13 Chapter - 13 - Devil in the Dark

From there they only met some light resistance, soon they made it to the structure. It was a writhing blob of orange and red flesh, the discoloration of veins protruded lightly from below its surface. Surrounding it was a moat of bubbling blood (or what looked like it), a bloated, sharp-toothed creature occasionally broke the surface. The UAC researchers on the moon were meticulously scanning it. A giant tongue served as a bridge leading to the only entrance. As they crossed over their boots made a sucking, squishing sound. They turned on their armour's flashlight and entered the structure. The inside has coiled, fleshy walls that dripped with slime and steam rose up from below.

They stepped inside and the light from the entrance soon disappeared, in the distance they heard what sounded like loud stomach rumbles. The passages pulsated in an organic fashion, many were very narrow, the marines moved through it without any idea what would lie ahead. The walls would stick together and they would have to nudge it to move through. They came to a empty medium sized chamber, they were cautiously making their way to the other side when they were attacked by appendages that leaped from the floor in the centre of the room, they latched themselves onto their armour and pulled them down. Digestive acids surged from orifices in the floor and caused lethal amounts of toxic humidity. The test-marine turned toward the tentacles and fired his chaingun into the flesh covered floor, the appendages snapped off and they made their way into the next passage. They slowly moved along, yanking the tentacles from their armour. Mega-Armour saves my ass again, thought the Phobos-marine.

They moved through the fleshy passage and heard a buzzing sound ahead, it got louder as they approached the next chamber. They pushed through another folded passage, it peeled back, stretching a of web viscus fluid against the surface of moving flesh. It revealed a slightly smaller chamber buzzing with swarms of Cherub, a disturbing fusion of infant humans and alien genetics. Neither of the marines had seen these before. They were floating clumsily through the air and crawling through small passages high up in the walls. The Cherub swooped toward them, screeching and buzzing with their claws extended. The marines took aim with the shotgun and pistol and fired, the abominations turned to dripping pieces. More of the freaks swarmed into the room. The test marine emptied the pistol's magazine, taking down several of the small creatures. The monsters attacked but were unable to overcome their superior firepower and splattered against the walls.

They made their way through another passage before coming to a very large chamber, the strange growth seems to have grown over a modern community center. Some of the original features remained but the building was being consumed. Walking slowly, they carefully check for the threat but all was quiet, save for the sound of slime dripping from the ceiling. They then heard a slithering, sucking sound coming from above. A large creature had crawled from an orifice in the flesh covered ceiling. Its huge, shadowy body streaked across the walls. The marines raised their weapons and fired the plasma and grenades but the monster was too fast for them to hit, it darted to a far corner and stared at them with a hundred red eyes. The sight of its eyes confirmed their belief that this was Baphomet, the icon of sin. It was all black and moved on four legs that ended in webbed feet that provided suction for moving along steep angles. It also had a large tail, sharp fangs and claws. The test marine dropped his grenade launcher and lifted his chaingun, firing quickly. The line of bullets streaked across the walls, the shadowy creature shot yellow energy causing the Phobos-marine to dive out of the way as the creature continued to evade.

The creature roared when it was struck by the gunfire. The Phobos-marine got to his feet and fired rockets. The creature jumped from the wall to the ground and knocked down the Test-marine with its tail, then shot another bolt of yellow energy, the other marine had to dive for cover, he found that his armour was partially charred. The creature had leaped back onto the wall and appeared to be regenerating its wounded flesh with its piercing eyes locked onto its prey. They fired again, but the creature had leaped toward the Phobos-marine and grasped him in its teeth. The marine responded by shooting rockets down its throat, while the Test-marine pelted it with gunfire from close range, he was soon swatted like a bug by the huge alien.

A series of explosions sounded from within the creature, it spat out the Phobos-marine, his armour was crumpled and coated with dripping mucus, while the other marine was recovering from being thrown against a column. The Phobos-marine wiped the slime from his rocket launcher and struggled to replace the magazine. Ka-boom! The alien was facing the chewed marine when the side of its head erupted. Roaring, it moved toward the attack, whipping his tail toward the Phobos-marine, forcing him to roll out of the way. The alien was greeted with another explosive to the face, it made a disturbing series of fast clicking sounds as it winced in pain and then clawed at the Test-marine, its claws seemed to morph themselves at its will. He went dashing to the side, one sight of those growing claws got him moving for better cover.

The alien stomped around and fired another ball of energy, black blood leaked from it's mouth. The Phobos-marine fired rockets that hit its side, it turned and threw more energy. The Test-marine had climbed to a second floor landing and aimed the chaingun at the creatures temple and fired. The creature cried out in the strange clicking sound, the rockets finally fell the beast, it scraped at the ground trying to regain it's footing but was kept down by chaingun fire. The Phobos-marine gripped his BFG 9000 and aimed at its huge head and fired after a short charge-up, it made a large crater in the side of its giant skull, black blood oozed freely from the gaping wound. The Icon lay defeated and the building rumbled, the mysterious growth slithered away from the building, causing some of it to collapse. They easily walked out of the building to find that the growth had disappeared, leaving behind a gross, bloody residue. The marines made their way down a path of slippery stairs, away from the slimed, dripping community centre.

They walked for some time until a strange zipping sound caused them to turn back. The growth that had enveloped the community centre was shooting up to the sky in small columns. Red matter could be seen from far away, converging above them. Dread gnawed away at them as they looked at each other with worried expressions, then up at the sky. A small blob was forming in the sky, it got larger as more of the red substance shot toward it. "I think we should move" "Yeah" they said to each other.

They ran along a stone path in a connecting park that was thoroughly charred. The red blob had grown large enough to take up a large part of the sky above them. The substance stopped shooting up to it and the mass took the form of a large, circular cloud with an empty space in the middle, it churned with many shades of blood-red. The anomaly was scanned meticulously from the moon colony, the sight of the blood-red wormhole against the charred Earth was unbelievable even for the objective UAC researchers. The wormhole seemed to focus and follow the two marines, they ran for any escape that they could find. The wormhole swirled with fast intensity and the marines were sucked from the Earth, along with lots of debris, into the angry storm. They had no time to think or act as they were dragged into the churning maw of hell. The UAC sensor equipment recorded the whole event, they watched helplessly as the greatest fighters mankind may ever know were again swept into the unknown. With the defeat of Baphomet, the portals stopped appearing on the Earth's surface and most of the alien activity had been neutralized, but the mysterious and bloody wormhole continues to churn in the skies above the Earth.

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