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Ekim, Part II: Night Combat
Posted By: Kiloh Ekim<www.g0d0fth3g33ks@hotmail.com>
Date: 13 May 2007, 2:13 am
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Ekim woke with a start. Well, actually he woke with the sound of ARs and plasma riles firing filling his ears. His hand already resting on the MA5B, he jumped to his feet. The Marines and elites were lining one wall of the barricade as their rounds lit an apparently empty street.
"Hold! The Flood are upon us!" an elite barked to those who were awakening with Ekim.
Then he saw it. One dark, misshaped figure jumping through the air farther than any man could be thrown. It was going right down the street without taking cover. A mindless mistake. It was hit several times before touching the ground and it collapsed when it did. It lied still for several seconds as the group thinned out and relaxed.
As Ekim turned his back, he heard a loud pain-filled groan. How it had enough strength to speak, nonetheless that loudly, intrigued him. He turned back to look once more at the corpse and saw that the pale-green, rotting creature was right in front of him in a dead sprint.
He didn't need to aim. He was that close. He pulled the trigger down and both of them were enveloped in a bright light from the end of his gun. He emptied his whole clip in its chest. The moment was lost in the loud BBBBRRRTT and deadly light and seemed to last forever. Click. The clip was out. That thing wasn't getting back up. It fell limply to the ground.
Upon further examination Ekim found that that thing—that monster was human. Was is easily the key word in his mind. This thing was a Marine and was still wearing the uniform where he didn't have holes blown clear through. But is seemed to be mutated and have something inside it. There was a large hole in the chest where something had crawled and stayed. But now there was little left of its chest and little to see.
Ekim finally decided he wait to sleep because he had a nagging felling that these things were coming back but in bigger numbers. He gripped his shotgun tightly, loading it, as he sat by the fire and talked with the ODSTs.
"What was that thing?" Bennett said.
"Don't know. But it didn't seem hard to kill" Case responded. Those two marines apparently knew each other since Preschool, were best friends, and decided to sign up together. They somehow ended up in the same squadron and worked well together. Regardless, the acted like a married couple.
"Speak for yourself" Ekim muttered under his breath.
"Dude, I don't think so" a Marine named Taber said, not hearing what Ekim had said "It got back up after we opened up on it. Nothing could have survived that. And I heard somewhere that there were things like that on Reach with the Covenant."
"No" said a blue armored Elite that was passing by "The Parasite is the enemy of the Prophets. It deserves no mercy and shall receive none. We shall burn all in our path."
Something about how viciously he said it quieted the group entirely. An awkward silence overtook the air.
Just then Ekim saw something he didn't expect. Through the dark night's air, the fire's light, and the conversation's tension he saw a small raindrop hit his M90 shotgun and trail down like a teardrop. It was going to be one hell of a night.
With a boom, thunder crashed again and again. What little shade there was happened to be away from the fire, so there was no getting comfortable. Ekim found himself pressed against a wall of the barricade with a small overhang along with Frickie.
YYYAAARRKKKK! A thousand voices screeched at the same time and the echo sounded like it came from everywhere. A surge of terror swept the listeners and everyone's', even the Elites', blood ran cold. In seconds the small amount of shelter everyone shared was gone. The defenders ran into the rain to get behind any wall of the barricade that they could and it was not long until this small band of fighters covered all sides. Time to fight. Flashlights showed through the dense rain as only white beams of water that could cast only a few feet.
Buckets continued to pour on top the make-shift alliance but their lives came before comfort. Elites and humans were both taught that. Ekim found it difficult to hold his gun straight as he was soaked to the bone and shivering wildly. But still no sign of the attackers. But they heard it this time. He was sure.
Far to his right a Battle Rifle started a three round burst and the group moved with a jump. Plod, plod, plod, plod. Footsteps moved right towards Ekim who cocked his M90 shotgun awaiting an easy up-close kill. He looked right down the sights as the gruesome target fell into view. But suddenly AR rounds skimmed past his head and others hit the barricade into a shower of sparks. It wasn't a Marine or Covenant for that matter; it was the flood he was looking at.
"No one told me they had guns!" Ekim yelled over the rain to Case who was standing only a few feet to his right blazing away with a SMG.
"Did you ask?" he replied when he bent down to reload his clip.
Ekim popped his head up again and saw something he never wanted to see in his life. There were at least thirty combat forms, Covenant and Human either jumping, running, or shooting down the street. Confusion once again overtook the air as the menace drew ever closer taking everything that flew at it. Bullets, plasma. No matter. The only light illuminating the scene was from the plasma firing, roaring ARs, and the occasional flamethrower.
Ekim took a quick glance to his left while ducking down and reloading his MA5B AR. He caught one glance of Case. He was firing his SMGs high at an angle and in a flash, a flood landed feet from him hitting the ground running. A lash of a long, tentacle-whip arm hit Case square in the chest which such force that it sent him flying backwards into a solid brick wall.
From there everything went badly. Most everyone turned to help their injured comrade but, in turn, left their stations for but a brief moment. From the darkness, the parasites moved with sudden and disarming attacks that the barriers were useless.
To, Ekim, everyone was lost in a wall of decaying flesh and mutated limbs the surrounded him on all sides. There was a full clip on his M90 shotgun and plenty of targets. Boom, click click, Boom, click click. The bastards fell one after another, bursting into a plume of some kind of spore with each kill.
His shotgun fired again and again until a damning Click sounded when he pulled the trigger. No time to reload and at any moment a flood would jump towards him and everything would be over. He started walking backwards. They were still survivors somewhere in the crowd but at this point it didn't matter. Ekim slipped his shotgun on his back next to his AR and moved to grip his FRAG grenades.
But then the parasites stood still. Ekim's finger froze in place on the pin looking for movement. All of the Flood had stopped in place; feelers had just stopped wiggling like there was something in the air that no human would ever sense.
They turned in one direction (Ekim's right) and sprinted away. Soundlessly, and command less they retreated only moments from winning. Time for another wave.
UNSC and Elites that had survived stood up and glanced around, shaken and beaten. There lay in front of them a field of scattered corpses, most Flood, but others were brothers, friends. The group numbered only seven. There was Frickie, Bennett, Taber, a Marine named Wandling, and three Elites.
Silence covered the misted area of wreckage. Those who lived only stood a few feeble feet above the dead. Frickie had a large cut above his right eye that bled down his face. Everyone else had their battle-scar trophies but the thing about Frickie was that he still stood straight up and rose above the battle weary group.
"Bennett, Ekim, get the flamethrower and burn these bodies. Make sure none of them get back up! Taber, Wandling, refortify this position and barricade. Ikst 'Nomatee, get your remaining men and search for any type of workable or fixable vehicle. We're gonna need to retreat." Frickie commanded. Suddenly there was hope and there was a leader. Complete cooperation.
As the group got to working the thought that the previous battle instilled in people's minds was this: We cannot continue surviving like this. We have one more shot or we will die.
One more thing happened while the group labored on: the rain stopped. From torrential, to raindrops, to nothing. But the sun still didn't show itself and it seemed that the night would not let them escape alive.
Everyone knew that Earth was being invaded and nothing human would emerge in its wake. Now, even, the military was being crippled, friends were dieing right in front of you, and your families were dead back home. Survival and revenge. That's all that was left for Ekim.
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