Lions
Zero hour of the latest Covenent offensive, and the a sole company of UNSC marines bears the brunt of the attack. A scratch company, composed of the survivors and remnents of half a dozen other units. Veterens and raw recruits, volenteers and conscripts, all thrown together into the mouth of hell. "Keep firing! You run out of ammo, strip what you need from the dead! You need it more than they do!"
Vinn Michaels, specialist LAAG cannon operater first class. He's already lived through two tours of duty and is only a month away from the end of this one. "Yeah! Come on, Covvy! Come to Vinny!" he shouts over the roar of the LAAG's rotating barrels. Third time. Always the charm. He never sees the plasma bolt that vapourizes half his head.
Carl Wollen joined up the day after his 17th birthday. He remembers the slick holovids about "Fighting for the good of the Earth" and the big promioses they made to him in the recruiting office. Choking slowly to death through a punctured lung, trying to puch back in whats left of his intestines- No, nobody told him it would ever be like this.
Judd Neuman, a petty criminal and car thief. After his third arrest, the judge gave him a choice after he was found guilty. Eight years in prision, or enlistment in the military. He chise the army. He didn't realise then that it was a death sentance. Right now, a Covenent plasma sword pointed at his neck, his uniform covered in the blood of his fallen comrades, that eight years hard labour doesn't look so bad.
And him. The Master Chief. He's here because his is the place he was created for. He fights because it's the only thing he knows. After all, can a bullet do anything but the one task it was created for? "Heads up, Chief. I'm picked up incoming," comes Cortana's synthesised voice inside his helmet. "Get down! Scorhed earth salvo!" When stalemate is reached, the military strategists on one side of the other will often fall back on scorched earth tactics, brutally reasoning that if they cannot take and hold the onjective, then neither shall the enemy. Toxic blast clouds roll across the trenches, envoleping everything, killing human and Covenent alike...
...And afterwards, nothing human is left alive on the battlefield. "All dead. Just kid, most of them. Poor bastards. They gave everything they had, but they never had a chance," says the Master Chief, removing his helmet and holding it over his chest in tribute to the fallen marines. "Chief?" "We were just bait to girng the Covenent out into the open. A whole Covenent brigade wiped out at the cost of only a company or two of our own troops. Somebody somewhere probably figures thats a fair deal."
"The english soldiers fight like lions." "True, but don't we know that they are lions led by donkeys?" -General Hoffman, German High Command during WWI
Zero hour of the latest Covenent offensive, and the a sole company of UNSC marines bears the brunt of the attack. A scratch company, composed of the survivors and remnents of half a dozen other units. Veterens and raw recruits, volenteers and conscripts, all thrown together into the mouth of hell. "Keep firing! You run out of ammo, strip what you need from the dead! You need it more than they do!"
Vinn Michaels, specialist LAAG cannon operater first class. He's already lived through two tours of duty and is only a month away from the end of this one. "Yeah! Come on, Covvy! Come to Vinny!" he shouts over the roar of the LAAG's rotating barrels. Third time. Always the charm. He never sees the plasma bolt that vapourizes half his head.
Carl Wollen joined up the day after his 17th birthday. He remembers the slick holovids about "Fighting for the good of the Earth" and the big promioses they made to him in the recruiting office. Choking slowly to death through a punctured lung, trying to puch back in whats left of his intestines- No, nobody told him it would ever be like this.
Judd Neuman, a petty criminal and car thief. After his third arrest, the judge gave him a choice after he was found guilty. Eight years in prision, or enlistment in the military. He chise the army. He didn't realise then that it was a death sentance. Right now, a Covenent plasma sword pointed at his neck, his uniform covered in the blood of his fallen comrades, that eight years hard labour doesn't look so bad.
And him. The Master Chief. He's here because his is the place he was created for. He fights because it's the only thing he knows. After all, can a bullet do anything but the one task it was created for? "Heads up, Chief. I'm picked up incoming," comes Cortana's synthesised voice inside his helmet. "Get down! Scorhed earth salvo!" When stalemate is reached, the military strategists on one side of the other will often fall back on scorched earth tactics, brutally reasoning that if they cannot take and hold the onjective, then neither shall the enemy. Toxic blast clouds roll across the trenches, envoleping everything, killing human and Covenent alike...
...And afterwards, nothing human is left alive on the battlefield. "All dead. Just kid, most of them. Poor bastards. They gave everything they had, but they never had a chance," says the Master Chief, removing his helmet and holding it over his chest in tribute to the fallen marines. "Chief?" "We were just bait to girng the Covenent out into the open. A whole Covenent brigade wiped out at the cost of only a company or two of our own troops. Somebody somewhere probably figures thats a fair deal."
"The english soldiers fight like lions." "True, but don't we know that they are lions led by donkeys?" -General Hoffman, German High Command during WWI