SGTLEGENDKILLEЯ

Fate Continuum

Act V

"Metropolis"

Chapter III

"Industrial Streets"

At the sound of Sangheili in distress, K'an and Naki quickly made a few bounds to the mouth of the alley way. Once they reached the roadway, they could see a group of five Sangheili locked into a heavy firefight with a large pack of Brutes. While they were outnumbered nearly twice over, the Sangheili were being bravely lead by an obviously adept Ultra. Under his command was a quad of Majors and a trio of Minors. The fighting was intense; no wonder the Humans had fled the area.

"Well, I guess we found the fight." Naki muttered as she quickly pulled her Carbine from her back.

"Yes. Shall we give them a hand?" K'an quickly asked as one of the Minors succumbed to a spray of Spiker rounds.

With their weapons now ready, the two began to throw rounds at the Brutes. As they emptied their magazines, they quickly moved away from the alley to take cover behind an abandoned Human sedan. From the angle of attack they had, they took the Brutes by surprise to the point it seemed to cause a bit of a flurry in their ranks. With this, it seemed to go well. K'an and Naki continued to dump their weapons as skillfully as they could to pinch. K'an's shields flashed heavily as they nearly broke, causing him to drop quickly behind cover. With a growled curse, he slammed a fresh magazine into the mag well of the Battle Rifle before pulling the bolt back. He leaned up, resting the barrel of the weapon on the rear quarter panel of the sedan to precisely place several shots at the two remaining Brutes. He took one of them out just as Naki's Carbine took the other in unison. With the Brutes now dead, all of the shooting stopped, K'an and Naki were left panting from the rush of combat.

K'an stood up, looking over at her. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah…" She looked up, resting her Carbine on her lap.

"I am just peachy…" K'an looked up from her to see the group approaching them. "That was some nice shooting." He lowered his weapon to his side and offered her his hand to help her up.

"Thanks." She nodded as she accepted the help to her feet.

"Hello, brother... And sister." The Ultra approached the two seeming pleased. "It was quite the blessing to have had your aid in that fight. Thank you."

"You're welcome." Naki nodded.

The Ultra looked behind him at his remaining warriors. Only one of the Majors had been killed, while all but one of the Minors had perished. As the three spoke, the others were firing a few warning shots towards some Human civilians who were seemingly sticking around in the confusion of things.

"Are you two alone?" The Ultra asked, wanting to get a scope on the situation.

"Yes," Naki answered. "Though there was another Ultra in a warehouse north of us. But she may have moved already."

The Ultra huffed slightly at the notion of the other Ultra being a she. "That is not good news. I had nearly a whole garrison of warriors when the Brutes first turned on us. Now these Sangheili are all I have left."

"I have not seen any others…" Naki replied.

"Damn." The Ultra sighed. "And now we must not only deal with the Humans, but now the Brutes as well."

K'an shook his head. "For now I think we should focus on the Brutes sir."

The Ultra snapped his attention at K'an's suggestion. "Excuse me?"

"The Humans are not a threat anymore," Naki defended K'an's position. "Their forces in this city are scattered and broken. Right now, all we need to do is survive the Brutes betrayal and regroup."

The Ultra seemed unwilling to buy into this. "Not a threat? This is their home world. Of course they are a threat. Even their civilians in numbers are dangerous. Have you soaked your head lately?" He asked with increasing agitation.

"There are not enough of their forces in this city to cause worry. Most of their civilians have fled or have been killed already." Naki shrugged. "I walked from one side to the other and I encountered only Jiralhanae. No humans."

The Ultra grimaced. "Well, we just saw several. I believe it is best that if I or my warriors see any Humans, they shall be gunned down."

Naki growled in retort. "Ideologies as such are the reason this war is still stretching on."

The Ultra snarled with distaste. "It isn't your place to argue the politics of the war, miss. How about you return to the kitchen and stay out of our way."

With this conversation quickly leaving acceptable bounds, K'an would take charge of the heat. "How about you shut your fucking mouth?"

"Watch your tongue, Major"

"Watch your privilege, Dickhead." K'an fired back as he quickly got between him and Naki. It was one thing that the Ultra would be upset, but it was totally unacceptable of him to be maliciously sexist. K'an would not stand for it.

The Ultra stood tall against K'an, giving him quite the cold and upset stare. "What kind of heretic are you, Major? Do you really wish to trample in my path?"

"Take your path elsewhere."

The Ultra growled. "I will not allow you to make a fool of me in front of my underlines."

"Too late." K'an smirked slightly.

"Very well." The Ultra turned to his Warriors. "Watch the perimeter. I will be but a minute."

K'an noticed that the Ultra had begun to reach for the hilt of his sword on his side. Instead of waiting as most of his kind would, he swiftly drew his Magnum from his side only to shove the barrel of it into the Ultra's face. Pulling the trigger easily sent the large handgun round through the Sangheili's skull. It was quite against the norm for his kind, but K'an was not intending to gamble his survival on an idiot. As the Ultra dropped to the ground, one of the Majors drew his gun and spoke up.

"What is the meaning of this!?" He demanded with a shaky voice.

"It is better to have lived a day as a Wise Man than live a lifetime as a fool." K'an answered as he lowered the Magnum back to his side.

"Sir?!" The Major stood beside his kin, all wide eyed of fear and uncertainty at what had just happened.

"I have survived this entire war in the thick of things and I will not have some deranged officer be the death of me." K'an firmly told the watching Warriors. "If you wall want to survive this: you will lower your weapons at once, listen to me closely, and follow my lead. Do you understand?"

The remaining Sangheili looked amongst each other with obvious conflict. After a brief moment of quiet discussion, they began to lower their weapons.

"Good. You have a minute to gather your thoughts before we head south." K'an nodded, growing into a more no-bullshit ideology. "Anything you'd like to add?" He asked Naki as he turned his head towards her.

"No."

K'an sighed and looked down at the Magnum in his hand. It had a heavy amount of blood and some bits of skull spattered along its barrel length. He grumbled as he shook the hand gun to rid it of some of the filth. "That was exciting…"

"I guess... If you like shooting your own kind." Naki sighed. "You know, we can try changing minds without shooting once."

"I doubt he was one of those who would change."

"You never know…" Naki argued.

"He also was in appropriately speaking to my female friend. That was unacceptable."

"Still not a reason to kill someone though…"

K'an rolled his eyes. "Then press charges. I regret nothing."

Naki crossed her arms. "Well what now, K'an?"

"Like we said: We head south." K'an nodded and turned to the others. "C'mon Sangheili, it's time to move!"

The Sangheili underlines didn't give much of a fuss. Sure they were still clearly nervous and uncertain about their change of leadership, but it was clear that they all wished to escape the city. K'an did not feel too bad for their stature on their lost Ultra, for he noticed one of them spit on his remains as they passed. He must have been quite dickish to even them. As K'an believed: Typical of most Ultras.

The group made their way steadily down southward deeper into the city. Soon the industrial buildings began to be replaced by city blocks of office buildings. The buildings got taller and more sophisticated the further they went. Eventually the group was finding themselves stopped at a slight fork in the road at the mercy of a wedge shaped corporate office. After taking a moment to look down each of the routes, K'an had chosen the more direct right roadway. They had made it halfway down the block before the sounds of swiftly approaching Human vehicles could be heard, stopping the group in their tracks. A trio of Warthogs slid around the corner of the intersection ahead and quickly came to a stop.

"Get inside!" K'an shouted as he jumped to action.

As the Warthogs began to fire their guns at the group, K'an turned and buried his shoulder down at the glass door nearest to them. As swift as he had changed his directive to the door, he had broken through the glass, opening the doorway completely for the rest of the group. Not wanting to face a Human convoy, they all quickly ducked inside after him.

"What are we going to do? I saw a tank!" The Minor pointed out trembling.

"Shut up and follow me. Let's get upstairs!" K'an ordered at the sound of the vehicles beginning to approach even closer.

K'an quickly led the group up a staircase to the right of the lobby. They went up a few flights of stairs to the second floor of the building. They stopped and glanced around the cubicle floorplan as they waited for either the Humans to follow them or for their next order.

"We should find another way out." Naki suggested. "Their tank can't be everywhere at once."

"From the look of the building, there are windows all around it. We could exit pretty much anywhere from the second floor. Don't you think?"

Naki hummed slightly. "Yes"

The group all watched down the stairs for a few moments. The sounds of their vehicles were not too close, and seemed to stay a decent distance away. It did not sound like the Humans were dismounting to give chase either.

"Ok," K'an spoke with a sigh. "Let's just wait a moment and think for a second and take a bit of a breather. It doesn't seem like the Humans really care much for us." K'an stood up firmly. He looked to the three Majors. "Stand guard on the staircase."

K'an looked over at Naki as the Minor seemed to wander a bit from the staircase towards one of the windows to look out.

"Don't" Naki told the Minor. Of course he seemed only too nod and disregard what she had said.

K'an rolled his eyes. "We just need to keep track of them. As long as they are not in the building we are fine."

"Sir. There tank is just outside." The Minor spoke from besides one of the windows.

"Thank you, Minor. Now stay away from the windows." K'an looked back to Naki. "My only concern is that we probably will hit an influx of Humans while we head south. I would imagine most of their important sectors are in the center of the city.

"Yes, except that is where Regret landed." Naki suggested.

"Still…" He sighed. "If I know Humans well enough. If there was anywhere they would protect, it would be one of their ONI build-" He was suddenly interrupted by the concussions of an explosion right next to them.

The explosion came from the barrel of the Human Scorpion tank that the Minor had noticed. The canon round breached the room's tinted window, going through the Minor's torso and into the ceiling of the room, causing the room to shake. The concussion alone threw the rest of the living violently from their feet. Disregarding that he had just witnessed the young Sangheili with them split in half by an artillery piece and his leg, he quickly recovered from his fall ready to take charge.

"Armor!" K'an shouted. Thank the gods for their helmet and headsets, if not for their hearing protection, that canon would have blown their ear drums out. "Move through the hole that was just made for us!"

The two Majors quickly scampered for the opening that the tank had made through the rear wall of the room. K'an did not see Naki running with them. His hearts sank as he looked frantically for her. He was of great relieve to hear her grunting from the connecting room that had been blocked off by debris from the blast. She was fine, just stuck on the other side of a collapsed wall.

"Naki!" K'an shouted as several rounds of the tank's coaxial gun tore through the side of the building. "Are you alright?!"

He was somewhat panicked by her lack of response

"Just get safe! I am going to take the Majors around to get you out, alright?"

K'an took himself briskly through the hole in the wall after the Majors before any more tank rounds took more of the building down. The hole opened up a path into a lengthy hallway that continued straight from the room, at the end of the hallway K'an could see the two Majors waiting for him. Eventually, after he attempted most of the doors to find that they failed to open, he made it to the end of the hall.

"Come on. We have to go down a floor to find a way to regroup with Naki again." K'an ordered as he passed them for the staircase at the end of the stair case after them. "Damn it." K'an grunted as he pulled himself back behind the SUV at seeing that the pack consisted of seven Brutes and a trio of Unggoy. "I fucking hate these Apes."

"What are we to do, sir?" One of the Majors questioned.

"Activate your camouflage. We are in the middle of the street, so we cannot move. We just need to wait them out." K'an growled as he turned on his own camouflage.

The two Majors followed suit and became nearly invisible. Luckily enough the trio had become transparent as the first Brute began to amble around the side of the SUV past them. Any time that such a situation that involves one being so close to their enemy requires great nerve. As more of the pack sauntered around both sides of the truck they held their breath, each clutching their weapons tightly. After seconds that instead seemed like several minutes, the final Brute, the Chieftain wielding a Gravity Hammer stomped past them, huffing with each step. Just when it seemed like the pack would have just passed without noticing them, the front Brutes stopped in their tracks.

"Leader!" One of them called out, causing the pack to halt. "I smell Elites nearby."

"Fuck" K'an cursed under his breath.

"Search them out!" The Chieftain began to order his Pack to search for the Sangheili.

As the leader kept shouting out orders, K'an lightly nudged the Major next to him. "Toss a grenade at the Minor Unggoy to the middle right." He paused for a second. "Now!"

As the Major began to toss his grenade, K'an stood up as brisk as he could, leveling his Beam Rifle to take a shot at the nearest Brute. The beam went through the back of the Ape's head, causing him to fall like a dropped heap of stone. The Major's grenade had been thrown well, and ended up sticking to the back of the Unggoy's back. Ironically enough, while only one of the three Brutes near the grunt was able to dive away from the explosion that killed the two Brutes and the Unggoy

K'an and the nearest Major moved towards the sidewalk to make some headway from the pack as they fired their weapons to continue to quickly dwindle the group. Unfortunately, the other Major failed to follow them and instead went the other direction to take cover behind another vehicle. K'an was busy watching the tried his best to protect him from afar, the Major behind the car managed to kill several of the Brutes with his plasma rifle, leaving onto three including the Chieftain. His streak was soon ended as one of the two lesser Brutes leapt forward with a Mauler only to fire it twice into the Sangheili's chest.

"Shoot that fucking Chieftain, kid!" K'an shouted as he watched the Chieftain disregard the single Sangheili in favor of brandishing his hammer and charging swiftly towards the fleeing two.

K'an fired his Beam Rifle into the back of the Brute that had just killed the separated Major, leaving only one Brute except the Chieftain who was still charging towards K'an and the remaining Major. The other Brute was armed with a Carbine, and while the Major was frantically firing his two Plasma Rifles at the charging Chieftain, K'an was doing his best to line up a shot to kill the ranged Ape; As Humans had shown in the past: Chieftains were much easier to deal with in isolation and with multiple warriors to take shots at the Brute. As long as the Major stayed alive all would be well. Unfortunately, this was not to be.

The Brute marksman pulled the trigger just as K'an had scoped him in. The Brute's Carbine round went into the nose of K'an's rifle, but not before he sent a round through the Brute's neck. While the round effectively killed the Brute, the Beam Rifle was rendered useless. As he threw the wasted weapon to the ground, he watched as the Chieftain reached the Major before him. With an energetic roar, the Brute swung his Gravity Hammer swiftly for the Major's chest. The Sangheili had clearly not been prepared for this and was left against the wall as the Gravity Hammer struck him forcefully on the chest. This resulted in the hammer discharging harshly, causing the poor Sangheili to be gored along the wall. Such a view caused a huge flurry of fear to stir up inside of K'an, not only from the blood, but also of fear of the Brute.

The Chieftain gave a growl as he turned for K'an. As swift as he could he drew both the Magnum and the Plasma Rifle from his sides and began firing both of the weapons as fast as possible at the charging Brute. It only took a few bolts of plasma break the already nearly depleted shields, leaving the plasma bolts and bullets to impact heavily against the ape's chest. Despite the quickly diminishing distance between the two, K'an had nearly overheated the Plasma Rifle as he focused on using that first. As the weapons allowed internal temperature was reach and the vents on the side flipped open, he dropped the weapon from his left hand to swiftly place it with his other hand to firmly hold the Magnum steady.

With a firm grip and a split second to line up the sights for the Chieftain's helmet, K'an began to fiercely fire the handgun as fast as he could. The rate of fire that he currently hefted the weapon was beyond what any Human could comfortably control, fortunately for his strength and size, he was able to dump most of the magazine of explosive 12.7mm rounds into the ape's face. While the oncoming fire was nearly fatal for the Chieftain, it was not enough to stop the mass of such a beast, leaving K'an to take the front of the collision of the Brute outright. The weight of the toppling Jiralhanae easily was enough to plow K'an straight to the ground on the fact that the two were in entirely different weight classes as it would seem. The two slammed heavily to the ground only to slide a few meters from the class of momentum, leaving the two sprawled out next to each other. The Chieftain was still alive and was clutching his face with pained growlingly. K'an too was in great pain from the encounter. His entire right side was numb from neck to his toes from the hit and also from the hindered leg. He looked down to see that his brace somehow remained intact. Swallowing his immense pain with a groan, he looked sluggishly for the Magnum before the Brute could recover. Luckily it hadn't clattered further than his reach and he quickly gripped it.

"Suck on this." K'an grunted as he hefted his sore self to aim the hand cannon at the Ape's head, firing a trio of shots into its neck and head before the slide of the weapon locked back, being now fully emptied.

With all of the Brutes now dead, K'an let himself go limp to rest. He closed his eyes and focused all of his efforts on his pained breathing to stomach the hardly receding pain. Tackling the pain was the majority of his issues at the moment. He would be able to get up once he could stop his ears from ringing and his head from spinning. He shook his head lightly and rolled onto his stomach slowly to look down at the road beneath him where he would stare at whatever point stuck out to him to stare at. Steadily, with some forced breath and some power of will, the spinning stopped, leaving him only slightly dizzy. Clenching his jaws together, he prudently lifted himself from the street; he gave great care not to put much weight on the on his leg.

"Naki?" K'an spoke out softly into his comms piece. "Hello?" He tried again after not getting a response. On further inspection, it would appear if his radio had been broken in the collision of the Brute. "Just my fucking luck." K'an grumbled as the distant sound of a Scorpion tank and several Warthogs moving nearby.

Realizing that it would be best for him to not stick around, K'an quickly took the passenger bag that he had dropped to the ground. He took little time to replace the empty magazine of the Magnum with one from the bag. With as much haste as he could give he began to head south further into the city.

The sun was less than a few hours from setting over the horizon and soon darkness would be his greatest ally.