Happiness came in families.
Markus finally realised this just as it was taken away from him.
He was a young suburban boy of 11, he was part of a well-functioning and developing family, one of the few that hadn't split up and gone different ways, and now he was especially fortunate as it was his birthday and he was about to go inside to celebrate.

Celebrating his birthday was one of the few things that Markus did, that could remove the fear from all of their hearts. The fear of invasion, the fear of destruction and the fear of death was in all of them, ever since public news of the Storm Covenant had displayed itself; the small human colony of 'New Hemisphere' lived in fear, as the entire planet of Genesis II knew they lacked any sufficient resources to stop the invading alien horde.

Markus smiled as he walked out of his apartment flat, he loved watching the streets down below and guessing how far it was down there. He would often spend evenings watching the cars and shuttles zoom by, such a high sky scraper such as this building had a lot of air traffic traveling under.
He lived at the city New Hemisphere on the new colony of Genesis II, one of the most popular holiday destinations according to recent news; another significant factor of this new city included it being an ONI controlled settlement.

The system of Genesis II was a beautiful green planet was covered in vegetation, mountainous ranges and large channels of rivers and oceans. The city of New Hemisphere had been expanding quickly for the last four years, creating a massive location to be pushed aside by the forces of Storm.
Markus looked upwards at the large skyscrapers, and the blue sky. How we longed to fly on day with the massive Shuttles in space, one day that might come true his father would say. The massive UNSC shuttles could be spotted every now and then but not now.
Something shiny was in the sky however; it looked different from the casual UNSC ships.

Markus squinted his eyes at the strange purple object in the sky, and opened his mouth in absolute dread; the flier was approaching quickly and descending down to his own sky scraper.
The covenant banshee shot through the sky, ripping through the atmosphere at an alarming speed, its purple wings cutting the air like a hot knife through butter.
The flier screamed downwards and flung past the skyscraper, Markus hurried to turned his head and watch its descent, almost starting to scream as the banshee opened fire at the pedestrians down below. Its blue plasma cutting men in half as it pulverised the floor and burned everything in its path, women were screaming and a loud beacon started emanating warning noises to the entire city. The sound of explosions, roars and screams filled the entire atmosphere like a rabid and crazy void of the dammed.
Markus swung his head upwards as his mother started screaming in fear and shouting filled his apartment. His father yelled for him to come back into the house, to get to safety; but after looking up at the sky of a once beautiful morning, he knew that wasn't to be.
A massive purple Assault Carrier was floating in the air, its appearance causing dread in the city of New Hemisphere, more screams and prominent warning sirens emanated from the puny defence systems of the city; human turret fire revealed missiles issuing up and smashing into the blue barrier of the Carrier; and then it responded in kind.

Blue Plasma bolts the size of houses rained down on the city in an array of hundreds, every shot hitting the streets and skyscrapers like thunder on pebbles. Skyscrapers exploded in fumes of blue and black, streets were torn up by the roots and the spectacular city of New Hemisphere started being consumed by fire, ash and plasma. As the gunfire continued to splatter upon the city, Markus could see thousands of purple shuttles dropped from the gigantic Assault Carrier, quickly descending down and preparing to unleash hell on the planet of Genesis II.

Banshees and phantoms dropped alike and descended upon the city, firing plasma down and dropping large vehicles into the suburbs. Markus caught a sight of a phantom dropping down in his street, large brown creatures landing on the roads and cracking the floor with their weight; they snarled at all the fleeing humans and opened fire. Cutting down innocent men and women as they stood, showing no remorse and leaving no man alive.

Markus stood defiant towards the Assault Carrier as her mother screamed out his name, then finally, as if he knew it was going to happen, the covenant storm ship above aimed one of its many turrets towards the sky scrapers location.

Fiery plasma spewed out of the warm gun and swept in an arc straight towards Markus, it descended down like a meteor from heaven and impacted heavily with the side of the building underneath the little boy's apartment.

The explosion rocked the entire building with a collection of fire, plasma and smoke, letting Markus fall backwards and land roughly on his back. As he tried to get back up again, all he could hear was the creak and groan of the entire skyscraper buckling as plasma cut straight through it, leaving a gaping hole in the side of the building and sparking it with lightning, ash and plasma. Finally the groaning stopped as the building started leaning to the right and finally, it cracked under pressure and started to fall into the solemn ground.
And all Markus could see was darkness.