The End

Crashed

Pain shot like molten lava through my body, a constant dull ache that reverberated through my head as my eyes fluttered open. The sight that greeted me was a devastated scene, flames burned slowly in the background, the heat barely being registered by my pain ridden nerves, and I lay upon the roof of the glass bubble of the cockpit as the entire helicopter sat upside down on the ground.

The cracked glass hadn't been destroyed thanks to my TK shield but it hadn't stopped me from getting thrown forwards into the shield itself, resulting in my considerable discomfort, although nothing seemed to be broken.

I raised my head slowly and looked around, the pain dulling gradually as I did, to my left flames burned on the ground as a part of the main rotor blades lay twisted on the ground. To my right was the female pilot hanging upside down from her harness in her seat, arms dangling down and her helmet missing. Long Auburn hair tumbled down to the glass roof as blood tricked down her face from her neck and mouth to form a sizeable pool of it on the glass roof.

I sighed but as I looked she groaned out loud. I scrambled to help her and as I reached her, her eyelids fluttered open to reveal brown eyes ridden with pain. "Hi" I said somewhat awkwardly "I'm here to help", the woman coughed before managing "I hope so". "Don't move, I'll get you free," I said before cradling her back and then releasing her harness causing her to drop heavily into my arms.

She groaned heavily as she fell and I lowered her onto the roof slowly as not to hurt her. "Better?" I asked and she laughed softly as she breathed heavily, "considering things I'm doing fine!". I smiled at her "alright smart mouth let me patch up your cut then", I leaned down and went through the pilots own vest to pull out bandages and cloth packing before applying it to her neck and tying it in place with bandages.

Now the bleeding had stopped the pilot looked a little better and she nodded her thanks as I finished up. "Alright I'll look around to see what's up" I said to her and after she nodded her understanding I crawled out of the glass cockpit into the open.

It was a mess.

The helicopter had clipped the edge of a small office building as it came down and then burrowed a short furrow into the road, the Tarmac surface cracked and splintered, crunching under my boots as I stepped on it. I looked around to the front of the helicopter and grimaced as I saw the other soldier that sat on the other side of the helicopter now hung impaled on a signpost.

Blood dripped freely down the bent metal post and I felt pity for such a violent death, but to my horror the soldier moved as I looked on. A dreadful rasping gurgling noise emanated from the soldier as he lifted his head heavily, blood flowed from his mouth as he looked around and spotted me. It was painful looking at him, the pole had entered through his lower belly and stuck up through the back of his right shoulder, the pole invading diagonally through his body and most of his major organs.

"He...lp...." he rasped as I approached and not being able to speak I merely nodded before reaching to my medipack but he shook his head as He saw this. "Too........la....te......" he gasped and I looked at him in confusion, he managed a small smile before he reached down to his leg and just about pulled out a pistol with his left hand, almost dropping it, his grip weak from the pain.

He raised it towards me before looking at me and saying "Help.......", I knew what he wanted me to do, I looked the soldier in the eyes before asking slowly, "are you sure about this?". He nodded, smiling, "y...es...", I nodded before stepping forward and taking the soldier's pistol from his hand.

The soldier let his hand drop to his side as I steadied myself and raised the pistol. I looked the soldier in the eye and asked "Ready?", he nodded and just before I pulled the trigger he said "Thank you....". A split second later the crack of the pistol sounded and rang through the street, the soldiers head snapped back before rolling forwards onto his chest, on his face was a calm and serene expression.

I moved to him and slid his eyes shut before replacing his pistol in its holster and then turning back to the helicopter. "What was that?" asked the pilot, who had crawled out of the helicopter and now had her own pistol in hand swaying as she stood there. "Woah you shouldn't be moving around so much" I said but she looked at me and said firmly "I'll be fine". She looked around then noticed the dead soldier, she grimaced and then turned away from me before throwing up on the ground.

I waited awkwardly as her vomit splattered noisily onto the ground and she coughed heavily. After another moment of heavy breathing she turned back to me averting her eyes from the soldier and said "sorry...erm you err.. finished him?". I nodded before saying "you should sit down you know" and she nodded before slowly stumbling back towards the helicopter, I followed after her and helped her back into the cockpit.

After she had lowered herself onto the roof of the cockpit she sat there for a moment in silence before sighing heavily and looking out onto the destroyed road. "You alright?" I asked concerned, and she nodded before looking at me a sad look on her face. "It's just sad.... I mean that's how most people die these days... never naturally, no one grows old and actually lives a life....". She sighed again looking down at her lap, I looked at her for a while before reaching out and lifting her chin up so I could look her in the eyes.

They were a soft hazel and were swimming with tears as I gazed into them. "You'll be alright." I said smiling at her "I'm sure you'll be fine! you'll meet a special someone, you'll get old and you'll live out a life. you'll be happy I promise you that, but first we just gotta get out of this okay?" We stared into each other's eyes for a long while and then she slowly smiled. "Alright" she said sounding hopeful and nodding.

I beamed at her and said "great! Now first things first I haven't introduced myself! I'm Jason".

She giggled slightly before saying "that's right where are my manners? I'm Hannah" we shook hands and beamed at each other. "Now" I said "let's work on trying to get back to NATO!".

We then spent the next hour or so working out where we were and figuring out a route to the NATO base. It looked like we had come down on the outskirts of London and luckily we only had about 2 to 3 days worth of travelling to do to get to the base, depending on what we came across.

We then spent a few minutes gathering anything we could that might help us along the way.

Finally we were packed up and ready to go, we both crawled out of the cockpit and stood up. Hannah had a injured leg however so she had to lean on me to move at a decent pace so I had my arm around her waist to support her and her arm around my neck. "Ready?" I asked and she looked up to me tightening her helmet strap in reply.

we then looked forward and started on our journey.