DISCLAIMER: I do not own A Certain Scientific Railgun or Halo.
A/N: A shorter chapter than usual, but the next 1 or 2 chapters ought to make up for it as we go into Kuroko's first battle. That means... action! Teleporting, grenades, explosions!
I will be attempting to set up a monthly update schedule; but if needed, I'll allow myself one week of leeway as necessary if the chapter isn't ready yet.
Anyways, there are two Malcolms (it was not intended; I think I forgot about the first one). Army Lance Corporal Malcolm and Private First Class Malcolm. I apologize for any inconvenience it may cause.
Also, thanks to my Beta Reader BbK2442 for his much appreciated help.
...You thought I wasn't going to keep my promise, did you not? Well... it was close. Haha.
A week and one day has gone by since Kazari first started training to become an officer. They hadn't been idle while Misaka-san was asleep; she, Saten-san, and Shirai-san couldn't have wasted any time, even if they weren't certain of what they wanted to do or what Misaka-san thought. If they were going to fight, they had to train as hard and as much as they could; if they ended up doing nothing, than that training was just something to get their minds off of worrying about their friend.
Kazari's training wasn't physical like the others; she didn't have to worry about building up her strength or endurance like Saten-san. She just needed her mind and her eyes. It shouldn't be hard; she was just going to be controlling a surveillance drone to keep tabs on the battles, report relevant information to Captain Prock (or directly to units on the field herself if it wasn't relevant enough to bother the captain with), and assist the other staff officers whenever and wherever needed.
However, she still had to read and look over a lot of material regarding the Covenant, tactics, and strategies, including Sun Tzu's Art of War. She had to memorize the basics of leading men into battle, maintaining discipline and morale, and so much more... It was a lot to take in, and at the same time she had to learn how to control the drones, tune into certain units' frequencies, and set waypoints on their HUDs. She was required to spot concentrations of enemy forces through the drone's feed, identify targets of value, and anticipate what the enemy was going to do next.
If even all of this was required of her, Kazari wondered just how much more everyone else had to do. The captain, the major, the lieutenants... It gave her a great deal of respect for them. She couldn't weigh them down; she had to keep up with them and pull her own weight! So, she trained hard, and she's learning as much as she can as fast as she can. It's not just her friends counting on her now; it's everyone.
"Uiharu," Kazari looked up as Major Tachibana walked over to her, "the captain wants a sweep of the Covenant's base before the ODSTs move out. Take Drone-4."
"Yes ma'am." She responded before turning her attention onto the task at hand. As the major kept an eye on her, Kazari took command of the surveillance drone, bringing it online and sending it into the sky. As the drone headed for the enemy base, she opened up another window and continued reading what she'd been going over earlier.
Kazari's eyes constantly shifted from the drone's feed and what she was reading, her attention equally divided between the two up until the drone started to near its destination. When that happened, she quickly maximized the drone's window and took the controls. "Covenant base coming into sight." She said, aware of the major behind her, as she increased the drone's altitude.
The City of Dustin (named after the captain of one of the colony ships that first came to Ballast) was situated in a highly isolated area, with steep rock walls four kilometers out from the city on three of its sides and a sea to its back. The only way into the city by land was a narrow valley that runs in-between the rock walls in the southeast, where a long highway connects Dustin to the next city over.
The Covenant, when they failed to take the city in the initial invasion, had set up a base to the right of the valley's entrance to cut the UNSC off from any reinforcements. The multiple shade turrets the base had, along with its close proximity to the highway, prevented the captain from calling in any air support from an island airfield two hours away from Dustin. So, the ODSTs, supported by Scorpion tanks, were tasked with taking out the base alongside Shirai-san.
The last surveillance sweep of the base yesterday had revealed that the Covenant were reinforcing their position, creating barricades and digging trenches around their base and the valley entrance. Fortunately, though they had barricaded the highway, it didn't appear that they were interested in blowing it up. As long as it didn't take much damage during the battle, the 77th would be able to quickly move on after clearing the highway.
However, as the drone got closer to the base, Kazari saw something that hadn't been there before when she'd observed the earlier surveillance. At the valley's entrance stood a large shield wall reaching from one side to the other, and it was easily thirty meters high. They blocked the valley? She wondered, centering the drone's view on the shield wall.
"Well, that's new." Tachibana softly commented, eyeing the wall.
Kazari ignored her; instead, she looked around for the captain and called out to her. "Captain Prock, there's something you need to see."
Prock, who had been speaking with the operations officer, broke away after a moment and walked over at her usual brisk pace. "What is it, cadet?" She asked, her eyes turning towards the laptop's screen.
"The Covenant set up a shield wall that's blocking the valley, ma'am. They cut off their only way to retreat." She told her, explaining the situation.
"Hmm..." The captain was rubbing her chin thoughtfully. "I was afraid they'd fall back into the valley to secure their flanks during the battle, but with this we'll easily be able to surround and annihilate them. We don't have to beat around the bush; we'll attack from every side at once." She turned away, but not without one last word. "Good work, cadet." With that, she walked away, calling out for Cole to get her Saionji and the commander of the armor attachment.
"Bring the drone home, Uiharu." The major said from behind her.
"Yes ma'am." Kazari responded, starting the drone on its way back. There was nothing else new aside from the wall.
As the girl started multitasking again, Tachibana looked at the clock. "It's almost time..." She whispered, a sad edge to her tone.
Ever since lunch was over with, Mikoto and the others had been putting the hand signals they just learned to use. For a while they had been doing standard drills in a corner of the base which had a lot of crates around that they could work with, but then Cole had proposed a 'game'. It was a kind of cat-and-mouse game, with the three troopers being the cats and the rest of them being the mice; except, instead of running from the cats, the mice had to sneak around and try to take down the cats.
The rules were as follows: One, the mice can't speak; Two, the girls can't use their powers. Three, it has to take two mice to hold a cat down to the ground for five seconds to 'down' a cat for three minutes. Four, if the cat grabs an arm or leg of a mouse and the mouse doesn't break free in three seconds, that mouse is out of the game. Five, the mice win by having all cats downed at the same time.
They were also split up into three different teams: Saten with Nishizumi, Kuroko with Nakada, and Mikoto was with Tsuda and Yunokawa. They each started out in a different corner of the 'battle zone', and a cat went for each separate team.
Crater was against it, but he got outvoted by seven to two (Yunokawa was too lazy to vote and Kuroko sided with the sergeant).
The game had been going on for about nine minutes, and currently Clark's and Crater's icons on Mikoto's HUD (Cole had temporarily modified the strike team's HUDs) were both red. She and Tsuda had taken Clark out really early on since Yunokawa distracted him by... just walking up to him and letting herself get caught. After getting him from behind, the two girls that were left went looking for their next victim but got chased by Crater instead and had to lose him. At that time it'd been just about three minutes, so... they did something pretty mean.
They went right back over to where Clark was still lying on the ground, and when he got up after his three minutes were up, they... pounced on him. After dealing with him (again), Mikoto and Tsuda went looking for Crater, only to glance around a corner and see Saten and Nishizumi sitting on top of him. After forming up with them, Malcolm's icon had started flashing, which meant she was getting taken down... until it stopped and both Kuroko's and Nakada's icons went red.
So now the girls and Nishizumi were hunting Malcolm, and they had a little over a minute to do it before Clark tried to get back up. Nishizumi was in the lead, Tsuda behind him, Mikoto next, and Saten was covering the rear. Nishizumi glanced out from the crate they were currently behind and motioned the group forward one by one to the next crate. As he followed after Saten, Tsuda glanced around the crate and hurriedly snapped her head back into cover.
She had found Malcolm.
The trooper was walking in the opposite direction, and Tsuda motioned for Nishizumi and Saten to flank around on the right side. For Mikoto, she motioned for the brunette to get ready to head to the next crate over on her mark. The girl glanced around the corner again and gave the 'go', and Mikoto quietly rushed over to the next crate.
Just as Tsuda followed, Malcolm looked behind her, causing the younger girl to stop in her tracks and give a sheepish wave. The trooper instantly gave chase, Tsuda turning towards the way they came and running. Mikoto stayed behind the crate and waited for Malcolm to run by before trying to take her by surprise. The woman saw her coming, side-stepped her lunge, grabbed her by the wrist, and managed to pin her down to the ground until Mikoto was out of the game.
By then, Tsuda had turned around and made a grab for Malcolm's arm just as Nishizumi and Saten rounded a corner and started to run over, but the trooper grabbed Tsuda by the wrist and it was clear that there was no way the girl was going to break free by herself.
Just as Malcolm thought she had everything under control, Tsuda, a hyper girl who's basically in a permanent sugar rush, reacted without thinking. "WABAAM!" She yelled, and her foot went straight up into Malcolm's chin.
"I don't think this was in the rules." Sergeant Crater muttered, standing above an unconscious Malcolm whom Clark was trying to wake up.
"War isn't fair." Tsuda defended herself, a cat's grin on her face.
"It's a game!" Nishizumi said, slapping her across the helmet.
Mikoto stood nearby, watching them with lowered eyes. When Malcolm had taken her down, it had hurt her pride, but it was her own fault. She had been counting too much on the trooper being distracted by Tsuda, she'd left too big of an opening for her to counterattack, and she just wasn't strong enough to do anything when Malcolm had pinned her down. Of course she couldn't have used her ability, but Mikoto felt like even without it she could have, and should have, taken her out.
Maybe I rely too much on my ability... Mikoto briefly thought, but her attention shifted back on Tsuda and the others when Crater hit her on top of her helmet when the girl kept trying to defend her actions. It was a little amusing to watch, actually, and she soon forgot about her hurt pride.
"Really, what do they think they're doing?" Kuroko, who was standing next to Mikoto, muttered.
"It looks like they're having fun." Mikoto said as Malcolm finally woke up and made a grab for Tsuda who hid behind Nishizumi while Clark tried to hold the angry woman back.
"Are we not in a war?" The redhead muttered again, her voice low.
"Well, it's important to let loose every now and then, right?" Saten chimed in from behind them. "By the way, Shirai, how did Malcolm take out you and Nakada at the same time?"
Kuroko huffed, crossing her arms. "We almost pinned her down, but she broke free and grabbed both of our arms."
"Speaking of that, what were you and Nishizumi doing sitting on top of the sergeant?" Mikoto asked Saten.
The girl grinned big and wide. "We got up on the crates and jumped on him!"
"Hahaha. Really?" The brunette giggled.
"Shirai." The three girls looked up at Kuroko's name and saw Crater standing in front of them, his helmet in his hands, and his expression serious. "It's time. Report to 1st Lieutenant Suzuki of the 2nd ODSTs platoon, otherwise designated the 18th."
"Yes sir." Kuroko said; and, instead of leaving right away, she turned towards Mikoto who own expression had become closely guarded. "Kuroko will be back soon, Onee-sama," the girl said, flaunting an arrogant smile, "so~" She leaned forward, closing her eyes and puckering her lips.
Mikoto's hand quickly covered Kuroko's mouth, the girl giving her friend a weird look. "What are you doing?"
"Ghood lukk kiss." She said, her voice muffled.
The scene from when Mikoto first woke up after her coma suddenly popped into her mind, and the girl's face went beet red. "You already had your kiss!" She shouted, pushing Kuroko away, who pouted at her. "A-anyways..." She muttered, averting her eyes away from her, "be back in time for dinner..." The concern in her voice was unmistakable.
Kuroko's face brightened up. "Yes!" She happily said; and, with a final look to Saten who gave her a confident smile, Kuroko took off.
"Uiharu's looking out for Shirai, so she'll be fine." Saten said before leaning in really close to Mikoto who took a step back in surprise. "So... what was that about a kiss?"
"Uh..." Mikoto gulped. She hadn't wanted anyone to know about that, especially Saten! "Well..." She quickly looked at Crater. "W-we should be getting back to training, r-right, sir?"
The sergeant grinned at her. "That reminds me... You missed out on it earlier, so how about another endurance run?"
"Ee?" Ruiko weakly uttered.
Another one!?
Kuroko made her way into the courtyard of the compound where the ODSTs and other personnel were making final preparations to move out, and she began looking around for Lieutenant Suzuki. She spotted Lieutenant Wayne walking by, so she called out to him. "Lieutenant Wayne," She said, getting his attention, "are you familiar with a Lieutenant Suzuki, 18th platoon?"
"Suzuki...?" Wayne asked, sounding rather... surprised; however, after his initial reaction, he seemed to realize her intentions. "Oh, are you reporting to her?"
"Yes, is something wrong?" Kuroko asked, confused by his strange response.
"N-no, it's nothing," He said, starting to look towards the ODSTs, "anyways, she's-"
"Right behind you." A soft voice whispered into his ear.
"Uwaaah!?" Wayne spun, taking a couple of quick steps back. "Re-..." He stopped himself and straightened up. "Suzuki..." He muttered, his voice low.
A woman in her early twenties stood in front of Wayne, her light-brown hair in a short bob-cut, her eyes matching the color of her hair, and there was a sweet smile on her face. She wore the armor of an ODST without the helmet, but the gentle look on her face looked nothing like what Kuroko thought a hardened shock trooper's face would look like. "Forgive me for startling you, Wayne, but I couldn't resist. Hehe." She giggled at the end, slightly covering her mouth with her index finger.
Kuroko stepped around to Wayne's side and, looking up at him, she noticed he was averting his eyes and there was a slight blush on his cheeks. Does he...? She wondered, but then remembered what she came here to do. Straightening up, she saluted the lieutenant. "Private Kuroko Shirai, Lightning-3, reporting for duty."
Suzuki returned her salute. "1st Lieutenant Rei Suzuki, 18th platoon. I look forward to working with you, Shirai-san. The briefing is about to start, will you join me?"
"Yes ma'am..." Kuroko said, her voice a little low. She was surprised by Suzuki's friendly manner. Is this person really an ODST?
Suzuki then turned back to Wayne. "I'm sorry, but we must be going now." She turned around, motioning for Kuroko to follow. "This way, Shirai-san."
"Ah, wait," Wayne called out, and Suzuki looked back at him, "be careful out there..." He said, his voice low.
She smiled. "Thank you."
They parted ways without any further words, Wayne watching them leave.
"The Covenant base is situated to the right of the valley entrance here, and the shield wall that covers the entrance of the valley prevents them from falling back." Captain Prock stood in front of the officers that were gathered for the briefing next to a projected map of the area. Kuroko was sitting by Suzuki and Uiharu, and both of the young girls were listening diligently.
"As you know from our first briefing, the Covenant scrapped a large part of their base to use in their barricades, and they've set the focus of their defense on the highway leading into the valley." The captain continued. "It is the center of their formation, and we believe it is due to the large amount of natural cover there. I repeat, their base is not the center of their defense, as strange as that sounds.
"Since we covered their defenses and weaponry in the last briefing, I will move on to the plan. Our original plan was to have half of our forces focus the attack on their base and force them to send reinforcements to that flank before having the other half of our force move up and blitz through their weakened left flank, using the Scorpions to quickly secure the entrance to the valley and keep them from falling back into it. From there we'd surrounded and annihilate them.
"However, since they've blocked the valley off, we can assume that they have no intention whatsoever of falling back. They're going to go down fighting, every last one of them. Our plan now is to attack them from all sides, overwhelm them, and take them out with our superior firepower.
"Private Shirai's involvement in this plan is the same as before. With Uiharu providing her bird-eye assistance, she'll go in ahead of the main force, take out their turret emplacements and snipers, and continue to wreck havoc on the enemy throughout the battle. If all goes according to plan, this battle should be over in time for dinner. Are there any questions?"
No one spoke up.
"Good." Captain Prock said out loud. "Remember, we take this valley, and we take the fight to the Covenant. That's all; dismissed." She turned away, the projector going dark and the lights coming on as the officers started to disperse.
As Kuroko followed Suzuki, Uiharu placed a hand on the redhead's shoulder to get her attention. The flower-haired girl smiled at her, and that smile reminded Kuroko of what she was fighting for. "I have your back, Shirai-san. Always." Uiharu told her, and Kuroko returned her smile.
"I'm counting on you, Uiharu."
They went out into the hall and the two girls separated, each heading in a different direction, and neither looked back.
"Shirai-san," Suzuki said, grabbing her own helmet from another ODST before looking back at Kuroko, "you'll be going with Recon Force Bravo, but my squad and I will assist you if you find yourself in trouble." She continued, placing her helmet on. "Call on us at anytime."
"Yes ma'am." Kuroko responded, placing her own helmet on.
Nearly instantly, Uiharu's voice came over her radio. "Shirai-sa-... Shirai, can you hear me?"
"Oh, no honorific?" Kuroko answered her, a smirk on her face.
"I apologize, but unnecessary chatter is prohibited."
The smirk vanished. "I see."
"When you reach the combat zone, I will mark the targets on your HUD. Take them out as quickly as possible. Also, remember, you need to keep moving; you can't let the enemy catch sight of you. Do you understand?"
"I understand."
There was a short pause before the girl spoke again. "And, one more thing... be careful, Shirai."
A soft smile spread across Kuroko's lips. "I will."
Uiharu went silent just as a couple of Warthogs pulled up in front of Kuroko and Suzuki. "Recon Force Bravo ready to move out, ma'am." The female marine manning the gun of the first hog, Sergeant Major Stacker, said, saluting the lieutenant.
Suzuki returned her salute and then turned back to Kuroko. "This is where we part ways, Shirai-san. I'll see you on the battlefield." The ODST gave her a nod and then hurried off.
Kuroko looked at the two Warthogs, one armed with a machine gun and the other a passenger version. The armed hog was full, with a sniper sitting in the passenger seat. The other hog's passenger seat was empty, with two other marines besides the driver sitting in the back along with a crate of what should be grenades, for her own use. "Climb on in, girl." Stacker said, motioning towards the second hog. "We're moving out."
"Yes ma'am." Kuroko answered and hurried to the hog, jumping into it and making herself comfortable in the large seat. Just as she got settled in, the driver held his hand out to her. "Private First Class Malcolm," After a moment of hesitation she shook his hand, "the man in the back is Tann and the woman is Amar." He said, tilting his head towards them. "We've got a crate of grenades, so whenever you run out, just drop back by here."
Amar picked something up by the crate and handed it to Kuroko. "Grenade belt, with some bullets in the far left and right pouches." She said, and her gift was followed by Tann's. "Grenade bandolier. This one's your choice; it'll weigh you down more, but you'll have to make less trips, right?" He asked.
"I'll take it, thank you." Kuroko said, taking both of them.
"Put them on now; it'll be easier than holding onto them." Private Malcolm told her, and she complied, putting on both the belt and the bandolier while they were still stationary.
She barely had the time to make herself comfortable before Stacker received the order to move out. "Alright, men, it's time! Recon Force Bravo, move out!" Kuroko noticed the woman look back at their hog, and even though her eyes were obscured by her visor, the girl felt as if the sergeant was looking for something, or someone, that wasn't here anymore.
Before she could contemplate on it further, Stacker faced the front as the Warthogs started to move forward, heading out of the base and past army trucks and Scorpion tanks that were loaded with ODSTs. Kuroko looked at the sights they passed, and she looked up just in time to see two surveillance drones fly overheard, heading in the same direction that they were. She started to get nervous, and she wondered if she would really be alright.
She's going to be fighting in an actual war, killing other sentient beings and watching fellow human beings die around her. How many lives will she take? How many people will die? No... that doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is getting her friends home safe and sound; and, if that meant carving a path through this 'Covenant', Kuroko would gladly do so. For Saten, For Uiharu... and for the girl she loves.
With that last thought, she watched as the Warthogs took the lead of the column heading out of the city.
It was finally time... for her first battle to begin.