-1Disclaimer: I do not own and never will own halo that belongs to Bungie studios I only came up with the story of this individual piece of fan fiction so please don't kill me Mr. layer man.

Note: Hey guys this is my first fan fiction so please leave me reviews and tell me what you think praise and constructive criticism is highly welcome but please no flaming that doesn't help anyone thanks guys hope you enjoy it.

Ps this first chapter is set in first person consisting of the characters inner monologue except for the first bit in italics which is a journal extract.

WARNING: due to violence and swearing this is not recommended to kids or those who are offended by such things so im rating this as M for mature but if your like me and love those kind of things then go on right ahead I wont stop you now will I.

The Forgotten Memoirs

Chapter 1: Prologue

"They say war never changes but I cant quite say if I agree or disagree its probably a mixture of both if that's even possible . True the underlying points of war are constant one force trying to defeat another by forcing a surrender, a submission if you will of the enemy or failing that there complete annihilation . That is the one constant in all wars past, present and future and that will never change for man god nor beast it is set in proverbial stone unmovable by anything no matter how powerful or ancient. What does change is the enemy, tactics, weapons and so many variables its to hard to count nor care for when fighting for your very life and so I wont bother to list them all. What I can tell you though is war isn't just whether the cause your fighting for is or not. War is brutal . War is savage and it will take everything of your being and crush it before your very eyes as the world you knew crumbles around you in a torrent of blood rain and ashes it doesn't care who the victor is, all it cares about is how many people its demonic hands can maim murder and kill before no one is left to fight . It would gladly destroy whole worlds and every man women and child in existence if it could. War it is a plague, a disease on the face of the galaxy one that will never die, and the reason for that is it is in man's very nature a primal bloodlust at our very core not just of humanity but every other thinking living breathing being in existence and that is why there will be no cure…" - The last pages in corporal Ryan Stave diary. Reported as MIA 2549 human-covenant war.

2544

Planet Deltan in the outer colonies

Somewhere in the desert region….

Ash and smoke fouled the air and burned my lungs as if the fire surrounding me and my squad burned within my very own lungs. My eyes felt as if someone had pierced them with shards of glass and poured salt into the wound. I could hear men and women dieing all around me their lives cut short by super heated plasma tearing through their flesh, incinerating muscle bone and organs like a candle to a piece of paper. The agonized screams of death pounded at my head like a jackhammer blow to my very core everyone of them a smash on my already shattered mind but there was nothing I could do to save them they were all going to die and that was it. We were being slaughtered like cattle by the inhuman beasts who were becoming closer and closer like an evil plague of locust destroying everything they came across and leaving nothing but death and pestilence. They called themselves Jiralhanae but we called them brutes, vicious monsters tearing men apart like dolls of a child and causing said men to cry for there mothers just like those children who wail for the loving embrace of their parents in the night after a bad dream. But no this was more than a simple bad dream that one wakes up from this, this was a nightmare in reality one that stole your breath and your life driving fear into your very core, your very soul leaving your paralysed and vulnerable. We'd already lost Peters and Andrews shortly after the drop-off. Andrews chest was blown apart from a combine needler attack. When the shards hit him he just froze in shock I made eye contact with him moments before the explosion which caved his chest in before sending me hurtling and about a thousand pieces of his organs in a 20 m radius. The sight of his exposed ribs and mangled corpse combined with the smell of burning flesh made me vomit I'll never forget the look in his dead eyes one of horror and excruciating pain that plagued his face in the moments before death. We lost Peters not soon after, a particle beam rifle just bore a hole right through his skull and the shot kept on going, at least he didn't feel any pain like Andrews did I can take a tiny piece of solace in that but again id never forgot that sight either they were both good men neither deserved an end like that. Hell no one did but unfortunately fate and the covenant had other plans. This mission was a giant cluster fuck that was the only way to describe it and im betting the brass knew it hell those ONI bastards probably even planed it as a distraction for some covert black ops, so much for good luck on your first mission recruits, we were nothing but cannon fodder, expendable units expected to die. But not all of us did. Correction I didn't.

I could barely see anything in the thick dust infused sandstorm if it wasn't for the constant bombardment from plasma rounds I wouldn't even know which direction the enemy was advancing from. There was only me Thomas and the sarge left. Thomas was the first to go got stuck by a random plasma grenade. He took one look at us and then dived out towards the enemy from behind the crashed pelican we were using as cover. A muffled explosion signalled his death. I hope he got some of those covenant fuckers for us it's the least he deserved to take some of them with him to the grave. I reloaded and noticed I was down to my last magazine for my ma5B assault rifle. I guess this was it straight out of boot cap and into the grave like so many before me. With no idea whatsoever if the brutes and their grunt minions were close I sprayed the last of my ammo over our cover and heard the satisfying howls of two grunts and the death growl of one of those giant apes. As I stared at my now empty gun sarge stood up to throw his last fragmentation grenade when a burst of plasma hit him directly in the chest plate burning straight through it. Seeing as my gun was empty I threw it down and ran to his prone figure. I yanked his armour off revealing his blackened scorched, burned chest. He squeezed my hand tight as I pleaded like an infant for him not to go. I couldn't die alone. He reached around his neck with his spare hand and tore off his locket and squeezed it into my hand. His eyes looked at me once more before his body went limp and collapsed, the blood from his mouth and wounds pouring over me like a red river of death staining my uniform and my hands a deep shade of burgundy, but I didn't care anymore I tried being a man and sucking it up and failed and I'd cried and balled all I could till I couldn't no longer neither had worked. I was going to die alone with no one by my side. Id watched my friends and fellow marines all fall one by one around me and now it was my turn. A cold comfort washed over me I had accepted the inevitable and that there was nothing I could do. I Stood up and faced towards the covenant siege with my eyes closed and my arms out wide embracing my end however it may come.

That's when it happened the biggest explosion I'd ever heard. The light seared through my already closed eyelids leaving my retinas nowhere to hide and causing incredible pain in my eyes and head. My ears popped and something sticky ran down the sides of my head mixing with the blood of my comrades on my already stained armour. After the light faded and the rumbling clash that reminded me of thunder had faded all was silenced and I realised that the miles of fuel pipes under the dirt and sand must have gone off due to the excessive amount of explosions from on the battle field. Three tonnes of oil passed through those pipes every hour. Humanity didn't really use fossil fuels any more preferring to rely on renewable hydrogen fusion energy but this late in the war the UNSC was taking scraping together any resources it could get its hands on including oil. By luck or by fate it managed to ignite from under the ground killing everything around it. Some would have called it a miracle but I would rather call it a bitter twist of irony pushing me to the brink. I opened my eyes when I realised I was the only living thing left on the battle scarred wasteland. I wasn't dead. I had survived when no one else human or otherwise had. I sank to the floor and from somewhere deep in my body found the ability to cry once more and that what I did over everything that had just happened and the cruelty of it all. The fact that I should have died was the last thing that passed through my mind before I succumbed to the darkness of unconsciousness brought on by exhaustion or shock is that it should've been me. Then the world faded to black…

Thanks for reading guys hope you enjoyed perhaps I'll continue hopefully I will but that depends if anyone has reviewed as it's the only way I'll know you've checked this out so thanks once again guys.