Chief sighed as he slid behind a berm for cover. A flurry of weapons fire rained down on them from the cannons mounted onto whatever was underneath, or controlling, the base's defense perimeter. He watched Alyosha do the same, while Sam and Will tried to engage the enemy's incoming missiles with their rifles. Thankfully for them and anyone else sitting close by, they were slow moving.
Alyosha commented, "We're gonna have to find a way to breach its armor quick! This damn thing's uparmored to hell!" only to call out via communications, "Rusty, I'm sorry I have to ask you this, but strafe the bastard and take its attention to you! Anis, get missiles on the defensive walls and turrets! Neon, load up AP Slugs and start tearing through the walls with them! Rapi, you get your missile launcher out as well!"
Affirmative replies flooded the com, while Chief ordered, "All Lucky elements, assist as best as you can. Delta, spot and snipe weaknesses. Signal, stay close to her and make sure to keep us in radio contact. Pinne, Sam, you two are our vanguard, I want explosive shells on the walls, back up Spartan 034 and 043!" as he stood to his feet and fired a burst of MG fire at incoming physical projectiles.
Missiles started flying from the crews who carried them, Rapi and Anis laying into the forward walls. The Nikke-grade munitions punctured the concrete walls of the forward operations base as a Marine rushed forward with a rocket launcher. She took a knee beside the Chief, shouldered the weapon and squeezed off both rockets. They cratered the walls, lowering the stability of the place.
She was forced to dip back into cover to reload, telling the Chief, "Sir, I'm gonna be honest, I didn't expect to be fighting it out with aliens again!" which garnered a short snort out of Cortana. The other Marines joined up as well, pushing forward with battle and assault rifles and opening fire on the missiles launched by the base. The damn things moved terribly slow for something that was meant to hit and take them out.
Chief nodded, patted the Marine in charge of the platoon on the back, then gave several hand signals. The Marine officer nodded, then called back to his men, "I need two men on the right flank, two mobile, and the rest at the front! Stagger your positions in cover and keep the Nikkes safe! We'll beat this piece of shit yet!" only to stagger as the ground shook once more, annoyingly enough.
The man sighed and ordered, "Execute!" As he saw Rusty dive down on the base's defenses, laying into them with her own weapons. Her energy sword seemed to be quite capable of cutting through the reinforced concrete. The Marines moved to their respective positions, firing their Assault Rifles at the overtaken base, with one of them murmuring something or other.
The launcher Marine stood to her feet and fired two more rockets dead at the center of the base. They detonated and seemed to shatter the upper control area of the base. The walls beside it began to crack as the plasma cannons and defenses tracked the moving Nikkes and Marines and fired. Rapi and Anis, both of whom were advancing, narrowly found cover as the bursts of energy hit.
Alyosha, who was watching the action unfold, felt his breath hitch in his throat, feeling completely useless. He looked to the rear at the scientists that were taking cover behind a wall and wondered just how much more useful he'd be with an actual combat armor set and a weapon. Before long, though, the young man noticed the bolt of energy heading toward him. Luckily for him, so did the Chief.
The leading Spartan moved in front of Alyosha and took the brunt of the shot. Cortana barked over radio, "Damn, Chief! Armor is at thirty-five percent integrity! Take cover and stay there!" as the Chief dragged his fellow Commander into cover. He stood back up and fired a burst from his rifle, then looked to Alyosha and gave him a nod. They'd be fine with the Spartans around. Maybe.
He gasped as he saw Sam, the Spartan, heft a massive pack of plastic explosive onto a wall. He and Will ran back behind cover as rounds struck around them, with Sam immediately hitting the detonator, cratering the rest of the wall around the machine. And they knew it was a machine because, as soon as that last wall went down, the ground rumbled loudly.
As the group stopped to look, they saw it. The remnants of the walls were torn out of their flimsy foundations, four legs springing up from beneath the ground as dirt, ice and snow were moved in order to allow this new Rapture to rise. A dome-shaped structure emerged from beneath the base's central area, the cannons and turrets shifting to adapt to it, less like the spikes of a porcupine and more like the guns on an armored vehicle, turning to point at their targets.
A head emerged from amidst the armor plating, almost like a turtle rising from its carapace. Massive teeth lined a triangular mouth that snapped open, the machine letting out a roar that stunned the group for a moment, its eyes glimmering a bright blue. It stepped forward as armor shifted into place properly. Two cores, exposed, appeared on the sides, a dome shield activating.
"Well, damn..." Pinne murmured as she loaded armor piercing rounds, "Chief! Commander! Orders?!"
"Keep mobile!" Chief barked, "Spartans, assist!"
Sam and Will moved in unison, as one would expect out of well-trained supersoldiers. They fired their weapons at the beast, each splitting off to one direction in order to distract the massive creature's defensive systems. Shifty finally managed to break through the Alva particles that were blocking coms and tell them, "... You're facing a Lord-class Rapture! Intelligence names it:Land Eater!"
"Fitting!" Cortana replied, though it wasn't directed at Shifty proper, "Chief, its battlenet's active! I'm trying to link to it and maybe give you some more options!"
The Spartan nodded as he moved forward, jumping over cover to join his team and the Counters. Sammy fired her weapon on full, the barrel starting to glow a little red, much like Niner's. Up above, Rusty dropped strike after strike on the shield. The massive Rapture's cannons fired back, flak rounds exploding around the flying Nikke, causing her to shift her position and swear to herself.
Anis murmured, "Of course, it's gotta have a shield, because things can never be easy for us..." As she slammed home several extra shells for her launcher. Rapi, meanwhile, was her characteristically stoic self, engaging with heavy fire, even though the shield barely seemed to buckle under the fire. She tapped Anis on the shoulder, then grabbed Neon and pulled her back into cover as a volley of plasma struck around them.
She looked to Chief and asked him, "Any ideas on how to take out the shield, sir?"
"Working on it," Both Chief and Cortana spoke over TEAMCOM. Sam and Will were keeping it thankfully distracted enough, but that wouldn't last long, considering the damn thing seemed to be stomping toward them fairly quickly for a giant sea turtle strapped with guns. The Chief poked out again and fired a burst from his weapon, then dipped back into cover and gave several chops of his hand, each pointing to a different spot. Scattering the team in case the damn thing had missiles.
Rapi nodded, then stood to her feet and changed positions under the cover of her team-mates. Beside her, Niner swept the shield with automatic fire and a hint of fury in her red eyes, spent casings falling out of her MG. She ducked back into cover, pulled the super-heated barrel out, tossed it into the snow and slammed in a new one, before standing back up and firing.
A volley of plasma struck her armor, some of the rounds melting her shoulder armor plate, which she kept pointed at the enemy. In front and down low, Pinne fired her shotgun and changed positions, watching the AP slugs she and Neon launched at the beast hit and crack parts of the energy shield, much to their surprise. It still closed the distance unhindered, though, firing its weapons in volleys.
Rusty radioed, "I swear to Christ, this thing's starting to tick me off with its shield!" as she pulled a grenade off her belt, primed it and waited several seconds, then threw it. The impact caused it to detonate on the shield, the explosion enveloping a part of the hard-light that kept the machine safe. She grit her teeth, then murmured, "The kind of shit Syuen gets me into..." only to yelp as a plasma round hit her lower armor.
She powered her pack and pushed right, dodging even more fire from the machine and watching as the Spartans enveloped it. The Marines fired heavy weapons, too, though theirs simply bounced off the shields. Even the HEAT Rockets fired from those double launchers. She swore to herself, if she got out of here, she'd upgrade her gear, too, considering just how screwed this sitch was.
Alyosha spoke over radio, "Shifty, any idea how to down this thing's shields?"
"Best bet is to focus as much of your fire on it as you can, commander... Sorry," The girl replied, clearly apologetic. Not like this was really her fault, the Commander thought. He peeked over his cover, pistol drawn just in case, only to gasp as he saw the shield flare, flash and then disappear. He heard a familiar cheer over the radio and smiled, realizing that Cortana must've done something.
The AI, meanwhile, breathed a sigh of relief, sounding a bit sick as she said, "Never doing that again. Chatterbox was right, the Raptures really have only a few thoughts running on repeat," before she told Chief, "Aim for the two cores on its carapace..." then watched him redirect his squad's aim with movements of his hand. He drew his M6 and aimed his shots at the machine, firing.
As the Marines cheered the destruction of the shield, they, too, refocused their fire on the machine's core. Will and Sam both noticed this and, despite the towering building of a machine stomping ever closer to them, they drew their pistols as well, with Will calling out, "Bigger they are!?" as he watched a few more enemy rounds and turrets on the machine track him.
"Heh! You betcha!" Sam shot back with a grin as he fired his gun.
A grenade exploded against one of the turrets, disabling it. Rusty dived down and sliced three more turrets down, disabling defenses on one side of the machine as she radioed, "You boys requested CAS!?" with a grin. She fired her burst MG at the two cores as well, watching the beast start to stumble. She called out again, "Anis, you and your missile launcher think you can hit its legs a bit!"
"Hah! Smart!" Anis replied with a jovial laugh, shouldering her launcher, "Taking its kneecaps now! Neon, Pinne, back me up!"
She, Neon and Pinne fired their guns at the machine's forward legs. Bullets scraped armor, explosives tore it off. AP rounds and HE shells tore through the joints, causing it to stumble and nearly fall over. Still, it advanced on the damaged stumps, slower, but firing its weapons. More and more rounds struck its armor, cratering it and damaging the twin cores mounted just above its head. It let out a roar and sent a volley of missiles at the squads.
Displacing and firing on the move, the Nikkes and Spartans seemed to be doing work. Rapi aimed down the holosight of her rifle and snapped off two more shots from her own underbarrel launcher, punching holes into the machine's head and causing it to roar in what she could only assume was the pain it felt. She dropped her empty rifle magazine and loaded in a new one as she said to herself, "This is turning into a mission for the books..."
Though it was in its death throes, the building-sized machine decided to go out in a blaze of glory. A single cannon coughed out another plasma shot, one that arched for Alyosha, as the beast exploded, its insides bursting into flames as it collapsed and tore itself to pieces. Chief, however, had noticed the shot. Even with his shield partially depleted from the turrets, the Spartan bounded toward Alyosha's position just as the man stood up.
Cortana yelled in his ear as time seemed to slow. The Spartan cared little, right now. He needed to get to the Commander, keep him safe. He skidded to a halt in front of the man, then crossed his arms in front of his face, powering an overcharge for his shields. When the round struck, however, the burning warmth of the hit was felt through his armor. Warnings blared as the heat grew exponentially... He felt himself lifted off his feet and thrown aside as the plasma boiled away his shield, then parts of his armor. The pain hit next...
He blacked out...
... Only to come to to the noise of a radio playing music in the background, muffling the quiet buzz of neon lamps. When he opened his eyes, he saw said lamps and almost went blind, but they quickly adjusted. He straightened up in his bed, then looked at his arms. Faint burn marks, but they seemed to have healed rather quickly. "Certainly took you long enough," Halsey's voice carried over to him.
He looked over to the doctor, to see her sat by his bunk. She told him, "I had to apply the same method I utilized in treating Kelly to heal your wounds, though there was thankfully far less radiation than the Covenant's usual weaponry. Your armor, however, is a mess," as she started removing the various sensors and attachments that were checking his various vitals. The heart rate monitor let out one long beep for a second, but Halsey shut it off.
She helped him get up and off the bed as she berated him, "You should certainly be more careful in front of what weapons you jump... Be thankful this place has the ability to help me repair and mend the damage to the MJOLNIR, else you would be walking out into combat naked. Though I will need a different alloy to replace the damage the Titanium layers sustained."
"Is everyone else okay...?" John asked. Halsey took a moment to appreciate John's usual selflessness. She gave him a nod of approval which seemed to assuage his fears about the situation. He rubbed the injury on his arm, which was fading, but still pulsed a little with pain, then told the doctor, "If you can repair the armor quickly, doctor. I'm going to need it out there..."
"Certainly," Halsey shot back. She handed him a shirt and told him, "Your Nikkes seem scared..."
"They must think they failed to keep me safe or something..." Chief sighed as he donned the shirt. He clarified to the confused doctor, "They're meant to protect their human commander first. The programming of ther NIMPH system says so," only to notice he was only further exacerbating the confusion. He told her, "You'd be better off asking Cortana about it. I'm not well-versed in the tech, ma'am," as he buttoned up the shirt.
"Understood. Thank you for the tip, John," She replied as she tapped away on a tablet, like she usually did. The Chief nodded to her, then walked out of the medical ward, only to see the Nikkes and Alyosha waiting outside. The lattermost smiled as he saw the Chief was up, while the Lucky Strikes all seemed to stare at him apologetically. He raised his hand in greeting and showed them to settle down.
"Good to see you're okay, Chief," Alyosha told him, "We were all worried sick..."
"That's an understatement," Anis chuckled, "Signal burst into tears while we were waiting."
Delta, who was surprisingly comforting her little sister, cast a stone-faced glare Anis's way. The two members of the Scouts approached and saluted their Commander. Delta told him, "You should have let one of us take the shot, sir..." before sighing. She continued, "Nevermind... It's good to see you're alive and well. We have good news... We've found what we're looking for."
"Scientists gave us the data..." Pinne said awkwardly. Niner, beside her, trembled, however. The blonde Nikke set a hand on her friend's shoulder, only to look to Chief apologetically. The Spartan sighed, then approached Niner and also set a comforting hand on her shoulder, which made the girl look up at him with tears in her eyes. She broke protocol for a moment, hugging the Spartan as she quietly cried. The other side of the group smiled, though most of the Luckies were still a bit worried.
He looked to all of the Luckies, then told them, "I'm gonna be fine. The armor apparently took the brunt of the damage anyhow. Glad you're okay, Commander Harris."
"Chief," Chuckled the man, awkward, "Sam and Will are outside patrolling, by the way. They figured..." Only to receive a nod of approval from the Chief. He understood. They needed to keep up security, even after killing that massive Rapture. Spartans never did anything in halves. And he also noticed the Marines had been dragged along to it as well, considering they weren't there.
They just needed to prepare to head out...