Hello again. Sorry for the long update. School and thanksgiving take up WAY too much time. Not to mention I have gotten back into drawing anime. Don't judge me. Please R&R.
"So," Maverick asked, "Are there more of you still alive?"
"No. Probably not," Romius answered. If there were, they would be in a cryogenic unit. Um, A.I., what is your name?"
"I am Offensive Bias, Forerunner A.I. Primary Function is to combat Mendicant Bias and the Gravemind."
"Thank you. Please check the cryogenic units on all Forerunner installations and ships."
Offensive floated over to an access panel. "I'm sorry sir. There are no others. You are the only Forerunner in existence."
"OK then," he said, rubbing his hands together.
A knocking sound came from the door at the end of the chamber.
"That's not good. There isn't supposed to be anything in that chamber. Offensive, please show the monitoring device for that chamber.
Offensive brought the hologram up. What they saw made them groan. Maverick sat down and held his head in his hands.
"What is it?" Jacob asked.
"It's the Flood," Maverick answered him. "I thought we had wiped the last of them out. I'll notify command that we need to evacuate the planet immediately." He switched to a FLEETCOM link. "Attention all UNSC personnel. Please report to the nearest drop ship. We must evacuate the planet immediately. This is not a drill. Emergency code F2776-FLOOD. Parasitic Flood organisms discovered. Please report to the nearest drop ship and evacuate the planet." He turned to his team. "Let's blow this joint."
A marine brought several tons of explosives into the room. Romius helped the Spartans to put them in all the correct places.
"You do know," he told them, "That these explosives will not be enough to destroy them."
"Yes," said Sara. "But it will seal the entrance hopefully. Offensive, can you self destruct this installation from your Dreadnought?"
"Certainly."
"Good. Set these things down and let's get out of here."
The team walked back into the lab. They recovered the tunnel and then started to grab anything that might be important. A cargo truck had been backed into the lab and they started putting all the equipment onto it.
"Well, apparently the elevator is fixed," Kimberly commented.
Offensive guided Thorn and Jacob as they lifted the pillar and placed it in a strong box. It did not take long for everything to be loaded onto the truck. Everyone jumped in as the truck started up. It joined several other trucks on the trip to the elevator. Two trucks at a time were being lifted to the surface. The Arc of Light had entered the atmosphere and landed at a makeshift dry dock while the troops loaded all mobile supplies into the hangar and cargo bays. The captured Wraith and Banshee were loaded into a high security bay locked up. Maverick shook his head.
"It's a pity that the Flood is down there. This was becoming a fairly nice installation."
When all the supplies were on board and most of the troops, Maverick looked at his tactical pad.
"Detonation in 10 minutes."
The rest of the troops hurried to board the Arc of Light. The Spartan team rushed to the Dreadnought. They were all in and launched when they noticed the medical evacuation. The infirmary was still loading injured troops and other personnel onto a medical transport. They were only about half way done. Maverick halted the detonation countdown with only two or three seconds left. Then they heard an explosion from deep within the ground. Maverick look at his TAC-pad again. All the explosives were still intact.
"Offensive, give me visual on the Cryo-bay," he instructed.
The hologram came up. Jake groaned. Maverick swore.
"My God, they've escaped," he said.
He opened a comm. line with the medical transport.
"Get your asses out of their NOW! The Flood have broken out of their imprisonment in the Forerunner installation and are on their way out."
They watched as the elevator shaft shuddered and collapsed as the hoards of teeming parasites flooded out. The medical transport lifted off with its doors open, still loading patients onboard. The Flood overwhelmed the troopers and patients still on the ground. The transport closed its doors as the Flood ripped a medical officer off of his post. The small craft barely managed to escape destruction by the Flood Pure forms. It floated up beside the Arc of Light and landed in its main hangar bay. Both the Dreadnought and the Arc of Light exited the atmosphere. Maverick again opened a comm. link.
"Captain, we do not have the communication abilities to call for back up. Please call for a Sangheili ship to come and glass the surface of this planet."
"Will do, son. Do you mind telling me what in hell happened down there?"
"Yes sir. We discovered a Forerunner installation near one of the lab stations. We entered and heard a knocking sound. Offensive accessed the monitor for the next room. It was filled with flood. We packed the room we were in with explosives and left. That was when we initiated the evacuation. The flood broke out before we could set off the explosives. They came up the elevator shaft and took part of the medical staff and some of our injured. Speaking of which, have you talked with General Fortree?"
"No son, I haven't. I thought he must be on your Dreadnought. He wasn't on the med transport. I looked there because I was told that he had been injured in the bombardment."
Both of them bowed their heads.
"The only explanation is that he is still down there. Send a probe down to search for survivors. We have a sample of his DNA. Put it in the probe to search specifically for his DNA signature. We'll find him either way."
The connection blinked out.
"Fortree didn't make it out. We have no idea whether or not he is still alive."
All of them bowed their heads.
"On the other hand, he could still be alive. The captain sent a probe ship down to the surface to look for him. If he is dead or alive, the probe will bring him back. If he is infected, the probe will kill the infection and again bring his body back. We will find him one way or another."
A few hours later, the probe returned with the body of General Robert Fortree. He had numerous wounds all over his body. Most of them were from the collapse of the command building, but he had several new ones from fighting the flood.
Once the Spartans were on board the Arc of Light, the Admiral brought up the video the probe had taken when it had retrieved Fortree's body. Everyone in attendance gasped when they saw the scene of his death. Flood bodies littered the ground. Most of them had been killed by hand to hand combat. The few with gunshot wounds had powder burns from the close range of the combat. Fortree was clutching his Magnum to him, having fought to the very end. Now, his body lay composed in an ornamental casket of polished chrome. The casket was put into an enlarged cryo unit to preserve his body.
After the funeral, Maverick and Kreft quietly removed Fortree's casket from the cryo bay and transported it to a top secret lab facility in the core of the ship. Once there, they opened the casket and reverently placed the General's body on a scanner. They scanned the neural connections of his brain, and then placed him back in the casket. Sara uploaded the scan to module holding an A.I. chip. The three watched as a hologram appeared on the display of the module. It was the image of a young man in dress uniform. He looked to be about twenty-five or twenty-six years old.
"Greetings," he said. "I am Manuel."
The three greeted him.
"Would you please be so kind as to plug me into the main database? I need to download as much information as possible so that I can be of assistance. I already have knowledge of the last mission, but other than that, I am at a loss."
"OK," Maverick said. He picked up the chip and plugged it into the main data terminal. Manuel downloaded all the top security clearance codes and information on most of the UNSC fleet.
Maverick and Kreft turned away. They had to return the body to the cryo bay before anyone noticed that it was missing.
Once Manuel had finished gathering information, Sara inserted his chip in the back of her helmet. They returned to their main cabin to find Romius sitting in an arm chair drinking a soda.
"Well, you've certainly adjusted to life here," Kreft commented, laughing.
"Yes, it is quite nice here. I trust that you recovered your General's body."
"We did. He killed several Flood with hand to hand combat. Several others were killed with point blank shots with a hand gun."
"He was a resilient cuss, wasn't he?"
"He was. Never had I known a non-Spartan to be able to withstand the amount of injury he did without being killed. Most of his wounds were from the collapse of the command center, before we had even discovered the flood presence. He would have lasted longer if he hadn't been injured in the first place," Maverick said.
"Hey, Maverick?" Thorn asked. "Did you ever detonate those explosives?"
"No, to tell the truth I didn't. I suppose I ought to." He looked at his TAC-pad and entered a code.
Back on the surface of the planet, the ground heaved upward, destroying several buildings, and then proceeded to collapse again. The crater left by the explosion quickly filled with debris from the surround area. The crater rose into a dome again. The dome started to crack, then fell apart as the Gravemind ripped its prison apart.
"At last, I am FREE! You slime of the ground will be powerless to stop me." The sound reverberated through the atmosphere. The Arc of Light was just exiting the atmosphere at the time. Everybody onboard heard the thunderous roar.
"Um, not good."
"I would say not. The presence of a Gravemind is a serious matter indeed. We must deal with it accordingly," Romius said. "The Gravemind is what caused the fall of the Forerunners. However, a direct and concentrated attack on the surface of the planet could kill off most of the infection. Then a bombardment of explosives could open up the ground. The attack would continue until the flood were destroyed."
"We've called in a ship to glass the surface. It will kill the infection easily. Then we will bury the exit of the facility. We'll starve the flood. This entire system will become a quarantined area. No one will be allowed in or out," Jake told him.
"That works too."
Something rocked the ship, throwing everyone to the floor. The Captain's voice came over the intercom. "All personnel to their battle stations. The Flood are attempting to shoot us down."
The team ran to the bridge. The Captain motioned for them to come over to him. "The Flood have commandeered several Covie ships. They are firing at us in volleys. We need those craft shot down. The New Dawn will be here in two or three hours to glass the planet. We have to hold the Flood down until then. There are mass driver cannons mounted on the top and bottom of this ship. Man them and shoot down those ships."
The team ran to each of their positions. Not long after, Flood occupied craft started exploding like a bag of Jiffy-Pop. It did not take long for each of the craft to be shot down. Maverick hugged Sara, took off his helmet and kissed her. "Nice shooting! Now maybe we can relax and have some alone time."
"I'm afraid that that won't be possible," the Admiral said. "The New Covenant is making its presence very well known. We are heading to Reach, where UNSC forces have been rebuilding. We need all personnel battle ready when we enter the system."
"Yes sir. We understand sir." Maverick looked at Sara with longing.
"Don't worry son. You'll get alone time eventually."
Maverick laughed bitterly. "We're Spartans. We don't get 'alone time.'"
Sorry for the wait. Had virus. Please R&R. Thanks for reading.