Hello I'm Dakodah Ceil, I was born in a small undisclosed town while my mother and father looked for a nice district for my mother to have a family while my father works with the UNSC. In 2543 alittle after my brother's birth we were informed of my fathers death. This is my story and how I became I legend to marines.
/2551, March 3/Sidma District, Reach/0900 hours/
A brown haired girl slowly tossed and turned in her bed while an alarm went off. The sun rays poked through the blinds to the small apartment flat. The room had two small cots with posters over crudely painted walls, with a small closet off to the side. Green eyes grogilly flooded open and groaned. Eyes darting over to her alarm clock she jumped out of bed and rushed to put on some cargo pants as well as a baggy green t-shirt. Making her cot to look nice she walked towards the door of the room and picked the bag she pack from last night.
Opening up the door and walking out into a living room mix with a kitchen. A nine year old boy with brown hair and blue eyes greeted her.
"Hey Dakodah! Can you walk me to school today? Pwease!" He gave the best pouting face.
Dakodah laughed and said" Today you have off remember? You just want me to stay here instead of going. Listen sport I'll be back and I'm gonna bring you back something to, how about that?" She ruffled his hair and walked over to the fridge pulling out some milk and an energy bar.
"I don't want you to go! Please stay!" He begged as she finished the bar and walked towards the door with the duffel bag in hand.
"Sport, your nine years old, old enough to grow up a bit. Working at the construction yard won't pay the bills forever. Not to mention it's alittle to late now."
The boy's eyes clouded over with tears and ran to give his big sister a hug. She ruffled his hair and pulled him away saying for him to go eat breakfast. Opening the door onto a rundown street in the Sidma district, she closed and locked the door.
The street was in one of the bigger towns but not quiet a city sort of thing. She started walking down the street passing the old construction yard where many people greeted her and wished her luck. She would miss this place, but it's better for her to move on and get a real job. Knowing the newer alien threat might come by she just didn't want to be a helpless nobody that would get killed. She frowned slightly thinking what may happen when the time comes. Everyone on the major media networks say they can never take over Reach...
Even she a 17 year old adolescent knows that's a lie. From what she has read on her laptop (hacking into a few popular coms of the marines) had learned that they were in deep shit...
She automatically stopped at the bus station that would take her to hand in her paper forms. She knows that she will most likely die like her father... Her mother begged her to rethink but she had already decided.
She had naturally been stronger then most children and had been able to work in the construction yard since she was 13 and was a very fast runner. She always wondered why she was different from others.
A honk woke her out of her thoughts. The bus driver looked irritated and she walked on and inserted the correct amount of money. Sitting in the middle she looked down at what she was wearing in more detail. A dull green t-shirt, tan cargo pants, and worker's boots from the construction yard.
She sighed knowing that this idea probably will get her killed or worse... Her little brother would still be waiting for her for when she got back and the money she would make would be more than enough for her mother to be able to quit her job and raise Joseph... If only..
/2551, March 5/ Recruitment camp C-094, Reach/0700 hours/
"ALRIGHT YOU WORTHLESS PIECES OF CRAP! Line up in a straight line at attention! Today you guys get the pleasure to meet you senior co-workers and they will tear you down, mold you into a better piece of crap, beat the hell out of you, then MAYBE you can start the actual training!" The yelling was all done by Drill Sergeant Grisble.
If there were any light hearted souls out there standing in the line, they probably peed themselves by now. The first day was worst but now came the more difficult part which involved actually living through what some may say is hell.
They were standing outside in the mud. The camp had at least 10 bunks with one mess hall, office, and armory all lined up into two sections. The training grounds were caked in mud, targets, jungle gyms, and tracks for running.
Dakodah could be seen in the middle of the line attempting to keep a smirk off her face at how the recruits paled at what he said. She was wearing an outfit similar to what she wore before but the material was itchier and meant to keep them warmer. She had her hair pulled back into a pony tail. Bangs framing her face even though it was against protocol.
The Drill sergeant saw her attempting to keep the smirk away and walked to in front of her, making a boy not much older than her, beside her pee himself but you could barely tell with all the mud covering his face and clothes. Very few Recruits had little to no mud caking them. They were the smarter ones or had some sort of manual labor they had preformed before this so that they were stronger. At the sight of the recruit beside her pissing himself the smirk won against her.
"And what are you smirking about private? Something funny I should know about?" The Sergeant asked in a loud booming voice. The older recruits that were nearing the end of their own training were either smirking, or stifling laughs about the newer recruits.
"Permission to speak freely sir?" Dakodah asked with a smirk still playing her face. The Sergeant looked wearily at her knowing that if already knew protocol for speaking to him then she would be a different story then the others."Permission Granted Private."
"Well as much as I enjoy the sight of people being scared passed pissing themselves I would think that making them soil their clothes would have little effect on the field."
The drill sergeant looked unfazed by her question and moved on to talk about protocols and weapons.
/2551, May 15/ insurrectionists firefight section s-056, Reach/ 1500 hours/
People moved in and out of the trenches filled with sand bags. The insurrectionists had decided to try to take over a few of the major towns in Reach to improve profit.
Dakodah was laying next to a bush with twigs on her helmate. She was wearing BDU with M52B body armor and her weapons she had been training with were a SRS99-S5 AM semi automatic sniper rifle along with the standard Battle Rifle.
The last month of training was hell. She was defiantly not the strongest or fastest but she at least could think for herself and aced any hypothetical situation.
She also was a crack-shot with a sniper and was good with hand to hand combat. Close quarters though were not her fortay. Right now there was gun fire hailing down from the other side.
The insurrectionists decided to do something cowardly. While the major forces are in outer colonies they decided to take over bigger districts attempting to get more money. The older recruits were already sent to away to bases so now the partly trained recruits and fresh newbies straight from local towns.
Giving kids guns and telling them 'go out and shoot anything that's not us' isn't a good idea... One of them even shot their own foot...
Koda locked onto one of the ranking officers on the other side. Zooming in she saw several reinforcements arriving and preparing for an old fashion charge to take over this section.
"SIR! The enemy's preparing to charge, I suggest we rally up some of the more experienced recruits, then strip the newbies down to lightcombat to have them run rabbit while the others flank um." Koda yelled from where she was at. All the recruits looked to the ranking officer and he nodded his head.
The newbies paled while the older recruits gathered what they had and prepared to leave. Dakodah was about to go with them when the sergeant yelled" All the non newbies listen to your new lance corporal! I know you won't make me regret making you in charge and having to go back on how much I brag about you to the other sergeants, right Ceil?"
Koda nodded and brushed the branches from her helmate. "I'll take point." She then lead the older recruits around the field into the trees without being spotted by the enemy. She had about thirty recruits following her. She stopped when she neared the enemy hold out.
Taking out her battle rifle she scoped in and saw some explosives near the main hold out. They were planning on sending in two twenty man units. This was going to be difficult. They were out numbered but the enemy should be out gunned...
Making a few hand signs she waved half the recruits with her to go ahead while signaling the other half to take out long ranged weapons. An easy tactic. Sending in one of two waves. With the newbies playing rabbit the closer ranged assault rifles of the older recruits would take the bulk of the enemy out with the last taking out long distances to medium distance.
Signaling half to be longer range to find better cover while the others to follow her lead she slowly crept to the side of the insurrection hold out. The assault team already in position. The newbies were about to run out onto the field. Everything was perfect for her plan.
At the signal of the newbies running onto the field at the same time the insurrectionists' first unit. As if on que the assault team flanked them from the left while the mid range fought from the right with snipers taking out the field unit.
Rushing out of cover Ceil took aim at the first person she saw and didn't hesitate to pull the trigger. A feeling akin to regret rested in the pit of her stomach. Pushing past it trying to settle with that they were attempting to hurt Reach thus her little brother helped her get through and continue firing at anything that shot back.
They were winning, barely, the enemy was better trained and had more experience then most recruits. The casualty rate however told a different story. Dakoda saw they already took out 2/3rds of the enemy and they were already down by 1/2.
Her battle rifle ran out of clips when someone tried to run at her with a knife. She did the most logical thing to do. Throw it at his head and whip out her sniper.
Retreating to behind a tree she lined up targets. The majority of her unit was pushed back to the field in a gory firefight while the midrangers were taking cover behind trees.
The majority of her targets were near the main hangout near explosives...
"Retreat back to sniping squad!" She yelled over the gunfire. They did as told. Firing one round the majority of the hold out was taken out with the lot of the enemy.
They began to run out onto the field past the smoke and picking off the rest of the insurrectionists. Koda was taking names and getting head shots left and right.
When all was said and done they lost more than half of what they started with. Dakodah looked at the carnage. Regret, pain, disgust, and sorrow filled her after her adrenalin wore out. She just killed them without mercy... Killed them like it was just plucking flowers from a meadow. A hand on her shoulder brought her out of her thoughts.
" You did a good thing Ceil. You save the majority of the newbies and those tactics of yours prevented more of us from dying." Sergeant said trying to calm her.
Dakodah whispered" I killed them without thought. What human being does that..."
The Sergeant frowned for a moment in thought and said" A soldier that's who. If you didn't do what you had to then you would be dead and so would have others...-he paused thinking What is keeping you going right now?"
Dakodah thought for a moment and said" My family, I promised to see them again." The Sergeant nodded and said" Remember that, they keep you from them. If you fail here, they would be next."