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New ODSTs: Feared By All by FootballPlayer
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New ODSTs: The Outpost
Date: 11 June 2004, 10:59 PM
UNSC Olympia, Slipspace, 0700 Zulu, 12-12-2555
The light cruiser UNSC Olympia shot through the inky black of Slipspace, propelled by massive Shaw/Fujikawa assemblies. Deep inside the cylindrical hull, an elite ODST strike team was assembling their equipment and donning their armored suits. Unlike the armor of pre-Invasion ODSTs, their armor was powered, shielded, and enhanced strength. Their ship was different too. The Olympia was one of a new class of human ships, designed to take the war to the Covenant. These ships had small crews, light armor, and only a company of ODSTs at most (the Olympia had a reinforced platoon aboard for this raid), but they had all the new enhancements of reverse-engineered Covenant technology. They also had a SPARTAN-II.
Prelog-2553-Sol System, Earth, UNSC Fleet Command
The Covenant fleet above Earth was a collection of rubble. How it had happened was a matter of speculation, but against all odds, the UNSC fleet and the Marine troopers on the ground had wiped out the bulk of the Covenant. Furious battles still raged between Covenant ground teams and Marine forces, but the immediate threat to Earth had passed. And it was largely due to a soldier in battered green armor. That same suit of armor, along with three other equally battered suits, now rested in the corner of a hangar bay, being attended to by a team of technicians. Several thousand feet below, the owners of the suits rested in well-padded chairs drinking Coca-Cola. An ensign was fumbling in the corner of a room with a set of planning boards, and a tall black man with a Southern accent was nursing a Jim Bean at the head of the oak table. Admiral Sam Jackson took a sip of whiskey and spoke softly.
"Now, Spartans, I know that you haven't had any rest for a few weeks, and that you deserve a year of two of R&R. But we just found something big...real big. We think it's another Halo installation. We've assembled a team on the corvette Majestic, just a skeleton crew, a company of ODSTs, and an ONI research team. No need to give the Flood targets, if they're there. Anyway, the Majestic has been assigned to investigate, secure, and analyze the Halo. If the ONI team determines that the ring can be used against the Covenant, we will send more forces. If not, then we will gather all intel on the Forerunners and blow it up. The operation will be run from the corvette, with minimal ground operations. Now, the mission....
Halo 003- Pelican Echo-31, 450 kilometers above Halo 003, 2253
The survivors of the Flood and the Covenant were hanging on for dear life as the overloaded Pelican boosted out of Halo's atmosphere. The surviving scientists, all three of them, out of the 50 that had landed, stared at the ODST platoon. The mission had been going smoothly until the Majestic had detected a small Covenant armada approaching. The corvette had landed on a small, gaseous moon of the system's gas giant, and the radio signal alerting the surface team of the Covenant had been too late. In the battle that followed, the Flood had been released, and the humans had retreated into the heart of a massive Forerunner structure. There, they had waited out the Covenant and Flood assaults. Meanwhile, the SPARTAN team had commandeered a Covenant dropship and disabled two cruisers, and escaped to the Majestic with a copy of Halo's data files. Remarkably, the Covenant had defeated the Flood, and the chaos had given the human survivors an opportunity to escape. The ODST company had attacked and taken the control center, and an ONI AI had overloaded Halo's plasma generators. The humans had scrambled into their Pelicans, but the ONI team had been shot down as they escaped. The sole surviving dropship and its trio of Longsword escorts had barely escaped the explosion.
An exhausted ODST sergeant stared back into the ONI scientist's eyes. Sergeant A.J. Johnson chewed his cigar and sprawled in his harness. The Majestic loomed in the Pelican's viewports, with severe plasma damage, but three Covenant cruiser kill to its credit. The rest, as they say, is history...
UNSC Olympia, Slipspace, 0730 Zulu, 12-12-2555
The ODST platoon waited in the drop room as Sergeant A.J. Johnson finished his story.
"...of course, the ONI guys took all the credit, but I think that the SPARTANs were the heroes, since they did make retrieval possible...and those ONI guys can't fight off a Grunt alone, much less a Hunter."
The ODST platoon was occupied in putting together their powered armor. The old-style body armor was horribly inadequate against plasma, and the MOLJNIR armor had been adapted to fit the best of the ODSTs. The ODST Mk.II armor was bigger, less agile, and slower than the SPARTAN's armor, but it was a massive improvement on the old body plates. It had an integrated grenade launcher, enough ammo and energy to keep it through a week of solid combat, and a sealed atmosphere. It also had shields. The suit fit inside a modified HEV, and was proven in early combat trials. By 2554, every ship had a platoon of Mk. II soldiers to lead assaults.
Corporal Robert Martin snapped a knife holster to his belt and slid in a Ka-Bar. His suit was already laden with a light machine gun, a pair of submachine guns, and a pistol. His shoulder-mounted grenade launcher had twenty high-explosive rockets, and a small wrist-mounted flamethrower was fully charged. His gloves had electrodes in the palm, through which he could focus a brief burst of electrical energy. A heavy capsule containing a Fury nuclear "football" dangled from his left shoulder, and his armored chest and hips were covered in nylon ammo bags. A bandolier of frag grenades and a trio of EMP charges was slung over his shoulder. The entire load weighed almost three hundred kilograms. The rest of his fire team, three men and three women, was laden with explosives, rifles, and ammo, but none had a Fury. The group posed for a picture taken by a Navy assistant and staggered into the HEV. The voice of Captain Morris echoed in their headsets, and a view of Omega Ceti IV popped onto their HUDs.
"Thirty seconds, Marines. We've fired the MAC rounds at the planet as requested, and they should hit as you release. Good luck, Marines!"
"Someone get us some battle music, leathernecks!" Sergeant Johnson's deep voice ordered. The ODST's anthem came on the COM, but it was mixed with something else...Sergeant Johnson's ancient flip music had been blended into the anthem. Corporal Martin grinned as the remix rolled over him. The Olympia slammed backwards as all thrusters reversed, and the planet was suddenly blurred as two MAC rounds hit it at .6 C. The Covenant energy shield flickered and died, and a cloud of dust marked the impact of a MAC round, its kinetic energy depleted, but its 600-ton mass still created a massive dust cloud. The HEV ejection sequences began. As Corporal Martin's HEV was blasted into space, he screamed.
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