March 23rd, 2537, 01:15 Hrs

βουνό Ridge

Vision, Zeta-Byzantium system

-Grizzly Team-

To anyone looking, Human or alien, βουνό Ridge was devoid of any human presence, the Covenant in their dig site had made sure of that, but to someone who was deliberately looking for it, they might have just about seen the two shimmers as a pair Spartan III's moved quietly through the grass. Before Jake stopped at the edge of the grassy plateau and looked down at to the rocks that made up the ridgeline, quickly surveying for any threats.

"Clear" Jake whispered over the Teamcom, indicating the lack of hostiles before dropping down, followed by his partner for the recce.

"Intel was right at least covenant hasn't got much here," Thom-A293 muttered looking around.

"Yeah, seems almost unfair sending us to spoil their fun," Jake commented as they moved towards a nearby outcropping

"Uh huh, but doesn't three teams just seems a bit overkill?" asked Thom as they dropped to a crawl as the moved towards the ridge edge.

"Well, you know what they say, overkill is underrated!" answered Jake as pulled himself up to the edge of the ridge "now let's see what we're dealing with" Jake continued, getting back to work as he engaged his helmets built-in zoom function, which made the base clearly visible, even though it was over a kilometre away, and let his suits automatic tagging system, mark any hostile targets he saw. "I've got a couple dozen hinge heads, a lot more jackals and a metric fuck tonne of grunts, how about you?" Jake asked, as he watched the aliens as they moved around the far side of the dig site, studying their routine, their pattern and most importantly their weaknesses, things that could and would be exploited.

"Same here, no heavy equipment though, think they could've already found whatever they were digging for?" was Thom's response as he studied the other side of the site,

"Maybe, but if they have it's probably still here, otherwise this place would've been glassed already, but if it's still here I'd bet it's either still underground" pausing to point out the sloping shaft digging into the ground "or in hinge head central," Jake continued drawing Thom's attention to the large covenant structure positioned at the other side of the site, which was where most of the covenant were congregated around.

"So it's either still underground along with whatever they're using to dig it out with, which is probably really bad, or in the most heavily defended place in the local area, which is definitely really bad, I'm starting to see why they sent three teams now," Was Thom's conclusion to Jake's hypothesis, using his arms to add to his dramatic delivery, however, due to the SPI armour both of them were wearing, to anyone without a HUD his arms were merely a ripple of shimmers.

"Yeah, good thing Carter sent us out to do a little recon," muttered Jake, referring to Carter-A259, the leader of Panther team and their overall mission leader "cmon it's a long way back and Carter wants to hit this place before dawn" Jake continued as he crawled back away from the cliff and began to retrace the path they'd taken minutes before, followed closely by Thom.

"Yeah and he's gonna love what we've got to tell him" added Thom sarcastically.


March 23rd, 2537, 02:32 Hrs

30 km east of βουνό Ridge

Vision, Zeta-Byzantium system

-Grizzly Team-

Rosenda hated guard duty, she knew it was important but that didn't mean she liked it, she hated guard duty mostly because of how boring it was, nothing ever seemed to happen when she was on guard duty. But she especially hated having to do guard duty with Beth, Rosenda had no problem with Beth as a person, but Beth was a mousy person and wasn't much of a talker and that meant there wasn't anything to alleviate the boredom of guard duty, she'd rather had been out scouting with Jake or Thom, they always found a way to lighten the mood when it was needed. Even when they were under fire by whoever or whatever they'd been sent to kill, capture or simply blow the fuck up. Beth, on the other hand, was quieter and tended to enjoy her own company, which meant anyone paired with her for a boring job, like guard duty had to rely on themselves to alleviate the boredom, that being said though Beth was a lot better now than when she's first met her, she didn't speak to anyone other than Jake for the first few weeks that she'd been part of the team and it had only been through Jakes reassurances and a large amount of encouragement, that she'd even started speaking to her or Thom at all.

"Roz?" whispered something on Rosenda's right, causing Rosenda to jump and to instinctively point her gun at the source of the sound, expecting to see an elite trying to get the drop on her, only to find Beth staring at her, through the sights of her SAW.

"Shit! Beth, don't do that, I nearly shot you!" Rosenda blurted as she attempted to regain her composure, whilst pointing her gun away from Beth, who owing to her quietness, Rosenda had actually forgotten was lying right next to her.

"Have you seen any sign of the guys?" Beth asked, her voice laced with agitation showing how having a teammate point a gun at her, had left her a bit nervous.

"No, and their nearly ten minutes overdue," Rosenda answered, before placing her hand reassuringly on Beth's shoulder in an attempt to make Beth calm down after nearly shooting her. "Don't worry, since we've not heard anything, they're probably ok," Rosenda added to further put Beth at ease, having learned quickly in basic that when Beth was agitated, she developed a jumpy trigger finger. Much to the chagrin of whoever had been on the receiving end of the numerous near friendly fire incidents, and that keeping Beth in whatever counted for a comfort zone in combat was in everyone's best interest.

"Yeah, I hope they haven't-" Beth started, before suddenly levelling her rifle and pointed it towards a large clump of trees in front of them, so quickly in fact, that it took Rosenda a few seconds to even register that Beth has spotted something.

"Beth, would you kindly take my head out of your crosshairs, please?" requested Jake jokingly over Teamcom as Rosenda spotted the familiar outlines of Jake and Thom, about 50 meters in front of her, emerging from the undergrowth.

"Nice of you to Join us, and it may interest you to know that Carter's not happy about your poor timekeeping," Informed Rosenda sassily over Teamcom, as Jake and Thom dashed across the open ground towards a nearby barn, which was serving as their base of operations.

"Thanks, Roz, I'll take it under advisement, maybe" was Thom's reply as he followed Jake inside.


March 23rd, 2537, 03:06 Hrs

βουνό Ridge

Vision, Zeta-Byzantium system

-Grizzly Team-

"All Spartan's stand by to engage," Carter ordered to all the Spartan's under his command as they waited to attack. But as Beth crouched on the cliffside waiting for the signal to attack, she studied the base, the intricate defences, the well-placed patrols, this place would have been a nightmare for the Marines, or even ODST's to attack, but they weren't either of them. "Yeah, not so fun when you're the ones getting your ass handed to you," Beth concluded smiling slightly, and with that, she raised her sniper rifle and on cue, proceeded to blow the head off a distant elite.

What followed could only be described as a full-blown panic erupted throughout the Covenant ranks, one second everything was calm and quiet, the next there were explosions and gunfire coming out of nowhere, those that weren't killed in the opening volley didn't last much longer than those that had, within seconds the Spartans had breached the covenant perimeter and had broken through their defences, mostly down to the fact that anything that had been in a position to try and mount a defence was either dead, dying or hiding behind something solid, probably trying to work out what the fuck was going on. Beth fired as she ran, speed and aggression were key to the plan, with only twelve Spartans against over at least a hundred covenant, they couldn't get bogged down in a prolonged firefight, they had to be aggressive and push hard.

"Move it guys we're almost there!" Jake shouted encouragingly over Teamcom, their objective was only ten 10 meters away, Carter, had split the three teams to have the best chance of finding whatever the Covenant was looking for, Fox team had been assigned to secure the dig site, just in case whatever the Covenant was looking for was still underground; Panther team, led by Carter, were in charge of securing the landing pad, just in-case the covenant had found what they'd been digging for, and were waiting for somebody to pick it up. Grizzly Team, however, had drawn the short straw, their target was the large structure Jake had spotted during his recon earlier in the evening, which had been identified as the covenant HQ, which explained why it was the most heavily defended place in the entire site. Fortunately, most of the defenders had been killed in the opening volley, and like the rest of the site, the defences were set up to deal with regular troops, not with Spartans in stealth armour.

"Roz blow the door! Beth cover her!" Jake ordered, Beth acknowledged and moved quickly up a ramp towards the main door, Joining Rosenda who was already there, placing pre-prepared charges on it.

"Beth, you might wanna lose that thing," muttered Rosenda, as she continued to place the charges not really noticing the firefight around her, Beth meanwhile was about to ask what she was talking about, when it dawned on her that her bulky rifle wasn't suited to close quarters and that Rosenda was simply reminding her to switch to her SMG sidearm.

"Thanks" sighed Beth as she emptied her clip to some distant targets who were trying to get around Jake and Thom, who were busy dealing with the dwindling numbers of the buildings remaining perimeter defenders, before securing her rifle and drawing her SMG.

"Alright, we're good to go" Rosenda chirped gleefully over Teamcom as she and Beth quickly moved back from the now explosive laced door.

"You girls, should start the party, we'll follow when we've dealt with this lot" Thom suggested cockily as he mercilessly cut down a retreating grunt with his shotgun, Jake, who was in the middle of gunning down a trio of Jackal's, merely gave a green acknowledgement light, to show he agreed with Thom's suggestion, for once.

"Ok, Beth you go right I'll go left, got it?" asked Rosenda, Beth merely nodded her understanding, which was more than enough of a response for Rosenda, who let out a small laugh as she pressed the detonator, before the pair rushed inside, guns blazing.

Meanwhile Jake, after removing his knife from the final elite neck, and after assisting Thom with dealing with the few remaining immediate threats. Jake followed by a now gleeful Thom, moved to regroup with Beth and Rosenda, when a thought crossed his mind.

"How the hell did I get paired with this lot?" Jake wondered, Beth he got, she was quiet, and he used to be the only one she'd speak to, Which explained why she was with him. Rosenda and Thom though, they were a different story; Rosenda was a notorious back chatter and always full of sass, not mentioning a bit overenthusiastic when it came to explosives. Thom meanwhile was a complete Maverick, always being gung-ho and never thinking ahead. But despite their negative traits, Rosenda was quite capable of being very caring when she wanted to, and there was nothing wrong with enjoying one's work. Thom also had some good traits going for him also as he had the skills to back up his Maverick attitude in a fight. Although he still needed to work on his situational awareness.

"Nice of you two to join us!" smirked Rosenda as they entered the now body strewn room, the room was actually quite large with one side filled with consoles and holographic screens and took up most of the building the other was what appeared to be a small office, both bisected by a corridor running through the building, ended at a downwards sloping ramp. Beth was in the office pushing bodies around and looking for anything important, Rosenda meanwhile was crouched at the top of the ramp, watching for any other hostiles.

"Thom guard the door, Beth, you keep looking for whatever had the Covenant interested, Roz; you're with me, we'll clear the basement," Jake addressed, and was met with three acknowledgement lights on his HUD as he moved towards the ramp, Thom wouldn't have much to worry about, the gunfire had died down to just an occasional burst of gunfire or two, as the other teams finished off opponents at their objectives. "I'll lead, you follow," he stated to Rosenda, who responded with a simple nod as he cautiously moved past her and down the ramp. From the top of the ramp Jake could see that it turned halfway down to the left before turning again at the bottom before continuing down a corridor towards the opposite end of the building before turning through an open door on the left, advancing quietly down the corridor Jake could hear quiet squealing and mutterings, clear indications of Grunts, clearly they were hiding down here, and that there wasn't an elite with them otherwise they'd have attacked Rosenda and Beth when they'd breached the door. This was good, grunts on their own weren't much of a challenge, but what was down here anyway and why would they have been down here in the first place? Both were good questions, both of which Jake had an intention to answer.

Jake stopped at the door, Rosenda falling in behind him; Jake raised his hand to signal a five-second countdown. As his hand reached the three position, he heard a shrill squeal from one of the grunts around the corner, realising a distraction had presented itself, Jake abandoned the countdown and pushed through the doorway quickly to capitalise on it. Through the door, Jake found himself in a short corridor running to his left with a series of small rooms running along the right side and was filled with several grunts all with their backs to him, the furthest of which was pointing its weapon inside one of the rooms, easy targets. Jake let rip with his battle rifle, joined a second later by Rosenda's heavier SAW which cut the tiny aliens to pieces in seconds. It was only after the last grunt's perforated body fell to the floor, did Jake take a closer look at his surroundings, and immediately regretted it. The rooms weren't rooms, they were cells and each one of them was full of dead humans, Jake almost retched at the sight, Rosenda next to him did also, some of the bodies looked days old, he could tell simply by the look of them, others, however, looked more recent by the fresh plasma burns he estimated at least ten minutes old, it was hard to look at, worse than that was the stench which filled his nostrils and refused to leave, he felt tempted to throw up, but then Jake was distracted by something he had just remembered, the Grunts had been distracted by something, something in the last cell.

Jake move forward quickly towards the last cell, trying to avoid looking too much into the other cells as he did so, and even harder to ignore the smell. Arriving at the last cell he braced himself and looked inside, bodies strew the cell some dead for days others less so, but then he heard it, a quiet whimper from the far corner of the cell, Jake looked to Rosenda, who'd followed him down the corridor, braced himself and stepped in carefully picking his way through the corpse towards the source of the sound, he immediately noticed that the source seemed to be coming from one of the bodies, moving closer he placed his hand on the corpse and moved it to one side. What followed almost making Jake jump, the source of the whimpers, a girl, only she wasn't whimpering anymore, she was screaming.

"Please calm down, you're safe now," Jake spoke in a gentle voice, trying to calm her, it didn't work, and Jake couldn't exactly blame her for it, there he was, a ghostly shimmer telling this girl to calm down, she was clearly terrified, and probably thought he was an alien, if only he could show her he was human she might calm down. Then Jake remembered, his suits invisibility could be disabled, it was a feature to conserve the suit's power when not required, quickly Jake brought up his suits sub-menu and disabled the invisibility function. "Please, calm down, you're safe now, were he to help you," he repeated, this time the girl stopped screaming, but she still looked terrified of him, she could see he wasn't an elite, but she still didn't see any solid evidence that he was human, but that was going to be tricky, as he had no intention of removing his helmet for 2 reasons, firstly he wasn't taking off the one piece of armour protecting his head when there was even the smallest possibility of a hostile attack, it was then that Jake's brain hit upon a simple solution. "The visor, depolarize your visor" Jakes brain told him, if he did that she'd see he was human, but this was the second reason not to remove his helmet, at only 13 if people saw how young he looked, even though he had the body of someone in their twenties, it could lead to some awkward questions being asked. However this was a child here, the chances of her putting two and two together were slim and the benefits outweighed the risks. "Is that better?" he asked gently, the look of terror on the girl's face eased and was joined by relief, but also a look of curiosity, nothing new there, even the Spartan II's got curious looks from battle-hardened Marines, and so one from a child was no big surprise.

"Who are you?" she asked reaching up to touch his visor. Prompting Jake to mentally swear, even though she was a child, if he didn't give her answer, she could start trouble if she told someone about how she was rescued by a man in strange armour that could turn invisible, who refused to tell her who he was, again a small risk but even small risks could still be dangerous, perhaps he was over analysing things, but it was better safe than sorry.

"I'm an ODST, but that's not important, what is, is that we're getting you out of here" Jake explained softly as he rose, lifting the girl to her feet, her hand firmly gripping his. That would be more than enough to sort any future trouble out and prevent any further questioning, and carefully led her out of the cell by her hand, trying to avoid the other bodies as he did so, her grip never slackening for a second. At least until she left the cell and saw Rosenda's ghostly form standing in the hallway giving a puzzled look that only Jake could see. Rosenda however, realising she was now the one causing the girl alarm, quickly disabled her camouflage as well to show she was friendly too but kept her visor polarised. "Don't mind her, she's nice," he said reassuringly, the girls only response was to peek out from behind his legs, to see if he was telling the truth, Rosenda meanwhile was standing there, awkwardly, wondering what she was going to do next.

"Go check on the others, and tell them we have a guest, will you please," Jake ordered her, the others being Beth, Thom and the other two Spartan teams. Who in all of the commotion Jake had forgotten to inform of the preceding events, and whom he doubted he could contact directly due to all of the metal around them, that and to also let his second-in-command get out of the situation she'd gotten herself into. Rosenda merely gave a quick nod and jogged back up the corridor, but paused at the doorway and gave the girl a friendly wave, before passing back through. "Come on, let's get you somewhere safe" he declared, turning his attention back to the girl, who now she was out of the gloom, Jake could actually get a good look at, The girl was no more than 8 years old with Strawberry blonde hair, and dark blue eyes.

"Ok," the girl replied meekly, taking his hand again as they walked back up to the entrance in silence, taking care to not trip on the dead grunts that littered the route, this suited Jake fine though as the lack of need to provide conversation gave him time to think, namely about what they were going to do with the kid. The protocol would have been to hand her off to the locals and let them sort it out, but with the planet about to fall, and the UNSC ready to pull out anytime now, that would mean certain death for the girl. Therefore Jake decided that the better option was to take her with them when they left and let the UNSC sort it out for them, maybe even get her sent to one of the safer inner colonies and far away from the covenant, she definitely deserved better after what Jake could only dread she had suffered through whilst in covenant hands. Reaching the surface Jake found the room now totally trashed, evidence of Beth's search and by the lack of anything important looking, it was a fruitless one, with Thom still at his post at the door, now joined by Beth, both of whom had gotten word about their 'Guest' though as both of them also had their Camo turned off, but like Rosenda had left their visors polarised.

"Anything?" Jake asked as he moved to join the two in the centre of the room, the girl still clutching his hand.

"Nothing, haven't heard from the other teams through" was Rosenda's casual response as she moved to switch to a fresh magazine for her SAW, the second part of which Jake translated as telling him they had left him the privilege of giving the others the bad news, which would mean he would be the one who received the earful of angry expletives from the other teams, maybe if he mentioned the kid, they'd cut back on the swearing, at least a little bit.

"Yeah, I'll check in with the others," Jake remarked, before giving a mental sigh and prepared for the barrage of angry swear words that were about to come his way, before speaking over Teamcomm. "Grizzly leader to Panther and Fox Leaders, we have a bust on our end, be advised we have a civilian child with us, she appears to be the sole survivor of some civilian's the covenant was holding," he explained.

"Panther Leader to Grizzly leader, copy that it's the same story on our end," Carter replied, pausing only to sigh at his frustration, rather than using volley of cuss's to note his emotion, maybe mentioning the kid had helped "anyway what's the status of the kid, we need to know if-" Carter continued only to be interrupted by a loud noise, or to be more accurate a huge explosion. Jake knew how big it was by the sound alone, without even taking into fact the ground had literally been shaken by the blast. Quickly, Jake and the rest of Grizzly with the girl still in tow raced outside the building to see what was going on, the only question on Jake's minds though was simply, 'what had caused the blast?' the answer came seconds later.

"Fox leader to all units, the covenant have a scarab, I repeat the covenant having fucking scarab!" announced Fox leader, as Jake watched her and her team scurry out of the mine shaft near the compounds centre, followed seconds later by a blast of molten plasma, just to illustrate her point.

"Copy that Fox leader, all teams converge on Fox's position and give them a hand, we need to hold out until our evac gets here with some heavier ordinance," Carter barked, quickly taking command of the situation.

"Copy that Panther, Grizzly's One, Two and Four are moving to assist!" Jake announced, before turning to a confused looking Beth, "You stay with the kid and keep her safe," he informed her, only to feel a tug on his arm, turning to find the source to be the kid, looking rather confused and a bit alarmed by what Jake had just said. "I've got to go help some of my friends, but don't worry she'll look after you, okay?" Jake explained pointing out Beth who had stretched out her free hand to the girl to signify the point, The girl gave a nod, showing her understanding before letting go of Jake and taking Beth's hand instead. With the kid now safely in Beth's capable hands, Jake along with Rosenda and Thom, sprinted for Fox's position engaging their active camouflage, and in Jake's case his visor as they did so. "What are we dealing with?" Jake asked as he, Rosenda and Thom dove behind one of the larger pieces of cover available to them, "other than the giant walking tank" Jake added as he laid down suppressing fire on the sea of hostiles that had pursued Fox back up the shaft.

"Hunters, Elites, you know the usual guys we don't want to run into. How'd you guys miss this anyway?" spat Fox leader, as she emptied her carbines clip into a group of grunts, killing some and forcing the others to seek cover.

"Hey, we said we didn't know what was underground, but we did say it probably wasn't good!" Thom snarled back as he hurled a grenade at a cluster of Covenant, who had taken cover behind one of the boulders that littered the shaft.

"He's right, this isn't their fault," agreed Carter as his team joined in on the suppressive fire, "Evac in two mikes, and their letting us use a nuke on this place, so we've just got to contain these guys until then" he added, right as he slotted an elite, who'd poked its head out of cover, to try and find the source of the gunfire, that the Spartans were pouring on them.

"Yeah well, that's fine and all but how are we going to get out of here with that scarab laying down heat, we'll get blown out of the sky before we can ever clear the blast range" Fox leader observed, she was right without a way to block the scarab in the tunnel, they'd get cut to pieces, luckily Jake had a brainwave.

"We'll blow the tunnel mouth shut after we chuck the nuke down it, we should have some missiles left for it" Jake suggested, as plans went it was a good one.

"Roger, anyone with missile's left, get them ready, Lucas and I will get the nuke, the rest of you, hold the line till we get back" Carter ordered, with him and Lucas dashing off towards where the evac pelican and the nuke were landing.

"Jake, catch!" Rosenda bellowed, hurling her rocket launcher at Jake who caught it with ease, which was impressive as Rosenda was more focused on providing suppressive fire, than to aim her throw properly, Whilst Rosenda was the resident demolitions expert, her SAW, with its higher fire rather and ammunition capacity was better suited to the job of keeping the covenant pinned than his battle rifle, as was Thoms shotgun, simply because of it's spread, which left him the only one free to take the shot.

"Thanks," Jake replied, stowing his rifle, and shouldering the Rocket launcher, "Ok people, when Carter and Lucas get back with the nuke, lay down covering fire so we're clear to do this thing" Jake announced, it wasn't necessarily needed, but he wanted to make sure everyone was on the same page, just as Carter and Lucas returned, with Lucas carrying a rather large and nasty looking bomb.

"On three people!" Carter bellowed, he didn't need to explain the procedure, Jake had done so already "1,2,3!" he shouted, the covering fire starting on one, Lucas hurling the nuke down the tunnel on two, and on three Jake and the other rocket armed Spartans, unleashed their volley; before everyone bolted for the safety of the Pelican, no one wanted to be here when the bomb went off.

"How long did you set the timer?" One Spartan asked from behind, Jake didn't want to know, he already knew it was going to be too short for comfort.

"Three minutes, so move it, people!" Lucas answered from further back, whilst he was strong, he wasn't the fastest Spartan there, Unlike Jake who was leading the way, the threat of a nuke was spurring him into overdrive. However as the Pelican came into view, fire came in from their right flank, evidently, they'd missed a few Tango's in the sweep. However they couldn't stop to return fire, and couldn't slow down to let their camo become effective again, at full sprint, the camo couldn't keep up with the changes. Beth meanwhile, from her position in the pelican had seen the threat and begin laying down covering fire, which left the rest of the Spartan's free to continue the dash for the Pelican. Jake his muscles burning, and with one final effort charged up the ramp, collapsing into a seat next to the child, who was already strapped in, the rest of the Spartans the following suit.

"That's everyone!" Beth informed the pilots, before taking the only remaining seat, just as the pelican roared away, the pilots not too keen on the whole nuke idea either.

"30 seconds people, hang onto your teeth!" Carter shouted over the roar of the engines, even in the now sealed rear compartment, the engines were loud, clearly working overtime; everyone responded by grabbing on tight, Jake sparing a glance at the kid, thankfully she was paying attention, and had braced herself as well, smart kid. As the pelican roared through the atmosphere clawing for altitude like a homesick angel, Jake just hoped they'd put enough distance between them and the bomb, seconds later the bomb went off, causing the Pelican to shake violently, but as they hadn't been atomised instantly and as no radiological alarms were screaming at him, he knew the answer, they had made it, Just.


Authors notes

So apology time, I really didn't mean to let this piece get so behind, I really mean it, I just got really stressed out by the lack of interest and left me feeling no confidence in my writing (I'm not confident in myself most of the time, even being described as my own worst critic), but since a piece, I published to try the waters again, received good reviews I've decided to start work on this again (I mean it this time!), I'm going to be working on this in rotation with two other pieces, (the sequel to the piece that got me back into writing, and another piece that I'm going to put up in a few weeks, (as a way to make up for lost time, and to test myself, hope it doesn't backfire). Anyway if you have liked it so far feel free to review, even just to convince me to continue this, but don't feel forced to.