Tethers: The Catacombs

Tethers: The Catacombs

A quick author's note: I'm reposting this chapter after making some minor changes to it, mostly pertaining to the change in uniform for the squad, as well as some other edits. This is what I plan to make the first 'chapter' of my Tethers compilation.

"Can you hear them?"

I made sure my com was off before I heaved a sigh, trying uselessly to ignore my squad mate's question. I squeezed my eyes shut, making the darkness around me disappear under my eyelids. Yes, I could hear them--feel them, too. The resounding "boom" was felt in the pit of my stomach, the enemy's artillery fire above us both destroying our comrades and our resolve. Well, mine, at least. I could only hope that the others weren't as nervous as I was.

Movement, the sound of armor and under lays rustling, roused me and I watched a dark figure rise. I didn't need to shroud the tunnel in my helmet's spotlight to know it was Storm, the biggest of us by far. He was only two years older than me, but he seemed much more mature, both in his size and marble demeanor, cold and unbreakable.

"We'd better get moving, then. It's time," he said in response to Flare's question, which came somewhere from up the tunnel. Storm had the grizzled voice of a soldier, though he'd only seen as much combat as the rest of us, which was hardly a boastful sum. "I'll lead. Puck, you cover my six."

I nodded, then, realizing he couldn't see me, said, "Yessir." He began to move and I followed, hefting my sniper rifle on my shoulder. Taking up the rear was never a glamorous job, but it was a task I could easily do. I have a tendency to freeze up when I'm surprised, unlike Storm, who reacts with guns blazing.

At length, Storm stopped. I shuffled to a halt behind him. He was holding up a fist, which meant his special motion sensors picked up unfriendly contacts ahead. I swallowed as he pointed to the adjacent tunnel to our right, then his finger pointed up the tunnel. I had to play sniper.

Wishing Tide was with us as I positioned myself using the corner as cover from enemy fire, I readied my sniper rifle to wait for the oncoming onslaught.

It came faster than I anticipated. I thrust the butt of the rifle under my arm, nearly knocking myself in the jaw with the sight. They were fast--one was practically on top of Storm, limbs swinging, though Storm's assault rifle was rapidly tearing mucky holes through its chest cavity. I aimed and fired a headshot, and the beast went down in a heap. The shot resonated, and time seemed to halt as we tried to make sense of the grotesque heap of flesh at Storm's feet. There was a shriek--a roar--something that sounded foul or pained, and I had the next creature in my sights and it fell. Then I scoped for more.

It felt like hours, but it was over in less than three minutes. Storm yanked the clip of ammunition out of his rifle and slapped in a new one. I lowered my sniper, also sliding in reloads, and I could feel my hands shaking with adrenaline. Glancing up, I noticed that even Storm looked pale in the face.

"What were those things?" he whispered.

The corpse at his feet was liquefying, decaying at a tremendously fast rate. And it smelled, too, with the stench of rotting tissue. I covered my mouth and nose with a gloved hand, then I tentatively knelt down and examined it, trying to find any discernable qualities amidst the gore. Its head was absent from its neck, which I suspected was a result of the sniper slug I rather forcibly inserted into its cranium. Nearly gagging, I rose, shaking my head at Storm. "I have no idea."

Storm was busy sopping blood and what I supposed were pieces of flesh from his armored suit, using a specialized rag made just for the job. Mellites, part of the Bedlam Army, the enemy we should have encountered, were attracted by the scent of their comrades' blood from great radiuses, so it was best not to roam about bathed in it. Whether or not these things were mellites, it was best not to take any unnecessary risks. Storm nodded, no longer visibly perturbed. "We need to find the others."

We weren't allowed to use our coms in the Catacomb Tunnels, though Flare had contacted us earlier right after we split. No one could be certain of what Bedlam system monitored the air waves at any given time, making electronic communications, even verbal communications very precarious. I accessed my mental map of the Catacombs, thinking about where we started and how many turns we had made. The cavernous tunnels honey combed underground, in criss-crossing patterns like the board of a game Sarge showed me called Tic-Tac-Toe. Only the map looked as thought someone didn't draw the game board with straight lines, the tunnels curved, and many of the paths led to dead ends, creating a maze. There were two ways through it, and Storm and I were covering one, Flare and Tide on the other. Our rendezvous point was at the end – and so was my personal battle, the Bedlam reactor core control center.

Storm halted again, fist held up. We were nowhere near an intersecting tunnel, which meant no cover around corners. Storm and I dug in, preparing ourselves, unsure if this onslaught will fail to use projectile weapons like the last one, or if we would even come in contact with the same monstrosities. At that point, I wasn't sure which enemy was worse. Six or seven of the same misshapen creatures approached us, and I held up my sniper to start picking them off. Through my sight, I was able to observe them for the split second before I blew off their heads. They had insect-like, bulging, red eyes with a reptilian snout, broad shoulders with disproportionately large arms, thin, crouched legs…

"They're mellites," Storm and I breathed in unison, the last of the creatures falling, dead.

"Only three times as large," I continued as we looked at each other. Mellites were tough, little aliens only about a meter high. But these things were taller than Storm, and more than able to contend with him.

"Genetically enhanced, perhaps?" Storm speculated quietly.

"Defective is more likely. Their flesh is already rotting away." I could vaguely feel moisture through my gloves, and I was sickened to realize that they were covered in torn tissue. I immediately wondered if the flesh was infectious, but I kept that grotesque curiosity to myself. Storm hummed in thought, the deep rumble in his throat simply churning with calculated thoughts that he didn't vocalize, then we started moving once more. We didn't dare to speak more or stay in that one place for too long. The truth was, I was scared shitless. It was one thing to fight normal, living enemies, albeit with plasma pistols, but it was another to fight nauseating undead.

We reached the rendezvous point after three more similar encounters with the freak mellites, but Flare and Tide weren't there. More mellites, however, were, and they greeted us with howls and swinging, clawed arms. I knocked a few off right away, but there were a lot, many at close range and hard to target for headshots. Enveloped in my sight, I didn't realize one was coming at my side, and I took a blow to the back. The shield breach alarm was trilling in my ears as I tried to move, but it felt like the hit had turned my insides into a bloody sauce.

"Puck!" Storm yelled. "Get up! Goddamn it, get up!"

I couldn't, so I rolled away, onto my back. The creature's fist smashed the ground and cracked the surface where I had been moments before. My sniper, which my frozen fingers gripped for dear life, hadn't been dropped, but I couldn't get an angle when I tried lifting the rifle. Then a shot cut through my fear, the creature's head, and it fell. Before I could react more than realizing it was Tide's doing, I was hefted to my feet.

"Tide'll cover you," Flare said after steadying me, surprisingly calm as his shotgun tore through a mellite-zombie. "Get to the core."

I nodded, though I wasn't sure if I could even move. Then, all doubt left my mind as I painfully ducked another swing of a mellite, narrowly dodging. I crawled away, heard a grunt and the thud of a boot connecting with flesh, then a shotgun shell detonation. Once on my feet, I was running somewhat sluggishly, tuning out the booms of combat that rattled my being. Half stumbling up to a computer operating console, my fingers danced shakily across the touch screen.

I wondered if they could hear us, too.