LCpl Gronin, D. Day 1, 1300 Hrs.

"2nd and 3rd are coming back from their fight." Lance Corporal Daniel Gronin said in a voice traced with the slightest hint of a Russian accent. He peered through the scope of an SRS99, observing the returning platoons in the distance. He and his spotter were perched atop a five-story school building that Bravo Company was using as a command post.

Beside him, Lance Corporal Jeff "Meat" Hammond watched the Covenant corvette through his spotting scope. Flashes of light erupted within the clouds of smoke around the alien vehicle. Explosions rippled both throughout the air and down upon the ground, leaving flame and haze all throughout the valley. The corvette continued to pound the UNSC defenses. Hammond asked Gronin, "Any contact?"

"Nothing yet, but they'll be coming from the south now."

Hammond shifted his attention in that direction, scanning the building and roads leading towards a nearby park. The lance of Covenant had come from that nearby park and tried to push up on the company's left flank, only to be outflanked by 2nd platoon. Now 2nd and 3rd were consolidating their strength and forming an even tighter defense a block away from Company HQ. The only reasonable choice the Covenant troops had was to try to attack 1st platoon to the south, who were guarding the roadway leading downhill.

They waited for Warrior 1 to take contact, but no attack came. The two Marines were disciplined enough to remain silent and wait, but they were restless too. After a while, Gronin spoke up, "Meat, you see anything at all?"

"Nah."

Gronin was more anxious than his friend. He had been waiting ever since they landed on Victory to fire a shot from his weapon in combat. Now his chance would finally arrive, but the Covenant just weren't making their move. Perhaps the other Marines were repelling their attacks too well. The young sniper rubbed his eyes underneath his ballistic lenses.

"What the hell? Look at that." Hammond pointed out. The corvette began to rise up into the air, flying almost vertically. It loomed high above the city. Soon, it began to bombard larger swathes of area with plasma, hitting warehouses, the spaceport, and downtown all at once. Then it shifted slightly. Suddenly, massive rounds of plasma shot out of the corvette, this time hurling towards the two snipers.

They cursed, hurriedly picking up and ducking behind some nearby vents for cover. Gronin closed his eyes as he awaited the impact. The thought of never having the chance to kill even one Covenant crossed his mind. He lay there for a brief second, anticipating his death.

A thunderous boom shattered his ears and shook his body as the plasma rounds impacted. One round hit three floors below them, obliterating all three of the floors in between. Another round hit the far side of the roof, the concussion rocking through Gronin. The other two rounds hit the other parts of the building, causing extensive damage to it. Before they could even stand, another barrage hit the building. Gronin stumbled as he tried to stand, but the explosions knocked him aside. Hammond was beside him, clutching onto the rooftop vents for balance. Both of their ears rang as their bodies were knocked around by the explosions. This time however, the roof began to crack, and then sink. Then, as another round struck the building, the roof caved in altogether. Gronin and Hammond fell through the building, holding onto their small piece of the roof as rubble crashed down all around them.

In a daze, Gronin awoke amidst smoke and flames. His ears heard nothing save for the sound of ringing. He saw Hammond lying nearby, and he panicked at the thought of losing his friend. But then the spotter stirred and got up to his feet. They looked at one another and then all around them, exchanging looks of confusion and worry.

"Do you think anyone's alive?" Gronin asked, but his voice sounded mute to his partially functioning ears.

Hammond said something to him, but he couldn't hear it. The big Lance Corporal grabbed his DMR, and Gronin followed suit, grabbing his sniper rifle and checking to see if it still functioned properly. It did. Hammond's weapon however, was damaged from the fall and unusable.

They combed through the rubble, their ears eventually recovering. The building itself was mostly intact on the first floor, save for the rubble from the roof and the floors above. Most of the destroyed structure fell on the outside of the building, and the roof was completely gone, collapsed in and around the school. Other voices were heard combing through the rubble. Dead and wounded Marines lay scattered throughout the destruction, some half-buried in fallen concrete.

First Sergeant Allen shouted above the noise of the rubble, "Marines, gather up the wounded and get your asses outside!" Gronin saw the slight, grizzled, and old former ODST rallying Marines and moving the wounded. He had lost his helmet, and a small stream of blood covered the side of his face.

An RTO ran up to the First Sergeant, "First Sergeant, 2nd has a perimeter outside, but the evac birds are gonna take some time getting all the wounded out."

"PFC, you tell those damn birds to prioritize and load as many men aboard their Pelicans as they can in one go."

"I already did First Sergeant. They're too busy trying to evac units downtown."

"Damnit," Allen dismissed him, and without missing a beat or caring to greet Gronin and Hammond, he said, "Gronin, Hammond, head through the doors and take up a position on the second floor. Covenant are gonna make their assault soon. Don't settle in for long, we're leaving once we get the wounded out of this building."

"Moving First Sergeant!" they both said, rushing through the doors and into the remains of the former cafeteria. A squad from the weapons platoon and some other survivors rushed about the open space, setting up defensive positions and moving the wounded. Overhead, the roof was torn open, and the sun shone in. A set of stairs ran up to the second floor, where just enough of the edges of the floor remained for Marines to take up positions along the walls and windows, overlooking the outside of the structure.

The snipers moved up the stairwell, setting up a position to the south and providing overwatch to Warrior 2 and the medevac Pelicans. As soon as they had settled in they immediately heard gunfire to their rear and Marines yelling, "Contact!" Then it became utter chaos; the Marines were fully engaged while some of their comrades were busy digging out the men buried by rubble. Somebody yelled, "We're being overrun!" and Gronin picked up and shifted his field of fire to the rear.

Down below, Marines fired their MA5s frantically at thin air. Neither Gronin nor Hammond could see any targets. Upon the ad-hoc parapets of the second floor, a team of Marines fired down into the fray, suppressing the far side of the room. Suddenly, a light emerged from behind one of the Marines. The light impaled him and lifted him into the air, and Gronin saw the brief flicker of a leg kicking the dying Marine down onto the floor below. Energy swords appeared around the other Marines too, dispatching them in quick order as the invisible blade wielders leapt below, their active camouflage flickering mid-leap.

Soon, plasma fire began to tear through the Marines beneath them, as dozens of the invisible Elites moved to press in. Gronin brought his weapon up and placed the optic where he saw flashes from a plasma weapon. He fired, the SRS99 booming loudly as the round caught an Elite dead in the chest. It stumbled as its shields fluctuated, but another round put the thing down for good. Gronin watched it go down in satisfaction, having finally killed. He cut his celebrating short however, bringing up another target within quick succession of the last one. He fired again, hitting an Elite in the arm and then losing his sight picture as the alien ducked behind a wall of rubble.

The Marines were being slaughtered down below. An energy sword slashed through the air, cutting a Marine across the chest and sending him to ground, dead. Gronin fired at the Elite who killed him, hitting its head and sending blood and brain matter splattering across the ground. Soon, plasma fire was directed upon them as well. Hammond returned fire with an M6C pistol while Gronin reloaded.

"Fall back! Fall back!" A Marine began yelling in panic. Gronin and Hammond picked up and leapt down onto the stairs, then began running towards the exit doors. Several other Marines hurriedly followed them, being cut down and picked off as they ran for the door. Unbeknownst to the snipers, the Marines were retreating in disarray, and they had all but forgotten those who were still wounded and partially buried beneath the rubble. The Covenant mercilessly butchered them as they lay injured and unable to defend themselves.

The doors shut behind them, and the Marines began to barricade it with rubble and furniture. Besides Gronin and Hammond, only three others made it out. "What the hell are we doing?" one Marine asked.

"We have to get out of here. Let's go," a second Marine responded, his expression terrified and demoralized.

The third Marine was the RTO from earlier. "But we're still medevac-ing the wounded."

"I don't care Belichek. Rubio let's get moving before they break through," the panicked Marine said, motioning to the first Marine.

"What about the wounded Braxton?" Belichek, the RTO, asked.

"We can't save them," Braxton, the panicked PFC, said.

"Privates, get it together!" Gronin shouted, shutting them up, "We don't leave Marines behind. Get in position away from the door. We're gonna buy as much time for those medevac Pelicans as we can. Get to it."

Reluctant to refuse the Lance Corporal, the Marines took up their defensive positions before the door. They huddled against the walls of the dark hallway. A light emerged from the door, glowing brighter as a high-pitched charging foretold an imminent explosion. The door blew open in a suffocating ball of fire and plasma. Immediately, plasma fire filled the hallway. The Marines returned fire, hugging the walls tightly for any chance they might have at avoiding enemy fire. PFC Rubio was the first to go down, being struck by plasma multiple times even as he lay dead. Hammond collapsed against the wall as two rounds struck him, one into the plating on his torso and the other into his arm, causing him to lose his grip on his pistol. Shrugging it off, Hammond reached out for the weapon, reloaded it, and continued to fire at the advancing Elites. All of a sudden, an Elite materialized out of thin air, moving in from a side hall. It stood over PFC Belichek and raised its sword, cutting the Marine halfway down the middle and pulling the energy blade out through the crackling and smoking radio pack upon his back. PFC Braxton lowered his rifle and turned his back, cursing and screaming as he ran down the hall toward the exit.

Gronin and Hammond began to slowly lose ground as well. The volume of fire was so heavy that Gronin was forced to simply empty his sniper rifle into the enemy ranks, hopefully providing enough cover fire for the two of them to fall back to a better position. Their hopes of retreating were dashed however, when a plasma grenade went off in front of their cover, knocking both of them upon the ground.

The Elite who had killed Belichek re-materialized from cloak and advanced upon Gronin, raising its sword to finish him. Before it could deliver the final blow however, a blast of fire and lead erupted across the Elite's chest, causing him to falter and draining away his shields. The sound of a weapon being re-cocked was heard before another shot hit the Elite again, sending its purple-blue blood splattering over Gronin and Hammond. Immediately, a Marine moved to grab the dead Elite and held it standing in place.

The Elites returned fire and advanced, but their shots only impacted against the back of their fallen ally. The unknown Marine dropped his M90 and primed a grenade, tossing it into the throng of Elites, who did their best to avoid the explosion within the cramped hallway, but to no avail. Many were caught in the blast, sending them reeling from the force and shrapnel it had generated. Lacking shields, they scrambled for cover. One of them, angered by the Marine's tenacity, charged forward, firing madly. The Marine dropped the dead Elite and ducked into the fallen rubble Gronin had been using as cover, grabbing his M90 as he did so. As soon as the Elite came upon him, he fired point-blank into the creature's face, killing it instantly.

By now, Gronin and Hammond were moving about and crouched low. Gronin picked up his rifle, reloaded, and attempted to fire, but the Marine waved him down. The two snipers finally got to see the face of the Marine who saved them: First Sergeant Allen. "Get the hell out, now!" He shouted. They refused, so he shouted again, "Go! You're the last ones, so go!" At this, they relented and fell back, staying low to avoid fire, all the while the M90 fired shot after repeated shot at the enemy.

When they made it outside, the M90 was no longer firing. After linking up with the survivors and the Marines from 2nd platoon, they waited to see if the First Sergeant would return. Eventually, the medevac birds were able to take all of their wounded, and the unit began to move out. Believing the Elites to be regrouping and sneaking up on them from another angle, Lt Lann of 2nd platoon pulled everyone out. First Sergeant Allen never returned, but the Elites had stopped their attack and vanished.