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"First Step upon Hell"

March 9 2526 - Hour 1241

CPL Serin Celik

Approaching Covenant's Airspace, Biko

Missions are never meant to be easy, but Serin had long started to understand how that statement meant more than just that.

Complications were expected, plans weren't meant to endure much through first contact, but what happens when the 'first contact' is enough to set a mission to a point where it's a matter of 'retreat or risk for completion'? There are many questions that she had wanted to ask Log about why he thought this was a good idea, to continue and deal with a risky situation. He was trying to make it 'simple', to be 'easy on them', but what she got was a greater unease at the notion they were dealing with unknown factors. Even so, her worry doubled when Sif spoke and provided them with a dreadful new report as the dropships they had boarded were finally smoothly reaching their target.

Warning, detected numerous cruisers and destroyers protecting the target. Fighters have been deployed- they are preparing for infiltrations via Pelicans.

Tension emerged at this news, especially when Sif provided them with some visuals through their helmets. 'Numerous' was such a reductive term to encapsulate twenty or so ships preparing to defend the foothold on the planet. The Covenant was ready to play hardball to keep their current positions. And they had been notified of the main point of Operation Silent Storm from the looks of it. Her former siblings might be good at dealing with bad situations, but there are bad situations and impossible ones. They needed to have a footing to do something, they needed to be in the position to react. They weren't invincible as some propaganda from ONI would suggest- they still needed 'something' to do anything against horrible circumstances. And as far as they could see, this was really bad.

Commander Crowther was once again questioning her superior's decision to go through. Bickering between the two had become a normalcy ever since Logan had taken the initiative and pushed for the mission to go on. Each detail- each odd stacked against them warranted new quarrels and this one was the same... and yet not. Logan didn't seem to be as nonchalant about the doubts of his fellow commanding officer, especially when he turned the conversation into something more interesting.

Since the Covenant had deployed their smaller ships in the open, it wouldn't have been wrong to assume that they wouldn't expect an Anti-Air operation happening this close to their formation. Sif was intrigued, but seemed to corroborate his idea: instead of just infiltrating the ship for intel, they would also use this opportunity to hack the ship's defensive measures and use them against the fighters and then detonate the ship so that the EMP waves from its destruction would eliminate most of what was left of their defenses. It would be the opening Operation SIlent Storm needed, and just what the Covenant weren't prepared to deal with. There was more bickering, but since their mission's setting wouldn't change much, Crowther had less of a reason to press on the topic's cons. In fact, he behaved less opposed to the notion of 'taking a shot' at the Covenant for losing men against their ambushes in the last few hours.

And the infiltration started as smoothly as planned this time around. Once they slammed into the hangar, breaking a few dropships in the process, the troops disembarked as friendly turrets started to provide cover and reap through the groups of foes that had been concentrating around the area. Fighters were blasted down with explosives, both human-grade and offered by the carcasses of the Covenant. That was where Serin felt the 'heat' of combat. She had been on Harvest, thinking that it would have been there where she would have felt the same pressure Logan had back when he made his first great move in his career.

He said no when she asked if that was the case, and the young woman realized just as her DMR sprouted rounds faster than usual how right he had been. Her confusion on his words faltered as the mixture of panic, determination and dread created a devastating emotional cocktail that gave her what she needed. Fast-paced reaction. No talking, only listening and firing- killing. Dead surrounded them, and she was tempted to even think she was smelling it through her helmet. A foolish assumption, but she found her state of mind too numbed by the corpses surrounding them to genuinely care of logic. They had a mission, and it all seemed what mattered at the moment.

Could it be a leftover of the program?

Serin didn't get through what ensued beyond augmentations, but she did have preliminary indoctrination before being subjected to those. She had been taught to be loyal to the UNSC, to fight to her very death for its survival, but she was also taught how to behave with the killing. Enemies, foes- nothing to sympathize. Had it been just rebels, she would have been slightly less pleased with her current pace. But with the Covenant? These monsters were known to leave close to no prisoners, and those that were killed generally weren't executed normally. Brutes and Jackals were known to be cannibals and would devour men, women and children without a care for what was put in front of them. So, within that brutal context, this felt right. She was cleaning the filth as Logan would say.

Once the hangar was cleared, the rest became a wild chase through the pinkish halls of the ship, rifles cracking bullets, plasma weapons retrieved to reinforce their firepower blasting and burning into enemies, while grenades took care of a large concentration of enemies and Hunters set between them and their destination. The path was a brutal one the moment they would handle crossroads. Covenant troops would rush them from multiple sides, providing for quite the lengthy skirmishes. Gage was lucky to have a layer of shield as one of the grunts proved to have a lucky thing for precise shots. The plasma pistol's blast slammed on the side of his head, the entire damage absorbed by the shield but the impact forcing the former ODST to back away. He was lucky to be alive, but seemed to loosen his calm around these circumstances, looking around in all directions despite the order of engagement setting him to look in a specific direction.

She couldn't blame him, that sight just putting her through a similar state of paranoia within that entire walk. Eventually they reached their destination, the command room overwhelmed viciously as it lacked the same 'endurance' as the precious combat squads they engaged against. The Elites there had better shielding, but nothing that could exactly hold against a barrage of bullets from more than a dozen rifles of various calibers and kinds. The room went quiet as soon as the last Elite drew his final breath, allowing for the next phase of their plan to unfold. Sif took a while to get the entire ship's defensive system under control, mentioning that the Covenant had updated their AIs to better handle infiltrations of that kind. It was still not enough to stop her, and it also gave her the chance to study what they were dealing with in the near future.

And as they waited for the process to be over, with a temporary defensive perimeter established within the room, Serin spotted a very interesting detail that Logan seemed to miss due to Crowther once more taking his attention off the team and into a new conversation, this time it sounded more like them bickering on the escape plan. The young woman didn't care about that, focusing on the detail itself as she saw Gage massaging the side of his head through the helmet, and she was quick to realize it was the spot where the plasma blast had hit him. The shield had worked, the helmet was in good condition, but then she remembered how Doctor Gerhardt had mentioned flaws within the shield system. Not just tied to how limited it currently was in terms of endurance, but also about the lack of defense against any leftover kinetic force from a plasma shot. The impact's pressure did push Gage's head to the opposite side of the shot, looking like a reaction to a punch. What were the chances of him having developed a concussion and maybe some wounds due to that?

"You are getting that checked once we're back to base," Serin muttered, no hesitation in her voice. It was an order, and the reaction was almost instantaneous.

Gage gave her an annoyed look through his visor, almost ready to shoot down that idea. But after a long staring contest, the man sighed and nodded. No words were exchanged, but he could tell she didn't mean to sound condescending. That was the kind of injury which would really cripple his career in the UNSC if not treated as quickly as they got back to base. Sif was soon done with her task, confirming that everything was set in action as the external turrets and plasma mortars started to react to the once friendly contacts just as soon as they started to leave the commanding room. The AI got hold of the 'detonator' and decided to wait until they were safe rather than trigger it through a timed self-destruction.

More Covenant troops blocked the path, but not as many as before. They had cleaned up a good part of the troops within the sector, and their rush back to the hangar ended with them regaining hold of the dropships they used to enter the ship before leaving the larger ship to its destruction. Stressed, frustrated, the adrenaline persisted for a while and she was confused for the lack of much-needed relaxation as they could finally see what was going on. Lights exploded left and right as rapid-firing cannons and spatial artillery tore through fighters and nearby ships, soon forcing a return of fire back from the affected cruisers.

Her confusion and unease- And then... bliss. The sight of the ship exploding and tearing numerous fighters in the process left her with a satisfied mood that let go of any previous stress. All that hard work resulted in such a destructive effect. She was smiling through her helmet, a sight that ended once Sif noticed and giggled about it in her private comms. The blush for that embarrassing situation lasted up to base.

The first step was over, but now the next one was to offer support to the land forces and clean up the rest of the Covenant on the planet while Operation Silent Storm unfolded. But with what she had seen within that ship, the intensity of the firefight, she could tell it wasn't going to feel the same until much later, when a situation like this one would repeat for them. Yet, now she could understand her superior a bit more. How he became so... interesting when it comes to combat.

Boarding a ship and destroying it? Quite the experience for sure.

AN

Serin embarks on a path of 'understanding' of her boss. Sadly, that ain't a simple process. And things will just complicate due to the war. In fact, next time I will see some… Spartan time. But not telling who~.