-30 minutes earlier-
(Daisy Pov)
"Listen to John," I heard David say as I soared below the Covenant ship. My suit's impulse jets directed me toward a massive hole in the underside of the hull, allowing starlight to shine through.
"Daisy, this is John. What's your status?" the leader of Blue team spoke over the comms, and if I had to guess, he was probably one of the three that made it through.
"Green. Cal and Sheila missed the mark. David got blown off course but is going to go through another hole on top of the ship," I informed before pausing, "And on your end?"
"Just Me, Kelly, and Sam. Linda and Fred also missed. We're heading your way."
"Alright,"
My boots thudded on the deck of the ship as I pulled my MA5B off my back. I turned on the flashlight on the end of my rifle. The blue display lit up with a round count of 60.
'Repair crews should be out here,' I watched every inch that I could see. I couldn't help but feel a bit excited in the way that I wanted to put the years of training to use. So far, we'd been stuck on the sidelines while the other teams took out insurrectionist targets. The reason? We didn't have a full team, and of course, they hadn't assigned anyone else to us so that we could actually do something.
But my wish didn't come true, and a minute later, the trio from Blue team arrived.
"Heard anything from David?" the Spartan with the white 087, Kelly, asked over the comms.
"No. I doubt he will say anything until we link back up," I said before smirking as a thought came to mind, "I bet he's paranoid that the aliens would tap our long-range frequencies."
"Sounds like him," I heard John remark, "During the strategy exercises for the leaders in training, he was always a prep freak."
'Yeah, he is," I smiled to myself.
As we went to proceed, I noticed a glint out of the corner of my eye. It was on the level above us, and it was rapidly approaching the back of my head. I dipped my head, pulling out my rifle as I turned to face the direction it came from.
The glint turned into a beam of light as it penetrated where I had been standing. Looking up, I spotted one of the aliens we had been warned about. It wore some form of space suit, but the cone back/head was unmistakable.
I fired a couple of rounds, no sound being made because of the vacuum of space. They ripped through its suit before it fell backwards and began floating away, "Contacts," I said over the comms.
More enemies this time, ones with round shields of light, appeared across from us on the same level. There were at least four of them, two with blue shields and the others with yellow ones. At the same time, on the top level, more of the cone-headed aliens were at the edge, beginning to fire down at us.
But a few of them didn't have plasma pistols but purple handheld weapons, 'Needles?' I wondered as three finger-long purple crystals shot out from the end of the boomerang weapon.
'They can't be that strong,' Bullets bounced off the armor, Halsey had shown us. So there was no way those crystals wouldn't shatter on my armor. But my instincts screamed at me that they were danger, 'Damn it, his paranoia is rubbing off on me,' I spun behind the inlet of a wall, my eyes widened as the purple things followed me as if they homed in on my position.
I peeked back around, seeing the needles shallowly dug into the metal. A moment later, they popped, scattering into pink dust. I fired a couple more rounds, aiming for the ones with the pink needle launchers, 'Pink needles that can penetrate warship armor and explode… This just gets better and better,' I remarked to myself, ducking back behind cover.
Glancing over to see how the members of Blue team were doing, I saw them in a similar position, stuck behind cover, plasma raining down on their position as well as mine. "We can't stay out in the open. You got a plan over there?" I asked, picking off a shield alien who'd push too far up across from me.
Samuel spoke up as he was standing behind cover, "The aliens keep coming out of a door that looks a lot like the one behind us, just not as banged up," he poked a thumb to a purple and lit up blast door that had scorch marks all along it and a flickering circle in the middle of it.
"Kelly, you're the fastest. If they are half as advanced as they should be, the door should automatically open once you get close. If not… then we'll blow it open," John relayed a green light in my HUD lit up, telling all of us that Kelly had acknowledged the order.
I popped out from behind cover, giving some covering fire as I belted out with full auto. Quick bursts, dropping, or more like floating, the enemies. I focused on the ones up top; they didn't have an energy shield, and they had the high ground, but not for long.
Three down on the left, then four more on the right. I hit the mag release, slamming another magazine in and snapping the bolt back forward with a release lever. I moved back from behind cover, only finding nothing up top. 'Tch, cowards,' I wanted to kill them all, but now they were running away.
"The door works, come on in, I'll cover you," I heard Kelly announce, and I didn't hesitate to sprint in the direction of Kelly's shotgun blasts. I was the first to get through the doorway, turning to the right of the doorway the moment I stepped inside the ship.
John and Samuel were right behind me, shards and bolts of pink crystals and plasma seemed to track the path behind them. They both cleared the doorway in a hurry, John pealing off to my side and Samuel to Kelly's in sync. The door closed after a moment, and I took the liberty of emptying the rest of my magazine into a set of holographic controls, or what I thought were controls.
I dropped my second magazine of this little expedition as Samuel spoke up, "Hell of a welcome party," he said, also reloading.
"What did you expect? A cake and a firm handshake?" Kelly elbowed him softly.
John, beside me, tapped on a wrist command pad. David had something similar, "According to my suit, our objective is that way," He nodded his head at the corridor in front of us, "We're close, hopefully David will be there by the time we get there," he said, turning the device off.
I snorted, "Of course he will be." I walked past him, taking the lead to the reactor. I swapped my rifle for my shotgun. The readout on my helmet read 12 shells: more than enough to kill anything that moves.
We walked through the hallway, finding not a single fucking thing besides more hallways. I was starting to get annoyed, but the thought of David having to fight the entire crew of the ship made me feel a bit better.
*FSSS*
The next purple door opened, and we moved through. We walked into a large room, which was taller than it was wide. It looked like a cathedral, with vaulted ceilings and a platform above us without any form of railing. The room was silent except for the clanking of our boots against the metal flooring.
Something was off, but I couldn't put my finger on it.
My eyes watched the doors that were placed along the perimeters, each of them open, peering into empty hallways. I changed my mind, carefully pulling my assault rifle back off my back, putting my shotgun back in its place. A dull clunk as it firmly clung to the magnetic mounts on my back.
The next words I heard made the hair on my neck stand up, "John… those doors only open when someone or something is near them," I heard Samuel say, and by the way that Kelly and John's posture shifted, they seemed to realize the same thing I did.
But none of us stopped or outright addressed it any change could tip off the audience we had.
"They're probably waiting for us to get to the center of the room. That would be the best place to ambush us," Kelly suggested.
"Ok… on the count of three, everyone lob a frag at a doorway. We'll fall back to the right corner at the front of the room," Three green checkmarks lit up in acknowledgement as John finished speaking.
My hand slowly snaked down to a grenade on my belt, unclipping it, "Three…Two…One…Now!"
I ignited the primer and threw the metal ball, skipping it past the doorframe. The others did the same, and the instant we turned to run for the corner, all Hell broke loose.
From the platform above us, a wave of hostile aliens popped up, crowding along the edge. From each doorway, a squad with a single big alien and 3-5 smaller ones mixed with the cone heads and the shield ones poured onto the floor around us.
*BOOOM*
The grenades we had thrown went off, blowing apart a few of the squads, including the one that was occupying our new cover. Plasma pelted the area I ran, but always remained just far enough away for me to evade it; simply put, they couldn't keep up.
We all made it to the second doorway of today without any problems evenly spread between the two sides of the door's frame. I stepped into the doorway for a split second to return fire, only to immediately duck back behind the purple metal. A rain of plasma melted the floor in view of the doorway a moment later.
"Kelly, Daisy, see if there is a way to the upper level. Sam and I will clear out down here if you can take some of the heat off of us from upstairs," I didn't need to say anything, my armor already saying what I thought.
I took off down the hallway away from the giant open room up an incline. I had not even gotten three-quarters down the hall when Kelly passed me, sprinting, 'Damn rabbit,' I scoffed.
We hit the end and turned to find another incline like a flight of stairs. Tracking up another ramp, we hit the door Kelly a couple of seconds before me.
The door opened, and I opened up, spraying a row of coneheaded aliens with my rifle. They were lined up neatly and, like dominoes, fell over the edge with just a few rounds each.
"LLIKMETH!"
"Hmmph," I fell over, my rifle clattering onto the metal beside me. I landed on my back but reacted in time to catch a large limb approaching my helmet.
One of the taller aliens was on top of me. It snarled as its four mandibles opened just inches from my visor, giving me a full view of razor-sharp teeth. 'Damn bastard,' from the wrist I held was an energy blade that had sprouted from its gauntlet. Its armor was gold with yellow accents that glowed, flowing through it.
My eyes instantly locked on as they caught motion from around the alien's leg. I brought my other hand, latching onto the thing's other wrist, forcing it away toward the wall of the room. The damn thing had reached to pull out one of the bigger versions of the plasma pistol; the small ones had.
I couldn't help but be surprised as I struggled to completely subdue the freak. Its muscles felt like coiled steel, and squeezing them felt like trying to crush solid rock. Glancing out of the corner of my helmet, I saw Kelly unable to blast the thing on top of me without risking hitting me as well, but from behind the pillar was able to keep picking off other aliens so that they couldn't get to me either.
'Come on, Daisy, this is pathetic,' I told myself as I shifted gears. I smashed my helmet into the alien's mandibles, discombobulating it for a second. I twisted my hips before pivoting with my core hard and turning the alien with my upper body. We rolled into the opposite positions with me on top this time.
Quickly, I rolled and snapped with my hand around the arm holding the plasma rifle. The weapon flew out of the alien's hand, being flung down below. I took the chance to get even.
I brought my now free hand up and smashed my fist into its face even while it tried to block. It began to squirm, and I made sure to keep a good base of gravity, keeping it from getting any type of base underneath it. I followed my punch with an elbow, popping one of its eyes out of its socket, blood now leaking from its face. I finished it off, pulling out my knife and sticking it through its other eye, its flailing abruptly stopping as the blade entered its frame.
I turned around, pulling my shotgun from my back, and began clearing out the rest of the aliens. Three pumps here, four more as I spotted another tall alien out in the open below us. I took out a few frags as we finished clearing the upper level and began to dead drop them onto the aliens below us.
By now, both the upper and lower levels looked like a warzone. Glowing blue blood caked against the walls, the dead open eyes of the aliens we had just slaughtered. When all was said and done, and after my grenades went off, body parts and a mix of shrapnel joined, adding onto the collage.
With the firefight over, I moved back to where I had my little scuffle. I kicked the golden armored corpse, rolling it over the edge, revealing my rifle. I picked it up to look at Kelly, who was beside me, and gave her a nod; she nodded back in understanding.
We backtracked down the stairs, linking back up with John and Samuel. I took the time to reload my shotgun, a cartoon hippo on each shell smiled at me as I shoved each one into the magazine tube.
"The readings are coming from that way," John said, pointing to a door branching to the right in the middle of the room between two pillars that rose through the floor above, "Come on, we're not that far-"
"JOHN LOOK OUT!"
Samuel shouted before ramming him, throwing him to the side. My eyes went wide as I saw a blue bolt pass through the air, closing the distance in an instant. It crashed into his chestplate, knocking him off his feet as he tried to avoid it.
My eyes followed the source, seeing a blue-armored tall alien. I brought my shotgun up, splattering its head onto the wall from where it sat.
"Sam!" I heard Kelly cry as she ran up to check on him. My HUD flashed as the green status symbol for Samuel turned yellow, indicating he was injured.
"That was stupid, Sam," John said with concern.
"I-I'm fine, it just burns like nothing else," Sam said as he got helped back to his feet.
I stayed watching the surroundings, making sure we weren't about to be ambushed again, but I couldn't help but notice that on Sam's left chestplate. To the right of his white 034 was a melted hole that went all the way to his undersuit.
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Rip to the homie Sam.
Honestly I think his death was relevant to a kind of theme that ran among most Spartan-II deaths.
Simply put I look at the ones we know die and can't help but think that almost all of them are... cheap. Like Daisy in canon dying because of like 2-3 needles (If I am rememberring correctly) that pierced what would be the hardest point of Mjolnir. Or Anton and Li getting literally vaporized in an instant by a large glob of plasma. And even Grace in Mjolnir Mark V getting hit with three 52 mm grenades from a Brute shot that instantly killed her. That one is a bit more understandable, but I just don't see that few grenades killing a Spartan in Mark V. Not even mentioning how technically Fred is the culprit behind the most deaths of Spartan-IIs
Meanwhile you have like Linda who got literally melted for all intents and purposes during the Fall of Reach. Was presumed dead and had her body put on ice AFTER clinically dying, only to be revived a couple weeks later.
This is all to say I am going to try and rectify these inconsistencies in the story make it make sense ya know.
Anyway I gotta test in MA-501 this week it's a take home test from tues-thurs. So expect a chapter Friday most likely.