<:: Sam Waters ::>

[Zardoz]

Name: Samuel Waters
CID: #89572
DOB: 20/08/1978
Height: 6'0" (182cm)
Weight: 192 lbs (87kg)

Current Assignment: Worksite 14, Manual Labor

Relatives

James Waters | Brother | Stalkerized
Maria Waters | Wife | Deceased
Jessica Waters | Daughter | Deceased
Elinor Simmons | Partner | Deceased

Citizen Record

148 - Resisting Arrest
245 - Assault with a deadly weapon
502 - Driving under the influence
507 - Public Non-Compliance
56 - Criminal Damage
63 - Criminal Trespass
187 - Homicide​

 

[Zardoz]

Encounters (16/05/2021)

█ - Friends | █ - Acquaintances | █ - Enemies | █ - Deceased

█ Lucas Leavitt - Supposed leader of this crew, on talking terms with him
█ Derrick Ramos - Rough around the edges but is aware of the situation
█ Demitra Kuryakin - Hard worker who served him his drinks
█ Vakhtang Aslanishvili - Owes him for the bar tab
█ Thomas Sanchez - Bit of a misfit
█ James Doyle - Barely knows the guy but he seems alright
█ Vortigaunt Prophet - Sent him on a wild goose chase
█ Himself - Self explanatory
█ Mark Schoenfield - Met his makers, no longer his problem
█ Karol Nordinstrom - Wondered what kept Sam going
█ Kairos Agon - She has had a tough time with the man then a change of heart
█ Brooklyn McGowan - Patched up his wounds
█ OTF.BAT6-COMM.62665 - Wished he was there to finish him off
█ OTF.BAT6-QUISLING.12703 - Forced him to remember​

 

[Zardoz]

Yeah, that's a good idea Sam. Go run off into the portal- reminisce about a life you no longer have. Maybe, just maybe, you'll save your deadbeat brother unless he's some pawn for this thing's machinations.

Hell, I don't even know if it was gateway or a light bulb. Maybe I consumed that much scotch the sun was playing tricks on my eyes again and I just ended up hallucinating the whole damn thing.

Egh.. guess I better get a move on. James is no doubt getting his teeth pulled out by now and I'm hopelessly lost, if it even is James that is. Monkey's paw bullshit. It'll no doubt be a clone or something, probably waiting for me with a 1911 that has my name written on it on the business end.

Ugh... well shit.




SUBJECT: SAM WATERS
STATUS: MIA, LAST SEEN 02/17/21
LOCATION: UNKNOWN

​

 

[Zardoz]

Seeing the city up ahead gave me a false sense of hope, the kind of hope you get when you thought you had it all figured out. Instead it turns out that hope you had has about as much shelf life as the last bottle of Jim Beam you pissed away. No, I was no where near James' location nor did I expect much of a welcome party by the local residents.

Something about this whole place felt off, the only work in town seemed to go to the electricians but I doubt those lights were running out of any sense of civic duty or overtime pay. Bullets, bombs, soldiers and cops, everyone was fair game until all the bodies dropped, and there I was alone once more. Not even dispatch could figure out who killed who.

I was more than willing to do my part and add to the statics but for whatever reason I shoved in a new magazine. Everyone said their piece with their pieces and had left this place behind in one way or another. Partisan forces and Combine soldiers fought it out and I missed the party. In a city of fools and misfits, it was only fitting the clown of the circus had arrived as the final act. Then again involving myself in another run from the cops was the last thing anyone needed. Only cop I had sympathy for was the poor bastard that had to write up the report.

I kept searching in my now reduced state of being a scavenger, hoping my trip did not overstay its welcome no matter the alternative. Instead of searching for diaries detailing steamy affairs or tax write offs, it was back to the old bottle. With my supplies now depleted all that was left was a packet of smokes and my own company. Sooner or later those cancer sticks will kill me if those tunnels wont.

Only one thing left behind, an old busted up radio. It functioned about as well as the TV reception in a brothel from Amsterdam. Without any options left I travelled back through those tunnels where your chances of ending up as a reanimated corpse only goes up tenfold. Then again I was not doing a bad job already.

Witnessing glimpses of my own mortality and listening to my ineptitude on the airwaves made one thing clear to me...


...this place was a bad joke, and I was the punchline to it all.






SUBJECT: SAM WATERS
STATUS: MIA, LAST HEARD 03/03/21
LOCATION: UNKNOWN​

 

[Zardoz]

Memories are regrets, even the good ones. You never really know how good you had it until you realize that you are knee-deep in alien shit and about to visit the second world, and you don't need an interdimensional wormhole for that. Pissing my life away in Vakh's bar was heaven compared to this. Jumping through that portal was what first roped me into this whole damn mess. It was true that I was not going to any high places before, though I now learned that just as you crawl out of one hole you are just as prone to slipping into another. No matter how deep the pit sank, you could always go lower.

Strange tentacle creatures and all the other unfortunate bastards were trapped down here before me decided to throw a party for their new special guest, a fat drunk that should have known better. It was hard for me to tell who enjoyed each other's company the least. All I knew is that whenever you joined a dinner venue with fleshy alien monstrosities it was not going to end with confetti or a slice of cake. Maybe putting a bullet or two into them was some solace at making amends. At one time or another I dedicated my life to protecting and rescuing others from oblivion, solving people's problems. All I really ended up doing was going into one Hell after another trying to boil each equation to a binary output.

It had been around twenty or so years since that day. She had been dead longer than I knew her but I was still mad for them not taking me with her. If saving people meant putting them out of their misery then I ought to have followed that mantra to its logical conclusion, doing myself and others a favor. Those creatures were just about to follow through on that notion before another green flash of light penetrated into the biomass of the chamber I had become entangled in. Old habits die hard, and doing what I did best I jumped from one shithole to the next. No rest for the wicked.

There was not even a moment to blink as the particle orb transported me to the surface of some other city, even more decayed and ruined than the last. Eerie concrete tower blocks, decaying bumper cars, rusty ferris wheels and empty roads told an all too familiar story. Yet in a strange sense throughout the darkness of it all there was a ray of hope, even if I had not known it at the time. Grass, trees, and all other manner of plant life that was not trying to bite my ass grew from the cracks. Large hazard signs placed by the old authorities contradicted any sense of comfort and security yet life still flourished here, even more so without humanity or aliens trying to get in the way.

It was at that point I spoke too soon, the crackle and bang of bullets tore across the landscape. One had nearly sent me upstairs if the bastard was not such a bad shot, maybe it was just my luck or own sheer stupidity that kept me going. I darted across the road with barely any bullets of my own to my name, it was an unequal exchange but an exchange I was used to. My major crime had been checking off at an unauthorized port of entry with no visa and a ton of duty free that I smuggled across the border. At least these black mask cops were honest about the whole betraying humanity thing, everyone back at the worksite seemed to forget that whole business.

Each ember of spark flying off the metal doors and fencing of the tower I was scaling told me a straightforward narrative. Far more comfortable knowing who was out to destroy you even if the sharp implications were to ever meet my legs or brainbox. This fight continued up until the rooftops and there was no way to backdown now. I just had to act tougher than I looked and cross the gap in any way I could. Between it all the steep drop only reminded me that there was just as many ways to meet a swift end here as there were slow ones. I launched myself across at that moment, eyes shut and oblivious, it did not matter where I landed. The disbelief of my assailant bought me the final second to get some peace and quiet with another thud. Still not as bad as my last block in Queens.

Karol, Kairos, Mark, James, Brooklyn, Vakh, Sanchez, Ramos, Lucas and all the names that meant something to me at one point or another were gone. Here I was alone on a one way-trip to a messy end. It was at my lowest when I was flying at my highest.

​

 

[Zardoz]

I I

- - -

<< R E W I N D

- - -

> P L A Y

- - -

"I was tired... dead tired. Far distant eyes looked beyond mine and it suddenly became clear that the vortigaunts were not bullshitting. The world really was a stage and as soon as I saw those lines of ones and zeroes flashing towards me it was going to end exactly like how it began, with a loud bang. Akin to my experience with all women, lady luck would eventually leave me too. I released my finger from the trigger and then... it was over."

Spoiler: OOC

Forgot to update this but I was not sure how to end the story. Probably will be the last post here.

​

 

[yoursteamfriend.royce]

Pov: Ramos at the bar later that night.

 

[Zardoz]

I I

- - -

>> F O R W A R D

- - -

> P L A Y

- - -

Spoiler: Darkness

"Darkness, that old familiar feeling, a constant companion lurking in the backdrop of most people's lives whether they chose to recognise it or deny it. For me darkness was the only way to tell if someone was human, before and after the world went to shit several times over. You could either recognise it for what it is or ignore it, a common dilemma at the worksite. As for myself there was not much room left for imagination, I was more done up in misery than a mardi gras flotilla when the saints stopped marching in. Indeed, the saints would not be marching in anytime soon as a bright flash of light washed over us. Turns out that fate has a sick twisted sense of irony, the story of my life, all after being rescued from one purgatory to the next."

"It was all so sudden the realisation that I threw it all away again. I thought I saw her face smiling at mine, but instead two eyes morphed into three, more like a beast toying with its prey. No it was that 'Saint' alright, or whichever the thing it professed to go by, Prophet, Demon, God, Demon God or all of them wrapped in one. Hell, why not both? If dying was not already a big kick to the balls then it was finding out that Scientologists were right all along. Looks like Lord Xenu here was going to have some words with me, perhaps striking another Faustian bargain? I already struck one, the question now was if the devil was here to reap his dues?"




"I had no reason to doubt their connection to the other world, the incorporeal one that is, after all I seen it with my own eyes. Instead of chastising me the beast had reassured that I done as asked... for now. It would repay me this one time which confused the Hell out of me. One moment I had pulse shots ripping out, one going through my head, then the next thing? A sharp stinging sensation which viscerally pulled me from this brief bleak void to where I had died. Although if this alien truly knew, I would be back in Jersey around twenty years ago rotting away in a bar. No, I was back in Russia once again."

"The fighting where my body fell was raging further down in the bunker complex, gunshots and explosions becoming more dim and distant. I felt around for my gun which I could not find for the newfound life of me, a newfound life soon to expire. Last time I had checked my birth certificate did not come from a cat sanctuary so it is safe to assume there was not going to be a third. never mind ninth chance. Those dropships inbound for the bunker was carrying reinforcements with not a single friendly soul in sight. Scarcely had I anytime to remove my jacket to assess the damage, but maybe Overwatch would be fooled into thinking they finally got my ass. It turns out you can only really get so far when shot in the leg and with a bullet shaped hole in your head where the answers should be."

"For once I had to let them take me to the dark fortress, one of many headquarters in the empire of this whole sordid mess. There was no real way I was getting out of this one but I figured the Prophet did not rescue my life just for me to throw it away. For now I trusted whichever scheme my benefactor had, as much as I did not want to, in the lack of better options I went along. Even for soulless cyborgs they were very hands on, far more than their brain washing implied. I am not sure what freaked me out more in all honesty, the humans that collaborated in building this or that I was about to learn the true meaning of purgatory."

"So, this was it? Green liquid. A giant vat of the stuff, behind a glass barrier. Wounds that were bound to get infected at some point or another started sealing up. They were healing me in captivity, and for what? It was hard to make out anything through the lens of thick green sludge, but the prisoner pods on the wall did not offer much reassurance. Inside the prison holding bay I was about to meet the same fate as my brother James before me, they just needed to make sure their specimen was fully stable and sterile."

"Days, weeks, maybe even a month? Time becomes a blur as it did back in Vahk's bar and many others, although this time with a nastier drink. Soon enough my captors removed me from this prison into another, a far more harsh prisoner pod, wrapped in an iron maiden for processing. Now sitting in darkness I await my fate. I could only hope the Prophet had not sold me out even after finding my brother for him... only now does it make sense."

"The darkness returns but this time I am not afraid of it. For even this shall pass."



​