- davidfazz243
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- Exalted Legendary Member
And so, Achronos lifted the banhammer high above his head, exclaming "You shall not sully these forums again!" And with one, deft blow, he brought the banhammer down upon the offender, and slew him.
Bah, what's the point? You're only goingt to troll, flame or E-raip me.
Lieutenant Robert Chambers slid a clip into the MA5B assault rifle he held in his hand.
"Let's go over it one more time." He said, in a deep, gravelly voice.
"We enter here- He pointed to a large bulkhead on a set of blueprints "Push through to the bridge," His tone turned icy cold; "And eliminate anybody inside."
A murmur of approval rumbled through the ODSTs: some snapped charging handles forward on weapons, others checked the seals on helmets. They had not been in combat since the destruction of an Innie bomb factory on Eriandus II some months ago, and were all edgy.
He surveyed them all; his squad, the best of the best: ODSTs and proud. He looked at James, his close quarter's specialist. James was skilled with a combat blade, and the best with a shotgun. He was pulled from the team for three weeks for "CQB training" When asked about his time there, he simply said "It was the hardest training in my life" and left it at that. Some said that he had been taken to 'The Killhouse'- a Live Fire CQB training area on mars. One in ten marines survived the training, and some said that the Misrah Armouries used their experimental technologies there. But whatever they did there, it changed James. He was talking to Kenneth, the team's explosives expert. They would certainly need him on this mission, for breaching and clearing rooms.
Chambers was snapped out of his thought train by private Joe McKenzie- A sprightly young rookie. "Two minutes boss!" he said "Come on! The captain needs us at hardpoint A!" The rook sprinted past him, hands tight on an M7 sub-machine gun. He tapped open a bulkhead, and lead the ODSTs through into a Harvest-Class freighter, attached to one of the many hardpoints on the Severance.
An oddly sleek design for a freighter, the Harvest class was designed for speed and manoeuvrability over capacity; a smuggler's ship. They shuffled through the airlock in single file, spread wide as they reached the ship's cargo bay, and stood aghast. Though small in comparison to other freighters, the cargo area still dwarfed the ODSTs a hundred times over.
They all braced themselves against the bay's massive walls, and waited as the ship disengaged with a "Clunk!" There was a shudder, and the ship turned away and swam through space, stopped a few hundred kilometres away from the Severance and jumped into the slipstream.
//Ten Hours Later, Edge of The Eriandus System//
"Ugh..." Chambers was doing all he could to stop himself vomiting inside his helmet. The Freighter had burst out of slipstream space, tumbling and spinning, simulating a malfunction, and Chambers was feeling the worst of it.
"Sir?" The Pilot of the craft demanded. "Contact inbound, no IFF."
"Right." Chambers replied, shaking away his nausea and moving forward. "Ready up, marines! We got some Innies comin' over, and we're gonna make damn well sure we kick 'em out!"
Robert felt a rumble through the deck of the freighter as the enemy ship latched on. A sizzling smell reached deep into chamber's nostrils, and he realised the bulkhead behind him was burning, prompting him to dive for cover. It exploded outward, covering the marines in debris, and blowing away crates of soy. No sooner had the smoke cleared than the Innies charged through the airlock, bullets spewing from the crude LMGs they carried.
McKenzie went down instantly, clipped from behind his makeshift cover. This prompted a hail of accurate return fire from the others, cutting the Innie boarders to pieces. The aftermath was bloody, but all eyes were turned to the rook, who was already filling himself full of biofoam. After all, no new ODST was truly green, was he? Chambers walked over to him, signalling to the others to guard the airlock.
"You alright, marine?" He said with a smile that was barely seen behind his helmet.
"I'm fine, sir. Now let me do my job" The rookie leapt to his feet, concealing a wince of pain. A ragged bullet hole emblazoned the side of his ballistic armour, just clipping his side. It was leaking blood.
"No. You need to get out of here, ASAP. Back to the Severance " Chambers said, with an air of a father cautioning a beloved son.
"But sir-"
"No. In the life craft. Now." Robert's tone started to darken.
The marine nodded, and limped into his pod.
"Now," Chambers turned, addressing his remaining squad. "Lets finish this!"
**********
"James. Take point." Robert ordered. The CQB specialist responded immediately, pacing ahead of the group. There were now seven in the fireteam, moving in a line formation through the insurrectionist ship's narrow corridors. It was eerily quiet, and the lack of enemies was enough to make the usually calm captain jumpy.
His radio buzzed into life, making half the squad leap out of their skin. The Transmission sounded hurried, almost desperate. Like the last S.O.S from a fast-sinking ship.
"This is-" A burst of gunfire. "Alpha. Insertion- Complete." More screams. "Five men K.I.A. We-" Another Scream, this time followed by a heavy cannonade of fire. "Six men left." The last part of the message played chillingly clear.
"We're taking the heat. Bravo team, it's all up to you." Chambers understood immediately. Alpha team was a squad of eleven men, sent onto the innie ship after Bravo made contact. Obviously Alpha was seen as the main threat, and the enemy forces had overwhelmed them. This would have been the case, but there was one thing Alpha didn't have; James.
Suddenly, his hand sprung up in a fist shape: "Stop". The whole team dropped to their knees, and the captain edged his way forward. He put his hands flat with palms up. 'What?' James pointed to his eyes, counted four on his fingers, and pointed around a corner.
'Eyes on. Four Contacts. Next right.'
Robert nodded, then put his right thumb up. 'You're weapons free'
Then, slowly, James moved around the corner, closely surveyed by Chambers. He moved to the first contact, who was sat in a reclining chair, sleeping. The specialist removed his knife from a shoulder holster, and slashed the man's neck with one, smooth movement. It was like watching poetry in motion; one by one, James moved along, taking each man down silently. Once his work was done, like all good craftsmen, he cleaned up. The bodies were moved and piled against a nearby wall, and the blood was cleaned from his blade.
"Let's move." Was his flat, monotonous transmission. As his squad moved toward James, the captain checked his TacMap; The bridge was only a bulkhead away. He found the door; a large, titanium-A structure that looked like it had been ripped straight from the heart of a Marathon class cruiser. Someone important was commanding this ship.
"Kenneth. The Door. Now." His explosives expert moved with startling speed; weighing up the door with a well trained eye, pulling just the right amount of C-7 and Det Cord out of a crumpled bag, then placeing it on the door. He inspected the Det Cord again, and shook his head. The replacement was an experimental FIREHAWK detonator, that was inserted into the explosive like old fashioned C4.
The FIREHAWK detonators contained a small amount of fissile material -That some said was taken from Decomissioned TORCH-IV nukes, the predecessors of the FENRIS system- that, when triggered, created a small Electro Magnetic Pulse, blowing electronic door controls.
"Stand back!" Kenneth whispered, followed by "Fire In The Hole!"
The door burst open, and the marines leapt through, each scanning for targets.
"What?" Kenneth uttered.
This wasn't the bridge. It looked more like a... Medical bay. Computers, drips, ECG machines and brain scanners all obscured something large in the center. Signalling for James to watch the door, Robert moved closer, taking the Team's medic, a female officer named Rebecca, with him.
They edged forward, and started to clear away some of the complex machinery. Lying before them, on the only bed in the room, was a man. He was covered head to foot in armour that looked like the old (and classified) MJOLNIR MK.I exoskeletons, only much more ergonomic and refined. Tubes, wires and pipes all snaked from his armour to the machinery all around him, and every so often, he twitched as if in intense pain.
"What is this, Rebecca?" He asked his medic.
"Judging by the chemicals they're pumping into to him... And the armour..." She paused for thought. "Sir, I think he's a Spartan."
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