the guard. It looked synthetic. Multiple wires were strung about the body and face. What was supposed to be skin barely clung to its face, as if it were almost peeled off by a Brute. However, it did wear a vest of some sort, something to identify what the Institute's motives were. Unfortunately, the sweater barely gave off more than a symbol for the organization: an orange figure with what appeared to be multiple arms and legs, arms and legs spread out.
'This place definitely loves its science stuff.' Jackson thought stiffly.
However, instead of arguing with the guard and punching it square in the mechanical jaw, he decided to come quietly. He wanted to see what else this place of horrors had to offer.
"Where are you taking me?" he asked the guard.
"The Director wishes to have an audience with you." the guard replied with a heavy monotone voice.
"Well then," Jackson briefly chuckled, "show me the way".
Hello guys! How are you doing today? I hope that you had a great day. Anyways, I have an update for you guys today: I am in the process of creating a new story! What does this mean for this story, or anything else for that matter? Well, not much really. I will still make this story as well as the new one. It will be a crossover between Skyrim and Achievement Hunter (more specifically using characters and plot themes from the AH Kings series in Minecraft.) I hope to start publishing the story by the beginning of the summer (around the end of May or beginning of June). If you guys want to assist me with ideas and characters, please let me know. I also hope to be able to pump out new chapters more often. So be on the lookout for that!
Anyways, please rate and review.
RNG, OUT!