Disclaimer: I do not own Teen Titans nor Halo. I also do not own the Matrix.
CHAPTER 10:
SHAFTED
Cyborg stealthily walked through the corridors, looking around him for any signs of movement. In the room ahead, he saw an elite with its back to him, using the console of one of those purple crates Cyborg always saw. Cyborg quietly walked the rest of the way to the elite while unslinging his rocket launcher. From a few feet behind the elite, Cyborg whacked the alien in the back with the rocket launcher, instantly killing it, or at least knocking it out. Cyborg slung the rocket launcher over his shoulder again, then went up a ramp to his right.
Sticking to the walls, Cyborg sneaked through the catwalk over the room below, where several grunts and a red-armored elite were patrolling. There was an uncovered part of the catwalk up ahead, so he first checked to see if no Covenant were looking up, then silently dove for the next covered portion of the catwalk. There was a grunt looking the other way in front of him, so he bashed it with the butt of his rifle.
Cyborg saw that no one had discovered his presence, so he looked for the way down to the Silent Cartographer's control room. He saw a ramp going down to the room below, and a door just ahead of it, but the red elite was guarding it. Seeing no other way to advance, Cyborg picked up a few grenades from the grunt then, after taking careful aim, primed one and threw it at the elite below. It was a perfect throw, as the plasma grenade attached itself to the back of the elite's head, so it had no idea of its impending doom. The grenade exploded after a few seconds, sending panic among the grunts that were under the elite's command.
Cyborg ran down the ramp and went for the door. He was able to go through without the grunts seeing him, as they were too busy running around after seeing their leader get blown to bits. Cyborg went down the winding ramp on the other side of the door, encountering two jackals. He brought them down with his assault rifle, then continued on.
Cyborg finally found himself in some strangely constructed room. After taking out some jackals, Cyborg went to the middle portion of the room, and saw a hunter standing up straight with its back to him. Cyborg found the perfect time to use his rocket launcher, so he switched to his heavy weapon and took aim at the hulking alien. He pulled the trigger, and the explosive warhead blasted the hunter off its feet. The other one suddenly appeared, hiding behind its shield. Cyborg had then already aimed at the second hunter, and he fired his second and last rocket at it. After the hunter was dead, Cyborg discarded the rocket launcher with a sigh and proceeded down another winding ramp at the other end of the room.
Then, Starfire suddenly spoke through the radio, "Starfire to ground teams: you have two Covenant dropships coming in."
Cyborg stopped to listen to the conversation.
"Dammit!" Robin answered on the radio, "Okay, Marines we've got company. Let's get ready. Engage enemy forces on sight."
"It'll be easier to hold them off from inside the structure," Raven suggested, "Can you get inside?"
Robin took a while to respond, "Negative! They're closing in too fast! Cyborg, Raven, you need to find the Cartographer! We'll keep them busy as long as we can!"
"Good luck, Robin," Raven answered, then said to Cyborg, "We'll be in trouble if we don't get out of here before additional reinforcements arrive. Let's find that map."
Cyborg went past some more complexly designed rooms, before finally ending up in a room being patrolled with a significant number of Covenant. He decided that stealth would be the best tactic here. Cyborg waited for a patrolling grunt to pass, then ran for a pillar that would obscure the Covenant's view of him. He heard no signs that the Covenant had been alerted to him, so he waited for the grunt to pass by again. As the alien did, he grabbed it by the neck, and choked it to death. It was quiet enough that no one heard the grunt's whimpers.
Cyborg was about to move on, but before he could, a yelp sounded through the room.
"There he is!"
The grunt pointed at Cyborg, and the metal man unloaded half a clip into the alien. His presence was now known, so he just ran to the other side of the room. A red elite appeared from around a corner and started firing at him, so Cyborg armed a frag grenade and threw it at the elite. The elite ducked, so the grenade missed him, but it forgot that it was a human grenade, not a plasma grenade. The frag bounced off the wall behind the elite, and exploded, sending the elite flying in the direction of Cyborg.
Cyborg passed the corner the elite had gone through, and saw more Covenant – an elite and some grunts. He fired his whole clip into the group, but only got a few grunts. He retreated to reload, but the elite ran up to him. Cyborg had no time to reload, so he instead got up close to the blue elite and hit it several time in the head with his rifle and finishing it off with a left hook. The elite fell to the ground with purplish blood dripping from its face.
The other grunts started running away, but Cyborg stopped all of them with his pistol. A group of jackals then came out from behind him, so Cyborg threw another fragmentation grenade that was able to take all of them out. Even more grunts ran down a ramp near a chasm, so Cyborg reloaded and put bullets through all of them.
Finally, the area was secure, and Cyborg was exhausted from fighting, so he sat on the ground to rest for a while.
"What're you sitting down for?" Raven asked furiously, "This is no time to rest! More enemy forces are coming in, so we need to find that map and get out of here!"
Breathing heavily, Cyborg replied, "Just a minute." Then he slowly rose and went through a doorway that he knew would lead to the Cartographer. Just as he rounded a corner, two elites saw him and began firing at him. Cyborg didn't want the fight to last long, so he armed a plasma grenade and threw it at the nearer elite. The elite evaded the blue orb, but the other one didn't see the grenade because its companion was in the way. He tried to shake the grenade off his armor, but just ended up getting fried by the plasma explosion.
The other elite charged at Cyborg, firing. Cyborg fired his assault rifle and screamed at the elite. He sensed that his shields were going down rapidly, but so were the elite's. Finally, both of their shields were down, and as Cyborg pulled the trigger again to finish the alien off, nothing happened.
Click.
Cyborg pulled the trigger again.
Click. Click.
Still nothing. The elite's plasma rifle meanwhile had overheated, and it was waiting for the weapon to cool down. Cyborg reached for his sidearm and aimed at the elite's head.
Click. Click. Click.
Cyborg had forgotten to reload earlier. The elite's plasma rifle was almost cooled down. Cyborg saw that there was no time to reload. He looked to his right and saw the other elite's plasma rifle on the floor. He threw aside his pistol and reached for it. He picked it up and aimed at the elite. Two shots went out, but both missed the elite. Cyborg pulled the trigger again.
Kssshhh. Kssshhh.
The plasma rifle's power had been depleted. Cyborg's last resort had been lost. The elite laughed at Cyborg mockingly, aimed at his head, and pulled the trigger.
Kssshhh. Kssshhh. Kssshhh.
The elite swore in an alien tongue. It looked down at its weapon, and realized he had been given a faulty plasma rifle. It looked up again and saw Cyborg's fist going straight toward its head. It swore once more, before Cyborg's knuckles connected.
After finishing up the fight, Cyborg picked up all his guns again, and reloaded each of them. He then entered an personal reminder into his suystem to always reload his weapons.
"Yeah," Raven commented on this action, "That's a pretty good idea."
Cyborg then went over to the panel in the middle of the room the two elites were guarding, and pushed a single button. A hologram of the ringworld appeared over the panel. Cyborg and Raven saw that Halo was actually divided into several segments. They watched on as the hologram of the ring broke up into many sections. Raven started accessing the data.
"Analyzing... Halo's control center is located... there!"
One of the segments of Halo enlarged itself, then started to rotate around its axis.
"That structure appears to be some kind of temple or shrine, if I'm interpreting this correctly. Interesting. A shrine is an unlikely place to put such a significant installation."
"Let's criticize it after we've gotten back home," Cyborg told her.
"Agreed," she replied. Then she tried to contact Keyes again.
"Raven to Captain Keyes."
There was no reply from Keyes. Instead, Starfire answered.
"The Captain has dropped out of contact, Raven. His ship may be out of range, or experiencing problems with their equipment."
"Keep trying," said Raven, determined to inform Keyes as soon as possible, "Let me know when you've reestablished contact and then tell him that Cyborg and I have determined the location of the control center. We'll be heading there as soon as we're topside."
"Affirmative. Starfire out."
Cyborg turned around to get back up to the surface. He hoped he wouldn't find any Covenant along the way. But of course, this wouldn't be the case. Cyborg went past the previous rooms and ramps, then on one ramp, he was finally sighted by a jackal. The jackal and its friend fired at him with their plasma pistols. Cyborg returned fire and got both of them, but at the cost of almost three-fourths of his shield.
Cyborg continued up the ramp, and arrived in a room that had been empty when he entered. Numerous Covenant forces were inside, and Cyborg knew he couldn't take them all, but they had all already seen him. Covenant from both the floor above and on the same floor as Cyborg was fired at him. Cyborg sought cover behind a narrow column. This was not good. He was pinned down, with half his shield away, and his ammo was barely enough to take all of those Covenant. And he also had only one last grenade. Was this how it would end?
But all this was interrupted by the sound of an assault rifle firing from the floor above. Cyborg peered out from the column, and saw the Covenant firing back at an unseen enemy. Cyborg knew that the source of the assault rifle fire was a Marine, because a frag grenade was thrown into the group of Covenant above which finished all of them off. Cyborg waited to see who was his rescuer, and saw none other than Robin, appearing out of a corner and firing at the Covenant below him. Cyborg called out to him.
"Robin! Man, you sure couldnt've picked a better time!"
Robin paused from firing and replied, "When I saw those aliens go inside, I knew you'd be in trouble. And I guess I was right." Then, he took care of the rest of the Covenant and motioned to Cyborg that the coast was clear.
Cyborg went up a ramp to the floor above him, and regrouped with Robin. Even Raven was glad to see him. Cyborg was about to give Robin a hug, but Robin refused, stepping backwards and shaking his head rigorously.
"Thank you, Robin," Raven thanked him sincerely, but afterwards she became serious again, "But we need to find that control center immediately. I've informed Starfire that we're on our way out."
"Okay," Cyborg and Robin replied simultaneously.
The two then went up more ramps to get to the surface. Cyborg noticed the dead bodies of the Covenant Robin fought to get to them. He had to admit, Robin was a one heck of a fighter.
Finally, Cyborg and Robin were nearing the locked door Cyborg had opened before. Robin was in the lead, while Cyborg covered his back. They didn't expect any kind of ambush. But then, the gold-armored elite Cyborg was worrying about before jumped out of nowhere, and slashed its plasma sword at Robin.
Robin did not lose his focus even after the elite's sudden appearance. Robin dodged the attack, matrix-style, causing the elite to only cut air. Then, Robin armed a fragmentation grenade and jammed it into the cracks in the elite's armor.
"Cyborg!" Robin yelled, "Get down!"
Robin dove for cover, and Cyborg did the same. After two seconds, the grenade exploded and ripped the elite's abdomen into shreds. After cleaning his face of some purplish elite blood, Cyborg praised Robin for his excellent work, then they continued upward.
As they turned a corner, they saw a Covenant dropship that had just taken off after unloading its troops. Robin told Cyborg to stay back, and asked for a grenade. Cyborg took a plasma grenade and put it into Robin's hand. Robin then took a frag grenade of his own, and told Cyborg to keep quiet.
After some time, Robin suddenly threw the frag grenade into the next corridor, followed by the plasma grenade. The first grenade clanged against the metal floor, then exploded after two seconds. The explosion injured a few stealth elites, but also sent the plasma grenade into the air. The plasma 'nade exploded in the air two seconds later, killing off four invisible elites. Then Robin rolled sideways and fired at some aliens Cyborg couldn't see, until two more invisible elites dropped dead to the floor.
Cyborg marveled at Robin's skill. He was a way better fighter than he was.
"Gee, Robin... that's just... scary..." he said. Really, he was getting a little afraid of how good Robin was.
"Thanks..." answered Robin as he stood up straight again and lowered his rifle, "I guess."
"Raven to Starfire," Raven said on the radio, "Cyborg, Robin and I are back on the surface, requesting pickup."
"Roger," Starfire replied almost immediately, "I am on my way."
As Cyborg and Robin exited the structure, Starfire and her pelican came into view. Then, the pelican slowly went down and hovered over the ground in front of the two. Cyborg boarded the dropship, followed by Robin.
"Let's get moving Starfire," Raven said, "Here are the coordinates to the control center and the flight plan I've worked on."
Starfire analyzed the data Raven sent her as she maneuvered up the pelican.
"But Raven," she said, confused, "These coordinates are underground!"
"The Covenant did a thorough seismic scan. My analysis shows that Halo is honeycombed with deep tunnels which circle the whole ring."
"I hope you are right Raven," Starfire replied worriedly as she flew the pelican toward the structure where Cyborg encountered his first pair of hunters on the island. The pelican gradually descended down to the structure. As it did, the circular structure opened like a well that went deep into the ground, and Starfire piloted the pelican through it. After the pelican had descended into the hole completely, the structure closed itself up again, leaving Robin, Starfire, Raven and Cyborg in the darkness.
Ughh... this story is so long. I guess I underestimated the length. Anyway, at least I'm almost halfway done with it. I think the next level is Assault on the Control Room, followed by 343 Guilty Spark, then The Library, next is Two Betrayals, then Keyes and finally The Maw. The only parts I'm worried about are those repetitive indoor sections in Assault on the Control Room, and also The Library. I remember there are a lot of sections for The Library, each time you go up a floor on the huge elevator, but they all are basically just the same. Two Betrayals was also very confusing, especially since it's just Assault on the Control Room in reverse. I myself can't wait until I reach The Maw. The vehicle part is one of my favorites in the game.
The next chapter is the one with probably the most memorable title... I Would Have Been Your Daddy. Why did they name it that anyway?