Wirehead Studios

Restlessness approached; I awoke. I removed my face from the earth, I turned, and a dancing fire was in front, our ship crashed. I attempted to reveal my memory of what had caused, to no avail.  I had the slightest clue of this incident. I nearly fainted as I attempted to stand, a blunt pain pulled at my left leg, my left arm was torn and covered in blood. I was surrounded by crew, dead or unconscious, none that I saw responded just yet. We were far from base HQ, it was some time in the night, past flight hours; no one would come looking for us until the first dawn. I tried my best to focus on consciousness, who knew what happened to the ship, but it definitely didn’t seem like a transmission failure or natures wrath. Something out there, in the dense alien jungles, wanted to kill us.

 This world was akin to Earth, yet so uncivilized. Like the massive cities crowded together, and the air colonies above Earth, the jungles and landforms lit the ground so nicely, with color to be found everywhere. The stars where a site to behold, with billions of them illuminating the night sky. The constellations forming together in the night to create the view of the galaxy; the heavens. Who knew such a wonderful setting would bring impending doom? As I returned to a slightly more “normal form” of my dwindling perception, I looked around for supplies, health kits or surgeon field packs, weapons. I limped and stumbled to a U.A.C. crate, it was skewed on its side, opened. Someone must’ve left here already, I had look for them, I tried to operate my intercom; for a minute I was talking malarkey to a broken radio. My mental regeneration was slow; I suppose I received a moderate concussion as well. The crate labeled “U.A.C.: Creating safer worlds through superior firepower”.  They scavenged what they could carry; everything was taken, from small arms to medical treatment; it’s too bad they couldn’t carry a chaingun. With total might I latched on to my weapon, I relaxed with a more badass sense of security.

Slowly I walked out of the crash zone; into the wild. I could manage to use my right arm to a certain point, I still had to hold my chaingun with one hand, and unfortunately I’m no Flynn Taggart or B.J. Blazkowicz like in the movies. My right arm began to feel sore carrying the giant gun. At one point of my journey, I stopped to rest, there was nothing else I could do, the other survivors may have already trekked past much too ahead for me to travel any farther. I leaned on a mountainous tree, helplessly I drifted to sleep.

 I woke up; there was some sort of disturbance in the bushes ahead, then some sort sounds, like communication. I stood up, and lifted my chaingun. I learned in the matter of what seemed hours is that no one or nothing will help you, only kill you. I had to conclude that anything out there was packing heat; even the trees had to appear violent. It stood out of the jungle, and into my view. It was somewhat thin, but it wore plates of armor, and carried a gun, a big f*****g gun. It didn’t know if I was armed, he could’ve killed me twice if it wanted to do so, yet it only glared at me. The tension only increased, I knew I had to act. I fired my chaingun, but it needed to be powered on. A pull of the weapon's joint, and it powered to life. As the barrels of death began to spin, the alien knew I was going to fire, it rolled out of the way, as it left my view, many others sprang to life out of the wild. The chaingun began to speak, it roared a battle cry, decimating the creatures, tearing them apart, giving out death at such a high quantity. One fired at me, a burst of searing plasma tore my chest apart into pain, the armor that had protected me had started to collapse. Ignoring any injuries, I took off running; I continued to fire, the recoil from the dancing gun was unparalleled.

 The chaingun, my only friend, began to die, the barrels choking smoke and heat, the bullets running low. I flew with plasma bursts, chasing me across the jungle, into the cover of the night. I stormed into denser and denser jungle, with the might of too many aliens attempting to remove my existence. Long live, I! The running felt more natural, without the short presence of the chaingun. I saw a glimpse of light, a way out of this endless torment. The impact of plants had ceased, and no more of the jungle’s intervention to bother me. Freedom was short lived.

 It was a cliff, a limited space of stone, forward was a violent river, and backwards was death. The footsteps approached, threatening and fatal. They drew their weapons, one spoke for small time. I had no choice, death had found me; I leaped into the river. The fall was so precious and insecure, but the torment did not leave.

 I gained consciousness yet again, but this wasn’t the same. No jungles, no aliens, or rivers. It was a room with odd architecture, there were so many peculiar things, it seemed aged, the metal was rusting, there were floating items, and a floating gun. Where am I? What happened? A memory returned; I was on board a ship. It was dark, silent except for the music playing in the pilot area. The ship began to quake, rumble and shake violently.

“What’s going on?” One of the pilots spoke.

We all turned towards to the co-pilots, what was going on?

“I’m afraid it isn’t turbulence,” The other co-pilot responded. He pointed towards an object, it
raced towards us.

The ship began to beep violently, the pilot turned, “Brace for impact!”

My thought was interrupted, something spoke.

“Welcome to the Arena!”

My only question is what happened between diving into the river and appearing on the ship?

My bad, I suppose I didn't clarify there. He was teleported to the Arena, like Sarge in the Quake 3 intro. I thought I read somewhere that you get taken to the Arena the moment before your death, I've must have come up with that myself. So he would've died moments after diving into the river. Appearing on the ship was the memory he needed in order to know what happened all along. Thanks for asking that!