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We Regret To Inform You


"LZ is hot, advise mission abort! I repeat grid Tango-31 is hot!"

"Here that marines?! Looks like they came to us! Now lets give em' what they came for!"

"Yes Sir Sergeant Durson!"

The marines of Sigma Company had been fighting the Covenant on Xerxes III non-stop for the past four weeks. This was to be their last mission before falling back to ONI Section Three's CASTLE II base on Sanction. Not that they wanted to. Sigma Company's leader, Sgt. Durson, wasn't exactly held in high regards by the spooks at Section Three. Sigma Company would prefer to spend a year fighting the Covenant on Xerxes III then have to face Section Three in a briefing room. They were curious about the Spartan IV project at CASTLE II, but not enough to want to go to ONI's fortress. As a matter of fact they wouldn't even talk about it for fear that that slime; Colonel Asimov would think they knew too much and permanently silence them.

"We're at the LZ. Everyone off. Now! Now! Now!" shouted Sgt. Durson as he and the rest of Sigma Company jumped out of the Albatross drop ship. "Neil, Vasquez, and Robertson, take the 'Hog and flank those split lips! The rest of you, with me!"

Sigma Company's Warthog was no ordinary Warthog. Instead of a gauss cannon or a chain gun, PFC Neil, the company's mechanic, had mounted a captured Shade in the back, a modified Jackhammer launcher had been mounted next to the passenger seat, and mounted in the front were two LRAC's or Light Rapid Assault Cannons. Smaller versions of the chin guns mounted on Pelicans. To top it all off long spikes were mounted to the front and rear bumpers.

"Grenade" someone yelled. Suddenly the soldier next to Durson erupted in a blue ball of fire. Suddenly it was quiet. "Where are they" asked Corporal Jones, the company's demolition specialist.

"Use your head marine, they're camouflaged. Alright people I want five seconds of continuous fire, then light up those alley ways with grenades. They came for something, so let's give it to them!"

Gunshots echoed everywhere as Sigma Company turned the streets and alley ways around them into smoldering piles of rubble, blood, and Covenant bodies. An Elite's shield generator exploded on his back. Another's armor was melted onto his body by Jones's MB393 flame thrower. Once the marines of Sigma Company were sure they had completely turned every elite within five city blocks into the equivalent of melted Swiss cheese, they turned to Sgt. Durson for orders on what to do next.

"Now that's what I call an honest-to-God turkey shoot!" said Durson. "Now that the Covenant know we're here, getting those access codes is going to be a lot harder. Brayton, Cosenza, Abelar, and Recchia. You guys are Blue Team. Your job is to try to get the Covenant away from the museum long enough for us to steal the codes. Pedroza, Jones, Hirano, Morente, and I are Red Team. We're going to infiltrate the museum and take back the codes. Provided Blue Team can keep the Covenant distracted long enough, this should go off without a hitch. And Brayton, your Blue Leader. Feel free to use those HAVOK tactical nukes."

"But Sir, what about Neil and the others? Are we just going to leave them behind?" asked Cosenza

"If we didn't see them back in that firefight earlier then I don't expect we'll se them again. Hopefully they're not dead and will follow order by picking us up in front of the police station. Otherwise, we'll have to fight our way back to the drop ship." replied Sergeant Durson.

Sigma Company's mission in the Xerxes system was to find and retrieve an AI memory cube that was stolen by the Covenant. The AI in the cube had access codes that ONI so desperately needed that they sent in Sigma Company to retrieve the cube no matter the cost or time required for such a dangerous mission. The only reason the Covenant hadn't been able to access the cube was a fail-safe designed to detonate the fifty kilotons of explosives incasing the cube if it was accessed anywhere but at CASTLE II Base. Normally a mission in the Xerxes system would be relatively easy due to the large number of UNSC ships in the area but a massive Covenant fleet had exited slip space in the middle of the system. Strangely and much to the disadvantage of the UNSC, the Covenant ships had cloaking devices. Therefore they destroyed the UNSC battle cluster around the system from the inside out. Oddly enough, they didn't glass a single planet. Instead they sent thousands of troops to each planets surface. Sigma Company had been too every planet in the system and now they ended up on Xerxes four and a half months after their mission had started. The ship they had taken into the system, the Prosecutor, had been badly damaged and might not get them to Sanction.

One hour, twenty minutes later, Red Team was right under the museum where the Covenant were keeping the AI cube.

"Jones, use the arc cutter to give us a way in. As soon as he finishes the hole, everyone fire your grappling hooks up the hole. Once we're in use hand signals only. If you have to shoot then make sure you're silenced and don't use anything explosive without my orders." whispered the Sergeant.

Jones finished putting a hole in the sewer roof and removed a circular section of it. It opened into a dimly lit room with a couple of crates and chairs folded in the corner. Red Team fired their LD55 grappling hooks systems into the ceiling if the room above, then pulled themselves through. When they got to the top, there weren't any Covenant in the room. It didn't look like there were any outside the room either. Durson held up two fingers and pointed to one side of the door, then the other. Hirano and Morente moved to one side of the door, Jones and Pedroza did the same thing on the other side. Durson fired down the hall way with his silenced HPAR31 rifle. There was a muffled thump and an elite appeared. He fell to the ground with a soft thud. Durson motioned for the rest of blue team to follow. As they crept down the hall Sgt. Durson noticed the dead elite looked different. He couldn't quite place his finger on it but he thought the armor looked different. "Oh well" he thought. "Times a wastin'" As they entered the next room he noticed smudges in the air. Camouflaged elites.

"Open fire, they know we're here! Screamed Durson. The elites were hit with hundreds of rounds each yet did not fall. As the elites fired back Pedroza was hit in the left arm by a plasma bolt.

"Agh, crud that hurts. I'm gonna kill you scaly freaks!" Pedroza unloaded his rifle into the elite that shot him. Still the elite did not fall. Morente threw a plasma grenade and it stuck to the elites head. Three seconds later it detonated. The elite was on the ground but not dead. Half of his face had been blown off and he lay there in a pool of his own purple blood. Pedroza walked over to where the elite lay and emptied his clip into the elite's mouth and it died.

Once Red Team finished of the rest of the elites they moved on to the room containing the AI cube. Suddenly the walls on either side of them exploded inward. A hunter stepped through on both sides and moved to guard the cube in the center of the room. A small plasma turret on a platform was mounted to each hunter's back. Standing on the platforms were black armored grunts firing the turrets. Plasma impacts splashed all around Sgt. Durson and the rest of Red Team. Hirano aimed his Jackhammer launcher at one of the hunters but it only destroyed the platform on the hunter's back. The hunter roared and charged at Hirano barely missing him and crashing into the wall. Jones's MB393 made short work of the first hunter but the second still had the plasma turret on it's back. Durson silently crept up behind the hunter, jumped onto the platform and ripped off the grunt's methane rig. The rig spewed methane everywhere, including on the hunter. Jones ignited the methane with his flamethrower and both the hunter and grunt were engulfed in flames.

"And now for the prize" said Durson. He walked up to the pedestal in the center of the room on which the cube and fifty kilotons of high explosive sat. "Morente, you carry the cube. Everyone else form up around him. Now lets get out of here."

Red Team made their way to the front of the building only to see mass chaos in front of the museum. Hundreds of grunts, jackals, and a few elites all fired down a street in front of the building. They didn't notice Red team running through there midst and if they did they did nothing about it. Suddenly a warthog came flying to the street. It was Blue Team! But it was Neil's warthog. Red Team ran over to where the hog' stopped.

"Brayton, where's Neil and his team?" asked Durson

"We found them when we were trying to draw the Covenant away from the museum. They're bringing the drop ship. We're supposed to wait here till he picks us up. We wired five HAVOKs in the sewers around this part of the city. We wired them to a single detonator with a voice code to activate the five second countdown." Replied Brayton. Sigma Company held of the Covenant until the Albatross drop ship arrived.

"Good to see ya Sarge" said Robertson.

"Neil! You're late!" shouted Sgt. Durson as he and the rest of Sigma Company boarded the Albatross drop ship. Once they were safely in the air Durson gave the order to detonate the five HAVOK Tactical nukes placed around the museum area of New Cote De Azur.

PFC Abelar picked up the detonator and entered the voice code "Let's blow this popsicle stand." Sigma Company saw five huge blossoming balls of fire as most of the city was engulfed in flames. Ironic that New Cote De Azur should share the same fate as that of old Cote De Azur; Only on a much larger scale.

"Welcome aboard Sigma airlines. This is your captain speaking. ETA at the Prosecutor in three minutes. As soon as we dock report to cryo bay 7B for cryogenic freezing. Once all non-flight personnel are frozen we will enter slip space and begin voyage to ONI Section Three's CASTLE II Base on Sanction in an uncharted system. Slip space voyage to Sanction estimated to be one day, six hours, and thirty three minutes. Thank you and have a nice flight.

One day, two hours, and thirty three minutes later Sigma Company had been revived from cryo sleep and were preparing for there arrival at Sanction. Once they docked they exited the Prosecutor only to find a heavily armed escort waiting for them. The AI cube was put into a heavily armored tank-like truck. Sergeant Durson and the rest of Sigma Company were blind folded and led into the back of a pelican drop ship. Once their blind folds were removed they were sitting in a dark room with what in the dim light appeared to be a table and more chairs in front of them. The lights came on and Sigma Company saw a woman and a man sitting side by side at the far end of the table.

"Welcome to CASTLE II, I am Dr. Lauren Halsley. For those of you who are wondering, Catherine Halsley is my mother. The man to the right of me is Colonel Asimov though I'm sure most of you have already heard of him." We thank you for retrieving the AI cube and I am sure you're curious about what this is." Dr. Halsley inserted the cube into the slot on the table. A holographic image of a lavender woman flickered into life. "This is Cortana. She is a smart AI created by my mother. She has been involved with the Spartan I, II, and III projects. Her remaining operational life span is two and a half years. She has the access codes to release the Mjolnir Mark XII armor suits from the high security vault containing them. Cortana, what is the code?"

"We Regret To Inform You" replied Cortana. Dr. Halsley entered the code on a small nav pad. Two huge vault doors opened behind her. Inside, standing on metal mannequins, were thirty black, green, and silver Mjolnir Mark XII armor suits. Olive green metal alloy layered on matte black with silver lining all the ridges on the armor. There was a full head helmet. Mounted on the left shoulder pauldron was a small, football size missile battery.

Dr. Halsley keyed her personal COM and said "Spartans, you can come in now." Thirty men and women walked into the room. Each one was easily at least six foot five. "Do you like your new armor? The Mjolnir Mark XII. The pinnacle of UNSC engineering."

A team of technicians hurried in and began helping the Spartans don the ¼ of a ton armor. Once the Spartans were fully suited up, to Sigma Company they looked almost as lien as the Covenant. In their armor each Spartan was at least seven feet tall. With the armor and their own biological augmentations they could lift eight times there own weight.

"Well ladies and gentlemen," said Sergeant Durson "looks like we can finally win this war."


To Be Continued

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