Matt-038 (Halo Fanfiction)

Chapter 56: Potential Survivors

Author's Note: If you have any tips writing tips, please feel free to comment.

Again, I gratefully accept constructive criticism as a means to help me develop my skills further as a writer.

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Chapter 56: Potential Survivors

Location: Uncharted system, Aboard Longsword fighter, Halo debris field

September 22, 2552

1637 hours

Matt settled into the system-ops seat of the Longsword attack craft. He didn't fit. The contoured seat had been engineered to mate with a standard-issue Navy flight suit, not the bulky MJOLNIR armor. Both Spartans had their helmets off.

Matt scratched his scalp and breathed deeply. The air tasted odd— it lacked the metallic quality of his suit's air scrubbers. This was the first quiet moment he'd had to sit, think, and remember. First, there was the satisfaction after the successful space op at Reach, which went sour after Linda was killed and the Covenant glassed the planet... and Red Team. Then the time spent in a Pillar of Autumn cryotube, the flight from Reach, and the discovery of Halo.

And the Flood.

Matt stared out of the front viewport and fought down his revulsion at the memory of the Flood outbreak. Whoever had constructed Halo had used it to contain the sentient, virulent xenoform that had nearly claimed them all. The rapidly healing wound in his neck, inflicted by a Flood Infection Form during the final battle on Halo's surface, still throbbed.

Matt wanted to forget it all... especially the Flood. Everything inside him ached.

The system's moon, Basis, was a silver-gray disk against the darkness of space, and beyond it was the muted purple of the gas giant Threshold. Between them lay a glistening expanse of debris—metal, stone, ice, and everything else that had once been Halo.

"Scan it again," Matt heard John tell Cortana.

"Already completed," her disembodied voice replied. "There's nothing out there. I told you: just dust and echoes."

Matt's hand curled into a fist, and for a moment he felt the urge to slam it into something. He relaxed, surprised at his frayed temper. He'd been exhausted in the past—and without a doubt, the fight on Halo had been the most harrowing of his career—but he'd never been prone to such outbursts.

The struggle against the Flood must have gotten to him, more than he'd realized.

With effort, he banished the Flood from his mind. Either there'd be time to deal with it later... or there wouldn't. Worrying about it now served no useful purpose.

"Scan the field again," Matt repeated.

Cortana's tiny holographic figure appeared on the projection pad mounted between the pilot's and system-ops seats. She crossed her arms over her chest, visibly irritated with the Spartans' request.

"If you don't find something out there we can use," John told her, "we're dead. This ship has no Slipspace drive and no cryo. There's no way to get back and report. Power, fuel, air, food, water—we only have enough for a few hours.

"So," Matt concluded as patiently as he could manage. "Scan. Again."

Cortana sighed explosively, and her hologram dissolved. The scanner panel activated, however, and mathematical symbols crowded the screen.

A moment later the scanner panel dimmed and Cortana said, "There's still nothing, you two. All I'm picking up is a strong echo from the moon... but there are no transponder signals, and no distress calls."