Part one --- Dalton
PFC Jack Dalton's fingers ran over the familiar, cold steel stock of his MA5B Assault Rifle. He pulled back the bolt and inserted a magazine as the Pelican drop-ship he was riding in neared the landing zone. The radio in his helmet boomed orders from his commander, he sounded panicked.
"It's a hot LZ. Heavy enemy resistance. Additional, heavy weaponry will be dropped via Pelican after all Marines are on the beach. In range – dropping bay doors in three… two… one…"
The doors in the rear of the Pelican dropped slowly, revealing the other fifteen drop-ships in formation, each initiating touch-and-go landing procedures, their bay doors also dropping. Dalton, sitting five seats from the door, had to stretch his neck to even see the sandy beach below them. As the sand became visible, so did the reddish-purple armor of the Covenant troops below. The sight of the troops made his stomach turn. It would be his first time seeing combat, and this thought wouldn't leave his mind until – only a split second later – a Pelican flying in formation behind them was struck by a blast of green plasma. The Pelican's right thruster gave way, casing the drop-ship to lose its orientation. The left thruster sputtered and went dead. It seemed to hang in the air for a moment before it plunged to the ground. As it fell, Dalton could see his fellow marines trying furiously to unbuckle their safety harnesses so they could try to dive from the ship. Even if they would accomplish this feat – Dalton would never know, as the ship dropped from his view almost right away – it would be in vein; they did not have parachutes.
His Commander started yelling again, this time giving orders. Dalton was too pre-occupied with pondering his immediate future to listen. Next to him, Pvt. Tim Schultz grabbed Dalton's collar and with a look composed of terror and lunacy he screamed, "I can't believe this is actually happening! I'm going to kill fifty of those goddamned bastards!" The bay of the Pelican erupted in the shouts of the marines in it as the Pelican touched down. The harnesses on the seats released, and the ten marines ran onto the beach amidst a chorus of "Go! Go! Go!"
Time seemed to stop as the PFC from a small town in the Midwest United States looked around the beach. He was nearly two light-years from his home planet, yet the water still smelled salty, the air crisp, and the clouds in the sky cotton-white. It was just like the way he remembered. He was only on a beach once before. When he was fifteen, his family traveled to Daytona Beach in Florida. If he closed his eyes, he thought he'd hear the shouts of children having a good time, riding the waves and building sand castles. His train of thought was shattered when bursts of plasma buzzed through the air and began impacting behind him. His mind clicked off and his instincts took over. He trained his rifle on the nearest enemy and fired off a three round burst of fire into the midsection of the short alien. He keeled over, still firing his plasma-pistol into the sand beneath him, and collapsed in on himself. There were one hundred and forty marines on the beach sixteen seconds into the mission, and Dalton had scored the first official kill of the operation. Rounds popped from rifles all around him, and the group of ten marines that composed his drop team ran for cover behind a large metal object placed by the Covenant to hinder Pelican landings.
Corporal Craig Billiard was highest ranked marine in the group, and was therefore designated group leader. "Okay, we need to reach that mound up there, all one-forty-of us. Its about a twenty meter sprint. On my mark, we stand and each fire ten rounds at an enemy. Schultz, Martinez, and Brisbeau, cook off grenades and fire them at our ten, twelve, and two, respectively. Okay, ready? Three…two… one… MARK!" The marines leapt to their feet and fired bursts of fire into the line of Covenant forces. About half of the rounds met their marks and the enemies fell. The other three marines threw grenades in front of the group about ten meters out, causing a smattering of Covenant grunts to leap for cover, most of them being unsuccessful. Behind them, a Pelicans' engines roared to full power, and it hovered fifteen meters off the sand. It stayed in that position for a moment, and then the .50 caliber mini-guns opened fire into the Covenant line ahead, killing about ninety of the one hundred and ten enemies. Corporal Billiard shouted for the platoon to move forward to the mound he motioned to earlier. The marines stood and ran to the position in a loose arc formation, guns leveled, ready to fire with a squeeze of the trigger. Billiard's team was the first to reach the mound, he signaled for his men to crouch, and called over PFC Charles Brisbeau, the platoon's sniper. "Check ahead. See if we're going to need the heavy weaponry." Brisbeau nodded and looked through the scope of his S2 AM sniper rifle. "Corporal, I'd get on the horn and call for them. It looks like we're going to need all they can give us."