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1543 hours, July 14, 2557 (Military Calendar) / Australia, Victorian Otways (Forests), Earth

First Sergeant Phillip Moore with his two charges, Private Jamie "Peanuts" Parrot and Private First Class Patrick "Pullme" Puli had been forced to leg it out of the forest when the warthog they had been driving ran out of fuel. "Damn waste if you ask me sir. She was a fine vehicle and we're leaving her for the covie bastards to find." Peanuts said with distaste.
"Well, if you really want to, you can stay with the 'hog and wait for them to show up." Replied Moore.
That shut Peanuts right up. Good, thought Moore, now I might be able to think of a way out of this stupid forest. There didn't seem to be one, there were no roads in sight or even signs of roads, the only thing they had seen since they left the 'hog was three grunts, a jackal and a shit load of trees. "While we're here you might as well tell us where you guys got your nicknames." Moore said trying to inject some humor into his shaking voice.
Pullme smiled and replied "My one's pretty self explanatory but Peanuts here got his for something less obvious… the size of his balls."
Peanuts gave Pullme a withering stare and opened his mouth to say something but all that came out was a wrangled gasp. At first Moore thought nothing very sinister but when Peanuts touched his chest Moore saw a red splotch spreading through his shirt. "SNIPER!" Moore bellowed grabbing Pullme and shoving him into the dirt with him.
Moore heard a whooshing sound and felt the wind moving overhead as the energy bolt flew over his head. Looking up Moore saw the jackal firing at them; shouldering his battle rifle he looked through the sights and positioned it over the assholes head. It looked down at him through the sights on its weapon and for a moment time seemed to stop, they both looked at each other. It would have been a very humbling, meaningful moment had the jackals brains not been blasted out the back of his head. Moore crawled over to Peanuts' side and felt for his pulse… but he had none. Swearing Moore picked himself up and looked over the Pullme. "Come on, we gotta go if we wanna live."
Pullme didn't move, giving him a sharp kick Moore started to get scared, not that he really cared too much about Pullme he just didn't want to take this alone. He shoved Pullme's body over and he came up missing half his face. Wincing Moore checked his pulse… just in case… nothing. Grudging getting to his feet Moore searched for anymore Covie assholes who might be hiding in the brush surrounding the clearing Finding no living enemies Moore pushed on into the forests, his marine standard issue boots sinking ankle deep in the thick mud, as Moore started moving up a hill it started raining heavily. "Great, just great! Now all I need is some friggen energy sword elite to jump out of nowhere."
Moore heard a series of loud 'thumps' soon followed by even louder explosions which shook the ground beneath Moore's feet. Wondering what the hell was going on Moore looked up to the sky and saw a Covenant frigate moving through the air… into the ground. The frigate disappeared under the tree line but Moore still heard the massive explosion when the enormous Covenant craft hit the earth. A shockwave and earthquake like forces came at Moore with so much force that it knocked him off his feet but he got off easy the force easily uprooted several trees and sent them flying. Astounded, all Moore was able to spit out of his mouth was "What the hell is going on out there?"

1543 hours, July 14, 2557 (Military Calendar) / Australia, over Victorian Otways (Forests), Earth

Captain Taylor corkscrewed to the right and dove in with the rest of his unit, they were charged with the destruction of the Covenant Frigate which had parked itself over the Otways. The enemy had launched a massive assault of seraph fighters to stop them but they were getting their collective asses kicked. The Covenant didn't stand a chance, the frigate had obviously come in from the battle above because it was already badly damaged and had lost its shield generator. The strange thing was that the Covenant didn't seem too concerned in keeping the damn thing in the air. Their attack was mostly aggressive and seemed to have the main purpose of simply killing as many humans as possible. Taylor had called this in but none of the brass seemed to care about that, all they wanted was the frigate on the ground so they could rid themselves of the stupid annoyance. So far they had managed to kill about 70% of the total enemies who had tried to defend the frigate and also put most of the engines keeping the craft in the air. It would only be a matter of time now until they had destroyed the ship entirely. "Sir! We have multiple enemy contacts two o'clock high!" someone crackled over the ship to ship intercom.
"Shit." Taylor muttered to himself "Red team, move to engage enemy contacts on bearing 2 o'clock. Blue team, move bearing 5 o'clock then swerve around to intercept from behind. Squash the fucker's guys!"
The Captain received a deafening amount of 'yes sir!' replies then red and blue teams moved to obey Taylor's orders. Smiling at them Taylor said over the intercom "Green team, follow me, we're gonna take out the Covenant ship!"
Green team, lead by Captain Taylor flew under the belly of the Covenant frigate blasting where ever they could reach with their 90mm chain guns. Loading the spine missiles for what was about to come next they gave the massive ships main engine with the missiles. Captain Taylor heard a series of decompression 'thumps' as the frigate let out the pressurized air it held then soon after Taylor saw the entire engine blow apart in several small explosions. "Yea haw!" Red team leader screamed upon seeing what had happened.
Captain Taylor watched the Covenant frigate crash into the forest and felt elated when the crashed hull caught fire in several spaces. He forced his eyes from the Covenant wreckage back to the oncoming Covenant assault, this battle wasn't over yet. "Break and engage! All units break and engage."
Keeping his flight path straight into the assault Taylor felt invincible; they had just taken out a Covie frigate by themselves. He opened up with his chain guns and two enemy seraphs exploded into balls of flame, then the two massive forces collided with each other and the forces became one. A single ball of human and Covenant ships ducking, dodging, diving and weaving between themselves with crisscrossing streams of smoke marking where missiles had passed. Taylor had just finished blasting a Covenant ship when his ship was shaken to its core; looking back Taylor saw the cause of the problem. Plasma scoring marked where his engines used to be, his heart now rising to somewhere in his throat Taylor hit the emergency eject button but a warning sign came up telling him that it was impossible for the parachute to function properly at this height. "Shit."
Taylor woke up in a daze a few hours later trying to remember what happened, then it all came back to him. Taylor groaned and got out of his Longsword interceptor. "Well there, nice to see a friendly face… Captain." His eyesight still a little blurry Taylor waited for it to clear so he could identify the target. Even though he sounded friendly Taylor drew his pistol, you could never be too careful.

Sergeant Moore watched as the Captain pulled his pistol from its holster, Moore became panicky for a second, he had no back up. If he was shot here then that was it, he was dead Moore was about to move to disarm the Captain when he lowered his pistol and looked at him as if he was seeing him for the first time. "Good to see you… Sergeant." The Captain replied smiling.
Sergeant Moore relaxed; the Captain wasn't interesting in killing him anymore. "So, what brings you to our level of the battlefield?" Moore said conversationally.
The Captain gave him a sober look; airheads never really shared the Marine outlook on battlefield jokes. "You will address me as Captain Taylor or sir. Understood marine?"
Moore could almost feel the hostility radiating from the airhead. "Yes, sir. So what do we do next?"
Captain Taylor looked off into the distance as if he could see something that Moore couldn't. After a little while Moore was going to say something when Taylor turned back to him with calm steady eyes. "We're going to find the Covenant frigate that we downed."
Moore was utterly shocked into speechlessness for a second… but only a second. "WHAT THE FUCK!? And do you have any particular reason for going on a suicide mission or is it 'just because'?"
Taylor gave him a stern look. "Because, firstly the Covenant didn't act like they usually do, if I had to give it a good guess I'd say they wanted that ship to crash here. I want to know why. This isn't a frontal assault for Christ's sake, we're just going to see what they're doing and we'll bug out immediately to report to base. Secondly, I know the way back and I'm sure you don't otherwise you wouldn't be just wandering here alone. Thirdly, I'm going to go with the old excuse of: 'because I said so.'"
Taylor walked off and Moore had no choice but to follow, he was right about him being lost but Moore was sure as hell that he was wrong about them immediately bugging out. At least if the Covenant had their way.

Time unknown, (Before the fall of Reach) / Location Classified
Waking up from a daze lieutenant Carter took in his surroundings, he was in some sort of containment cell completely colored purple with a faint hissing coming from the walls. The only side that didn't have a wall did have something that looked more sinister, a coating of purple pulsating something stretching over the entire opening. At first Carter wondered why there were no guards; did they think that his escape was really that impossible? Then he saw it, a slight movement, a shadow against a shadow. There were some of those invisible bastards out there somewhere and they were watching him, he knew it. Instincts set into Carter since the time of his officer training set in, he instantly forced himself to calm down a think the situation over carefully. He isn't dead… yet, so that means they want him alive for some twisted reason so he probably was going to know sooner or later. They may want information, well if it was information they wanted then information was the last thing he was going to give them. They had put him under armed guard so there was a chance of him getting out of this prison. Carter began searching his room for some sort of way to get out, finding nothing after searching every square inch of the quarters Carter became frustrated. Turning back to the pulsating wall Carter could almost sense that the invisible creatures were completely still, as if watching him intently. Carter snapped "You like what you see you alien fucks? Huh? You wanna get a little gay with me? You alien fucks! Get fucked!"
Sitting back down on the floor of his cell Carter wished they had the decency to put some sort of bedding or chairs in his cell. Waiting was absolute hell for him, were all his soldiers dead? Did any make it out? Were there any still in the ship? Carter felt a pang of pain at the thought of the ultimate fates of his men and women, he had led them in here and he wasn't going to lead them out. Damn it, why was he here? Why had the Covenant done this? The waiting was killing him and he hadn't even been here ten minutes! Carter forced himself into a calm state again, ok; let's see what we can do here. Carter made one more though search of the prison in the hope of finding something he hadn't seen before, and then he tried using his neural implants to contact any of his soldiers. All he got was static, whether that meant they were dead or the Covenant had put some sort of radio shielding around the cell Carter couldn't be sure. All he knew for now was that he was alone.

Ship Master 'Hynue watched the human specimen with a detached fascination. He watched as it searched it room then finally gave up and started yelling something in their crude language. Not speaking the alien's language he didn't know exactly what he was saying but from the tone he was able to surmise that it was annoyed to say the least. 'Hynue clicked his lower mandibles, to equivalent of a shrug, whether the alien liked it or not it was here to stay until the prophets decided otherwise. Continuing to watch as the specimen sat down and dejectedly looked into space 'Hynue wondered what it was thinking. He could understand, if he had lost as many soldiers as this poor fellow… no, wait! He couldn't think these things; they were insulting at best, heresy at worst. These creatures deserve nothing but annihilation, pity was beyond them. He could be killed for thinking such things, so, putting them in the back of his mind 'Hynue got up and left the holding cells headed for his proper spot in the ships control centre.

Carter watched as the doors opened and closed, he guessed that someone was going out because he couldn't see any wavering mist entering. That was when the Covenant decided to show themselves, they appeared seemingly out of thin air but Carter knew better. The wavering mist like wall disappeared and one of the tall aliens approached him, it pressed something on a black box and sounds came out… ones that he could understand. 'If you will come peaceably, stand on your feet. Otherwise prepare yourself.'
The voice sounded like an order rather than a statement and it awoke Carter's stubborn streak. He stood up and the creature moved towards him but before it was able to restrain him he kicked it in its ugly face and tackled it to the ground. Strong, alien hands found his shirt and hauled him onto his feet. The alien he tackled got to its feet and wiped a smear of purple blood off its red armor, then punched him in the chest as hard as it could. Carter doubled over and coughed up what seemed to him his entire stomach but he didn't get a chance to look as the alien hands dragged him out of the cell. The playing field has been set, Carter thought dully as they forced him roughly through a door, and it seems they don't want to give me any more ground.

0234 hours, July 14, 2557 (Military Calendar) / Aboard UNSC Destroyer Flaming Heart, in orbit around Earth

"Who are we boys and girls?"
"ODST's sir!"
"Who are we?"
"Sir. ODST's, sir!"
"I'm sorry my hearing aid must not be working I think you'll have to be a little louder!"
"SIR! ODST'S, SIR!"
"Damn straight! We are the hardest of the hardcore; if we and Satan were in the same cell block then Satan would be our bitch!"
The ODST's in Fox Company from 21st Battalion prepared themselves for launch. They strapped themselves into the odd 170 drop capsules that would take them into Earth's atmosphere so they could stop the massive Covenant assault swarming its way through New Mombassa. The bridge connecting new and old Mombassa had apparently been taken by the Covenant and it was their job to clear it so that a Spartan could cross safely and take out the Prophet of Regret. Normally the ODST group would protest helping anyone not part of their special elite group but Captain Murphy had been adamant. After the usual pre-drop briefing, which was a little more heated then Murphy was usually they jumped into their ceramic pods which would take them down. The drop pods were launched from orbit around a planet, entering the planet's orbit and taking the soldier down relatively safely. I wasn't all that uncommon that one of the pods wouldn't deploy its chute and as they call it the ODST would 'dig their own grave'. The ODST unit was completely voluntary so it took a special kind of crazy to join up. The last words they heard before they were launched out of the Flaming Heart were those of Captain Murphy "I hope the Covenant have plenty of dip 'cause they're getting a few extra guests."
The drop-pods then blasted out of their tubes and fell into Earth's atmosphere heating up to an amazingly high temperature. When they reached the lower portion of Earth's atmosphere the pods deployed their chutes, other than a few which had to deploy their secondary chute when the first failed there were no incidents. Half a minute before they touched ground Murphy yelled over the intercom "Can anyone guess what the marker that I placed on our team display is?" Staff Sergeant Michael Pricket answered "Sir, the bridge?" Murphy laughed over the team com and replied "No, it's OUR bridge… and I want it back."

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