Rifle

Chapter Twelve

There they went again, there they went again.
A place where every time they went, at least one person was hurt- by shot or by bite of the Flood. They knew what they were walking into, but they had to go anyways, all bearing a secret of their own.

This time, she wore the containment unit. She wanted to. She had to. He was too beat up to not be armored. She was fine taking the position of President. She could remember that game from simulation- President.
It would take two teams of in-training Spartans: one team to Protect the targeted person, and another to target them. Now, though, it wasn't a team they were fighting. It was no longer a game. Not everyone would always come out alive, like they would in the games. They were risking their lives to try and reverse the effects of the virus.

They had too much to lose. If they lost any of these repetitive games, they would lose the whole planet, the whole nation, and all of the people who had resided there.
No. No more games. They had to get this right- no matter the consequences.

It would take the power of a whole squad to capture more Flood, but they didn't have a full six. They had a mere four- a four, who, didn't exactly seem to work the best as a team. Two of them were completely separate from the rest of the team, Haza and Campbell. They didn't even work together, either, both flied solo.
Elizah and Bant kept close, though, trying hardest to coordinate their attacks. Trying their best to let only one through.

There was a major difference, though; they planned to get three this time: Three Flood samples. How they would accomplish this, it seemed, would be impossible.
They felt that losing was inevitable- that they were going to die there; they had felt that every time, actually.

The mouth of the cave looked fleshy, now, too.

As they walked towards the opening, something seemed different. Something seemed more eerie. They almost couldn't figure out what it was. Campbell was upfront, scouting ahead.
Haza was just in front of Elizah, and Bant was in the back of the troop.
The opening to the cave was different- it was taller and more narrow and long that it used to be.

As soon as each stepped foot in the opening, they could feel the air around them grow colder. She almost expected to see snowflakes fall around them.

Wrong.

Bant could feel something lightly land on his upper arm- like a feather- it tickled.
He turned his head; it was a Popcorn.
He immediately jumped sideways and his shoulder hit the wall, getting the attention of his fellow Spartans. Springing into life, Elizah shot it off of him with one bullet from the revolver.

Bant, with strange instinct- looked up towards the top of the crevice.
A nest. Millions of Flood orbs were perched above them, and, as the first flood indicated, they were ready to attack. Elizah followed his gaze upward, and her eyes widened in fear at the horror.

Once again, the gunshot had made them all dance- to and fro in some invisible wind. They were starting to move around, crawling on top of each other.
As if they were completely aware and thinking, they all started to crawl towards the entrance of the cave. They moved as one big body almost.

"Get inside he cave, now." Everyone heard from Bant's intercom.
Not a single one of them bothered to look up or back at him- his tone gave much of it away. They all hurried into the cave, with Flood coming up on the rear.

The whole layout had changed within a matter of days, it seemed, because everything was different. The ballroom-sized area was smaller and longer, as the entrance had become. It was roomier to fight, though, which is just enough of what they needed to protect from the oncoming hoards.

The swarm followed their trail in a lively way. "Only let one through every three minutes, only after the one before it is secure." Elizah reminded them.
They listened.

Only one of the first few was allowed to pass and She caught it in the container.
It was as if the rest of the pack noticed, and starting jumping more at a time; it got harder and harder to keep up with.
A loud clanking sound was heard as the machine kept the creature stable in the containment unit.

"I got one!" They heard an exited squeal. "Let another through!" she demanded of the company.
Another was let into the group, and the machine seemed to eat it.

"One more."

The last one was easily captured as well, and a cheer resounded from Elizah as she closed off the container. She was slowly regaining it- her hope- from each and everything that went right. He could tell, too, and it only made him calmer.

The group took out the rest of the attackers rushing them from the entrance.
It wasn't over; though- Brute forces from behind them were beginning to gather.
They backed up towards the entrance, but feared more were spawning on the ceilings. Elizah removed a weapon from her back.

He hadn't noticed- none of them had- that she had brought a second set of firearms. Not just one forbidden weapon; but two forbidden weapons.

"I'm tired of obeying the rules."

Which was accompanies by blasts of fire towards the malicious crowd that approached them- all scorched- more advanced towards them, crawling over one another and making distressing sounds. She shot again, one long blast, which wiped the current hoard clean, giving them enough time to escape before more emerged.

They did escape towards the entrance.
They got out clean.
It almost seemed too good to be true.
Surprisingly, it wasn't.
One mission going by without any screw-ups or injuries was what they were trained for. The past missions had failure because of many different reasons.
This mission went well because they were better prepared for each and every circumstance.

Which was her thought, at least.

The only thing to do was leave this place- for good. They were done, and, next time they would be here, hopefully it would be to close the entrance; for it to be sealed off with the entire Flood population inside of it; for it to be permanently gone.

It wasn't a long walk to find where their vehicle was.
Soon, they were loading everything into the transportation vehicle.

Elizah and Bant finished first. They both felt a tugging at their arm.
It was Haza; his eyes flickered from side to side as he motioned for them to be quiet. He pulled them aside behind the vehicle.

"What is it?" Bant asked in a loud whisper, while releasing Haza's grip from his arm.

"I found the artifacts, both of them." He whispered back, quieter than Bant had been, he tilted his head sideways, to look beyond Bant- to see if Campbell was paying attention.

Elizah and Bant both displayed shock on their faces, their eyes all widened. The day was getting better for them. Where did he get the artifacts? How? Why is he telling us this now?

Her face lit up. Hope. It was hope like she hadn't imagined it. It was staring her right in the face, and it bore the form of mystical green eyes. She wondered if hope would stay that way- so close to them; or if hope, in itself, would ultimately disappear.

"Remember to keep this secret, okay?" once again, his eyes motioned back and forth, checking the area around them. "I can't say where I got them… or how…"

He nodded his head, silently, and tried to walk away as quiet as humanly possible.
He was much more quiet, though.

Bant was driving them all back. Elizah sat across from him in the passenger seat, while Haza and Campbell sat in the back. Different objects were stuffed under each seat.

Bant's eyes looked up and caught Campbell fidgeting with an ebony backpack under his seat. Campbell stuffed it back under and resumed looking out the window.

"Hey Haza, can you grab me something Orangey to drink?" Elizah was reading, a novel. It was one Aron had written- Aron always loved writing. She took off her helmet and set it by her feet before retuning to a chapter.

"Surething." Haza nodded and reached under the seat, his hand felt for drinks. He moved aside a gray bag. There was something…smooth…like flesh. It was cool and round and…moving.

He screamed.
Bant slammed on the brakes, and a Popcorn Flood hit the windshield. It got up, recovered, and crawled around in confused circles. As soon as it realized what was going on, and smelled the scent of humans, it leaped at Elizah with incredible speed.

"Shoot it!" She yelled. Her book went flying as she squirmed- trying to rip the demon off her armor. They had no guns. The guns were all packed up in the vehicle.
Bant reached across the dashboard and got the pistol out of the glove compartment. He aimed and shot the monster off of her. Its wiggling corpse limply fell in her lap.
She snatched it with her left hand and tossed it out the window.

"H-how did that thing get in here?" Campbell looked around.
Everyone shrugged.

"Maybe it got in while we were in the cave or loading?" Haza suggested- it was an honestly good suggestion- but it had flaw.

"Yeah, that's got to be it." Bant agreed, and started the car up again.
Elizah nervously returned to her reading.
They knew it wasn't the truth.
It would have attacked them earlier, if that were the true case.
The only conclusion was that there was a traitor among them.
That didn't make sense, either, though. A person, a Spartan, putting Flood in a place- didn't add up. They would be in danger as well. They would also be at risk, unless it was some sort of suicide attempt.
The only logical deduction- was to keep hidden the obvious.

If there was a traitor among them, the only thing they could do was to make the traitor underestimate whom they're dealing with.
The question, though, was if it'd really give them an upper hand or not in the long run…or prove hopeless.

There was one, though, who thought quite differently.
Were they really bought in to such nonsense? Those Humans?