Chapter 8

Victoria lay flat against the hangar floor, her rifle in her hands as she silently watched the corridor in front of her as she used a dead grunt's head as a makeshift tripod. Her visor integrated with the reticule of her weapon sights as she watched silently, she knew that more elites were in the corridor in front of her with active camouflage activated. She silently peered down her rifle scope, searching for slight deformities in the air slowly panning her weapon from left to right facing down the hallway before she spotted a slight haze in the air about a hundred meters down the hallway. She tilted her weapon up slightly, her hand squeezing down on the trigger, a trio of rounds blasted out of the chamber and striking an unseen target, purple blood spurting out of thin air as the elite's active camouflage faded, collapsing to its knees and then onto its stomach, the blood gurgling from the three new holes in its head.

"Victoria, this is Hans, we have the package, have you reached the hangar bay and secured our exit?" Hans' voice crackled over her radio, his voice barely able to be heard over the static, she lifted her left arm from its location steadying her rifle, knocking on the side of her helmet.

"I read you Hans, I've arrived at the hangar but I've got stealth elites assaulting my position, I'm getting some serious interference on this end, this ship it's wreaking havoc on my radio."

"It's the same on our end, but that doesn't matter, we need to hurry. The Vanguard of the covenant fleet has arrived and is fighting it out with the Taskforce as we speak, ODST's are enroute, they need a clean landing area, see what you can do, we should be there soon."

"Please be quick about it, there's no way these elites haven't called for reinforceme…" Victoria interrupted herself as she set her rifle back into her shoulder and fired off another 4 bursts, spraying down another elite whose camouflage she was able to spot. "Just hurry alright, I'll try to keep the bay clear of aliens."

"Victoria, the covenant are massing 3 bulkheads ahead of you, I've sealed the blast doors between you and tried venting their atmo, but they seem to have caught onto my presence and are deploying countermeasures." Indigo blipped over her helmet earpiece, a worried tone in her voice.

"Is there anything else you can do to stall them?" Victoria asked as she drew a grenade from the strap on her armor's breastplate. Yanking out the pin as she held down the safety lever in her grip.

"I'll see what I can do, activating automated anti-personnel defense systems, should be able to thin the herd a bit." Victoria nodded to herself as she launched the grenade down the hallway, watching as the camouflaged elites all moved to try to escape the blast radius, only for a number of them to be cut down, with the survivors having revealed their positions, Victoria methodically shot them down one by one until the hallway was clear.

"Yellow 5 this is Specter 309, incoming for pickup run, do I have a clear LZ?" A new voice combining in her earpiece with Indigo, filling her head with noise as Victoria tried to concentrate as the sound of covenant weapons could be heard echoing through the door at the end of the hallway, most likely the aliens battling it out with the countermeasures Indigo had initiated.

"Specter 309 this is Yellow 5, the LZ is clear for now but I don't know how long it will stay that way, what's your ETA?" The door at the end of the hall finally was hacked open by the covenant forces, a horde of various, grunts, elites and jackals swarmed through the doorway on the other end of the hall about 300 meters long. Victoria began letting loose rounds into the crowd, picking off a number of aliens at range, only for them to be stepped over and replaced by one of their comrades who zealously charged down the hall, firing their weapons wildly in Victoria's direction as they ran.

"Victoria this is Hans, we're almost there, had to retrieve Indigo from the ship's systems, she left a little surprise for the covenant."

"Yellow 5 this is Specter 309 we're incoming to your location, the fighting between the taskforce and covenant reinforcements has slowed us down, had to take the long route through the debris field, we'll be there in approximately three mikes."

"I copy pilot, but I'm not sure we have that long. Covenant are swarming around the hangar bay, my motion detector is picking them up on all sides, the only thing holding them back is the bulkhead doors, and we have no idea how long they'll last!" She shouted over her mic as plasma bolts whizzed to her left and right. She began to stand up, continuing to fire her weapon, shooting the legs out from under an elite and expiring a pair of unwitting jackals. "Hans you better hurry the hell up or you won't be able to find much left of me!"

As the enemy forces advanced into closer range, she began tossing grenades into the crowd of monsters like they were candy, once realizing that not even 4 of her fragmentation grenades could kill enough to stop the horde, she retreated back to the doorway on the hangar's side, switching hands and continuing to attempt to suppress the mob by firing with her left hand as she jammed her fist into the door's console, ripping her armored fist back out of it, this time with a handful of wires, causing the door to slam shut as she began to hear the enemy pounding on the door. One of the Elites on the other side warbling, "Bring up the Hunters!"

Victoria dashed back towards the center of the small hangar bay where a bunch of cargo containers could be used as cover, swapping in a new magazine as she ran. Sliding over a waist high container and using it as cover. The door to her left, towards the front of the ship was then opened, with the rest of Yellow Team sprinting through the doorway, with Marshall lagging behind as he dragged the prophet by his neck, the alien weakly struggling to try to pry away his steel grip, Hans at his side with his sidearm drawn, covering their back.

"Spartans, Indigo here, last I checked before you unplugged me, the covenant were converging on this hangar bay through multiple service hallways, I suppose they finally caught on."

"Welcome to the party guys, was wondering when you were gonna show up." Victoria jeered as the rest of the squad took up positions near her using the containers as cover.

"I'd like to think of it as fashionably late Vic, Marshall, give me the package."

As Marshall shoved the prophet into Hans' grasp, the covenant finally busted through the hangar doors thanks to the help of the Hunters with them. A dozen grunts leading the charge over the crushed doorway only to be mowed down by Yellow Team in a hail of bullets. Only more even more to charge through the breach, this time jackals with their shield gauntlets held high to defend the elites behind them, the team continued to suppress them only for a number of other doors to open up and for more covenant forces to charge in, surrounding them, yet none fired, with Hans standing in front of the team well visible by the alien troops, his magnum buried into the back of the prophet's wrinkled head, his other hand seized firmly onto the scruff of the old alien's neck.

"Anybody moves and he dies!" Hans shouted, taking the barrel from the back of the alien's head and firing three rounds into the floor right next to the prophet, and then placing the muzzle back on the prophet's head. Freezing the covenant forces in their tracks as the prophet waved his hands ordering them to stop. Both sides now standing there silently, weapons drawn and aimed at one another, with the spartans outnumbered by at the very least 500.

"Well….they haven't killed us but we're kinda stuck like this now, what are we supposed to do now Hans?" Lydia asked as she cocked forward the pump of her shotgun, causing a few of the grunts it was pointed at to flinch.

"We wait" Hans spoke through the comms so that only the squad could hear. Tilting his head to the left to look back towards the open hangar shield. "I hope you're armed Spectre 309, we've got the Target held hostage but I don't know how long we have till one of the covenant gets trigger happy."

"Yellow Leader we cannot make an approach unless the hangar is clear of hostiles, this D77-TC can't maneuver in there, I'm sorry sir but." The Pelican pilot was suddenly interrupted on his side by a second voice. "Get this goddamn Pelican inside that hangar Matthews, or so help me I will find someone who will!"

The other end of the line was filled with some tense arguing followed by what sounded like a wet paper bag being slapped. Meanwhile the prophet began speaking to the covenant forces in their language, the Spartans unable to understand it but the tone seemed pretty clear, he was allowing them to open fire on them.

"Roger Yellow Leader, entering the hangar in 5….4…..ready the nose cannon..2…..1, engaging retrogrades."

Jessie turned and watched as the Pelican came screaming in, its engines shutting down and switching to VTOL mode just before the ship passed through the atmospheric shield covering the hangar door, the now hover mode jet engines blasted into action, just barely compensating for the momentum and speed of them entering the hangar thanks to the help of the retrograde thrusters positioned on the nose of the gunship , causing Marshall to leap out of the way and behind cover to avoid being roasted by the jet exhaust that passed just next to him.

"Yellow Team get your heads down, engaging!"

Almost the moment after the pilot spoke the auto-cannon positioned under the nose of the gunship turned to its right and began firing, the high explosive shells sending the covenant forces close enough to its impacts flying, shredded by the shrapnel. Hans yanked the prophet with him as the two of them leaped back behind cover, the autocannon sweeping across the hangar in front of the team from right to left, the cannon's connection to the pilot's eyepiece ensuring almost perfect accuracy as it ripped through the hundreds of alien footsoldiers. The rest of Yellow Team all got low in their cover, the shell casings the size of soda cans and searing to the touch raining down on top of them, clattering against the floor.

"Launching Anvils, it's about to get loud!"

Both of the missile pods began firing as well, coating the room in a massive fireball as Hans pinned the prophet as close to the ground as he could get it. As the fire cleared, all that remained were a few scattered alien foot soldiers, and a pair of hunters who had been bracing behind their shields, massive arm mounted shields the size of concrete barriers that were already pocketed with shrapnel and the blood of their unfortunate comrades. The massive worms' hive mind bodies hunkering down as the autocannon turned back to them, only for a loud clang to sound, Hans looking up to see the barrell bright red, a shell jammed half way into the action, stopped by the deformed barrel.

"Cannon's jammed! And the pods are spent!"

"Just turn this bird around!"

The pelican's left thruster tilted back into flight position, spinning the pelican to the right, the two hunters and the few straggler aliens remaining all took advantage of the opportunity, beginning to fire their weapons at the unshielded vessel, their plasma weaponry burning small holes in the gunship's hull. The squad leaned up from their cover, attempting to clear the rest of the covenant and protect the pelican, but the Hunters' arm shields were completely deflecting any fire they put on them, though there were successful at killing the rest of the hostile stragglers, as well as gaining the Hunters' attention. The hunters growled in strange guttural noises, aiming fuel rod cannons at the squad.

"Hey! Earthworm Jim! Smile for the camera!" A voice called out from behind them, followed by a rocket that struck the alien directly in its arm mounted weapon, spewing its fuel all over itself as it roared in pain, bellowing as it held its shield in the air, the second rocket leaving a massive hole in the creature's chest. For a moment it looked as if the creature was unaffected, only for it to crashed to its armored knees and then flat to the floor with a massive metallic clang, its bond brother roared in anger but was only struck in the chest by a hail of bullets, the squad turned to see 6 ODSTs, one of which who looked like the leader due to their green stripe down the center of their helmet was holding a rocket launcher, both its barrels smoking, the others all spraying their rifles into the hunter, as well as one of the marines operating the Pelican's rear mounted machinegun.

"Yellow Team, focus fire on that final Hunter and take it down." Hans spoke as he rose for cover, aiming at the alien's exposed feet.

Say what you will about the intelligence of those creatures, but damn could they take a pounding and still survive, it took almost all of Yellow Team's remaining ammunition and a fair bit of help from the ODSTs on the Pelican to take the creature down, the damn thing was a bullet sponge, it and its shield. However, the shield was not enough to cover the entirety of its massive body, and eventually the hundreds of bullets that pierced through the massive creature's segmented armor began taking an effect. The creature giving off a deep groan before collapsing to the ground in a heap just a few meters from its bond brother.

Hans sighed deeply, the sound only heard by himself in his helmet as he shouldered his rifle, "Area clear, check the dead and get the package onto the Pelican on the double." He turned back to the ODSTs who were now dismounting off the back of the Pelican.

"Where do you even come up with half of these one-liners?" One of them asked the green striped officer.

"And who the hell is earthworm Jim?" Asked the other who had been manning the chaingun

"You ingrates don't watch enough classic vids, as uncultured as you are ugly." The officer spoke, voice thick with sarcasm, rocket launcher still smoking in their hand, her helmet speaker's voice distorting her vocal cords but did little to disguise her feminine voice as she unlatched her helmet, letting the braid down the back of her head fall, the tattoos on either side of her scalp covered in sweat.

"I'll drink to that ma'am."

"Oorah"

"Can the chatter and get to work you two, check the bodies, make sure they're dead." She turned back to Hans and gave him a little nod due to her saluting arm still holding the oversized weapon. "I'm Lieutenant Gabriels, and I'm gonna take a wild guess and say you're Yellow Team. I hear you brought the marines a new chew-toy."

"Good to meet you Lieutenant, and yes the prophet has been captured." Nods down toward the alien trying to crawl into a hiding spot between two of the cargo containers, only to be seized by a pair of the ODSTs and dragged back towards the Pelican which has now landed, its engines still on standby.

Jessie sauntered over, spinning the stolen alien weapon on his fingers like a giant metallic cowboy, vision pointed directly at Gabriels as Hans rolled his eyes silently under his visor, knowing exactly what he was up to.

"Thanks for the assist out there beautiful, I must say, those are some nice tattoos."

Gabriels looked him over, a bit of a dry look on her face. "Nice codpiece, does it come in adult sizes?"

"They do, but only in pink."

Gabriels snorted, holding back a bit of a chuckle. "And they say you Spartans are humorless."

"Have you met John?"

Hans watched as the pilot climbed out of the pelican, his hand nursing a broken nose as he circled around the Pelican, eyes scanning over the gunship. Hans turned back to him and placed his armored hand on his shoulder to get his attention. "Why did you land soldier? We need to leave before any more Covenant reinforcements arrive."

"We took some plasma fire in that entrance of ours, I need to make sure there's no hull breaches."

"With all due respect pilot we don't have the time for this, Indigo disabled this ship's reactor safeties and there are covenant reinforcements on the way who don't plan on letting us escape with their prophet, we need to get back to the taskforce before this ship goes nuclear or enemy reinforcements catch up."

Hans was interrupted by the scream of one of the ODSTs as he went sailing through the air, smashing back first into the wing of the pelican before slamming to the ground in a heap, the rest of the group turned just as one of the hunters everyone thought was dead moments ago proceeded to curb stomp the other ODST in the chest with a sickening crunch.

"Gabriels get your men back!" Hans shouted as he shouldered his rifle, firing as he attempted to get the behemoth of an alien's attention, and he most certainly did. The creature surprised him with it's newfound speed considering all the wounds it had already suffered, it has slipped his mind that the death of the hunter's bond brother had caused it to slip into a rage that gave it the strength to continue. It's speed he had not counted for and he was unable to move out of the way in time as the creature smashed him with the armored plate the alien used as a shield, decimating his suit's shields and sending him rolling across the floor, by the time the color returned to Hans' vision, the hunter was already on top of him, and using the tip of its shield, brought it down onto his chest with a force that severely dented the hangar floor Hans lay on.

For a while Hans couldn't see anything, his entire visor was covered when the force of the strike caused him to vomit blood. He tried to call out, but found that he could barely utter a croak, and as hard as he tried he couldn't breathe. He was in complete anguish as he lay there, what felt like every single one of his ribs had been shattered, even if he wasn't slightly indented into the hangar floor, he didn't plan on lifting his head to assess the damage as he knew it would only send a bigger tremor of pain through his body if he tried. He just lay there, furiously trying to draw in little bits of air as the gunshots continued around him, the fight he was still unable to see. After what seemed like an eternity to Hans, something came over and grabbed his head, attempting to remove his helmet, they finally figured out the release mechanism as the helmet was pulled off of him. Hans' face was covered in blood, his green eyes being the only distinguishing feature of him that could be seen.

"Don't you worry Spartan, we're safe, and we're getting you out of here." Gabriels voice called out as she turned back in the direction of the Pelican. "Someone help me move him! Damn suit weighs a ton!"

Hans tried to say something, only to violently cough up blood again, the pain rocking through his chest every time he tried to lift his arms to wipe the blood from his eyes. Gabriels tried to grab hold of him by his armpits and drag him to the pelican, but the attempt itself almost caused her to slip a disk. The armor Hans was wearing itself weighed around half a ton, not including the genetically modified grown adult inside of it, not to mention that the suit was still wedged into the floor. Suddenly a needler shot whizzed over her head, shattering on the floor behind her.

"Shit." She silently muttered to herself as she grabbed up her helmet off the floor, slipping it back onto her head as a new wave of covenant stormed onto the upper catwalk of the hangar. With her rocket launcher empty, she drew one of her caseless submachine guns from the holster strap on her hip, ripping a burst of fire at the catwalk, and spraying down a few of the grunts attempting to get an angle on them.

Gabriels looked around her, trying to assess the situation and get a grip on what was going on. Martinez and Schultz were both dead, that much she could tell from this distance, their bodies mangled horribly by the attack from that hunter. The body armor her ODSTs wore was tough, but there was no chance of it standing up to a hunter, but this spartan, this spartan might live. She looked back towards the pelican, the pilot was sitting on the boarding ramp, firing his sidearm wildly at the catwalks as his free hand pressed against his thigh where it looked like he had been hit.

She watched as the Spartan with the shotgun grabbed the pilot and Schultz, heaving both of them onto it's shoulders and bounding up the bay door of the pelican while the rest of her ODSTs remained, returning fire at the covenant. The smartass one with the alien weapon had already grabbed Martinez. And another was running right up to her, firing as they moved.

"Is he alright!?" The spartan spoke, her voice deepened and distorted by her helmet, but feminine.

"He's still breathing, but I cant move him, armor's wedged into the deck." Gabriels stopped as a few plasma shots landed a little too close for comfort, causing both her and the spartan to raise their weapons and return fire for a few moments.

"I'll handle the heavy lifting Lieutenant, I need you to cover me."

With that, the Spartan holstered her weapon and shoved her hand into the metal floor of the alien hangar, to Gabriel's amazement she tore back the deck that was trapping Hans like she was peeling a banana, lifting the massive Spartan onto her shoulders, holding his helmet in her other hand. Together the two of them retreated back to the pelican and the rest of their comrades, all the while Gabriels providing the Spartans covering fire.

"Someone spin up the engines, I'll keep us covered." Gabriels shouted as she stood as she fired off the last of the rounds in her submachine gun before dropping it to the floor and getting on the pelican's chaingun, clearing the chamber before opening fire on the covenant that were now swarming their position. She continued to hold her ground as she felt the rumble of the pelican's thrusters begin to spin up, suddenly she saw something flash past the peripheral of her visor and hit the hangar floor just in front of her with a clang. Gabriels looked down, just in time to see the plasma grenade activate, its light enveloping her entire visor, followed by an explosion that lifted her off the ground like she was a feather, in a spit second she was flying, followed by an impact on the back of her head, and then nothing.