RP:Operation HELLFIRE

Rules

 * Rule 1: What I say goes
 * Rule 2: Try not to make dozens of posts before everybody else can reply :]
 * Rule 3: The obvious of no godmodding
 * Rule 4: If you want somebody to die, ask the owner of the character.
 * Rule 5: The RP occurs in the Necros Era
 * Rule 6: Forces will be divided up across multiple battlefronts
 * Rule 7: There is a death cap of four SPARTANS. Remember this though. SPARTANS are faster and tougher than Brutes, smarter, better equipped and even have the necessary armour to survive a direct gravity hammer impact. Try to save all your spartans for the REAL challenge later on ;]
 * Rule 8: The RP will be fought in a 'unusual' method, that will be detailed later
 * Rule 9: You can add your units up
 * Rule 10: We change phases, when I say we change phases. Comprende?
 * Rule 11: ONLY I can add music. If you add music, I will delete it.

Rules on adding new units
The SPARTAN phase is strictly for SPARTAN units and for forces supporting them, AKA Task Force Lightning. The second phase is for all UNSC forces in general, if you want information of what kind of unit to add, or how to add, send a message to my talk page, and I'll maybe help some time soon ish, hopefully.

Order of Battle
The battle will be divided into 3 phases. When they change from one to the other is my order.


 * Phase 1: Training, preparation, introductions, transport
 * Phase 2: SPARTAN infiltration
 * Phase 3: UNSC Invasion
 * Phase 4: Taking the capital
 * Phase 5: End of the Operation

Introduction
General Order 707BThis order is to be shown to all UNSC forces prior to engagement and must be destroyed after reading, and deleted from local caches, under order alpha 61

''During the upcoming Operation HELLFIRE, we will be engaging the enemy on their terms, in their settlements, amidst their civilians. Due to the notorious nature of the Jiralhanae, and their natural aggression, strength and willingness to resist, the United Earth Government council passed this order. Any Jiralhanae civilians that resist the UNSC's invasion attempts are classified as hostile in the combat zones. Any civilian forces that enter armed conflict, or unarmed conflict, including physical violence, are to be classified as hostile and are treated as such. Any armed forces using civilian hostages, or using buildings vital to the civilian infrastructure, such as hospitals, governmental buildings, educational buildings and such, are verified as valid targets and green light on engagement must be passed by theatre commander (battalion) before engagement commences. Targets using human prisoners of war (POW) as living shields are to not be directly engaged. If used as human shields, disengage combat and resolve situation with specialised forces '' to recover hostages as safely as possible. ''Surrendering or injured combatants are to thoroughly disarmed, bound and placed under extreme guard. Any resistance or indications of a false flag operations warrant targets to be reclassified as hostile targets, and can be engaged in combat.''

Signed Fleet Admiral William T. Castle, Chairman of UNSC Military Operations

Operation HELLFIRE is the lynch pin in the much larger joint Operation FIRE. The overall aim of the Operation HELLFIRE was to decapitate the Covenant Remnant by severing their chain of command and demolishing their capital, while Remnant reserves were drawn elsewhere by Sangheili Republic, Imperium, Plainsfierian and Machina forces. While other elements of Operation FIRE were diversionary attacks, designed to draw out forces, while also destroying vital Covenant military capabilities, HELLFIRE was a mass invasion aimed at taking ground from the enemy and destroy their leadership.

The plan was simple. While diversionary operations were diverting the bulk of the Remnant forces away, the UNSC would infiltrate their core sectors with a captured Remnant ship bearing false flags and disable their orbital defence grid. Once it has been rendered ineffective, the UNSC would begin their invasion, with several battle fleets and the aim to overwhelm the Brutes with sheer numbers, and drop down enough invasion forces to simply shock and awe their way through their defences. The over all aim is to destroy their armed forces, capture the major settlements and industrial areas and take the capital, along with taking the leadership of the Remnant, dead or alive.

Force Composition

 * Task Force Lightning
 * UNSC Campbeltown
 * UNSC Eidolon
 * UNSC Highwind
 * UNSC Yggdrasil
 * UNSC Where Eagles Date
 * UNSC Hortensia
 * UNSC Black Lagoon
 * 117th Special Operations Regiment
 * 11th SCARE Regiment, 3rd Battalion
 * 12th SCARE Regiment, 4th Battalion


 * Task Force Thunder
 * 8th Fleet
 * 10 battle groups
 * Transport Division Three
 * 13th Fleet
 * 10 Battle groups
 * 16th Fleet
 * 10 Battle groups
 * Taskforce Echo
 * 33rd Fleet
 * 10 Battle groups
 * 3 Cruiser Flotillas
 * 4 Destroy Squadrons
 * 4 Frigate Squadrons
 * 8 Marine Expeditionary Forces
 * 7th Marine Expeditionary Force
 * UNSC 8th Marines Expeditionary Force
 * 25th Marine Expeditionary Brigade
 * 16 Army Divisions
 * 1 STO squadron
 * 1 SRS Squadron
 * 2 ODST Battalions
 * 10th Shock Troops Battalion
 * 2 Force Reconnaissance Regiments
 * 1 Raider Regiment
 * 2 SCARES Regiments
 * 1 PSAT Regiment
 * 1 SF Squadron
 * 1 AIA squadron
 * 1 Commando Battalion
 * 2 Army Ranger Brigades
 * 2 STAB Brigades
 * 1 AC Brigade

Sign up

 * Ajax 013
 * Dread
 * Actene
 * Norman-123
 * Sgt.johnson
 * CF001
 * Spartan 119
 * Lordofmonsterisland
 * Spartan 112
 * Masterchief46517
 * Spartan G-23
 * Spartan-091
 * SPARTAN-501
 * SPARTAN-118
 * Carpe
 * MasterGreen999
 * FightWithHonor

Sgt.johnson's Characters

 * SPARTAN-290
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: Indigo Company, 1st Battalion, 117th Special Operations Regiment
 * Rank: First Lieutenant (O-2)
 * Equipment: BR09 Battle Rifle, M108A1 CAWS, dual-Angel Arms Cutlass, M7B Tactical Knife
 * Dammit
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: Indigo Company, 1st Battalion, 117th Special Operations Regiment
 * Rank: None
 * Equipment: M9K Canine Armor
 * Connor Anderson
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: Special Reconnaissance Service
 * Rank: Major (O-4)
 * Equipment: M10 PDWS, M47 Compact Pistol, M4 Folding Knife
 * Malcolm Lennox
 * Factions United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: 18th Special Operations Company, 10th Shock Troops Battalion, 105th ODST Division
 * Rank: Gunnery Sergeant (E-7)
 * Equipment: BR09 Battle Rifle, M6L/S PDWS, M3B Combat Knife

CF001

 * Francis Davidson
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit:25th Marine Expeditionary Brigade
 * Rank:Brigadier General
 * Equipement:M2A holographic forarm Grip


 * Spartan-A067
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit:Squad Athens
 * Rank:Sergeant
 * Equipement:MA6A Individual Combat Weapon System


 * Spartan-A099
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit: Lambda Squadron
 * Rank:Captain
 * Equipment: Battle Rifle 09 Scoped Rifle, Sniper Rifle System 99G-S3 Anti-Material, M108A1 Close Assault Weapon System


 * Mary Lee Davidson
 * Factin:UNSC
 * Unit:Battlegroup Everest
 * Rank:Vice Admiral
 * Equipement:UNSC Everest


 * Spartan-A107
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit:Lambda Squadron
 * Rank:Second Lieutenant
 * Equipement:Spartan Laser, M73D Carbine, Heavy Battle Rifle 11


 * Jordan Davis
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit:UNSC 14th Nomad Fleet
 * Rank:Fleet Admiral
 * Equipement:UNSC Shōkaku


 * Lily Stewart Davidson
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit:3th Orbital Drop Shock Trooper Expeditionary Unit
 * Rank:Sergeant
 * Equipement:MA6A Individual Combat Weapon System


 * Gary MacTarvish
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit:3th Orbital Drop Shock Trooper Expeditionary Unit
 * Rank:Lieutenant
 * Equipement:HBR-11


 * Spartan-A067
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit:Squad Athens
 * Rank:Sergeant
 * Equipement:MA6A


 * Spartan-A008
 * unit:Squad Athens
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Rank:Petty Officer second Class
 * Equipement:M73D Carbine


 * Spartan-A033
 * unit:Squad Athens
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Rank:Petty Officer Tird Class
 * Equipement:BR09


 * Spartan-A042
 * unit:Squad Athens
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Rank:Petty Officer Tird Class
 * Equipement:M90D Close Assault Weapon System


 * Spartan-A027
 * unit:Squad Athens
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Rank:Petty Officer Tird Class
 * Equipement:M81C Ultra Light Machine Gun


 * Spartan-A019
 * unit:Squad Athens
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Rank:Petty Officer Second class
 * Equipement:Spartan Laser


 * Spartan-A022
 * unit:Squad Athens
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Rank:Petty Officer Tird Class
 * Equipement:Battle Rifle 09 Scoped Rifle


 * Spartan-A106
 * unit:Squad Athens
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Rank:Petty Officer Tird Class
 * Equipement:MA6A Individual Combat Weapon System


 * Spartan-A081
 * unit:Squad Athens
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Rank:Petty Officer Tird Class
 * Equipement:Battle Rifle 09 Scoped Rifle


 * Spartan-A040
 * unit:Squad Athens
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Rank:Petty Officer Tird Class
 * Equipement:M73D Carbine


 * Spartan-A004
 * unit:Squad Athens
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Rank:Petty Officer Second class
 * Equipement:MA6A Individual Combat Weapon System


 * Spartan-A092
 * unit:Squad Athens
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Rank:Petty Officer Tird Clss
 * Equipement:Battle Rifle 09 Scoped Rifle


 * Spartan-A020
 * unit:Squad Athens
 * faction:UNSC
 * Rank:Petty officer tird class
 * equipement:M73D Carbine


 * Genevieve Tanner
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit:1st Special Service Force
 * Rank:Colonel
 * Equipement:M73D Carbine,M7A Sub Machine Gun


 * Isabella Portelli
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit:1st Special Service Force
 * Rank:Colonel
 * Equipement:MA6A Individual Combat Weapon System, M10 Personal Defence Weapon system


 * Jim Ambrose
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit:3th Orbital Drop Shock Trooper Expeditionary Unit
 * Rank:Major
 * Equipement:Battle Rifle 09 Scoped Rifle


 * Steve Daniel Huang, Senior
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit:226th Infantry Battalion Excalibur
 * Rank:Colonel
 * Equipement:Sniper Rifle System 99G-S3 Anti-Material


 * Camille Stewart
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit:Battlegroup Everest
 * Rank:Captain
 * Equipement:UNSC Okinawa

LOMI

 * Riker-012
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: Kilo Company
 * Rank:
 * Equipment:


 * Kilo Company
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Equipment: Various Weapons, Equipment, Armor, Vehicles, etc
 * Members:


 * 12th Naval Squadron
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Equipment: Various Space Fighters
 * Members:


 * Dekd Nok
 * Faction: Kig-Yar Pirates
 * Unit: Kig-Yar Pirates Command
 * Rank:
 * Equipment:

SPARTAN 119

 * Ross East Jr.
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit: UNSCAF 3rd Special Operations Squadron
 * Rank: Lt. Col.
 * Equipment: F/I-905 Claymore, I-660 Spear (secondary aircraft), M98 Compact


 * Nanook Kalaluit
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit: UNSCAF 3rd Special Operations Squadron
 * Rank: Major
 * Equipment: F/I-905 Claymore, I-660 Spear (secondary aircraft), M6L Personal Defence Weapon System


 * David Kilgore
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit: 3rd Armored Division
 * Rank: Captain
 * Equipment: M-1050 Brown Bear Anti-Heavy Walker Vehicle, M2A Light Assault Rifle, M6L Personal Defence Weapon System


 * Mattias Eriksson
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit: 3rd Armored
 * Rank: 2nd Lieutenant
 * Equipment: M1000 Tiger Heavy Battle Tank, M81C Ultra Light Machine Gun, M98 Compact


 * Michael Price
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit: 77th Airborne
 * Rank: Lieutenant
 * Equipment: M99C Special Application Scoped Rifle, Battle Rifle 09 Scoped Rifle, M98 Compact


 * Sarah East
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit: 77th Airborne
 * Rank: Sergeant
 * Equipment: M389B General Purpose Machine Gun, M41B2 Medium Anti-Vehicle/Assault Weapon

Actene's Characters

 * SPARTAN-A294
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: SPARTAN-IV Bravo Company
 * Rank: First Sergeant
 * Equipment: MA6A Individual Combat Weapon System, M13 Machete, Personal combat blade, M84 Wolf exoskeleton


 * SPARTAN-B030
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: SPARTAN-IV Bravo Company
 * Rank: Private
 * Equipment:: MA6A Individual Combat Weapon System, M6L Sidearm, M47 Sidearm, M13 Machete, M7B Tactical Knife

Norman-123's Characters

 * SPARTAN-G124
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: SPARTAN-IV Ghost Company
 * Rank: Second Lieutenant
 * Equipment: MA6A Individual Combat Weapon System, M90D Close Assault Weapon System, M6L Personal Defence Weapon System, M13 Machete


 * SPARTAN-G198
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit: SPARTAN-IV Ghost Company
 * Rank: Gunnery Sergeant
 * Equipment: M1091 Sniper Rifle System, M7A Sub Machine Gun (two), M6L Personal Defence Weapon System, M13 Machete


 * SPARTAN-G066
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: SPARTAN-IV Ghost Company
 * Rank: Staff Sergeant
 * Equipment: MA6A Individual Combat Weapon System, M90D Close Assault Weapon System, M6L Personal Defence Weapon System, M13 Machete


 * SPARTAN-G091
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: SPARTAN-IV Ghost Company
 * Rank: Corporal
 * Equipment: MA6A Individual Combat Weapon System, M90D Close Assault Weapon System, M6L Personal Defence Weapon System, M13 Machete


 * SPARTAN-G150
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: SPARTAN-IV Ghost Company,
 * Rank: Lance Corporal
 * Equipment: Battle Rifle 09 Scope Rifle, M41B2_Medium_Anti-Vehicle/Assault_Weapon, M6L Personal Defence Weapon System, M13 Machete


 * SPARTAN-G084
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: SPARTAN-IV Ghost Company
 * Rank: Private
 * Equipment: Battle Rifle 09 Scope Rifle, MA6A Individual Combat Weapon System, M6L Personal Defence Weapon System, M13 Machete


 * SPARTAN-G112
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: SPARTAN-IV Ghost Company
 * Rank: Private
 * Equipment: M113 Scout Rifle System, M90D Close Assault Weapon System, M6L Personal Defence Weapon System, M13 Machete


 * James Hafson
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: Sandstorm Squardron
 * Rank: Senior Airman
 * Equipment: M6L Personal Defence Weapon System, B-9E Shortsword


 * Gordon Duster
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: Sandstorm Squardron
 * Rank: Captain
 * Equipment: M6L Personal Defence Weapon System, B-9E Shortsword


 * Jerry Hills
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: Sandstorm Squardron
 * Rank: First Lieutenant
 * Equipment: M6L Personal Defence Weapon System, B-9E Shortsword


 * Kyle Stevens
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: Samurai Squardron
 * Rank: Captain
 * Equipment: F-406 Katana, M6L Personal Defence Weapon System


 * Robert Stanley
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: ODST, attatched to task force thunder
 * Rank: Major
 * Equipment: M90D Close Assault Weapon System, MA6A Individual Combat Weapon System, M6L Personal Defence Weapon System, M5 Folding Knife

Masterchief46517

 * Chris Johnson
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit:
 * Rank: Staff Sergeant
 * Equipment: MA6A ICWS, M57, M3B Combat Knife, HBR10HB-SR or M113 SRS


 * Kevin Johnson
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit:
 * Rank: Second Lieutenant
 * Equipment: MA6A ICWS, M57, M3B Combat Knife, M122 LMG or M90D CAWS


 * Alias Jackson
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit:
 * Rank: Sergeant
 * Equipment: M2A Light Assault Rifle, M57, M3B Combat Knife, M13 Dragon Modular Assault Walker


 * Redmond Jacobson
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Unit: Taskforce Echo
 * Rank: Rear Admiral
 * Equipment: UNSC Wellington

Spartan G-23

 * Graham Aker
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: 25th Highlander Regiment
 * Rank: Colonel
 * Equipment: M98 Compact, MA6A ICWS

Spartan-091

 * SPARTAN-091
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: Indigo Company, 1st Battalion, 117th Special Operations Regiment
 * Rank: Commander (O-5)
 * Equipment: BR09SR Designated Marksman's Rifle, SRS99G-S3 AM Sniper Rifle


 * UNSC 8011-10 JLT (Juliet)
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: Indigo Company, 1st Battalion, 117th Special Operations Regiment
 * Rank: N/A (System AI)
 * Equipment: Neural Link


 * Gordon Lydecker
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: 18th Special Operations Company, 10th Shock Troops Battalion, 105th ODST Division
 * Rank: Gunnery Sergeant (E-7)
 * Equipment:


 * Jennifer Wolf
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: 18th Special Operations Company, 10th Shock Troops Battalion, 105th ODST Division
 * Rank: First Lieutenant (O-2)
 * Equipment:


 * Madison Carson
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: 18th Special Operations Company, 10th Shock Troops Battalion, 105th ODST Division
 * Rank: Sergeant (E-5)
 * Equipment:


 * Lee Deacon
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: 18th Special Operations Company, 10th Shock Troops Battalion, 105th ODST Division
 * Rank: Staff Sergeant (E-6)
 * Equipment:


 * Ambrus Kovách
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: 18th Special Operations Company, 10th Shock Troops Battalion, 105th ODST Division
 * Rank: Corporal (E-4)
 * Equipment:

SPARTAN-501

 * SPARTAN-144
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: Lambda Company, 1st Battalion, 117th Special Operations Regiment
 * Rank: Major
 * Equipment:


 * SPARTAN-338
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: Lambda Company, 1st Battalion, 117th Special Operations Regiment
 * Rank: First Lieutenant
 * Equipment:


 * Katerina Nevsky
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: 18th Special Operations Company, 10th Shock Troops Battalion, 105th ODST Division
 * Rank: Gunnery Sergeant
 * Equipment: M6L PDWS, BR09, M99C SASR


 * Maria Williams
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: 112th Naval Squadron, attached to Taskforce Arrow
 * Rank: Captain
 * Equipment: F-406 Katana


 * James McHenry
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit: UNSC New York, attached to Taskforce Arrow
 * Rank: Admiral
 * Equipment: Zeus-class Super Carrier

Carpe

 * Christian Chinnault
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit:27th Reinforced Infantry Regiment
 * Rank: Staff Sergeant
 * Equipment: BR09, M57, M3B Combat Knife


 * Rafael Ortiz
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit:27th Reinforced Infantry Regiment
 * Rank: Corporal
 * Equipment: AIE-486I HMG, M10 PDWS, M3B Combat Knife


 * Kali Britten
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit:27th Reinforced Infantry Regiment
 * Rank: Lance Corporal
 * Equipment: M12 SMG, M77 ECQCS, M7 Tactical Knife


 * Logan-G081
 * Faction:UNSC
 * Unit:SPARTAN-IV Kilo Company, Knave Squadron
 * Rank:First Lieutenant
 * Equipment: M1091 Sniper Rifle System, M6L Personal Defence Weapon System

Dread

 * Charles-K113
 * Faction:United Nations Space Command
 * Unit:
 * Rank: Sergeant
 * Equipment: MA6A ICWS+M025 Rocket Launcher, M6L PDWS+AN/PVS-78 MONOCLE, M13 Machete.

SPARTAN-118

 * Section 2, Backfire Squadron
 * Faction:United Nations Space Command
 * Unit:Bravo Company
 * Rank: Various
 * Equipment: Various

Parkster

 * Novus
 * Faction: Covenant Remnants
 * Unit: Novus's Stalker Sub-pack
 * Rank: Stalker Ultra
 * Equipment: Stalker Rifle, Stalker Pistol, Combat Knife, Incendiary & Stun Grenades

MasterGreen999

 * Jeremy Patterson
 * Faction:United Nations Space Command
 * Unit:Blackheart Platoon
 * Rank: 1st Lieutenant
 * Equipment: MA6A Individual Combat Weapon System, M6B Special Operations Battle Armour, M7 Tactical Knife


 * Jose Marez
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit:Blackheart Platoon
 * Rank: Sergeant, XO of Blackheart Platoon
 * Equipment: M90D Close Assault Weapon System, M7A Sub Machine Gun, M6B Body Armour, M7 Tactical Knife


 * Tech Specialist Lambardo
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit:Blackheart Platoon
 * Rank: Private, First Class
 * Equipment: MA6A Individual Combat Weapon System, M6B Body Armour, AN/PRC-101 Radio Pack, AC5 Heads Up Display


 * Medical Officer Duff
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command
 * Unit:Blackheart Platoon
 * Rank: Private, First Class
 * Equipment: M90D Close Assault Weapon System, M6B Body Armour, Medi-Cell Syringes, AD-01 Defibrillator, Biofoam Canisters


 * 105th ODST Regiment, 2nd Battalion, Bravo Company, Blackheart Platoon
 * Faction: UNSC
 * Type: Infantry Unit
 * Function: Provide support where needed, move the battlefront forward
 * Commander: First Lieutenant Jeremy Patterson
 * Unit Size: 36 ODST Troopers
 * Unit Composition: 3 Anti-Armor, 8 Snipers, 5 Grenadiers, 10 Riflemen, 8 CQB, 1 Tech Specialist, 1 Medic

117649AR

 * SPARTAN-B072
 * Faction: UNSCDF
 * Unit: SPARTAN-IV Bravo Company
 * Rank: Corporal
 * Equipment: MJOLNIR Mk. VIII Powered Assault Armour, M389B General Purpose Machine Gun

FightWithHonor's Characters and Units

 * Bear Squadron
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command (UNSC)
 * Type: Special Operations Infantry Platoon/Squadron
 * Function: Light Infantry operations
 * Commander: CAPT Marcus Conrad, UNSCMC
 * Unit Size: 45 UNSC SOCOM personnel (SPARTAN-IVs and UNSCMC NCOs and Officers)
 * Unit Composition: 3 Sections (2 Infantry 1 Special Purpose/Support)


 * Fireteam Echo
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command (UNSC)
 * Type: Special Operations Infantry Fireteam
 * Function: Light Infantry operations
 * Commander: Staff Sergeant Alyssa-E075, UNSCMC
 * Unit Size: 6 SPARTAN-IVs

Spartan 112

 * Krieg Squadron
 * Faction: United Nations Space Command (UNSC)
 * Type: Special Operations Infantry Fireteam
 * Function: Orbital insertions
 * Commander: Captain SPARTAN-193
 * Unit Size: *39 SPARTAN-IVs


 * Sigurd-K117
 * Faction: UNSCDF
 * Unit: Krieg Squadron
 * Rank: Second Lieutenant
 * Equipment: MJOLNIR Mk. VIII Powered Assault Armour, MA6A ICWS


 * Cain-K029
 * Faction: UNSCDF
 * Unit: Krieg Squadron
 * Rank: Second Lieutenant
 * Equipment: MJOLNIR Mk. VIII Powered Assault Armour, M108A1 CWAS


 * Boris-K069
 * Faction: UNSCDF
 * Unit: Krieg Squadron
 * Rank: Second Lieutenant
 * Equipment: MJOLNIR Mk. VIII Powered Assault Armour, HBR10HB-SR

Phase 1
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The two golden visors stared at each other from opposite sides of the hallway, subtle hand gestures and head motions dictating the course of action. The more petite figure tucked closer to the wall and pulled a thunder flash grenade from their assault rig, depressing the red trigger. A few seconds later, the titanium alluminide spoon clicked. The user used their thumb to flip the spoon up to the armed position, giving another click, then immediately tossed it into the hallway, not bothering to look. It bounced once, the sound echoing through the silent corridor then immediately flashed a bright silvery-white. Almost immediately there were cries of anguish from inside the corridor. The SPARTANs both ducked around the corner and levelled their rifles, firing in short controlled bursts, the flashes from their barrels illuminating across the sheen of the purple walls. They fired the last burst, the brass casing impacting on the floor, echoing once again through the empty corridors. The SPARTANS looked to each other again and nodded. They quietly rose up and crept forward, passing through the thin wispy smoke cloud generated by the combination of their gun fire and the flash bang.

“Harry, are we clear?” One asked, his voice crackling over the communications

“Yeah, patrol is down in section three-alpha, proceeding to section four-alpha to reunite with Brimstone one three.” She responded, taking the lead

Harry-B019 moved forward, slowly holstering her rifle on her IMP and retrieving the small shotgun from beneath the back and unfolding the stock and clicking it into place.

“Yari and Izzy should of called in by now.” Kyle radioed back, moving up behind her

As they moved up the corridor their motion detector gave out a short bleeping, motioning a target was moving right towards them.

“Hostile contact, left side!” Harry shouted, ducking to the right side of the corridor and levelling her gun. The bulkhead door unsealed and a Brute stumbled out, flailing his arms in the air. There was a SPARTAN on his back, one hand holding onto his helmet, the other on a blade jabbed deep into his neck and legs wrapped around its chest. It stumbled, one last gasp of breath escaping, then fell onto its chest. With a wet noise, the SPARTAN with drew the knife and calmly shook off the blood, then holstered it. Another SPARTAN entered through the bulkhead, carrying his rifle at his hip.

“Izzy, you’re late!” Kyle grunted, berating him

“Sorry Kyle, this big guy dropped a jammer right on top of it. Yaritza neutralised him though, so don’t worry.” He said, laughing it off. Yaritza said nothing and just fell back into formation.

“Heard from Jude or Lars?” Harry asked, motioning for the others to keep moving.

“They’re at Staff Sergeant Bravo One Five Five’s position, taking hostile fire from multiple hostile packs.” Yaritza replied, barely even in a complete sentence. “Then we can’t wait, we have to go back them up.” Harriet replied, leading the team further down into the corridors, towards the sound of distant gunfire.

Matthias-B155 stepped out of cover for just a moment, long enough to get a burst off from his M2A, cutting down a oncoming Brute warrior, the high power SAP rounds punching through its chest plate with a distinct crunching noise.

“Left side, shifting fire!” Lars shouted, swinging his entire upper body, and his LMG with it. He opened fire, releasing an unrelenting stream of fire down onto another pack trying to step out of cover in the cargo bay.

“Nice job Matt, total cluster fuck.” Rebecca grunted, firing her SMG from her hip, the rounds impacting across the Brute’s chest, silver-orange sparks flying off it.

“Revy, calm down.” Damien shouted, firing his SMG over an upturned crate

“Just orders.” Matt replied “The Lieutenant is supposed to be getting onto out position soon.”

The bulkhead behind them opened, causing Meg, the rear guard, to level her rifle. Harry charged through, ignoring it, leading her unit it, then bunkering down to open fire.

“Is Alpha here?” Harry asked Matthias, crouching down in cover beside him

“We though Augustus was with you?” He responded, confused

“Fuck, we lost Augustus then.” She grunted “He must of broken off and gotten pinned down.

“Fuck this.” Rebecca grunted, dropping her weapon and drawing her two pistols from their holsters. She leapt over her barricade and lunged into closer cover, then began to fire both her pistols, cutting a number of them down.

“Rebecca, get back into formation, we have to wait until relieved!” Anton shouted over the radio

Unanimously, there was a bleep from their internal mission timers.

“What the hell, we’re timing out?!” Kyle exclaimed

“I thought Motoko was bringing her section down here to cover us out? Where the hell is she?” Meg asked

“Radio is out, the internal structure is messing with longer ranged comms.” Matthias sighed

As soon as he did, Jo leapt over their barricade and followed Rebecca into the fray, followed involuntarily by Meg. However, as soon as they all charged in, they became pinned down by overwhelming fire. The Brutes surged forth, out of sight of the rest of the Section, over running them near instantly, with a chieftain slamming Meg to the floor and then knocking Jo back. As soon as they both tried to engage it, they slammed into each other, neither co-ordinating with the other. As soon as they did, the mission clock hit zero, right before the chieftain could bring down his hammer. The Brutes, the cargo containers, even the walls faded away like mist, the holograms ending.

As soon as it cleared, both Jo and Rebecca leapt up to their feet, through off their helmets, and pushing each other.

“Jo you limp wristed bitch, I had the fucking kill shot!” Rebecca grunted

“Step off you fucker, it would of crushed you straight away, you don’t have the skill to take a chieftain on that close.” Jo growled

“Fucking say that again you bitch. I dare you.” Rebecca growled, bumping up to her chest plate, intending to try and make Jo step down.

As soon as she did, Jo sucker punched Rebecca in the face, knocking her back slightly, but she immediately recovered, socking Jo right in the eye. They soon descended into a brawl, with both of them being pulled away by each other, with both teams trying to separate them.

“Settle down!” Matthias demanded, getting between them, both of them having to be restrained by four Spartans

“Go to hell Matt, you can’t even organise a skirmish without Augustus to fucking baby sit you.” Rebecca shouted, not even realising what she’d said

Matthias looked to Rebecca, knowing what she said was perfectly true. He’d allowed them to get pinned down and strung out. He stepped back, almost ready to let them brawl again.

“Lance Corporal Bravo Zero Zero One, Private First Class Bravo Zero Two Three. Report to the gauntlet immediately, I want fifty runs, from both of you.” A PA announcement run out.

Above them, in a booth, their commanding officer looked down with despair.

“HIGHCOM is being characteristically unrealistic. There is no way we can get them ready for this mission in the three weeks we have left.” Mitchell said, leaning back in his observation chair

“We have no choice. We’re going either way. Too many cogs moving, too many things in motion.” Ajax said

“What went wrong down there?” Dawes asked, looking down on the Spartans.

“Spread out too far, in unfamiliar terrain, with little or no communications. Lieutenant B312 couldn’t unite them fast enough, they kept getting pinned down while trying to regroup after their objectives. Joyeuse, upload Objective Six Oh Four Charlie, and call in Buzzsaw for their run. Let’s see if they can fair better.” Ajax said, his tone neutral “Dawes, Mitchell, you can run observation, I’m going to go talk to B312.” With that he left, his polished boots clanking on the metal grating of the booth.

Amelia B312 was sat downstairs, in the foyer for the holographic combat exercise area, looking directly at her helmet, a twisted reflection of her face dancing across its curved surface. The lift pinged, and Ajax walked through, his eyes immediately locking onto her.

“Lieutenant, congratulations, you have a dead squadron of SPARTANS on your hands.” He said in a dead pan tone, whether he was being sarcastic or quite serious was beyond Amelia’s understanding of the man.

“Sir, there’s a number of operational problems beyond my control.” She said, not trying to rise to his bait “Communications, operational equipment and the plan.”

“You think the combat plan is flawed.” He asked, sitting down opposite her, looking straight at her

“I do sir. We shouldn’t have to infiltrate it in small teams and complete smaller singular missions.” She replied, her crystal blue eyes locked onto Ajax

“You’re right in that respect, but a single surgical strike leaves us open, and reduces our mission time.”

“But in that circumstance, we can complete our primary objectives much faster and more efficiently. There are other things we can do to improve the survivability of the mission plan on contact with enemy forces. Jacking internal fibre optic lines, forming an internal battlefront, set-” She said, before being interrupted by Ajax raising his hand

“All of those reduce time available for the mission, and then exposes us to their superior numbers. That’s why we decided on taking vital systems then performing a vacuum flush.” He replied

“Then there isn’t anything I can do.” She said, getting up

“Don’t take it the wrong way Lieutenant, but this is the way it must be done.” He said, getting up and passing her

“You have excellent leadership potential.” He said almost patting her on the shoulder, but flinching at the last moment. “Don’t let your unit run rampant without you.”

He left, leaving Amelia alone. She looked back to her visor then flipped the helmet in her hands and stood up, her armour shifting. She tucked it under her arm and left to meet her waiting unit.

“Okay, I want all section leaders to run close quarters combat drills for three hours, then take a rest period.” She said to the unit, who all looked slightly disheartened at that result. She dismissed them then walked away, being followed by her XO.

“So, what’d the boss man say?” Raina asked, carrying her helmet in her hands

“That we’re following that plan, no matter what.” She replied flatly.

“Huh, well I guess we have to adapt or die.” She replied

“That’s what we do best.” Shephard replied from behind her “There’s no alternative for us.” Raina just let out a short, bitter laugh and shrugged her shoulders, leaving both of the SPARTANS somewhat perplexed by her nature.

Rebecca leaned back in the chair, keeping the icepack to her head, groaning intermittently.

“Come on Rebecca, it couldn’t of hurt that much.” Lars asked “Jo has a shit left hook.”

“No, I fell on the stepping stones and hit my head twice during the fall.” She sighed

Lars was about to laugh when the door opened up and Second Lieutenant Augustus stepped in.

“Everybody out, except Jo and Rebecca, get out.” He ordered

Everyone silently filed out of the recreation room and left just the two Spartans sitting down, both with bruised faces and black eyes.

“I heard about the fight you ladies have, and you need to sort that crap out, or I’m rotating you to different units.” He said

“What about you boss man, where the fuck were you?” Rebecca asked

“Me and the gunny got pinned down outside our objective and had to fall back. We ended up timing out too.” He frowned “That’s beside the point. I didn’t run into him and give him a black eye.”

“Yeah... okay boss man, we fucked up.” Revy frowned, looking to Jo, who just averted her gaze.

“I’m putting you on both on a team building exercise, starting immediately.” He frowned “You’re both getting dropped in the reservation with zero gear. If you aren’t back here by tomorrow morning, you’re both being moved to different units.”

With that, he left, leaving the two alone.

“Well, we better make it work...” Jo said quietly

“You know Jo, you’re a completely different bitch without a gun in your hand.” Rebecca laughed, taking the icepack off her head and standing up. She took Jo’s hand and helped her up “I don’t think either of us want to leave this sweet gig.”

12th of April, 2612, Port Midgard, Manheim, Omicron Orionis system, 1500 local time

Commodore Gabriel Lilico stood on the observation bridge between Seibzehn and Achtzehn decks, quietly observing Manheim. He leaned on the burnished steel railing, waiting the pale yellow sun seemingly rise over Manheim. As it did, he could see the silhouettes of Ruhr station and Rotweisse rise across the horizon of the planet. Numerous MAC stations blotted the view around him, with several civilian freighters rising from the surface and numerous freighters rising from orbital lift terminus stations, mostly UNSC, though the occasional deep purple, whale like hull of Sangheili transports, and even a white Imperium transport, here to trade materials of war. He rubbed his finger along the bespoke railing, until the sound of approaching footsteps interrupted him. He turned to face a vice admiral, with a weathered, pale face, greying facial hair and a scar running from his chin to right ear.

“Lilico, I’m glad you came.” He smiled, shaking his hand ecstatically.

“Good to see you too Doggett. How is ONI treating you these days?” He smiled

“You know, secretive this, secretive that. Never been busier, but it’s worthwhile work he said, grinning from ear to ear, before his smile faded “I heard about what happened on the Ullr.”

“Typically brass.” Lilico frowned “I get celebrated for losing a ship, and allot of good people.”

“Lilico, you did well.” Doggett said, reassuring him “You got over half the crew off. Considering how catastrophic and sudden the damage was, it’s damn near a miracle.”

“I guess you read ONI’s review then.” He sighed, turning around and learning on the railing

“The review was quite flattering actually, which is why you got promoted to Commodore.” He said, leaning over the rail to observe Manheim

“I haven’t been commissioned to command a vessel in 3 months, what does that say to you?” He said, interrupting him before he could reply “What it means is, desk job.”

“The reason I asked you to come up here, was on behalf of ONI.” He said

“No way am I becoming a desk spook.” He said, turning around, in revulsion

“No. ONI needs a good ship captain for a new vessel” He said, beckoning him to follow him

Lilico followed onwards to dock Dreizehn, where ONI prowlers usually parked up between combat missions. As he stepped after him, he noticed a substantially larger vessel parked there, different from the usual sleek prowlers, though not indifferent.

“ONI is handpicking you to be the captain of one of their new stealth carriers. Lilico, this is a once in a life time opportunity.” He said, leading him to the dock observation pod

“What’s it for?” He asked

“Deep strike missions in concert with special forces. You’ll be assigned to Task Force Lightning for an upcoming UNSC operation, you’ll be further briefed on taking command. Do you want to take command of her?” He asked

“How long do I have for a shakedown?” Lilico asked, looking down on her.

“Under a month. The current XO is the expert on the stealth systems.”

“Okay, I’ll bite. Tell me more.” He asked, turning to his friend, a smile creasing his lips for the first time in weeks.

“She started life out as an Odin-class Carrier. She underwent substantial upgrades to her hull structure to increase her stealth capacities. Along with that, her computer, communication, electronic and cyber warfare systems have all been improved.

“And the shakedown cruise?”He asked, still staring at her ship.

“Escort the rest of the Task Force to Arcturus, to pick up a number of special packages, then return to Manheim and make your final preparations before your first combat operation.”

“Well, last thing is.... what’s her name?” He asked, running a hand through his short, close shaven hair

“The UNSC Eidolon.” Vice Admiral Doggett responded

Lilico firmly shook Doggettt’s hand as a gesture of thanks, still looking on his new ship “Treat her well Lilico, she deserves the best.” He smiled

12th of April, 2612, Sydney, Earth Sol system, 0300 local time

There was a faint buzzing, as the phone rang, prompting Romanova to rise from her bed, struggling with her long red hair. She fumbled, reached for the phone, hitting the loudspeaker button.

“Hello, this is Major General Romanova, who is this.”

“It’s Castle, sorry for the early call Alex.” The voice responded, in a neutral voice, with faint British undertones.

“Late call Bill. Are you on Manheim right now? What time is it?” She asked, rubbing her face

“Just gone one six hundred. I thought it was two three hundred there?” He asked, his voice slightly distorted

“Yeah, plus four more hours. Good thing we don’t pay long distance, what’s wrong?”She asked

“Just got word from your man Doggett that we now have the Eidolon operational and preparing to jump to Arcturus for her shake down. Task Force Lightning is operational. Once the last few battle groups I called in arrive, Thunder will be operational as well.” He responded

“Bill, I know you’re the chairman of the security committee but... did you call for a reason?”

There was a short, distorted chortle from the phone, which almost unsettled Romanova.

“No, I do have something for you. BLACK ROOK is on the move, he told me himself. He’s send a small number of task forces to aid us. The others already know.”

“That’s good at least.” She yawned “But I need my sleep Bill.”

“I’ll leave you to it Alex. Night.”

“Night.” She replied, hanging up.

She crawled back into her bed, settling under the covers and rolled over, before a thought came to her.

“That means, they’re going in to cover their tracks. ROOK is thinking too far ahead.” She thought to herself, before shutting her eyes.

Okay ladies and gentlemen, for the first phase of the RP, you can use it to create introductory posts for your characters and units, introducing their training and such. BTW, nobody is going to be informed of the mission’s nature until they’re en-route.You have about 4-3 weeks, in RP time. Navy, marine and Army forces are positioned at Manheim and Arcturus, though ultimate gathering point is Port Midgard, Manheim.

1
Crack! The lone sound of the sniper rifle hitting a incredibly fast moving target, that was moving as fast as your average ghost in the firing range sounded out.

''Crack! ''Another rifle fired, although it missed the bullseye.

"It looks like I win." SPARTAN-G198 said.

"It Looks like I win, SIR." SPARTAN-G124 said, frowning.

"Oh, come on. You're just jealous."

There was a silence.

"Shut up."

"Is that an order?"

"Yes."

"If I don't obey, are you going to court martial me?"

"Yes."

The friendly bickering continued, the two lone voices in the firing range arguing while half-listiening to the dumb AI announce their scores.

"Sir, twelve seraphs closing in on us."

"Affirmative." Captain Kyle Stevens called over the unit com.

There was a flash of plasma, and Kyle Stevens rolled this Katana to the side and fired this TITAN lasers. There was a satisfying boom as the banshee exploded. Kyle brought his Katana up, firing several air-to-air missiles at another banshee. The banshee exploded again.

"Sir, enemy reinforcements are moving into position."

Kyle glanced at his radar. Shit. Before he could give a response, a blast of plasma hit him, shaking this fighter. Double shit. Kyle aimed his air-to-air missiles again, taking down another seraph. Just then, the alarms in his Katana sounded, and a blast of plasma hit him. Everything turned black for a second, then the words appeared in front of him, courtesy of his neural interface.

Captain Kyle Stevens

Vehicle: F-406 Katana.

Kills: 3 Seraphs.

Method of Death: Rammed by Seraph, then finished off by plasma canons.

Replay battle? [Yes] [No]

Kyle sighed unhappily. HighCom had, for whatever reason, made their simulations so much more difficult recently. He waited, as the various members of his squad returned to reality. The dumb AI announced that they had wiped out, in total, thirty banshees and 5/6 of the squadron were killed in action.

"Alright. We better try that again." Kyle said, irritated. There was a collective groan from the members of the squadron.

"I'm getting annoyed to, but orders from above. WAY above, apparently. So get to work." Kyle said.

There was an less-than-enthusiastic Oh-Rah and the simulations started again, for the upteenth time today. Norman-123 03:14, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

2
"Bandits, 12 o'clock, distance 60 klicks, ten smaller contacts, look like Seraphs, with twenty-five larger contacts, Probably Phantoms", Major Nanook Kalaluit said into the radio of his F/I-905 Claymore Heavy Fighter.

"Roger", Lt. Colonel Ross East Jr. responded, "Green light to engage"

Ross pressed his finger against the weapons selection touchscreen and selected his AIM-34 HORN beyond visual range air-to-air missiles. Ross then turned on the independent targeting system for the missiles, allowing him to lock on to six enemy aircraft. The lock tone filled Ross' ears as he pressed the weapon release button.

At once, six HORN missiles flew into the distance and disappeared over the horizon. Seconds later, six contacts, four Seraphs and two Phantoms disappeared from the radar.

Nanook Kalaluit, Brittni Skylar, Jean Robiechaud and several other of Ross's squadronmates fired their missiles, sending dozens of streaks of fire towards the Remnant aerial convoy. The radar showed that all the enemy aircraft had been cleared from the sky.... or had they...

Suddenly, Ross saw a massive contact on the edge of his radar, approaching fast. IFF marked it as a hostile vessel. A black dot in the distance appeared, quickly growing larger, revealing itself to be a Covenant Remnant Frigate.

"Covenant frigate incoming, burning through the atmosphere, ready your TALONs and stand by to engage", Ross East Jr. said into the radio as he selected his aircraft's TALON anti-spacecraft missile.

"You know the drill", Ross said "aim for the plasma torpedo tubes when it drops it's shields to fire."

"Incoming, more hostiles coming from the frigate, six Sera...", the transmission from John Archer was interrupted an explosion.

"MAN DOWN", Ross heard Nanook Kalaluit yell through his radio.

Ross quickly switched to AIM-11 CLAW short range air-to-air missiles fired at Seraph flying directly at him. Ross pressed the weapon release button on top of his stick. The missile flew at the alien fighter in a streak of fire, before exploding violently on impact, vaporizing the front half of the enemy aircraft.

Ross pulled back on his throttle as he pulled right, making his aircraft preform a sharp turn called a J-turn, before slamming the throttle forward to chase after a pair of Seraphs. Ross got the first Seraph in his sights and pulled the trigger. Ross's TITAN LASER fired, striking the alien fighter and blowing it out of the sky. Seconds later, Ross took down the second Seraph.

"Flight lead, be advised you have an enemy on your tail", Allie "Ditto" Allison's voice spoke through the radio. Plasma bolts flew past Ross' cockpit.

Ross pressed a button on the touchscreen. Several rocket propelled "mines" flew from the rear of Ross' fighter. The weapons behaved rather differently in an atmospheric engagement then in a space battle, rather than floating in space until something hit them, they acted more like backwards-firing missiles, homing in on the enemy aircraft and shooting it down.

Ross saw the Seraph explode in his aircraft's rearview monitor as Nanook Kalaluit reported "I've got the last two, skies clear."

"OK, time to deal with the frigate", Ross said as he readied his TALON missiles and turned towards the enemy vessel, followed by the rest of his squadron. Ross heard the lock tone and fired. Dozens of streaks of fire flew at the enemy ship, all of them going for the gap in the shielding near the plasma torpedo tube.

As the missiles flew at the Covenant ship, beams of purple light shot out from the ship, shooting down a few of the Claymores of Ross' squadron. Ross, as well of the rest of his squadron, however, pressed on, swerving to stay one step ahead of the Covenant point defense weapons. Eventually, one of Ross's missiles struck home, flying up a plasma torpedo tube and detonating the ship's plasma stores. The bow of the ship was blown off in a great fireball as Ross and the other surviving Claymores turned away from the burning ruins of the alien warship as it fell to the ground.

The surroundings out the window of his Claymore's cockpit disappeared as the simulation ended. The screen now read:

Lt Col. Ross East Jr.

Vehicle: F/I-905 Claymore.

Kills: 8 Seraphs, 2 Phantoms, One Covenant Frigate.

Mission Completed, Squadron Casualties: Six.

Replay battle? [Yes] [No]

Ross exited the simulator, and was closely followed by the rest of the UNSCAF Third Squadron.

"That was better, we completed the mission this time, but those casualty rates are simply unacceptable.", Ross said.

"What's up with HIGHCOM, setting the simulator to such a high difficulty level, The Bravo Kilos are nowhere near that good! I mean, we took down a cruiser at Kanna with no casualties, but that frigate took down more than half the sqaudron!"

"They're preparing us for something...", Ross said, "Something big", Ross then gave an exacerbated sigh, as he said "Well, lets try this again".

3
Three beeps, that's what he heard before Sigurd screamed towards the Earth. All he could do now is wait until he hit the ground. Looking through the external cameras, he could see hundreds of other HOPE pods descending with him, each held a brother or sister, a SPARTAN-IV. He checked the altimeter, 14,000 km from the surface. As the pods descended, he opened a channel to the other pods in his Squadron "1,500 km from atmosphere, prepare for the burn." The pods eventually cut into the plants atmosphere, and it suddenly got very, very hot inside the pod. Moments passed and the pods passed through the atmosphere, and suddenly anti aircraft emplacements opened up around the pods

"Keep on track, don't break formation."

He checked the altimeter again and it was at 20 km.

"You know the drill, form up on me when we hit the ground. We will proceed with our objective from their."

He looked at the outside cameras and saw where they were headed, it was a Covenant city, one controlled by the Jiralhanae. A Knife fighter flew in front of Sigurds pod, being pursued by two Seraphs. The fighter pulled hard in an almost vertical standstill, the Seraphs scream past not getting a shot off, and the Knife fired off its Lasers, knocking both Seraphs down before moving on. The ground got closer and closer, before the pod finally slammed into the ground. The front of Sigurd's pod shot off, he grabbed his assault rifle and rushed out, more pods landing around him.

Ten Spartans had arrived, flanking Sigurd. It didn't take long for the Brutes to descend upon the site. A small pack numbering twenty turned the corner into the street where Sigurd's section had just landed.

"This is Krieg Five One, we have hostile contacts advancing on our position preparing to engage."

Sigurd pointed down the road to the Brutes, who were advancing cautiously towards the landing zone. As they neared, Sigurd finally gave the signal to open fire. The road erupted in a firefight, as the Brutes rushed to find cover. A few made it and returned fire, forcing the Spartans to back off.

"Grenade!" yelled out one of the Spartans, who primed a M9 grenade and let it sail towards the Brutes. Some rolled out of the cover and were quickly cut down, the others were caught in the blast. "All clear!"

"Form up on me." Sigurd told the others in his section. He opened up a TACMAP of the area. Krieg 4-2 and 4-3 had landed nearby. "Krieg 4-2 this is Krieg 4-1, are you there Cain?"

"The Com was filled with the sounds of gunfire. This is Cain, good to hear from you Sigurd. Boris and his section got here but it seems they were tracked. We could use some support."

"Understood, Krieg 4-1 on the way." He closed the channel and turned to his unit "Lets move out, keep your eyes open!"

His unit had made good timing, and caught only a single Brute on the way. They had taken position left of where Cain and Boris' units were pinned. Inside what seemed to be a Covenant parking garage of sorts. Across from where the two sections were a pack of Brutes had set up a barricade, hoping to pin down and overrun the Spartans. He pointed downwards towards the enemy, and put a grenade into his MA6As attached M024.

"All units open fire!"

The section opened up. Some of the Brutes turned to face the new threat. Spikes flew past the Spartans, but the gunfire kept up. Some fell back, but were sniped down by section three's marksmen. After five minutes, no Brutes remained.

"Krieg 4-2 here, thanks for the support."

"Sigurd, on the way down I noticed a Brute convoy headed towards the main plaza, it cuts along our route, we could ambush them on the way."

"Good plan." He pulled up his TACMAP and placed a beacon on an intersection. "We can strike them here. My unit will be on this warehouse structure. Have India on this building, overlooking the area. Place explosive charges on the road and kill any survivors."

"Cain here, I see the convoy there approaching fast." The Spartan was hidden in an alleyway with his assault team, in front of where the explosives were set.

"Wait until they are right in the middle and detonate."

They waited, until the lead Shadow had passed and all charges detonated. In moments the convoy was in flames, the Shadow was thrown off to the side from the force. A Slasher IFV stopped and Brutes began to pour from its bowels, but were cut down by the Squadrons gunfire. A rocket impacted between the turret and the body and blew the IFV apart.

Within seconds a dozen vehicles were burning in the cities streets. Brutes were strewn across the pavement, one ran from a burning Crusher, its flesh was charred and it was screaming in pain. Sigurd walked over the helpless creature and spat on it, before bringing his axe down on its head.

"Good work everyone, getting reports that the city has fallen." A trio of Pelican dropships flew overhead. "Looks like this simulations over."

The area slowly began to dissolve, and Sigurd stepped out of the holographic area. Cain and Boris took up his flank as they headed for a debriefing.

"Good work on that burning Brute by the way." Cain sarcastically quipped.

"Group those shots! Your shooting worse than my blind grandmother!" Yelled out Captain James Gerard. He walked back and forth, watching as his newly assigned soldiers were missing their targets.

"Bah! Callihan! Get down here and shows these boys how to shoot!"

A scarred Marine stepped from cleaning his M6 pistol. "Yes sir." He stepped over to the weapons table and picked up an MA6A and held it tight to his shoulder.

"Step one! Hold the rifle tight against your shoulder. This helps you prepare for the recoil of firing your rifle."

Callihan fired off the rifle in quick four round bursts, leaving neat holes in the targets.

"Step two! Don't think you can go Rambo and keep your recoil steady on fully automatic. Fire in bursts and group your shots."

Callihan emptied the magazine into the targets, leaving four neat wholes in the chests and heads. He placed the rifle back on the table and stood next to the Captain.

"And that is how you use an MA6A, how you worthless shitbags ever got through basic training is beyond my comprehension. Keep training until otherwise." he turned to Callihan, who was looking awkwardly at the five recruits. "Callihan you are dismissed, thank you." He saluted, "Sir, thank you sir." and walked back to his barracks. It had been years since the Battle of Kanna, but he couldn't get the sights out of his head. Watching his friend in B Company die on the way to the beach, a squad mate torn apart by a Brute chaingun. He could handle it, but it still disturbed him.

112 04:02, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

4
Jared-091 stood over the holotank, knuckles propped on its edge, watching his newly-minted Spartans run the exercise again, after Ajax's boys and girls had filtered out. They took the approach in a much more textbook fashion, checking corners correctly, sprinting quietly down the halls when necessary, avoiding combat unless directly confronted. There were no outbursts or overt attacks, and all of the Brutes were taken down silently, usually from behind. Juliet sat on the small dais off to the edge of the overview map, legs crossed indian-style, her chin propped in her hands. She smiled faintly as she turned to the SPARTAN and said, "You trained 'em well, Jared. I guess that they really do take after their instructors..."

Jared said nothing, but nodded appreciatively and continued to study the actions of Indigo as they worked their way towards the objective. They communicated through closely-concealed handsigns and body language changes, very rarely opening the comms channel, save for the terse announcements of "Bravo Kilo down" and "Clear", and moved as a unit, covering the right sightlines and trusting their teammates to cover their own. They split and reformed as he had taught them, drilled into them, beat into their brains. Tactics that he had reiterated again and again, reinforced with more and more grueling physical punishments each time. The personalities of the individual instructors shone through, each one's unit showing their individual outlook on recon strategies. It was swift, it was deadly, and in a way it was beautiful... though perhaps that was just his happiness at seeing them all doing so well after so long.

Certainly, he could see them straining to reach the time limit, a sloppy knife stroke here, a botched shot there, but each slip was quickly corrected by one of their team mates. He had trained them-- as Jamal had suggested, as they had argued over and over again for so many times-- to think of their mates as family, to anticipate their movements, to know them as extensions of themselves, a truly integrated team. He had even experimented-- controversially-- with integrated neural intefaces, allowing the team members to get a taste of what their thoughts were the moment they had them. It moved fluidly and excellently, as they split apart to complete individual objectives. This was where it could get a little dicey, he remembered. They worked great as a team, but alone... they might not work as well.

They tabbed on their ac-cam settings, blending into invisibility and moving surprisingly silently for two-ton armored soldiers. And... there it was, the first slip-up. He winced slightly as Francesca got the attention of a Brute as she tripped up her sidestep around him. He spun, wheeling on the blurred object behind him, paws swinging heavily through the air. Frankie ducked and pivoted, catching him in the pressure point behind his knee. His leg sagged, seizing up, and he tumbled to the floor. Leaping upon him lightly, Frankie darted her combat knife up underneath his chin with a savage stroke and slicing viciously across his armored trachea. Digital blood sprayed and the Brute died with a gurgle and a spray of maroon mist. Jared relaxed a bit as she moved rapidly away from the scene of her violent deed. And that was it. The rest of the operation went as planned, and they combined once more, making their way briskly to the egress point. They passed the checkpoint just as the timer reached zero zero zero zero. Perfect. At least according to the estimates.

Jared clicked down the intercom button and said flatly, "You made it out in time, Indigo. You passed.  But that's not good enough for me.  Run it again, make it faster and with no slip ups.  I'm watching you, Francesca, Marty, and Van.  He could see their subdued groans and griping from the windows above and he smiled.  That had been him, so many years ago.  Just that thought brought back painful memories of his brothers and sisters in the program.  He shook his head and closed his eyes.  Juliet appeared next to him, resting a holographic hand on his shoulder as he stood up again and rubbed his greying temples.

"You did good, you know that, right? You and Jamal both.  Trained these guys and girls to their best."

"I know. I just hope it's enough." He turned back to the holotank and clasped his hands behind his back, aligning his armor's newly painted blue battle-stripes-- for Indigo-- with the other markings on his armor.

Oakley looked over at Frankie after the exercise finished. "Didja see those psych-jobs in Bravo go at it? Damn! It's a wonder they aren't all Section-8'd right out of the program!  An actual fight, and so much cursing and yelling!  Psychopathic, the lot of them."

She turned to him, green eyes glimmering, tucking a lock of sweat-soaked brunette hair behind her ear as she stowed her helmet in the pressurized armor locker

"To be fair, they definitely nailed more Brutes than we did, Oak."

"Well, yeah, but they were so disorganized! I mean, all over the place, only limited comms--"

"Oak, shut it. We're on the same team.  There's no need to get so competitive about it." She hopped on one body-suited foot as she struggled to grab the fastener tab on the bottom of the foot. "Ugh, can you help me get this?"

Oakley put down his assault rifle, slotted his helmet into the correct socket, and closed the locker with his biometric thumbscan before heading over to help his friend out. She sat down as he found it and popped the seal, then kicked him playfully in the face. He sprawled out on his back before leaping to his feet in a combat crouch. Reflexes were funny things. He peered at her through watering eyes, mock-betrayed expression on his face as he said in a puppies-have-died voice, "You set me up!"

She grinned wickedly as she made a dash for the women's showers, body suit's loose parts flying behind her.

Oakley rolled his eyes and began working on his own suit.

Gordon Lydecker sat on the observation deck, staring at the large hi-res holographic display of the space outside the UNSC Colorado's outrageously thick battleplating, his officer counterpart, Jennifer Wolf, at his side. The faint strains of Tchaikovsky that waltzed through the background were courtesy of the 18th's recent acquisition of new ECW equipment, and the team's ready adaptation to them. The rest of the first were spread out throughout what was intended to be an all-personnel lounge, but what turned out to be the ODSTs equipment-storage room and private club. All of the ship's complement of Shock Troops hung out in the room, and most of them had added a nice memento to the decor, which consisted of various shards of metal, Covenant anatomy, alcoholic beverage bottles, battle flags and spray-stenciled logos. It was personalized to the extreme. They had even rigged up the high-res holo by linking it into the ship's external sensor array through a series of quality redirects. The brass, officially, frowned upon this exclusivity, but seeing as the Shock Troopers were so effective, it was technically okayed for "morale purposes". There were a few Marines who had earned the Helljumpers' respect that were allowed in, but most of them were shooed away by the mood that was so obviously emanating from the area.

"Op's coming up," Wolf said quietly. "Scuttlebutt has it that were going to put the full-stop on the Remnants."

"Capital?" Lydecker said more than asked. "Makes logical sense to me. Question is, how the hell are we gonna get them ready for this?"

"Good question," spoke a gravelly voice sitting across from them. Captain Cielo's face was marred by several deep scars and pits from the countless battles he had participated in. Grey had already started to shoot through his black hair, brought on not by old age, but from pure stress. Not that he ever showed another sign of the weight of being the 18th's commanding officer. The man was hard as nails, the "blood and guts" type passed down from all military history, unflinching and authoritative. He had great respect among the men and women of his unit, which was why he was here at the moment, withdrawn from the group but still making his presence known. He was hard to read. "How do you think you stand?"

"Well, sir," Lydecker said, "I'd have to say that we're mean and green. We do have a few rookies amongst us, and I'd planned on running them through some high-stress tac sims and a lot of PT."

"Noted, Gunny. I'll take that into consideration.  Lieutenant, what are your thoughts?"

Jennifer uncrossed her legs and sat forward, then put her drink to the side. "Sir, I think that we've done enough. It's no use stressing them further. As we go through the drop, things happen, random chance.  I know that, on the ground, they are ready.  They are prepared.  They've got their ammo counted and their armor squared away, and they can kick those Brutes' asses back to whatever goo they came from.  So barring all chance, we've got a good chance."

Cielo nodded. "This is about what I've heard from the other leaders, and it's appropriate from where I stand. It's good to hear that you've got the majority of your personnel prepped." Standing, he stared out the "window" for what seemed to be a long while, taking occasional sips from his glass before turning to them once more.

"We shall see," he said bemusedly. "Where this takes us. Sergeant. Lieutenant." He nodded and strode of purposefully.

Lydecker shook his head. "Who knows what he's thinking about. He probably has every conceivable strategy down.  I know you and I've got plenty."

He sighed, and hoped they were indeed ready. This was going to be the worst of it, that was certain. Where the shit hit the fan. He took another sip of his rum and turned his attention back to the room, and to the woman at his side.

-- SPARTAN- ' 091 ' [ ' Bureau ' ]    [ Talk ] 06:10, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

5
'''15 April, 2612. Simulation ground 12, Bravo Company compound, Camp Sparta, Arcturus, Arcturus System'''

The clatter of gunfire ripped through the late night, along with several small explosions.

First Lieutenant SPARTAN-B122 and Gunnery Sergeant SPARTAN-B147 concentrated on what was happening downrange. In the current exercise, the objective was for the two teams of Section 2 troops to fight one another in a town, both simulating a loss of the Command section. So far, both SPARTAN-IV teams had performed outstandingly. But, then again, they had trained for years for this. The two SPARTANs had devised a simple system to ensure the best training for each of the Sections two teams; Darcy-B122 was in charge of training Assault team Alpha, radio code 'Backjack 2-1', while Kevin-B147 trained Fire team Bravo, with the radio code 'Blackjack 2-2'.

The simple way to simulate a kill in this competition/training was to use the sensors in the armor to lock up sections of the body if hit, and lock up the armor completely if killed, making for a fairish competition.

The Assault team was, obviously, assaulting the town, with the Fire Team holding it. The Fire Team had the advantage of height and more ranged weapons, but the Assault team had the advantage in close quarters battle, and specially trained for urban combat. Both teams already had combat experience from WARDOG, although a lot of that experience was drowned from boredom during the battle. This exercise was also a friendly competition between Darcy and Kevin, for the victor and his team would bragging rights on the loser, until the next exercise rolled around in a week or two.

Together, they watched the Assault team storm the town, and the Fire team rushing about to set up a perimeter.

Darcy chuckled evilly, as he stroked his cat Khalid, as his Assault team neared the perimeter of Kevin's fireteam.

The pair traded threats, jokes, and insults between themselves as they watched their SPARTAN subordinates fight for bragging rights. After a 5 minute firefight, Assault team Alpha ended up winning, leaving only Staff Sergeant SPARTAN-B122standing, but Fire team Bravo lost every man in the team, losing even with a heavy machine gun. But it had been close, only a well placed shot or two changed the outcome for the assault team.

Bragging rights were gained, money changed hands, and morale rose. All in all, a successful exercise.

6
"Sir, enemy reinforcements neutralized." Spartan-G066 shouted over the com

"Nice work, Spartans."

Major Robert Stanley wasn't surprised. The massive convoy of shadows would have taken hundreds of marines, plus air support to take out. But somehow, five SPARTANs had eliminated the shadows.

"Alright. Now. Get the objective. We'll cover your back." Robert Stanley shouted The "objective" was a single prophet. As if the covenant were making an answer, two phantoms flew overhead, and began flying down.

"Alright marines, we've got company. ROLL OUT THE WELCOME MAT!"

The welcome mat concisted of hundreds of rounds of fully automatic assault rifle fire, a few rockets and sniper rifle rounds, and to finish off the single brute captain ultra, a single blast from a SPARTAN laser.

SPARTAN-G066 and his fire team ran inside the building. He had to admit, the covenant had a natrual talent in interior design. If you didn't count the various paintings of glassed human worlds.

"DEMON! RUUUN!" THe shout of a grunt interupted Neil's thoughts. Maria ran ahead and slashed the grunt's methane breather in two with her combat knife.

"DIE, DEMON!" Another grunt came charging at him. Neil fired a quick burst with his assault rifle and the grunt fell. That did it for the rest of the grunts. A collective "RUN AWAAAAAAY!" was heard by the grunts, before they were shot in the back.

"Damn grunts. HATE their squeaky voices." Megan complained.

"Well, they're easy to fight. Unlike the brutes." Carl replied. As if in response to his statement, a single brute captain minor stepped out, twin brute plasma rifles in his hand.

"Demons. Your death will bring me much-" The brute didn't get to finish his sentence, on account of five guns firing at him at once and killing him.

"You know what? Scratch that. Brutes suck." Carl said.

"Just get the prophet. Never mind how much brutes suck or not, even though they are pathetic" Neil said.

They made their way across a massive purple chamber.

"One more hallway, and the we're at the prophet's chamber." Neil said. Two jackalls spotted them. One raised his energy shield in one hand, cutlass in another and charged. Neil waited until he was close, then kicked him. The cutlass went flying, and the jackall went right after the cutlass. The other jackall fired his plasma pistol. It bounced off Carl's shields, and Carl shot him. Just then, two brutes-Neil noticed that they were ultras-ran at him and his squad.

"Supressing fire." Neil ordered. The squad fired at the brutes, who flinched, howled and died.

"Now. The Prophet."

The prophet was floating in a gravity chair, a few meters above the spartans. Six Jiralhanae Honor Guards protected the prophet. There were also various brutes and jackalls around.

"It ends here, demon." The prophet said.

"It appears not." Neil replied.

"It appears SO." The prophet replied. The door burst open, and a single brute chieftan, followed by his two bodyguards, and about twenty brute captains. Dammit. Neil cursed.

"Put up a good show, demon. I want to watch." The prophet said.

"Sure. There's audience participation too." Neil replied. Then he leapt at the prophet. The bodyguards moved to stop him. ''BANG! BANG! ''Two blasts from his shotgun took down one honor guard. He meleed another one, then jumped onto the prophet's chair. He meleed him four times, then fired again at the honor guards.

"HELP! HEEEELP!" The prophet shouted. The honor guards moved in to obey him-only to be cut down.

The fight wasn't exactly one sided. Carl went down in a deadly crossfire. Maria was hit twice by a gravity hammer, and Bill took out a few brute captains before dying too.

Neil glared at the prophet, then smacked the energy shield one last time. The shield flickered and died, and Neil smiled.

"Goodbye." Then he fired his shotgun at the prophet once. Everything faded to black, and was replaced by a few yellow words.

SPARTAN-G066

Kills: 88 grunt minors, 41 grunt majors, 12 jackalls, 32 brute minors, 22 brute majors, 12 brute ultras, 2 brute captain minors, 1 brute captain major, 2 brute captain ultra, 4 honor guard brutes, 1 prophet.

Mission Cleared. Casualties: 127 Orbital Drop Shock Troopers, 3 SPARTAN-IVs.

Replay Mission?: [Yes] [No]

Neil selected "No." Then he let reality return to him, feeling a sense of happiness. Finally. The simulation they had been working on, and failing for the past week now, along with about two hundred ODST's had FINALLY been passed.

"Well, Staff Sergeant, we finally did it." Major Robert Stanley said, walking over to him.

"Yes sir."

"Did you die?" Carl asked, interupting them.

"No." Neil replied.

"Yeah. Got hit by a banshee's fuel rod cannon." The major replied.

"Yeah. Now. Guess we have another stupidly hard simulation to look forward to after the break, eh?" Neil said.

"Sadly."

Norman-123 14:56, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

7
Christian Chinnault squeezed the trigger on his battle rifle, sending a three-round volley straight through the faceplate of a red-armored Grunt. Shifting his aim, he fired three quick bursts into another target, this time the Brute leading the weaker Unggoy. The alien roared and fired a sustained burst from his spiker rifle in the marine's direction. Chinnault held his ground, firing a few more bursts into the beast. With a great howl, the Brute crumpled.

Chinnault stood and slung the rifle over his shoulder. Drawing the M57 holstered at his side, he began speaking orders softly into his COM. "Raf, Kay, move on up to my position. Raf, be ready with that big gun." Taking up a position behind a large building, he waited for the others to arrive.

Two short clicks confirmed the transmission of his orders. A minute later, two other Marines reached Chinnault's position and took cover with him. "What next, Chris?" asked Rafael Ortiz. A large, muscular Hispanic, Ortiz held a light machine gun in his hands lightly, and on his back was slung a shortened M108A1 shotgun.

Kali Britten merely checked her weapons, silent and reserved as usual. For a short, almost petite woman, she carried an ridiculous amount of weaponry- she had a submachine gun and an automatic shotgun slung on her back, as well as a long combat knife in a chest sheath.

"There's a Covie gun position ahead," Chinnault began. "Kali, you and I will move on through those two buildings to get inside." He indicated a pair of structures resembling apartment buildings. "Raf, you're going to get up on that hill and lay suppressive fire for us when I signal." Rafael nodded and stood, running to his destination. Kali drew her shotgun and looked to Chris for confirmation. Chinnault nodded, and the two moved ahead.

Kali went in first, shotgun held at stomach height. At these ranges, the 12-gauge rounds would blow a Brute in half. However, the sound alone would almost certainly doom them. Chinnault followed, pistol in hand.

Chinnault turned a corner and swore. Three Grunts sat in the corridor, playing some sort of dice game. They looked up and squealed, reaching for their weapons. Chinnault's pistol barked four times and the Grunts went down, methane leaking from their masks. Behind him Kali screamed. Chris turned to see a Brute Minor charging, mauler raised to fire. Kali lay on the ground, bleeding from the abdomen. Chris emptied the magazine into it, but the fourteen rounds did nothing but anger it. He felt a sudden pain as the blades of the weapon stabbed into his chest, then the world faded away.

Chinnault stood and swore loudly. "What the hell is HIGHCOM playing at?" he asked Kali, who stood next to him. "This is ridiculous. The Brutes in this sim moved faster than any I've ever seen, and the last one took fourteen rounds without flinching!"

Kali shrugged. "They've got some op coming up, my guess being against the Remnant," she offered- no small amount of words from her.

Chris shook his head. "Well, obviously, but if you want to look at it like that, there's no way this is just some snatch-and-grab raid. This is gonna be big. Did you see the sims? It looked like a residential area. We're fighting on their home turf."

Kali shrugged again and turned to watch Rafael, who was still alive. A monitor above him showed what he saw in the sim.

Chinnault turned and walked to the mess hall, wondering what was going down.

8
"I want those tangos down" yelled Spartan-A099 A099 pulled out his shotgun and fired it full automatic round in the uncomming brutes.

"Look like i have to do all the job" Since the end of OPERATION:WARDOG the regiment were trainning harder that never be before. Highcom was planning something big something that would lead to the end on the Covenant. Of course nobody knew wath this magor operation would be. For the first time in 60 years the UNSC, the USR, the Planisfer, the Machina, and the other nation member of the AUR would launch a full scale assult to broke the back of thr Remnant.

Everyone in camp Spartan were busy every compagny had a job to do dependung of there role. Lambda squadron has just finnishing his trainning and everyone were cleanning their own rifle after a long day in reconnaissance simulation everyone were tierd and at this point they this would become even harder when it would become a real fight C <font color="#A9A9A9">F <font color=Teal>00 <font color=Teal>1 16:35, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

9
Jamal-002 viewed Indigo Company's fourth run at the assault course, wearing olive-drab fatigues instead of his usual MJOLNIR Mk. VII armor. Even though he had stayed in that armor for nearly the past seventy years, it still felt bulky, and it felt good to just wear normal clothes for a change.

Over the previous runs, the fire teams had nearly done things perfectly, working together to eliminate brute packs one by one. Their integrated neural interfaces allowed for each team member to know what the other team members were doing, and if one team member slipped up, their reaction times were as such to allow for a correction to be made. He had argued many times with his superior officer, Jared-091 over their training; Jared had taught them to rely on no one but themselves, but Jamal wanted them to work as a team. Their preferences were shaped over countless battles - Jamal had fought with a team for most of his early military career, and his team was wiped out when they stopped functioning as a team and started going lone wolf. Ever since 2552 he had served alone, and he hated it. Jared on the other hand had always served alone, functioning as a long-range target acquisition and elimination specialist - Sniper. It was rumored that his marksmanship had only been second to Linda, and it showed.

He watched the teams maneuver stealthily and quietly, using all of their equipment to maximum efficiency. The marksmen would drop those crazy Jackal rangers in short order, and then would begin to cover their comrades on the ground as they quickly designated their targets and dropped them before someone could say "brute". That was the peculiar thing - Jared had fostered independent and creative thinking in each of them, and every single one of them probably could operate alone just as well, if not better as they did with a team. Jamal had fostered a team-based approach to their operations. This contrast had strangely led the trainees to act like the famous D-boys of old, capable of making snap judgement while at the same time having the capability to operate in small, precise teams.

Jamal watched as one trainee quickly mantled over a low wall, sneaking up behind a low-ranking Brute. When one of the Brutes in the simulation had seen that trainee, one of the trainee's team members used HBR11 to precisely take out the alerted Brutes while the others separated and completed their objectives. The trainee that had been spotted ended the Brute by jumping onto its back and driving their combat knife deep into their throat, cutting several major arteries and veins. All of that was done in the space of less than two seconds.

It was impressive, and it would have to be. Scuttlebutt said that HIGHCOM was planning an operation to take down the Remnant once and for all - something that he should have been privy to, but he wasn't. For now, Indigo's edge was about as sharp as it was going to get without breaking that edge.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw the door into the TOC open. It was a very disgruntled MP holding an utterly massive dog on a leash.

"What's the problem, Officer," said Jamal in a slightly sarcastic voice, chuckling at the sight.

"The problem, sir, is that this mongrel came up to my post and decided to piss on my leg," replied the MP.

"Alright, give him to me," said Jamal, while dismissing the MP.

The MP walked up, handed the leash to Jamal, and saluted before performing a crisp about face and exiting the TOC.

"Aww, Dammit. Did you seriously have to go and piss on the pogues leg?"

"Rarf!"

"Good boy," said Jamal while patting Dammit on the head, and giving him a bone to chew on before going back to watch the rest of the exercise. -- <font color="White">Sergeant Major <font color="White">Avery Johnson  19:57, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

10
12th of April, 2612, in orbit around Arcturus 2000 local time

As Admiral Jacobson watched over Taskforce Echo from the bridge of the Wellington, he wondered why Echo was ordered to report to Arcturus immediately after they had finished ambushing a small Remnant convoy. He figured that something big was coming as they several Battle groups in orbit around Arcturus. But what is something that even the he couldn't figure out.

As Chris checked his weapons, he know that careful maintenance would insure that they was ready for whenever he would need them. But he couldn't shake the feeling that the his greatest test of his career was near.

As Kevin lay in his bunk, he couldn't help but wonder what the UNSC was planning. All he know was that several units were amassing around Arcturus, he even heard that other forces were at Manheim.

Kevin finally couldn't take the waiting anymore, so he decided to head to the shooting range for some target practice.

12th of April, 2612, an abandoned town, Arcturus 2025 local time

As the wind blow, a M13 Dragon come around a corner and fired off two missiles followed closely by a few rounds from its M68A2 Gauss Gun. As the practice targets blazed, Alias smiled as he scored a 90% on the range. After he was done practicing he called for a Pelican to take him back to the Chicago.

The one thing that none of them knew was that one of the UNSC's finest moments was coming.

Second Lieutenant  Keith Johnson   com link 23:08, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

11
''War never ends. It just needs to take some breathers from time to time in order to get its wind back.''

This, Shephard-A294 realized, was a fundamental truth about the galaxy, one that had been proven to him time and time again throughout his life. When he’d been huddled in an orphanage back on Mamore, the death cries of his parents and sister still ringing in his ears, it had seemed to him that everything was over: his past, his future, even his life. But he had been wrong: there had been a new life and future waiting for him, delivered by a well-dressed man asking him if he wished to help save humanity. He’d said yes; he’d agreed to sacrifice everything for the SPARTAN-III program. That simple agreement, coupled with his own stubborn resilience, had given him new purpose in a world that had ceased making sense with the death of his family.

In the calm, welcome darkness of his quarters, Shephard crouched against the far wall and casually examined his assault rifle. His bunk was directly in front of him, but he rarely used it for anything other than sleeping. Operation: PROMETHEUS had conditioned him to be ready for an attack at any moment, and the habit had carried over into all aspects of his life. To sit down was to leave oneself vulnerable to an attack, and so Shephard rarely sat down on anything. He had used walls to support himself so many times now that he no longer got aches in his knees, even after long periods of crouching.

His training on Onyx with the rest of Alpha Company had instilled in him the lethal skills and instincts that one needed to survive and succeed on the battlefield. It had given him speed, strength and knowledge. It had given him a purpose in life, a place amongst some of the finest troops ever forged from humanity’s innumerable ranks. It had given him many things, but its greatest gift of all had been his friends, his brother and sister Spartans.

He ran a hand across the assault rifle’s cold frame, his fingers caressing every niche and crevice in its surface. The weapon and many others like it had been Shephard’s constant companions on the battlefields he had traversed over the course of his career, and he made sure that it was always well-maintained and close at hand. To hell with whatever regulations there might be about unsecured firearms in living quarters; no one was going to separate him from his assault rifle.

His weapons might be the only things he kept close to him now, but an eternity ago there had also been his friends, his fellow Spartans in Alpha Company. He had trained alongside them, had made friends and cultivated rivalries with them, had mocked and outwitted the DIs with them. They had filled a void in his heart that had been left gaping open since the death of his family on that horrible, fiery day. By the end of their training, he would have gone through Hell itself for any of them, and they for him.

And they had.

On battlefield after battlefield, on planet after planet, they had ventured together into the depths of darkness, doing what others couldn’t--or wouldn’t--do. No matter what the enemy, be they Covenant or Insurrectionist, he and the rest of Alpha Company had always emerged victorious. Every time they headed into the fire, they emerged unscathed, a new victory under their belt and a new boost to their already soaring confidence. There had been nothing they couldn’t accomplish together. No challenge had seemed insurmountable to them. They had been invincible.

And then had come Operation: PROMETHEUS and K7-49.

They had landed on that miserable little asteroid and had done everything that had been asked of them and more. Wipe out the generators, render the whole facility useless; that had been the plan, and they had gone at it with all the confidence and determination that had served them so well in all the battles before this one. When the first batch of enemy reinforcements had arrived, they had kept fighting to finish the mission at hand. And when even more reinforcements had landed, when the entire company was facing enemy forces so thick that there hadn’t been a single street or alley that wasn’t swarming with hostiles, they had still fought on, ignoring their losses and remaining focused on the mission. It had been hard and it had been painful, but they had accomplished their objectives and done what they had come to do. They had won.

The only problem was that there was no where else to go after that, no way to get off of that rock. And the enemies had just kept coming like water from an open faucet.

Lieutenant Ambrose, CPO Mendez, and all of the other DIs would have been exploding with pride had they been there with them. Every one of them fought like tigers to the bitter end, just as they had been trained to do. Any other unit of grown men would have considered and even gone through with plans to give up and surrender, but all three hundred of the twelve-year old commandos in Alpha Company had waged bloody war against the overwhelming forces, never once considering the fact that they were fighting an unwinnable battle.

But they had been, and they had paid the ultimate price.

Shephard had watched them all die. Hails of plasma fire cut down fire team after fire team as the Covenant forces advanced on their positions. Energy swords decapitated those who were too slow to dodge the incoming blows and the wounded were set upon by ravenous Grunts and Jackals even as they struggled to fight on. The proud ranks of Alpha Company had been reduced to a few dozen desperate children fighting for their lives against an implacable foe. In the end, all of their years of training and experience, all of their boundless confidence and determination, all of it was useless in the face of overwhelming numbers. The friends who had become his new family had died and he had been left alone in the universe once again.

It was then, as he took cover in a gutted building, that Shephard had learned the true meaning of loss and hatred. He had mourned for his first family and hated the terrorists who had taken their lives, but this time he had the skills and equipment to take revenge on those who had orphaned him yet again, and somehow this had made his sorrow and hatred even greater. And there, as a child crouched against a wall just as he was now, an assault rifle not much different from the one he held now gripped to his chest, he had vowed to do whatever it took to make the filthy aliens pay for what they had done to his friends.

Back in the present, a small alarm chimed and claimed Shephard’s attention. It wasn’t often that he allowed his mind to wander like this, and he couldn’t quite understand why he had chosen now of all times to relive the past. But there was strength to be found there alongside hatred and sorrow and sometimes he wondered if there was any real difference between the emotions.

Using the wall to support his body, Shephard rose to his feet. He blinked laconically in the poor light. I’m wasting time. There were plenty of things he could be doing right now, from helping to monitor Bravo Company’s ongoing training sessions to practicing piloting his Wolf.

He crossed over to his bunk and seized his crumpled uniform up from the cot. Personal appearance had never been much of a concern for him, but regulations were regulations and that meant that he had to maintain some amount of military discipline. He would have preferred to express this required discipline through combat efficiency and respect for his superiors, but apparently skill and behavior alone were not enough.

With a sigh, Shephard let the assault rifle fall to the bed and began to pull the uniform over his white undergarments. The removal of the uniform revealed a straight, dark sword sheathed in a matching scabbard. It was one of the few physical reminder of the past remaining to him, a gift from the aliens who had ultimately been his salvation from death on K7-49.

Mercenaries and pirates. They had been the sort that Shephard had fallen in with after surviving on his own in the weeks following the destruction of Alpha Company. The Kig-Yar had seen a use for the tenacious human they had discovered in the ruins of K7-49, and he for them. His third “family” had been composed of a crew of the birdlike creatures, and both he and the Kig-Yar had had to strive to break down the many barriers that existed between them. With him at their side, the crew had made a killing off of piracy against Covenant ships, and in turn they had helped him hunt down the Sangheli commander leading the forces who had slaughtered Alpha Company. It had been with their gifted weapon that Shephard had fought and killed that particular demon.

But even that had not been enough. The crew had been ambushed and butchered by even more Covenant troops, and Shephard had barely escaped in his own ship, making a blind Slipspace jump into the void of space. Then, devoid of any further hope or drive, he had sealed himself in a cryo-chamber and given himself up to fate.

But that hadn’t been the end.

His uniform donned, albeit in a egregiously sloppy manner, Shephard ran a hand through his untidy black hair. Looking at him, one would have failed to guess that he was the last “original” SPARTAN-III: he was young, barely into his twenties, and his skinny arms frame bore a touch of scrawniness that would not have been looked for in a genetically enhanced super-soldier. But, despite what his appearance might suggest, he was one. Not only that, he was a sergeant in one of the most lethal military units in the history of mankind, and he had work to do.

It was his responsibility to ensure that the troops under his command were spared the fate of Alpha Company. It was his duty to help ensure that no one ever had to undergo the pain he had been forced to endure. These tasks could not be taken lightly for any reason.

Slipping a belt around his waist, Shephard retrieved a holstered M6 pistol from the bunk and clipped it on. He never went anywhere without some form of protection.

Opening the door to his room, he blinked at the sudden brightness of the hallway beyond it. Then, his vision restored, he strode out and headed for the training facilities.

There was work to be done.

12
Novus laid there in the grass, looking up into the night sky. The rest of his sub-pack were either sleeping or guarding the small village, which they were assigned to. A waste of a perfectly good group of covert soldiers, Novus thought, but he had his orders. He laid on this hill often, sometimes thinking about what his life could have been like if he'd done it differently. However his military career was far more successful than any civilian occupation would have been. Novus gazed endlessly at the stars. He liked to link them up, even if the patterns were not official constellations. He made random images, some funny, some just plain weird. And sometimes he'd see an object that would bring back a memory.

A lot had happened in the past seven years and he was a different person now because of it. He remembered his first battle at the Human world of Kanna, then only a few weeks later, the battle at Vespera. His first two glimpses of real war. Real pain. And real death. How he survived he did not know but he was most definitely grateful for the brothers that had saved him on numerous occasions. Brothers that were not here today. He often wondered whether they were now in the stars, looking down and saving him just the same as they once were. However he repressed any religious nonsense out of his mind. He had to keep a rational clear head in life. That was the only way he had moved on from all the losses.

Many of his brothers had fallen but new alliances were formed. At the rank of Stalker Ultra, he commanded his own group of, what he considered, the best stealth Jiralhanae in the local Remnant military. He was completely satisfied with his previous placement, on this planet, but just not here in this insignificant village. Maybe the fact that it bordered a main road, leading into one of the most important cities on the planet, had something to do with his sub-pack's allocation. However he would still rather be guarding something of prestigious importance to the Remnants. Not a random village.

Despite this he carried on looking at the stars. He looked very closely. There were not any shapes or linking patterns this time, nor where there any visual signs of anything peculiar. He just felt a hollow feeling in the pit of his stomach. The kind of feeling he got when a battle was about to start, when he loses a brother, when he saw the truth behind Operation: JUGGERNAUT or when he was close to death all those many unforgettable times. It made him shiver and cringe thinking about those things. However they had made him into the soldier he was today. Battle after battle, loss after loss, change after change.

He didn't know why. Or how. Or when. He just felt like something was going to change again soon.

Very soon indeed...

13
DATE: 12th April 2612; LOCATION: Camp Sparta, Arcturus; TIME: 0600

The Brute Chieftain's massive Gravity Hammer slammed down into the ground of the small purple hallway, sending two MJOLNIR-clad warriors flying backwards with the gravity burst, the floor badly dented in from the force of the blow. Yanking his hammer from its' embedded position in the floor, the Chieftain rushed towards the two Spartans and prepared to place the death blow when two sniper rounds impacted into the Chieftain's shield: stumbling back, the third Spartan fired third round that struck the shield and broke it, but the fourth missed as the Chieftain dodged. However, as he rose out of his dodge roll, the Chieftain suddenly felt a blade stab into his armpits and neck several times, and as he spun to strike this new Spartan, the soldier grabbed his head and spun it quickly to the side, and then repeated, managing to snap the Brute's notoriously thick neck. The Brute sunk to the ground, blood oozing from his neck and mouth.

Clayton-K197 walked over to the two that had been thrown by the hammer. “You two alright?”, he asked

“We're fine Clayton”, replied James-K012, “Thanks for the assist”

“Have Jared and Dillon checked in?”, asked Aubrey-K093, walking up to the others

“Nice shooting Aubrey”, said Nick-K189

“Not the time Nick”, said Aubrey, “So, have we heard from them?”

“They checked in not too long ago”, replied James, “Said they weren't encountering much resistance, but they're having trouble rendezvousing”

“Well, let's just get to the rendezvous point and cross our fingers”, said Clayton, “Best way out is to get done with this”

The four Spartans began moving out, and soon enough they began hearing a firefight: quickening their pace, they soon entered a large hangar bay, and looking out they saw a Spartan-IV assault team pinned down by heavy Brute resistance.

“Spartans never die!”, said Clayton as he dropped down from their third story position into the midst of the Brutes, killing two as he fell onto them in his multi-ton MJOLNIR.

“Nick, you're with me”, said James, “Aubrey, cover us”

Aubrey nodded, and began to pick off Brutes on the edges of the fight, careful to avoid Clayton and the Brutes immediately around him, for fear of striking Clayton. James and Nick quickly descended down to the second level, where Nick broke away and moved to take control of a turret currently under Brute control. Firing and dodging the returning fire, Nick managed to take out the two Brute guards and then jumped onto the turret, stabbing the Brute through its' jaw and into it's brains; commandeering the emplacement, Nick dispersed the Brute group with heavy fire, while James began attacking from the side with the aid of the Spartan assault team as well. Soon enough, the Brutes were all dead.

“Spartans, identify”, said James, “This is James-K012, Fireteam Knife 1-1”

“Naomi-K108, Recon Team Knife 3-1”, replied the team leader

“Naomi, have you seen Jared or Dillon?”, asked James

“Negative”, replied Naomi, “Look, we're running out of time: thanks for the assist but we're moving out. Good luck”

James glanced at the mission timer, and noted that they were almost out of time. “Roger that Naomi. Good luck”

Quickly now, James called his team together and they moved out, searching almost frantically for the weapons control center of the ship. Finally, they began to draw near and met up with Jared and Dillon, the duo facing a Brute squad.

“What took you so long?”, asked Jared

“Got lost”, replied Nick

“Shut up and shoot!”, yelled Aubrey

Within a half a minute, the Brutes were dealt with and the group moved into the room containing their objective, weapons control systems. However, even as they moved quickly to disable the systems, the door around the room began to open, and Remnant soldiers began pouring in: first came captured Unggoy, easily eliminated by the team, and then the more tricky Kig-yar pirates; next came several teams of Jiralhanae, and at last two pairs of Mgalekgolo walked in.

“Hunters!”, yelled Nick, dodging an Assault Cannon blast

Watching, James saw one of the Hunters move and smash one of the computers containing the control systems, and then saw it begin to move towards another. “They're not gonna let us get control of the ships' weapons, even if that means destroying them”, stated James, “Take 'em out!”

“Yeah, you do that”, yelled Clayton sarcastically as he punched a Brute in the face before turning to deal with yet another

Jared noted the near depleted timer and made a stupid decision, rushing forward to try and plant a grenade within the Mgalekgolo: dodging the Hunter's shield, he was quickly blindsided and thrown against the wall by the second Hunter's shield, who then proceeded to crush Jared's chest armor.

“Jared!”, yelled James, but just as he did the mission timer depleted and the simulation ended. Jared stood, coughing badly from the force of the hologram's blow; while not really dead, the hologram had still hit him with a devastating force, enough to knock the wind out of him.

“Knife Squadron, exit the simulator”, came a voice over the intercom, “Team leaders, speak with the CO immediately for critical analysis”

“S*** stupid holo-apes”, said Clayton as they walked out

“Better luck next time”, said Nick, trying to lighten his friend's mood

Clayton glared at him. “Not in real life”

Riker-012 watched as King Squadron passed through the rough simulation of the mission to come, Viggo-G132 and Elijah-G237 standing nearby as well.

“Status”, said Riker to Elijah

“They're lagging”, Elijah replied, “Engineering and Sniper teams 3-3 are a good five minutes behind mission schedule and APS is two minutes behind. Fireteam 3-1 is a minute ahead schedule however. The rest are roughly 15 to 30 seconds behind.”

“That's not good enough”, said Viggo, “They all need to be ahead of schedule; not on time, definitely not behind”

“The Admirality is too optimistic, as always. We can't get our Spartans to keep on schedule, Bravo Company's having internal fights, Joker's having leadership issues and that's just the start. We need more bloody time”

“We aren't going to get any”, replied Viggo, “We'll just have to do what we always do: survive. We're all Spartans, after all: us and them”

“Are they?”, queried Riker rhetorically. Turning, he walked out of the door and jumped into his own personal Warthog, heading for the officer's quarters of Camp Sparta's Kilo section: reaching it, he entered and looked at the group of gathered officers, noting that not all were present.

“Gentlemen and ladies, I'm instating 16 hours of training mandatory training a day: we're rolling out in a month whether we like it or not, and there's no way I'm sending out my soldiers just to get them killed. Understand?”

“Sir?”, came a voice

“Yes?”, asked Riker, spotting the questioner to be Kyle Jasper, Key Squadron's XO.

“Sir, they're already doing 13 hours of training a day. If we raise that to 16 they might break”

Riker stared directly at Kyle. “We chose these boys and girls to be Spartans. Either they survive, or they break. There's no middle ground. Any more questions?” No hands raised this time. “Good. If I'm needed, I will be in my quarters till 0830”

In his quarters, Riker looked at his few possessions, including his small collection of memories from his life: the casing of the casing of the first bullet he used to assassinate someone for ONI Section 0, the shards of the combat knife he'd used to kill War Chieftain Annanius, the V-Mail requesting his presence in the SPARTAN-IV Program, and others. But what drew his attention at the moment was a necklace, the pendant of which was a small emerald stone with the initials O.M.H. engraved upon it: picking it up, Riker examined the necklace, then carefully placed it back once again.

The necklace was perhaps his most important keepsake, reminding him of some of his most poignant memories: at one time, it had belonged to Riker's first love, a fellow ONI spook known as Codename: SHISA. Unfortunately, she was killed during the Battle of Chaos, and while Riker had come to peace with her death in time and was in love once again, the necklace always reminded him of how dear friends were worth more than many things, and how they could easily be lost.

Staring at the necklace, Riker hoped that this was the right choice. His Spartans had defeated Kig-Yar pirates, Brutes occupiers, and two Human rebel groups: however, this time it was different. They were going up against the main Remnant bastion, the capital itself: they were going to infiltrate the capital, defeat the rebels from the inside and then take on their forces alongside reinforcements. But could they do it? Were his Spartans really Spartans yet?

Riker decided not to think on it too deeply and moved to reviewing the battle statistics and plans. He didn't know how think would end up, but there was no need to over-analyze and worry. They were Spartans. What could go wrong?

“Ha!”, yelled Kevin Karaki, Op Chief of Knife Squadron

“You little -”, began Arelynn-G056, Gunnery Sergeant of Key Squadron Section 2, but she was cut off by Kevin

“I said 'ha!'”, he gloated, “Beat you again”

Arelynn slammed her fist down on the Majong board, scattering several pieces. “Stupid game”, she hissed

“Calm your a**es down, both of you”, said Brandon Smith, Knave Squadron's XO, “Don't make me pull rank over a stupid Indian game”

“It's Chinese, thank you”, said Kevin

“Whatever”, replied Brandon, before he went back to carving his wooden statue with his combat knife.

“Least I'm good at something”, came Kevin's retort, “You on the other hand just cut wood”

“What are you making anyways?”, asked Jacob Terra, King Squadron's XO

“None of your business”, said Brandon as he continued to carve, “It'll be a beautiful work of art once it's done”

Just then, Billy-G039, Kyle Jasper and Phillip Lenavitt, the command section of Key Squadron, walked in dejectedly: while Kyle and Phillip sat down silently and the latter began to absentmindedly clean his gun, Billy walked over to the nearest punching back and began to demolish it.

“That bad, huh?”, Kevin dared to ask

“Not one of the teams reached their objective”, stated Kyle, “The ASP team was taken out in the 70 seconds, and both assault teams were obliterated when they failed to work together to take out a Wraith tank, and after -”

“A Wraith?”, cut in Kevin

“They were in the vehicle depot. There wasn't much room for the Wraith to maneuver, but the Brute piloting it managed to take out multiple Spartans before the threat was neutralized, and then the explosion killed another Spartan. The remainder were picked off easily”

“Sucks to be you”, said Kevin, “Of course, Knife didn't fair much better: two teams dead, one objective completed, the others timed out. Chief call out your team leaders too?”

“Yep”, said Phillip, “And they haven't got out yet either. If it were Ajax in there, I'd be afraid he was torturing them” “How long has he had them for?”, asked Jacob

“An hour”, said Billy, walking away from the beaten husk that remained of the punching bag. Walking briskly over to his weapon locker, Billy pulled out sniper rifle and moved to the door.

“Where are you off too in such a hurry?”, asked Kyle

“Shooting range”, Billy replied curtly, walking out. Slowly, Kyle got up and followed, heading to the shooting range where Billy sat with his sniper rifle, taking out the targets in rapid succession and deadly efficiency. Billy turned his head ever so slightly so as to see that Kyle was beside him, then turned back and continued: when he stopped briefly to reload, Kyle asked, “Which part of it bugs you more? That they didn't coordinate or that none of them made it even when they coordinated?”

“What bugs me”, said Billy as he continued firing, “Is that HIGHCOM thinks we can just throw them out there and expect things to work themselves out. During WARDOG, we had several weeks to combat the Brutes, and they were badly prepared: here, we're going into their strongest held defensive position with soldiers that can't work together, can't stay on schedule, and can't survive.” Billy paused and reloaded, then said, “I don't want HIGHCOM to treat these boys and girls like they treated me and my siblings.”

“You're afraid they think the Spartans are expendable?”, asked Kyle

“They made two and a half thousand of them”, replied Billy, staring Kyle in the eye now, “What do you take that to mean?”

“That you're an army”, Kyle stated, “Now get your men together and prove it”

With that, Kyle walked off, leaving Billy alone at the firing: turning and looking down the field once more, he fired, the bullet penetrating six targets before getting stuck in the hillside.

DATE: 12th April 2612; LOCATION: Port Midgard, Manheim; TIME: 1100

Samuel Albert Davis sat in the mess hall of the UNSC Guardian of the Universe, quietly drinking his coffee as he watched the most recent newscast by Sol: Now's reporter Anna McCorrick. Other members of the Universe's crew walked about the mess hall, and Samuel payed little attention until one specifically walked over and sat down next to him.

“Any news on exactly where we're headed?”, asked the visitor

“What do you think, Jacob?”, Samuel replied, turning to face his comrade. “'Course I haven't heard anything. We're moving out to Arcturus in three weeks time and then moving out from there. Can't figure anything beyond that”

“Scuttlebutt says we're picking up NOVA's at Arcturus”, said Jacob

“I doubt it”, Samuel replied, “They wouldn't need an entire taskforce for some NOVA's. No, whatever it is we're picking up there is more important and more powerful.... and that scares me”

“Why?”, asked Jacob, “If it's better than NOVA's, it'll blow the Remnants outta the galaxy. What's better than that?”

“Sometimes, the most powerful thing can be the most dangerous”, said Samuel cryptically. Shaking his head, he said, “It doesn't matter. We aren't figuring anything out until then no how. How're the others handling the down time?”

“Fairly well”, replied Jacob, “Nick's trying to figure out how many he shot down at Syracuse so he can put the kill-marks on him and Marshall's Katana”

“That's normal”, laughed Samuel, “How's Akane holding up. She wasn't looking too good after the fight. Think she's got Pits?”

“PTSD? Nah. She's tougher'n that; she'll be fine”

There was silence a moment, then Jacob spoke again. “Samuel, does it ever strike you strange that our families have such bad luck?”

“What do you mean by that Jacob?”

“Both our parents died; your son and your daughter are dead; my brother and sister died. Just seems like fate's out to get us”

“Life's only what you make it”, replied Samuel, standing to leave. “I choose to make the best of it. You've got to make your own choice”

At that, Samuel patted Jacob on the shoulder and then walked off to check on the rest of his squad. Jacob continued to sit there, watching Sol: Now momentarily before changing the monitor from television to internet functions: clicking to view the much more interesting site known as UberN00b – Things the UNSC Doesn't Want You to Know, Jacob searching for “12th Naval Squadron”

--<font color=#990000><<Feel Deeds Awake: <font color=#BB0000>Now For Wrath,  <font color=#DD0000>Now For Ruin,  <font color=#FF0000>And A Red Dawn>> 21:43, April 28, 2010 (UTC)

14
“Cornhusker, this is Checkmate Actual. Tally three Bravo Kilos, two hundred meters, on my one, over.”

“Roger, Checkmate Actual. Cleared to engage subsonic. How copy?”

“Checkmate cleared to engage subsonic. Checkmate 1 is engaging.” A quick flurry of suppressed gunshots rattled the quiet air. “Tangos down, Checkmate holding overwatch, over.”

“Roger, Cornhusker out”

--- “I don’t like this.”

“Nigel, just follow me. Ok?”

Nigel nodded slowly.

The two figures inched forward slowly, each step cautious, probing. Then, the fist in the air. Halt.

The lead figure crouched slightly. Underneath the faceless titanium helmet, Nigel could imagine Armand grinning to himself. For reasons incomprehensible to Nigel, Armand liked this sort of thing.

Then he felt a quick touch on his leg. Two taps.

He reached forwards and replied. Two taps.

He saw Armand nod. He saw him shift his grip on the rifle. He saw him coil. Then, in a blur of motion, the Spartan charged around the corner. For a moment Nigel only felt fear. And then, some unseen forced propelled him into the unknown.

He found a plaza full of Brutes.

By now, Armand’s rifle was flashing. Shot after shot, burst after burst. For a brief second, the two Spartans had the advantage. They were trained, motivated, the very best. They had the advantage of surprise, and they took it.

For a brief moment, the Brutes were stunned, broken, flat-footed. Two went down, dead and others scattered, milling in confusion as FMJs tore into their scattered ranks.But then the tide shifted. The moment of confusion passed and the Brutes began to return fire. At first it was sporadic, quick, unaimed bursts from Brutes dashing for cover; but then the fire intensified.

Within seconds Armand was down, his arms and legs flailing in a tangle of webbing and armor. Nigel grabbed him behind the neck and began to pull. He felt a sting in his leg. He kept going. Somehow he managed to get the other Spartan behind the corner.

“Corpsman!”

“Hank, move your section to the left, hunker down, cover Laura’s team. Laura, take your assault section, move forwards once Hank has his men in position. Ok?

The two Spartans nodded, then moved off to join their teams. Wlad stayed put, crouching behind the low berm with Gunny Anders.

Moments later, he heard the soft rattle of gear to his left as Conic 1 moved out. Then silence. No birdsong, no far-off conversations, nothing but the wind blowing in the trees.

“Conic Actual, Conic 1 in position.” Hank’s fireteam was ready. With Checkmate blocking on the right and Conic 1 on the left, the trap was ready.

“Roger. Conic 2. Move up.” Time to spring the trap.

Then he heard it. The far-off shout of an angry Brute. They’d been spotted.

“Taking fire! Taking fire!” Somewhere off to the left Wald heard a young Spartan's shout become a panicked shriek. Spikes cracked overhead in golden streaks answered by the thump of the Spartans' automatic weapons.

Now to his right he heard the distant rattle of rifles. Now Checkmate was engaged.

The comms were flooded with chatter, static mixing with screams.

“Conic 2-2 down!....”

“Corpsman! Fuck, I need a Corpsman…”

“Here they come!...”

"...Suppressive fire! Dammit, suppressive fire!...."

"Taking fire!....""

"I'm hit! I'm hit!"

"...Falling back!"

“Gawd dammit, Marine! How many times do I have to tell you? Don’t stick your ass around a corner unless you know it’s clear. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, Gunnery Sergeant!”

“I can’t fuckin’ hear you, gyrene!”

“Yes, Gunnery Sergeant!”

“That was a shitty performance on your part today. Y’all are just a bunch of goddamn coneheads. I will not tolerate that kinda shit in my section. We took fifty percent casualties out there. That means half of you fuckers got yourselves killed. You were sloppy, you were unprofessional, and that is fucking unacceptable! Do you hear me?”

The gunny stamped out the last words like each syllable was one was made of cold steel. Within minutes of leaving the sim area, a furious Gunny Anders ordered Conic into the leaning rest. They'd been there for the better part of the hour, and any Spartan unlucky enough to falter or fall had felt the wrath of the Gunny.

“You are gonna getcher balls cut off out there, if you keep fucking up like this! I expect more outta you. You are gonna get fucking killed, and that is not acceptable in my section! So when we’re done doin’ our little meet-and-greet bull session with the squadron, I am gonna PT you until you fuckin’ drop. Got that?”

---

The clusters of armored figures began filling into the cheaply-furnished room. Most of the young faces were tired and haggard. The faces of many were covered with small cuts and lacerations, blood mixing with sweat. And expressions were universal: defeat, exhaustion, disappointment.

“Officer on deck!” The weary Spartans scrambled to their feet as Captain Marcus Conrad, UNSCMC strode into the room.

“At ease.”

Conrad was not a tall man, but he had a presence which more than compensated for his lack of stature. Unlike many officers, he was not a distant man. He himself was a “mustang,” a former enlisted man who’d gone on to earn his bars as an officer. As prior enlisted, he shared a common, unspoken bond with the forty young enlisted men and women in the room and it was in moments like these that this common heritage was most evident.

“Ok, Bear, debrief time….I’m not gonna sugar-coat this one: we sucked out there today. We took heavy losses, a couple of our guys walked right an ambush, and our assault teams got thumped pretty hard.”

“Our comms were pretty shitty. Especially you, Conic. When you started taking fire, you spazed out, you flooded the radios, and that’s part of why you got hit so hard. There was so much shit hitting the air, the corpsmen didn’t know where to go or who was hit, the team leaders lost contact with their guys, you lost cohesion, you broke up, and you got slaughtered. We can’t do that kinda stuff. You have got to keep your comms discipline.”

“Secondly, we have gotta get co-ordinated. Checkmate was doin’ their job fine, until Conic got hit; and by then they were too far to the right to support them. That let the Bravo Kilos eat up Conic. Section leaders, be aware of what you’re doin’. If you lose touch with command element, you guys have gotta communicate directly with each other. Okay?”

“That’s all, then.”

 FightWithHonor  Contact me

15
15th of April, 2612, Port Midgard, Manheim, Omicron Orionis system, 1600 local time

The 112th came in low over the horizon, engines flaring as they accelerated out of the thin mountain range that bordered their target. In the distance, a looming Covenant city was visible, sparkling in the pale blue sunshine of the alien star high above. Their mission objective was to provide air support for ground troops landing in the city, and they were armed for it with less than 15 kilometers left to go. So far, it was a cakewalk.

In the cockpit of her F-406 Katana, Captain Maria Williams watched the city grow rapidly in her viewport. They were now less than ten kilometers away, and she could just barely pick out the fire trails of landing HEVs. The city was being assaulted by a full division of ODST shock troopers, who would be relying on the 112th for air strikes. The 112th normally operated as an interceptor squadron, but their days working as mercenaries had left them well versed in a variety of roles, including ground support.

“Check boards and tighten formation. Watch for AA.” said Maria as they closed on the city. It was an odd combination of low level buildings and towering, shapely skyscrapers that were reminiscent of their bulbous starship hulls. There was ample room for anti-aircraft units to hide. “We’ve got to stay on station for the groundpounders, but otherwise I don’t want anyone getting too close to that city.”

The 112th banked to the right, decelerating and turning wide around the city. They would orbit the city until the ODSTs marked a target for them, circling out of range of any Remnant ground units.

Suddenly, the voice of Mathew David, Demon 9, erupted into Maria’s headset. “Shit! Incoming Seraphs, nine o’clock high!”

Maria shifted in her seat and craned her neck to look back. Behind them, five full squadrons of Seraph fighters burst through the cloud cover, plasma cannons firing. Their engines burned wide holes in the soft white clouds as they dove, screaming past the almost motionless 112th. Plasma fire bracketed the squadron and three loud thumps resounded through Maria’s fighter.

“Where the hell did these guys come from!” yelled Demon 4

Maria had no time to answer. The Seraphs looped up sharply from their dive, reversing direction and heading straight for the squadron. Maria reacted without thinking; a lifetime of fighting in the cockpit took control. She yanked the stick hard to the right, rolling into a dive, and keyed her TITAN lasers. Twin red streaks flashed across the sky, cutting through the closest enemy fighters. More plasma fire filled the air, as the Seraphs continued their attack. Maria swore, arming her other pair of TITAN lasers and firing them into the nearest enemy fighters. Two more gutted hulks fell from the sky, cut nearly in half.

The Seraphs flashed past, giving Maria a brief second to check on her squadron. It didn’t look good. Over half of the squadron’s fighters were damaged in some way, and only a single fighter still had intact shields. Maria checked her boards and saw the Seraphs were looping around for another pass. They’d taken heavy casualties on their first pass, but they had overwhelming numbers and clearly realized how much damage they’d done to the human fighters. They were coming in for the kill now.

Maria had only seconds to give her squadron orders, and realized with a start that she had no idea what to do. The 112th had been armed for ground support, and had no air to air missiles equipped. They’re only defense against the Seraphs were their TITAN lasers, and good as the weapons were, they weren’t going to be enough. Not against four squadrons of Seraphs. Their chances in a dogfight were abysmal.

But running was not an option. There were thousands of ODSTs in the city by now. If the 112th retreated, the entire offensive would be at the mercy of the enemy squadrons. They could strafe the ground troops, prevent extraction, hover as close air support--or if they wanted, incinerate the whole city with plasma charges. The 112th was the only defense against them.

“Demons, bank right and scrub the formation. Break into flight pairs and go for individual dogfights. Keep moving and tie them up. Go.”

A chorus of acknowledgements filled her comm and the 112th broke into pairs, each accelerating individually towards the onrushing mass of Seraphs, who turned to face the human fighters once again. Maria and her wingman came straight in, while the other five pairs approached from other angles. Their approach would prevent the Seraphs from massing their fire and allow them room to maneuver, hopefully enough to get them close to the swarm. Once they were in deep, they could use the enemies numbers against them and cut off their angles of attack. It was their best chance.

The seraphs opened up with their plasma cannons, and blue-white streaks of fire flashed past Maria’s cockpit window. She rolled up, then to port, dodging a pair of shots, then retaliated with her TITAN lasers. Three of her shots connected, bringing down enemy fighters, but a fourth passed harmlessly past it’s intended target. Because the weapon was hit scan, it meant her aim was off. That alone shocked her. Her aim was never off.

Moments later, the two sides met and merged into a single group, combining into a single vicious fray. Maria tore back on the stick and threw her fighter into a dizzying climb, intending to loop around and drop it for a shot. As she climbed, however, three Seraphs broke off from the chaos below and accelerated, slipping in behind her. She dove, rolled, and pivoted, but the three of them refused to break off. She couldn’t shake them. She swore, reversed her engines, and rolled to the side, pivoting 240 degrees. She smiled. In all her time as a pilot, she’d never seen a Brute fighter stick with her after something like that. They’d be gone.

Just as she turned to come about for a pass on the enemies below, however, light and heat flashed over her. She swore and looked behind her, only to see all three Seraphs hot on her tail, plasma cannons firing. Superheated energy bolts slammed into her rear armor through her already weakened shields, boiling it away. She grunted, trying to control her wildly shaking stick as her fighter dropped altitude and pulled into a dive. Swearing, she glanced behind her at her squadron, and realized that over half of them were gone. Just as the realization dawned on her, a final plasma bolt leapt from the cannon of the lead Seraph and slammed into her cockpit. For a brief moment, there was a blinding light…then it slowly faded to black.

The simulator pulled back, revealing the sleek grey walls of the simulation room. Maria coughed and pulled herself out of the mock Katana cockpit, stretching her legs and glancing about the room. Four 112th members were already out of their sims, sitting on the couches adorning the room or, in the case of Tanner Grace and Jacki Stort, conversing near the mission summary board. Maria stepped out of the simulator, strolled over to the board, and found her name on it.

'''<p style="text-align:center">Cpt. Maria Jordan Williams.

<p style="text-align:center">Vehicle: F-406 Katana.

<p style="text-align:center">Kills: 7 F-99C Seraph Fighters

<p style="text-align:center">Mission Ongoing, Squadron Casualties: Five.

<p style="text-align:center">Replay battle? [Yes] [No] '''

As she watched, she noticed the casualty report grow to eight, then to nine, then to ten. She glanced about the room as the sims opened, checking who was still in the mission. Finally, the mission summary updated with it’s ending report.

'''<p style="text-align:center">Mission Complete, Squadron Casualties: Eleven. '''

Maria checked her board, and found the lone survivor to be Robin Lennings, Demon 11. The second to last was Jermiah Swin, Demon 8. She waited for everyone to gather around the couches in the lounge, then approached it herself.

“So what the hell happened there?” asked Adrian Juno “We just got our asses kicked.”

“Damn straight.” muttered Matt Davids “They were everywhere. I got four kills. How did we even manage to pull that one out? When I got hit, there was 20 of them and four of us. ”

Maria turned to Swin and Lennings, who both looked disappointed but, oddly enough, also appeared to be on the verge of laughing. “This’d better be good.” muttered Maria

Jermiah finally laughed, a wide smile crossing his creased face. “Well, there was a good fifteen of them on my six and one baddie on Robin, so I killed my thrust, let them ram me, and deployed my beacon right on my own hull.” He paused, as if expecting a laugh, then looked disappointed when he received only a few confused looks. “I deployed an air strike beacon, guys. Had Robin drop a few ATGs on me and let the shrapnel do the rest. Good stuff, right?”

All Maria could do was shake her head at the sheer outlandishness of the maneuver, though Jermiah did manage a few shaky smiles from some of the others. That sim had gone absolutely terrible. The 112th hadn’t flow a mission that bad in a sim in years, and never in an actual Op. It was unsettling.

“Well, as much as I know you’d all like to hear Jerry tell us about having his Katana bombed out of the sky, we’ve got work to do, demons.” said Maria “Get in your sims and run it again.”

''16th of April, 2612. Simulation ground 12, Camp Sparta, Arcturus, Arcturus System, 1500 Local Time''

The assault course sim was being run in numerical order, with Albion Company running it first and Omega going last, so that meant Lambda was, predictably, close to the end. By the time they were scheduled to run the simulation, word had filtered out about it’s difficulty, and the notorious tensions it had already caused in Bravo. So, when it was finally Lambdas turn to run it, he was all the more interested in how it would turn out.

Standing on the edge of the observation dais next to his CO, SPARTAN-144, Connor-338 watched intently as the SPARTAN-IVs of Lambda prepared to run the by-now infamous sim. It was changed in different ways for every team, of course, to ensure a reliable and fair testing, but the overall difficulty was kept as close as possible to the same. No one seriously thought any of the SPARTAN-IVs or their officers would cheat, but no one was going to take any chances with it either. Regs were regs, and regs had to be followed.

The mission began with a simple countdown timer, announced on the HUD of the soldiers running the holographic simulation. As soon as it began, the Lambda Company SPARTANs were in motion, advancing quickly through the halls at double quick pace…without any sound. Other SPARTAN-IV companies specialized in stealth, and some were even better at Lambda in certain areas, but Connor couldn’t help being proud. The Lambda kids had taken to SPARTAN training like ducks in the water. It came as naturally to them as any soldier Connor had ever seen.

They advanced quietly through the hallways, quickly and silently eliminating any Brute guards in their path. Connor couldn’t help but admire their precision and the how easily they settled into the role of assassins and saboteurs. Even after running around in SPI armor for half his life, where stealth meant the difference between life and death, and spending a few years contract killing select HVTs for Section 0, he still wasn’t as much at ease with it at they were.

The missions were all tailored slightly for the specialties of each company, so that meant Lambda’s objective was, naturally, to take out a hostile commander and exfil without anyone noticing. The companies emphasis on silently killing select targets wasn’t surprising, given the history of it’s top commanders, though Connor knew that the NCOs, the small SPARTAN-III team especially, we’re occasionally uncomfortable with the role. That’d didn’t stop them from going at it wholeheartedly however, and that translated into what was as near to perfection from a select target elimination point of view as Connor could tell.

And in the training sim, it shone through brilliantly. Connor leaned down against the glass wall of the observation booth with interest, watching them perform the sim. They had a timer, of course, but he could hardly tell it from the way they performed. Their role often required a certain amount of speed combined with absolute stealth, so it was no surprise they kept tightly disciplined under pressure. Still, he did see occasional moments of awkwardness as they moved through the mission as a team. They didn’t allow it to slow them down much, and they made up for it in other sections, but he saw how they paused occasionally, working out who should go first, who should perform the kill shot, who should knife the bravo kilo first. They were good in a lot of ways, but they were not a good in a team setting. Someone had once remarked that the original class I SPARTAN-IIs acted damn near telepathic as a team, and Lambda certainly did not. They were still one of the best groups in the UNSC--but in the hyper competitive SPARTAN-IV ranks, they were a bit slower than the rest.

But as they reached the point where they would split into individuals, they finally hit their stride. The hesitation, however minute, was gone. They were in their element, their comfort zone, the place where they became a sight to behold. They didn’t just continue as they’d done without mistakes, they improved. They got quicker. They became more precise. And they maintained their stealth without a single problem. Because a longer section of the simulation was devoted to the individual segments, something that minutely favored Lambda, they cleared it in 7 seconds under the time limit. The final breaches and takedowns of the targets were picture perfect, and they were all done solo. 44 HVTs were eliminated, while the rest of the company simply had to exfil. The holograms faded away and the SPARTANs were left alone in the massive simulation room, with a clear view of Connor and Leonid observing them. Connor had left the box windows untinted deliberately. He wanted the SPARTANs to know he was watching them, both to judge and support them.

Lambda Company filtered slowly out of the room to be debriefed, and Connor turned to Leonid. Him and Old Egor, as he was called, had had a bit of a rocky relationship at first, though truth be told, Leonid seemed to have a rocky relationship with just about everyone except his weapons. They’d eventually figured out how to put the things they had in common ahead of the things they didn’t, and become, not friends, but a good team at least. Connor valued Leonid’s skills and years of expertise, even if he wondered about his mental state sometimes, and Leonid seemed to value his superior people skills. Connor had been apprehensive taking a leadership role in the 117th initially, given his long line of problems stemming from getting to deeply invested in his soldiers, but having an anti-social psychopath for a CO had calmed him a bit of that fear.

“They did pretty good.” said Connor, tabbing through the statistics of the mission while video of it played in the background. “No screw-ups. Cleared it well under the time limit. Still have some issues with teamwork, but we’re still working on that. Clean knife kills and some very good shooting, particularly by Ghost.”

“It tested them on what they’re good at.” said Leonid “No surprise.”

Connor frowned. “A full on combat sim would be good, but I’m not sure we have the time. Omegas been waiting for days to have a go round, and Jared might put Indigo through it again.”

“Holo-sim them against each other. Or another company. Just get them some field time.”

Connor sighed and picked his helmet up from the table, before reaching into one of his armor’s pockets for his flask of vintage Gilgamesh whiskey. He didn’t drink any, just turned the small titanium holder over in his palm, feeling the engraved 441st Combat Company patch. It brought back good memories.

“Yes sir.” he said, walking out the door “I’ll have a simulation set up in three hours.”

''16th of April, 2612. Private ODST Lounge, Aboard UNSC Colorado, High Orbit Over Point Midgard, Manheim, Omicron Orionis system, 2100 local time''

Sergeant Katerina “Kitty” Nevsky knew she wasn’t the galaxies best poker player, but she hadn’t realized how bad an idea it was to play it with the other members of the 18/10 before it was far to late. She looked down at her dwindling pile of chips, and checked her hand again. Shit.

“I got nothing.” she said, “I fold.”

“Again?” jeered her subordinate squad leader, Staff Sergeant Edik "Arsenic" Abelev “You ain’t too good at this, are you gunny?”

“She just hasn’t had years of 18th Shock Troops training yet.” mocked Corporal Benjamin "BJ" Novak “Too many years with those stuffy old 15th boys.”

“Keep it up,” replied Katerina, voice mock icy “and you’ll be doing PT till you feet bleed.”

“Come on gunny, you know we kid.” said BJ “Oh, and by the way Edik, four of a kind. Suck it.”

Edik swore, putting his cards down to show he had only a pair of twos. Kitty died a little on the inside. Her hand had been even worse than that miserable one. BJ laughed and grabbed the pot, by now a substantial sum of money. Kitty and Edik watched glumly as he counted out what had been their combat bonuses a few moments ago. So much for buying that new Eastwood Studios movie, Katerina though wryly.

Katerina glanced at her few remaining chips, the last of her money, and decided it wasn’t worth it to keep playing. Grabbing her chips up from the table, she took a swig from her iced beer and flipped BJ a 200 cR chip, which he caught deftly with his off hand even as he drained his glass of whiskey. “I’m out.” she said, stretching her legs “Beat the pipsqueak up, will you Edik?”

The Staff Sergeant merely grunted, focused on the game and winning back his bonus. Katerina smiled and stood up, glancing about the room for something to do. In the corner, some of the members of Team Three were playing an intense game of darts, while the rest of the company was scattered about the room, conversing, betting, or in the case of two clearly intoxicated young troopers, playing a seriously over-intense game of go fish. Katerina shook her head as one of them broke into a rant of curses and expletives when he lost, and drained the last of her beer.

Downtime for a elite combat unit like the 18/10 came few and far between, so whenever they got R&R, they had a natural tendency to go a little overboard. Command let this slide, given effectiveness of the unit, just like it let go their control of the former all personnel lounge. The brass was smart enough to know which battles were worth fighting.

Kitty ambled over towards the makeshift bar Team Two had set up, vaguely aware that she’d likely already had a little to much to drink. She’d always held her liquor well, and the beer wasn’t all that potent, but Yahtzee had conned her and a few others into a drinking contest a few hours earlier, which she soundly won by putting twenty three shots down. Still, the beer tasted good and she hadn’t had downtime like this in months, so she figured it couldn’t hurt to unwind. Dropping a five cR chip to the makeshift bartender, PFC Russell "Hammer" Hamner, Katerina grabbed another cold one from the cooler and sat down at one of the barstools, an old Warthog seat that some clever bastard had grabbed off one of the LRVs while it was down for repairs.

She admired the array of war trophies mounted on the wall, from the hammer and helmet of a Brute chieftain to the red flag of a former Insurrectionist group, before swinging around in her chair to take note of what the other NCOs were doing. Lydecker was, predictably, standing next to Lieutenant Wolf, and Mac was berating a pair of troopers who’d had the misfortune of planting a dart in his shoulder blade. The music in the background was a little to soft for her tastes, but she was just an uncultured farm girl, as she liked to put it.

Despite the pleasant atmosphere of the night, however, something still seemed off to Katerina. Maybe it was just the break from combat being to sudden and disarming, but something in her gut made her wonder if the sudden bout of R&R was a rest for something bigger to come. She hadn’t heard anything definite, but she’d overhead some people talking about a possible big push coming soon. She couldn’t help but wonder if command was giving them one last respite before sending them back into the thick of things.

She glanced over at Lydecker and Wolf, who were now conversing with Captain Cielo with worried looks on their faces. She couldn’t hear what they were saying, but their expressions, tense but clearly trying to cover it, told her everything she needed to know. Glancing down at her half filled beer, she handed it off to a stray marine, one of the few who’d been let in, and told him to keep it. Whether she liked it or not, she was back in combat mode. They were still technically on break, but in Katerina’s mind at least, preparation for the battle to come, whatever it was, had already begun.

''19th of April, 2612. Aboard UNSC New York, Commanding Vessel of Taskforce Arrow, Contested Inter-system space, Remnant KY-92 System, 0100 local time''

On the bridge of the UNSC New York, Zeus-class Super carrier and flagship of Taskforce Arrow, a broad smile lit up the face of Admiral James McHenry as the Remnant cruiser in the forward viewport exploded. The massive Mark VIII 'Tornado' Heavy MAC gun on the fore of the carrier belched fire, and a white hot slug flashed forward, slamming into the cruisers sister ship and gutting it stem to stern. The Remnant forces, a frigate and cruiser pair, had reacted quickly when Taskforce Arrow had slipped in system, but not quickly enough. The flotilla of warships had rolled over them in seconds, leaving the four smoking hulks to drift dead in space, annihilated beyond repair.

The Taskforce had been ordered to the system to assault a Remnant shipyard, though everyone in the fleet knew it was more about harassing the enemy and keeping the crew sharp than doing any real damage. The shipyards here were under equipped and poorly supplied, thanks to a series of blockades imposed by UNSC forces. It was an isolated target that would be easy pickings, and hardly worth sending thirteen vessels in to destroy. Just one more example of how the military bureaucracy functioned on a day to day basis.

The fleet accelerated in system, engines at 70% power. There was no need to rush it. The shipyard wasn’t going anywhere and the planet had no defenses to speak of. The small Remnant defense force hadn’t even gotten off a shot. It was a cakewalk. Hardly worth the fuel it took them to get in system, or the explosives they would plant to blow the shipyards.

Through the viewport, McHenry spotted the engine flares of ten Pelican dropships exiting the hangar of the New York and cruising toward the shipyard. They were loaded full of ordnance techs decked out in EVA gear, who would plant charges on the shipyard then return to the ship and detonate them. McHenry found himself actually bored, a bad thing for an officer whose job it was to stay alert and watch for threats to his taskforce.

The Pelicans began their final approach, then decelerated rapidly and spun 180 degrees on their axis to face their troop bays towards the shipyard. Admiral McHenry enlarged the image, and watched as individual EVA troops jetted out of the cargo bay and crossed the 200 meters of open space to the shipyard. A small force of Covenant EVA troops emerged, but precision fire from the Catherine Halsey eliminated them almost immediately. The EVA teams finished their task within ten minutes and returned to their dropships, which turned and headed back to the New York. They docked only a few minutes later, and half and hour after they’d eliminated the enemy planetary guard, the force headed out on an out system vector.

Behind them, the charges detonated, turning the shipyard into nothing more than a floating field of scrap metal, and the Taskforce began warming up their slipspace drives. They could have easily besieged and taken the planet, but their orders said only to destroy the shipyard and then proceed onto their next target. They’d been on continuous duty for almost three weeks now, assaulting, overwhelming, and destroying low-priority Remnant targets before proceeding to the next one. In all that time, they’d encountered only a dozen enemy craft, with several of the targets being abandoned and undefended. They still had fifteen or so odd targets left to go, and Admiral McHenry was about to order the jump to the next target when a message came in.

Puzzled, he opened it. To his surprise, it was a high priority message sent straight from a HIGHCOM office at Point Midgard on Manheim. It ordered immediate him to immediately return his taskforce to Manheim and await orders, but for what it didn’t say. McHenry had effectively ended any hope of rising beyond his current position when he berated some high level brass over it’s combat doctrine two years ago, but even so, he was usually kept well informed. He scrolled down to the recipients section, and found that hundreds of ships had received the message. Dozens of taskforces, combat groups, and fleets. Something big was about to happen, and judging by the size of the force being assembled, it would not be easy. Opening up a fleet wide channel, he broadcast the new development to the other ships in the Taskforce, and they jumped into slipspace moments later.

16
April 15 2612 Sigma Octanus For the last 3 weeks the UNSC 14th Nomad Fleet have been busy preparing themself for a top secret operation called Operation:HELLFIRE. Of course nobody knew what would be this mission only Fleet Admiral Jordan Davis relly knew what it would lead to: the end of the Covenant Empire. Everyone were busy Large part of the garison were on the ground and space squadron surch as the 77th Naval Squadron were also preparing for this unknow mission using drone has target for the trainning.<font color="SteelBlue">C <font color="#A9A9A9">F <font color=Teal>00 <font color=Teal>1 20:00, April 28, 2010 (UTC)

17
Explosions rocked the battlefield as Seraphs and assorted UNSC fighters clashed in their air, their charred hulks raining to the blackened soil below. At the same moment a nearby bunker attempted to wait out the storm. After a few minutes the explosions had ceased. The door slowly opened, revealing a Jackal scanning the terrain. The dogfight was over, at least two dozen Seraphs had been annihilated; but it was a victory nonetheless, the human bombers littering the landscape.

It clicked something in its alien language, and then flung open the doors. Its lance of marksmen slowly filed out of the bunker, forming a semi-circle, scouting the area for anything resembling a target. A few moments later a few Brutes moved out as well, going beyond the perimeter formed by the bird-like creatures, shifting through the wreckage for survivors. After a few tense minutes, they concluded there were none.

"Alert the Chieftain," shouted one of the Brutes, to the Jackals. "that the battle in the air has been won! We are free to move out."

One of the Jackals shouted back, and ran inside. The pack gathered together, discussing their opinions on the battle. They talked so loudly they had yet to notice the dots in the sky moving ever closer. However, one of the Jackals noticed, and chirped an order to its allies. They backed away from their positions, leaving the Brutes to their fate.

In a few moments 3 dozen black pods had crashed into the ground, crushing the Brutes beneath them. The Jackals recognized their foe, and attempted to set up fixed shields around the bunker; they were too late. Almost simultaneously, the doors to the pods were kicked open, multitudes of black-clad troopers filing out. This was Blackheart Platoon, and they were prepared for war. Near the center of the group came a particular trooper. His face was covered in scars, his hair crudely shaven off, leaving a colorless stubble. The shadow on his face matched it. His eyes were cold and uncaring, not bothering to blink as a rifle shot flew within an inch of his face. He ducked as his men ran past him, returning fire on the outmatched birds. He reached into an ammo pouch, and opened it up, pulling out a piece of his secret stash. A Sweet William cigar. After removing his visor, he jammed it in and took a lighter from the pouch as well. As he flicked it on, a grenade stuck to a nearby soldier's pack. He threw down the lighter, leaping forward and tearing off the primed pack, throwing it behind him. It detonated a moment after, bathing the pair in blue light. As the light dissipated, he turned toward the soldier and began to shout, his face obscured by the cigar smoke.

"Watch what you're doing out here, Duff!" He barked. "Your biofoam was in that pack. Anyone here gets shot now, they are fucked! Do you hear me, Medical Officer Duff?"

The man called Duff wilted before his superior. "Yes sir, Lieutenant! It will not happen again, sir!"

"You're damn right it won't happen again!" He screamed back. "You don't have any supplies left to lose! Now pick up your shotgun and get back in the fray!" The soldier saluted, picked up his rifle, and charged.

The man with the cigar was First Lieutenant Jeremy Patterson, at the end of a very long war.

XO Jose Marez laid down suppressing fire, knocking an unsuspecting Jackal off of its feet. As its partner turned to look at it, a pistol round knocked its brains onto the bunker behind it.

Marez waved his hand, ordering his troops forward. With only half a dozen Jackals left, Blackheart was in high spirits, and bullrushed them before they had a second to process the action. Seeing the massive troops sprinting forward, the remaining Covenant routed into the bunker, slamming the door behind them.

Sergeant Marez watched this with a grin on his face. This was a victory no matter how you looked at it. He called over the platoon's tech specialist, Lambardo.

"Lambardo, patch us in to Command. Let 'em know we've routed the Covenant at the bunker. We'll be moving in to flush them out."

"That's a negative, Marez." Jeremy grunted, moving over towards the pair. "This simulation's done for the day. The men did well, at least excluding the rookie."

"Give Duff a break, Lieutenant." Lambardo pleaded. "The kid's terrified of you. We tell him this is the most fun platoon in the regiment, and then he gets nightmares about what kind of hellhole the other platoons are. We don't wanna be liars, sir."

Jeremy gave a wide grin. Somewhere beneath that shell the same man remained. "And that's exactly why we're done early, Lambardo. Rumor has it that one Lieutenant Wolf got her hands on some wine. I say it's time Blackheart crashed the party; am I right boys?"

The crowd that had gathered around him cheered, throwing primed grenades into the air.

Patterson saluted his men. "See you at the party, boys!"

The grenades detonated, killing the entire platoon in a torrent of shrapnel and lead.

'''<p style="text-align:center">Sergeant Jose Marez.

<p style="text-align:center">Armament: Squad Leader.

<p style="text-align:center">Kills: 4 Kig'Yar marksmen

<p style="text-align:center">Mission Objectives Completed: 1.

<p style="text-align:center">Unit Casulaties: 36

<p style="text-align:center">Replay battle? [Yes] [No] '''

MasterGreen999 20:18, April 28, 2010 (UTC)

18
17th of April 2612, Manheim: Training exercise

Chinnault watched as the real world vanished, replaced by sheer inky blackness. Soon the virtual world faded into view. Chinnault and his squad stood in the loading bay of a Pelican, watching as the land below swept by.

"Alright people. here's the drill," the company commander, lieutenant Rachel Peters, shouted over the COM. "We're providing a diversion for a NAVSPECWAR task force moving to destroy a Remnant fuel plant. While we provide a frontal assault, elements from the task force will infiltrate the base and place charges to detonate once we've both exfiltrated. This op should take no more than thirty minutes."

"Echo Three here, any intel on enemy force composition?" asked a soldier Chinnault couldn't identify.

"Negative Echo Three, we are going in blind on this one," replied the lieutenant.

"Figures," muttered Raf. "HIGHCOM isn't letting us off easy on this one."

"Sow the chatter, people, and lock'n'load. We hit the dirt in two," shouted Peters. The company stopped talking, everyone intent on their equipment. Chinnault pulled his combat knife from its sheath and tested the edge on his thumb. It was perfectly sharp. ''Of course it is," Chinnault thought, remembering this was a virtual reality. Everything was perfect.

The Pelicans settled down, raising a cloud of dust thick enough to force Chinnault to don a pair of goggles. "Alright people, go go go!" screamed Peters. The company disembarked. Chris, Kali and Raf and gathered together the junior members of their squad and awaited orders, which Peters happily dispensed.. "Bravo, take your wing around to the east! Alpha and Charlie, center with me! Delta, west. Move out!" The preassigned fireteams, including Chinnault's Delta, moved out to their areas. The Remnant might not yet know it, but they were in for a kicking.

The Pelicans had dropped the company a klick away from the site. Chinnault and the rest of Delta began their run to the site. Watching their vital signs in his command HUD display, Chinnault noticed that one of the Marines was having difficulty breathing. These sims were designed not only to test the Marines on combat situations, but also simulated problems such as health issues with the soldiers. Right now the unlucky soldier, randomly picked for this by the computer, likely "felt" the effects of his "infirmity."

Chinnault switch to the command COM frequency and told Raf, "Keep them on course. I'll just be a minute." Raf nodded. Chinnault switched back to TEAMCOM and shouted, "Alright people, Ortiz is now in charge. Paccheo, hold up." The private stepped out of the formation, which continued on around him and Chinnault.

Chinnault walked over to the young man. "Sorry son, you've drawn the short end of the stick. Looks like you're our sick man today." The soldier, red in the face, nodded. "Just fall on back to the Pelicans and report in for casevac." Chinnault patted him on the back, then turned and kept running.

What was the point of that? Chinnault thought. This is gonna be a milk run, especially with what they've been throwing at us the past few days. Shaking his head at HIGHCOM's arbitrariness, he ran on.

OOC: If anyone else currently on Manheim is interested in merging storylines, let me know.

19
David Kilgore's platoon of Brown Bear Anti-Heavy Walker Vehicles, as well as two platoons of Scorpion tanks, a platoon of Tiger Heavy Battle Tanks, and a platoon of Komodo Anti-Vehicle Platforms rolled towards a Covenant armored unit consisting of seven Scarabs and about fifty Wraiths, supported by about 100 Brutes

"Everyone, stay together, we need to keep the Scarabs off those tanks, and we're dead meat if they can't keep the Wraiths off us.", David said through his radio.

"Scarabs incoming!", the voice of the Tiger platoon leader, a Swede named Mattias Eriksson said through the radio.

"All units in my platoon", lock onto your targets and open fire!"

David Kilgore pointed the turret of the Brown Bear at the lead and the second Scarab, using only his neural interface. Controlling a tank turret with one's mind took some getting used to, but Kilgore had been doing it for years, it was now second nature to him.

Kilgore fired two MGM-1 anti-walker missile at the Scarabs, one missile per walker was all he would need.

The missiles shot from the launch tubes of his AHWV and flew into the air before diving down onto the top of the Scarab. David's missiles, along with those fired from the rest of his platoon swarmed down on the Scarabs, slamming into the roof of the Scarabs right on top of the core. All seven Scarabs exploded in balls of flames as the missiles impacted.

The vehicles that had once been the worst nightmare of every UNSC marine now lay in burning ruins.

The Tigers, Scorpions, and Komodos rolled forward, opening fire. 105mm and 90mm cannons roared as they impacted shattered Wraiths left and right, beams from the Komodo's TITAN Lasers burned through three Wraiths at a time. One Wraith that came to close to Kilgore's vehicle was taken out by SABRE ATGW from the M41 missile launcher Kilgore had attached to the PALADIN weapons station.

Within minutes, the Covenant armor was routed, leaving only the Brutes. Some of them fled, others charged at the UNSC armor in a final act of defiance. Kilgore turned the turret of his AHWV to three Brutes and several Grunts and fired the M45C Heavy Machine Gun, cutting them all to pieces. The rest of the Brutes soon met a similar fate.

The screen of the simulator went blank.

<p style="text-align:center">Lt. David Kilgore

<p style="text-align:center">Vehicle: M-1050 Brown Bear Anti-Heavy Walker Vehicle

<p style="text-align:center">Kills: 2 Scarabs, 1 Wraith, 3 Brutes, 7 Grunts.

<p style="text-align:center">Mission Completed, Unit Casualties: Four Scorpions.

<p style="text-align:center">Replay battle? [Yes] [No]

Kilgore exited the simulator along with the rest UNSC tank crews involved in the mission.

"I thought these simulations were supposed to be tougher than usual", one Scorpion commander said

"They are", his buddy replied, "But they're still using Covie Remnant equipment, which is clearly second rate".

20
DATE: 12th April 2612; LOCATION: Camp Sparta, Arcturus; TIME: 2200

Finishing up the last of his battle plan revisions, Riker moved away from his desk and to his personal bookshelves: stacked within them were books, plans, reports, films, comics and a hundred other things, both professional and not. Though few and far between, when Riker managed to get brief respites from the rigors of training Kilo Company, he liked to enjoy what he considered the finer things in life, such as stories and films, particularly fantastical tales hailing from the Japanese culture of Earth. Grabbing the next to last book in the Godzilla: Destiny series, he began reading the grand drama, finding it quite enjoyable.

However, he did not have long to enjoy himself, as soon the nearby holo-pad lit up, presenting an AI's avatar. The avatar was that of a highly stylized version of the Japanese storm god Susano'O, dressed in a brilliant steel armor akin to a samurai's suit, but with a massive sword in his hand and a sun-shaped crown upon his brow. A shield was upon his right arm, a great sun-shaped image formed from metal spikes floated behind him, and the center of his form was composed of a ball of light within the chest armor, a great emerald set directly in the center of his breastplate. Riker immediately recognized the avatar as that of his AI companion, Susano.

“Riker”, said the AI curtly, waiting for a reply

“Yes Susano? What do you want”

“Kami of Lambda Company would like a word with you”, stated Susano, his voice all too hauntingly similar to Lord Terrence Hood, the man from whom Susano had been made. Originally designed as a commander in a project designed to create AI-controlled drone armies, the project was scrapped and Susano would have been too had it not been for the intervention of Andrew James Lewis, then-director of ONI: Andrew had felt a certain level of respect for his former commander, and had redirected Susano to the S-IV Program as a last honor.

“Thank you Susano”, replied Riker, “Let her in Susano” Immediately, Susano's image faded away and Kami's image replaced him. Whereas Susano was a brilliant and awe-inspiring warrior in form, Kami was a brooding woman: similar though different to Cortana and Joyeuse in form, Kami glowed of grey and yellow, her tussled hair falling into her face and covering one of her eyes. Slender in form, Kami was not the buxom-blessed and well endowed avatar that some were, not even as much as Cortana or Joyeuse, but it was a style she embraced.

“Kami”, said Riker, nodding slightly

“Riker”, replied the AI, “I would like to pass on an invitation from Conner-388 and Leonid-144 for Kilo Company to participate in a full combat sim against Lambda Company. Leonid believes Lambda needs work in the area of teamwork, and believes a full-out battle sim is the best way to achieve this. So, do you accept?”

Riker smiled slightly to himself. He and Leonid had always carried a strange relationship, born from their similarities and differences: both were slightly brooding due to their past, which both revolved around ONI manipulating them to suit their own agendas; however, Riker had become “more human” over the years, whereas Leonid had remained remarkably unchanged, seemingly the same person mentally as he was in 2525, at least to the casual observer. Looking at Kami, Riker said, “I accept your offer. When shall we start?”

“As soon as Kilo can gather”, replied Kami, “Lambda's almost prepared as it is”

“Expect us there at 2230”, replied Riker

“Aye sir”, replied the AI, disappearing before being replaced with Susano after a few short moments.

“Rally the troops, I suppose?”, the AI queried sarcastically

“Let's give 'em H***”, said Riker

“Alright you lazy sons of you-know-whats, get your dadgummed hind ends out of these bunks before I blow the bunker out from under you!”, yelled Brandon Smith, raising all manner of chaos as he woke the sleeping Spartans scattered throughout their quarters.

“What's going?”, asked Charlie-K023 of King Squadron as he rushed to don his armor properly, watching the other Spartans running around like chickens with their heads cut off

“Boss's got us a date with Egor's Loners”, replied Goodwyn-K013, “Time to show them how much rear we can kick in one night”

Riker strode through the Kilo barracks, ensuring that everyone was properly prepared and fully awake, showing tough love to the drowsy by kicking them “lightly” in the leg. “Alright Riker, what's the plan?”, asked Matthew Frank, XO of Knife Squadron, as she quickly walked up beside the fast-paced commander.

“Leonid asked for a full on combat test”, replied Riker, “So we're obliging. We're going to need to be careful: this is as much a test for us as it is for Lambda. We've trained beside them every day for years, fought with them during CATECHISM, DEVIANT, WARDOG and REAPER, and I've reviewed their run-through of the mission sim: they're not lacking in ability. They're the stealthiest illegits the Spartans have ever seen, courtesy of Leonid, but they lack leadership skills: we have leadership, we just need to work on mission focus. Play on their weaknesses, use our strengths.”

“What's the sim location? Wide open combat grounds?”

“That's the idea”

“Perfect. Vehicles?”

“Some light and medium ground vehicles, a couple tanks. No air support”

“Standard hard drop?”

Riker nodded. “Only have what you can carry with you”

“Sounds perfect. A little too much so”

“Don't think this'll be easy. Lambda won't give up easy. I'm sure there will be some place designed to play against us as well”

“We'll woop 'em Riker, don't you worry about that”

“Just don't get cocky kid”

Matthew nodded and ran off to continue preparations as the Spartans and their commanders rushed about preparing for the upcoming inter-company fight. Word was passing along: fights like these didn't come often, and with the news being passed around that Lambda and Kilo were going to have it out, the other Spartan companies were having their computer wizards hack into the cameras of the simulators, linking the images to the large monitors in the various mess halls throughout the multiple barracks. This was a fight they didn't want to miss

DATE: 12th April 2612; LOCATION: Camp Sparta, Arcturus; TIME: 2245

Riker looked at the holographic map of the battlefield displayed on his HUD and noted the variety of terrains they had. Currently, he and the rest of Kilo Company were at the extreme southeast of the battlefield, situated within a large cavern hidden within a minor mountain range. Below them stretched a forest that grew westward across the theater of war, while on the eastern side there was a large river winding north to south. The battleground was predominantly made of small rolling hills covered in golden plains grass, and in the center of it was a small town. On the far northwestern end of the battlefield was roughly where Lambda Company's camp was located, placed on a small plateau in a similar mountain range.

The objectives were simple enough: the three primary objectives were to first capture the city, then disable the enemy base, and lastly to take the enemy flag; there were also two secondary objectives, which were capturing the vehicle depot in the west and the long-range mortar to the east. Each camp was equipped with seven fixed turrets to defend the base with, as well as three Warthogs, four Mongooses, and one Coyote, not to mention the few Wolf suits brought by the ASP teams; besides this, their only equipment was what they had armed themselves with. Capturing the city would be of major concern due to the fact that it housed the sole ammunition depot available to either side.

“Alright, Billy, you take Key Squadron to capture the mortar; Sean and ??, take King and Knave Squadrons to take the city, and watch your six; Dominic, you take Knife Squadron and capture the vehicle depot, we'll be needing it; ??, stay here, buckle down and set up defenses as best you can, cause you're defending this base.” As Riker passed out orders, the teams began to move quickly about, forming up and heading in the direction necessary to carry out their objectives. Riker watched them go, wondering how Leonid was dealing with things on his side of the battle

“All quiet on the western front”, whispered Naomi-K108, as she and the reconnaissance team of Knife Squadron moved towards the vehicle depot

“Roger that, keep us posted”, replied James-K012. Motioning to the others to move forward, they began to creep towards the recon team's former position, only for Jared-K025 to bring them to halt once again.

“What's up?”, asked Nick

“Thought I saw a glint on the far side”, Jared replied; fingering the COM to Naomi's team, he said, “Naomi, look to your right, far side of the complex: do you see anything in the shrubbery?”

The COM was silent a moment, then Naomi replied, “Got some bogies in the bushes alright; a couple have sniper nests in the trees. If we're not careful they – look out!”

Sniper fire was heard suddenly, cutting Naomi off in mid sentence. The smoke trails gave away the positions of the snipers in the trees, and because of this Kilo's own marksmen returned fire, the foliage about the two companies erupting as bullets ripped through them.

“Forward!”, yelled Dominic through the COM, pushing his squadron into the shadow of the vehicle depot, the two assault teams pushing into the complex itself while the sniper and recon teams fired back at Lambda's forces with the aid of the fireteam's marksmen.

Gunfire erupted from inside the vehicle depot even as Matthew and Kevin ran into the building; both dodged to the side, flattening against the walls of rooms opposite one another. However, the ASP team was close behind the two commanders, and unleashed fire with their heavy weapons, a rocket launcher unloading its' two rounds into where the Lambda fireteam had stood moments before.

“This is gonna be one H*** of a night!”, yelled Kevin, jumping into the fray as he unleashed “death” with his marksmen rifle

Locke-K098 moved quickly through the city with the rest of Fireteam 1-3, watching for signs of movement at any turn. Over his head, several sniper rounds rang out before being answered by an artillery shell: Locke could only assume that Lambda Company had gained control of a Scorpion Tank that had been parked somewhere in the city. The question was now, could King and Knave Squadrons reach the city's police control systems in order to gain the city, or would Lambda reach it first?

A rocket blasted passed right in front of Locke and exploded several yards away, causing him to become aware of a second shot and react in a split-second's time, dodging the rocket but still being hit by the aftershock. Getting up, Locke fired several rounds from his Assault Rifle and get moving, dashing out of the line of fire to catch up with his fireteam as King Squadron's ASP team moved in with their Wolf exoskeletons.

Jack-K004 and Kate-K008 moved ahead of the rest of the fireteam, both watching the front while Locke covered the back with the others remaining relatively in the center. Noting several members of Lambda rushing past the alleyway that they were currently in, Jack quickly ushered the team into one of the buildings and directed them upstairs, where they were fortunate enough to get the jump on two Lambda snipers, knocking them unconscious and “killing” them. With two less opponents to deal with and a safe area for the moment, Jack paused to check the situation.

“Sayid, which direction is the police HQ?”, asked Jack

“North north-east”, stated Sayid-K089 as he looked through his sniper rifle's scope, “I see at least one Wolf guarding from a rooftop, and there appear to be –” Sayid dropped down behind the roof's edge as two sniper rounds flew by, impacting on the door they had come through earlier, blowing it apart. “As I was saying, there are multiple snipers present”

“D***it”, said Sawyer-K015, “Why'd it have to be us versus snipers. Why couldn't we have taken on someone that couldn't pick us off at 100 yards, like Albion”

“Because then they'd pick us off at 5 feet, which is what we're supposed to do to Lambda”, replied Locke

“Hey guys”, cut in Hurley-K016, peering over the edge, “I'd suggest we get out of here now”

“Why Hurley?”, asked Jack

“Because there's a Wolf not too far off, and he just saw me. Oh crap, heavy fire!” With that, Hurley dived out of the way as the edge of the building began to explode and crumble under the weapons fire that the Wolf was wreaking havoc with. Unable to move quickly enough, Sayid and Locke were sent sailing while Sawyer dived out of the way and Kate and Jack toppled to the street below

Matthis-K067 looked over at his partner, Abbadon-K133, and nodded. Charging out, the two began pelting the Lambda resistance that guarded the main entrance to the mortar facility, and without anywhere to hide, the Spartans were sitting ducks. Matthis grinned to himself again, glad that he and Abbadon had brought their Wolves along for the ride.

Suddenly, Matthis caught a large form out of the corner of his eye, then watched as Abbadon bit the dust, even as the other Spartans rushed past them to assault as-of-yet contested mortar facility. Turning, Matthis saw another Wolf pilot, marked foe with his IFF tags: pulling up its' massive weapon, he realized it was a foe even faster, dodging to the side as the enemy pilot unleashed the heavy rifle's wrath, blasting away trees that had been standing behind Matthis seconds before

Rolling out of the way, Matthis managed to get behind the enemy pilot and knocked the Wolf's gun away: momentarily confused, Matthis began to pelt the foe with hand-to-hand combat, until the enemy regained its' senses and began to fight back. Blocking and giving blow after blow, Matthis at last placed the enemy in a choke-hold, only to have the opponent grab him and throw Matthis over his head. Slammed hard into the ground, Matthis did not have time to react before the enemy Wolf pounded his chest, “killing” him.

Laying there, his armor locked due to the “fatal damage” inflicted, Matthis could only hope his brothers and sisters survived longer and did better than he had.

21
17th of April 2612, Manheim: Training exercise

Chinnault caught up to Delta in a few minutes. Hitting the dirt next to Raf, he whispered, "What do we have?"

"We've got eyes-on at least twenty Baby Kongs, plus Grunts and Jackals," Raf replied, shifting his heavy machine gun to the side and pulling his sidearm. "Snipers are in position, waiting for Peters' signal to fire."

Chris nodded, calculating odds in his head. Delta had thirty Marines total, and each Brute down there was worth at least three of them. The snipers would need to make every shot count, and even then it would be a tough battle. And Even if we're not entering the complex, he thought, we'll need to take every single one of them down for the SPECWAR team to make it in.

Switching to the TEAMCOM, he began issuing orders. "All snipers, target one Bravo and be sure to down it. Riflemen, make groups of two or three and concentrate fire on one target. Support gunners, just let loose." Chinnault rolled onto his stomach and wriggled to the top of the hummock they hid behind, bringing the scope of his rifle to his eye. "Wait for Peters' signal," he ordered, and waited.

The minutes dragged by. The "heat" from the programmed sun made Chinnault's uniform stick to him. He longed to reach back and scratch his back, but he held his position. Staring down his scope, he focused on one Brute. The alien carried a Pinner rifle and had a long, scimitar-like blade slung over his back. Chinnault let his reticule drift onto the Brute's face, let the dot rest over his eye.

Peters' voice crackled over the COM, shaking him out of his semi-aware state. "All units, fire at will."

The harsh crack of the company's sniper rifles began in earnest. Chris squeezed the trigger on his rifle and watched as the Brute stumbled backwards, the bullets arrested by an energy shield. Chinnault felt a shadow fall on him and turned to see Raf standing with his machine gun in hand. The gun roared as it sent fifty-caliber rounds down the slope at four thousand rounds per minute. The Brute fell, this time permanently.

Chinnault opened fire again, this time on a Jackal drawing a bead on one of his snipers. The bird-like alien squawked and collapsed in a shaking heap. "Watch your fire, Marines!" Peters roared. "We have a cloaked NAVSPECWAR team in the area, avoid own goals!"

Raf sighed and ceased firing his machine gun. Unslinging his M10 sub-machine gun, he brought the weapon to his face and picked off one of the Grunts. "Milk run, Chris," he said. "Milk run."

Chinnault opened his eyes and stood from the sim-chamber. "Well, that was surprisingly easy," he said to Kali and Raf, who were also standing nearby. The unit had suffered no casualties, and Paccheo had been successfully casevaced.

"With the sims we've been running, going up against someone who has no clue we're coming doesn't seem to make sense," Kali pointed out.

"Yeah, the last few made it seem like we'd be part of some massive invasion," Raf agreed. "Are they just trying to get us complacent? Make the next one sting even worse?"

"If they are, it won't work," Chinnault said. The others nodded.

22
0530 Hours, April 17th, 2612 (Military Calendar) /

Arcturus System, Arcturus, Camp Sparta, Ghost Company Barracks

Neil rubbed the sleepiness from his eyes, trying to resist the temptation to punch a hole in his ever-so-irratating alarm clock. He switched it off, and got up, stripped and stepped into the shower. A cold shower brought him to his senses, and he put on his uniform and headed for breakfast.

"Hey Sarge." Megan greeted.

"Hi. Finish your breakfast and we'll continue with training." Neil replied, trying to sound all-business like while his mouth was full with the bland porridge the mess hall served. It was not lost on Megan.

"You know, you should finish your food then talk." Megan suggested. Neil glared daggers at her and continued eating.

"Alright, today, you will have to work together with an assault team from Delta Company on a simulation. Crap. Five SPARTANs walked inside.

"Okay, here's the plan. You ghost wimps stay out of our way, and we-" The Spartan didn't finish on account of Maria slapping him, then kicking him in the groin. The Spartan, in which Neil decided to nickname smart-mouth howled in pain, and the four other Spartans went into fighting stances. As did Neil's fire team.

"Yeah, this inter-company thing sucks." Linda commented.

"Can't help but agree." Fred replied.

0909 Hours, April 17th, 2612 (Military Calendar) /

Manheim System, Manheim

Sandstorm Squadron swooped in the air, twelve shortswords flying in neat formnation. Captain Gordon Duster brought his plane around, then shouted in the TEAMCOM.

"I'm marking the target on the screens of all navigation officers. Over." The shortswords made their way across the various plains of whatever rural area the simulation had dumped them on, when a squadron of banshees suddenly jumped them.

"We'll make work of them in no time." An Airman shouted over the com, just as the very airman's shortsword exploded, falling to the ground.

"Fail." Senior Airman James Hafson muttered.

"Stow it, airman." Gordon Duster ordered. He brought his shortsword in a evasive flip, while the rear gunner fired the rear turret at the banshee. The banshee exploded in a spectacular fireball. Slowly, the bombers fought their way out of the banshee squadron.

"Begin carpet bombing operations." He ordered. The varioius crew on his shortsword began to work, and before long, bombs hit the massive covenant army.

"Head back to base." A few moments later, the shortswords landed, and everything vanished.

<p style="text-align:center">Captain Gordon Duster

<p style="text-align:center">Equipment: B-9E Shortsword

<p style="text-align:center">Kills: Numerous

<p style="text-align:center">Mission Failed (Enemies not completely eliminated). Casualties: 8 Longswords

<p style="text-align:center">Replay Mission?: [Yes] [No]

"That was, to put it bluntly, PATHETIC." Captain Gordon Duster announced. "Two-thirds of you got shot down in the mission. What if this wasn't a sim. Two thirds of you would have broken-hearted families, and the mission wasn't even completed. Your flying was sloppy, you engaged enemy air forces poorly, and we barely made it back to base alive. Now GET BACK TO WORK, YOU SONS OF BITCHES!"

1345 Hours, April 17th, 2612 (Military Calendar) /

Arcturus System, Arcturus, Camp Sparta, Simulation Room 35

Janice watched the brute chieftain lumber about. She raised her sniper rifle, preparing to take him out. Once she had taken out the chieftain, Norman would storm the chamber, iniate the self destruct seqeunce of the space station and run. ''We make a good team. ''The two were very good friends, and worked well together. She sometimes wondered if their relationship could go anywhere, but he shoved that thought out of her mind. They had a siumulation to pass. They would then meet up, hijack a phantom and escape. ''Bang! Bang! Bang! ''The shots rang out, and the chieftain fell. The remaining two brutes jumped into the air, just as Norman ran inside, clutching a shotgun. In seconds, both brutes went down.

"Head to the hangar. I'll mark it with a nav point. Over." Norman ordered.

"Yes Sir." Janice replied.

Janice ditched her postion and made her way down the hallways of the massive covenant space station, the Gate of the Vengeful Path'. She pondered the stupid name of the brute space station inplented by HIGHCOM for about two seconds, before firing her twin sub machine guns at a single brute who was dumb enough to stupidly charge her. She then continued running, making sure to avoid the corpses of brutes that littered the area. She opened the doors of the hangar, emerging at the the second floor that overlooked the actual hangar, only to find the brutes already engaged on the bottom floor. Norman was already there Janice switched to her sniper rifle, and got a brute who was coming at Norman from behind. She hit a brute with the butt of her rifle that tried to attack her, then fired a burst with her sub machine guns. Blood spurted from the brute's wounds, and he fell to the ground She then got back to the task at hand-sniping brutes in their own hangar.

"Area secure, let's bug out," Norman said. They jumped inside a phantom, and left the ship. Just then, two seraphs came at them.

"Man the turrets!" Norman shouted. "I'll take evasive action." Streaks of plasma cut through space. One Seraph blew up, and the second one got off a few hits, damaging the phantom's hull before being taken out. Norman hit the accelerator and the phantom flew away.

<p style="text-align:center">SPARTAN-G198

<p style="text-align:center">Kills: 76 Grunt Minors, 44 Grunt Majors 21 Brute Minors, 15 Brute Majors, 2 Brute Captain Majors, 1 Brute Chieftain, Two Seraphs

<p style="text-align:center">Mission Completed, Casualties: None.

<p style="text-align:center">Replay Mission?: [Yes] [No]

Janice stepped out of the sim room. It felt good to finally defeat a simulation on their first try. Recently, HIGHCOM had been greatly increasing the difficulty of the training missions.

"Feels good to win." Norman said, silently approaching her and echoing her thoughts.

"Yeah. It sure does."

Norman-123 03:58, May 1, 2010 (UTC)

23
''12th of April, 2612. Simulation ground 12, Camp Sparta, Arcturus, Arcturus System, 2245 Local Time''

Connor had to hand it to his CO. The man might not have the best people skills, but damned if he wasn’t a good tactician. Connor, clad in two tons of bulky MJOLNIR armor, was currently concerned with speed, not stealth. They were a good deal away from the main combat zone and the other objectives, to the far north of the city and west of the mortar facility. The open fields made stealth almost impossible, even for the skilled Lambda operators, so speed was their only option, at least until they reached the forest a few hundred meters east of them.

Behind Connor was Phantom Squadron, clad in similar armor and easily keeping up. They were running at a steady pace in full combat gear, but none of them showed signs of slowing. They all followed quietly, alert for danger and weapons prepared in case Kilo was a little more clever than they’d thought. So far, however, that didn’t seem to be the case.

Immediately after beginning the situation, Leonid had predicted the strategy he believed Riker and Kilo would be using. Maybe it was years of hunting people down for a living, where getting inside someone’s head was as valuable a weapon as a rifle or knife, or maybe it was their similar backgrounds, but Leonid, despite his detached and almost emotionless state, seemed to jump into Riker’s shoes with very little difficulty. As Connor and him had surveyed the battlefield, Lambda watching quietly behind them, he’d pointed out the objectives around the field, and how he thought Kilo would deploy. Two squadrons to the city, one to each of the secondary’s, and one to guard the base. Standard, safe, and well intentioned. But hopefully futile.

They’d deployed immediately to counter Kilo. Rather than trying to match their strategy and rely on the raw combat muscle of their troops, both Leonid and Connor had agreed to a more nuanced plan, designed to distract, confuse, disorient, and hopefully demolish Kilo. And Connor’s role now was directly part of that plan.

On his HUD, a green acknowledgment light flashed twice over Banshee Squadron’s readout, the in position signal. Checking his HUD, he saw that Banshee, Squadron Four, was now entering the mortar facility and securing the southern entrance--just as planned. Connor and Phantom ran on for less than a minute, when gunfire rang out, close by. Over his comm, Connor heard Banshee platoons southernmost scout, SPARTAN-L140, speak over the comm in an icy calm, eerily flat voice.

“Enemy contact two hundred meters south of the objective.”

Connor smiled, and picked up the pace. Kilo had acted just as Leonid had predicted and walked straight into their trap. Connor checked his HUD again, and marked the route he and his squadron would take. It was a serpentine path that wound southward from their current position, into the forest…and directly behind the attacking Kilo squadron. Activating his armor’s built in active camo generator, he watched as the squadron behind him followed suit and melted into invisibility.

The lure was out, and they had a bite. Now it was time to reel them in.

SPARTAN-G145, Scott to his friends and Captain to everyone else, sat as still and silent as he could manage in the thin line of trees and bushes surrounding the eastern entrance to the vehicle depot, the only way inside. He knew his job, knew what was depending on it, and knew what he had to do. He would not fail, and neither would his SPARTANs.

He shifted slightly, edging his B509 Battle Rifle forward and glancing through the fire control scope he had attached, already linked to his under slung grenade launcher. Inside the depot, half of his force was hard at work preparing for what was coming. They’d manage to reach the depot before Kilo, but Scott knew they wouldn’t be far behind.

Spread around Scott was one Section from First Squadron, better known within the regiment as Ghost Platoon. They had set up sniper nests and gun positions in the foliage surrounding the eastern approach, but they couldn’t activate their active camo because they would need it later, leaving them much more visible. Normal soldiers probably wouldn’t have noticed them, but Kilo Company were SPARTANs just like themselves--no normal soldiers.

Suddenly, ahead, Scott spotted movement in the bushes, and slowly moved his Battle Rifle towards the location. He wasn’t the only one. Three meters away, he saw one of his marksmen, SPARTAN-L064, move his rifle slightly. The small shift prompted more movement from the tree line, and Scott suddenly felt the familiar urge of adrenaline through his veins as his body prepared for combat, even if it was only a holographic simulation.

“Problem.” said L064, voice inflectionless. “Enemy contacts, one hundred fifty meters to the east. Probable squadron size. Hostiles have taken notice of our position and are reacting. They’re moving to establish superior firing positions.”

Scott had only seconds to make his decision, but it was a luckily easy one. Allowing the enemy to move would put both the plan, and the lives of his troops in danger. That could only be stopped one way.

“All teams, Captain G145 reporting. Open fire.”

Green LEDs burned across the rim of his HUD, and moments later, without a single verbal exchange, Section One open fired. Bullets filled the air and cut through the foliage around the hostiles as gunfire sounded around the compound as Ghost began it’s attack. Scott fired a burst from his BR09 that drilled a Kilo SPARTAN straight in the chest, damaging his shields but barely slowing him down, and followed it up with several more until the target was smart enough to take cover. For a moment, Lambda seemed to have an advantage, a decisive lead--

And then that moment ended. Gunfire ripped into Ghost’s ranks as Kilo retaliated, opening fire and charging forward. A pair of Wolf exoskeletons, piloted by the Kilo ASP Team, bounded forward, spraying heavy machine gun fire into the trees and slicing on of Scott’s fire teams to pieces. Scott emptied his magazine, fired a grenade from his launcher, then reached for another mag, and considered the situation. With less than a single Section remaining, and more Lambda SPARTANs going down every second, there was no way they could hold out against a squadron sized force. Thankfully, they had two advantages. The first was that Kilo didn’t know Scotts force was so tiny.

And the second was that they didn’t need to hold out anyway. Firing his battle rifle, Scott keyed his comm, establishing a channel with all of his remaining forces. “Execute phase two.” he said. “Fall back.”

Moments later, a resounding boom echoed behind him, as the Combat Engineer teams inside the vehicle depot blasted out the rear wall as an exit. Scott rolled to his feet, emptying another mag and finally wounding a Kilo SPARTAN, and sprinted away from the vehicle depot. All around, what was left of his force followed suit, pulling away and laying down suppressing fire to cover their retreat. Several of his SPARTANs were hit and wounded as they retreated, but there was no time to stop for them. Their only objective now was to get as far away from vehicle depot as possible--specifically to a hill close to the base that they’d set as their rendezvous point--and let Kilo believe they’d won a victory over them.

Then, once they believed they had the depot under control, and they brought their troops inside to mount up, they’d trigger the explosives on the building and send the whole thing crashing down. It would deny Lambda the vehicles, but it was a sacrifice they were willing to make. It’d taken most of Scott’s troops--only a handful were left--but they’d done their job.

SPARTAN-144, Leonid, ducked and rolled as a grenade launcher round flashed over his head and detonated on the wall behind him, showering his shields with shrapnel and making him flash like a roman candle. Coming out of the roll, he leveled his LAR and let off a long burst in the direction of the incoming fire, making the enemy grenadier duck for cover in the burned out ruins of what had formerly been a nicely built, pleasantly red house.

Behind him, his security team open fired, sending a hail of rounds toward the target. They were usually tasked with the protection of the whole Company Command Team, but because that force had been split apart, with the Operations Chiefs commanding the base defense and 338 leading the flanking maneuver, they’d be tasked with protecting him. The security team had been handpicked by Leonid and 338, from the best soldiers in the company. They were supremely qualified.

It showed. They moved quickly and efficiently, securing flanking positions and hammering the attacking enemy with gunfire. The would be assassin’s shields flared, failed, and died. Armor piercing rounds struck home and the lone soldier dropped, armor penetrated in a dozen different places. He was out.

Leonid automatically reloaded his LAR, then turned to the security team and beckoned them to follow. They had to keep moving. The ammo depot had been secured by advance elements of Reaper Squadron, but it was coming under heavy fire as Kilo tried to push towards it. Riker’s team had already secured the police station and gained control of a significant portion of the city, and Leonid’s force was being pushed back through the streets towards the depot. Leonid had assigned four teams of combat engineers to fortify it as an emergency holdout position, but they weren’t finished yet. They would have to hold off on falling back to it until the emplacements were completed. That meant they were attempting to hold the street around the depot from Kilo Company forces with a mixture of heavy machine guns, explosives, and insta-crete barricades, most of which had been taken from the depot.

Leonid took off at a dead run, sprinting towards the depot, security team close behind. As he rounded a corner and emerged onto the street parallel to the ammunition depot, Leonid caught sight of the battle ahead. Across a line of battered, hastily insta-crete fortifications taken from the depot, Reaper Section Two was under heavy attack from a Kilo company force. They were trying to hold the road on the northern side of the depot, and weren’t doing to hot. Riker’s SPARTANs were advancing from the east, darting in and out of cover and moving up on the Lambda position, while two Wolves hung back in the background laying down suppressive fire. Leonid himself had four wolves at his disposal, with two taken from Ghost Squadron and two from Reaper, but they were positioned on rooftops, providing suppressing fire on Kilo forces on their own side of the city.

The Kilo Company forces were pushing steadily forward, and despite their best efforts, Lambda seemed almost powerless to stop them. This is what Leonid had feared. Though they worked excellent independently, their effectiveness was reduced more and more as their force got bigger and bigger. They were coordinated, skilled, and with a keen eye for tactics, but they hesitated, got in each others way, and didn’t delegate their fire as good as they should have. Kilo, by comparison, looked like a single, well oiled machine as it pushed forward, teams covering each other instinctively in cover to cover formations.

That ASP Team wasn’t doing Lambda any favors either. As Leonid watched, four Kilo SPARTANs broke into the open, sprinting boldly across the street to an advance position near a broken down fence. Three SPARTANs from Lambda rose up behind the barricade and were about to unleash a torrent of machine gun fire, when one of the ASPs put a sustained burst into the center of their group. One SPARTAN went down straight away, while the other two dropped to the ground, wounded badly. Beside them, a fellow SPARTAN rushed to tend to their wounds, as a rocket fired from the under slung launcher on one of the wolves’ MB67 Assault Rifles blew a hole in the barricade and showered the troops with falling rock. Leonid was about to open a channel and call for heavy support when one of his SPARTANs beat him to it.

“Reaper Two Lead, requesting immediate AM sniper support.” said the Section Two leader, SPARTAN-L168. His voice, admirably, showed no sign of the strain that he must have been feeling and kept the company wide flat, icy tone. “Kilo Company ASP team, One hundred sixty five meters east of our position, eliminate.”

In his HUD, Leonid watched the status indicators of one of the sniper teams begin to move, repositioning to get a clear line of fire on the Wolves. Moments later, two shots rang out in quick procession, striking the Wolf suits directly in the chest and penetrating through to where the pilot’s head was positioned. Both suit slumped to the ground, eliminated. Kilo turned and shifted it’ fire towards the rooftops, and caught one of the snipers before they could escape. Leonid felt a moments anger at the stupidity of the sniper teams for staying in the line of fire for so long, but managed to control it. There’d be time later. For now, he settled with dishing out as much damage to Kilo as possible and ran for the barricade, reloading his LAR.

The sound of gunfire had been growing for quite some time, and by the time Connor’s squadron had looped around behind the attacking Kilo force, it had risen to a crescendo that Connor imagined could be heard for miles. Sprinting through the forest with his SRS99G cradled in his arms, Connor weaved through bushes, ducked around trees, and ran straight through undergrowth as he ran for Banshee Squadron’s position. Behind him, the rapidly moving and cloaked figures of Phantom made the forest seem to waver and shift in and out, making the active camo more of a gesture than an actual necessity. If Kilo wanted to see them, they would, regardless whether or not his SPARTANs were invisible or not.

The mortar facility was ringed by forest on three sides, with the tree line a scant six or seven meters away from the entrance. The entrance itself was flanked by a pair of guard towers and was wide enough to fit a Scorpion tank, making it hard to defend. Banshee had the vast majority of it’s squadron placed around the entrance, with only a small rear guard to defend the western entrance. Kilo was pressing hard to the south, leading the charge with a pair of Wolves and an infantry charge, though Jason had managed to ambush the walkers with his own Wolves and eliminate them. Still, they were outmatched by the Kilo Company forces, and were having to steadily retreat to avoid taking casualties, which they’d done remarkably well so far.

Kilo’s rear guard had apparently been intended more as a formality than anything, something that made Connor wonder if they’d forgotten who they were dealing with. Maybe Kilo had thought their penchant for stealth only extended to urban environments, maybe they hadn’t thought Lambda would be bold enough to ignore the city, or maybe they were just stupid, but whatever the reason, they were woefully unprepared for Connor’s attack. The first warning they received was when they spotted the dozens of cloaked figures sprinting through the trees towards them, less than fifteen meters away, and by then it was far to late.

As the closest sentry raised his rifle to fire, Connor darted forward, drawing his combat sidearm in one fluid motion and dropping his shoulder on the surprised enemy. The impact of the two ton SPARTAN was dead center and drained it’s shields with a satisfying pop, and as the Kilo trooper fell to the floor, Connor leveled his pistol and fired three rounds in quick succession straight into his visor. The silenced pistol coughed three times and the helmet faceplate shattered, bullets ripping into the forehead of the target. Connor holstered his pistol and glanced to either side quickly, confirming all the sentries were down. The Lambda troopers, trained for years at assassination, had all performed even better than he had. No reports had been issued, and they still had the element of surprise, at least until one of the Kilo soldiers checked their TEAMCOM and realized their entire rear guard was gone.

Lambda needed no instruction on what was next. Connor had told them the plan already, and one explanation was all they’d needed. They drew their rifles, armed their grenade launchers, and checked their light machine guns, ready for the next phase. It was time.

“Go.”

On Connor’s one word signal, Phantom burst from the forest, guns blazing, and charged Kilo’s rear flank. The enemy squadron turned in surprise, momentary confusion quickly giving way to a stark realization that things were about to go straight down the shitter. Then, predictably, all hell broke loose. Grenade rounds, fired from the launchers of Lambda team, detonated in the center of Kilo’s ranks, taking down three and making their shields burn bright gold. Machine gun fire from the heavy weapon NCOs cut across them, and then Connor drew his MA6A and charged straight in, assault rifle burping rounds. Alongside him, charged heading straight into the fray. Despite all the chaos of what was going on, all the explosions, all the gunfire, all the “death”, no one said a word. The hardest thing for Connor to get used to when working with Lambda was the silence, the consistent quiet that they exhibited whenever combat began. It was eerie, in the center of a war zone, to hear absolutely no chatter at all. But it was one of Lambda’s signature trademarks.

Kilo finally shifted their fire towards Lambda, swinging around en masse to bring their weapons to bear. But, behind them, Banshee took the opportunity and open fired, cutting into Kilo’s rear with massed gunfire. Caught on both sides, and outnumbered two to one, Kilo didn’t last long. Combined fire pelted them, breaking shields and penetrating armor, dropping SPARTANs left and right. Several Kilo members attempted to break away, running south, but they made it no farther than a few meters before sniper fire slammed into their rear and brought them down. The few Kilo Company members left emptied their magazines and used whatever ordnance they had, but even the damage they did with that wasn’t enough. Lambda closed in around them, overwhelmed them from all sides, and brought them down with brutal efficiency.

As the last enemy soldier fell, Connor took a second and scanned the Company-wide roster. While it wasn’t as bad as he had feared it might be, it was still not good. Scott’s small force of a Section and a half of Ghost Squadron was almost completely wiped out, and was down to a single Fireteam and Scott himself. Leonid’s force in the city was being hammered by the numerically superior Kilo Company, and Banshee and Phantom, under his jurisdiction, had taken fifteen casualties, all but one from Banshee.

There was no time to waste. Clicking off the roster, he beckoned to Jason-G013, Banshee Squadron’s commander, and Mason-317, Phantom’s. Gathering them up, he explained the next section of the plan and made sure they knew their roles. Ten minutes later, Phantom was geared up and ready to move out, and Banshee had taken up their position in the mortar and had it crewed and ready to fire. With the second phase of the plan complete, Phantom headed out, marching now to a far more important objective.

24
Three pairs of boots clattered on the immaculately polished floor. They were in nearly perfect step, a fact that owed its existence more to habit than to design. Long hours of military training and drill made everything, even walking, instinctively uniform.

However, a careful listener would have noticed that two of the walkers were shuffling slightly in order to keep in step with the third. It made sense; after all, they both had a full foot on the shorter man.

The hall they were passing through could have been on any base anywhere in the galaxy. Along both sides of the tiled floor were long rows of cheap, faux-wood office doors, each tagged with a brass plaque or plastic card. From the open offices came the sounds of ringing phones, tapping keyboards, and conversations of varying volumes, the loudest usually issuing from the nearest Sergeant Major’s office.

The walls between the doors were cluttered, covered in odds and ends from all over the galaxy. There were the loudly-painted mottoes and mascots, the squadron zaps, the proudly-framed challenge coins, the polished trophies, the bulletin boards and the official portraits and CSVs of stern-faced officers and NCOs.

“Well, looks like we’ll be leaving this shortly.” The tallest, darkest figure spoke, half to himself, half to his companions, a mingled hint of longing and excitement in his otherwise measured tone.

“Hmmph.” The next tallest snorted, nearly colliding with the flagstaff above the CSM’s office as he did so, ducking with only inches to spare. “Until HIGHCOM tells us, we know nothing.”

“Word from Patton says we still got time. Granted, it’s probably not much, but we need to use it." The shortest man finally spoke, the authority in his voice overriding his inferior stature. "I talked to the XO this morning; he managed to get us some time in Tac 5. Get your sections ready, we go in at 1300 sharp. Sim Chief doesn’t like it when we’re late.”

“Aye-aye sir.”

“Ok sir, Conic will be ready.”

The lines of armored figures shifted nervously. “Hurry-up-and-wait” had been the mantra for the day. The squadrons ahead of them had finished behind schedule, the power had gone out once, and now the holotank was down…again.

Bear’s last run in the simulator had been a bitter disappointment, and the young Spartans wanted another crack at it. And so they waited impatiently in their battle rattle, cracking quiet jokes and talking tactics in small, huddled knots.

Finally, they heard the whining hum of the hologenerators, a sound which was met with cheers, hearty laughter, and muttered grumbles of “finally.” Without waiting for a command, the forty-odd Spartans rose in unison, clicking and rattling as they made their final gear and weapons checks.

“Take your places! Take your places!” The team leaders were yelling, pushing their Spartans into disorderly files behind the simulator’s twin doors.

There was a gentle hiss as the pressure between the holotank and the room was equalized. And then the shouting started.

“Go! Go! Go!”

Leo was the first through the door. Weapon at the ready, he quickly assessed the situation. Bear had been deployed in a small ravine, its sides overgrown with grass and weeds. Broken and rusting packing cases were scattered on the ravine floor, relics of the planet’s more prosperous age.

But the landscape was quickly interrupted by an even less pleasing sight. Partially silhouetted on the ridgeline ahead were two Brute sentries. For the moment, their backs were turned. “Checkmate 1-1 has two Bravo Kilos, on my one. 50 meters”

“Checkmate 1, engage. Do it quiet.”

The radio’s crackling voice had barely cleared from Leo’s ears when he heard two muffled pops from behind him. Ahead, the Brutes slumped, dead.

“All callsigns, this is Cornhusker Actual. Conic, fan right. Checkmate, fan left. We’ve got a job to do.”

Craig crested the ridge and hit the ground with a gentle thud. Shouldering his rifle, he peered through its scope with a keen eye. Ahead was the bunker complex, an ugly network of pillboxes and hulking concrete mounds.

“Alright Craig, whaddya got for me?” Trig was practically bouncing off the ground in his excitement. He could see Brutes ahead, and he wanted one. “Come on, who can I nail?”

“Two Brutes, on my two.”

“Yeah, I see ‘em.” Trig had his rifle against his shoulder and his visor on the scope. Already he was settling down and the long hours of range time were kicking in. For a few moments they waited, waiting for the radio to crackle. And they heard it.

“Caltrop Arrow, we’re ready. Go ahead.” “Firing.” The rifle cracked, once, twice, three times; and with each shot a Brute went down, a neatly singed bullet hole in his chest.

Nigel dragged himself through the tall grass, his webbing tugging with the ground as he crawled forwards. Pausing, he glanced back to make sure his overloaded Bergen wasn’t protruding from the awkwardly-animated foliage. “Only a few more feet,” he thought to himself. It’d been a long crawl, slithering through the weeds, always on the lookout for booby traps, constantly probing with a combat knife in search of buried “Bouncing Betties.” Partly to Nigel’s disappointment and partly to his relief, there had been no mines.

Then, all hell broke loose. From somewhere behind him, he heard the rumbling bark of a machine gun mixing with the angry crack of sniper rifles. Overhead, tracers snapped and hissed. This was the moment.

“Come on!” Nigel heard the shout and scrambled to his feet. All around him, other Spartans were doing the same. The bunker entrance was just ahead. Sprinting forward, Nigel fired a few blind bursts from his carbine, before sliding to cover behind the reassuring concrete bulk. He took a few seconds to catch his breath, and then glanced around. Armand was right behind him. Their eyes met, exchanging a wordless message. Nearby, other teams were stacking up, crouching in neat files.

Nigel rolled around the corner. Within seconds he had the charge in place. He’d daisy-chained three SMACK canisters together and slapped them right on the sheet metal doors only weak point: its hinge.

Punching the timer, he bellowed a “clear!” warning and scrambled back around the corner. Within seconds, the charge detonated, blowing the multi-ton door clear off its hinges.

The assault teams were through the breach before the smoke even cleared.

The atmosphere in the dingy briefing room was the polar opposite of the one which had inhabited it just days before. Spartans talking with animated hand gestures were in every corner, recounting their latest kills to equally enthusiastic comrades. They were boasting, cheering, and laughing, slapping teammates on the back, high-fiving squadmates. Morale was through the roof and it seemed that everyone was smiling or grinning, indeed, even the normally livid Gunny Anders was beaming.

They were so rapt in celebration it took Captain Conrad, normally an impressive authoritarian several minutes to quiet the squadron to settle down enough to get a word in edgewise.

“Well, guys, looks like we did it. I just finished talking with the Sim Chief. We took down almost a hundred Bravo Kilos, took our objective with time to spare, and we did it with zero casualties. Bear, the drinks are on me tonight!” <font color="Black">Fight <font color="Black">With <font color="Black">Honor 02:28, May 3, 2010 (UTC)

25
Gunnery Sergeant Malcolm "Mac" Lennox, Special Operations Command, 18th Special Warfare Company - he wasn't sure what the nomenclature was anymore - was obviously irritated. He had been reading his copy of A Soldier's Tale for about the twenty-fifth time when two rookie troopers had "accidentally" thrown a dart into his shoulder blade. The pair were replacements for the losses suffered at Baikal, and both of them had very little actual combat experience under their belts; a Remnant clean-up operation here, a few raids there. He decided to take this time to teach the FNGs about the values of patience, situational awareness, good aim, and staying cool under fire.

"Which one of you had the bright idea to throw this dart in my direction," questioned Mac. His bright blue eyes seemed to pierce the souls of the two rooks, and neither of them answered.

"I'll ask again. Which one of you had the absolutely genius idea to throw this in my direction?"

After about five seconds of silence, one of them finally spoke up.

"I... I did, Gunnery Sergeant," stuttered the one on the right, whose insignia identified him as a Private First Class, and whose nametape read "COSGROVE". He was Team Three's computer specialist, and had enlisted into the Marine Corps following a failed semester at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He was bright, but he'd need watching.

"Cosgrove, may I ask why you chucked this weapon in my direction?"

"I... I didn't mean to, Gunnery Sergeant. It slipped out of my hand, Gunnery Sergeant."

"Cosgrove, may I ask how it slipped out of your hand? Do you have the grip of a small animal? Did your mind not completely process the action it was performing? Did you not have a firm grasp of where your target was, or are you just a complete dumbass?"

Cosgrove began to sweat, and body began to tremble. His pale skin also turned red from the embarrasment, and his buddy, Lance Corporal Byko, took a huge gulp as his eyes darted around the room.

Mac figured they had suffered enough embarrasment, and his cold demeanor soon warmed, and he cracked a smile.

"Relax, you two. If you get stressed out over me questioning you, how are you ever going to survive an interrogation at the hands of rebels or baby kongs? Both of you are dismissed, and make sure you aim this time."

The dynamic duo remained at Attention until Mac began to walk away, and they fell out of their ad-hoc formation, returning to their festivities. Mac returned to his personal cot in the corner of the ODST lounge, flipped to the exact page he had left on, and began reading again. Out of the corner of his eye he saw his former Platoon Sergeant, Gordon Lydecker, and his lover, Jennifer Wolf, conversing with his Company Commander. Rumor had it that they were about to end the Remnant once and for all, and by the expression on their faces it wasn't going to be a walk in the park. At that time, an old saying creeped into his mind.

Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow you die.

<Center>*		*		*</Center>

Major Connor Anderson - at least, that was his current alias - walked quickly through the pristine hallways of what had to be one of the most, if not the most, classified facility in UNSC space. Unlike most of the sailors and marines in the facility, he was not wearing a military uniform, but instead wore civilian clothing, donning a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, as well as a pair of slightly worn hiking boots. He had his aviator shades hanging from the pocket of his jeans, and he came to a sudden stop in front of a locked door.

On the door was more than a few signs, many stating the unneeded warnings to keep out and not to trespass. He sighed, and went through the retinal and fingerprint scanners. After the light over the door blinked green, a tone sounded and he opened the door into what had to be the most classified room in the most classified facility in UNSC space. Inside was a conference table, and the room was bugged - microphones and cameras were embedded all over the room.

After taking his seat at the table, he reached into his briefcase and pulled out a datapad, a stylus, and something archaic: a pen and pencil. After about two minutes of waiting, the door buzzed and opened. Through the threshold came a female Major General, flanked by a pair of Marine guards. They began to wait inside of the room until she dismissed them, and they sharply left the sanctuary.

Usually, Majors don't have the ear of flag officers, but he was the exception. He was probably the most important, least known officer within the UNSC. Find his real name in the personnel records, and he would be listed as some General's aide-de-camp. But, that wasn't his job. He was one of the highest ranking officers within the Special Reconnaissance Service, and ran one of its most secretive portions - a team of crack intelligence collectors, analysts, and shooters.

She took her seat, smoothed out the skirt of her uniform, and pulled out her own datapad. She waited for the door to close, and then she began her offer.

"Welcome back, Major," said Major General Alexia Romanov, whilst offering her hand and cracking a slight grin.

"Glad to be back," said Anderson. He noticed that her complexion was clearing up, something that he had been waiting to happen for a while.

"How's your current assignment?" questioned Romanov.

"I like it. Being in the field is far better than sitting behind a desk."

"You can say that again, Major. I still wish I had you as a desk-jockey though, you did good work."

"Thanks."

"Anyways, lets get past the formalities. I'm here to talk to you about your team developing intelligence prior to the start of HELLFIRE."

"HELLFIRE?"

"Yes, HELLFIRE. Our contribution to the whole of FIRE, and our final mission to take out the Remnant once and for all."

On the datapad, a highly redacted version of the classified war plan for HELLFIRE was displayed. Anderson quickly skimmed through the specifics, and took mental notes.

"What do you want me to do?"

"Like I said: develop intelligence before our Special Operations Forces go in for the kill. They need targets, coordinates, names, faces, maps... whatever you can provide. I don't want any of our forces being wiped out in this battle, and that's where you come in."

"Roger that. Get the who, what, when, where, and why, correct?"

"Leave the why to the analysts. Just get the who, what, when, and where. Take whoever you need, SRS or STO. Keep it quiet, we don't want to have to stage a rescue mission before everything is ready."

"Roger that."

"Once you get your equipment and men together, you will be embarking on the USNC Athena within thirty-six hours. Get it done, Major. You're dismissed."

After a series of file-transfers, Anderson gathered his things, and stood at a sloppy position of attention before offering an equally sloppy salute. -- <font color="White">Sergeant Major <font color="White">Avery Johnson  14:12, May 4, 2010 (UTC)

25
The satchel charges detonated, tearing the room’s doors off their hinges in a flash of smoke and noise. Before the dust had a chance to even begin to settle, they were in, weapons blazing. Each member of the assault team selected their targets with practiced ease as each one cut down the surprised Brutes on the other side of the now-obliterated door.

Within seconds, the entire pack had been eliminated, leaving the six SPARTAN-IVs in the assault team to step nimbly over the bodies and make their way to the other side of the room. Two took up positions on either side of another, slightly larger door while a third examined the portal.

“Damn.” His expression was hidden behind his golden visor, but the annoyance was clear in his voice. “Looks like they’ve reinforced this thing with armor on both sides; that must’ve been what these tangos were trying to do with the one we just breached. It’ll take more than just a basic charge to take this thing down.”

With an audible snort, another Spartan stepped forward, his armored hands reaching into a large bag slung on his hip. “You’re such a dumbass, Sarge. If the Bravo Kilos are using more armor, then I’ll just use more bombs.”

The first speaker reluctantly stepped to the side, allowing the demolitions man a clear path to the door. “Still carrying way too many explosives,” he commented wryly. “One of these days you’ll take a hit to that bag, and then we’ll find out just how much you really like fire.”

The demolitions expert—Hamish–laughed as he produced several large charges from his bag. “Other people get blown up; I just shrug it off.”

“Just get this door open.” Hector, the team’s leader, nodded to the rest of his squad. “Alright Narya, let’s do this.”

Hamish stepped away from the door. “Brace yourselves, this one’s gonna be big!”

Assault Team Narya assumed their formation, weapons at the ready. A moment later, the door was replaced by a massive fireball that tore the reinforcing armor apart and caused the shields of the Spartans flanking the door to shimmer. Just as before, they dove in, selecting their targets and blazing away.

There were more Brutes this time, and they, unlike their deceased brethren, were ready for the attack. But the room they defended presented very little in the way of cover, making most of them easy targets for the breaching Spartans. Bullets and shotgun pellets tore through armor and flesh, killing most of the targets before they had a chance to fire back. Easily dodging hails of sloppily aimed spiker and plasma rounds, the team continued its grisly work, reducing the defending pack to a pile of bleeding corpses in less than thirty seconds.

Hector thumbed more shells into his shotgun. “Spread out and check for survivors.”

The team complied, each member checking his or her weapons as they did so. They hadn’t left much to inspect, and they moved with a casual, almost cocky, sense of ease.

One of their number slapped a clip into his standard MA6-class assault rifle. It was a rarity among assault Spartans and technically against regulations, but he still carried it into combat, wielding it with the same lethal ease that his brethren used with their shotguns and submachine guns.

Reaching down with the weapon, he used its affixed bayonet to roll over a dead Brute. As he did so, he heard a grown from the body underneath. One of the Brutes was still alive.

His body tensing, the Spartan shoved his weapon’s bayonet in the injured warrior’s face. But rather than snarling or attacking, the wounded Brute merely raised both arms upwards; he was surrendering.

The Spartan’s finger curled around the trigger, but he didn’t fire. After a moment’s hesitation, he reached down and grasped one of the outstretched arms to haul the Brute to his feet.

In a split second, the Brute was on him, his powerful arms clawing at the Spartan’s neck. With a cry of surprise, the Spartan fired his assault rifle into the attacker’s chest—just as a burst of SMG bullets tore the Brute’s head off.

Every member of the team whirled on the commotion, weapons at the ready. When they saw that the problem had been taken care of, the relaxed—for the most part.

“What the hell just happened?” Hector demanded furiously.

“Percy tried to take a prisoner.” James-B153 lowered his still-smoking SMG. “I took care of it.”

Hamish laughed coldly. “You never learn, do you Percy? We don’t take prisoners. Especially not Brute ones.”

Percy-B030 straightened. “He surrendered.” He fought to keep his voice steady and certain of itself, but it still trembled a little from the surprise of the attack. “What else are you supposed to do?”

“Kill him,” James responded. “Kill him and get on with it. Don’t fall for such a dumbass move like that again.”

The squad carried on after that, killing more simulated enemies and accomplishing their objective without taking any casualties. But Percy remained quiet during the remainder of the exercise and did not speak until they had returned to their quarters to rest.

--Actene