Chapter 6 – Chill Exposure

1435 hours, October 20, 2552 (Military Calendar)

Aboard UNSC orbital defense platform Cairo Station, Geosynchronous Earth Orbit

Master Gunnery Sergeant Noah Henderson fed several shells into his M90 shotgun, before crouching behind the large table in the center of Cairo Station's armory. He leveled the weapon at the blast door that separated his armory from the adjacent Commons Blue. The sudden appearance of a burning flare and sparks from the sealed blast door told Henderson all the grim news he needed to know.

The Covenant have secured the Commons, and now the bastards are coming for me.

"Heh," he muttered to himself, gripping the shotgun tightly. "Come and get it, you Covie bastards."

Henderson's eyes widened in alarm as he saw the bright light at the heart of the blast door intensify, and he threw himself to the deck as the blast door blew apart in a massive explosion. Pieces of shattered door flew across the armory but Henderson quickly returned to a crouched position, shotgun raised as he saw the outline of a Covenant Elite charging through the smoke.

"Get the hell out of my armory, split-lip," Henderson roared, firing his shotgun even as the Elite fired several blasts from its plasma rifle that cut through the smoke and narrowly missed the Gunnery Sergeant. His first shot caused the Elites energy shield to flare brightly, easily visible in the rapidly dissipating smoke from the blast door's destruction. Without missing a beat, Henderson quickly pumped the shotgun and fired again. This time, the shell punched through the Elite's remaining energy shield, and the alien was knocked backwards by the impact. Warbling in surprise the alien ducked out of the armory.

"Call your friends! I got enough ammo for all of ya!" Henderson taunted, hefting the M90.

A moment later, two Elites charged into the room. One was the red-armored bastard he'd already punished with his shotgun and the other was one of the lower ranking Elite Minors. Henderson inwardly cursed his choice of words as the Elites fired a stream of plasma at him. He ducked behind the table an instant before several bolts of plasma seared through the air where his head had been. One came so close it singed off some of the close-cropped hair and he felt the skin beneath bubble and burn, causing him to groan in pain.

"Come on now, is that a weapon or a flashlight!" Henderson yelled. Grunting in pain from the burn of the plasma fire that had nearly taken his head off, the Gunnery Sergeant gritted his teeth and rolled out of cover. The blue-armored Elite had closed in by now, and Henderson quickly snapped the barrel of his shotgun up into the alien's face.

The weapon boomed, and the Elite's energy shield did nothing to protect it at point-blank range. The creature's entire head was turned into a mist of shattered bone, blood and brains, and the remainder of its body crumpled heavily to the ground.

Unfortunately for Henderson, his decision to leave the safety of the cover provided by the armory's central table proved to be a fatal one, and the remaining Elite turned its plasma rifle on him. A burst of plasma hit the Gunnery Sergeant in the chest, and the man screamed in pain as the superheated plasma burned straight through his chest-plate, fatigues, and flesh.

Henderson stumbled backwards and toppled to the deck, the shotgun clattering to the floor a second later. There were several deep holes burned into his abdomen, exposing mangled flesh and charred bone. The plasma had completely fried the nerves in the man's body, but as he lay on the deck, he could smell his own cooked flesh, a sensation that made him gag.

A large shadow fell over the downed man, and Henderson peered through watery eyes at the figure above him. The Elite Major stood over him, plasma rifle aimed at his head.

"You fought well, for a human." The Elite spoke awkwardly, its alien throat struggling to produce the words in English.

"Fuck you…" Henderson snarled, a final act of defiance even as the life began to ebb out of him. The Elite chuckled deeply, and blue-white fire erupted from its plasma rifle, mercifully ending the Marine's suffering.

As the Elite turned to leave the armory, it heard a soft mechanical whirring behind it. It turned and was surprised to see that a section of the floor has slid open, revealing a staircase leading downward. From this new opening, at least five rifles emerged, all aimed at it by humans who had none-too-gentle expressions on their faces.

The Elite barely had time to register the cursed green armor and gold visor of the demon before all six human weapons opened fire in unison. Purple blood sprayed through the air and over the corpse of Master Gunnery Sergeant Henderson as the Elite dropped to the deck, energy shield overloaded in seconds. Private First Class Chips Dubbo was the first to climb up into the armory, and the Australian Marine quickly stomped over to the fallen Elite before promptly firing a burst from his MA5C assault rifle into the Covenant soldier's head.

"Damn Covenant bastard!" He shouted, spittle flying from his mouth as his rifle's rounds turned what remained of the Elite's head into a purple paste. The rest of Dubbo's fireteam made their way into the armory, taking the opportunity to reload and re-arm themselves with the remaining weapons and ammunition still stocked in the room.

For his part, the Master Chief made his way over to what remained of the Gunnery Sergeant. Only an hour ago, he had been speaking to the man, and now he was dead. John's face was impassive behind the visor; this was an occurrence that had occurred so often to the Spartan throughout the decades of war with the Covenant that he had become numb to it.

Without a word, John crouched beside the fallen Marine. There was no need to close Henderson's eyes, as nothing remained of his face aside from charred bone and brain matter so instead John lifted the shotgun from beside Henderson's corpse and silently fed shells into the weapon from a box on the nearby table. Had they not been intercepted by a pair of Covenant Elite stealth troopers in the Cairo's MAC storage bay, John and the Marines would have probably made it into the armory in time to save Henderson's life.

John banished the thought from his mind. No good would come of dwelling on it now.

Having stocked up on fresh weaponry and ammunition, the Marine fireteam, who had opted to accompany John on his search for the Covenant bomb while others stayed behind to hold the Pelican bays, stacked up on either side of the breached blast door leading into the nearby Commons.

Before moving onwards, John grabbed several more fragmentation grenades from the table, replacing those he had used, before bringing up the station's schematics on his heads-up display. While he was aware that time was of the essence, as the Covenant had undoubtedly ferried a bomb onto the station similarly to the other two platforms in the defense cluster, he also wanted to ensure that he wasn't going to stumble into an ambush set by Covenant forces.

His caution was justified: his scans of Commons Blue revealed that large numbers of Covenant were scattered throughout both the main room as well as the overlooking security station. In addition, he noted the presence of several manned plasma cannons that had been set up throughout the Commons that would be able to quickly deplete his energy shield if given the chance. Certainly, the automatic weapons would be immediately fatal to the Marines, who possessed neither the energy shielding, MJOLNIR armor or the speed of the Spartan.

"Marines," John said, and the other humans in the armory all turned to face him. "The enemy are dug in in the Commons, and they have plasma cannons covering most of the room. I need you to stay here and cover me until I've cleared the cannons."

"What, and let you have all the fun, Chief?" asked one of the Marines, his expression hardening. John could see the anger in the man's eyes, an emotion that was present to some degree in each of the Marine's faces. All of them had lost friends and family to the Covenant and were eager to get revenge on the enemy who had taken so much from them already. While John could understand and even sympathize with it to some degree, he could not allow the Marines to throw their lives away blindly seeking vengeance.

John spoke in as gentle of a voice as he was able, "I'm not losing anyone to those plasma cannons. I just need you to hold position until I can take them out." John turned back to the entrance to the Commons. Just beyond, hidden out of view behind a half-melted UNSC combat barrier was the first of three plasma cannons that John needed to neutralize before it would be safe for the Marines to advance. The Spartan readied himself, crouching slightly and raising the shotgun.

After a moment's deliberation, the Spartan bolted out of the armory and into the Commons, a blur of green that shot past the combat barrier and the charred corpse of a Marine defender towards the raised island on the opposite side of the room. The Grunt gunner, sitting astride the plasma cannon, perhaps hadn't been expecting an attack from the armory and had just enough time to open its eyes wide in terror before an eight-gauge magnum shell smashed into its head, reducing it to a bloody pulp. John didn't stop, and he covered the remaining distance in moments, ducking into the side corridor running alongside the Commons before the other two plasma cannons could get a bead on him.

The pair of Grunts lurking in the darkened passageway probably didn't expect to be confronted by the sight of a seven-foot tall, armored killing machine. John's shotgun boomed and one of the Grunts was instantly transformed into a shimmering blue mess that painted nearby wall and floor. The other Grunt shrieked in fear, but its cry was instantly silenced as John brought the butt of his weapon down hard on its head, shattering its skull.

An Elite roar greeted the Spartan's ears and he looked up in time to see one of the larger aliens charging up the set of stairs on the opposite side of the corridor. John quickly pumped the shotgun and fired, lighting up the enemy's energy shield. The Elite halted its charge and John took the opportunity to leap towards it. By the time his knee contacted the Elite's breastplate, John had pumped the shotgun again and as the barrel of the weapon pressed into the alien's face, he squeezed the trigger again. The Elite's headless body flew backwards down the stairs it had came from, purple blood spattering through the air.

Instead of continuing down the stairs the Elite had appeared from, John instead opted to use the open gap in the wall separating the corridor from the Commons to his advantage. He switched to his battle rifle, slinging the shotgun on his back, and peered out. On the other side of the room, to the left side of the door to the armory, was another raised island with a manned plasma cannon. By now all the Covenant troops in the area were aware of his presence, and a stream of plasma fire cut towards him from multiple sources.

Ignoring the plasma bolts that splashed against the wall near him, causing his shields to flare as chunks of debris and superheated matter sparked against them, he raised the battle rifle and fired. A three round burst slashed through the head of the green-armored Grunt gunner, silencing it immediately. He shifted his aim, and a trio of Grunts below and to the right of the island fell to precise bursts of gunfire.

From the tunnel behind the fallen Grunt gunner emerged an Elite, mandibles splayed wide in anger as it hurled something in John's direction. The Spartan was already backpedaling down the tunnel as the glowing plasma grenade impacted the wall before falling to the ground. Covenant plasma grenades, through some unexplained internal mechanism, could differentiate between enemy targets and inanimate objects and would only fuse to said targets.

The grenade detonated, briefly illuminating the darkened corridor with an intensely bright blue-white flash and a surge of electrically charged particles. Despite retreating to the entrance of the corridor, John nonetheless felt the heat from the explosion wash over his energy shields. The Spartan waited several seconds before making his way back up to his former position. He immediately spotted the Elite; the large alien had thrown the dead Grunt gunner aside and taken its position behind the cannon.

Even as a barrage of plasma fire surged his way, John grabbed a plasma grenade, and he pumped his arm. The grenade shot towards the Elite and stuck it between the eyes. The alien warbled in surprise and let out a roar of rage or fear a moment before the grenade exploded, incinerating it along with the plasma cannon.

That's two. Now for the third one.

John had identified the location of the final plasma cannon during his initial sprint across the Commons. It was set up in the security station on the opposite side of the room, with a commanding view over the entire Commons. It needed to be silenced before he could think of allowing the Marines to push up.

He made his way back up and then down the opposite set of stairs in the tunnel, towards another entrance to the Commons. As he passed the mangled corpse of the Elite he'd treated to the business end of his shotgun, the Spartan eyed the opposite side of the room. He'd only get one shot at this, and it had to be perfect. There was another passageway on the opposite side of the room, and he had to make it there in one piece.

The Spartan bolted across the room at a speed that would have made Kelly, the fastest Spartan in his class and therefore easily the fastest human to have ever lived, impressed. As he moved, his battle rifle fired, and the Grunt manning the plasma cannon in the security station slumped beside his weapon. Despite neutralizing the gunner, John wanted the cannon completely out of commission, so he threw a fragmentation grenade up into the room, bouncing it off the corner of the bulkhead and letting it roll to a stop beside the cannon.

There was a resounding boom, a roar of surprise from the security room and an outpouring of panicked plasma fire but the most important task had been accomplished.

"Plasma cannons down, Marines. Move up!" John reported over TEAMCOM.

"Roger that, Chief." The voice of Corporal Timothy Davis, the leader of the Marine fireteam replied. "Save some for us."

John didn't reply. Instead, he pressed into the passageway that would take him out at the far side of the Commons, below the security station. He had a plan to deal with the Covenant up there, but he'd need the Marines to pull it off. The rest of the passageway was clear, but in the wide corridor that led to the staircase to the security room, he noticed a dozen enemy soldiers taking cover in there regrouping.

John hurled a fragmentation grenade into their midst, the explosive bouncing off a Grunt's head before detonating, killing at least five of the smaller aliens and causing the Elite's shields to flare. As the disoriented aliens shook their heads, John quickly closed the distance and his shotgun boomed, pumped, and boomed again and two of the weakened aliens fell. He continued into the corridor, now painted with alien gore and viscera, and his eyes registered yet another Covenant plasma cannon at the base of the staircase along with a clustered group of Grunts and Elites.

John rolled across the corridor into cover on the other side, sidearming another grenade into the Covenant position mid-roll. The resulting blast decimated the alien position, wiping out all of the Grunts as well as the cannon and staggering the few remaining Elites. John rolled back out of cover, his shotgun blasting away until the last of the Elites fell to the deck, its torso mangled beyond all recognition by the eight-gauge buckshot.

By now, the Marines had caught up and were in the process of suppressing the Covenant forces upstairs in the security station.

"Marines, on my mark, frag that room!" John barked. He charged up the staircase, pausing before the double set of pressure doors leading into the security room.

"Mark!" John shouted. The gunfire subsided as the Marines all hurled fragmentation grenades up and into the security station. John mentally counted down from three, and when he heard the overlapping detonations from the grenades, he opened the doors and charged in. He was met with the sight of several shredded Covenant troops, body parts and weapons thrown across the room by the grenades. One Elite groaned, lying on the ground with both of its legs blown off below its odd backwards-swept knees. The dying alien reached for its plasma rifle, lying on the ground ten feet away.

John whipped out his M6C sidearm, and quickly put several rounds into the fallen Elite, as well as any other Covenant in the room that still moved. "Area clear!" he called over TEAMCOM. He accessed Cairo Station's interior cameras and scanned the local area for any signs of Covenant ordnance; he needed to be sure the bomb wasn't hidden somewhere. The sensors picked up additional enemy contacts, as well as plasma discharges outside the security station, at the nearby docking umbilicals. He also detected the presence of several UNSC IFF transponders including… Commander Miranda Keyes.

"Marines, on me!" John ordered immediately. With the four leathernecks in tow, John rushed out of the security station and around a large UNSC supply crate. Plasma bolts streaked overhead as he turned the corner, and he immediately spotted Commander Keyes and her bridge crew, all armed with M7 SMGs, taking cover behind various consoles. They were taking fire from Covenant forces further down the corridor. He also saw Sergeant Major Johnson taking cover behind an ammunition crate. Covenant corpses lay scattered around the corridor, but it was quickly apparent to John that had he not sent Johnson to the bridge crew's position earlier, they would likely have been dead by now.

Johnson spotted the approaching Spartan and quickly waved in greeting, "Come on, Chief, this way!"

"I was almost on board when they showed up." Commander Keyes stated, nodding towards the Covenant troops.

"Don't worry, ma'am, we're on it!" Johnson said, raising his battle rifle.

Due to the longer range of the enemy forces, John slung his shotgun and switched to his own battle rifle. He moved in, firing as he went, and a trio of Grunts fell to precise bursts of gunfire. Behind the Spartan, Corporal Davis' fireteam opened fire. Suddenly finding themselves under significantly more fire than they had been moments ago, the Covenant forces scattered behind what available cover they had.

As the Marines and Naval crewmen poured fire on the alien position, John moved up, eager to exploit their newfound vulnerability. A fragmentation grenade landed behind the Covenant's cover, and the resultant explosion caused chaos among their ranks and John bore in, his battle rifle blazing away. Two more Grunts fell to sustained fire and an Elite reeled backwards, clutching at the rounds that had penetrated its chest. The moment it was out in the open, another burst from Johnson's rifle sliced through its head.

The remaining Elite leapt over the ammunition crate it had been crouched behind, roaring a challenge at the Spartan as it fired its plasma rifle on full auto. Even as its shield lit up with projectile impacts from the other humans in the area, the Elite was undeterred, perhaps sensing that its time had come, but it was determined to at least take its hated enemy down with it.

John's own shield dropped sharply due to the pounding it was taking and even as his vision began to blur from the flare from plasma discharges, he flicked his battle rifle to full auto. Lacking the time to make the switch to his shotgun, he needed to put the alien down before it could break his own shield.

Once he was close enough, he swung his battle rifle viciously at the alien's gun arm. He heard the crunch of bone breaking as the alien's arm fractured beneath its armor plating and the plasma rifle fell out of its grip. The Elite roared in pain and threw a punch with its other fist. John dodged to the side and the blow missed him. The Spartan swung his knee up into his adversary's midsection, and the Elite doubled over from the blow.

This time, John swung the butt of his rifle at the Elite's head. The creature's helmet shattered like porcelain under the blow and its skull cracked from the impact. The Elite crashed to the deck, and broken teeth skimmed across the ground as it landed face first. Without hesitation, John brought the battle rifle back into firing position and put two bullets into the Elite's head, silencing it for good.

The corridor went silent, and Commander Keyes rose from cover along with her bridge crew. She nodded in thanks to the Spartan. "Thanks, Chief. I owe you one."

"Get going, Chief! I'll cover the Commander." Johnson said. John didn't reply, instead consulting the Cairo's schematics, scanning the station to identify which sections were still occupied by Covenant forces. All the areas he had passed through were still being held by human forces. Additionally, the Marines had managed to repel enemy attacks from both of Cairo Station's habitat sections and were in the process of clearing out the last of the Covenant from Security Station Four. The only unsecured sections of the station were Portside Shipping, the exterior docks and the fire control center.

According to the schematics, the entrance to Portside Shipping was below the station's umbilicals, and the only way to make it there would take a spacewalk through hard vacuum. John's MJOLNIR armor granted him the ability to go EVA as the suit was able to recycle air for ninety minutes. This meant the Marines would have to remain behind.

"Davis," John said, addressing the leader of the Marine fireteam. "You and your men stay here and watch our backs." The Corporal nodded in agreement.

"You got it, Master Chief. Good luck."

"Knock 'em dead, Chief!" Dubbo added.

John made his way down the corridor towards the far umbilical while Keyes and her crew took the closer one, of which the Commander's ship, the Stalwart-class light frigate UNSC In Amber Clad was docked. He stepped over a dead Grunt, pausing only to take several plasma grenades off its corpse, before moving into the umbilical.

As he marched down the wide passageway, the door behind him slid closed and there was a hiss as the pressure doors at the end of the umbilical unsealed. A pair of Elites clad in zero-gravity vacuum suits with antigravity packs mounted on their backs rushed in, coming to a sudden halt when confronted with the unexpected Spartan, who slammed the butt of his shotgun into the first Elite's faceplate, causing its shields to shimmer and knocking it backwards.

The second Elite swung its plasma rifle at him, but he ducked underneath the blow, swiftly grabbing a plasma grenade and sticking it to the alien's chest at point blank range before sending it flying backwards with a frontal kick. The Ranger Elite tumbled in the null gravity, colliding with its companion before the grenade exploded, incinerating both aliens and tossing what remained out of the umbilical and into the vacuum beyond.

John moved to the exit, toggling on the suit system that would allow his boots to remain attached to the exterior of the Cairo while in the vacuum of space. He swallowed the severe discomfort he had always felt when it came to operating in space; he had to find that bomb before it destroyed the station, allowing the Covenant a straight shot at the Earth's surface.

As he clambered carefully across the exterior of the station, following a NAV point that highlighted the entrance to Portside Shipping, Cortana's voice cut in over his suits COM, "So, it seems the Covenant were kind enough to leave us a little something." The AI then switched to FLEETCOM, "Sir, boarders have breached the fire control center. They have a bomb."

John felt an unfamiliar sensation: a twinge of fear as Cortana confirmed the presence of Covenant ordnance. Every moment of combat was fraught with danger. At any moment, his life could be snuffed out in an instant. But his training and decades of experience meant he had innate ability to adapt and overcome any such danger. Most of the time, he had control over his own fate.

But if that bomb was to detonate in the next few minutes, before he could stop it, that was it. He'd be dead and there wasn't a damn thing he could do about it.

Once again, Admiral Hood seemed to take the news as calmly as if he'd stepped on an insect. His response was immediate, and his voice didn't betray any emotion.

"Can you defuse it?"

"Yes, but I'll need the Chief's help to make contact with the detonator."

"Chief, get to the bomb, double time!" Hood ordered.

"Yes, sir!" John replied. As he made his way towards the NAV point, he detected motion in his peripheral vision. Far above and to his left, making their way over the looming form of the still-docked In Amber Clad were another pair of Elite Rangers. John knew the damage such Elites could inflict on UNSC ships in zero-gee combat, and they had earned the title of "ship killers" as a result.

The Spartan unlimbered his battle rifle and began to fire in short bursts at the Rangers as they navigated their way across space, antigravity packs pulsing as they went. Fortunately, their target didn't seem to be the human frigate; these Elites were heading right for John. His weapon made no noise in the vacuum of space, and the recoil compensators in his armor ensured that he stayed on-target.

One Elite's energy shield lit sparked as it was hit by burst after burst of gunfire, and without anywhere to take cover, John's gunfire eventually broke through the alien's energy shield before breaching the alien's environment suit. Atmosphere hissed from the punctures, and the doomed Elite spun in space.

The second Elite closed in on the Master Chief, and it opened fire with a plasma rifle in each hand as it came into range. The alien's antigravity pack kept the recoil from its weapons from sending it spiraling off-target, and a hail of plasma bolts smashed into and around the Spartan. John gritted his teeth and forced himself to remain on target, but it quickly became apparent that he was severely outgunned, and the Elite had a very good chance of melting him to a crisp at close range.

Instead of attempting to backpedal, John instead ran forward, the magnetization in his boots keeping him from flying uncontrollably into space as he made his way into the cover provided by the overhead umbilical. Once in the relative safety of the umbilical's shadow, he paused for a moment to allow his energy shield to recharge.

The Elite didn't seem overly keen on its human opponent escaping its wrath, and it soon descended past the umbilical as it sought out the Chief. But John was ready. As soon as the alien dropped into sight, John snapped his shotgun up and fired. The first shell slammed into the Elite's chest, and while it's energy shield held against the impact, it was nonetheless rocked backwards by the kinetic energy from the shot. By the time it had reoriented itself, John had pumped the shotgun and the next round blew a large hole in the Ranger's chest, sending it spinning away into space.

With the immediate threat taken out, John returned his attention to his helmet's NAV point. The entrance to Portside Shipping was very close, and as John moved out from the umbilical's shadow, his attention was drawn to a pressure door, beside which was signage informing him that he had indeed made it to his objective. He made his way through the door, and was relieved when the door sealed behind him and the airlock he stood within rapidly repressurized. John had always hated combat in zero-gee. There was an element of unpredictability that wasn't present during usual terrestrial combat, and he respected and feared space as an opponent that no Spartan could overcome in battle – a harsh lesson he had witnessed during the fall of Reach with the loss of James-005.

He paused in the airlock, looking down at a dead Marine. The man's name – Private First Class Makarov Georgiy, flashed over John's HUD as he stopped to retrieve several magazines for his battle rifle from the dead Marine. Beside him was a dead Elite, and both corpses were clad in their respective species' environmental suits. John moved on briskly; time was of the essence, and the time to think about the Marine's death and the ghoulish need to take ammo from the dead soldier was not now.

John expected to face more Covenant in the next room, but a check of the Cairo's sensors revealed only a pair of Marines crouched behind a combat barrier. He stepped out of the airlock and both Marines whipped around, assault rifles raised but an instant later they lowered their weapons once they realized who it was.

"Master Chief, sir!" One of the Marines said, standing to attention. Their friend-or-foe tags flashed on John's heads-up display – Lance Corporal Lee Keeler and Private First Class Xian Zedong. Several other IFF tags flashed, but they were all attached to negative life signs. There were alien corpses scattered across the loading dock, but the large freight elevator connecting to the supply dock below was out of sight.

"Report," John said calmly. LCpl Keeler nodded and pointed across the room towards the elevator shaft.

"Covenant forces attacked a few minutes ago," Keeler explained. "Elite Rangers and Grunts. We held them off, but I think we're the only ones left…" As John listened, his armor's audio receptors detected a sudden, high pitched buzzing sound, and a dozen red dots appeared on his motion tracker, rising up the elevator shaft at an alarming rate.

"Drones!" John shouted, and the two Marines dove into cover behind their combat barrier an instant before a swarm of roughly human-sized, copper colored insectoid creatures rose over the lip of the elevator shaft. Green bolts of plasma and pink crystalline needles erupted from the Drones' plasma pistols and needlers and the creatures unleashed a hellish torrent of fire at the humans. John darted for cover behind a nearby bulkhead, his rifle firing a three-round burst as he went. The projectiles slashed into one of the Drones, and the alien let out a high-pitched insectile screech and plummeted back down the elevator shaft.

The rest of the Drones scattered across the loading bay, flitting about near the ceiling, and clinging to the high-scaling walls on either side of the elevator shaft. The aliens moved constantly, making them difficult targets to hit and the volume of fire that they produced forced even the Spartan to remain behind cover. Even as John took potshots at the aliens, dropping two more of them out of the sky, PFC Zedong cursed as a needler shard embedded itself in Keeler's forehead. The man toppled over, dead before he hit the ground and the shard detonated, spraying bone and brain matter across the deck of the loading dock.

"Private! Stay down!" John shouted. In his experience, Drones were some of the most dangerous units that the Covenant employed. Swarms of highly aggressive creatures with the ability to negate cover with their ability to fly, in conjunction with fast-firing weaponry and extremely good aim, a swarm of Drones could easily decimate a unit of unprepared UNSC troops.

And more often than not, Drones were deployed to force their enemies to fire up at them, opening them up to a secondary attack from ground-based Covenant units. A quick look at the station's sensors revealed that the freight elevator was slowly making its way up the shaft, carrying a half dozen Grunts and half that many Elites. This confirmed John's suspicions.

"Zedong," he said, and the female Marine turned towards him, crouched awkwardly behind the barrier as plasma bolts sizzled against it. "The Drones are trying to hold us down until reinforcements arrive on the elevator." The Marine didn't say anything, but she clenched her assault rifle in a white-knuckled grip. John knew that they couldn't afford to get pinned down; the time until that bomb blew up was rapidly ebbing away and he needed to move.

He spun out of cover, battle rifle raised high and opened fire on the darting figures flitting about overhead. Despite their agility, John's aim was perfect and one, two, three more Drones went down, streaks of cream-colored ichor trailing from the corpses as they fell out of the air.

As the number of Drones dwindled, and correspondingly the volume of incoming enemy fire slackened, PFC Zedong was able to provide some extra fire support, and her assault rifle successfully shredded two more of the insect-like aliens. The remaining Drones scattered behind crates and boxes in the loading dock.

John was quick to take advantage of the turning tide of the battle, and he darted for the nearest crate where one of the Drones was hiding. He turned the crate with such speed that the Drone had no time to react before John's armored leg lashed out, crushing the Drone's chest with a sickening crunch that splattered alien blood and gore over his energy shield.

John heard the flitting of Drone wings, and he knew that the aliens had just sensed the death of their comrade. The three remaining Drones rose out of their cover, lifting into the air and opening fire on the Spartan. John returned fire, shredding the first alien he saw with a burst of battle rifle fire. The other two Drones, approaching from behind the Spartan, were singularly focused on him and didn't notice Zedong leveling her assault rifle at them, and a hail of 7.62mm rounds tore both Drones apart before they could do much damage with their own weaponry.

The Spartan nodded in thanks to the Marine, who flashed him a grin of her own, before he turned his attention to the elevator shaft. By now, the elevator was two-thirds of the way up the diagonal shaft, and it was still teeming with Covenant troops.

The Spartan primed a fragmentation grenade, hurling it down towards the freight elevator, before following it up with a plasma grenade, before aiming his battle rifle down at the carnage below.


"We can delay no longer!" growled the High Prophet of Regret. The Covenant Hierarch sat on his gravity throne in the center of Solemn Penance's bridge. The massive assault carrier served not only as the flagship of the Fleet of Sacred Consecration, but also as Regret's personal warship.

In stark contrast with the other High Prophets, who preferred to operate from the Covenant Holy City, High Charity, Regret had always preferred to travel on board Sangheili warships and see them in action. Indeed, he had been on board the Solemn Penance for the past several annual cycles, overseeing Rhul 'Salmutee, the vessel's Zealot shipmaster as he conducted the Covenant's noble work by purging the human filth from whatever planets they were discovered to have infested.

Regret had always admired the warrior prowess of the Sangheili species and admired and respected 'Salmutee's zealous devotion to the Great Journey. And now, their faith was to be rewarded. They had arrived at the planet upon which the gateway portal to the Ark installation was located. From the Ark, they would be able to activate the Holy Rings, and all of the Covenant faithful would be propelled to the Divine Beyond, and the heretics would be burned away for their transgressions.

And I stand as the one who will initiate our Great Journey

Regret had quickly assembled the vessels he could in a short space of time and taken them to the planet identified by the Luminary recovered from the glassed human world of Meridian as "Erde-Tyrene". What they didn't expect to discover was the enormous human presence in orbit. The entire planet was defended by their formidable weapons platforms, and swarms of human vessels flowed around them - a nearly impenetrable defensive array. In fact, the defenses of this world dwarfed even those that had been present at their "Reach" planet.

Could this be the human homeworld? Regret mused.

Regardless, nothing would stop the Hierarch from culminating the Covenant's Great Journey. Regret had quickly triangulated the portal's location on the planets surface; one of the larger landmasses on the world's southern hemisphere, and he decided to focus all of his efforts on punching a hole through the human defenses over that area. All he needed to do was punch a hole in that one area so he could take the Solemn Penance down to the surface to access the portal. So far, his fleet's boarding crafts had managed to knock two of the three platforms out of the sky with antimatter charges, and the third would soon follow suit.

But Regret was keen to advance now, before all of the human forces could congregate on his vastly outnumbered fleet. Secretly, he sought to locate the portal and depart for the Ark before his fellow Hierarchs caught wind of his mission and sent their own forces. It was no secret that political machinations ruled the day in the highest echelons of Covenant society, and inwardly, Regret feared that should the Prophet of Truth seize control of the Ark first, he would have no more need for Regret.

And so he had acted first, without informing the other High Prophets. And even now, faced with such an overwhelming enemy force, Regret remained steadfast. They could not wait any longer.

"Shipmaster, order the rest of the fleet to advance. We must take our chances with the human's orbital weaponry. Have the cruisers tear through as many enemy ships as they need to, but we have to get to the surface. The portal must be found!"

The gold-armored shipmaster glanced at the Prophet; his expression inscrutable under the ornate headdress he wore. But 'Salmutee was loyal to Regret and to the Great Journey, and the Sangheili bowed his head as he spoke, "Yes, Hierarch," before turning to issue orders to his bridge crew.

The Prophet steepled his fingers together. The Great Journey was nigh, and nothing would stop the Covenant now.


Author's note: Another chapter out! And in record time too! Truthfully, I have had had the long weekend off from work and its allowed me to spend most of my waking time writing. Unfortunately I am back to work after tomorrow so I doubt future chapters will be out as speedily as this one was. But alas, we deal.

I'm hoping to make this a story just as much about the individual people, both human and Covenant, as it is about our main duo of Chief and Arby. Hopefully this is coming across so far in this fic. I know this chapter mainly dealt with Chief's exploits on Cairo Station, but the next one is gonna go back to several other perspectives, as well as a new one which I'm excited but also nervous to try my hand at. But I'll give it a go.

Thanks everyone for reading and reviewing :-)