 |
About This Site
Daily Musings
News
News Archive
Site Resources
Concept Art
Halo Bulletins
Interviews
Movies
Music
Miscellaneous
Mailbag
HBO PAL
Game Fun
The Halo Story
Tips and Tricks
Fan Creations
Wallpaper
Misc. Art
Fan Fiction
Comics
Logos
Banners
Press Coverage
Halo Reviews
Halo 2 Previews
Press Scans
Community
HBO Forum
Clan HBO Forum
ARG Forum
Links
Admin
Submissions
Uploads
Contact
|
|
|
Spartans Never Die
Posted By: A Halo Fan...natic<mikeandrewp@gmail.com>
Date: 22 March 2009, 1:28 am
Read/Post Comments
|
"Spartans never die."
That's what they said, way back when. Way back in yesteryear. Spartans never die. We're too tough, we're too resilient. A super race. Inconquerable. Nothing can kill us, except us.
When the war ended, we were heroes. Loved by the public. Hated by the public. Feared by the politicians and generals. Think; the perfect fighting machines, bred and trained for war, super reflexes, incredible strength. Imagine a hundred bloodthirsty Supermen, each with unflinching loyalty, not to their country, not to their leaders, but to their immediate officers.
Of course they locked us away.
An iron hospital. A comfy cage. Left to rot, left to die, locked us in and lost the key.
It's a cold, airless rock orbiting a cold, airless planet, orbiting a forgotten star in the backwoods of nowhere. It wasn't a bad place, all things considering. They actually gave us TV. Not that we ever had any use for it.
We had no use for anything. There were no weapons on that rock. No armed guards. No guards at all. Just a few caretakers, none of them armed with anything more dangerous than a spoon. They gave us food, kept our rooms clean, helped us as we got older...
It was like a geriatric center. A geriatric center for supersoldiers.
You see, there was a flaw with the processes they used on us. For those few lucky--or unlucky--who survived the many hormonal injections there was one treatment regarded as particularly risky: reinforcing the bone with steel and titanium coatings and mesh.
All well and good. It was certainly useful for prevention of broken bones. But bones shrink as one ages, while metal does not...
As we aged our bones shrank, warped, weakened--and when hemmed in by metal, they snapped. Broke.
Shattered.
We were cripples. Legs were usually the first thing to go. I was lucky in that only my arm and a few ribs snapped, though that was little consolation. We were the best, the finest--
--and now the weakest.
There was no chance for escape. Supplies were shipped in by ballistic capsules, not space ships at all, just metal shells with stuff in them. The staff was on a three month rotation. They were brought in and out by small shuttles, with just barely enough fuel to make it to the frigate half a million miles away. The ships had no weapons, and could not travel fast enough to do any damage to the warship by ramming it.
A perfect prison, with no bars or guards. Simply the laws of orbital mechanics.
So our bones warped and twisted. We died. Usually of trauma, or systemic failure due to hormonal imbalance, or brain hemorages, or cancers from the weird chemicals of our creation, or radiation from our duties. The million indignities and illnesses of old age, and our own unique problems.
The very best medical doctors came to work on us, to make a token effort to save us. More often they served as the executioner, giving us the final shot, the last shot in the dark, after we had survived so many.
But not me.
I lived. I was the last. The last Spartan. I'd survived the horrors of my birth, the dangers of my career, and the sad injustices of old age. But I knew that my detainers must be getting restless. Impatient.
They would have me killed soon.
So I left.
When the shuttle came, I walked on board with the staff that was departing. I explained to them what I was going to do, and reassured them that the warship would send another shuttle shortly. They agreed to stay.
I departed from the station, and fired the engines once, exhausting all their fuel. The warship did not destroy me, though I had half hoped that it would. Its AI must have determined my trajectory. I was no longer a threat. No longer a danger.
Simply an old man on one last journey.
The sun's corona is beautiful at this distance. The ship's polarizers are maxed out, and the cooling system is straining to deal with the load, but it doesn't matter now. I have about a day before impact, but only three hours before the ship's life support fails. As soon as the cooling system is overloaded and dies it will be over in seconds.
This is my last testament. The details of my life and career don't matter, and are classified besides. Just know this: I go bravely into the light, without hesitation or fear.
My name is not important.
I am not afraid.
After all,
Spartans never die.
|
