Adams and Steve had marched for the best part of a day avoiding the covenant as much as they could but covenant patrols seemed to be everywhere but to be fair they're pelican had crashed behind enemy lines and they were walking back to the FOB. About ten kilometres away from the FOB Steve's radio crackled into life "this is Spartan Kelly 087 all FOB units divert to castle base immediately" the two soldiers stopped in their tracks "Spartans" said Steve "castle base" said Adams and almost simultaneously their jaws dropped, they turned east and started marching silently towards castle base. After a few hours of marching Steve stopped his eyes fixed on the covenant carrier that hovered above castle base "holy shit" Adams reached the top of the hill a he to saw the carrier and his jaw almost hit the floor "they always said that every great civilization faces something they never expected, never prepared for, the covenant appears to be just that" Steve looked down at castle base defiantly "then we fight to the last man resisting them because in my eyes it's better to die resting an invader than join them." "That still doesn't change the fact that there's a massive fucking ship between us and castle" Steve considered this for a minute then saw some soldiers along the eastern edge of the hill "well we could rally the FOB troops and assault the outside of castle" Adams spots the soldiers "well I'll give you an A for effort but we can't take it with that many soldiers it'd be like taking a country with a battalion of men." "It could be done" replied Steve defiantly then opened radio communication with the other soldiers "this is Private Steven White to all FOB units do you copy, over" a gruff male voice answered "this is lieutenant James Ford where is your commanding officer" "we're all that's left of our unit our pelican was taken out by plasma fire sir." "Alright soldier we need to retake castle base back it's heavily guarded by covenant forces" "yeah we noticed" "don't get smart with me son, our main objective is to buy castles occupants some time to slip out the back understood" "copy that, let's do this." Steve and Adams check their ammo and grenades before vaulting over the side of the hill and jogging quickly and quietly up to the covenant line of defence "ok Dave take 'em nice and quiet" whispered Steve, Adams nodded a reply as he drew his knife and inserted into the back of an elites skull, the elite collapsed but Adams caught it and dragged it out of sight. Steve moved up behind the nearest grunt slowly put his arm round its head then sharply jerked his hand down to its breather and crushed it suffocating it with oxygen. "Two down, forty thousand to go" Steve thought to himself and as he thought this he was only half paying attention to the elite charging towards him it was only when Adams shouted "look out!" that he saw it but by then it was too late.