Marines and Elites
Chapter 8: Building and Rebuilding
Elites
Ten hours after Chapter 7
Utarz was what one could call a pervert. Or a ladies man. Or a combination of both. In any case, right now he was having an… interesting wet dream and he was quite eager to finish it.
Of course, he knew that wouldn't happen.
A light flicked on in his room, followed by a loud "Get up, numbnuts!", followed by a blow to the head.
The dream imploded, Utarz grabbing his head in pain. His eyes shot open, and he glared at his awakener.
"Would it kill you to give me an alarm clock Atar?" He groused.
"General, or sir!" Atar snapped.
"Gimme an answer."
"Utarz, get your arse out of bed and move it to the kitchen!"
"Fine." Utarz muttered, seriously annoyed about his dream being interrupted. He walked into the kitchen, where Tracer was sitting down, drinking some coffee and looking at what seemed to be a picture.
"We have coffee?" Utarz asked, puzzled.
Tracer chuckled. "This place has everything. I can imagine why you're surprised though. It's a miracle that none of this went off."
"Huh." Utarz went over to the table. He grabbed some cereal and milk and went to the picture. "What's this?"
"It's a blueprint." Tracer replied. "For a Wraith."
Utarz chuckled. "A blueprint for a Wraith? You planning on building your own vehicles now, huh?"
"Yes."
Utarz blinked. Building weapons out of scraps of a Banshee was one thing. But a tank, a goddamn tank was another.
"Uhhhh, how exactly are you going to build a tank out of a Banshee corpse?"
Tracer looked at him. "It won't just be from those parts. There are a lot of spare parts in the basement that the previous owners used. I'm going to be using those as well."
"Oh. Well that makes sense."
"Wait." Atar had come into the room. "You'll be using human technology to build a Covenant vehicle?!"
"One should always take what one can get." Tracer replied. "Besides, I don't have much choice in that matter. I can't make a Wraith out of burnt scraps."
Atar growled but he let the matter rest. He sat down, opening a can of military rations.
"Seriously?" Utarz said in disbelief.
"Utarz, I don't know about you, but I was born a soldier." Atar responded. "I've been living on this stuff for my entire life. Eating it now is no different."
"Gods above." Utarz muttered. "That's probably why you're always so crabby."
Atar gave Utarz an irritated glare, then went back to his 'food', muttering to himself.
They ate their meals in silence. Atar was busy working out attack strategies in his head and how to actually make the other two listen to him. Utarz was bored and letting his mind wander elsewhere, inventing jokes and insults. Tracer was studying the blueprint, trying to work out how to improve it.
But all of them where thinking about the humans in some way or another.
Marines
"…I mean obviously they won't think about attacking us again, I mean with our awesome skills and all." Tim was bragging.
"Tim, we hid behind a rock." Ed pointed out. "We didn't fire a single round."
"I did!" Tim replied indignantly.
"Shooting rounds into the air when we get back to base doesn't count." Howard said.
The Marines were having breakfast, discussing the previous events that happened yesterday. It had evolved into Tim bragging about their 'skills', a view that the other two didn't share.
"Says who?" Tim replied angrily.
"Says me. Deal with it." Howard responded.
Tim growled and poked moodily at his pancake. Ed chose this moment to speak up.
"Seriously though, what are we going to do with these aliens?" He questioned.
Howard sighed. "We'll probably kill ourselves by going into a direct fight, so we should just monitor them for now."
The other two stared at him. "How, are we going to monitor them?"
Howard smirked. "We'll hide somewhere, and listen in on their conversations."
Tim stared at him for a while. Then he burst into laughter.
Howard raised an eyebrow as he watched Tim thump the table in laughter.
"Hahahaha… good one Howard, good one!" Tim managed to choke out. "Very funny, suggesting that we'll watch the Elites closely with our eyes and we'll just crouch under a rock while they chat among themselves. HAHAHA!"
Howard leaned back in his chair, smiling at this. Ed just facepalmed.
Tim chuckled. "But seriously though, how are we going to monitor them?"
Fifteen minutes later
"I hate you guys so much." Tim muttered under his breath.
"We heard you the first time Tim." Ed replied.
By now, the Marines were hiding behind a hill opposite to where the one called Tracer was tinkering with some mass of metal. They weren't too sure what he was making but it seemed to be something large.
"What is he making?" Howard wondered. "Some sort of weapon, maybe?"
"What kind of weapon is that large?" Ed asked.
"AA guns. Those things are huge." Tim said.
"Guess we'll just have to see for ourselves." Howard said.
They crept out of the shadows to look at the heap of metal. It was just a bunch of metal rods, bars and some other shapes now, but they got the idea that Tracer was going to turn it into something better.
Utarz came up to him. "Yo, Tracer."
"Hm?" Tracer looked up at Utarz. "Oh, hey."
Utarz looked at the metal. "So you're going to turn this thing into a Wraith, huh?"
Howard's eyes widened.
"What's a Wraith?" Tim asked, puzzled.
"It's a Covenant tank. It's so hard to destroy without mass firepower that it's almost impossible."
"Wonderful." Ed muttered darkly. "As if we didn't have enough problems."
The Elites appeared to be arguing with each other now. "It is possible." Tracer insisted. "I just need to be alone for a bit to do it."
"Can you do it without being alone?" Utarz asked.
"Yes, but not when the present company is shooting wisecracks at me." Tracer pointed out.
One had the impression that Utarz would be grinning if it were physically possible for him. "Well then, I'll be quiet but I'll stand right here."
Tracer gave him an irritable look. "Why?"
"To bet that you can't do it." Utarz replied mischievously. "Fifty credits."
"…" Tracer stared at Utarz for a bit. "…Seriously?" he asked incredulously. "You're on!"
"Good!" Utarz cackled. "Prepare to lose some cash!"
Two hours later
"Damn." Utarz muttered.
"Word of advice:" Tracer stated. "Never bet against my inventing and improvising skills ever again. Now give me fifty credits."
Utarz grumbled as he pulled out a small device. Howard turned back to his own soldiers, who had disbelieving looks on their faces.
"How did he do that?" Tim asked, amazed.
"I've never seen anyone build something that complicated…" Ed said softly.
"Focus." Howard snapped, bringing their attention back to him. "Don't you two realize what this means?"
Tim frowned. "It means that they have a tank and we have a jeep. Wait, that's not fair!"
"Exactly." Howard said. "We can't let them have a tank of all things. They'll destroy us in mere seconds."
Ed watched Utarz walk away. "Well, I did bring the grenade launcher…"
"Excellent!" Howard proclaimed. "The grenade launcher worked perfectly during the testing so it'll be perfect! Open fire!"
"Wait!" Tim said. "Will it blow it up? I mean, that thing does look pretty strong."
"Aim for the weak spot."
"Which is?" Ed asked.
"It's back. The motor is there so firing a grenade there will-"
"Ok, I get it." Ed interrupted. He took aim with the grenade launcher, frowning and making calculations. Then he fired.
Elites
Tracer wished he could smile as he looked at the Wraith. It was looking like his best creation so far. He was just getting ready to press the button to activate it when he noticed the humans.
And recognised the grenade launcher.
He watched as Ed fired the launcher and before he could say or do anything, the grenade hit the engine and exploded.
The Wraith came apart in a massive ball of purple fire. Parts flew everywhere and crashed, Tracer's greatest work destroyed in a flash.
"WHAT THE FUCK?!"
Tracer's yell could be heard from the Elite's base. They stared in the direction of the fire and the yell.
"Do I really want to know?" Atar muttered at large.
"Probably not." Utarz responded, too pissed about the bet to feel sympathetic for Tracer at the moment.
