The streets of New Mombasa were lonely and forsaken. Everything was made slick and smooth by the rain, painted in green neon by his helmet. Jason fought the urge to shiver as he progressed down the darkened street. Another patrol had found him, and he'd left a pile of corpses in his wake. If nothing else, Jason could remain certain that he was at least a very proficient killer. He was working his way up an incline, towards the nav marker.

He poured through what fragmented memories he had available to him, but couldn't remember Temple at all. He had a hazy recollection of the ship and the briefing. The clearest of all was Captain Dare, the ONI spook. Probably because she was the only woman there, and, well...it had been a long, long time.

Jason stopped, briefly, and stared up at a huge door blocking road. It informed him that it was closed, and he realized he'd have to find an alternate route. Something was blinking, nearby. Through the drizzle, he located an unlocked door next to a sign that read Detour, with an arrow pointing at the door. Jason frowned, considering the situation. If he didn't know any better, he would have suspected someone of helping him out.

The ODST turned and glanced out over the desolate cityscape he'd left behind. Nothing moved. No one was alive. Sighing, Jason went through the door. It led to what appeared to be small apartment complex. Furniture littered the area, toppled over and broken. Someone had scrawled in big black letters Glass This across the far wall. Jason chuckled darkly as he proceeded, navigating the blackened corridor.

His humor, though grim, quickly faded away with cold memories of his own encounter with the total destruction of glassing. And death. He thought about his squad on New Jerusalem. They'd spent months together. A long time when you considered the average lifespan nowadays and how often people got shuffled through the system. He'd gotten to know them as well as he had anyone else since joining the UNSC. And there was something more there, being an ODST meant more than being a Marine.

You had to be crazy to be one, and being among others as crazy as yourself was soothing in its own insane way. Now...Jason considered his current situation. Now he was alone in a necropolis of a city being lorded over by maniacal aliens who wanted nothing more than to exterminate him. His grip tightened on the gun.

He'd see them all dead, first.

As Jason came to another door, leading out of the apartment building, he froze. It slid open to reveal a courtyard of slumbering Grunts. A dark grin, full of malicious intent, spread across his face. They had all slunk away from their Brute overloads for a nap. Instead, they would find nothing but death.

Jason slipped silently across the courtyard, pistol in hand, and emptied the magazine. He put a bullet into each of their brains. Across the area, he discovered another detour sign and another open door. This one led him to a room that had seen its share of combat. Brute, Grunt and Marine corpses littered the ground floor of the apartment complex in equal silence. Blood of all kinds was mixed in, staining the carpet, the walls and the ceiling.

This building held something more important, however. Jason glanced up. This was where the navigational marker was leading him. Jason gave a Brute corpse a swift kick to the head as he passed it, then made his way up a flickering stairwell. It led him to a corridor bathed in bright, phosphorescent blood. Someone had made the Covenant pay here, and Jason commended whoever that was. He hurried along, wanting to meet up with Temple and try to jog some of his memories. And get closer to finding the rest of his squad.

He'd already lost one, he didn't want to lose another.

He wasn't sure if he could bear it.

There were a dozen doors per corridor, most of which remained close as he walked by. But as he approached, one of them opened. There were a pair of surprised squawks, the sound was accompanied by a brilliant blue flash that sizzled past his helmet. Jason turned and began firing even without the ability to see.

When his vision cleared, he had one empty SMG and two very dead Jackals. Jason let out a low, long sigh and pressed on with much more apprehension this time. After a long trek, he finally reached the top of the complex.

"Temple?" he asked, eying the man in black armor standing in the room beyond him. The ODST was staring at something, a smashed, flickering screen.

He turned. "DuPree."

His visor was up. The man who was Trent Temple had a face, Jason assumed at least, that women would find attractive. Very defined features, a dusting of dark facial hair, intense, blue eyes and what could almost be called a fashionable war scar that ran from beneath his left eye down to his chin. He seemed like a poster boy.

"I was wondering if they had gotten you, out there in the rainfall. Now...what do you remember?" Temple asked. The face, Jason realized, jogged a little bit of his memory.

"I remember the briefing, aboard the Say My Name."

Temple nodded. "Good, good. And do you remember the mission?" Jason struggle for several seconds before shaking his head.

"No," he admitted.

"That's also good. We never got around to it. Captain Dare refused to tell us what the hell was going on. We made the jump and everything was green...until the Prophet of Regret jumped to slipspace inside the Earth's atmosphere."

Jason's eyes widened as he felt a rush of memories. The pod, the Covenant cruiser, the shock wave...that would help explain the state of epic desolation New Mombasa was in.

"How long have I been out?"

"Roughly six hours," Temple replied, he returned his attention to the flickering, shattered screen. Jason finally noticed what it was that was lodged firmly in the center of it. An ODST helmet. The name read Dare.

"Damn," Jason whispered.

"Yeah. Must've been an explosion." Temple turned and walked over to the window. It had been shattered and rainwater presently leaked in. Jason joined him as he stared down. Their eyes fell upon a ruined ODST pod.

"Dare's?" he asked. Temple nodded. They stared for another few seconds in silence before Temple sighed heavily and turned to face him.

"Now comes the hard part, DuPree."

"Which is?"

"We're going to have to split up if we're going to figure this out. I'm going to make for an ONI building, a local headquarters, across town. I'll get in, see if I can get some more information on our squad or what went down while we were passed out."

"And me?"

"Our squad is out there, somewhere. I need you to play detective, figure out where they are or what happened to them. And, obviously, play hell with the Covenant. Run some interference. I read up on you, DuPree. You've got damn high marks in stealth. I read you even trained with the man himself, Price. The man's a legend. Anyone that passes his test is okay in my book. I trust you." Jason felt strange at receiving the praise. He merely nodded.

"Now, let's split up. I suggest you start with the pod, then go out from there. I'll keep in touch," Temple said.

Once more, Jason nodded, and made his way back into the rain and the darkness.