"Ugh… W-what happened?"
Within the ruins of pelican Echo 543, a tall man with black hair, blue eyes and dressed in a green bodysuit lifted his head up. It was Marcus. As his vision kicked back into his eyes, he saw that the resting area had been bent upwards slightly and that there were three large holes in it, one in the ceiling and two on the left wall.
"Ooooooh!" someone groaned, a female voice.
Marcus looked down the resting area and saw another woman in a green bodysuit raise her head. It was Tanya. She had a small bruise over the side of her head and part of her bodysuit was a little ripped on the shoulder. Next to her, Stinger and Alice sat up, both groaning but they looked okay. Then, Tyler gasped a little as he sat up rubbed the back of his head. Next to him, Alima groaned and sat up. Both were okay.
The marines around them, however, were not. They did not have the bodysuits to protect them and so when the pelican crashed, all of them were killed instantly. Marcus sighed, guilt filling him like water filling a tank, as he looked down at the body of one of the marines.
Survivor's guilt he thought to himself.
Then, an explosion outside brought the group back into reality and Stinger looked out of the resting area.
"Whoa!" he exclaimed. "Look where we are, guys!" he said.
The rest of the group scrambled to the end of the resting area and looked out. In front of them were two enormous landing clamps that were holding a large shape. Their eyes followed the clamp up and they found themselves looking at the bottom of a large ship. It was the one they were hoping to escape on. It was the Axiom.
"At least we arrived to it," Stinger said.
"Yeah, but the problem is now we have to find a way to get on board," Tyler replied.
CRASH! Another long sword fighter crash landed nearby and exploded in a fireball. A banshee flew overhead, firing an ion blast onto the remains of the long sword fighter just to finish off any one that might have survived the crash.
"Hey you guys," a voice called and the group looked left to see a marine waving at them. "C'mon! We need your help!"
"You guys go on," Marcus said to the group. "I just check the cog pit,"
Tanya nodded. "Alright, let's go," she said and she climbed out of the resting area and ran over to the marine. The rest of the group, apart from Marcus, followed close behind. Marcus ran back the resting area, being careful not to step on or trip over the bodies of the dead marine, to the cog pit.
"Hey Brian!" he called. "C'mon, we have to go!"
He stuck his head inside the cog pit and went wide-eyed at what he saw.
The co-pilot was lying dead with his head against the control panel, which was bent and smashed in some places, having been killed instantly. Brian was lying upright in his seat with his neck cocked to one side.
Oh no! Please don't be dead! Marcus mentally pleaded as he stepped near Brian's body and placed two fingers on his pulse on his neck.
Marcus sighed. He was dead. The crash must have broken his neck. At least, though, he could be thankful it was a quick death rather than a long and painful one.
"Okay, we need you guys to help defend the Axiom," a voice from outside ordered and Marcus looked through the smashed cog pit window to see the marine leading the squad towards a large building.
The building was about seventy feet tall and about twenty five feet wide with a large cube section base. On the top of that base was a smaller cube section that had a large circular platform placed on the top of it. Coming out of the platform were two metallic cylinders about ten feet tall. Sticking out of the cylinder were two thick pipe-like section that led up to a large cube shaped object, that was connected to the top of the cylinders, with a large cannon sticking out of the front of it. On the back of the cube section of the cannon was a small seat. Going up the sides of the two cube sections of the building were flights of stairs that came to an end at the top of the smaller cube section placed on top of the larger cube section next to a ladder that led up to the platform. The entire thing was a turret emplacement.
Marcus ran out of the cog pit and down the resting area to the end of the pelican. He climbed out and ran over to join his squad, who were waiting for him at the bottom of the flight of stairs, who was explaining the situation to them.
"We think the Covenant might try and launch a few ships to start glassing the planet," he told them. "We can barely hold the line in the skies so we need you guys to help us,"
"Don't worry," Marcus told the marine as he reached them. "We won't let any Covenant get near the Axiom,"
"Thanks, man," the marine replied. "Alright, get to your stations. Let's go,"
The marine ran off and turned the corner at the end of the building. Marcus ran up the steps with his squad close behind him. As they climbed higher, a better view of the landscape became visible. When they reached the top of the base cube section, Marcus stopped and gazed out over the great expanse of land in front of him. The desert-like landscape stopped only a few hundred metres away from the turret emplacement. Beyond that was the grasslands and fields that he and his squad had seen many times over the past few days. A few hundred feet behind the border where the desert and the grasslands met was a small river with a metallic bridge going over it. A road led to the bridge and from the bridge far off into the distance. For a moment, Marcus was entranced by the view and he forgot about the war going on all around him.
"Marcus!" Stinger's voice called from behind him, snapping him back into reality. He looked over his shoulder to see Stinger at the front of the group running up the stairs. "You with us, man?"
Marcus shook his head slightly. "Yeah, right, sorry," he replied. "Okay, let's head up to the top of the emplacement,"
They continued up the steps towards the ladder at the top of the smaller cube section. However, just as they reached the ladder, their radios suddenly crackled to life with activity.
"COVENANT SHIPS HAVE ENTERED THE ATMOPSHERE!"
"We've got reports of glassing all over the planet!"
"All UNSC ships are to leave immediately! I repeat, all UNSC ships are to leave immediately!"
Then, they heard a transmission that made their hearts almost stop.
"A Covenant CCS battle cruiser is in the atmosphere! All UNSC fighters…wait! Oh God! It's-It's descending! It's headed towards the Axiom!"
The group looked at each other with wide-eyes. A Covenant ship was heading towards the Axiom! If it got to it, then the ship was doomed.
Marcus rushed over to the ladder and began climbing up it as quickly as he could. The others followed close behind him.
Suddenly, a light lit up the sky behind him and Marcus, who was about three quarters up the ladder, turned and looked behind him to see a barrage of enormous purple blasts shoot down from the clouds and hit the ground, exploding on impact and making the ground shake. Then, a large shadow appeared in the clouds and it gradually grew bigger. Then, after watching it for about ten seconds, the bottom of a CCS battle cruiser appeared out of the clouds.
Marcus swore under his breath and climbed up the rest of the ladder to the platform at the top. When he reached it, he ran over to a small circular hole near the other end of the platform and stepped in it. At once, he shot up into the air towards the seat at the back of the cube section as if he had been grabbed by a pair of invisible hands. He slowed to a halt next to the seat and he grabbed hold of it and pulled himself into it.
"Hurry, Marcus!" Alima called from below.
Marcus looked up at the sky and saw the CCS battle cruiser flying closer towards them. By the rate it was moving, he had only a few moments to stop it before it reached the Axiom.
He activated the cannon and grabbed hold of a control stick and pulled it backwards so the cannon rose up until it was pointing at the bottom of the Covenant ship. He grabbed the firing stick and pushed down on the trigger. At once, the cannon emitted a loud charging noise and Marcus saw a bar on the control panel in front of him turn green and then yellow and then orange before finally stopping at a dark red colour. He and the others looked up at the cannon hopefully and began mentally praying it would fire in time to stop it from destroying the Axiom and the many hundreds on board it.
Finally, the level in the bar on the control panel reached the top and emitted a loud beeping sound. Marcus grabbed the firing stick and pushed down on the trigger. At once, the cannon shook violently as it fired a super magnetic projectile towards the Covenant ship.
"Cover your ears!" Marcus shouted down to the group, who obeyed and crouched low or dived to the platform floor, covering their heads and ears. Marcus quickly got out of the seat and jumped into the anti-gravity lift and hovered down to the platform and dived down on the platform floor, covering his head and waiting for the inevitable explosion.
BOOM! The air itself seemed to explode as the charged projectile slammed into the bottom of the CCS battle cruiser. Marcus looked up a little to see hundreds of explosions erupt along the bottom of the cruiser. Two large explosions blew out from the hanger on the left side of the ship, throwing out large chunks of debris and ship and fighter remains into the air. Marcus placed his head down again and covered it as much as he could with his arms.
Finally, a second major explosion blew the ship in two. The back section of the ship fell down to the grassland surface and crashed into it, making the ground rumble. The front half exploded again, throwing large chunks into the air. Some of the group looked up and went wide-eyed.
"Quick, get off the platform!" Stinger shouted.
"What is it?" Alice asked him and he responded by pointing up at the sky. She looked up and saw the reason why.
A large piece of what had been one of the spires on the bottom of the craft had shot up into the air when the front half of the ship had exploded and it was falling, directly towards them.
The group ran over to the ladder and slid down it to the top of the smaller cube section and began running down the steps as fast as they could. Above them, the section of spire fell down towards the turret hundreds of miles an hour as Reach's gravity pulled the object in.
Moments later, it slammed into the turret emplacement, destroying it completely.