Highlander's War : Cp 2 Pt 2
Posted By: sam_fisha<sam_fisha@yahoo.com>
Date: 28 January 2005, 7:45 PM
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Highlander's War Chapter 2 part 2
The Captain ran down the halls of the Highlander in a desperate attempt to reach the bridge. Somewhere on the ship a Covenant saboteur was waiting for him. He stopped when he heard a loud clunk behind him. He turned around and aimed his pistol at the source of the sound but saw nothing.
He backed away from the sound and turned to continue towards the bridge when he was pushed down by some invisible force. He toppled to the ground and felt as if he were covered with a hundred pounds of mud, holding him down. He struggled to his knees but was unable to stand as the weight held him to the floor.
"Reheehef!" An Elite laughed somewhere where he couldn't see it. The Captain flipped over so he was facing up against the weight. On the ceiling above him, clutching to several pipes, was a cloaked Elite. The shimmering figure dropped down beside him, chuckling in its strange tongue.
"Engineering team A, get to section b-fourteen, we're getting some strong gravity fluctuations here." The Captain heard Lok's voice over the P.A. The Elite next to him deactivated its cloak and reached down to his shoulder. It appeared that even the strong Elite was having trouble with the increased gravity. The Captain thought for a second. They must have messed with the grav generator.
The Elite picked the Captain up and threw him over his shoulder, carrying him like a rolled rug down the hallways to main engineering.
As the door slid open the Captain saw what the Covenant had transformed his ship into. Engineering was littered with Covenant soldiers and weapons. On the raised platform that dominated the center of the room the Covenant had set up one of their plasma cannons, devastation against infantry and it had a clear view of the only door into the room. Beside the cannons stood two Jackals who held Carbines rather than their large shields. On the ground level packs of heavily armed Grunts patrolled the area. And in one of the corners stood a group of engineers and three Marines, all of them bound by a thick wire.
The Elite who was carrying him howled something and one of the frolicking Grunts hobbled over to them as the Elite put the Captain on the floor. The gravity had returned to its normal half 'G.
The Elite barked something at the Grunt who began speaking a slaughtered version of the English language, similar to that of a drunken Marine who had just gotten out of a bar fight. "Why you come here in ship?" It asked as if it was a chipmunk begging for nuts.
"So I can kill every one of you ugly bastards." The Captain said calmly, hoping it would keep the little creature from talking again. The Grunt turned to the Elite and chirped something, the Elite barked something back. The Elite then turned to the Captain and kicked him in the side, hard. The air rushed from his lungs and he fell to the ground. He tried to gulp in air while also gagging as if he were about to vomit.
"Answer our questioning." The Grunt chirped in its high pitched voice. The Captain got up off the floor slowly, standing his full height so he stood above the small Grunt who was now slightly shaking inside its reddish armor. "You answer my questions you tiny pile of shit, why did you attack our ships on sight?! Why did you destroy Harvest?!" The Captain yelled, drops of his saliva landing on the sparkly clean armor of the Grunt.
"Because of you're demons." The Grunt said, its chirpy voice lowering to a less annoying level.
"Demons? Demons!? I'll tell you who's a demon; you ugly bastards ATE my wife ALIVE !" The Captain yelled, barley able to keep his sight from glazing over as he filled with rage. He lurched forward, freeing himself from the Elite's grip and sat on the Grunt, pinning him and trying to pull his breath mask off. The Elite pulled the Captain off and threw him across the room into a wall. The Grunt recovered and yelled at the Captain. "Bastard!" It then turned and ran wailing back to its small comrades, which seemed to be comforting it. "Kill the Grunt!" Yelled one of the bound Marines, who quickly received a kick from one of the Elite guards standing next to him. The Captain was quickly bound with some kind of wire and placed by the other prisoners.
"I'm getting worried Dordly, the Captain hasn't responded for twenty minutes and I'm losing engineering teams left and right, no one is responding." Lok said as he tried frantically to reach his engineers. Vew looked back at Lok. "I'm calling the Marines."
Five minutes later.
Vew reached under her bunk and pulled out a shotgun. There was Covenant on the ship and she wanted to kill it. She turned to leave her room when she saw five of the elite ODST standing in the doorway, equipped for combat. "The Sergeant ordered us to accompany you in searching for the Captain." Said one of the soldiers.
After twenty minutes of searching the corridors none of the search parties had found the Captain or the missing engineers. Vew turned to her army of ODST. "Next we check main engineering, then the armory. Let's get moving." Soon she and the ODSTs had arrived at the door to main engineering, which refused to open. Around them a group of ten Marines had gathered, curious to see if there was any Covenant inside.
The Corporal finally managed to get the door leading into base on open. It slid aside to reveal the war zone that Base One had become. Human and Covenant bodies alike littered the ground, burned and perforated. The smell of burning metal wafted through the area and the staccato hammering machinegun fire echoed though the area. The soldier manning the thirty caliber fired relentlessly at a group of five Jackals which approached, their shields overlapping and backs turned to the Corporal.
Another soldier was leaning against a crate, blood coating the area around him as he fired at a group of Grunts who were trying to find cover. Another soldier stayed crouched behind a crate, popping up occasionally to fire his SMG at an Elite.
The Corporal saw the easiest target and took it. He armed a frag grenade and gently tossed it into the group of Jackals, who squealed and screeched before being turned into a clumpy mush disturbingly similar to that of the mess hall's massed potatoes. The Elite turned and fired its plasma rifle at him; the blue white bolts lashed out and missed the Corporal, burning into the bulkhead a few inches from his chest.
The man at the thirty caliber swung the barrel of the weapon to face the Elite and fired, sending an onslaught of bullets into its body. The Elite yelped as it was filled with holes and sent to the ground. The Corporal quickly turned and fired his shotgun into the group of Grunts, without any cover they made easy targets and were quickly dispatched.
The Corporal walked to the Marines and took a moment to read his FOF identifier. "Are you the only ones left? I left seven men here!" The Corporal asked as he counted the bodies that littered the ground.
"No sir." Private Freddy said. "Private Bert went into that shaft to find a way out." He said as he pointed at a large maintenance shaft on the far end of the room.
"How'd the Covenant get in here?" The Corporal asked as he absent mindedly pumped two shells into his shotgun.
"A grav lift hidden behind some of their crates, over there." The Private responded as he motioned to a group of crated with his thumb. "And they sealed all the exits before we knew what happened, that's when Bert left."
The Corporal nodded as he sorted out the information. "Then put on a fresh vac suit, if they've sealed us in then the next thing they'll do is decompress this compartment."
Vew continued to try to open the door as it continued to refuse. She glanced around at the group of soldiers around her and felt slightly embarrassed at her inability to open it. "May I assist?" On of the elite ODST asked. She looked up at where she assumed his eyes were behind the dull gray glass that covered his face. "Sure."
"Stand back." The soldier said as he set down a black duffel bag and began to unzip it. Vew and the others took a small step back. The out of the bag the soldier pulled a M19 SSM rocket launcher and hefted it onto his shoulder easily. Vew and the others took a lot more steps back.
Then the soldier set down the rocket launcher and picked a small det pack from the bag and placed it on the door. "The rocket launcher is for what's inside." The ODST explained as he set the det pack.
The Captain talked quietly with the other prisoners the Covenant had taken. One of the Marines had smuggled in a combat knife and cut the thin wire that bound the prisoners. Their hands free they continued to act as if they were bound while they planned an escape. Around them a small army of Grunts, Elites and Jackals patrolled the room. But most of all a Covenant plasma cannon on the raised platform had a clear shot to their position. To the left and right of the prisoners were two Elites, loosely clutching carbines in their hands. The Captain leaned over to one of the captive Marines who were sitting next to him. "You take the one on the left and I get the one on the right." He whispered. "And the engineers will run for that access way, have them hide." He finished.
The Marine leaned to the rest of the prisoners and relayed the message. Then he nodded to the Captain, who lurched forward and ripped the carbine from the Elite's hands and quickly placed the barrel on the Elites back.
The Marine did the same to the other Elite as the Engineers ran to the maintenance way which was only twenty feet away. The Grunts in the middle of the room turned and saw the running engineers and open fire. Two of the runners were caught by the plasma and tumbled to the floor; the rest entered the tunnel and closed it behind them. The Captain had no time to react as the Elite he was holding hostage whipped around and grabbed the carbine by its barrel and clubbed him with it. The Captain fell to the ground with pain splitting into his head.
To his left the other Elite was forcing off the three Marines who were struggling to keep control of the carbine. The Elite which had taken back his carbine barked something and aimed his rifle at the Marines, who quickly raised their hands and backed away.
The Captain backed into the corner with the other Marines as the two Elites chuckled and brandished their weapons. Slowly the Elites backed away fro them, leaving the plasma cannon a clear shot at them, an execution.
The Captain knew he had no chance. A brilliant bright flash filled his vision and he was blinded for a second, the sound of ripping and burning metal and screams filled is ears as he gritted his teeth, waiting to be shot down. When his vision returned he saw that the prisoners around him were still alive, the bright flash had been the main doors being blown apart. Where a group of Grunts had earlier been sitting there were now bodies and blood. Storming into the room were ODSTs and Marines, firing their weapons at any Covenant they saw.
The Jackals defending the plasma cannon were cut down by the fire and the Elite manning the weapon quickly met the same fate. The Elites guarding the Prisoners fell to the ground with their heads replaced by a void of air. Within seconds the Covenant stronghold was turned into a body pile. The soldiers grouped in the middle of the room and began kicking the lifeless bodies. The Marines took the raised platform leaving the elite ODST in the center of the room.
The Captain noticed a shimmering shape in the doorway and yelled to the soldier. "Watch out!" The ODST ducked and turned to face the shimmering images.
The shimmers transformed into two Elites as their camouflage deactivated and left them in the open. Both of the Elites were holding a plasma rifle in each hand, ready to fire. They let loose their plasma on the ODST who were in the open and filled the room with blue bolts of energy.
Ensign Vew flung herself to the ground underneath the wall of plasma fire and rolled behind a crate where she had partial cover. The Marines on the raised platform fired at the Elites who eventually dropped, propelled backwards by the force of the bullets.
The Captain looked at the area of the room where the elite ODSTs had been when the plasma wall descended on them. He knew no Marine could survive that kind of firepower.
He was unable to react when he saw what he did. Standing in the middle of the room where all of the ODSTs, with a yellow orange haze enveloping their armor, gradually dimming as the shields regained strength. "You're...Spartans?" The Captain asked, dumbstruck. "Perhaps should discuss this in private." One of them responded. The Captain could only nod.
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