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This is Suicide by Neile Pederson
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This is Suicide: Chapter 1
Date: 10 November 2002, 11:09 pm
The group of Grunts and Jackals simultaneously looked up in confusion, attempting to determine the source of the deep rumbling noise. The sound was most definitely not produce by any organic object, but sounded more like a machine of some sort. And it seemed to be muffled by something, as if it were hiding, waiting to appear. The search could be narrowed to a single section, and all of the Covenant soldiers turned to the west, relative to the red super-giant star that was now at its highest arc in the sky. The alien warriors continued their scan of the designated area, but to no avail. Whatever this thing was, it obviously did not want to reveal itself quite yet.
The Master Chief, John SPARTAN 117, watched all of this enemy action through the scope of his sniper rifle from behind the limited cover of a small cluster of scrub-brush at the edge of the treeline at the top of a small hill. This collaboration of alien races were brilliant, tactically speaking, with the interstellar structure and speed to back-up whatever military goals they decided they wished to pursue. But when it boiled down to it, the entire unit was only as smart as the dumbest Grunt. Basic mob mentality, the Chief had been informed of when he was training on Reach. He had left his M12 LRV, affectionately dubbed the "Warthog" by the UNSC, at the base of the adjacent hill with the motors still running, parked alongside the two other Warthogs commanded by Lt. Jacob McHenry and Sgt. Elise Draught. Oddly, Draught was the only female ground Marine that John had come in contact with throughout the course of this war.
The Warthog was classified as a Light Reconnaissance Vehicle (LRV), but it was far from light. The jeep weighed in at 2349 kilograms and was as sturdily built as any vehicle in the UNSC Ground Assault Force. The majority of the Warthog was constructed of a super-alloy of titanium, carbon fibre and steel-alloy supports, giving it a structural integrity that was renowned even amongst the Covenant. The four fully independent control arm assemblies were constructed of an experimental honeycomb structure of densely packed carbons with crush properties resembling those of diamond. Attached to the ends of each of the arms were heavy-duty electric motors with an output nearing 1500 standard horsepower and 1660 Nm each. This gave the Warthog incredible acceleration capabilities for its size and a top speed nearing 105 kph. Coupled with the compact fusion core encased in the center of the vehicle, the Warthog could operate for an almost indefinite period of time, thanks to the massive heat vent and exchanger arrays. But the primary function of the M12 was a troop transport, and with this role comes the necessity for the capability to accept a wide range of offensive weaponry. The standard equipped weapon was a M41 Light Anti-Aircraft Gun (LAAG), but the UNSC has been know to mount quadruple M19B Warhammer rocket launcher or dual M76 Rapid Assault Weapons (RAW), the big brother to the M73 Squad Support Weapon. The LRV rode on tires nearly three and one half feet in diameter, rendering awesome ground clearance, but raising the height of the Warthog to a point where it became unstable and prone to rolling in hard cornering. All in all, the M12 LRV was one of the most competent and widely used vehicles in the entire UNSC, so much so that every M704C Pelican dropship carried one attached to the bottom of the engine array.
The Covenant forces were still looking in the general direction of the parked Warthogs, giving the Master Chief a chance to take out some of the heavier weapons of war before he mounted a full-on assault, charging in gun blazing. That was an easy way to claim a position on the next Coroner shuttle. No, one had to play smart when one was outnumbered nearly 3 to 1.
The crosshairs rested on a purple Elite, slightly above the eye and towards the right side of its head. John double-tapped the trigger, releasing two 14.5 mm 295 grain armor-piercing rounds from the two-foot barrel at nearly 1500 meters per second. The discarding sabot shells slammed into the Elites head in rapid succession, one round demolishing its shields and the second penetrating the Covenants head, shattering the skull of the warrior in a shower of brain tissue and violet blood. The Elite dropped to ground, revealing that the second round had completely passed through its head and had continued on, taking out two Grunts that were unlucky enough to stand behind the Elite at that precise moment. That sound of the shot pounded against the cliffs surrounding the Covenant cluster, echoing repeatedly and further masking the location of the Master Chief. Simply amazing, thought the super-soldier. I kill three of their military personnel and nobody even has a clue where I am. He scanned the remaining enemies through the 10x scope, settled on the neck of a blue-armored Elite that was facing the wrong way. John squeezed the trigger, releasing another large-bore fin guided round, watched it slice through the creatures trachea, stealing the life of its target.
With the numbers slightly more even now, John sprinted over to his waiting Warthog, heaved himself up into the operator's position and was on the accelerator before his rump was in the rather uncomfortable seat. The jeep lunged forward with enough force as to almost cause the Marine in the passenger seat to fall out. The Marine, a Private First Class by the name of Mendoza, turned and gave the Master Chief a look that would scare an Elite within and inch of its life, but John just shrugged it off. The Chief drove directly at a large hill he had checked out when he was camped out in the bushes. It was not so much a full hill, since the entire back half of it had been eroded away. The SPARTAN slammed the accelerator to the floorboard, the digital velocity display indicating the Warthog was at top speed, the other two LRVs flanking him. The 25% uphill grade did nearly nothing to impede the progress of three rushing assault trucks. All of the vehicles launched off the edge of the hill at the same time, landing amidst what was left of the Covenant forces. The sound of nearly ten tons of machine slamming onto organic lifeforms is something that one never gets used to, but takes joy in none-the-less. The two Warthogs on either side of John's Warthog split, chasing down separate groups of enemies. John cranked the steering wheel to the right and stomped the accelerator to the floor, causing the LRV to overpower the traction provided by the huge tires. The Warthog spun in two full circles, slamming multiple aliens to ground before running the rear treads over them, often times ripping the armor off of the hideous little creatures. John loved the sound of the M41 LAAG spewing hundreds of rounds out of its muzzle every second, and it was a good thing that he had chosen the best gunner in the entire Black Serpent platoon, because nobody else would have been able to keep up with the rapid rate of rotation. The electric chain gun's three barrels spun at a rate that made them a blur, firing over 500 12.7 mm AP rounds per minute. Whatever was left of the enemies defenses crumpled under the devastating shells.
The Master Chief got out and surveyed the carnage, stepping over and around corpses. The amount of blood almost caused him to forget what his objective was, but not quite. He turned back to the three Warthogs, now that both of the other vehicles had regrouped next his jeep.
"Everybody out. Lock and load weapons, break out the health packs if you need 'em and then join me at the fallen tree over there. Don't worry about the trucks, they'll still be here when we come back," John stated dryly.
The Marines did as instructed and the assault team set off to complete what they had been sent to this armpit of a planet for.
This is Suicide: Chapter 2
Date: 21 November 2002, 5:20 pm
The group of Marines fell in behind the Master Chief as they had been instructed and John could see by their collective expressions of confusion that they had not been fully briefed on the objective of the mission. Obviously, if they were out on a barely charted planet, fully prepped for battle and following a SPARTAN-II around, this had to be really important. The Chief figured now would be as good a time as any to let them in on the full details of the mission. Of course, it would be a breach of section 11-756-04.6C of UNSC tactical information regulations, since the details were considered confidential, but he needed all his men (and women in this case) to be fully aware of what was going on if they were to be combat effective, so screw the regs.
"Okay, everybody take a knee" The marines did as they were told.
"Excuse me, sir, with all due respect, what the hell are we doing on this rock?" Mendoza asked through his thick Spanish accent.
"If you'll give me a minute, I'll get to that," the Master Chief responded. "The reason we're so far out in the galaxy is we were sent to retrieve a certain programmed entitled 'Haven Guardian' from a M704C Pelican that crash-landed a few clicks from here about six hours ago. The Pelican was carrying the program to the new shipyards being constructed on the far side of the planet when if was shot down by Covenant plasma cannons. The program is held in the hard disk banks of said Pelican, which is why we were sent with a L14 grade AI. She is the only one that will be able to retrieve the program and then initiate the scuttling sequence.
"Unfortunately, the Covenant have located the crash site and are closing in on it as we speak. Make no mistake; if the Covies get their claws on this program, we may as well give them the coordinates of every human colony is the galaxy, including Second Earth. All of us know that this is completely unacceptable. Draught, get in contact with the Intrepid and tell them to have Pelicans with reinforcements and heavy weapons on Alert Five. We may need them later. SADDLE UP!"
The Marines jumped up with a collective war yell and ran to complete what they had been told to do. The Master Chief trotted back to his Warthog, stood on the tire and opened the small compartment on the bottom-side of the dashboard. He reached inside, fumbled about until he found the button buried amongst a large knot of wires and poked it with his index finger. A small data chip slid out of the center control cluster. John slid the chip into the slot in the side of his helmet and a familiar voice greeted him with a slight tone of irritation.
"Hello John. It's about time you took me out of there. You know, for advanced as the LRVs are, they sure don't give an AI much room for playing."
"I don't think that was considered when they were designed, Dana." The slot in the console had been quickly added to John's Warthog right before this mission started with the sole purpose of hiding the AI in the event of the Covenant capturing the small tactical force. There would be no way that those aliens would even bother doing a thorough of the Warthogs, since they already now everything about every human vehicle, but they would take the MJOLNIR armor apart piece by piece, which is why Dana was kept in the Warthogs. Which was fine as far as John was concerned, since Dana rambled on in a way that made Cortana look like a deaf-mute.
"Do you need me to interface with your suit and see about overcharging your shields?" the construct asked.
"No, but keep an eye on the levels when we get into combat."
The super-soldier walked around to the back of the Warthog and opened a small weapons locker. He reached in, picked up two fragmentation grenades, 8 clips of 7.62 mm armor-piercing rounds for his assault rifle, two more clips of 14.7 mm for his sniper rifle and one 6-round clip of experimental ammo that the UNSC Military Research and Development Corps had just designed. It used the same casing and the same number of powder grains as the standard A147SR munition, but these rounds had been equipped with small explosives imbedded in the tips. According to the number crunchers, this shell could tear through energy shields held by jackals and would be able to kill any elite with one shot to the head. Of course, like every thing else, it must be combat tested to see if it truly did what it was supposed to do.
The Marines loitered next to the fallen tree near the north rim of the cliff structures, many of them smoking cigarettes, broken up by the occasional cigar. Smoking was made illegal in the early 21st century, but the UNSC tended to turn a blind eye when their troops gave in to this habit.
The March brothers sat on the log checking each other's armor and weapons, just to make sure that they would both make it back to the Intrepid today. Word was that before Earth was destroyed and they left for the training camps on Mars, their parents had made them promise to watch out for each other above all else. Of course, when their parents were killed by the Covenant, their promise became the primary driving force of their rage and now the war was a personal matter to them.
At the opposite end of the tree was Sergeant Elise Draught, one of the most competent communications officers that could be found in the Corps. She knew how to operate every communication apparatus in use and most of the outdated one also; definitely a very good person to have when in a sticky situation and needing immediate evac. Were it not for the large scar running down the length of the right side of her face, she would be downright beautiful, causing one to wonder what she was doing in this brutal war. Maybe John would ask her about it after the mission was over.
Sitting next to her was Mendoza, the heavy weapons expert. He was usually at point, since he had the necessary firepower to send any Covenant patrols dumb enough to wander in front of him back to whatever god they prayed to. His weapon set for this mission involved the use of a M73 SSW machine cannon and a M19 Jackhammer rocket launcher.
Sitting of to the side of the tree was Private Jason Doyles, the demolitions guy. He could toss a grenade over 100 meters and be accurate to within one meter. And if he could sneak inside a complex undetected, he was capable of leveling the entire structure in three minutes flat. Since everybody was allowed to choose their own weapon set for this mission, Doyles decided to bring along nearly twenty pounds of heavy-duty plastic explosive and three tanks of nitroglycerine, which needed to be held in a vibration dampening case so that they would not go off prematurely.
The rest of the Marines that John did not know so well stood in a small group near the LRVs, talking and laughing in an attempt not to show how nervous they all were about this mission. After all, it had already been determined that the Covenant had established a presence at the crash site and the UNSC, in all its infinite wisdom, decided to send in a small tactical force, with the closest backup five minutes away.
The early scouting patrols had indicated the presence of several squads of Grunts, about twelve Jackals, nine Elites and two Hunters. Not to mention the Shade plasma turrets, six Ghost rapid attack vehicles, two Banshee ground assault aircraft and a Wraith medium battle tank. This should be anything but a walk in the park.
This is Suicide: Chapter 3
Date: 3 December 2002, 3:42 pm
The Marines walked single file into the hills, Mendoza taking point, followed closely by the Master Chief and the rest of the small tactical force. The only noises were those of the breeze rustling the leaves on the alien plants and the slight hiss of the pneumatic piston supports every time Mendoza moved his M73 SSW machine cannon. The Master Chief turned to a PFC named Rowling and made a quick motion with his right hand, indicating a position status check.
"Two mark one clicks, south by southwest, downspin," the private said softly.
The Master Chief nodded in response and turned forward to give direction changes to Mendoza. He checked his chronometer, checked the Pelican's crash beacon indicator and figured that at the current rate of travel that the team would be at the destination in a little over an hour if they didn't run across any Covenant patrols. His tactical radar did not show any red points in the immediate vicinity, which was all that mattered since any long range Covenant could probably be avoided all together with some simple evasion tactics. The team just had to be careful and avoid stupid mistakes so as to minimize casualties and successfully complete the mission.
John had turned off his internal communications channel because Dana's incessant talking had started to get on his nerves and the silence was welcoming, and yet, almost as annoying as the sound of Dana's rambling.
In the back of the line the March brothers were chattering on about which one of them could kill the most number of Covies today and the SPARTAN super-soldier thought to himself, I will. It was almost funny sometimes how the Marines customized their armor. Some of them painted on designs ranging from tribal patterns to flames to skulls. The March brothers carved notches into the edges of their armor and now each of their battle suits looked to have severely tattered edges. The UNSC frowned on such changes, but most of that sentiment disappeared as one looked at individual units. Most commanders gave their soldiers free reign over their equipment if it kept morale up and did not alter the combat effectiveness of said unit. As for the Master Chief, he did not need any more customization than the nicks and dings and sections of missing paint on his armor. He wore the battered suit with pride, knowing that no other marking would be necessary to prove that he had indeed seen quite a bit of combat.
It took the tactical force nearly an hour and a half to get to a point that the crash site could be seen through a pair of binoculars, mostly due to the increasingly rugged terrain. Even John, with his massive stride and enhanced muscle structure, had trouble with some of the hills and fallen rocks. Every step caused a burning sensation to shoot through his legs and in the background John could here some of the other soldiers complaining about the long uphill hike, but the mission was far more important than their aching muscles and constant bitching.
John perched atop the small ridge behind a cluster of rocks and bushes and Mendoza plopped down next to him. The SPARTAN took a long look through the binoculars, going over in his mind what the options were. No matter which way you sliced this situation, it was ugly.
"What do you think, private?" John asked as he passed the binoculars to Mendoza.
Mendoza sat silently for a few minutes, taking in the formations of the Covenant defenses and thinking of the best course of action.
"Well," the Spanish man said, "If you post on the opposite ridge over there and you snipe what you can, I'll camp over by that tree to the right of us and hammer them with the M19 as much as possible. We could send the March brothers down the left slope of the crater and have them sweep out as many of those Covie bastards as they can. Maybe we should have Draught call in the Alert Five teams now so we won't have to worry about reinforcements. Sound good to you, sir?"
The Master Chief placed his large hand on Mendoza's shoulder with a slight smile, impressed at how well this young man could form battlefield tactics. "Alright, let's do it."
They both walked backwards, always making sure to stay as low as possible, to the team that was still waiting at the base of the ridge. The plan was repeated and assignments were given out. The March brothers and the Master chief headed off to the left of the crater while Mendoza and a few other Marines trotted off in the other direction. Draught retreated further down the hill and radioed for the Pelicans to head inbound. The Intrepid also surprised the strike team by informing them that a few Longsword interceptors that had just finished doing a scout of an area upspin and would be able to fly air superiority and help take out the Banshees.
With everyone in their positions, the count-down started.
"Engage enemy targets on my mark," John said into his communication link inside his blast helmet. "Three...two...one...mark."
All hell broke loose.
This is Suicide: Chapter 4
Date: 4 December 2002, 5:47 am
The Longsword interceptors swept in at half throttle, cannons blazing, unleashing volley upon volley of 27.3 mm deleted uranium shells into the crater, shattering the pile of boulders that the Covenant had used to create a crude defensive wall around the crash site, spraying dust and stone chips into the air. The screaming engines almost completely eclipsed the yells of the Covenant leaders attempting to call their soldiers back into a defensive position. Many of them huddled under the wings of the M704C Pelican that lay in wreckage amidst the fallen trees and charred grasses in the stadium-sized crater, with the exception of the Hunters, who had no need to hide due to their thick armor. The main structure of the dropship was still intact, but the engine arrays had been torn of when it slammed into the ground and lay nearly one hundred meters away, seeping coolant and hydraulic fluid.
Overhead, the Longswords pulled up and flew around in a tight circle, preparing for another run before they would have to return to the ship. The interceptors closed up into a tight delta formation, nearly wing to wing, twin ramjet engines howling like hell's war dogs. The pair of Banshees were nowhere to be seen, but the Wraith was firing as rapidly as possible trying to down at least a few of the Longswords, to no avail. The interceptors were simply too quick for the plasma burst to catch up to. On the next run, all three of the UNSC aircraft targeted the Wraith with their heavy machine cannons and one of the interceptors fired a pair of Rockeye laser-guided missiles, just in case the gunfire wouldn't be sufficient destructive force. The Rockeyes slammed into the front of the armor plate shielding the cockpit at the same time that the large-bore uranium shells peppered the thick layers of armor. The combined efforts of the weapons caused the medium battle tank to erupt in a storm of metal alloy fragments, fire and smoke. As the hover-drive of the Covenant tank sputtered and failed, the frame of the behemoth fell to the dusty earth, settling with a loud metallic thud into the grass. Smoke still roiled from the cockpit and the skeleton of the Elite in command of the destroyed assault vehicle could be clearly seen still sitting at the controls, cooking in its own armor. The flight of Longswords turned due east and pulled up to nearly a 45˚ angle, losing barely any speed in the process. A Hunter sidestepped out from behind the engine array of the doomed Pelican, charged its fuel-rod cannon and released the bolt of superheated plasma explosive at the tail of the rearmost escaping assailant. The fuel rod quickly closed the distance between the Hunter and the intended target; the pilot of the Longsword barely had enough time to figure out that his interceptor had been hit before it detonated mid-air in a shower of white-hot metal chunks and rapidly expanding and combusting oxygen.
What a shame, thought Mendoza as he watched the remaining wreckage slam into an enormous tree on the top of the hill, about two hundred meters away. Turning away from the gruesome crash site, he unhooked his M19 Jackhammer rocket launcher from the back segment of his armor and hefted it up to his shoulder. The private kneeling next to him peered through a set of binoculars, calling out targets of opportunity and reloading the M19 when necessary.
"Hunter with it's back turned, trotting up the far side of the crater, probably tryin' to flank us, sir. If you lead him by about fifty meters, it should be a direct hit," the private remarked. He was young, most likely fresh out of Basic Training. Mendoza secretly wished that the kid would not be killed during the mission, but one cannot control everything.
Mendoza did as the private had suggested and squeezed the trigger. What followed was the all-too-familiar whoosh, like that of any enormous blowtorch being lit, and the hard shoulder-kick of the recoil. The rocket leapt from the launcher tube and quickly accelerated to almost the speed of sound, headed towards the ground roughly forty-five meters in the path of the rushing Hunter. The Hunter saw the rocket out of the corner of its eye and attempted to stop, but it was already too late. The 102 mm shaped high-explosive charge broadsided the Covenant, the ensuing explosion throwing the creature several meters backwards against an uprooted tree, its corpse tumbling over the large log and coming to stop on the other side of the stump.
Draught popped the caps off of the red marking flares and placed them in the middle of a large clearing at the base of the hill surrounding the crater. The ground was scorched and there were uprooted trees at the edges of the clearing; apparently the Covenant also found this area a good place to drop off troops and supplies. After the landing zone was marked off, Draught ran up the long, steep slope in the general direction of the Master Chief. The air could not have been more than 85% as dense as Earth's atmosphere and by the time Elise had reached the top of the hill, her lungs were burning and she felt the urge to bend over and catch her breath. But the plasma burst that whipped past her head gave her different plans. She ducked, rolled to the left and crouched behind a large stump, pulled the M6D pistol from her side holster and scanned the open area some fifty meters below. A Jackal crouched behind one of the Pelican's landing struts, firing its plasma rifle towards Mendoza, the private who was currently sending explosively personal Messages from God to the Hunters. The firing position of the enemy warrior gave Draught a clear shot at its back, and she took it. The 12.7 mm explosive round slammed into the back of the creatures neck, detonating on contact, shattering it spine and esophagus, leaving it to die in a matter of minutes. Elise sidestepped to the right, knowing full well that the Covenant would now be aware that they were under attack from multiple directions now, lobbed a fragmentation grenade into the fray and hit a dead sprint over to the Master Chief's position, about thirty yards away. She slid the last few feet to avoid a burst over plasma rifle fire, like a baseball player of years past.
Lieutenant Jacob McHenry lay in a small clump of bushes on a rocky outcropping further up the craters side and opposite the majority of the rest of the tactical team. The position afforded good visibility of the battleground, but was fairly exposed to enemy fire, should they find him. Through the power of his 10x scope, McHenry looked at the face of the Grunt manning the Shade plasma turret on the left side of the crater and decided it could be vastly improved upon by taking it clean off. He squeezed the hair-trigger and in less than a second, the Grunt fell to the ground with a hollowed-out head. Much better, thought the lieutenant. In the upper right corner of the scope, he could see the feet of an Elite trying to sneak up and flank the cluster of Marines at the crest of the impact hill. McHenry found the little earhole in the side of its head and released another round from the all-powerful rifle. The shell tore through the Elite's shields, penetrated its eardrum and ripped straight through its brain. The corpse fell face first into the tree that it was hiding behind and bounced backwards to lay looking straight up at the sun circling overhead.
The Master Chief kneeled with his back to a large rock that had been charred from the crash of the Pelican. He swapped out his assault rifle for the S2B AM3 Advanced Sniper Rifle, lobbed a M9 HE-DP frag grenade over his shoulder and spun to right, clearing the rock, snapping the scope up to the blast shield in front of his right eye. With the scope activated at 15x, the Chief settled the crosshairs on one of the Ghost hovercraft and fired. The shot ripped into the plasma retention grid on the lower right side of the craft. Blue plasma gushed out of the ruined tanks, leaving a trail behind the Ghost. Just as planned, the craft detonated in blue fireball, consuming the pilot and scorching the bushes on either side of the path the late Covenant commander was attempting to get up. But while he was targeting the Ghost, a Jackal had managed to make its way out of the massacre in the crater and had snuck up behind the SPARTAN. John didn't even see the green glow of the overcharged plasma pistol or hear the snap of the bolt being released. The plasma shot tore through the 10 meters of air between the crouched Covie and the Master Chief's back and the impact knocked John forward, causing him to lose his bead on the leader of the pack of Grunts trudging their way up the steep slope to Mendoza's position. The MJONLIR shield instantly dropped to nothing, but with no real cover to hide behind until they recharged, the super-soldier did not have very nice options. John spun on his heel to face the Jackal and took off at a dead run. Thanks to the genetic augmentations, the short distance between the opposing soldier closer at a rapid rate. The Covenant warrior was crouched behind a large rock, shield held firmly in front of its relative frail body. The Jackal fired its pistol as quickly as it could, but the Master Chief simply shrugged off the onslaught of energy bolts. He hopped over the rock, the Jackal trying in vain to track his movement with its attack, but John landed on the opposite side of the Covenant. Within a split second of landing, the SPARTAN spun around and landed a kick to the side of his foe's head, caving in the Jackal's skull as if it were made of cardboard. John looked down to view the damage done to his battle suit and was thoroughly surprise to see plasma charring on his breastplate and a trickle of crimson blood coming from underneath the alloy plating. He couldn't remember the last time that a Covenant had drawn blood before, but it had certainly been a while. A muted beep signaled that the MJONLIR had finally built up enough of a charge to reengage the shields, followed by a low humming sound of the generators coming back online. A brief glance up at his health status indicator showed that the Jackal had caused quite a bit of superficial damage and John winced at the sharp pain of his cooked flesh rubbing against the vacuum-sealed suit. Next chance I get, the Master Chief thought, I better patch that up.
Mendoza pressed the firing stud on the forward grip of his rocket launcher and the high-explosive munition screamed towards the Wraith. The rocket ripped a hole roughly the size of a grenade in the outer armor, exposing the thinner bulkhead. Knowing that this would only anger the tank's operator, the Marine quickly pressed the firing stud again, only to hear the metallic click of a arming hammer striking an empty launch tube. The Spanish man cursed to himself in his native language and nearly shouted for the Marines crouched a few feet away to run. The Wraith fired its cannon, the plasma fragmentation mortar shell arcing towards the crest Mendoza was laying on, attempting to reload the M19 as quickly as he was physically capable of doing. In his peripheral vision, he saw the other Marines sprint along the rim of the crater, firing at a trio of Grunts that had just made it to the top of the slope. Mendoza turned just in time to see the plasma burst in front of him, felt the heat of it boiling his skin an instant before it slammed directly into his face.
Draught turned away from the sight of Mendoza's charred corpse being blown into no less than four different directions. Elise closed her eyes, whispered a farewell to her fallen comrade and was instantly filled with a rage that controlled her very thoughts. She was suddenly galvanized by the thought of Carlos and possessed by a need to avenge his death. She would not let that Wraith kill any more of her fellow soldiers, even if it meant that she would die in the process. Pure rage caused her to run down the slope of the crater, made her sprint towards the tank, clubbing Grunts and Jackals with the butt of her MA5B as they tried to impede her assault, caused her to jump up unto the pylons containing the hover drives and stick the muzzle of her rifle into the narrow slit that the operator used to view his surroundings. Draught emptied the entire clip of armor-piercing rounds into the face of the Elite at the controls, determined to kill the wretched creature that had stolen away her only true friend in the Corps. The Marines on the rim rained as much cover fire as they could on the Covenant soldiers forming an ever-tightening ring around the tank, but many of the aliens dodged the rounds, firing their own weapons at Elise. She felt the impacts of nearly two-dozen needler rounds, ten plasma rifle bursts and an overcharged plasma pistol burst before the world went dark.
This is Suicide: Chapter 5
Date: 8 December 2002, 7:01 pm
McHenry watched in horror at the events unfolding in front of him. Sergeant Draught must have lost her mind, because she was running at a fairly good clip down the hill, feet sliding on the loose dirt, heading directly for the remaining Wraith. And by the way she was storming into the Covenant ranks, smashing the heads of any enemy in front of her, it didn't look like she was simply carried away; she looked downright monstrous. McHenry fire the last three rounds at the hostile forces closing in around her, but it was like pissing on a forest fire. The aliens closed in on the Wraith Elise was attacking, all of their weapons firing. The needler rounds and plasma tore through her armor and flesh, dropping the poor Marine to one knee before the needles exploded in a flash of pink haze and energy. Draught fell to the ground, her back and arms shredded and smoking, before the tank, now without an operator at the controls, shut down and settled on top of her legs. McHenry flicked the release latch on the side of his rifle, let the empty clip drop out and slapped in a new clip. Before the indicator light that recognized a new clip came on, he pulled back the bolt and let it snap back in place, chambering one of the large-bore rounds. The lieutenant snapped the scope up to his left eye, spun the zoom dial to maximum just in time to see a Grunt lob a grenade at him. Damn, Jacob thought to himself. They had found him. The plasma grenade arced towards the sniper's position and, oddly enough, stuck to the scope attached to his rifle. Without thinking, McHenry tossed the rifle over the edge of the rocky outcropping he was laying on, pulled out his sidearm and fired at the little alien that had tossed the explosive. It dropped to the ground, dead. The thunderous boom of a detonation resounded from below, followed by another, larger, blast. Iridescent purple metal alloy fragments, typical of Covenant armor, hurtled through the air at an amazing speed, a few of the chunks finding their way inside the cracks in Jacob's armor. The heat of the pieces seared his skin and inner clothes, and the Marine tried frantically to strip off the chest plate. McHenry lay on the grassy slope behind his perch, screaming at the intense pain of his body attempting to reject the metal through cauterized wounds. He pulled his boot knife out of the sheath on the inner part of his right lower leg and jabbed at the clotting patches of blood covering the holes in his chest, prying out the shards while trying as hard as he could to avoid going unconscious.
Sean March squatted behind a boulder, reloading his assault rifle while simultaneously gnawing on the stub of a wooden toothpick. True wooden toothpicks were difficult to come by after the destruction of Earth, so when the opportunity to purchase a pair of unopened boxes of Lebanon cedar toothpicks presented itself at a bazaar on Orion Prime, he had gladly paid the rather high price for the cherished splints. Now it had become a ritual that he would chew one toothpick during each mission, which helped ease the tension of dangerous situations and also aided in keeping track of how many battles he had been involved in. Sean looked over to his brother, Scott, nodded to him and both of them threw a fragmentation grenade over their respective covers. The double explosion quickly eclipsed the slight thud of the destructive orbs bouncing on the dirt. The related Marines charged out from behind their hiding places, stormed down the hill, guns blazing, and jumped completely over the wreckage of a Ghost, landing between two Jackals that were on their way up to confront the brothers. All four of the warriors turned to look at each other, for a brief moment in confusion, before opening fire on the opposition. Sean dropped to his belly, temporarily knocking the wind out of him, and fired at the Jackal's feet. The Jackal's weight was too much for its fractured ankles to support and it collapsed in a pile of ugliness. Scott was also getting sick of this fight, which he had not asked for, and ran up to the short creature firing plasma bursts at him. Scott jumped over the Covenant's head, unsheathing his boot knife simultaneously, turned on the Ghost wreckage and stabbed down into the Jackal's brain, but, oddly enough, this did not kill the strange being. Surprised and mildly disgusted at the site of an alien moving around with a knife through its skull, March simply cracked down on the knife with the butt of his rifle, like driving a nail with a hammer. The blade completely emerged from the bottom of the Jackal's head, while the force of the blow crushed the top of its cranium. Blood and brain tissue were simply wiped off the stock of the assault rifle and boot knife using the grass as a crude cloth, and the brothers kept moving inside the crater, searching for more hostiles. The pair ran to the smashed engine array of the Pelican, landing next to it with a metallic clink of their armor colliding with the hull of the downed dropship.
"Okay, here's the plan. We'll circle around the back of this array, toss a couple of grenades under the Shade over there, gun down that quartet of Grunts by the Ghosts and steal a couple of 'em. Should be fun, right?" Scott said with his trademark mischievous look in his eyes.
"Yeah, right. You're ****in' crazy, you know that?" Sean responded, only half joking.
Scott didn't respond, only ran off around the array. Sean was hot on his heels, but skidded to a stop when he saw the body of his brother go flying out from behind the opposite side of the engines, landing in a tree half way up the slope of the hill. He was still moving, faintly, which was good. At least he wasn't dead. A Hunter stepped into view from behind the section of hull and Sean's eyes widened in fear at the sight of the eight-foot-tall hulk of blue armor. But apparently it didn't see him, because the Hunter was charging up its fuel-rod cannon, the green glow from the heating rods reflecting off the compound curves of its armor plating. Not thinking of any thing except his brother's safety, the Marine ran at full speed at the Covenant and jumped on it's back. Judging by the way the Hunter thrashed about, it didn't like having a hitchhiker at all. OK, maybe this wasn't such a good idea, Sean thought as the beast backed up against the ruined engines of the Pelican. The impact sent a burning pain through his legs, but Sean was still able move and crawled onto the left shoulder of the pissed off titan, drew his pistol from the holster at his waist and stuck the muzzle in the small slit in the armor, pressed it up against the Hunter's eye. The pistol barrel in its face only angered the Hunter even more, so the Marine pulled the trigger, spraying orange blood on his own face. The corpse dropped to the turf, stirring up a cloud of dust and throwing Sean several feet from the heap of metal and dead flesh. The younger March lay on the ground, stunned and in pain, but forced himself to stand up on wobbly legs and go attempt to retrieve his sibling from the tree. After finding it near impossible to get his legs to cooperate in the quest to climb the tree, he turned to steal a Ghost only to watch a sniper rifle with a plasma grenade stuck to the scope fall from McHenry's perch, fall amidst the four Ghosts parked under said perch and blow up. The ensuing explosion consumed four of the Ghosts, overloading their plasma tanks and detonating in a grand show of fire, smoke, metal fragments and blue plasma clouds. Amazingly, one of the Ghosts escaped destruction and Sean sprinted to it while the Covenant near it remained sprawled out on the ground. One of the Grunts nearby began to turn to face him, but it was cut off by a pistol shot to the head. March hopped over the fallen alien, smacked another nearby Grunt in the head with the butt of his assault rifle and jumped into the controls seat of the remaining hovercraft. He punched the activation button and yanked on the controls, gliding at high speed over an Elite that had stood up in time to be beheaded by the exhaust vectoring blade on the back of the engine pods. The Marine pushed the acceleration lever as high as it would go and pulled back on the controls, lifting the nose of the Covenant craft to avoid scraping it on the hull of the Pelican's engine array, jumping the Ghost up into the treeline at the top of the hill. Parked at the peak of the crater rim, Sean turned the Ghosts around and fired the twin plasma cannons at the remaining Covenant troops who ran under the relative safety of the wings on the crashed dropship.
Through the scope on his rifle, the Master Chief noticed an Elite yelling something into a handheld communication device. Dana quickly intercepted the signal, translated it and relayed the information to John.
"John, the Elite just called in an air strike. Three Banshees will be inbound in a matter of minutes. I suggest we fall back and wait it out."
"No, get in contact with the Alert Five team and get an ETA. We're not leaving 'Haven Guardian' behind," the SPARTAN responded with more than the usual amount of stubbornness. As if on cue, the rumble of the ion engines of several Pelicans emanated from the far side of the crater and they seemed to be getting closer. All three of the enormous armored green dropships appeared from behind a pillar of rock. For once the commander, who was renowned for being impulsive, even if her impulses were usually right, thought ahead and sent in armed dropships. The equipment haulers flew overhead, pounding the ground with the twin chain-gun turrets secured to undersides of each wing. The slugs weren't strong enough to penetrate the armored wings of the crashed ship that the Covies were cowering under, but the turret gunners were lucky enough to catch a few Jackals as they were running for cover. John motioned the angular aircraft towards the landing zone and ran over to meet them as they offloaded reinforcements and fresh supplies. A corporal named Lewis trotted over to John, shielding his eyes from the dust being kicked up by the Pelican's engines.
"Sir, I'm Corporal Lewis..." the middle-aged man started, nearly running to keep up with his superior's huge stride.
"I can read your name tag perfectly fine. The battle's not here. Get your equipment and go help out my men," The Master Chief responded coldly.
"Yes sir," Lewis said, obviously disappointed for being brushed off, but there was no time for formalities right now. John continued his lumber over to the weapons cache that had just been offloaded from the dropships, picked up a grenade and dropped his sniper rifle in his portable weapons locker that the Pelicans had brought with them. He then walked over to the next crate, kicked it open and removed another assault rifle, ten clips of ammunition and administered a painkiller shot to himself. Ready to reengage those Covenant bastards, he sprinted back up to the top of the crater in time to see a private (one of the March brothers, it looked like) clinging on to the alloy shield attached to a Hunter's left arm. The Hunter was trying as hard as it could to shake off the unwanted company, but the Marine was determined not to be thrown. It looked like a bull-riding competition that John had seen videos of while studying human history on Reach, only a little more deadly. The private pulled his sidearm and fired into the Hunter's eye, dropping the behemoth, but the Marine was thrown several feet. Amazingly, March didn't stay down. Instead, he ran over the only undemolished Ghost and hijacked it. Is this whole outfit full of lunatics?! the Master Chief thought to himself as he charged into what was left if the rapidly calming battle. Halfway down the hill, four large blips appeared on John's motion tracker display, rapidly closing the distance to the crater.
Banshees.
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