The Marine and his Attachments - A Satire

[crono23]

In the far corners of the galaxy, where few men dared to roam, a lone ship belonging to the United States Colonial Marines drifted into the area. It had picked up a faint distress signal a few weeks earlier, and with it's duty being peacekeeping in such desolate areas, it decided to investigate.

But our story does not involve this military ship, but rather, two soldiers that were a part of said ship. A young private known by nothing other than 'Barry', and a Requisitions Officer who nobody knew the name of.

Now Barry loved his attachments. He loved them more than he loved his own mother. On every single mission, real or simulated, Barry would try to be first in line to the Requisitions Office to select an assortment of Attachments for the field.

However, on this specific mission, the Requisitions Officer of said ship had ran into some trouble. Recently his supply of attachments had been dwindling, partly due to the ship's distance from the nearest military outpost, but also due to the reliability of the marines to loose their attachments in the field. He had tried many times to get in contact with USCM High Command, in the vain hopes he could acquire a new shipment of attachments, but to no avail.

By this point in our story, the RO was truly fearful. He knew his marines were so accustomed to attachments that he had no idea how they would act if he told them he simply had none to hand out. However, there was a glimmer of hope in the form of one last crate of the things. A crate in which he hoped contained enough attachments to tide over the marines for one last mission.

However, as he opened the crate supposedly containing the last attachments on the entire ship, his blood ran cold. It was completely empty. He quickly checked the rest of the crates in the area, fearing it might have been mislabeled. It was not. There were no attachments on the ship at all, and just his luck, Barry the marine was currently first in the waiting line.

Shivering heavily with dread, the RO slowly walked over to his desk, his right hand on the grip of his pistol in case things went south. Barry greeted the RO with his signature smile, but said nothing. Not that anything needed to be said. The RO knew with complete certainty that Barry was expecting the usual smorgasborg of attachments, one that did not exist at this crucial point in time.

"Barry..." The RO began slowly. "...It is with...great regret...that I must inform you there are no more...attachments..."

The smile instantly vanished from Barry's face. "No attachments?" He inquired. "That's impossible, surely there's something? Although I do enjoy the joke RO!"

The RO slowly began to reach for the button controlling the shutters to his desk. He knew exactly what would happen next. "I'm afraid it's not Barry...we are completely out of attachments."

For several tense seconds Barry and the RO exchanged glances. Nothing else happened. You could hear a pin drop. Slowly, Barry took a few steps back. The RO's hand shivered to the point where it seemed like it would fall off his arm.

Barry took a long deep breath while slowly removing his pulse rifle from it's resting spot on his armor. "If there are no attachments." He said with terrifying calmness. "THEN I WILL FUCKING TEAR YOU LIMB FROM LIMB!"

Thankfully, the RO pressed the button fast enough to avoid a face full of lead, but it was not enough to stop the sounds. Where it was once quiet, he could now hear guns shooting, marines banging on the shutters, people punching each other and even screaming. There had been a Military Police Officer outside last he checked, but the RO knew for a fact the unfortunate MP was dead at this point.

However, despite the sounds of rioting outside, one sound seemed to be louder than all the others. A strange ticking sound, like a clock. Realization dawned on the RO and he ran faster than he ever ran before, vaulting a table and flipping it behind him, just narrowly making it to the cargo hangar as the C4 blew apart the flimsy metal shutters protecting the RO from the ravenous marines outside.

With nothing to stop the tide of rabid marines, they flowed in like a wave, led by Barry who was foaming at the mouth and screaming in ways that no human ever should be able to make. They immediately set about destroying things. Glass, paper, tables, and the long-empty attachments vendor were all reduced to rubble, with a terrifying efficiency never before seen from ordinary humans.

While the marines razed his working space, the RO cowered inside a powerloader, thumb in mouth in an effort not to make any sounds that might alert the horde to his position. He considered turning the mech on and using against the marines, but he knew there were far too many for him to feasibly survive. Instead he watched, unable to do anything as the marines turned his once-tidy cargo hangar into a picture from hell: crates and boxes strewn everywhere, fires burning all around, and marines laughing and screaming as they ran around the once-tidy display, shooting their guns in the air and occasionally going at each other.

However, as these events unfolded, the Chief Engineer just down the hall stared from under his desk as he watched the marines rioting in the hallways. The entirety of the ships police force were shoved into a corner, lifeless eyes staring in the direction of the savage animals they had attempted to tame.

Realizing there was no hope for the ship at this point, the CE quickly dashed into the room containing the Supermatter Engine. He immediately got to work, bashing the gas coolers in with a crowbar and setting the emitter to fire at the supermatter with speed rarely seen by the piece of equipment. Lastly, he dragged a phoron tank onto one of the many injectors and attached it to the device, watching with satisfaction as a sickly orange gas filled the SM chamber.

And it was not a moment too soon. The CE's head quickly turned towards the sound of an explosion, staring with horror as more rabid marines flowed into the engine room and began shooting at him. Without a second to spare, the CE put his crowbar through the pipe connecting the tank and the injector, and withdrew his welder from the toolbelt around his waist. The last thing he saw was bright orange as searing pain engulfed him and the screams of burning marines reached his ears.

The ship exploded violently, the SM detonation providing more than enough power to tear the ship apart. The few marines that survived were cooked by radiation, killing them quickly. A sad fate if not for the fact that the destruction of the ship was caused simply by a lack of attachments.

Written in the spur of the moment. I do hope you enjoyed, and please remember that attachments are not worth your life.

[Surrealistik]

please remember that attachments are not worth your life.

Yes they are.

[Biolock]

I loved it, and I want to hear about how the survivors ended up in one last stanza.

[Karmac]

Truly inspirational, those marines are a shining example of competency in a sea of idiots and Sulaco Staff.

[Eenkogneeto]

10/10 Would riot again

[Renomaki]

A sight I witness all too often, sadly...

Thankfully admins are attempting to curb this.. Mostly.