A/N: I hated writing that stupid banquet, so now on to some action! Everything is owned either by Bungie or Lucasarts.
Chapter 11: The defense of Earth
The brute seemed just as surprised as the human. It reached for it's plasma rifle but Ehren was faster. In a flash of silver the brute was bisected from shoulder to groin. Ehren stepped over the carcass, deflecting plasma shots from the terrified grunts.
"Get your weapons! We've got a battle to win!"
Marines guarding the other two entrances to the ballroom had already fallen back behind a barricade of tables. The whine of plasma merged with the discharge of rifles. K-17, wielding her large repeating blaster, painted the walls with blood. A-9 and N-6 picked off the survivors with their own blaster rifles.
On the other side of the room, Ehren was carving a bloody path through the endless sea of grunts, jackals, and brutes. Miranda covered the mercenary with bursts from her SMG. "Where is that damn Spartan when you need him?" Miranda yelled over the din as she downed another grunt.
And as though in answer to her question an explosion ripped a hole in the ceiling. There a pelican dropped through with five figures standing at the opening to the cargo hold—four Spartans and an elite.
This caused a momentary lull in the fighting as everyone took a glance at the newcomers. Most of the grunts immediately turned and ran, the brutes cursing their cowardice. However shortly after the fighting returned the covenant pulled back deeper into the hallways in order to rethink their strategy.
The pelican landed, releasing its troops as well as the five warriors. The Spartans saluted Miranda as she approached. Ehren only knew Master Chief from the other three because of his height and the fact that he was the only one to salute when he neared.
"Thanks for showing up, Chief," Ehren said as he wiped the blood off his sword. "Who are those other three?"
"They are my team," Master Chief pointed to them in turn. "Fred, Linda, and Will. This is the mercenary I was telling you about, Admiral Varick."
The three Spartans saluted stiffly, apparently not having a very high opinion of the Admiral.
"So what's the plan Chief?" one of the dignitaries asked.
"All ambassadors and admirals are getting out of here, everyone else is going to kick some covenant ass. Now get on the pelican."
Once the pelican had lifted off. Ehren, Miranda, the Spartans, and the Arbiter laid down plans for retaking the building.
"We'll split up into three groups, Ehren will lead Red Group, Master Chief will lead Green Group, and Arbiter will lead Blue Group," Miranda dictated. "I will go with Ehren, he will also have his droids and six of the dozen helljumpers you brought with you Chief. Chief will have his Spartans and the other six helljumpers. Arbiter gets all the Marines in here. We each go out a different door. There is only one way into this building. Take different routes to it so we can take down as many covenant as we can in the first sweep. Are we clear?"
"Yes ma'am!" Everyone present replied.
"Wait, Miranda, does 'all the Marines' include Johnson," Arbiter inquired.
"Yes."
"Do I have to take him?"
"Yes, you do, and if I find out that you killed or allowed the Sergeant to be killed you are going to spend the rest of your life in the detention center of the Iron Wolf."
The Arbiter visually paled at the threat. Ehren noticed a smirk from Avery, who had been pretending not to be listening.
"That goes for you to, Sergeant," Erhen growled.
"What goes for me?" He asked innocently.
"You know what," Ehren replied as he turned to get his team together. K-17 was taking potshots down the hallway at the shield wall the jackals had put up, occasionally getting hit by a concentrated purple beam.
"They have snipers, Admiral."
"Then take them out."
"Doing so, Admiral."
"With a thermal detonator."
K-17 grabbed a sphere from behind one of her breastplates. "Would this do?"
"The bastards won't know what hit them."
She flipped a switch on the ball and hurled it over the shield wall while quickly ducking back into the cover of the door. After a couple seconds, during which they could hear the general panic caused by the thermal detonator being hurled into their midst, the deafening roar of an explosion followed by a wall of fire shooting past the doorway caused even the most battle-hardened marines to flinch away from the door in surprise.
"Well," Ehren breathed as the fire died. "Lets go see how we did."
The explosion had destroyed the interior walls nearest to it, debris from the roof had filled the crater in the floor, and only the covenant that had been farthest away from the blast had any remains. Bits of bone, bleached white, were welded into the melted metal and newly formed glass. Daylight, and the sounds of battle outside, drifted in through a crack in the ceiling.
Miranda was NOT happy.
"You could have killed us all in that blast!" she fumed. "And what about the others, did you consider that they may be within the blast radius? Do you even care?"
Ehren merely looked at her and started walking down the hall, or what was left of it. They came up against few covenant after that, most simply ran away in terror from the humans who could destroy an entire squad and the building they're in with a single grenade.
The only one who stood and fought was, oddly enough, a grunt.
Rounding a corner they were taken by surprise when a flurry of pink needles flew down the hall at them. Ehren ducked back behind the corner, but one needle bounced off the wall and into his leg. A yell of pain erupted from his chest when his leg exploded into meat; it had taken out his hamstring. One of the other marines had gotten a lot worse off. Receiving a needle in the neck was deadly enough, but the resulting explosion took his head straight off, showering them with blood.
Ehren, his anger fueling his body and numbing his pain, rounded the corner and plunged his sword through the grunts face. Then he sent force lightning coursing up the sword and into its brain. He kept it up until the grunt's head exploded, releasing his sword.
Ehren slumped to the ground, his once white dress uniform was torn and bloody, revealing the breastplate he wore. His body trembled from the power he had released on the creature, and he passed out from the loss of blood.