Kiesha Barker swore. Ducking back around the supply cabinet as a new wave of plasma lashed out. The burning bolts of blue and green were beginning to leave small splotches of light on her retinas. Blinking rapidly to coax the spots away, the young marine swapped her SMG magazine out. With one hand she put the weapon around the corner and fired a short burst, the nozzle bucking up from the release.

An elite's shield flared as the rounds impacted around him. The blue armored creature dropped his spent plasma rifle and drew his backup. The jackal crouched next to him charged up its plasma pistol and prepared to release the bolt the next time the human emerged to fire again.

Kiesha lowered her weapon and turned to the figure beside her. Sergeant First Class John Ramos sat next to Kiesha, clutching a magnum in his hands. "Barker, we need to move on their position, were not getting anywhere," the sergeant said. John himself had a large bandage wrapped around his stomach, where he had taken a needle.

"Understood sir, you stay here, give me some covering fire, and I'll try to out maneuver them," Kiesha replied. "Wrong private, your staying here, I'm moving, now hand me your SMG," John yelled out as plasma washed around him.

"With all due respect sir, I think its best that I move since I'm not wounded," Kiesha said quickly before the next bolt struck.

John simply couldn't argue with the logistics. "Alright then," he said reluctantly.

"Be ready to move on my command," the marine sergeant stated. Kiesha stood up, SMG in hand, and prepared to dash out into the open. "Ready, here we go," John said. Kiesha took a deep breath, the only thing on here mind was the supply cabinet that she had to run too, some thirty feet from her current position. The elite ceased firing as his plasma rifle overheated.

"Go!" John called out. Eyes on the target, Kiesha leaped from cover as John emerged with his magnum and opened fire. The bullets zipped down range and struck the jackals shield, flattening against it and falling to the floor. Undeterred by the shots hitting just inches from his face, stopped only by the transparent shield of energy being projected from his wrist, the jackal took aim at the target who had just recently presented itself.

Halfway, Kiesha told herself, another second and she would be there. Out of the corner of her eye she saw it. The massive blob of green, growing bigger every millisecond, crackling so loudly, she couldn't even hear the loud firing of John's magnum, sparks of supercharged energy lashed back and forth across the surface of the orb as it closed in.

One chance! Kiesha shouted in her mind. Taking one more step, the determined marine shoved off the floor with all her might, leaping the last ten feet, headfirst. With a loud Clang! Kiesha's chest plate made contact with the floor, the young woman skidding several feet before stopping her momentum. A little sore from the impact, the soldier stood up against the supply cabinet. Panting slightly from the exertion, Kiesha slowly made her way down the long cabinet, which stretched almost the entire length of the room. The opposition was hunkered down at the opposite end. Kiesha moved from the cabinet to a small stack of boxes, placing herself between them and the wall. Looking back, she saw a blackened crater in the wall, outlined with red, tendrils of smoke rising gently. Kiesha didn't even want to think about how it would have felt to be hit by that thing.

John dropped the spent magazine and slid in another, cocking the weapon, and preparing to fire. Suddenly, the audible sound of an opening door caught his attention. Quickly raising the magnum in front of him, John sited the elevator door. It was vacant. What the, John thought.

"Don't shoot, I'm friendly," a voice from the elevator called out. Lowering his weapon slightly, the marine exhaled.

Kiesha moved along behind the crates until she reached the corner of the room. Concealed in the shadows, she peered up and spied the covenant she came for. Without even thinking, Kiesha brought up her sub-machine gun with both hands, and opened up.

The elite was about to send another volley of fire downrange when his shields flickered to life. The sound of bullets ricocheting off of metal shrieked in the elites ears as his shield rapidly decreased. Turning to the left, the elite saw the source of the gunfire, a cloud of orange fire radiating just a few meters away. Then in a flash of light, his shields died.

The bullets pinged against his armor, punching through as one bullet after the other piled up on top of each other. They began biting him, burning into his flesh. Screaming in agony, the elite desperately raised his plasma rifle to attempt a counterattack but it was swatted out of his hands by the sheets of lead. Blood spattered the wall and floor and the elite fell to his knees. Vision blurring, dozens of hot lead pieces embedded in his flesh, the elite got one final glance at his killer.

Then without any more control, he fell forward onto the blood slicked floor, the collision knocking the last bit of consciousness from him, and putting him out of the war.

The moment the elite fell, the jackal came into view. The weapon red hot and smoking from the rapid use, without the protective gloves Kiesha wore, she would have been burned. The jackal began to shift its shield toward the new threat, as Kiesha took aim.

She squeezed the trigger and was rewarded with an ironic click. No, I'm out! Kiesha screamed in her mind. A split second before the female soldier ducked behind the crate, the bright strobe of a yellow tracer knifed through the air. Passing through the jackal, a loud spurt of liquid sounded in Kiesha's ears. A gout of purple issued from the jackals side and it collapsed to the floor, dead, its shield deactivating with a low whistle.

"Was that Ramos?" Kiesha said to herself as she ejected her empty magazine onto the floor. Stepping around the dead elite, and into the open, she looked down the aisle at John's hiding place. When he emerged, Kiesha realized that he wasn't alone; a second man was supporting him. He had a smoking battle rifle hanging against his chest. Kiesha quickly strolled over to the pair, excited over the new marine.

"Damn, I'm glad to see another human, Kiesha said as she introduced herself. "Same here," said Michael as he extended a hand.

"Names Private first class Kiesha Barker, sir," she said, graciously accepting the hand shake. "Glad to meet you, I'm Corporal Michael Grant," he replied. Placing John down against the supply cabinet, the trio began to immediately exchange information.

"Barker and I are from the 128th Infantry Brigade, we were assigned to the bridge, but it got pretty ugly," John began.

"What a coincidence, I'm from the 128th also, assigned to guard an airlock, but like you two, it got ugly," said Michael. "We were displacing and falling back, losing guys until it was just a few of us left. In the confusion I took cover in a closet and I don't know what happened to the rest of my platoon." "Retreat is insane after all, we all got split up."

John took a deep breath, "well we were trying to get back into the bridge, it was breached some time ago, and the covenant has it holed up."

"Yeah, I was worried about that, I was trying to figure a way in also, so I could access the naval band of communications, and try and figure out just how bad the situations gotten," Michael continued.

"What I'm wondering," Kiesha began, "is why they haven't blown up the entire station yet. "When this whole thing started, they were destroying entire platforms with some sort of high yield bomb, according to reports."

"Maybe they want this station for some reason; I was watching the battle earlier through a window and didn't see a single orbital MAC cannon destroyed," John said.

Then, from a random thought, it hit Michael. "I know what they're trying to do," Michael said ominously, "They are trying to take control of the guns so that they can fire them on our own ships," he said in a single breath.

"Are you serious?" Kiesha said rhetorically. "They must be, that's why they have locked themselves into the bridge and haven't simply blown up the station, they must still be trying to overcome the stations AI," Michael said.

The group sat, silently for a moment, each comprehending what Michael had just concocted.

Breaking the silence, John spoke: "Our objective is clear then: take back the bridge and prevent these alien bastards from making fools out of us by using our own guns."

"We can't, its impossible for just the three of us to do it, they must have at least an entire platoon in there," Michael said.

"What about the rallying point sir?" Kiesha said, looking to John. "Yes, I was just thinking about that, if anyone is still alive they are probably there. "Rallying point?" Michael questioned.

"Yes, before the fight our Company Commander told us that if we ever lost contact with each other, and things got too hairy, to regroup back at our barracks," Kiesha answered. "Yes the bravo company barracks is on the third deck, right above the armory, we should make our way there.

Kiesha walked over to the bleeding corpses of the covenant and stopped over the bodies. "Anything we can use," John called over to her. Kiesha crouched down, reached over the elite's body, and picked up its plasma rifle. "Well this things no good, scrapped by the bullets," the marine reported.

Michael walked over to the jackal and slid the large disk off its wrist. "This thing could come in handy, Michael said, wrapping it around his own wrist.

Kiesha peered at him and scrunched up her nose. "What's so funny," Michael said, catching her look from the corner of his eye.

"It's just that that thing looks so stupid on your wrist like that," she replied.

Feeling smug, the young marine quickly made an observation: "I suppose the top brass has made that happy face bandanna regulation, eh," he said, pointing to the fabric wrapped around Kiesha's forehead. "Excuse me sir but I'll let you know-," she was cut off.

"Marine stow that attitude, and same for you corporal," John said authoritively. "Maintain discipline, and bicker when you are not in any form of uniform." "Toss me that plasma pistol Grant," he added.

Scooping up the weapon, Michael tossed it to the man a bit puzzled. "What do you plan to use that for sir," he asked. Raising the plasma pistol in his left hand, and the magnum in the other, the noncom answered back: "You know what they say, two pistols are better then one."


The three marines clambered into the elevator. The same feeling of confinement came to Michaels senses. It had been bad enough when he was alone, now he had two other people with him; each square inch they took up made the choke point more effective. So he decided to voice his thoughts:

"This elevators a pretty nasty choke point, don't you think sir?" the marine said casually to Sergeant Ramos.

"I've noticed soldier, but we don't have much of a choice now do we, better to take the direct route downward then to navigate the halls to find a set of stairs, who knows how many covenant we could have encountered," the man replied.

He was right Michael concluded, but having the burly man draped over his shoulder didn't exactly ease the feeling of vulnerability.

Turning to the wounded Sergeant, Michael shrugged him slightly, noticing his head was beginning to lower. "Don't fall asleep now sir," Michael said.

Snapping back up, the sergeant didn't even say a word, just mumbled some sort of incoherent noise. His head lowered again, but he fought to keep it up. He's weakening, Michael thought. Michael had one of the mans arms wrapped around his neck for support and he could feel the soldier becoming increasingly heavy as he began to become more and more incapable of holding himself up.

The marine corporal looked straight ahead at the woman facing him. She too noticed the Sergeant's nature. A look of uneasiness began creeping upon her features.

"He'll be fine, we'll get him patched up when we get to the barracks," Michael said. Kiesha nodded slightly but her expression only seemed to worsen.

With a tell tale whoosh, the elevator door opened. Kiesha stuck her head out into the hallway and looked both ways quickly, then drawing her SMG, stepped out.

Michael preceded with John heavy but still conscious enough to raise his magnum with his free hand.

"It's this way" Kiesha said, checking her PDA. She quickly sprinted down the hall and peered around the corner when she came to a T intersection.

Michael hefted John and proceeded after her.

"This way," Kiesha shouted, as she ran down the hall.

"Barker wait, we have a wounded man here," Michael called out to her, attempting to catch up.

"I know, and we need to get him treated fast or else he won't make it," Kiesha yelled over her shoulder, a tone of anger in her voice. Too weak to speak now, John, focused all his energy on his two legs, willing them to go faster, and ease this marine's load.

Need to hurry, need to move faster, need to get John help, Kiesha repeated over and over in her mind.

She raced through a doorway, and sidestepped a storage crate.

Damn it marine, Michael thought. He couldn't even see her anymore, as he stumbled through the automatic door. Turning to the left he caught site of Kiesha, at the opposite end of the hall. He was about to make another attempt to call out to her, but the words hadn't even formed in his mind as he watched the young woman get swatted to the floor.

Kiesha felt as though she had run straight into a lamp post, a surface against her chest as solid as steel. The invisible force had hit with so much force, Kiesha felt the dent form in the center of her chest plate, the metal bending like clay. Unable to control her own physics, the marine did a complete spin in the air, her feet not even touching the floor.

One second she was looking at the ceiling and then another, the floor was racing toward her face. Reflexively, she brought her hands up to break her fall. She slammed into the metal, her head snapping forward, the lip of her helmet made contact with the floor, stopping Kiesha's face from meeting the cold hard metal. Vision blurring, the marine couldn't feel her body, and she knew it was the end.

John watched the marine go down and knew exactly what was happening. Before Michael had even had time to move, the veteran solider raised his magnum with all the strength he could muster, and squeezed the weapon. The trigger that had felt so light in the past now seemed unmovable, but he had to pull it. The years went by in his mind, John thought of the amazing things he had down, his strength pulling him through, unfailing every time.

And now, he needed that strength more then ever, to save the life of his marine, he pulled back the trigger spring. Once, twice, three times, each shot rattling his arm, sapping the energy from him, but still he fought. Dropping to his knees, he brought his other arm to support his weapon.

The air above Kiesha exploded with color. The electric blue netting of a stealth elite's shield flared to life as the high caliber rounds hammered against it. Diverting his attention from the downed pray at his feet, the elite shifted to the priority threat.

With no time to fumble for his rifle, Michael reached for his magnum, the man down on his knees next to him, now yelling loudly. Then from the flashing shimmer of light down the hall, came several additional flashes. The plasma streaked at John, still firing and yelling at the top of his lungs.

Michael could do nothing but watch as the blue streaks slammed into the marine, splashing like water on impact and washing over his body. The impact forcing the marine backwards, off balance, the yelling ceased and his face turned to Michael.

Michael peered at him for an instant. His expression wasn't pained, in fact he didn't even wear one, his eyes weren't looking at Michael, and instead they were staring past him, at something that Michael wasn't aware of. Then his face disappeared in the sea of scorching blue plasma.

His body mutilated and burned, the marine slammed against the floor. Michael was not even looking however, all his attention was on the shimmering figure some sixty feet down the hall.

The elites shield at a critical level, it turned to take cover. Michael fired a single round. The bullet struck the elites shield, a centimeter from his face. His shield nearly gone, the elite could actually see the bullet, literally floating in the air, and spinning rapidly. The elite couldn't close his eyes. The momentum of the round was too much however and the moment the last bit of shield gave way, the bullet disappeared into the elite's eye, punching out the other side, and ricocheting off a bulkhead.

The elite collapsed, dead, he had actually seen the bullet that had taken its life.

Michael holstered the smoking pistol. He looked down to the heap below him. Charred and disfigured the man was no longer recognizable. Averting his gaze, the strong soldier ran down the hall, hoping he still had a companion.