Chapter CLVII: Backdoor's Open

March 3, 2548 (UNSC Calendar)/

Mirn Province, LV-426, Zeta Reticuli System

"Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake."– Napoleon Bonaparte

My squad aimed for a small clearing, perhaps fifty meters long and ten wide. It was very flat and had no large rocks anywhere visible. I'd like to say that we landed in a very coordinated fashion and immediately brought our weapons up, but we weren't Rangers. I was proud of that fact and I considered every single one of my men to be a lot better than any Ranger save for maybe Nezarian. This time unfortunately, I wished that we had shared a particular part of their training.

I landed a little bit harder than I had intended and felt my legs shake under the impact. Fortunately for me, the ground was soft and the added cushion of the grass helped mitigate the impact somewhat. I rolled forward in order to absorb the strength of the impact and realized that I had been going too fast for that. I came out of my front roll and ended up having to jump again, this time slamming into the floor and skidding through the mud for a couple of feet.

"And he nails the landing!" Schitzo yelled loudly. I half expected a crowd to cheer in the background.

I turned on my side to see Miranda struggle to stay afoot, running forward as fast as she could in order to avoid falling down on her face. Like me, she had been moving forward too fast, unconsciously thinking herself a plane as opposed to a VTOL. She failed and fell to the muddy ground as well. Livingston and Sandor both managed to do belly flops and slide a few meters before stopping down. Hoff was the worst of us, hitting one of the treetops with his legs and doing half a flip before turning on his jetpack and flying parallel to the ground, he pulled up before turning off his jetpack, falling back down from an altitude of three meters.

Marv landed on his feet and took a couple of quick steps forward to get rid of the momentum. That left him with muddy soles and us with muddy visors.

I felt like throwing a rock at him.

"Simply flawless team," I complimented everyone. "Next time we'll definitely record this." I groaned in an exaggerated fashion as I dragged myself back to my feet. "No doubt they'll put this video in manuals."

"No need to shame us further Lieutenant," Miranda said finally when it became clear no one else would speak. It made sense that she would be the one to speak, seeing as she had served under my command for the longest amount of time. It didn't make any sense for her to still be nervous about it. For some reason it annoyed me.

"Pavel, what's your position?"

"Two-seventy meters to your northeast. Blinking on my beacon once."

I saw the blink on my HUD marking my best friend before it disappeared once more. The Covenant could see that if they looked hard enough. "Good. Caboose?"

"Already en route to your position," he replied. "Emerging from forest now."

I looked around until I spotted our Recon Squad coming up. They looked to be in overall better shape than us, but that might be because they had had the time to wipe off the mud from their armor. Caboose nodded at me and ordered his men back into the forest in order to get air cover.

"Join up," I ordered. "Pavel, have your squad meet us at Rally Point Yankee."

"Yankee? I didn't know we had that many rally points," Pavel replied. "We certainly didn't before we had an AI."

"Sounds about right," I acknowledged in reply. "We'll meet there and join up with the rest of the company later." I paused and carefully considered everything that had transcribed in the past few minutes. "Any word on dos Santos and his unit?"

"They jumped ship as soon as it started moving up," Pavel said. "That much I heard, his platoon probably had some trouble getting out. Likely took some casualties too."

I shook my head. "Nothing we can do about it," I shrugged him off. "Let's get moving, this area will be swarming with air recon in a few minutes."

Immediately after meeting up with Pavel and his Heavy Weapons Squad we changed our bearings slightly to meet up at the designated fall back point. I was right to stay below the cover of the trees, a trio of Phantoms escorted by five Banshee ground-support craft passed almost directly above us but failed to spot us.

"Hate those things," Hoff admitted.

"Phantoms or Banshees?" Sandor asked.

"Banshees," he replied. "Hate the noise they make."

"At least they fit the name, eh?"

Marv was quiet, he seemed tired. Livingston wasn't speaking much either, but then again, she had just been shot on the side of the face. She had refused medical attention from Sutton or Reeves, insisting that she could handle the burn until we got to safety. Miranda seemed to be as always, moving with shoulders ever so slightly hunched and somehow managing to appear meek even behind the intimidating ODST armor.

I shook my head and sighed. It was a miracle that we had gotten out of this one alive.

A few conversations started here and there throughout the platoon, but they quickly died when everyone realized that nobody else really wanted to talk at the moment. We were still behind enemy lines and away from any support.

"Hold up," I said, seeing something in the distance. "Zepeda, what is it?"

The platoon sniper didn't reply immediately, instead he took a couple of steps back before standing behind a sturdy pine tree. "Something's off."

I examined the map of the area that I had stored on my HUD. "Everyone blink their IFFs on my mark. Mark."

Twenty blue lights erupted around me before disappearing. I waited a few seconds, praying that whatever Private Zepeda had considered to be wrong wasn't a well-planned Covenant ambush. Five seconds passed before twenty-two blue lights appeared in the area in front of us, clearly positioned to attack us from the sides and front. I smiled when I recognized the names of some of them. It was dos Santos and his platoon. The smile disappeared form my face when I realized that Four was supposed to have twenty-four men.

"Relax, it's Four," I announced the obvious to my men and women. "Move up."

I walked at the front, with my squad directly behind me and the other two flanking me at a distance of ten meters.

Lieutenant Domingo dos Santos appeared from behind a thick shrub and waved at me. "Hail sire!" he said.

I pressed my fist against my chest and bowed in mock greeting. "Domingo," I said, depolarizing my visor and giving him a smile. "It's great to see you."

The small man smiled back and offered me his hand. I shook it and pressed my shoulder against his; giving him a pair of pats on the back while he did the same. "Your men?"

"When we jumped we were surrounded on all sides, for a moment we were overwhelmed."

I nodded understandingly, just as Pavel had figured. "They died bravely then. Their families have every right to be proud of them."
Domingo returned the nod with a grim expression. "They do. And all of you have every right to be proud of yourselves as well!"

A few of the men and women from Four and Five gave oorahs in reply but most seemed too exhausted to do even that. Still, I could see everyone near me smile behind their now-transparent visors.

"We did a good job," I agreed. "But it still isn't over."

"We were going to head to the company fall back point," Domingo told me. "Until we spotted your movement, that is."

"Same," I told him. "One platoon in the front and one in the rear?"

"I was thinking two squads on the front and sides and one on the rear," Domingo replied.

I nodded, it did sound slightly more military than my own suggestion. "All right, let's get moving then."

"Let's get moving," Domingo echoed.

The rain had only made our journey worse. It was cold enough on this latitude that I wouldn't be surprised if it suddenly started snowing. I remember seeing on one of Bee's movies that rain mixed with snow was a bad omen. Now, I wasn't one to believe in those silly superstitions, but I'd prefer if it didn't happen regardless. I saw that many of my ODSTs had their chins tucked to their chest on instinct, as if the rain could get in their eyes through their helmets. It couldn't. What it could do was wet the undersuits and in turn your skin. You could turn on the heat in the climate control functions, but now you'd just have warm water on you.

"I see them," Zepeda, our scout, announced. "They're here."

I smiled and sighed with relief. "Announce our presence," I told him. "Everyone else hold your positions."

I saw dos Santos relaying the same orders to his platoon and our formation stopped completely for a minute before the rest of Jaguar Company acknowledged our presence and ordered us to meet with them. Zepeda's helmet camera was aimed at the small flat-topped hill that the other three platoons under Captain Hayes were. I couldn't see many details in account of the crappy camera and crappier weather, but they were there and our situation had just gotten a lot less precarious.

Friends hugged and offered each other complimentary butt slaps. That prompted a few shoves and more than a couple of complaints, especially from female ODSTs that didn't particularly like being treated like one of the guys. After all, a lady is a lady. Even if said lady carries a 7.62mm MA5-series assault rifle and can nail a target at one hundred yards without skipping a beat.

"Sarge!" Bumblebee called out. "Sorry…erm, Lieutenant."

"Bee," I replied, ignoring his slipup. "Everything good?"

He smiled again and shook my hand vigorously. He seemed glad that I was alive, and that made me feel good for some reason. "After we saw that ship taking off and we lost connection I gotta admit that I was a little worried," he said in his strong Scottish accent. "Then Four had some trouble getting out…"

"But we're fine," I assured him. "I'll have to show you the video some time."

"No doubt a spectacle, eh?" he said. "Oi, Snark!"

I turned to see my former sniper jog up to us without his helmet and with his extremely long SRS held in front of him. "El-tee! Glad to see you made it in one piece," he said, also smiling. "Who brought down the corvette?"

"The shipmaster," I admitted, "but I think that we had enough of a participation to be warranted a percentage of the kill."

"Sorry Sar-Lieutenant," Snark shook his head. "Rules are rules. If you didn't kill the ship personally it doesn't add up to your kill count."

This time I grinned. "I was wondering when you'd try to pull that one on me."

"At least now he knows what it feels like," another familiar voice said from behind me.

"Api, good to see you," I greeted the tattooed Helljumper. I noticed that both Serge and Beckel were standing next to him. "Beckel, Serge, pleasure."

"Likewise, sir," Beckel replied with a smile.

Serge acknowledged me with a small nod before moving up to Caboose and having one of those almost wordless conversations that the two old veterans often shared. Every one of us stared at them for a while before returning our attention to each other.

"So what happened on your end?" I asked.

Snark was the highest-ranking man here so he explained. "We didn't have much trouble, inflicted some minor casualties on the covvies before shooting down the corvette's engines."

"Not all of them apparently," I muttered. "Or maybe you just turned them off."

"Through explosion?" Bee asked. "I wish things were that easy."

"Hey, explosions do tend to solve everything, don't they?" Beckel said, smiling.

The terrible joke brought some laughter. It was the kind of laughter that came from men that had been to close to dying only hours ago. I knew that it felt like we had won and deserved some rest, but the next order of business was to get back behind UNSC lines, and something told me that we weren't going to get Pelican evac.

"I'll leave you…enlisted," I said, making the word sound as if it disgusted me, "to your business, no doubt Captain Hayes wants to see me and Dom."

"We who are about to die salute you," Bee said, saluting smartly.

"I should be saluting you," I whispered loud enough for them to hear. They chuckled at that, they were all well aware of the state of affairs in between the company's commanding officer and myself.

I took off my helmet despite the slight drizzle that refused to let up. It was an unspoken tradition that when officers met during almost-combat situations they'd talk face to face. I don't know why it had started, but I liked it.

"Captain Hayes," I greeted with a slight smile on my face. After all, I was allowed to smile after the stunt that my platoon had just pulled off.

"You might want to hold that smile in Castillo," Hayes said dismissively, "we're not safe yet."

I saw Lieutenant Jen Weller nodding in agreement to my side. Both Desjani and dos Santos kept neutral expressions.

"Of course, sir," I replied. "What are our orders?"

"If you'd just let me get to that, I'd tell you," Hayes said in a tone that was almost a growl. "Our actions have removed one enemy warship from the battle and accordingly weakened the enemy frontline. The Covenant units that had kept themselves supplied by the destroyed corvette now find themselves without that luxury and on our home turf."

I saw dos Santos smile at that and allowed my lips to curve upwards slightly as well. Even the stoic Weller seemed to enjoy the idea of being able to hit one part of the enemy frontline hard.

"That particular section of the line is being held back by members of Battalion One from the Flawless and some additional units from the Navarone. They are so far doing an excellent job at holding the line, and without any supplies the Covenant should collapse quickly." She paused for breath. "We are going to speed up that process."

"Oorah," dos Santos said.

Hayes acknowledged him with a nod and went on. "If a large section of their line fell it could mean that rear-echelon units would be able to step through the gap and envelop the enemy units from the sides. Ideally we'd knock out a large percentage of their forces on the area."
That in turn meant that we could hold on to this rock just a little bit longer. If we did that, the support fleet that was supposed to be coming in our aid could even the odds against the Covenant ships up there. That in turn could make this shitstorm into a salvageable victory, both military and political. And it all depended on how fast and hard we could hit their ground forces. If it all went according to plan we would be leaving behind a wrecked colony, but there would still be humans on it.

"Jaguar Company will work as one unit for this one," Hayes stated. "With the exception of a specialized unit that's being created for the duration of the mission. Sergeant Avninder will take your platoon snipers and provide recon intelligence and support once the attack starts. This unit, the Scout Sniper Squad, or SSS for short, will work independently from us."

Snark leading a platoon of crack snipers? Now that was something for the covvies to fear.

Hayes went on. "Rest of the battle plan should be pretty standard. Two platoons will leapfrog the other two with one providing support wherever it's needed."
I had an idea of which platoon wouldn't get any rest.

Hayes didn't seem to notice my slight eye-roll, instead keeping her briefing with that annoyingly sexy voice of hers. "The HW Squad on Platoon Five will remain at the center of rear and front platoons providing machine gun and heavy weapon support."

"That's the gist of it," Yas said, speaking up for the first time. "We'll go over the details right before the battle. We move out in twenty, tell your men."
We saluted.

"Dismissed," Yas said. "Oh, and Frank, tell your men that they did a good job."

I smiled at his praise even despite Hayes' scowl. Yas' relationship with me had come a long way since that time we first met. I thought he was going to be a dick and no doubt he expected the same of me. I'd been more wrong than him, of course, but a friend's a friend.

"Thanks Yas," I said, calling him by his nickname. "Your praise is hard earned."

Yas smiled at that.

"Captain," I said to Hayes one more time before walking back to my unit.

Unfortunately for us officers, all of our companies had scrambled up as friends talked to one another and told each other the most recent stories. No doubt that in future retellings some of those stories would lose a little bit of their veracity and gain an amount of grandiose when they were being told. After all, you only got better at telling a story if you told it many times. You should've heard me talk about that time I clothes-lined an elite with a baseball-bat sized spike grenade.

Man, was that great.

"Five!" I yelled loudly, putting my helmet back on. "Five," I repeated. "Squad leaders on me, everyone else group up."

The moment Caboose and Pavel were with me I started explaining the plan. "We'll make a wedge and meet up with Battalion One. From there I can only assume that we'll be allowed some rest."

"My squad will remain in the center for the duration of the operation?" Pavel asked.

"So far that's the plan," I nodded. "As you know-"

"Subject to change, got it."

It occurred to me that not very many officers would've let one of their subordinates cut them off in such an abrupt manner without attempting to remind them of their position.

"Caboose, your unit is supposed to function in concordance with the rest of us, but again, you might be sent off earlier to cause some mayhem."

He nodded. "We'll handle it."

"I know you will. And please tell Private Zepeda that he'll have to work with the rest of the company snipers. I take it he won't have trouble with that order."

"Not in the least," Caboose said.

"That's all," I said. "Inform your men."

They both gave me very lazy 'sir's of acknowledgment and moved back to their respective squads while I returned to mine to give them the same briefing.

Seventeen minutes later we had all filled our pouches with grenades and ammunition dropped from low orbit by an Albatross dropship. The pilots of the ship had spray-painted us a thumbs-up on one of the canisters accompanies by a good luck wish. I'd have to see about buying those guys a beer.

"Jaguar!" Hayes came in through the company-wide channel. "Let's get moving. There's some covvie ass-kicking about to start and we don't want to be late."
Take away the bitchy and borderline unprofessional attitude that she seemed to reserve only for me and Tahlia Hayes was a model ODST officer.

For numbering one hundred fourteen men Jaguar Company moved quickly and rather stealthily. The dense forest covering this region of the planet certainly helped. LV-426 was lucky to have two small and mineral rich satellites orbiting it while being relatively barren itself. That meant that the planet got to keep its ecosystem and it could easily mine the satellites.

Caboose and his squad moved up ahead, scouting the ground before us and then giving us warnings. We managed to avoid a pair of exceptionally large patrols and ambush a few smaller ones. Hell, Yas and a few of his men rigged a pair of Wraiths to blow after killing the elites that were supposed to crew them.

"We see it," Caboose came in with a dull tone. "The back of their frontline."

The ground in front of me sloped up sharply. It wasn't steep enough for us to need to use our hands to climb, but it sure brought the hurt to my calves and thighs. I knew from my minimap that Caboose and Recon were over the side of the hill. Topographical maps showed a wide valley and then a ridge-like formation of spiky hills. The brave men and women of Battalion One and the Marines from the Naverone manned those hills. They were all that stood in between the large Covenant ground forces and any civilians still remaining on the planet.

"Time for action Jaguar," Hayes said immediately after she confirmed the sighting. "Platoon snipers are under Sergeant Avninder, fall in on him."

"Satellite imagery shows a beautiful crag that'll give us a good vantage point on most of the valley," Snark said. "We'll make it hard for them."

"Then hurry up," Hayes retorted. "Platoons One and Three are going to lead the attack at first, Two and Four are behind."

"HW Squad," I called out. "Move up behind Captain Hayes and Lieutenant Weller."

Pavel and his squad packed up their heavy weaponry and huddled towards the line that Platoons One and Three were already forming. To my left I could see Zepeda heading out to meet up with the rest of the green dots marked as friendly snipers. Snark and the others would make life hell for any high-ranking Covenant officers.

"Castillo, call your men back and form up behind us," Hayes ordered in a sharp voice. "You know what you're supposed to do."

I nodded as I recalled Recon Squad. "We'll provide support Captain," I assured Hayes. Some of the ODSTs in the unit might've noticed that my voice carried a little bit more than the usual cockiness present in all of us Helljumpers, instead it sounded almost like I was taunting her for needing my support.

Shit, watch it Frank.

Despite my tone Hayes didn't reply. She probably didn't want a confrontation in full view of her men, men who were supposed to trust her to be calm and levelheaded. Men who were supposed to follow her to their deaths if she so ordered.

No, she preferred for me to be the asshole.

"All units green?" Captain Hayes asked after we were all formed up.

"Two's green," Yas said.

"So's Three," Weller said.

"And Four," Domingo said.

I rolled my head, cracking my neck. "Five's ready and good to go."

"Machine gun unit is green," Pavel said.

"And SSS is all good," Snark said, elongating the two last words. I could picture him clearly, aiming down his scope and zooming in on the elite with the fanciest headdress.

Once on the top of the hill I could see the valley. Trees and thick foliage still covered this hill and the slopes down to the valley, but from that point on the forest became thinner and thinner until it completely disappeared. The first half of the valley was completely occupied by Covenant forces. Buildings and vehicles were parked in the artillery-pounded mud. The second half of it was instead filled with trenches, craters, and the husks of wrecked vehicles, both human and Covenant. I could see a few instacrete bunkers on the far side of the valley, a few of them were even firing sporadically at the covvies. Despite the alarming amount of Marines and Covenant the battlefield was still relatively quiet.

But that was about to change.

A couple of lines scrolled through my HUD. "Battalion One has been notified of our position," I told my men. "They'll start the attack as soon as we give them the go sign. After that…"

"After that we kick some ass!" Sandor said loudly.

"After that we kick some ass," Hoff agreed.

Livingston paused next to me to examine the view. We couldn't see everything, but the space in between two pine trees allowed us to see a large section of the valley. "Fun," she said, groaning afterwards.

Marv chuckled at that.

"Remember the rules," I said, glancing at the two squads that would be directly under my command for this op. "We get called in for support and we go there. Simple as that."

Everything was clear to everybody, I was just trying to ease some of the nerves I was feeling. With time I could get over someone under my command dying, hell, sometimes I didn't even need that much time to forget all about it. But if I screwed up now a whole lot of good men and women could die, and I wouldn't be able to live with that.

The few Covenant patrols that we encountered on the downhill slope were composed only of grunts and jackals. One and Three took them all out quickly and silently. It didn't seem likely that they could've sent out any alarms with knives in their throats, but it put the rest of us on edge.

"We're in position," Hayes said finally, communicating with whomever was commanding the Marines on the other side of the valley.

I didn't hear what reply she got, but I did see the barrage of artillery hit the edge of the Covenant encampment. The explosions lifted dust, dirt, mud, and the occasional limb. The covvies weren't particularly surprised, they were probably used to this kind of attacks.

The sight reminded me of a war flick I had seen about the Battle of the Somme. Half a millennium later we were still using the same shock tactics. Honestly, I think that we were past the point where we should be using laser blasters.

"Where mah lasers at?!" Schitzo complained. This time he was dressed in a white full-body armor from one of Bee's 20th century sci-fi flicks.

"Lighting up our projected route," Hayes came in. "We'll follow the rise, it should give us cover from the sides."

Calling it a rise was being nice. The small section of the valley that was higher than its surroundings was only about twenty feet taller than everything else. Fortunately for us, it was rather steep, forming an elongated mesa of sorts. Under any other situation it was tactically useless, for us it was the difference between life and death.

"Lighting up targets," Snark came in. "We have all visible officers tagged and the higher ranking elites won't live much longer. Just waiting on you, sir."

"Execute," Captain Hayes ordered, her voice carrying more than a small amount of satisfaction in it.

The five cracks of the SRS-99s werenot deafening, neither were theyparticularly loud at this distance. They were, however, extremely pleasant to hear. Half a second later the five snipers fired again at pre-designated targets. After that they seemed to lose coordination and instead I could hear them firing at random intervals.

The Covenant troops farther back to the rear were the first to react to the gunfire. They were, after all, the ones closest to the source. It was a shame that they hadn't seen us then, because it was at that time that Hayes ordered the two lead platoons to open fire. Forty-eight ODSTs complied happily and pummeled the aliens.

"Snark," I said. "I want you to tell me everything you see. Everything important." At that moment I didn't care if I overstepped my bounds ordering someone from a different platoon, but judging from our numerical disadvantage I was hoping to get all the help I could get.

"Sure thing El-tee," he replied calmly, surely searching for his next victim.

One loud gunshot.

And he found it.

A second later I found my own.

Whoever was in charge back here reacted quickly, forming up the little grunts under his command in between the two troop barracks nearest to us. Despite the quick reaction we still overwhelmed them through superior numbers and firepower. The grunts fired wildly, still trying to pinpoint our exact positions. I took out a pair of grunts carrying plasma pistols just as Hayes ordered two of her four squads to slide down the small raise to protect our flank. Weller did the same with her platoon and they pushed forward.

Pavel's squad started hitting large concentrations of enemy troops without any discretion, hitting anything and everything that could be hiding aliens. They had an extra-large ammo load and that was bound to help us during this mission. I could hear the sniper fire in one corner of my mind, probably taking out elites in golden armor or fancy headdresses. That was probably to draw the most violent retaliation.

"Covenant artillery is firing back on Marine positions," Snark came in. "They still don't deem us a threat."

"Be sure to change that," I told him, forgetting that I wasn't his CO. "Try taking out those artillery crews."

"Wilco, Lieutenant," Snark replied. "Zepeda, Yumiko, you heard the-" I closed the line to avoid any more distractions.

"Elite squad," someone warned. "Hit them hard!"

On the other end of the battlefield someone else called for fire discipline and Hayes made sure to keep barking out orders.

For the first fifteen minutes of battle we stood in the back, firing occasionally at targets of opportunity but for the most part remaining quiet and ready to rush to support any unit that needed our help.

"Lieutenant Castillo!" Corporal Kenneth Royce called. "We've got cloaked units firing on our position;they hit the sergeant, requesting immediate support!"

"On the way," I replied immediately. It had been a while since I had last interacted with Royce and I couldn't help but notice that he was still a corporal. No doubt the UNSC was delaying promotions as much as possible in order to keep men and women in the Armed Forces for the longest possible amount of time.

"Hoff and Novak, switch to thermal and see if you can pinpoint those cloaked elites. Take them out the moment you see them."

"Yes, sir," they replied unanimously.

I looked at Caboose's squad and quickly identified the two men with long-range weapons. Lance Corporal Niles Atkins and Private Anurak Montri both had BR55s.

"Atkins, Montri, same orders for you two. Stay on the raise."

The rest of Caboose's and my squad moved down and joined with Royce and his squad. Out of the two squads covering our left flank his had been hit the hardest. His sergeant had been hit in the chest and was critical but could probably be stabilized and saved. Another soldier had been hit through the visor with either a carbine or a needle and wouldn't be getting back up no matter how hard we tried.

I jumped behind cover and spotted a blur that I quickly fired at. The silhouette of an elite became barely visible before one of my marksmen took it out with three rounds. I ignored the falling corpse and sprayed at another blur of movement.

"Frag out!"

"Over there! On our right!"

I looked around before a burst of plasma made me jerk my head behind cover.

"Jackal lance moving up through the center!"

"Hit them with grenades!" Royce ordered. "Don't let them get close to us!"

The explosions that followed killed half of the jackals. The rest were quickly wiped out with automatic gunfire. I personally took out one of the jackals, hitting it square in the chest.

"Lieutenant, there are two watchtowers activating to your…ten o'clock," Snark warned. "And they're up now."

I moved to the other side of my cover and saw the two sniper platforms only just finishing to raise above the other Covenant buildings, gravity lifts keeping them up.

I fired at the grunt manning the plasma turret and watched it tumble over the edge. The jackal sharpshooter on the same platform fired one quick shot at me before I zeroed in and killed it.

I winced as the carbine round nicked my shoulder, right in between the pauldron and the rest of the chest armor. My helmet didn't let me see the wound, but my HUD told me that my suit had been breached and that my injury was minor.

"At least it won't leave a scar," Schitzo said positively.

The other watchtower was still a threat though. The gunner opened up on the area where I had left Hoff, Miranda, Anurak, and Montri.

"Snark?"

As per usual, his reply came in the form of a 14.5x114mm APFSDS round. Probably a little bit of an overkill for a grunt. Or any organic target short of an elephant for that matter, but it got the job done.

"Thanks," I said, letting one of the marksmen take out the jackal.

"Sanchez, Griffin, move up!" Royce ordered. "Cover them!"

The gunfire barrage intensified while two Helljumpers with MA5 assualt rifles and M90 shotguns attached to their backs moved up. They killed a few grunts before switching to their shotguns and hitting an elite hiding behind a crate. The two blasts knocked the elite on its ass.

"Cloaked targets are all eliminated Lieutenant," Hoff announced. "No cloaking devices seen through thermal."

"Switch back to regular optics and cover this advance," I ordered them.

Already the two squads from Platoon One were moving up, leaving and my men standing behind them to cover their advance.

"Back up we go," I ordered. "Snark, what do you see?"

"I feel compelled to remind you that I'm not your personal pair of eyes," Snark told me. "You've got one of your own men here, you know?"

He did have a point. "He's shy. Humor me."

"Heavy Covenant activity, but that's to be expected. They still aren't firing on us but they're already forming defensive lines in front of you. Friendly forces are already attacking and have moved halfway through the no-man's-land." He sent me an image of what he was seeing.

Several dozen Scorpion tanks were advancing, firing their main cannons as fast as the reloading systems allowed them to while shrugging off small-arms fire with no trouble. Behind the Scorpion tanks I could see Armadillo and Tortoise troop-transports moving with several dismounted marines in between them. The resolution on Snark's Oracle scope allowed me to see all of that with crystal clear clarity.

"Armadillos?" I asked. "Weren't those Army exclusive?"

"Must've commandeered a few," Miranda replied obviously listening in to my conversation.

"Army got hit hard," Snark agreed.

I cut the line and sank back in with my unit.

"Platoons Two and Four prepare to move up!" Hayes ordered loudly.

"That's our cue," I said. "Five, move up and provide support!"

We had roughly forty-five men moving up to the frontline at the same time. That meant that there were a bunch of targets for the covvies. The rest of the company started pounding away at Covenant positions with an almost criminal disregard for ammunition conservation. Pavel's squad in particular was an offender. They didn't stop firing the entire minute that it took to complete the maneuver. After it was completed I found myself in our rear, with Pavel's unit even further back.

"Come on! Keep up!" I yelled, leaving cover and moving up to the front, my men behind me.

"Uh-oh," Snark said, this time on the company-wide net. "Two Wraiths are turning to fire at you!"

The image of the two Covenant tanks appeared on our HUDs and everybody recognizing their own positions ran like hell. The two mortars impacted empty ground, but nonetheless they disrupted our advance.

"We need to take them out," Hayes said.

"Sir," Pavel came in. "My unit has a Spartan Laser."

"Do it," she replied. "Now!"

I saw as Pavel ordered Corporal Dana Bamber to move back and find a vantage point from which to take out the tanks. Lieutenant Weller also ordered two of his men to go with her and cover her while she fired.

"Wraith number one is toast," Bamber announced half a minute later. "Two is…" She fired. "Gone. All clear."

"Move forward men!" Yas ordered.

"Lieutenant," Miranda said. "You're hit."

"Want me to patch that up?" Livingston offered.

"No, it's minor," I replied. "You can do that later."

"That's the spirit," Sandor cheered, making me feel slightly uncomfortable.

"Holy shit Banshees," Snark warned everybody again. His voice didn't carry any trace of shock whatsoever, once again reminding me why I had given him his nickname.

I found myself about to order Api to shoot down the Banshees when I remembered that Weller might've not enjoyed me ordering her men around. Asking Bee to complete that same task would've been even worse, since Hayes would've had grounds to charge me for insubordination right then and there.

I needn't have worried. Both Weller and Hayes were capable officers and immediately ordered their SPANKr toting men to hit the Banshee fliers. Bamber also took part in the defense and hit one of the craft with her Spartan Laser. I saw the fireballs, the Banshees destroyed far enough to pose not theat.

"Spirit dropships approaching from your right flank, sir," Snark warned a few minutes later. "Looks like…They're trying to drop troops behind you!"

"Hit them with rockets!" Hayes ordered. "Castillo, get your men back there now!"

"Already on the way," I replied. "Hurry up!"

Three Spirit dropships were already hovering in a point we had cleared and left behind. Yassir and dos Santos were ordering their men around while the ones that had explosives and rocket launchers fired them at the dropships. One of the three Spirits was knocked out of the sky, but it was able to drop its cargo before blowing up and crashing back down on the ground.

"Zepeda, hit the leader!" Caboose ordered his man. "And any officer you can manage!"

Two cracks resounded and I knew that a high-ranking elite was missing its head. Before I could ask for confirmation on the kill I was being fired upon by about one hundred different aliens.

"Down!" someone yelled and I was only too happy to comply.

I slammed into the muddy ground and wiped some of the mud from my visor before crawling up to better cover. The aliens were spreading out in a semi-circle, trying to surround us. At the same time we were doing the same, trying to beat them to the edge but not wanting to make our line too thin.

"Fire on their flanks," I yelled. "Keep them bunched up!"

"Discourage those grunts!" Weller ordered one of her squads. "Keep those jackals in check!"

Hayes was focusing on repelling a charge by some of the elites. The aliens had been dropped closest to her position and she currently found herself in more trouble than the rest of us.

"Spirits are coming for a firing pass!"

"Take cover!"

I ran away from the pink plasma, wishing that they had made it another color, being murdered by something pink was awfully embarrassing. One of the explosive rounds hit right next to me and burned one of my boots. I could feel the heat all the way through the titanium armor and suppressed a grunt of pain as I felt the heat coming into contact with my skin. The last thing I needed was more skin grafts.

"They're coming on through our left!"

I was on the left.

I hopped back behind cover and saw Marv nod at me from another building. I waved him over and he joined me along with Hoff. "They're trying to flank us," I told them. "We'll hold back the attack until Hayes and her platoon can push them back."

"The three of us?" Hoff asked, checking his DMR for rounds before reloading it. "Great."

"Relax," Marvin told him, placing a hand in his shoulder. "It'll only take a minute."

"For them to wipe us out," Hoff grumbled in reply.

"Nonetheless," I said sharply. "We'll do it."

All three of us left cover and moved up to a little pile of rocks that seemed to serve no purpose other than to provide cover for us. I could see the unit that was attempting to flank moving through the barracks and various pieces of equipment.

"Fire," I ordered.

Hoff was the first one to open up, his DMR nailing an elite in the side of the head and shoving it against a tarp. The elite trid to grab it but it fell off and both slipped down to the floor.

The tarp had been covering fusion coils

I didn't need to tell PFC Ryan Hoff what to do next. Like every good quarterback he saw an opening and he took it. Instead of using a pigskin to deliver it, this time he used a pair of bullets. The fusion coils detonated, vaporizing the elite and killing two jackals and a skirmisher in the blast. After that both Marv and I opened up.

We aimed for the officers if possible, but the covvies had diverted a large number of their own in an attempt to flank us. We fired everything we could just to keep them from rushing our position.

"The elites must've been impatient, because they ordered all of their grunts and jackals to charge at us. Unfortunately, this time it worked. Their large numbers overwhelmed us and I suddenly found myself kicking at a skirmisher that had jumped at me from behind a crate.

The skirmisher slammed into the ground and I stomped its chest in. It took only one powerful stomp to do that, my superhuman strength allowing me to quickly dispatch the alien. I spun and slammed the butt of my rifle into another leaping skirmisher's face. I could see the fangs fly from its mouth and almost grinned at its shocked expression. Marv finished it off with a quick shot to the neck before spraying two grunts preparing to prime plasma grenades.

One of them launched it, the other one didn't.

"Grenade!" he yelled.

All three of us rolled away, only barely avoiding the blast.

"Lieutenant!" Snark suddenly came in. "You've got four elites inbound on your-. Holy shit! Banshees, everybody out!"

I cursed again as I stood up, switching my rifle from burst mode to full-auto. The first of the four elites that Snark had warned us of appeared right over the piled rocks we had been using for cover with two plasma rifles. I emptied what was left of my mag into its chest and Hoff got the honor of killing it with two shots.

"Cover me, I'm reloading!" I yelled, feeling stupid for saying that like a videogame character.

I saw Marv toss a grenade and two elites with battered shields jumped over. Marvin killed one of them and I finished off the other one with a quick burst.

"Whoa!" Hoff cried.

I turned to see him duck under an elite that had apparently tried to tackle him. I fired at it, several rounds pinging off its shields until my rifle did something that a movie director would've been proud of.

It jammed.

"Fuck," I cursed, running at the elite with one hand drawing my pistol and the other going for my knife. My discarded BR55 was already on the ground behind me.

I tackled the elite in order to keep it from frying Hoff's brains with his plasma repeater. The elite was a big specimen and didn't fall down, instead taking a couple of steps back in order to compensate for the force of my impact. I fired with my pistol at its arms, draining its shields and launched an upwards stab with my knife.

The elite took a step back and my knife sliced through its lower right jaw. It launched a kick at me that I only just manage to dodge and then tried to shoot me.

Marvin fired what was left of his ammunition at it and staggered it somewhat, buying me some time to tackle it again. Once again the elite took my attack and withstood it, but the rest of my pistol rounds were enough to drain its shields and I quickly started slashing at the gaps between its armor.

But the elite, being eight feet tall and on the heavy side of 300 pounds, just shrugged my deep cuts off and grabbed me with both its arms before throwing me to the barracks to its side.

"Ouch," I said after having slammed into them and slid to the floor.

Hoff then killed the elite with a gunshot to the head. "Tackling?"

"It usually works," I told him. "And it saved your life."

"It was a good tackle," he told me. "If you had hit me it probably would've been a career-ending injury."

"I'm flattered," I replied, not really feeling it.

The elites and the skirmishers had been the last of the aliens to rush us, and Hayes had managed to get one of her squads to move to the flank and hold back the aliens still there.

"Captain, we've reached the halfway point, friendly forces are already in sight," Yas' voice came in.

"Excellent job Lieutenant," Hayes replied immediately. "Hold the position until UNSC forces link up with you."

"Wow, that was actually faster than expected," Hoff said. "I thought they'd put up more resistance."

"They're low on supplies," I reminded him, "probably couldn't get half their vehicles up and running and had to conserve ammunition."

Marvin nodded in agreement with my assessment.

"Have you ever actually enjoyed a victory, Lieutenant?" Hoff asked me.

"Not for long," I admitted.

Livingston had just finished bandaging up my wound. The round had gone above my collarbone and cut through the muscle. It was nothing overtly deep, but a little bit more serious than I had imagined at first. The wound wasn't serious enough to warrant wasting bifoam, so instead she closed it with glue and then placed a square of gauze over it.

I thanked her for her help and put the top of my undersuit back on;thankful for the warmth it gave. After that I started strapping the rest of my upper body armor to myself. Most of our company was still holding the position, but the Marines had moved to the sides and were sweeping through the confused and broken Covenant lines.

"Snark!" I greeted the man. "Glad to see you're in one piece."

He smiled weakly. The Banshees sent to kill him and his Scout Sniper Squad hadn't let up for a few minutes and had bombarded the woods behind them. Thankfully, no one had been injured aside from a few splinter cuts. "Glad about it myself," he said.

"You guys did a good job," I told the five snipers. They all gave me quick nods of acknowledgement.

"What happened to your shoulder?" Snark asked.

"Carbine round glanced me," I explained. "Nothing serious."

"Well, if you don't mind I'll be off somewhere, resting."

I nodded as they departed, moving slowly towards their respective units. Stan Zepeda remained behind, standing a little bit hunched despite his usual calm and silent demeanor.

"Get some rest Stan," I told him, using his first name. "You deserve it."

He nodded slowly. "Thanks you, Lieutenant."

I felt like I needed a little bit of rest myself, but instead I grabbed an energy bar and took a bite off of it. Like their non-combat counterpart, the ration bars, they tasted like absolute shit.

I examined the wrapper, displaying a force of impossibly brave-looking Marines marching with their weapons aimed at an unseen enemy. The favorite food of the UNSC Marine Corps it claimed.

"Favorite my ass," I grumbled, taking another bite of it.

I walked through our position until I saw Bumblebee. "Hey," I greeted. "Where's Yas?"

"Lieutenant Dajani's with Captain Hayes," he told me, looking up from a seated position. "They're meeting up with Lieutenant Commander Becker and Captain Galván."

"Briefing?" I suggested hopefully.

"I don't know," he grunted, "but they're probably planning a follow-up op."

"No rest for the wicked."

"I believe the right term is weary…sir."

I looked at him and laughed. "All of us are a little bit wicked, Bee."

"More wicked than weary?" he asked. "I don't think so."

I smiled sweetly. "I'm an officer of the UNSC Marine Corps Bumblebee. You're forced to agree with me."

He stood up and quickly saluted. "Sir yes, sir!"

I didn't need to think over his gesture to realize that he was mocking me. "At ease," I ordered him. "I said at ease, not as you were. Maybe next time you plan on mocking me you'll thi-"

"Lieutenant Castillo!"

I turned to look at the source of the voice and then back to Bee. "Lucky bastard," I told him as he smiled. "Sit down and finish your food."

"Lieutenant Weller," I greeted the woman. "Outstanding job back there."

"Thanks," she replied. "Likewise."

"Any idea on what we're going to be doing next?"

Weller shook her head and wiped some dry mud from her face. "The reinforcement fleet should already be here," she said. "Perhaps that'll prolong the battle, allow us to evacuate more of the civilians."

"So we do our jobs," I said, smiling.

Both of us walked towards the front of the Covenant encampment. A troop transport Warthog was waiting there for us, Domingo already sitting in the passenger seat. The driver took us across the former no-man's-land, carefully avoiding the craters and corpses. I noted that most of the corpses here were alien, but as we got closer to the UNSC camp I saw that trend change and found myself staring at many human corpses torn apart by plasma explosions.

"Lieutenant Commander Becker should be in the war room," the driver said as he stopped in front of the main building.

"Thanks Private," dos Santos said, hopping off the car.

Weller and I followed him and entered the room. It never ceased to impress me how professional and military our mobile CIC buildings could look. This one in particular reminded me a little bit of the bridge on the Inconvenience, albeit a lot larger. The officer's rooms were to one side and there was a separate section for the unit assigned to protect the CO and XO of the battalion. The war room was very much like our drop bay, with a holo-table right in the middle. It goes without saying that it didn't actually have the launch tubes for the drop pods.

"Ah, lieutenants," Lieutenant Commander Becker greeted us, there were bags under his eyes. "Good to have you here."

"Sir," I said as all three of us saluted. He saluted in reply and told us to be at ease.

"If you'll excuse me for a moment," he said. "I need to talk with Captain Hayes." He turned to face Captain Galván, his XO. "You too Darius."

"Sir," Galván replied before walking out of the room along with the rest of us.

All four of us ODST lieutenants walked outside of the room along with Captain Galván. It had been a while since I had last talked with him, so I took advantage to catch up. Naturally, both of us being military all that came up was the current situation.

"Things look good so far," he was saying. "With Apex, Boomer, and Cutthroat moving up west and everybody else heading east we're already starting to make progress."

"That's good," Weller said, stating the obvious.

"Did you name the companies in your battalion?" I asked suddenly. "Or have they always been called that?"

"The 201st MEU is pretty old," Galván told me, apparently not surprised by my question in the least. "But the companies have always been named like that."

"Good names," Domingo said. "I like them."

"Any idea what they've got in store for us, Captain?" Weller asked.

Galván seemed slightly surprised that Weller would address him in a professional manner. She was, after all, a Helljumper. Helljumpers were supposed to be cocky and use as little respect as possible towards those not in their class. Sometimes I found myself having trouble addressing a non-ODST superior officer as such, even if he was a good superior officer.

"I don't know what they've got in store for you," he replied. "I know I'll be helping to envelop the Covenant troops in the area. You? You'll probably weaken them for us."

"Sounds like something we would do," I admitted. "Were casualties high?"

"Not particularly," he shrugged in reply. "More than I would've liked…"

"None of us enjoy casualties," Yas spoke for the first time.

I thought about the three ODSTs that had died in the past hours. Two of dos Santos' men had been left behind to the Covenant and one of Hayes' sergeants had been hit right through the visor. I'm glad to say that I didn't know them, but I still regretted their loss.

Captain Hayes called us into the war room a couple of minutes later. She didn't sound happy.

I wondered what she was unhappy about and how it would affect me. The moment I saw the holographic display I suppressed a groan. This just kept getting better. and better.

Thanks to SilasWhitfield for proofreading this chapter and for some dialogue quotes he came up with.

I know I said I'd post this in the morning, but my internet went down for a while and then I went to see jack Reacher (awesome movie btw) and then I went to a friend's house and I only just got back. Sorry for the delay, but here it is.

Not much to say about this chapter I guess. Snark's still an awesome sniper and Frank hasn't gotten used to not having him on his unit even after two years. Everyone's a badass, Frank get's saved by Hoff and Marv, and a couple of our disposable red shirts die. I've got about a hundred ODSTs to kill now. But you know me, I'll probably only kill the ones that you care about the most because I'm a dick like that sometimes.

I haven't heard your views on my spelling and grammar, my beta tells me that I keep getting better, but nobody's perfect and sometimes I do some awkward wording and stuff like that. I don't think that SilasWhitfield misses a lot of stuff when proofreading, but in case he does just tell me so I'm more thorough when doing my final check of the chapter.

Men and women (not likely) of : I thank you once again for reading this chapter and reviewing the last one. The review button is still where it was yesterday, just letting you know.

Stay strong.

-casquis