Hey there Fiction Forum. Recently I’ve decided to try my hand at writing and would like your feedback on this story. I won’t post a Download link here, as I don’t have a site to upload it to, but send me your email (however you like, public reply or private message) and I will send out Act I: Dusk by this time tomorrow. I don’t need to remind you all that this topic does, in itself, serve as a copyright notice, as well as this sentence. Keep in mind that ALL works are automatically copyrighted, so a copyright notice is not even required. Thanks in advance.
If you’d like me to try and copy and paste it here, then just say so!
Darkness
Act I: Dusk
The ODST looked up. False alarm. He thought of the Sarge, he would’ve blamed it on his “insane ODST-cat-reflexes,” had he thought he heard something. Buckley allowed himself a smile as he thought of his old CO. the smile quickly faded as he remembered the Sergeant’s fate, as well as the rest of the squads’. They hadn’t died, but from what he could tell there was no way to save them.
Thinking back to the fight earlier, he tried to keep his mind busy studying the creatures that scarred his memory. He knew he had to stay focused, search every corner, every wall, every inch of ceiling and floor—everything. They could be anywhere. Buckley found a clear corner to stop and think.
Alright, what do I know? They’re small, they can get around easily. They always come in numbers, but are easy to kill. They always go for your back, the spine maybe? That has to be it. He started talking out loud, to break the silence, “So I have to keep my back to a wall whenever I can. So what are they? They look like some kind of plant, but it seems to be an infection, too.” He winced as he thought of his squad mates again. “They were still there after the little things hit them, but not for long. These things took over them, changed their bodies into twisted, strong, vicious monsters. That time they got three of us, but me and the Sarge got away. We couldn’t kill the infected ones.” He couldn’t bring himself to call them by anything other than infected. “They were just bullet sponges.
“So we worked on an escape route through this maze, but we didn’t check the rooms well enough. I had to get away from him, too.” He considered himself a good navigator, and he had always been the squad’s scout, but he couldn’t find his way out. Every room was exactly the same, and they weren’t given a map of the place. His helmet was able to keep Nav Data of things he’d actually seen, but it only kept a certain amount before it got rid of the old. Buckley was so far in that the path to the entrance had been deleted already.
That was all the thinking he could do. He needed to start moving again. They were given a mission: blow this place to high hell, and now he knew why Keyes wanted it gone. Luckily, the squad was on their way out when they were attacked. Now all he needed to do was get out and detonate the explosives.
Buckley put his MA5B Assault Rifle on the ground very carefully before dropping to his knees and actually prayed he could make it out alive. When he looked up he was surprised to see the room was still empty. He stood back up, letting his Rifle stay at his hip, and started walking again. Just 2 steps later and the lights clicked off. The ODST was left there, standing perfectly still, with nothing…except darkness.
For a split second, Buckley considered just giving up, accepting defeat, and blowing this place up with him still in it. But before he could even look down at the bomb’s status on his helmet’s visor, he remembered his helmet’s VISR. VISR was designed for ODSTs in night missions, as it outlines buildings, allies, weapons, vehicles, and, most importantly, enemies in color. A smile spread across Buckley’s face once again–the little -Yoinks!- had actually given him an advantage.
The ODST hadn’t actually noticed the structure much, but it reminded him of the UNSC’s. Purely functional, with as little ornamentation as possible, although this new kind of structure was more of a middle ground between the UNSC and the Covenant’s extremely ornamental structure. Unfortunately, it was difficult to move through while watching everything.
He shrugged off the architecture’s problems to begin moving again. He looked to his right and found himself staring at a wall of red lines. Instincts kicked in, and he put his back to the wall before opening fire with the rifle. The little guys blew up and died without using too much ammo. They all sprayed some kind of spore into the air. Buckley thanked his helmet again as air filtration kicked in.
It took him a few minutes to start walking again. Long enough for one of them to find him. Buckley looked down the hallway as one of his ex-squad-mates looked up, and turned his head slightly to each side. What is it doing? Is it…sniffing? In that moment, the creature turned around and stared at him. Looking at it, it seemed…surprised? Surprised he was alive, maybe? No, it was curiosity. Curious of what? Then it clicked, it’s wondering why the hell I’m still just standing here.
Buckley’s mind raced into overdrive as he realized this. He couldn’t kill these things, they took too many rounds. He had one option as the creature started towards him and hoards more of the little ones after him, and that was to run. He turned and sprinted away, while dropping a grenade behind him. It wouldn’t kill the big one, but it would slow him and thin out the little ones. The ODST ran as fast as he could, turning often to break line of sight and hopefully get closer to an exit. He looked back, and the infected marine hadn’t gained ground. There were more of the little creatures with him, though, so Buckley put his rifle upside down on is shoulder and fired. It wasn’t accurate, but it didn’t matter. They were everywhere, and they didn’t stop.
He kept running, and they just followed. Even if he slowed for a few seconds, so did they. They weren’t trying to catch up, they didn’t need to. They knew he would have to stop eventually, and that they could simply keep going. They were just going to wait him out. He had to kill them somehow.