Red vs. Blue...vs. Green
Story One: I'm Living in a Cave
Chapter One: Nicknames and Body Parts
It was just like any other day in Blood Gulch; the sun was shining, the Halo was spinning and the Red and Blue outposts stood tall and mighty. Everything was just as it had been...except for one small thing; nobody was there. It had been a week since Command had received a message from Blood Gulch Outpost One and to be frank; they weren't that worried. This hadn't been the first time that both the Red and Blue teams had lost contact simultaneously. They had probably killed each other outright. Even so, Command sent their shallowest and worst to check out the situation of Blood Gulch Outpost One. In the nearby cave system, seven figures materialised. Seven Green figures. One of the figures was talking; "Hut, two, three four! Hut, two, three, four! Hut, two, three, four!"
Finally, the figures materialised into solid objects once more and stood, blinking (if they had eyes, they would) at those around them. The Sergeant continued; "Hut, two, three, four! Hut, two, three, four! Hut, two—"
"We're not even marching sir!" exclaimed Corporal Bob.
The Sergeant paused, checking to see that Bob's comment was accurate.
"Oh yes." he agreed...then took out his shotgun and shot Corporal Bob. "He was a brave man," he said, saluting the Corporal, "died with honour in the name of his planet…and I didn't even know his name."
"Because you shot him!" shouted the other Corporal, forgetting entirely what Bob had done before he'd been shot. The Sergeant raised the shotgun to the Corporal threateningly. "...Sir."
"Better." enthused the Sergeant, lowering the shotgun. He turned to the five remaining squad members, looking them up and down. "Morning ladies." The others turned to each other, a little confused.
"We're men sir." said the small Private uneasily but with a hint of admiration. The description of 'small' for the Private is more mentally than physically.
"Really?" enquired the Sergeant, taken aback. "Wow, I did not see that one coming. Anyway," he cleared his throat, "I am your commanding officer. You don't know my name and I don't wanna know yours...so let's keep it that way."
The Lieutenant standing beside the dead Corporal was bemused; this wasn't exactly the pep talk he'd expected. "Excuse me…commanding officer…what happens when we're in the field and one of us needs to be signalled."
"Yeah," piped up the surviving Corporal once more, "we can't just call out 'Hey you' and hope for the best."
The Sergeant rounded on them. "Well I won't just call out 'Hey you', will I. I'll add some distinguishing features like…height." The squad members surveyed each other from a distance, sizing each other up. Finally, they all came to one conclusion.
"I think we're all about the same height sir." informed the small Private, again including admiration in his tone.
The Sergeant thought once more, it must be said, with great difficulty. He was never taught about nicknames in basic training. These are the same people who told him to call his squad 'Ladies'. "Then…hair colour." he suggested.
"I don't think we can see our hair. Plus…I can't remember what my hair looks like." said the small Private, his annoying voice grating the ears of the rest of the squad. He did however make a good point; none of them could remember what their hair looked like.
"Yeah, me neither." agreed the Corporal.
"Whatever it was, I reckon mine looked horrible." droned the second Private in the corner. Wherever he was, it didn't sound happy.
"Does anyone have a birthmark on any particular place?" enquired the Sergeant, now getting a little desperate.
The Lieutenant had had enough. Whoever had decided to send down this idiot of a Sergeant had clearly gotten their wires crossed...or his. "I don't think we-"
"I do." interrupted the commanding officer. "I've got a birthmark on the tip of my-"
"Sergeant!" shouted the Lieutenant, the squad thankful for him doing so.
"How'd you know what it was called?" asked the Sergeant.
"Sir," began the Lieutenant calmly, wanting to end this thread of the conversation as quickly as humanly possible. "I don't think physical features will count. We're all conveniently wearing armour because it keeps our identities a secret, makes no assumptions about our history and on an unrelated note is a lot easier to animate."
"Well..." thought the Sergeant, looking down for inspiration as everyone does. It didn't help. "I guess we'll have to resort to calling ourselves by armour colour." It took a few moments before he realised that they were all wearing differing shades of Green, and a few seconds more before it dawned on the Sergeant that he only knew the name of one of those shades; Green.
"Perhaps nicknames would be good." suggested the small Private brightly, bobbing up and down. "I'm sure you'll be good at them sir."
"Son, your words are coming out of my mouth…because you're so far up my arse." It should be pointed out that the Sergeant was no stranger to suck-ups. The Private however was a stranger to insults in general.
"Very funny sir, you burned me bad." laughed the small Private, turning light red under his green armour, or whatever you call it.
"First things first, I need a nickname. Something unique, cool and simple. It must have finesse, character and says something about my intelligence."
"I guess 'Einstein' is out of the question." muttered the Corporal.
"Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh...ooh!" jittered the small Private. "Ooh, we should call you 'Twelve'."
"Why's that?" asked The Commander.
"Because, out of a rating of ten," began the Private, "you're twelve." The Sergeant had been in several encounters where the enemy was tough, trained and outnumbered him three hundred million to one. Even so, nothing had made him as scared as he was of this little person. Just to be safe, he inched his way backwards to a distance he deemed acceptable. Unfortunately, the wall was in the way, so he had to make do with that.
"Right, to be frank," he assessed, "all of your suggestions sucked. They utterly, utterly sucked. You and Suck could go to see Sucker Punch, suck a frozen Coke through a straw and wear an 'I'm With Suck' T-Shirt. And you'd still have to pay for all the food and the tickets...which would suck" The squad quietly agreed; that was quite frank. "From now on, Icome up with the nicknames."
Two and a half hours later…
No one had moved, nothing had been said and the Sergeant had come up with only one possible nickname; "Well, I guess since I'm a Sergeant...I should be called Sarge." It was at this moment that a sniper's bullet zoomed close to the Sergeant's head and hit the wall behind him. He didn't care who shot at him, he didn't care to go after them, all the Sergeant knew was that, whoever it was, didn't like him using that name and that he was not willing to die for it. "I guess it doesn't suit me anyway." he said, launching back down the difficult road to intelligent thought. There was really only one nickname that he had always wanted. This was his chance. "Maybe 'The Commander'."
"But that's longer than Sarge." complained the Lieutenant again but The Commander had already made up his mind.
"Maybe so, but I'm sure you boys will be more than happy to stand up for the two point three seconds it would take to shout out my name in the line of fire out of cover and in the direct path of enemy bullets, shells, grenades, missiles and searing plasma bursts just to signal me to retreat." The Commander glared at his Lieutenant for a moment before the silence was broken again.
"Sir, I think we need to act quickly to save you."
"What? Assassination?" The Commander ducked and weaved ridiculously.
"No, if your head goes any further up your arse then we'll be left without an ego to take cover behind." The Lieutenant chuckled to himself and the remaining Corporal sniggered but quickly stopped himself as he didn't want to be Swiss Cheese. The Commander paused to think of a clever comeback.
"Fuck you Lieutenant...Phill." he eventually decided. Not the best comeback, but definitely the worst.
"Actually sir, it's Peter Hill." said the Lieutenant dryly. He wasn't surprised that The Commander got his name wrong, what with everything that he had done since meeting them.
"Says here in my helmet 'Phill'."
"No, it says P. Hill." he corrected. "P. Hill." The Lieutenant hoped that this had gotten through to The Commander, his helmet couldn't be that thick. He then noticed that The Commander had taken out his rocket launcher and was carefully aiming it at the Lieutenant's feet. "I guess Phill works fine."
"I knew it would." I'm good at naming things." It was at that point that the only Corporal left leant closer to the small Private and the only other member of the squad who hadn't said a word to whisper a witty comment.
Unfortunately, all he could come up with was; "Think he can name the thing that's growing where his dick should be?" The Commander, being only four feet away and standing on the same noise-bouncing cave, heard the remark and turned to berate the Corporal vocally.
"Well now, what do we have here?" he began in true Sergeant fashion, just like he was taught. "And what do you wanna be called? Talkie McFuckmunch? Sucka MyDick? Likieda Anal? Scrabble Da-Ass? Kite-Ninja-Bitch-Under-The-Reach-Around-Sex...Fuck?"
"You swear too often sir."
"Load of crap! But I have to admire your balls."
"Not while I've got my strength, you won't." joked the Corporal, but it went unnoticed and The Commander continued.
"What are you called?"
"Ben Dover."
"Ben Dover?"
"Not on your life. It's actually Holden."
"What can I do with a first name? What's your last one?"
"McGroin."
"Holden McGroin."
"Better yours than mine." laughed the Corporal. This was totally worth the outcome.
"Son," began The Commander, "you tell me your name...or there won't be a person to give a name to."
The Corporal removed his previous thought.
"Harry Friend."
"Friend?" scoffed The Commander. He took a few steps towards the lonely Corporal, pretending to be taller than he actually was. He circled the lower rank just out of punching distance. "We have no friends here."
"I'm your friend sir!" cooed the small Private, hand high in the air, hopping to get attention.
"Eat dick, wiseass!" spat The Commander without looking.
"Right away sir!" and with that, the small Private ran to the dull one in the corner. No one looked because no one cared.
"It's Sunday school all over again." complained the dull Private, but, again, no one cared. The Commander continued his speech.
"No friends. Not you, not me, not the Reds, not the Blues, not that sock Phill wanks in whenever he thinks of his mummy."
"Hey!" piped Phill to no avail.
"I suggest another name. A tougher, powerful, angry name. Enemy!" he announced with a sense of occasion. To him, it was everything a soldier needed.
"That..." began the Corporal, "...is..." he continued, "...the worst name I have ever heard suggested to anyone for anything...ever...in the history of this war and I would be doing mankind a favour by ignoring your suggestion."
"But," rebutted The Commander, taking a step forward and brandishing his shiny rocket launcher, "as you know, my suggestions are final." The Corporal was thankful he was wearing armour or The Commander might've seen him sweat.
"Enemy it is sir." he enthused.
"Excellent!" The Commander moved along to the silent Private standing next to Enemy. "And you? Who are you?"
"Ooh, ooh! Sir, I'm afraid his voice filter and outgoing radio isn't working. He can't say a thing." said the small Private, enjoying it somehow. "But I can tell you his name."
"Yes, what's his name?"
" Name."
"Yeah, tell me his name."
"Name."
"First and last."
"Name."
"Fucks sake son," broke off The Commander, pausing this tennis match of a conversation, "you tell me that Private's name or you'll be like a fart in a candle factory."
"Private Name."
"It don't be private here, you tell me his name or I'll fill you so full of rockets you'll make it back to Earth faster than the fleet."
"His name is Name."
"Bullshit."
"Name."
" Bullshit."
" Name."
" Bullshit."
" Name."
" Bullshit."
Needless to say, this could have carried on a lot longer if it hadn't been for Phill's interruption of; "Sir!"
"Hold on there," ordered The Commander, "we've got a wiser arse than you and I won't let him make me kiss it!"
"But his name is Private Name." insisted Phill. "That is what he is called; Name."
"Then why the fuck didn't you tell me?" The Commander rounded on the small Private. Phill sighed. Why did he have to be stuck with the only Sergeant who was a few bullets short of a magazine? The Commander's next conversation thread didn't ease Phill's suffering. "You're weird Name...what's your first name?"
"Unknown." answered Phill.
"Wasn't he given one?"
"No sir, his first name is Unknown." Even Phill couldn't believe it when he said it. "Private Unknown Name."
"Jesus son," said The Commander turning to Name, "I feel sorry for ya. From now on, you shall be called...Name."
Name attempted to discern how far they had come from giving him a nickname from his real name and in that second he realised three things; one: his nickname was his name; two: he hated everyone around him; and three: he hated everything around him, especially everyone. Unfortunately, he couldn't do anything about it so he remained quiet and decided to stare at the ground for inspiration. It didn't work.
"And who are you?" enquired The Commander to the small Private who was the only one who wasn't at ease. Even his helmet couldn't hide the wide grin that seemed to penetrate it.
"I am your mechanic!" cheered the soldier enthusiastically, with pride and a hint of a tone that can only be described as arse-kissing-er. "I am ready to do my duty inside and between the rank of Private to make you happy...because...I am a Private."
"I think I might get you to vacuum this cave" started The Commander, working an insult into his sentence, "the way you suck up son." It didn't seem to have the desired effect.
"Yes sir, good one sir." piped the soldier happily. If anything, his hidden smile seemed to grow.
"And you name is?"
"Troy Virgil Parts, sir."
"Okay then," said The Commander without any interest, "you will be called Parts. Congratulations Private." and before Parts could say another word to him, The Commander walked to the last of the squad. Parts decided to reflect on his happy few seconds in private but also in earshot of everyone else.
"Oh my God. My own nickname!" he whispered in exclamation. "I'm so honoured to be given a name from the Commander. I shall always keep the name of Private Parts" He sighed at his luck. Then a thought occurred. "Wait." But nobody was interested and The Commander had moved on anyway to the sulking soldier.
"Who are you?" asked The Commander.
"Captain Larry." moaned the third Private. The Commander seemed to regret asking him any question at all, as did everybody else.
"Why do you sound so down?" he continued under duress. He tried to change the subject; "You should be happy to die for me."
"It's not that" droned the soldier in the corner. He paused and sighed as if it was an effort just to talk, let alone breathe. "It's the colour armour I was given. Its the wrong shade of green."
"Yes." agreed The Commander. Suddenly, the entire squad was interested, staring at the unique colour of his green. "It does look a little glum."
"Sludge-like." concurred Enemy.
"Repulsive." concurred Phill.
"Off-putting." concurred Parts.
Name nodded.
"Yet distinguished." admitted The Commander.
"Unique." concurred Enemy.
"Familiar." concurred Phill.
"Strong." concurred Parts.
Name nodded.
"It does look familiar." thought The Commander but whatever it was didn't come to him. "What do you think it is?" he finally asked the sulking soldier.
"It always seemed to be snot to me, but I don't want to talk about-"
"Snot!" interrupted The Commander, forgetting his squad member altogether. "That's what it is!"
"I thought so." concurred Enemy.
"Looked familiar." concurred Phill.
"Well put." concurred Parts.
Name nodded.
"You will be Snot." proclaimed The Commander, but resisted the urge to pat him on the shoulder. Snot thought about this name for a few annoying seconds in silence.
"Why?" he finally asked.
"Because it suits you." pushed The Commander. Snot thought about this too.
"No it doesn't." he said bluntly.
"Yes it does." pushed The Commander again. Snot thought. He will do this a lot.
"I would really like to change that name." he said.
"Well, you tell me another name you would like in the next three seconds" said The Commander brightly, "and I will consider changing the name to one that-Whoops, time's up! You've got Snot." And with that, The Commander quickly walked back to the spot where he had landed. Snot, you guessed it, thought about the last few minutes he had spent on this planet and his luck so far. As he did the calculations, he looked to the ground for support. It didn't work.
"Right," addressed The Commander, "move out ladies-I'm sorry! Damn it! You're all men." He cleared his throat, ready to try that again. "Move out men."
Several seconds of silence and a lack of movement began and ended several seconds later. The Commander tried that again. "I said move out."
"Where to sir?" enquired Phill. This question seemed to get The Commander in a bind; even he didn't know where they should go. He checked over his options which were two caves that lead to the outside world, or at least the outside box valley.
"Umm...this way." he pointed to the right.
"That leads straight to the Red base." chimed Parts, happy with himself.
"Umm...ok," considered The Commander, "that way."
"That leads to the Blue base sir." chirped Parts.
"Ok, umm...this way." He pointed to the right.
"That leads to the Red base again sir." repeated Parts.
"Right, uhh..."
It was at this instance that Phill had had enough. "There are only two exits from this cave sir." he began, teeth gritted. "One leads to the Red base and the other leads to the Blue base, both of which are our enemies so if we do in fact move out from this spot we will be immediately shot on sight, so, for the moment, the only place we should really be moving out to should be...oh...um...here!" The squad looked from Phill to The Commander and back to Phill again in an awkward silence.
"Watch duty." snapped The Commander.
"Oh crap!" swore Phill. He didn't want to get killed this early.
"Ha-ha," teased Enemy, "you got watch duty."
"You go with him." ordered The Commander.
"Oh crap." echoed Enemy.
"Phill, watch his back," he looked between them, "and Enema, you watch his."
"Sir, its Enemy."
"It's a little difficult to remember."
"You gave it to me yourself!"
"Move out!" commanded The Commander. As Phill left the cave he was quite glad that even though he could get killed on watch, at least it wouldn't be around or by his 'superior officer' and instead by the enemy and Enemy...uh, the enemy troops and Enemy...Enemy and-Oh, fuck it. You get the point. As Phill entered the sunlight, he let out a sigh of relief; at least out here he could escape from his Sergeant's stupidity.
"And see if you can find another way out." boomed the voice of The Commander down the tunnel.
"Oh my God! You just don't fucking get it!"
It was a nice clear day outside the cave. Natural life carried on as it had for centuries on Halo. It was peaceful, silent, safe.
"Shit! This is a goddamn disappointment." shouted Enemy almost as soon as he saw the outside world.
"You were going to say that no matter what, weren't you?" asked Phill after shitting his armour then composing himself after realising that there was no one there to kill them.
"Everything's a goddamn disappointment to me." growled Enemy. "You were in basic, you tell me. Didn't those babes there just disappoint you?"
"I wouldn't know. I never saw their faces."
"Exactly!" shouted Enemy again. If he kept this up, Phill was gonna have to shoot him. "What about this place then? One valley, two bases, nothing and no one to fight against. Dis-a-fucking-pointing."
"Would you rather being shot at?" enquired Phill, already knowing the answer that was to follow. He just hoped that someone would hear Enemy talking and take a few pot shots almost entirely directed at his face.
"Hell yeah! I'd give anything to have somebody shooting at me."
"That can be arranged."
"Atten-tion!" shot The Commander. He paused, sniffing the air. "Why does it smell like shit out here?"
"Sir, there appears to be no one outside." informed Phill.
"They're all probably knee deep in their own piss, too afraid to stand up to a man like me."
"What kind of a man would that be?" enquired Phill to himself. "One with girl bits?"
"Goddamn disappointment." said The Commander.
"Told ya."
"I guess I should inform the other Corporal."
"The other Corporal is dead sir." said Enemy blatantly. "You shot him, remember?"
"Yes, that's right. Oh well, poor lad. At least he served his planet well...and will do so later when he's served at dinner."
"B-b-but what about the rations?" stammered Phill incredulously.
"Are you kidding?" argued The Commander. "I would never pass up fried Corporal over shitty rations! Fubar, you hear. Fubar."
"It doesn't matter what kind of bar they packed sir," rebutted Phill, "they were issued for a reason a-"
"Oh, shove a foot in it!" interrupted Enemy. "Bob's foot to be precise. And don't bother arguing with The Commander; he's gone." Phill looked up where The Commander had been. He had definitely already left.
"Sautéed or fricasseed?" posed The Commander from within the cave. Enemy was joining him now, returning through the tunnel.
Phill sighed; "The agony of choice." and joined his squad inside. They then proceeded to pluck the Corporal, roast him and pass him out.
"I want the wing." barked The Commander.
"There is no wing, he's not a chicken sir." corrected Parts.
"Private Parts, zip it!"
"Immediately sir."
"Who's got the ovaries?" enquired Phill.
"I think I got a pair." responded Enemy.
"I thought so."
"Pass me his pancreas." droned Snot. "It's about the most awful organ in the body and I want two."
"Name, what did you want?" asked Parts.
Name turned to Parts, seething through his armour at the idea that this idiot didn't remember that an hour ago he had explained that he couldn't talk at all.
"He doesn't want whatever you wanna give him. He needs a man's meal." stated The Commander. "Give him the goolies. Who's gotten hold if Bob's genitals?"
"As much as I would like to see where this goes sir," stopped Phill, "I think we should go over the battle strategy that Command gave us."
"Good idea. Put Bob's bits down everyone." Everyone continued to chew on Bob loudly. "There isn't really much to the orders. They simply say 'Win'."
"What? No plans, no strategies, nothing?"
"Winning is a strategy Lieutenant. It's one I've used all my life in combat."
"And how many times has it worked?"
"Not sure really," admitted The Commander, picking at Bob's nails, "I never really stuck around much as they were going terribly bad on our end but I remain confident that we pulled through in the end and gave the enemy a thorough licking."
"You're sure?"
"Yes I'm sure; all the supplies were gone. What else were we going to eat?" enquired The Commander taking a bite out of Bob's big toe. "You're very wound up for a Lieutenant."
"I just prefer to be with a group of people who know what they're doing rather than a bunch of incompetents. I pray nightly for it."
"Oh good."
"God hasn't exactly answered my prayers as of yet but I hope he'll get round to me soon."
"Well, don't wait up. Now," The Commander returned to audience the squad, "there may be no guards on the outside but I can guarantee that they'll be waiting on the inside with God knows what weaponry at their disposal."
"Sir," began Parts, waving a hand in the air, "they'd probably have our level of weaponry; we're on the same team."
"People can go stir fry crazy when trapped in an enclosed space with a group of idiots running about." declared The Commander.
"Amen to that." breathed Snot.
"These soldiers may have broken off from us," continued The Commander, "and engineered their own firearms."
"So what you're saying," summarised Phill, "is that our own men and women stationed at Blood Gulch Outpost One have been fighting each other for so long that they got sick of each other and started fighting amongst themselves. Then they stripped themselves of all modern armoury and proceeded to create more advanced weaponry out of limited resources, namely; their armour, their guns, their rations, grass and a few pebbles; and are now presently residing inside their bases waiting to kill us."
"And your problem with this theory is?" enquired The Commander, tossing Bob's leg round in his hand.
Phill considered for a moment. "Nothing." he assured and went back to his dinner.
"Good," broke away The Commander, "now my strategy is to wait until nightfall and then enter the bases one at a time in a pincer movement; Phill and Parts will take the left, Enemy and Snot will take the right and Name will take the roof. You will trap our allies from within and kill them. Questions?"
"I know I don't have one sir." piped Parts. "I heard your plan and I loved it."
"Name, you're being awfully quiet." noticed The Commander. "Why don't you share your opinion?"
Name sat there in a sullen silence. In his mind, he dreamed of being far away on a distant woodland world. A slight breeze filtered the air and weaved the blades of grass like the waves in the ocean. The trees were green and the blue sky shimmered like sapphire. And then hundreds of naked women parachuted down from the sky.
It was at this point he realised just how unlikely that would be and remembered where he was and hated it.
Everyone else on the other hand thought he was being philosophical in his silence and liked it.
"Very profound." admired The Commander. "Right, I think you all agree and will be able to remember; we move out at nightfall."
Thirty-six hours later...
"Fuuuuuuuuuuck!" exclaimed The Commander. "It's still daytime!"