The Armageddon Over Earth

Part Eighteen

Nathan didn’t return to the giant training room that he had called home for the last few days. Instead he was directly escorted to the Armageddon’s docking bay where his ship that he arrived on was still there, the outdated Vector spy ship. The Mother hoped that the Militia soldiers would recognize the ship as the one they stole from the Vector and assume it was Nathan returning from his mission. He entered the ship and turned on the engines, ready to board the Quicksilver in a matter of minutes. The Vector soldiers escorting him gave him the all clear and so he departed the Armageddon. Merely minutes later he was awaiting docking onto the Quicksilver. The Militia soldiers had recognized the ship and ceased fire as they knew it was Nathan, they didn’t expect anything out of the ordinary.

Nathan entered the docking bay and landed his ship, the ship gently touched the ground of the Quicksilver before moments later, he emerged carrying his augmented Vector weapon. Nathan was ready for a fight and seemed almost too eager to commence with the bloodshed, he felt hatred for every single Militia soldier and his self control was thinning as he peered around, observing the Militia engineers hard at work. They were just as bad as the soldiers, he thought.

“Nathan? Nathan Walker? I...I thought you were dead. General Collins held a memorial service for you” Nathan turned around to find Clint Munsfield staring at him as if he’d seen a ghost, but in Clint’s eyes, he had. Nathan had always like Clint, he was a kind man, always friendly and talkative, he could spend hours talking about his family and how his grandson is going to grow up to be a political ambassador. Clint was a cargo officer as he was too old to engage in combat; nevertheless he had wanted to do his part for his planet. Clint started to look happy and excited. “We need to get you to the General right away. He needs to know that you are alive. Everyone was sure that you’d died. This is fantastic!” Clint smiled and started jogging away, presumably to tell someone of Nathan’s survival. Nathan had not said a word and didn’t share Clint’s excitement. Instead he just started walking again, not bothering to stop and kill this feeble old man; he was harmless and insignificant to the mission.

Nathan left the docking bay, knowing he had a long walk, or a long fight ahead of him since the bridge was on the other side of the Quicksilver. He must have been walking for around five minutes, only briefly seeing Militia soldiers who posed no threat to him; they did not recognize him so none of them noticed him. Nathan struggled not to dispatch a wave of bullets on the Militia soldiers; he desired vengeance so much, his finger was itching on the trigger of his gun which he had not moved since he arrived on the Quicksilver.

Nathan recalled all the shortcuts and knew the quickest way to the bridge was through the crew’s quarters. Clint must have sent out a message that Nathan had returned since many people left their quarters to try and find this so-called dead man. Nathan had started to wish he had just killed Clint; a lot of attention was being drawn to Nathan. “Back from the grave I see?” A familiar voice called from behind Nathan, it was Vincent McLean. Nathan had always despised Vincent, not just for keeping him prisoner, not just for beating him to a pulp, not just for forcing him to watch his brother’s death, but for the fact that he would worship such a traitorous bastard like General Collins.

Nathan ignored Vincent and continued walking down the hallway through the crew’s quarters at a brisk pace, the quicker he completed his mission the better. “Hey, I was speaking to you!” Vincent yelled before jogging to keep up pace with Nathan, clearly irritated. Vincent put and arm on Nathan’s shoulder and grasped it to make sure Nathan didn’t escape; he leant closer and whispered in his ear. “You’d better watch out pal, everyone wants you dead” Nathan had had enough though, he suddenly grabbed Vincent’s arm which was on Nathan’s shoulder and twisted it until he heard a satisfying crunch followed by a yelp of pain. Vincent managed to get his arm free before falling back, horrified at what Nathan had just done. He brought himself to his feet again and started chasing Nathan who had already started walking away. With his other good arm, he delivered a devastating punch on the right side of Nathans face that almost made him topple over but still managing to maintain his balance. Without any warning Nathan drew his weapon and raised it before firing a single bullet into Vincent’s head.

Vincent’s body dropped instantly and collapsed to the floor like a ragdoll of meat, his eyes open and a shocked expression plagued his face. Suddenly there was chaos. Other soldiers who were watching Nathan were now either attempting to run away or attempting to acquire a weapon in order to kill this psychopath. It was pandemonium and there were people running everywhere. Out of the corner of his eye, Nathan noticed a Militia soldier who had loaded a pistol and was raising it. Like a flash, Nathan spun around to face his enemy before immediately gunning him down. He started firing more bullets at any Militia soldier he saw, even those who didn’t look hostile. Their bodies dropped to the floor, some falling onto other bodies due to the sheer amount being killed.

Once he saw no more signs of life among the dozens of corpses that scattered the floor, he started walking towards his destination again. He was glad that he had finally managed to kill that piece of filth Vincent. The universe is better off without him. Nathan left the crew’s quarters, a mere few minutes earlier the quarters were full of life and noise from all the Militia soldiers, unwinding after a long shift, the sound of conversations and laughing seemed like a distant memory. It was replaced with utter silence, nothing moved and everything seemed considerably colder.

Nathan continued his trek across the Quicksilver aware that it was going to be more difficult to reach the bridge now that his cover was blown. He passed the engine room, debating whether to just walk by and leave the Militia workers in there alone, or storm in there and butcher everyone who occupied the room. He chose the latter. He stood around the field of dead bodies, rage had consumed him and he had lost track of his true focus, to reach the Bridge. As he was leaving the engine room, he heard whimpering coming from a storage room, he walked over and opened it to find several Militia engineers cowering at the floor, terrified at what would happen next. Nathan had gotten back on track though and remembered that these engineers were harmless and therefore weren’t worth killing. Nathan checked how much ammunition he had left, he found that he only had two magazines left. He had to conserve his bullets from now on.

Nathan left the engine room and yet again, continued his journey to the bridge, determined not to get distracted. Minutes passed and he saw no other Militia soldier, he was getting closer. As he passed the final hallway, he saw giant metal doors and he knew that behind those doors was his destination. The Bridge.