I do not own Halo. It stared back at me, the expression I couldn't determine, but I can assure you that it was beaming with pride. The monster drew its weapon and prepared to kill me. I reached down to the side of my right thigh where the sidearm was strapped to my leg. The motion was almost automatic though it wasn't at all a reflex, I was basically running purely off adrenaline and I didn't really think to move at all, though I was. I flipped the pistol up in front of me and shot it once in the chest, the Elite was too fast though, and it swung disarming me with a swift blow to the handle of the pistols. The pain in my fingers was so immense, I wasn't sure, but I thought that I had broken a finger or two. Nothing that a little visit the medic couldn't fix though. The gun of mine clattered to the ground about a meter away and spun to a stop about 2 meters distant. It was too far, he would kill me before then. The chest wound decloaked him temporarily, and I was able to catch a glimpse of the look on his face. Suddenly I saw my childhood, not all of it, just the select most important moments. Moments like when I found out about the Covenant, and when my parents died. The Elites face was full of pride and full of glory as he was about to kill the enemy of his religion, perhaps the greatest honor he may ever face. Or not. A submachine gun roared near the door and I watched as the Elites expression change. First it was smug, grinning at my potential death, suddenly it whipped its face to the right, hearing a person move, he may not have seen them or something. Anyway, his eyes flipped to the left, looking at the entrance to the room, and as he saw the rifle aimed at him his expression became the kind that you feel when you're stomach suddenly feels sick as a result of stress. Looking up in disgust it let out a final bellow of defeat as about sixty of the submachine guns ripped their way through the Elite, smearing his blood all over the wall behind him. His body fell limp to the ground and collapsed over my legs. I leaned back and sighed feeling sudden moisture on my shin. I slowly looked down, angered by this. My leg was coated in purple blood. I wasn't the fondest of blood myself and quickly recoiled in shock. The body thumped to the ground as I snapped my legs out from underneath the bulk of the Elite. I quickly jumped up trying feebly to brush the blood off my legs. The two Marines at the door were breathing hard, clearly glad they were able to save me as a tooth smile that crossed their faces was easily visible even from my distance of about 15 meters. "Thanks." I was the first to break the silence. They were beginning to return to a normal breathing rate as the other Marines of our group moved into the area near to the brig control. I had nearly forgotten about the prisoners. I stepped up the raised platform near the holopanel and hit a few button like projections on it. About half of the cells opened. The Marine who was on the other side of the panel stepped up behind me and pushed my hand out of the way hitting a few buttons more opening the rest of the cells. "How did you know how to fix that up?" I said, my confidence in understanding the Covenant computer systems reduced. I was amazed that the ease he opened the cells with. "Let's just say that I have been on that side of the cell a few times before." He gestured to the cell nearest to us where a Marine was curled up in the corner. I wondered if he were dead or alive. Here I thanked my great luck that I had not been captured, otherwise I would have been put though hell like these people. Stepping into one of the cells I extended a hand to the Marine who was curled up in the nearby corner of the cell. He was either knocked out, asleep, or least desired, dead. I poked him to wake him up however the body toppled off to the side and sprawled across the ground. His chest was burned from electrical shocks and his jaws were clenched tight. His Ears were a little bloody as a result of the electrocution. He was one who clearly hadn't talked when they told him too. Suddenly leaping out of a cell came a familiar figure, that of Logan. The tall figure was bouncing back and forth from left foot to right. Excited to be free he weakly yelled before collapsing of exhaustion or hunger, either way. He lay on the floor twitching a little, the biggest smile a man could have crossing his face. Myself however I had a smile to match, I was sure that I was going to die back there. I stepped up to the marines near the door as about 6 more shuffled by me aiding the prisoners to walk out of the structure. "Who shot him?" "It was me." Skip was standing behind them. He was at least twice as far down the hallway. "A pretty good shot, aren't we?" "Yeah, really, I just got lucky, that's all." "Still, thanks for saving my life man, I could have died back there" I gestured to the look stained wall, "I probably should have, but I didn't." "Yeah, we know. Trust us, you should have seen the look on your face when you saw him." "Ah, well, lets go help some Marines!" I moved off to the back of the room and grabbed a prisoner, slinging his arm over my shoulder. "So, how are you doing." He replied weakly, one eye closed, "Ah, just fine. Now that you guys have showed up that is." "Well, despite the temptation to think so, we aren't your guardian angels." He moaned clutching his side. "You sure you're ok?" "Yeah. GAH!!!" He collapsed onto the ground clutching that side again. "Medic!" I yelled as soon as the body thumped to the floor. The medic ran over, "What?" "Ah, I think he is hurt, a wound to his abdomen area." I was already in his medical toolkit grabbing the field scissors. I cut out a hole in the side of his Marine uniform to reveal a large swollen area. The whole thing was black and blue, pulsating with every heartbeat. It was coated in some sort of shiny coating that made it look scaly and almost scary. "Man, we're gonna have to operate on it, he could have bone fragments or shrapnel in this wound." "Oh, great, now we are gonna have to cut im open surrounded b the enemy, behind enemy lines, and while hundreds of sick and wounded flow out of this camp. Afraid that it can't be done, load him onto the next Pelican and operate en route." "No, could cause more fractures in any potential broken bones he has." "Um. Guys." he coughed up some phlegm, "I am still conscious. Doesn't that mean that I get choice over where my operation is?" "Oh. I hadn't noticed." I said slowly and more soft than usually. I was now thinking more of him, I was thinking of a person rather than an inconvenience. "Yeah, well, I say to operate right here, whatever it takes." I stood up. Thinking for a second I came up with something, to let the medic handle this one. "okay, I'll let you handle this one medic. Good luck" In all, we freed 416 or so prisoners from the holding cells, about half that number however were found dead. Some people were paired two in a cell, one often beaten bloody and missing teeth, their rations stolen by their cellmate. Our next task was to load the ex-cons into the Pelicans which were now swarming our area picking up tens of prisoners a load, overloaded and working the engines way to hard Pelicans with BAPs in tow pulled up to drag away more prisoners. The engines howled as a Pelican would begin its ascent. Dust and small stones would whip us in the face as we desperately waved our arms signaling for them to lift off. Picking up nose first slowly they would lift into the sky and cross above the tree line with only feet between them and the top of the taller trees. A few Covenant survivors were found, though the remainder forces only caused a half dozen casualties, mainly just burns. We found a door in the back of the facility that was something around 3 feet thick. We would sit there tapping on it, listening for a return however we do not believe that there is anything living in it. We brought in some demolition specialists and they attempted to blast their way through the door however they were cut short only half way through as they began to realize that the door may be sealed for a reason. We didn't know what, but something must have been back there. We stood near it for a while using some sound resonance to determine what was in it, though according to our readings, it was empty. We decided it best to leave it be, we had no reason to go within it, it might just be a bomb shelter for all we knew. The last evac ship came, and we followed the motto of some of the army. "First ones in, last ones out" We were dropped at the camp and we watched the sunset as the Pelicans flew off towards it, ready to dock in the satellite area we had found. We got a dozen Pelicans from the supply and storage bays in the base as well as some Warthogs, a few BAP's and two StarJumpers. StarJumpers were our last chance out. A breed of ships that were created as bombers were actually more useful and more practical as the last line of defense, or rather escape. We were all hoping to damage the space blockade of the Covenant to be capable of the escape succeeding. But only about 40 of us could escape, so chances are that either all of us would escape, or none of us, we have a Marine motto, leave no man behind. *************************************************************** I put a hand through my hair. My hair was moist, I had been sweating for a long time now, it was too warm out. I had slept through the whole night pretty good, waking up at reveille. The music of the trumpet was playing. Surprising we stuck so close to tradition over time, being that playing instruments became a practice of only those who were supremely dedicated to playing music on an authentic instrument. I sat up hitting my head on a bar that was inconveniently placed above my bed. I rubbed my forehead and slid out of the bed. I stepped outside and looked off towards the horizon. There was a blue pillar extending up into the sky. The first moments of the day were fading and my happiness fleeting as well. Skip and I walked over to the tent that was set up to be a cafeteria structure, and sat down near to Jim, who was sitting hunched forward weakly eating food at an incredible rate. We grabbed a tray and walked up to the chef, if you could even call it that. The "food" we got was something that could easily scare someone who didn't know what it was, and almost looked as though I should use my fork to kill it. "What is it?" Skip said. He was acting more and more like Logan recently. These changes must be caused by the stress. I wonder if what caused Logan's seemingly stupid behavior was actually stress. "You sure you wanna know?" the chef replied. Skip stood for a second thinking, quickly giving in to fear. He nodded a no and watched the glop flop onto his plate. I stepped up to him, and he looked me in the eyes. I must have looked scared, "Don't worry, it tastes half good if you swallow quickly." The chef said. "What if you don't?" "Well." "okay, don't worry about telling me. Just give me the food." I sat down at the table, no interest in eating what I had, a great hunger in my stomach. I hadn't eaten in too long. "Jim." I nodded acknowledging him. "How are you?" He was chewing and finished adding in a grunt meaning that he knew I said something. Swallowing he said "Fine now, look at me, I'm a free man!" He quickly shoveled more food into him mouth. I stared confused. Skip was also glaring, no anger of course at Jim. How could he eat that food so readily, I doubt that it's dead myself. I grabbed the fork and violently stabbing downwards stabbed the "food" in the center, watching it ripple as a result. It acted as a gelatin would though it showed no signs of being anything that tasted even remotely good. Shivering I pulled out a wiggling chunk and let it slide almost strait down my throat. Military food had never been good before, why would it start now? Actually it, along with front line living conditions had never been improved. Our rifles were more accurate with every model, our scopes more accurate, our magazines jammed less, everything had gotten to become a better soldier, but since about 2100 had a soldier gotten a better mattress or a meal that was even half decent. Jim however was happily swallowing it. That weird thing was that we both hadn't eaten in the same length of time, but he was clearly starving. He finished the plate and leaned back in his chair. "Yeah, glad to be back in society ya know?" I nodded along to show I was listening as I swallowed a second bite of the glop, "To be able to sit in a chair and not be beaten," I nodded again, "and to get to eat! I can't believe the retrieval team was still out during the prison raid though. That means that you probably took more casualties for it." I nodded again, swallowing the garbage. "Yeah, but we needed the space anyway" he was about to say something but I cut him off, "I know, it sounds a little, or rather a great deal evil sounding, but you have to understand." "What?" "Well, I don't want a bunkmate." "That's sad. You would rather have a man gunned down than get a bunkmate? Besides, I don't think that you need to worry about it, today is the last day." I swallowed in surprise choking over some of the slime. "The last day?" "Yeah, the last day, the day the Covenant melt us. Well, actually we won't be melted, we will die long before that. See, sometime soon it will get warm enough that we will all die of heat exhaustion. But don't worry, you can probably get some anesthetics to make it a painless death." "Still a death" I said, angered. Why hadn't I heard this? "Oh well, you didn't think you could avoid it did you?" I think that I actually did think that I would escape recently. So much hope had been transmitted to me. But why! If I was to die here inevitably why had they instilled such hope? The speaker above us crackled, "All personnel report to the briefing room! It's the last day, and the last few missions." I was ready, I stood up half of my food gone and paced to the door, throwing my helmet over my head and wiping the sweat from my forehead. I quickly marched to the briefing room, I had nothing to lose. I watched the Commander stand up at the front of the room. He stared back at us with a reassuring look. The Commander listened to the silence somehow, hearing our despise for today, the day we would all die. Today we were planning as many operations as we could fit into the limited time we have, but by 1800 hours, it will all be over. His voice split the silence like a wedge shoved into a stone as he said, "Alright Marines, men, or rather friends. We are gathered here to witness the last stand of the Humans of Lunar 4. Now listen, before I start this I would like to make sure that no one feels obligated to participate in this operation. Also, I don't want anyone to say sir today." A few people grunted in approval. "I'm serious. We are going to enjoy this last day. Now listen, here is the mission plan. We want to strike the Covnenat here." He pointed to the map that he had and waved his finger. It was a hit or miss operation I guess. "We have a nuclear facility there, and given we hit it with enough speed we can take over. The good news is" "We don't have any nuclear silos left Commander. The Covenant would have taken it out." "Not this one. How about if I told you that this one was not made public." "What do you mean by that?" the Marine replied catching his drift. "Well, it was made so that knowledge of it was on a need to know basis, and you, did not need to know. The facility looks like a standard mining facility from the outside and the inside too. But we have a network of tunnels that connect the base to another hidden area. A silo. 3 nukes. Powerful enough to destroy a quarter of Lunar 4 each, and when fired into the sun..." "Boomie." Cut in the Marine. "Exactly. We can take them out too. Its as simple as making it to the controls and hitting the big red launch button. Unfortunately as it happens, a mine would be a great place for defending ourselves. So it was among the first targets hit to prevent a guerilla operation. Something like this one." "Ah, great, so how many can we expect?" "Well, there is a problem. We don't know. Our peeper network has been compromised almost entirely, they all started dropping. We were supposed to still have at least ¾ of our network still intact now. But anyway, we could expect strong opposition, so we will be in full force. The shelling won't last too long, chances are they are all inside anyway. So just rush in, guns firing and maybe we will all come out alive long enough to see the ships explode up in the sky. 12 brilliant flashes all over the world. I would love nothing more." "Well, I'm in." I said. "You don't need to say that, just get in the dropship if you are coming, otherwise, do whatever you please as long as you don't interfere with the operation." He said with a calm tone. It looks like he has used up all the anger that he had built the past few days. "Alright, lets go!" We all stood up and shuffled out. About 200 of the 450 Marines were on this mission, and about twice the former number of drop outs were among our guerilla forces. More people were done fighting. A bad sign that we would all make it out alive, people were surrendering, giving in to the temptation to leave and live in fear. The sacrifices we make to not have to fight and feel true terror. Skip was among the ones the was staying, but he walked alongside me talking. "Well, best of luck to you Jacob. Hopefully you will get back here so we can talk a little. But here, take this." He handed me the Bible. "Take it." He waved it a little to draw my attention to it. "You know what I think on these things. I won't take it." I pushed his hand back towards him. "What do you have to lose?" I was quiet for a few seconds before reaching out to grab it, "Fine." I dropped it in the pocket of my flak jacket that was right between it and my heart. It was just the right size as if the book had been made for that pocket or vice versa. "Read it. Skip to the Ten Commandments, you will find that those are the most important. Oh, but the one about murder, skip over that one if you are regarding a Covenant. It's gods will to kill those beasts." "Ah, so now we're using their excuse." "No! Well, yeah, but we are right!" We were at the dropship and a volunteer was handing out weapons. He was a civilian judging by my first glance though he was stronger than most. He easily tossed guns and ammunition into the dropship and to any Marine who was willing to ask. "Gun?" I said asking permission to have one. He nodded and tossed an Assault Rifle in my direction. I leaned forward and grabbed the gun. His throw was a little off. I loaded up into the APC and sat down. I watched as Skip walked off towards the tents. Why wasn't he coming? I finally broke my stare and faced the opposite wall. A Marine was sitting on the other side of the APC with a big smile across his face. It was Logan. Why was he always so happy. He stepped over to the other side with quick steps, the transport was at a slight slant and he was going downhill towards me. He sat down. I was the first to say something. "Why are you so happy?" I didn't look at him as I said that, I just stared across the APC at the wall. I had a bad feeling about this one. "I have everything that I thought I was going to miss forever now. I have food, I have friends." "Yeah, and you have a whole army of Covenant all over you now. Great. I would pay anything to get out of here." I looked over to him with a surprisingly smug look on my face. "You?" I said asking him a pointless question. He sighed, "Yeah, I would." He put his arms behind his head, he was stressed right now. They always had said that humor was great for relieving stress, I think I got my answer as to why he was smiling so much. The eating was a sign of his stress too. "I hate knowing that I will die within a few hours. It's pretty demoralizing." "I understand. Logan. I was wondering. In prison, did they torture you?" I asked with a near to unwilling tone. It was inconvenient to keep someone that had been in torment back in that time of pain. "Yeah, not me, but just about everyone else. I'll never forget it." "You won't forget it because it was so impacting and atrocious?" "No, because you don't forget things like that in a few hours." "Oh. Well that is probably a good reason too." "Yeah. But anyway, I never saw anyone get tortured, only the before and after of all of them. They would be hundreds of feet down the hallway and we would still hear screams. So many." He clutched his face with his free right hand, the other holding the rifle, "All day long, we would hear screams and the guards would beat us almost every day just for the satisfaction that it brought. They would kill us if we tried to fight back and sometimes even if we didn't. It was truly an embodiment of hell in the prison Jacob." He had used my name to communicate force or power from what I had gathered, that was a sign of just how hard things were. "Ah. Well, I'm gonna read this." I pulled the bible from my pocket and held it by the bottom corner and waved it in the air. "Ah, Skip got you eh?" he said. "No. I got me. Skip helped me." I had a desire to follow something larger and for a long time it had been fate. But now I saw that you are in complete control of your own life. Then once you are done something has to happen, and why not that you go to heaven or hell. The Bible, despite its outward cleanliness was full of wrinkled pages and dust from extensive use. I now regretted that I had not been such a fool before as to ignore religion. I have to put faith in something I discovered. I had to. ******************************************************************* I got pretty far before my eyes became strained, reaching into the triple digits before giving in to the pain in my eye. I got a bookmark to make sure that I wouldn't lose my page and slid it back into my armor. The bible was the only printed book left, all the others are sounds or videos in this day of technology and reading was becoming something that you learned almost solely for writing and the bible. We were passing through the wrecked city or New Missoula, the first city struck in the invasion. A lander set down right here and deployed hundreds of enemies. Dead bodies of both Marines, Civilians and Covenant were strewn all over and flaming heaps were a commonplace in this desolate place. "Man, I don't see how any living thing could have survived out here at one time." Jim said looking out the rear window of the APC with one arm up against the wall. It seems as if this place was just a normal city until all of a sudden they saw this bright thing up in the sky." He paused, "and then it was all over." I stood up and firmly patted him on the shoulder, "Sorry about your family." He turned to me and started to say something but nothing came out. He was speechless. This is where his whole family lived. Mainly extended family being that he wasn't married, but they were very close in his family. This was one of the most populated place on Lunar 4. Lunar 4 was mainly an agricultural foothold in this system. It was orbiting in a binary star system that meant that most of the year it is light out. It is the second planet in this solar system and the last. The seasons are nonexistent as they are on Earth. Every full rotational cycle we have two summer s and two winters. The Covenant struck as we were on the far side of the colder of the two stars and brought assault carriers in somehow without alerting any of our scouts or our peeper network. No one knows how they got through though. They just crept up on us all at once. Suddenly the ship was sent ajar and flipped up into the air, the left side was airborne for a full second. We were able to regain control but only briefly as we plummeted off of our pillow of air and landed firmly on the ground. Quickly I ran to the front of the ship to look out the canopy, searching for signs of what hit us, but I saw nothing out of the ordinary other than that the pilot was dead. Shards of glass littered the cockpit like confetti for no apparent reason. I looked carefully. There was a bombed out building to our left and then a street running perpendicular to our position. Some slabs of concrete were strewn around, but there was nothing there. I scanned the area quickly. As I began to turn to leave and hunched down to get into the main personnel area some gunfire started to pelt the area where I just was. Now I knew what was going on, it was an ambush. The CO of our platoon was the first to speak, "Alright Marines, we've got a little fight on our hands, get to the higher ground and do whatever you need to in order to survive, 2nd squad, follow me, we'll pave the path for you guys and get holed up in that building." I was among the second platoon. It was easy for me to feel confident on this mission because the CO himself was a man who had the appearance of seeing lots of field action. "Johnson" I flinched hearing my name, the adrenaline was rushing through my body, "I need you to go open up the back door for us, the switch is in the cabin, can you handle it?" I put a hand firmly on m guns grip and barked out a quick "Sir" before pacing to the front. I slowed near to the cabin, they obviously had armor support to do that much damage, or maybe a Hunter. I slowly peered around the corner ducking back behind it as I saw some poorly aimed Plasma bolts coming in my direction. They filled the cabin with a green glow for a second as I ducked behind the wall again. When there was a break in the fire I jumped over to the switch and hit a series of buttons before ducking and crawling back into the main area of the APC. "Alright, I think I got it open, all you have to do is hit the switch to get it open." I reported to the CO. "okay, Johnson, get one of those anti-vehicle guns, drop your assault rifle." I was trained not to question commands, so I dropped the assault rifle and picked up the anti-vehicle rifle. The anti-vehicle rifle was a stationary gun that was our answer to the Shade guns. It sat on two little support large in the front and fired from a large chain of ammunition. It had no need to reload and carried any amount of ammo. It was heavier then the normal rifle and came with a secondary feed to make sure that it wouldn't jam and some add-ons like scope and suppressors. Such things were a great convenience however the 80 pound pack that they came in was not. Luckily most of the supplies were worthwhile and the others were lost or generally pitched out on the battlefield. The CO was busily opening the door with a few other Marines. He shouted a 3, 2, 1, GO and flipped open the door. They shot a nearby Grunt pretty quickly then set up in nearby defensive positions, crouching behind fallen fragment of the building to return some more covering fire to the enemies in the area. "Come on Johnson, hurry up!" he yelled at me. With that I moved at an increased rate flipping the pack over my back.. I heard the crack of distant gunfire from an Assault Rifle about a hundred yards away, then more and more gunfire. Within a few seconds we were in a battlefield. I flipped around the corner and fired off a couple dozen rounds towards the enemy forces, none of which hit, but enough came close to them to cause them to duck while we ran for cover. The CO walked up to me crouching and yelled over the gunfire. "Johnson! You take Logan up there with you and get some high grounds in that building. Give us some cover fire!" "Sir!" I waved two fingers at Logan and then tilted them to the top of a building. Jim crouched and ran over to a position near to the door to the building and nodded his head in the direction of the door. The Marines on the ground continued to fire though I had only seen one enemy get struck by a bolt. The 1st Platoon tossed them ammo almost as fast as they could fire it. I ran back to the door of the building and kicked out the glass window to the lobby. The alarm sounded idly as I smashed my way through the rest with the but of my gun. I ducked through and slammed my back against the wall. I looked into the main lobby. It was covered in debris, but other than that there was nothing out of the ordinary, so I stepped in. The escalators were still working, so I hopped up on one and rode it up to the top of the third story. Again I leaned against the wall and crept to the left, careful not to step onto anything. I quickly jumped around the corner. Nothing. The next area was where the elevators were. Suddenly I recognized this building. So far all of the places I had fought at had never rung up this sense of home like emotions. This was the Mall of New Missoula, and it was all looking unusually sad. It was essentially a tower inside of a tower, and it had a tower of buildings in the center, then the outside was a shell of businesses too. The building was one of the places I went to countless times on dates, and as a small child to visit the Santa Claus as he "visited" Lunar 4. So many fond memories of this place. And I took it all for granted! But I had to stay focused. I slid stealth-fully over to the elevators as Logan caught up to me. I pressed the elevator button a couple times and was soon rewarded for my efforts with the bell of the elevator ringing as it hit our floor. I opened the door. Sitting in the corner was a bloody body, that of a woman who was still holding a shopping bag. She wasn't too badly wounded but still killed, possibly just from shock. I stepped into the elevator emotionlessly, I had seen so many dead recently I had become used to it. For Logan however it was no small feat to get inside the elevator however the sound of gunfire awoke him as his sense of duty was recovered. He stepped in as I closed the door. It seemed a little odd going up an elevator with such a commercial setting, especially with the elevator music still playing as we moved into position to attack our enemies. The elevator reached the top floor and I slid out slowly making sure that the floor wasn't occupied. The 49th floor however was clear. I paced over to the window and set up my rifle on the ground with its two supports. I also dropped the backpack as I pulled the pistol out of my pocket. I grabbed it by the muzzle and smashed a hole in the window. The hole weakened it little being that the window was resistant to being smashed by anything. The portion that I punched out had too little an affect, so I turned around to announce my failure when suddenly I heard a yell.