Shards of Memory

I squeezed my eyes shut as a fresh gust of freezing snow was blown into my eyes, obscuring my vision and adding to the burning sensation on my skin. The clothing I had been given didn't offer much protection; the scarf was soaking wet, and my goggles had frosted over. The raging blizzard made it almost impossible to see my destination, at the bottom of a large mountain. I sat perched at the top, shivering uncontrollably from the icy gusts of wind that constantly buffeted my soaking uniform. The shivering was already pretty violent, and I was beginning to feel a little light-headed, my muscles miscoordinated. Hypothermia was already kicking in, a sign that I need to hurry my ass up.

Just that morning, I sat in the cozy office of the head of the Department of Defense, sipping from a mug of steaming hot coffee. We had discussed the importance of my mission; I was to infiltrate and sabotage a Russian military research facility, located in central Serbia. I dreaded the trip, of course; weather conditions in Serbia during the winters was known to be extremely brutal and unpredictable. A few weeks back, Russia's President, Vladimir Putin, had officially issued a threat to launch thermonuclear weapons at the United States if the US didn't retract it's forces from the country. Of course, it didn't sit well with President Obama. A spy that had been stationed in Potevka got word of a mysterious facility being used for experimentation. What they were doing exactly was, of course, highly classified. Which is why they sent me there. And now, after an eleven and a half hour flight from the Frankfurt International Airport to Moscow, and a four hour drive to Potevka, here I am, on top of a snowy mountain and freezing to death.

Forcing myself to stand up, which was not easy, due to the hypothermic reaction in my muscles, I started the descent down a slope of soft, fresh snow. The movement helped to warm me up, lowering the intensity of the shivering, but my limbs remained numb, and walking in a straight line proved to be a challenge. My thick, black coat was almost completely white, and despite the thickness, I felt moisture creeping down to my skin. I stumbled down an icy pathway, and slid the remainder of the way down, landing with a soft crunching noise as my body impacted the snow beneath. It was just a straight run to the base now; the blizzard would cover me.

The weight of the M4 Carbine on my shoulder fatigued me, increasing the difficulty of reaching the base. If it wasn't for the re-enforced, waterproof case it was in, the gun would have been ruined by now. All my ammunition was kept in a tightly sealed container, located in a waterproof satchel on my tactical utility belt. Also, at my right hip was the M9 pistol, and strapped on my chest was my customized SOG combat knife, recently sharpened and oiled. In an effort to keep my overall silhouette somewhat small, I was forced to use the standard issue Army body armor, to my extreme displeasure.

The heavy winds muffled the crunch crunch crunching of my combat boots as I sprinted head-on at the nearing building. My other two squad mates would meet me at the old service tunnel that we would be using to enter the facility; the door lock was rusted and in poor condition, and it was far enough away from the main base for the door satchel explosion to not be heard. After a few more minutes of stumbling through the knee-deep snow, I finally spotted the maintenance tunnel's entrance. Fighting back the raging exhaustion I had received from forcing my way through the blizzard, I picked up the pace a little bit. As I got closer, the area became more clear. I spotted three silhouettes, though they were facing the opposite direction from me, and I couldn't see who they were. However, I got this strange feeling in my gut, that I couldn't trust those men. I have no idea why, but there's this nagging feeling that something isn't right...

And then it struck me: I only had two other team members on this mission, and there were three men. They must have been compromised. I don't think I can take them in a fight head-on, and I definitely can't slow down and think anything through; I can feel the hypothermia getting worse. I have lost all feeling in my face and feet, and my legs were extremely numb, and almost too stiff to walk. The exposed flesh from my fingerless black gloves  was already taking on a blue tint. I needed to get inside, and fast. So, I sat down briefly, and weighed my options...

Opening fire wasn't an option; although the shots would be muffled, I don't want the gunpowder getting wet from the blizzard. And I still wasn't one hundred percent certain that these men were hostile; maybe they were my squad mates, and they were holding a guard prisoner. I decided to sneak up and see what the situation really was, and figure it out from there. I was still out of their earshot, so I ran about twenty five meters, and slowed down. It was difficult, but I finally managed to get close enough to the men to hear what they were saying. To my dismay, it wasn't in English.

"Я только собираюсь спрашивать еще раз ..., Вы только?" (I am only going to ask one more time... are you alone?) One man said, though I found it hard to understand, since the man spoke with a very odd dialect. A figure lay slumped in front of him, bloodied and frostbitten. I couldn't possibly recognize him from my current angle, but whoever it was was determined to keep quiet. Instead of answering the brute, he spat blood into his mouth. The man jumped back and spat it all out, grimacing. He ran up and kicked my squadmate in the jaw, knocking him down with an audible cracking sound. I could already feel me losing feeling in my body. The time for action was now. I grasped the black handle of my knife, ripped it out of it's resting place on my chest, and started to move towards my victim.

However, the environment was against me. Weak and numb from cold, I slipped on the snow and lost my balance, landing face first. The Russian man turned around and stumbled towards me; he seemed a little buzzed. I decided that he probably downed a bit to warm himself up, if he had to guard that door. I can't believe that we thought it would be so easy to get in; our scouts never mentioned anything about a guard, so we believed that we could just waltz right into to a top secret enemy military base. However, I didn't have time to wallow in my own stupidity, as a man twice my size was on his way to kick my ass. I had lost my knife from the fall; desperately, I looked around for it. My eyes fell upon something shiny; after a moment of adjusting, I decided it was my knife. On the ground for ten seconds, and already covered halfway in snow.

I stretched out my arm as far as I could; whether I touched the knife or not, I have no idea, because my fingers are far too numb to feel anything.

Why didn't I pack any winter gloves? I knew how bad it was here! I promised myself to bash my head into the wall for being such an idiot once I was out of Russia. A year of advanced training, and I didn't even consider the weather.

Clenching my teeth together, I slowly dragged myself towards the weapon. Getting back up wasn't an option for me. If it wasn't for the man's drunken stumbling, he would be on me right now, choking me to death while his friends cheered him on. Now, all I could see was the very tip of the knife, hanging out of the frozen cold. I reached out and grabbed it (which wasn't easy; I was shivering violently) and turned on my back, keeping the knife hidden from my oncoming assailant. With a start, I realized just how close he was to me.

Right when he was close enough to bend over and grab me, I kicked outwards, striking him on the side of the knee with a steel-toed boot. There was a shudder-inducing popping noise that sent a shiver down my spine, one I'm sure wasn't from the cold. He screamed and started falling right in my direction. Instinctively, I lifted the knife up, and he landed right on top of it. The cheering of his friends stopped after my assailant didn't get back up; only I knew of the knife plunged into his Adam's Apple. He was making some ghastly choking noises, trying to fight for air and losing. Blood was dripping onto my face; as sick as it made me, it's warmth definitely felt good. I forced the knife out of his throat (which took a little more effort than it should have). which released a lot more blood. Another man ran over to see what was happening, and I stabbed him in the leg. He fell, and I yanked his pistol out of his belt (like mine, he had the sense to keep it away from the snow) and used his uniform to shelter it from the cold. After putting the gun in the direction of his head and firing, I pointed at the last man standing, and fired three times into his chest. He collapsed without a sound.

I had to roll to get the body off of me; he weighed more than he seemed like he would; and he was pretty big. One of the Russian's captives stood up and ran towards me, hands tied behind his back.

"Hello, Grey." It was Second Lieutenant Mortimer, my best friend in the field. "Can you grab my knife and cut me free? Dumbasses didn't even disarm me."

With some effort, I managed to lift my arm to the knife and yank it out of his scabbard. Immediately, the small amount of added weight forced my hand to drop to the ground. Mortimer turned and grabbed the knife, and severed the rope himself. Then, he put the knife back, grabbed my shoulder, and lifted me up. After carrying me to the entrance and laying me on the floor, where I would be mostly sheltered from the cold due to the bunker surrounding the door, he wrapped my fingers up with a bandage, to keep the cold away. They were already frostbitten, no need to make them worse. I wiggled them, trying to get the feeling back into them. It definitely worked; it was very painful. But hey, at least my nerves hadn't shut down.

I lost my knife out in the snow. When we get inside, I won't be able to open fire. Only Mortimer wasn't freezing to death; they kept him where I am currently sitting, so he was mostly sheltered from the onslaught of arctic winds. My other squadmate, Jerry, was probably as bad as I was, if not worse from the beatings.

Now that I had regained some of the feeling in my arms, I yanked off my gloves and rubbed my hands together, to generate some warmth. Then, I stood up, stomped a few times, stretched my arms and legs, and brushed as much snow off of my uniform as possible. Feeling much better than before, and Jerry having been checked on, I gave the signal to move inside. The two nodded and blew open the door; before I entered myself, I made sure to rip the knife off of the second dead Russian.

There was heating inside. It was the best thing I had ever experienced in my entire life; despite the fact that it evoked pain from the sudden change from negative twenty degrees to about sixty degrees, at least I wasn't shivering anymore. The hallway was very old and sparsely used; the floor was covered in a thick coat of dust, and it was a little difficult to breathe. Old, rusty barrels stood in our way occasionally, as well as rotten, splintered wooden planks. There were steel doors located along the walls every fifteen or so feet, though most were either sealed or rusted shut. There was an odd, musty smell in the air. The rough concrete walls and rounded sealing felt constricting, and the choking dust particles in the air didn't do much to help.

"Hold up," Mortimer ordered, holding up his right hand, his left holding the M4 rifle to his chest. In front of him was a thick, hardwood door, with a simple bolt lock. Slowly sliding the bolt out of the socket, and flinching when it made a loud click noise, Mortimer slowly creaked the door open. After peeking his head out and doing a quick sweep of the area, he gave the all-clear, and Jerry and I followed him into the next corridor.

This one was obviously more important to the Russians than the other one; there were far more doors, and they were all labeled. Most of them were in Cyrillic or number coded. Since I had to take six months of Russian classes before undertaking this assignment, I could read most of them, though there were a few characters I couldn't quite decipher. However, nobody could be seen, which made me a little suspicious. Tightening the grip on my 'borrowed' combat knife, I continued to follow the other two.

"Where exactly are we going?" Jerry whispered, almost too quiet to hear.

"We're gonna follow this hallway until we find a room along the lines of 'Testing'," Mortimer responded.

Go figure. Taking time to read every sign and still keep a lookout for signs of trouble, we snuck down the hallway; it wasn't easy, as our wet boots squeaked on occasion. All of the rooms were empty of people.

"I'm getting major bad vibes from this place. There should be people everywhere, and yet we haven't seen a single doctor or soldier anywhere, save for the ones outside," I stated, keeping quiet just in case. "I'm getting kind of worried that these guys are gonna throw us a welcoming party sometime soon..."

"Nonsense. They can't possibly know we're here. They're probably at some... orientation, or something," Mortimer replied, though from the sound of his voice, there was no doubt that he shared my worries.

"We should thin out. More likely to get caught if we're all huddled together in one spot," I suggested. The other two nodded their acknowledgement and moved about the hall; Jerry going to the opposite end and into a wide shadow, and Mortimer lagging behind by quite a bit. The end of the hallway was getting closer and closer, and still nobody in sight.

"No. They would still have guards in an orientation. I think they're on to us. Stay frosty," I ordered.

Here we were: last three doors in the hall. I held up my left hand and clicked the safety off of my M4. Reading the signs, I finally found what we were looking for- 'Testing Laboratories' -and gave the news to my two squad mates. Located on the wall on the very end of the hallway was a staircase going down. That's where they all are, I bet. Sliding open the door, I slinked in, slowly, and around the corner, and saw-

A huge Russian man with a leather jacket, pointing a Makarov right at my head. I heard the BANG and tilted my head to the right. Suddenly, almost a split second after, my head jerked backwards and collided with the wall. The left side of my head, right above the ear, burned incredibly bad. My head was pounding, and I felt blood dripping from my temple. The pain was unbearable, forcing me to clench my eyes and teeth shut tightly. My head was throbbing, and everything looked blurred. Must be a concussion... It was hard just to form the thought. Forcing my arms to lift me up to a sitting position, I rubbed my temples (much to my displeasure on the left side), eyes shut. Finally, I opened my watery eyes and saw the man who shot me, slumped against the opposite wall, a large knife wound on his throat. Jerry sat perched in front of me, ripping a bandage and tying it around my head. Immediately, I felt it soak, but the bleeding slowed. I put my gloved hand on my wound and used the other to pry open the waterproof satchel where my M9 was. Grasping the pistol tightly with my right hand, I slowly stood up, and almost lost balance. Glancing at the floor, I noticed how much blood had dripped out; a small puddle was already formed, with a small smear at the base of the wall. Shakily looking up, I saw what looked like... a giant portal? Is that what they were researching here?

Then another muddled thought entered my mind. Where does it lead? Will it go to the United States? Does it lead to another Universe? A sudden, overwhelming sensation of curiosity overcame me. I suddenly wanted to go into the portal... although I wasn't sure it was safe, as it could be unfinished, or a failure. It might not even be a portal, although it looked like it...

It looked like a slab of translucent orange material, with ripples of reddish-pink electricity. Surrounding it was a metallic outlining, wrapped in electrical cords. There were stone steps leading up to the... orange stuff. Suddenly, an alarm went off.

Shiiit.... Grabbing my M4 off the ground (and slipping in my own blood), I turned and kept the barrel pointed directly at the doorway, as a barrage of footsteps approached my location. My other two squad mates sat beside me, crouched, guns trained where the attackers would come in from. The first Russian ran around the corner, expecting us all to be standing, so his shots went a little too high. Jerry put a burst into his chest, one bullet even puncturing his throat, and he collapsed. The next runner up stumbled on the bleeding carcass of his friend, and I managed to land a few shots in his head. The rest learned from the others, and stopped trying to rush in. Instead, I spotted a flash grenade bounce inside, then white. My ears rang, adding to the concussion I was suffering from. I stumbled to my feet and ran diagonally until I collided with the wall. Just seconds after I was to safety, I heard several sharp cracks of gunfire, but I couldn't decipher where it was coming from. I put my thumb, index, and middle fingers to my eyes, clenching the bridge of my nose tightly, and started shaking my head, to clear the confusion. My vision restored, and my hearing semi-restored, I looked around to see where I was. I was standing where the first Russian had been waiting with the Makarov. Jerry and Mortimer were laying on the floor in the center of the room, drenched in blood. Tears welled in my eyes, then before my sadness was replaced by anger. I poked my M4 around the corner and caught four Russian soldiers off guard; after a quick ratatatatat noise, they all fell to the floor. One was peeking around the corner, and snapped back to safety as a round landed in the wall, inches from his head.

Taking this chance, I ripped a frag grenade from my belt, pulled the pin, and tossed it out the door. Knowing that it was pointless to stay around and get killed, I made a run for the portal. Before I jumped in, I made a radio call to HQ, reporting what was going on in the facility. They let me know that they were sending in an emergency extraction team to rescue me. I could already hear the Russians recovering from the grenade, so i just told HQ not to bother and shot my rado. Then, with absolutely no regrets, I ran headfirst into the portal.

THUMP! I landed on the ground in a grassy field, rather painfully. Sitting up, I tried to figure out where I was, and how I got there. I tried to figure out why my head hurt. But, most of all, I tried to remember what my name was...