by Eric Nylund
The explosion Roland triggered at the sniper perch gave Team Two the go-ahead, though Roland was surprised they’d been in a position to follow so quickly on the heels of his and Jonah’s assault. Not that it bothered him. With two simultaneous stealth attacks against what the Covenant thought was an unknown outpost, the aliens would be in complete disarray. The timing of the second attack allowed each team a slightly increased window of opportunity, but there was still no room for delays.
Roland threw his second grenade. The two shieldless Elites went down, not dead, but out of the fight—one missing its legs at the knees and the other with a gaping wound in its stomach, intestines and fluid pouring forth onto the matted grass.
The remaining Elites once again lost their shields, this time for good. They wheeled around, trying to spot their attacker. Roland’s camo flickered, momentarily giving away his position, as he emptied his clip into the disoriented Elites.
Across the compound, Jonah had stepped into the barracks to find a dozen bewildered Covenant—six Grunts, two Jackals and four Elites, all with some level of confusion plastered on their faces.
The initial explosion had caught them off guard and the disruptor had removed their shields and deactivated their weapons. Now, still reeling from the effects of the flash bangs, the lot of them were essentially helpless. Not being one to waste the upper hand, Jonah pressed the issue, driven by a terrible motivation that sat at the heart of his hatred for the Covenant—the thought of his biological brothers and sisters, his mother and father, killed—murdered—vaporized into dust and ash during the Covenant’s sacking of Eirene.
As the first few silent rounds flashed from the muzzle of his M7S, impacting on the nearest Elite’s chest and throat, the momentary sadness brought on by the memory of his family’s smiling faces dissipated, replaced by joy.
THE STARK contrast between Jonah’s words—that wasn’t so bad—and the sight of him made his proclamation all the more surreal.
He stood calmly, coolly, on the lip of the slope that led to the Covenant barracks building. Even clad in full armor, the cockiness and pure confidence of his pose betrayed the shit-eating grin Roland was certain was plastered on his friend’s face. And then there was the blood.
How anything could be labeled as “not so bad” and yet involve that much carnage—Roland just laughed.
The remaining Covenant stood transfixed, bewildered by what they saw: Standing on a low ridge in the middle of their encampment was a sole combatant, a lowly human dog, coated in the blood and viscera of their brethren. Such a thing was unthinkable.
Once he was certain he had their complete and undivided attention, Jonah knelt, slowly—deliberately—never taking his eyes off his enraged foes.
In his right hand, Jonah held his combat knife, gripped blade back, eager for a fight. Thick chunks of flesh and clots of purple and green blood stuck to the blade’s edge—hanging in strings, like saliva from the maw of a ravenous beast. With his left hand, Jonah reached for the ground, pausing only briefly as he gripped something just out of sight.
Roland watched from the nearby shadows as he set the remainder of the charges along the rim of the final reactor. His suit’s active-camo function was quickly depleting its dedicated power supply, and he could see that the Covenant, though momentarily confused by Jonah’s presence, were beginning to tense up.
He sensed the energy in the atmosphere begin to charge; these last few survivors would not allow their lives to end as helpless victims to the assassins in their midst. A defiant glower on their faces, Roland saw three of the Elites draw their muscles taut—they were getting ready to make a move; ready to pounce. Their first steps on their so-called Great Journey may be mere seconds away, but the warriors’ code by which they lived meant these Elites would not die without a fight. Their sense of honor would not allow it, just as it would not allow them to be taunted by the murder of their kin, which is exactly what Jonah was doing—taunting them.
It’s what he always did—Every damn mission, Roland thought. He just can’t help but play with his food.
The eerie quiet that had settled upon the camp following the initial burst of violence gave Roland the sense that they were directly in the eye of the storm—that whatever hellish fury had played out only moments before, what was to come next would be worse, and it would be sudden.
He placed the last of the charges and locked the detonator’s receiver in the “on” position, then knelt and lifted a half-loaded Covenant carbine rifle from a dead Jackal’s grasp. He sighted the Elite nearest Jonah, the weapon’s aiming reticule drawn directly at the beast’s head—the instant he so much as twitched, a hail of radiation would liquefy his brain cavity.
Out in the open, the Covenant soldiers still frozen in disbelief, Jonah rose from his crouched position, a severed Elite head gripped tightly in his left hand. Jonah lifted the trophy high in the air, and then spoke for the first time since the encounter began: “Rolle, light ’em up.”
The lead Elite’s head rocked with three successive bursts from Roland’s scavenged carbine before its massive body slumped to the ground, lifeless.
The handful of Covenant survivors leveled their weapons at Jonah, who hefted the severed head and threw it full force at a Grunt about to unleash a fully charged blast from its quivering plasma pistol. The macabre projectile hit the Grunt in the chest, shaking it off balance and sending its plasma blast spiraling into the night sky.
The tiny, angry alien attempted to right itself, but not in time—Jonah had already removed his pistol and as the Grunt regained its bearing a single slug impacted its temple. Jonah then made short work of the scattered Grunts and Jackals displaced about the courtyard, while avoiding fire from the few Elites still in the fight.
He and Roland had the advantage of placing their enemies in a crossfire between Jonah’s slightly higher vantage and the tree line Roland used for cover, making it difficult for the Covenant to focus on just one attacker.
Roland finished off two more Elites but then his carbine trigger clicked empty.
A third Elite charged Jonah, whose attention was focused on wrapping up the only other surviving Covenant, a Kig-Yar cowering behind a personal energy gauntlet. As Jonah worked his way around the shield and planted two bullets in the Jackal’s side, Roland called a warning, “Jay, seven-o’clock,” and peppered the back of the Elite with his submachine gun, whittling away at its shield.
Jonah spun.
The Elite barreled toward him, only a few meters away, anger and hatred burning in its eyes. As if he were simply swatting a fly, Jonah tapped the trigger of his magnum twice, putting a bullet into each of the Elite’s kneecaps.
The beast fell.
Roland sprinted over as Jonah slid a new clip into his pistol.
The Elite struggled to lift itself—beaten, yet defiant. Unable to stand, it rested on its bloodied knees.
“Nice shot.” Roland bent down to grab a plasma pistol from the ground, sweeping the area for survivors as he rose.
“You softened him up.” Jonah walked toward the injured Elite, also checking the periphery for any signs of trouble.
“Still got some fight in you, big guy?” Jonah stopped just out of the Sangheili’s reach. “Ya know? Up close, you Slip-Lips aren’t so special. You know that, right?”
The Elite stared up as the two Spartans look down on it.
“I mean, really,” Jonah prodded. “I’ve always meant to ask . . . what makes you Covenant thugs think yer so damned special anyway? What gives you the right to do the things you do?”
The Elite passed his gaze from Jonah to Roland and back. “There is honor in our path,” he began, “you . . . your kind . . . humanity? You are nothing but a disease that must be wiped clean from this galaxy—a taint upon—”
“Yeah, well—this disease ain’t goin’ nowhere. In fact, seems ta me, it’s right up in yer goddamn face and there ain’t much’a damn thing you can do about it.”
“If we were to meet in b
attle as warriors—true warriors,” the Elite hissed, “you would fall, just as so many of your kind have fallen—to our swords and fire; under the weight of our boots. But you—you are not warriors. You are assassins. Weak and timid, you hide in the shadows—”
“Says the alien shit-heel who invented active-camo,” Jonah said. “Yeah, yer noble. How noble’s glassin’ a planet from orbit?” Jonah tapped the kneeling beast across his temple with an open hand. “Answer that.”
“Your influence must be expunged—eradicated—from the worlds you have fouled with your very presence—”
“I really don’t like this guy,” Roland interrupted. “Cut ’im loose, Jay. I think it’s past time we beat feet.”
“I fear not the path to the Great Journey beyond. I embrace it.” Though he was bloodied and gravely wounded, the Elite’s eyes welled with pride has he spoke.
“ ‘Great Journey,’ huh?” Jonah huffed. “What’s so great about it?”
The Elite stared directly at Jonah’s visor, making eye contact despite the fact he could not see Jonah’s face through the reflective surface. “You will never—”
In a blur of motion, Jonah’s hand flicked forward, plunging his blade hilt-deep into the side of the Elite’s neck.
The creature shuddered and lurched, sick wet gurgles bubbling up from its throat. It lunged for the blade, more reflex than an actual attempt to defend itself. Jonah stood motionless, holding his ground.
Purple-black blood seeped from the wound, dripping from the Elite’s split mandibles.
Jonah maintained his stance for a moment—looking down on his latest victim with disgust—then suddenly, violently wrenched his wrist, twisting the blade in place. “It was a rhetorical question, asshole,” he said, his voice a mix of disdain and boredom as he slid the blade out of the dying Elite’s neck.
In one fluid motion, he removed his M6C from its holster with his left hand, and kicked the alien to the mud-and blood-caked ground with a thud. As the heavy alien body settled, a sudden and silent flash burst from the muzzle of Jonah’s pistol as he fired a single round into his fallen enemy’s face—the bullet entering through the roof of its still-twitching mouth before exploding out the top of its thick skull, depositing itself, along with a myriad of brain bits and bone fragments, in the soft, soggy turf below.
“Overkill, don’t you think?” Roland offered, mockingly.
Jonah leveled his M6C dead center on the dead Elite’s chest, firing four more rounds, each whispered thwip of gunfire—thwip, thwip, thwip, thwip—answered by the kiss of punctured flesh and ventilated lung. “Better safe than sorry,” Jonah cracked back as he safetied his weapon and ran his blade along the armor-plating on his thigh, wiping away the residue of a battle well won.
“Yer funny.”
“Someone’s gotta put a smile on that grumpy face, Rolle, old boy.”
Roland checked his sensors and the power charge on his suit’s battery. “We got other places ta be and this joint is prime to blow—you ready to roll out?”
“Yeah.” Jonah paused as he gave the area one last visual sweep—Covenant carcasses and discarded weapons littered the campsite. “This place is dead anyway—”
As the last syllable escaped Jonah’s lips a sudden crackle of energy sparked in the cool night air.
FIVE
_____________
SOMETHING NEW
* * *
Roland’s body quaked—a violent, sudden spasm erupting from his torso and pulsing through his limbs in a series of aftershocks—then he seized as the muscles along his spinal column clinched and froze.
Jonah sprang back, instinctively taking up a defensive stance—pistol instantly off his hip and in firing position, the events before him slowing to a crawl.
For less than a second Roland stood perfectly upright and motionless before his body jerked with another forceful, involuntary start as the dual-pronged tips of a Covenant energy sword pierced his chest, sliding through his body and armor like wet paper. Jonah’s eye caught on the flicker of the blade’s plasma sizzling red with blood—the weapon’s dual blades protruded farther from his partner’s chest.
Shaking himself from his daze, Jonah unloaded his Magnum’s clip just over Roland’s shoulders.
The bullets pinging off something large, but unseen; each round harmlessly deflected into the night. A replacement magazine clicked home in the pistol before the last of the barrage’s shells hit the ground.
Roland’s muscles relaxed and he let out a gurgled, raspy cough, and a single, whispered word . . . “Clear . . .”
Everything—the blade, Roland, Jonah, the evening breeze—stopped for a handful of seconds—still and eerily serene; the only sound the pop and sizzle of the energy sword as it seared the flesh around and between the wounds.
Then, just as suddenly as it had appeared, the floating sword pushed forward with a quick, deliberate thrust before viciously being ripped up and away, exiting through the Spartan’s right shoulder, just below the neck. Upon reaching the apex of its arc, the energy sword shimmered then blinked out. Gone—but not gone.
The force of the swipe nearly cleaved Roland’s upper body in two, a thick geyser of blood spraying upward as the mortally wounded soldier slumped to the dirt, lifeless. As Roland fell, the spray of his blood coated a cloaked shape looming directly over his broken body.
Like an apparition, the smattering of crimson life danced in midair. Jonah couldn’t make out the exact shape of his enemy, but its weapon of choice suggested it was Sangheili. He brought his pistol to center mass on the red blot and sidestepped toward a downed Unggoy to his left.
The small, dead creature’s Plasma Pistol would come in handy if Jonah hoped to penetrate the cloaked Elite’s shield. Jonah had two additional disruptors, but he would need them at the next target site. Regardless of being a man down—friend or not—there was still a mission to accomplish.
As Jonah retrieved the alien weapon, he was sure his foe would attack.
Instead, the alien held its ground—showing an extraordinarily high level of restraint, even for an Elite. Usually Covenant warriors pressed any advantage—attacking in force until their enemies were overrun and slaughtered, but this one was different. It hadn’t taken part in the firefight between the Spartans and the rest of the camp’s Covenant contingent. It had stayed back—hidden; waiting.
For what? Sangheili weren’t cowards. Unlike the Unggoy and Kig-Yar, whose bravery and ferociousness most often relied squarely on the tide of battle, the Sangheili were uniformly fearless foes. Why would this one in particular wait until its colleagues were beaten before launching its assault?
Jonah wanted answers to these questions—craved the hows and whys—but more than anything he just wanted this creature dead. He wanted to see the life drain from its eyes. Wanted to revel in its death.
He felt rage well up inside—like a weight pressing down against his chest—as he gripped the Plasma Pistol and began to rise, pointing both of his weapons at the bloodstained blur across the yard.
Motion trackers should’ve caught him before he got close, Jonah thought, running through the past twenty seconds, grasping for logic in this surprise attack—in his friend’s death.
He squeezed the trigger on the plasma pistol, building a charge as he and the alien circled one another. He and Roland liked to goof—liked to have fun—but they were careful. Damn careful. And way too skilled to have their partnership ended in such an ignoble fashion—taken unaware by a lone Elite.
Hazarding a glance at Roland’s mangled body, Jonah’s mind raced. “Goddamn it,” he shouted. “How’d you do it, you sonuvabitch? How’d you get the drop?”
Jonah released the plasma pistol’s trigger, sending a large green burst of energy careening toward the ghostly blood smear. The Elite tried to leap out of the way, but the plasma blast tracked its target, catching the alien in its side just below the rib cage. The beast let out an angered cry as its active-camouflage and its shielding sparkled with ti
ny flecks of electricity and faded, revealing an Elite warrior like none Jonah had ever seen. The Elite seemed like any other in terms of its size and physical makeup, but was made more imposing by the sleek, custom armor that covered its entire body, including a full-faced helmet with a cycloptic visor port wrapping from right to left. There was also an odd shifting in the armor’s coloring, as if it were analyzing and adapting to its environment, the base color of the armor adjusting, changing to blend with the background, making it hard to focus on the alien’s movements. While not as effective as active-camouflage, this new chameleonlike feature definitely provided a strategic advantage.
Squinting to get a clearer view, Jonah noticed the armor itself was more rounded—more elegant—than the typically segmented Sangheili battlefield attire and was adorned with etched detailing, which was hard to make out in the low light, but seemed to have a purpose similar to war paint—ornate and aggressive. This Elite may not want to be seen, but clearly wanted any who got a good look to understand completely, and without question, that he meant business.
Jonah followed the plasma blast with a barrage of bullets from his pistol, lightly feathering the trigger for maximum rate of fire.
But this Elite was too fast. Jonah hit his mark with a few rounds but the nimble alien easily avoided the rest; an unsettling turn of events for a marksman of Jonah’s caliber.
Jonah holstered his pistol and pulled his fully loaded SMG from his back, bringing it to bear on the Elite, cocking the weapon in one fluid twist, but the alien’s shields and camo recovered from the plasma hit.
“There’s no way,” Jonah said shocked. “Well, Rolle, buddy,” Jonah already missed his friend more than he cared to admit, “looks like we got ourselves somethin’ new with this one.”
Jonah flipped on his suit’s VISR enhanced vision. Luminescent tracers marked the edges of buildings, trees, abandoned weapons and corpses, giving a defining edge to everything in Jonah’s line of sight.