Chapter XLII: Patada En Las Bolas
February 25, 2541 (UNSC Calendar)/
Rio de Juno, Juno, Olympus System
It ain't me, it ain't me, I ain't no senator's son, son,
It ain't me, it ain't me, I ain't no fortunate son, no,
The lyrics of that ultra old-fashioned song were then made difficult to hear by the falcon's rotors. It was pretty fitting for the situation we were in. The supercarrier was still damaged, although scouts had reported that some robotic creatures were working on repairing the three engines. The entirety of the forces on the supercarrier were now waging a conventional war against the UNSC forces on Juno. We had gotten some reinforcements from the other planets in the system now that the evacuation was complete. We were fine on food and ammunition, but we were still outnumbered at least five to one.
Some folks are born with silver spoon in hand,
Lord, don't they help themselves oh,
I watched the barren, featureless land as the two-falcon patrol made their way through the air. So far we hadn't spotted anything of interest, same as the past five times. Most of our drones didn't have the range to fly out this far, but pelicans were to valuable to risk, so falcons it was.
The gunner in the other falcon waved his hands at me. He was one of the Rangers, although I didn't know his name. He made a motion for me to put my helmet on, which I promptly did.
"Anything?" he asked through the radio.
"Don't see anything that you don't," I replied.
"Same ol' same ol'" he said.
I shrugged and he did the same. This time I didn't take off my helmet as I scanned the wasteland that was the ground under us. There were some smoke plumes in the distance, probably Shortsword bombing raids. I could also spot what looked like a large mountain in the distance, only that it wasn't a mountain, it was the Covenant supercarrier. Unable to fly, unable to move, and we still couldn't take it out. Right now command's plan was to eliminate all Covenant ground forces before launching a raid that would weaken the supercarrier's shields. Then the Navy would do their equivalent of a charge and bombard the gargantuan craft with literally everything they had.
So far, it was not going well.
"Patrol-two, what do you see?" asked the pilot's voice in the general channel. "About five clicks south, southeast," he indicated.
"Looks like nothing to me Patrol-one," came the reply.
"When are we scheduled to go back?" asked Patrol-one.
"Half an hour," replied the other pilot.
"Let's go check it out," Patrol-one indicated.
"Roger that," said Two.
Both UH-144 Falcons veered sharply to the right to get in course. I held on to the gun I was manning to avoid falling out of the craft. Pavel was behind me, as usual. Ok, that came out wrong. Pavel was with me… No, still sounds wrong. I guess you get the point. He was manning the other turret on the falcon, and hadn't said a word since we had hopped on the VTOLs. He seemed a little bit tired, but I didn't ask why. Didn't really care either.
"You see that?" he asked. Patrol-one, that is.
"Yes, looked like shimmering in the air."
"What is it?"
That had woken up my interest, I glanced in the general direction of where they had pointed at and suddenly I saw it. It was like an elite in active camouflage only that the size of the flickering air was rather larger than an elite. Some thirty meters tall perhaps. I couldn't make out a discernible shape.
"Wanna take a shot at it Patrol-two?"
"What's the harm eh?"
Both of the falcon's cannons fired in unison at the flickering air. The bullets bounced off it and produced some sparkling. Instants later we were receiving fire from plasma that seemed to originate out of nowhere. Pavel and I shifted our M247s to fire at the invisible target. After a few moments of that something appeared out of nowhere.
The object in question was one of the covvie active camouflage or stealth pylons. It had been hiding itself and a few squads of covvies. Oh, and also a scarab. The massive combat platform turned to face us. It was a wonder that we hadn't been shot at yet, they surely wanted to effectuate a stealth attack. So much for that.
"Veer to the left!" Pavel yelled as the scarab's main gun powered up.
Both falcons veered violently in opposite directions, a stream of heated plasma burned the air where the other falcon had just been and made my eyes see colorful sparking lights. Plasma from small arms was hitting the underside of the falcon and passing dangerously close to me. I shifted my aim towards the brute leaders of the squads, managing to take out two before the falcons flew out of range.
"Patrol-one, did you tag it?"
"Affirmative Patrol-two," he said. "We got him."
The flight back to base was uneventful, other than a couple of 'fucking nosy pilots' from all of the gunners, nothing of interest happened, and we landed in the parking lot of Rio de Juno's supermarket as the pilots were taken away for debriefing.
"Hey Pavel," I said as my friend headed in the opposite direction.
"What?"
"You never finished telling me whatever was that was so bad about having sex with Delacroix."
"Oh right," he noted, looking a little uncomfortable, even behind all that ODST armor. "Well, where was I?" he said, this time speaking through the radio between his and my helmet. "The Christmas dinner was almost over, and she was getting all touchy-feely with me," he started. "Then she asked me if I wanted to go over to her room, she's an XO, so she gets her own room," he explained.
"XO as in hugs and kisses?" I teased.
"Yes, as in hugs and kisses," he said. "Anyways, we were sitting down on the bed, making out, I was showing her some of my Pavel magic when she decided to go to washroom…"
"Washroom?" I asked.
"Well, bathroom, if you prefer, or water closet."
"Ok, go on," I said.
"And when she came out…"
That moment my helmet's radio started acting up. It still had some static every now and them because it had been repaired instead of replaced when the plasma burst fried its radio components. I took it off.
"Sorry man, shit is malfunctioning again," I said as I banged the helmet a few times.
"I don't think that'll work," he observed.
"Well, can't you tell me?" I asked.
He sighed and took off his own helmet, he looked around a couple of times before taking a breath to speak. Then my whole world went completely black.
"Guess who is it?" asked a familiar voice.
"Jesus Christ! Marina, I told you not to scare me like that!" I complained loudly. "I was about to elbow you in the face or something," I joked.
"Sure you were," she said as she uncovered my eyes, allowing me to see a very confused Pavel.
"Where did you come from?" he asked.
"Oh, you know, over there," she said while pointing nowhere in particular. She then gave us one long look, her expression changing slightly. "What were you two guys talking about?" she asked slowly.
"Porn," we both replied simultaneously. It wasn't even planned.
"Suuure," she said, obviously not believing us. "Anyways, I'll see you later Pavel, Frankie, come on."
"Duty calls," I said while shrugging at my friend, who seemed to be breathing hard.
Marina walked me all the way to her pelican while talking about something or other and asking me about my patrol. She seemed a little bit worried when I told her about the scarab, but it was far away and would probably not even come here.
"What was Pavel so worried about?" she asked.
"Oh, nothing, he was about to tell me what was so bad about getting it on with Chloe," I said.
"Lieutenant Delacroix?" she asked.
"The same."
"So…"
"So?"
"So what happened?"
"Oh, you interrupted us," I explained.
"Why didn't he go on?" she asked.
"Well, you're a girl," I told her.
"Well how very observant of you," she said.
"Thanks," I replied, pretending to be proud. She pushed me playfully.
"Why doesn't he want to tell me?" she asked me.
"I told you already," I said. "It's obviously something he doesn't want to share."
"Oh well, nothing I can do about it."
Having said that she pulled me inside of her pelican and closed the bay doors. You can guess what happened next.
"Staff Sergeant?" a voice said.
"What the fuck? Doesn't anybody knock?" I asked. At first I thought I was still in the pelican with Marina, but I remembered returning to my little house before falling asleep.
"Sorry, sir," came the answer. "There's one Lieutenant Wilkins looking for you," the man said.
"What time is it?" I asked.
"Nighttime," he replied.
"Ha, ha."
I stood up and dressed up while following the PFC that had woken me up towards the town hall. Surprisingly, he took a turn before reaching the place and instead headed into another street.
"What did you say the name of the lieutenant was?"
"Wilkins."
"Wilkins? What the hell is he doing here?" I asked, mostly to myself.
The PFS simply shrugged and stopped in front of an undamaged house, He motioned to me that this was the place and I walked in, only to be greeted by two armed and armored men.
"Morning gentlemen," I said as I walked between them.
"Ah, Staff Sergeant, I'm glad to see you're here," a familiar voice said.
"Lieutenant," I replied. "Why do you require me?"
"You're handy with a knife, aren't you," he asked.
Handy is an understatement, I am a god with a knife.
"I guess you could say that," I said modestly.
"Well, I need your help here," he said as he led me to the basement of the house. Once we reached the bottom step I was surprised to find something that I had never seen before during my time as a soldier. A prisoner of war.
"This here is Tantonius, chieftain of the tribe of Rakicugh," the lieutenant explained.
"Do not soil my name, heretic," answered the brute with a deep rumbling voice. "I will use your bones to clean my teeth!" it said.
"Of course you will Tantonius," answered the lieutenant. "This here is Staff Sergeant Castillo, since you have been less than cooperative with our inquiries, he will help motivate you to talk," Wilkins said.
The brute seemed to struggle with the long words in a foreign language for a few moments before baring its teeth in challenge and rattling its chains, which were thick and numerous.
"I will not talk to you, you mongrels!"
"Sir, you want me to torture it?" I asked quietly.
"Is that a problem?" he asked.
"No, but aren't there special operatives for that?" I asked.
"The closes torture team is a couple of systems away," he explained. "It's not a big deal, just cause a lot of pain. Besides, you are required to follow my orders," he said.
"Very well, sir."
"Also, let's make this our little secret," he said with a creepy smile.
"Of course, sir," I said.
"Let's start with something simple Tantonius, how about you tell us the name of your ship?"
"Never. Puny human," came the answer.
Wilkins nodded at me as he tossed me a knife. It was the same large standard-issue combat knife that I had, only that this one had a sharper look to it. See what I did there? Anyways, I caught it with my hand and put it awfully close to the brute's head. He didn't even budge, probably because the knife was the size of its finger.
"Very well, I'll only ask one more time," Wilkins informed the brute. "What's your ship's name?"
The brute spat at him. Looks like it was as much a sign of 'go fuck yourself' in their planet as it was in ours.
"Staff Sergeant."
I sighed and spun the knife so that the point was facing downwards. I raised it over my head and sank it all the way to the hilt on the brute's right foot. It was a good thing it was secured, because it rattled its chains like crazy.
"You won't get anything from me you insect!" called out the brute.
This time I didn't wait for the go sign from Wilkins, I simply used my strengthened muscles push the knife through the brute's thick flesh. It went all the way from its foot to its knee in a few long seconds. The brute started howling in pain.
"If you answer our questions, we won't hurt you," Wlikins said while leaning in close to the brute.
The brute grunted before shaking its head. "Avenging Inheritor," it said. "That's the name of the ship."
"Really? I thought you'd last longer," Wilkins said. I pulled out the knife, the chieftain visibly wincing as I did so.
"Next question, how large are your forces?"
This time the brute refused to answer. He tolerated a similar cut in its other leg, the loss of a large chunk of its right foot, not-to-deep slashes across the arms, and a very nasty slash in its shoulder.
"That's going to leave a mark," I said.
"It will be a mark of pride as soon as I kill all of you vermin.
"So, us vermin managed to give you that ugly scar?" Wilkins asked.
The brute couldn't come up with a decent comeback and instead roared loudly at Wilkins.
"Your forces?"
The brute remained silent, shooting us daggers with its eyes. I pushed my knife all the way through its hand and nailed it to the floor, then I twisted the knife. I was enjoying this way too much to be healthy.
"No?" Wilkins asked. "Well then sergeant, kill it slowly then."
"Yessir," I said. I wasn't even playing along. I would take my time with this bastard. Something about slowly working on this brute got my blood pumping. It was actually scary.
"I suggest you start above its groin, not for the expected reasons, but because the creature has a cluster of nerves in the area, or so the doctors tell me," Wilkins said as he started leaving.
I pulled the knife from the brute's hand and started tracing a line from its chest all the way down to the areae that Wilkins had signaled; It was like cutting through leather. Finally the brute's eyes had a very human expression of worry before I stabbed blindly at its nervous-cluster area. It was a furry beast, so I didn't get a chance to see what was in there. Not that I would take my time to explore either. I also winced myself as the knife sunk in dangerously close to the area where my own family jewels were located.
The brute yelled in a shout frighteningly human. I stabbed the same place again. Tantanius yelled again, this time in a slightly higher pitch.
"Stop, stop!" it said.
I stopped, mostly because I was having a very maleish wincing sensation as I stabbed a humanoid creature in a place that probably would've made me spill everything I knew.
"Tell me what I need to know, Tantanius," Wilkins said, suddenly back from the ground floor.
The brute roared loudly in response, its defiant cry mixed with some very obvious gestures that made sure that everyone that could see it knew it was in pain. The chains the brute was bound with rattled like crazy, but ultimately they held. Wilkins grabbed the knife from my hand and sunk it to the hilt in the place where I had stabbed the brute twice, eliciting a yell that made a shiver run up my spine and down again.
"I'll tell you everything," it said after a lengthy cry of pain.
"That's what I like to hear," Wilkins said, leaving the knife in the creature's belly.
"Dismissed Staff Sergeant," Wilkins told me, a rather creepy grin on his face.
Fifteen minutes later I was back in my room after learning a lot more than I needed to about the physiology of the Jiralhanae. I enjoyed torturing the thing a lot more than I should have. I washed its dark blood from my hands and forearms in the sink, then I wet my face.
"Jesus Frank, what the fuck?" I told myself. With that, I went to sleep.
"You hear that?" a marine was telling a friend.
"What?"
"One of the drones spotted a perfect place for an attack in the covvie front," he explained. "An operation is already being prepared," he said excitedly.
"Great!" the other marine said as he shared his friend's giddy anticipation.
Of course, I knew otherwise. The information hadn't been gleaned from a UAV drone, it had been acquired from a brute POW after a lengthy torturing session. The brute had been executed after it was promised that it would be freed back into its lines if it cooperated. It had spilled out everything it knew. The most interesting bit of information was that one particular point in the covvie front was only sporting a scarab for protection.
I know, 'only a scarab' is used loosely there, but a single bombardment raid by a few shortsword bombers followed by a strong push would send the covvie ranks into disarray and allow for us to encircle many units and destroy them utterly, effectively balancing the odds in our favor. If we were to succeed, we would by no means be in a winning position, but we would be on even ground with the troops of the Avenging Inheritor.
I just hoped that they would actually go through with this operation, we were standing on dangerous ground here, the odds were stacked against us, and we needed all the help we could get.