A/N: Here's Chapter 9 and what is essentially the beginning of the story. All helmets can be found in Halo Reach (sans Mark IV) as they're the varaitions I'll be using. In the upcoming chapters I'll be using the freedom an AU story offers to my advantage. For example, events may happen sooner/later and names of places on planets may be names I've come up with. As for information regarding ships/weapons and anything else Halo, information has been gathered off of Halo Nation and Halopedia. Anyway, thanks for reading and sticking with the story, hope you enjoy this chapter. (Side note: Chapters 10 and 11 will be uploaded at the same time.) - LegendsOfOnyx
Chapter 9: The Briefing
Reach FLEETCOM Military Complex
Planet Reach
April 19, 2528
07:20 hrs
Firing range
Three shots were fired followed by the perfect shot buzzer.
It had been two months and seventeen days since Violet had joined Indigo, and she had grown close to everyone one of them, Louis included. The banter the two had during missions and off duty were one of the things she hoped they never lost.
Indigo had been sent out on a number missions after Violet joined. Most involved quelling small Rebel insurrections, whilst others required them to infiltrate Rebel Strongholds to steal intelligence and data on planned attacks. The down side to those missions was that there had been many instances where they had to leave some data behind, either due to the sheer size of the data, or at the risk of being detected. On one mission, Indigo found themselves on Harmony for three weeks. Originally there to assist in rescuing Marines that had been captured by Rebels, they then found themselves assisting with countering a surprise Rebel siege on Firebase Dynamo. It had been a close battle as one member of Indigo had been injured as the siege began, meaning it was down to the other five to do the fighting. It made them realise that they relied on each other more than they thought, and that they couldn't take each other for granted. The siege also tested and improved their teamwork and the ability to remain composed in highly stressful situations (even if being one member down had put a bit of stress on them at first). The Rebels had come close to overrunning the whole base, but, due to Fireteam Indigos assistance, the Rebels were forced to retreat on the twelfth hour of the final day of the week. Indigo had returned to Reach a day later.
Since joining the team, Violet had taken a certain liking to spending time in the firing range of a morning. It had been one of the things that helped her adjust for the first two weeks, as she was still recovering from the attack in the gym.
The second had been in the form of spending time with Clementine. Both girls would head to the firing range together, giving them more opportunities to bond over something they both enjoyed doing. They'd either talk the whole time they were there or just enjoy the comfortable silence between them.
At the beginning of April they agreed to a friendly competition. It was as simple as who had the highest score on the last day of every month. To make it more of a challenge for themselves, they set the movement setting on the targets to maximum, and to make it fair, they'd start and finish at the same time. They also agreed to wipe their score the first day of every month.
This morning they were there as usual, enjoying the presence of the other and both laser focused on hitting the speeding targets.
"That was lucky." Violet huffed when Clementine hit her three quick precision hits.
Clementine exhaled. "Yeah, it was."
Violet remained rooted, her eyes tracking one target then two. She carefully memorised their paths and went to pull the trigger to hit the first.
The intercom around the base suddenly came to life, surprising Violet enough for her to pull the trigger and miss her target completely.
She slammed the DMR she was using on the counter in front of her (thankfully not hard enough to damage the counter or weapon), removed her helmet, span around and glared daggers at the offending piece of hardware, only just catching the end of the announcement.
"...peat. Fireteam Indigo is to report to Briefing Room immediately."
Violet remained fixed in place, daring the intercom to come to life again so she had a reason to tear it off the wall. Clementine stood next to her amused, and placed her weapon down onto the counter. She thankfully still had her helmet on so Violet couldn't see her failing to hide her growing smile. Ten seconds passed and Violet still hadn't moved nor said anything.
"What the actual fuck!?" Violet suddenly shouted at the intercom.
That was enough to have Clementine break down laughing, having to remove her helmet to breathe properly.
Violet glared at Clementine, only causing her to laugh more.
"Oh, I'm glad you find this hilarious Clementine." Violet said. Trying hard to remain as pissed off as possible at the fact that she had lost her chance of overtaking Clementines score for now. But as her best friend laughed more, she couldn't help but join her.
"C'mon Ms. I'm-too-competetive-for-my-own-good," Clementine teased. "Let's see what they want."
On their way to the Briefing Room, Louis, in his dark green armour sans helmet which he was holding, almost ran into them.
"Jesus, it's not like you two to be dragging behind, you're usually the first two there." He said, falling in behind the two jogging girls. "Being late usually falls down to me."
As the three jogged down the hallways, they received a few good luck wishes from the people they passed.
"I know. We may have had an itty, bitty outburst at the firing range." Clementine teased, bumping Violets shoulder, who shook her head with a small smile on her lips.
"You didn't break or dent anything, right?" Louis asked. "Faraway will flip his shit if he has to buff out another counter." Louis teased whilst still being one hundred percent serious.
"Hey, I haven't broken anything yet." Violet defended herself.
"Oh I know," Confirmed Louis. "Just making sure you know is all."
They arrived a couple minutes later. Ruby, Mitch and Marlon were already armoured up and waiting for them.
Ruby's armour sported the classic white and red of a medic. Her helmet was the Mark V Gen 1 HAZOP and its visor was almost as white as her armour.
Mitch wore jet black armour with prominent red markings. His helmet was the MJOLNIR Powered Assault Armour/G, or GUNGNIR. Its visor, a single small circle on the left side of the helmet. Mitch's visor was bright red, giving the impression that a singular red eye was staring right at you.
Marlon was also in jet black armour but with blue markings instead. His helmet was the classic Mark IV. Marlons visor was jet black, just like his armour.
Louis was inspecting his helmet which was the MJOLNIR VI/S, or 'Scout'. Louis used this helmet as it came with a hardened uplink/remote sensor package installed. This would allow him to easily spot and call out targets and distance for Marlon. Louis' visor was gold.
Violets own armour was similar to Clementines, except Violet's was dark purple, not dark blue, yet they both shared the silver highlights. Where Clementines helmet was the Recon prototype (designated MJOLNIR Powered Assault Armour/R), Violets was the MJOLNIR/AA, or 'Air Assault', which was developed as an improvement to the ODST helmet. Violets visor was jet black, like Marlons.
Mendez stood before them, hands behind his back and directed their attention to a projection of their target.
"This was a small UNSC powerhouse," He began, zooming in on the target more for them. "I say 'was', because it was recently attacked and overrun by local Rebels. We need you to retake that powerhouse, by any means necessary. Any question?"
Clementine raised her hand. "Opposing forces strength Sir?"
"Small, Spartan, they caught our troops off guard with the attack." Clementine nodded her understanding.
Louis raised his hand this time.
"If it's only a small group, why send in a Spartan Fireteam of six and not a few squads of Marines?" He asked.
Mendez looked him dead in the eye and didn't answer, he didn't need to.
Mitch hit his shoulder. "I wouldn't." He warned.
Louis remained silent after that.
"Any other questions?" Mendez asked.
Everyone remained frozen and silent, awaiting dismissal.
"Dismissed Spartans, your Pelican is waiting on exterior landing pad A-5."
They all saluted and left the Briefing Room going to the armoury before heading outside for their awaiting Pelican dropship.
"Really Louis, that was your question?" Mitch asked disbelievingly. "Fuckin' A." He sighed.
"Mitch. Please?" Clementine asked, a not-so-subtle request for him to drop it, and he did. "Let's get this over with quickly. Agreed?"
Five status lights turned green on her HUD.
