- Wolverfrog
- |
- Fabled Legendary Member
Here it is. The finale of book one. My first completed fan fiction...I'm so proud. To all those who have read, and stuck with the series, thank you. Without you, I'd never have been able to do this.
Part 39 - Where heroes fall
The Elevator door opened, and we raised our guns, in preparation to fire. I sighed in relief; no one was there. Blade spoke over the secure intercom.
"We need two people to stay here, cover our retreat. Any volunteers?" the weathered ODST asked, and we all looked amongst one another.
"Well; I need to arm the bomb, so I've got to go with you sir." Switch told us, and we nodded. He was the only one with the skills necessary to rig the explosives.
"Ah hell, I'll stay with the FNG." Rook said, indicating Mains as well, who looked taken aback. Blade gave the two a pat on the pack.
"Good stuff you two. Don't let anyone near this elevator, it's our only way out." Blade stressed, repeating the words several times. "We'll meet back up with you soon. Stay frosty."
And so, leaving Rook and Mains behind, we proceeded down the rough, irregular tunnel; Blade, Switch, Sergeant Johnson and I. At a signal, we fanned out in standard UNSC marine formation, Blade up front, Johnson and Switch three metres behind them, and I a further three metres back, sniper in hand.
We were all officially in the hot zone now, with caution being the priority over speed. One careless action could cost them all their lives.
"Do you think the Covenant could be waiting for us?" I whispered, as we approached a sealed blast door. Blade indicated for Switch to hack it open before replying.
"If there's one thing I've learned about the Covenant lad, it's that they never expect the obvious." Blade lectured, and I nodded, reassured. At that moment, the blast door unsealed, lights flickering from red to green, and the heavy steel slid aside.
As it turned out, the Covenant were waiting for us, but they certainly weren't ready for us. They were sat inside a room, weapons holstered at their hip. As one, we all fired, at the various Grunts, Jackals and Elites. The fight would have been over there and then had it not been for the Jackal shields and Elite energy shields. As it was, we only wiped out half the enemy force. The other half were still standing, weakened but not beaten, and now they had draw out their weapons.
We immediately flew into cover, I posted myself behind the concrete of the blast door doorway, and felt Johnson take up post next to me. He stood a full head taller than myself. On the other side of the doorway, Switch and Blade took cover. I could hear the Covenant preparing to search for us, and dug out a plasma grenade from my belt, priming it. The flashing lights of the grenade activated with an eerie screech. I chucked the plasma ball overhead, where it landed in the centre of a doorway, just as an Elite was about to walk through it. The Elite jumped back, but not far enough.
"Look out, grenade--" was all the blue armoured alien was able to say, before the grenade exploded in a cloud of plasma, sending the Elite flying past us, where it hit the floor, dead. We took advantage of the turmoil to storm into the room and clear out the rest of the Covenant. I caught a black Elite with it's shields down, holding no weapon in it's hand. As it tried to lunge at me, and take me down with it's large, tapered hands, I quickly removed my machete from it's holster and drove the large knife into the alien's stomach, felling it. After a few moments of frenzied fighting, the room was clear. I wiped my blade on the dead Elite's leg, and the purple blood of the alien slid off sickeningly.
We decided to take a quick breather in the small room, it looked to be around five metres by six metres. I sat down in one of the chairs, rolling a Grunt corpse of it first. The rest of the small team did the same, Johnson bringing out a cigar. He turned to Switch.
"What about you trooper, fancy a Sweet Williams?" Johnson asked, and the ODST Techie shrugged.
"Yeah, sure why not? You got a light--" Switch began, before Blade knocked the cigar Johnson had passed out of the shocked trooper's hand. The tobacco stick landed in a pile of Elite blood.
"None of my soldiers are gonna smoke on duty." Blade growled, and Switch nodded meekly, although I could tell he was rolling his eyes or scowling inside his mirrored helmet. Johnson wore the ghost of a smile on his face, looking at Blade with a sceptical expression. The ODST scowled loudly, and stood up.
"Enough resting, we've got a job to do." Blade ordered, and we all sighed, reluctantly standing up. "Switch, unseal the other door."
"It's kind of hard to do this without a laptop." Switch grumbled, bringing out a screw driver and preparing to unseal the metal hatch covering the override command board by the electronically sealed door.
"When I joined the corps, we didn't have any fancy shmancy--" Johnson began to say inspiringly in response to Switch's complaint, before Blade cut him off.
"Just hush it Sergeant." the ODST ordered, despite the two men both being the same rank. Johnson turned away, and it was his turn to scowl. A few seconds later, and the lights on the door changed to green, indicating we could move forward.
Twenty or so metres in, the ravaged corridor turned sharply to the right, and Blade held a hand up, indicating for the team to hold. He posted himself at the corner, peeking a head around. All seemed to be clear, for he gave a signal for us to move forward.
Beyond the corner, the passage went on for another hundred yards or so before we encountered yet another locked blast door; locked. Blade stopped outside it.
"If the Covenant are locking doors behind them, they must have codes. Reckon they've got help from a prisoner?" I remarked, and Blade folded his arms speculatively whilst Switch got to work hacking the door terminal.
"It's possible, but our priority here is to destroy this centre, so the Covenant can't get their hands on the data. Everything else, including rescuing a possible hostage, is a secondary objective." he instructed firmly, and I nodded. "Get ready to flash and smash."
The door slid open, and I and Blade chucked in two flash grenades, where they bounced on the floor of the larger room twice before detonating, blinding anyone on the other side. We charged in, only to find the room empty, save for a pile of UNSC marine corpses.
"Bummer." Johnson said, striding in the room. "Guess the Covenant all further down the road."
"Too right. Take some ammo; these people won't be needing it where they are." Blade intoned, indicating the human corpses. It felt disgusting to be touching to cold, clammy bodies of the marines to merely loot some ammo, but I cheered up slightly when I found a human sniper rifle, and a battle rifle too, the latter of which I was still a little unsure with, but fairly competent.
The door on the other side of the room was already open, or rather, blown off it's hinges. Evidently, we were drawing closer to the main data centre, and the last bastion of humans in the building.
I proceeded down the dark corridor, the lights were out and I considered switching my VISR mode on. I decided against it; it was still temperamental and I didn't want to risk it malfunctioning in a fight.
The squad moved up ahead of me, in the same formation. We soon reached another blast door; this one the biggest yet. A pile of marines were lain down by the door, blood on their shirts. Whist Switch worked on overriding the lock; Blade and Johnson checked the pulses of the marines. They shook their heads: they were dead. I grimaced, and waited patiently for Switch to finish hacking the door, walking up to it, intending to be the first one in.
It opened, and suddenly, a pistol was pointed at my head. A human pistol. I blinked, and looked at the wielder, and gasped.
"Michael?" I questioned, frowning. The Spartan realised who we were, and lowered his weapon, looking over my shoulder. He ushered us all inside, and then hit a button, sealing the door once again. Fin and James were standing around in the background, dragging Covenant corpses off to the side, and dragging marine corpses out of site too. What were they doing?
"It's good to see you troopers. We could do with a bit of help." Michael told us. Blade shoved past me.
"How did you get in here before us?" Blade questioned of the Spartan, who shrugged in his one ton armour.
"We came up from the sewers underneath. Got the jump on the Covenant who were trying to hack the terminals. CCTV shows more are on the way; so we're planning a little ambush for them." Michael informed us, pointing a thumb back at Fin and James.