Tall green trees surrounded the area as they reached up into the sky with all sorts of creatures chattering and making noise. Several insects buzzed around a squad of marines who were slowly walking through the hot forest as they kept watch around them. "Six hours of trudging through the forest, and for what?" a marine said to himself. "If the Covies don't get us, then we'll be eaten alive by all the animals around here, hell, these insects keep pissing me off enough." he said aggravated, swatting in the air.
"Pipe down private, or turn off your comms if your gonna keep bellyaching." a rough voice said back over the comms. The embarrassed marine quickly turned off his communications as a few soldiers around him laughed.
Further ahead of the marines another group of soldiers sat around fallen trees and rocks, but these were no ordinary troops. Standing almost a full foot taller than the marines, and wearing heavy MJOLNIR armor that was all customized with different helmets. No, these were Spartans. Usually seen without their helmets on, they had decided to take them off for a brief moment, though their features were still hidden by shade. One of them laughed, hearing the complaining soldier, "Hmph, marines. Always complaining about something." Wearing blue and black armor with a commander helmet and sitting on the rock was their leader, Warbird. He had resting at his foot a DMR and a pistol magnetically attached to his leg. One Spartan was on a cliff just above them and he let out a low whistle. About time they got here, that took longer than anticipated, he thought as footsteps were soon heard. The squad of marines finally arrived as they moved in to see the Spartans, all shocked.
"What? Spartans down here? We might actually win."
"Hell yeah we got some reinforcements."
One marine approached them, Warbird looked over to his shoulder and saw his insignia making him the sergeant. "I'm guessing you boys are from that ship, uh whatsit called, Hour of Twilight?"
Warbird approached him nodding, "That's right. This is my squad." He looked over his shoulder to see the last Spartan from his jump down the side of the cliff. "Go on, introduce yourselves."
Dusting himself off, one stepped forward, "Spartan 259, Archangel, sniper and marksman. Best shot on team and on planet." A sniper rifle in hand and a DMR on back, it was clear he liked to fight from a distance. Warbird knew better though, and any who would try to get too close to him would be greeted by skills in close quarters as well as long range. A spare knife on his right shoulder and extra sniper rounds on his left, he seemed ready for any battle as EVA helmet had a skull scratched where the face would be. His sniper seemed to be cut also, but in tally marks. In all there were 25, one for each head shot he's gotten.
The next spartan seemed to be slightly smaller than him, and was also wearing extremely light attachments. "Spartan 305, Nighthawk. Fastest runner and scout." His armor was a dark blue and black here and there as he sat on a fallen log leaning forward on his knee taking his own head count of the marines inside of his scout helmet. Warbird knew it, and at this point the marines could have guessed that he was the youngest, especially compared to the next.
"Spartan 286, Reaper, heavy gunner and scourge of the covenant." he laughed in a rough voice. His armor was the largest with bulky attachments around the shoulder and the gungnir helmet to match. All across his armor were bullet marks and plasma burns, and he wore it with a certain pride that made everyone think he liked being shot at. Maybe he did, Warbird had once said as a joke around everyone. He really was their heavy gunner also, with a saw on his back next to a rocket launcher, he carried with him a ripped off turret gun with a crude handle melted onto it that was against the same wall he leaned against.
The last stood up and nodded at everyone, "Spark, 298. I run most the tech, help hack covie equipment and help fight. She was stood slightly behind Archangel and to his right as her assault rifle and pistol were either on her back or her leg, where her robotic arm dangled with several gears whirling in place, but still very silent. She had on a recon helmet as she looked around at everyone seeing various flaws in the basic UNSC armor. She wore on her belt a solder as that seemed to be what kept Reapers armor and equipment all together as some of his burns were directly across in a line.
Having had his entire squad introduced, Warbird looked back at the sergeant, "Now that the greetings are out of the way, let's get down to the mission. The Covenant outpost you're looking for? We found it. It's just beyond the forest and does have a lot of guards." he began.
"They have our men in that base, so do have a little care when you burst through guns blazing." The marine said in a dangerously low tone , "We've been tasked to break them out and take the base, I'm guessing yours is the same?"
"More or less, we have an...extra objective. Regardless, elites are holed up in there with multiple guns, two shade turrets in the front, and three wraiths in the back of the base behind some walls. I'm sending 259 and 305 to the ridge to flank them."
Archangel and Nighthawk grabbed their guns in hand and nodded. They began to move away but a voice stopped them for a moment, "Spartans, wait!" The sergeant looked back at three of his men, "Will, Zack, Arbid go with them."
"Great, we have to babysit." Nighthawk sighed over the team's private comms as the marines caught up with them, and they began to move away to the cliffs.
Archangel was sat against the wall on the ledge they had managed to scale across. The marines kept watch across the covenant camp just in front of them, what a bunch of nervous wrecks. Nighthawk approached them as he looked at him, "And what are you doing exactly?" Angel asked him, "Running laps to make sure your short legs don't give out on the next marathon?" he laughed.
Nighthawk gave a short laugh, "Nope, just checking with the marines. They are a lot nervous now that they have no cover aside from laying on the ground, and the Covenant base is just in front of them."
Archangel sighed, "Must be greener than grass then. Got something for you." He pulled out a magazine and handed it to the Spartan who took it and put the new mag into his DMR, "Spark made 'em for us. High velocity can knock down anything from here to the other end of that base, and further if they run."
"Uh huh, and how many magazines do you have?" he asked helping Angel stand up off the ground out of courtesy.
"Five." A basic reply, trying to get a reaction out of his friend, who shook his head. He could almost see his eyes rolling through the helmet, "Well we both technically have only 20 rounds." He walked over to the ledge of the cliff to where all the other marines were watching the base. He could tell their hands were shaking as they held a steady aim on the entrenched position. "You see the targets?"
"Yeah I got one at least for the marines. Center of camp, see that building?"
"Yup."
"My guess is that is the prison where all they're being held."
"Alright then, now for the second thing, you see him?" The two looked around through the different ranks of elites as Angel finally found one that stood out, "There he is. Elite Zealot, 3 o'clock, in the communications hub near the right edge of the camp."
"Yup that's our guy, he hasn't changed to much since the last time."
"How ever elites even age," Angel said laughing, "Alright marines pick a target and aim for the head and make sure you aren't looking at the same thing. Hawk, you see those plasma batteries near that pylon?"
"Yup, time for some fireworks?"
A voice came through over comms, "Hey you ladies finished with your tea party? Were all ready to go down here, just waiting on you."
"Just waiting on you to finish putting on your big boy pants, hit it Angel." Nighthawk replied to their leader.
"You got it. Get ready to fire on my mark. Three….Two…"
`~Elite base two minutes ago.~
"Rethaki, send out the okay signal to the main base, looks all clear here still." A Zealot in black armor looked over the shoulder of a minor elite clad in standard red.
"But sir, the transmission isn't due for another five minutes." The elite replied in a shaking voice as he looked back to the zealot.
"Do NOT question me major. Send the signal."
Sighing, the elite tapped a few buttons on a console and the communications pylon began to softly hum. The zealot began to walk away from the major who breathed a sigh of relief. Finally he's gone. He began to relax a bit more, and then he heard a shot. He looked behind him and saw a trail of smoke leading to where the zealot was walking, only he was now lying on the ground and not moving. Several other shots began to rang out, flashes of fire coming from the barrels of human guns who seemed to be on the cliffs just above them as the elites quickly ran for cover. Looking around and diving behind a half destroyed building the major looked around to see the communications hub and began to sprint over to send out a distress signal. Several more shots rang out, the bullets landing in the plasma batteries near the pylon as they began to glow brighter with each shot that hit. Some elites stationed near it began to notice and tried to run away only to have the coils explode in a bright blue flame destroying the legs to the pylon sending it crashing down to the ground.
"The communications hub is down we're cut off!" a minor shouted as they all tried to fire back on the hill. Several explosions went off near the entrance as a Shade turret gun rolled through the gates. "Move to the front, more heretics moving in from the front!" he soon cried later running back into the base.
"Keep firing go, go go!" The major cried, "Drive them back we must-" he lost his voice as he dropped his gun from an immense pain coming through his back. He looked down to see the tip of an energy sword protruding out of his chest and then pushed forward, sliding the sword out his chest. He slowly turned around slowly seeing the elite zealot in black and white armor walking away from him as the world slowly started to drift away. He looked around, and he saw his home on Sanghelios across a few fields. The battle slowly began to drown out as he took a few steps forward. He fell onto his knees taking a last look at his planet, and a shot rang out. He fell forward on the ground with his helmet falling down right in front of him.
Reaper could barely feel his hands. His turret gun was firing a continuous stream of bullets at the covenant forces who hid behind whatever cover they could crouch behind. Most his bullets were bouncing off walls of burying themselves in the ground. The rest of the squad was firing behind some rocks and if they moved up, the walls the elites had tried using against them. Yeah it's about time I had time to unload my gun into something! Glancing at the cliff he saw Angel and his squad still flanking them and grinned. Make sure they can't hide from the fire. He grinned as he began to walk forward again advancing the front with just his movements alone as the elites began to run further back to the walls of the base. "That's right run back into your little hole to curl up and die!" He yelled as he ran after them squeezing his trigger here and there to scare them more. Over his helmet comms he heard a voice, it sounded like it was Warbirds saying stop but he couldn't tell. All he knew was that they had them on the run, and he would press the advantage. Turret it hand he still ran them down through the main body of the camp into the back area.
'Wra-. Reaper they have Wrai-" He heard Archangel say soon after as he reached the gates. They were slightly open, it seemed they had tried to close them. "You need to wait for back-"
Hmm, if only my gun wasn't so loud. Oh well not my problem. He kept firing until he stopped to move through the door. He brazenly moved to the next area screaming, but then suddenly stopped. Ohhh he said Wraiths. Three covenant mortar tanks, Wraiths, were staring at him. He looked back at them, as it seemed they were in a deadlock staring contest. "Oh, now THIS, is a fair fight." he said starting to walk forward. "Cmon' what'cha got?" The turrets of the wraith followed him as he kept walking, "You want to shoot me?" he shouted. "You think you can kill ME?" The turrets in turn fired the heavy plasma rounds at him. when they made contact with the spartan the bright blue explosion blinded everyone who was staring at it. Once the explosion ended he was still crouched here with a white glow around him. He stood up, completely unharmed and grabbed his rocket launcher off his back. "My turn."
He charged the three tanks he shot two rockets at the tanks, one heading left, the other right, and he ran at the middle. The two tanks exploded immediately on contact as the other tried backing away from the sprinting spartan. Reaper jumped onto the tank bashing the tank with his bare hands until a small hole was exposed in the tank. He grabbed one of his grenades and lodged it inside and quickly jumped off as the last wraith finally exploded. He caught his breath as he looked behind him. The rest of his squad was watching the burning tanks as Reaper was stood there. The shadows making it look like a cloak was covering him as he looked back at everyone. "What?" He asked looking back at them, "It was self defense they shot first."
"Alright then." Warbird began, "We got troops to save and a base to clean up let's move it."