So here we go chapter 13, sorry about the long update time, my netbook died and i lost a lot of work, plus a lot of stuff going on in real life and what not is the cause but i still manged to get this out for you.
Don't forget to leave a review at the end.
I don't own anything, it all belongs to its respectful owners, as in not me.
UNSC Colony world Shanxi, Yamatai East End, 1459 hours, September 29, 2587
The Challenger tank was the Scorpion's replacement for a reason, it was bigger, better and more fearsome than the older tank. Its engine growled as it turned the street corner to face the platoon of enemy soldiers. Most of the batarians panicked at the sight, the more battle hardened troops stood their ground and tried to organise the green horns. Heavy weapon units were quickly put into effect by the batarians but not before the Challenger fired off its first shot. The 120mm round exploded mid-air behind enemy cover, the thirteen or so troops hiding behind the wall, hoping not to be seen were turned into sickly orange and yellow confetti.
The heavy machine gun on top let loose as well, the armour piercing rounds tore through most cover and punched through batarians armour with ease, leaving the unfortunate soldiers with fist sized holes in their chests or simply blasted their heads apart. Rocket fire and grenades were the batarians counter attack—several shots made it through the anti-missile system and detonated against the golden shields, weakening them.
Becky took the twelve men left round the enemy flank as they concentrated on the Challenger; she led the way as they got into a position on the left flank.
"Felix, you and Vakarian stay here and provide sniper support. Meet us inside." Becky ordered. Her voice was unnaturally cold, distant. It put Adrien on edge slightly to see her act differently from the woman he'd been getting to know over the course of several weeks.
He kept by her as they moved closer to the enemy position, his rifle at the ready. He had learnt pretty early on that despite the gunpowder used in the majority of human weapons, they were not to be trifled with. The bulky looking weapon she had with her, a MA5D she called it, was capable of some serious damage, even against kinetic barriers. From their position they had a completely unobstructed line of fire at the enemy.
"Fire on my go." She ordered, mainly for Vakarian and Felix. Adrien lined up his first shot as he waited for the signal, which came in the form of a younger batarian getting ripped apart from the armour piercing ammo of her rifle. He opened fire and watched two batarians hit the floor before they could even react, another was torn in half as the powerful sniper rifle Felix carried fired, and the slight vapour trail formed from the bullets flight path spoke of the power of the weapon.
Using the seconds they bought by the flanking manoeuvre they quickly rushed forward and wiped out the remaining enemy troops. The apartment buildings once lavishly decorated entrance was now littered with the yellow-y blood of the defenders, their corpses were scattered around, the synthetic polycrete road and sidewalk were covered in blood and internal organs that had been spilt out, brain matter and skull fragments stained a wall and small fires burnt as munitions set whatever material alight.
"Stay with the tank, watch our backsides." Becky ordered the three inside the tank who manoeuvred it into some cover. "Medhurst take your team up through the southern stairwell, Victus you're with me on the north." She said as Felix and Vakarian re-joined them in the lobby.
"Got it, you heard the lady, get moving!" Medhurst barked at his team, the six of them headed for the stairs on the south side with the AGR following behind them.
Adrien took point as they moved up the stairs, their boots making a steady thud-thud-thud as they moved. The building was only fifteen stories tall, for which he thanked the Spirits, inside the upper floors was little resistance, some women and children who had decided to hide in the apartments along with some slaves who had managed to survive. Bursting through the door to the roof Adrien was forced to fall back—literally to avoid a torrent of gunfire aimed at them, thankfully for him Becky was only two steps beneath him and caught him.
"Granite where are you?" Becky shouted over the Com, the Sergeant with a strange accent was quick to respond.
"Bit busy here, you're on your own for the moment, I found a bomb inside the fucking building, disarming it now… I think."
"You think? YOU THINK? What do mean you think?"
"I mean I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing, it is an alien bomb after all. But they don't call me 'Ten bombs Nick' for no reason you know."
"Don't do anything stupid Medhurst, I'll send one of the Turians round, he'll know what he's doing." She barked at the other Sergeant before turning to the other Turian. "You, go over there and help them out, with that bomb and try to figure out why they planted it there in the first place."
The Turian nodded and moved back down to go round and help with the bomb. Adrien watched him go before turning back to the door, batarian fire had ceased, probably to cool down from overheating them. Becky took the brief pause in enemy fire to lob flash bang grenade, they moved out from the door and into cover on the roof when the batarians were disorientated from the powerful flash of light and sound wave, he threw a grenade at two batarians behind a ventilation unit, the resulting detonation caused them to fly in multiple directions and cover their friends in blood and bone fragments.
The roof was split into two sections; the lower section and upper section, they were separated by a metal set of steps and half a dozen feet. There must have been six or seven batarians on the lower half with twice that number providing support from the top. Adrien leaned out from behind a ventilation unit and let out a burst from his assault rifle and shredded the torso of an unlucky batarian before he shifted his aim to take out one of the batarians on the upper half of the roof.
"Move forward, come on!" Becky yelled over the gunfire, she stood and took out two batarians from two short bursts from her rifle, mass effect rounds bounced and scratched her armour, some even caused visible dents and caused her to stagger slightly. The ODSTs didn't hesitate and joined her, taking out the witless conscripts with an unfortunate amount of ease. Adrien and Vakarian also stood, their shields flared as rounds struck them, it didn't take too long after that for the joint human-turian team to remove the remaining resistance, and reach the jammer.
Becky placed the C-12 on the jammer and was moving back into a safe distance when Felix called out to her.
"Hey Sarge! Got a live one here."
Becky stopped and looked over and sure enough one of them was still alive, trying to claw its way out of Felix's boot. She walked over and kicked it before Felix could even move his foot, she leant down and grabbed it and held it up.
"I am going to fucking kill you, got that? Now lucky for you I'm on a time limit so—adios." She finished the sentence by throwing him over the edge of the roof, his screams quickly stopped with a sickening splat and crunch of bones as he hit the sidewalk below.
Hitting the detonator on the C-12 she watched the jammer list and then collapse over the side of the building, the coms were quickly filled with a mass of voices, some asking for air strikes, others asking for an EVAC.
"Command, this is Sergeant Coulson, all jammers are disabled, I repeat all jammers are down." She reported over the coms.
"Copy that Sergeant, good job, where's Lieutenant Shepard?" the Captains voice answered.
"Dead Captain, he didn't make it." Becky replied, she sat down by ventilation unit the rest of them joined her as they sat down together in the rain.
"Shit, understood Sergeant, I've got a bird on its way to pick you up." Dixon informed them; just as she finished Granite team came onto the roof and joined the sitting members of Echo 1-1. They sat in silence while they waited; it took not five minutes for the pelican to show up and take them back to friendly lines. As they flew over the city they saw armoured columns push through enemy lines, a large plume of smoke rose up from the south.
"What happened over there?" Becky asked the pilot.
"Four eyed fuck bags dropped a building on the Spartans to try and stop them advancing."
"Did it work?" Becky asked.
"What do you think?" the pilot replied with his own question.
Becky let out a snort and shook her head; the batarians really didn't know what they were up against.
Yamatai Industrial District, Shanxi Tether Complex, Tether loading Bay 0-3,
"Two, use the Jackhammer to take out the sentries. Three, Four flank round and hit them from the side. Five you're with me." The lead figure questioned, a green acknowledgment light flickered on his HUD to answer him.
He held up three fingers to the other four hulking soldiers behind the ten foot wall at the very edge of the loading compound for the space tether. Just behind the wall stood two sentries and nearly twenty Batarian SpecFors, whatever they were doing here didn't matter, Fire team Zuma was here to put a stop to it, capture the tether and to take it up to the Crown in orbit and to take control of the station.
As he folded a finger away to indicate two seconds until they moved, another finger went down a second later. Upon zero seconds he motioned for Two to move, the rocket launcher wielding Spartan jumped on top of the wall and fired, the two automated sentry guns exploded in two glorious fire balls. Three and Four rushed round the side to catch the aliens from behind as Two jumped off the wall and One and Five jumped up.
The SpecFors moved into cover as quickly as possible but the Hard-light weapons and perfect shooting from the two Spartans cut the number down from twenty to fourteen. Jumping down from the wall One and Five landed silently and moved forward, Two joined them seconds later. The small rounds used by the batarians barely caused their shields to flicker as they impacted, the batarians were unable to move or lean out of cover and supress the three advancing Spartans, the few that did dare had their heads burnt out by the powerful energy based weapons.
"Throwing pulse grenade!" Five shouted, as he threw the Forerunner grenade. Seconds later the grenade detonated, causing the nearby SpecFors to shout in alarm as their weapons, shields and all other forms of technology on their persons started to malfunction before the grenade detonated a second time. With the pulse from the second detonation the batarians were literally turned into nothing but dust.
Behind cover from the Spartan teams' assault the SpecFors thought they might stand a chance against the super soldiers if they stayed in cover and worked together, this however changed as two more of the soldiers started firing from the batarians exposed rear, fighting on two sides against a superior foe was the cause of the SpecFors defeat at the loading bay for the tether.
Walking over the still smouldering corpse of the batarian Special Forces the Spartan team moved to the elevator, the cart itself was in the loading bay and had sturdy looking boxes packed away inside ready for transport—it appeared the batarians had been in the process of loading the cart before Zuma's arrival.
"Infinity, this is Zuma, we're at loading bay 0-3 and are about to take the wagon up to the Crown." Zuma one said into his radio as he and the rest of Zuma moved into the cargo wagon.
"Understood Zuma, your mission remains the same; take control of the Crown and capture Edan Had'dah alive, he is to face trial for crimes against humanity and the mantle, understood Spartans?" said the voice of the officer in the Tactical Operations Centre aboard the Infinity.
"Understood sir, we'll get it done." The leader replied before disconnecting the Com. The three other members of Zuma were checking out the crates while the fifth member of the squad took his position at the controls panel. At Zuma one's nod Five activated the controls, sealing the wagon and propelling it up the carbon nano-fiber cables at high speed.
Up on the Crown Edan Had'dah was trying to salvage an impossible situation; his fleet was nothing more than debris, even the emergency reinforcement fleet he had in place was any match, his armies were being wiped out entire battalions at a time and now he had hostile soldiers using the cargo transports connected to the station as a means to capture him. He was furious, these pathetic little upstarts were nothing but slaves and yet still they managed not only to build a fleet that rivalled his own but they had also brought in those insufferable Council species and some new aliens that were nearly unstoppable according to his Commanders on the ground.
He watched as the cargo wagon carrying the incursion team move closer to the station, thankfully he had prepared for such an eventuality; the crates inside were filled with thermonuclear devices his forces had confiscated from the stupid little upstarts and enough normal explosives to breach the hull on a Dreadnought. The only thing stopping them from being detected was the shielded linings of the crates. He smiled to himself as he typed in the detonation codes for the nuclear devices, if these people wanted him alive then he would make them earn their prize in blood and sweat.
"Zuma, be advised I'm picking up a signal being transmitted from the Crown to your location." The officers' voice spoke over the Comms again, this time with a hint of urgency in his voice.
"Understood, we'll check it out." The leading member of Zuma responded as his team mates forcibly opened one of the crates, inside was nearly two dozen kilos of plastic explosives surrounding an instantly recognizable Shiva nuke, the display of which was flashing red.
"Open that door Five!" Zuma three shouted. Five moved to the emergency release for the cargo doors.
"Get ready!" Five shouted in warning.
"Just do it!" Zuma one shouted, without a moment's hesitation Five pulled the release, the air tight doors snapped fully open, sucking the air from inside the container and the five Spartans inside into most upper regions of Shanxi's atmosphere. Activating their thruster packs the Spartans headed down towards Shanxi as quickly as possible.
Seconds after Zuma's escape from the container the explosives detonated and for a brief moment a new star existed in the heavens above Shanxi, the blast destroyed the tether, thousands of kilometres of nano-fiber cable whipped about wildly as it was pulled to the surface, debris from the support rings started raining down in the already worn surface.
Inside of Zuma Five's armour the situation was just as chaotic; alarms flashed and wailed in warning while the rest of Zuma disappeared from his HUD, their IFF's winking off one by one until he was alone falling towards the ground, he could vaguely hear the officer aboard the Infinity calling out to his team but he was unable to respond, the shockwave had knocked the breath out of him, that combined with the heat from the blast and from the friction caused by his current re-entry left him unable to speak, at most all he could do was scream as he plummeted towards the ground.
Inside the Forward Operating Base known as F.O.B Guardian, the main base of operations for citadel council coalition forces, General Desolas was busy orchestrating the final blow to the batarian resistance in the coalition sector of the city. When he had heard the human vessel Sevenfold had been shot down and crashed in his area of command he had sent teams to look for survivors and if possible to bring back anything of value from the ship.
"General, the last of the survivors are being brought in now, Commander Walters is with them but he doesn't look good sir, without proper medical care from the humans he might not make it." One of his officers said, Desolas looked up from what he had been doing to thank the officer, when he did he hesitated; it was one of his senior medical officers, his lightly coloured armour was stained with dark red blood, with small patches of blue, purple and green from coalition troops.
"Understood, I'll contact the human command now to notify them, I doubt they'll want him to die—they'll either hang him themselves or give him a medal and call him a hero, either way they'll want him alive."
"Yes sir," the officer replied before going off to see to the wounded.
"Contact General Strauss and inform him we have the survivors from the crash and that Commander Walters is among them. We need them to send over some medics for the wounded." Desolas ordered to another officer before leaving the command centre and heading towards the medical camp. The cold rain had turned the ground into a horrible muddy mush that squelched every time he took a step—if there was one thing he hated more than batarians, it was mud, especially the squishy kind that got between the nooks and crannies of his armour.
Entering the tent where the humans were being held he made way straight for the Commander, after all Desolas wouldn't be alive right now if it wasn't for this man. He noted that some of the humans nearby tensed and looked ready to jump him should he try anything, although he had no intentions of doing anything.
"What happened to him?" he asked one of the nearby humans, the young looking male was hesitant to respond but did so at the others prompting.
"The Commander was flung from the life pod when we landed—well crashed really, the flaps failed to deploy in time and I don't know what happened after that, it was hectic, chaotic even, I joined the Navy so I wouldn't be in this situation." The young human replied.
"Desolas…? That you? Ugh should have known I'd get stuck with you… I've got a case of chronic bad luck." The Commander said weakly, he looked nothing like the man that had visited the Indomitable just a few short weeks ago, his grey uniform was cover with blood and mud and was torn in multiple places, his skin was dirty and stained with dried blood from the smaller cuts and grazes that had already started to heal themselves. The Commander had had his left arm cut off just above the elbow, the most alarming thing however, was the presence of the bandages over his face; they covered a good portion of his right side, including his eye.
"You seem to be lucky enough to have survived that Commander." Desolas replied.
"Luck has nothing to do with it." Philip replied from the bed, his voice was weak, far weaker than it had been during their first meeting together.
"Yes well, you're alive, that's good." Desolas said, "Why did you choose to sacrifice not only your ship but your entire crew as well? I mean why you didn't let everyone down on this planet die while you would have been safe?" he asked the Commander quietly. Walter looked at Desolas with a small weak smile before replying.
"My dad once told me that; 'our choices and memories are all we have left in the end.' I wouldn't be able to live with myself knowing that I could have saved over two million people but chose not to just for my own sake. I did it because it was right." The Commander was whispering by the end, he was losing consciousness. Before he could do anything else a large explosion shook everything, shouting and hurried footfalls was next as everybody on the base either panicked or hurried to do something.
Looking outside he could see why; a brilliant ball of fire lit up the dark storm clouds, it was an incredible sight, both awe-inspiring and nightmare inducing; fire and lighting lashed out from the clouds in what could be described as the wrath of an angry God.