Halo by Various

Author:Various
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Gallery Books
Published: 2019-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

>Burgundy 1445 hours

* * *

At least Marines got to go out and do something, even if “something” meant getting into trouble. Not long after the last communication with the Red Horse, Lopez and her crew had dropped off the radio, their clichéd bravado and lame jokes slowly swallowed by static and interference. She thought she’d heard a crackle of contact from Benti, but that’d been snuffed out immediately.

Burgundy worked her way through a pack of gum. Her jaw ached something fierce. A book lay unattended on her lap. She’d tried reading, but couldn’t stop checking the cameras, and had given up after she’d read the same paragraph for twenty minutes.

There wasn’t anything to see. Just the barricades in the shadows. Once, she thought she’d glimpsed a silhouette with two heads, one head pale and veiny, which was a pretty ridiculous thing to think you’d seen. Nothing came out of the darkness to confirm that glimpse, so she’d put it down to nerves.

Her aft running lights were still on, so with the cameras she could still see about ten meters past the Pelican’s rear. She’d thought about turning the lights off but nixed that idea. If something was out there, she’d be as good as putting out a flashing holographic sign that read “Burgundy’s Home—Just Come Right In.”

So she waited.

And she waited.

And she waited.

She took the latest wad of gum from her mouth, thumbed it on the dash, and froze when two figures lurched into the light on the feed. Her thumb sticking to the gum, she yanked free and gripped her pistol. Don’t you lay a hand on my bird, Covie scum. I’ll hole you, I’ll hole you a hundred times over.

Then she looked closer. It was Cranker and Maller. They were stumbling, injured. Head wounds, it looked like, dark patches running down their faces, torn clothing, and they were leaning into each other, but they were walking. Alive!

The relief that washed over Burgundy was so intense she almost cried.

“Oh thank Christ.”

They clearly needed help. She’d not thought much of them—loud and rowdy and pushy in the mess line—but here, now, it didn’t matter; they were the most excellent human beings in the universe. She wouldn’t be alone now.

She slapped the controls for the gangplank and vaulted out of the cockpit, snatching up an assault rifle from the locker as she passed. The ramp opened too damn slow. She ran to the lip as it lowered, checking the nearby barricades and containers for any other movement.

“Guys!” she hissed. “Get on in here! Now!”

Up close they were worse than they looked on the cameras, Cranker listing badly now, Maller pivoting toward the sound of her voice, the ramp dropping, dropping.

“You’re—”

Much worse. Much, much worse.

Skin mottled and bruised and sunken, veined through with dark tendrils. Eyes white and unseeing. Some growth fastened to Cranker’s neck, an enormous pustule that shivered and twitched. Maller, what had been Maller, opened his mouth, and howled, a sound no human could make.

Burgundy scrambled back, opened fire.

But it was too late.

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