4) Becoming Human, part 2

   So what is it; to be human that is? I certainly wasn't sure what I was when Ghost woke me. I had skill sets and knowledge that displayed training and years of it. I had the muscle memory of a warrior. My encounter with that first Dreg told me it wasn't just that I was a warrior - I was closer to a living weapon. But I wasn't just a dumb weapon - I understood combat, timing, emotion. I knew fight or flight decisions meant the difference in life or death. Survival of not only myself but others depended on the decisions I made. I didn't know who I was, but I felt there was a great significance to not only surviving but becoming more capable. 

  "We need to move more quickly." Ghost was not frantic, but he certainly wasn't calm either.

  "More of those?" I pointed back to a pile of Dregs we had just come through.

  "Worse. These are just the lowest level combat and recon troops. My sensors are picking up far greater energy signatures ahead." Ghost's words sounded a bell of doom in my head.

  "Which way?"
 
  We had come to forking hallways - you could see the stairwells at the end of each, left going up, right going down. The dark that had been so thick as to be felt earlier had lightened some.  The emergency lighting in the ancient facility still somehow gave light in some spots, and holes in the building provided some ambient light.

  "Right. We have to move further into the complex and find you some transport out of here." Ghost floated a ways ahead before projecting an image in front of me. "This facility used to house great interstellar ships for travelling the galaxy." A small twin-engined craft appeared in Ghost's light. "This appears to be what lies ahead of us. With any luck I can get it jump-started and get us to the City."

  The City. Those words rang with the sound of hope. A strange fire, a passion, rose in me. I had no idea why - I had never been there in my conscious memory, but I was stirred to pick up the pace. My steps rang out through the corridor as I ran down it and leapt down the stairs. My impetuous movement put me ahead of Ghost and nearly cost my my head as a blade came whizzing at me from my left. I shot without looking and rolled over to a corner, bouncing off a low row of monitors. The sudden stop stunned me for a moment, but the sound of shots and Ghost shouting woke me just in time to move. Running for cover, I fired at where it sounded the shots came from and heard a satisfying thump and scream from across the room.

  "Three more." Ghost's voice rose over the din of small arms fire and the cacophonous chatter of the fallen.

  "The first one?"

  "A vandal - far more dangerous than those Dreg. But he withdrew after your first burst took him in the chest and leg." If Ghost could have looked worried, well he looked worried to me.

  I leaned out from cover and saw two angry Dregs posturing and screaming at me halfway across what I now saw to be a large monitoring room. Well, they really weren't all that smart, and after a couple shots they weren't a problem any more either.

  "You're hit." Ghost was very matter-of-fact.

  "Yeah, burns a little. But I've already started to recover. Guess that is normal for me?" I quizzed Ghost.

  "Yes, as a guardian you are tougher than an average human and heal much more rapidly. But don't make a habit of getting shot, please? I just got you back."

  We made our way out a doorway and through the service passageways of the building's ventilation system. I was staggered, at first, as we stepped outside. More large buildings across vast fields, towers, rotting remains of stellar transport systems and weaponry all came into view. 

  "This was the Cosmodrome. In the golden age of humanity millions upon millions passed through here and out to the stars. It is both a monument to humanity's potential and its failure. It is a mausoleum as much as anything now - a memorial of the death of that age and the hope it brought." Ghost soliloquized.

  "Where's the ship? We really need to get out of here." A great unsettled feeling had fallen on me, chilling me to the bone.

  "You sense it too." Ghost sounded almost mournful.

  "This place gives me the creeps. And there are more of those Fallen around. Some, I have already spotted - others, I can tell are there - they have left enough trace."

  "Well, your HUD appears to be working, so I will mark everything I can." Ghost ran a scan and suddenly dozens of colored lights appeared on the inside of my visor. "Is that size and position ok?"

  "Shrink it, then move it upper left, and fade it out a bit." I had Ghost fine-tune the images for me. "There...Any suggestions as to taking a path from here?"

  "There's cover to the south, but you will still have to cross open ground, and clear out a nest of Dregs."

  I sprinted from the shadows towards the south wall of a smaller maintenance building. To the east of that building was the larger central building of the complex. In that building was my hope. In that building was a ship. And for me, a ship meant freedom.

TS



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