New Mombasa: the soldier's war

Summary: The story of a soldier during the Battle of New Mombasa.

Disclaimer: I assure you, completely, that I am not making any sort of monetary profit off of this. All I own is: Phalanx (Gears of War), Arctic Fugitives (Left 4 Dead), and the OC's in this fic.

Setting: The area in and around New Mombasa, Kenya during the time of the covenant invasion of Earth, taking place in the time space around Halo 2 and Halo 3.

Chapter 1: The road from Mogadishu

My name is Private Icharus Secundius Perseus, and I am a soldier in the human war against the covenant. I joined the Army four years ago. Not the Marines, not the Navy, the Army. I have never seen action before. Now I am traveling in the side seat of a warthog on the road from Mogadishu to New Mombasa. The army base back in Somalia got shut down due to lack of funding; command's pruning the vine to cut expenses from this war. In my platoon, we're all kind of pissed. We've been sitting around for as long as we can remember, hearing about the legendary exploits of the Spartan II supersoldiers, and the USMC. Most of us haven't ever seen a grunt up close, save for a few of the veterans here.

"Percy." said the gunner on my hog. He was straining to make out something in the sky.

"What?" I ask.

"Look up at the sky. Something's going on." I crane my neck. Above us, in the blue sky, there are explosions.

"Sarge, what's going on here?" asks a new recruit, his hands trembling with fear.

Our sergeant looks up at the sky and then orders: "Floor it; put the pedal to the metal; it's the covenant!" I grip the Battle Rifle in my lap.

Over the radio, our noncom, Lieutenant Tokke yells: "Driver: step on it! Get inside the city, move move move! Gunners, warm up those turrets! Passengers: lock and load; this is it!" We could see the megatropolis in the distance. We had to get out of the open where we were exposed. I pulled out my sidearm: an M6D pistol. I cock the hammer, but leave the safety on.

The battle above draws closer, we zoom towards the city. The gunners unlock their turrets, spinning around a couple times to get the platform working. They all look towards the sky expectantly. The man on my turret: Corporal Greg, points the mounted rocket launcher up at the sky. I load the grenade launcher underslung from my rifle.

The city is so close now; I can made out the individual buildings on the outskirts, when suddenly, blue plasma strafes the highway. My driver, PFC Cinders startles, nearly darting off course. I put my hand on his shoulder: "You're going to make it; keep on course." he swallows, and holds the wheel with gritty determination. Behind me, I hear the rocket turret go off.

"Take that, you bastards!" yells Greg. His missile hits an approaching banshee, destroying the craft. It falls shrouded by blue flames.

"There's more of em'!" shouts Tokke. The rest of the convoys mounted guns open fire into a group of oncoming banshees, decimating the group. Suddenly, a green orb flies from a banshee, and strikes the hog next to us, killing everyone.

I hold my fire, scared. I can't get a shot on the flyers. Into my helmet radio, I yell: "Passengers, watch the surroundings!" Just as I finish saying this, I turn to my right. I see elites on ghosts face to face. "Ghosts to the right!" I yell. The training took over. The elite in red armor is closing quickly, but he won't make it. I raise my BR, aiming down the sights. I squeeze the grenade launcher button, waiting for him to come a little closer. At a hundred meters away, I fire my grenade. The explosive projectile zooms through the air, hitting the ghost on the side, exploding something. The elite dies in the blast. Undeterred, his fellows charge us.

Quickly, I try to reload my grenade launcher. Tokke orders four warthog gunners to fire into the ghosts. They're coming too fast. I let off another grenade, which struck an elite in the head, turning him into a bloody mess. We're at the outskirts of the city now. Suddenly, a purple aircraft appears flying out from the city. Over the city, there are covenant ships, their gravity lifts deployed.

The purple dropship, identified as a "phantom" let fly a hail of plasma at us from a turret underneath its nose, and from two shade turrets on its sides. Tokke's gunner opens fire with his gauss cannon. Greg fires his rockets at the armored hull. Something drops from its underside. "Wraith!" shouts Tokke. Cinders swerves to avoid the wraith blocking the highway, and Greg destroys it with his rockets. ahead of us, stand three pairs of hunters. The hulking aliens charge their cannon, and fire.

The green projectiles impact our convoy, and suddenly, the air is filled with the clicks of flying insects; drones. Cinders rammed through a hunter, and I blasted his partner in a gap in his armor with another grenade. He still stands, and fires on us. The shot darts across the gap. "Bail out!" I shout. Cinders skids the tires, flipping the hog, and Greg flew from the turret. I leapt out of the hog, and rolled upon slamming into the ground. I scraped along the dirt and gravel, and pulled myself to my feet, sporting a burgeoning headache. The hunter came at me. I reloaded my grenade launcher, and turned off my rifle's safety.

Trembling, I return fire at the drones, blasting them out of the sky. I reload my magazine, and face my enemy, scared speechless. The alien monstrosity advanced upon me, hiding behind his shield. The cannon flashed, I tensed. The blast issues out of the cannon, and I dive out of the way, flat on my face. I look around quickly. I'm alone; everyone else is dead or in the city. I head the hunter roar, and rolled onto my back. The hunter slams his foot down; I roll aside, firing my rifle at him. A bullet strikes him in the neck, only enraging him. I circle to his left, trying to access the weak spot of his back. I get around to his back. At that very moment, he swings his shield at me, only missing by fractions of a second. I run, trying to get away from the armored death machine.

I pull away from him, and turn back to face him. I fire my rifle, finding gaps in the armor. Another blast flies from his cannon. The explosion throws me up in the air, uncoordinated. Time seems to drag, and I try to steady my grenade launcher. In slow motion, I aim down my rifle's iron sights at the hunter's neck. I yank the launch button, and the grenade impacts the alien where the neck met the head, decapitating it and strewing orange blood all over the ground. My enemy drops dead, and I land on the ground, hard.

I taste salty blood in my tongue, and rise to my feet. All around me is desolation. The six hunters are dead, however, the convoy had been decimated. We had come in a convoy of ten warthogs; seven had been for protection, and three were for transporting soldiers. I survey the carnage, and count eight destroyed warthogs. Two of the transports and six of the gun trucks are flaming ruins, and two sets of tire tracks lead to the city.

I weight my options, tired and nervous. I see that I can't stay here, be killed by the covenant. I can't go back to Mogadishu; I lack the provisions. I have to go into New Mombasa. I turn to face the city and begin walking the three miles to the outskirts, following the tire tracks.

An hour later, I arrive in New Mombasa. All around me, civilians run and panic, trying desperately to escape the city. A man accosts me and demands: "My son, have you seen my son? I lost him in the inner city!"

I hesitate, then answer him in my most level voice: "No, I haven't. I just got here a minute ago. I'm with the army, and I need to know: where's the enemy, and where's the battle?"

"Where's the battle?" raged the man. "It's over behind me. I don't want to know where the enemy is. I'm getting hell out of here, and if you don't want to die, you'd better follow me!" I slip away from him, and fight through the thick crowds, heading towards a fire escape. I jump and grab the ladder, then pull myself up. I quickly run up the stairs, and onto the roof, and was shocked by the view.

Before me, is desolation. The great bridge to the inner city is a battlefield. On it, I see people running for their lives from the murderous rush of the covenant. Behind a wall of sandbags, a few valiant people armed with whatever guns they could find are trying to hold back the covenant onslaught. With them are a few marines, and a gauss warthog. With a flash I realize that Tokke survived, and that the wise thing to do would be to regroup.

Quickly, I descend the building, back into the streets. I then realize that I've never been to New Mombasa before. I continued, now in eerie silence. The mob is gone, but the destruction and chaos remains. Many buildings are burning, but I heard a noise, and then my troubles grew worse.

I heard a jackal sniff around, and I froze, hiding behind a ruined bus stop. The creature gave one of its weird sounds, and I heard a most unwelcome voice: "Come out, human, and your end will be quick." I reach down and pull out my pistol, turning the safety off. I stoop to ground level and pick up a broken beer bottle by the neck.

I challenge back: "I've got a gun, and a knife. Tell me: which one should I kill you with?" I don't feel anywhere nearly as confident as I sound, but I can't let him know how truly afraid I am.

"You will pay for your insolence." he grolws, and the jackal, carrying a sniper rifle pokes his head around the corner. I raise my left hand, and fire my pistol into the alien's head, sending him down instantly. The elite roars with fury, and bursts around the corner, energy sword in hand.

Instantly, I open fire, shooting him indiscriminately, desperately trying to break his shields. With a flash, they break, and I lunge with my knife. The elite's sword came down in a flash. Twisting to avert it, the blade slashes my arm, but I close the distance before he can stop me. Before he could even raise his arm to protect himself, I stab into his neck, releasing a pained roar from him. Mercilessly, I strike again, shoving the glass into the gap between his chest plates, piercing the skin. I slam my full weight into his body, knocking him to the ground, and I level my pistol, finishing him with a bullet through his heart.

The adrenalin exits my blood, and I feel a pain in my left arm. I look at it in shock. The whole length of the limb, the sword had opened a huge, shallow gash running from shoulder to knuckles. I'm losing a lot of blood; already, a small pool of blood has formed around me. I know that I only have minutes left before I bleed out, and limp into a deserted shop, seeking bandages. I look around the interior. I've stumbled into a clothing store.

immediately, I pull a shirt off its rack., and wrap it around my wound, then I take another shirt and tear it into strips, and lash it tightly to my arm. I check my ammo counts. I have another magazine left of Battle Rifle, and one of pistol. I waited for half an hour before moving again. My left side was stained with blood, and I loosen my tourniquet slightly, feeling the warm blood seep back into my numb, tingling arm. I suppress the feeling and leave the store. There are no more covenant nearby fortunately.

I wander the block for fifteen minutes until I found a store with a gun in the window. I walked around and entered through the back. I took a look around the interior. It was either a pawn shop, or antique dealership. Either way, I can't really tell, but I don't really care; I'm just after some weapons. I approach the window and grab the rifle. It's an old lever action 1873 Winchester. I search around for ammunition and find a grand total of 200 rounds of it. I then look for a replacement for my pistol. I look around for another weapon, and had nearly given up all hope when I opened a cabinet and found an MP-5 with an abundance of magazines filled with ammunition. Lastly, I took a morning star from the back room and exited by the front door. "This will ruin something's day." I mumble to myself.

I approach the bridge, and I can still hear gunfire. I pull out my Winchesters, raising and lowering it a few times to get the feel of the weapon. The gunfire is louder now, with the sound of Tokke's gauss cannon plainly audible. I steady my frayed nerves and then dive behind a parked van, the plasma bolts whizzing by my head.