A/N – All things Halo belong to Bungie and Microsoft. All things Kim Possible belong to Disney. 'Immigrant Song' was written by and I assume belongs to Led Zeppelin.
This particular story comes out of the sick and diseased recesses of my own brain, and is the end result of what happens when I spend a day bored at work. Also, there are certain... continuity issues between this chapter and the first. I fear I must ask your indulgence in this, dear reader, as the scenario behind this story, and the cast thereof, has grown considerably since its inception. I may attempt to rectify this once the tale is completed.
Chapter 4 – Hoplite
First Lieutenant Yori del Cielo, Specials Platoon CO, 4/24 MIR, the 'Ninja Monkeys', was having a bad day. This was nothing new for either her or her men, as the Monkeys tended to pull the crap jobs anyway, but there were one or two little fillips to this particular bad day. For one thing, they were accompanied by something in the neighborhood of ten Navy ratings and one very junior lieutenant j.g. They fought gallantly, and died bravely (which was why there were only ten left), but they weren't exactly up to Yori's standards.
For another thing, extract was well and truly FUBAR. Which was doubly bad, given the large number of Jackals they had on their heels. Fortunately, they'd managed to kill more than they'd lost.
Unfortunately, they were moving uphill through a forest, with trees high and narrow, sparsely placed upon the floor yet with branches that filled the sky. They were only alive because Yori had applied her Yamanouchi instruction to their E&E training, as she had to all other aspects of the personal instruction she'd given them when Colonel Barkin authorized the platoon. That training had served them well, up until now, but they couldn't run forever, the available cover grew thin, and-
"Chu-i!" one her men – Sigmundson, that was the name, Corporal Ludvik Sigmundson – called out to her. "Up this way!"
She looked to where he pointed and smiled: the rocky outcropping he indicated would be a good place to make a stand. Natural cover, offering what looked like wonderful angles of fire.
"Well done, Lud-san," she said, pulling up next to him and patting him on the shoulder, even as plasma shots pock-marked the ground around them. Then they took off running again, as Yori simultaneously directed her platoon towards the rocks and ordered her platoon sergeant to assist her in staging a delaying action so they could get snipers in place.
Her orders were followed by a chorus of "Yes, Chu-i!", and she found herself grinning again. Her platoon sergeant, himself a bit of a student of military history, had bestowed the title upon her once the platoon completed training. Its pedigree was from pre-WWII Imperial Japan on Earth, and was a conceptual equivalent to 'First Lieutenant'. Given her... prior history she'd almost taken offense at the title, but there'd been real affection in the sergeant's eyes, and in the eyes of the men, when they called her that. So she'd at last accepted with a graceful bow, and a light blush, and the roaring cheer that had sprung forth from the Ninja Monkeys told her why they'd wanted to give her a special title.
It was still strange to her, in a way, that she'd found the acceptance amongst the Marines, in form of a Japanese rank, that she'd never found on her old world of Yamanouchi.
Mankind had, over the course of the centuries since colonization, left Earth and settled the stars for some of the damnedest of reasons. It seemed as if every splinter group or weird ideology with enough members and money had jumped planet and wound up on some colony world or terraformed moon somewhere. The bloody Klukkers even had their own planet (emphasis on had; Klukkerworld, as it was called by nearly everyone not on the colony, was an Outer Colony, and now was so much brown glass).
Few really complained, as such migration tended to get the idiots all nice and isolated in one spot and out of everyone else's hair. It was hopped that they'd simply inbreed themselves into extinction. A vain hope, perhaps, but one must look on the bright side of things.
One of those worlds was Yamanouchi.
The colony was founded by a group of zaibatsu, led by a fellow named Fukushima Arai, and a group of historians led by a sort-of-samurai named Toshimiru, who were convinced of the superiority of all things Nippon. Not so much in terms of Shintoism, or bushido, or even sushi (though they did hold sake as greatest of alcohols), but rather in terms a bit more... phenotypical.
In essence, they were a bunch of racists.
And in the end, they rebelled against the UNSC.
This drew the attention of a SPARTAN, the 43rd MIR, and 4th Army.
Their rebellion did not succeed.
One member of the 43rd MIR, which wound up garrisoning Yamanouchi well into the Covenant War, was a young Captain named Alejandro del Cielo. Young Alejandro, as has long been known to happen during occupations, fell in love with a local gal, one Takashi Kaoru. Kaoru, for her part, fell in love with him as well. That he was given to courtly graces certainly didn't hurt matters, nor did the fact that she found his Iberian features as exotically alluring as he found hers.
Fortunately for all involved her family was a relatively urbane and cosmopolitan sort (for a resident of Yamanouchi, which wasn't saying much), and allowed the marriage, albeit begrudgingly. Then Yori came along, the Grandparent Instinct kicked in, and so far as they were concerned, the union had been their idea all along.
It was the grandparent's influence, in fact, that allowed Yori admittance to the Yamanouchi School. Their case was helped by the fact that Sensei was himself also a relatively urbane and cosmopolitan sort (again, this wasn't saying much). Kaoru herself had been one of the few female graduates of the school, and she and Alejandro both had raised Yori with the conscious intent to prepare her for the school.
For her part, Yori thought it was a good idea.
She still thought it was a good idea, for she had learned much from the teachers, even if she'd had more bad days there than good. Her relationship with Sensei was decent enough, even if it was only forged through her shear competence than through any special love he had for her. Of the student body, half tolerated her, while the other half considered her mere presence (almost even her existence) as a special and unforgivable personal affront; the old attitudes and thoughts still prevailed in a large segment of the population, and to them and their children she was and would forever be gaijin. The foreigner. The outsider. The half-breed who was... worth less than one of pure blood. That she was demonstratively better than any of them at all things ninja most assuredly did not help matters.
Especially in the eyes of a student named Fukushima. He had a given name, but he neither used it nor allowed anyone else to call him by it. He was, after all, a direct male-line descendant of Fukushima Arai, and that was name enough for anyone, thank-you-very-damn-much. In fact, he used to insist that he be called Fukushima-sama, rather than Fukushima-san, for reason of his exalted descent.
Used to, until he tried to force this point with Yori. She refused point black to call him Fukushima-sama (or to call him Fukushima-much-of-anything, unless she absolutely had to). That this half-breed refused to do his pure-blood nobility only natural obeisance infuriated him, and he called her out over the slight. She accepted his challenge, and face him in the salle according to the rules of the school.
He lost the desire to be called Fukushima-sama when Yori kicked his pure-blood ass five ways from Thursday.
Not, of course, that he didn't find other ways to make her life miserable.
Not, of course, that she didn't kick his pure-blood ass quite often, when given the opportunity.
But at last she graduated, and was called to a meeting with Sensei, a requisite counseling session about what she intended to do with her education (and it was a good education, for along with ninjitsu the school grounded its students well in the liberal arts, even with a distinct "Nipponese superiority" slant). She informed him, politely, diplomatically, but firmly, that she intended to travel off-world and enlist in the UNSC Marine Corps.
Sensei was not enthusiastic about her career choice. Even when she mentioned the Covenant War he was not enthusiastic. As far as he was concerned, the Covenant Invasion was merely a propaganda ploy on part of the UNSC, designed to allow those who had "marched in and trampled upon our most ancient and sacred traditions" to force an even greater measure of control upon the human-settled galaxy. And even if the Covenant did exist, he'd argued, it wasn't as if the UNSC was having any great effect upon their advance, if the reports were to be believed.
"And what has the UNSC ever done for you, Yori-san?" he'd concluded. "Eh? What has it given you, that you should serve it?"
"It has never called me gaijin," she'd answered after a long moment's silent consideration. In the silence that followed (as not even Sensei could claim that for himself) Yori stood up, bowed deeply, expressed her deep sorrow that he could not give his blessings to her choice (for she had come to respect him deeply), and then took her leave.
They never spoke again.
Yori hoped that the old attitudes had finally broken down on her world. In a way, she was certain they had, for by all accounts the UNSC vessels stationed in Yamanouchi space had forced the Covenant to kill them before they glassed the world, and her people, for all their faults, deeply understood honor and duty. She hoped that sacrifice had been enough to engender a reconciliation in the hearts of Yamanouchi. Maybe it was.
But even if it wasn't, her own duty was clear, as she found a slightly thicker-than-normal tree, ducked behind it, and readied her rifle. She and the platoon sergeant would draw the Jackals in two different directions, and then withdraw to the rocks under the cover of the platoon's fire. It had been her singular honor to lead, train, and fight with these men, and if she must die here with them, then that would be her honor as well.
Yamanouchi had taught her that much, at least.
Captain Betty Director, CO Heart of Sword, was having a bit of a good day/bad day mix. A good day, in that she and a decent portion of her crew were alive, despite the crashed ship, and because her plan to distract that Covenant from the Marines seemed to be working. A bad day, because her plan to distract the Covenant from the Marines seemed to be working.
"Designate targets Bravo One, Bravo Two, and Bravo Three," Lieutenant DeLong called out as he worked the (barely functional) tactical controls. "We have three Covenant Banshees inbound. ETA six minutes."
"Weapons status?" Betty asked as she tied a rag over her ruined eye. With her working eye she studied the flickering and staticy tactical holo, and saw for her self the inbound Banshees... and something else, a faint, ground-level sensor contact, situated eastwards and bearing west-south-west, towards the only opening in the mountains that Heart of Sword had landed between.
"Archer pods ready and working, Captain. Targeting is a bit iffy. P-D cannons are down, but we've got maintenance crews on it. Nukes-"
"Simplify, Carlos. Can-" she winced at the sudden spike of pain "-can you engage with what you have?"
Shit. Her legs were going weak, and this pain in her abdomen- Just what she needed with a Covie air attack on the way, and the other sensor reading that looked a lot like a bunch of Covenant infantry and armor come a'marching.
"I... I think so, ma'am."
"Then be about it, Guns," Betty replied, bracing herself against the tac console and pushing the pain out of her expression. Her only role in this would be to project an air of confidence, a beacon of something that her beleaguered crew could latch onto. And by God she was not going to leave that bridge unless Bonnie herself came up and made it a medical order.
And even then she'd probably fight it.
Commander Ron Stoppable, XO Heart of Sword, once of ODST, was having the single weirdest day of his life. Except for maybe the incident with the noodles, the monkey, and the soy sauce... but no, this topped that. Finding out that Kim Possible was alive and freaking SPARTAN topped that to no end.
Even if, a small, dispassionate portion of his mind observed, Steve Barkin's reaction to this would be somewhat similar...
He had the vaguest of notions that his jaw was hanging somewhere about his ankles, that his eyes had taken on a certain dinner plate quality, and that his e-rat bar was laying on the ground.
Dammit. That was one of the good flavors. They were so very rare.
"I thought it was you."
Forcibly, he dragged his brain back to the present.
"What?" he asked the SPARTAN – no, Kim.
"I thought it was you," she repeated, and he noticed that she looked almost as shocked as he did. "When Captain Director told me your name, and when I saw you in the mess... Ron? It's you, isn't it?"
"Yeah," he said breathlessly, nodding his head and quite visibly getting a grip on himself. It was very hard (like looking at a ghost), but he put a stranglehold on his instinct to freak out. "Yeah, it's me, KP. I... Kim, we thought you we dead! Last I saw you, you were six, just lying there in a hospital bed, and I watched you die right in front of me!"
So much for the stranglehold.
"How in hell are you here? You're supposed to be dead!"
"I think," Kim said softly and slowly, "that they replaced me with an unstable flash clone."
"An unstable- yeah, okay, that makes sense," Ron replied, calming down in the space of a breath. "And we all thought- it looked so much like-"
All of sudden he jumped up and hugged her. She, with a somewhat bemused expression, patted him on the back, not fully sure how to react to this, but deciding that it wouldn't be a good idea to hug him while wearing the armor.
"It's... it's good to see you, KP," he said at last. "You don't know how good. I mean-"
He let her go and stood back, looking her up and down, and a big grin crossed his face.
"I mean, if you, Kim Possible, can come back from the dead," he said, "then maybe..."
"Anything's possible, for a Possible?" she said wonderingly, as if she were surprised to hear herself utter those words.
"Yeah. Maybe we've got some hope here after all, KP. I... I just wish your parents could have seen this."
She turned her face away from him.
"They were on Middleton, when the Covenant glassed it?"
"Yeah. I'm sorry, Kim."
She stood there a moment, lost in thought, and then nodded.
"I'd thought as much, but no one ever told me. I just-" she stopped again, and shook her head. "I'm just glad you weren't there as well, Commander."
"Back to the formalities?"
"Yes. Please and thank you. This... this is a bit much for both of us, I think, and it'd be best if we..."
"Kept our heads in the game?" he finished with a light smile. He saw the old spark and fire of his friend in her eyes, and he wanted nothing more than to find out how much of Kim Possible remained in SPARTAN-487. He wanted to tell her about school, and Monique, and Bonnie, and Felix, and everyone else. But he guessed that conversation could wait until later. Assuming there was a later.
But anything was possible, for a Possible, so 'later' just might be happening, after all.
"If that's how you want it, Chief, then that's cool," he continued. "We've got a lot to do. The Captain gave me a lot to do, and I guess I'd better be getting down with it."
"I'd recommend eating first," Wade said over their coms, "but be quick about it. I've been monitoring the Covenant battle-net, and there's something going down a about a klick and a half north of us."
"If some of our people are in trouble," Ron asked, "then shouldn't we, I don't know, hurry?"
"The Marines seem to be holding their own," Wade answered, "and the two of you will do a lot more good fed and ready. Just do it quickly."
"Wade."
"Yes, Chief?"
"How much did you hear of our previous conversation?"
The AI was silent, and Ron stared at Kim in dawning understanding. He knew the Big Secret, now, and there would likely be consequences to that. Potentially bad ones.
"I-"
"This is going to involve some creative paperwork, isn't it?" Ron asked.
"More than likely, Commander," Wade replied, the AI sounding relieved.
"Aw, man."
"I believe we have driven them off, Sarge-kun."
"And not a moment too soon, Chu-i," the platoon sergeant replied, looking at his two remaining clips. "If we have the chance, I'd recommend attempting to regain the ammo reserves at the landing site."
"If we get the chance," she replied, then lowered her voice. "Was I right to move, Sarge-kun? Tell me truly."
"As you said, Chu-i, the landing site was an indefensible position," he replied steadily. He held his Lieutenant in high regard, and knew that she did the same for him, and that her asking the question wasn't a sign of weakness. Just the desire of a Lieutenant to learn, something that he'd always liked about her. "For a withdrawal under fire, it was very orderly. One of the best I've seen, at least."
"Perhaps," she allowed. It went against the grain to pull back under fire, no matter how justified it was, but it hadn't been a rout. An orderly pull-back to a better position.
Unfortunately, they'd left a fair amount of their rifle ammo with the downed Pelican. But the site was only a half-kilometer away, and if the Jackals were cleared out, then-
"Chu-i!"
She looked up. It was Ludvig, again.
"To the south! They're coming again!"
Yori looked through her rifle scope, down to the south, through the trees. She raised an eyebrow in surprise.
"Sarge-kun," she said evenly and calmly. "Please take a look at this."
The sergeant looked through his own scope and bit off a curse.
"Is that-"
"It does appear to be so, yes. They have adopted a testudo formation."
The testudo, or tortoise, formation was the classic defensive posture of the Roman Legions. In this case, the Jackals had formed a six-by-six square. The front rank had their shields up and interlinked, leaving just enough space for their plasma pistols. The middle twenty had their shields up and angled over, both to protect the top and to cover the open spaces on the front and flanks. The ten on the flanks simply held their shields to sides. A few of the snipers tried to take the shot, but the angles were all wrong, and there wasn't quite enough open space for their bullets to penetrate.
Then the Jackals opened fire.
"Who taught them how to do that?" the sergeant asked as he and Yori ducked to cover. "I want to know who taught them how to do that."
"Is there a reason, Sarge-kun?"
"Yes, so I can track him down and shoot him." He shook his head. "Jackals fighting as disciplined, organized infantry. Who would have guessed?"
"It could be worse."
"Please, enlighten me."
A plasma shot showered them with heated gravel.
"It could have been Elites fighting as organized infantry."
"Oh, please no," the sergeant groaned. "Stuff of my nightmares, Chu-i. Ranked Elites."
"Fight the horde," came Ludvig's voice over the com, singing. He sang at some of the strangest times. "Sing and cry..."
"...Valhalla, I am coming!"
Lieutenant DeLong pushed a button and a pair of Archer missiles sped out from the ship.
The three Banshees had been joined by three others, then by six, then by twelve, and then there were twenty-four – now twenty-two, he'd swatted a pair – Banshees screaming down upon them. Again, there wasn't much for her to do, with her ship on the ground and quite thoroughly unable to maneuver. There wasn't much for anyone to do, so the only people on the bridge now were her, Lieutenant DeLong, and about fifteen ratings running the tactical and communications systems.
Everyone else was involved in the repairs.
She smiled a bit as Carlos swatted a third Banshee. Another missile exploded without a hit, but the concussion scattered the other Banshees away from their attack run. They regrouped and tried to come in again, but Carlos held them out of range, each Archer shot hitting just the right ship to disrupt the formation and force it to break off.
"Captain," came a whisper by her ear, making her jump, "would you care to tell me just what in the hell you're doing on your feet?"
"Just holding down the fort, Doctor Rockwaller," Betty said, turning to face her CMO. Commander Bonnie Rockwaller, MD, looked almost just as she back in high school. Even the obvious signs of aging she wore well, for they added a definite air of maturity to her natural beauty. She even made the uniform look hot, as the not-so-well-disguised glances from several of the crew attested.
There was a bit of... history between her CMO and her XO, though Betty didn't know the whole story. Something about a rather adversarial relationship in high that had warmed considerably when Dr. Possible (female) took Bonnie under her wing, and then something about a chance meeting in a bar, about six months after Middleton's glassing. The details about that were shrouded in secrecy, except for the fact that Ron and Bonnie tended to blush (he just a bit more than she) when anyone brought it up.
"Of course you are," Bonnie replied. "And you can do that sitting down."
"Commander-"
"Sit in the chair, Skipper," Bonnie said in her queen-bee voice, the grown-up queen-bee voice, the one that had seen her world, her lover, and so many friends die, and took no argument.
Betty sat in the chair, one of the few that actually remained upright in the detritus-covered bridge.
"Better. How are you feeling?" she asked quietly.
Another Banshee exploded.
"Not too well," Betty answered equally quietly. "A bit weak, and growing weaker. Some abdominal pain, but-"
She stopped with a stifled gasp as Bonnie started poking around her stomach. She winced again when Bonnie poked her ribs, and the doctor scowled and whispered a curse.
"Captain, you have two broken ribs, probable major organ damage, and most likely are bleeding internally," Bonnie said quietly and methodically. "You need to get off this bridge and down to what's left of sickbay."
"No, Commander."
"Dammit, Skipper, if you don't-"
"Bonnie."
"This is one of those Hero-Captain things, isn't it?"
"It's a duty thing, Bonnie. My place is here, on this bridge, so long as I'm still conscious, until the ship is out of danger. No ifs, ands, or buts. Am I clear on this?"
"Yes, ma'am," Bonnie answered, resigned. She knew her Captain well enough, and decided to spare herself the effort.
"Now, how are we for wounded?"
"One point in your favor, Skipper, is that you're not the worse case I've got," Bonnie replied with a shrug. "Most of my SBAs made it out okay, so we've got the staff, and the supplies, to handle the load. Just..."
She nodded towards Lieutenant DeLong.
"Just keep us alive so I can actually save some of them, 'kay?"
"We'll do our best," Betty replied.
"Can't ask for anything more than that, I suppose."
Another Banshee exploded, and another, and then the survivors scattered and fled. Towards the east. Towards the incoming horde of Covenant infantry.
The horde came, organized as taught by their Lesser Prophet sponsor. The Kig-yar involved didn't know where he'd learned the tactic, and they didn't much care. All they cared was that it seemed to be working, that the interlacing of their shields kept the rifle fire of the humans at bay and allowed them to shoot on the advance. A slow advance it was, but a steady one, a nearly safe one, which would persist until they were upon the humans, the range where the human's rifles would be a liability, and then...
And then the Kig-yar would fight as they were meant to, and then they would feast.
But in their awe of the new tactic, and in their bloodlust of the fight to come, they missed something something that no Roman legionnaire worth his pilum and lorica would have missed. For in their assault all the Kig-yar were focused on the enemy in front, the one that shot. Not on their flanks. Not on their rear. Not above them.
Not in the trees.
"That... is the second strangest thing I've ever seen," Ron said as he and Kim crouched in the spare underbrush and watched the advancing Jackals. Both were rather stymied by what they saw.
"That looks like a testudo formation," Kim said.
"A what?"
"A shield formation used by the old Roman Legions, on Earth," Wade answered. "It worked pretty well for them, though I wonder who taught it to the Jackals."
"I'm kinda curious about that myself," Kim replied, "but we've got more immediate problems. Like how we stop it and save those Marines."
"Chief?" Ron asked after a moment. "Do you have a spare plasma grenade?"
"Uh, sure," she replied, pulling one off her belt and handing it to him. "Do I want to know what you plan to do with that?"
"I'm going to climb up that tree over there," he said, pointing towards a particular tree that was both along the Jackal's line of advance and had a reasonably thick branch jutting out at something less than skyscraper heights. "And then I'm going to toss this," he held up the grenade, "into the middle of their formation."
She looked at him for several seconds, and even through the visor Ron could see her working the situation out in her head.
"Okay," she said at last.
"Just like that?"
"If you say you can, Commander..."
"Hey, Mom always did call me her little monkey," he responded tartly, and then shuddered.
"Commander?"
"I always hated monkeys. Summer camp. Bad experience. I'll tell you about it later."
He crawled off towards the tree.
"Good luck, Ron," Kim whispered when he was out of earshot, and wondered why she called him that. That life, the name Kim Possible, was behind her now. Her memories of her parents and family were little more than fading shadows (weren't they?), and she was honestly surprised that she'd even remembered Ron at all. They'd only been six, for crying out loud.
Yet when they put her in the cryotubes, and when they put her on the table to be modified, hadn't she cried in her heart for her parents to reassure her? Hadn't she cried out to Ron for the same?
But that tube, and the table, had changed her. Kim Possible had cried out. Her name was Kim-487 now.
Wasn't it?
She shook her head. Existential questions could wait until after the plasma stopped firing; for now, she had a duty to attend to.
Then she began to creep forward, towards the rear of the Jackal formation, so she could either exploit his opening or bail him out of trouble in case the plan went awry.
It always had gone that way, when they were children.
The tree was narrow, and offered precious few hand-and-foot-holds. Still, Ron made the climb faster than one would have thought, given the difference between Thebes' gravity well and the one to which he'd been born. The branch that he'd aimed for was a bit... thinner and far more flexible than he had thought from the ground, but it held his weight, and he scooted down it until he was right above the middle of the Jackal formation.
He had no idea why they didn't see him. Maybe it was his luck at work, or-
A ricocheting bullet whipped past his head. It seemed that the Marines were trying to make a fighting stand, and they looked to have taken out a least a couple of Jackals. Either way, there was no real point to delay, so he switched on the grenade and tossed it towards a small gap in the shields.
It hit one shield, bounced off, hit another, bounced off, then landed at the edge of a third and plopped onto the ground right in the middle of the formation.
The testudo is a good formation for keeping enemy missile weapons out. However, the umbrella of shields had the unforeseen effect of keeping in the supraheated plasma charge from the grenade. The blast went up, hit the shields, angled back down, and swept along the ground and gutted the Jackal formation.
"Boo-yah!" cried Ron, as bits and pieces of flash-fried Jackal filled the air around him.
Then, "Uh-oh!" as the branch gave way and unceremoniously dumped him into the middle of the ruined testudo.
She sprinted towards the remaining Jackals just as soon as she saw Ron fall. What few Jackals remained would quickly recover from their shock, and Ron lying stunned and dazed in the middle of them would not be a good thing. Not tactically.
Not... personally? Maybe not, she admitted, as Ron seemed to have brought out something in her that had long lay hidden. At least, that's what she worried was happening. Maybe she just didn't want the man her goofy, former best friend had become to die.
Either way, it was the right choice.
She forwent the pistol at her side, and ignored the rifle on her back. Instead Kim drew the plasma sword she'd taken from the Elite, and set the blade alight as she waded into the Jackals. Some heard her coming, and turned to fire, but they moved so slowly, seeming to take ages just to twist about and raise their arms. And then she was upon them, each attack with the sword twisting her away from their shots, and each twist away from the shots leading into an attack with the sword.
They moved so slowly, and she could hear the wind roaring past her as she moved, the air crying out as she cut through it.
At the sound of the grenade explosion, Yori had simply raised an eyebrow, figuring that it was little more than a Jackal attempting to get one over the rocks and failing. At the sound of panicked and pained Jackal, she took a risk and stuck her head up over the rock.
Then she grabbed her rifle, popped herself full up, and sighted in.
"Platoon!" she called over the com. "Up top and rifles out. Do not shoot the SPARTAN!"
All Ron knew was that he was lying on the ground, he'd lost his gun, and there were a lot of temperamental Jackals who not only surrounded him but who were also putting two and two together regarding what had happened to their fellows. He figured that he was about to experience Death By Jackal, and for some damn reason, all he could think was that he really wished he'd gotten to try meatcakes.
He'd heard they were really good.
Then there was a dark shape carving its way towards him, and bullets flying about him, and Ron curled himself up into a ball and squeezed his eyes shut.
Then it was over, the fight had stopped, but he felt some sort of presence looming over him-
"Commander?"
Ah. Kim. He kept his eyes shut.
"Am I dead?"
"I... don't think so, Commander."
Tentatively, he opened his eyes. There she was, standing over him, plasma sword in hand, with a bunch of dead Jackals scattered about them. He turned his head towards the rocks and saw a group of Marines, along with some of his crew, clambering down and walking towards them.
"Good," he muttered as he sat up. "'Cause if this is heaven, then Rabbi Katz owes me a refund!"
He was about to ask her for a hand up, when-
"Holy crap! That's the XO!"
"Lieutenant," he said as he, with great dignity, pushed himself to his feet. "Murphy, right?"
"Yes, sir!"
"Keeping your men in hand, Lance?"
"Yes, sir!"
"Good job," he finished, giving the young j.g. a pat on the shoulder. Then he turned to the (very attractive) Marine lieutenant, the one whose patch said-
"Lieutenant... del Cielo?" he asked, momentarily stymied by the juxtaposition of her name and facial features.
"Commander Stoppable," she said quietly, bowing low. "My thanks to you, and to the SPARTAN-" she bowed again, this time in Kim's direction- "for saving my men and myself."
He turned an interesting shade of red and waved his hand. Kim just nodded.
"Yeah, well, just doing my duty, Lieutenant."
"I know, Commander."
"In any case," he continued, growing strangely uncomfortable with the look in her eyes, "what I need right now is a situation report."
"Of course," she answered crisply. "Up atmospheric entry, Colonel Barkin designated a position at 405407N150832W as the rendezvous point for the regiment. We were attempting to make our way there when our Pelican was attacked by a two ship flight of Banshees. Our pilot drove off the attack, but we were damaged and forced to land at a position some five hundred meters west of here."
"That's where they met us," Lieutenant Murphy interjected. Ron raised an eyebrow.
"We put down bare meters from their escape pod," Yori explained. "Their training for such an endeavor as this is... lacking, but they have fought bravely, Commander. They do yourself and Captain Director honor."
"I'm glad to hear it, Lieutenant," he said, nodding at Murphy and noting the tone of pride he heard in Yori's voice. This was one group of Navy pukes, he figured, who would ever always belong in part to the Marines.
"So you withdrew a half-klick under constant fire from the Jackals?" Kim asked.
"That... is correct, Senior Chief," Yori answered warily. Kim cocked her head to one side, clearly doing the math...
"Then I'm impressed, Lieutenant," she said at last. "Very impressed."
"It was... a difficult task," Yori said with a slight bow. "But I have an excellent platoon."
A bit of a cheer greeted that, and Ron grinned.
"Well, Lieutenant, what do you say we get your excellent platoon over to the rest of the Marines?"
"Commander, those coordinates are nearly fifty kilometers away, if I'm reading this right," Wade warned over the com. "It's a defensible position, but I really wish Colonel Barkin had picked something a bit closer."
"So transportation's a problem."
"With our Pelican down, yes," Yori answered.
"Um, sirs?" Lieutenant Murphy said, raising a hand for attention.
"Go ahead, Lieutenant," Ron said.
"Sir, if it's a right we need... well, we were sort of on fire at time, but when we were coming down ballistic I spotted a small Covenant outpost. Looked to have at least one of those tuning-fork transports of theirs, maybe more."
"Can you tell me where it is?"
Murphy turned in place for a few moments, getting his bearings. Then he turned around and pointed in a vaguely east-south-east direction.
"That way. About three, maybe four klicks."
Ron just nodded. Lieutenant Murphy was one of Heart of Swords' junior astrogators, and had earned a reputation at the Academy for always knowing where he was in relation to where he was going. The kid never got lost, ever.
"Sitch me, Wade. What are we in for?"
"There's a small outpost where he says it is," the AI admitted. "And if I'm reading this right, it looks as if most of the garrison was deployed elsewhere."
"Where elsewhere?"
"You're standing in them, Commander."
"Ugh!" Ron said, jumping back. He had, in fact, been standing atop the very well-done remains of a Jackal.
For a half a second, he thought he heard Yori giggle. But if the Marine Lieutenant was laughing, she hid it well, and thus spared most of what remained of Ron's dignity.
"Right, well," he said, brushing himself off and trying to act nonchalant. "Lieutenant del Cielo? K- Chief? You up for assaulting a Covenant outpost?"
Kim knelt down, picked something up off the ground, and handed it to him.
His gun.
He took the pistol from her and tucked it back into the holster.
"Let's go," she said.
"If I may make a suggestion, Commander?" Yori said.
"By all means."
"Haste forced us to leave a portion of our ammunition, and some... heavier equipment, behind at the Pelican," she admitted. "I would recommend a brief detour to collect it."
"We can carry heavy stuff," one of the ratings put in, causing the Marine next to him to laugh and smack him on the back.
"It'll cost us some time," Ron mused, "but then again, if you can't do any good when you get there, hurry isn't all that important. All right, Lieutenant, sounds like a plan."
"Then would the Chief care to take point?" Yori offered, as she gestured in the direction of the fallen Pelican.
END CHAPTER 4