Battered Bastards of Ida
Chapter Three: Fall of Gladsheim
February 18th, 2527

"In Gladsheim, Charlie Company was due for rest and recuperation from the fighting they had seen in the Plains of Ida theater of operations, but thanks to the overwhelming force of the Covenant Fleet, that was not to be. We were sick of fighting, but it wasn't going to stop for us anytime soon. There were times I thought about turning an MA5 on myself and taking the easy way out, but somehow he was always there. He never was one to give inspirational speeches, but he knew exactly what to do to keep us fighting. He was what kept us together for so long..." Recovered Field Journal of Hospital Corpsman Third Class Jack Dean.

Second Lieutenant Nikolai Cross had been on Harvest for almost two and a half weeks and he had already been in a field hospital with third degree plasma burns covering the entirety of his back from a Covenant artillery piece against Charlie Company position in the Plains of Ida.

Charlie Company was apart of the 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment of the 17th Marine Infantry Division stationed planetside on the Outer Colony of Harvest and they had seen some of the toughest fighting of the campaign so far, with only forty four surviving members walking away from the Battle of the Ida Plains. Lieutenant Cross was the last officer of the entire company still alive and senior enlisted marines were few and far between.

After Lieutenant Colonel Cisneros' timely rescue, it was discovered by the marines of Charlie Company that the fleet in the space surrounding Harvest had been defeated once more and were now licking their wounds out of system, leaving the ground troops to fend for themselves against the Covenant invaders. With little in the way of support and no reinforcements coming anytime soon, Cisneros was forced to leave the Second Lieutenant temporarily in charge of the Battered Bastards of Ida.

With mismatched weapons and armor pieces, varying levels of morale, and wounded still being treated, uniformity amongst the marines of Charlie Company was nonexistent. No one marine looked alike, but each fought tenaciously to defend the ground gained during the battles within the Plains of Ida.

Now, the company was allowed to lick their wounds in the rubble ridden town of Gladsheim. It was a small town, mostly categorized by destroyed farm supply warehouses, but the Magnetically Levitated train station was surprisingly still standing within the center of the town, leaving it as a viable placement for the battalion's headquarters.

While Cross was technically supposed to still be in the field hospital, he had left several days ago to assist the recently promoted Staff Sergeant Westin in reorganizing Charlie Company as best they could with the members they had left. Charlie Company was stationed in the collapsed MagLev train that was a kilometer from the outskirts of town, acting as the vanguard for 3rd Battalion's headquarters.

With Brigadier General James K. Kennedy, the commanding officer of the 17th Marine Division, and his entire headquarters dead Lieutenant Colonel Cisneros was acting blindly without orders. Nobody knew who was in command of the Harvest Campaign anymore and every battalion was acting upon their own orders, without official word from a higher command.

2nd Battalion of the 1st Marine Regiment was silent, with no news being heard from them, while 1st and 3rd were holding their positions to lick their wounds and recover. Army units had been moving against the Covenant, but any and all reports from them had ceased arriving to Cisneros' HQ. Another marine regiment, the 9th Marine Mechanized Regiment of the 288th Armored Division, had performed a regiment sized attack against the glassed capital city of Utgard, but had failed miserably.

The 9th lost nearly all of their officers and was currently in hiding within the Vigrond Highlands, led by the regiment's executive officer, one Major Katerina Clyde. Reports from them were sporadic at best. Right now, it seemed that the 1st Marine Regiment, the 9th Marine Mechanized Regiment, and the 6th Army Aviation Battalion were the only active elements planetside, with the rest being completely wiped out.

3rd Battalion's sister battalion, 2nd Battalion, had taken the reclaimed Plains of Ida after Cisneros pulled his marines off the line. It seemed as if the Harvest Campaign was crumbling and the presence of several Covenant Battleships within the colony's upper atmosphere did not help to increase morale amongst the men and women who had already been beaten and bloodied by the intense, month long conflict in the Plains of Ida.

Cross had yet to see the worse of the war, with only one day of combat officially under his belt. The marines of Charlie Company, however, had grown a deep respect for the young, inexperienced officer.

Rumors of the way Cross had held the line practically by himself to buy the others time had circulated throughout the entirety of the company, leaving them with a fond respect for the marine who had only seen a single day of fighting. Charlie Company, on the other hand, had been, at the very least, around fighting for the last year. They were veterans. They were men and women who had seen more combat than some service members saw with twenty years of experience.

They were the Battered Bastards of Ida. That was all people referred to Charlie Company after the reclamation of the Ida Plains. The rumors of how they fought off three divisions of Covenant and killed sixteen Covenant Zealot officers (while in reality it was hardly a division's worth of Covenant filled with the cannon fodder that were Grunts and Jackals and no confirmed or speculated Zealots) circulated like wildfire amongst the survivors of the 1st Marine Regiment.

Instead of being known as the company's actual nickname, the Charlie Company Jackknives, Battered Bastards of Ida seemed to be their new, unofficial nickname.

None of that mattered to Nikolai Cross, however. He was too busy trying to figure out how the company would be organized. With only forty four members, with Cross and Westin filling in as the only component of company headquarters sections, platoons were split up into three sections with fourteen marines in each. Each section was led by one of the remaining three Sergeants in the company.

It was barely three squads worth of men, but it was an ad-hoc formation made to accommodate what Cross had to work with.

In the crashed MagLev train, Cross was busy reading through a report given to him by Lieutenant Colonel Cisneros about standing orders for the companies of 3rd Battalion. Currently, the orders were to entrench and wait for reinforcements that seemed unlikely to arrive anytime soon. With the UNSC Navy seemingly beaten, the 1st Marine Regiment and the few other survivors on the planet were stuck without assistance.

It was a hellish situation and Cross could do nothing but be frustrated. Not even a month in the field and already he felt as if he had seen enough of war. "Hey, L-Tee." Staff Sergeant Westin's voice drew Cross away from his thoughts, with the Staff Sergeant taking a seat next to the temporary company commander. Westin had just briefly inspected the few remaining marines of Charlie Company, while Cross filled out paperwork.

"Mornin', Staff Sergeant." Cross greeted him with a yawn. "Did you send a section to take over for Sergeant Grant and her section on the line?" The Lieutenant questioned his second in command. 2nd Battalion had established a defensive trench-line which encircled the town ruins to prevent any Covenant from breaking through, though no attacks had been committed against Gladsheim since Brigadier General Kennedy's death.

Westin nodded, removing his combat boots to massage his sore feet. "Yessir, I sent Sergeant Lewis. His section sat out the last patrol, so I sent them out there for an eight hour shift." He explained, adding a brief justification to fully satisfy Cross.

"Sounds good." Cross said simply, before letting out a deep sigh and setting down the stack of papers that were in his hands. "This is not a situation we want to find ourselves in, Staff Sergeant. We're outgunned, outnumbered, out everything, and to top it off with the metaphorical cherry we have no fleet. It's just going to get worse from here." As if on cue, the ground violently shook, with a deafening sound roaring out simultaneously.

Both Cross and Westin stood from where they sat to run out of the ruined MagLev train and investigate. When Cross figured out what it was, he stood in complete awe at what was overhead.

A Covenant operated CPV-Class Heavy Destroyer was taking up position over the burnt out town ruins of Gladsheim. "Sir, with all due respect, stop talking about bad situations." Westin managed to say, before the destroyer's underbelly opened, unleashing a hell upon the planet. It wasn't glassing the planet, not this time.

It was dropping troops in pods and, even worse than that, a large transport of sorts fell from the belly of the figurative beast, landing on the ground with a thundering roar. "What the hell is that thing?" Cross asked, taking a step back in surprise.

"That is hell on legs, L-Tee. It's a Scarab. Four legged assault platform capable of destroying a regiment's worth of infantry marines." Lance Corporal Isaac Jackson explained, joining the two as they watched the destroyer drop troops into the middle of the town. Gunfire erupted from where the battalion headquarters were stationed, but they had little chance to repel the assault being sent their way.

Lieutenant Cross ran back inside of the MagLev train, grabbing his MA5B Assault Rifle, when the company's single radio came to life with the sound of chaos. "Cross, this is Cisneros!" The Lieutenant Colonel paused and magnum shots could be heard over the transmission. "We're fucked here, son! I sent the wounded your way the minute we caught sight of that ship." Another pause for gunfire. Plasma shots could also be heard. "Consider this a battlefield promotion. Get them out of the combat zone and rally any troops from the trenches that you can find. I'm destroying my radio now. Good luck out there. Cisneros... out." Before Cross even had the opportunity to speak, the transmission suddenly cutout, left only with static.

Cross stood, dumbfounded by what he had heard for several seconds, before springing into action. He grabbed the backpack radio, slinging it over his shoulders and exiting the MagLev train. "Westin, get the company ready to move out. We're falling back." He stated, defeat in his voice.

"Yessir. Charlie Company!" Staff Sergeant Westin's voice boomed, sure to capture the attention of any and all of the company. "You've got two minutes to gather your gear! We're moving out!" He shouted out the order, moving to make sure everyone followed their orders.

"Lance Corporal, get up to the line and pass the word. We're falling back. They're to fall in with us." Cross explained, sending Jackson out to the trench-line. Cross then ran back into the train and began packing up his makeshift headquarters. In reality, it was several ammo cans filled with disorganized papers and his duffel bag. With no vehicles to assist in transporting his marines, Cross chose to burn the paperwork to prevent it from being captured after it would be left behind during the company's retreat.

Westin joined Cross in packing up the company's headquarters, moving as fast as they could. It was only a matter of time before the Covenant defeated what little resistance was within Gladsheim.

Once Cross exited the MagLev train with everything that was needed, he found that the wounded he had been tasked with escorting out of the combat zone were arriving in throngs, with varying states of wounded arriving. Some were walking wounded, who were carrying what weapons they could find, while others were less mobile. Many were being carried on stretchers by fellow wounded marines and corpsmen.

A marine who had a bloody bandage wrapped around his head and walked with a limp from some sort of leg wound approached the Lieutenant. "Master Gunnery Sergeant Henry Terrance, sir. I'm the senior NCO of the battalion. " The marine introduced himself, shaking the Lieutenant's hand. "I'm also the senior member of this column." Terrance explained, motioning to the garbled formation of sixty plus wounded and corpsmen. No officers seemed to be present in the formation, unfortunately.

"We're walking the wounded out of the combat zone, Master Guns. Anyone who can still fight are to grab whatever weaponry can be scrounged up. We're leaving in ten minutes." Cross explained to the senior enlisted man, who nodded.

"Yessir." Terrance stated, briskly turning to the wounded column. "Walking wounded, grab weapons and ammo! Stretcher bearers, take a minute to rest now and give the wounded water! We won't be stopping for quite awhile!" The Master Gunnery Sergeant bellowed to the wounded men and women, who moved to follow the senior non-commissioned officer's word.

Westin approached Cross, his MA3C Assault Rifle in hands, his standard issued CH252 armored helmet on in place of his usual soft cover. "Sir, this is a lot of guys to cover with barely a platoon sized element." Westin stated, voicing his reservations.

"No time to worry about that, Staff Sergeant. I had Jackson pass word to the entrenched marines, but I think some of them are being hit as we speak. We may need to fight our way out of this war zone." Cross stated, placing his own CH252 armored helmet on over his head. "Let's move it people! We've got Covenant hot on our tails. I want First Platoon covering our flank, with Third Platoon covering our front! Second Platoon will file in with First when we link up!" The Lieutenant shouted his orders, shouldering his personal duffel bag and grasping his MA5B Assault Rifle.

Before long, they were finally ready to move out, with the sound of resistance within the town ruins dying down. It seemed that Gladsheim had fallen, leaving Cross and his marines alone. 3rd Battalion was virtually wiped out. 2nd Battalion was almost a hundred miles away, making it unlikely to link up with them, while the other surviving units on the planet were few and just as scattered as the others, barely able to survive, much less operate.

Cross chose to march at the flank with the makeshift First Platoon, led by Sergeant Garrett Alexander, helping to ensure no one was left behind on their march out of the combat zone. First Platoon and Second Platoon were the most well rested sections within Charlie Company, while Sergeant Grant's Third Platoon had just come off a six hour shift of watching the line. That's why First and Second would be protecting the flank once they linked up with Sergeant Lewis and his marines. They were the most well rested.

The one makeshift group of one hundred and fifteen marines, mostly consisting of walking wounded and battle weary troops, slowly began their march east, leaving the ruins of Gladsheim behind them, with no sure destination ahead.

Cross knew that the only way for him to lead the marines under his command was to the east of them and that was the general direction he wanted his marines to go. There was also a mountain range, the Modstand Mountains, to the east, situated between the Gladsheim region and the Plains of Ida. It was possible for them to march into the mountains and use them as a place to hide from the Covenant, but that was a lot of ground for the wounded to cover, with very little breaks in between.

It was the only option they had, at the moment, and Westin intended to capitalize on it. After regrouping with the surviving troops that had been pulled out of the trench-line encircling Gladsheim, Cross made his intentions known to the top NCO's. The one hundred and ten kilometer march to the Modstand Mountain was underway.

At that time, Cross had no idea how vital the Modstand Mountains would become to the Harvest Campaign..