2256 HOURS, APRIL 6, 2553 (MILITARY CALENDAR) \ ELITE HOMEWORLD \ LZ ALPHA
Red and Green squads had already moved out, so now it was blue squads turn. "Be prepared for anything." Fred advised Sean.
"I know that, you don't have to tell me." He replied a tad annoyed. The two moved out as fast as they could, occasionally ducking behind cover anytime they heard something suspicious. The Covenant dropped off about two clicks away from them and five minutes before they had. The element of surprise was on their side though, as they sprinted from cover to cover and down a long stretch of clearing in the forest. "This doesn't feel right, too easy." Sean heard Fred say over the COM.
"I'm with you on that one, just means that we should move at twice the speed while being twice as cautious." Was his reply as he picked up the pace with Fred following suit. They had just paused inside of a small brush as they heard footsteps, the scream of banshee engines, and trees being brushed aside and destroyed by a rampaging wraith tank. 'Bout time.' Sean thought as Fred gave orders on the COM.
The plan was simple; they'd jump out as the wraith passed, take over its controls and turret, and then use it to kill everything else around them. The time had come; they jumped out and took every one of them by surprise. Fred leaped up on top of the wraith, pulled open its hatch, and dropped down with his shotgun in his hand. Sean on the other hand jumped up and kicked the brute in the turret squarely in the back of its head. This killed it instantly as the body flew out and landed on two startled jackals.
The ambush had happened so fast, so perfectly, that by the time the Covenant pointed their weapons at the tank, it was too late. Sean immediately mowed down the closer groups while a ball of energy surged over his head and took out a massive group of them. The banshee above had heard all the commotion, and circled down towards them. Fred stared at it through the view screen, waited for it to come in range, and fired. The shot was dead on, hitting the banshee on its nose and destroying it instantly as the shattered parts flew everywhere. "OK, let's go take care of some more." Fred said over the COM as the wraith hurried forward to meet the rest of the Covenant forces.
2306 HOURS, APRIL 6, 2553 (MILITARY CALENDAR) \ ELITE HOMEWORLD \ APPROXIMATELY 1 ½ KILOMETERS FROM THE CAPITAL
Red and Greed squad moved at as fast a pace as they could go and were making great time. As an added bonus, they hadn't hit a single group of Covenant yet.
The run ended about half an hour later as they made it to the outskirts of the capital……only to see a massive battle being fought. The elites had fortified the buildings with turrets and anti-air defenses while troops on the ground where busy holding back the advance as best they could. This was made all the more difficult by the dozen banshees circling over head and the three wraiths on the ground. They needed to act quickly.
Linda grabbed the sniper off of her back and aimed carefully as the other slipped to the side. Her targets were clear; the three brutes manning the tank turrets. Due to either the Covenant's arrogance, or an extreme amount of good chance, they had lined themselves up perfectly so that one shot would take them out. She steadied herself, her arms were motionless as she zoomed in and found her target.
A loud bang was heard, or would've been had it not been for all the plasma flying everywhere, as the 14.5mm bullet pierced each brute's helmet, went through the head, and came out the other end and continued on its way. Everyone was too busy fighting to notice the brutes fall forward and die, save for green squad and red one, who jumped out of the tree line before anyone would notice the dead soldiers, punched holes in the back of the wraiths and planted a plasma grenade in the hole as they rolled back into the cover offered by the forest and three loud explosions took place that startled the Covenant troops and decimated their artillery strength.
They all searched frantically from cover and were rewarded with nothing but return fire from the elites. A brute and group of grunts ran behind the tanks to search for the culprits of this attack, and the brute suffered for it as his head had a new hole in it and he fell to the ground dead. Before he had hit the ground however, four pistol rounds went off and took out the grunts.
With the element of surprise gone, Linda began to fire from her new position under some thick trees and bushes and was slowly picking off the brutes one by one. Once her first clip was expended, Kate rushed out from the forest with a plasma rifle in her hands as she began to fire at the jackals and grunts while three-burst shots came from behind her and assisted in her killing. With the success of their initial attack, the Spartans had dwindled the army down to a few brutes and jackals as the banshees were taken care of by their elite allies.
In an over confident manor, Kate mopped up the jackals ad left two brutes before. "I got them." She said over the COM before she rushed up to them. She waited 'til the last second possible as she primed a plasma grenade, thrusted it onto front brute's chest, and flipped over as the resulting explosion took it out. However, she had been too early on the triggering, which meant that her shields were flashing red from depletion as she turned towards the second brute. Time seemed to slow down then, as she could see it swinging a brute shot at her. She couldn't move in time, and put up her arms as she expected her recklessness to get her killed.
She stood there, one second, two seconds, three…..she wasn't dead? She instead opened her eyes as she saw twin beams of energy sticking out of the brute's stomach as they were removed and the brute fell to the ground dead. "Thanks, whoever you are." She said graciously at the floating energy sword before her.
"You're……alive?" She heard a voice say from where the sword was floating. The cloaked elite then seemed to appear out of nowhere, it was the Arbiter!! "Ah my friend, it is so good to see you again." He said as the sword was deactivated and attached to his thigh.
"Umm, sorry to burst your bubble Arbiter, but I'm not Master Chief." She enlightened the elite as the rest of her unit came out of hiding once they had made sure everything was clear.
"So, there were other survivors." He said as he placed his palm underneath his chin as he thought deeply about this. "So then, who do I have the honor of welcoming to my planet?"
"I'm Kate." She replied as she bowed before him.
"Name's Linda." She said putting her sniper rifle on her back.
"I'm James." He said as he slammed a fresh clip into his battle rifle.
"And I'm Will." He said with his back to them as his rifle swept the area, expecting something to jump out at them. "There are two others who were sent to halt the advance, but we've yet to get word from them."
"Alright then, let us move out an assist them in any way we can. I will not let them kill a brother of my friend." The Arbiter said as he got out his plasma rifle and led them all away.
2315 HOURS, APRIL 6, 2553 (MILITARY CALENDAR) \ ELITE HOMEWROLD \ 5 CLICKS FROM LZ APLHA
Ever since they took the tank, things had gotten worse for blue team; much, much worse. It started when they took a direct shot from behind, forcing them both out of the tank as it exploded mere seconds afterwards. The rest of the time was spent running for whatever cover they could find and trying their best to cope with the all the setbacks.
Now, they were busy shooting as they backed up, trying to just stay alive. Neither of them had seen it before they already fell in, but they backed up into a crater and tumbled head over heels for a moment before they righted themselves and barely dodged a wraith shot that hit where they were a second ago. They took cover behind a rock and saw more and more red dots appear on their motion tracker, all of which were thankfully in front of them….for now. They kept poking their heads over to get out a few shots on the advancing grunts and jackals as wraith fire hit everywhere around them, forming small craters in the ground.
"Rick, Rick come in, I'm requesting immediate air support." Sean said as he tried to reach Corrupt Heart. "Send a UY down her now and detonate it above so you don't kill us."
"PHANTOMS INBOUND!!" He heard Fred shout into his ears as five massive dots appeared on the motion tracker. Troops fell out of the sides as they touched down and attempted to take out the two humans. They then saw one of the back holes open up and knew what that meant: hunters, things were about to get a lot harder. It would take a few minutes for the bomb to arrive, and they both knew that they would be dead by then.
2324 HOURS, APRIL 6, 2553 (MILITARY CALENDAR) \ ABOARD CAPTURED COVENANT VESSEL CORRUPT HEART \ COMMAND BRIDGE
"PHANTOMS INBOUND!!" Was the last thing Rick heard as explosions and gunfire were heard over the COM and it went dead. He had slowly made his way near the drop point, and was now poised to fire of the UY. He knew that the cloaked ship would hide the bomb from sight, and the radar jamming system he was using would prevent them from detecting it, so he took the shot. He launched the bomb out of the cannon that had been fitted to the bottom of the ship.
The cannon had originally been built for MAC rounds, but desperate times called for desperate measures. The engineers on board had loaded the completed bomb into it through the tube that lead down to it, Rick had opened up the hole that allowed the bomb to enter, and fired it on a remote detonation. He waited for the right moment to trigger it, and awaited the command.
A few tenseful minutes passed by as he heard nothing, and then he heard a desperate scream over the COM. "GOD DAMN IT TRIGGER THE FRICKING BOMB RICK!!" Sean shouted as Rick heard what sounded like a plasma blast hit him and heard Fred dragging him across the ground. So Rick sent out the signal as ordered, and saw a small blue explosion from orbit as it went off.