Evolutions: Essential Tales of the Halo Universe

by Various

  “Patch this through, then.” Hooked her chair over, but didn’t sit. Couldn’t sit. “Maybe someone will hear.”

  “—is the UNSC Red Horse to the Mona Lisa, come in Mona Lisa. Anyone hear me?”

  A deeper echo as every speaker in the ship broadcast Rebecca’s hail. Lopez never thought she’d be happy to hear that voice.

  “Never a sweeter sound, AI Rebecca. Is the commander there?”

  Foucault’s voice entered. “I am. The situation here—”

  Didn’t want to cut him off, but also wanted to deliver her information fast, and in as calm and professional a manner as possible.

  “Sir, I got all the recon you’ll ever need. This ship is ONI, with a certain Major John Smith most recently in charge. Section 3 sent it here, to experiment with the Flood Spartan-117 encountered on Halo, although ONI might not have known about all of Major Smith’s project “enhancements.” But at the very least they came to secure a sample, so they could ‘study’ it, and they brought guinea pigs with them too. Under the orders of Major Smith, they’ve been deliberately infecting human prisoners and”—she paused for a second, unable to believe she was saying this—“Covenant prisoners too. Covies and civilians. Our own. Infecting them and turning them into these damn monsters, these zombies! And no one told us!” You never told us, Commander. MacCraw was staring at her, his grin gone. “I found a passenger manifest here and some of the people, they were ours, sir, Navy, they were soldiers who’d served during the insurrection—”

  “I know, Sergeant.”

  That brought Lopez up short. Something in his tone had turned her stomach to ice. She put a hand on MacCraw’s arm, not sure who she was reassuring.

  “Sir?”

  “The Major Smith you refer to is en route to the Red Horse, in your Pelican. He has informed us of the situation.”

  Damn. Her stomach roiled, and something in her plummeted. How had the evil little spook even made it to the hangar?

  “Sir,” Lopez said, gritting her teeth. She couldn’t think of anything else to say. “Sir.”

  “Major Smith did fail to mention that any of you had survived.”

  “Bastard,” MacCraw said, but without emotion, gaze uncharacteristically distant.

  Lopez swallowed. “He’s a liar and a traitor and a war criminal.” Reduced almost to incoherence. “Everyone who died on this ship, my kids, the crew. If not for him, they might be alive.” Couldn’t even begin to articulate her rage at Smith. Her disappointment in herself for letting him escape.

  “Rebecca has verified his story.”

  It wasn’t a lie. It wasn’t the truth, either.

  “I’m going to kill him,” she whispered. “I’m going to—”

  Foucault ignored her. “Having witnessed this ‘Flood’ firsthand, Sergeant, what is your assessment? If it were to reach one of the outer colonies, for example?”

  “I’m not paid to think, sir. Remember?” Bitter. Furious. Knew what Foucault was driving at, knew that the coward wanted her to have to say it. To have to accept it.

  The pounding on the door increased. Rakesh wasn’t alone anymore. Now he had friends.

  “Nevertheless.”

  Officers. Officers. Making decisions from a distance.

  “We have no defense against such a foe,” Rebecca said, sparing Foucault from uttering the words. “Any planet infected by the Flood would be overrun in a matter of days. More food for the Flood. More knowledge of where to find food. They retain all useful information. Outpost coordinates, more pilots, increased numbers with which to commandeer ships, to reach more colonies. You know this to be true.”

  Lopez found herself quoting Smith. “ ‘It’s a big, bad universe, Commander. Covenant aren’t the worst of it.’ ” Found herself agreeing with him, as he’d wanted her to.

  Rebecca again, in a soothing tone that didn’t soothe at all: “The Flood represents the greatest threat to humanity since the Covenant. A cure must be sought—”

  “A cure?!” Realized she was digging her nails into MacCraw’s arm. Couldn’t let go. Served him right for elbowing her before. “There is no goddamn cure! According to the files, this was never about a cure, this was about control, about creating mindless monster soldiers you could control. Who knows what Smith was doing that isn’t in the record. But a cure? If you’d seen what we’ve seen . . .”

  “We have, Sergeant,” Foucault said. “We have . . .”

  Lopez loosened her grip on MacCraw’s arm. He put his hand over hers, palm sweaty. “I guess I thought we were better than the Covenant. Not just a little better. Really better.”

  “Research is always necessary, Sergeant.” Rebecca was calm, assured, implacable. But she hadn’t had the worst day in the history of worst days.

  “The research was useless,” Lopez said. “Totally useless. We’ve known about this thing for weeks and all we’ve done in that time is expose ourselves to more risk. That gas giant was drawing in the debris, crushing it. It would have vacuumed up everything. And what did we do? We sent a goddamned cab.”

  MacCraw’s silence grew heavier beside her.

  A pause, and Foucault again: “Our orders are to destroy the Mona Lisa. We cannot allow any of the Flood to survive. Rebecca has informed me that there are two remaining escape pods on the lower deck. The launching mechanisms appear disabled, so they may need manual releasing. Once Major Smith is on board, you will have until we are in position and the Shiva is armed, and then we will open fire. We cannot delay any further. The major has brought the attention of the Covenant capitol ship upon us.”

  “You knew.” Those two words saturated with grief, fury, betrayal. Betrayed twice, three times over. For nothing. Didn’t want to come close to acknowledging the hope Foucault had held out in the form of the two pods.

  A force rippled through the ship, made the bridge almost flip for a second. Lopez went flying, righted herself before she crashed into the wall. Saw that McCraw tried to hold onto the console before falling. The ship settled, but Lopez could hear tearing sounds in the metal, a booming through the air ducts like a giant smashing something with a huge hammer.

  “What was that?” Foucault asked, urgent.

  “I don’t know. But it’s gone and passed,” said Lopez. “And we’re still here.” Making it sound accusatory.

  A moment of silence. For all of them. She hoped that was Foucault’s conscience knifing him.

  “Eight, maybe ten minutes, Sergeant,” he said finally, and she could hear the shame in his voice. Hoped even harder it knifed him for the rest of his life.

  Lopez pulled MacCraw to his feet.

  “Good luck,” Foucault said, already becoming distant.

  “You know what you can do with your luck,” she snarled, and kicked the mic. Turned to MacCraw, who looked close to being sick. “That went out over the ship?”

  MacCraw nodded dumbly. “At least, the part the explosion didn’t cover up. Do you think that was Benti?”

  “Could’ve been. Could’ve been something else. We don’t have time to worry about it, so long as we’re still breathing air.”

  Nothing on the remaining consoles indicated a drop in air pressure, just a sudden surge of energy near the engines.

  Eight to ten minutes. Knew what MacCraw was thinking. They’d survived nightmares only to get shot down by their own commander. He’d already given up, tears glistening in his eyes.

  Couldn’t have that. She was still his sergeant.

  She slapped his chest. “Let’s hope someone was alive to hear it. Now hustle! We blow through some space zombies, get cozy in a pod, and we’re gonna live, you hear? We’re gonna live.” She grinned suddenly, fiercely. “And we’re gonna get back home to the Red Horse, and then we’re gonna tear the commander a new a-hole. Two new assholes, one for you and one for me. And then we’re gonna find Smith, and we’re gonna take our time with him, I think.” Couldn’t even pick one of the many things she wanted to do to the spook, saw the same violent yearning lift MacCraw
’s chin. “And then, when we’re done with him, then what?”

  MacCraw sniffed and blinked his tears away.

  “And then there’s ice cream, Sarge.”

  Their grins were hollow. Voices breaking. The Flood still hammering on the door, the door they had to go through.

  “Damn straight.”

  >Benti 1613 hours

  * * *

  Benti raised her rifle, Burgundy in her sights, but both Clarence and Henry reached out, with expressions that said, No, don’t, you’ll let them know we’re here, and there are too many of them. Benti bit her lip bloody, couldn’t block her ears; Burgundy wouldn’t stop screaming; even though her voice was ripped to shreds she shrieked and screeched, begged and pleaded, all her terror and desperation echoing around the cold engine, ringing in Benti’s ears as they lifted the pilot and pressed her against the mucus glob with the rest of the Mona Lisa’s crew.

  And then she really started screaming.

  Benti couldn’t look any more. She screwed her eyes shut, but that wasn’t enough. Turned, pressed her forehead against Henry’s knee. She had to do something, but didn’t know what to do. Henry looked over his shoulder, then dipped his head down to peer at her. His breath reeked. He stank of Covenant, a smell that never failed to get her blood up, and she leaned back. But he had intelligent eyes. Kind eyes. Something like recognition in them. He could hear all she could hear, could understand it all.

  She had to do something.

  But.

  A thunk and crackle tripped their attention, disorientating the Flood on the deck below. The ship’s PA was waking up.

  “—is the UNSC Red Horse—”

  Rebecca.

  Benti’s delight was drowned out by the crashing, raucous cacophony that exploded from the Flood.

  “What’s going on?” she hissed, leaning close to Rimmer. Clarence lifted his hand from Rimmer’s mouth just enough.

  “You gotta find some way to turn it off, it’ll enrage them, they go crazy when they hear something, might be food, they go crazy, they’ll look for where it’s coming from—” Clarence clamped his hand over Rimmer’s mouth again, the prisoner already too worked up. He shook his head, indicated with his eyes. There was a speaker way too close to them.

  Down below, great spasms of rage gripped the Flood. The voices over the PA, Foucault’s, Sarge’s—oh, Mama Lopez, what the hell is going on?—sent them into a mad frenzy, howling and throwing themselves about, pouring in doors, out doors. An infected prisoner smashed a speaker down on the deck with a single blow, denting the wall. Benti saw Cranker turning this way and that like a drunk puppy trying to do a trick for its master.

  Just audible over the din, the sarge listing all of ONI’s sins. Rebecca spelling out the doom of the human race, should the Flood be allowed to spread.

  The more she heard, the more Benti began to think she understood what the Flood might be doing in the engine room. It stank of insanity. It stank of processes and alien know-how that messed with her mind—but what if it was true?

  What if they were collecting pilots?

  Benti ducked down near Clarence’s ear. “We have to destroy it. That thing they just shoved Burgundy into, I think, I dunno, I think they’re trying to somehow hotwire the slipspace engine without bridge control. We have to destroy it.”

  Clarence looked at her like she was crazy.

  “And even if not, that engine is important to them somehow,” Benti said. “We have to take care of it.”

  Clarence looked around, skeptical. Their options were limited, and the smell of Rimmer’s piss was getting to Benti. She checked the engines again. Henry put a hand on her shoulder, steady and strong.

  If they damaged the slipspace engine, things could go bad. Very bad.

  But . . .

  “To heck with it.” She was in charge.

  Benti leapt to her feet, grabbed her remaining grenades, pulled a pin, and hurled it at the mucus glob. Clarence lunged at her. Too late. Pulled another pin and lobbed it. Watched it bounce off the glob as she threw the last. Henry surged up beside her, over her, cricket bat at the ready. He stooped and grabbed a handful of Rimmer’s jumpsuit, Clarence’s vest, and jerked them upright.

  “Let’s go, now now now!” Benti didn’t wait to see where the final grenade had landed. She grabbed Rimmer’s sleeve, dragged him into a run, running from the howling Flood, from the first detonation booming behind them, running for the hatch they’d come through, shoving Rimmer before her, Henry, Clarence, hauling the hatch shut behind them with a solid clang.

  Burgundy had stopped screaming, at last.

  >Foucault 1616 hours

  * * *

  “Major Smith is secure on board,” Rebecca announced to Foucault, and part of him wanted to say, “So what?” The screens showed the Covenant ship readjusting its course to intercept them and the Mona Lisa still wallowing there, dead, but with all sorts of life aboard it. About to be extinguished.

  Foucault inclined his head slightly, his only acknowledgment of her words. He had no wish to meet Smith at the moment. Or any other moment.

  “What should we do with him?”

  “Let’s keep him in solitary for a while,” he said. A good long while.

  Rebecca seemed as if she might leave it at that, and then ventured, “Doesn’t it help to know the major may have acted on his own? ONI isn’t responsible for this. This was never meant to happen, and the very fact we’re here shows that ONI is acting in good faith. He’ll be court-martialed. Maybe even worse.”

  Foucault wondered if she was right, if he should take some comfort from that fact. Someone would pay. At some point in the future.

  Then he thought of the two pods and of all the Marines who might be alive and heading for them, the only chance for survival.

  “No. No, it doesn’t.” A new kind of hell. A fresh bout of nightmares to keep him up. He wondered in a distant kind of way if it’d all fade in time, or if eventually he’d have to give up his command. “Smith may have acted on his own, as you say. Or he may have been following orders, and Section 3 will now use him as a scapegoat and wash their hands of the matter. It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t change a thing.”

  A moment, and then Rebecca said, “Telling them about the pods was a pointless gesture. Under the circumstances.”

  Pointless? Her tone told him she was giving him a warning. She’d told Foucault about the Section 3 operative she’d sent with Lopez’s squad. The one tasked with cleaning up any messes. Perhaps she envisioned the same terrible dilemmas. Or perhaps not. Anyway, she’d sent an operative and he’d fought back by opening a narrow line of retreat for Lopez. Whatever happened, it was beyond their control now.

  “Politics. Survival.” He said the words like curses.

  Rebecca watched him. Who knew what she was thinking, this copy of a person?

  “The survival of humanity is paramount, Commander.”

  Rebecca needed a better speechwriter. Lopez would never forgive him, not for the rest of her life, be it eight minutes or eighty years. Neither would he.

  The timer since last contact was now replaced with a status feed on the loading of the Shiva missile. Another monitor tracked the Covenant capitol ship bearing down on them.

  A voice from the bridge: “Commander, picking up a detonation within the transport. Slipspace splinters. I think the slipspace engine has been ruptured. We need to withdraw before it goes completely.”

  When he didn’t respond: “Sir, we need to withdraw to a safe distance.”

  “No. Not yet.”

  “Sir—”

  He felt old. Tired.

  But still.

  “No. We stay.” He was aware of the attention of the bridge crew on him, on the monitors, waiting, their own fate in the balance. “We stay until the last second. We don’t abandon our own.”

  Until we have to.

  >Benti 1616 hours

  * * *

  In the aftermath of throwing the grenade, Benti thought she’d h
eard Foucault on the intercom saying good luck. Had he? Really?

  Those words echoed in Benti’s ears. In her bones. In her feet pounding the corridor floor. She’d always defended the commander when the others were poking fun at him in the mess. All she had to show for it now was “good luck, so long, nice knowing you.” She felt sick to her stomach.

  “The important thing,” she said, panting, the sound of pursuit on their heels, “is the pods. At least we have somewhere to run to.” Her legs were tired, were heavy, but she couldn’t stop, had to keep going; knowing what was behind them, didn’t even want to stop.

  Rimmer clung to Henry’s arm as he ran, like a child to a parent. The hand on Henry’s arm was white-knuckled with strain, fingernails digging. “They did that to us. To us. I mean—we were never meant to—how could they—” Even out of breath he didn’t stop talking. “I’m not even on death row.” Henry growled and shook his arm, but Rimmer didn’t let go, didn’t shut up. “I only sold stolen goods. That was all. I never—”

  Benti tossed a look over her shoulder. Clarence behind her, stone-faced and focused, unflinching at the walls groaning beside him and at the rumble and explosion they left behind.

  “What way—?” Intersections and junctions flashing by. She had no map, but now there was no useful map of the ship. Just keep your head down and cross your fingers. Lots of graffiti scrawled in blood now. Some of it by prisoners before they’d become part of the Flood, some of it after, all of it unreadable at that pace.

  Henry looked at Benti expectantly, loping alongside with ease. He could have left them all behind, but hadn’t. She couldn’t help thinking of him as a big dog, forgetting the intelligence and awareness in those eyes.

  The Elite dipped his head, and said something. A question.

  Given the circumstances, there were only a few things he could’ve been saying.

  Benti slowed a moment, took the rifle from Rimmer and put it in Henry’s waiting hands.

  “Hey, what are you—”