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Over The Line; Part 1
Posted By: AmokTheClown<jake.oconnell@defence.gov.au>
Date: 10 December 2003, 4:14 AM
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'Trenchcoat this is Nighteyes, Contact, enemy contact my position'
Sergeant Chilsa swore under his breath. He'd anticipated this move by the covenant. No, he'd expected this move. One does not simply wipe out and enemy stronghold and hold it without retaliation.
'Copy that Nighteyes, fall back to this Loc."
Sergeant Chilsa moved through the confined headquarters area to the radio operator stationed across from him.
'Wake them up, private, switch all broadcasts to the open channel, then go out there and join your squad.'
Private 'Stan' Stanascovich gave a slight nod before he opened the Comm channels.
"All units, this is phone booth. Enemy contact, delta quadrant, stand too. All units stand too."
Stan didn't need to be told twice. He switched the broadcast mode to automatic and grabbed his rifle, sprinting out of the HQ area. A quick glance over his shoulder saw the Sergeant preparing his gear for the ensuring battle that was fast approaching. Stan tilted his rifle to the side, grabbed the cocking handle and reefed the working parts back, then, with a satisfying KERCHACK-released them, cocking the weapon. It always surprised him how quick his weapons drills were in situations like this.
Overlooking a white-gray desert somewhere in delta quadrant, Corporal Streep watched a mixed unit of covenant ground troops advance through 'The Gauntlet'-a valley that ran straight up to the front steps of their main position.
Even with the night vision scope of his S2 AM Sniper Rifle he had trouble making out the exact size and numbers of the enemy units. Snow fall had increased over the last twenty minutes and reports from Tactical Land Command indicated that a storm front was headed their way. Something that they really didn't need, now that the Covenant had assembled a force big enough to take back their stronghold.
The prized piece of real estate, unofficially called 'Munin', was the UNSC's former forward base of operations. Established at the site due to a structure that was built into a cliff wall. The hallways of the structure travel deep into a series of catacombs and chambers. But that wasn't the only reason the area was heavily fortified. Deep inside the stronghold, throughout a series of heavily guarded rooms were devices that had been uncovered-The Covenant had been studying these devices up until UNSC forces overran the site.
All but one artifact had been ferried to the UNSC cruiser 'Archeron' that was in geo-synchronous orbit. Priorities had changed with the discovery and after a few weeks into the operation all ground forces deployed had began a steady withdrawal off the planet, destroying installations as they went. This was their last foothold on the planet, only needing to repel attackers until the remaining artifacts were removed. A hard thing to do when undermanned.
Sergeant Chilsa knew this all to well as he moved to Munin's upper rampart that overlooked The Gauntlet. But on the other hand, his idea of manpower was a battalion positioned at the front steps each manning their own M41 LAAG. Its not as though he was naked-two Scorpion MBT's dug in with a clear line of sight down the Gauntlet. Two more on either side of the valley walls ready for tank hunting. On the ramparts and covering the main entrances were Shade gun emplacements and at ground zero were five Warthogs. But for all this awesome firepower, Chilsa knew the firefight would be short and brutal. Estimates on the Covenant strength was in excess of five times they're own excluding air and fire support.
It almost seemed to Chilsa that everything that could have gone wrong had. The Acheron had sustained heavy damage to its pelican launch bays; emergency repairs were in place to reactivate them. The ten craft that actually remained fully functional were practically sealed in the hangers. Soon, the Covenant would have air supremacy. Only one item remained to be transported, but it was not moving from its bunker until the dropships arrived from the Acheron.
A voice exploded over the Comm-net.
"Trenchcoat this is Nighteyes, contact. Enemy contact in a big way over"
Chilsa hit the transmit panel on his headset.
"This is Trenchcoat, report"
The transmission dropped out for a few moments, the background pockmarked with plasma fire.
"Main force is maneuvering up the gauntlet. Huge amounts of fire support. Sensors are off the scale. Can't hold out sir. We're being overrun... I'm... I'm about to gift wrap it sir. Streep out"
Earlier that morning, Corporal Streep's men had buried a series of demolition charges into the valley wall at a crucial bottleneck that would bring enemy forces into a tight formation. The charges we supposed to be remote detonated, but the counter attack had been orchestrated relatively quickly, not giving the demolition experts time to complete the task.
Moments later a huge rumble cascaded down the valley. A huge bass tone shook Munin to its foundations. Sergeant Chilsa looked desperately out into the impenetrable white wall that enveloped his position. Looking for a fireball, looking for something. Something to show that Corporal Streep's sacrifice hadn't been in vain.
Looking for a miracle.
Chilsa's heart sank, though the image was grainy and distorted by the amount of snow falling, through the eyes of his range finder, he could make out the covenant force moving over the rubble of the landslide. At least a quarter of their force was buried under their feet.
Not even a dent thought Chilsa.
The Covenant advance continued.
"Alright" Chilsa spoke gruffly into his helmet mike "lets give this scum something to remember us by, alpha and bravo guns, online, I want a wall of lead coming down on these Covenant bastards. Shell any dense concentrations you see. Charlie and Delta guns, keep that fire support off of us, once the main body comes under your guns, move to a new position, maintain hull down"
A chorus of acknowledgements strolled across the Comm-net.
"Fire team Charlie, stamp out their officers. Anything less then chaos is not acceptable. Fire team Zulu... you know what to do."
Chilsa nodded to Lieutenant Turley and jogged down to his warthog, jumping up onto the LAAG. He hit the cocking mechanism, listening to the autoloaders cycle through their checklist. A green button light flashed; indicating the weapon was armed.
Satisfied, he opened up the Comm-net again.
"We hold them off long enough for the drop ships, then we get the hell out"
Chilsa swatted the driver on his shoulder and the warthog lurched forward, taking up position with the rest of the troop. Running over in his mind the brief he'd been given by Lieutenant Turley- ten minutes, they were expected to last ten minutes against a covenant force of this size.
He needed twenty.
The dropships that were inbound were on approach vectors from halfway across the planet. The Acheron had to maintain its position, hidden from the covenant destroyers in the planet's shadow, keeping it relatively safe. But that relative safety had crippled the flight decks for many hours, forcing the crew to jerry-rig a fuel point outside of the cruiser just to maintain the few craft that were airborne.
"And another thing marines, if those sons-of-bitches breach the inner sanctum, our man inside gonna light this firecracker. And ain't none of you be waiting for any dropship."
His voice became a low growl.
"Do you get me?"
The Master Sergeant didn't need his headset to hear the reply that boomed out from the myriad of gun pits and concealed positions. He nodded smartly to no one in particular.
"Damn right you do."
Private Jessop was situated in fighting pit alpha. From where he was positioned, he felt that the only other situation that had ever matched this one was...
Christmas shopping.
The amount of targets that we strolling across the sights of his S2 AM Sniper Rifle; he was almost giggling with excitement. Nearly all of the other snipers felt the same. All twenty of them had their weapons trained on the Elite officers that were advancing towards them along the gauntlet. Hidden in their concealed positions, they were impossible to detect, with the added advantage of snow falling, thermal sensors would be useless.
The Covenant were walking into a fire alley.
The worst possible kind of fire alley too. Land Command had left a large contingent of snipers to deal with the covenant in a way that the despised, and suffered greatly under. Covenant forces always fought at relative close range, engaging enemies with energy weapons at range proved to be ineffective, due to the speed of their projectiles. The UNSC didn't have this problem, due to the fact that the majority of their weapons were supersonic. Human warfare had evolved in a way that didn't have the moral indignity of ground warfare at long range.
"Marking" Jessop whispered into his headset.
The Sniper element also had the advantage of digital markers they could place on their targets. These markers were assigned, then relayed to the other members of the squad, stopping them from wasting rounds on the same target.
Twenty shots rang out in quick unison like a western rodeo whip cracking convention. Supersonic rounds screaming through the air like hyperactive swallows at mach seven. But no vapor trails this time, further adding to the snipers advantage, the snowfall was concealing it.
Nineteen bloodied, dead Elite's dropped.
Then a second, lone shot slit the air with a CRACK.
Twenty Elite's lay dead on the ground.
Another volley of sniper fire filled the air. Tendrils of smoke quickly fading into the snow.
Twenty more targets hit the ground, spewing purple blood from horrible wounds. Many of them were headless.
The Covenant responded quickly to this unexpected threat, hordes of Jackals activated their energy shields and formed a protective wall in front of the Elite's, who were now marshaling the grunts into a wall of canon-fodder at the foremost of the advancing force. The Grunts moved quickly, fearing the wrath of their masters more then the humans. This effectively blocked Fire Team Charlie's line of fire, they would have to wait.
The Elite officers couldn't have picked a worse response.
Lieutenant Turley had briefed the gun crews on this maneuver Elite officers used regularly. Two M808B Scorpion Main Battle Tank Turrets swiveled into position, barrels dipping. Crew Commander Corporal 'Flex' Jones smiled curtly as he pulled the trigger.
At least three of the Elite's got their own up-close-and-personal slice of Armageddon down on the valley floor. Two huge explosions rocked the earth beneath the feat of the hapless aliens, shattering the air around them. The shells detonating with in all their glory hurling hunks of flesh and armor into the air. Their personal bodyguard didn't have it any better either. Pieces of them rained down on the surrounding area.
A few seconds later, Alpha and Bravo guns joined the fray, hurling 90mm High Velocity shells downrange. Two fireballs blossomed up from amid the Covenant ranks, Bodies following shortly afterwards. Four 7.62mm coaxial guns ignited the air with tracer, creating something akin to special effects from a science fiction film. The four Scorpion tanks shook with vibrations from the amount of fire they rained down on the enemy.
A voice exploded over the Comm-net.
"Enemy air, inbound. Three flights of banshee's approaching at speed. ETA 30 seconds, look alive. Get that anti-air mobile"
Sergeant Chilsa slapped his driver's helmet.
"FIRE TEAM ZULU, MOUNT UP!"
Five Warthogs exploded from their concealed positions, engines screaming. Snow spitting from the wheels as they tried to grab traction. The rear gunners traversing the guns to track the aircraft as they started they're attack run. The three barreled machine guns spun at an incredible rate as they spat shells into the air. Three Banshee's went down in a huge explosion; they're destroyed chassis' tumbling end over end into the ground.
Corporal Jones swiveled the turret of his MBT, searching for the fire support that was supposedly tailing the main force of Covenant. He was about to choose a more opportune target when his targeting lens flared blue then white. He followed the fluorescent blue plasma projectile for a moment before speaking into his headset.
"All units, incoming enemy fire support" just as he finished, five more plasma mortar rounds shot into the sky.
"Six incoming, I say again, six incoming bombs, logging trajectories, wait, over"
Jones started punching buttons furiously, trying to persuade the Scorpion's fire control computer to give him the grid co-ordinates of the incoming plasma bombs. A small loading bar appeared on the screen, changing colors as it filled. A split second later, figures and diagrams flashed on the screen, then a 3-D representation of the Gauntlet, small indicators flashing where the bombs were predicted to land.
"Oh, no"
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