"Asymmetrical warfare. Even in the face of overwhelming numbers, a single determined irregular can wreak untold havoc with the proper combination of surprise, misdirection and timely application of direct force."
- Sierra Eric-239, instructing Fireteam Chimera, late 2557.
It started with tremors.
The quakes started around the base of the support tethers. Inciting detonations; ground trembling thumps unseen to those at street level. You felt them though, that steady rumble; like a giant's stomach rumbling. Glass window panes rattled in their frames, sometimes shattering in some cases. Car alarms of those few vehicles not cannibalised by the war set off simultaneously. Building alarms too. A keening cacophony of horns and tooting sirens heralded the city's destruction. Water mains burst and sent geysers of cooling mist high into the air, painting the sun-baked concrete a deeper grey. Nothing happened for an uneasy twenty seconds after that. Insurrectionists across the city looked about in panic, eyes wide; bewildered. The UNSC they could handle. This was an unseen, unanticipated threat; and all the more frightening because of it.
Then the secondary detonations started; a ribbon of fire racing along the nerves of the support tethers, high into the sky above. Nobody missed those.
Then came the third detonation; the most deafening, at the very base of the orbital itself. This was the largest blast to date, and would have been larger, had Chimera not disabled some of the charges within the battered Admin Tower.
Then nothing. For a moment, a stillness reigned. The sky itself seemed deafened by the preceding blasts. The city hung on tenterhooks, as though afraid to breathe. Then came a low, lurching groan; of steel and fibres being pressurised beyond their industrial limits. Then there was a wicked metal whipping crack, as central support cables laced throughout the Orbital tensed to breaking point and then snapped entirely. These had been the last thing holding the Space Elevator's massive support rings in place.
The rings dislodged, slipping from their moorings. Tearing free. More pings, more screeching metal and violent twangs. The groaning lurch reached fever pitch. Weight and intertia did the rest. The rings wrenched free, one by one; discarded across the city like horse shoes over an ant colony. Entire city blocks were smashed apart as they spun down into the streets below. One particularly large chunk ploughed through the glass atrium of the admin tower, severing the connecting walkways on each floor as it tore downward with a ruthlessness only gravity could provide. It fell like a grand piano through a ladder of bamboo walkways. Then the tower itself collapsed in on itself, sliding inward; the top floors pancaking into the floors beneath. The entire Admin district was levelled.
Thousands died. The Insurrectionists who weren't crushed outright were torn apart by a blizzard of tumbling masonry and slicing debris. Hundreds more would die of smoke inhalation, as toxins thrown up by the devastation slowly poisoned them in the weeks to follow. Only those who submitted to UNSC custody would survive, and even then would face the prospect of immediate incarceration and life imprisonment.
A blinding plume of dust welled up over the city, blurring the horizon from view. The haze would hang there for three full days. There remained a vast emptiness in the skyline, where Orbital Two – the very resource the UNSC had been sent to protect – simply no longer was.
Conspiracy theorists noted the timing of the nets returning to functionality. A full three seconds before the catastrophe, the virus gripping the planet suddenly abated. In Argjend, fire suppression systems re-activated in a great hissing chorus, and communications nets regained some semblance of local connectivity. In New Cadiz, recording systems across the city – traffic cams, weather and irrigation monitors – sprang back to life in a blurt-surge of data. Just in time to capture the mayhem.
One camera in particular, a forgotten monitoring system mounted on a wooden beam at the edge of an abandoned lot, would prove crucial in the days ahead. It was ancient tech, long since obsolete. Probably worth a few credits in a back-market sale. The lot it safeguarded was no longer of relevance either; a long-since disused car depot. The ancient camera was in a sorry state altogether; set on a rotting platform of dry, brittle wood. The platform had slipped free of its joists, shunting the lens in its perch, tilting it to one side. It now faced up toward the sky, useless for its original purpose. Instead it managed to capture the collapse of Orbital Two square on.
In the months ahead its images - crackling, static-shot and jittery as they were - would become synonymous with post-war civil unrest in the Outer Colonies in 2558. In time, they would spread around the galaxy. Iconic in their devastation.
UNSC forces evacuating the city were spared the worst of it. Those lucky few who had escaped the wayward drones' murderous strafing fire turned about at the sound of the wrenching, mechanical wail as Orbital Two came down. Chidinma, holding Rashid's hand in the back of an open top truck, watched the rings impact with earth splitting force. She rose to her feet, standing tall in the truck and opening the com lines, which had suddenly become clear. She gripped the side rail of the truck so hard it warped in her hand.
"Respirators, everyone!" She barked across the wide band, "Respirators now!"
There was a flurry of commotion throughout the convoy. Rangers and marines snapped masks over their faces. Dust goggles, keffiyehs, even colonial surplus gas-hoods; anything to hand. Medics hastily yanked dust cover blankets over the still-setting biofoam encasing Rashid's leg.
Then the wall of dust swallowed them. The wind whipping them savagely, tugging at their webbing; rattling their equipment pouches like halyards in a harbour. The two remaining Stride members of Stride Team Kodiak, exposed at the rear-guard of the column, had to plant their feet to prevent the dust from buffeting their machines further. Servos purred and sighed as they adjusted to fight the artificial wind slap.
The Battle for New Cadiz had ended as it began, in calamity. To call it a victory for either side would be at best a gross misinterpretation of simple objective facts. The city had ceased to exist as a functioning habitat. Like many of the discarded cities across the galaxy of the 26th century, it would become a tomb; an abandoned ruin, welcoming curious onlookers in future decades to come, and witness mankind's folly.
To the two remaining souls trapped deep beneath the tunnels below, it was but the latest in a series of death traps offered forth by the ruins of New Cadiz.
Viktorya hurled herself bodily, a graceless dive. It saved her life. The tunnel behind her came down, a thousand tonnes of crushing rock and tumbling earth. A single feeble support beam held the groaning earth back, and even then further dust sifted down, ominously. She clambered to her feet and sprinted forward, heart thundering like a jackhammer. She didn't want to die, not like this; like some rat in a cave-in. Enemies she could fight, and welcome in open battle. There was no fighting the relentless crush of the city above.
She rounded the corner. The tunnel ahead was blocked. Nothing but boulders and dark, densely packed earth. The only source of illumination were the running lights on her armour, which had auto-sensed her lack of a helmet and sprang into life to compensate.
The light caught something. With a start she realised it was Damien's hand, peering out from beneath the heaped earth. The TACPAD on his wrist was cracked across its face, and his dark blue armour was all but painted grey by the dust.
She started forward, pulling rocks free and scooping at the heaped dirt. Every action heightened the risk of bringing the rest of the tunnel down upon them, but she didn't hesitate for a second.
The hand twitched. She heard a groan. Redoubling her efforts, Viktorya took his arm by the wrist and pulled.
Damien's upper torso emerged from the rocks. His hair was matted with grime, and a savage cut above his right temple was pouring blood. His eyes were closed, but he was alive. His armour had locked moments before the tunnel had come in around him, his arms covering is head; a reflexive reaction that had surely saved his life. It was only the merest chance that a rock hadn't directly pulverised his skull. Viktorya felt for a pulse. It was there, faint but steady. She gave him a shake. Nothing.
Then she slapped him on the cheek. Hard.
Damien coughed, spluttered. He squinted up at her through eyes pinched with grit. She too was filthy.
"Worse sights you could wake up to I guess." Damien croaked with a weak smile.
Viktorya just scowled at him.
Together they shook him free of the debris. Damien's armour was heavily dented; the running lights flitted on and off limply. Everything ached.
Damien checked his TACPAD. To his surprise it was functioning, despite the open crack in the monitor. Kaizen's interference had vanished as quickly as it had appeared.
His own vitals made for dismal reading. Three broken ribs, numerous compression injuries and countless lacerations. The suit had spared him the worst of it, but he was firmly status orange.
Damien swiped back into the root menu. A flick of his finger tip brought him to the squad menu.
Chidinma was the only one Status Green. Viktorya was in the same boat he was, and Rashid hovered ebbed and flowed at a dangerously dull amber-red. He blinked when he came to the last name on the list, wondering if his soot-stung eyes deceived him.
Status Red.
It was a mistake. It had to be. The systems had gone haywire, the entire network had gone stark raving mad. This was no different. Damien tapped the refresh button in the corner of the screen twice, impatiently. Still the display showed the same:
Spartan Luke Grey, Sierra 465 – Status Red.
No vital signal, total bio-com loss. It was the simple finality of it. There was no keen wailing of a failed cardiac signature, no shrill beeping or morbid fanfare. If there had been he'd missed it, blacking out as the world came down around him in a deluge of muck and silt. Now only a single red status icon stared at him, blinking silently, demanding his acknowledgement.
Damien tried to piece it together. God how his head pounded. He had just reached the annex when he had heard the explosions from the surface, had felt in his bones and his rattling teeth the aftershock as the destruction spread. Then came the collapse.
The tunnel ahead of him, where Luke had been standing guard was entirely closed to him now; nothing but packed earth and hard rock. Only the heaviest excavation equipment would ever shift it.
Damien rested his hand against the impassive earth wall for a moment, head bowed. Viktorya stood behind him, saying nothing. The dust too was getting to her eyes. Eventually she rested her gauntleted hand on his shoulder, giving it a single squeeze-shake. A prompt, as much as anything else.
Damien nodded, wiping his face, clearing his throat.
Yeah. The mission. There was always the mission. Couldn't lose focus.
"Surface coms?" Damien asked, voice husky.
Viktorya shook her head.
They worked their way through the only channel left to them: the ragged tunnel leading back to the Admin Tower's elevator shaft. This section of the tunnel had been reinforced. That was good: for the Tower above had pancaked itself across the Admin quarter, flattened by the descending Orbital with all the subtlety of a Gravity Hammer on a fence post. By the narrowest fortune the top of the shaft hadn't been plugged entirely with rock.
While one side of the tunnel had collapsed, there was still sufficient room to work their way through. The ducked, they crawled, and shimmied; sometimes shoved to get their way through. The tunnel stank, the limited air congealing with the soiled meat-smell of the crushed Insurrectionists around them.
One of the lift shafts had been completely buried in debris from the collapse above. The other beside it looked much the same. Until Viktorya held a hand up to stall Damien. The other hand pressed a single finger to her lips.
"Listen."
"I don't hear anything." Damien wasn't lying. The keen ringing had faded in his ears, ebbing now to a low hum. He leaned his head forward, straining to hear.
Then he felt it, prickling his filth-caked face. Something coming from up above, the faintest thing.
A breeze.
The Pelican kissed dirt on the outskirts of the ruined city. A fresh contingent of ground troops had established a cordon around the city– Navy personnel for the most part; still dressed in the crisp white ballistic armour adopted by ship-borne personnel. Oddly enough, their colourless uniforms blended well with the dusty sandstorm choking the city. Deserters and shell-shocked survivors emerged from the mist, and were quickly hauled into custody.
This particular group Rebecca travelled with were different. Slope-backed Aviator helmets; impassive face masks and jet black armour. Royal Commandos, they called themselves. As intimidating as they might once have been, they didn't even faze Rebecca now. She was used to dealing with entirely more intimidating company. The commandos were here for one specific purpose: extraction. Rebecca stood with them now, adjusting to the late afternoon chill of an unfamiliar world. They had given her a survival jacket which was easily two sizes too big for her, and such was the effect that she felt all of four feet tall.
There was still no sign of Eric, who had seemingly vanished from the entire system.
"Movement." One of the commandos clipped over the com. There was subtle shift of movement as weapons adjusted, down-sighting.
"Stand down." Another commando reported. "Friendlies."
Two figures emerged from the mist. Too large to be human.
Rebecca's hand went to her mouth instinctively. She had only ever seen Chimera in parade ground muster, or at worst muddied after in-field exercises. Since the mission began, she had been watching on the cams. Watching from Chimera's eyes. When they finally emerged, and the extraction team saw what had become of them, somebody let out a horrified gasp. She realised it was her.
Viktorya had Damien's arm slung over her shoulder, though she herself shuffled with a pronounced limp. They seemed to prop one another up. Their helmets were missing, and their eyes squinted through smeared muck and dried blood. Their armour was no different; gone was the parade-ground lustre, replaced by bullet-chippings, dents and fire-scoring. Entire sections of Damien's armour had lost its blue paint colour, instead having been sheered to the base steel beneath. Torn combat clung to their battered suits like dismal garlands.
The commandos rose to meet them, parting in the middle. Respect, and no small amount of fear. The medical teams also dithered, too anxious to approach, giving them plenty of room. There was a hushed awe to the entire procession, as these titans of war trudged home, their killing done.
Rebecca took a hesitant step forward, froze. She realised there was only two of them.
The Spartans made no eye contact with the commandos as they passed. Only Damien offered Rebecca the briefest of nods. She didn't blame him. The man had had a city fall on top of him, and he'd walked away, in a quite literal sense.
And that was it. Chimera settled into their support chairs, content to let the medics fret and fuss over them. Damien stared straight ahead, numbed by the intensity of it all, oblivious. Swallowing, he brought up the squad status listing on his broken TACPAD; dragged Luke's name over to the MIA column. Mission statistics began running through his head automatically. Five hundred and sixty three combat kills (confirmed); and that wasn't even counting the possibles. Damien himself had contributed to over one hundred of those kills. As the loading ramp purred close his glance caught the mission clock in the top corner of the battered TACPAD.
Seven hours had passed since they made land fall.
He closed his eyes, and rested his head against the cold skin of the deck wall behind him.
The hatch hissed closed, cutting out the sunlight and enveloping him in darkness.
And so the Battle of New Cadiz drew to a close. That is not to say that hostilities were at an end, or that fighting would not continue in the region for the long months that were to follow. Many Insurgents took to the surrounding wasteland, and waged a stubborn if largely ineffectual campaign against the UNSC forces dispatched to hound them. Of greater concern were those who filtered back into UNSC society, establishing themselves in the now booming refugee slums that threatened to overwhelm Argjend and redefined the city's landscape.
The efforts of Task Force Enduring Resolve had crushed the rebel uprising on Granica V, but at tremendous cost. Its failure to secure the Orbital would be buried under red tape for years, though the true reason for this would only become apparent in the months ahead.
As a conflict it was peripheral on the galactic scale. The conflict had begun in March 2558 - and was overshadowed by wider diplomatic missions between the UEG and the Sangheili government. The battle for New Cadiz had kicked off three months later, and raged over a three day period. Net coverage was minimal, primarily on account of the wider interference from both Insurrectionist meddling and the wider grid instability caused by Kaizen's domination of the global networks. It would only appear on the wider Waypoint network some months afterward – meriting minor comment in the editorial section; a talking point for political science academics and would be revolutionaries; or a corner page filler for content strapped editors at best.
The image of Orbital Two collapsing soon became more memorable than the actual context of the conflict that had led to it, and it too would in time be forgotten in the racing pulse of the twenty four hour galactic news cycle; replaced by other, larger battles.
For Fireteam Chimera, it was only the beginning.
Elsewhere.
The drop pod had impacted into the tundra, far from any major population centre, ploughing deep into the marshes of the northern continents. It had been difficult. Kaizen's forcibly triggered Rampancy had meant he'd had to blow the manual release bolts on the pod to force it clear of the Carpathia, and to avoid electronic tracking he'd killed all but the most rudimentary propulsion systems. He'd steered the pod in by eye alone, aiming for the largest landmass he could see.
One of the Northern Continents. They would find the pod quickly, so he moved even faster; careful to double his tracks over every river he came across. He was careful, and this caution slowed him down. He took only what was necessary: his Battle Rifle, a survival pack, stocked with rations; hastily packed. That and the beacon.
It was an unusual design, for a beacon. Too sleek for a standard distress signal; its contours were too moulded, its material too dark compared to the standard, box-bulk units military teams carried to unchartered worlds. It was the only item of cargo he had brought aboard since embarking on Laconia. Smuggled aboard, would have been a more apt description, he reflected.
He carried the beacon over his shoulder as he marched across the rolling hills, making his way toward the mountains beyond. Eventually, miles from where he had originally made landfall, on a high crop overlooking the rolling valleys below, he set it down. He gripped the release handle and let the single transmission light on the side of the unit pulse into life. Steady green across the board.
"Operator-239 to Those Who Listen, come in Those Who Listen. Request resupply. Coordinates to follow."
And the message would repeat.
He waited a full three hours before a response crackled through. No formal identification, no branch identifiers or acknowledgement of the code-name given. Just a crackling, throaty whisper, barely more than static at the vast range the beacon stretched.
"Go ahead 239."
"Request re-supply. Spartan units compromised. They've made their move."
"Arrowhead?"
"Confirmed. Condition Zero is in effect."
"Condition Zero confirmed. A team is inbound to your position. Full resupply included. ETA eight weeks."
"Eight weeks, confirmed."
"Good hunting, 239."
The line went dead. His superiors had given him the all clear; full-resupply on a Condition Zero budget. His shopping list had been quite extensive.
They were feeling generous today.
Behind his faceplate, Eric's lips peeled back in a twisted smile.
Time to go to work.