Chapter 5

I had just sat down to eat when Jaynè walked into the kitchen dining area and leaned against the wall in front of me.
"Um do you need something Jaynè?"
"No. I'm just standing guard."
"would you like to sit down then?"
There was a moment of silence as the Zealot looked at the chair before she tried to sit in it. Luckily the chair was bigger than normal chairs as she barely fit in the chair with her armor. Once she was sure the chair wasn't going to break on her she reached up and removed her purple helmet with her helmet hissing as it depressurized. It took all of my training and will power not to choke on my food as Jaynè's face was fully revealed from under the shadow of the helmet; however, I couldn't stop myself from saying, "Wow."
At my comment her cheeks went slightly purple as she placed her helmet on the table.
"That feels much better. That helmet can be stuffy sometimes."
"I agree. Even this helmet can get stuffy but I'm pretty sure neither of these helmets are as bad as the Spartan's helmets."
"Spartans?"
"I believe your kind calls the best one demon."
"is that what a Spartan is?"
"yep."
There was nothing but silence as I ate and Jaynè fiddled with her helmet. The peace and silence was broken by the comms coming alive.
"Casey. You there?"
"Yeah I'm here Jim."
"I'm coming up on the building you designated with two allies in tow and a few civilians we managed to save. I hope you guys don't have any surprises for me because you guys know I hate surprises."
"Wellllll."
"What is it Casey?"
"Um Devi can tell you about his two um friends himself."
"Hey leave me out of this transmission."
"Don't argue right now you two just make sure your allies behave and don't cause any trouble."
"Roger. We'll start removing the barricade to let you in."
"ok Jim out."
I let a sigh as I put the rest of my meal down and grabbed my mini-gun from beside the chair and started to move towards the front of the hotel but before I did I asked Jaynè, "Do you and Rechèl have cloaking on your armor?"
"yes but mine is damaged from all of the plasma damage it sustained."
"Alright well stay hidden while staying nearby so that I can introduce you two to Jim."
"I'll pass the instructions onto Rechèl."
"alright. Well let's go meet our team leader."
As I walked out I heard the sound of her helmet pressurizing then lock into place. I shook my head at how loud the helmet was but I had other things to do. Once I reached the main entrance I saw Casey carefully moving the stuff on the the barricade and Sarah up on overwatch with the two Elites hiding behind her with Rechèl cloaked.
"alright team we're here."
"alright Jim almost done moving the barricade over."
Out of curiosity at who could possibly be with Jim I looked out the window through the barricade and what I saw made my blood run cold. Standing beside Jim was the Master chief and behind them was at least twenty civilians with about ten marines surrounding them.
"Um guys."
"yes Devi?"
"He has the Master Chief with him and about a platoon of marines and civilians."
At my revelation I saw out of the corner of my eye the two Elites stiffen as well as Casey and Sarah.
"What do we do Devi?"
"I'm not sure but we need to hurry up or else Jim is going to get suspicious."
With that said Casey sped up moving the barricade enough to let the spartan through. Once the barricade was moved I moved into a defensive position and revved my mini-gun. As soon as Jim stepped in he saw us with our weapons primed and ready to fire if need be.
"Woah. I'm actually impressed that you guys didn't let your guard down."
There was a little bit of rustling coming from the barricade as the Master Chief struggled to get through.
"oh and guys this is the legendary Master Chief."
If I wasn't afraid for my new allies lives I would have been standing in awe at his armor. Once Master Chief got through he looked at us and looked at each of our load-outs and when he looked at my load-out he tilted his head and spoke some of the few words you can get out of him, "Nice load-out kid. It's rare to see one of those in action now a days."
When he complimented me I just stood there in complete shock as it was super rare to get him to talk when he's out of combat.
"Um. Thank you sir."
We just stood there in awkward silence as the civilians and marines filed through the opening and went under the grand staircase towards the kitchen and right under our Elite friends. Once the last of the civilians and marines were through Master Chief's AI appeared in his hand looking a little uneasy.
"John. Our motion sensors are picking up unidentified Elites in the area. They could be a threat to the survivors and us."
At the AI's exclamation I had gone ridged and I had turned ghostly white. The Master Chief must have noticed because as soon as I had stiffened he looked at my and said, "What's going on soldier? Are there Elites here."
Before I could even respond the AI cut me off.
"Sir his vitals just sky rocketed. He must have an Elite here in the building."
"So you have some Elite allies eh? Good."
When he said that it felt like I had been punched in the gut and before I could recover from my confusion he said the thing that I least expected, "Alright Arbiter. You and your soldiers can decloak."
once he said that an Elite wearing silver armor appeared next to the Spartan and they stood about equal hight but the surprises didn't stop there as the sound of two energy swords igniting could be heard from upstairs and not long after Jaynè and Rechèl were being walked down by two male Elite spec ops unit with their hands up and an energy sword behind them. Jaynè was the first to speak, "Well this is embarrassing."
"I agree. Um Arbiter was it? Could you please tell your spec ops to put their swords away. We're on the same side!"
The Arbiter only chuckled at her while the spec ops Elite behind her stepped back silently which gave me the impression that a female Elite's temper is something you don't want to ignite. The Arbiter waved his hand to stand down and once the two soldiers put away their swords there was an audible thump as the two females knocked out the males making them land hard on the ground. The one that got the worst hit was the one that was behind Rechèl. As Rechèl walked away from the two hurt males she exclaimed, "Jerks." By this time everyone was laughing at the two Male Elites predicament but the Arbiter stopped laughing when he saw the glare the female Elites were giving him. Once everyone had calmed down and the two male Elites were helped up and the massive exchange of information began.
(A couple of hours later.)
"So that's all there is to know about how I met Rechèl and Jaynè."
"hmm well at least they survived the turn. Oh before I forget the shorter spec ops is Von Adamee and the taller one is Stye Quantemee."
As he introduced them they greeted us and I could tell that Von wasn't to keen on standing close to Rechèl since she is the one to hold a grudge. As we conversed among ourselves Chief just stood back watching us talk amongst each other then everyones comms came alive and an urgent message came thru.
"Attention all surviving ground troops the Covenant are about to glass New Mombassa and everyone within a mile of the super carrier's center are to get as far as they can while everyone else is to brace for impact."
As the transmission ended all of the humans ran to the glass to see that the Covenant super carrier was on the other end of the city but we didn't want to risk the shockwave so we ordered everyone to take cover. Not long after the last person took cover the super carrier fired its beam into the planet. One of the civilians was dumb enough to stand up when the laser stopped but before anyone could tell him to get back down the shockwave hit our building hard. It was a sudden blast of hot air shattering all of the windows on and in the building as well as launching the one civilian who stood up to the back wall. When the civilian hit the wall there was a loud snap and all of the soldiers instantly knew that he was dead. After a few minutes of waiting and checking to see if there was going to be a second shockwave everyone got out of their cover with most of the civilians running to check on the civilian that had been launched from the blast. None of us were surprised when the civilians reported that he was dead.
"alright. Everyone we need to get to the extraction point and those who are able find a weapon and prepare to move."
"Yes sir!"
With what weapons everyone had there were roughly twenty assault rifles, fifteen sub-machine guns, forty pistols, and five rocket launchers. I was actually surprised by the sheer number of weapons we had but experience has taught me that with this many weapons the ammo would run out faster but I didn't let that detour me as I switched my belt to a fresh belt of ammo for my mini-gun. Once we all had our gear checked everyone started to move out with the chief out front.