Cyrus VII
November 9, 2557
Captain Valdez was less than enthusiastic when Bowman had relayed the information.
"The rebel group here is basically causeless. They're taking up arms to simply make the place dangerous. No movements to overthrow the government. They're tough and sometimes, they know how we work. Some of them defected from my unit and others come from other nasty groups like the New Colonial Alliance."
"You're not bailing on me are you captain?"
"I am with you one hundred. However, this will be dangerous. If there is a hell on Cyrus, this place is it."
"We have the storm on our side. I've got a man fixing up our scout drone and we'll be able to strike silently. So far, we haven't detected any motion sensors."
"Very well. We'll come in from the north and await your go."
"Roger that." Bowman cut the connection and signaled Austal and Fowler. "You boys ready to wrap this up?"
"Better hurry." Fowler said, "Looks like they're getting ready to go."
"I see em."
"Austal, where is that drone?"
"Not sure sir. But now's not the time to look for it."
Bowman was about to argue about that when he saw Pine in front of him hold up a fist and then flatten his gloved hand into a palm. Both Spartans dropped prone on the ground and slowly crawled ahead, like a pair of lizards observing flies.
"Fowler, Austal. Shake em up a little."
"Roger that." Tapping the younger Spartan's shoulder, they crept out in the open, active camo modules making them nearly invisible. There was about twenty feet of open ground that shimmered as they stalked across.
On their HUDs, Bowman marked a pair that had drifted a bit off from the rest of their party. They stood at the back hatch of the truck with the lasers, most likely tampering them so that it wouldn't be identified if it passed a UNSC checkpoint. The Spartans had them outlined to reveal their exact position and where they were facing.
Fowler saw them up ahead and pressed forward. He reached out where he couldn't be seen and tapped the side of the vehicle. His eyes remained glued to the outlines, watching as one of them began to approach.
At such a close range, he could easily be spotted by even grunts. However, his attention was all that was needed.
"What's wrong?" His partner asked.
"I heard something." The gunman replied, looking where Fowler had been. He relocated across the vehicle's other side, where the lasers were. It was a good amount of firepower, he gave an estimate that nearly one and a half dozen rifles were in the bed.
Fowler saw the first gunman standing a little more alert. A green light blinked.
Austal was in position.
Fowler was now focused on the partner, standing idly. He tapped the side again, tuning down the power of his camo to make him slightly more visible.
The guard's reaction wasn't especially quick. Fowler took the best advantage of that.
"Hey!" The Spartan whispered.
When he whirled around, something lunged from behind. Austal's hand was like a vice around his mouth and the knife he wielded was sharp as a scalpel. It was plunged straight down into the rebel's throat and the two fell back into the brush. Marcus easily held down as the dying man thrashed uselessly against him. It took a while, but he finally laid the corpse down.
"Target down."
"You're too much of a show off." Fowler shook his head. The second rebel had called out his partner's name and moved right back to where they had been originally standing. As he passed where the Spartan was hiding, he lunged straight out. His M90 CAWS shotgun striking low and causing the careless soldier to trip. Fowler slammed the stock of the weapon into the forehead and he was out like a light.
"Both targets down."
"Affirmative." Bowman said, "We're attacking in thirty. Keep yourselves concealed. Rest of you, don't move position. Fowler and Austal are responsible for tagging and flushing out enemies."
He got a chorus of affirmatives, from Valdez, Pine and the squad leaders of the C7DF. A timer began counting down on their HUDs.
Waiting in an ambush seemed to slow down time. It gave them all the opportunities to think how haywire it was going to be. One mishap and Bowman's plan was over.
"You ready little brother?" Fowler asked once the timer hit five.
"As I'll ever be."
The timer reached zero.
"Go!" Bowman gave the signal.
Simultaneously, seven different angles of fire erupted unseen in the thick brush. Multiple targets were felled.
Fowler dashed over to cover, his suit's camo deactivating due to the sudden movement. He reached his destination, but a pair of rebels saw the movement and opened fire. He tagged one of the HUD, causing Bowman himself to drill a few bullets into his back.
Austal rushed over, slamming the back of his own rifle into the rebel. Reeling over, he finished him off with a few shots as well.
More rapping gunfire sounded from the other side and finally subsided into silence.
"Clear?" Bowman asked.
"Clear." Pine replied, "No hostiles in sight."
"All my teams report clear." Valdez said.
"Alright. Converge on the convoy."
Silently, the groups rendezvoused at the huddle of vehicles. Except for the lasers, Valdez had his men begin searching for contraband.
"Where's Fowler and Austal?" Bowman asked as Pine shuffled over to the truck with the lasers.
The latter shook his head as he examined the boxes, "Chrome Paint. Covers up the scanner so that it is unidentifiable by checkpoints. Looks like these weapons were meant to be smuggled into UNSC territories."
Bowman knew that Spartan Lasers were difficult to get, even for UNSC forces. So even one rifle would be a very good price as well as countless motivated buyers, waiting to wreak havoc on UEG soil.
"Stand by." Bowman sent Pine and Valdez to transfer their reclaimed weapons. "Tyrant, this is Eon Lead."
A few seconds later, the screen popped up on the datapad. Tyrant dismissed someone next to him before turning to face the camera.
"Good to see you Eon Lead. What's the word?"
"Spartan Lasers and contraband secure. Everyone wins on this one."
Tyrant gave a nod, "We're still investigating on our end to see how they got stolen and how we were unable to track it. In the meantime, I've got some new intel headed your way. I have a Sec One Agent from Naval Intelligence to brief you. We're going after whoever killed Jaguar. See you all back on base."
"Really? Why don't you just tell me yourself?"
"That's classified Eon. Tyrant out."
Austal found the drone wedged about twenty feet up between a forked branch. He had the second moth flitting about as his fingers danced over the screen, attempting to knock its cousin free. What at first, was a simple task became tedious and frustrating by the second. Squinting through the increasing rain and the flashing alarm of the second drone's last minutes of battery made any more attempts futile, not to mention that he was afraid if he persisted, he'd risk damaging both drones.
"It's not working." He told Fowler. "Can you climb up and get it?"
"Are you kidding me?"
"Hey," Austal feigned fatigue, "I don't feel good."
"Right and my arm hurts too. Not to mention that my skills at being a monkey suck ass."
"You dizzy too?"
"No."
Austal glared through his visor, "Then come on."
"You so owe me." Fowler muttered before cursing under his breath. He threw his weapon at the younger Spartan, who caught it in midair. He reached up to the nearest limb and pulled himself up.
"Hey, you know the last time I climbed a tree?"
"When you were a kid on a grav gym?"
"No stupid. When I was back on New Llanelli as an ODST, these kids were flying around those toy pelicans just hours after the Covenant invasion. One of them had it stuck in a tree and began crying for me to go get it down. Well after I begin getting up there, these two asshole jackals begin shooting at me with their needler rifles. Took two in the hip before my man Haynes vaporizes em with a rocket. I mean, how are you liking that shit? You're trying to get a toy for a kid and these assholes decide to shoot at me like a fly on the wall. That's why I hate cowards like that. Jackals with their name written all over it. Got no respect for them."
"Well did you get the toy?" Austal was now craning his neck up.
"Yeah I got it, but it was full of holes."
"Like Swiss cheese." Marcus made an Mmm sound, no doubt thinking of food.
"Don't you dare talk about food right now."
"Why, you hungry?"
"Man, I could eat an entire fuckin tray of lasagna right now."
"Pizza too. Ten slices."
"At least." Fowler leaned as far as he could towards he stuck drone, outstretching his free left hand, fingers literally inches from the end of the machine. "It's too far away. I can't reach it."
He shifted some more, halting when sharp sounds of cracking came from the branch underneath. It was beginning to buckle.
"Oh hell."
A final desperate lunge managed to get the moth knocked free. It plummeted down rapidly.
Austal dove for it like a wide receiver at a football game. His hands outstretched and closed gently around the delicate machine. "Gotcha!"
"Alright kid. You now owe me one extra." Fowler stepped to the branch's other side, but he let out a yelp of surprise when his foot suddenly gave out and the broken branch fell to the ground. He had no time for reflex grabs as his hand slid right off the slick branch and he plummeted straight down.
Austal looked up right in time to see Fowler's fall, right above him. Acting on instinct, he stepped back and charged forward a split second later. He hit Fowler just in time to save him from a back breaking fall. However, the force had tumbled them over each other and they both lay side by side at the stump of the tree.
Brett shifted, letting out a low groan and wincing from the newfound pain in his arms and leg.
"You okay?" Austal knelt in front of him with a depolarized visor, a streak of crimson trailing from his nose. When he exhaled, a splatter of blood exploded out and smeared the inside of the visor. "Aw shit. This is friggin perfect."
Fowler actually smiled at his misfortune, "Brother, it is going to take more beer to pay for this one than you can afford."
With the operation finished, Valdez's men found only one survivor that was barely conscious. He had a butt hit on the back of his head and was out to sleep for a good five hours.
When his comrades found him, he was shaken and traumatized. He was speaking in a nervous voice, as if they could still hear them.
Before he fainted from the shock again his words were, "We never saw them."
With the Spartan Lasers back in the hands of the UNSC everyone can go back to their original business. Right?
Thanks for reading and reviewing. You give my writing purpose.