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Dangerous Voyages [Part 3]
Posted By: Elizar<kopaka2219@hotmail.com>
Date: 25 April 2006, 12:23 am
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Three pelicans awaited them by the hangar bay. The ODST occupied the first pelican and filled most of the second, while the marines took the third, and few of them went in the same pelican the rest of the ODST were. The siblings were one of them.
Baldvin made a quick glance around the pelican, checking out those who would be with him in the mission. He stopped by one of the ODST, who held a battle rifle, but had a needler clipped on his belt.
"Do you have a death wish or something?" Baldvin said, drawing Anne's attention at the same moment. She though sat back and watched her brother. Insulting someone outright may not be the best thing to do.
The ODST raised his head, obviously having tried to catch some sleep on the way over to the DZ. "Eh?" He muttered, then saw where Baldvin was looking. "Ah, you mean this?" He said and picked up his needler. "Has been with me for some time now."
Baldvin shrugged. "I may have some liking to Covenant weapons, but when I tried out the needler ended up with me almost dying."
"You have been using it wrong, with enough practice and knowledge, one is able to master it like a sniper would master an S2 and make it obey every command." The ODST said, putting the needler back. "Private Rint Dergate. Helljumper."
"Baldvin Verant, Just a normal marine." Baldvin answered, and pointed to his plasma rifle. "I am not the only one figuring out that Covenant weapons are useful against them." He pointed to his sister, who showed her carbine.
"Good luck on the mission." Rint said, then leaned back and closed his eyes.
"Alright, we cannot settle by the gravlift, but there was a squad of marines sent here to clear the area for us, since we lack any real vehicles. When we settle down, scant eight hundred meters away from the gravlift, you may be hearing how the scorpions and warhogs are taking care of the opposing forces that drop down the gravlift. We may run into some opposition that got through on the way, but I doubt they will be able to beat us. We are dropping down in eight minutes." Darius Striker turned off the com unit, and put it in its place. He gave a low sight, but knew that if things were seriously wrong, he would know it in time. For him, the mission was to destroy the ship with multiply satchel charges located in strategic positions. ONI wanted though that the ship would be brought down without any damage to it. Darius was not the person to obey ONI's orders so lightly. He simply didn't care about them, only about facing Covenants and surviving, and with a hope that who he stroke down would set back the Covenant enough for humankind to deliver a final blow and win the war.
Everyone who was asleep was woken up by the sudden yank to the pelican as it surged downwards quickly. The whole area was canyons and miniature valleys. It was remains of a river that had dried away long time ago. There were some occasional shrubs and trees, but nothing good enough to provide cover other that few tall rocks which had chipped from the edge of the canyon walls long time ago.
Anne swung her S2 rifle forward, looked through the scope and activated the night vision setting on it. She made a quick look through the area forward of her. After few seconds of checking it out, she lowered the rifle, and brought forth her carbine. She looked at her brother, and shook her head. She hadn't seen anything in the faint twilight.
Darius looked over the group that had come from the three pelicans, and as he assured himself those he had were enough to finish the mission, he brought up his SMGs. "Alright people, radio silence from now on. No unnecessary chatter." Though technically not behind enemy lines, he knew that if the group would be attacked and outnumbered, there would be no backup for them, only a hope that the pelicans wouldn't be attacked as trying to extract them.
The group was spread to group of seven that had some distance between each other. All in order to keep from them all getting boxed in an ambush by the Covenant and to keep their six clear and pick up any stragglers who thought it would be a good idea to sneak behind the humans and deliver a fatal blow. A Covenant doing so would be quickly spotted.
Darius halted his team as he came to a small canyon. There was a nice short winding pass down to it, but below was a small group of Covenants. There were two elites, one in red armor and another one in blue armor. They were ordering a group of grunts around, one of which manning a turret which was aimed directly towards Darius' position. He was simply lucky he hadn't been spotted. The group seemed to be relaxed, and didn't expect any trouble. They had simply figured the humans were now at the gravlift, hopelessly trying to clear that space of Covenant troops, which would in the end overwhelm them.
Darius silently backed away to his group. "I need the marine sniper." He said quietly, as any loud noise would certainly attract the attention of the Covenant group below.
Shortly after Anne came through and looked up at Darius, who was head taller than her. "I saw that you carry a covie sniper." He whispered to her.
Anne didn't reply in words, but brought forth the beam rifle she had on her back.
"Good. There are two elites there, take them out with that weapon. It should leave the enemy confused enough to halt firing and trying to figure out what friend had shot at them. I didn't spot any jackal snipers."
Anne nodded, and crept towards the edge. She was joined with two marines holding battle rifles, ideal for sniping down the grunts from a longer distance. She looked through the scope, checking out the two elites. She quickly switched between them, training herself to their moving pattern and found out how to take them out as quickly as possible.
She was ready, exhaled and pulled the trigger as she aimed to the red elite's head. The elite roared in angered surprise as hit by a Covenant beam rifle. He looked to the edge where the shot had originated, but saw no jackal. Instead he saw the second purple beam of light go towards him. That was the last thing he saw.
The blue elite saw what had happened, then roared and shot his plasma rifle at where he figured the shot had come from. The shots hit only scant centimeters away from Anne, who squeezed the trigger for the last time, delivering a killing headshot to the blue elite. She heard a loud clank sound from the rifle has it had overheated and now opened up the energy chamber to cool itself off. The ODST with her dealt with the grunts quickly. Within seconds, the small party of elites and grunts were all dead, leaving Darius and the rest of his team to go down to the canyon without any trouble.
Without any more opposition, they came to the valley where the gravlift was located. Darius motioned Central to look around, his best spotter, but she didn't see or hear anything. On the edges of the valley were three scorpions and a dozen of warthogs of both types.
"What is the status?" Darius broke the radio silence by contacting the Lieutenant in charge.
"Been quiet for some time, but we had encountered few heavy infantry, but we dealt with them swiftly." The answer came to Darius' personal com channel.
"Anything I should be worried about?" Darius asked, hoping to get no surprises on the way to the gravlift.
"We don't expect any enemy to come down now. But once you are near the gravlift, there is nothing we can do with the scorpions, or you would be caught in the splash damage. The hogs will be though on the ready."
Darius was silent for a moment, then figured there was nothing more to ask about. "Thank you, over and out." He closed the link to the lieutenant, then opened another one to his group. "Regroup at my position, we are going in." He ordered.
It took just few minutes for the lingering teams of seven to catch up, and once they all were there, they headed to the gravlift base. As they arrived, they waited for half a minute, waiting for any enemy to come down they would have to deal with. But it appeared that the Covenant didn't care.
Darius stood in front of them, and took a deep breath. He had also the com open for those who might not hear him in the back.
"This is it. I have gone before inside something like that, and I know what we will see. Fernir was also generous enough to get into their network and find the blueprints for the cruiser. It is a standard cruiser.
"When we get inside, you will be in a square room. On each side are four doors, four of them large ones to open the way for heavy vehicles. As soon as we get inside, I want two guards at each of the small ones, and five guards for the bigger one. It is going to be 'first come, first get' kind of way. Then, we can continue planning and split us into three groups, each with its own objectives."
He looked over the group, and saw that everyone, even the marines, were ready. There was no question of it. He had spotted fire in some of the marines' eyes.
"Go inside! Now!" He waved his hand in a signal, and jumped on the platform. Next to him was a severed arm of a hunter, with shield. Before him was charred remain of a wraith. He wondered for a second if that would hinder them access up to the ship, but as he felt his body surge upwards, he didn't wonder anymore, and looked forward, waiting for his transportation into the ship.
Darius felt the cooper taste in his mouth. He had gotten the same taste when he went up a gravlift for the first time. He quickly looked around, trying to spot any enemy, but there was no Covenant around. He saw some of the marines trotting along, checking the area out, and some that hurried to a door that was in need of a guard.
"The big ones open in the middle!" Darius called. Central walked to him, acting more like a body guard than an underling to Darius.
"Central?" Darius asked.
"Nothing in here." She said glancing over the room for the final time. "We are clear for now, and with guards posted, we are ready to split into groups."
Darius nodded. "Alright. Lieutenant York, come here for a second." He motioned a marine leader. "Central, York, you saw the plans with me, and I hope you had them memorized." He said, and looked at them both. They both nodded in a response.
"Central, your objective is the engine room, but you will go past the control room. ONI contacted me at the last second, so I cannot take that one down before you reach there. They want me to get few things they think are located in one room in the ship. It is too far from the control room for me to secure it properly. York, you will go to the weapon storage, and check the inventory. You need to find out if they have shipped weapons to the Covenant fighting at Nykeir. Secure it. Though you would want the siblings with you, those who use the covenant weapons, they are going with Central to the control room.
"Central, when you have secured the control room, notify me so we can make it a RZ, for a regroup and improve the plans in case something went in the way. As of the teams, I have selected a group of ODST to go with me, York, you have most of your marines, hopefully selected beforehand."
"I have." York answered quickly.
"And the rest will go with Central." Darius gave a reassuring nod. Central was about to say something, but figured that it was Darius who was in more need of ODST troops for whatever ONI mission he had been commissioned to do. It was not in Central's place to doubt her superior's orders.
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