- Wolverfrog
- |
- Fabled Legendary Member
I have to say, I'm kind of proud of the character I created with Admiral Eden. Evil, twisted, intelligent and utterly, totally patriotic.
Part 39 - Are you with humanity, Captain?
"Drop your weapon Admiral," Graham ordered Eden coldly. If murder could be personified, then it would be described as the stare the Captain burned through Eden with.
Eden dropped his weapon, and to Graham's shock, began laughing, applauding.
"Very good captain, you caught me in the act, red handed."
"You're going to pay for this Eden. We won't bother with prisons. Do you know what the UNSC does to traitors? I'm sure you do. Lethal injection," Graham growled at the Admiral, whose smile turned to a frown of annoyance.
"I'm not the traitor my friend. No, you are all traitors! Every human who bowed down to these alien freaks of nature are traitors!" Eden indicated the ranger Elites, who glanced at each other. "I'm many things Daniels, but traitor is not one of them. I'm a saviour."
Graham laughed with scorn, as did the Elites beside him. At hearing the Elites mock him, Eden's fists clenched, and his jaw tightened. An utter xenophobe.
"Saviour? Saviour of who? Yourself? You've killed many good people on this ship Admiral. Innocents, with families back home."
"Small sacrifices for the greater good. You know this Captain."
As Eden finished this, the door behind him opened, and a squad of seven ODSTs charged in the room, rifles aimed at the Admiral.
"Sir!" the leader of the ODSTs saluted to Graham.
"Have you restored oxygen levels in the ship?" Daniels asked, looking down with disgusted pity at the defeated Eden.
"Affirmative sir, gravity too," the ODST Captain replied, jamming into his barrel into the back of Eden's neck. "On your knees scum."
Eden sank to the ground, putting his hands behind his head, giving a melodramatic sigh. Graham stared at the Admiral suspiciously, and thought for a second he could see the ghostly trace of a smile playing around Eden's lips. But after an instant it was gone, replaced by a blank stare of obvious depression. Daniels dismissed the incident as a trick of the light.
Slowly, he walked towards Eden, bending down to his level.
"You're defeated, Eden. It's over. Make peace with God, maybe he'll find somewhere in his heart to forgive you."
Eden's head rose, and Graham was slightly unnerved by the grim, confident smile he was treated to. The Admiral shook his head.
"You know Captain Daniels, for someone so intelligent, you are remarkably dim at times. So gullible," Eden laughed mockingly. Daniels frowned, and in anger smacked Eden in the face. Eden still laughed, even through a bloodied nose.
"I don't think you've grasped the situation Eden. Today, justice wins. I hold all the right cards," Graham told Eden in a disgusted voice.
"Ah, but dear Captain, perhaps I have an ace up my sleave. Perhaps I have seven."
What did he mean? With a sudden realisation, Daniels looked up at the trooper aiming a gun at Eden. Dread filled him.
"My my Captain; surely you didn't believe that these ODSTs were your men?"
Suddenly, the ODST Captain withdrew the battle rifle barrel from Eden's neck and aimed it at an Elite. The rest of the ODST squad did the same. Before the Elite Rangers could draw out their plasma rifles, the ODSTs fired; the first wave of shots took down the shields, and the second wave soared clean through their necks, sharply cutting off the screams of pain and shock. The five Rangers tumbled to the ground, dead.
Graham drew out his magnum and fired a shot. It hit an ODST, who cried out in pain as his bullet torn leg collapsed beneath his weight. Before he could do anything else though, Eden sprung into action, knocking the gun out of his hand with one fist and striking him heavily in the gut with another. The Captain staggered back, gasping for breath. Before he could reorientate himself, an ODST violently grabbed his wrists and bound them together with manacles.
Eden was stood up, brushing the dust off his blood stained Admiral's coat, regarding with distaste a fleck of Elite blood which had splashed onto his insignia.
"I'm going to have to get a new coat after all this," he muttered casually, as if he had just taken a walk through the woods and accidently got some mud on himself.
"Well Eden? What now?" Daniels demanded, glaring at the Admiral.
Eden chuckled, sitting down in the Captain's chair, running a fond hand across the mahogany shell.
"Well I think a drink is in order for starters," Eden began. "Don't you think so, Captain Reece?"
The ODST removed his helmet, revealing him to be a war torn man of around forty, with more scars on his face than Daniels had had hot meals.
"That sounds like a plan sir," Reece agreed. He and his fellow ODSTs sat in the visitors lounge in the corner of the room. Eden beckoned Graham to move towards him. Feeling the laser sights aimed at his back, he trudged forward, sitting opposite to Eden.
"This is what we people in power call escalation, Graham. You held the gun at my head a minute ago, and now," Eden drew out a pistol and jammed it into the Captain's sweating forehead, "I hold one at yours."
"What's your plan?" Graham demanded, and to his surprise, a look of elation crossed over Eden's face. The Admiral removed the gun from his captive's head, drawing out a pack of Lambert and Butler cigarettes.
"Want one?" Eden queried, sticking one of the ends of the cigarette into his mouth, lighting it with the lighter hanging around a chain on his neck. Graham remained stoic, not wanting to accept anything from the corrupt Admiral.
"Suit yourself," Eden muttered disappointedly, breathing smoke into Graham's face. Smoking wasn't as dangerous as it used to be. Nicotine levels were pretty much none-existent, and many of the dangerous chemicals inside the cylinder had been substituted with safer elements. The risk of cancer was still present, but in these modern days, cancer was no longer a problem as it had once been up until the 22nd Century -- a Doctor could cure it within an hour.
Even so, Graham thought it a disgusting habit.
"Sir, I have full control of the ship's airlocks and life support systems," the ODST Captain, Reece, called over. Graham felt himself go cold, his eyes widening.
"Choke 'em Reece," Eden replied with a trace of regret and remorse in his voice.
"Roger that sir. Rest in peace, crew."
Before Graham could utter a word from his shocked mouth, a siren warning that airlocks were open sounded, each ring it made signalling that an area of the ship had been exposed to the cold, unforgiving reaches of space.
In less than a minute, the entire crew of the Galapagos was dead.
"And all falls quiet," Eden murmured, a lone tear falling from the corner of his eye.
"Murderer!" Graham shouted, standing up aggressively. Eden, without glancing up from the desk that had his attention held, aimed the gun at him once again.
"Small sacrifices for the greater good," the Admiral repeated, shaking his head as if to clear the melancholia which had grasped him for a moment.
"Good? What are you doing that could possibly be considered good?" Daniels demanded. Eden sighed.
"Please, sit down Captain. I'd hate to have to shoot you in the leg, but in earnest, you're beginning to annoy me. However, I understand your anger -- how could you not be angry, not knowing why I have done things I have done?"
Reluctantly, Graham sat himself down.
"Explain then."
Eden smiled, a quick, small tug at the corners of his mouth. Graham realised that Eden didn't like having people hate him -- so why was he doing all this?
"I'll start at the beginning. When I was very young, I lived on one of the Outer Colonies. My father was governor, my mother a prestigious lawyer."
"I had a good childhood, albeit a lonely one. My parents had little time for me, and my father forbid me from going to a state school -- nothing but the very best private tutor on the planet for me. I had few friends."
Graham was unable to stop himself from getting a wry comment in. "That's surprising, did the other children not share your passion for murder and genocide?"
"Call me what you will Daniels, just not until I've finished my tale. As I said, I lived a good life -- until the Covenant attacked when I was 18 years old."
"My parents, of course, had their own private escape vessel. They told me to come with them. But I couldn't. There was a girl out there, Amelia, the love of my life. My parents didn't approve of her, she came from a farming family. I didn't care. Whilst my parents left on their ship, I went out into the city where the Covenant roamed, searching for her. Ironically, my parents were shot down as they left the planet."
"I found her, eventually. Trapped inside a burning barn at her farm house. An Elite was stood by it, laughing as he heard her screams from inside. Her parents were already dead, killed by falling pieces of rubble. The Elite had grown confident, and wasn't paying attention. It didn't hear me as I crept up behind it. By the time it had noticed me, it was too late for it to do anything; I pushed it into the fire. Its screams melded with Amelia's, before both of them suddenly stopped."
"I broke down the barn, moving through the fire to save Amelia. I found her, or what was left of her anyway. I knew as soon as I saw her body aflame that she was dead. Feeling all the weight leave my legs, I fell to my knees. Soon after, the smoke seeped into my lungs, and before I knew it I was unconscious, about to suffocate to death next to my lifeless girlfriend."