45
« on: January 18, 2010, 17:35:24 »
Sorry for the jump. Max character limit hit. Part 5 is violent and has scary imagery. You've been warned.
Part 5
James 417's helmet sat next to a 3D Chessboard in Major Noble's quarters. They played while trying to make sense of what they'd seen. James 417 didn't talk much during hard thinking so Amelia bounced ideas off him. They played like amateurs.
"Maybe it's some Covenant troop type we haven't seen before. Like commandos that can infiltrate and even use our equipment?" she said.
"Hmm." James 417 said and moved a bishop up two boards and diagonally three squares. "How did they get onboard?"
Amelia took the Bishop with a pawn. "What if they can look like us?"
Their eyes met, horror on both their faces at the possibilities.
"You really need to lose that mustache. It's very distracting." she said. James 417 stared at her and their tension broke with sudden laughter.
"It must be really bad if it takes your mind off shapeshifting aliens." he said when he could.
"It's just, that's how I deal with stress."
"Random insults?" he asked. She went into the head and came out with a towel, a razor and a bulb of shaving cream.
"No way!" he said, laughing again.
"Hold still. That's an order." She squirted cream on his lip and whisked the razor under his nose. James 417 shifted in the seat. She was leaning over, straddling his armored thigh, focused intently on his mouth. He could see the fine wrinkles around her eyes, and faintly smell her floral shampoo. She wiped the leftover cream from his mouth. "Much better." He grabbed her waist, intent on stopping her next word with a kiss when the alarm klaxon sounded.
They moved as one, she grabbing her pistol and he his helmet before dashing into the hall. He jammed his helmet on and heard Cerebello giving the damage report.
"Fire in the morgue, two casualties. Small arms fire in the hall behind the Bridge."
The Bridge! They rounded the corner to see the dead civilian jamming on the button to close the decompression doors. James 417 dove through the hole as the door irised shut, trapping Major Noble outside. Captain Ridley raised his sidearm to fire on the corpse. It caught and wrenched the Captain's arm, loudly breaking the bones and tossing the him into the comm controls. It picked up the pistol. James 417 ran at it, but the dead man fired five shots into the Captain's chest. James 417's armored fist connected with its jaw with all he had. The dead man flew across the bridge, cracked the viewport and fell to the deck. It rose steadily. Its jaw had unhinged on one side and hung at an angle. It tried to grin.
The crew took cover as it emptied the pistol at the Spartan, lighting up the deflection field and sparking off his armor. James 417 had frozen for a second. He simply had not expected an unarmored human to get up after taking that punch. Cracking the viewport should have broken every bone in its back.
They ran at each other, James 417 pulling back for another punch. The dead man caught his fist and pivoted, throwing James 417 right back at the viewscreen. Wen the Spartan hit it, the tortured shriek of escaping atmosphere filled the Bridge. They ran at each other again, but as the man swung James 417 ducked under it and hit the override button. The pressure doors opened and Major Noble was ready. Her Recon armor was sealed and the full complement of ODST's swarmed in and pulled the crew to safety as she opened fire on the man, sending him staggering backwards. As soon as the ODST's were clear James 417 released the button. Noble realized what he was doing a second too late to lunge in, but Riddle tossed in a Spartan Laser before the door shut.
The dead man and the Spartan saw the weapon come sailing into the room, saw each other see it, and dashed toward it. James 417 got there first and laying hold of the long weapon swung it up into the man's damaged face, pulling the trigger. The man fell over on its back as the heavy weapon whined, charging up for the shot. The beam would have burned right through it had it not lashed out to tangle the Spartan's feet. The shot went over high, destroying the cracked viewport and sucking them both spaceward.
James 417 was amazed the thing could reach him. He released the weapon as they both skittered across the deck. He got a handhold and the dead man held his foot. The thing-man crawled up him until it stared into James 417's faceplate. Its jaw had completely detached and its tongue furiously slapped his neck in the wind. Fine red filaments writhed out of his open throat, feeling for James 417's face. He saw that its right arm was now a tendril twice as long and thin as it had been.
James 417 grabbed the head in one gauntleted hand and slammed it against the deck three times. On the third it finally released him and went sailing toward the open hole. The whiplike arm lashed out desperately and wound around James 417's right arm. He gritted his teeth and gave his suit the command to jettison his gauntlet. The monster sailed out into space, gripping his glove and followed by his naked hand as the Mjolnir armor amputated the forearm and sealed itself against the vacuum.
Cerebello patched video into his helmet. The exterior camera panned along the ship. The man-thing was crawling along the hull, looking for another way in.
"Shoot it." James 417 said and watched a turret rotate and fire, finally destroying the thing.
"It's over." he said into the comm.
"The Captain's dead." Major Noble replied. "I am assuming command of this ship."
James 417 sat in the Captain's chair, regarding his stump as the doors cycled open and repair techs in hardsuits came in to patch the hole.
Part 6
The next day they sighted the asteroid. Though the Cost Of Dereliction’s thrusters were by far the largest, there were many more engines sticking out of the rock at bizarre angles. It was peanut shaped with most of the thrusters bristling off the larger bulb. Along its waist lay a clutter of landed broadswords and one civilian yacht. People were climbing around the outside of it.
Now-Captain Noble whistled through her teeth as they surveyed the readouts on the Defiant Answer’s bridge.
“Is there any atmosphere on that rock?” she asked.
“Affirmative.” Cerebello said. “I detect a weak Crawford field holding in the atmosphere. But most of the reactions powering those thrusters are unshielded. It’s how I found them so quickly. The whole asteroid is extremely radioactive.”
“So how’s the crew climbing around in high rad?” she asked.
“Could be a resistant alien biology, or hardsuits.” Cerebello offered.
“The thing I fought yesterday used to be a man.” James 417 said. “If it was an alien it didn’t start that way.”
“Give me closeup on those crawlers.” said Noble.
The screen magnified to show the creatures. They had four limbs and a head, but there the similarities to humans ended. The shoulders were huge as were the arms. The neck was engulfed. Also, many of them had a long whip for one or both arms, or extremely long fingers.
“We’re taking those things out and getting our AI back.” Noble said grimly. “Battlestations! James get to your booster! I want my peas in the pods! Marines, suit up for vac! Techs, proof the Scorpions and Hogs for anti-rad. You have two hours people! Shag it!”
As the boots hit the deck she turned to Cerebello. “Wait ‘til my Broadswords are ready to launch. Fire a salvo at their thrusters and then jump us 3 hours ahead. Launch Broadswords and set up the optimal ambush formation.”
“On your mark, Ma’am.” Cerebello said, smiling.
“Mark!”
The Defiant Answer opened fire. The fighters launched off the asteroid like a swarm of hornets, whirled once then homed in on the Defiant Answer. It waited just long enough to see the main thrusters shatter then disappeared.
Part 7
It was a typical land-commander error. Noble had assumed that without thrust the asteroid would drift in a straight line right into their ambush. They sighted the drifting asteroid an hour early and it was well above them.
Everyone was prepared but the techs. They had fitted the Warthogs and Scorpions with gripper treads for maneuvering the asteroid in micro-gravity but they had not completed shielding the electronics from the radiation. As James 417 and the broadswords broke formation and accelerated in pursuit of the asteroid, Captain Noble gave the command to launch without the land vehicles.
Scores of pods launched from the forward bay of the Defiant Answer like a salvo of coffin-missiles. Pelicans followed trying to keep up.
“Hit it with high explosives!” Noble commanded.
“Ma’am, HE shells won’t do much except to the surface. Would you like me to fire Armor Piercing instead?” Cerebello said.
“Just do it!”
“Aye Ma’am.”
James 417 caught his breath as the main guns fired lances of light straight through the onrushing ships, but Cerebello knew what he was doing and though the shells speared the void close to some Pelicans and ODST pods they went down range straight and true.
The shells impacted the asteroid as the broadswords were launching. The detonations barely cratered the asteroid’s surface, but the shockwaves crumpled the fighters like a giant stomping on tin cans and blew most of the air outside the range of the Crawford field. Only a dozen or so made it off the surface whole and they flew like they were stunned, neither forming up nor attacking.
James 417 lead the dive hoping to mop them up before they could get their bearings. As one, the enemy fighters wheeled and opened fire. Ignoring the Spartan’s broadswords they sent missiles and chaingun fire into the ODST pods, shattering several.
“Foxtrot one! Foxtrot two! Guns,guns,guns!” James 417 cried and his wing opened fire destroying the enemy fighters in one volley. He broke off from the group, heading for the asteroid’s surface, commanding the fighters to pick off the remaining thrusters and provide air support for the surface battle.
Ten minutes later, his boots on the asteroid, he commanded the deploying ODST’s to fan out, fire on site and locate the AI. The void was unbearably quiet. Nothing moved on the surface. They swept their patrol. He went back to his booster frame for some altitude. Thirty minutes later he radioed the Defiant Answer to report.
“Ma’am there’s no sign of life down here. The ODST’s have discovered some very unusual linkages for the Thrusters, but no sign of the AI.”
“Tell me about the thrusters, James.” Captain Noble said back.
“They are powered and commanded by some sort of biomechanical connections. Part cabling from the Cost Of Dereliction, part connective tissue from who knows what.”
“Is it alive?”
“Yes, Captain. I think so.”
The radio filled with screams.
“Defiant Answer this is Delta Seven! Multiple contacts, multiple contacts!”
“I’m inbound Riddle!” James 417 called whipping the booster frame about. “Marines! Converge on Delta Seven, move! Broadswords give me cover!”
They were on the far side of the asteroid. As he rounded it James 417 could see the bright lines of tracer fire and see the tiny sparkles of starlight off the spinning ejected casings, but he could only hear the gunfire when the suit radios activated.
The creatures were boiling out of a cave. The gunfire was really chewing on them and pushing them around, but they didn’t fall or stop. The first one reached the squad of ODST’s and batted the first three off the asteroid with one swipe of its tentacled hand. They flew off screaming and writhing as the air and the blood and the heat escaped the long gash each had across his chest. They died quickly, their bodies would not be recovered.
The night burned red as an ODST discharged his Spartan Laser into the mass. Multiple creatures flew off the asteroid in burned pieces, but more swarmed out to take their place. James 417 crash landed his frame on the surface, skewing around tail toward the cave. He popped the minigun and opened fire on the horde, sweeping the fire back and forth at head height.
The monsters spun off into the sky as James 417 reaped them like grain before the scythe. The ODST’s were able to regroup and focus fire into the mass. Rockets thumped into the opening as the Marines arrived and opened fire. The wave ended and everyone waited, their barrels glowing red in the airless night.
The second wave was equally monstrous, but they looked more human and many of them came out firing assault rifles, pistols and smg’s. Air escaped the cave with them and the sounds of battle were oddly muted and tinny in the thin pressure. The front ranks of ODST’s got stitched up with the small arms fire, but only two died of suit rupture. They opened fire and let the monsters have it and it was over even quicker than the previous wave. After that there was no enemy activity for half an hour. The Marines quickly set up a minibase and stationed turrets around the mouth of the cave. The base was pressurized in minutes and the simulated gravity plate switched on. Captain Noble touched down in a pelican and called a meeting in the minibase.
James 417 watched out the portal as the gripper tanks and hogs were flown in and secured to the asteroid.
Cerebello had captured many battle images from the broadswords, and showed them zooms of the creatures they were fighting. Many wore scraps of uniforms and armor from the Cost Of Dereliction.
“You mean we’ve been killing Marines?” Judson asked, face pale. His group had been especially boisterous in celebrating on the mic’s as each monster fell.
“They weren’t Marines any more.” James 417 said.
Cerebello spoke. “Seismic scans from the bombardment show this asteroid is heavilly tunneled and hollow in at least one large place. We have to assume the main force is inside and have secured the AI there.”
“What are the alternatives?” Captain Noble asked.
“That they just tossed the AI into the void like an empty beercan.” said Riddle. Judson and Rook exchanged knowing glances and Velazquez laughed.
“You mean we might crack this egg, fight all the forces of hell inside and the AI might be whipping through the galaxy?” she asked.
“Not likely.” said Cerebello.
“He’s right.” James 417 said. “Whatever these are, they started human. Some of them had to know the value of an AI. What’s guiding this asteroid? What are the thrusters connected to?”
“But why would our AI guide their ship for them?” Riddle asked. He looked at another ODST, callsign Chillswooper who shrugged.
“Probably had no other choice.” said a serious ODST named Helios Thulsa.
“Alright. So we’re going on the assumption that the AI is in there.” Noble said. “Cerebello, what can you tell me about the Cost of Dereliction’s AI?”
“Real sweetheart. Striata. She’s pink and a genius.” Cerebello said.
Thinking of the human monsters he’d seen, James 417 asked a question and dreaded the answer.
“Cerebello, did the Cost of Dereliction have a Spartan?”
“Yes, James. It did.”
“Ann.”
“I’m afraid so. It’s likely that the AI is toward the back of the asteroid, close to where the main thrusters were wired in.”
They all sighed at Cerebello’s words. The cave entrance was on the front of the asteroid. They would have to fight through the whole thing.
“Alright people we know what we need to do. The good news is that cave is big enough for our Scorpions and Hogs. And the Defiant Answer should be able to punch holes along the way for drop pod insertion of backup weapons and extra ammo. Let’s go get our lady and get out. Oo-Rah?”
“Ooo-Rah!” they answered. As they poured out of the minibase to form up James 417 thought of Noble’s words: Let’s go get our lady. He thought about Ann. He’d seen what a civilian could do when the monster took hold of them. He wondered about what a Spartan monster might be like.