Seven: Dark Finale

Because Blue Team was in a dropship rather than Banshees, they had to be very careful about disembarking in the escape pod dock. One wrong move could send them plunging to their deaths hundreds of meters below. While Cortana piloted the ship and then sent it buzzing back to Alpha Base on autopilot, she was also talking with her Spartan. "Where is all the biomass coming from?" she asked, "I'm at least three percent sure there weren't enough people here to make a Hive."

"You'd be surprised," was the reply, "but you're also correct. The rest of the fleet finished up their mission, so they brought in the excess. It's all just mass we were getting ready to recycle anyway, so it's no loss. We'll just recover it after the detonation if we can, though clean-up's going to be a bitch and a half."

"'Recycle'."

"Yeah. Like carrier forms. When combat forms reach the end of their useful life, they become carrier forms and make more Infection Pods to keep spreading the parasite. ...You probably don't want to know any more than that."

"Fair." To Blue Team, she said, "We need to get to the bridge. From there we can initiate a reactor detonation."

The Spartans flashed an acknowledgement at her, moving the only direction they could through the burned-out halls. That, in turn, forced them into the Autumn's maintenance access ways when a scorched blast door blocked their path. Moving single file through a very small and dimly lit passageway lined with Flood biomass was not their idea of a "safe" combat zone, but since when has any combat zone been safe?

Kelly paused to peer at a bulbous Flood growth on the floor. After a second, "Flood Growth Form - Blister Pod" appeared on their HUDs. "This thing is disgusting," she said.

[Mood.]

Infection Pods boiled up out of the floor, climbing a ladder through a hatch. Kelly angled her plasma rifle around Fred to add its fire to destroy them. The Chief tossed a grenade down the hole to clear away the others and paused to listen to the POW of a few carrier forms and the hissing of some Sentinels' lasers. When it all went quiet, they dropped down through and took cover, then fired on the floating machines, cutting through their rudimentary shields and sending them crashing to the ground.

The Spartans kept moving through the slag and stamped a knot of Infection Pods to death before coming to a locked hatch. When they turned up the gain on their audio, they heard scratching on the other side.

The four backed away, and Fred and Sam went to one knee in the front, assault rifles at the ready, while Kelly and Linda each primed a grenade.

They were just in time. The hatch's locks snapped with a bang and spilled combat forms into the hall. The two female Spartans let their grenades fly, then joined their brothers in firing on the survivors. When they too went down, the Spartans headed down the hall - and stopped dead when they heard the growl of Hunters beyond, along with the howls of the Flood. Kelly creeped forward to scope out the situation.

A pair of Hunters were going up against a Tank Form and a small swarm of Infection Pods, and the Flood was winning. The Tank Form lumbered over to the Hunters with surprising speed, its club-like arms turning to huge spikes. It drove the spikes through the gaps in one Hunter's armor, actually lifting it off its feet. It was dead by the time it hit the ground, and its brother roared in grief.

The Hunter's massive shield dealt a crushing blow, sending the Tank Form smashing against one wall. It sagged there for a minute but staggered upright again - only to get blasted apart by a fuel rod charge. Then the Hunter turned to the Infection Pods - and turned its back on the Spartans.

Kelly couldn't have asked for a better opportunity if she had planned it herself. She darted forward, priming a plasma grenade, shoving it deep through the worm-cables of the Hunter's back, then lunged away so fast she was a blur to non-Spartan eyes.

The Hunter exploded, and the shrapnel of its armor took out all the Infection Pods with it, letting the Spartans move into the hall.

A sphincter of flesh and plating of some sort opened at their approach, revealing the Flood and the Covenant battling it out in one of the Autumn's many mess halls. Some of the Unggoy were carrying fuel rod guns, and Linda drew a line on one of them even as the Flood charged the Covenant.

As expected, the Grunt's death caused its weapon to self-destruct, setting off a chain reaction through the others, leaving only one combat form behind. They gunned that down too and moved on to the bridge, where more Covenant waited. Yet they were no more of a challenge than the others the four Spartans encountered, and they entered the bridge essentially unimpeded.

Fred slotted Cortana's chip into the holopedestal next to the viewscreen, and her avatar appeared, as crimson as ever. "I leave home for a few days, and look what happens. This won't take long." She briefly touched one of her temples. A twenty-minute timer flashed up on the screen. "There. That should give us some time to put some distance between ourselves and Halo."

The Chief reached for her chip-

"I'm afraid that's out of the question, really," said Spark over the local COM.

"Oh fuck off!" the rampant AI snarled.

"Ridiculous," the Monitor continued as if he hadn't heard, "That you would imbue a warship's AI with such a wealth of knowledge! Weren't you worried it might be captured? Or destroyed?"

It didn't take Cortana long to track him down; he was at the same place as Before. "He's in my data arrays; a local tap. Remove your subroutines from my arrays, you beast!"

"You can't imagine how exciting this is!" Spark exclaimed, zooming around Engineering, "Having a record of all our lost time. Human history, is it? Fascinating. I will enjoy every moment of its categorization! But to think that you would destroy this installation, as well as this record? I am shocked. Almost too shocked for words."

The countdown on the screen ground to a halt, and Cortana hissed out an expletive. "He stopped the self-destruct sequence. Accursed Monitor, we will see you destroyed!"

"Why do you continue to fight us, Reclaimers?" The Monitor sounded like he was scolding disobedient children. "You cannot win! Give us the construct, and I will endeavor to make your deaths at least relatively painless and-"

Spark's voice cut off mid-sentence. Cortana smirked. "At least I still have control over the COM channels."

"Where is he?" Fred demanded.

"You could say please. There are Sentinel taps throughout the ship, but the Monitor… he's in Engineering. He must be trying to take the core offline."

"We can't let that happen," said the Chief, "How much firepower would it take to crack the engines' shields?"

"Actually not much at this point. A well-placed grenade or rocket perhaps. Why?"

She turned to see the Spartans pull out their remaining grenades, and Sam hefted the rocket launcher he'd been hanging onto. The AI's eyes widened. "Okay," she said, "Let's do it."

Once again Fred reached for her chip. Cortana cried a warning as half a dozen shielded Sentinels appeared beyond the bridge's viewport. Fred yanked her from the console and ducked below the display, letting the other Spartans deal with the machines while he slotted the AI back into his armor.

After that, they headed back out into the hall. "Head to Cryo B. We should be able to reach the engine room through there," said the AI.

The Flood flesh door - "Flood Hive Form - Porta" - didn't open at their approach, so they kept moving past it. They came across another sealed door - this one an actual hatch - which burst open as they drew near, spilling more Flood into the hall. Shotgun cartridges and assault rifle bullets tore holes through the animated corpses, which staggered and fell. When the area was clear, they found themselves in a small ammo station and quickly scavenged for rounds.

They were about to head through the far door when they heard a low grunt from another pair of Hunters. They peered through the glass and saw two Tank Forms go lumbering by with a combat form clinging to each one's back, riding them like horses.

Cortana started laughing, and the Spartans all looked at one another. While they tried to figure out if they really had seen what they thought they saw, the Hunters and the Elite with them came under attack by the Flood forms. One of the Hunters fired on the Flood, which set off a chain reaction with half a dozen plasma grenades scattered on the floor, killing all of them save one of the Tank Forms. Again the humans took that chance, throwing some grenades of their own to blow it apart.

They moved on to the next hall, where they came across two Ranged Forms firing at some shielded Sentinels, who were firing right back. Though the parasites were making a good go of it, the machines were winning, their lasers cooking the Flood faster than they could repair themselves. The Sentinels zapped them to pieces, and then the Spartans gunned them down and kept moving.

They ducked under a half-raised hatch, gunned down still more Sentinels, and followed the arrows on the floor to Cryo B. The cryo bay was even more overrun with combatants and Flood growths, but the Spartans' shotguns proved more than equal to the task, even though their armor made disgusting "schluck, schluck, schluck" sounds as they waded through the parasitic growths.

They pressed on. Sam found reloads for his rocket launcher and fired on a cluster of carrier forms, setting off another chain reaction. The main passages were blocked with debris, forcing them through a Porta and into another maintenance access way, through to where the Covenant was fighting a group of Sentinels. They whittled each other down to a few, and the Spartans eliminated the rest and the Flood who came in behind.

"We should stock up at the armory first; it'll save time," the construct suggested, and the Spartans agreed, following the arrows on the floor. Though the Marines had scavenged what they could earlier, there was still a wealth of ammunition lying around, and Linda loaded up a rocket launcher of her own while Sam stood guard and Fred and Kelly slotted shells into their shotguns.

They all jumped when Sam fired a rocket, though, and whirled around just in time to see two infected SpecOps Sangheili go flying, bodies shredded by the round.

They moved faster after that.

When they paused outside Engineering, the hall clear for the moment, Fred said, "Kelly, you're with me. We're going to be exposing the shields and providing cover fire. Sam, Linda, destroy those shields, quick as you can. We'll regroup on the third floor; Cortana says there's a service elevator that will take us to a vehicle bay. We'll move out and call Foehammer for extraction."

The others flashed acknowledgements. Then they entered the engine room and split up to do their jobs. The rocket-bearers stayed on the second level while the other two continued up to the third, each pair picking one half of the room.

The hall in question was swarming with Flood and Sentinels furiously fighting each other, Flood growths climbing the walls before their very eyes. The monsters and machines only intermittently noticed them, each more intent on the other, but when they were spotted, they were attacked right away.

Cortana walked Kelly and Fred through pulling back the exhaust couplings, and all four Spartans took aim at their respective targets. One by one, all of the shafts got at least one rocket put into them, and the Spartans all sprinted in the direction of the elevator, only half-hearing Cortana shout, "We've got fifteen minutes; go, go, go!"

The door leading to the lift was locked but exploded towards them when the Spartans rounded the corner. The lift was somewhere above them, but they could hear the gears grinding as it descended. "Back up!" the AI called, "Covenant coming down the lift!"

Fred and Kelly fell back as Sam and Linda came forward, launchers at the ready. When the lift dropped into view, they fired on the Elite and its cadre, killing them all almost instantly. Kelly put a bullet in the last Unggoy's head to put it out of its misery even as the doors inched closed behind them. The glass was blown out by another explosion right before the lift rocketed upwards.

"Cortana to Echo Four-Nineteen, come in Echo Four-Nineteen!"

"Roger, Cortana. I read you, five by five."

"The Pillar of Autumn's engines are going critical, Foehammer; request immediate extraction! Approach the crash site and be ready to pick us up at external access junction 4-C as soon as you get my signal."

"That's affirmative. Echo Four-Nineteen going on station."

The explosions shaking the Autumn suddenly increased in frequency and intensity, almost throwing the Spartans off their feet.

Foehammer was back over the radio a moment later. "Echo Four-Nineteen to Cortana, things are getting noisy down there; everything okay?"

"Negative, negative," was the response, "We have a wildcat destabilization of the ships fusion core; the engines must have sustained more damage than we thought!"

Blue Team emerged in a vehicle storage bay. There were a number to choose from, and after a few seconds, two Warthogs went tearing out, each carrying a driver and a gunner. As they barreled through a Covenant-Flood firefight, the AI said, "Analyzing… We have six minutes before the fusion drives detonate. We need to evacuate now! Activating final countdown timer; when it reaches zero, the engines will detonate. The explosion will generate a temperature of almost one hundred million degrees. Don't be here when it blows. Pedal to the metal, organics; hurry!"

The vehicles took their own paths through the hall, though they were careful to stay in sight of one another, and it was much the same fore the following tunnel. The next hall was a bit harder, but both kept to one side where a bridge extended over a series of barricades. They wove through two more rooms and tunnels before Cortana opened the COM channel again. "Cortana to Echo Four-Nineteen, request extraction now, on the double!"

"Affirmative, Cortana. Foehammer inbound."

Both Warthogs dropped a dozen feet and skidded to a stop on an exterior bridge when Cortana said, "This is where Foehammer is coming to pick us up; hold position here!"

It sure as shit didn't look safe for an LZ; the whole area was covered in Flood growths, with long, thick cables of flesh dangling from the top of the ship.

The Pelican appeared on their left, trailing smoke and tailed by two Banshees. Cortana cried a warning, hoping John had a plan to save her-

A plasma bomb hit the back of the Pelican. At the same moment, the cables - the tentacles - came alive, lashing out with unexpected speed. The tentacles coiled around the ships and squeezed - the Banshees were crushed instantly, but the Pelican was more resilient than that. The tentacles physically ripped it apart, tearing metal like paper, and pulled Foehammer alive and fighting from the cockpit.

The remains of the Pelican fell away, and the tentacle holding Rawley swayed - right over the bridge.

Fred didn't even need to give the order.

Kelly vaulted from the gun over the entire Warthog and sprinted forwards even as Linda brought her LAAG to bear.

There was a low, distant roar of pain, and the injured tentacle released the pilot. She fell - right into Kelly's arms.

Fred skidded to a stop next to them. The other Spartan dumped Foehammer into the passenger seat, jumped back on the gun, and they sped off again.

"Calculating alternate escape route," said Cortana, "Ship's inventory shows one Longsword fighter still docked in launch bay seven; if we move now, we can make it!"

The Spartans whipped the Warthogs through the service tunnel and between pillars, only their enhanced reflexes saving them from crashing more than a dozen times. "Foehammer, strap in!" Cortana cried, "And everyone, unclench your jaw! Severe drop ahead!"

They did as she instructed, and just in time, too; the LRVs plunged dozens of meters, landing heavily on a pile of Flood corpses before flooring it again, clearing a gap in the trench. Then the Warthogs shot through a narrow tunnel just wide enough to admit them and slammed to a stop against some fuel canisters blocking the path.

All the Spartans jumped out. "Sorry, Foehammer," Kelly said before cutting through the straps of the seatbelt and bodily tossing the pilot to Sam, who threw her over his shoulder and flat out ran for the Longsword, his siblings right beside him.

They didn't bother with any kind of flight checklist; the instant the engines spun up, they blasted out of the bay, angling up and away from the dying ship, aiming for the gathering of transports in space beyond the ring.

There was a bright flash of light, a momentary sun on the surface of Halo, and a shockwave rushed outward right before the ring started fragmenting. One long section sheared off near the detonation site. It tumbled end over end across to the other side of the ring and cleaved clean through it, more collisions and explosions sending debris out in clouds.

The UNSC cheered, and on a separate, private channel, Cortana heard the Fleet of Shadows do the same.