Outside the red clay facility gives you a decent view of the surrounding area as well as the sky which was the whole reason the facility was there in the first place.

---

Several hours had passed with no excitement inside or out. It was looking to be yet another boring day on this planet. When suddenly the makeshift warning lights kicked on and started flashing a silent warning to those outside. This was known to everyone to be the signal that the enemy has entered the system and they should ready themselves.

Aaron saw the lights kick on and tapped his comm twice to give his confirmation and ready his group. He was in charge of the north set of exterior EMP turrets. He sprinted towards one of the spider holes they were hidden in and slide in, making sure that the cover was placed back to make it look like nothing was amiss. As he sat and waited, he tapped his finger against the lever that would pop him up and out to fire upon incoming ships.

Scorch hurried outside and gave his turret a once over before hopping in the seat and strapping in. He opened the comm and with his usual sense of humor hailed Scorp. "Torchwood to Red Leader, come in Red Leader!"

Aaron hissed as he heard someone talk over the comms. He was pretty sure that everyone knew about the comms silence order. In response he clicked his comm on and simply went "Sssshhhhhhh." he hoped that Scorch would catch on and if the enemy could hear them that they would think it was nothing but static.

Scorch rolled his eyes and leaned back in the turret seat. Nobody around here could take a joke. Just waiting was boring anyway. At least if they talked on the comms, it should bring the enemy right to them.

Aaron heard all the clicks and brought up his own radar, front-and-center. It was no where near as powerful as Spook's radar so he had to wait a few seconds before anything appeared. He hoped that others would be doing this since they couldn't get a visual while hidden.

Wonderful....I feel like we're in ancient Africa. Scorch thought as he brought up his radar, using Spook's clicks to direct his turret.

The sound of the approaching ships could be heard as the grew closer. When they reached predetermined distance, the turrets automatically popped from the ground. "Aim for the landing craft! Priority!" Aaron shouted as he hit the trigger and laced the air with ion blasts.

"No need to shout, boss." Scorch told him as he squeezed the trigger, sweeping his turret's barrel through the air and filling the air with ion blasts as well

The air suddenly lit up with the blue of ion blasts from the turrets on the ground as they sprang from the ground. The sudden attack caught the ships off guard and within seconds, three of the ships were soaring towards the ground their edges traced with crackling energy. The remaining ships began heavy evasive maneuvers and a few returned fire.

"Just making sure you catch the air of urgency there Scorch." Aaron said as he tried hitting the, surprisingly agile, landing craft.

"Oh I know the urgency here, boss." Scorch replied as he moved the turret back and forth, filling the air with plasma fire. He hated shooting at incoming ships, the pilots were always capable of dodging. It just wasn't fair, then again he'd rather be shooting fish in a barrel if he had a choice.

"Come here you weaselly son-of-a-bitch." Aaron said as the landing craft continued to evade. He finally got a lucky shot and landed a hit on the rear of the ship which shorted out the engines and brought it down rather ungracefully.

As the initial shock of the ambush wore off, the enemy fliers got their act together and began their counter-attack. A turret erupted in flames near Aaron and Scorch as a bomb found its mark. Also, not immediately noticeable, the larger ship was turning to make a decent into the fray.

Despite the fact that people have begun dying around him, Aaron couldn't get the smile off his face, thankfully it was hidden under the mask. He always loved the feeling of a large weapon in his hands, and you couldn't get much bigger then a mounted turret. He caught Spook's info and focused fire on that area and peppered a fighter coming in for another run on the turrets.

---

Spook not particularly equipped to deal with a direct assault, rushed to the top of the facility where the observation deck was. Here she could spot enemy targets and using the system, send nav-points to the teams on where best to ether condense fire, or where the enemy would be coming from. Being at the top level of the facility made her somewhat vulnerable with the rest of the spotters, but hopefully the shields, which gave the sky a sort of muted orange haze, highlighted on coming enemy, and projected a very helpful latitude and longitude, would protect them. 

Spook saw them on her radar before she saw them visually. It looked like two squadrons of fighters escorting two landing craft. To make matter worse, there appeared to be a faint outline of something larger hanging out in the upper most atmosphere. There were on a quick approach, heading down towards the planet.

Spook had heard the order about radio silence so she immediately began to relay the series of clicks that communicated the locations of the incoming swarm.

The air suddenly lit up with the blue of ion blasts from the turrets on the ground as they sprang from the ground. The sudden attack caught the ships off guard and within seconds, three of the ships were soaring towards the ground their edges traced with crackling energy. The remaining ships began heavy evasive maneuvers and a few returned fire.

As the bubble around her ignited with energy signatures, Spook used her left hand to relay the positional information through code. This helped keep down radio chatter which could become confusing. It left the airways open for more concerning matters. With her right hand she assigned markers to the more troublesome ships, carriers, weapons platforms and any ship that looked particularly resilient to fire. Marking these allowed tracking missiles to zero in on the hard targets more effectively.
She saw one of their birds go down and keyed her radio to Shaft. "Tav, we've got a falcon down in sector 8, I'm marking it for you now. I repeat, wounded on the ground in sector 8. Follow the nav-point."

As the initial shock of the ambush wore off, the enemy fliers got their act together and began their counter-attack. A turret erupted in flames near Aaron and Scorch as a bomb found its mark. Also, not immediately noticeable, the larger ship was turning to make a decent into the fray.

"She's coming back around!" Spook called into the mike. "Concentrate fire on aerial sectors, sectors one five one through two two four. Marking targets now!" Spook magnified the image of the larger ship, pinpointing what looked to her like weak points, fuel containers and weapons bays.

Tavish came barreling out of the base, skidding among the troops and managing to do the miracle of not hitting anyone and not actually getting hit as well. Well, the warthog took a hit or two, but they were heading towards the crashed ships. "We got any big enemies out here I should avoid?" he asked Spook as they continued towards their target.

Scorch saw the beast of a ship twirling around. Taking Spook's directions, he whirled his turret towards it and opened fire, reigning down hot molten plasma along the possible fuel containers. He knew if it got closer he should aim for the weapons bays, so it couldn't fire at them, but if he could take it out before then...

The ship had already started firing on them as it began to descend towards the ground. As it got closer they could tell that it was something along the lines of a heavy assault carrier, probably what the smaller ships came from. The ground shook with every energy blast that struck it, and a few more explosions could be heard from destroyed turrets. The good news is that the recovery warthogs had been deployed so some of the heat had been taken of the stationary targets and onto the mobile ones.

"Someone shoot that bitch down please!" Spook ordered into the comm, assigning three more target flags to the menacing ship.

"Don't avoid the big ones, just line me- Oh..." Stitch was silenced by the sight of the large ship, before releasing the charge he'd set up in his Spartan laser, right in it's direction. "Think that's the big enemy Shaft?" He continued charging and firing, despite the ground's shaking making aiming hard, despite aiming not being his top priority on something so big right now. But it was still polite to ask. "Where this thing's weak spot?"

"Believe me, we're trying." Aaron shouted over everything going on. Damn this thing was taking a pounding and didn't seem to be flinching. "Can we get anything else on this damn thing?" He called out over the comms, hoping he could get a hold of anyone that could provide a little assistance.

"We can't concentrate on that just yet..." Tavish said, sliding about in the warthog and making it skid around to avoid a shot that reigned down from above. Mud splattered the side, but that was the only consequence "We've got soldiers to bring in." He'd been given orders to come out and fetch wounded as best he could, and that's what he was going to do.

"You're the heavy hitter, aren't you, boss?" Scorch responded as he concentrated his fire on the fuel containers, there was no point in changing it to the weapon bays now. If he had actually made some progress in weakening the shields and hull at the fuel tanks, it would be prudent to continue to fire there

"Yea, but this thing just isn't packing quite the same punch you'd want from heavy artillery." Aaron said, "Stupid turrets are just shocking the big bastard." About that time there was a dual roar as two Saber fighters ripped by over head and two large explosions ripped open the hull of the carrier. "Saber one to Spartan - Scorp. Got your back up there on the carrier. Seems we caught the eye of some of its escort. We are going to draw them away into the atmosphere where the rest of the task force is waiting."

Spook spoke to her fellow spotters, organizing ground support where it was most needed.


"Right." Stitch shook his head. He had a job to do. He just hoped the ship would wait till he was done. "Just get me closer, I'll path them up." He gave one futile last shot at the ship, just to make sure the gun didn't have a charged beam before he put it on his back.

"This ain't looking too good..." the ship had gone down right near the big attacking... thing. he wasn't sure what to even call that. "Stay low," Tavish told Stitch firmly, skidding along and slamming against a large goo suit, rolling over it with ease "Don't want you injured too."
Tavish found a clutch of allied wounded being futilly protected by three or four minorly injured Marines, all using a crashed Pelican for cover.
"Get on." Tavish said at once, parking as close as possible to the team without actually running them over, and hoping down from the driver's seat to help the injured on.

The incoming fire dwindled down to nothing as the heavy carrier listed to its side before gaining momentum before crashing hard into the ground. It was doubtful they would be able to salvage anything from that flaming wreckage. The rest of the operating fighters had already left the atmosphere in pursuit of the two Sabers.

"Looks like the heat's off from above guys." Aaron said, anyone else needing assistance?" He asked as he hopped off his turret and looked around to see the damage.

This all felt like a bad video game to Spook.

Stitch helped on the injured along with Shaft. "We'll patch you up." He took out his health pack from his back, replacing it with his spartan laser. "It's gonna take a bit of time to get to all of you, but I hope you'll all pull through." It would likely take longer for them to heal as well, but at least covering wounds would work for now, he hoped.

"Hope you're used to doing this on the fly," Tavish said, placing some more of the wounded onto the warthog. When everyone was secured and being treated by Stitch he start off, heading back up towards the garage in order to drop them off for the medics. "How are we doing up there guys? Any injured?" he said into his microphone, trying to contact the others.

"We're doing as good as we can." Aaron said when he heard Tavish over the comm. He looked around at the now flaming turrets around them. "No survivors out of those that got hit on the turrets. Go ahead and drop of your injured and then come over to me. We still have the troop transports and that carrier to clear. Spook, can you see anything crawling out of those wrecks?"

"Nothing yet." Spook answered him. "There's too much smoke, but the moment I do you'll be the first to know."

"Alright, good. Keep an eye on the carrier wreckage. It has the highest chance of survivors." Aaron said as he turned to Scorch and waved him over.

Scorch hopped free from the cannon and walked over to Aaron, "Yeah, boss?"

At Aaron's response, Stitch didn't even turn his attention away from the injured as he spoke to Tavish. "Get us going, we need to get them somewhere safe." At this point, he was resorting to simply putting bandages on holes in the bodies, hoping they would hold out till a safe place.

"Yes sir." Spook told him and informed her fellow spotters that she was heading out. She hoisted Baby onto her back and headed beyond the shields, searching for a vantage point to better see the downed carrier.

Aaron watched as Stitch and Tavish drove by towards the base. "Once they get back, we are going to go and help secure the wreckages till Command gets a hold of us."

"Oh goodie. More standing around and doing nothing while waiting for orders." Scorch replied, saluting Aaron with a nod.

"All part of the job." Aaron said, clapping Scorch on the shoulder. "Maybe we'll get lucky and there'll be something to shoot when we get there."

"That's doubtful, there was hardly anything here to shoot in the first place." Scorch told him with a shake of his head

"I think they kept most of their forces up in space." Aaron said as he started an internal power-up and starting check list for his gun incase they do run into something out there. "In that case, the flyboys got most of the action."

With the aid of a grav lift Spook achieved the position she needed to keep an eye on the downed carried and Tavish.

"And they think we're glory hounds?" Scorch replied as he hefted his trusty flamethrower from the holster on his back. He hoped the chance arose to use it, fire being so beautiful and all...

As Spook made it to her spot and looked back down her scope, she saw that something had happened while she was on the move. It looked like a small group of Marines near the downed enemy transport had come under fire from a few Emeralds that had survived. They were currently holding cover behind their ruined warthog. "We got enemy infantry at the troop transport! Need fire support!" came the call over the comms.

Tavish emerged from the entrance of the base, the cart empty now. There weren't that many survivors, unfortunately. "You guys hear that?" he asked, motoring towards the downed enemy ship and the troops taking fire.

"I've got Emeralds pinning down a group of ours sir." Spook told Scorp over the comms, her voice was interspersed by sniper fire as she opened up on the emeralds. The first of the green helmets exploded, impacted by her new explosive rounds.

"Thanks Spook. Assist how you can and keep an eye out for flanking units or reinforcements." Aaron said to Spook before responding to the Marine's call, "Roger Marine, you've got Spartans inbound and one over your shoulder. Stay low and stay alive. Tavish, me and Scorch are heading out on foot, can you pick us up on your way in?"

Tavish tried not to snort at the "stay alive" comment, instead he nodded and said "Sure. Better hot foot it." He would pick them up, no doubt, but he didn't want to go too far out of his way to get to them. They were after the marines after all, arriving their late wasn't a good idea.

Scorch groaned at the thought of having to catch a warthog. He holstered his flamethrower, sad by the simple fact that he just took it out and began hoofing it towards the beacon on his HUD. Emeralds...Emeralds were good opponents.

Spook continued to take out as many little green helmets as she could. "They're like ants sir." She told Scorp over their comms.

"Gotta be an end to them eventually, Spook. Just keep killin' em as you see 'em." Aaron said as he lumbered along as fast as he could. He could see the wreckage, but was still too far away to be of any help.

Tavish pulled up in front of Aaron and Scorch, pausing the car for them to climb in quickly. They needed to get down there fast.

Aaron quickly hopped onto the Warthog once it arrived. He just hoped that they would get there in time.

Scorch jumped into the passenger seat and hung his flamethrower out the side. "Punch it Shaft."

Tavish let out a huffing noise, then sped off so fast it almost rocked the passengers free. "What's it look down there A- Spook?" he asked, bouncing off a damaged armour on the road.

Stitch, now that the survivors were safe, had taken to holding his laser out of the back, looking around, ready to fire. "So I'm just gonna try and blast as many of those green bastards as I can, right?"

"Like an ant farm." Spook told him. "SHIT!" They'd located her and began opening fire. "I've got to change posi-" Her transmission went dead with the sound of goo weapons fire, but she was on the move, utilizing her suit's active camo to relocate. She was glad for the surplus of local grav-lifts.

"Contact us once you get moved." Aaron said, he was worried for a second that they might have gotten her, but he brushed it away. He knew she was better then that. The warthog flew over a hill and the scene was laid before them clearly. The troop transport was getting reinforcements from the downed carrier that fell a few hundred feet away. The Marines were all huddled together as their cover was slowly whittled away. "Shaft, drop us off over there." He said as he pointed towards the incoming line of armors from the carrier. "We can hold them off while you get those Marines outta there. Stitch, you stay in the Hog and help keep the Armors off Shaft. Once you get the Marines back to the compound you come back and help us out."

"Alright, but you better be prepared to jump." Tavish said with a grunt, making straight for the line. When they told him to drop them off by the armors, he was planning on getting them as close as possible. Perhaps even going through a few on the way. it would be a distraction to draw the fire from the Marines at least.

As Tavish hit the line of Armors, quite literally, Aaron said, "Now Scorch!" and leaped from the Warthog pulling his gun from its resting spot on his armor. He smiled as he heard the familiar sound of the barrels spinning up before punching neat little holes into the armors ahead of them.

Scorch grinned as he jumped from the warthog, squeezing the trigger on his flamethrower and filling the air full of super hot liquid fire. "Burn baby burn!"

As one jumped on the warthog and attempted to rearrange Tavish's face, it's head suddenly exploded as Spook sent a round in what might as well be the back of it's skull.

---

Tavish stuck a thumb up for Spook to see, then promptly slammed the hand down to smash the head of a armour that was trying to climb over his bonnet. He made a turn at a safe distance, and started coming back.

---

"Alright Shaft. We got 'em preoccupied for the moment. You get those Marines outta there." Aaron said as he continued to punch holes into the armors so Scorch's flames could find the gooey inside and burn them out.

---

"Alright lads, all in!" Tavish yelled as he pulled up alongside the injured men "I'll get you up there in no time, I promise!"

---

The Marines wasted no time in hoping into the available seats on the Warthog. "We're all on! Let's go!" hollered one of the Marines as he fired on an armor that peeked out for too long.

---

Tavish hit the gas, motoring away. "I'll come back and grab you soon." he said into the microphone, talking to Scorch and Aaron "Just don't die while I'm bringing these guys back."

---

"More on your location." Spook told Scorch and Aaron. "Red... green... one diamond. They look pretty pissed boys, setting sights on the diamond." Considering they were generally more dangerous than the others.

---

Scorch sprayed his flames back and forth, creating a fiery wall for the armors to try and cross. "Come on! You bunch of cowards!"

---

"Didn't plan to Shaft." Aaron said as Tavish drove away. When he heard Spook point out more incoming enemies he brought his attention back to the fight. "Alright Spook, I see 'em." He knew that the diamonds were pretty tough to take down and hoped she would be able to take him down herself. "How you doing over there Scorch?"

---

"Just peachy boss!" Scorch shouted as an emerald ducked past the flames and knocked the weapon from his hands. He growled and rolled with the blow. When he came to his feet, he had brandished his katana. It worked well enough the last time..."Can't talk right now though."

Aaron looked over real quick and saw the Emerald close the distance on Scorch. He knew he wouldn't be able to help him or they'd be overrun. "Understood. Let me know if you need assistance."

The Emerald saw Scorch draw his katana and come back up, if it had a mouth it would have sneered. The Armor brandished its rifle, holding it so it could effectively use the bayonet.

It was comforting to know that the one he fought earlier wasn't just a fluke. It seemed that the Emerald were more honor-bound that the others. Scorch rolled his shoulders and readied himself. "Won't need it boss, but thanks for the offer." He replied to Scorp. He gestured with his hand that the opponent should move closer. "Come on, slime ball."

The Emerald let out a small growl before charging forward and bringing the bayonet around like a wild hatchet.

"Hey Spook? Think you could mark 'em for an airstrike?" Aaron called over the comms. "If anything just let the flyboys know we need them to dismember a few more armors here."

Scorch blocked the bayonet strike effortlessly. He was astonished by the sheer force behind the attack however. He batted the rifle away and brought his blade about to slash at the creature's chest.

The Emerald's reaction was delayed as it tried to dodge backwards. The sword caught it in the chest and left a two inch gouge in the armor. It also caused the armor to fall over onto its back, which it quickly tried to get back up.

Scorch swiftly closed the gap between them and brought his sword down for the coup de gra.(sp?) He brought his sword in to take off his opponent's head. "Diamond edging is excessive...they said..." He mumbled and scoffed as he saw just how useful the excessiveness had turned out to be

The Emerald didn't have a chance as its head rolled cleanly off.

---

Flames erupted on the helmet of one of the diamonds as Spook tried to take one of the commanders out. What looked like glass chips exploded, glinting in the sun, catching the light and casting prismatic rainbows for a moment. In the instant later, more flakes of diamond as a second shot ripped through the diamond's exposed face.

What remained of the Diamond's head fell to the ground and the creature stumbled around, one half of him not working while the other fought to keep itself up. It looked around, trying to see where the attacks were coming from.

Spook was high up on one of the taller buildings. With a teleporter behind her she could make a quick escape. As she saw the diamond searching for it's attacker, she unloaded another three shots into the thing's chest area. "Go down fucker..." She whispered to it from her vantage point.

The three rounds to the chest seemed to do the trick. With its center mass exposed and the remnants of burned goo oozing out, the thing flopped over and lay motionless.

"Hey Spook? Think you could mark 'em for an airstrike?" Aaron called over the comms. "If anything just let the flyboys know we need them to dismember a few more armors here."

"I gotta switch ammo." Spook told him. "Gime a sec." Spook ejected baby's half full mag and loaded a standard four round mag filled with beacon indicators. These did not need to be fired with such accuracy, but in case the armors went on the move, she made her shots as accurate as possible. Little orange indicators splattered with sticky adhesive onto the backs of the center most armor in the groups that were spreading out from the wreckage. The boys overhead would have range indicators to tell them where to fire.

---

Tavish didn't meet any opposition on his way back to the headquarters and there were medics waiting to take any wounded off his Warthog. One soldier ran up to him, "Is this all there was?"

"Pretty much. Not many survivors." Tavish said grimly "I'll keep an eye out." He sped away, heading back towards the others. He could see they were having some issues with an armour.

That was an understatement. The line of Armors was thinner now, but was still pushing towards the Spartan's position with speed.

There was a "THUD" as Tavish hit an armour, then promptly stopped on top of it. "Get in guys." he said, nodding to the other two "Unless you're not done playing with these overgrown dolls."

"Alright. Understood." Aaron said as he mowed down one last armor before hopping onto Tavish's Warthog. "We need to move, now! Gotta airstrike inbound on the marked positions and I already told them not to hold back."

Scorch groaned when he heard Scorp's orders. He sighed and bent down, scooping up the severed head of his opponent. He cupped it under his arm and hopped onto the back of the warthog. "Tech heads never did give me back the last one."

Aaron shook his head at Scorch's trophy. "Alright Shaft, get us the hell outta here!" he yelled as the sound of approaching jets could be heard.

As Shaft tore away from the following armors, with Scorch and Scorp onboard, the sound of the Sabers could be heard soaring through. They ripped past at high speed followed shortly by a rippling explosion on the ground that engulfed the carrier and cruiser remnants along with the armors. "Saber 1-5 to ground forces. Hope that helped ya out." the pilot called over the comms as they left the atmosphere. "Thanks for the assist Saber 1-5, we would have gotten them eventually." Aaron replied. Before the Spartans made it back to base, the comm opened again. "Spartans, we need you to report to the back of the compound. They need you for a quick mission off planet, we have a bird waiting for ya." Aaron responded, "Roger, Spartans on the way. Make your way there Spook."

---

"10-4 sir." Spook said, already on the move to a new location. She engaged her cloaking and diverted her course, only disengaging it when the threat of immediate danger was behind her.

"Off world? Lovely." Scorch said with a nod. He tucked the emerald head beneath his arm, "But I'll be damned if they get to 'study' this one."

"Wonderful." Tavish grumbled. It seemed as if he and Spook barely got a time alone lately. And they had some reasons to be alone together. He sighed, but kept on going back to the compound. The faster they got this done...

The Spartans arrived at the designated spot and they found a Pelican prepped and ready for immediate take off. They were met by what appeared to be a communications officer. "You're heading up to the Stratavarius before grouping up with a task force. All I know is they have a disabled cruiser that needs sweeping and you're heading up the sweep."

"Thanks for the heads up." Aaron said, "Alright Spartans, let's get this over with." he said as he jumped up onto the Pelican.

"Wonderful...so now we're overly qualified janitors." Scorch groaned as he climbed aboard the Pelican. He chose the seat just outside the cockpit. He personally hated the cramped feeling he always got inside one of these ships. The strange thing being that he had no problems whatsoever with the drop pods the ODSTs use...

Spook jogged to a stop behind the group as they began to board. She was breathing heavily from having run the entire way. "What... what's going... what's going on?" She asked, breathlessly.

"We're clearing a ship of hostiles." Aaron said as he strapped himself in. "Sounds like they are expecting one hell of a fight."

As the Spartans got themselves strapped in, the bird lifted off and made for space and their final destination of the The Stratavarius.

---

-Return to Slovia
Halo C.E. RPG