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Author's Note: Again I want to reiterate the warning I issued previously. If language, battle scenes, or mild gore descriptions bother you then please discontinue reading. Thanks to djkauf for editing. This will be my last post for a little. I will continue to work on this story so that when I return I will be able to post all the way to the ending. Have a Happy New Year!

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July 5, 2032
It was the middle of the night before I managed to regain some presence of mind. I knew I would have to do something with the Determiner bodies to reclaim some sense of humanity. With tears running down my face I drag the lifeless bodies together into a pile when I freeze, hearing a sound on the first floor of the building. The clanging of stockpiling weapons and going through cabinets can be heard. I quietly pick up the blades I dropped in realization of my kills and make my way to the top of the steps. The voices being cast up the stair well are human and not military.

From the sounds it’s only two people. “I wonder how big a group of Determiners it was that managed to kill all these Beag. Must ‘ave been one with a lot of balls to risk going hand to hand on them. Ya think it’s another group going for that weapon we were told about?”

“Why the hell would they send another group for a god damn weapon?”

“There were two groups that we killed already, so who’s to say there weren’t more? Maybe the Beag killed a couple, too?”

“That’s a lot uh effort for some piece of shit gun. They probably just wanted to send a bunch of people expecting some to get killed on the way. After all they has to go through our territory and Beag territory and there ain’t nobody makin’ it through our place.”

“Except that one group of people a couple nights ago who killed a couple of our leaders after we finally managed to get a meeting with some Beag commanders. God damn Determiners messing everything up, if it wasn’t for them we wouldn’t even have to worry about the Beag.”

“Like we would actually manage to get peace with the Beag. My guess is the meeting would have involved us being sold as slaves or selling out our friends to kill us all. Now shut your trap and let’s get this done before we get caught.”

Softly I sit down on the top step in thought. The Gremlins are trying to make peace with the Beag? Don’t they know we’ve tried that? It ended in the death of all our leaders who attended the meeting; stupid humans. I flinched, I knew my mind was changing some too, but since when did I stop aligning any part of me as human. I have to stop whatever is happening to me, I don’t want to turn into a monster.

I hear the Gremlin’s begin to ascend the stairs. Idiots, how have they managed to stay alive this long without being careful? I should erase these pathetic excuses of life from existence and purge my city of their filth. Shaking my head to banish those types of thoughts I see the glowing body of one round the corner in the stairs. Seeing my silhouette on the stairs from the moon shining through the windows, he freezes. My eyes lock on his. He pulls the trigger on his gun while he yells out to his partner, “Beag!”

Several shots land in my abdomen, two in my arms and one in the hardened faceplate. My breathing doesn’t change, just slow consistent breathes of a hunter unafraid of its prey. As another shot lands in my shoulder I lunge forward down the stairs and use the blade I developed on the outside of my right arm to rip his throat out in a backhand. The cut, while not as effortless as using the circle blades, gave a satisfying gush and I could not help but break out in a smile of pleasure.

The other Gremlin now has me in his sights and opens fire, catching me in the hip and arm until I use my right arms blade in a downward punching motion slicing him from neck to groin. His lifeless body falls backwards down the stairs while the first body slumps to the ground. I know that I should feel bad for killing a human, but these are Gremlins, worthless creatures that have no place in my city. Crying out in frustration at my own mind’s flip flop between being human and alien I break into a run to get away from my mess. Why is this happening to me? I’ve turned into some crazed freak that gets off on ripping people apart. Oh and to sweeten the deal let’s throw in a vagina and boobs.

The buildings become a blur as I stop paying attention to where I am while my mind continues to implode in self loathing. I run out into the middle of a street and see a group of four Facpor and twenty commanders accompanying a type of Beag I have never seen before. Standing roughly ten feet in height and built with sleek muscles, I notice this type is different in style. Where the warriors are based in number, the Facpor in strength, the commanders in endurance, and the terrorlings in range this type looks to be a combination of all those plus, with its larger head, an intelligence beyond the others.

It takes all of us a moment before we realize what is going on. All Beag heads turn to this new type awaiting orders of some kind when I realize I have just stumbled upon the leader. With a narrowing of the leader’s eyes, five commanders break off to take me. Several shots are fired in my direction and I don’t even flinch when they hit my stomach in the same positions as previously healed wounds. As my faceplate closes I feel the corner of my lip perk up into a maniacal smile. I know this is a hopeless situation and that I should run for my life but I want to die trying. Maybe, if by some miracle, I manage to kill this leader I will have redeemed myself from the horrible things I have done. If I can’t, then I will be doing the world a favor by eliminating a monster.

I run straight at the group of five while the rest of the Beag watch. I pull out my circle blades as more bullets rain down feeling like nothing more than cotton balls. I slice through the first three commanders with ease knowing their sweet spots and rookie tactics. The last two pull out their own blades and swing at me. Blocking with my own blades I move to the side of one and punch him in the wrist while his friend tries to move around him to get at me. I spin putting my back to both of them and slice through the spine of my shield with my left hands blade. The commander in the back attacks now that I am around his friend only to be met with my right arm’s block and me dragging my backhand claw down his arm to his neck. I turn to face the Beag leader and with a sharp yank I feel the commander’s spine rip. As his body falls the world goes a little fuzzy and I almost fall over. Looking down to my stomach I see many bullet holes with a trail of blood for each. The sheer number of holes has slowed my healing but as I watch I see more and more holes close leaving more alien flesh beneath.

I look back up to their leader in challenge hoping, he sends another couple to their slaughter. He regards me with greater significance, no longer looking at me like a bug needing to be squashed but a formidable foe. I break into a run towards the leader, taking the lull in combat as my chance to get close before a torrent of bullets falls upon me. With a motion of the leaders hand a single Facpor moves to intercept. With a swing of one of its mighty hands I feel the ground beneath me rumble which would cause a human to stumble but I continue straight on my course. I hit with one of my circle blades into the Facpor’s forearm only for it to sink a quarter inch and hit something hard enough to break the blade. Shocked at such a tough hide he manages to knee me, tossing me back to my original position. I land on my back feeling like someone just punched me in the stomach despite my toughened hide.

The Facpor runs at me while I get to a crawling position. When only a couple yards are left I lunge forward and duck under its right arm. I drag my backhand blades down the ribcage of the beast. Unlike the circle blades I feel these blades sink through the hard barrier into soft flesh. With a roar in pain the Facpor continues forward from its momentum and falls in a heap behind me. I turn and run to my downed enemy. It swings its huge hands to swat me away but I slice through one of its shoulder causing its arm to flop useless from me having hit a vital tendon of some kind. Using its other hand to swing I fly backwards and feel my back hit a mailbox. I taste blood in my mouth and look up with slow eyes seeing my enemy trying to regain use in its arm. Looking over at me I see surprise on its face at my ability to survive, “Just die Surra!”

My surprise at yet again understanding a Beag is cut only by the fact I can tell this Facpor is female. Looking at the other Beag I finally notice that all the warriors I recognize as male while all the Facpor I see are female. My mind makes the connection, they aren’t different races coexisting, but the Facpor is the female of the species and the small warrior the male. Shaking away the thoughts I try to focus my mind on the combat, on showing all here I am the owner of this city. With a strained effort I stand and walk towards my rising foe. When I meet her she swings with her one good arm and then tries to step on me. With one foot forward I take the chance to cut where the Achilles tendon would be and am rewarded with the Facpor falling to its knees. Using one of its heels as a step I leap up on her back and disable the other arm. In an effort to get me off she shifts her weight shaking me lose. I land on the ground gracefully and look towards my audience. With a quiet primal growl I sink my claw in the lower abdomen and rake my way up to the chin leaving intestines falling out as I go. As I reach the end of my cut, the massive body falls to the ground. It wriggles a couple seconds before all life vanishes. Fear me, for this city is mine and I protect what is mine.

The Beag leader emits a growl in anger at my display. I take my opportunity to rush the leader. I get within an arm’s length when I feel a swing from an extra two sets of arms connect in my face and stomach sending me over a building. As I see the roof of a building rushing towards me I am met with darkness.

~o~O~o~

I awake with a pounding head, every pulse of blood sending a branch of pain in my skull. I open my heavy eyelids and find myself looking up at a ceiling that has a body sized hole. I try to move my body but find it unresponsive. I will some part to move but nothing happens. Paralyzed from the neck down in this kind of place would be really bad. I try to move for several more minutes before I settle myself for a moment. Giving up hope of ever being able to walk again I feel death acceptance creep into my mind. My body’s self preservation kicks in, washing through my mind. I will kill those scums for daring challenge me in my city. With a loud crack and jerking of my neck I start to feel sensations in my body. The rush of broken bones, internal bleeding, pieces of wood sticking through my thigh and burning lungs makes my throbbing headache feel like a pinprick.

With each crack of bone and contortion of muscle I feel a pleasurable pain course across my skin as my body manages to rebuild itself. I hear heavy foot falls outside and manage to drag my body across the floor towards the rear exit. “Find the Surra. I want its skull as proof they still exist.”

I make it to the doorway before my body regains full functionality. I stand up and run across the street away from the small army of Beag. They will pay for their insolence. They may have won this fight but I will be back for them and I will use their bodies as proof of my superiority. I don’t even care if I’m not thinking entirely human; as long as my thoughts are focused on killing Beag instead of humans I’m comfortable. The blood rage carries happiness for the death and destruction of war. As a human I blindly accepted the good and the bad but now I thrive in the bad. The Beag are as bad as they come and will make a delectable fight before I move to the battered and weak humans.

In my escape I run into a small scouting party of warriors. Even in my injured state they prove to be nothing more than bugs, easily purged and put on display. I take a piece of their bracer armor and use it to cover my biceps. I move my arm a couple times to test my range of motion and find it unencumbered. I know the sounds of the fight will draw attention so I quickly run, with my now fully healed body, towards the heart of the city.

~o~O~o~

July 4, 2032
Kilp:
After losing Mast we met up with the Armored Company again. They had already integrated the ionization weapon into a tank. With a large group of twenty soldiers, including experienced Determiners and people from the more rural parts; we were briefed on escorting the tank to the heart of the city where we would be setting up a base of defense. Now that we had a weapon they knew could successfully kill a Facpor, because they tested it on one, we were going to take the fight to them. As we packed up the Hummers with large stashes of collected ammo and all the food and medical supplies we have left there was silence in the air. Everyone knew this was our last stand. While other cities may still have teams managing to survive this was our last chance to take back the city. Atace informed us that if we failed to defend this weapon the schematics were already onboard the ship so they could start having other teams build their own. Even with that knowledge I couldn’t help but get the sense we had already lost. We lost our friends and family. We lost our humanity. And now we were going to lose our lives.

July 5, 2032
We rode straight into the city. Red was in my Hummer driving while I operated the gun. His male brain was so focused on driving that he didn’t talk. I missed his jokes that kept me from focusing on the constant threat of dying but I diligently stayed alert to every motion. We mauled through groups of warriors and commanders losing few with our extra firepower. A Facpor flipped a vehicle before having an unfortunate encounter with an ionization weapon, frying the life out of it. When we ran into a group of Terrorlings; we lost the use of two cars because their acid ate through the axle but we didn’t lose anyone. Arriving at the construction site that was selected for our base around lunchtime we set up a perimeter.

It wasn’t long before small bands of Beag showed up to try and break up our gathering, but with a tank able to fire without recoil consequences they were melted quickly. It turned out that the weapon didn’t even have to reload so they were able to fire semi-automatically killing two or three at a shot.

We also attracted friends who were surviving groups of Determiners, who offered to help us defend so our company grew past my ability to count. It looked like we actually might have a chance until one of the last groups to arrive told us that the Beag were organizing to take us out. They said groups larger than they had ever seen were organizing and closing in around us leaving us completely surrounded.

A large group of us sat together eating our last meal talking over all the things we missed from before the war. All the places we wished we had gone or the people we wished we had met under different circumstances. My thoughts drifted to Mast; I wish I had met him before this war. He was a good guy I would have loved to have been friends with, but that’s in the past and won’t ever be. I wonder where he is right now, hopefully still alive.

My thoughts are broken when the conversation turns to a competition over who has seen the worst spectacle of death. I told them about the time we found bodies that were disemboweled on top of their own heads. Tap talked about watching twenty Determiners get squashed by a Facpor. It was someone else who was called the winner however; they had seen a Beag kill twenty five of its brethren so it could kill the remaining few Determiners. He said he only managed to survive because he was in the building across the street when this went down in an effort to supply flanking support. My guess is from how often he flinches he was hiding in that building bawling his eyes out.

We have all seen a lot of terrible events but we all grow silent while we consider the thought of a Beag who would kill all its own men in an effort to kill a human. It’s Red who breaks the silence, “Just show him a nude picture of Kilp, bet he drools long enough to get zapped.” Everyone chuckles while I punch him in the arm.