Hey guys, I got a new chapter for you. This one is a touch on the short side, but it sets up some awesome fight scenes I have planned. Let's get on with it:
The sewer tunnels were dark and wet, and they smelled. Well, I imagine they did. My helmet made it impossible for me to tell. A few of Mickey's Equalist friends had flashlights, and Korra was bending a large flame in the palm of her hand to make light.
As we advanced, Mickey took the lead, while I covered the rear of the group. The night vision on our helmets would help us see any threats long before the others would be able to, and our guns would stop the threats before they became a problem. At least, that was how it was suppose to work in theory. Even with two ODSTs and one of the world's most powerful benders in the group, the odds still weren't in our favor.
Despite the fact that the city above our heads was occupied by a Covenant force, I would still rather have been trying to sneak through the streets in broad daylight rather than hiding out down here. I wasn't afraid of the dark. No ODST is. Shadows and darkness are second nature to us, aside from being the embodiment of the term 'shock and awe'.
No, I was more worried about what these dark tunnels could have been hiding. The various races of the Covenant all had their little quirks, even if they fell in line and followed orders and what not. Jackals, when left on their own, tended to be some of the worst. Most of the other races were content just to kill you with a bolt of plasma. But Jackals? They'd eat you alive if given the chance.
But we weren't in the home environment of the Jackals right now. Every trooper with at least one tour of duty under his belt knows that tunnels and underground places belong to the Drones. Human sized bug like creatures capable of flight, Drones were the stuff of nightmares, especially if you had a fear of bugs. Agile, tough, and incredibly smart, a single Drone could be a challenge. A whole swarm could be a death sentence.
"Do you think we're safe down here?" Korra asked as she fell in step with me. I shrugged, but quickly realized that the darkness of the tunnel combined with the color of my armor meant she couldn't see me.
"I don't know," I answered honestly. The Covenant had a lot of time to secure the surface. It wouldn't surprise me if they had sent scout parties at the very least down here by now.
"What is it they want with us? Why have they come here?" one of the Equalists, a woman, asked.
"To kill humans," Mickey answered.
"That's it? That's the only reason?" Korra asked. It was clear she found it hard to believe that an alliance so advanced was driven by something so primitive.
"Covenant have never had another reason," I answered. There was some intel I had heard that suggested that the Covenant went nuts whenever some kind of alien artifact was found. But that fell under the classified category, so it wasn't worth mentioning. Besides, what I said was the truth. They would kill us all simply because we were human, they didn't need another reason besides that.
"Did you hear that?" one of the Equalists asked. We all paused and strained our ears, listening for anything out of the ordinary. For several tense heartbeats, there was only silence.
"I don't know, I think you're hearing things…"
"Wait, there it is again," the first guy said.
"I heard it that time too," Korra muttered. I had as well. A faint buzzing noise, echoing in the tunnel around us. Like the sound of giant beetle wings. Both Mickey and I raised our weapons, aiming into the shadows and standing on point. Something was down here with us, and I had a bad feeling I knew what it was.
"Contact. We got buggers," Mickey said, keeping his voice low.
"How many?" I asked, falling back so I was standing next to him, but aiming in the opposite direction.
"Just one, a scout. Saw it zip past in a tunnel junction up ahead," he reported.
"Buggers?" Korra asked, her eyebrow arched in confusion.
"Drones," I answered.
"Huh?"
"Big damn bugs," Mickey added. We needed to move, and quick. If the Drones didn't know we were down here yet, they would soon. The moment they knew about us, they would be all over us. As a group, we began to advance forward again with me falling back to the rear of the group again. My heart pounded in my ears as we went. A feeling of tension had settled over me, like I was waiting for anything to happen.
Suddenly the woman Equalist screamed in terror. I spun around and was just in time to watch a Drone carry her off up a vertical shaft. Before any of us had time to react, the tunnel was alight with bright green bolts of plasma. Drones on both sides of us, hidden in the shadows, had opened fire with their plasma pistols.
"Contact!" Mickey yelled before opening fire with his M7S. I did the same with my own SMG, firing short quick bursts at our attackers. The air was filled with screams as a few of the Equalists were hit by the plasma. Alongside this, there were the high pitched shrikes of the Drones as Mickey and I tore them to shreds. A wall of stone suddenly erupted from the floor of the tunnel, sealing off my end by essentially slamming the door in my face.
"Run!" Korra yelled before she unleashed a torrent of fire into the tunnel ahead of us. More shrieks reached our ears as the Drones ahead of us were either ignited or forced to retreat. I swapped out my magazine for a fresh one before helping Mickey mop up what was left of the buggers that hadn't run off.
What was left of the group ran like hell, eager to get out of the death trap that had suddenly snapped closed around us.
"Where the hell is that exit?" Mickey asked.
"It shouldn't be much further now," one of the survivors replied.
"Shouldn't be? Seriously? That's what we're going off of?" Korra asked.
"Hey give me a break, we didn't have alien monsters shooting at us last time," the Equalist defended. He took about three more steps before another Drone appeared, snatched him up, and vanished down a side tunnel. The man's screams echoed for a while, but quickly faded as he got farther away.
"We can't stay down here anymore. The buggers will pick us off one by one until there's no one left," Mickey said. Korra smirked and slammed her fist into her palm.
"Leave that to me," she said. My eyes went wide as I realized she was about to earthbend a hole to the street above. I quickly placed my hand on her shoulder and shook my head, stopping her mid stance.
"What?" she asked, looking up at my polarized visor with confusion.
"You'll attract attention," I answered. At first, she looked like she was going to launch me into the ceiling of the tunnel. But then, she let out a sigh and stepped out of the bending stance.
"JD's right. I'll bring a patrol down on us if I collapse the street in broad daylight," she said.
"So then we leave these tunnels the old fashioned way," Mickey said.
"There's a manhole cover about two hundred yards that way," one of the few remaining Equalists said, pointing down a side tunnel with a flashlight beam.
"That's our way out," Korra said with determination.
To say that the surface was more preferable to the sewers would be like saying the ocean is a preferable way to die over the desert. Both are deserts. One is just made of sand, while the other is made of salt water. Either way, you're still gonna die hot and thirsty. The only real difference is the view.
I wasn't entirely sure where we came up at. We were much closer to the edge of the city, I knew that much. The jagged skyline of the city center could easily be seen from here. Pillars of smoke rose skyward as several buildings burned unchecked. The assault carrier still hung over the city, silent, yet watching intently.
It's silver hull gleamed in the sunlight. Yet despite this, several purple lights were visible all around the ship. The size of the thing alone was impressive. That wasn't taking into account the firepower it had, or the amount of troops and equipment it and it alone carried. If it wanted, it could have turned the entirety of Republic City into a molten slag heap and be back into orbit in under an hour. But for some unknown reason it was just sitting there, as if the entirety of the non essential crew had gone to ground.
For whatever reason, I didn't know and I didn't care. So long as it held position and held it's fire, the no doubt thousands of civilians that were still trapped in the city had a chance to escape with their lives. Not that it mattered anyway. UNSC forces were usually forced to use a nuke when it came to the shielding an assault carrier possessed. That was just to take the shield down, once this was accomplished litterly everything left in a ships' arsenal just to try and breech their armor and hull. Success rates were low. The UNSC virtually never won a space battle against the Covenant. If they couldn't I highly doubted this world could muster any kind of defense or offense against this thing.
"Should we try and call for an evac?" Mickey asked. I gave a simple shrug in response. Assuming there were any operational airships left, I highly doubted that anyone would be willing to send them into the nightmare Republic City had become, even if it was to save the Avatar.
"We should at least try to make contact. I don't know about you, but I'd be pretty mad if we walked into Asami's place only to find it abandoned," Korra said. As much as I hated to admit it, she was right. A lot of time had passed since we'd last had contact with our friends. There was a very good chance that things had changed during that time and we could have been heading in the wrong direction.
Looking at Mickey, I knocked my fist twice on the side of my helmet before pointing at a nearby rooftop. He nodded in understanding before heading off toward the building I had pointed at. Korra just looked at us with an eyebrow raised, clearly waiting for someone to explain what was going on.
"Less radio interference from the roof," I explained. She nodded in understanding and left it at that. What few remained of us huddled in the entrance to the building Mickey had disappeared into, hoping to remain hidden from any Covenant snipers or air forces in the area. I sat down for probably the first time in hours on a flight of stairs, using what chance I had to rest.
Korra came and sat on the stairs next to me. She looked tired and battered, covered in dust, soot, and grime from the sewers. In all honesty, she looked about as tired as I felt. Given everything she had been through in the past twelve hours or so I couldn't blame her.
"What?" she asked when she noticed I seemed to be looking at her. Not that she could really tell, given that my helmet visor was still polarized.
"You look how I feel," I answered, allowing the visor to depolarize. She gave a small smile before she leaned on me. I didn't bother to try and shake her off. Frankly I was too tired, and at this point I could have cared less. It was nice to get some small sort of comfort out of all this chaos. It wasn't really romantic or anything like that. Just two tired people leaning on each other for support.
"Hey Rookie, you might wanna get up here and see this," Mickey's voice cracked over the comm. Oh well, all good things must come to an end, I guess. With a groan, I pulled myself to my feet, repolarized my visor, and started toward the roof. Korra followed along, curious to see what I was up to. The roof gave us a much wider view of the area around us. Mickey was crouched in a corner, watching a flurry of activity taking place much further down the street.
Pulling the sniper rifle from my back, I leveled it on the roof's edge and used the scope to get a better view of what was going on. Both Mickey and Korra were able to see the scope's screen, and thus were able to see as well. What we saw was something that was the stuff of nightmares. A massive, lumbering machine, striding atop four legs as it stomped it's way through the city.
"Scarab," I muttered with equal parts annoyance and horror. The Type 47A Ultra Heavy Assault Platform, or Scarab for those of you who actually have a life and don't want a mouthful to say, is like the Covenant's attempt to bring to life 'War of the Worlds'. Standing at just over a hundred and sixty feet tall, walking on four legs, and boasting a plasma cannon capable of destroying virtually anything it hit, a Scarab was something not to be taken lightly. The fact that there was one currently stomping it's way though Republic City didn't help our nerves.
"We need to warn the Captain and Gunny," I said.
"Interference is too strong to get a signal out. I was able to pick some transmissions though. From the sounds of things they're still at this fancy mansion place you two keep talking about," Mickey said.
"It shouldn't be much farther to walk now," Korra added. I shut down the rifle scope before returning it to my back.
"Looks like we're walking out of the soup," I muttered in annoyance.
The Sato Estate was way more fortified then the last time I had seen it. Stone and concrete barriers had been erected by earthbenders around the entrance and up driveway, yet there was no one present. There were several small scale plasma burns on the mansion itself, indicating that a fight had taken place. But the lack of bodies just made everything all the more confusing.
"I thought you said they were still here," Korra said, keeping her raised in preparation to bend.
"I said it sounded like they were still here," Mickey corrected. I remained silent as we walked into the main entrance and looked around for any signs of life. The once ornate entrance had obvious signs of a fight, with scorch marks and bullet holes everywhere. Hanging in the corner, I took notice of a camera. It was far more advanced than anything the locals had, and was scanning the main hall like a vigilant watchman.
Stepping forward, I let out a whistle and gave a short wave toward the camera. It turned and focused on me, and didn't move. Korra, who had been watching me this whole time, came forward and stood next to me. Spying the camera, she cocked her eyebrow in my direction.
"Some toy of yours?" she asked.
"Someone, somewhere close is keeping an eye on this place," I answered. The inner doors of the mansion swung open, revealing a small squad of four UNSC Marines. To say that I was surprised would have been an understatement. A pleasant surprise, but a surprise none the less. Three of them were armed with MA5s, while the fourth had a BR55 battle rifle.
"Come on, quickly, before the Covenant come back," the one with the battle rifle said, motioning us inside. We were led through the mansion, and then into a small tunnel which headed down into the mountainside. As we had guessed, our friends had fallen back to the old factory beneath the estate, not the house itself.
The factory was abuzz with activity. United Forces personal ran back and forth, either working on equipment or carrying out some form of order. Apparently, there had been a lot more UNSC personal scattered about then initially thought, hiding in the mountains and only revealing themselves when the attack began. It still wasn't no where near enough though. Sure there were some M12 Warthogs, a pair of M808 Main Battle Tanks, and enough Marines to outfit them all. But that was a drop of water compared to the pond the Covenant could field from one ship alone.
"Mickey, Rookie, thank God," Buck said as we approached him. There was some sort of command center that had been set up in the far corner of the factory. Buck, Dutch, and Romeo had been providing security for the area, making sure none of the unauthorized United Forces personal stumbled across something they shouldn't have.
"Good to see you too, Gunny," Mickey replied before he made his way over and began to fist bump and catch up with the rest of the squad. The Gunny, however, stayed close to me.
"When we lost contact with your airship, we thought you were dead. Now you turn up, with a VIP no less. Not bad for your first outing, Rookie," he said, looking past me to Korra.
"Not exactly my idea of a night out on the town, Gunny," I replied. Buck just shook his head before turning his attention to my companion.
"It's good to see you alive, Avatar. The Captain and General will be happy too," he said. Korra cocked her eyebrow in confusion at the gunnery sergeant.
"General?"
"Follow me," Buck instructed before he led us toward a tent that was an olive drab color. Inside there was some radio equipment, a large table in the center with a world map, and some screens that showed different points around the estate. Standing next to the map was Captain Dare, and a man I didn't recognize. He was tall, wearing a red uniform with dark hair, pale complexion, and golden amber eyes.
"Pardon the interruption, but some squad members have returned," Buck said.
"Of course. General, I believe you've already met the Avatar. This is Lance Corporal Durant. Durant, this is Iroh, commander of the United Forces First Fleet," Dare introduced. I gave the General a quick salute, which he returned.
"General Iroh has been putting forward a plan of attack against the Covenant," Dare continued.
"Iroh…that's not a good idea," Korra said.
"I'm sorry, Avatar Korra. But the President's final order was absolutely clear. All remaining United Forces are to attack," Iroh replied. The rest of us all shared a glance of uncertainty. We'd seen the Covenant first hand, fought for our lives against them. We knew what was at stake.
"What intel we've been able to get indicates that this is a relatively small Covenant fleet. Only three assault carriers have been sighted. One over Ba Sing Se, one over the Fire Nation Capital, and one here, over Republic City. There have been reports of smaller ships attacking outlying cities in raids, but so far these three ships are the only ones that have held position," Dare reported, using a world map that was laying on the table.
"Our attack will coordinate with Fire Nation and Earth Kingdom attacks as well. Any and all top secret and experimental technology has been approved for usage. We'll strike hard and fast, and hopefully give us a fighting chance," Iroh added.
"What few UNSC forces we've been able to gather will be helping participate in the attack. It's not much, but hopefully it'll be enough to make a difference," Dare finished.
"Understood," I answered in a monotone voice. In my head, I was screaming so hard it was amazing my lungs hadn't forced their way up my throat.
"Get some rest, and then get geared up Rookie. We're wheels up in twelve hours," Buck said. I gave another salute to the General before turning and heading off. Korra half mumbled some excuse about being tired too and came after me.
"So what do you think about this?" she asked in a low voice when she had caught up with me.
"You want the blunt truth or hopeful lie?" I asked. She pursed her lips.
"Both. But give me the lie first," she said.
"It's…bold," I said, choosing my words carefully.
"And the truth?" I kicked a long wooden crate with the tip of my boot as we walked by.
"Pick one and get cozy, cause we're all gonna die."
And cut. Next time, we head into the maw as the United Forces attempt an all out attack on their enemy. How will all this play out? Remember to read, review, let me know what you liked or didn't like, and I'll see you all next time.