As they sped along in the Warthog, Sgt Forge couldn't help but tease Professor Ander, "So what? No "thanks for rescuing me, Sergeant". "Later, the Covenant are assembling a huge fleet." "Suddenly, the LZ doesn't look so good. Spirit, we're gonna need back up."
The Pelican that brought Sgt Forge down approaches before being shot down, erupting in flames as it crashes to the earth. "And...another Pelican." He says sheepishly as Anders rolls her eyes, "Let's get out of here. I saw a teleporter over there."
As they emerge from the teleporter, Forge radios the Spirit. "Spirit of Fire, we are ready for transport. Anders, stay by that beacon." Anders walks over to Forge as he forgets to close the channel, "John, I... I think I know how to stop the Covenant. I need to get to my lab." Forge raises an eyebrow at her tone, "John? We sure are moving fast." She smacks his arm as he laughs, "Baby steps, Professor. Let's try not dying first."
Holding back laughter, a pilot manages to sound somewhat normal as they arrive, "Pelican, inbound on your position." As the Pelican arrives, Anders turns to Forge, "Finally, Sergeant. I need you to stay down here and get this area locked down." Before he can answer, Douglas is heard over the radio as Anders rushes to the Pelican to hide.
"Don't worry, Professor, we'll keep John safe till he can get back to you!" Howling laughter is heard as Sgt Forge freezes up, with Captain Carter cracking a rare smile as Red Team arrives via HEVs.
Pushing that all aside, Forge Red Team and the Marines get to work clearing out the Covenant and Flood in the area, when they come across an interesting sight. Up ahead, they spot a few squads of Grunts abandoning a Scarab, as a few Flood tentacles spring up out of the ground and take it over. "Well, lookie there, the Covenant abandoned the Scarab. Wonder if they left the keys in it."
Forge grins as they waste no time blasting Flood forms by the dozen, eager to get their hands on the Scarab as several Flamethrowers run out of fuel to raze the Flood tentacles clinging to the Scarab.
"You know, the Covenant really shouldn't leave their toys lyin' around," Forge says as he sends a squad of Marines up to pilot the Scarab, letting them have some fun for once before Serina points them towards the next group of enemies.
With the addition of the Scarab, things get smoother as they burn and blast their way towards a bridge, where an enemy Scarab is waiting, along with several Honor Guard elites, who roar out challenges towards the demons.
"Well, they asked for it," Jerome says as Red Team engages the Elites, leaving the Scarab to Forge and the rest as the Marines decide to ram straight into the other Scarab. The Elite aren't faring much better as the Spartans coordinate using years of training and fighting together to overwhelm the stronger aliens.
As they backstab the last Elite, they turn to find the two Scarabs all tangled up as Forge emerges from the enemy one, "I got us another one, owner said I could take it!" He yelled with a grin as Douglas ran over and started it up, and he and the Marine started the hell that was untangling the two.
After clearing out the area, Forge finally calls in to report. "Captain, the area is locked down. Anders done with her skull session?" "The Professor has filled me in, good work, Sergeant. Stand by for mission briefing."
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Some time later, in Professor Anders lab, Shawn is less than pleased to what he'd come back too.
"Not only did you bring one of those thing on board, violating several hazard and contamination protocols, you're also saying we need to get rid of the one piece of equipment we need to get home, that we are incapable of replacing?!" Shawn was very agitated.
Sigh "I have to agree Professor, is this really the best plan there is?" Captain Cutter looked tired, even Serina seemed weary after the mess they'd been through.
"I understand the plan, detonate the drive, make this fake sun go supernova and flatten everything here, the ships, the Flood, all of it. But do we have to use the Spirits slip space drive? Why not nukes?" Shawn asked.
"I'm rather incline to believe him on this one, without that drive, even if we do blow this place to dust, we still won't have a way back home." Serina said as Anders stood her ground, "We don't have any nukes, and even if we did, nothing in the current UNSC arsenal would make a star go supernova."
She then went on a long tirade full of technical terms that only Serina seemed to understand as Captain Cutter and Shawn felt their heads spin. After Anders was done, Serina ran a few calculations and confirmed, Ander's idea was their best bet to level the place.
"Fine," Shawn finally relented, "But no airlift, I'd rather it not get blown out of the sky before it gets to the right spot."
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It got blown out of the sky . . .
Shawn was more than a little upset that they hadn't listened to him on that one, he'd played all the damn games for goodness sake!!
So to cool off he tried to reestablish communication with his ship as Red Team and Forge went to go drag the drive the rest of the way. As he looked for the best signal on the ship, Shawn wandered into Anders lab and found her staring a bit too hard at a Marine's helmet cam that was pointed at Forge.
"Am I interrupting something, Professor?" He asked, more than a little creeped out as Anders shot up like a cat getting it's tail stepped on. "What the?! How did you get in here so quietly?!" She sputtered as Serine made her presence known, "He walked in swearing about no signal strength, you were too busy birdwatching to notice."
Anders went bright red as Shawn took a photo through his helmet and sent it to Forge, give him a little more reason to not die. 'shit, I forgot about that . . .' He realized as Anders collected herself.
"So what bring the inventive Spartan into my lab, not gonna point your gun at my specimen again are you?" She demanded while moving to stand in front of a tank, where a Flood infection form floated. "I'll burn that thing if it's the last thing I do." He swore before shrugging, "I'm just trying to reconnect to my ship, I had it stay outside of the planet in orbit, wanna know if it's still there."
Anders blinked, then blinked again. "You have a ship?" Shawn nodded, as Anders felt confused. "Since when did Spartans get whole entire ships? I thought the whole point was to sneak around, or drop from orbit to kick ass?!" He nodded again, "I can do all that, plus a few extra things that let me get away with just about anything."
"Uh huh." She didn't sound completely convinced but let it slide as Forge finally reached reached the teleporter that would take them to the Apex. Captain Cutter's voice was heard as Shawn hurried to the hangars, "Sergeant, engineers are on their way to rig the core. We're nearly there." "Wait for me, I'm going down as well, gotta make sure Forge makes it back to the Professor in one piece."