Machine Called Human

Contract: Shedding Monster

A city fallen to sudden martial law and disarray from an unknown virus grew into anarchy and complete war between rival gangs and fending civilians. CDC units teamed with the military National Guard and private military contractors held down quarantine zones and forward operating bases, both of which held civilians - the forward operating bases, though, was very limited to civilian population. Electrical plants in the area were vandalized, sewage was disconnected, and water had grown limited. The streets were patrolled by gangs who fought over turfs, and National Guardsmen who surveyed routes for transport and civilian makeshift safehouses.

Alpha Providence, the world's largest and advanced private military company, was one of the few contracted mercenary groups to help aid the American city of Detroit in restoring order and helping the CDC and National Guard with any help they would need to counter this unknown virus. However, only three teams were inserted from Alpha Providence - one advanced and highly trained Freelance unit (consisting of six operatives, plus one) and two Conventional Units (consisting of twenty-four operatives). So far, things have been hard as the National Guard have been pulled back, for the most part, due to losses and heavy reliance on the PMCs contracted into the city.

Out of the three PMCs placed in the city to help the CDC and National Guard, Alpha Providence had been pulling most of the weight and taking hard hits. So far, they had accomplished dismantling a human trafficking infrastructure within the city from captured civilians, some of which were already sickened from the virus. Water was restored in most quarantine zones and FOBs, more transport routes were secured, and an entire local gang had been wiped and detained with the help from Academi forces.

The Freelance Unit had gone on with little to no sleep, the seven man unit hopping from one objective to the next. These so-called Freelancers were specially trained and selected within the Alpha Providence population, after all, and were prepared to take these hits.

However, after a certain quarantine zone had been overwhelmed by two gang groups teamed together, the Freelance unit had been tasked to secure the area and assure safety of potential civilians and CDC officers, which was situated at a local high school, while the two Conventional Units of Alpha Providence scattered with Academi and G4S units to restore electricity in the city after a large blackout. The Freelance unit were first greeted with a harsh fight outside the school perimeter, mainly with makeshift explosives, before finally reaching inside after the half hour long firefight.

There, all seven had split into groups of two to cover the school at a faster rate, though the commander of the group and lead of the unit, had went off himself to head to one of the largest rooms in the school - the cafeteria. As the lead, Logan "Pact" Pierce, had left his way, everyone else had went to different floors and buildings on the campus. It was a hard fight by himself, but Logan's sheer, strong will to save civilians and secure the area was his only priority in mind. He had to, no matter how many he had to kill just to reach the cafeteria, and no matter how much he has to lose.

Logan leaned against the wall as he covered his wounded side with his hard knuckled gloved hand. His ballistic mask was shattered nearly in half, displaying his left bloodshot, dark red eye and some of his white hair soaked in blood belonging to not just himself. The right socket of his mask was cracked over, the lens flickering a faint red light as the visual systems malfunctioned from the trauma done to the mask.

Some of his lower intestines had spilled out, though what remained of his APC vest had put enough pressure to keep his organs in, for the most part. His left knee was also shattered, bringing him to a hard limp, shrapnel peppering his right arm, and bullet holes on his shoulder, thigh, and right forearm pooling blood against the floor. Even so, his only two weapons was a lightly modded M4 rifle and an axe - yes, an axe.

He removed his hand from his wounded side to pick up the axe that leaned against the wall and growled a low, pained growl as he dragged his bad leg with each harsh limp. He limped towards a set of double doors within the school-turned-quarantined shelter and pushed his weight against it, the doors flying open. Inside the large cafeteria were the local gang grunts banging on the sealed doors to the kitchen and assaulting civilians that didn't manage to escape inside the kitchen facilities.

It was dark outside, about two in the morning, with a majority of the lights flickering, fighting to stay alive from the severed emergency electricity. The thugs all turned to Logan's heavily wounded entrance just as he turned his back to them slowly. He didn't use to axe to bar the doors, but rather his rifle, locking it between the handles firmly and slowly bent - yes, bent - the butt stock and barrel to lock the weapon in place. It took a harsh fight against his wounds to put strength into just that.

"Who the fuck is that?" Some of the thugs questioned, raising their blunt weapons and pistols at Logan's back. The lights flickered, staying off for a fewseconds before flickering back on. This time, only little bulbs remained flickering. "Buddy, the fuck? You is dead already homie!" Everyone laughed as the beaten, nervous civilians looked at Logan with eyes of little hope.

"Dead?" Logan said in a low, gravelly tone from the blood staining his throat that made it sound even more evil and villainous. What was more was the malfunctioning mask creating his voice to sound deeper and less human. The heavily wounded mercenary turned towards the thugs, dragging the axe against the ground. "Dead..." The malfunction eye socket of his mask was the only thing seen flickering that faint red color as the lights had shut off, all electricity within the structure completely dead. Then, that flickering red eye had ceased, as well.

Those armed with pistols and small arms opened fire, muzzle flashes faint but giving just enough light to see that he wasn't there. "Yo, yo! He's fucking gone, stop shooting!" One of the thugs said. "The fuck the lights at? Who got a flashlight?" Another said in the complete dark room - no lights outside were on, the majority of the city completely dark. Not even the moon was visible in the dark sky. "You guys hear shit or is that just me-...!"

The sound of flesh tearing and a bone or two snapping broke the last speaker off as the back tip of the axe had swung through his throat and sent him flying into another group of thugs, as if Logan had used the axe as a baseball bat. "Holy shit, THE FUCK HAPP-...!?" The voice was cut off from a hacking sound against flesh, followed by a stab - the axe's cutting end slammed and cut across the thug's stomach followed by the back, picking end rising up beneath his jaw.

Everyone began shooting frantically, some shouting to stop as friendly fire was exchanged within the gang under the pitch darkness. Another scream, this time more lady like, ceased all gunfire, followed by one of the lights above shattering. The sound of a snapping cable then came about, with a loudthud.

The wounded mercenary tore through the panicking thugs with his dulling axe. He stabbed, tore, broke, and beat each thug individually beneath complete darkness. Logan had swung his axe in a golf club like fashion against the back of a distressed thug, sending him flying towards the barred door. A few grunts and cries of fear were heard from that direction, indicating some were trying to escape. Silence fell, until the sound of a footstep with a drag of another foot and something wet and heavy plopped against the floor, these sounds growing closer and closer. The socket of his mask flickered a faint red again, a few thugs managing to thrust themselves towards the source with the means to fight.

To be less descriptive, that doorway had become a bloodbath and scream filled, obscene sounding mess. Communications inside Logan's mask were a hard static, but he could barely make out what was being said. The city's electrical layout was secured and brought back online. The lights flickered on, the civilians looking around as they were dirtied even more with blood not their own.

Bodies were strewed about three cafeteria, some splayed out on tables. One man hung from a cable above, his intestines spilling down his feet with a liver shown resting on the bloodied floor right beneath him. An arm here, leg there, and a head rested in front of a CDC operative stripped of his protective suit. The operative shouted in fear.

Logan dropped on the floor now, his axe clattering against the blood puddled ground. The door in front of him, which the rifle and some bodies had blocked, slammed a few times as someone on the other side tried to get in. "Boss, the civilians safe?! Pact?!" That was the voice of Night Watch, Logan's right hand. The civilians were relieved to he safe from the assaults, but they were also terrified. They didn't see Logan as a hero as he is now and what he had done, but more of a monster, from the horrors strewn about the cafeteria room.