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Beached
Posted By: NevinNiven<awm338lapuamag@hotmail.com>
Date: 13 August 2001, 11:47 PM
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"Begin recording." A pause of silence and an inhaled breath. "This is Sergeant Blake Stone, and I'm recording this as I walk through a forest on Halo, it smells of moss and wood, and water. I'm starting this log because we now have communications opened with Earth. And I want my family to hear this. I failed my duty, my honor, my pride, is broken. I failed in my duty, my duty as a Marine is to protect those that cannot do so for themselves. I failed. I let two techs put me in a pod and blast me into space, I watched them die. It should have been me, I was supposed to protect them, but they shoved me back down. And here it is, from the time when the Covenants boarded the Pillar of Autumn."
"This is Captain Prindle! Covenant have boarded the ship. All Marines and capable hands, equip yourselves and prepare to hold back the enemy forces until all hands can be safely evacuated."
I charged towards my locker, skidded to a stop and pulled my gear out. An H&K .45 pistol, and my AR. I bolted down the hallway, sounds of gunfire echoing throughout. I saw flashes reflect off of the metal panels in the walls. The stench of burnt flesh and melted metal reached my nostrils and I cringed reflexively. I leaned around the corner and saw four Grunts, I fired my AR and dropped them all. They flew back and bounced off of the walls in the low gravity.
I kept walking, I reached a four way intersection and a tech ran past, screaming. Five Jackals were chasing after him. I opened fire, tearing the lead Jackal's stomach open and turning its insides into a thick stew, he dropped to the floor. The recoil tracked my weapon up and the next burst of fire blew the second Jackal's head off. Two more tried to stop, but slid and slammed to the floor in the blood. The last turned and ran, I gunned him down, his arms flailed out to the sides as he fell face first to the ground.
The tech returned, and stopped by me. He thanked me in a panicked voice, and his shaky hands gripped mine in their dirty grasp, I returned the grip with a firm one of my own. He bobbed his head.
"DOWN! NOW!" I yelled, throwing him to the side as I leapt to the other. Two Elites rounded the corner. One laid down cover fire as the other slowly moved in. I kicked my pistol to the tech and told him to make a run for it. He nodded and I raised my AR and fired, placing five bullets in the lead Elite's chest. The tech's footsteps could be heard echoing down the hallway. I took careful aim and fired. I heard a scream, a human scream. THE TECH! I whirled around and saw his shadow pasted against the wall, shaking violently from impact.
"NO DAMN IT!" I stared as the shadow disappeared and was replaced by a thump. Then the alien's shadows played across the walls flickering, and they screeched in agony. A Corporal with a Flamethrower stepped around the corner. He looked at me and signaled to follow, I did so, he walked down the corridor opposite the way I came.
A crackle of static, "This is the captain speaking! The Covenant are about to beach the bridge." Gunfire sounds, distant. "No, they've broken through!"
"We are the Covenant, you with hand over the abomination that we are after, the man and machine being that was never meant to be and must be eliminated. If you hand it over, we will let you go."
"Never, I'll never give him to you!"
Gunfire, much louder, from a pistol erupts into the mic, then. Nothing.
"NO!" I started to turn, but the panel beside me snapped open and two techs grabbed me and the flamer and pulled me inside.
"We've got to ge you out of here." Said the elder tech.
"No, its our duty to protect you. You'll surely die if we don't get you out alive." I said.
"Cortana has ordered us to get you off this ship, you'll be traveling with some very special cargo." The younger tech said.
With that, the younger tech shoved me into the pod, my foot caught the lip and I tumbled in. The elder tech tossed the flamer in. I scrambled to my feet and grabbed the ladder rungs. The panel on the far end snapped open. five Grunts entered. They opened fire. I watched in horror as the elder tech leapt in front of the young one, taking the full brunt of the fire, he was turned into a smoking mass and the young tech pulled out a pistol, firing madly. This scattered the Grunts for a few moments. He planted his foot in my chest and shoved me back inside. Then an Elite appeared and garbled an order, the Grunts charged forwards again. Firing as they went, the tech caught a blast in the shoulder. As he spun, we made eye contact, his full of pain and mine utterly helpless to do anything. He flopped to the ground.
The pod blast door snapped shut and we were blasted into space. Along the way neither of us talked to the other, I was to disgusted with myself. And I don't know what he was thinking. When we saw a bright flash through the window, we knew the engineers had scuttled the ship. We both stared as pieces of debris rocketed past. When we hit the atmosphere we stared at the floor. When the chutes deployed we looked out the window. A breathtaking view of one of Halo's seas, with waves lapping up against the beach, in the sea, sharks fifty feet long blew themselves out of the water, chasing after massive fish. We thudded down on the sand.
I walked out and was greated by a warm climate, with warm sand beneath my boots. When Bell walked out (I read his name tag) we squinted from the light. I turned to him and smiled. He smiled back, we were alive.
"We have to get our gear, and food and water, take what we can and leave. I'll need a Sniper Rifle, AR, Pistol, Minigun, and that's all." I stated.
Bell replied, "I just need my flamethrower, AR, and pistol. Let's grab what we need and get out of here.""Agreed, by the way, did you recieve Cortana's message over the radio?" I asked.
"Yeah."
"Amazing that we have that cyborg and a Jeep with a minigun ain't it?"
"Right, whatever."
I walked inside and opened the cargo bay doors, grabbed my gear, Bell did the same, we stocked food and water into the Jeep. Then we walked over to the sleeper pod with the cyborg in it. We popped it open with a hiss of air. He snapped awake.
"Where. Why." He asked.
"Halo, Cortana." I answered.
"Should've known she'd get us into this."
"I take it you'll be needing every type of weapon we have?" I asked.
"Yep."
"Bell, grab his stuff and put it in the Jeep."
"Roger that."
The cyborg climbed into the driver's seat, Bell took shotgun, and I took control of the minigun. Five minutes out a massive flash and pieces of metal hurtling past us told us that the Covenant had found our pod and had begun orbital bombardment. We drove another five hundred yards when the ground in front of us erupted, with a small geyser of flame in the middle and massive pieces of sand being flung upward. The cyborg slammed the throttle down and into the shockwave, we were thrown into the air. Another blast hit behind us and send us hurtling forward, and twisted to one side. The Jeep landing and twisted on two wheels, the cyborg corrected and we were on four wheels moving towards a small cove. We drove into the cove and made camp.
"Sir, we have found the first of the human pods and destroyed it. However the cyborg and two compatriots escaped. I humbly suggest we launch an attack on the filthy humans who plague us with their presence."
"Agreed, launch your attack in four hours. You know, this place was thought to be lost. An irony that this great relic was found by humans, whom we now wage war against. They have created a Jjarro abomination. And it must die, after the suffering they caused our race, they come back to haunt us. I just hope the texts are true and lead us to it before the humans locate it."
"Many thanks, o great general."
Several hours later a high pitch whine sounded overhead. The cyborg leapt to his feet, grabbed his AR and leapt into the driver's seat of the Jeep. Bell grabbed his pistol and slung himself into the shotgun seat. I grabbed my AR and leapt into the gunner's bucket. I spooled the minigun up to speed. No delay for firing when I pulled the trigger now. The cyborg turned the Jeep on and floored it. We roared out onto the beach, and slid to a stop behind an outcropping of rocks.
Sixteen Elites dropped out of the dropship. The ship then throttle up was signalled to leave. Unfortunately for him, he was sent my way. I opened fire with the minigun, forty-five bullets were sent out in the first second, flames lipped from the barrels and shells poured out of the ejection port, smoking. The 20mm DU bullets tore through the floor of the dropship.
The pilot couldn't believe what he was seeing holes were being punched into his ship as armor piercing bullets tore through the deck and punched through the ceiling. He watched as his crew bay was shredded by a hail of bullets. Those holes rapidly closed on his position. He stared in disbelief as they reached his position. His controls burst apart in a shower of sparks as the bullets shredded them. Searing pain, unimanigable, pierced him, his legs and chest mangled beyond recognition, his left arm severed at the elbow, his right detached at the shouler. The bullets let their Depleted Uranium out as they impacted the tough hide of the Elite. The flames caused by them blew holes in his body. His head exploded into a mist as his gray matter was splattered against the wall.
I continued to track the dropship as it passed overhead, hitting the pilot's compartment just as it passed over, I swung around (firing all the time, and hitting its flanks) and tracked the bullets into the engine, piercing the fusion reactor's shielding. The reactor went critical and exploded. Vaporizing most of the ship, but some of the ship survived, in pieces.
The Elite's leader couldn't believe what he saw as the dropship exploded, sending flaming and smoking shrapnel flying overhead and into the water. He could see the flames from the human chemically propelly weapon licking at the sky. Then the bullets started coming at him, he stood still out of shock. sand was kicked up in great clumps as the fire neared him, it passed to his right and blew his first Lieutenant apart in a shower of blood, the minigun continued to whine and thump as the bullets were shot forth. They tracked to the left, annihilating half of his newest Ensign into mush, which splattered onto him. Then the bullets tracked and cut another in half. The minigun spun down, smoke pouring from the barrels.
The cyborg opened fire, taking down another two Elites. Bell fired half of his clip, destroying one's knee and splattering the face of another. I opened fire with my AR, taking down another one, tearing his intestines apart. Bell fired again, emptying his clip, making a mess of one's chest, and mangling another's arm. The cyborg sprayed fire and took down another three. They spun to the ground and lay there.
The still standing Elite pressed something near his throat. "Humans, you have defeated me here today. I ask for you to kill me, for if I am forced to go back, my fate would be even worse than being dying here, honorably. It is better that scrubbing toilets all my life."
The cyborg spoke, "No, you are going to tell of your defeat here, you will spread the word that the humans will not fall so easily."
The Eilte raised his rifle, the cyborg fired, a shot that hit it in the heart, bursting it. It was thrown back and slammed into the sand, sliding another six inches. His blood pooling around him and being washed away by the ocean.
"And now, five weeks later, I'm still here stuck on Halo, stuggling to survive. This may be the only one I send because we are tight for power. We have to construct ammunition. And we are still here fighting for the secret of Halo. We are stuck on this island in space known as Halo. We are. Beached."
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