Hello, this is my first time on the Halo Wars forums, and I am hoping to not be torn to pieces!
Here goes nothing...
---
Prologue
Darkwing
We are killers.
Some call us traitors. They call us inhumane. They say we’re just as bad as the Covenant. Just as much of a threat to humanity. Just as sinister.
And they’re right.
There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t regret it. Regret what I’ve become; what I will become. I’d sold myself down a one-way path into hell. There was no turning back. Not now. Not ever. The remainder of my life was seemingly written in stone.
Maybe I am a traitor. Maybe I deserve death for the crimes I’ve committed; for the innocent lives I’d taken; for the decisions I’ve made. And if death shall come, then I will welcome it with open arms. Acknowledge it as a blessing.
We are Darkwing.
---
One Month Ago
The iron hard fist cracked against my cheek, the feeling equivalent to being run over by a school bus. For the third time, my knees buckled and gave in from under me. I slammed hard against the blue mat that, in reality, wasn’t as soft as it was cracked up to be.
The crowd around me erupted in snickers. Thanks, guys. That’s exactly what I needed right now: being the nearly unconscious newbie recruit who made a fool of himself not even a month into training for the UNSC. It was such a typical, corny story that usually ended with the rookie becoming a war hero.
Not this story.
No, this story is about pain. It’s about the ever-prospering internal struggle that I still recall to this very day.
This is a horror story.
“Get up, Private Volker, this isn’t daycare!” cried the Drill Sergeant. He tried to keep his glare stoic and angry, but I could see the amusement in his eyes. He only wanted me to get up so that I’d go right back down.
For whatever warped reason, I gave him the satisfaction, slowly regaining my feet, wiping my bleeding lip with my tee shirt and facing my opponent once more, leaning heavily on my right leg.
Derek, I believe his name was. Corporal Derek Fisher. His head was shaved like a cue-ball, and he had at least six inches on me, as well as another sixty pounds or so. He was grinning wickedly, clearly pleased with his last four takedowns.
“Ready for one more, rookie?” he mocked, putting his fists up again.
“Ready when you are,” I replied, not even bothering to hide my lack of enthusiasm.
We circled each other once more, feigning punches every now and then. The small crowd of eight other recruits watched us in complete and utter silence. I snuck a quick glance at the Drill Sergeant, who was smoking a cigar in the corner of the room, nodding thoughtfully and scribbling some notes down on a clipboard.
When I turned back, I saw only a fist as it cracked between my eyes.
Down, down I fell, my breath leaving me completely as I fell like an unstrung puppet to the mat. It took a moment for the pain to rush through me, scorching me from the inside out, unbearable. I covered my face shamefully, hoping, no praying that I didn’t pass out.
But Derek Fisher uttered those last few words with such chilling conviction that my eyes shot open once more.
“You protect yourself like you protected your wife.”
My wife.
Dead.
She’d been killed only a few months before, on Harvest, shot down outside our house when the Covenant had attacked. I hadn’t been there. I hadn’t been there to protect her, to ensure with every ounce of the life within me that she made it out of there alive.
And then she was gone, just like that. Taken from me. Gone like my hopes of ever becoming a Marine now. Gone like my faith that we’d survive this war.
Anger.
Pumping through me, spilling lava into my veins, sloshing around inside of me. Everywhere I looked, I saw her. I saw her dying. I saw the Covenant storming my world, burning our homes. I saw Derek Fisher, mocking me, much to the crowd’s amusement.
And then, at last, I saw hell.
---
More will come soon, hope you enjoy!
~Murph~