Project: AKRA pt 11

“It’s okay…I know.  I can get a bio amp replacement if we make it through this.”

“Hey, you guys over there?”  Agrest’s voice shouted.  “Get over here now!”

Ziko pushed himself off the tree, they all grimly watched for a moment as what remained of his arm was quickly chopped and consumed by the blade grass and its acid once the suit’s structural integrity had been broken down.  “I hate this fucking place.” It seemed to be an understatement from Ziko as he watched his arm get eaten by the grass.

The three walked over to Agrest, his huge sniper rifle leaning against the tree.  Raist realized it was Agrest’s shot that killed the diving bird before it killed them.

Leio was sitting on the ground, her knee looked crushed, and everything under it was gone.  Her other ankle was broken, bent back up to her calf.

“What are you going to do with me?” she asked, looking straight at Raist.  He felt his stomach drop a bit with the implication of one entirely real option he could take to save the rest of the group time.  This was a woman he was intimate with, yet the mission was now at risk of being compromised due to both her legs.

“What happened?” he asked, trying to buy some time to think this through.

“The ankle was from the fall, and this,” she pointed to her missing calf and the crushed knee, “was from that bastard over there.”  She indicated a large dead beast.  “Heh, damn.  I’ve never seen such a hostile fauna before.”  She leaned back while they crouched down to inspect her damage.  Even with her mutilated legs, she still was amazingly lusty, along with a slight independence still obvious in her countenance.  “No wonder they put their fortress here.  Secure the skies, and let the planet take care of the ground.”

Raist could feel everyone waiting for him to decide what they were going to do with the obvious change in plans the injuries and the planet presented to them.  Maybe they were especially waiting to wonder if he would leave Leio, or kill her.  The latter might be humane.

He stood up.  “We are not leaving anyone behind.”  He looked to Ziko before continuing, “I am taking you off Assault-role.  It’s too dangerous to not have a combat-able person not firing, so because of your injury you are the one who will carry her.  Leio, you are staying on the Sweep.  The rest of us are changing our weapon configuration.  Agrest, switch to your Silvershot for faster shots, I’m moving down to the ‘Saw and Leio you go with whatever you can shoot while still staying on Ziko.  Z, you can either go weaponless or take a one-hander.”

“And me?” Philira asked.

“Stay with the Plaz-Shot.  It is obvious to us now most of the fighting is going to be close range.  I need Agrest and Leio to be on drone watch out.  We are not that far in raw distance to our target so we are going to press on.  I do not think resting is a wise decision.”

He walked over to Leio. “You know what we have to do right?” he asked.

“Of course, get it done already.”

They dragged her to an area devoid of the grass where it looked shot up from the battle.  He handed her the handle of the SSAW with its softer grip, pressing it towards her mouth, she opened it and bit down on the handle.

“Hold her,” he commanded.  Philira and Agrest knelt down and held her body and arms down.

“Heh,” she muttered out of her jammed mouth, turning her head towards the sky.  “Never…get used…to this.”

Raist knelt down by her foot, grabbing the misplaced foot, and, without waiting for any okay or any delay, pulled downward and backward.  Immediately her leg started flailing while the other two struggled to hold her down, letting out a painful ‘guuuaaaaa!’ through her gritting mouth.  It was clear she was trying to maintain control despite the massive pain and compared to a scream most would have let out, her moan was fairly benign.

He continued pulling back until it was straight, and pushed it softly back into the semi-correct position.  He held her foot still for a moment while she stopped moving; she spit the gun handle out.  “I’m okay…”

All three of them let her go as she sat there.  “Should be walk-able in about a cycle.  I feel my nanites reforming the bone already.” It was quiet for a moment before she continued. “Well, stop staring at me already!  As much as you guys like to do it, let’s get this going.”  He reluctantly managed a smile at her pride hiding her shame of slowing the group down.

She lifted an arm up and Raist grabbed it, hauling her body over his shoulder then transferring her to Ziko where she sat on his shoulders.  She used her one leg to wrap under his shoulder to his back and was using her hips to hold onto his head.

“Not pretty, but it will work.  Z, can you still function?” Raist asked, handing him a pistol for his one remaining arm.  The chemicals in them and their advanced nanites could keep them functioning at conditions worse than this, but still wanted to make sure.

“You mean with that hot ass wild woman riding him all night?” Agrest joked.

“I think his head is facing the wrong direction for anything wild,” Leio said, giving Ziko a tight squeeze.

“Damn Raist, no wonder you like her.  I can tell she’s probably into bondage,” Agrest responded.

“Don’t make me squeeze his head off.”

“Why would you punish me for your two perverted minds?” Ziko said while he practiced moving around a bit with Leio on his shoulders.

“I think he’d like that.” Agrest added, “Either getting his head squeezed off, or your ‘punishment’ that is.”

At least their spirits…and chemicals… were still high enough to joke.  Raist looked at the Spreading Squad Assault Weapon he was holding in his hands, its neon blue lines pulsing an incredible power just waiting to be unleashed.  He was practicing drawing his knife out of the SSAW Philira had hidden in it in the event of a surprise.  Raist was glad their spirits were still good for now though.  He knew how bad missions could get.

Project: AKRA pt 5

They are doing an orbital insertion down to the planet…here we go!

 

At this distance the descent suit did not block out the visual yet, and each prepared differently for what was coming.  For Raist he was always struck by the strange sensation of his appreciation of beauty in nature, even as his job was often to kill without remorse.  There was just something in the divine perfection of how color and motion came together.  He sounded stupid when he talked about it, so he tended to keep that part of his thoughts to himself.  It was easier to joke or swear than to be philosophical, or far easier to talk about banging Philira than wonder about reality with those around him.

All five of them had small micro tethers that kept them connected for the duration of the drop, and within the tether was an advanced processor that regulated each motion of their descent suits to keep it descending evenly and without problems.  With no warning the visual went black as spheres enclosed each of them, protecting them as they first hit the atmosphere and to prevent them from catching fire.

He hated this part the most, as nanites were blocking out the sound ever since he launched out of the ship, and now the black provided no distraction for his mind.  It was the questions that bothered him the most.  It was never doubt because he didn’t have any.  More like if his life could have been different, if it should have been different.  Unlike a lot of classes like Scouts, he had choices many of them never did.  With choices came responsibility, and the weights of deaths were weighing on him even if he did not overtly show it.

Did he think too much about things?  His previous Scout, Laiun, told him as much.

He knew above him the descent suit would have streamers deployed to slow their velocity, whipping violently based on the speed they were coming in with.  He knew underneath him the landscapes might now start to be visible, but all that was around him right now was darkness.

Light filled the void as the surrounding sphere melted away above and beyond him.  The planet had changed a lot since he last saw it from space: he could see clouds, the green/purple of plants, even mountains in the distance.  The melting of the sphere reformed into parachutes that variously reformed themselves with the synchronization orders of the rest to ensure the perfect descent of the team onto the planet.

Get through one jungle, a river, more jungle, and then the base of the mountain.  Sounds simple in premise.  Not too far to cross at all.  That mountain didn’t look too far away; he could get there by a single planet cycle.  This was going to be the easiest ‘hard’ mission they ever took.  He could ‘retire’ pretty quick, as he was burning out as a result of the destruction he caused.

That was before something went wrong with their descent system and Ziko suddenly fell out of the pentagon formation.  The rest of them went crashing into the strange upper-story plant life that ripped their advanced suits apart as if they were paper.

As Raist went tumbling to the dark forest floor, his only thought was that he had never felt this much pain this early in a mission before.  He had never lost someone before it even started.

“Ziko!”  He screamed before his head impacted something hard and he blacked out, still falling farther down.

Project: AKRA pt 3

This is a new story I am serializing right now, it is about a group of super elite soldiers sent in to recover ‘AKRA’ from a very hostile planet.  The team is getting ready right now.

 

“I told you guys everything that was said to me,” Raist answered.  “This has the feel of something way beyond what we normally take on.  Most of the time things turn out to only have minor consequences, but just the way the courier was talking, and the price it paid for equipment had the feeling that this was very serious.” Raist opened his eyes and looked right at Ziko then Agrest, hoping to calm his old friend’s worries.  He felt kind of bad leaving out some of the things, like that he was sure the courier was actually a girl, maybe a Scout given the hair color.

“What the hell is an AKRA anyway?”  Ziko stood up, turning in synch with the computerized commands of the machine to change its neutralization pattern.

“Has to be either a robot or comp unit,” Leio guessed as she pulled her arms down and ran her hands through her bright orange hair, shaking it gracefully as it waved down her shoulders.  “‘Data recovery?’ Come on, what else could it be?”

“I’m with you, but those were my words I had said to it,” Raist making sure that distinction was there.  “It was never explicitly stated other than when it said ‘data processing unit’.  The only thing we know for sure is that it has a recovery chip implanted in its system that we will be able to track it down with.”  He pointed over to where his clothes were, and a handheld scanner configured to the tracking chip slowly pulsed, showing that AKRA lay down on the hostile planet below.

Ziko’s question repeated itself in Raist’s mind: what was AKRA, and why was this feeling only getting worse?

***

“I recommend Level-2 survival supplies,” Raist spoke to the four silver-suited figures in front of him.  They were near deployment, grabbing the last of their gear in the armory before their descent.  The suits they had equipped were capable of a high tech camouflage as well as defensive in terms of ballistic attack.  Further, they carried extra medical nanites to synch with each soldier to provide advanced healing and drugs during combat.

“Studying the terrain, I would recommend at least three,” Agrest suggested.

“Go with at least one extra med pack as well,” Leio added.

Raist nodded, deferring to their specialties and around them everyone made necessary changes.

Once their suits were activated, the near-invisibility they provided would blend them in completely to their environment.  Each of them tested their nano-camouflage in turn, rendering each of their various differences in appearance such as the boldness of the two women’s natural hair colors, Agrest’s taller frame, and Ziko’s muscular body all unobservable.  There was only a vague shimmer of light where they were standing.

The technology involved a complex set of data transmission of accurately replicating the light pattern of objects behind the person. By projecting them on the multi-layer crystalline suit in the front, it created something as near invisibility as was visually possible.  It was a perfect invisibility as it used what was behind to person to relay to the front, making it applicable in any environment or any angle

“Expecting this mission will be a siege, or an extraction?”  Agrest asked, but he had already loaded many supplies; he knew how often the role of the Sniper meant he would be in hostile territory far longer than anyone expected.

If anyone was watching the room, they would be disturbed by the supplies and weapons floating in air like ghosts before they disappeared as they were pocketed or filed away in a cloaked backpack.

“We are running it as an extraction, but the terrain is extremely hostile, as I hope you guys had studied.  I am not over estimating this at all.”  Raist’s second statement was unnecessary to his crew. They all knew him well: he was not the type to exaggerate danger, at least before they went into it.  That fact actually put a bit of caution into their minds.

“The combat drones we have sent have been shot down at about halfway to planet-side,” Leio said, decloaking as she pulled up a holo of their target and the visualization of the effective kill zone around it.  Her tight combat suit left her still looking very attractive, perhaps more so with the way it hung tight to her legs and butt.  “Their air defenses are extremely solid, and even our low flying drones were killed when they approached horizontally.”

“From what I have seen, the forest looks extremely dense,” said Philira.  The voice came from a barely-visible ghost holding a Plaz-Shot Scattergun.  Only her tone was any clue as to whom had said the statement.  “I see why you chose this path.  Even if they knew we were in there, there would be no way to locate us for termination.”  ‘Termination’…only a Scout would so distantly comment on their likely death that way.

Big Scifi giveaway I am part of

Hey guys I am part of a big scifi giveaway this week.  I am giving away Project: AKRA if you have not picked it up yet.  Lots of new talent to check out.

http://sffbookbonanza.com/freebooks/

I am still hammering away at trying to be an author, so something like this could help big!

Enjoy if you check it out.

New story time! Slipdrift

Hey guys going to start the same thing with Proud Infinity, give sections of a story out each day and the whole book will be done in about a month.  This story is about a guy who is a start athlete and is caught and forced to play a deadly version of the game.  The whole story is over at amazon for 99 cents right now.

 

Slipdrift

 

The violent sport of Gun-Drift still endures with its popularity, despite calls to stop the game, or the occasional rumor of illegal/deadly versions.  Nearly every planetary system contains an Arena that has Gun-Drift among its events and carries a tremendous public following.  There have only been a few substantiated reports of these unregulated Arenas, but have proved difficult to close down the tight crime rings that keep them in operation.

 

– Terran Intradex Ver. 4: ‘Gun-Drift’

 

See also ‘Common Games at Arenas’; ‘Gun-Drift: Confirmed Deaths’

 

“Don’t look at me with those eyes,” he warned as I kept my gaze coldly focused on the man I hoped I would one day kill.  His flunky clubbed me in the stomach due to my noncompliance, shouting “Listen to ‘um!” in a drawl.  I tried fighting my head and eyes upwards to him one more time, but the shock rod hit me in the back, knocking me to the floor.  I staggered one knee up, starting the say the name “Fe…” before I heard the whine of the electrically charged rod hitting me one more time; I went down, blacking out before I even hit the ground, unsure if I was saying his name, or the name of the girl I loved.  As my world shut down it would be the last time I saw the natural light.

 

***

 

Somewhere in an abyss of unconscious thoughts swirling without any guidance, a vague sensation of something slipping down my eyes eventually became overpowering.  “Uhhh…” My partially comatose body rolled to the side, but the strange spilling sensation continued.  Like a shock across my body, the lightning strike of awakening blasted across my physical and mental states as I opened my eyes and found myself looking at the rusting pipes of a fixture.

‘Where am I?’  I rolled to the side as I saw the teal-colored thin wall of a repulsion-field extending from the ceiling to the floor; excluding the light this produced, the rest of the locale I now found myself in was dismal, dark and dank.

Proud Infinity pt 32

Trego is in jail wondering if everything was just a dream.

 

“You would forsake me so fast?”  It was her voice.  I wondered how long before I would start hallucinating about her.

“Fuck you, go away,” I said to the darkness.  Damn, I hated just being used.  I kind of wanted to shoot her if the circumstances were such that way again.

Her…the cause of everything.  Guess it was not too long.  It was in the shadows of despair within my mind and the actual darkness in this cell that I definitely started to hate her.  I felt used beyond redemption.  White blood celled.

The bag was pulled off of my head, and her bright blue eyes were almost touching mine.  She smiled was wide as she brought her face back.  “Hi Tre!  My, what have they done to you?”

“Unfortunately…” my voice came haggard.  I had not spoken in a long time, and being deprived of water left my throat dry.  “My race has… our less than… glorious… moments towards each other.  Are you… real?  Or just here to…to torment me before I die?”

I honestly expected her to disappear, or maybe appear as the guy who was probably going to torture me.  But she stepped forward, putting her hands on my arms, and something happened as I was falling towards her.  I landed in her chest as she held me gently.  My arms hung limply at my side and I definitely could not feel them.

“Proud…you are real…” I mumbled, feeling her actually hugging me and feeling overwhelmed by that fact as I whimpered softly.

“Of course.  Why would I not be?  I had promised I would protect you, did I not?”

“Did…you?  Can’t… remember.  I can’t move…hunger…pain.  My arms…”

“I know.  I know.”  She held me there, and something warm was flowing from her into me.  I felt a strange awareness come over me, an awareness I once possessed slowly come back to me.

“Healing,” I stated and she nodded.  I could at least walk, even if I felt weak and out of it.  “But how can we get out of here?  I thought you cannot influence reality that much?”

“I have gotten stronger.  I am still limited, but enough to get you out of here.  I had to wait until everyone in your near reality counted on you dying.  To that reality it makes no difference if you actually die, or are simply gone.  The jail guard was killed in an accident today, he was the only one who knew you weren’t actually dead yet.”

“Complicated rules.”

Her eyes widened a bit at the simple truth of my statement.  “Indeed.  It is time we go.”

“Uh, are we going to teleport or something?  I don’t think we can just walk out.”

She disappeared, and I certainly did not make the trip with her.  “Uh, Proud?”

The door to my cell opened, and she was the one that had done it.  “Come on.”

“And if we are caught?”

“I will protect you.  It will not happen though.  Stay close.” She offered her hand and I reached for it, but my hand did not move.  She bent down, grabbing it, and I noticed my emaciated arm that she had taken.  I had been in this delusional state in this dark cell for longer than I likely knew.

At the very end of the hallway, I tried tugging her back as I saw the shadow of a guard coming.  She shook her head and sure enough the form on the wall had turned around and started walking away without ever turning the corner.  We walked through some sort of facility, and it was uncanny that at every turn someone would be walking through the opposite door, or turned engaged in something.  We continued in the strange ballad of perfect timing until we came out to a ship pad.

Proud Infinity pt 28

We are getting close to the end, how is it going to resolve!?

 

The cute girl of the space port leaned far forward as she dashed inhumanly fast at the other man on the ship.  He barely had time to look surprised before she punched him in the stomach, and slipped behind him, her arms going around his neck.  For a moment I thought she was going to kill him, but he simply fell to the ground unconscious from being choked out.  I threw their two bodies out of the way of the truck and we hopped in.  I hit a string of button prompts on the screen before it went to flashing ‘Ready?’ and we were off.  I remember how many times I had died trying to get the damn truck moving.

“Am I crazy?” I asked to the two woman with me.  Mitreah shrugged, saying probably, but she wasn’t one to judge.  Proud said no.  If I was crazy, at least it was fun.

We rumbled through the streets, passing by the millions of places I had seen so carefully in the scope of a single cycle.  I was shot there, I killed someone there…  We came now to the single road into ReCorp.  The gate opened for our vehicle, and on both sides the ground fell away into the huge pit.  I hoped this controlled vehicle wouldn’t decide to spill us over the edge.

“In case you are wondering, we are taking out the particle accelerator or disabling it in some other way to stop it from causing the creation of a dangerous particle.”

“You don’t need to justify anything to me,” Mitreah said.  “I am simply happy to be back to my old self.”

“I thought you might like to know.  Do you really not care what I tell you to do?”

“Often it is only our Creators that know our override, and no, you do not possess complete control over me, in case someone was thinking of doing something perverted.”  She smiled slyly at me. “Though to you, I might do things willingly…”

I shook my head only once. “No, I outgrew that a long time ago.”

“You seem sincere.  But my Creator died, and you seem fun enough, so I might have done this mission anyway if you asked.  This is what I truly enjoy; not sitting in an empty room people rarely come to.”  I had asked before, she only came if I knew her code word, she was too loyal to the nearly defunct spaceport.

Damn, this was scary; I had rarely made it this far before.  Everything I had done had been to bring me to this position, and now, well, now it was time.

In my hand was my Liner pistol, and a small satchel of high explosives from an ex-special operative.  I had long ago in all my annihilations gotten over the idea or revulsion of killing.  If I could spare them like at the dock I would.  This was too important even if they were innocent.  I was not convinced of their innocence or not, but it did not matter to me anymore.

The vehicle stopped, and some guy opened the door.  “Hey.”

“Hi,” I said, lifting my pistol and plugging him right in the chest.  I turned back to the two girls. “Let’s go.”  Proud jumped out gracefully, landing and walking behind me.  Mitreah jumped out, dashed across the room insanely fast, slashing a man who was standing there.  The only thing I saw was a spray across the wall behind him.

“Any idea where to go?” I asked the two of them.  I had not been inside here for a long time, and this one the first where I had my skills and the two women with me.  They responded ‘no’.  “Well, let’s see if we can’t get lucky this time.  We can always try again,” I said as I started laughing at my own joke.  Turning to my left I ran through a door shaped like a circular portal that opened as we got close.  If it was an accelerator, I only had to work my way to the middle where the core would be, so that seemed a good place to start heading.

We were running down a hallway, eerily empty, with Proud behind me and Mitreah the combat android in front of me.  Some guy stepped out from a corner, and before I even realized he was there, he was dead at her feet.  She crouched back down in a scary combat stance.

“Hey, this way,” I said to her as I took to the right as we headed a new way, and within seconds she caught up with us and was back on vanguard.  There was a sign warning about having protective suits on and I figured we might be getting close.  My fear of dying was long since gone; I had done it so many times.  I neared the portal, but it didn’t open.  I tried the handle and it was locked.

“Damn it!”  I pulled my pistol towards it, firing some rounds into the locking mechanism and front kicked the door, but it remained solid.  “No way.  A damn door is going to stop us?”

Proud Infinity pt 27

Hey guys hope you are enjoying these free segments, let me know with a like or a comment!  Trego is deep in the time loops and starting to figure out what is happening to him.

Here we go!

 

I woke up and I started laughing.  Let’s do this.  Even the universe was with me on this one.  I had spent so much time learning and doing everything.  Each of my attempts got me further and further.  The last couple times spent talking to Proud helped calm my mind.  I felt ready.  I was never a soldier, but I had become one.  I knew how to move, how to think, how to fight.  I had been transformed into this nearly unstoppable fighting force.

Okay.  I reviewed everything in my mind.  I could get onto the truck heading into ReCorp at the port, I could pick up the combat android, Mitreah, disguised as a receptionist, and the old guy would give me some old explosives with the right conversation tread.  And lastly Proud would only come with me into ReCorp if I asked her first at the bar, she really on it because things had to ‘come full circle’ which apparently really mattered to her.

I walked into the bar.  Everyone there was staring at me like they had what I think was the very first time, so many times ago.  I turned straight to my friend, long ago giving up what others ‘thought’ of me.  “Proud, I think I might have it this time.  Would you like to come?”

Her lips rose slightly in a knowing way.  “Of course.  How nice of you to ask me.”  I left those fools I was saving at the bar in their confusion.

“Alright, so I think this time I stand a really good chance.  I woke up and remembered everything.  It was pretty overwhelming, but I think this might be it this time.”

We held each other’s hand as we dashed towards the fence.  The old guy would not be here for a while, but I did not have the luxury of time as everything was precisely orchestrated.  I ran down a few streets, up a building and knocked on the door.  He was surprised as he always was, with his gun hidden right behind the door as I had found out once dying in the hallway.  He probably wondered at my hand ‘floating’ in the air gripping nothing.

I said the right words, which were unfortunately lies, about how I was an agent and used his operator name and some key phrases such as “Coding Alpha Delta, Operator task transference requested”.  His innocent face hardened, and nodded when I said it was vital I have any explosive he might be able to give me to stop an implanted enemy.

Taking the small pack he gave me we ran out of there over to the spaceport.  Alright, still plenty of time.  At the very edge of the sky the ship was just barely visible to even my highest magnification I could overlay on my eyes.  I needed to be on that, but time was on my side.

“Mitreah: Farewell fallen sword,” I said while walking straight towards Mitreah.  Her eyes glazed over for a moment and they changed the color slightly before coming back into focus.  She looked right at me, cold but absolute focus.

“Override confirmed.  What are your orders?”

I smiled. “Alright!”  I shook my hand with Proud’s in it and she looked back and nodded happily.  “You wouldn’t believe how long it took to figure that one out.”

“So far, so good, Tre.”

Still talking to the girl, “We are going to go onto the vehicle that ship is carrying and are riding it into ReCorp.  I need your entire combat mode powers unlocked, and it is imperative I am protected at all costs.  Oh, and can you do it with a normal personality?  I don’t like the coldness.”

Mitreah laughed. “Sure.  That final part is a strange request, but I cannot deny it is much more fun this way.  This should be entertaining.”

“Do you want another weapon?”

She shook her head. “I prefer my own.”  Her hand changed from its thin fingers into a sharp blade the length of her forearm.  I had seen that trick before and I guess I never realized how serious of a weapon it could be.  She always just struck me without the actual blade, but the razor edge would end anyone easily.

I walked with the two girls who were here to protect me out to the landing pad.  I felt poised, I felt ready.  I would stop the time fracture.

We still had a little time while it was landing.  I felt poised but there was a little doubt creeping in.  What would happen after the fracture was over?  I was not sure, and I actually did not care.  I had lived more than long enough, with more than enough experiences.  I wanted to complete the divine task given to me.  Maybe this was Proud’s purpose all along.

The ship had landed, and a large bay door had opened, the loose grav plate vehicle sitting there as two people went through the final checks before they would drive off.

I started walking up. “Hey, are you authorized to be here?”  It is always a good idea to question people before they question you.

“What?  Yes we are…”  He lifted his face from the screen he was holding.  I took out my Liner pistol and smashed it across his face.  He fell to the ground before I looked to the next one. “Mitreah, take him out, but try to not kill him.”

Proud Infinity pt 26

I hope you guys picked up the books, I will continue pasting Proud Infinity sections, but hope you got them!

 

“Is it true you are here just to help maintain my sanity?” I asked.  I had slowly pieced that together.  From what I had figured out, LineGods like Proud occasionally interfaced with ‘acting agents’ or whatever we were called.  In situations like this, the time loops can be so mentally breaking that the agent does not ever act correctly so the LineGod interface is created.  What I was not sure of was if the fact Proud was here meant I would not have ever gotten out of this on my own, or if she was a ‘reward’ of sorts, or what exactly.

“One of my reasons.”  She was swinging her legs off the bench like a little girl.

“It fucked me up for a long time the first couple times we had sex, or I tried killing you.”

Her face was sad as she looked downwards.  The bow and her long green hair hid her face.  “Yeah, I felt so bad for you during that time.”

“I used to think ‘why the hell is this girl here, she is only making it worse.’  I see that’s not the case now.”

She smiled at me.  “I am glad.  I am only here to help.”

“I see that now.  Most of what I do is to eventually get out of here, and on some level to help you because I care about you.”

I looked at her and thought back to the myriad of thoughts I once had about her.  She was a manifestation of some universal will in a way that would most synch with me.  It was disturbing at first, maybe a touch of shame to see my perfect embodiment of a female in physical form, but given her tailored traits I quickly came to like her.

“For a long time I stayed distant from you because I felt like it was this ultimate manipulation.  Something crafted just for me, in a way to be this trap I would fall for.  Like I was some dumb animal lured in by an intriguing girl.”

“You were harder to convince than some others.  Your skepticism was an advantage as well as a clear negative in terms of us having a good harmonic rate.”

I grabbed her hand, and we held hands as we watched the ducks swim around.  “What I realized, and this is hard to state, is that you were just a ‘child’ of the universe much in the same way as I was.  You are much more so, but you were not the universe, so much as just this thing it spit out.  Haha, that sounds so bad.”

She laughed too.  “It’s okay.”

“But that you were a person – sort of – like me that was stuck in this.  You were the only one who knew what was going on.  The only one I could talk to, even if you couldn’t answer everything I asked.  You became my friend, the only one I could turn to.”

“That was kind of the point!  Of course I was here to help your mind, and to eventually have you do the right thing to break this loop.”

“What happens when we break out of it?”

“Don’t know, never happened!”

It made me laugh a little.  “Are your Chrono Senses perfect?”

“That is a weird question to me, but as you understand it, yes.  I see all the paths that we can take.  However, there is a break that occurs, and of course, until we break out of this, I cannot see the next cycle.  It is a pretty strange thing for me.”

“Are you…uh, hard to say, but like have you done this before?”

She shook her head, giggling; she seemed like a kid again to me.  “No, this is the first time I have been created, so you are my first.”

I sighed a bit.  “Good, I don’t feel as stupid.”

“I am part of the Line, so I was vaguely aware before this, but as an individual, no this is completely new to me.  I have had a very good time with you.  I feel quite lucky to have been granted creation!”

“Anyway, I think I have most of this ready to go.  I got a few key players into position, and I have made it into ReCorp a few times but also get killed pretty early.  I have not tried in a long time, and got a lot of training with Mitreah, and some tactics from that old guy.  I guess we are going to figure out if I can make this stop fairly soon.”

The wind blew and some of the mist hit us.  It felt cold.  Real.

I continued, “I am glad I met you Proud, you have been fun to get to know.  If it ends, and you are gone, or I die, I am still happy to have met you.  To go through this with, as dark as it has been.”

“Don’t talk like that.” She separated her hand from mine and rubbed my hair.  I leaned into her and let her continue massaging my head.  I was happy to feel her hands on me.  Her soft fingers played over my eyes, going through my scalp, and just the nice feeling of her stomach and ribs methodically breathing.

“It is getting late,” she began, “are you going to end it?”

“No, I want to spend all the time with you.”

“Okay.  Me too.”  She tickled my chest, bringing her finger up and down.  I kept my eyes closed so I would not know.  I only kept focusing on the nice feelings before I was hit with the most tremendous pain imaginable for a few short moments.

 

Proud Infinity pt 25

Hey guys hope you are enjoying the story.  For those that missed it, here is the link to the first part of the story where you can read everything up till now: https://vayneline.com/2017/01/16/sample-of-my-next-story-proud-infinity-stuck-in-a-time-loop-with-only-a-god-to-keep-him-company/

 

***

 

I spent a lot of time with Proud.  I had come to like her in a way no one else ever before.  We were utterly alone in this.  I could say any right move to manipulate anyone.  But every cycle, every loop it was the same. Not with Proud.  She was the only one who kept her consciousness through the resets.

I might have gone crazy actually if I had to ‘re-meet’ her every single time.

“Hey Proud, let’s take a walk,” I said, looking down the bar.  Everyone else stared at me, holding the door open for an invisible person.  These people stopped seeming real to me a long, long time ago.

“I am really impressed with you so far, Tre, you are making great progress.”

We took a walk over to a small park, where there was a fountain jetting upwards and a bench overlooking the pond.  We sat down.  I didn’t expect to do much this time period, mainly used it just for a break.

I turned, smiling at her briefly before sighing as I turned forward.  “The Emotion Field sure isn’t perfect for what is occurring here, is it?” I asked.  The Emotion Field I eventually learned was the term that referred to a dimensionality our experiences, especially the strong ones, are laid down on.  The somberness of graveyards was the easiest example.

“I sympathize with you.  The fact your recollection is imperfect is a testament to your fortitude and determination.”

I laughed.  “The words are nice, but the situation isn’t.  Thanks anyway, Proud.  So you remember everything?  Is that even possible from a memory point of view?”

She was twirling a piece of her hair and her ribbon in her fingers.  She acted like such a girl at times, it was endearing.  “You act like we have to play by the same rules.  What is it like for you?”

“Sucks,” I said, sprawling out on the bench, my arm was around her back.  She giggled, and leaned into me.  She nuzzled her head against my shoulder.  “I very rarely remember anything specific.  It’s mostly this endless overpowering vagueness.  I know that doesn’t make full sense.  But I come up to situations, and on this unclear level I remember how to do things.  I remember how to aim, how to fight, how to dodge, how to say things specifically to manipulate people.”

I stopped, pointing at two girls that were walking by.  “I don’t seem to know anything about the blonde, but the dark hair one, I get hit with these thoughts that she likes vanilla cake, likes showing off her flexibility, and is lonely.  Also she’d fall for my ‘come with me if you want to live’ gambit.”  I looked down, pulling Proud away from me for a moment.  “Then later I really get to see her flexibility in action…” I hit her with a sly smile.

Proud playfully hit me.  “You’re bad.”

“I joke, but in truth it really messes with me.  I start to forget what I know ‘for real’ compared to remembering from back fractures.  I have essentially given up on thinking that maybe I am just projecting or making up things like what I said about that girl and simple roll with that I have found all those things out in the past.  It is this disturbing thing where I ‘know’ so much, but can’t remember how I know any of it.”

“I am sorry, Trego.”  She was sincere.  “Is there anything I can help you with right now?  You know you only need to ask.”

I didn’t have any requests; simply being with her was enough.