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Attack on Sol (Part 20)
Posted By: Slit Throat<halo_boy16@yahoo.com>
Date: 3 November 2004, 11:28 PM
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Sorry about the long wait but I've been really busy with school and stuff. I'm trying to finish by Nov. 9 so I'm sorry if the final couple of chapters are not the best I've written.
The Flood. That name was charged with meaning for the Master Chief. The days of fighting on Halo had been some of the worst in his life and now, the creatures that had made those days a living hell were back.
The rest of the Spartans had little idea of what the Flood were aside from what the Chief had been able to tell them. Linda had no knowledge whatsoever as she had been clinically dead during that period of time.
"The Flood?" she asked.
"A parasitic life form that infects a host and rewrites its nervous system, effectively taking control of the host's body," said Cortana, cutting off the Chief. "The small ones are the infection forms, and the larger ones are infected hosts. The bloated ones are essentially breeding grounds for more infection forms. Shields will keep them out, but if they go down..." she trailed off.
The Master Chief gestured towards their objective, the huge volcano that dominated the skyline. "There's nothing we can do about them right now. We need to disable those AA guns. Humanity is depending on us."
"No need to be so dramatic," teased Cortana as the Spartans began to jog towards the volcano once more.
Kalit stood guard at the main entrance to the air defense facility. As soon as word had reached his commander about the Infidel's attack, he and two other members of his unit had been stationed outside the main entrance to keep watch for any landing parties that may try and disable the defenses in this sector. He had been ordered to be ready for anything.
Kalit did not really think the Infidel fleet would try anything that hopeless as they were sure to need all of their resources in the orbital battle.
Suddenly, something large flashed overhead and slammed into the ground a short distance away, just over one of the hills the base's main entrance was surrounded by. Kalit and his soldiers immediately had their weapons trained in the direction it had gone. He gave a signal and one soldier flicked on his camouflage and went to investigate.
Several units ticked by when abruptly, a dark shape rose up behind the other soldier, raised one tentacled arm and brought it down on his head. The soldier immediately collapsed. Kalit had just enough time to turn on his camouflage and roll to avoid the enemy as it leaped at him.
The creature stood for a moment, confused, then turned and ran to the huge metal door guarding the base. It gave a short gurgling sound and abruptly, a huge number of the creatures were flooding towards the base from seemingly nowhere.
Large, bloated forms waddled forward, fell to the ground and exploded doing the door little damage. Another form like the first ran forward and from where Kalit lay on the ground, it appeared that it was carrying a fuel rod gun! This form fired at the door, melting some of the outer layer away. It fired again and this time blew a significant hole in the metal. The rest of the creatures began gurgling excitedly and hitting the door with their tentacles.
Finally, the solid metal door fell to the ground with a crash and the horde swarmed into the base. Kalit slowly stood and turned on his communication device.
"The base has been penetrated by enemies not of the Human's kind Your Excellency. Be warned, they are very dangerous." A swift 'beep' followed the message informing Kalit that it had been heard and acknowledged. He glanced around and without hesitation followed the creatures into the base.
The Spartans arrived at the main entrance to the control center to find the door already down and the body of what appeared to be one of the Assassins lying on the ground.
"Looks like the Flood have already been here," observed
Cortana.
"Great," muttered the Chief. He motioned for the Spartans to follow him as he moved forward.
The interior of the base was dark and gloomy and the Chief felt as thought they should be ambushed at any moment. His worries only grew as the Spartans continued on without meeting any resistance. They were few obstacles in their path and those that there were had already been cleared by the horde of Flood that had poured down these narrow corridors. After a little while, the Chief began to hear the sounds of battle in the distance which only grew louder as the Spartans moved deeper into the base.
Abruptly, the Spartans turned a corner and found themselves in the entrance of what appeared to be the main control center of the base. It was also the scene of what must have been a large battle. Blood, both green and purple, covered the walls of the room. The numerous bodies littered on the floor gave evidence of a major assault by the Flood that had succeeded in pushing the few surviving Covenant out into a hallway on the opposite side of the room from the Spartans.
A few Flood combat forms were guarding the hallway's entrance firing down it's length. Occasionally a plasma bolt would flash the other direction and strike one of the Flood, but it would simply shrug off the damage and continue firing. They could not, however, shrug off the damage issued from the Spartan's Battle Rifles.
Even as the body of the last combat form fell to the ground, the Spartans charged into the room. Will, Linda and Fred covered the hallway as the Chief moved to one of the computer consoles and inserted Cortana's chip. He hoped she would be able to find a way to disable the AA guns quickly. The Fleet did not have much time left. As she did so often, Cortana surprised him.
"I can trigger an overload sequence of the base's energy source with a timer from this location," she said almost immediately. "The explosion should have enough force to destroy this entire facility and perhaps even the guns themselves."
"Do it," replied the Chief, "we don't have any time to lose. Set the timer for three minutes." Instantly, a three minute countdown appeared on his HUD. The Chief ejected Cortana's chip and inserted it into his helmet.
"Spartans," he said, " we have three minutes to get out of here. Lets move!"
They turned and ran back through the entrance they had come through and back into the system of hallways that separated them from the outside. But their escape was not nearly as easy as their infiltration. It seemed that the Covenant had brought in reinforcements and the vast majority of those were dedicated to keeping the Spartans from escaping the facility.
The hallways were jammed with Covenant, both alive and dead, as the Spartans made their bid for freedom. For a long minute and several intense firefights, it seemed to the Chief that the waves of Covenant were simply too much and that this was another Charge of the Light Brigade, but even as those thoughts began to surface, the purple hallways opened up into the barren landscape that surrounded the volcano.
Without pausing, the Chief and the others launched into a full sprint attempting to get as far away from the imminent explosion as possible. With only fifteen seconds left on the countdown, they reached the entrance to the mine they had seen earlier. The Spartans climbed down into the shallowest part and braced themselves.
For what seemed an eternity, the world was still. Then came a low rumbling and the tunnel groaned as the explosion shook the ground in a huge radius from the facility. When the ground finally stilled, the Spartans climbed back outside to find that the large building was now no more than a large smoking crater.
The Chief contacted Colonel Ackerson on his helmet mike, informing him of the destruction of the base. "The AA guns have been disabled Colonel," he said, "we're ready for the NOVAs."
"Longswords inbound Chief, nice work. The explosion rattled something in the Cormorant, so you'll have to return here for extraction." Colonel Ackerson sounded oddly disappointed, almost as if he had wanted the Spartans to fail!
"On our way sir," the Chief acknowledged. He motioned for the other Spartans to follow and jogged off in the direction the Cormorant lay.
Within a few minutes, a pair of Longsword bombers appeared with a NOVA bomb slung between them on a multitude of Titanium A cables. The Chief glanced up at them and smiled behind his faceplate as they flew off toward the volcano. Mission successful.
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