- Footbutt
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- Exalted Member
Toril lifted her gaze up, past Nathan's face, to stare at the unfamiliar surroundings. "Where are we?" she asked, holding up a hand to forestall his protest of her getting to her feet.
"I'm not sure. This might be a personal bay for the shipmaster or a dignitary," Nathan answered, watching her fasten her hair in a tight bun and handing over her helmet.
"Nice," she said mildly. Securing her helmet on her head, Toril bent down and retrieved her SMG and pistol from inside her pod. "Where's everyone else?"
"When your HEV got hit by a plasma turret, your trajectory changed and you missed the LZ." He gave her a weak smile. "You were in trouble so I followed you here."
Still keeping her head moving to the left and right to look past him, she snorted. "Well that was dumb."
Her snide comment nearly rocked Nathan back on his heels. "What?"
"Oh, don't get all defensive," she joked. "Now Williams will be missing two members of his squad, not just one," she casually pointed out. "Have you tried raising him on the comm?"
"Not yet," he said, still off kilter from her comments. "Though we probably should try to maintain comm silence until we know how to get over to the LZ."
Toril nodded. "Don't want to alert the Covies of our whereabouts." Her head seemed to perk up, as if a thought had just occurred to her. "Then these could be useful." She unfastened two short, black barrels attached to her left hip and held them out.
Nathan frowned. "How did you know to bring sound suppressors?"
She playfully bounced the metal rods off his chest and smiled through her visor. "You boys never think past your next meal." She then brought her hand over her chest and gave a theatrical sigh. "I, on the other hand, figured we might be in a different sort of trouble."
His expression shifted over to a more confused look. Why didn't I think of that? He hefted his SRS in his hands and stared blankly at the loudest weapon of the lot, second to a rocket launcher.
"Yeah, that thing isn't so subtle," she said with a smile. Toril reset her shoulders and shifted into the professional manner the situation demanded. "So how do we get out of here?"
Turning to look at the door from which the two Elite guards had come, he pointed at the dead bodies. "I already got those two over there, but that door will most likely be the source of more Covies."
"More targets," she corrected him. "What, so up then?" Toril asked while motioning to the balcony with her SMG.
"Looks that way."
*** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** ***
Alice watched the distant leading Phantom disappear into the small, forward hangar bay, away from the compromised central bays, and pointed. "There they go."
Douglas gave a short nod. "I see them." He took their commandeered ship into a tight turn and gunned the throttle. "You think there will be a committee to greet us?"
Cracking a smile, she shook her head. "I think they had no choice but to head towards a bow docking bay. Cutter really gave them a sucker punch with the MAC," she commented. The two giant vessels were now breaking off from one another which meant self preservation was now seen as a viable tactic.
"You want to link up with the ODSTs on board before we go romping around?"
Alice pursed her lips. If all the Covenant wanted was to nab the Monitor and jet off, then the Spartan's allies would need to carry out their orders of disabling the ship. She personally didn't have the slightest idea how to do that, but then again, her expertise was in killing, not contemplating. Still, she felt a twinge of guilt for not reading up on Covenant vessel design more than she had. "No, I'd say we've got a Priority 1 asset that needs securing."
"Yeah. And if the Covenant don't know we are coming, so much more the tactical advantage," he replied with a clipped, mocking tone, doing a fairly good impersonation of Serina.
Alice tilted her head in thought. "You know, it's times like these I kind of wish she were-"
"Don't say it," Douglas cut her off, flashing a warning stare. "Besides, once we land and drop out of this thing we kill some Elites, rescue the Monitor, and get the hell out of there."
"Simple enough," she agreed.
Douglas steered them gently through the containment field and settled their ship to the left of their target Phantom. The Covenant troops had already exited the transport and were regrouping just off the port bow of the ship, giving Alice almost a bird's eye view of the enemy. One Elite was barking at another and pointed off to the right. Alice leaned forward to try and peer around the other Phantom, but couldn't see what had gotten their attention.
"We better hurry, Alice," Douglas said, flipping a few switches on the console in the process.
"Wait, can you bring this thing's cannons online?" she asked shrugging off her restraints and getting to her feet.
Douglas reseated himself and quickly brought up a visual feed from the starboard bow plasma cannon. "Done."
"Good. Give me fifteen seconds, and then take them down." Alice patted him on the shoulder. "And Doug . . ."
"Don't hit the Monitor, I got it," he said in a knowing tone.
She smiled. "Mark."
Alice carried the mental countdown in her thoughts as she flew to the back of the Phantom. She quickly reloaded both of her weapons and made sure she procured some plasma grenades. She took a deep breath . . . three, two, one.
She activated the gravity lift and jumped down to the deck of the hangar bay. Alice hit the ground running even as Douglas rained down fiery pink plasma from the forward cannons. She saw two Sangheili take three quick bursts and their charred bodies fell to the ground. Another Elite tripped over one of his fallen comrades and Alice obligingly unloaded six pistol rounds into his torso.
Douglas continued to rake his fire across the floor, super heating large metal plates and vaporizing limbs that were unfortunate enough to be caught in its path. Billowing clouds of acrid smoke began to fill the area as Alice finally spotted Contrite Variant still attached to the odd device the Sangheili was holding, only now the Monitor was being dragged in the alien's wake. She quickened her pace towards her target just a dozen meters away and switched to her assault rifle.
By now a few Covenant troops were returning sporadic needler rounds and yellow plasma bursts, but it only help Douglas pinpoint those still fighting. Alice was almost within range when a hollow shot rang out. Her first thought was to suddenly find cover, but Alice faltered in mid stride when she recognized the sound.
It was a UNSC SRS sniper rifle.
Way off to her right, two Sangheili warriors toppled to the ground when two white streaks passed through helmet and skull. Alice traced the source by snapping her head up and around. Half concealed on an upper floor behind a glowing railing was an ODST. Apparently his squad has already made it this far forward.
Above her, Douglas ceased fire, allowing Alice to quickly overrun the last Elite. The alien snarled a challenge, placing one of his hooves on top of the Monitor. He looked as if he was threatening her with Contrite Variant's destruction, and Alice skidded to a halt, her weapon up and ready to fire.
Whether or not the Sangheili in question had heard the previous three SRS rounds, he surely heard the fourth. The ODST was accurate if not subtle, and put the Elite down with a bullet through its temple.
Covering the distance to the lifeless Monitor in two seconds, Alice quickly deactivated the energy device used to capture it by depressing the trigger underneath the dead Sangheili's long-fingered hand. With a short pop and crackle, Contrite Variant's eye flashed a brilliant orange before returning to its normal blue hue. Disengaged from the device, the Monitor backed away from Alice and lifted up off the ground.
"It's okay," Alice said, holding up her left hand and maintaining vigilance with her eyes. "You're free now."
"Oh, my." After stopping his retreat, Contrite Variant gave an approximation of a nod. "Thank you, Reclaimer. I didn't realize that-" The floating machine stopped in mid comment and took in the alien hangar bay with a panoramic sweep of his eye. "Is this your vessel?"
"No, this is the Covenant Cruiser," she replied.
Behind her, Douglas landed hard on the deck and was at Alice's side in seconds, shifting his SMGs aim at the various smoldering bodies. "What a mess," he commented and nodded to Alice. "Is Cyclops okay?"
Either Contrite Variant didn't understand the jab or chose to ignore it. "So we are aboard a ship capable of entering the Slipstream?"
"Yeah . . . so?" Douglas asked slowly.
Alice could detect his frowning expression by the way he shaped his words. "But we need to get you out of here," she quickly added. The Monitor was looking back and forth between the two Spartans as a kid wanting permission to venture off. And she didn't like it one bit.
"Splendid! Then we can finally be on our way." And with those words the Monitor turned to go.
"Grab him!" Douglas yelled, reaching with both arms extended.
Alice took one long stride and lunged for the Monitor. Her hands made contact with its hardened shell and she immediately felt a jolt of pain in her hands that quickly ran up her arm. Little lightning tendrils played over her armor and increased in intensity. "Aah!" she belted out and let go of the floating machine.
Douglas abandoned his pursuit of the fleeing AI and caught Alice on her way to the floor. She had suffered a partial armor lock and her suit was now quickly dissipating the charge she had received. "I'm fine," she grounded out between clenched teeth. "Just get him."