Chapter 09: The Observatory

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"Oh...finally," Greg whispered as he came to a halt at the base of the mountain.

He looked up, seeing the observatory he'd been walking towards for what felt like too long now looming overhead like a steel sentinel, looking grimly over the barren and forsaken land that fell under its providence. There were a series of switchbacks that provided the only means, as far as he could see, up to the structure itself. Greg slowly looked around, taking the time to rest for a bit and survey his surroundings.

Luck had been with him after that confrontation with the volar. Nothing else had come after him. Unfortunately, he hadn't run into any other buildings along the way, and just one abandoned car that had yielded nothing worthwhile. So mainly the walk had been boring. He'd hurried up as much as he could, and certainly it had gone faster because almost nothing had tripped him up, but he still felt the press of time.

With that thought looming on the horizon of his consciousness, Greg stopped resting and began making his way up the switchbacks. It was mindless and simple work, but also irritating work. There were eight of them, going up and up and up. But, like all bad (and good) things, it came to an end, and he at last found himself standing before the entrance to the observatory. It was an impressive structure, and neat-looking too. It was basically a tower of white metal with a bulbous cap that had a large metal pole sticking out of it.

Greg refocused his mind now that he had reached the next portion of his mission. He checked out the small area that served as a front lot for the observatory, but it was empty save for some benches and tables. He then moved in through the front door, clearing the room beyond slowly with his shotgun held firmly in hand. As he stepped inside however, he immediately picked up on something: blood. There was blood on the floor.

Human blood. A trail of it.

And it was fresh.

Someone was here.

"Hello?!" he called out. "UNSC Marine Corps!"

He paused, listened, and thought he heard a faint voice respond. "Crap," he whispered, and set off. Going as fast as he could while still checking his corners, he cleared the first floor, following the blood trail through an entrance lobby, a very small elevator lobby, then up two flights of stairs. The floor he came to looked like it wasn't really meant for the public, and he figured it was probably where whoever ran the place lived. Sure enough, as he opened a door and stepped inside, still following the bloody trail, he found himself in a very small living room. There was a kitchen area ahead of him, and...a body. This was where the trail ended.

Greg cursed and moved forward, immediately recognizing Private Bell. He was lying on his face on the floor and not moving at all. Kneeling by him, Greg checked his pulse, but his skin was room temperature. There was no pulse. He was dead.

"Who's there?" an extremely weak and familiar voice asked.

"Serrano?" Greg replied, rising quickly to his feet and turning towards the nearest door. "I'm coming in," he said and opened the door.

There he found Lance Corporal Isabella Serrano sprawled out on a single-wide bed, one leg and one arm hanging over the side. Her right arm was bloody on the forearm, and he immediately suspected the problem.

"Greg?" she asked weakly. She was deathly pale and as he crouched down beside her, he felt heat rolling off of her in massive waves.

"I'm here, Izzy," he replied. "Wolf thing bite you?"

"Yeah..."

"Don't worry, I can handle this. How long has it been?" he asked as he shrugged out of his backpack and dug out his medical kit.

"Don't know..."

She passed out. He sighed and cracked open the kit, then grabbed his last remaining dose of anti-poison, went through the process, and injected her with it. He gave her the entire dose, then tossed the hypodermic in the trash and stood up. He watched her for close to five minutes, frowning intensely, worry pounding through his skull. She was still breathing, but nothing had changed about her. Finally, he decided either it was going to work or it wasn't, and he should go forward like it was, which meant taking care of her.

With a sigh, he grabbed a chair, dragged it over, and then carefully picked up her limbs and repositioned her so that she was laying fully on the bed. He then sat down and set the medkit next to her, then set to work fixing her wounds. The wolf bite was bad, worse than his had been, as apparently she was missing her armor on that part of her body. He pulled away the shredded, bloody remains of the sleeve there, then cleaned and bandaged the wound. Once that was done, he injected her with a universal antiviral/antibiotic.

For a moment, he waffled about whether or not to check her over for more wounds, and finally decided to do a cursory search to see if she was bleeding from anywhere else that was obvious. He checked her over quickly and found nothing, then took a moment to check her temperature, sticking the thermometer in her ear and waiting for it to beep. He winced when he saw that it read 104F. Not great but not technically lethal, provided it didn't rise. He sat in his chair, watching her anxiously, and considered what to do for a moment.

Finally, he packed up the medical kit, replaced it in his pack, stood, and shrugged into the backpack once again. There were things that needed doing. Before he left, Greg checked in the freezer. It didn't work, but it was still cold inside. There was some ice. He grabbed it, then hunted down a plastic bag, bagged the ice, then smashed it up, wrapped a small towel around it, and moved back over to Serrano. After laying it across her forehead, he took a look around the squalid bedroom, confirmed that it was secure, then left it and closed the door firmly behind him. And then he set off to make sure the observatory was secure.

* * *

It was slow work that was equal parts satisfying and irritating.

It was satisfying because there was something oddly satisfying about clearing a building, room by room, checking out each and every space, and making sure that there was no one and nothing hiding. It was irritating because he couldn't stop thinking about Serrano, terrified that he was too late, and she was going to die. He kept going back to her roughly every ten minutes, making sure she hadn't stopped breathing, and he ended up checking her temperature each time, so he just left the thermometer there. After half an hour, it dropped a degree.

Within another half an hour, it dropped a second degree, and still she breathed.

Bit by bit, he relaxed, and he kept searching. On the first floor he found the lobby, the small elevator lobby, a janitor's closet, and a tiny bathroom. Nothing in them, though he took the opportunity to take another bathroom break, and lock the front door. On the second floor he found a little area that acted as both an observation deck, with a floor-to-ceiling glass front, a collection of chairs and tables, and a little concession stand that was almost empty. But not totally empty. He noted that and made sure to come back when he was done.

The third floor was just the apartment, which he cleared once more, just to be safe, and checked on Serrano again. The fourth floor was the actual observatory. Besides the main room, there was just another supply closet, and a few small rooms meant to house the technical guts of the telescope. Still nothing at all. Once he was sure they were secure, he went and scavenged whatever food he could from the concession stand. There wasn't anything worthwhile in the bathroom or closets he found, so he retreated to the apartment and locked the door behind him.

With that out of the way, he performed another, more thorough search of the apartment, including Private Bell's corpse. He found a varg bite on his leg and figured he must've succumbed to the poison. Damn. Although he finally found that sidearm he'd been missing since he woke up in the blizzard. Frowning, he reached down and began to disengage the man's hip holster.

"Sorry, Bell," he muttered as he took it, "but I need it more now."

Once it was free, he attached it to his own belt, then pulled out the pistol and checked it over. It was empty, Bell had fired off every last shot, but the gun looked intact. He reloaded it with his single magazine he'd been holding onto since way back when, and then holstered it. Unfortunately, Bell didn't have anything else on him, nothing in his pockets, and he didn't have a pack of any kind. With a sigh, Greg continued his search.

He found some painkillers in the bathroom, and some more food and drink in the kitchen, even a few cans of soda in the fridge. Mountain Dew Starburst. One of the newer flavors. He was in the process of sorting out everything he'd found when he heard Serrano call out.

"Greg...you still there?"

He walked over to the door. "I'm here, Serrano."

She sighed. "Just call me Izzy. Get in here."

He opened the door and saw her still laying on her back, staring at the ceiling. She looked a lot less like death warmed over now. "What...happened?" she asked, focusing on him.

"I found you barely conscious laying in this bed, and then you passed out mid-conversation. You were bitten by a varg. I injected you with the antidote, and cleaned your wound. Then I went to search the observatory. Just finished the search."

"How long was I out?" she murmured weakly, reaching up and pulling the towel-wrapped ice, now no doubt melted, off her forehead.

"About two hours," he replied.

"Damn. Well, I guess I'm not dead. I feel like hell..." She frowned suddenly, her eyes narrowing as she refocused on him. "You didn't...do anything to me, while I was out, did you?"

"No, of course not," he replied.

She studied him, then relaxed and closed her eyes.

"Do you believe me?" he asked.

"I do, actually. You never threw up any red flags like that. Um...thank you. For helping me." She paused again. "Is Bell..."

"He's dead," Greg replied. She sighed and nodded silently. "Everyone else is, too."

"Confirmed KIA's? All of them?" she asked.

"Yes, although I thought you'd know that."

She sighed. "My memories are a little hazy right now, after all that happened and that poison. It was a really close thing, I think. I honestly thought I'd hallucinated you when I woke up just now. I was positive you were dead. I saw you get sucked out the back, man. I really thought you were a goner. It's a freaking miracle you're here."

"Yeah it is," he confirmed. "I almost wasn't. More than once I almost bought it." He shook his head slowly, ran a hand down his face. "It's just us now."

"No sign of the second Pelican?" she asked.

"No, none. I mean, it could've landed somewhere else on the island...or it could've gone into the ocean. Or maybe it managed to fly on farther inland. And I'd be honestly surprised to find anyone else alive on this island. I've found a few corpses so far."

"Yeah, I remember that at least. You'd have followed the same path we did."

"You were very thorough in your searches, you hardly missed anything," he replied. They fell silent and remained so for a few minutes. Finally, he sighed and rubbed at his eyes. "Okay, we're going to need a plan."

"Yep," Izzy grunted. "There's a military base on this island. We need to get there. Even if there aren't survivors or power there, there has to be supplies. I think if we're going to put a call out or even find a way off this island, that'll be our best bet."

He nodded. "That's definitely a solid plan. Before we go, I think we should do a full inventory of resources, maybe have a meal, and I really need to finally take an opportunity to check myself over for wounds."

"You haven't done that yet?" Izzy asked.

"No, haven't really had the chance. Here," he said, and got up, "could you empty your pockets onto the chair?"

"Yeah, sure," she replied, and began doing that.

He left her to it, moving into the bathroom. There, he began the long, painful process of taking off his armor, his boots, and then his uniform. After five minutes, he stood nude before the mirror and studied himself. He looked like absolute hell. His body was bruised and battered, and there were a number of scrapes and cuts to go with all the ugly bruises. Honestly though, he was surprised he hadn't come out worse for the wear. He took the opportunity to wash up with a rag and a bar of soap he found, mixed with some of his water from his canteen. Probably a waste of resources, but it would go a long way towards making him feel better.

Even if it hurt, running the cloth all over his battered body.

But after he'd washed up, then cleaned his wounds and bandaged them, then pulled his clothes, his boots, and his armor back on, he did feel a lot better. As he stepped out of the bathroom, he saw that Izzy had left the bedroom and was sitting at the table in the living room area, a meager pile of belongings spread out on it before her.

"I'm surprised you didn't have more," he said.

"We did," she replied, frowning. "When we got attacked by those wolf things, they got Bell's backpack. We found just the one pack, and I gave it to him to haul, and they ripped the pack off his back and away into the forest. I have no idea where it is now."

"Damn, that's bad luck," he muttered. Finally, he shrugged out of his pack and emptied it onto the table for her to see. They were in this together now. He was going to need her help as much as she might need his, or at least hopefully wanted his. They spent a little while sorting through it, then ended up dividing a meal among themselves. They each took a can of Mountain Dew, and he gave her his second canteen of water. He had the peaches, a few grab-bags of chips and a candy bar he'd found down at the stand, and she had the can of mixed fruit he'd been holding onto, as well as a can of black beans and a chocolate bar.

They ate in silence, contemplating the road ahead.

When they were finished, he replaced the supplies. She at least had another pistol and two spare magazines on her, one of which she gave to him. She also had a combat knife, a lighter, and some flares on her, all of which she pocketed.

She had also managed to find a map of the island.

"You've got a look on your face like you're mulling over an unhappy idea," he said.

She glanced at him, then laughed tiredly. "I was thinking about the fastest way to the military base."

"What is it?"

She laid the map out and pointed at it. "The mines, here. About a klik east, down the mountain. That's where the main entrance is. It's either go through the mines, or take about eight times the walk around the mountain."

He sighed. "There could be anything in there..."

"I know, but I think we should do it. Not a bad place for survivors, too."

"If there are any...yeah, I agree." He pointed at a little square about halfway in between where they were now and the mine entrance. "Any idea what that might be?"

"A rest stop, or a cabin maybe, I dunno."

"We should check it out on the way there. At this point, any supplies we find are going to be crucial," he replied.

She nodded tiredly. "Yeah..."

"How are you feeling?"

She sighed. "I hate to admit it, but not up to par yet. I'll need some time. Maybe another hour. Then we'll go," she said.

"Okay."

She got up and headed back to the bedroom, where she laid down slowly on the bed. Despite everything, Greg found himself feeling the best he had since he'd first woken up on this godforsaken place.

He finally had an ally.

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