The air in the Pelican was still tense as the Spartans' decided what to do. To stay on the Pelican was almost a guarantee suicide. All present Spartans', aside from Jordan, could safely jump out of the Pelican as it entered into Earth's atmosphere due to their shielding. Jordan of course had no shielding and left him with the least likely hood of surviving. He would go down with the crashing Pelican. Needless to say most One was not thrilled with his idea and stated it many times.
After identifying the problem, and getting over Jordan's stupid idea, One made a plan on how to deal with it. Her and the Spartans with shields would jump out of the Pelican once it had entered Earth's atmosphere. The Spartans that were jumping would take as much equipment with them as possible. However they would leave the remaining Spartan with enough weapons should he survive the crash. Now if said Spartan were to survive the crash than he was too either A) remain put with Pelican until available personal would regroup with him, B) if Covenant hostiles were too numerous was too abandon the ship and regroup with friendly personal, or C) if he landed close to the Objective than he was too soften up enemy personal until friendly personal arrived. Needless to say 267 liked option C the best.
"When we regroup we are going to update your armor." Were One's parting words before she jumped out of the falling/crashing Pelican.
267's only nodded his head response as he controlled the falling ship as best he could.
Now 267 sat alone in the cockpit of the Pelican determined not to die just yet, he had Covenant to kill after all. Red flames covered the glass of the cockpit as the friction of the air reduced the speed of the falling Pelican. Although this change in velocity was minimal. Jordan had opted to "land" the Pelican close to a UNSC Vehicle production facility that was a mile or so from the Objective. This choice would satisfy all three options as he could stay near the Pelican so that any UNSC personal present in the facility would mostly likely check the Pelican for survivors. Or if not, he could leave the Pelican behind and grab a vehicle and use it to get to the Objective. Being a Spartan he opted for the latter as he was not one to stay still.
267 could now see his objective coming into sight and realized something. He would be crashing a lot closer to the facility than he intended. In fact he would be crashing into it.
"Oh this is going to hurt." were the last thoughts that ran through his head before he crashed into the building.
When 267 finally came to consciousness he found it odd that the nose of the Pelican would be pointed toward the ceiling. After touching the release on his harness he found out the hard way that the ceiling in fact was not the ceiling but the floor, as his helmet cracked into the glass of the cockpit.
"Well if I didn't have suffer any skull trauma during the crash I most certainly have now." 267 said as he picked himself off the floor.
Pain wracked his entire body. Pain was good. It meant that he was still alive. He set his pain aside for now as he had to secure a perimeter and assess any hostiles. When he was given time he would examine the extent of the damage done to his body.
Moving to the equipment locker stored in the cockpit he opened and grabbed all the materials inside. Inside the locker was a standard issue Assault Rifle, Pistol, and four Grenades. What was not standard UNSC weaponry were two Covenant Energy Swords, and 267's own custom knife. He properly secured each armament to a place that would be in easy reach. The pistol went along his right thigh, the grenades were placed in pouches along his belt, and the swords went on the small of his back. The knife however was placed into the scabbard on his chest.
Once everything was to his satisfaction he exited out of the cockpit Assault Rifle forward. The sliding door of the cockpit startled several Jackals that had come to scout out the downed Pelican. 267 wasted no time in going full auto. Purple alien blood, organs, and limbs splattered the entire troop bay of the Pelican. In an odd twist of circumstances the troop bay of the Pelican had lived up to the name "Blood Pan" but this was the first time the 267 had seen one covered in Covenant blood.
"Isn't irony a bitch?" 267 asked a Jackal that he passed by on his way out of the Pelican. Though the Jackal was probably to busy holding his entrails inside itself to pay any attention to the rhetoric question.
Upon exiting the Pelican he came face to face with a squad of grunts and their pissed of Brute Commander.
"Kill the Demon!" roared the brute.
Immediately the Grunts began to fire off their guns. Luckily for 267 Grunts weren't known for their ability to aim. 267 let off a few burst from his Assault Rifle as he sought cover. Alien blood and guts spilled across the track of the Warthog production line.
The Spartan eventually managed to take cover behind a Warthog that was mostly complete aside from the fact that it had no wheels. The Brute Commander roared at the four remaining grunts to circle around while he jumped the cowardly Demon. Fear of their master's whip drove them forward despite what reason stated.
The Brute jumped on top of the unfinished Warthog and pointed his Spiker at the ground where the Demon ought to have been, but was not. A foul aroma reach the Brute's sensitive nostrils. Turning his head to the source of the smell he saw all four of his grunts butchered. The most fortunate Grunts had only their heads loped off while one was ripped almost in half and the other…well all four of it's limbs were spread out in a two meter radius. As the gogre in the Brute's throat rose so did it's fear. How could the Demon have done this? Where they as demonically gifted as was rumored?
"Over here." came the softest whisper in the human's heretic tongue.
The Brute whipped out around spraying spikes in a wide arc. He hit nothing but empty air. Confusion over came the Brute's face. Had he truly heard the voice. To answer his question pain erupted his right arm it arm as it was lopped off. A scream of pain came out of his mouth. He grabbed the injured limb in a vain attempt to stop the blood from pouring out.
"Over here." came the taunting whisper again.
In anger the brute made a vain swipe but once again hit nothing. The Brute was about to turn and run favoring life over an honorable death. The slicing of flesh stalled him as his back of his neck was pierced all the way through. Astonishment, crossed the Brute's face as it stared at the gore covered blade that had pierced him. One last agony raped his spine as it was hauled out of his body. The Brute was dead but it had not lost consciousness. It could only stare in amazement has his head and spine was turned to face his executioner. There he stared the Demon it's cold unblinking golden eye.
"Well this is good start." 267 said as he tossed the spine head combo away from him.
He reseated his blades and took his Assault Rifle off his back. Checking his built in Compass he headed in the direction of his Objective eager to kill some Covenant. This Spartan was full of energy and was going to hit the Covenant like a horse kick to the groin.
The upper torso of a Jackal splattered against the wall, entrails dripping important fluids. It was not the first to die as it and several of it's bigger Skirmisher cousins laid broken and mangled in the entire hallway.
Three of the last twenty of the Jackal squad, and last Skirmisher backed up from the monstrosity that had killed most of their brethren. It was the only race that the Covenant truly feared a Demon.
267 looked at the last of his four opponents, his knife and pistol drawn. He would have gunned them down with his AR if a Jackal hadn't burnt it in half with an over charged shot. Then again it wouldn't have been burnt in half if hadn't needed to use it as a makeshift shield.
The Skirmisher charged firing it's plasma pistol. This action spurred the remaining Jackals into action. 267 could not retreat and their was no cover in the corridor so he charged. The two opposing forces met. Needless to say there was no competition. A knife to the Skirmisher's temple ended it's life instantly. Using his pistol he squeezed off six shots, three for each Jackal. One headshot for each one, along with a double tap to the chest. Ripping out his knife out of the dead Skirmisher he tossed it end over end at the Jackal. Much to his disappointment the knife had lodged in it's beak and had not killed it as he had hoped. However said Jackal was freaking out at having knife lodged in it's beak that it had dropped it's Carbine. 267 briefly watched with some amusement as the Jackal struggled to get the knife out.
He then calmly walked up to the struggling Jackal and grabbed his knife by the hilt with his left hand, simultaneously crushing the Jackals fingers. Bone was bent out of the flesh.
"Let me help you with that." 267 said as he ripped the knife out of the Jackal's beak from where it was lodged to the front of it's beak.
The Jackal now had a use less mouth separated into four mandibles. Taking his right hand he placed the pistol in the Jackal's now useless mouth.
"Split chin." he thought oddly as he pulled the trigger blowing out the Jackal's brain.
267 cleaned off his knife and surveyed the carnage. He had long ago grown numb to numb to killing the Covenant in an odd disturbingly manner. Besides, Covenant did worse.
267 policed the weapons' of the Covenant dead. He had scrounged up several different grenades and a Jackal shield. Now all he had to do was decided on which rifle to take. He could choose between the Carbine and the Needle Rifle. Both rifle's had distinctive advantages and disadvantages. With Carbine he got more penetration power. With the Needle Rifle it had exploding rounds that would send a pink crystal shrapnel scattering in all directions. In the end he decided on the Needle Rifle as it was the weapon with the most abundant ammo among the Covenant dead.
Satisfied with his choice of weaponry he took a moment to check the Comm Frequency to see if there were any allies broadcasting nearby.
"under atta…need assistan…look human… not hum…argh." was the voice that came over his headset.
It was a Grunt that had spoken, no surprise there, they had no discipline. What was surprising though was the message. Although he could have ignored it, the message was rather curious. This warranted investigation…though this could be a trap. Well he wouldn't find out if he just stood around musing about the idea.
"Well either way I get to kill something." said in a rather cheery mood.
As the Spartan made his rounds through the complex to the origin of the transmission he encountered very few Covenant. He only met individual Grunts when he entered rooms or hallways. Which was odd in of it's self as Grunts were never seen alone. Another odd thing that added to his growing suspicion was that all of the Grunts had been facing the origin of the transmission with weapons raised. He guessed that the transmission did hold some weight of truth to it.
As he got closer to his destination he countered no Covenant what so ever. This made him tense, something about this was very unnatural. He was less than forty meters from his destination. He had cross-referenced a map with origin of the signal which showed him that the signal came from the dockyards of the facility. Another thing that unnerved him was how spacious the dockyards were on the map. A perfect place for Jackal snipers to take roost.
The customary sliding door of the UNSC brought him back to the present. As soon as he was passed this hallway he would be in the dockyard. When he was about halfway through the hallway a tremor rocked the facility and caused all of the lights to flicker off. 267 was caught off balance by the tremor but soon regained it. When the lights did not come on immediately he activated his helmet's night vision. A green hue overtook his vision as the night vision activated, illuminating the hall before him. Raising his Needle Rifle he proceeded forward once more.
As the last door parted he found himself in the dockyard. Crates with precious materials were stacked from floor to ceiling. What immediately grabbed his attention and made him stop in his tracks at the amount of blood and gore that he saw. The fluorescent blue blood of the Covenant Grunts covered the floor in streaks, along with all the other species of the Covenant. More disturbing however was that no bodies were present to account for the amount of blood. There were a few pieces and limbs scattered about but nothing that would amount for the blood at all. As he traced some of the streaks he saw that some of them went up and over some of the tallest crates.
As his eyes traveled upward he noticed that the light was heavily filtered. Upon looking through the windows he saw that heavy smoke snuffed out most of the sunlight.
Was the Covenant glassing Earth? It would explain the quake and the smoke…but that still did not help his predicament any as he still didn't know what killed the Covenant troops present. Speaking of which he got the strange vibe that there was something was wrong with everything. Everything felt too coincidental to not have been orchestrated.
Lifting his weapon he proceeded to back up feeling the need to some where else any where but here. It was not fear per say but an intuition that this was a trap. Upon turning around to go back through the door he found that someone…no something impeded his progress. The being lashed out with a punch and he found himself flying through the air. As soon as he hit the ground he rolled backward and brought his rifle up, only to see the same chalk white being grab his rifle with one hand and used the other hand to uppercut to him on the chin. He felt his body lift up into the air under the force of the blow, but his opponent was not done as it took his Needle Rifle and brought it around like a baseball bat to his midsection.
He tumbled through the air and his body literally broke through a crate. His entire body hurt under the strain, but he got up anyways after all he had taken worse hits than this.
The soft pitter patter of feet got his attention. Raising his arms he grabbed the punch directed at his head. Finally he got a good look at his assailant. The hand was cuffed in a black bracelet which stood in contrast to the chalk white skin. The hand of course lead to a chest that had…breasts? It was a she? Staring at the face he could see pursed black lips, slanted eyes, and corded blood red hair. Her body was thin but highly muscular.
"Like what you see Genocide?" the female asked.
The Spartan immediately kicked her away, but she rolled with the force of the blow and did a back flip to realign herself. No one had ever called him Genocide, save for Hell spawn. His skin felt like it had burned from her touch, but his armor wasn't even scorched.
Taking a good look at his opponent he saw now that she wore only a black tiara, the black bracelets, and a red silk dress that didn't cover her breasts. She smiled at him seductively.
"This is bad, real bad. The breasts are distracting me from the threat, but the threat is distracting me from the breasts. Not to mention the fact that some how this Hell spawn found Earth. Did that mean there were others too?" he thought never taking his eyes off of…well at least he was focused on one aspect of her.
"My face is up here." she said rather menacingly.
"Who are you and why are you here?" Jordan snapped out, coming out of a rather incriminating day dream.
She smiled wickedly now having the Spartan's full attention on something…that wasn't on her.
"My name is of no relevance. I am a messenger from the Destroyer. He has an offer for you."
"Whose the Destroyer?" the title sounded self explanatory, but it never hurt to gather intelligence on important players.
"He is the General that will lead to the downfall of Earth and the culling of humanity…along with all the Covenant fools. The Destroyer's offer is rather simple…join his side as his Lieutenant."
"Well that sounds like a great offer, but I'll decline."
"Pity, well if we can't have you by choice we can least take you by force."
"You and what army?"
The demon snapped her fingers and five other demons of varying sizes appeared around him.
"I just had to ask." 267 said very sarcastically.
"Take HIM." she commanded her demons.
267 had already taken off into the facility finding it far better idea to turn the ambushee into the ambusher. He rounded corner after corner never taking the same turn twice. Eventually he lost the heavy footfalls behind him. He slowed down taking a moment to slow his breathing. He still couldn't believe the demons had found earth. After he dealt with these demons he had to tell command of the new enemy he had encountered.
He smelled a foul odor of the new demon long before it fired.
CA-CHINK
He immediately rolled sideways. Bits of blood and bone splattered the crates, but none of it was his own. 267 swiveled about to the origin of the shot and nearly paused. It was huge. Standing at 5 meters the giant was glutton incarnate. A twin horned helm covered the skull and the eyes, but left the mouth of yellow teeth uncovered. It's arms were thickly muscled, but it had a gut the size of a Warthog. It bore no armor save a massive chest plate that looked more like a bib on it, and black boots. The weapon it held it it's hands had a greater muzzle in circumference than his body. What was strange about the weapon was that the part near the handle looked alive. It had a mouth that would open and close with teeth made for grinding.
"What the?" 267 said as the massive demon reached back and grabbed something from behind it.
From behind it brought the corpses of a marine and a grunt. As his mind came to a startling revelation the horror of his opponent grew. The demon dropped both corpses into the mouth which than began to grind the two together. 267 may have been undeniably disgusted but he was not horrified to the point of being unable to move. He jumped off the floor and pushed off one crate with his foot soon as his opponent had swiveled the disgusting gun in his direction. Blood, bone, and a piece of a grunt mask occupied the spot he once had. His enemy was bring his arm about to reload, but soon had a very pissed of Spartan in it's face. 267 had both claws extended, which he used one to lodge in the left eye socket and the other to repeatedly smash/claw at it's face.
This did nothing more than anger the demon as it brought around the gun to pistol whip the Spartan. Sensing the shift in the demon 267 jumped off and away. The demon was already in full swing and ended up smashing it's gun into his own face. Upon landing 267 watched the massive demon stumble around in confusion.
"Well at least you hit something." 267 said charging his opponent.
Not having enough lift to reach the face so he settled with stabbing into the gut. He had made a decent sized cut before his on the left arm broke. 267 was no prepared for this as he slightly stumbled. More on instinct than intuition he raised both of his arms in front of him in an X fashion and rolled with the hit of the fist. Mid-way through the parabolic arc he rolled and landed on his feet.
Staring at his opponent he watched as it took the broken blades out of it's gut. In it's hand the blades looked the size of tooth picks. It gave a deafening roar clearly pissed, but unimpressed by the size of the blades. Too make matters worse a second demon of the same size came crashing through behind him cutting off his only avenue of retreat. This one was turned and roared at him as well.
"There no way my luck is that bad." 267 murmured as he was now caught between the two gluttonous giants.
The new demon behind him began charged with a warbling war cry. 267 ran toward the one he was engaging earlier with another of his hair brain ideas. The one in front of him leveled the barrel at him, but he was far to small and to nimble to get a proper bead. 267 quickly closed the distance to the massive demon and activated his plasma sword in his right hand. First he jumped off the floor and focused all of his momentum into the creature's left knee. It was jarring hit, but was one that was rewarded with breaking the creature's knee joint. Second he jumped off the knee to the creature's gun arm. With his plasma sword he cut the hand off at the wrist. Before the gun had begun to tip he had shifted his momentum with the demons amputated arm. Reaching forward he grabbed the massive weapon by the muzzle. Using his body as a pivot point the brought the mouth of the gun onto the demon's head. The teeth of the gun latched onto the head and began to chew. The entire momentum of the demon had come to a sudden halt at having the head chewed off the body. Once his feet hit the ground he threw the muzzle of the gun into the innards of the first demon from the slit he made on it's gut. Upon throwing the muzzle into the gut his hand wrapped around the trigger. He gave the demon a moment of realization before he pulled the trigger.
The body of the demon tensed before it slackened and began to fall forward. 267 suddenly realized that he may be crushed under the weight of the creature and braced for impact. When the impact never happened he opened his eyes and saw that the massive body demon was being supported by the massive gun which was now propped against the floor. Relief flooded through the Spartan's mind before he was nicked in the back of the head. Turning his head he saw the mouth of the demon gaping open, trying to take a bite out of him. He had blasted out the entire chest and back of the creature and it still refused to accept the fact that it was dead. Taking his plasma blade he severed the top of the head. It fell immediately to the ground. As he stared at half of the head he felt the tongue which still attached to the mouth hit him.
"That's just twisted." 267 somewhat disgusted.
Moving forward he got out from under the corpse. A groaning to his back made him turn around hurriedly fists at the ready. Nothing behind him moved. The groan came again this time from above him. Looking up he saw a mound of corpses dumped into a dumpster sized well dumpster on it's back. As the groan intensified he saw that the mound of bodies was coming toward him. He didn't have time to run as both Covenant and Human bodies were dumped onto him.
Nothing moved from the mound of corpses. There was a settle movement of a few bodies at first before the body of a Brute Chieftain was thrown off the mound. Standing at his full height on the hill of corpses the Spartan had only one thing to…yell "That's so fucking nasty!"
Half walking half stumbling the Spartan eventually made his way off the corpses. Taking a moment to catch his breath once more he readied himself for more physical exertion. His moment was up as a figure camouflaged in shadow charged at him with physical harm on the mind. Acting quickly he caught the punch. He reached for his pistol while at the same time taking in the sight of his opponent. It was slightly shorter than him, roughly the size of a normal human, clad in pitch black armor. It had the same features as a human, two arms, two legs, and five fingers on each hand. One of the only features that stood out was a pair of red goggles. He had nearly unclipped his pistol from it's holster when he caught movement to his side. The strike was fast, about as fast as him so he had absolutely no time to block the kick. Once again he was sent flying through a series of crates. While he was still in the air a third opponent came down straight at him. He was not prepared for this and was sent to the ground with this new opponent on top of him. As they landed the ground cracked sending dust everywhere.
The other two clad in entire black stayed back and waited to see what would happen. They didn't have to wait long as they heard a loud smack and their compatriot was sent flying past them.
"You guy's don't know how bad you've pissed me off." 267 said getting up.
267 reached for his pistol once more only to feel it missing. Looking around 267 could not find it, and realized that it would be pointless to search for it amongst the dark corridors. As he turned back to face his opponents he saw that all three of them had joined together at the breach. All three of them turned away and sent out bolts of red lightning to the corpses. 267 had a sinking feeling about this as he guessed what was happening. All of the Covenant and Human corpses rose up as if given new life. The three in turned to face him with a wall of zombies at there back. To make matters worse baton's attached to a cord appeared in their hands. Blue lightning arced up and down the length of the baton.
"Great, I'm fighting Demon Ninja's wielding nun-chuck glow sticks with a host of Zombies to boot. I guess my luck is that bad. At least I have the proper tool for the job." he said as he activated his plasma blade in one hand and drew his knife in the other. He didn't want to use both blades at once just yet. Both sides charged at another and the bloody melee ensued.
In under five minutes most of the zombies laid in pieces on the ground and once again were dead. Scratches and burns covered the entire armor of the Spartan. Luckily none of the strikes had pierced its thickness.
267 sliced the last zombiefied Brute in half while simultaneously dodging a strike from his ninja-like opponents. More of the Zombies came at him only to fall like freshly cut grass. It didn't matter how many they threw at him as their numbers were quickly subsiding and he was still willing to fight.
The last zombie was a Marine that was cut in half by his blade. Now all that remained was him and them. Each one of them was panting heavily from the physical exhaustion.
"Come on." 267 said as he felt the effects of time slowing and speeding up simultaneously as he entered the effect called Spartan Time.
All three charged at once. 267 opted to tackle the one in the middle first. He flipped the knife and caught it by the blade. Cocking his arm back he threw the knife straight at the center one's head. It hit true between the demon's eyes and the demon was stopped dead in it's tracks. Putting away his plasma blade he strode forward and ripped both batons out of both its arms. With baton's in hand blocked the first few strikes from the demon on his right before he slipped through it's guard and stabbed the electrified baton up through the demon's chin. With only one baton in hand he confronted the final demon. It's strikes were fast and furious, but he was faster and fiercer. Ducking low he took the baton and shoved it through the top of the knee cap into the leg. The demon buckled with the loss of it's leg and fell backward. Before it could rise back up 267 took one of his Covenant Energy Swords and plunged it into the demon's chest. It gave one last gasp of pain before it succumbed to death.
267 relaxed finally feeling triumphant. It was short lived however as a blast of air rocked him off his feet, but this time he didn't go through the container's but rebounded of them. He tried to rise up, but a sickening pain seared through his abdomen and pinned him into the floor. Looking up he saw a burning red blade piercing him. His eyes traveled further to the Demon Messenger who still had her hands on the blade.
"This is the gift of the Destroyer to the prodigal son." the demon messenger said clearly and carefully to be understood.
267 stared at her with mix of hate and resentment. He couldn't die here like this. Not here, not now.
As he fought to stay conscious he saw a two pronged blade pierce the Demon Messenger through the back to her nipples. Pain spread across her face as she entered her death throes. Before he lost consciousness he saw the killer of the Messenger and began to shake him.
He heard his savior say "Spartan, stay awake…Spartan".
It sounded like Zuka…but he wad dead wasn't he?