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Avalon, Part Three; Chapter Ten: The Steward
Posted By: Triad<m.eelkema@student.tudelft.nl>
Date: 2 January 2006, 1:47 pm
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Avalon; Part Three: Circulos Vitiosus
Chapter Ten: The Steward
2000 hours, September 22 2502 (military calendar), Below Ring-surface, Avalon nebula
Steven was being dragged. That was the first thing he managed to realise. His awareness of his surroundings could only grow very slowly, as if the gears in his mind were turning in thick molasses. As he opened his eyes the first thing he saw was the pale blue-grey floor which was occasionally interrupted by seams in orthogonal directions. This surface was sliding underneath him, giving him a sense as if he was floating. This sensation was dismissed when he recognised the noise he was hearing as the sound of his own two feet dragging on the floor like two worthless appendices. He was still extremely drowsy, yet his coming-to was gaining more and more momentum.
Steven was being pulled through an A-shaped corridor at least twenty feet high and ten feet wide at the base. The tapering parts of the mauve-coloured walls were adorned with meter-high square-shaped silver calligraphy which shone so bright there was no other apparent need for illumination. The calligraphy was comprised of multiple circles with an assortment of bars, dots, triangles, curves and other geometric shapes. To Steven it looked like an amalgamation of every script he knew; Cyrillic, Egyptian hieroglyphs, Greek, Cuneiform, Latin, Arabic, etcetera. The Commander tried to discern who or what was carrying him, but his field of view was still narrowed, and he could barely move his head. The entities escorting him were hiding in the shadows of his vision.
The strange-looking walls disappeared from his sight, indicating that he had entered some kind of room. After a couple more steps he was suddenly thrown to the floor like a living duffle bag. The smash into the floor was not that violent, but it was enough for Steven to convince himself to lie there just a little bit longer. It gave him time to re-arrange his thoughts. How did he end up here? Where was 'here' anyway?
After his XO had failed to re-establish contact, he himself had led a search-party, along with Lieutenant Simmons and the rest of his Marines. The landing on the ring had been textbook-worthy, the entering of one of the mysterious structures even more. But from there the mission had somehow gone horribly awry. Yet he couldn't pinpoint precisely at what moment things had started to hit the fan.
"Awake." An unearthly, yet strangely familiar voice thudded through his head. "Awake, Human," the booming voice commended again. Steven slowly moved onto his hands and knees and lifted his heavy head. The sight made his spinal fluid turn to ice water. In front of him stood a throne which seemed to sprout up seamlessly from the floor. It was made of the same material as the walls and surfaces of the room, but it had wild curves and organic looking arches, as if it had once been a lump of fluid metal thrown into water to solidify. On this strange throne sat a person. Steven was certain it wasn't an alien, but he also knew it wouldn't exactly qualify for a human. Actually, Steven didn't know at all what he was gazing at. The person in the imperial looking chair was dressed in a creaseless ruby-red robe laced with gold embroidering. Sticking out of the sleeves of the garment were two wrinkled marble-white hands with inch-long fingernails, which looked more like claws than human extremities.
Steven's eyes finally came to rest upon the head of this strange entity, which was just as pale as his hands. The optical section of the Commander's brain couldn't quite get a grip on the man's face, probably because the proportions were somewhat skewed, which threw off Steven's ability to look at him as a human. The man's jaw structure and cheekbones were much too slim for a Homo sapiens, the distance between his eyes much too small, and his forehead much too high. His hairline seemed to have receded almost to the top of his head, accentuated by deep inlets. The remaining hair was put in a ponytail a meter long and was bound together with five blood red ribbons. In all the being had a tremendous imperial air to himself, and Steven couldn't help but feel humbled by its regal appearance.
The ghostly looking dignitary opened his mouth to speak. "What is your name, Human?" Steven couldn't believe what he was hearing. The man spoke in a crisp English accent, but the high-pitched squeaky voice of the man dumbfounded his auditory capabilities. This was amplified by the fact that his eyes couldn't match that what he heard with what he saw. There was something odd with the being's mouth going on.
While pondering over all of this Steven remained silent, so the dignitary asked again: "Human, I know you can understand me. What is your name?"
Finally it dawned on Steven; the man was using some kind of translation device, maybe incorporated in his throne, much like the electronics in the Commander's chair on the Dutchman. "My…my name is Steven Fisher," he stuttered.
"Very well. My name is Aio Maylen. I am the Steward of this installation. What is your function, Steván?"
The commander's keen ears could barely hear the Steward's true voice behind the amplified sound of the artificial voice coming from hidden speakers. His true language was the purest gibberish he had ever heard. "I…am the Commander of a UNSC-vessel called the Flying Dutchman." Steven was now fully awake and his alertness was fully charged, which gave him the nerve to come up with questions of his own: "What is this installation exactly, if I may ask?"
The Steward frowned, leaned back into his seat and lifted one of his fragile hands from the armrest. "This is Halo. It's the last build of the seven fortress worlds, constructed in the final days of a once great, but ailing empire, which spanned from one end of the galaxy to the other." Maylen moved forward again to look Steven straight in the eyes with an inquisitive look. By doing so, the Commander noticed his irises were even whiter than his skin. "Your predecessor asked the same thing. I wonder why you Humans need to ask this. Don't you know about our great history? I mean, how couldn't you?"
"Predecessor? Are you talking about Captain deVries? Is he here?"
"In a matter of speaking. But you haven't answered my question. How could you be unaware, oblivious of our all-embracing legacy?"
"What are you talking about? I've never heard of a galactic civilisation preceding humankind."
"I will admit of course the final ages of the Great Empire were defiled with devastating wars and the rise of the all-consuming Flood. But surely you and the other visitors must be the heralds of the fact, that you have conquered the Flood and re-established our universal dominion."
"I'm sorry, but I haven't got the faintest idea what you're aiming at."
The Steward seemed annoyed by his ignorance. "The Flood, is it defeated?"
Steven was confused. "Ehm, last year New Orleans was flooded by a hurricane for the first time in five hundred years, if that's what you mean."
"That is not the Flood we speak of. Tell me, aren't you the harbinger of the recession of the parasite and the resurrection of our empire?"
"I…I'm afraid I have to disappoint you. I'm from a planet called Earth, and we Humans only ventured into space about six centuries ago. Hasn't Captain deVries explained all this already?"
"The other human leader you speak of was under the impression we were his antagonists and that he was being captured. Therefore the ill-mannered curmudgeon was very opposed to talking to us."
Steven nodded. "That sounds like him. Can I see him by the way?"
Maylen went on: "…especially after we performed some tests on his subordinates."
Steven froze. "Tests? What kind of tests? And what exactly is this 'Flood' you're talking about?"
The Steward gave a sign to the guards standing behind Steven. "Stand up, walk with me, and I'll show you."
Steven followed Maylen towards a door at the far end of the throne room, meanwhile closely guarded by the two men who had also carried Steven. Now that he was fully conscious again, he could see what they looked like. The two guards were obviously soldiers of some sort. They had the same pale skin as Maylen, odd facial dimensions and receding hair bound in a ponytail. They were dressed in jet black uniforms, which looked not all that different from the black ONI-garments. Yet, Steven knew this likeness was purely incidental. The guards were easily more than seven feet high, but were rather slender build. In their arms they each carried stocky weapons made from a glimmering purple metal. The weird shape of the butt of the carbine didn't actually correspond to any rifle-configuration Steven knew, but the trigger and silver white nozzle were dead give-aways that it was definitely a projectile-firing device.
The seemingly endless walk through the now familiar corridors led past numerous doors, and finally ended when Maylen opened one of them and passed through. Steven followed, still flanked by the two guards. The room they had entered reminded the Commander of a police interrogation chamber, with bare-naked walls, glaring light, and a mirror which took up the entire ten meter long wall opposite the entrance. Steven wondered if there were more like Maylen looking at them from the other side.
"So, where are these tests?" Steven asked incredulous.
Maylen walked towards a small holographic console next to the mirror. "Move up to the window and see," the Steward said and switched one of the shimmering symbols. In an instant the entire mirror turned transparent, revealing the dimly lit room behind it. The wide open hall was empty and completely devoid of any kind of obstacle. Maylen flicked another translucent button, opening a couple of doors in the left side wall of the room. Twelve Marines and five Navy-men were pushed into the hall by some of the same kind of heavily armed soldiers like those which were standing behind the Commander. Amongst the crewmembers was Ensign McBain, whose dark red bags under his eyes gave Steven the impression he had been sleep-deprived for months. As soon as the doors had closed the crew tried desperately to open it again, but all their efforts were in vain. The despair and complete lack of discipline shocked Steven, and made him wonder what they had endured.
"What have you done to my men, damn it?" Steven asked angrily.
Maylen didn't take his eyes of the window and answered in a calm and cold voice: "Nothing compared to what is about to happen, dear Commander."
On Maylen's signal the doors on the other end of the hall opened, and out poured a wash of thousands of small spiderlike creatures. The things looked like overgrown ticks, a brownish yellow sack one foot in diameter with a dozen tentacles sticking out of it like rattails, which they used to propel themselves across the floor at remarkable speeds. Out of the 'head' of the creatures which housed these stubby legs protruded two more tendrils, twice as long as the others, and with a thickening at the end of them. Although the critters didn't have any discernable eyes, they seemed to know exactly where to go, in this case the humans at the other end of the hall.
The remains of Steven's crew panicked and scattered, some of them screaming their lungs out hysterically in fear and desolation. One of the Marines was the first to be caught by the fleshy pods, being pulled down after dozens of them threw themselves upon him and latched on. When the doomed individual was on his back flailing his arms and legs in a desperate attempt to fight off the assailants, one of the spiders strung his legs around his neck and thrust his elongated appendages into his skin. The Marine immediately ceased his futile resistance and surrendered his body to the will of his intruder, gasping for air in the process.
The rest of the crew had cornered themselves and were fighting the creatures hand-to-hand with a fury Steven had never seen before, not even with the Marines in battle. Many more Privates and Sailors fell defending themselves from the living wave of yellow flesh coming their way.
A hidden rage consumed Steven's heart, fuelled by every single fallen crew-member. He clenched his fists and tensed himself, ready to throw himself towards the Steward. But at the moment he lunged, the guards grabbed him and twisted his arms. "AAH! YOU BASTARDS! I'm going to rip your spine out, I swear to God! You messed with the wrong Commander!"
Maylen smiled. "Control yourself, Steván. Your crew needs your attention."
As Steven was pushed closer to the screen, he could hear the gruesome screams of his men through the window which were accompanied by the smell of the infernal beings. It reeked of an abattoir filled to the top with slaughter-waste which had been left alone for a couple of months during a scorching summer. Steven could simply taste the purest scent of utter decay he had ever encountered. This incredible stench made the contents of his stomach boil along with his blood. He tried to close his eyes, which were tearing up, and turn his face away from the horrifying scene, but on Maylen's order one of the guards grabbed his head and forced him to witness the atrocity.
Right before his eyes the skin of the Marine first caught by the aliens was slowly turning into a jaundiced mush. In the meantime the infector was burrowing itself into the caved-in chest of its victim, digging itself in through a wash of black syrupy blood.
A mixture of intense rage and sickness took hold of Steven as he fell to his knees and vomited his guts out. Pure bile burned in his throat as he crawled to the window and started pounding it with his fists.
"Don't bother, Commander. It is impossible for the test-subjects to hear you," Maylen said with a sadistic tone.
"Why? For heaven's sake why are you doing this?" Steven cried.
"Simply to test your resilience to the parasite." Maylen gestured Steven to look at his crew again. "Look, Commander. Your men have succeeded to fight off the first wave of the Flood."
To Steven's surprise Maylen wasn't kidding. The remainder of the group in the corner had managed to kill the creatures by either using their helmets or boots as a cudgel, or just by grabbing hold of a parasite and squeezing it until it popped like a balloon. But the victory had come at a horrible toll. Only four Marines and Ensign McBain were left standing, the rest had all been consumed and assimilated by the parasites, lying on the floor in a puddle of their own decomposition.
"Time for the second wave," Maylen said with constraint exuberance in his voice. Another set of doors opened, and Steven was astounded to see what kind of creatures streamed into the gore-smeared room, for it weren't the ticklike things that had made up the first assault. These were bulky biped masses of rotting flesh more than seven feet tall with long whiplike strings where their forearms should have been. All of them had one of the parasite-beings encased in their chests, some of their stubby leg-tentacles still sticking out like improvised chest hair.
Behind this first row tottered a couple of smaller monsters, obviously differing in build from the first set of limping corpses. What shocked Steven the most was that he recognised their shape. But what struck him even more were the patches on the jackets some of them were still wearing. The patch clearly depicted an ancient galleon with blood red sails cruising straight into the wind; the legend of the Flying Dutchman.
As soon as the frothy heaps of disintegrating meat sighted the leftover humans they attacked, simply by hurtling themselves towards them. The two Marines standing at the front of the group screamed in terror and held their arms in front of their faces to protect themselves, but it was to no avail. The sledgehammer blow of one of the infected aliens crushed the ribcage of the first Marine like an egg and dashed him against the wall, nearly liquefying all of the remaining bones in his mangled body. A second Flood-sufferer flung his tentacles at another soldier, caught him in the neck and took his head clean off, a fountain of blood gushing out of the lifeless body while it fell to the floor like a sack of beans.
As the remaining Marines were beaten into a bloody pulp, Ensign McBain escaped the fray by crawling on his hands and knees through the legs of the attackers, which were too busy mauling the Marines to notice him. When he had left the massacre behind him, he got to his feet, ran towards the screen and started to pound it frantically just like his Commander had done from the other side moments ago. Steven tried to get McBain's attention by getting up to the window and yell at him, but he soon realised his crewmember could neither hear nor see him.
The beasts caught sight of McBain and charged towards the window like a pack of hunger-crazed bears. The first creature to reach him whipped the Navy-man across his back. The terrified face of the dying Ensign froze. Steven was only inches away, but there was nothing he could do while he stared straight into the fixed and dilated pupils of his distinguished bridge-Officer. After a couple of seconds a small trickle of blood started to come out of the corner of his mouth. The dead crewmember fell to the floor, revealing the fact that a large part of his spine was torn out of his body. The last thing Steven saw before he fainted was one of his most respected team-mates beaten into the floor by the filth of Hell itself.
To be continued
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