Grave expectation
The orbit was going perfectly well until the Ship Master came in.
As we completed our last rotation, the only disturbance blipping on the screen was an outpost along one of the coastal areas. It was unimportant and immediately ignored. We were going to head farther inland before landing when the ship master stumbled in. As of late his appearances on deck were far and few and we thought nothing of his lack of presence. The doors slid open and he stumbled in and all our eyes were on him. I took off my head gear and placed it in my lap, slightly bowing my head as did the other soldiers in respect for our commander.
A sort of…gurgling groan erupted from his throat, coming with it a cloud of what looked like rot. Infected with flood. A spore that must've gone undetected in our last encounter with the fell thing. I swung around the side of my seat, grabbing for a plasma pistol. He was already on my squad leader and chewing his throat out. The other Sangheili seemed to be moving slow as possible, the techs that kept the ship afloat fleeing with their little experience in fighting, and the other soldiers along with myself stood our ground. The leader was down but he'd be rising quick. I let out a few pulses of plasma, winding the ship master and covering our retreat. Each room on the ship was outfitted with a Flood failsafe. Flares to torch the inside once the clean and living were out.
I was shoved to the back as the team filtered out the door and insured that it was locked airtight. But I guess Ghalri didn't check thoroughly enough. He pressed the button on the outside panel and we listened to the room fill with flame…and slowly filter out the doors until the pressure deck finally gave way and exploded. A failure of a failsafe, I and a team of two fled deeper into the hull that began burning. We lost two in the fire and were forced into the hold below. How we missed the infection was a mystery.
Fleshy webbing was gracefully laced all around the transports and to the walls. An obvious nesting sign left by whatever sort of flood creature had evolved in our hold. We tried to torch the nearly living nest it had made, a small cluster of spores frantically raced around the floor and either exploded from our assault or escaped through our legs. I gave way and chased the small cluster that fled. I heard one of my team shout out in pain as the spore crawled deftly around his head. We had no time.
The fire had spread further into the hull, I pressed against the wall to try and avoid the flame. My only chance was the escape pods. Red alerts whined loudly down every hall and lights blinked out the warning. I'm not sure how many were left alive to head it but I do know that I finished off the Ship Master as he lumbered and writhed down the hall. His body was swollen and pulsing with the plague. I blew his head off just to be safe.
I mashed buttons frantically before the portal doors slid open and I crawled into the descent pod. They closed behind me and I kept my body straight as the security belts wrapped around my waist. I heard a side of the hull finally give way and explode, rocking the whole ship and rattling my pod loose. I tightened my grip on the little bars at my side before typing in the release code and clinging. I felt the pod detach and the boosters fired up. The descent down was rough, I deployed friction cushions and the descent wings to try and slow down but it didn't do much good. A few warnings beeped out and I braced for impact as the pod crushed head first into the ground below.
Far off, something exploded. I crawled out and watched the flaming pieces rain down from the sky and sprinkle in the thick foliage around me. The sky overhead was cloudy and dark with smoke and soot. I held my head and sat up in the darkness. My ship was gone. My team was gone. And I was left alone in this jungle of some throwback planet without a weapon other than my plasma pistol and a carbine rifle. I re-secured my head piece and got to my feet.
There would be time to grieve, yes, but a body can only last so long without food and water. And if I was going to survive, I would need to get to it now. I looked back and squinted through the foliage, surveying what I could see of the wreckage. Perhaps what was left of the wreck could be salvaged. And there looked to be something underneath the wreckage of my ship. Something that kept the fires burning…