A/N: This is my first Fanfic. Please review and please no flaming. I do not own any stuff from the Halo world but I do own the characters. Thank you. Enjoy the Story

BOOM!

The sound of the M9 fragmentation grenade rendered me temporarily deaf. All I could hear was a loud buzzing noise even though I was right in the middle of a large fire fight. I was caught in a middle of a large firefight between my platoon and possibly a large sized enemy patrol. I am Corporal Lloyd Ferros of 1st platoon, Easy company, 21st battalion, 501st ODST divison. We were the tip of the spearhead, heading to recapture the capital of Knossos, Xenion. The covenant had attacked the planet and sent troops and captured the capital before any sizeable defensive actions could be prepared. My divison was on of the most experienced in the whole UNSC and we were the first to be deployed and was immediately sent to recapture the capital. The planet's land surface was covered by 60 of thick dense forest so it was inevitable that the approach to the capital was by foot. It was priority to capture the city before the covenant finish what it is doing so my battalion was sent on a big long trek while the rest of the divison create large roads from the original landing zone to the capital and other cities. All our vehicles were assigned to the other battalions to use and take care of while we took back the city. Since we had no vehicles to support us, multiple squadrons of pelicans, hornets, sparrowhawks, skyhawks and shortswords. We even have the support of two armed-to-the-teeth Vultures who will be providing a large amount of fire from above with its rocket pods and chain guns. Within the next two hours, our grizzly's will move up and be able to fire on the capital city with its anti-vehicle rockets.

As the buzzing noise in my ears died down, the sound of resounding gunfire from both my platoon and the covenant's fire was overwhelming. All of the soldiers from my platoon were opening fire with everything they had from their cover. When we ran into the covenant, everyone just jumped behind any cover that we could find. I was on the flank of the platoon's advance with my spotter. I was the platoon's designated sharpshooter with Private First Class Greg Longhi as my spotter. We were both friends since we met each other at the scout/sniper school. Greg was hiding behind a large boulder to my right while I found myself in a small ditch. My primary weapon was the M99 Special Application Scoped Rifle or as many people call it the M99 Stanchion Gauss Rifle. It uses the same technology as the Gauss Cannon on the warthog but also the MAC cannons. It was 20kg which is very heavy for a sniper rifle but I accept the weight for it has a large 10 bullet magazine with a range of 4.5km. This rifle has saved me through very tough times. Enemy fire was concentrated on our centre so I was able to move quietly out of my ditch and get to an area further to the right so I could get a good shot off. Greg covered my whole move across with his battle rifle. I got to a place and had a perfect sight of a brute captain controlling his troop movements. By this time, half the covenant force was dead but there were a few really good targets left.

I lowered my rifle and aimed right at the body of the brute captain. The Stanchion could easy rip through the brute even with its power armour. I inhaled a breath and squeezed the trigger. It made a slight noise and a bullet ripped through the brute with its hyper velocity bullet. I quickly changed my target and aimed at a brute minor that was still alive. I took another shot and killed my second target of the day. To conserve my ammo, I took out my M6C and began picking off the grunts who were running around confused because their leader was dead. My platoon quickly advanced and killed all the remaining covenant troops before they could retreat. Our commanding officer, Lieutenant Jessica Monte, was standing in a small clearing, surrounded by covenant dead, and called for the rest of the platoon to gather around her.

"Alright men, we gotta continue onwards besides our casualties. They will be med evaced soon by Pelicans. Two Pelicans are going to be sent down to collect our wounded and dead. With Bravo missing three soldiers and Alpha missing none, we need to have Alpha take the point and bravo follow up. We need to move fast and capture the capital back. The Grizzlys will then be ready to provide some artillery support. Its just a few miles left and we can do it really fast with all the air support and fire support that we have. I want Charlie squad to stay on our right flank to provide sniper support and as a scout to look for any covenant patrols. I want you guys to take them out as fast as possible. Alright everyone 3 metre spread and we go hard and fast."

Our squad moved out just as instructed with Greg and I on the far right hand flank. We were at least 10 metres to the right of the main body of the platoon and in line with the men on point of the other squads. My Stanchion was out and ready to fire while Greg was holding his battle rifle in an attacking stance. We were getting close to the city and it was going to get dangerous. After hiking around the dense and damp forest for another hour and taking down several small covenant patrols quickly, we reached the outskirts of the city. A huge covenant warship looked like it was decomissioned and on standby over the city. It cast a large shadow over the city causing almost total darkness as only a part of the sun was reflected down onto the city. Jessica called for a full stop for all the units of the squad and spoke:

"We are at the city and our support is ready for the assault. We need to clear the way of enemy positions which may cause trouble for our soldiers. Air support will be almost everything that we have including two Vultures. Also some Grizzly's and Rhinos have set up ready to provide artillery support. I don't want anyone doing anything too rash especially against Wraiths. The Grizzly's anti-vehicle missles can take care of it and the Vultures or Pelicans or Sparrowhawks or Hornets can take down anything else. Make sure you guys call in support for anything worth it." she commanded,"We move in squads with Alpha taking centre and Bravo taking a longer route and cutting through soft covenant resistance to take the mayor's office back. We think there may be prisoners there. Charlie, you two need to provide some sniper support for the intial attack and then follow Bravo. There is a large bell tower there where you can begin to sniper any covenant targets. The bell tower is taller than any other building by a lot. Make sure to take out any hunters, elites and brutes out first. They are the most dangerous to our troops. We attack on my command."

Greg and I moved to a good position with a great field of fire and then went prone to help the accuracy of the fire. Firing on the run with the Stanchion is almost impossible because of its intense weight on 20kg. In my backpack I had 13 more clips for the Stanchion and Greg held 10 extra clips to add to my firepower. All this ammunition will allow for me to take out many enemies with the powerful range and power of the sniper. I preferred the Stanchion from the other sniper rifles because of its large range, accuracy and penetrating power. It is an anti-material rifle so a single bullet could pierce through a ghost and kill its driver. Laying prone I began to inspect the amount of covenant defenders which were stationed around the area we were going to breach. We would support Alpha until they got into the city where then we would move to support Bravo and punch through the lines with Bravo. Bravo would capture the mayor's office and Alpha would clear out covenant resistance street by street. Everyone had loaded up a lot of ammunition and supplies for this mission. Everyone was overloaded with bullets to kill the covenant and hold our positions. I could see around a company strength covenant formation. Our air support will begin with a pass on the covenant positions and afterwards Jessica would commence the attack. There was apparently a divison of covenant soldiers in the city defending it. We all braced ourselves for the major fight ahead.

Thats the end of the first chapter. Sorry if it seemed short.