Chapter 2 Over My Head

In my slumber, I would get dreams of golden titanium-plated armor in a sandstone crypt with carved symbols and ancient phrases all over the walls of the crypt, I go to touch the armor but when I do I wake up in the apartment Glock in my hand facing the balcony door that looks out onto the ruined city of St. Los, I got up and began making my way down the apartment complex stairs to the ground floor out to the street, and began heading north, the air was as cold as ice with a frost-like glaze on the windows of the buildings around me as I progressed through the empty street looking at the abandoned vehicles both military and civilian wondering what battle went down to cause this amount of destruction to make the entire population of a major city evacuate. I keep walking down the street till I see in the distance the lens glint of a scope and a radio at my feet which I picked up and turned on "you're a long way from home aren't you stranger?" the voice on the radio asked in a monotone robotic voice "depends on what you call home, know an old preacher who used to live in this city" I said into the radio looking directly at the glint facing me "so Jeremiah still lives that's reassuring, what's your purpose here in this graveyard?" the voice continues as I stare down the glint in the distance "how much magnification does that scope have?" I asked the unknown voice through the radio "enough" he responded which made me chuckle "my purpose is to reach the federation city in honor of the preacher who told me about this land you locals call Requiem" I explained to him through the radio and I see the glint disappear from where it was "walk over to me and ill take you there," he says and the radio goes silent, I walk to the location of the glint and see a tiny base of operations made of sandbags and with a big comms radio for long-range communication, some rations, and a canteen, and a military ammo box on the ground "been watching you since you dropped, names Locust," the armored stranger said as he approached with his rifle on his back, it looked like a fifty caliber but I couldn't tell for sure "my names Hyde, Hyde Jackson" I said to him as I set down my rifle and sat down "like Jekyll and Hyde? Heh, that's funny, the plan is to camp here till nightfall and move to the city to avoid any attention from the other bastards" Locust explained as he also sat down, his armor was high-tech yet primitive at the same time "sounds like a good plan to me but one question, however, is whats the conflict going on here within Requiem?" And he told me that since time started moving onward there have been wars going on throughout the lands of three, this region of Cernunnos was named after the Celtic God of nature with all its forests, jungles, and abandoned towns taken over by the wildlife and nature "interesting to say the least" I commented as I looked down at the lantern in the middle of the little camp. As I pondered on the idea of the potential history that plagues the land a soldier drives to the camp "friend of yours?" I asked him as I watched the heavily armored soldier get out of the truck "yep, squad member of mine, what's the intel Jackal" he asks the soldier while he removes his helmet "checked the whole perimeter, no signs of anyone hostile within a noticeable distance, we got squad delta zero five in the apartment buildings down the street stationed for cover and support for our way back to the city" he informs us and we look at each other in thought "then we're gonna wanna go right away to avoid trouble" I say and Locust looks at me in surprise "what makes you think hauling ass immediately out of dodge right now would be a good idea?" Locust asks as he stands up and steps toward me, I look towards him and say "because nobody is in the general vicinity which makes this the perfect opportunity to flee undetected" and they nod, we pack up everything and drive down the road, during our drive I get asked by jackal "what brought you to this planet back there?" To which I respond with "basically got exiled from the settlement ship above called the USS Apollo where I heard about this planet and the name Requiem and the bits and pieces of the regions but not much at all" Locust nodded at my explanation but a little bit afterward headlights light up behind us "more friends?" I asked but no answer followed making me pull my rifle off my back and aim "you won't be able to make that shot" Jackal warns me but falls on deaf ears, I hold my breath, wait three seconds and discharge a round right into the driver's forehead causing their truck to crash "that should be all of them," I said as I lay back in the bed of the truck "good shot lad" Jackal says as he removes helmet "thought there wasn't anyone around?" Locust asks sarcastically and Jackal chuckles a bit "they don't make these visors like they used to, gotta get my thermals repaired because the binoculars obviously don't do the job correctly" Jackal says as he puts his helmet back on and looks at me "so lad how did you make that shot?" he asks me and I turn to him to face him "I didn't know, I was aiming for the wheel on his side of the vehicle" I say and chuckle, the rest of the ride was quiet while I looked into the mass amounts of vegetation that shrouded us as the sun went down into the west when we passed an abandoned vine-covered gas station I started to drift off to sleep and get a vision similar to the last one but the armor was more detailed and realistic similar to Jackal's armor in design yet aged longer in terms of looks, the visor was black as night and at the belt of the armor was a high-tech sword hilt with a button on it, I grab it and press the button but once I do I wake up as we're arriving at the gates of the federation city "sleep, well lad?" Jackal says as he looks at me and I nod, Locusts presses a button on the dashboard of the truck, and the gates open and we drive in "you were mumbling in your sleep, complete gibberish" Locust laughs as he drives us through the gates, many civilians start to stare as we drive to the central part of the city "we're almost there lad, the boss man wants to see you" Jackal says as he puts on his helmet, I get up once we arrive in front of the headquarters building and exit the bed of the truck with my rifle on my back and my Glock holstered on my hip as we walked into the building which smelled of gunpowder, metal/metal shavings, and concrete "you will get used to the smell after a while," Locust says as he pats my shoulder and walks me to a locker room with a seven-foot tall soldier who was also in the room, his armor was beaten but not broken, and unusable and looked so heavy it looked like he could fall over with one wrong move "Hyde Jackson?" the soldier asked as he faced me "yes sir, I was tasked by a certain famous preacher who went mad to come to this metropolis in search of help" I explained while revealing the medal the preacher gave to me "Jeremiah still lives" he says as he holds up the faded medal up to his visor "a friend of Jeremiah is a friend to me, Hyde" he says as he hands it back to me and guides me down to an armor set up room "we studied your accomplishments while you were on your way here Hyde so we could get a general description of what your capable of" he explains as we go to a armor kiosk "general description? Sounds like your unimpressed" i said and he shakes his head while a female officer walks towards the computer panel "hello Hyde im Levine ill be helping you with your armor process are we set?" She explains and then asks me and I give a thumbs up "great now just step onto the platform and we can get started" she says while pressing a few buttons and dials on the screen, I step onto the platform on the feet clamps and grab the hand clamps "good now just relax Hyde we're just gonna add a few things and you can get right to the action" she explains as she starts pressing buttons and turning some dials, the machine starts applying shoulder plates onto my bodysuit and works the way down my arms by putting on gauntlet armor, the machine starts putting on a chest plate with built-in jet boosters and also leg armor from the thighs to the boots "armor sequence complete" Levine states as she powers down the machine which forces it to release me "now to pick your helmet" the boss states and guides me to a shelf of helmets ranging from different shapes and sizes "you seem like a scout type so we should get you a scout type helmet, I recommend the recon and scout helmets," the boss says, I grab a recon helmet that has a short visor, a comms module, and an infrared camera on the right earpiece area, I put it on and nod to signify that it's a good fit and ill take it "welcome to the federation" he says and I shake his hand.