""The last transmission from the Captain's dropship was from this area. That was over twelve hours ago. When you locate Captain Keyes, radio in, and I'll come pick you two up." The Pilot said into her radio.
"Understood, Rawley. Drop us down right here, in the flatland." Six said, switching off his radio. "Or at least I think its flatland. I can't see through all of this damn fog."
"Me niether." John said simply. "I don't like it."
The Pelican lowered down to the thankfully flat swamp below and landed gracefully. Six was polishing a brand new DMR and was adjusting it to his liking, and John was just ready to do what he did best. Six got the scope tuned, pushed a fresh clip into the bottom, loaded it, and turned the safety off.
"Ready, Six?" John asked.
"As I'll ever be." Six replied.
The two dismounted the Pelican and walked cautiously through the swamp, not knowing that the enemy that lie ahead of them was one that even the Covenant's Prophets feared.
"See anything?" John asked Six as they walked through the thick fog. They could barely see three feet in front of each other, and their flashlights wren't helping as well as Six had thought they would.
"Hell no. You?" Six replied.
John just sighed. Six guessed that that meant no. "Well, we should keep moving. We're bound to vfind something if-"
"Dropship Victor 933-" Six's radio said.
Six reached up to his helmet. "Hello? Do you read?" He asked.
"-need assistance. We are under att-" The communication faded.
"Are you..." Six asked John, but John nodded before he could finish. John was hearing this, too.
"-new hostile-isn't Covenant-"
This startled Six. "Did he just say what I think he-"
"Shh." John whispered.
"Captain Keyes has been captured by hostiles-large structure in the sw-" More static. "-putting this message to repeat at regul-intervals. Dropship Victor 933, clear." And then the transmission ended.
"Well, shit." Six said. "We need to move. Fast."
Suddenly, there was gunfire off in the distance.
"Those are Human weapons." John said.
Six ran off towards the noise, and John followed, both anxious of what they might find when they got there.
They got there, alright. But the place that they thought that they had heard the gunfire coming from was stone dead.
"I don't like this at all. Not one little bit." Six said. A padded noise echoed behind him. It sounded like footsteps, running. He looked back, but there was no one there.
"If this isn't Covenant..." John said with a pause. "Then I'm afraid of whatever it really is."
"Huh." Six replied.
John looked up. "What?"
"Well, I thought you weren't afraid of anything."
"Why would you assume that?"
"I'm not sure. Because you're so... Closed up. You know? You don't really let too much out."
"Yeah, well, that may be true, but trust me. Everyone is afraid of something"
"Oh yeah?" Six asked. "What're you afraid of, then?"
"Well two things, really. The first, I'm afraid of not knowing. Like I said, I fear whatever we're really hunting. If i'm not prepared to go into battle with someone..something that i'm not familiar with..." John exhaled. "I get real uncomfortable."
"That I can understand." Six replied. "What's the second one, then? And it had better be more 'ridiculous' than my fear of the underground, or I won't have any dirt on you for as long as I live."
John hesitated. "I..."
Branches cracked behind him. Both Six and John dropped the conversation and aimed behind John.
Heavy, hoarse breathing came from behind him. A hand, grey and pale, reached out through the fog and grabbed John with a death grip on his leg. John looked down quickly, startled, and Six raised his DMR.
The weak and shaky arm pulled itself forward, revealing the creature to be a badly wounded Sangheilli. It grabbed John with its other hand, which was soaked in purple blood. It looked up directly at the two Spartans. Its eyes read as a mixture of emotions. Rage. Sadness. Despair. But above all of these, the Sangheilli showed Confusion.
"Two... Demons?" It asked heavily in English.
As much as Six hated the Covenant, especially Sangheilli, he couldn't help but feel bad for it. He looked at its armor. It was standard issue. This was a new recruit.
"You'll be alright." Six told it, kneeling down and looking at its wound. It was an american football shaped hole directly in the middle of it's back that went all the way out of the other side. How the hell was this Sangheilli still alive?
"Just scratch. Not bad, just... Just scratch." The Sangheilli said. It lowered its head knowingly. "Will not... Will not... turn!" It said with a sudden shout. Something crawled under its armor and skin. It screamed loudly as the gap in its midsection closed up slowly.
"What the fuck...?!" Six said, backing up about a foot. Replacing the Sangheilli's grey skin was a treebark looking pale green tissue. Diseased muscle stretched across the gap and tied itself together, knotting and binding with sickening wrapping noises. The Sangheilli shouted loudly as something sprouted from it's neck.
"Krort ghuj ni! Raka shu! Raka shu!" The Sangheilli screamed at the top of its lungs in Wortish, the Sangheilli native language. "Skraq ei! Skraq ei!" It screamed at Six. Six knew Wortish pretty well, as his numerous stealth experiences helped him learn the Elite language. Though he never really payed attention to it often, he understood everything that the Sangheilli had just said. He raised his gun and fired four deadly accurate rounds into various parts of the creature's brain, killing it.
John kicked the now dead hand off of his foot, obviously very disturbed.
"What was it saying?" John asked.
There was a pause.
A long one.
"After it stopped yelling, It said..." Six gulped. "It said, "It's not my fault!". Then it said "Get it off, get it off!""
John was quiet. "What about after that?"
Another pause.
"Shoot me. Twice."
"Oh." John said. "Well..." He started, but stopped. Six looked at him. A stern figure and a solid soldier were two things that John excelled at being. But there was something about his tone of voice after that. Not fear.
That tone was disbelief.
"Alright. Okay. Let's keep moving, and... and maybe we can find Keyes soon and get the fuck out of this swamp." Six said.
"Maybe?" John replied.
"You have a better plan, then?" Six asked sternly. "Come on then, let's hear it."
John just sighed. "Never mind. Forget it."
"I swear, sometimes you're just so..." Six stopped. "So..." He looked with one hundred percent pure and utter terror as the dead Sangheilli erupted back from inside of the fog and stood behind John. Its face was warped, its helmet broken, and the front of its head was replaced by a gaping maw with razor teeth and spider-leg looking appendages clicking in front of its mouth.
"Wh..." John said quietly as he looked behind him.
Standing not six inches from his face was the first of the monsters that they would soon learn to fear.
"Oh my-" John said.
The creature went for John's throat.
The introduction of the Flood was a big thing for me. How would I introduce them? Should I stick to the plot or go off of the beaten path? I decided on this approach because of the fact that I want to experiment with the characters' deepest fears. Horror is an unexpected treat if you can blend it in well enough.
If you thought that the Flood and the Gravemind were terrifying now, get ready for a new level of spooky.
Keep reading, Wolfgang!
~Yours Truly, Husky.