Notes: Thanks to all of you who are continuing to read my story. Hopefully now that the fighting is starting I will tend to get more reviews.. ;)
Food Fight!
November 2nd, 2552 10:01 AM
Sol System - Aboard the MAC Orbital platform Malta
Level 4 Aft - Mess Hall A
Shots rang out as the doors finally ended their travel and the whole scene came into view. Justin noticed a small platoon of marines on top of the viewing deck, opening fire on the Covenant coming in from some strange whole made into the large viewing window.
He also noticed Brittany and the other lady he assumed to be her manager taking refuge behind the buffet serving tables. The marines were motioning for the two to make a quick exit, but they seemed to be frozen with fear, simply giving the marines a defiant head shake with each prompting.
Bob whispered as he moved out toward the room "I've got to get to her", but Justin grabbed him by the arm with the Hobbit's forks and held him at bay.
"You'll never make it across there. The Covenant haven't taken notice of us yet, so I say we flank to their side and help the marines take them out. Then we can get up there and rendezvous with the others."
Bob looked to Justin with both bewilderment and slight annoyance. Justin had always been their supervisor on projects, and was good at leading a team, but since the Covenant showed up there seemed to be a change within his demeanor.
Whereas there had been an easygoing and jovial aspect to his commands, now there was a coldness and decisiveness that almost demanded compliance.
But did he really know anything about combat? They had both had some minimal experience with marksmanship and small arms training. Hell, since the Covenant showed up if you were in the UNSC you were trained to shoot something.
A sudden scream interrupted Bob's train of thought as he looked in time to see one of the soldiers on the balcony writhing in pain; a blood gushing whole appearing where his arm should have been. The soldier then crumbled under his own weight, and his gun fired one last round in defiance as his head met with the floor.
Justin had seen the whole thing, however. The pinkish-purple needler rounds had arced gracefully through the air. Had it not been for their lethality it would have been a pleasant site to see them whisk their way through the air, but now it was just a feeling of dread at possibly incurring the same fate.
Justin pushed forward with his legs and began to gain speed as he led the other two men from his crew toward the covenant flank. There were 5 of them, 4 of the small grunts surrounding a larger red armored elite.
Justin had done a bit of reading on the suspected Covenant ranks and what the armor colors signified, but for the moment he couldn't remember any of it. His heart was beating faster than he thought possible and he was trying to get his breathing under control as they neared a large column that would provide them cover to fire from.
Justin slowed down to a cautious walk as Tom and Bob threw their backs against the column, grateful the column was large enough to conceal their approach thus far.
"Alright, I am going to start toward them and draw their fire. You two concentrate on the elite to wear down his…"
"This is Sergeant Damon Watkins to MSAC operator, do you copy?" The Sergeant's voice both surprised and soothed Justin's nerves a bit, as now Justin had a way to communicate his plan to the marines.
"Yes Sergeant, I read you. I am glad you guys are up there as we are down here to give assistance."
"Good, your guys have a good flank on the enemy, so prepare to open fire and we should be able to…" "Grenade!"
Justin watched in horror as an explosion ripped through the small squad of marines, casting parts of them across the balcony and into the kitchen and dining area below.
That horror quickly turned to rage as Justin heard what he could have sworn was the Elite laughing.
"Shoot those bastards!" Fire erupted from behind the column as Tom and Bob opened up with their MA5B assault rifles. Justin rounded the curvature of the large simulated-stone column and headed for the small group of combatants.
The elite roared as his shields began to flicker and then disappeared, then several rounds from each of the rifles penetrated his head and chest, cordially exploding holes in both places as the elite fell lifelessly backwards.
By now Justin was on top of the grunts, and using the massive strength of the Hobbit, dealt a crushing blow to the top of the first one's head. His shield began to dissipate as plasma shots streamed across his torso at point blank range.
He quickly grabbed the small grunt up in each arm and heard its bones cracking as the Hobbit's claws clamped closer together, until they connected and the creature ceased to move.
Justin then realized he had spent too long dealing with the creature and spun around only to see the bodies of the other grunts lying in pools of their own light-bluish blood. His shields flickered for a second and then started recharging at an agonizing pace.
"Nice work guys, let's get up there and see if any of those marines survived." Justin had already started making his way toward the stairs, and Bob followed close behind.
Tom, however, simply stared at the mess they had created. He had never wanted to kill anything before in his life, yet he had just gunned down two of humanities' most hated enemies. He felt it odd that he didn't seem to feel any remorse for what he had done, that the creatures before him had no significance with the universe other than to die for the sins they had executed against humanity.
A sudden movement caught Tom's attention. He studied it quizzically as the elite started shuffling around a bit. It was in the last throws of death; with its body still clinging to any spec of life it had, trying to keep it from departing.
A muffled click caught Tom's attention as a plasma grenade bonded itself with the now dead elite's hand, and Tom threw up his arms to shield his face as the super hot wave of plasma rushed over him, disintegrating flesh and charring the bones beneath. The concussion lifted Tom's lifeless body and tossed it several feet backwards as his head slammed in to the column that had recently been their protection and he crumpled onto the floor.
Justin and Bob both turned back in the direction of the explosion and then began rushing back to the floor in the vain hope of saving Tom's life. What was left of him laid unnaturally on the floor, and the smell of burning flesh made Bob want to throw up.
Tears welled up in Justin's eyes for his fallen friend that he felt he had known all his life. They had met in engineering college and had always been competitive with their grades and achievements, with Justin winning out in the end, as he became Tom's supervisor in the Corp.
"Justin, you guys copy?" Davis's voice was rough from too many years of smoking, which oddly enough he had decided to quit just before this assignment. Justin assumed that when the news of the Covenant arrival reached Davis' ears, however, that all bets were off.
"Davis, the bastards got Tom." There was a long pause as the words sank into Davis and began ripping at his heart. Davis despite his rough, often-unshaven exterior was a caring person, who had once spent twelve hours digging what was left of Justin's crew out from a retaining wall collapse at a previous job site. Had it not been for his determination Justin himself might not have made it.
"I can't believe he's gone." Davis' words were filled with hurt, but he refocused himself.
"I have gained access to some firepower up in the armory. The marines are holding the Covenant at bay so I should be able to make my way down and meet up with you guys to help take some of the assholes out."
"Roger that, Audrey is…" "Shit" Justin could not believe that he hadn't noticed the lack of contact with her since her warning of the Covenant earlier. He interfaced the Hobbit with his chatter and opened the call.
"Audrey, are you there?"
"AUDREY, ARE YOU THERE?"
"Answer me, WHERE ARE YOU?"
The chatter had some brief interference as he heard Audrey's muffled voice answer his query.
"Justin, there are Covenant all on this floor. There are marines fighting them, but I don't know how much longer they can hold out, the Covenant just keep coming." Audrey's voice was one of desperation that made Justin fearful as well. He didn't want to lose Audrey too. "I am still in the Comm room with the other crew.
"Ok, stay held up in the room and we will come to you. I'll fight every last damn Covenant on this ship to get to you.
"I love you Justin."
"I love you Audrey."
"You copy that Davis?" Justin disconnected the chatter and turned his attention back to the voice on the other end of the Comm system.
"Got it chief, I am a few floors up from you on level 8, so I will wait by the elevator and hitch a ride up to Level J with you. I have also been informed there are some escape pods on that level as well."
"Copy that, we will meet you on 8."
Justin closed his Comm and noticed Bob had made his way up into the cafeteria area. "Brittany, are you here?" Bob repeated the phrase as he made his way through the swinging doors used to bring refills to the buffet table.
Bob then approached some stainless steel cabinets near the rear of the kitchen when he heard a slight shuffling sound coming from behind one of the cabinet's lower doors. Cautiously he leveled the MA5B he had been carrying on his shoulder at the door as he inched his way closer.
"Brittany?" Bob tried keeping his soft voice from shaking as he reached out to grab the vertical unpolished handle attached to the door. He then yanked the door open as he jumped back, keeping the rifle trained on the opening the door produced.
Inside was a site that made Bob feel sorry for the young girl. Brittany was obviously near some state of shock, with both her hands grasping a meat cleaver out in front of her body. It was pretty apparent she wouldn't have been a threat to anyone, however, as the girl was clearly scared out of her mind.
Slowly Bob reached out his hand and took possession of the cleaver, gently pulling it free of Brittany's clutches. He then laid it on the floor and returned his hand to her, offering to pull her from her self-induced holding cell.
Nervously Brittany took Bob's hand, and then fell into his arms as she tried to stand. Bob didn't know how long she had been in there, but he imagined from the position she had been curled up in that her legs would have to be asleep.
"Bob, we have to go, now." Justin's voice blared over his external speakers as he stood halfway through the swinging door. Bob scooped Brittany up into his arms and hastily walked out of the kitchen and joined with Justin at the elevator just as it announced its arrival.
The ride up was brief but reflective, as the trio gathered their nerves and prepared to face the fight ahead. The elevator's holopanels now displayed the official FF logo of the Firefly newswire instead of the scene of celebration that they had previously displayed.
There were a few intermittent shutters within the elevator as the MAC canon continued to unload its arsenal toward the Covenant fleet, which was awkwardly reassuring that the station was still in the fight, and hadn't been taken over by Covenant forces.
Davis had joined them in the elevator, bringing with him a pair of M7 submachine guns. He also had an M6C pistol tucked into the back of his pants, but Justin hoped they would get to the escape pods before they would need to use any of them.
They all seemed to be focusing on the digital floor readout as the letter J illuminated and began flashing, followed by a short ding and the sound of air escaping as the doors vertically parted.
The elevator exited into a side hallway that that the team followed to the right. They quickly came upon an intersection and the team slowed to a halt. Justin and the others could just make out what sounded like a high-pitched squawking sound coming from the hallway to the right.
Justin also noticed on the floor of the hallway there was a red arrow pointing away from them with "Medical Bay 6" stenciled into it. Justin leaned closer to Bob and whispered in the lowest voice he could, hoping the external speakers wouldn't amplify his voice enough to give away their position.
"Take a peek around the corner to the right and see what's down there." Bob slid quietly over to the wall, planting his back firmly against it. As he peered around the edge, he could see two creatures with bird-like features to their heads. He assumed these to be the Jackals he had heard about. They appeared to have shields being held in one hand and a small gun in the other.
"We have two jackals at the other end of the hall, it looks like they have been put on guard duty of some sort." In the distance to the left Justin could hear gunfire, and was glad to know there were still marines fighting on this level. Hopefully they still had a chance to get to Audrey and get out.
"Ok, I am going to step into the hallway first. You two set up cover fire from the edge of the wall, and Brittany, you stay here out of site until we get that hall cleared." Brittany nodded her head in approval, as she was in no hurry to throw herself into the line of fire.
Justin quickly stepped out into the middle of the hallway but was quickly greeted with something he hadn't expected. The two jackals were now facing them, but along side them were two grunts as well. The jackal's plasma pistols glowed a brilliant green as their charges built up, getting ready to slam into anything that was stupid enough to get in front of them.
"Open fire!" Justin yelled and Bob and Davis opened up from behind the corner of the hallway Justin was just in. There was no time for Justin to get out of the way, however, as the two streaming masses of plasma left the Jackal's pistols and began elegantly streaming toward the MSAC.
Justin threw the Hobbit's arms up to shield the view plate and his face, but quickly realized this was a bad move as he remembered the arms did not have the shielding that the torso possessed. He watched helplessly as the plasma raced toward him, but them saw something odd.
As the plasma shots got within a few feet of Justin, their trajectory suddenly changed and they each flew to either side of him, slamming into and then melting sections of wall.
Although Justin was puzzled at what just happened, he was pleased to see the grunts were now put down and one of the Jackals recoiling from a shot that impacted his forehead and then creating a purple mess on the floor behind it.
The other jackal bent over with its head covered by its arms and made its way around the next corner. Justin assumed it was falling back to some secondary position and that there would probably be more to fight. He quickly took off after the creature, with the others in his team running behind.
Justin didn't know why he was abandoning caution, but he had a feeling that this Jackal's new location wouldn't present a problem to him. Perhaps it was his newfound confidence at whatever just happened with the plasma shots. Whatever it was, that Jackal was about to die by his hands.
Justin turned the corner and noticed the jackal in a prone position about 10 feet from him, its pistol charged once more and its body squarely behind its bluish shield. The Jackal released the deadly blast from its pistol and Justin swung the hobbit's left arm in an arc toward the oncoming shot.
He didn't know the purpose of the maneuver or even why it should accomplish anything, but he was once again surprised as this time the plasma's trajectory curved up and to the left, connecting with the ceiling overhead.
Justin ran slightly past the Jackal's shield and as he did he reached out and grabbed the creature's left arm and spun around, tossing it into the wall to the right. The sickening sounds of the Jackal's neck breaking echoed down the reverberant halls as it lay there motionless, seemingly frozen in time as the blood coming from its head made a sort of grotesque adhesive between it and the wall.
Shots suddenly rang out from behind him as Justin turned just in time to see something moving a few feet in front of him, but couldn't decide on what he was actually looking at. It was as if the air itself was moving in front of him. Suddenly from the movement in front of him came a guttural snarl followed by a couple of barking "worts". Justin then was bewildered as an object resembling a dual-bladed sword beaming with a purplish translucent glow suddenly appeared out of nowhere.
Justin's shock soon turned into fear as the blade started toward him. The barrage of bullets from his companion's assault and submachine guns were connecting, and the elite's camo dissipated revealing the towering creature as it rushed toward the small group.
As it reached Justin, it thrust the sword high in the air and began to come down in an arc laced with the beast's monstrous strength. Acting out of defense, Justin quickly extended up the Hobbit's right arm to catch the elite's hand as it was preparing to follow through with the deadly blow.
As the elite's plasma sword neared the Hobbit's hand, however, the weapon suddenly faded and where there was once the most feared of all the Covenant's handheld arsenal, now there was only the handle tightly gripped within the elite's hand.
The impact of the elite's swing connecting with the Hobbit's hand caused the entire suit to shake, but the hydraulics held it from going any further. Justin quickly closed the forks around the beast's hand tight enough that the sound of bones being broken once again echoed, this time being joined in augmented harmony with the elite's growls of pain.
Bob and Davis frantically searched for a spot to open up on the elite, but could not find an opening around or above the MSAC's bulky design. The elite it was wrestling with was hunkered down, putting all its might into trying to freeing itself from the Hobbit's grip, to no avail.
Justin quickly closed the forks on the MSAC's left hand and with the rage of what the last elite had done to Tom, thrust it forward into the elite's chest cavity. As soon as the entry was made, Justin opened the Hobbit's hand, expanding the forks inside the elite's chest, tearing muscle away from bone and shredding the majority of vital organs its chest contained.
The elite fought to let out another roar of pain, but all that could be heard was the gurgling sound of it drowning in its own blood as life quickly faded from its eyes.
The death of this creature or ten thousand more like it wouldn't bring Tom back, and Justin knew it. He had to calm himself and stay focused if they were to all stay alive, get Audrey and get off the platform.
The team stopped in front of the door marked "Communications". Justin was apprehensive as he approached the door.
Would Audrey and her crew still be alive?
The others started collecting ammunition from soldiers that had fallen apparently attempting to guard the Comm room. There were several types of all Covenant species' bodies littered around the floor, and Justin could only hope the now dead marines had managed to take them all with them.
Brittany had now decided it was fight or die time. She had had several plasma rounds stream past her in the last battle with the Jackal, and her renewed since to survive had been brought to life by the spectacle of seeing Justin take down the elite in hand-to-hand combat.
Her silky red hair draped toward the floor as she reached down to collect a fallen marine's M6C magnum pistol, and gathered what clips she could find as well. The thought of taking such items off of another dead human sickened her, but she fought back the urge to vomit as she fumbled with the gun, trying to figure out how to use it.
Bob noticed her awkward handling of the firearm and walked over to her, motioning for her to give him the gun. Brittany extended her hand out, the gun dangling on her trigger finger by its trigger guard. Bob took the gun. "Ok, this lever ejects the magazine." Bob thumbed the release lever, and the magazine slid out with a slight click. He then removed the magazine and examined it, noticing it had two shots left.
"We better load this up, no telling what is behind that door." Bob grabbed one of the other clips Brittany handed him, then forcibly shoved it back in with the palm of his left hand. He then cocked the gun to ensure a round was in the chamber, and handed it back to her, grip first.
"Don't worry about the safety, I am sure you are going to need to shoot soon enough."
Justin had been waiting around long enough. He walked to the front of the Comm room door, and it began to part with a soft hiss. He stepped into the room, and immediately became concerned with the scene laid out before him. Much like the hallway they had just came from, bodies of both Covenant and humans seemed to be incongruous ornaments strewn thoughtlessly about the room.
There had been much fighting and bloodshed in this room, as their was hardly a monitor or workstation that didn't have blood or other body matter splattered over their surfaces.
"Audrey? Can you hear me?"
Justin tried surveying the room for his wife, but most of the lights had been destroyed during the fight. He switched on the external lighting built into the Hobbit, and the whole scene of carnage only seemed to increase. In many ways this was parallel to the reason the lights were on the MSAC in the first place.
In case of a collapse of a structure, it would be your beacon to follow, to help guide you to the thing you most wanted to find. In those cases it would be your own life. Here it was looking for the life he valued more than his own. Pain began swelling inside Justin as he tried to fight the nagging thoughts that were mounting.
Surely no one could be alive in this room?
Notes: Well, I hoped you enjoyed this chapter. Yay, we finally made it to the fighting! heh. I hope I haven't bored anyone so far. If anyone is wondering how the Hobbit seems to be blocking shots and destroying plasma swords, fear not, as that will be answered soon enough. Thank you for reading and please review!
