Into the Inferno
Being lost in this cauldron of calamity was something I'd hoped never to happen, again. The starkness and black; cold, uncaring and corrupt. That's what it was. Fit like a glove, really. The whole fucking place sent an itch across my skin. The creeping, crawling feeling of something that just was not right in any such manner. No matter what, nothing could shake it. I never wanted to come back to this place, but I had no choice. Nothing had changed. Nothing at all. I could hear the roaring crackle of fire in the deep, and the heat – the air thick with it – cut through even the strongest temperature regulators. For all its vastness I felt closed in and crushed by an unwelcome weight. The darkness crushed down on my skull, ribs, arms and legs. The air felt thin, and for a minute I almost started to panic with the hallucination that I couldn't breathe. I felt sick- I felt small. All the morale was sapped from your soul and you were left a muddy pit. We'd all thought, "Won't get to us this time, fuck yeah!" And with enthusiastic fist-pumps toward the sky we dropped down in secret for our goal. Well, fuck-en A, man. God, I hated this place.
I moved along, keeping close to the ground and well in the shadows (not that there was really any place with light, in here, save for in the deeper circles by the fires and rivers of molten metal). The commotion of life – or near-life, really – ricocheted off the walls and bounced around in our ears. A soupy cocktail of growls, screams and other unworldly noises in speech that only the higher powers could unravel into something that made sense. Probably did to them, but then again they weren't human, so fuck it. Or, more appropriately in this case, "fuck that noise." I pressed up against a wall, every sensor and sensory mechanism awake and alert for any of the dastardly bastards we'd come across before. For all we prided ourselves on as soldiers of Man and its Fleets, I was pretty sure that we were all experiencing similar symptoms of belittlement and meekness. I woulda taken rainbows and butterflies over this.
Let me make this as clear as I possibly can: I hate goddamned rainbows and butterflies.
A voice, crisp and clear, resounded throughout my helmet's comm system, "North quadrant clear, awaiting confirmation on all sides. Rho recon, report."
"Negative on tangos, Alpha. Route's clear, at least it seems to be." I turned around, eyeing the SpecOps BBIA elements as they fell into place, weapons trained and comms quiet. They always did creep me out a bit. But just a bit. I was admittedly honored to have been given authority over a company. InAs was paramount to legendary in the Command. Surgical assault teams that were calamity-capable when given the proper authorization. It was absolutely no surprise to me that they'd been selected to back the charge into the Forge. What did give me cause to scratch my head was why in the friggin' Hell hadn't they been the ones to do it the first damned time! I mean I was definitely not the only one partial to the postulation that maybe, just maybe, things woulda gone plenty smoother than they had had InAs been the ones chosen initially!
The ION in my suit kicked on, weapons forming from the armor as I slipped forward through the black, slick as water across glass. As the self-elected forward member of the company I had more on the line than anyone behind me, really. Not that I couldn't hold my own, but I always envied the ones in the middle. Most people said that the middle was really the worst place to be, if not the back, but I tended to disagree. CQC had never been my favorite sport, despite my skill with a blade.
"Rain, rain, go away..." Someone muttered into their mic.
"We gonna get started soon?" Another asked, their voice on edge and bristling with anticipation.
"Stow the chatter!" The growling tone could only be from a Sergeant Major. They seemed prone to extreme seriousness, sometimes.
"Alpha zero, we're all clear here. Perimeter set and awaiting orders," the last team's CO informed.
"Roger, Gamma recon. Rho, Beta, Mu and Xi: proceed forward to the Anvil Lip. Do not engage unless unavoidable. Operation: Iron, stage two underway." The Alpha levied out his commands and then paused. It felt like he was searching for something to say, maybe something he'd forgotten. A deep, regretful sigh heralded his closing words, "If only prayers worked.. this valley's got one helluva shadow... Godspeed to the hell-bound, soldiers."
The Anvil Lip, the exact place where the last attempt at attacking the Forge climaxed and sank. No doubt whatever the Fallen had devised as a new security detail would be worse than before. It hadn't so much been what was there as it'd been what came next. The Blight never showed his face, but he'd sure as hell made sure we got a hellfire-warm reception from his legions of happy monsters. I'd gotten close enough to shake hands with some of them, last time. Although I'd opted not to, and courteously excused myself from the premises along with the rest of my party. Yeah, uh.. it hadn't gone well... At all. And our failure had turned into the talk of High Command. Then again, "failure" felt too weak a word. More like.. glaring megaflop. And even that did not come close to describing just how shitty everything had turned out after the catastrophic debacle of the now-infamous Operation: Bar Sinister.
Almost not surprisingly it was total BS. Funny, right?
We moved along as silently as thieves, stealing through corridors and immeasurable expanses of swallowing black, all of it frighteningly devoid of life. The voices of beasts clamored against the walls and floor; resounding off the ceiling and bouncing back to our ears to remind us of the dangers ahead. It made them feel all so terribly close, and for all I knew they could have been right up next to me, what with the near-total lack of light. Our helmet optics displayed very little, naught more than the faintest patches of shapes to clarify what was a wall and what was emptiness. That vacuity stretched on and on; always mocking, never shrinking.
I froze in step, an icy pain slipping down around my spine from the base of my skull. The prickling, needlepoint-fine stabs of fear cascaded across my body, resonating in time with my hastened heartbeat. I knew that feeling- I knew it well. I twisted 'round on the balls of my feet – which you'd think would be kinda hard to do in armor – looking everywhere at once for the source of this sinister presence. The soldiers behind me paused in confusion.
"Something the matter, ma'am?" One of them asked, his voice sounding far away.
They didn't feel it! Of course not, no one could. No one but me. Icy palms passed across my skin, making me sweat despite the suit's efforts. Everything about it was chilled, and it crept up into my head to pound in resounding beats against the walls of my skull. I shut my eyes tight and fought hard against the tide of fear, but I could hardly stem it. I stumbled, fighting for control over my own muscles as they struggled to turn me around and run back to where some misguided voice told me was safety. But I couldn't listen, I couldn't let this place or that thing get the best of me!
God, it wouldn't go away! Why wouldn't it go away?
I could sense a hand on my shoulder, and barely registered the sound of voices in the comm. They all ran together and overlapped into one, and I wouldn't have been able to make any sense of it had I wanted to. Not because I could hardly focus on the words, but because something else was speaking over them, now.
Like the low, rumbling of the earth as it rolled through space his voice dripped across my consciousness, "Poor, poor little Samantha. Come here to have a go, again? Why, I would have thought that our last little.. encounter.. would have dampened your hunger for a bite. We would not want to see you choke, now, would we? Then again, your kind's unparalleled stubbornness always has been quite the failing throughout your miserable little run in life, now hasn't it?" He had a tendency to get angrier as he rambled on and on. Maybe he just didn't have great reign over his emotions, or something.
"Get out of my head, get out of my head, get out of my head, get out of my head you fucking monster get out of my head!" I started screaming deliriously, aware only of the presence that enveloped me. Shivers, like snakes, combed across my brain. I could feel his fingers, they were inside my head! He was reaching inside, gripping at handfuls of mush and strands. He was emptying me all over again- he was pulling away at my mind and there was nothing I could do!
"Shush, my little princess. Quiet your cries. No one can hear you, and no one cares. It will all be over soon; there is nothing you can do. It's quite all right, really. You'll be dead before you even realize what's happened. No need to fret. Just give in." His voice was a mockery at something soothing and sweet, but the powerful hooks lacing his words caught on and dug in deep, dragging me down without a fight. I shook my heard hard, as if that would throw off his grip and release me from his hold. I had to warn the others, if there was still time. He knew I was here, and now he was in my head. That meant he knew how many soldiers were here; the size of the force above and what we planned to do. We were all in grave danger, maybe even more than the last time!
My internal defenses kicked in as if a delayed reaction to a wound or blow, and violently fought against the tide of psionic assault, forcing around his hands and choking his wrists. I could hear him growling in fury, possibly at the notion of some little smear in existence daring to resist something as timeless and powerful as himself. Well, if he thought he was just gonna waltz into my head again and steal more than just my sanity then he had another fucking thing coming!
With a violent snap I was torn back into total consciousness, now aware of the rumbling explosions of gunfire and the ear-splitting screams of bloodthirsty rage spraying from the mouths of the maddened horrors under The Infection's command. A wall built up in my head to keep it out, and I turned my now undivided attention to the situation at hand.
"Good to have you back, Legate Major!" An officer greeted, apparently noticing my altered vitals from one HUD or another. I analyzed the fray in whole as I responded, demanding a SitRep. "Hostiles swarmed us as soon as we lost you. Something tells me Command's gonna get bit in the ass for not listening to you." I could see him over by a far wall, hunkered down and weapons alight. Something howled in the darkness, its cry piercing the din with terrifying clarity. Whether it was in pain or just furious, I couldn't tell. I had been pulled to the middle of the assembly for my own protection, and the front line of defense was holding well, for now. The armor over my right hand ran and congealed into a new shape, with target indicators on my HUD blinking to life.
I pushed ahead, closer to the front, and opened fire on the nearest threat. A barrier had been laid down, composed of burning plasma. Not lethal to Fallen in its current size, but still painful and difficult to pass through. While they were caught pushing through the net we took advantage and mowed them down. Well, that's a bit of an exaggeration. Most larger Fallen can take a horrifyingly large amount of punishment before even slowing down. Thankfully no such entities were among the hordes swarming on our position.
"Alpha, this is Rho, are you still with us?" I had to yell, even with the suit buffering as much sound as possible the racket was nearly impossible to hear clearly through.
I heard a low growl as the comm cut on, it sounded like one of frustration, and then he answered, "I read you, Rho. Still kickin', but maybe not for long."
"Are we getting any support from orbital or have they ducked out again?" I asked. Another small troop of Fallen punched through the barrier and were bearing down on us fast. "Um, you'll have to wait a sec, Alpha, we've got trouble." I hit the nearest element on the shoulder and signed I would be heading in to meet them. She nodded, and four other InAs elements elected to join me. On my mark we broke through the front line and collided with the enemy. My blade blinked into real space for a crushing blow and a ferocious uppercut to the hound-monster's abdomen. It could only let out a yelp as I danced around the diving strike of another and immediately went for a killing blow against a third. The charge lasted only seconds, and soon all that remained of the horrid beasts was rotting carcasses and puddles of fluid and guts. We backtracked to the safety of the company, and I let the Alpha know I had survived.
"As to your question, Rho, the answer is 'no'. I requested a network lockdown on the Forge and orbital backup, but until the ships are in immediate danger we won't see a lick of assistance, and Command doesn't think the Forge is worth a total lockdown, at least not with such a low chance of success. Apologies."
"Dammit!" I would have punched the nearest wall, but I was a little too far away for that, so I fell back on just carving another hostile to chunks with a few rounds from my firearm. That was so fucking typical! Command rushed into the situation all hyped up and ready to go, but the moment that it started to go sour they backed out without even trying to lend any kind of hand. You'd think that they wouldn't pull that kind of bullshit after what happened the last time an assault on the Forge failed.
The torrential horde of Fallen past the barrier lessened their assault, and slowly the crowd began to part as some invisible hands divided them neatly down the center. I reported back what I saw, and confirmation sprouted throughout the Forge from other teams who were seeing the same thing. From the darkness came light, burning wild and bright. Demonic tendrils of flame licked through the air as a unit of Ghouls armed with weapons we'd nicknamed sickle-screamers marched forward toward the plasma, and behind them came a Djinni – one of the strongest and most feared of all the Fallen breeds. Its blazing eyes flashed over the burning wall, and with the raising of a hand and the extension of a single finger it sliced the barrier in half without even so much as being close enough to piss on it.
"Rho, what is your situation? Rho? Rho! Rho, report! Rho?" Alpha's tone was turning harsh with anxiety. It was moments like these that I seriously did not envy their responsibilities.
"Oh, shit..!" Before I could say anything more, the Fallen were on us.
Author's Notes: All right. Well, best to explain now for anyone who reads this. I did not write this, another fanfiction author, "And The Adversary Succeeds" did. He will be publishing a re-envisioning of "Stigma" soon, and this is a sample of his personal alterations. His version will be longer, and probably more detailed. Honestly, I'd just as soon hand the whole thing over to him, right now. I've been wanting to rewrite Stigma myself, but with other projects already clogged up to the brim I was more than happy to hand him the reigns. His version will have a different name to more properly distinguish it from the original, and that title is "Bar Sinister." He will be remaining as true as possible to the original concept, but at the same time fleshing it out and adding his own original touches to the mix.