Chapter 10
New Mombasa
October 20, 2552
13:40 Hours, Earth time
Mazeras, Republic of Kenya
ODST Spec Ops Unit, November Six, aka Nova Team
Status: Currently engaged in hostel controlled territory
Location: Kenya National Library, Earth
[Play We Be Defenders By:Mark Petrie on You Tube]
The city of Mazeras was a beaten down husk of its former greatness from hours upon hours of constant battle. Buildings where collapsing down to their foundation and those that weren't were being chipped away piece by piece covering the dirt roads of the city with tatters of blocks of cement and concrete, small flowers of inferno bloomed all throughout the landscape. The sky in all its former beauty was now tainted with smoke, plasma fire and enemy aircrafts. When the Covenant first arrived the local army was dispatched in effort to give the citizens time to evacuate, however the Covenant quickly overwhelmed them, they quickly realized theywere no match for the power of the Covenant forces and were soon forced back into a corner where they could do little to assist their people in evacuating. Some citizens would choice to ignore the evacuation order believing their home more important than their lives. After the army was pushed back, these people would mount a desperate and inevitably futile resistance that lasted less than a few hours. Finally at 0647 October 20, 2552 the UNSC was able to dispatch three squads of ODST to reinforce their lines and aid in pushing the Covenant out.
"Those bastards got a barricade up ahead!" Chamber shouted, "Ah, Hot Head, find Forge you and him are gonna close the gap and take the library."
"You got it Sergeant!" Katrina replied as he begins searching hastily for Corporal Miles, "Get the lead out Forge!" When he finally found him he was pulling his knife out of the neck of a nearby grunt, the grunts fluids squirt from its neck as he does. "Forge!" he calls out to him "We're moving! It's you and me."
"You can't be serious." Forge replies sarcastically sheathing his knife, "You better stay close to me wouldn't want u getting lost on the way there."
"What was that?" Katrina yelled running ahead, firing her Silenced SMG as he moved, "I can't hear you from back there."
"Slow down Katrina!"Forge exclaims chasing after him, "You need someone on your six, get back here." Forge's words fell on deaf ears as he continued his attack. "Damn it."
"Die Covenant bastards." Katrina yells mowing downing half a dozen grunts before stopping behind a block of stone rubble to reload. As he pulled the new magazine from it's pouch a great force pushed the stone debris he was hiding behind narrowly crushing him, and causing him to hop away as quickly as possible making him to drop the magazine in his grasp. That's when she saw him a brute towering over the block of rubble he was taking refuge behind only moments before, he stood at least seven feet tall deck in blue armor, the gravity hammer glistening in his grasp. The young Lance Corporal quickly reached for his downed magazine, but the brute was to fast. He quickly used his hammer to smash the magazine making it little more than a worthless hunk of metal. Katrina quickly retreated his hand for fear that it too would meet the same fate.
As the brute moves in fast looking to deliver a killing blow he is struck in the chest by a barrage of gunfire. How long was it one second or two, thirty? Or an hour... it seemed as if the brute was taking on bullets for an eternity. When the bullets finally stopped the brutes power armor was in tatters, and the holes in his body were many and bloody. The brute starts to let out a cry only to finally be drop with a well aimed shot to the head.
"Thanks Corporal." Katrina sighed in relief.
"Corporal huh?" a female voice replied, "I figured you'd be the last person to be able to authorize a promotion in the field."
"if it ain't PFC Armin? Hey there sugar lips you here to watch me slay some covenant bodies?"
"If by watch you actually save your candy ass, then yeah that's it exactly."
"Oh please, I had it all under control." Armin picks up his crushed magazine off the ground and tosses it casually in his general direction, "... mostly under control. Ah, is there a reason you're here?"
"Cpl Miles told me to back you up, and good thing he did if I didn't get here when I did you'd be a pancake."
"You just gave me a little cover... A lot of cover. How'd you lay down so much fire anyway?"
"Dual wielded Sub-machine Guns. Everyone tells my, these were Lt. Hawkins' favorite too. Sorry, it's not like I'm trying to replace her or anything. but ya know I know if she were still here then I wouldn't be so..."
"You listen here all of us: Sgt. Chambers, Cpl. Moreno even Cpl Holden, all of us are family. And the moment you put on that uniform you became family too."
"I'm not so sure Lt. Hawkins would see it that way."
"Really" Katrina chuckled, "That'd be pretty strange seeing as she's the one that taught us that."
"Thanks Lance Corporal." Armin said smiling to herself a little.
"Don't mention it." Said the marine quickly trying to change the subject, "That was quite a head shot at the end there, hit him square between the eyes."
"Head shot? I wasn't aiming for the..."
"If you two are done flirting?" Corporal Miles shouts in a somewhat irritated tone, "We can finish clearing out the rest of this building like we were ordered to."
"Aye Corporal" Armin quickly acknowledges and moves forward.
"Cpl Miles why you always have to mess up my game?"
"On your own time Katrina, not mine."
"Corporal... the rank is all I need, its in the bag."
"Wha... What's that even mean?"
"Well... she looks up to me."
Cpl. Miles smiles, "ya know there is a difference between looks up to and looks after right?"
"Real funny."
2 Hours Later
[Play The Menagerie Halo 3 ODST on You Tube]
The troopers of nova team stand together in a tight nit corner of the library. "This ain't good." Sgt. Chambers explains, "Even though it's been pretty much conformed that the Covenant's true target is in New Mombasa They're still doing whatever they can to make sure no one in this city gets out alive. We've got several dozen citizen at this location with no way to evac we'll have to create an opening for them to escape, I need ideas and I need them now."
"There's an emergency escape route in the underground railway." Moreno starts the decision "Its not ideal but something, we could escort them there."
"Its not a bad plan." Cpl Miles interjects, "But we could encounter too many enemies along the way and civilian causalities would be too high."
"Well Forge, if you've got a better idea I'd love to hear it." Chamber asked.
"We split into two teams. Team A clears the path to the railway of covenant forces while team B stays back and holds down the fort. Simple but effective."
"I see what your getting at? But how do we determine who stays back."
"Moreno, Katrina, and Armin should stay back while the rest of us push our way to the railway."
"What? Why them?"
"Moreno's at his best when he's given a single location to defend, as for the two boots, I've been keeping an eye on them they're ready for this."
Sgt. Chambers nods. They calculate the amount of ammo and supplies need for the team A to clear the way to the railroad. Followed quickly by giving Cpl Moreno all the locational information they have available for him to be an effective sniper and lead the two young troopers. Once everyone had a decent understanding of the situation and the condition of their gear they set off, only one looks back.
"You're worried about them aren't you?" Sgt. Chamber says to Cpl. Miles noticing his misplaced attention. "Tell me the truth, Why'd you want them to stay back?"
"If we make it through this..." Cpl Miles says slowly, "When we make it through this. There might be a chance for those two to live something similar to normal lives. I'd hate for them to ruin it by getting themselves killed."
"Forge... they're trained Trooper just like you and me. You giving them the royal treatment isn't doing them any favors."
"You're probably right Sergeant. Favors or no, I meant what I said... They're ready for this."
"I hope your right." Sgt. Chambers smiles giving her Corporal one big slap on the back, "Now lets get moving."
The Corporal nods and follows after her, looking back only once more.
"I hope so too."
Team B's Location- Kenya National Library
"I'm heading up top. You two guard the parameter I don't want anyone getting in or out without my say so, comprenda" Cpl Moreno instructs.
"Got it Corporal" Katrina replies waiting for the Corporal to leave his line of sight. Quickly the young trooper removed his helmet and let out a fairly large sigh of relief. Revealing his Caucasian and yet slightly tan face with dark brown hair trimmed into a middle fade.
"What in the world do you think your doing?" Armin says in moderate protest. "Cpl Moreno told us to guard the parameter, you can relax on your own time."
"Huh? I would have guess a college girl like you would be a lot better at thinking for herself." Katrina interjected, "Besides we cleared out a couple city blocks worth of those Covenant bastards, they've probably running back to whatever cocoon they crawled out of."
"Cocoon really?" Armin smiled as she too removed her helmet, "They maybe are enemies right now, but you can at least give them some degree of respect." Under her helmet was innocent looking girl one would swear had never witnessed the perils of the battlefield. She had dark red hear that had been slicked back and patched tight for the purposes of fitting into her helmet, however one or two slips of hair managed to break free from the herd and dangle gently in front of her face. Her light brown eyes shone with the light of irreproachable purity. So much so that Katrina had to reassure himself that this was indeed the person to whom he was so frustrated with.
"Respect. Mhmm." Katrina said shaking in frustration, "Now, what was that shiny degree you gave up four years of your life to get? Linguistics? Y'know what it doesn't matter. Tell me sense you seem to know so much, tell me, is respect going to bring back my family, how much respect is it gonna to take to speak with my friends one more time. Is respect gonna make my planet livable again. Is it! Cause if its not you can take that shit and send it right back where it came from."
"You know that's not what I meant..." Armin says as she stop to think for a moment. The words leave her lips, "Your were from Reach, weren't you?... I'm sorry."
"Sorry you say..." Katrina looked away as if showing just how worthless that word was to him. Listen up cause apparently they didn't beat it into you hard enough back the academy. Right now the only thing standing between humanity and extinction is you. Me. Some rifles... And a couple died covenant A.. Holes. And no fancy diploma is gonna make that any less true."
"Katrina" Armin paused, "This war isn't going to last forever... And like it or not we're gonna have to find common ground eventually. And when it does the world will need people like me to bridge the caps of communication."
"You sound pretty confidence, just how many languages you locked away in that head of your's."
"I'm fluent in Sangheili and am currently working on my Jiralhanae." Armin boasted.
"So like in English... What would that mean?"
"I speak Elite and a little bit of brute" Armin clarified, "I heard there are devices that allowed to understand the languages of the alien race with no training or anything although I've never seen it. With inventions like that to help bridge the gap a peaceful conclusion to this war can't be to far off."
"Do you really believe that? You know... You you'd be a lot more attractive if you didn't talk?"
"What was that?" Armin snapped.
[Play Halo Reach- Ashes on You Tube]
Suddenly," This is Cpl Moreno, We've got enemy movement!" Sudden the foundation of the build shook a little as if that building and that building alone was have an earthquake. "Two phantoms with ground troops! They spotted me... taking fire... Its no good. Re-positioning. I'm gonna need Radio silence, I'll see you on the other side niños." The communication system went silent.
A/N: Life sucks, but I'm starting to get the hang of it. Armin is going to be introduced in a few chapter so i thought i little behind the scenes info was in order. The Next chapter is already more than half way done and will be uploaded within the next two weeks I'm sorry for the lack of updates. and I promise to do my best to stick to a tight minimum one chapter a month schedule.