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Present Darkness, Chapter Two: Part II
Posted By: russ687<russ687@hotmail.com>
Date: 28 November 2004, 2:12 AM
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0600 hours, November 21, 2552 (Military Calendar)
UNSC Carrier Stanton Bay
In orbit above Planet Red Dawn (Codename), Theta 1440+90 System
The tactical display showing all the ground operations on the surface of Red Dawn was not alive with activity, completely contrary to the expectations of the Executive Staff prior to sending their troops to the planet. Instead of showing lively full green units engaging the Covenant and accomplishing their objectives, there was nothing but 'neutralized' platoons, dull green units indicating low-strength platoons, and a lot of red-colored enemy locations swarming the area.
Foster stared at the display, trying to help devise a new strategy to get their mission accomplished. They were at a confirmed forty-percent strength, far below what normal standards were, and scattered across the Area of Operations. They had a lot of ground to cover with minimal resources, with a very tight time limit that was not negotiable under any circumstances. When the Covenant arrived in force to reclaim this system, they would either stay and fight to the death, or leave and follow through with their original hit-and-run plan.
He turned around and looked back to where Lieutenant Colonel Nodern and is battle staff were working, trying to cut the corners and maximize the potential of the remaining troops on the surface. Foster felt directly responsible for this terrible failure in this first hour of the operations; that he was at fault for dropping these ODSTs in, what was so far, the worst location on the planet. Even the Regular Marines, who were tasked with securing the mining sites and known storage sites, were having a far less loss rate, something very uncommon in ground operations.
He knew that in reality there was no way he could have known, with the short amount of time given to him to decide the drop zones, that they would be infested with those aliens. His superiors, while grim about their situation, told him that as well. But it didn't seem to change anything; the burden on his shoulders was feeling like the weight of failure.
Foster turned to face a saluting Ensign. He returned the salute and grabbed the paper handed to him.
"Navy reconnaissance birds have just reported this in."
Foster looked through the papers handed to him: a page of text and four digital photographs. He looked back up at the Ensign and waved him off. "Thank you."
The Navy officer turned and walked away.
Foster moved into better lighting, as the deep red lights in the GFCIC didn't offer much. The time of the information was less then ten minutes old.
___________________________________________________________
//INTEL//
0552 NOV-21, 2552
___________________________________________________________
Foxtrot 588 Delta (Pilot: Lt. Cmdr. Jacob Darren)
INFORMATION AS FOLLOWS:
Information gathered by recon sensors have displayed a high amount of Covenant activity within the ODST drop zone AO. An estimated strength of three battalion's of troops are moving through the area.
Further flyby revealed hostile contact (fighting) scattered in the AO; however, these noticeable firefights do not involve Covenant and Marine forces. It is speculated that these contacts are between Covenant forces themselves, as for what reason is unknown. The recorded contacts are known to be throughout the entire AO, and the appearance of the main Covenant fighting is not with the Marines, but apparently with themselves or this other unidentified force that is indeed hostile to the Covenant. There has been limited reports of fighting from the Marines surface-side since this information was observed.
In addition to the observed fighting between the Covenant and this unknown force, infra-red sensors have reported several large heat emissions sources in systemic locations around the AO, leading to the conclusions that there are underground facilities that may be connected, with these observed hot-spots as the surface locations (i.e. possibly entry points).
FOR IMMEADIATE REVIEW BY MARINE INTEL
TRANSMISSION 503522-1440 TANGO
DISTRIBUTION: LIMITED
___________________________________________________________
//END TEXT//
___________________________________________________________
Foster raised his brow at this information. The Marines all reported extremely heavy resistance upon landing, the heavy causality rate testimony to that fact. And soon thereafter, reports of fighting did drop radically, allowing the remaining troops to regroup and regain a tactical advantage against the Covenant swarming the area.
However, now this information comes to light; was there really another force hostile to the Covenant on this planet? Or was it the Covenant fighting themselves? The photographs and sensor reports didn't lie, there was heavy fighting going on through certain areas of the AO, and none of those locations had any Marine's present. What did that leave?
The planet's surface, and more specifically the ODSTs AO, didn't have any return of this type when the initial recon craft flew over. There was no fighting, no heavy Covenant presence, nothing that would lead him to suspect that this area was infested with enemies. And with Longswords flying support missions overhead and their own ships scanning the area, no single Covenant drop ship could have sneaked in to drop off any troops.
That meant that the initial speculation about there being underground facilities or tunnels must be true. How else could such a vast number of Covenant, and now apparently some of their enemies, pop up out of nowhere? The mystery behind this seemingly failed drop was coming around. He had been right about the drop zone being safe with the initial intelligence he received, but there was no way he could have foreseen this possibility with the limited resources he had reconnoitering the AO.
Something else was going on here, something bigger. The Covenant were fully engaged with this threat, meaning that it had to be a bigger threat to them than the Marines. He had never seen this before; he had never seen the Covenant willfully turn their backs on humans to fight another enemy.
This planet was not what they had initially thought. This was no simple resource-gathering operation by the Covenant. Something bigger resided on this planet, and his gut told him they would find out soon enough.
"Sir," Foster said, walking over to Lt. Col. Nodern. "We have some new Intel. It seems as if we have a new factor in play on the surface."
Nodern looked up, question etched on the weathered face.
Foster set the stack of papers and pictures on the table, the resounding slapping-noise catching the entire battle staff's attention.
"There's a new enemy."
0605 hours, November 21, 2552 (Military Calendar)
6 Kilometers North of Drop Zone Mike X-Ray
Planet Red Dawn (Codename), Theta 1440+90 System
Westfield, Johnson and Wilson came around with little prodding. The two snipers and Lynn helped get each of them down from their awkward inverted positions inside the Pelican, then gave them a few moments to get their bearings. The door-gunner, his nametape reading off 'Delyn', nearly shot one of the snipers when he suddenly came around, bringing out his pistol in a disoriented defense.
Bottom line, though, Lynn was just happy to have them all come around without major injury, and the added support from these two snipers gave them more resources to fight. Force Recon snipers were the best available, and that fact didn't go unknown among any of the ODSTs standing around the over-turned Pelican, still smoking slightly.
Lynn retrieved his BR55 and checked its magazine. If those two snipers hadn't arrived when they did, his pistol wouldn't have done enough to save him from the Covenant; which gave him another painful reminder to not lose his rifle. The other Marines got their gear together, with Westfield hefting the M271B, and stood silently outside the Pelican, looking around cautiously after they heard what Keeton had said earlier.
The second sniper, Lynn reading his nametape and rank insignia as 'Corporal Tanner', came back around from the front of the Pelican and nodded slightly to the group. He had only heard this sniper say three words the entire time, leading him to the conclusion that this men resembled his own PFC Johnson: quiet and professional.
"Tell me what you've encountered so far," Keeton said, kicking the dead body of a Grunt.
Lynn went through the memories of the last hour. He wasn't quite so sure what had happened either. "Heavy Covenant resistance at the drop zone, and we were the only survivors of my platoon. Overall analysis is that this mission has gone to hell."
Keeton nodded in silent agreement.
"And you? What have you two seen?" Delyn asked, staring blankly at the dead Grunt at the feet of the sniper.
"We were the first of three teams on the surface; ground recon. We lost our team leader after a run-in with the Covenant, and our comm. specialist to...them." The sniper's tone was flat and devoid of emotion.
"Them?" Question obvious in Delyn's voice.
Keeton looked up from the dead body and into the gunner's eyes. "I don't know what the hell they are or where they came from, but the Covenant want them dead just as bad as they want us dead."
Lynn shook his head in confusion. "Wait, there's more 'aliens' on this planet?"
"Aliens? Hardly." The sniper holstered his pistol and brought out the long sniper rifle. "I don't know how to explain this, so I'll give it my best shot.
"They're Covenant, at least they appear to be. More specifically they're Jackals, but they're not normal; something about them has changed. They don't wear any traditional Covenant armor or uniforms, they don't have shields, they don't have anything. But they are Covenant Jackals." Keeton looked around the group of Marines staring back at him. "It's in their eyes; something's not right about them."
"That's it? They're rogue Jackals?" Westfield asked, his voice clearly portraying no concern
Tanner, the second sniper, spoke up for the real first time. "No, that's not it. When you see them, you'll understand."
The ODSTs remained silent. Under any other circumstances, none of them would have believed these two snipers. But it was evident they were not lying; they had in fact seen this Jackal enemy, and by the tone in their voices and the look in their eyes, it was not something to be taken lightly.
Lynn looked at each of the Marines in the circle. These men were all tired, and most were dealing with injuries from any number of reason, including himself. However, their situation remained unchanged, even with this news from the snipers; they had to get their act back together and get their mission accomplished. He brought out his watch and looked at the time counter.
01:27:38. They were approaching the ninety-minute mark.
Keeton spoke up, reading Lynn's intentions. "I'll take point."
Lynn nodded and got his bearings of the terrain. He picked a relatively easy path to traverse, then pointed in that direction, causing all the ODSTs to look. "We'll head that direction for one click, then get our exact location with the LRISC and find out if anyone's nearby. Clear?"
The three Marines, two snipers, and Pelican gunner nodded.
"Once we get far enough away from this crash-site, we'll have more room between us and whatever may be searching for us. There's Marines out there who could use a few more hands, so let's make sure we do whatever we can to get to them."
There was a silent agreement among the others. Lynn wasn't sure what they were thinking, but he knew it was his time to step up to the plate and get them moving. His own feelings were probably the same as theirs anyways: fatigue, anxiousness, paranoia, but he knew their training for these types of situations would pull them through, along with a little luck. Besides, did they have any alternative?
"Let's move."
The forest, despite having a relatively thin spread of trees, seemed to close in on them. The sun, still rising higher into the sky, was not visible through the high branches that caught every beam of light. Down here on the ground, walking through the rocky ground and around bushes, it was darker then any of them would have liked.
None complained, or even spoke, as they silently made their way along the slope of a hill that rose up above them and dropped down below them to that distant river. The tension was obvious, and the rifles were kept shouldered and scanning the area around them. While it seemed reasonable enough that they would be able to spot a threat, with the sparse vegetation, that fact didn't ease up the high-strung nerves of the Marines.
Lynn found himself looking around anxiously with his rifle up, but he couldn't determine whether it was his training or the paranoia of being on this planet. It was weird to have thought that only minutes earlier he had viewed this place as a peaceful landscape, all of it relaxing and taking the edge off, and now he was weary of every shadow and possible hiding place. Why had that changed? Was it the horror story those snipers had told? Maybe it was his near death confrontation with the Elite. He couldn't decide what was making this change, how he could go from a firefight at the drop zone where nearly everyone of his friends and teammates died, to a somewhat serene crash-site, to a silent walk through what was now appearing as an ominous, deadly forest.
Was he on the verge or cracking? He had heard the stories and even seen it first-hand when someone just breaks under the constant pressure and fear. When someone hit that point, there was no going back. Section Eight discharge was the only step after that, providing, of course, that you survived the battle under which you cracked. Neither thought appealed to him, but he couldn't shake the feeling. It was times like this where he felt like he didn't even know himself; that he was his own complete stranger.
Lynn instinctively stopped and brought his shouldered rifle to point up the hill. The entire group stopped as well, their weapons steadily pointing up the hill. Lynn could hear his own heartbeat, his lungs filling with air, the blood rushing through his veins. He had heard something.
There it was again. A high pitched scream emitting from somewhere up the hill. The sound was eerie and haunting, something he would have expected out of a horror movie. It seemed to pierce through the silent forest and echo around them, causing them all to reaming silent and motionless.
He didn't even have to think about it: this was that enemy the snipers had told them about.
"I got movement." Johnson whispered next to him. The other Marine was three meters behind him and had his rifle pointed up the hill.
Lynn tried to locate what the other Marine had seen. The hill slope they were staring at seemed still.
"I got movement!" Johnson said in a louder whisper.
There. He spotted something darting behind the cover. It was fast and small, and he couldn't get a good look at it, but it was nonetheless a threat.
The group stood silently, their weapons trained on the forest surrounding them. No one spoke as the high-pitched wailing filtered through the forest again. Lynn could feel the hair on his neck stand up and looked deliberately up the slope for that threat again. The fear in his stomach was rising; this threat was not normal. It was fast, faster then what he had seen the Covenant move.
Crack.
Lynn spun around and looked at the seemingly small creature in the air lunging towards him. Time seemed to stop as he stared into the creatures eyes; they were blood red. The black, skinny body of the creature ran down from its head, and its beak-like mouth was open, revealing a line of sharp, brown and blood stained teeth.
Lynn seemed the react in slow motioned as the airborne enemy came at him. He felt his finger begin to press the trigger as the enemy closed the distance. What would be a one second moment in reality seemed like an hour as his eyes and those red eyes stayed locked on. He could feel the creatures deadly intentions, and could see the death in its eyes. This being was not normal; something was wrong with it.
The creature was less than a meter away, in the air and coming at him. Lynn didn't decide whether or not this was going to be his last act, because regardless this creature would die. The hatred in those blood red eyes would see the hell that waited for it, by the hand of an ODST. The moment ended with his trigger depressing.
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