"... Maybe that's the keyword. "Were." Whatever they were before, they're not now. And they're everywhere now. I don't know what it is we're looking at, but it's not good. It's downright awful. And whatever it is, the Covenant can only wish they were as bad as this."

The not-Human thing stood there a moment longer, continuing its ear-splitting, not-Human roar.

Its physique was... Odd, at best. Terrifying at worst. The thing had a body that clearly marked it as being Human, but the tone of the skin suggested that whoever it had been was now decaying, rotting internally, yet somehow still alive. There was a very Human-looking head that sat upon the shoulders, sort of. The head seemed... Pushed back, as though whoever it was had been on the receiving end of a very thorough neck snapping. The look on the thing's face was one of pain. There was no better word for it. Rommel almost wished that whoever it was had been wearing a helmet, because there were plenty more gruesome details.

The thing's rotting flesh had decayed so thoroughly in some areas that it was downright falling off, bits of muscle and sloppy-looking blood draining visibly through the gaps. Black hair was visible on top of the thing's head, matted in some areas, falling out in other areas where the scalp had fallen apart. Its eyes were wide open, revealing murky green hues. The mouth of the thing was spewing the same smoke crap that was coming out of the ship.

None of that bothered Rommel so much, however, as the fact that the man's once-tan armor, now coated with that same sloppy-looking crap that was leaking out of him, had a big hole punched clean through the center of it. Three tentacle-like objects appeared to be protruding from the hole, where there was something attached to them- Inside the man's chest cavity, up near where his neck should have been.

Nobody fired as it as it continued its loud screech.

It paused, then sauntered forward with a slow, deliberate lumbering gait. Its legs moved as an infant might, not quite sure how to use them correctly yet, though with all the nature of a practiced hunter moving in on potential prey. The arms of the thing that used to be a man swung back and forth, uncontrolled by whatever the force was that willed him forward.

The thing made it to within twenty feet of the front line. By that point, whispers were breaking out. Nobody knew whether or not to shoot the thing. It wasn't acting entirely hostile. The roar it had let out earlier made it seem hostile, yet it hadn't exactly shown any intent to attack. It seemed... Exploring, curious.

Or scoping out the area, looking to see what it was up against.

A gasp broke out from somewhere to Rommel's left.

"Oh my God..." the same voice continued. "It's... It's... It's James! James fucking Keller!" As though on cue, the inhuman creature swung in the man's direction. The eyes of the head that hung loosely on the thing's shoulders rolled in their sockets, and the mouth moved. It made no words, instead only strange gurgling sounds. But Rommel was fluent in plenty of different languages, including body language and a little bit of lip reading.

The poor soul was either saying "Help me," or he was saying "Kill me."

"Don't worry James..." the man continued, slowly pressing toward... "James." He was really unsure that this was a wise decision, but the thing hadn't shown any hostile intent so far. "James... What the Hell happened to you, man?"

The thing took a step forward towards the soldier who was asking questions. Rommel's gun remained focused on James Keller, if that was his actual name. At the same time, his eyes darted briefly toward the moron who seemed to think that his old buddy was in speaking conditions, between the fact that his neck looked snapped and there was a hole where his neck should've started that had something else jutting out of it.

The man took a few steps forward toward Keller, slowly lowering his gun. "I really wouldn't do that, soldier..." Rommel announced loudly. Ten feet. The man ignored his advice, and continued to walk toward the thing, making reassuring remarks and asking questions. At six feet, the thing began to walk toward him, too. It raised its arms up, walking in the fashion of a Frankenstein monster or an old-fashioned zombie.

Either way, Rommel doubted it was looking for a hug.

The man slung his rifle over his shoulder, and looked at the stalks protruding from the thing's neck. "Oh my God..." he muttered. He reached out toward one of the feathery tips, as though to touch it.

"Don't you dare touch that thing, trooper!" Rommel roared. "You have NO idea what it is!"

"It's alright, sir!" the soldier yelled. "He's... He's my friend!"

"Private Dansen, do not touch Corporal Keller." Rommel didn't identify the voice, but he assumed it was First Battalion's commander. He had no idea as to what the man's name or rank was. Either way, the man- Private Dansen- didn't listen. He reached out, and brushed one of the stalks.

It reacted violently, recoiling backward. Keller's body visibly writhed, as though he was beginning to have a seizure. And then the corpse-like man gave out another loud roar- At the same time, its arm cocked back, and it flung said arm forward in what looked like a slap. Its hand made contact with the area between Dansen's neck and head.

There was a sickening snap, and the Private fell to the ground. In turn, it snatched up the man's MA5B, and ran straight for the nearest thing it saw- Which happened to be Rommel.

He swore under his breath, and dropped prone. Even as he did so he was pulling the trigger as he centered his sights on... Whatever the Hell he was looking at. The thing pulsed off a few rounds from the MA5B- shockingly, with one hand- but they went wide. Rommel's rounds were center mass. The thing dropped, hard.

And as it did, the noise started up. A chorus of inhuman wails, originating from the seemingly undead monsters standing atop the ship. But by that point the horde of strange creatures were streaming out of the ship in full force, rushing straight for the first line of troops... With seemingly no regard or care for the fact that they'd be gunned down instantly.

As the wave came through the thick veil of smog, things got even worse.

There were many more non-Humans, all of them in similar states. They were in the front lines of the horde, apparently just having been the first things to step out of the ship. But there were more, oh so many more... And they were not the non-Humans in any way.

The Sangheili creature that Rommel had seen was a non-Elite. The thing's natural physiology seemed to have met a similar fate as the non-Humans. Their heads were pushed backwards, forwards, or remained in place- And he realized some didn't even have heads- their flesh decayed. Most of them no longer had most of their armor, wearing shoulder pauldrons, bits and pieces, or otherwise useless parts. Stalks emerged from their chests, their necks, and in a few somewhat horrifying cases, the stalks were growing out of their mouths, their mandibles exploded and their faces deformed to accommodate the strange tentacles.

Some of their arms were snapped at odd angles, seemingly repaired of their own accord. Larger tentacle-like appendages, seemingly unrelated to the first, jutted out from their wrists, some of them with hands adapted to the cause, others with elongated fingers, others with missing limbs.

"Gun 'em down! Every last fuckin' one of 'em!"

A pair of not-quite-Elite things ran straight at Rommel in a pair, and he swung his rifle at the things and shot for the first thing in his line of sight. The first one's legs flared as its apparently still active energy shields caught the rounds. But they were Elite Minors at one point, unfortunately for them. Their shields were already the weakest available; their degraded armor just made it even weaker, apparently.

As his rounds tore through shields and armor, the thing's leg literally disintegrated where the rounds made impact, and the thing hit the ground hard. Rommel swung his aim at the second one, and emptied more than a few rounds into its stomach. Much to his shock and horror, the fucker's stomach erupted where the rounds made contact, and a fist-sized hole went straight through one end and out the other.

The fucker still came running at him, as though he had completely missed. He knew that living creatures could take a blow from a high caliber weapon and keep coming for a few more seconds... But they usually dropped, and hard. These things were not dropping.

He shifted his aim upward, drilling the creature with a hailstorm of bullets directly in the chest, where those damn stalks were coming from. There was a somewhat loud pop, and green goop exploded out of the chest cavity, all over the ground. The body slumped over and hit the ground hard.

Finally.

"Senior! What the fuck are these things?" he heard Miller exclaim from behind him, emptying his M7S into the enemy with vigor.

Rommel realized, not for the first time in his life, that he realized he had no idea what he was looking at. All he knew was that they had no friendly intentions, and that they didn't seem to care when he emptied rounds that could drop a bear right into their guts.

Given the fact that he had drilled a hole straight through the one, he also decided to tack on that he knew they didn't have guts to that list.

"No idea, Private! Just keep hittin' 'em!"

Suddenly Rommel became aware of a more erratic movement. He looked toward the source, and suddenly realized what he was looking at. He'd completely forgotten about the one he'd dismembered, and it was now skittering across the ground like some sort of fucked-up crab monster in an attempt to keep attacking him.

These things have no sense of self-preservation... Or pain...

He shot the thing continually. It took a while, but eventually the body collapsed, and the thing died... Or at least, he was pretty sure it was dead.

He wasn't entirely sure he cared anymore.

"Senior, there's something else, pouring out of the- sh- loo-"

"Say again, Three! Signal's breakin' up!"

"-ook at- the ex- some kind-"

"Fuck!"Rommel exclaimed. He got the gist of it, but really wished he could've gotten a clear signal. This really bothered him. They were just getting crystal clear signals a couple minutes ago. Had these things purposely unjammed the radio, to lure them in? No. They couldn't have. The things weren't even smart enough to move out of the way of constant fire from a Goddamn machine gun. There was no way they were intelligent enough to realize how to work a communications jammer. No way in Hell.

There was something else happening, something he wasn't realizing. He wasn't sure what it was, but by God, it was happening.

He looked up, toward the exit port that had been blown out of the side of the ship.

His eyes widened, and he just about dropped his guns.

Tens... Hundreds... Maybe even thousands of creatures were flowing from the hull. Not like these big, lumbering morons that kept running at them with the apparent intention of being killed.

They were like spiders.

Spiders the size of a man's torso.

But they were more complicated than that. Their body- If it was even a body- looked like a balloon, of a sac. It had weird, vein-like patterns all over it, and seemed to have a pulsating, sickly-green light coming from within it. Green pustules were visible all over the things. They seemed to crawl along on short tendrils... With a trio of stalks jutting out from what he assumed to be the front of them, which ended in feather-like tips.

They were swarming. All heading toward the line, with the same mentality as those drones.

Rommel didn't have to double-guess this matter.

"Don't let those fucking things get near you!" he exclaimed as loudly as he could. His voice carried far, despite the fact that the gunfire should've drowned it out. But between using his radio as a megaphone and his naturally loud voice, he was able to get the word spread pretty easily.

The next few minutes were total Hell. Fending off against both maniacal creatures and giant fucking spiders that he could only assume what they might do was... Less than an ideal situation.

They were forced to keep giving ground. For every one they gunned down, another twelve seemed to emerge from the ship. Rommel didn't know how many troops a Supercarrier could hold by default, but given the numbers they were seeing as it was, they hadn't even seen a fraction of a percentage yet. This was bad, really bad.

But the creatures weren't just rushing the line anymore.

For one thing, they seemed to have started figuring out how to use weapons. Plasma fire from various weapons, and the occasional Human-made projectile weapon, would open fire, causing some people to have to move just to avoid being fried. Some of the MG placements fell that way, too.

They also seemed to have figured out there were more troops on the roofs, and eventually... They just jumped up to the rooftops. Rommel couldn't tell what was happening from there, but it wasn't good. The shooting would stop, and the screaming would continue. The damn spidery things decided to crawl up walls and into buildings, too.

Overall, they made quite a statement: We're infinite, and we will overpower you with sheer numbers, and we will spread out... What they did once they were spread out was the question. Either way, it was overly clear that they had bigger fish to fry, and a military engagement wasn't entirely in their best interests.

Some people were shouting not to let them get away.

Others were shouting to hold position.

Others still were shouting to fall back.

Nobody seemed to have an idea as to what the best clear direction was. Some people were running for their lives, leaving positions unfilled and offering the enemy new ways to cut into the path. Those who chose to stay behind were either gunned down or killed outright by the brutal assault. Others still seemed to be getting killed by those bulbous creatures.

And as he noted out of the corner of his eye, some of the ones they'd cut down had the spider-things taking interest in them- And they crawled into the cavity in their chest. The body would seizure for a moment, then stand back up and keep coming.

"Lead, we can't hold 'em back forever!" Miller shouted behind him. He hosed down another group of the spider-things with lead, causing some to fall over, others to deflate, and some to flat-out pop.

Rommel had arrived at that conclusion a while ago. He was just trying to figure out whether or not his team would hear him if he sent that over the radio. It was better now than never, he supposed. He put a hand to the side of his head. "This is Fullmetal to all units! Emergency Order Omega Three! There's too many of 'em, and we can't hold 'em off from here! Ion, if you are receiving, try contacting our bird- Tell him to get his ass into a position where he can pick us up!"

Omega Three was an Emergency Order that most soldiers had a thorough fear for. Its meaning was simple: All units in the area needed to break off and run, or else they would die.

This seemed a very fitting situation for the application of the code.

"Cop- etal- ling- ack."

That'd have to be good enough.

The Spook fired the last few rounds in his magazine, cutting down another round of the seemingly endless horde. "Four, keep up! On me! Toss 'em if you got 'em!" He ripped a fragmentation grenade off his belt even as he spoke, hitting the primer switch on it without really being sure of where he wanted the thing to go. He spent only a second in deciding to just bowl the thing into the nearest group of assholes coming after him.

Not bothering to wait and see how many parts and pieces would be made by it, Rommel spun himself around, giving Miller a helpful shove in the right direction. The two proceeded to sprint down the street, hoping to whatever God there may have been that the covering fire provided by any remaining units would be good enough.

But where were they going?

Where would they run to?

They couldn't just keep running down the street. These... Things would just keep after them. And given the fact that he'd seen them jump onto buildings in a single bound, take bullets without flinching, and get torn apart without caring?

He was pretty sure they had the stamina to run after them as long as necessary, and without tiring out. Rommel's eyes darted about, looking for a suitable area. They needed something that they could use as an E-Z.

Somewhere preferably tall, away from the ground, so that these things couldn't easily get to them, and so that the Falcon could pick up the squad easily... There were skyscrapers all around, but it wouldn't do any good to just choose one at random. They needed something easily defensible if it came down to that line. Which, unfortunately, he was sure that it would.

Speaking of defense. Where were the mobile and armored companies? According to the brief situational report he'd heard earlier, there were supposed to be Warthogs and tanks here. He was definitely not seeing either of the above.

Boom!

Speak of the devil.

A pair of M808B Main Battle Tanks rolled around the corner, aiming their cannons directly down the street. They almost seemed to hesitate in firing, most likely because their drivers were not accustomed to seeing such odd, frenzied creatures running at the enemy in a straight line without any rhyme or reason.

Rommel grinned wickedly, however, as their cannons corrected themselves, and demolished another group of the things. Then he remembered something.

"This is Fullmetal to Ion. Ember Tower's nearby, can any units get to it, over?"

"- ffirmat- en rou- pilot, ove-"

"Repeat that last part again, Two?"

"Status- the pilot?"

"Ain't heard shit from Foxtrot-180," he replied. "Will try contacting when we get to the Tower."

"-opy that. Ou-"

Upon reaching the corner, Rommel darted right. The roads here were pretty clear, they'd managed to get out of the thick of it. The tower was just around the bend of the street, and to the left... As long as the damn thing was still there, anyway. Lord only knew what buildings were still standing, or for that matter stable.

But there it was. He could see it.

The Ember Tower was essentially the office building of a major industry in the area. The industry did a lot of transporting goods, mainly on-planet, but some off-world activity wasn't uncommon. It was seven stories tall, and sported its own landing pad in case there was a need for emergency helicopters to come in for any reason.

Alien space zombie things sounded like a good enough reason to him.

Rommel looked only over his shoulder once as he ran to the building. When he did, he was met with the less-than-reassuring sight of about fifty of the drones appearing out of nowhere, and completely demolishing the tank. They punched holes clean through the ceramic-titanium armor. The last he saw of the tank he was looking at was a bright orange explosion.

"Hey, boss...?" Miller asked, between huffs of breath.

"Yes, Miller," Rommel replied, "That just fucking happened."