Cath

The Cradle

The fact that the creature may have been interfacing with exo-Cradle comms equipment rang alarm bells in Freyr's head. What could it have been doing? However, she held her tongue at this moment. It was abundantly clear that the alien was in a lot of pain, and didn't want to stick around to talk here. She couldn't blame him; the events of the last hour would almost certainly haunt her forever.

However, she could find some kernels of hope among this sea of despair - she was reasonably sure her family were still alive somewhere. She was also confident she’d gathered more useful data today than in the previous ten years of work. She just needed to go home and assimilate all the information for it to be any use. She knew where Vreta was staying - she resolved to talk with him privately about the specifics if she could.

The man with augmented eyes nodded considerately at Vreta’s story. “I understand completely, we’ll get you back to the real world in just a moment - we know where both of you are. I just have one more question for you, Vreta’Sori. Why is it that you were in an evacuated crime scene today?”

While this was happening, Freyr could hear a slight commotion behind them. She turned to see the wounded from their trucks being stretchered inside. At the same time, the room hummed slightly, and looking over her other shoulder she caught a squadron of heavily armoured CraSec soldiers being spawned in. They lined up to grab weapons from an armaments locker before heading to the doors. There was a lot going on, and the questioning was getting a bit above her paygrade, so Freyr was longing to just get out of here.

The Cradle

“I see.” The man nodded thoughtfully at Vreta’s description of the attack. “Is this true?” His eyes drilled into Freyr. She nodded shakily. “Yeah, pretty much. I’m sorry...who did you say you were again?” The man smiled. “I wouldn’t worry about that right now, Dr Lang. The main thing is that i’m here to help - both of you.” He looked at Vreta again. “I also wouldn’t worry about this place. It will be a fortress by dawn tomorrow. We have our best terraformers on it.” The man gestured for both of them to walk through the glass doors into the transit station as they slid open. “Please, after you.”

The large, bright, sparsely furnished room Freyr had arrived in only an hour or two ago had been totally transformed. An entire command centre of holo-consoles and other equipment was being set up around the outside, leaving an open space in the middle for people to spawn in and out. Freyr could see a wide variety of people milling around. There were engineers and technicians in white jumpsuits, connecting up even more gear. There were at least half a dozen terraformers in whatever clothes they’d decided to program in. Freyr also spotted a few other people in the same black uniform as the man with the augmented eyes, who had now followed them through the double doors. These black-clad people all turned to stare directly at them, making Freyr feel incredibly vulnerable.

“Please, take a seat.” The man with the augmented eyes urged, walking past them to sit at an ornate wooden desk. There were two chairs facing him on the other side. After a split second, the man exclaimed. “Ah, of course, the chair!” He loudly snapped his fingers and a nearby terraformer turned around. The man gestured to Vreta, and after sizing him up for a moment, the terraformer hit a few options on her holo-interface. One of the chairs seemed to disassemble and reassemble in a flurry of half-digital moving parts. When everything settled, Freyr could see a large stool, presumably suitable for tailed reptilians. “Please.” The man smiled, gesturing to the seats again. Freyr sat down, growing slightly uneasy.

“Now - this creature you speak of. Is it the same creature as the ones who abducted those Skinners?”

“Yeah.” Freyr nodded, slightly thrown off by the fact that this man knew about the abductions.

“It came back? Why?”

“I uh, I don’t know.” Freyr turned to look at Vreta. “You said that it was doing something with a device when you found it. What kind of device?”

The man looked at Vreta as Freyr spoke, his facial expression completely unfathomable.

The Cradle

Freyr gently patted Bishop’s shoulder. He was just sitting back in his seat, eyes staring straight ahead. “Well done, Mr Bishop. Thank you.” She murmured. “You’re uh...you’re welcome.” He replied weakly. Leaving the pistol on the dashboard, Freyr opened her door and jumped out; her legs were so wobbly she nearly fell. She put her hands up and walked slowly forward.

Several soldiers and a medic rushed to greet her. One shone a scanner beam in her eyes and another handed her an oxygen mask which she gladly took a few breaths from. “You’re clear. Name?” One asked. “Dr Freyr Lang. We have wounded in the back.” Freyr said, teeth gritting when the pain from her seared arm returned. “Can i have a burn pack please?” The medic pulled one from her bag and chucked it to Freyr before rushing around to the back of the truck.

Freyr pulled the remains of her jumpsuit sleeve back to reveal charred, red pink flesh. She activated the burn pack and wrapped it quickly around her entire forearm, crying out from the pain. It quickly subsided though, as topical anesthetics in the wrap numbed everything down underneath. She staggered over to the truck in front. Vreta had just jumped to the ground and was waiting to receive the wounded. “Vreta, right? Can we talk?” Freyr asked, stopping alongside the tall alien. “You can both talk to me.” A deep, gruff voice called from behind them.

Freyr turned, and found a severe-looking grey haired man in a smart black uniform standing before them. His hands were clasped behind his back, and he cooly regarded them with augmented eyes that glowed with three light blue points. “Our medics will see to the wounded, thank you Vreta’Sori.” He smiled, as three of them jogged round the sides of the truck and began pulling the wounded down around them. “Please, come.” He urged, gesturing for them to follow him toward the transit station.

Freyr glanced at Vreta. She’d wanted to talk to him about what had happened in that warehouse. The creature with David’s face had been talking to the alien, and Freyr was sure it meant something. But something about this man in the black uniform made her think they didn’t have a choice. Hesitantly, she fell in behind the man as he walked toward the rows of nervous CraSec troops, still scanning the Border as it loomed over them. “Was that Major Osman I saw, slumped over in that truck?” The man immediately asked, turning and looking at Vreta while still walking.

The Cradle

The tendrils rapidly loosened from around Bishop’s arm and neck, and slithered back out of the driver’s side door as the nightmare beetle thudly wetly into the ground. He quickly closed the door, took the wheel back from Freyr and handed her the pistol. “Whoo! Good shooting boys!” He shouted raspily into his comms set. With her hands free, Freyr looked back out of her window. She could just about see the last two beetles racing toward them out of the foggy blackness. “Go go go!” She urged. The Border come to a stop, and was just a few hundred metres away. Just behind the Border veil, Freyr could see the floodlit transit station.

“Come on!” Bishop yelled, arms taut around the wheel as he juiced every ounce of power from the accelerator. Their truck whined and grated, sparks began flickering behind some of the control panels. A quick glance in the mirror confirmed that both of the bugs were right behind them. Their outstretched tentacles were reaching for the back of the truck, as energy bolts raked across both of their glassy carapaces. Freyr and Bishop both yelped as they hit a bump, sending the whole vehicle up into the air and careering through the Border at a tilted angle.

As soon as they crashed back through the Border and into colonised space, Freyr could see rows of CraSec vehicles parked around the transit station. Dozens of soldiers hiding behind the vehicles instantly opened fire upon seeing the beetles that’d followed them through. Issuing sharp clicks and squeals, the beetles skidded about and quickly disappeared back through the border.

Bishop slammed on the brakes, and they slid to a stop right behind the truck with Vreta on the turret. Freyr exhaled deeply, her whole body shaking uncontrollably. “Identify yourselves.” A voice demanded over loudspeaker, as a handful of soldiers drifted out from behind cover to surround the trucks. Most had their weapons trained on the clearly visible alien.

The Cradle

“I can see the transit station!” Bishop pointed, other hand guiding the steering wheel. Freyr turned to look and could see he was probably right. Though the Border was mostly opaque from the outside, they could still see out. Around a bend in the road, a mile or two away, was a mess of flood lights, marking their exit clearly on the landscape. “All Dagger teams - auxiliary power is in place, we’re ready to receive you.” A voice sounded on the comms set.

“They should be out here getting u-” Bishop began complaining.

“Incoming!” The soldier on the turret shouted.

The driver’s side door clicked open and two thick tendrils entered the cab. One wrapped around Bishop’s neck and the other around one arm. They would’ve pulled him cleanly out of the truck, were it not for his seatbelt. Bishop’s other arm frantically went up to his neck, so Freyr leant over and grabbed the unoccupied steering wheel before they crashed. “Bishop, listen to me. Keep your foot on the accelerator! Take this!” Freyr called over the din, her voice hoarse and croaky. She passed Bishop the pistol, which he used to start shooting the tendrils, his lips pursed and eyes wide. “Fucking die!” She heard someone behind them yelling, as the energy cannon overheated.

Keeping her eyes on the road, Freyr gasped and yanked the steering wheel as another of the beetles rocketed in from their left side, taking fire from the first car, and barreled straight into the second truck. It lurched sideways off the road, a huge dent in the side. “Karos!” Freyr shouted as the vehicle caught something on one of the tires and began flipping over and over through the air. Scraps of metal from the crash flew into the windscreen as Freyr somehow managed to maneuver their speeding truck around the pirouetting wreck. They bounced over something substantial along the way, which Freyr presumed must have been the beetle.

Still leaning over, Freyr used her free hand to activate the truck’s comm unit. “Car in front, help us get this thing off! Please!” She pleaded.

The Cradle

Freyr could hear the hell hounds scrabbling at the armour plate doors above the din of the energy cannon. But she barely saw them in her rear view mirror; her eyes were glued to the rippling Border wall. The lights were out on the road they’d powered onto, but the convoy’s floodlights traced the purple arteries running up that black curtain of night. Gradually, she could see canines appearing in the rearview mirror too, as they failed to keep up with the speeding trucks. The Border caught up with them, sucking them in.

“It’s reclaiming this whole site.” Freyr murmured, fascinated despite everything that was happening. She’d never seen the Cradle react in such a way, no one had. “Cradle Control, come in. We could really use reinforcements at our nearest transit station, over!” Bishop called into his comms unit. “Dagger 7, we’re receiving-”

“Bishop, look out!” Freyr shouted over the reply.

The Border surged forward suddenly, rushing up and swallowing the fourth vehicle in their convoy. For a moment it looked like they may be able to outrun it, but the Border kept gathering speed and enveloped them. Once inside, the sound muffled considerably, and the atmosphere filled with thousands of white flakes. Freyr’s lungs felt the pressure right away, as the Cradle began reducing the oxygen programmed into this previously colonised area.

After a couple of seconds, the truck began alternating between regular engine noise and a shrill whining sound, as though systems were failing. The halo of bright lights around the sides of the truck flickered and died, leaving just the headlights and gun lights. “No no no no no!” Bishop yelled, hitting buttons on the dashboard. “Are we slowing down? What’s happening?” A soldier called in through the hatch separating the cabin from the turret and troop bay. “Yeah! Something is messing with us. I think I can at least get the lights back on!” Bishop replied.

Still peering through the rearview mirror, Freyr let out a surprised yelp when the lights came back on. A large, pale, long-legged beetle with the now synonymous purple tendril extensions was perched on top of the truck behind them, ripping the helpless soldiers aboard it apart with its pincers. Freyr could see several of the tendrils flailing around inside the cabin, grabbing at the driver. The truck veered off the road, into the uncharted ground alongside.

“They’re under attack, shoot that thing!” Freyr shouted, her face stuck up against the side window. “Fuck that, we have more incoming!” The soldier on the turret yelled, firing at four more of the beetles as they raced out of the swirling storm of flakes at blistering speed, two either side of the convoy. “How are they going that fast?!” Bishop exclaimed. “Tiger beetles are built for speed!” The biologist in Freyr forced her to answer.

The Cradle

The insectoid nightmare issued the same nails-on-a-chalkboard scream under the hail of concentrated energy, and charged the front truck that Vreta occupied. Lieutenant Rowe, now one of the final surviving soldiers to have not got into a vehicle, saw the creature’s approach and began running toward it. “Get out of here NOW!” He yelled, grabbing a limpet charge from the back of Vreta’s truck just as it began turning to leave the compound. On the run, he shot two canines in his way before dropping the empty pistol and attaching the charge to his chest. With hellhounds diverting their attention from the bright lights of the truck to chase him, Rowe met the charging insect creature about twenty metres in front of the trucks and detonated the limpet. He vanished as a deafening directional explosion sprayed blood over the bonnet of the first truck. The creature was bounced directly through a glass window on the adjacent office building’s first floor.

The force of the explosion knocked Freyr, and the canine trying to bite her face off, to the ground. She could feel the truck she’d previously been pinned against rolling off behind her. She managed to wrestle her way on top of the struggling hound and put a bullet in its snapping snout. Staggering to her feet, she turned around and saw the convoy quickly turning in the car park space, to face the compound exit. Soldiers were standing up in the open back of all the trucks, firing behind her. Their faces were yelling at her to get aboard, but her ears were still ringing from the explosion. She had no idea how to get aboard now they were all in motion, but fortunately, the passenger door of the third truck swung open and she could see Bishop leaning across the seats with his hand outstretched, his dark face slick with sweat inside his helmet. She ran to the side of the truck and grabbed his hand. He immediately hauled her into the cabin, where she managed to tuck herself in and slam the door shut.

With the first truck having completed the U-turn, the four-vehicle convoy sped up considerably, motoring toward the compound exit with canines flooding around the skirts. Freyr realised she was hyper ventilating when she got sat down, and tried to calm herself. The sound of the energy cannon above them was ear-splittingly loud, but she could just about hear Bishop’s bellowing voice as he peered through the rear view mirror. “The Border is coming! Move it!” He shouted, leaning on the truck horn.

The Cradle

The soldier Freyr had latched onto was big and burly, and used his mass to crash through waves of the snapping creatures. One of the canines cut through the thigh of his suit and drew a fountain of blood, until Freyr kicked it off and followed up by stamping on its head. An energy pulse fizzed past, searing the flesh all the way up her left arm. Freyr screamed in pain and stumbled on, falling over a pile of canine corpses. She couldn’t find a purchase on the slippery bodies, until a hand grabbed her armpit and hauled her to her feet. “Time to go, ma’am!” Rowe shouted at her, covered in blood. “I thought you were dead!” Freyr shouted, as they suddenly burst out the other end of the throng.

“Not yet ma’am!” Rowe yelled, sending two rounds through a dog wrestling with the soldier Freyr had been following just moments before. He grabbed the man up off the floor and pushed him toward the trucks. “Bishop, take Doctor Lang to the trucks and get them started right now!” Rowe then worked to free another soldier, firing shots into the skull of a dog with it’s tendrils wrapped around them. “Copy that. With me!” Bishop boomed, pushing Freyr ahead of him as they started to run.

They passed a ragged line of CraSec soldiers, who had managed to free themselves and were now holding back the tsunami of horrors careering toward them. Sprinting now, they passed a thin stream of soldiers variously supporting or dragging other people towards the trucks. Some had smashed helmets and their faces half bitten off. Others were just screaming into the air, their eyes wide. “Back to the trucks, let's move!” Bishop yelled, picking up one of the wounded to free up the soldier dragging them to fight on.

Freyr’s vision was so blurry from running and the Border fog that she didn’t notice Vreta and Osman until Bishop shouted “Who the fuck is that!?” and pointed his pistol at the alien with one hand. He was understandably on edge, with everything going on. “Don’t shoot! He’s with me!” Freyr called as they finally reached the trucks, taking a gamble on the alien’s gender. Bishop didn’t seem entirely convinced, but a scream like fingernails running down slate quickly stirred him back into action. “Ok, move move move!” He shooed Vreta away from the back door before opening it up and securing the wounded soldier inside, before going to the stretcher for Osman.

Freyr looked back toward the cacophony of gunfire between the warehouses. She could see about a dozen soldiers making their way back to the convoy. A desperate rearguard action, led by Lieutenant Rowe, was being brutally pushed back by hordes of hellhounds. Freyr ran over to support the closest of the soldiers, quickly marching them over to another of the trucks. Upon opening the passenger door she was staring down the barrel of a pistol held by Karos Childermass. His hands were shaking and his face was white. Freyr snatched the handgun out of his hand, turned away from the door and was instantly pinned against the side of the truck by one of the hellhounds. It jumped up, it’s dripping jaws snapping at her face. Her gun hand was stuck just holding its teeth away from her throat.

“Oh fuck, It’s back!” Bishop shouted from the other side of the truck, pointing to the corner of the office building they were backed up against. The human-faced insectoid creature had just emerged from the darkness. Just behind it was the Border, now creeping forward at a walking pace. Bishop fired his assault rifle at the creature from the hip, shouting and swearing at the soldiers pouring in around him to get strapped into the vehicles.

Halo: Aegis Team

Tar 'Mdalak

---

Once everyone on the mesa had boarded, Vol closed up the grav lift and Tar activated the internal comms system. “Lock in tight, things could get bumpy.” As she said that, the shockwave from the Brute cruiser crashing into the valley behind the base hit the Phantom, buffeting it backwards. Tar gunned the engines and pushed them swiftly forward while Vol plotted them a course.

Their objective was to insert the team on a flat staging area beneath the main Forerunner structure. Enhanced stills Vol had taken while Aegis was boarding showed it was littered with large crates and lifting vehicles. Between them and this landing zone were an assortment of Brute drop ships and Banshees. However, they were distracted by the teams of Phantoms currently attacking the walls of the compound. There were also a handful of lethal AA guns around the compound, devastating any airship it could find. However, one had just erupted into a towering jet of flames, opening up a gap in their coverage. Tar pointed to it. “That’s the entry point, adjust our approach solution.” Vol obeyed with a cursory “Yes, commander.” They were working well, considering this was their first time together, Tar noted.

Maintaining a breakneck speed, they dropped down to just above the height of the walls and roared past the destroyed AA battery. The courtyard and the IFF tags for the rest of Aegis team zipped past underneath. “Fuel rod round, front left side!” Vol called, pinging it on the nav dashboard. Tar hauled the controls to the right, and the Phantom drastically tilted, throwing them against their harnesses. The round fizzed by close underneath their Phantom. “Can you get a shot off?” Tar asked. “No, they’re above us. Coming in hot!” Tar tugged the controls up and to the left, and the top of their Phantom crushed the wings of the Banshee above. A titanic scraping, clattering sound echoed through the troop bay, the banshee sliding along the length of their vehicle and falling off the end.

Tar cooled the engines slightly as they approached the landing zone. Vol marked a clear space near the ramp up from the courtyard and together they brought the Phantom in. Vol reactivated the grav lift and opened the side doors while Tar addressed the bay’s occupants. “Green light to disembark, go go go!” They both surveyed the area as Aegis team quickly headed out of the Phantom. The landing zone was very hot, and they were taking small arms fire from practically all directions. They only had twenty seconds before someone with the right armaments took notice. “Rockets! Right side!” Vol hollered. “Everybody out NOW!” Tar shouted, tugging the controls sharply. Vol closed the side doors up to increase their protection. If Aegis team hadn’t jumped already, they’d be coming on this evasive maneuver with them.

The Cradle

Freyr looked up at the alien, Vreta, she vaguely remembered his name was, and nodded numbly. “Move move move!” the sergeant shouted, shooting at something behind them as Freyr broke into a run, torch shaking across the ground in front of her. Several of the soldiers soon overtook her, their guns up and scanning the path between two more warehouses in front of them. Freyr could just about make out the racks of strong lights mounted on top of the CraSec vehicles a few hundred metres in front of them. They were parked outside the office buildings they’d started their investigations in. That all seemed like a very, very long time ago now.

A few seconds later, a cacophony of gunfire, shouting and other unnatural sounds joined the sporadic shooting from the rear of their group. It was coming from up ahead. In the back of her mind, Freyr knew she’d heard that transition from muffled hum to translatable sounds before. People had just passed back through the Border. Sure enough, she could see numerous torchlights and muzzle flashes from around the corner of the next warehouse. The gunfire and screaming increased as they ran towards the action, until sure enough, it erupted out right in front of them.

About two dozen CraSec soldiers spilled out into the crossroads in front of them from the left hand side and were immediately overrun by a swarm of creatures. They looked like muscle-bound, bald hunting dogs, except for the thin purple tendrils sprouting out all over their bodies. Dozens of them ran amok in the crowd of soldiers, jumping up, all teeth and black eyes, to pull them screaming to the floor.

Freyr skidded to halt as the action exploded across the road in front of her. She could see the Border had advanced even closer to the crossroads here too. Sitting halfway through the opaque surface, she caught a glimpse of a huge, bulbous sack of flesh, covered in purple appendages. It appeared to be pulling itself out of the Border wall by way of these tentacles. More hellhounds ripped their way out of the sack with their teeth and charged into the group. Freyr froze, her hands to her mouth and tears welling in her eyes.

It didn’t last long, as one of the canine-like creatures leapt at her, only to be blown to pieces at close range. “Doctor Lang, follow me!” A man shouted in her face. Freyr realised it was Lieutenant Rowe, holding a bulky shotgun. He turned, shot another canine running at him from behind, dropped the shotgun and shot another with his pistol before being plowed into the floor by three more. Freyr ran through the gap he’d created, toward the halo of lights by the trucks, hands covering her ears. Screaming and shouting mingling with staccato gunfire and in-human snarls on all sides. “Back to the trucks! Back to the trucks!” She heard someone yell nearby, and held onto them as they pushed through the melee. She looked desperately for Major Osman and the alien, both who had saved her, but couldn't see them.