Chapter IV: Rescue Operation
Recommended Listening: Soldier Side by System of a Down
Alex stared out of the window of the dropship with sullen, bloodshot eyes. He felt tired and stoic, but alternately he felt the adrenalin rush of an upcoming battle. He didn't know if he looked forward to it or not, but at least it was something to do. Something to properly kill and bury the time, for the moment at least. The MA5B felt heavy in his lap and he felt tired, his flesh was ashen from the lack of sun and that mixed in with his gaunt frame Alex was sure that he looked like a zombie by now. But he could still fight and he could still kill, that's all that mattered. The ship shuddered briefly in the turbulence and Alex was jarred from his daze,
"Hey man, you look like shit." Jackson started off the conversation.
"Thanks." Alex replied, sitting back further in his seat.
"No, he's right son; you need a good sleep when we get back to base. Or at least a good lay." Sergeant Kelly threw in.
"He doesn't screw." Jackson all but blurted out, Alex just sighed and pulled the helmet down over his eyes best he could.
"Woah." One of the Marines said, and he could tell that everyone was looking at him. There was muttering, but Alex tuned it out; he'd heard it all before.
"God is wearing black." he muttered, then ran his hand up and down the assault rifle.
"Quite in the ranks." He heard Kelly say loudly, and everyone shut up. Alex perked up as he realized that the dropship was lowering its speed and altitude; they were nearly at the Covenant outpost. Alex straightened up and secured his helmet in a more fitting fashion, he held his assault rifle firmly and prepared himself for the battle that was to come. All of the men seemed eager for battle, only a few of them looked nervous; there was a very random assortment of survivors who'd boarded the Pillar of Autumn when she'd fled Reach. The dropship came in for a very quiet landing, not even touching ground, and the back ramp began to lower. Alex found that they'd descended into twilight now, coming into a darker side of the ring; all the better for cover. He stood up and moved towards the exit ramp.
The Marines all hopped down from the ship, holding their various weapons. From what Alex could tell there were in a good sized valley with huge rock formations that provided barriers between different areas. The ground was mostly just barren dirt, but every now and then he could see a small plant or a dead tree growing out of it. There was nothing living around, just the twelve men and women; armed and armored to the teeth. The Pelican took off to go to a more safe distance and wait for them to be picked up with whatever they brought back. Alex knew that they'd either have to call in more Pelicans when they were done or steal a few Covenant dropships. The operation began and the group began to move forward.
They all knelt down, progressing slowly forward towards some lights off in the not too far distance. The Covenant work lights provided tons of illumination and all but screamed their position away to anyone who might be doing a sneak assault. Alex clung grimly to his assault rifle as he made slow progress, he approached a massive rock and began to go around; wishing vainly that he could use his flashlight because really he was just stumbling around in the darkness. He wondered what his odds of survival were, the chances that he was going to come away breathing from this battle; they seemed low. But then again, they always did; and somehow he kept on living when so many others didn't. In the beginning he'd had survivors guilt, but that had just become one more feeling in a sea of wretched emotions that the war kept on producing. Now, he had become rather stoic; almost emotionless. Like many others.
Part of him still wanted to find someone, the yearning for a true love still burned brightly somewhere deep inside of his psyche. But the flame of his youth and innocence had nearly been extinguished by the war and the blood, slaughter and killing. When he slept, it was either a dreamless slumber or a toss and turn filled night of vivid images of bloodshed, flames and the roars of Elites as they mercilessly slaughtered everyone he knew and loved. But, that's life for you; or his life at least. Alex stopped very suddenly as he realized he'd nearly walked right into a Grunt. At first he thought he was dead, that the Grunt would scream and shout and alarm the whole damn camp. But it just sat there, softly snoring. He found that it was curled up in a little ball, silently slumbering; probably sleeping on duty.
Alex grinned, they no doubt warned Grunts about sleeping on duty for a very good reason; it would get them killed. He provided the example and brought the butt of his MA5B down on the back of the things head with a vicious force, the Grunt never woke up or made a noise; it simply died as the back of its skull caved in a fresh bright blue ichor spilled out of the wound. Alex raided the body for a duo of plasma grenades, added them to his cache of guns and ammo, then proceeded onwards with the others. They made good time across the valley, coming across six more sleeping Grunts and one patrolling Elite who had been stupid enough to have his shield off. It took them a whole fifteen minutes to find the actual camp.
"Alright, listen up." Kelly whispered, calling the others; everyone gathered round. "Jackson, I want you up there on that ledge with the sniper rifle. When I say, open up; take down as many of them as you can. We'll begin the assault just after you start taking them down. Everyone else, you know the drill; kill everything that moves. The Helljumpers will no doubt be in captivity, rescue them and get them armed as quickly as possible; I'm sure they're ready and willing to get a little payback on the Covenant. Everyone ready for this?" Kelly asked, there were a string of soft 'yessirs' and then the men moved off. Jackson began his slow, quiet climb to get into position and everyone else moved forward.
They all clustered about until Sergeant Kelly growled for them to stop grouping up, and Alex looked down upon the camp. They were up on a small ridge, which gave them an excellent vantage point. There were a few portable shields set up, but they didn't provide much defensive power. Sprinkled around the perimeter of the camp were about half a dozen Shade Turrets, all manned by tired eyed and bored looking Grunts. Inside the camp, at its core was a floating watchtower which two Jackals manned. Spread around in small clusters or stacks were Covenant supply crates, and there were two Grunt living canisters. Besides that there were four Ghosts and two dropships, all parked together in a small grouping. Alex did a quick head count and saw about a dozen Elites and two dozen Grunts and Jackals. A little off to one side was a make shift cell, basically four energy walls in a square.
Jackson signaled quietly onto the radio that he was in position and ready with his sniper rifle, which he'd procured from Delta Station no doubt. Alex could see the man laid out on the higher ridge, sniper rifle laid out on a bi-pod with a stack of ammo next to him.
"Open fire." Kelly replied softly into his radio. There was a brief pause, then the rifle spoke with a sharp crack and a bright flare. One of the Jackals in the tower was suddenly missing its head, the corpse flopped backwards out of the tower and landed on the ground with a sick sounding thud that suggested a number of bones were broken in the fall. Before the second Jackal could even think about reacting, it was torn in half by a second blast; the legs staying in the tower and the torso going down to join its brother. Alex watched in sick fascination as two more rounds were capped off and two of the Elite's heads exploded in a violent, gory display of blood, brains and bone fragments. As Jackson was reloading, Kelly shouted something and suddenly everyone was charging. Alex opened up as he ran, pegging a few Grunts as they ran confusedly about; the element of surprised had worked well.
Alex primed one of his plasma grenades and threw it straight forward, towards the nearest Shade Turret. It stuck to the side, burning brightly blue and white; briefly illuminating the area. The Grunt manning the turret screamed shrilly and tried to abandon the gun emplacement; but far too late. The plasma grenade exploded, it picked up the twisted remains of the turret and threw it across the camp, killing the Grunt onboard and crushing one of the Jackals. Alex burned through his clip and dove for cover behind a toppled over supply crate. Chaos exploded all around him as he reloaded, the night was now filled with muzzle flare, explosions and violent screams and battlecries. Alex popped up again, firing his assault rifle into a crowd of Grunts that were approaching. They squealed and screamed as the bullets penetrated their flesh and far too minimalistic armor, and soon they were just another half dozen corpses.
Alex yanked the pin on a frag grenade and tossed it towards an Elite, as he knelt down to reload again, something solid and heavy landed next to him. He finished reloading, then saw that it was a corpse; a Marine body. He took a brief look at the face and found himself staring into the cold dead eyes of Jones. Alex sighed and knew he'd have to frisk him later for some ammo, because he was running low. He looked around to see what he could see, the battle had deteriorated into madness; as he'd expected. Marines and Covenant were running around all over the place, hurling grenades and exchanging gunfire; there were heavy causalities on both sides now. Jackson was making good work of the Elites whenever he could get a clear shot and now half of them lay dead on the ground.
Alex threw his last fragmentation grenade and completely demolished a shield wall that some Jackals had been working on. He saw a duo of crimson armored Elites heading his way and knew that he'd have to find some better cover. He jumped up and began firing in their direction, immediately they moved for cover; returning fire. Alex ran blindly forward, spotting Kelly and a few other Marines hunkering down behind a large rock.
"Cover me!" He yelled to anyone that was listening. And then luck decided to cheat on him, he tripped over a rock. Alex landed with a loud grunt on the ground, his gun went flying from his hand and the breath was driven from his lungs. He rolled over and then found himself staring at a plasma rifle, attached to this rifle was a very large, very displeased looking Elite. It growled menacingly at him in a very deep voice, Alex knew that he had bought it. He stared up at the Elite, waiting for death to come, and watched as the clawed digit slowly began to tighten around the trigger. Then the Elite's head exploded in a mass of violent bloody death and the body flew sideways, the finger twitched and fired the gun; but the few blue bolts that came out missed Alex by a few inches.
"Heh, told you I was watching your back on the field." Jackson said smugly through a burst of static. Alex allowed himself a small grin and snatched up his gun, he regained his composure and ran for the rock as Kelly and the others gave him cover fire.
"How we doin'?" Alex asked.
"Not too bad. We've lost half our forces but they've lost half theirs; consider we're a dozen and their three times that number it's not too bad." Kelly replied over intermitted gunfire, the Covenant were pinned down but still relatively strong in number.
"Steele, I've got a job for you, son. See if you can get over to the controls for the holding cell and get those damn Helljumpers out, we need the damned backup and we need it five minutes ago." Kelly said, he hurled a fragmentation grenade towards an Elite that decided to advance; but the damn thing pulled back just in time and the grenade went to waste being nothing more than a souped up fireworks display. Alex nodded a quick 'yessir' and set his sights on the cell, it was to the left of the rock formation and away from the general din of battle and chaos. The ground was littered with pools of blood and fresh, coldening corpses; but it was relatively safe. Alex gripped his rifle firmly and asked for some cover fire.
"Alright, go!" Kelly shouted, then he and the others popped up and peppered the Covenant's position; spraying a hail of red hot lead and forcing the alien bastards to hunker down behind their barricade. Alex sprinted across the open space towards the cell and in spite of the cover fire, felt as much as heard and saw a few plasma bolts rushing his way. One nailed him in the shoulder and another grazed his neck, but he didn't miss a beat. Gritting his teeth against the awful pain he dove for cover and landed just short of the cell, behind a small control console next to it. Alex quickly hauled himself up and threw his last plasma grenade towards the Covenant, he was rewarded with the sound of several Grunts being blown away; their little fragile bodies flying up into the night and off into oblivion.
The Marine looked down at the light panel and studied it briefly, after a short moment of confusion he finally just shrugged, shouldered his rifle and fired. The light panel flickered a few times and then went out, then the walls holding in the Helljumpers collapsed. There were eight of them in all, clad in complete black uniforms that were stained with both human and Covenant blood. The eight men and women came screaming out, snatching up the weapons of the fallen and making a mad, blind dash for the Covenant. Alex got caught up in the moment and charged along with them, firing as he went. The Covenant didn't have a chance, really. Alex and the Helljumpers were suddenly amongst the aliens, fighting and killing.
Alex spotted an Elite heading his way and emptied his whole rifle clip into it, soon overloading its shield and then putting it down forever. He reloaded his second to last clip and then watched as another Elite brought down its plasma rifle on a Helljumpers head, the helmet cracked and broke; and so did the man's skull. Alex blinked briefly as fresh, warm blood splashed across his face; and then grabbed his pistol and let his rifle hang by its sling. He started to fire, but watched as the other Helljumpers blew the Elite to all hell with an assortment of weapons. Alex then turned his attention to the other surviving enemies. He found a small group of Grunts left and unloaded his pistol into them, splattering their bright blue phosphorescent ichor across the ground and making something of a modern art statement.
Alex looked around for more enemies, but relaxed every so slightly as he saw that everything inhuman was now dead and bloody. He went about reloading both weapons, ejecting the spent clips and slamming fresh ones in. After that he holstered his pistol and let his rifle hang by its sling, the other Marines were approaching now. Alex did a quick head count and saw that out of the original crew of twelve, himself, Jackson, Sergeant Kelly and four others were alive. Out of the eight Helljumpers they'd rescued, six had made it out. So they'd gained a man, of course that was just strictly numbers speaking; they had gained six Helljumpers. The Helljumpers were fighting machines in their own right and well worth the losses. Alex saw the Marines and Helljumpers already going about gathering up every weapon they could find.
"Yeah, come on back; we've got a shitload of stuff here." Sergeant Kelly was saying into his comm unit. "Yeah, two dropships and four Ghosts; and a bunch of guns and supplies. And six Helljumpers." He stated. Finally, he turned to the others.
"Good job, guys! Cheers all around! Just grab everything of use and start piling it up. And pop open those crates, see what's inside." He said. Alex looked out over the darkness for a moment, and knew that he had a long day ahead of him; he got to work.