Staff Sergeant Mobuto reloads his shotgun, trying to find comfort in the familiar action. He checks his ammo (16 shells, same as the last time he checked) and checks his surroundings (cold, alien, oppressive, but currently clear, same as the last time he checked). He takes a long, slow, deep breath, counting the moments until the low throb of pain in his chest sharpens (broken rib still broken, same as last time).
Sitrep: alone in an alien bunker. Rest of the squad? Unknown, last seen under attack from unidentified alien combatants. Covenant? Hell if he knew, but if they were they were screwed even more so. Best of his knowledge Covies didn’t raise the dead!
(Lumpen, scuttling things coming at the out of the darkness. One jumps at Morales, who is screaming as it stabs at her face. The staccato of gunfire against wet organic sounds that seem to swallow it up. Skittering of too many legs as they keep coming, and then he’s falling into darkness, but not before he sees the bodies of the hingeheads they had dropped only minutes ago rise up from the ground, pustules bursting from their limbs)
16 shotgun shells. Same as last time.
There is a flash of gold and his body is moving ahead of his brain, swinging the gun up and pointing at the intrusion. It materialises in front of him, a blue and silver orb. A clipped, precise voice speaks.
"Greetings. I am the Monitor of Installation 04. I am 343 Guilty Spark."
Mobuto’s adrenaline and trigger finger is ahead of him, and the next thing he knows is the ringing of the shotgun blast echoing in his ears. The orb just remains floating, a judgemental eye looking down at him.
"Please conserve your ammo. The Flood has been released, and so you will need it."
His heart is racing, but this one isn’t an active threat. At the moment. He takes a breath (pain, rib is still broken) and asks “The Flood? Is that what those…things that killed my men are called?”
“We are wasting valuable time. Protocol dictates action. I must prevent the parasite from leaving this installation, and to do that I need your assistance. Come!”
It begins floating down the hallway, its eerie blue light showing the way. It brings to mind stories his grandmother used to tell him, about flickering blue flames that drew weary travellers to their deaths. “Hang on a minute. You can’t just expect me to just follow you? There could be more of those things down there, and some of my men might still be alive up there!”
The orb gives an exasperated sigh (which is impressive for something that doesn’t seem to have lungs) and comes zooming back to him. “I am sorry to say your men are already dead, and are already making their way towards us as we waste time. We must activate this installation and destroy the Flood presence, and to do that I need the assistance of a Reclaimer to do so.”
This orb has all the bedside manner of a field medic. But Mobuto sighs (yep, rib still broken) and takes a step forward. “So you’re saying this, this ring is a weapon. And it’ll stop those things?”
“Haven’t you been listening? Why do you delay? We must collect the Index.” The orb is off done the hallway once again, muttering to itself. Mobuto watches it for a moment.
Marine Week is an art and writing challenge that was created because Marines deserve more love and respect. It takes place from the 2nd to the 8th of August.
You want to participate? The rules are simple.
1. Post your work on Tumblr and tag it with #marineweek2020 and I will reblog it here. You can also post a link to your work if you posted it on another website. (Also, please tag this blog as well. It allows me to find it easier)
2. Please tag your work! Use appropriate tags and warnings.
3. Choose one (or both, if you want to) of the prompts for every day and be creative. Ships or no ships, everything is welcome.
Prompts:
Day 1: Bravery/ Shore Leave
Day 2: Unidentified/ Instinct
Day 3: Brotherhood/ Death
Day 4: Sniper/ Trust
Day 5: Alone/ Memory
Day 6: Alliance/ Good
Day 7: Uniform/ Brain Washing
Bonus Prompts: Savior/ Insubordination
P.S: ODSTs are welcome too. They may be under the jurisdiction of Naval Special Warfare Comand, but they’re still Devil Dogs.
P.S 2: If you post anything earlier or later, all I ask is that you tag this blog if you want me to see it, thank you.
The gathered officers and NCOs in the room erupted with various exclamations of discontent.
Staff Sergeant Elliot Reynolds himself was quite surprised, but he’d been on Delta Halo. He watched the Brute and Elite fleets suddenly start unleashing devastating volleys of plasma on each other. It was chaos.
The Marines loved it.
He personally enjoyed watching a Brute CCS-Class Battlecruiser’s reactor detonate in a wash of bright violet hellfire. You could tell it was controlled by the Brutes because it was falling apart at the seams.
HIGHCOM had absolutely no idea what happened. Well, until about an hour ago.
Brass had intercepted a broadband transmission with Covenant data encryption protocols attached to it. But it was sent directly to Orbital Defense Platform Cairo. And it was addressed to Fleet Admiral Hood himself.
Or as the Elites called him, ‘Fleetmaster of Fleetmasters’.
He wasn’t gonna lie, he kind of liked it. That aside, they were now in orbit of Pluto, waiting for the Sangheili (God it was weird to actually know the name of the Elite species) CAS-Class Assault Carrier Shadow Of Intent to exit from Slipspace to begin the meeting.
“Ladies and Gentlemen, today is a historic day for humanity. It is not victory, but it is survival. We will ally with the Sangheili,” Elliot could tell the unfamiliar word was odd on Fleet Admiral Hood’s tongue, judging by the slight click of his tongue at the end of the word. The grizzled Admiral kept a straight, emotionless face however. “and we will defeat the Covenant.”
“Oorah!” The Marines in the room barked.
It was followed by a swift, “Hooyah!” from the Naval Special Warfare Operators also in the briefing.
All Hood had to do was raised a single hand and the room quieted. He started talking again, but Elliot’s eyes were suddenly drawn to the one non-military individual in the corner.
A woman with blond hair tied back in a ponytail, pale skin, and emerald green eyes, clad in a set of black ODST armor with her arms crossed over her chest. On her left shoulder guard, there was the symbol of ONI, the Office of Naval Intelligence. It was the all seeing eye.
After a moment, the woman turned and walked out of the room. Elliot frowned. ONI showing up was never good. Quietly, the Staff Sergeant slipped out of the room and into the hall, following the agent. Of course, when stepping into the corridor, he caught the back of the agent’s boot turning the corner.
Quickly moving down the hall, Elliot passed a window. Curiously, he glanced out as he walked.
Floating in the void on the port side of the When Honor Dies, was the Halberd-Class Destroyer UNSC Ephemeral. Her captain was Khai. Just Khai. No one ever knew her last name. She was famous for near suicidal maneuvers that regularly worked.
Shaking his head to clear his thoughts, he sped up his walking pace and turned the corner. He was immediately set upon by the agent, but he fought back. The two grappled roughly in the corridor, but the agent gets the upper hand for a split second and manages to tackle the Marine into a room next to them.
A pistol was drawn, but it was knocked away. The two seperated, panting and slightly haggered. “What do you want, spook?” Elliot snapped.
“Simple. Victory.” The woman replied.
“You really aren’t good people are you?” Elliot scoffed.
“There is no such thing as good. Nor evil. Simply people. And their choices.”
“Oh no no no, there are good people. They are soldiers. And the people of Earth and the UNSC. People who resort to spying, assassinating, and propaganda are not good people. People like ONI.” Elliot growled.
“Hm. Staff Sergeant, you are a philosophical one.”
Oddly, that’s where it ended. They seperated, Elliot heading back to the briefing, and the agent leaving somewhere else.
Elliot didn’t know he’d just spoken to his future wife, at the time named Alexus Yuri Horn.
“We’ve got unidentifiable contact at grid Charlie-3-Zulu-9. Alpha 2-Actual orders you to investigate. Over.”
“Copy 2-6. Moving. 7-Actual out.” Staff Sergeant Elliot Reynolds clicked off his radio channel and flashed a hand signal to his Corporal, who nodded and began passing orders to the rest of the platoon. Normally a Sergeant wouldn’t command a platoon, but their Lieutenant was dead.
All around him, he heard the slight grunts of Marines standing up and weapons clicking into position. After a moment, his Corporal returned and nodded at him. Nodding back, Elliot raised himself to a combat glide position and began heading towards his ordered position.
To his left, right, and rear, the twenty five remaining men of Third Platoon, Delta Company, 5th Battalion, 12th Marines spread out in two horizontal (in relation to Elliot) lines of twelve men, five meters between each man. The remaining man, the communications specialist who somehow survived the ambush that wiped out half of Third Platoon, was at the back of both lines.
The fifth man in the first line, Elliot took a position about a meter forward from his line, and he heard the gap get closed behind him. Moving quickly through the thick underbrush, he blinked into the limited HUD Marines had and activated his IFF tag for any nearby friendly forces. “Bravo Squad, with me. Sergeant Winters, you have tactical command. Spread out twenty meters north of our current position an intersperse yourselves with the bushes and rocks. Advance on my command.” Elliot ordered into his helmet mic, crouching in the onyx black night as he paused to give the orders over the radio.
“Lima Charlie.” His fellow Sergeant over the radio.
Leaves and grass crunched softly as heavy boots moved quickly over then to get into position. Elliot led his personal squad forward into the night, then suddenly: “Fifty meters, 11 o’clock.”
The seven marines dropped to a kneel and raised their weapons as the squad’s unofficial marksman called out the sighting. “Indentify.” The Staff Sergeant muttered into the night at his team member.
“Silhouettes, Sarge. Nothing concrete. Too dark.” The woman replied.
Elliot opened his mouth to respond, but he heard something crunch off to his right and his instincts suddenly screamed at him to move.
The Marine rolled forward as a plasma bolt flew through the air where he had just been. It was so close he felt the skin on the back of his neck heat up. Stopping himself at a kneel again, he raised his MA5B assault rifle and pulled the trigger, aiming at the blobby silhouette in the darkness.
His rifle opened up with an ear-splitting roar, spitting 7.62 millimeter bullets into the night. “Contact contact contact!” He barked into his radio as his rifle muzzle flashed.
In the half a second that had passed, dozens more plasma bolts flew at his squad from different directions. Then something else.... bullets. Why were the Covenant using bullets?
A plasma bolt zipping last his visor reminded him that now was not the time for introspection. “Winters, get up here!”
“Reynolds we’ve got contact too!”
Sure enough, several muzzle flashes appeared along the line that Sergeant Winters had set up the rest of the platoon.
Next to him, a younger Marine caught a bullet to the face and the boy collapsed in a shower of blood. “Squad on me! We have to get back to the others!” Elliot roared over the din of rifle fire, and then began an all out sprint back towards the rest of the platoon, firing at the shadows all the while. Every once in a while he’d hear the distinct sound of an Elite, Grunt, or Jackal succumbing to UNSC ordnance. That further reinforced the question: Why in the ever-loving fuck, were the Covvies using human weapons?
“Winters! We’re coming up on your left flank’s 10 o’clock!” The Staff Sergeant snapped into his microphone.
“Copy that!— Watch your right! —Check fire! Check fire left flank!” The Sergeant shouted back, cutting off mid-sentence to shout a warning to a fellow Marine.
Pink glows in the trees, some from Jackal shields, others from various weapons of armor let him know where the Covenant were in the night. He shouldered his weapon as he ran and let loose two five rounds bursts into the darkness, and was rewarded with an alien squawk as a Jackal’s head exploded into a pulpy mass.
A few more meters and bullets started flying at Bravo Squad, a second member caught three bullets in the chest-plate. “Blue, blue!” Elliot barked towards the cluster of rocks that fire had come from.
Two heads peaked out from behind it and one waved them closer. Glancing back at the fallen Marine, Reynolds saw she was fine, being helped to her feet by a second Marine. “C’mon! Let’s move!”
Elliot picked up his pace, only to watch a pink crystalline needle pierce the eye of the Marine who had waved them forward, and then detonate in a shower of gore; The unfortunate Marine’s headless body fell to the ground in a heap. “Get to cover! Now!”
Bravo Squad finally got behind the minor safety of the long line of boulders and thick shrubbery, and Reynolds left his Corporal in charge, sprinting down the line of Marines standing and kneeling while firing into the dark. “Winters! Sergeant Winters!”
The veteran turned around from where he was helping the SAW gunner reload. “Reynolds, we’re taking heavy casualties!”
“Where the hell is Alpha?!” Elliot shouted to be heard over the cacophony of roaring automatic weapons.
“Idle, dead, I don’t know! We couldn’t get a message out. Comm guy says everything but local frequencies are jammed.” His fellow Sergeant replied.
“The only thing we can do here is die! We need to fall back!” He yelled. His instincts were telling him this position was untenable.
“No, we can still do this!” Winters retorted.
“If I give you an order, it is the goddamn mission!” Elliot roared.
Winters opened his mouth to retort, only for a shout to register a ways down the thin line.
“They’re in the trees! They’re in the trees!”
Before either Marine could react, an Elite Minor de-cloaked and leaped down from a tree above them, energy-sword crackling to life.
The massive saurian warrior let loose a roar the was absolutely bone-shaking at this range, then swung his sword, bisecting Sergeant Winters in one clean stroke.
“Sergeant! Sergeant!” A young private shouted in panic.
“Take it down! Take it down!” Elliot barked, holding his trigger and pouring bullets into the Elite’s shield, which flared blue as it absorbed the damage.
The Staff Sergeant’s weapon clicked empty right as the Elite’s shield dissolved, and he had to dive to the side to avoid the deadly sword. As the Elite focused on the other Marines, Elliot quickly ejected his spent 60-round magazine and inserted another from his belt into the weapon and stood up, racking back the bolt with a simple flick of the wrist.
When he turned back the Elite, he found a second Marine skewered through the chest by the energy-sword of the Minor. “Corpsman! Corpsman!” Someone shouted.
Elliot growled, then dropped his rifle and let it hang from his strap, pulling out his K-Bar and charging the unshielded Elite. He slammed into the towering creature with the force of a speeding truck and dug his knife into the rib cage of the Elite. The alien roared in pain as he withdrew his purple blood covered knife, and he ducked under the sword swipe, stabbing it in the back, then stepping back when two fellow Marines each put a five round burst into its chest, sending it to the ground.
Sheathing his knife, he took up his rifle again and raised his voice. “Fall back Marines! Double time!”
One by one, they broke off their fields of fire and started running out of the forest. Every few seconds a Marine would catch a plasma bolt or a bullet in the back and collapse with a scream.
When they pierced the tree line and reached the open field that surrounded it, the remaining ten or so Marines all started running even faster.
Then Elliot heard something.
A quiet whistle.
His instincts screamed again and he dove to the ground. “INCOMING!”
All around him, his fellow soldiers all dropped to their stomachs with him. But they didn’t get obliterated by a heavy plasma bombardment. Reynolds looked over his shoulder.. and saw dozens of M145D Rhino artillery shells slam into the Covenant as they advanced out of the forest.
“That’s our stuff! It’s comin’ in from behind!” A Marine from the planet of Tribute shouted, his accent thick.
“Our boys! That’s our boys!” A female Marine shouted, pointing up at the sky.
Sure enough, two olive green D77-TC Pelican Dropships emerged from the clouds, each with spotlights on their noses and M808C Scorpions hanging from their rear overhang vehicle mount. Rocket pods on the wings of both Pelicans lit up as a Covenant Wraith tank emerged from the forest, and instantly got vaporized by four ANVIL-II missiles, two from each Pelican.
On the ridge a little ways behind them, engines roared, and then seven M-12 Warthog LRVs came flying over the ridge, each one carrying Marines, and headlights bright. A second later, dozens- no, hundreds of Marines came charging over the ridge on foot, shouting the UNSC Marine Corps battle cry: “Semper fi! Do or die!”
The two Pelicans dropped their Scorpion tanks to the ground, which both immediately opened up with their mounted machine guns and heavy canons. Following that, two nylon ropes dropped from the back of each Pelican... and then Marines started jumping out of the back of the dropships sliding down the ropes to the ground; Even as the Pelicans let loose more missile barrages and raked the tree line with automatic fire from their nose guns.
A Warthog zipped past the last few members of Third Platoon, blasting a Covenant Banshee out of the sky in a ball of purple fire with a gauss canon. A Scorpion swerved in front of a cluster of Marines and shook as a Fuel Rod canon blast slammed into the turret. That driver had just saved a dozen lives.
Reinvigorated, the Marines of Third Platoon, Delta Company, 5th Battalion, 12th Marines all reloaded their weapons and joined the fight.
Two B-65 Shortsword Bombers zipped overhead, dropping hundreds of pounds of heavy ordnance on the Covenant positions in the forest and tree line, sending a rousing cheer through the Marine ranks.
And Elliot’s instincts told him that no matter the situation, the UNSC Marine Corps would prevail.
“The sniper. One of the most important assets in modern warfare. Recon, assassination, fire support, suppression, communications. The sniper is vital.
When you’re in the middle of a battle a can only focus on the Split-Lip in bearing down on you with an energy-sword, the best thing in the galaxy is to hear that crack of a 14.5mm bullet leaving the barrel of an SRS99D-S2 AM and blowing a half foot hole in the chest of your attacker.
You have to trust the Marine behind that scope. There are no prejudices on the battlefield. That Marine could be white, black, Asian, lesbian, gay, trans, asexual; The list goes on. A lot of the time you never know who pulled the trigger when that bullet saves your life. But if you bring prejudice into the field, you will be hated. By every Marine.
And when I say you need to trust the Marine behind the scope. I mean the Marine. Nothing else is important except that they’re a fellow Marine. We’re a family, and we will treat each other as such.”
- Staff Sergeant Elliot Reynolds, August 6th, 2550
I find it marginally amusing that I happened to see the ask on the lovely @infinityactual’s page and suddenly I got a lot more recognition. Just goes to show how amazing that blog is!
Anyway, slight off comment aside, should I also reblog various Halo Marine content I find to give some variety to the page?
