Hey Folks, Grubkiller here.
Here is the latest chapter.
Hope you enjoy.
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Ninth Age of Reclamation, Step of Silence, Covenant Holy City "High Charity," Sanctum of the Hierarchs.
Deep within the dominating vision of High Charity, orbiting the Sacred Ring, the Sanctum of the Heirarchs was an island of calm.
The walls, floor, and ceiling of the chamber were ornamented with mirrored shards made from the fused glass of countless worlds conquered by the Covenant Hegemony. They reflected the whispered thoughts of the ones who presided over the Covenant—mirrored them back, so they might consider the glory of its domain, and learn from its wisdom... because there was no higher source of intellect, will, and truth alive in the galaxy.
In the middle of the chamber, standing row by row in perfect formation and symmetry, Elite Honor guardsmen stood at attention, ready to kill anything that so much as looked at the prophets the wrong way.
But that was about to change, as the Arbiter, an Elite once known as Thel Vadamee, bore witness to.
In the wake of Sacred Ring's destruction last month, and the Prophet of Regret's assassination everything had started to change. Rumors had begun to circulate that the Prophet of Truth was meeting with high ranking brutes like Tartarus more often than usual.
There had also been rumors that he had given the order to withdraw the phantoms that had been sent to rescue Regret, thus sealing his fate.
The Arbiter had never been one to indulge in rumors and gossip before. But now, with so much at stake, and with such changes underway, he couldn't help but see the merit in these rumors.
Packs of Brutes were moving around the room. Normally, the Elites serving the Prophets these days had grown used to the amount of Brute visitors that Truth seemed to receive, especially that arrogant, self-glorifying (not to mention violent) Tartarus, who as Chieftain of the Brutes, considered himself Chieftain of all Covenant warriors. But today was different.
The Brutes walked up to the guards and just started wrestling their helmets off of their heads and their energy pikes out of their hands, and started shoving some of them away.
Dozens of Elite honor guards straightened and filed out of the great chamber, heads bowed low in shame, and their posts were filled by Brutes.
The Elites said nothing, but the Arbiter could feel their confusion and shame in their movements as they walked out of the room. Some, he would later learn had taken their own lives, unable to cope with the shame of being stripped of their status.
Brutes were now fighting over pieces of equipment like the savages they were. How the Prophets could ever give such favor to these barbarians was beyond him. But he was the Arbiter.
He had been disgusted when he heard about what the Prophet of Truth had decreed. The idea of demoting the Elites was shameful, and a complete slap in the face of everything the Covenant stood for. The Elites were meant to be the protectors of the Prophets, and leaders of its military, as co-founders of the Covenant.
To demote them in favor of these barbarians was the greatest slap in the face, and a violation of the Writ of Union.
The Arbiter continued to walk through the Inner Sanctum, over its translucent, burnished floors. There were several murals in the room that showed the history of the Covenant. It started with the war between the Prophets and the Elites, before they signed the Writ of Union.
'So full of hate were our eyes, that none of us could see. Our war would yield countless dead, but never victory.' Said the mural.
When he walked up to the door that led to the Prophet's private quarters, he was halted by a pack of Brutes, who were now donning the red and gold armored pieces. They took a long time, in a deliberate attempt to get under Arbiter's skin. They snarled at him and wore smug looks, but the Arbiter remained still, pretending to not notice their insulting behavior. Eventually he was allowed to pass, and ascended the stairs and walked through, and still more Elites passed him, stripped of their ornate helmets and replaced by the loathsome brutes.
Hovering a meter off the floor upon their imperial dais, sat the Covenant High Prophets of Truth and Mercy. Before them stood a group of high-ranking elites, including Spec ops leader R'tas 'Vadumee. They were having a heated discussion with the Prophets.
The Arbiter noticed that none of the Elites were council members, likely to them shunning the Prophets in a political maneuver. He couldn't blame them.
"This is unprecedented... Unacceptable." R'tas said, as the Arbiter was halfway across the room.
"A Hierarch is dead, Commander." Truth said. Though his eyes flickered with something that might be a secret amusement.
"His murderer was within our grasp. If you had not withdrawn our Phantoms-" R'tas began.
"Are you questioning my decision?" Truth asked with a subtle tone of indignation.
'So, the rumors were true,' Arbiter thought, as he stood at Attention.
But R'tas had to be careful now. Even though the Elites had lost their position as guardians of the prophets, they were still apart of the Covenant, and to show such disrespect to the Prophets was tantamount to treason.
"R'tas stood up straighter, and chose his words carefully.
"No, Holy One! I only wish to express my concern that the Brutes-"
But Truth held up his hand for silence.
"Re-commissioning the guard was a radical step. But recent events have made it abundantly clear that the Elites can no longer guarantee our safety."
R'tas clicked his mandibles, or at least the half he had, in the equivalent of a grimace.
"I shall relay your... decision, to the Council."
With that, he and the other Elites turned on their heels and began to walk out of the room, holding on to what was left of their dignity as the Brute guards started to chuckle. As R'tas walked passed the Arbiter, be nodded towards him, and the Arbiter returned it, before he walked up to the Prophets.
"Politics (small sigh)... How tiresome." Truth said under his breath towards Mercy. Then he turned to the Arbiter. "Do you know, Arbiter, the Elites have threatened to resign? To quit the High Council? Because of this..." He waved his hand dismissively, "...exchange of hats?"
"We have always been your protectors." Arbiter said.
"These are trying times, for all of us." Truth said.
"Even as the humans' annihilation filled us with satisfaction, the loss of one of the Sacred Rings, and the death of our fellow Hierarch, wracked our hearts with grief." Mercy said.
"Putting aside our sorrow," Truth said, gesturing towards Mercy, "we renewed our faith in the prophecy that other rings would be found. And see how our faith has been rewarded." He said as his thorne turned, and he gestured towards the holo-screen, showing the Ring over which High Charity orbited.
Mercy speed his arms out and bowed his head in reverence.
"Halo! Its divine wind will rush through the stars, propelling all who are worthy along the path to salvation."
"But how to start this process?" Truth asked rhetorically as he stroked his chin thoughtfully. "For ages, we searched for one who might unlock the secrets of the ring. An Oracle." Their thrones began to whir as they hovered towards a gravity beam in the center of the room. The Arbiter followed them. Truth pressed a button on his throne and the Oracle the Arbiter had encountered while fighting the Heretics appeared, hovering down from the ceiling. "And with your help, we found it."
The Oracle, suspended by the beam, was apparently in some kind of stasis mode, as he didn't move or say anything.
"With appropriate humility, we plied the Oracle with questions. And it, with clarity and grace, has shown us..." Mercy said as he triggered a hologram of the Ring's activation index, which resembled a human 'T', that glowed blue and green. "...the key."
"You will journey to the surface of the ring, and retrieve this Sacred Icon. With it, we shall fulfill our promise."
"Salvation for all!"
"And begin the Great Journey."
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The Phantom dropship fell into orbit of the Atmosphere, plunging down into the atmosphere with great speed. The ship shuddered from the turbulence.
Just off to their starboard side more ships that the Hierarchs had assigned to this mission, accompanied them.
The Arbiter's lower mandibles twitched. The Brute pilots had come in too close. They could have collided thanks to their aggressive piloting. But neither the Brutes, not their Chieftain aboard would listen to an Elite.
They hadn't so far, even when he was Supreme Commander.
He'd asked them to keep their distance, but they acted as if he were going to cheat them of any discovery, or any chance to get into battle.
Arbiter felt he would have been better off alone than saddled with Tartarus dogging his every move. Then again, maybe that was the Hierarch's way of keeping an eye on him, in the wake of recent events.
He had a general feeling, from what he knew of politics on High Charity, that the Prophet of Truth was very crafty, if not outright ruthless. Yes, this one probably didn't just outright trust him, but wanted some assurance that they would not fail this holy mission. A Brute Chieftain was put in charge and was here to monitor him and the rest of his brothers in this mission.
Wonderful.
As they got closer, they could see the Sentinel walls, that protected the Repository of Fate, the Covenant name for the Ring's library.
"No signs of activity," The brute pilot grumbled from his station as initial results from the systematic scans began to scroll through the holographic display.
"Just like last time," the Chieftain said, referring to the failed first expedition into the wall to find a way through the barrier. Sections of the wall had been damaged in the first assault. Melted with plasma. He grunted. "The structures created by our lords have deep roots and many defenses. They are full of many obstacles that only the worthy can hope to overcome."
"So they do," the Arbiter agreed. "And Prophets in their inscrutable wisdom have assigned you this mission."
The Chieftain of the Brutes looked over his shoulder for a moment. "Yes, and the Brutes shall see it through. Once the shield is down, we will head straight for the Library. We will not keep the Hierarchs waiting."
The Arbiter settled into his chair, getting ready for the final approach to the Sentinel wall. But they flew around the perimeter of the wall, they flew over the lake that had been used as a safe harbor by the Prophet of Regret, before his assassination by the Humans.
"Chieftain," The pilot boomed. "Our long range instruments are detecting multiple human signals. They are not even trying to hide!"
"Then put us down. I don't care where." Tartarus growled. "The Humans must not be allowed to stop us."
"The human that killed the Prophet of Regret... Who was it?" The Arbiter asked.
"Who do you think?" The Chieftain asked, annoyed.
"The Demon is here!?" The Arbiter asked, surprised.
The very creature that destroyed the first ring, and shamed the Arbiter for life, was responsible for the assassination of the Prophet of Regret, and the demotion of his people.
Tartarus snarled in acknowledgement. "Why? Looking for a little payback?"
Arbiter readied his weapons and prepared to drop. "Retrieving the Icon is my only concern."
Tartarus let out a guttural laugh. "Of course."
They eventually found one of the landing spaces for the original Covenant assault on the Wall, which was covered in destroyed sentinels and dead Covenant troops. It looked like a large explosion took a chunk out of the wall, which was still scorched and it spit sparks from exposed wiring.
The Phantom hovered over the platform jutting out from the outer wall, and the Arbiter jumped out, weapons raised, and the Phantom flew off.
An uncomfortable silence hovered over the room, and there were no signs of life anywhere. The Arbiter was about to start moving, when small robotic noises emanated from behind him.
He turned behind him and unleashed radioactive rounds from his carbine into a large machine, with massive arms and a large shield covering its entire frontal section. His rounds just seemed to bounce off.
The massive sentinel, which looked like a large glowing eye surrounded by multiple arms, prepared to attack the Arbiter. But just as it prepared to lung at him, suddenly, the sentinel was hit by a sustained burst of plasma fire that took off its metallic limb.
The sentinel gave off a metallic whine as it ruined to face its attacked.
The Arbiter saw the Phantom, and watched as the ship and the machine faced off like two wild animals sizing each other up for battle. Then the Phantom flew off, and the Sentinel gave chase.
The Arbiter's com-link received a transmission from Tartarus.
"Lower the shield, Arbiter! I'll pick you up when you're finished."
And with that, the Arbiter was well and truly alone.
The Arbiter looked around, melding in with his environment, he walked around the room that he was dropped in and surveyed the carnage. Covenant troops, mostly grunts and jackals, lay dead, with their weapons laying at their side. Scorch marks lined the floor and pocketed the walls opposite of where he stood. Pieces of Sentinel machines lay scattered in several spots.
In the outer wall no less. The Covenant forces had faced resistance and taken casualties immediately upon landing.
Blood was splattered all over the place, and footprints from various Covenant species led deeper into the facility. There were Covenant supply crates and communications modules scattered here and there.
'So, our warriors had tried to establish a presence here and then move deeper?'
He continued following the footprints down the brutalistic silver-gray metal corridors favored by the Forerunners, until they led to a dead-end.
No. It couldn't have been a dead end.
He looked at the pylon, and noticed the glowing green translucent symbols on it. He reached out and pressed the symbols, and they turned blue. The pylon split into two pieces, with one half that rose up into the ceiling, and the other went downward to the next level.
He jumped down, and once he was on the next level he came across another half dozen Covenant bodies lying in a pool of commingled blood. Struck once again by the absence of serious opposition.
But just as he was about to proceed, he heard a noise. It sounded like a powering up noise. He turned towards the source of the sound and saw a pair of panels on the wall, with lights flashing red and blue. The panels slid open, and several Sentinels flew out of the wall.
As soon as one saw him, it alerted the others, and they all turned to face him in unison and their weapons began to glow blue.
Then the Arbiter was attacked from every direction at once. glowing blue energy beams sizzled, and the smell of ozone filled the air as the airborne Sentinels circled, searching for a chink in his armor. All they needed was one good hit, a chance to put him down.
His shields glowed purple. His carbine cracked as he returned fire. The rounds bounced off of their shields. Realizing he would need very advantage he could yield, he shouldered his carbine and pulled out his plasma pistol and over-charged it. The glob green smiled through the air and struck the first sentinel. Its shield popped and it started to smoke and spark.
He picked up a fallen plasma rifle and duel yielded the two weapons, firing green and blue globs of plasma at the machines.
One of the machines exploded, another hit the deck with a loud clang, and a third trailed smoke as it spiraled into a column and exploded against it.
The battle became somewhat easier after that, as there was less and less incoming fire, and he was able to knock three more robots out of the air in quick succession. He started to move, tossing plasma grenades at the open panels, and destroying the deployment nodes for good. One especially persistent machine took advantage of the interlude to score three hits on his back and pushed his shield to the very edge.
He downed the last machine, and moved on.
His boots made a hollow sound as he approached another one of the gigantic pylons and hit the switch. They parted and he jumped down, dropping into the middle of a battle in progress between a group of Sentinels and Covenant ground troops. Blue lasers split the air into jagged shapes as robots burned a Jackal down. The contest was far from one-sided, however, as one of the machines exploded and showered the Covenant with bits of hot metal. The room was a long rectangular affair with a dark abyss in the center, likely a passage for sentinel use.
There weren't any Brutes left standing. Just a handful of Jackals and Grunts were left, but the Sentinels kept coming, spawned from their deployment nodes, possibly being manufactured on sight by a nearby forge.
With the element of surprise, Arbiter jumped in and tossed grenades into the open deployment panels, blasting them to pieces and putting them out of commission, permanently. The Sentinels turned to face him, decided between the Arbiter and the remaining Covenant troops, they didn't last long.
"Arbiter, our savior!" Said a cowering Grunt as it waddled out of cover, kneeling down before the Arbiter on the purple and blue-stained metal floor.
"Stupid, Jackal, say thank you!" Another Grunt hissed under his breath.
The Jackals hissed back and remained huddled off to the side.
"Report," the Arbiter said.
The Grunt Major that knelt before the Arbiter. "We were tasked with securing the outer wall, and finding a way to deactivate the shield. But resistance was stronger than we thought. Our masters went on ahead to find the power source, and they left us here to guard their rear. We do not question. We serve. That is our fate, such as the Prophets will," it moaned.
Arbiter couldn't care less for the self-pity of the Grunts.
"I'm here on a direct mission from the Hierarchs." He said. "You and your brothers will follow my command and assist me in this undertaking."
The Grunt Major backed up. "Excellency! We will do duty! Doubt us not."
The Jackals hissed and squawked, almost refusing to move forward.
"Why should we follow you, Sangheilli or the gas-suckers?" One of the Jackals asked in their shrill voices.
There was little love between the Kig-Yar and Sangheili. Their kind resented the position Sangheili held in the Covenant. And the Sangheili regarded the Kig-Yar as little more than scavengers. But now with the recent Changing of the Guard, the respectability of the Elites had fallen recently, especially with the Brutes and Jackals. Seeing what the Brutes were able to accomplish, other species would be looking to supplant the Elites themselves.
"I am on a direct mission for the Hierarchs, as are you. Do not dare blaspheme like that." The Arbiter said, looking over his shoulder.
"You misunderstand. You have dominated things for too long. Now you are no longer favored by the Prophets. You have been replaced by the Brutes, and our time will come soon as well." The Jackal spat.
Arbiter turned to face the Jackal. "We are in the middle of a Holy War and you choose now to disrupt the Covenant?"
"We will deactivate the shield and retrieve the Icon, and it will be the Kig-Yar, not the Sangheilli, who stand at the side of the Prophets."
The Arbiter walked up to the Jackal, and backhanded it across the face, knocking out a few teeth. The Jackal fell to the ground and spat purple blood on the floor, coughing and spluttering.
"You are an obnoxious creature." Arbiter said before he picked the Jackal up by the back collar and shoved him, before he looked to the other Jackals, who were taken aback and slightly cowed. "Now move out, and carry out the Prophet's will, for that is our duty."
And with that, the Jackals and Grunts moved out, with the Arbiter apart of the group.
They moved through the Sentinel wall, following the bodies, which increasingly included more and more Brutes the further in they went.
They found a couple Grunt stragglers here and there, but they seemed too far gone to make a difference. Most of the Sentinels and their deployment nodes they encountered were already destroyed, but they took down the stragglers wherever they found them.
Small repair drones, which looked like flying silver plasma pistols, were flying around, making repairs to everything in the facility that looked even vaguely damaged.
"You're getting close to one of the shield generators. Many of my Brutes have fallen attempting to take it down. Let's see if you fare better." Said over the Arbiter's Com-link.
"Oh, I'm honored to complete this dangerous and difficult task of pressing a button," Arbiter said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.
Tartarus just laughed over the com. "It is a task worthy of the rest of you race." He said, before terminating the transmission.
Eventually, they found another pylon. They activated it, passed through a hatch, and entered the corridor below and beyond, and then followed it to a massive chamber, which opened out to the outside, which was obscured by the translucent blue-green shield that covered the Site. They could all see the Library off in the distance, large and imposing as it was.
The chamber itself was a large circular room, with multiple branching corridors and maintenance shafts, and they all surrounded a platform with multiple energy locks surrounding a terminal.
But that wasn't what caught their attention at first. The first thing they saw were the multitude of Brute corpses that littered the floor and the piles of Sentinel debris.
That, and the giant Sentinel enforcer that was hovering over the platform.
The machine noticed them and engaged its shield.
"Big, scary thing! Run away!" One of the grunts shouted. But before he could turn around, the Arbiter grabbed it by the arm and tossed it forward just ahead of him.
"Split up! Divide its attention and strike the beast when its back is turned!"
The Arbiter and the Grunts and Jackals he commanded spread out, doing as he ordered, and they began to surround the platform from multiple angles. At the same time, the machine unleashed a volley of mortars and red energy shards that homed in on whatever they were aimed at.
A couple grunts were shredded, and a Jackal was engulfed in mortar fire that bracketed his position and snuffed out his existence.
But surrounded, the Machine was placed under withering firepower. Plasma rounds slammed into its shields, and its unprotected flanks. Bits and chunks of metal were shed from the machine, but it didn't go down without a fight.
The Enforcer's eye flared to a brilliant gold—energy projected forward, flicking like a sword strike. A few Covenant troops and the metal walls they sheltered behind wavered a moment, erupted into flames, and vaporized.
One section of the chamber detonated into a cloud of dust and molten rock.
Some Covenant troops retreated and took cover in the maintenance shafts that branched out from the room or ran underneath the platform.
The Arbiter engaged his active camouflage and went down into one of the shafts as well, coming through the bodies of fallen Covenant warriors for anything useful. He eventually pushed over a Brute and found what he was looking for: A Fuel Rod cannon.
He checked to see that it had ammo, saw that it had four rounds left, and left the tunnels to re-engage the machine. It's back was turned to him as it turned to engage a group of Jackals that had emerged from cover.
He aimed that launcher at the machine's back, and unleashed all four rounds into it.
All four rounds landed on the target and detonated on impact, and the mighty machine exploded and fell apart into pieces of metal that rained down all over the remaining Covenant troops.
As the remaining troop collected themselves, the Arbiter went around the platform and started deactivating the energy locks that kept the terminal shut down. When that happened, a terminal rose up out of the ground. The Arbiter walked up to the translucent panel and pushed his hand against it until he felt resistance and engaged it.
Then, outside the large opening, the blue shield began receding back up into the sky and fade out of existence.
He engaged his Com-unit.
"Tartarus, I've deactivated the power source. Our path to the Library should be clear." The Arbiter said.
"It is," came the response. "I'll pick you up at the ledge."
Hearing this, several of the Covenant troops walked up to the edge of the platform where the Phantom was mean to pick them up. Multiple Phantoms had started their approach towards the Library, where they would secure the perimeter and find a way inside.
"Now it's time for us to show our glorious 'supreme commander' the might of the Kig-Yar." Said one of the Jackals, who caused the other two jackals he was standing with to snigger among themselves.
The Arbiter didn't say anything, but mused to himself how 'Kig-Yar might' was a contradiction of terms, just as an avalanche of pod-like creatures swarmed up from below the ledge and engulfed the three screaming jackals.
They wrapped their tentacles around their necks and drove razor-sharp tendrils into their necks and began to burrow into their chest cavities.
The remaining Covenant troops, watched in stunned horror (especially the Grunts), before the Arbiter yelled, "Fire!" and the rest of the Jackals and Grunts opened up. Nothing could live where the dozen plasma beams converged—and most of the infection forms were dead within two or three heartbeats.
But many more began to emerge from the large gap that opened up in the wall and they swarmed over the Chamber.
As the Covenant troops tried to fire into the pod-infectors, the Arbiter tried to called for extraction.
But all he got was Tartarus telling him about some blasted machines, and ordered him to find his own way out of the Sentinel wall. Arbiter wanted to curse the arrogant Brute and all of his ancestors, but he had more important things to occupy his mind.
As he stood there, gripped by a growing sense of dread, he saw a flash of white from the corner of his eye. He turned to face it, and that was when he saw one, then five, twenty, fifty of the fleshy blobs dribble into the room, pirouette on their tentacles, and dance his way. His motion sensor painted a sudden blob of movement—speeding closer by the second.
The Arbiter fired at the ugly-looking creatures, and many were destroyed, but there were more, many more, and they rolled toward him over the floor and walls. He and his warriors opened up in earnest, the obscene-looking predators threw themselves forward, and the battle was joined.
There was the sound of snow crunching underfoot as Stacker's men pushed forward.
"Stay close, Marines. Move it up, this ain't no boy scout picnic."
Chips Dubbo saw Stacker disappear into the blizzard mist. But he kept his pace and followed the rest of the Marines inside the giant wall. The entire situation was different from what he had expected. With the Master Chief gone, it was up to the rest of the crew of the In Amber Clad to really step up and secure some key to the super-weapon they were standing on.
Commander Keyes planned to take it before the Covenant could. So, the Marines pushed deeper into the complex and see what they could find.
Ten minutes had passed when a Marine said, "Whoa! Look at this."
Sgt. Banks looked down at a dead Brute, some giant dumb ape species that they were starting to see more of lately. Other Covenant bodies lay sprawled around the area as well. Alien blood slicked the walls and floor. Sgt. Stacker approached from behind.
"What do we have, Sergeant?" Commander Keyes asked over the comm. She was watching the mission through their helmet-cam recorders from the In Amber Clad.
"Looks like a Covenant patrol," the noncom answered. "Those big ape looking things. All KIA."
"Right. That's means the Covenant is trying to find a way through as well. We have to get to the center of this Zone before the Covenant do. So keep moving." Keyes ordered.
It took another five minutes to reach the other side of the Sentinel wall, and they were able to see the shield.
They reached a door pylon and they started to fiddle around with the control panel.
"Wait, it looks like the shield is going down," Keyes said, as they continued. "We're going to start making our way to the Library. Make your way to the RV point."
"Copy that, Ma'am. Let's get this door open."
"I'm trying, sir," the Tech Specialist replied, "trying to figure out how these alien panels work."
"Just do it, son."
"Yes, sir." the Marine replied. As he continued messing with the controls, there was nothing but silence.
The Marines shifted nervously, unwilling to relax. They held position for another few minutes, until the Tech specialist nodded with satisfaction and opened the door.
The pylon opened up, and the top half went up into the ceiling. The Marine set up their rappel lines and descended to the next level.
One Marine raised a hand.
"Sarge! Listen!" All of the Marines listened. They heard a soft, liquid, sort of slithery sound. It seemed to come from every direction at once.
The Marines felt jumpy but it was PVT. Dubbo who actually put it into words. "I don't like the sound of that . . ."
"We need to get to the RV point, so let's-." Sergeant Stacker ordered.
"Over there!" One Marine proclaimed, pointing to a clutch of shadows as the others heard the muffled sound of metal striking metal. There was a cry of pain as something landed on one Private's back, drove a needlelike penetrator through his skin, and aimed it down toward his spine. He dropped his weapon, tried to grab the thing that rode his shoulders, and thrashed back and forth.
"Hold still! Hold still!" Another yelled, grabbing onto one of the bulbous creatures and trying to pull it off his friend.
More of the little pods skittered into the room from God know's where. He saw a dozen white blobs, each maybe half a meter in diameter, and equipped with a cluster of writhing tentacles. They skittered and bobbed in a loose formation, then sprang in his direction. The tentacles propelled them several meters in a single leap.
Only Sgt. Stacker and PVT. Dubbo knew what the hell they were looking at and acted accordingly.
They fired short, almost panicked bursts.
"Let 'em have it!" Stacker yelled.
They fired at the creatures. They popped like balloons, with surprising force. The tiny explosions caused more to burst into feathery shards, but it seemed as if dozens more took their place.
"Come on, let's move!" Stacker ordered, and the Marines started to advance, checking every corner and shooting every shadow that even looked like it moved.
"Sergeant, status!" Keyes said over the radio.
"We have multiple hostile contacts inside the Sentinel wall. They are not Covenant. Repeat. Not Covenant." Stacker spat into his mike as his Marines continued to fire at the infectious little blobs that continued to swarm them.
"We'll send help." Keyes said.
"Negative, Ma'am. Proceed to the objective. We'll hold out as long as we can." Stacker said, terminating the signal and returning to the battle."
"There's too many!" Another Marine shouted before a blob attached itself to his chest. "AH! GET IT OFF ME!"
Two Marines stopped what they doing to try and pull the blob off, only for themselves to get covered in the things.
The Sarge started to bellow a orders about covering doorways and laying down suppressive fire, but it was as if a floodgate had opened somewhere, as a new wave of the obscene, podlike creatures rolled out of the darkness to overwhelm the humans.
Marines fired in every direction.
Several new creatures appeared. Large bulbous pieces of mass that lumbered on two stubby legs. One of the Marines unleashed a whole magazine into the obscene creature. It fell over flat on its face.
"I got it!" The Marine yelled, triumphantly.
"Get Back!" PVT. Dubbo shouted.
The creature exploded, demolishing several dozen pod infectors, and sending the other creatures to the ground.
Many of the Marines were thrown back or lost their balance as well, as even more small creatures were released from the bigger ones, and soon, two, three, or even four of the aliens managed to get a grip on several of the Marines on the floor and pull them down.
"Fall back! Suppressing fire!" Stacker yelled, as he and the remains of the platoon started a fighting retreat out of the room, tossing grenades behind them to destroy the creatures and cover their escape. But even though they destroyed many creatures, they were forced to leave the rest of the Marines to their fate with the Flood.
The doomed Marines screamed as a razor-sharp tentacles plunged through both their uniforms, wriggled under the surface of their skin, and tapped their spinal cords. There were explosions of pain so intense that some blacked out, only to be brought back to consciousness by chemicals the things had injected into their bloodstream.
Some tried to yell for help, but couldn't make a sound. Hearts raced as their extremities grew numb, one by one.
Lungs felt heavy.
They began to lose touch with the rest of their bodies, something foul entered them, pushing their consciousnesses down and back even as it claimed most of their cerebral cortex, polluting their brains with a hunger so base that it would have made normal men vomit, had they any possession of their own bodies.
This hunger was more than a desire for food, for sex, or for power. This hunger was a vacuum, an endless vortex that consumed every impulse, every thought, every measure of who and what they were.
They tried to scream, but it wouldn't let them.
Helpless to do anything about it, they were fully aware of the invading intelligence as it seized control of their musculature, jerked at their limbs like a child experimenting with a new toy, and marched them around in circles even as their friends, who no longer had any consciousness at all, were completely destroyed.
One marine screamed, and the air left his lungs, but no one turned to look.
The Arbiter and fired into what seemed like a tidal wave of tentacled horrors, backed away, and resolved to keep moving. He was vulnerable, especially when the last of his troops disappeared under an avalanche of infector pods.
He destroyed many of the little abominations, but it didn't seem to matter.
Then, to make matters worse, the Covenant bodies that were already on the ground were starting to shuffle around after being reanimated
With a Plasma rifle in one hand and an energy sword in the other, he cut through the advancing creatures, slashing and blasting them until there was nothing left to destroy, only for even more masses of tattered flesh and swinging limbs to start lashing at him.
What had once been Brutes and Jackals, their limbs stretched to the breaking point and their faces and chest sprouting tentacles that shouldn't have been there, started to rise all over the chamber and begin to move as one towards him. That's when a dozen Sentinels appeared out of no where and began to engage the combat forms, their energy beams lancing at their decomposing forms. Several creatures fell, but the rest started to fire back or vault up into the air at the machines and swat them out of the sky.
Realizing that this engagement couldn't be his to finish, the Arbiter engaged his active camouflage and slipped out of the room, moving from room to room, trying to outrun or simply slip past the infestation.
The Arbiter found himself on the upper gallery of a large, well-lit room. It was packed with more combat forms, but none seemed to be aware of him.
He intended to keep it that way, and slid silently along the right-hand wall to a hatch. A short journey brought him to a similar space where what looked like full-fledged battle was underway between a small squad of Human troops and the Flood creatures, and several Sentinels. He briefly considered engaging the targets—there was certainly no shortage of them.
He held his fire instead, and lingered behind a fallen cargo module. After a hellish battle, the combatants had annihilated one another, save for a couple Sentinels, which left him free to access the pylon that led to the lower levels of the flood-infested wall.
His active camouflage started to flicker. He was forced to deactivate it and give it a rest.
It proved to be the worst timing as another of the hunchbacked creatures dropped from above and slammed into him. The Arbiter staggered back, dipped, and hurled the monster back over his shoulder. It crunched into the wall and left a trail of mottled brown-green, viscous fluid as it slid to the floor. He then plunged his blade into its back and into the floor, and withdrew his blade when it stopped twitching.
He continued down the corridor. He was starting to receive a transmission.
No, not receive. Pick up.
He listened in.
"Proceed to the objective, we'll hold out as long as we can!"
"Get it off me!"
"Suppressive fire, suppressive fire!"
He could hear the staccato rip and taps of the humans' primitive projectile weapons. He moved down the hall, only to find several Humans on the ground. Dead. More than a dozen combat forms lay dead as well. Mostly other humans, but a few Elites as well. One or two were armed with plasma rifles.
This was evidence that a few of his fellow Sangheilli had entered the facility. He moved on.
He crept through the wide galleries and narrow corridors, past humming machinery and entered a large, wide open room that looked out over the landscape and the Library.
A Phantom dropship was hovering nearby. He was nearing salvation.
But just as was about to leave cover, another of the misshapen bipedal hostiles shambled by, and he recognized the shape of the creature's head—the long snouts of his fellow Sangheilli faced him. These were likely part of a Sangheilli strike force that the Phantom had just recently dropped off. What held his fire was where the head was located. The alien's skull was canted at a sickening angle, as if the bones of its neck had been softened or liquefied. It hung limply down the creature's back, lifeless—like a limb that needed amputation.
Not even humans deserved this fate.
The beast shuffled by, and moved out of sight.
They started firing on the nearby Phantom that hovered over the ledge. It returned fire as well, filling the room with plasma fire, and cutting down several creatures and dozens of infection pods.
Taking his chance, the Arbiter burst from his position and charged for the center of the room. He battered aside the shambling beasts, slashing them with his energy sword, and crushed a handful of the small spherical creatures beneath his boots. His plasma rifle whined, his carbine cracked and thick, green blood splashed the floor.
He had taken down the last of the creatures when he turned around to see the damaged Phantom had already pulled away, and was long gone. Clearly it was waiting for someone that was not showing up.
He looked out over the landscape and saw that all hell had broken loose. Banshees and Phantoms hovered around, firing at unseen targets, and were fired upon by...
'Wraiths?'
He tried to access the Covenant battle-net, but it was in absolute chaos. From what he could gather, it seemed that the Flood had overwhelmed several Covenant encampments, and the whole site was compromised. Thanks in large part to his very own actions.
This wasn't just the site of the Library. It was a Quarantine zone. The flood have been imprisoned on this ring for who knows how long. And now they had a fresh source of bodies to feed their infection, and weapons to help them do it.
One of the large Sentinel forges that hovered over the ring was suddenly taking heavy fire from Wraith mortar rounds, and soon it took too much damage, and explosions blossomed along its hull, it started to slowly descend to the surface below, busting itself open on a snowy peak. Another explosion lit up the landscape as a result, causing burning debris to rain down all over the Quarantine zone.
He heard a guttural scream behind him that echoed through the tunnels behind him. He quickly stabbed his finger into one more of the large pylons, and it lifted out of the floor. But this didn't just lead down to the next floor. It led down a long, steep shaft, which seemed to go on forever.
He hesitated. but when the first flood forms were starting to enter the room, he jumped down into the never-ending abyss. He dropped like a rock, so far down and so fast that his ears popped.
The Arbiter hurtled down the shaft and eventually struck a bulkhead on the way down.
When he eventually came to, he got back up started to walk down the shaft, carbine in hand as heslswly made his to wherever it led. Eventually walked up to the door at the end of the shaft. It opened up as he approached, and revealed the massive snowy landscape. Finally, he had escaped the hellhole that was the Sentinel wall.
But just then, his relief was dashed by even more of the shambling horrors.
He was on the outskirts of a Covenant landing zone. What was left of one anyway. Covenant military equipment was on fire and the bodies of dead Covenant lay scattered across the snow... but not for long.
The recently deceased were soon walking around with extra tentacles and appendages.
He readied his carbine for battle, and was just about to charge out of the wall when he heard a loud whistling noise. He looked up just in time to see Udka-pattern Assault Carapaces land across the canyon.
They burst open, and . Elites emerged from them, swords and rifles drawn, and a full-fledged battle was soon underway between Covenant troops and the Flood.
The Arbiter prepared to join the fight.
Some well-placed grenades, followed by a jump from the shaft, and sixty seconds of close-quarters action with his sword were sufficient to see him through.
Still, every creature that fell was a victory, that would soon be added to the battle songs that would be made about him one day.
Bullets pinged from the metal walls, plasma fire stuttered through the air, and grenades detonated as the Arbiter fought his way through the area, and finally came face to face with a squad of . Elites he had seen land earlier.
They were just finishing the last of their attackers when one of them noticed the Arbiter approaching.
"Forerunners be praised, the Arbiter!" He exclaimed, saluting with his fist over his chest and bowing his head.
The Arbiter and his Sangheilli brethren stood in the disgusting brown and green ooze of many dead Flood. Twenty lay dead in the snow in this spot alone, their bodies twisted, contorted, missing parts, or just plain destroyed.
The Arbiter bowed his head back in respect.
"My brothers, I witnessed the battle from the wall above us. I fear there you bring more bad news." He said.
Their leader stepped forward.
"Yes, this quarantine zone has been compromised, and so is a great portion of our forces. But we must do what we can against the Flood." He said. Then he pointed off in another direction. "Our Commander has landed further in. We should join him."
The Arbiter nodded.
"Agreed. We'll rendezvous with our brothers and plan our next move."
Knowing the Phantoms were somewhere above the blizzard mist, and eager to join their brothers, the Elite squad forged ahead, moving up the hill where they saw their pods land earlier.
The Arbiter moved with them, ending up in the center of the pack, as they moved through a crevice in the rock formation.
"This tunnel should take us straight to the main center of this camp, where our Commander is."
"Be cautious," The Arbiter warned. "These creatures are starting to show an unusual level of cunning that they were not capable of previously."
The parasite would ambush them, soon enough. He had recalled the reports from the first ring, how the Flood started off as mindless feral beasts with some motor functions like operating machines and weapons. But when their numbers started to swell, their intelligence grew, and their ability to co-ordinate improved.
They had to be snuffed out soon, or else the Covenant would face a real danger of the Flood spreading.
The Covenant camp that the other Elites had mentioned appeared up ahead. Other Elites were gathered around a hill with plenty of cover on it made out of jagged metal debris from the crashed Sentinel facility from earlier, and a few shade turrets were set up.
Elites patrolled the perimeter, having finished off a recent flood attack.
Their silver-armored leader was just pulling his sword from the body of an infected Brute. When they got closer, Arbiter could see a familiar face. Or at least half of one.
"R'tas!" He exclaimed.
The Commander half-turned towards him and his jaw parted in surprise.
"Arbiter!? What are you doing here!?"
The Arbiter was about to explain himself when he was interrupted by the loud guttural screeches of the Flood. The Elites tensed up, weapons raised and eyes sharpened in every direction.
"The Flood is upon us!" One Elite called out.
"We must hold this camp until reinforcements arrive. Warriors, prepare yourselves!"
The Elites readied their weapons. One ignited his sword, and his mandibles split open as he roared a challenge down the corridor at the unseen screeching horde that approached.
The barking chatter of human gunfire and Covenant plasma ripped through the air, and the Covenant warriors' armor flared.
"Blood," one Elite swore, as he ducked for cover.
The Arbiter calmly and without emotion turned and lobbed grenades down range at the charging mass of creatures.
"So they finally attack." One warrior said as he eagerly swiveled his shade turret around and peppered the shambling horde with plasma fire.
The Arbiter saw a dozen of the spherical infection forms bounce out of the mist and aimed his carbine. He fired short well-aimed bursts from his carbine, popped dozens of the alien pods, and turned to confront a combat form. It was armed with a plasma pistol but chose to throw itself forward rather than fire. The Arbiter's unactivated sword hilt was actually touching the creature when he pressed the activation switch. The sword ignited inside ex-Elite's chest, and it opened like an obscene flower and the infection form hidden within exploded into fleshy pieces.
A pair of Elite sharpshooters climbed up into a Covenant watchtower using the gravity lift that held the pod aloft. With this new field of fire they rained precision fire down onto the field before them, and put down several of the charging creatures.
As R'tas swung his through another combat form, and crushed several infector pods under his boots, he heard a burst of static in his helmet's comm system. Interference whined as the combat harness' communications gear tried to scrub the signal, to no avail. It sounded like a Phantom pilot's voice, but he couldn't be sure.
Then he heard one of his warriors in the sniper tower call out to him.
"Leader, a Juggernaught!" He called out. "Foul and unholy beast!"
He looked and saw that there was indeed a juggernaut. The name they had given to the same bulbous behemoth back on the mining facility over Threshold.
"Close ranks! We'll take it down together."
The Arbiter and the Elites fired on the approaching beast with everything they had, but it just seemed to shrug off their every assault. It stumbled a little, but it kept advancing.
But just as it was upon them, a storm of plasma fire was unleashed from high above, and it turned the changing giant into a charred mess.
The Elites looked up to see a trio of Covenant Phantoms appear out of nowhere. The Elites let out a roar of approval as the dropships started firing at any flood creature that was still in the area.
The tide of hostiles fell back into the ankle-deep snow and the moment the last bulbous form was popped, the Phantom dropships started dropping off their reinforcements.
As this was happening, the Arbiter walked up to R'tas Vadumee.
"In the center of this zone is a Sacred Icon critical to the Great Journey. I must find it." The Arbiter said.
'Vadumee nodded. Clenching his fist, he turned to the crowd of Spec ops warriors gathering around them.
"We shall cut into the heart of this infestation, retrieve the Icon, and burn any Flood that stand in our way!"
The Sangheili roared and growled in agreement, raising their weapons in the air, ready to spill blood, as was the Sangheilli way.
As the men got to their vehicles, R'tas looked back at the Arbiter. "The parasite is not to be trifled with. I hope you know what you are doing."
Arbiter nodded, and looked off in the distance.
"That makes two of us."
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