Death Stranding: The Official Novelization, Volume Two

EPISODE XII – CLIFFORD UNGER

Night approached. The rain fell. There was no wind nor any sign of movement. The air felt like it was draped heavily around Sam’s entire body and the stench of the dead hung in it.

As Sam attempted to get up, he put his hand out to steady himself, but instead of making contact with the ground, it made contact with something else. It was a dismembered human arm. Once Sam’s eyes had adjusted to the darkness and he could finally survey his surroundings, he could see damaged shells scattered all around him. This wasn’t Amelie’s Beach. It was space-time that was full of death. Sam’s immediate reaction was frustration. He had wanted to go back to Amelie’s Beach. But then his mood changed. Just because this wasn’t Amelie’s Beach, didn’t mean that Cliff wasn’t here.

Sam took the rifle that the dead body was clutching.

Somewhere far off in the distance, Sam could hear explosions ripping the night air to pieces. The breeze picked up and the grass and plants swayed. The air that stroked Sam’s face was damp and hot. This place was different from the battlefields of stone, earth, and cold, dry air that Sam had encountered before. It was overgrown with plants he had never seen before and the sludgy bogs beneath his feet made it hard to walk.

The only thing this battlefield had in common with the others was the thick stench of death that permeated throughout it.

The Odradek on Sam’s shoulder rotated and stopped. It turned into a cross and glowed orange, showing the way to Cliff.

An explosion went off in front of Sam, as if showing him the way, and gracing the night with daylight for a split second. A green temple, filling Sam’s vision from the floor to the sky, appeared before him. He looked around to find a cell assembled from what he assumed to be tree branches surrounded by piles of skewered bodies, one on top the other, all soldiers dressed in field uniform. Several men appeared from the grass. All of them were dressed and equipped lightly and spoke to each other in a language that wasn’t English. Sam remained undetected as the men efficiently weaved their way among the intricately laid branches. Sam checked the direction that the Odradek was pointing and followed behind them.

The blades of a helicopter disturbed the night sky. Trees swayed wildly in the wind and the leaves that were torn off them danced through the air. The belly of the hovering helicopter opened and regurgitated its glowing, wet insides. Its long, tubular viscera that reminded Sam of intestines writhed its way down to the ground. Four soldiers nimbly descended. They were skeletal soldiers without skin, flesh, nor organs, but all clad in army gear. They didn’t seem to have souls, but they did seem to have a purpose. One by one the soldiers arrived on the jungle floor, each guided by a purpose that had piled up on the battlefield like sediment and penetrated their minds through the backs of their skulls.

The end of the helicopter’s guts was attached to Cliff’s abdomen as he lorded over the world below from his helicopter. The organ wasn’t like an intestine. This was an umbilical cord woven of all his negative emotions. It wasn’t an organ to digest all his resentment and sadness and hatred, but an organ to transmit it.

Cliff wound the umbilical cord that hung all the way to the ground back into his abdomen. Then, he suddenly kicked off the deck and dived into the jungle below.

A flare went off, as if Cliff was challenging anyone who might have been lurking below. It pierced through the night and lit up the jungle like the midday sun.

As soon as Cliff landed, an extremely hot wind began to gust violently. Trunks of trees crashed into each other and the entire jungle began to creak.

The skeletal soldiers ran in the direction that Cliff instructed, as Cliff followed behind them.

Sam was running through the jungle, which blew fiercely with hot air. He could feel the resentment of the dead beneath his feet every time his feet made contact with the ground. He made sure to keep running so fast that they wouldn’t catch him.

There was a burned-down village up ahead. The rice paddies around it were studded with holes caused by countless bombs. Dried-out fetuses were haphazardly thrown away. Sam saw one fetus wrapped around a gun that was the same size as itself. He passed a mountain of burnt and charred adult corpses. Sam kept on running, through a land where no one moved and no one breathed. The river was filled with the corpses of dogs and water buffalo and dead babies floated among the debris. The Odradek was pointing upstream. As Sam followed it, he could see flames and fires burning deep in the tropical jungle.

That must be where Cliff is.

Before he knew it, Sam had already entered a battlefield.

The ghosts of soldiers were fighting. It was the American soldiers who were clad in equipment that had been designed for killing. The weapons were engraved with the US insignia. Small-framed soldiers who didn’t even have guns attacked the American soldiers. Even though at first glance it looked like the American soldiers had the overwhelming advantage, the other soldiers put up a hard fight, and despite the difference in firepower, continued to attack. Even when they were hit, they got right back up and continued to fight. As the war raged on, the same scene played out again and again in front of Sam.

The Odradek was unwavering as it showed Sam Cliff’s location, but between them stood thick jungle. It was like a labyrinth and Sam couldn’t see the other side. The smaller soldiers were using this situation to their advantage. If Sam didn’t want to get caught up in their fight, all he could do was proceed cautiously straight ahead.

Sam walked out of the shadow of the trees and into a thicket, and then back into the shadow of the trees on the opposite side, holding his breath the entire time. He could sense something moving in front of him. He lay down on his belly and looked beyond the grass. Two of the skeletal soldiers were heading his way. It didn’t seem like they had spotted him yet, though. If he stayed still they might just pass him by. The tension in Sam’s body grew and grew, like a screw being tightened. If it surpassed his limits, he felt like his mind and body would both explode.

Once the soldiers were far enough away, Sam resumed his path. As he carried on forward, the jungle finally came to an end.

Now he was confronted with a swamp that was too wide to cross. He couldn’t tell how deep it was. And there was no cover to be found.

He would have to go around.

He continued left, attempting to avoid the swamp, but soon found himself losing his sense of direction. He couldn’t tell where the swamp was anymore. He could no longer hear the fighting. It was like both the ghostly soldiers and the sound of their weapons had disappeared. He was surrounded by the quiet of the jungle.

Sam climbed over the shrubs in the wild undergrowth that had grown undisturbed for thousands of years and the fallen trunks of giant trees, until he thought he could smell water. He started to suspect that he had gone in a circle and had arrived back at the swamp he was trying to avoid. Was this the way he came? Was he caught in a time loop and repeating the same thing over and over again? All he could do was rely on the Odradek and Lou. If he didn’t, he would never be able to shrug off his doubts or escape the jungle itself. He would be doomed to wander it forever.

On the other side of the swamp, trees were burning. Cliff must be close. Sam was certain.

—Give me back my BB.

Cliff’s voice echoed inside Sam’s head. When he heard it for the first time, he had been terrified for some reason, but he didn’t feel that way anymore. It may have been irrational and illogical, but Sam felt like he wanted to understand the man. Even if that only had its roots in Sam’s motive of rescuing Amelie.

Gunshots rang out. Sam was hidden behind the trunk of a fallen tree, but the bullets showered down upon him mercilessly. He had no idea where the enemy was. Moreover, it seemed like he was getting shot by multiple enemies at once. A bullet grazed the bark of the tree.

Another penetrated the trunk. Each and every time, Sam felt like he could hear someone crying. Perhaps it was the sound of all of the memories accumulated by these fallen trees, that had seen so much war and death, as they burst open.

Something fell beside the tree trunk, but Sam didn’t need to look to know what it was. It was a grenade. As Sam ran, the explosion chased him from behind. It threw him off his feet and headfirst into the ground. His world went dark. He couldn’t hear anything anymore. He had fallen into pitch black, but the pain that seared throughout his entire body brought him back to reality.

He tried to stand up, but he couldn’t feel anything below his knees. He tried again, this time putting his hand on the tree trunk for support. Sam couldn’t tell where his body ended. It felt like he had no definitive outline anymore. Like his consciousness was dissipating farther and farther out. Only the furious pounding of his heart told him that he was still connected to it.

Right beside his beating heart was Lou’s pod. Sam could feel Lou’s heartbeat, too. Their heartbeats became one, hitching Sam back to his body. Sam found his hands, feet, chest, stomach, and head, and pieced himself back together again.

“I won’t let anyone take you away from me, Lou,” Sam murmured, almost as if to spur himself on, and took off running.

On the other side of the thicket, Sam sensed something move again. The skeletal soldiers had returned. One had its back to him and was investigating its surroundings. Once again, it seemed not to have noticed him. Sam took aim at its back with his rifle. It was the only weapon he had and he had few bullets left. He couldn’t miss. Knowing that he had to make this shot count, Sam’s arms began to tremble with nerves. He couldn’t control his muscles. The sound of the wind, which he had barely noticed until now, seemed strangely loud. At this rate, he would never be able to make his mark. He had to forget everything. He had to forget the background noise and imagine that he and his target were directly connected. He wasn’t fumbling around for something in the distance, he was going to reach out and grab his target. He was going to hit it without the bullet wavering from its invisible. That’s what he focused on. The trigger and his finger became one.

Seconds seemed to drag on for minutes, but Sam was sure he saw the bullet sink into the soldier’s back. It smashed through the skeleton’s spine, and ribs scattered across the floor. Sam had eliminated one of the obstacles that stood between himself and Cliff.

That single shot elevated Sam’s senses onto another plane. Now, he could see the direction of the bloodlust that flowed through this jungle. He could sense where the rest of the skeletal soldiers were, where they were going and how they were going to get there. Even the seemingly chaotic jungle was formed of a kind of order that dictated the directions the trees grew in and the density of the underbrush. The creatures that lived in this forest were in tune with this order. The small-framed soldiers—who were beating their American counterparts despite their feeble-looking weaponry—probably knew how the jungle worked, too. They acted as though they were a part of it. The Americans were fighting against it instead, and losing.

The bullets in Sam’s rifle weren’t separate entities, they were a part of him.

Now that Sam had integrated into the order of the jungle and connected with his weapon, breaking through it no longer seemed so daunting. As Sam took aim it felt as natural as extending his own arm. It was like shooting bullets from his fingertips.

Sam had arrived where Cliff was waiting.

—I’ll get you out of here, BB.

Sam could hear Cliff’s voice again. He wasn’t afraid of it anymore. All that was left to do was defeat him and take back Amelie. But Cliff was taking advantage of the jungle to knock the omnipotence-filled Sam down a peg.

The Odradek reacted violently. The sensor that had been pointing in the exact same direction until now began to rotate wildly. Lou had curled up into a ball and was laying in toward Sam. Lou seemed scared of the approaching terror.

—BB… I’m gonna take you wherever you wanna go.

Cliff’s voice sounded even clearer than before. But Sam knew it was all in his head. Sam knew that he was around here somewhere, but he couldn’t see him. Even though Sam now had a grip on the flow of the jungle, he still couldn’t sense Cliff’s presence.

—Brought you an astronaut. Mankind can go anywhere. Even outer space.

Sam screamed for it to stop, but Cliff had taken root in Sam’s head and didn’t seem intent on disappearing anytime soon.

Sam couldn’t defeat what he couldn’t see. He couldn’t hit what he couldn’t touch. He couldn’t kill what was already dead. And he couldn’t revive what hadn’t been born.

A fire lit inside Sam’s head. It burst into an inferno in a split second, engulfing Sam’s entire body. In front of Sam stood Cliff, who was engulfed in the same flames.

—Give me back my BB.

Cliff extended a flaming hand and tried to grab Lou. Sam thrust it away instinctively. Cliff looked surprised and collapsed. But on his way down, he grabbed Sam’s arm. Unable to keep his balance, Sam fell down to Cliff’s level.

They were sinking intertwined into the swamp. Unable to even open his eyes, Sam blindly tried to shake away Cliff’s entangling arms. Somehow, he managed to stand. Cliff had fallen forward and looked up. His entire body was covered from head to toe in a thick black liquid. Only the whites of his eyes gave off any light, boring two bright holes into the darkness. He looked like the primordial life that had one day crawled out of this swamp. Then he stood, too. Cliff managed to wrench himself away from the swamp and wiped the black liquid off his face. He had regained his features and was now glaring at Lou’s pod. Sam could feel Lou’s fear.

Even though Sam could stand, he was buried up to his waist in the swamp and couldn’t move properly. Cliff grabbed him by the collar. Sam let out an angry groan, but Cliff simply buried his fist in his stomach to shut him up.

Sam didn’t feel pain, but rather heat. It felt like a mass of heat that had been driven into his guts. He convulsed as if his stomach had been turned inside out, and began to vomit blood and gastric juices. As Sam began to crumple up in agony, Cliff grabbed him by the nape of the neck and raised his head. Sam fell backward with the momentum and Cliff got on top of him. He began to try and unfasten the pod. Sam grabbed him by the arms.

—BB, BB. Can you hear me?

Cliff’s mutterings echoed around Sam’s head again and again. Sam was staring up at Cliff’s lips, but they were tightly shut.

—Can you hear me? It’s Daddy.

Sam began to hear multiple voices bickering, drowning Cliff out.

—You saw wrong. Now check the other way.

—No, open it up. He’s in there.

The voices were muffled and Sam couldn’t make them out clearly, but they sounded like they belonged to a man and a woman who weren’t Cliff. Cliff’s grip on the pod slackened.

Sam pushed Cliff off, and as he fell away, guns fell out of his uniform. Sam picked them up without a moment’s hesitation.

Now the tables had turned. Cliff was now looking up at Sam thrusting a gun in his face. If Sam was going to shoot, now was his chance. But Sam’s fingers didn’t move. They felt like they belonged to someone else entirely. If he defeated Cliff now, he would be able to go back to his own world. Maybe Amelie would be released from Cliff’s spell, too. Sam kept trying to convince himself to shoot, but he never pulled the trigger.

—Shoot him!

Sam could hear a commanding voice in the distance, but he couldn’t tell who it belonged to. It was so muffled that Sam felt like he was hearing it through several layers of film.

Cliff reached out with one hand. Was he still after Lou? Sam tried to pull back.

But that wasn’t the case. His hand was trying to cover the barrel of the gun. The palm of his hand was pressed right against its end.

—Shoot him!

Sam heard the voice again. He dropped the gun and Cliff dropped his arm. He was staring Sam right in the face. Then his gaze shifted to the pod.

But he wasn’t looking at Lou. He was looking at the mascot that dangled from it.

—Brought you an astronaut.

Cliff’s face twisted. Maybe he was trying to laugh. This figure had been attached to Lou’s pod from the start. Cliff pushed himself up a little and reached out for the pod again.

“BB—Listen, I’ll get you out of here,” he muttered.

Sam threw his arms around the pod to protect Lou.

“Give me back my baby.” Cliff’s eyes were shedding tears. It was the unmistakable face of a father. Sam couldn’t see it any other way.

“Are you Clifford Unger?” he asked.

A light switched on in Cliff’s eyes. He blinked a few times. It was like he was looking at something far away.

“They told me your name was Sam Porter…” Cliff’s mouth opened as he remembered his words. “But you’re Sam Bridges. My bridge to the future,” Cliff said, standing up. He removed the chain that was hanging around his neck. Dangling there was his dog tag.

“I was just like any other cliff. A dead end. No way forward. Nothing but an obstacle—looking on at the world that people like you were trying to build. Dividing people was the only thing I was ever any good at.”

Cliff looked down at the dog tag and hung it on Sam.

“But not you, Sam. You bring people together. You’re their bridge to the future… and mine.”

Cliff laid his arm on Sam’s shoulder. The astronaut hanging from the pod swayed. Sam could hear Lou laughing. Sam removed the pod and held it out to Cliff. But he didn’t try to take it. He simply looked at Lou smiling and stroked the pod window with his hand. Something had been set free. Maybe it was the connection between Cliff and Lou, or perhaps it was what bound him to Sam. Maybe it was something else entirely. He didn’t know what it was right now.

Cliff looked Sam in the eye and smiled. He stretched out his arms and drew Sam into a hug. Sam accepted. He could smell something nostalgic by Cliff’s ear. It felt like Cliff whispered something to him.

But his words were drowned out by the sound of a gunshot in the distance.

PORT KNOT CITY

It was a faint voice. When Sam tried to reach out and grab it, it became even smaller. It was Cliff’s voice.

He wanted to find the source of this memory and struggled desperately toward the ocean floor. He tried to sink all the way down to the dark depths, where no light could penetrate, but it was no good.

Sam was discovered near the outer wall of Port Knot City. He was curled up asleep in the fetal position, clutching his BB to his chest and covered in mud. It had been Viktor from Bridges who had found them and carried him back to a private room.

Although Sam had some external injuries, none of them appeared to be life-threatening. He may have been exhausted, but none of his vitals were showing any sign of danger. He had just been in a deep sleep.

Viktor laughed about how it had been difficult to prize the pod out of Sam’s arms. Sam had been curled up around the pod extremely tightly. It was like he was protecting it so that no one else could take it away.

“You kept Igor’s figure on there,” Viktor commented, surprised but grateful that his little brother’s treasure had remained intact. “Your pod didn’t fare so well, though. There’s a handprint on there that we just can’t get off. We checked to see if it was yours, but…”

The handprint belonged to Cliff, but Viktor had no way of knowing that.

“Deadman asked me to pass this on to you,” Viktor told him.

The monitor on the communications terminal activated and Viktor showed Sam a file that was protected by layers of strong security.

Sam opened the file once Viktor had left his private room. Then he decided to establish a line with Deadman. That was probably the procedure he was supposed to follow.

Sam flashed back to the day he woke up in Capital Knot City. When he had been unable to save Viktor’s little brother, Igor, and the rest of the Corpse Disposal Team from a voidout, and repatriated from the Seam.

Deadman’s voice was trembling slightly. He was probably recalling what happened that time he got caught up in the battlefield himself.

“Neither Amelie nor Die-Hardman were there. I was on Cliff’s battlefield,” Sam answered.

“I don’t think Cliff is our enemy. He’s trying to tell us something. He described himself as a cliff. That’s where his existence ends. And he can’t cross over here from the cliff edge.”

He was only half-dead—although Sam couldn’t bring himself to say that. He could probably say the same thing about himself.

Right now, Sam couldn’t bring himself to tell Deadman about Cliff’s confession, either. He had heard it, but he didn’t know whether what Cliff said was true or not.

Cliff seemed to be missing most of the memories of his life, and had come here through the power of emotion. Propelled by the regrets of the anonymous dead. If Cliff was a mixture of all those feelings—if he was an incarnation of that time of war and destruction—then Lou and Sam were following in the footsteps of Cliff and their other predecessors. And they were destined to clean up the mess that their fathers had left behind. Maybe Cliff had come to apologize for that. Maybe both Lou and Sam symbolized that sentiment to him.

Sam tried to retain some balance in his heart by interpreting it that way.

—Although that was something that you still weren’t unaware of, either.

Deadman brought Sam back down to earth after he fell silent.

The monitor went black. This time a hologram flashed up behind Sam.

It was Die-Hardman.

But the image didn’t move an inch. This man in the mask and black suit resembled a statue of a knight—a devoted servant to his lord—heading out to war.

Taking that as a signal to start, the image began to move. The message started silently with Die-Hardman looking back over his shoulder to check his surroundings. It wasn’t the action of a knight, but the delicate action of a scout sent to infiltrate the enemy’s lair. He looked weary.

—Alright. This message is insurance in case something happens to me. For Bridges’ eyes only.

Die-Hardman began to speak.

—This was sent to me. It appeared suddenly and without warning. Its Chiralium density is off the chart, so it must have been sent via the Beach. Amelie said you might recognize it, Sam. She was the one who sent it. It’s a Bridge Baby that the terrorists used. I’ve heard that they’re on Cliff Unger’s battlefield, too. As you can see, it’s just a doll.

—If you were alive back in the old days, you’d recognize this thing in a second. There used to be these naked baby dolls that were made up to look like Cupid. They were popular everywhere. But this is different. It doesn’t have the wings that an angel is supposed to have on its back.

—It can’t reach the heavens, but it can become a bridge to the realm of the dead. Amelie said she’d take me to the Beach if I wanted. But I’d need this doll to show me the way. It’s a trap. It has to be. But I’ve decided to play along—

The hologram froze for a second. Cradling the doll to his chest, Die-Hardman didn’t look like a father protecting the dependent, but someone who didn’t know what to do after being handed something strange.

—You’ve all been playing along too, haven’t you? You know this mask hides more than just my face. Look. This is my real face. Do you see any burn marks? I put on the mask and fabricated a lie. But Amelie’s a blank slate, too. No past. No record she ever existed. She’s a ghost. And the thing about ghosts… I’ve never met Amelie in person. Have you? Ever seen her in the flesh? Shook her hand? Touched her? Felt her warmth?

—The original team we sent was divided into two groups. Amelie was with the first. Mama and Heartman were with the second. They had no direct contact with her. Have you ever seen her as anything other than a hologram—

The message froze again and Deadman interrupted over the codec.

“Bullshit. They’re not the only people who can prove that she’s real. We’ve touched, alright. Plenty of times.”

Sam could almost see Deadman flinching on the other end of the codec call. He fell silent for a few seconds. But then he replied with something that Sam didn’t expect.

“I’m telling you, I’ve met her. In person. Lots of times when I was little.”

Deadman said bluntly. Sam was blindsided. He searched his head for a rebuttal or something to disprove what Deadman said, but came up empty. He couldn’t remember a time when they weren’t on the Beach. He was getting more and more flustered and couldn’t find anything to say.

Die-Hardman’s hologram began to speak again.

—Amelie was born on the Beach. Or rather, her physical body—her ha—was born into this world, while her spiritual essence—her ka—was born on the Beach. Medically speaking, they weren’t sure what to call it. In the end, they settled on a diagnosis similar to what’s known as “locked-in syndrome,” a condition where the subject is mentally present, but physically unable to move their body—except for their eyes, sometimes.

—The president was able to communicate with Amelie’s soul on the Beach, but her body remained in the hospital as it was when she was born. The president didn’t even officially announce that she had a daughter, but, after around twenty years—thanks mainly to the president’s efforts—a miracle happened and she began to show progress. Amelie’s physical and spiritual selves gradually came together, and her body began to develop normally.

—It was right about then that they realized she was also a DOOMS sufferer and began to ascertain her incredible abilities. She can transport herself physically to her own Beach. Guess it makes sense—that world is more real to her than this one. She may have overcome her initial struggles, but she still spent most of her life on the other side. Eventually, the president came to feel that her daughter had been through enough. From that point onward, all communication with Amelie would be via hologram. I swore an oath to the president and to America. As far as I was concerned, her word was law. So when she said Amelie was her daughter and the best candidate to succeed her… I believed it.

—But when the archives were restored, I couldn’t resist testing out my access privileges. I knew that I was going behind the president’s back, but I just had to know. And that’s how I found out Bridget was diagnosed with uterine cancer in her twenties, and couldn’t have children. You see? Doesn’t add up, does it? There’s no way Amelie could be Bridget’s biological daughter. So where’d she come from? Who is she? Is she even real? How can we be sure that Amelie is an Extinction Entity… when we don’t even know if Amelie is Amelie? Hell, for all I know the EE theory might be bullshit. But if it’s not—if she’s the cause of the Death Stranding—then I have to accept her invitation. I’ve brought a special gun. It’s special to her, to me, to him. To all of us. That’s why I should be able to take it to the Beach. I’m gonna stop what she started… by stopping her—

Die-Hardman checked to see that the revolver in his hand was loaded and put it back down. Then he became silent and just stared at the gun. It looked like the message had frozen again, but Sam could see his lips trembling slightly.

—One last confession—

Die-Hardman looked up.

—I’m just a man. No powers. Nothing special. Don’t have DOOMS. I can’t repatriate like Sam either. Don’t know the first thing about dying. I never tried it. Yeah, I’ve been to hell. Every single battlefield was hell. But no matter how terrible it got, I never died. Because all I ever did was run from death. Well! I gotta go. She’s calling for me. Bridges, don’t let me down—

The message ended.

Sam felt uneasy. It was like the frozen hologram of Die-Hardman was staring at him. It was hard to accept the man now his mask had been removed and he had an unfamiliar face.

“He shot Bridget when I saw him. She didn’t die, but then Cliff showed up and got in the way,” Sam said, trying to remember what happened on the Beach, in part to figure out his own confusion. “No,” he continued, “I must have been mistaken about Bridget. Everything that happened on that Beach felt like an illusion. Even Cliff himself. I must have just holed myself up on my own Beach and imagined Amelie and Cliff.”

Lucy used to say similar things to him in their therapy sessions before she became aware of the Beach and went there herself.

<—Sam.> The voice on the other end changed.

“Fragile?” Sam asked. “Are you alright?”

Fragile said that she was, but a hint of exhaustion still lingered in her voice. At least she had woken up from her coma. That was reassuring.