Chapter XIV: Infestation
Absolution Arc
1207 Hours, December 19, 2714
Orbit of Moon, Solar System
"According to the reports we've been getting en masse, there's some kind of activity going on in the Hellmouth." Primus reported through the comms channels. Lightning's Draught of Nectar, Rez's Kondratyuk's Escape, Silver's The Road Unraveled, Reaper's Devil's Due BKR, and Spectre's new─well, more like old from his time as a Red Veil Dark Knight─Xiphos-class ship in the same color scheme as his Fatal Vision were in orbit en route to the moon. It wasn't going to take long to get there, with or without the warp drive. "The Vanguard and the Speaker wants us to investigate what's going on down there, and they're concerned it's another invasion or territorial takeover attempt just like the Cosmodrome and wherever we've been."
"Taken?"
"No, it's not the Taken. Their bio signatures are irregular and they're definitely not extra dimensional. I tried pulling up as much as I could about the reports but they're permanently corrupted. Whatever it is, it's not friendly."
"Since when was anything we come across friendly?" Rez asked half-assed. "It's not like the next thing we come across will just give us cake and balloons and say 'we come in peace.'"
Spectre tightened his grip on the throttle and analyzed what his A.I partner managed to recover from the corrupted reports. Some of the fragments came in the form of distress calls and he ordered MI6 to play some of them.
"Outpost Delta four-one-niner to Vanguard, we're under attack by unknown assailants! They've overrun us and most of our weapons are ineffective! Send he– Arrrrrgh!" The distress call cut there. Spectre furrowed his brows at the sound of the distress call, listening attentively. He knew something was wrong from the one sending the distress call but something else caught his attention.
Before the transmission cut off, he heard an unworldly howl. One that chilled him down to the bone.
"Are the sensor grids from the outpost still functional, Alpha?" Silver asked his Ghost.
"They're still functional but we're not getting any signals. It's like something's jamming the signals from the sensor grids."
An unknown enemy that is mostly immune to damage and jams signals? Spectre shut off his side of the comms channel and faced his A.I companion. "Primus, what do you think we're dealing with?"
"The same thing you're probably thinking of. Scary in a disturbing context, frightening, and something in sheer numbers to overwhelm even a six-man Fireteam."
"If it is what I think it is, Rez, Silver, and Reaper aren't ready for this. They're under equipped and have no knowledge about how to face them."
"And given how we don't have an all-powerful bomb that can wipe out what we think it is and leaving everything else intact, this is gonna be another long cleanup mission," Primus said saucily. "When was our last cleanup mission? Twenty-one years ago, was it?"
Pendragon gripped the throttle tighter, another surge of loathed memories surfacing. Before it could start haunting him again, he shook it off. "…Don't ever bring that up. Right now we need to focus and get this cleaned up." He flipped a switch and reestablished connection with his team again. "Alright guys, here's the plan: Silver, Rez, and Cloud, I need you to stay upside, find the sensor grid and reestablish a secure connection. Try to find any survivors from the attacks during your phase on the mission. Lightning, Reaper, and I will descend into the Hellmouth and find out what the hell's going on down there. Once you guys are done with the search and reestablishing, regroup with us at the Gatehouse. If we're not there by the time you arrive, descend into the Hellmouth."
"Got it."
"We're all over it, Spectre!" Rez and Silver responded.
"And Silver? No sample taking. I mean it this time." Once the squad of ships were within orbit of the Moon, Silver and Rez broke off from formation and headed for the transmat point at Archer's Line. Spectre followed them to drop off the brawn of the team, ship hovering directly over one of the many ridges and where Cloud could land. The wings of the Xiphos went from horizontal to vertical, stabilizing it as it hovered. Even the auxiliary solar-powered wings opened up and provided extra stability on the hovering.
The Dark Knight with the nearly-extinct Excalibur subclass turned his head from his cockpit seat to face Cloud, who was on standby. "Cloud, if it is what we think it is, try to hold off from telling Rez and Silver what we're dealing with. Only when you deem it necessary to tell them, do it."
"Shiri masen. I understand." A section of the floor opened like a trap door and Cloud leapt down instead of transmatting. From the open space, the Dark Knight saw Cloud land on his hands and feet, leaving a crater on impact and moondust scattering like a tsunami.
You'd think by now he'd find another way to not attract attention when he lands… The open section of the floor sealed shut as soon as Rez and Silver were grouped with Cloud, Spectre pulling on the throttles and engaging flight mode again. His Xiphos returned its wings into its horizontal positions and took off, regrouping at the Hellmouth with his side of the team.
"Something's wrong with this picture… You get three guesses." Rex half-heartedly joked, glancing out into the Hellmouth with her partner and her teammates.
"Even more cracks along the surface of the moon?" Reaper cracked, preparing her Night Predator bow.
"Not even close, sister."
From their standing point on a ridge, Spectre knelt down and took out a pair of binoculars, the scanner functions analyzing the situation. "Aside from the sinister atmosphere being cranked up from 'Alien insect colony' to 'deadly creepy' and 'monsters are around the bend'? Yeah, there's all kinds of wrong in this picture."
"What're you picking up on the scanners, Spectre?"
Spectre lowered the binoculars from his visor and turned his head towards his twin. "Hive signatures within the Hellmouth are dwindling. Fast. It's definitely not Taken, I'll say it now. This is something else."
"How bad can it be compared to what we fought?"
"Again, underestimating your enemies can get you killed. The last distress call said these guys are immune to most damages." Spectre said, whipping out his custom-made Lex Prime and field stripped it. Along the barrel assembly were slots for some sort of computer chip. Taking out four square-shaped computer chips from his equipment pouch, he inserted a crimson red and green chip on one side and an ice blue chip and another green chip on the other side. Once the colors of the chips blended into yellow and cyan on their respective sides, he slid back the assembled slide to the receiver and cocked the sidearm handing it over to Reaper.
"What was that about?"
"Everything has a weakness, so I modified the sidearm with elemental damage enough to rapidly corrode a Guardian's armor and give them one hell of a nasty flu."
"And this thing is deadly beyond belief! No wonder a normal Lex series sidearm is considered cheap in the Crucible: two rapid headshots and you're done! But this? You only need one!" exclaims Reaper, twirling the sidearm in her hand.
"If we Dark Knights were still among the Tower, we'd flip Shaxx a double deuce and say, 'Screw you. Our weapons, our rules!'" To exemplify his point, Spectre threw up both middle fingers and reenacted his words using a gruff impersonation. "No wonder people use Thorn or Red Death in the Crucible…"
Lightning rolled her eyes and cleared her throat. "If you're done screwing around, let's get back to the matter at hand. Are the Hive retreating or dying?"
"Is there a third answer? Because they're doing all of the above: running and getting eradicated faster than I can kill them," he put away the binoculars and knelt closer to the ridge, maintaining his balance as he did. "This isn't a natural occurrence. It's something bad."
"How do you think It found its way to the Moon?"
"Hopefully not via asteroid that crashed on the surface and some unfortunate victim came too close."
Lightning shrugged and armed herself with her Empress of the Abyss. "You never know."
"Let's go."
Cloud, Rez, and Silver arrived at the outpost where the distress signal came from, dismounting their Sparrows and arming their weapons. From the outside, the outpost seemed barely touched. There didn't seem to be anything wrong at all.
Alpha materialized and scanned the outpost, treading cautiously as he did. Once the scanning beams ceased, Alpha turned back to his partner. "…No survivors, Silver. Whatever did this was swift and-or taking their sweet time doing Traveler knows what to their victims."
"Doors are locked, Alpha. Can you get it open?"
"That's all you had to ask," Alpha moved over to the door and started unlocking the door, shooting out beams on the keypad to gain access. Once the light turned green, the Nightstalker and Stormcaller raised their handcannon and scout rifle.
The door opened.
And what happened next came as a huge surprise.
"What the hell?!"
A body collapsed before them, arm extended as though they were calling for help. A sickly pus-like fluid began to pool from the corpse's chest, quickly turning into a mix of sickly green and orange. Boils were scattered across the body wherever skin was exposed, ready to burst at any given moment. It twitched faintly, adding more to the horror before the trio and its last rasps for breath desperate. The face, completely unrecognizable at first glance due to its mummified appearance, was overrun with some unknown growth.
"¿¡Qué mierda?! What the fuck?!" Rez exclaimed, dropping his Ace of Spades in abstract horror. "Oh Traveler, I'm gonna be sick!"
The Exo kept his aim on the corpse, the surge of disgust and sickness getting to him as well. He was an Exo, for crying out loud! "Alpha, can you scan the body?"
Hesitant, Alpha approached the unholy mess of a corpse. He inched closer, scanning the body with the time he has. "Silver, I don't like this one bit at all. It's a Guardian, all right… Light's been completely drained. Or corrupted. I can't tell either way."
Cloud approached the corpse and took a closer look, daring to do what Alpha and Silver didn't. With a knife, he poked at the growth on the deceased Guardian. He ruptured one of the boils and let some of the fluids run on the blade. He brought it closer to his visor. The alloy-plating reinforcing the blade's morphic structure was showing signs of corrosion. Or contamination. Once he was convinced nothing terrible could come from the corpse, he turned to the Warlock and Hunter and burned the knife to ashes in his hand. "Anata ha ni tsu ka kore wo tetsudau tsumori desu ka? Are you two gonna help me with this or not?"
"Like hell I'm gonna touch that!"
"Sudeni sensaa guriddo wo shutokushi setsuzokuwo sai kakuritsushi masu. Watashiha gisei shano sewa wo shi masu. Then get to the sensor grid already and reestablish the connection. I'll take care of the victims."
"By what, burning them?"
"Hitsuyouga ari masu. Korera no mono to douyouni risuku wo jikkou suru baai ha. It's necessary. Unless you want to run the risk as these ones did." Cloud growled.
"Yeahhhhh, I'm going." Like the coward he sort of is, Rez tiptoed over the corpse like he came out of a cartoon and into the outpost. A smell entered his filters, and he gagged at the toxic-like aroma. "Ugh, either the Hive is worse at sanitation or we got one hell of a problem in here!"
"What the hell is–" Silver stepped in and felt his jaw hang once his optics lighted his vision in the darkness of the outpost. "Oh Traveler save us!"
With Alpha providing the two Guardians light, the sickness within them multiplied to immeasurable levels. Even the aroma made it worse.
There was growth everywhere. From the walls, to the monitors, even every little nook and cranny. It was even alive. Spreading like plants growing rapidly. So many spores were growing that it was sickening to watch and some already airborne. Even there were pods that were large enough to hold a person in them.
Even worse, there were things hanging from the ceiling almost like the pods, yet more disgusting to behold.
"Damn, there's not much of the sensor grid left to fix…" The aforementioned sensor grid was overrun with the growth, sparks dancing about and the monitors revealing white noise. "Think the logs before it shut down will help us, Exo extraordinaire?"
"Worth a shot." Alpha was summoned into Silver's hand as he carefully traversed past the pods. The Ghost hovered over the sensor grid, doing what he could to extract any intact logs from what could've caused this. Tempted as he was to take a sample and analyze it, he remembered the last time he did that and nearly paid the price for it. One of his hands that was above a small outgrowth on the interface retracted back to his side. "Anything, Alpha?"
The Ghost looked back at him, whirring. "There's nothing left but fragments. Fragments that don't make sense at all without the rest of it." Alpha went in close to one of hanging cocoons and scanned it. He stopped scanning it and remained silent until, "This... This can't be! It's... It's a Guardian! They're dead!"
"Okay, I want out! I want out of this!" Rez put his hand up and started backing out, until he felt metal against his back. He turned around and saw the door shut. "Hey! Lemme out!" He started banging his fists against the door like a madman.
"Warning, warni…ng…! Unknown…" The central console blared, droning until its very last.
"I don't like this…!"
"You think?" The Stormcaller argued, back-to-back with the Nightstalker. "You think Spectre and the others know about this?"
"Damn straight he does! He probably knew we'd be in this situation and wanted us to die!"
"As if! He'd never do such a thing."
"If you two are done arguing, I think we got bigger problems to deal with…" Church muttered, glancing at the pods.
Rez and Silver watched as the pods started to shudder, almost as though something was ready to be born. On the other hand, the door started to be dented from the outside no doubt the Dark Knight partnered with them trying to bring it down.
"That's…disturbing on an entirely new level."
"Annnnd you just jinxed it, esé."
Silver scoffed, hands sparking with Arc energy. "Being trapped inside an outpost with some unknown enemy ready to make us assimilate with a locked door and a toxic fume? How could I not jinx the circumstances befalling us?"
"Where's a magic owl companion when you need one?"
"Expecting a Hoodini to save us now?"
"Anything better than a Dark Knight taking his sweet ass time getting through the door." Rez prepared one of his knives, readying his grip.
"Can't blame him if the door is reinforced plasteel." The Stormcaller commented.
"You're probably right. It was nice knowing you, esé."
The two had heard it, only for a split-second before they saw it─
─and before them, the pods had exploded, revealing what was within them. It had to be six or nine of them, surrounding the Nightstalker and Stormcaller dead center of the outpost. A sickly green aura surrounded the newly emerged hostiles, followed by the airborne spores surrounding them equally like moths to a flame. From what Rez and Silver could see, they were completely horrific. All of them were bipedal, backs hunched forwards to impossible levels and their bodies overrun with grotesque levels of fleshy muscles exposed and flexing. There was barely any sign of the overgrowth on them, to which had served as some form of hardened skin. Some of them had traces of both the Fallen and the Hive among them, yet those traces were heavily misconfigured and mutilated.
"Son of a," Silver breathed, unaware that he spoke as he raised his Tlaloc and fired a round at one of the monsters' head using a Dreg's own.
The biped with a mutilated Dreg's head snapped its upper torso backwards, snarling as it snapped its torso forward once again. In the darkness of the outpost, Silver saw the round he fired leave some mark. A mark where one of the remaining three eyes was shot clean to hell. Silver switched to his Susanoo and kept his finger on the trigger, ready to charge the fusion rifle. The creature bent forward and howled, its scream like a sonic blast as it brought the Guardians down on their knees. Their audio receptors were hammering against their own forms of hearing, squealing nonstop for Traveler knows how long.
Naturally, that was when the door that locked them in was torn apart, the brawn of the Dark Knights charging in with his Buster Sword and the navy blue aura surrounding him. Quickly and effortlessly, Cloud skewered them all without getting hit. The creatures' own blood splattered against the walls and ground with each massive slice the Buster Sword made, dismembering them in the process as well. For the ones who lost their legs and crawled towards Cloud, they were either crushed under his boot or incinerated to ashes with his expertise in controlling fire. The howls and screams of the incinerated monsters rang out once again, not as damaging or immobilizing as the previous howl was to Rez and Silver.
After all of the freaks were dead, Cloud channeled a fraction of his Limit Break and set off a controlled fire within the outpost the flames sparking to life. In an instant, the sparks caught fire with the growth and ignited. An inferno blazed on, the fungal-like growth becoming blackened, dead shells of what they once were supposed to be. The airborne spores caught fire as well, decimating to mere atoms and preventing further damage. Once all of the growth was harmless to his analysis, Cloud mustered up the rest of his Limit Break and spun the Buster Sword around him. A gust of wind with the force of a tornado flooded the area, flames quickly extinguished just as fast as they were summoned.
"Thank the Traveler you showed up! I thought we were gonna die in here!" Rez gasped, dusting off his Aspriet chest plate in case any of the ashes were there and tapping one side of his helmet where his ear lays.
Cloud had his back turned on the Guardians, returning his Buster Sword on his back and keeping his hand on the hilt. "Hitsuyouna mono ga ari masu ka? Do you have what you need?"
"We got what we could out of the sensor grid logs." Alpha said.
"Cloud, what the hell was that!?" Rez screamed, pointing towards where one of the pods was resting before it exploded. "First we have the Taken to deal with, now this? When are we gonna catch a break from constant show-ups of new enemies?! I'm telling you, we need the─"
"Warewareha sensaa gurido, Rez wo hitsuyouna ari mase n. We don't need the sensor grid, Rez," Cloud turned his head to face the Nightstalker before turning his body, baring his teeth under his helmet. "Watashiha wareware ga chokumenshi te iru koto wo mi te ki mashi ta. I've seen enough to know what we're up against." He started to walk past the Stormcaller and Nightstalker and towards the busted door, ready to communicate with Spectre.
"Cloud, I need to know: what are we up against now?" Silver asked, seeing the Rhino-using Dark Knight stop dead in his tracks.
He glanced back, taking a deep breath. "Sore ha─ It's the─"
"Son of a bitch," Spectre cursed under his breath, Skyfall at the ready and aimed.
He and his side of the team were at the chamber where the Sword of Crota was resting, the door sealed off by Hive runes…again. But something was different. A fungal growth was spreading across its surface similar to the ones he scouted out at the rim of the Hellmouth. The signatures even match. It is what I think it is. Dammit…!
He heard MI6 sigh. "Again with the locks? Why is it that the Hive have more than one lock?"
"Extra security?" Spectre joked. The A.I faced his partner.
"Very funny."
As the A.I began to decode the runes again, Spectre saw shadows moving out of the corner of his vision. Lightning and Reaper were prepared, arming themselves with their Dusk Repulsor and Aegis and borrowed Lex Prime respectively. Light and Reaper must've seen the same thing as I did… He groaned mentally and redirected his attention behind him.
I hate this… Out of all the times It could've came back, why does it have to be almost twenty-one years after the last cleanup mission? He reached for his main swords sheathed across his shoulders and drew them out. The one in his left hand, Duskdancer, was modeled after a traditional one-handed sword black as night with silver-gray trims and the crossguard—doubling as a hand guard—modeled after the Pendragon family crest and similar symbols to Dusk Repulsor's own running across the blackened blade. In his right, Black King, had a slightly thinner blade than Duskdancer and had an ornamented look along the section of the hilt and part of the blade connecting just as much as Gjallarhorn, but instead of a wolf it was of a sci-fi/cyberpunk look, especially with a circuitry pattern running along the flat of the blade and housing a 'central power node' on the part of the blade close to his hand.
"Looks like your suspicions were confirmed, brother." Lightning said, her sword igniting with flames as well as her shield.
"Tell me something I don't know, Light." Spectre grumbled, his irritation about the mission pushing his buttons.
The snarls were getting louder, closer. Snarls of hunger and assimilation. Behind his helmet, Spectre rolled his eyes and took a stance, reversing his grip on Black King and leaving Duskdancer alone. Where the Sword of Crota laid were pods made from the same growth he saw on the door. They moved, ready to awaken whatever was residing within it. Reaper aimed the Lex Prime at the pods, ready to take the threat on.
"Just when you thought the Taken were bad enough…"
"Just wait till you face Them." Tohsaka said to Reaper.
Spectre took a deep breath, counting to four and exhaling. "This sector is crawling with Infested, let's clean it up."
A/N: Double chapters, baby! Well, I tried to post this as soon as II-XIII was up, but Black Friday shopping was a bitch that I was dragged into it. Anyway, this chapter was supposed to be released on the same day of the one year milestone but it was released at 12:38 A.M PST.
Anyway, good luck out there Guardians, and keep on fighting!
