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ODST: The Helljumper Story PT,1
Posted By: Herbert Markwirth<herbertm@pcisys.net>
Date: 9 December 2007, 6:23 am
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CHAPTER 1
EARTH CITY
The year is 2552. The humans have valiantly fought off the alien races making up, as they call themselves, "Covenant". The Covenant have finally found the crown jewel… Earth.
The Pelican Drop-ship roared over the many buildings that made up a thick ethnic neighborhood. This neighborhood was nestled in "New" Mombassa. It was pretty beat up, thanks to a Covenant Ship slip-space jumping inside the city. The space elevator was destroyed, cutting off supplies. Now everything was delivered by ships coming in from space. It remained a mystery why it was the only city under siege by the Covenant. Some believe there is something buried of great importance to the Aliens.
The dropship was filled with ODST's (Orbital Drop Shock troopers). One trooper in particular sat in the back of the troop cabin, Sgt. Frost. He checked his assault rifle. It was a newer model, designed to have farther range with more accuracy, but it only held 32 rounds per clip. "Touchdown in 60 seconds." The words blared through the cabin intercom. The trooper Grabbed his helmet and shoved it on. His heads up display shone in his visor. There was displayed, his vital signs and suit status. The suit status checked out A-Okay. Good, No Malfunctions, he thought. He flicked off his rifle's safety. "Touchdown in 5." He Stood up, "Go, go, go!" The Marines piled out.
He moved up along the side of a building, and peeked around the corner. The alley way was splashed with red. A few dead marines lay contort positions. A single grunt was scavenging around, it was wearing a pouch around his shoulder. The grunt was stuffing grenades in the pouch. It was hefting a beat up assault rifle along with its standard plasma pistol. It stumbled and fell over a dead marine. The grunt stood up and mumbled, "Stupid Ape." The alien kicked the corpse. At the end of the alley, a Brute yelled something in an alien Tongue. The grunt whispered something to himself. "GRUNT…" said the brute and then the grunt said, "yes, your Excellency."
Frost looked up at another Trooper, "Now!" Both marines spun around the corner and unloaded rounds into the aliens. The grunt yelled out an alien curse word, and exploded into blue pulp. The Brute warbled out a war cry and charged. He swung, hitting the marine standing next to Frost. He screamed and fell back. A burst of rounds caught the Brute In the Head. It fell, blood spurting out of what used to be its head. Frost stood there, rifle barrel smoking. The trooper that was clubbed with the Spiker lay, holding his arm, which was obviously broken. "Thanks..", He grunted. Frost called for a medic who tended to the hurt trooper.
"Quiet", Sgt. Frost whispered. They could hear footsteps, distinct click, click, click, of grunts feet. "Me and fire team will surpress, assault team circle around back and flank… Move." The Sergeant moved around the corner with Fire Team. They took cover behind two cars, while Frost moved up. "Sarge! Look out!" It was too late, he ran right into a surprised Jackal. It yelled with a sharp voice and swung its carbine at the ODST. He sidestepped and pulled out a frag' grenade. He pulled the pin and tossed it to the Jackal's feet. It slid just behind him. It looked over his shoulder. Frost rolled behind a metal barrier set up by the late marines. An explosion shook the ground. He looked over and purple gore splashed the terrain. The leader Brute, not to far away, fired its needler. Purple glowing shards impaled the metal and exploded. The barrier groaned and a piece bent and fell off. Another burst of purple crystals homed in on the trooper. He dodged to the left but one cut right through his shoulder. He winced at the sharp pain, and gritted his teeth. He was thankful it just passed through his flesh and did not impale a bone. The bloody shard exploded behind him, blowing a chunk out of the brick wall.
The Assault Team turned the corner and poured fire into the leading Brute. The Alien turned into a cloud of blue-purple blood and it fell in its own remains. Frost sprayed bio-foam into the wound and slapped on a bandage. " 'Bout time you got here", Frost said over the radio. The ODST's finished off the remaining grunts. They stopped a moment to regroup, swap ammo, and pick up supplies dropped by the dead aliens. "Lets keep moving," The marines continued walking through the streets.
Atop a roof top a lone elite crouched, concealed in the shadow of a chimney. He was wearing an active camouflage generator, so he was invisible. He knew that the covenant split, and the elites left. Even though he was no longer covenant, he still had to try to side with the humans to fight the brutes. He peered through binoculars, watching the ODST's. He was surprised the humans took out three Jiralhanae, and a pack of Unggoy. The group of human soldiers moved into the alley just below him. He put away his binoculars. He ran down the roof and jumped into the alley.
The trooper covering the squad's six heard a soft thud. He just saw a clear distorted shape. Frost turned around and saw the shape as well. The clear shape turned towards him. Frost lifted his rifle and shot a burst at the distorted air holding the blade. A surprised Elite in black armor appeared out of thin air.
The Elite looked down, his camouflage generator was destroyed. He looked up at the troopers. It held up it's hand, "Please don't sho-". Some bullets caught the elite in the shoulder. It yelled again, "DON'T SHOOT." "Cease fire, and listen to him," Said Frost. If it was going to kill them it would of done it already. "You sure?" said one of his men. "Just do it," Said Frost. The elite took a moment to breathe. "Thank you." Said the elite. You could tell it had trouble speaking English. "My name is Zuka' Zalaumee, I wish to side with you." He explained how the covenant had split and the elites were thrown out. And some where far off the one called "Arbiter" and a platoon of elites and has already sided with Johnson, Miranda, and a group of marines, which they saved from the blood-thirsty brutes. He hoped the elites and humans could make some sort of temporary truce. "I still don't trust him," said the unsure marine. He defied orders, and shot his SMG at the elite. His shields blared. The elite lunged and lifted the marine and he stared into his eyes. Frost said seriously, "Put him down. If you want our trust your going have to earn it." Zuka' growled and said "… very well" and put the soldier down. Frost, his squad and his unwelcome guest walked down the street. He felt unsure about his decision, so he spoke on his squad freq so the elite wouldn't hear, "If anyone see the elite even slightly harm or kill one of my men put a bullet in his head."
Green acknowledgment lights blinked in his visor. They understood.
A Phantom dropship flew over head, rumbling through the sky. The troopers and the elite followed it and stopped behind a semi truck. Frost looked over the hood and turned the magnification dial on his helmet. He zoomed in on two Phantoms, one already on the ground, another just landing. The first one had brutes walking in and out unloading supplies. The squad leader of the brutes, was wearing green polished armor, and a small head-dress. The other Phantom landed, the landing gear sliding out. Three brutes walked out. Two of them were wearing honor guard armor, they had energy swords handles holstered. Each were holding a Brute-shot. The third one was a brute chieftain, in shiny orange armor and a large elaborate head-dress. He was wielding a giant gravity-hammer.
He remembered the mission briefing, and the main objective, take out the brute chieftain named Goruk' Zaland. Frost looked and listened intensively. The brute squad leader kneeled before the Chieftain, "Welcome, Chieftain Zaland." Frost looked at his troopers and whispered, "This is the one we came for, take him out quickly." The Troopers ran around the Semi and spread out. "FIRE AT WILL!", yelled Sgt. Frost.
One brute tossed a Spiker grenade and it firmly lodged itself into frost's helmet. "Shit," yelled Frost. He pulled his helmet off and chucked it into the air. It Exploded before hitting the ground. The Honor Guards stood in front of the chieftain, holding up large shields. They were serving as armor strapped to their arms. The would lower the shields only to fire grenades from their Brute-shots. One marine exploded from the waste down and landed in a pile of his own entrails. Frost felt a pang of sorrow, but the elite didn't even care. Slowly they took out the weaker brutes, then the honor guards.
The Chieftain fled toward the phantom. Frost began to shoot but he missed. He glanced at the elite. He was gone. Just as the brute began to board the phantom, Zuka hopped down from atop its hull and slashed the brute's arm off. It bellowed and then threw Zuka to the side with his one remaining arm. The Chieftain then moaned at the pain. Frost saw his chance. He turned to a fellow marine. "Hey, Baker give me your weapon." Frost tossed him his assault rifle, and Baker handed him his BR55 Battle Rifle. Frost switched it from semi-auto to burst fire, looked through its smart-scope, and let off three bursts. The brute collapsed to his knees. The brute propped himself up with a carbine. Zuka reacted quickly and pulled out a plasma grenade. It ignited and glowed blue. He tossed it and it fused to the brute's head. It collapsed again, letting go of the carbine, only to try to remove the grenade. It was a futile attempt, the glowing ball of explosive plasma was fused to his flesh. Zuka rolled behind cover just as the brute exploded. All that was left was the smoking, burnt lower half of what used to be a brute. The rest of it was splattered everywhere.
"Good Job, people… and Zuka. Lets get to the extraction poi-," Frost flinched as a purple beam shone through Baker's helmet. "SNIPER!" Frost took cover and his remaining men searched the roof-tops with their eyes. An ODST sniper found him and took out the jackal with one shot. Still more purple beams fired in between each pause. As the hour progressed they found three more snipers but lost three men. Three for three.
The radio man called for a dropship. All the men stood and watched. The Radio Man let out a sigh and said, " I've got some bad news. Command won't send a dropship because this area has been deemed a hot-zone and every bird they send in gets shot down by covenant guns," he was careful not to call them covies because it might upset the elite, "They can pick us up at this location." He pulled out a holo-map and placed it on the map and typed the coordinates. A digital map appeared. " Right here", He pointed to a back road next to an old truck stop outside of the town on the 3-D map. ODST's and Spartans were usually subject to the newest technology. "It's just out of range of the AA guns. The bad news is it is about a 10 hour trip on foot weaving through buildings and trekking across the open savannah to the truck-stop." " Well we're not going to get there by sitting around, So lets get going." Frost said.
CHAPTER 2
THE L.Z.
5 Hours later. Only three men were left, SGT. Frost, one of frost's men, PFC. Vladimir, and a Spec-ops Elite, Zuka Zalaumee. Frost looked down at the control panel they were running low on gas. Earlier, The two marines and the elite came across a mongoose All Terrain Vehicle. Now, they were being chased by enemy brute choppers, ground vehicles across a long bridge over a shallow river. The two marines on the ATV and the elite on a commandeered brute vehicle. Frost yelled back at Vlad who was hanging from the ATV, " Were running low on gas, we need to figure out an escape plan." "Got it," Yelled PFC. Vladimir. A few moments passed and frost said, "Got an Idea!" and he veered off at the end of the bridge along side Zuka. Frost said, "Jump!" "you sure?", Yelled Vlad. "just do it!" Frost hit the brakes and the two marines flew over the rail of the bridge. One of the brutes crashed into the Mongi' and passed right through it, but in the confusion hit a detached semi-trailer. After pushing the trailer 20 yards it came to a grinding halt. The other choppers came to a same fate. One by one they crashed into the semi and other choppers. What was left was a ball of smashed brute cycles and remnants of a human semi-trailer.
Zuka parked his chopper and strode over to the carnage. He stopped at a brute. It was pulling itself out of the wreckage. Its right leg was badly torn up and the left one gone. Zuka knelt. He reached for a carbine that survived and stood up. He put the barrel to the ugly ape face. His finger twitched and green fire spewed into the brutes skull. He tossed the rifle into the crash and walked to the railing. Frost and Vlad were swimming to shore.
The elite ran down the stairs and to the docks. He knelt down and helped the marines up. Zuka said, "That was clever, but yet… idiotic." "Hey what can you expect, we're humans." Frost chuckled. "Now what… Wait, Vlad do you have a 3-d map." "I did," he held up a piece of an electronic device that was leaking water, "but I have this." Vlad pulled out an older map. "good enough." He took the laminated paper. Frost studied it a and looked to his right. There was a small motor boat "This is what were we are going to do. This river leads out of the town and towards the ocean. If we stop two miles before the coast it's only four miles to the extraction point. And we'll shave off three hours of the trip. We need to shorten this up as much as we can."
CHAPTER 3
THE RIVER
The three beings climbed into the small boat and Frost started revving up the engine. It roared to life, pushing the boat forward. "Yeah, this is more like it," remarked PFC. Vladimir. The boat steadily picked up speed as it zoomed down the wide river.
TWO HOURS LATER…
"Holy crap!" yelled frost, as the darted side to side to avoid plasma fire from a brute Prowler coasting on the bank of the water. "Vlad, use the laser!" The Sergeant yelled over the roar of the boat engine. "what?!" Questioned Vladimir. "The laser!" Frost gestured towards a narrow rectangular crate. "Got it." The Private Reached over, popped the crate open, and pulled out a anti-vehicular, shoulder mounted laser cannon. He propped it up and squeezed the charging trigger. With a loud, booming whoosh a fiery red beam sliced through the air, with the scent of burnt oxygen. The Prowler exploded into a blue fire ball, tossing brute corpses like a rag dolls into the water.
They pulled the boat up to the bank of the river. "were here," announced Frost. As they climbed onto the bank, on looking a vast plain, dotted by a small rest stop along a seemingly endless road, The sergeant pulled out his radio. "Command, Command, we have reached the LZ. We have suffered major casualties. Requesting immediate pickup, over." Static replied to them for next passing moments. Then a voice spoke through the radio. "This is Raven, Anybody there?" "Man, is it good to hear from you guys." Remarked Frost. "Roger that, Pelican inbound, over and out." A few moments later a Pelican dropship landed, kicking up dust. The Three climbed into the Pelican. Inside the pilot looked into the cabin. Alarmed by the elite he grabbed for a pistol. Frost moved the Pistol away, "Don't worry he's with us. The elites have agreed to side with us. Call command and tell them about the news." "all right," said the pilot. The pilot turned back and said, "sorry, there's know time for rest. Were going to the air field, We going to need everybody for our next mission."
" I shall call my troops. They will aid in your mission." Zuka said as he sat down. The pelican was on fast track to an airfield loaded with Hornets, Pelicans, Albatrosses, and Longswords. The pelican touched down as crews of engineers and technicians ran to and fro. An Unknown marine walked up to them, "load up, we leave in two hours."
CHAPTER 4
THE JUNGLE
Sgt. Frost held fast as the nimble aircraft dropped down over the ridge, overlooking thick jungle. It was just after the first morning's rain, there was a flock of Hornet fast-attack aircrafts, two pelican drop ships, and a hulking albatross dropship. Frost was kneeling on one of the two landing skids on the hornet. He had a battle rifle in one hand the other hand clenching a handle, keeping him on the Hornet. The Hornets were to fly into a large clearing of mud and grass, and the ODST's would jump, releasing glider packs, Landing safely, while the drop ships headed to a forward command outpost on the edge of the jungle to rendezvous with the Elites. Frost scanned the fast-passing jungle below, occasionally seeing a grunt or two and a brute. They were told not to fire until they landed, so Frost just kept on gazing. Frost moved into a sitting position, readied his rifle and got ready for the jump.
The clearing was just in sight. One Problem. Three trees on the edge of the clearing fell to the ground, and with a messy splatter into the wet grass and mud. An Anti-Air Wraith tank, plated with gold-colored armor and armed with four anti-air fuel rod guns, hovered into the clearing. "Oh Shit!", yelled the Hornet's pilot. The Wraith released a volley of green balls of light, trailing green plasma. They struck the Albatross and One of the pelicans, which both went in separate directions, crashing into the vast jungle.
One greenish plasma bomb hurtled towards Sgt. Frost's Hornet. Quickly Frost yelled to the other passenger, "Jump!" Frost focused his attention back to his glider pack. He took a deep breath and slid off the landing skid. Slicing through the air, the wind ripped at his coal-black fatigues and tugged at his armor plating and helmet. He reached for the red glider activation handle. He tugged it, and his pack burst open, releasing wide camouflage-printed glider wings. He glanced pack, the other ODST had successfully deployed his glider. He moved his focus to his former hornet. The pilot ejected from the cockpit, releasing a parachute, just before it burst into a fiery explosion, sending debris and shrapnel everywhere. A flaming, twisted propeller whizzed right past frost, startling him.
Frost glided down into the treetops, getting caught on a tree branch. Dangling, the sergeant removed his pack, making him fall to the forest floor. He nimbly climbed to the top of the tree to get his bearings. Just north of his position, the smoke was rising from the overturned albatross dropship. He told himself he should head there to regroup with the survivors. He dropped pack to the ground, to his surprise, to meet the other ODST and the Pilot. "Glad to see you guys," Frost said, "let's get moving, we got to get to the Albatross." The three man team spent the next twenty minutes traversing the jungle terrain. Frost and the men crouched in a clump of tall ferns.
Fifty yards away lay the Albatross. Three brutes, one gold-armored, and a group of grunts were already there. The brutes were standing next to a row of marines, restrained by plasma cuffs. Grunts walking in and out of the dropship's cabin with more captured survivors. One of the marines tried resisting capture, by punching a grunt in the eye. It shrieked and stumbled back. The marine lunged and grappled the grunt's face-mask, ripping it from its face. The grunt began to choke and cough on the oxygen-filled air. Grunts can only breathe methane. The grunt fell, gagging.
One of the two blue-armored brutes moved fast towards the marine, only to shoot him cleanly in the head with a Spiker hand gun. He lurched back, face full of nearly-molten metal spikes. Other grunts ran to the choking one, helping him up and returning his face mask. One captured soldier turned to the gold-armored brute. Through clenched teeth, the marine hissed, "You brutes, are gonna to pay for this. You'll see. Were going to kick you ugly ass back into the stratosphe-" The marine was cut off, as the brute yelled, "SHUT UP!" The brute pulled out diabolical looking 2' long staff, the end of it sparking with electricity. The brute thrust the shock-staff into the marine. A jolt of blue flashed through his skeletal structure. The marine shook convulsively, stopped, and fell on his side, alive, but groaning in pain.
Frost saw his chance. "On three, throw grenades at the grunts, not the brutes, or else you might harm the marines," ordered Sgt. Frost, who's men replied with a whispered, "Yes sir." "One, two, three!" Objects fell atop the pack of grunts, who were startled by the impact of grenades at their feet. A group of half circle-shaped explosions sent grunt corpses hurtling through the air and into trees. The three person team emerged from the vegetation guns blazing. The brutes growled as one collapsed. The pilot ran to the cuffed marines while Frost and the ODST unleashed lead onto the two brutes. The pilot released one marine from the cuffs and moved to the next one. The gold brute pulled out his brute shot, firing a explosive projectile. It impacted next to the sergeant, killing the ODST and pushing back Frost. Frost, shaken, dove for cover. He reached for the dead brute's spike grenade and armed it. He tossed it and it lodged into the gold brutes helmet.
The brute ripped off the helmet, preparing to throw it. Right as the brute removed it, lowering the head gear to about his chest level, the an earth rattling explosion shook the ground. A cone of spikes flew up into the two remaining brutes, lodging in armor, piercing skin, puncturing organs, and slicing through skull. The brutes fell, one right after the other, with a sickening pulpy splatter, spilling blood on the wet forest floor.
Soon after the carnage, one of the young marines, a radio man, ran to his sergeant. "Sarge! Sarge! I've got a call from our forward command outpost. You know, the one where the flyboys went to support the Elites?" "Yes?" "They… have run into some trouble…" "Go on…" "There's a scarab wiping out the outpost, and they're requesting help…"
TO BE CONTINUED…
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