Episode 10
Philips brought the Warthog to a grinding halt. They had been driving for hours through a path in a forest, but found the trail blocked by the dense foliage. 'Guess we're walking.' Philips thought. Sighing inwardly, the ODST dismounted the vehicle, and began walking through the woods, with Mtan following right behind him.
After walking for several minutes, Philips figured that he might as well try to gain some information from his Elite ally.
"Mtan, I have to ask, what happened to the rest of your team after you crashed here?"
The Elite was silent for a moment, and Philips thought about dropping the conversation when his ally's voice rang out behind him.
"When our Phantom landed, I had been knocked unconscious by the crash. When I woke up, I found the bodies of my lance scattered around the ruins."
"So they died in the crash?"
"I do not know." Mtan said, "All I knew was that they deserved a better death than what they had recieved. I had intended to give them a warrior's burial."
The Elite's voice grew husky as he continued his story.
"But then everything went strange; the world took on an orange tint and my friends got back up." Philips winced as he realized what had happened next.
"But it wasn't them, was it?" Mtan grew silent for a moment before answering.
"No, it wasn't."
Philips decided to leave the conversation be for now, and the two of them spent several minutes walking in silence, with the rustling of the trees being the only ambient noise in the background. After a while, the ODST chose to ask another question that had been bothering him.
"So how did you know what was happening in the courtyard?"
"That was not the first vision I had seen." Mtan said, "During my time at those ruins, I had other encounters with these humans."
"How did you know that it wasn't the UNSC?"
"During my first encounter, they bore witness to me, but they had no knowledge of me or the Covenant. They tried to capture me." The Elite snorted at that sentence, "But after I proved too... difficult to ensnare, they attempted to kill me."
"What about Michael?" Philips asked, "What happened to him?"
"I do not know what happened to your friend." Mtan admitted, "After finishing my initial exploration of that temple, I chose to stay away from that place, until I saw you arrive. But his body was not in the temple during my visit."
The conversation stalled at that moment when they came across a metal bunker in the middle of the forest. This alone was an oddity, but odder still was the fact that there were absolutely no distinguishing markings, no defenses surrounding the complex, and the door was wide open.
The two allies felt themselves inexplicably drawn towards the fortification and they entered the structure. The interior of the base was just as bare as the exterior, with dull metal walls lacking any sense of decoration.
As the two of them explored, they came across a junction, and Philips took a couple of steps down one of the hallways. As soon as he did, a thick door sealed up the passage behind him with a loud thud. Spinning around, Philips ran back to the slab of metal and started looking for a way to open it. Finding none, Philips began desperately knocking on the door.
"What the hell?! Mtan, are you there? Mtan?!" There was no response from the Elite, so the ODST chose to keep searching through the building in the hopes of finding him again.
What Philips didn't know, was that right after the door had closed behind him, Mtan had drawn his energy sword and was prepared to slice through the the thick metal door. However, as soon as he did, the floor underneath him disappeared, and the Spec Ops Elite found himself falling down a deep pit. The landing was painful, which caused Mtan to let out a loud roar in pain.
Fortunately, while the fall might have killed a human, the Sangheili warrior came out of it with only minor bruising. Mtan shook off the cobwebs from the impact and used his energy sword to carve a path out of the pit.
Fortunately, the walls were fragile and soon he found himself in another hallway. Choosing a path, Mtan began seeking out his human ally.
Meanwhile, Philips found the first signs of habitation in this facility when he arrived in a large office. Walking behind the massive wooden desk, the ODST caught his first break; the computer was active and logged in.
Searching through the files, Philips only found one of note, titled "Planetary Anomalies." Accessing the file, he found himself watching a video file. A woman in a lab coat went about adjusting the camera, and clearing the desk, before she sat down and started speaking.
"Journal Entry 324:
Exploration of our world has uncovered ruins in many unusual locations. Given the odd and somewhat unnatural architecture, it's been theorized by many scientists, myself included, that these ruins are alien in origin. The facility we've created to access the ruins at the ocean floor have reported that they are unable to breach the alien structures within. Fortunately, the excavations in the desert have had better success in recovering the alien artifacts."
The researcher sighed and smiled, "I'll be honest, without Colonel Philips, we wouldn't have been nearly as successful at recovering this technology from those fanatics. The ones that keep claiming that 'the Ancients wanted the seal intact, and that we must not be made whole,' whatever that means."
She chuckled before continuing, "Anyways, I've heard that Kevin and Ashley are still going strong, and half the staff has been asking when they can expect the wedding."
A knock on the door interrupted her speech. "I gotta go, Helen Nate, signing out." She reached for the camera and the screen went black, causing the video to end. Philips was staring at the screen, barely registering everything the scientist had said after mentioning his mother. Something was definitely up.
"Rather curious, isn't it?" A voice emerged from the doorway, causing Philips to pull out his battle rifle and aim it at the source in surprise. But what was even more shocking was the man who was standing there.
"Captain?"
"It's me, Philips." Captain Toni said, before pointing at the gun, "Do you mind putting that down?"
The ODST private kept his weapon leveled at the Captain's chest, unsure if he was actually there and not a hallucination or another possessed corpse.
"What's your name?"
"Captain Marcus Toni, 105th ODST Division." Toni tilted his head to the left slightly, "Is that good enough, Jacob?"
Sighing in relief, Philips holstered his battle rifle onto his back, before nodding to his superior.
"Sorry about that sir. It's been weird these past few days."
Toni walked up to Philips and put his hand on his shoulder. "I'll bet. I've seen some really weird shit since I woke up in this forest. Well, now that we're together, maybe we can find Michael and Doc." He paused when the private depolarized his visor and looked down at the floor. "What is it?"
Wordlessly, Philips reached into a pouch on his belt and pulled out 2 sets of dog tags, before handing them to Toni. The polarized visor of the Captain stared at the names on the tags for a moment before a sound escaped him.
"Damn it." He whispered huskily. After a moment, he handed the tags back to Philips. "What happened to them?"
"I'm not entirely sure." Philips said, "But that's not the weird part." He paused for a breath, unsure if the Captain would believe him, before continuing, "After I found their bodies, they came back to life and attacked me." Surprisingly, Toni gestured for him to continue.
"So, I had to kill them... again." His voice turned husky again. There was a long moment of silence before Toni spoke.
"You're saying they were possessed?" He asked.
"Something like that." Philips admitted, "And whatever was possessing them seemed to be smart; Doc was fairly easy to beat, but Michael kicked my ass," Philips chuckled in spite of himself as he recalled how often that had happened, "And the only reason I survived was because of Mtan-"
"Wait, who's Mtan?" Toni interrupted.
"The Spec Ops Elite who saved me from Michael, and who's been helping me deal with all the other weird shit on this planet."
"Private, you've been consorting with enemy, which would normally be grounds for treason." Toni snarled.
"Sir, you don't understand. He's a deserter and he's been helping me survive these past couple of days."
"Philips, have you considered that he's trying to lead you into a trap? That he's trying to glean intelligence from you?!" Toni was shouting now, "We need to find this Split-faced liar, and ensure the security of humanity! Tell me I can trust you, Private." The captain finished, pleading.
Philips realized it all made sense; Mtan had been lying to him this whole time, trying to get information from him. Hell, he was probably behind whatever the hell caused Michael and Doc to attack him. Anger surged through his veins as he realized that the Elite he had considered an ally, even a friend, was using him this whole time.
"I understand, sir." His voice was barely holding back the quivering rage that was coursing through him. "That split-jawed freak is in this building right now. Together, we can take him down."
Toni nodded his approval. "Let's do this." The two ODSTs left the office with a singular purpose: To seek and destroy one Special Operations Elite.
Meanwhile, Mtan was searching through the empty hallways of this facility for his human comrade. As he searched, Mtan couldn't help but appreciate the irony of his predicament; for his entire career, he had fought and killed humans on the orders of the Prophets, and now he was working with one.
The Hierarchs had claimed that humanity was an affront to the gods, but secretly, Mtan had always respected humans. He found their tenacity to be exceptional, and he personally hated having to slaughter unarmed civilians.
His former commanding officer, Thel 'Vadamee, had secretly been the same way, and had shown honor to the human soldiers, whereas most commanders would've just cut them down.
When Vadamee had been stripped of his rank, Mtan had been reassigned to the flagship of the Prophet of Regret. After the jump over Earth, his lance had intercepted a transmission from the new Arbiter, proclaiming the Great Journey to be false and encouraging that the Sangheili ally with humanity.
Mtan was so caught up in his musings that he almost missed the fragmentation grenade that rolled to a stop at his feet. Acting on reflex, the Elite leapt back just as the grenade exploded. His shields took most of the damage, but a pair of battle rifle bursts roared into the ringing cacophany.
The first burst came from a human soldier leaning around a corner in front of him, wearing ODST armor. The 3 bullets impacted against his shields, which promptly gave out from the kinetic energy.
Because of this, the next 3 rounds found their mark; one round went through Mtan's shoulder, another hit his neck and the final round grazed the side of his head, bursting through his lower right mandible and breaking it off.
The 8 foot tall Elite collapsed to the ground in a heap, blue blood seeping from his wounds. Mtan's vision swam as he saw the first human soldier that had shot at him walk up to his corpse. He called out to his partner, who walked in from behind Mtan's back and stood next to the other soldier. Mtan couldn't believe what he was seeing.
It was Philips. He had ambushed Mtan with the help of this other armored human and then he shot him in the back. Philips was conversing with this other ODST, though in his state, Mtan couldn't hear what they were saying.
As the ODSTs turned away from the bleeding body of Mtan, they didn't notice that the Elite's prone form was stirring. "Why would you do that, Philips?" Mtan whispered, barely clinging to life.
He was shocked by this betrayal of someone he was starting to consider a friend. But the ODSTs either didn't hear him or didn't care, as they walked away without looking back.
It was done. That Split-faced spy would no longer trick him.
Then why did it feel so wrong?
Philips stared at the body of Mtan, with his ears ringing. Looking over his handiwork made him feel sick. This wasn't the first time he had ever killed an Elite, but this hurt a lot more. He had trusted Mtan with his life, and it was now clear that the Elite had been planning to betray him.
He was so focused, that it took him a moment to register Toni's words.
"That was a damn good shot, Private."
"Oh, th-thank you, sir." If the Captain heard the hesitation in his tone, he didn't comment on it.
"C'mon, let's get out of here and find a way home." The two ODSTs turned and walked away from the body of Mtan, their footsteps creating footprints on the ground from their blue blood-soaked boots. Reaching the entrance of the facility, the two ODSTs made their way to the Warthog that had brought Mtan and Philips to the forest.
"Where to, Captain?"
"I know where we should go next." Toni said before gesturing to the Hog, "I'll man the LAAG, while you drive."
The two soldiers entered the Hog and as they drove away, Philips failed to notice that Captain Toni's eyes began glowing yellow from behind his visor.
I hope everyone enjoyed the chapter. The next one will be featuring Shadow Team, so stay tuned for that.