PART TWO

"First squad! Take up defensive positions on the hill. Second squad, fall back into the forest as cover. No one fire until I do. And stay quiet!" he barked. He dashed a ways back, and unstrapped his acquired beam rifle.

Some of the marines quickly understood, others lingered at the battle site questionably. After being yelled again at by the Sergeant they hurriedly fell into place. Johnson shifted back into some tall grasses, with only the very tip of the rifle protruding.

Sure enough, moments later a lone Grunt waddled into the pile of deceased. It was alerted, clumsily holding its plasma pistol at the ready, and it moved forward cautiously. Johnson tracked it with the rifle's scope, although the rangefinder was useless as it displayed the distance in Covenenant text. But he was waiting for a bigger prize: a Brute always commanded a patrol. The Brutes had replaced the Elite's role in the Covenant hierarchy. He just hoped the greenhorns would hold their fire and shut up until he was ready.

Another few Grunts followed the first, and then a Carbine-wielding Jackal stalked behind them. That could be a problem. The Jackals had new vision enhancer's that were imbedded into a helmet. It supposedly increased their already superb vision ten-fold. If it spotted even one marine, this could get messy. But the marines needed to wait for the entire patrol to get in range, so the they could take them all out quickly before the Covenant forces could return fire.

There it was: the Brute commander. It was clad with brand new golden power armor, and completely covered with bandoliers of extra Brute shot grenades. Another Jackal picked up the rear. Johnson lowered his rifle for a moment, and quickly sent a low frequency text message to the two squads: "Target Jackals first. Hold till I fire." They would understand. Next to the Brute, the two Jackals posed the largest threat. Now if only that Brute would turn slightly left…

Suddenly a Jackal screeched an unintelligible squawk and raised its Carbine up towards second squad's position: it must have spotted them! The rest of the patrol turned and readied their weapons, and the Brute roared: "Humans! Come out and I promise your death will be painless!"

He beated his chest like a gorilla before wielding his Brute shot. Johnson had to act quickly before the marines were overrun. Amazingly they were still keeping quiet. The sergeant squinted, steadied the reticule on the Brute's ugly head, lined up for a kill shot, held his breath, and fired. The alien rifle had a surprisingly small recoil, it loudly shot out a high pitched PZZEEW, and a fine blue beam of concentrated plasma discharged from the weapon's tip. The beam raced toward the Brute's head, along the way collided with a Grunt's skull and instantly killed it, continued through its head, and missed the Brute by mere inches.

Johnson cursed and resighted, this time he wasn't going to miss—but he was beat to the shot! Five consecutive beams of green Carbine laser slammed into the Brute's cranium, toppling it in a pool of its own blood. The rest of the group panicked at the loss of their leader: the two Jackals dropped their rifles and retreated into the woods, while the marines finally opened up with their MA5-C's, raining lead and tracers down on the remaining Grunts. The marines came out of hiding and put a few last shots into the corpses, and even kicked them for good measure. Johnson tracked a Jackal and dispatched it quickly before it could escape.

Ramirez was shot. It wasn't bad, but plasma weapons hurt. He was slumped against a boulder, clutching his right arm. Johnson called Connolly; the squad's assigned Navy coreman, over to the injured marine.

"Patch him up, but make it quick. We need to get a move on. You don't want to make us late for our date with the Master Chief, do you!?" He joked with Connolly.

"No sir, I'm right on it!" He replied.

While the remaining marines rejoiced over their victory, the Arbiter paced out from the bush, holding the remaining retreating Jackal speared on his energy sword. He disengaged its power, causing the double shimmering blades to retract, and the slump of a body fell to the ground.

"It was lucky that I had come by here, human." The Arbiter stated. Again the marines were drawn back by his deep human voice. He hooked the sword's hilt on his leg, and then hefted his captured Carbine that he had slung over his shoulder. "And you are even luckier that I am a better shot than you." He said smugly.

For once Johnson didn't have a smart remark. He was concerned: the Sergeant was a master marksman, even with foreign weaponry. He preferred to take long range rifles into combat, always. But he had just missed an easy shot. He wished that he could brush it off as old age getting to him, but he feared it was something more.

For an instant he was back on the Alpha halo. He wasn't unconscious or dead, but he was paralyzed. He was laying on a cold metal floor, under hundreds of feet of stone, in a chamber that housed the Flood. Horrible, parasitic, evil creatures. The scourge of the galaxy. The Flood was the entire reason they needed to win this war. The Covenant were a huge problem, but the Flood threatened every single living life form. Unless they were stopped, they would consume and mutate every sentient creature in the galaxy

He could still see: Jenkins and the rest of his squad lay beside him, with bulbous parasites eating away at them. The appalling creatures clung onto their necks, and he could see their tendrils probing the marine's spines. He wanted to throw up, but couldn't. The little abominations made horrible squelching noises from no visible mouth, although it could be the sound of human tissue gurgling. They rocked slowly as they engorged themselves on his comrades' nervous systems. Jenkins gave a horrible spasm. They were being infected, mutated and controlled by the parasites, slowly and painfully. Johnson was more terrified, however, because he knew there was one feasting on his neck, although he couldn't feel it he knew it was there, he imagined its tentacles drilling through his bone and slipping under his skin…

He shook himself free, back to reality. Back to Earth, to the African jungle. The Arbiter motioned for them to follow, "Come, I will escort you to your Spartan. Do not linger.", and he set off into the woods at a fast pace.

The marines silently followed, running to keep up with him. They were getting close to their objective, but needed to take a few extra paths to avoid more enemy patrols. Twice they stopped so Johnson could kill Jackal scouts that were hiding in the forest canopy. They crossed a small river, and continued dashing ahead.

Johnson checked his computer uplink: they were only 100 meters from the Chief's crash site. The Arbiter broke off in order to surprise any awaiting enemies, and the marines approached the site. There was a hole in the tree cover, and a scorched crater beneath it. They stopped and followed it with their eyes. A scraped trail of earth led to the Master Chief, who lay rigid up against a rock some 20 meters away. Johnson worried for the worst. Goddamn Spartans, always jumping from aircraft. Don't they know falling hundreds of feet can't possibly be safe? Although he criticized the Spartan's actions, the Sergeant felt a pang of guilt that he wasn't the one laying dead. Earth needed the Chief, he needed the Chief. He couldn't be dead.

END PART TWO