Didn't know where else to post this, but this is a l'il someting I wrote back in November 2006 on another HALO-related forum, just found it again recently while going through some things. Thought you all might enjoy a good read
[BEGIN STORY]
A fleeting moment of consciousness, of being encassed in some sort of metal chamber. Then, a loud explosion, and the sudden sensation of being weightless, of floating through space. The moment of consciousness ended with a harsh, jolting thud, of hitting something solid. Then, consciousness faded away...
***
When he finally came to again, he awoke to find himself lying haphazardly on the cold, hard steel that served as the deck plating for the room he was in, next to one of the bulkheads that double-served as a support brace for the catwalk overhead. Everything was trembling, and he could hear muffled explosions and yells from outside the room.
Struggling to his feet, he took in his surroundings: the shattered glass on the deck from the control room above; torn, burnt pieces of metal from what was the cryogenic chamber he had been situated in. There was a large hole in the far wall, where one of the canisters holding the chemicals used in the cryogenic process had been. He surmised it had somehow exploded, and it was that resulting explosion that had ripped apart his cryogenic chamber and thrown him to the other side of the room.
Amidst the debris scattered about the deck, he was pleased to see there had been no one else in the Cryogenics Bay when the explosion occured. That, of course, raised the question of just where everyone had gone to, as it was standard UNSC procedure to unseal the occupants in the cryogenic chambers and then calibrate them and thier MJOLNIR armour for reinstatement to active duty.
The lack of qualified personnel to partake in these procedures, and the obvious damage sustained not just here but most likely elsewhere, meant something had gone horribly awry during his cryogenic awakening.
The SPARTAN, in his standard-issue green MJOLNIR armour, made his way to one of the doors leading out of the Cryogenics Bay. He tried pressing the button on the control panel to the right of the door, but aside from a slight hiss from the door's hydraulics, followed by a heavy clunking sound, nothing happened.
Sighing quietly under his breath, he calmly braced himself against one side of the doorframe, his foot propped up on the opposite side, and sliding his gloved fingers into the crevice between the doors, used all of his biologically- and MJOLNIR-enhanced strength to pry the door open.
With an ear-splitting protest of screeching metal, the doors slowly inched open. Once they hit the half-way mark, they opened effortlessly the rest of the way. The SPARTAN wasted no time in sliding through the doors into the adjacent hallway.
Out on this side of the Cryogenics Bay, the scene was far worse than what he witnessed inside. There were plasma burns and scorch marks on the corridor walls, holes where equipment had ruptured and exploded, small fires angling out of said holes, and bodies lying on the deck plating. He noticed there was some purple and orange blood sparsely splattered on the deck, but the amount of red human blood was far more thickly dispersed.
Also, on this side of the Cryogenics Bay doors, he could more clearly hear the yells from UNSC soldiers nearby, as well as weapons fire and distant explosions.
Not wasting anymore time assessing his surroundings and the situation -- it was quite evident that wherever he was, his UNSC counterparts were under heavy assault from Covenant forces -- the SPARTAN quickly looked amongst the dead bodies for any weapons, finding a standard M6D Pistol and an SMG. Checking thier ammo count and chambering a round in each for his expected confrontation with Covenant forces, he sprinted down the corridor to aid assistance to whoever he came across.
Out of habit, his eyes shifted to the bottom-left corner of his visor to see if he could pick up any FoF markers in the vacinity, but all he could see was a blank circle. It dawned on him that as the calibration hadn't been completed on his suit's systems it was most likely that none of the data-stream features of his Heads Up Display would be in working order. Again, he sighed quietly to himself as he made his way through the corridors.
***
It didn't take long for him to come across a group of marines ducked behind a hastily-assembled barrier, consisting of heavy metal crates. They were using the barrier for cover from incoming Covenant weapons fire, quickly popping thier heads up every now and then to take pot-shots at the Covenant troops further down the corridor. None of them seemed to take notice of the six-foot-tall figure in full-blown MJOLNIR armour as he slid past them and proceeded down an adjoining side corridor which would take him closer to the Covenants' position.
Quietly, yet quickly moving down the side corridor, the SPARTAN could see a sporadic blue reflection on the wall of one of the short corridors that branched off of the one he was in, leading back into the main corridor where the marines were going head-to-head with the Covenant. Obviously, the reflection coming from the Covenant hand weapons as they fired at the marines bunked in at the other end of the hallway.
Crouching, he carefully peeked around the corner and saw two Elites, accompanied by three Grunts. Out of instinct, the SPARTAN reached for his waist to grab and prime a grenade to throw at the Covenant. As he hadn't been properly brought out of cryogenic sleep, he hadn't been given the standard assortment of weaponry he would usually have to rely on. Sighing once again, he let the SMG hang to his side and grabbed the Pistol with both hands.
Not being able to use the Zoom feature, which was one of the components integrated into his HUD, all he could do was eye-ball his intended point of impact. Aiming the Pistol at the neck of one of the Elites, he inhaled and fired a single round.
A deafening bang echoed in the closed confines of the corridor walls as the solid metal projectile left the barrel of the gun, flew threw the air and successfully lodged itself in the unprotected neck of the Elite. The gargantuous blue-armoured alien let loose a blood-gurgling scream as he dropped his Plasma Pistol and grabbed frantically at his neck. A moment later he fell over onto the deck plating, motionless.
This, of course, alerted the other Covenant there of another target, and the remaining Elite and one of the Grunts turned thier attention to the new attacker, while the other two Grunts continued to fire upon the marines holed-up further down the corridor.
The SPARTAN quickly withdrew around the corner, taking a few steps back as bright blue Plasma shot past, scorching the far wall. As he was checking the status of his weapons, without warning the other Elite jumped out from around the corner and glared at him. The red-armoured Elite screamed something before charging at the armour-clad human.
Bringing up the Pistol to fire again, the SPARTAN was dismayed to find the firing mechanism had jammed somehow, as when he pulled the trigger, all he heard was a faint clicking noise. He immediately dropped the useless sidearm and was about to bring the SMG to bear when the Elite charged into him full-speed, using his Plasma Pistol as a sort of bludgeon to hit the green-armoured figure on the side of the head. The combined full-frontal charge into his chest and the side-swiping back-hand to his helmet resulted in the SPARTAN being thrown up and away off the ground, landing about ten feet back down the corridor.
Quickly jumping back on his feet, the SPARTAN brought up his SMG and fired a few short bursts at the Elite, the bullets ricocheting off the alien's armour and flaring his protective Plasma Shielding. Realizing the futility in the gesture, he discarded the SMG and prepared himself for a hand-to-hand combat confrontation with the angry six-foot-plus-tall Elite.
As the screaming alien charged him once more, at the last moment the SPARTAN quickly side-stepped the Elite's aggressive charge and slammed his right fist into his opponent's face as he ran past, sharply snapping the Elite's head to the right. Caught off-balance by the SPARTAN's move, he flew right past the armour-clad figure and didn't have enough time to react before the SPARTAN laid a well-placed low-kick to his left ankle, snapping the bone just below the protective shin armour.
Stumbling downward, he was now at just the right height for the determined SPARTAN to wrap his arm around his neck. Placing his other hand on one side of the Elite's head, in one quick motion he abruptly snapped the alien's neck to the left, and the Elite dropped to the deck plating with a loud clank of metal on metal. It took some effort, as the Elite's neck muscles were rather tough, but he managed. Breathing a little heavily, the SPARTAN reprocured his SMG and picked up the Elite's Plasma Pistol and headed back to where the Grunts were still positioned.
The Grunt that had turned on him in unison with the second Elite was now firing back at the marines with the other two; clearly, the ugly dog-like alien thought that the Elite would have more than dealt with a single UNSC soldier, armour or not. That complacency worked out to the SPARTAN's advantage, as the three Grunts were so focused on the marines down the hallway that none of them saw the hulking figure come back around the corner and emerge behind them.
Being of the lower warrior caste in the Covenant heirarchy, it didn't take much effort at all for the SPARTAN to eliminate them. The one closest to the side corridor found his air tank hose disconnected, ending up on the deck gasping for methane, his planet's natural atmosphere, that was no longer seeping into the respirator on his face.
The next one simply collapsed from a hard hit on the top of the head from the Plasma Pistol the SPARTAN was now wielding, the vertebra at the base of his skull crushed. The last Grunt standing suddenly found himself thrown to the deck with a heavy weight on his back, the SPARTAN having tripped him and placing his booted foot on the little creature's back, firing a short burst from his SMG into the back of the Grunt's head.
With this immediate threat now taken care of, the SPARTAN called all-clear to the marines at the other end of the corridor. Slowly, cautiously, they popped thier heads up above the protective barrier with thier weapons raised and ready. Seeing that the Covenant group had indeed been eliminated, they casually, tiredly stood up and eyed the armoured UNSC super-soldier at the other end of the hallway, who was now walking toward them.
"Report", was all the SPARTAN stated to the weary-eyed marines.
"Well sir, we were on our way to dock with one of the defense platforms in orbit over Earth, before heading down to the planet's surface to help aid the UNSC forces fighting against the already dug-in Covenant forces down there, when suddenly a large Covenant fleet appeared out of slip-stream and without hesitation commenced an attack on our ship.
They threw everything they had at us, just enough to bring down our defenses so they could send over a handful of thier boarding vessels. Once they got on board, all hell broke loose. We were heading to help fortify the bridge when we took heavy fire from this group. Thank god you came around when you did, sir. We took a few casualties and were starting to run low on ammo. Didn't know how much longer we could hold them off."
The SPARTAN nodded at the marine, quietly lost in thought for a moment.
"Okay, this is what I want you and your men to do. Take the bulk of your group and go, as ordered, to the bridge to help fortify that position. Hopefully the Covenant will not have gained control of that critical area yet. Assign two of your men to take the wounded to the Infirmary, make sure thier injuries are tended to. Those are your orders."
"Aye aye, sir!" The marine acknowledged with a sharp salute. The SPARTAN returned the gesture and turned to head down the corridor.
"And just where will you be heading, sir?"
"I'm certain there are other such encounters as this elsewhere throughout the ship. I'm going to see what I can do to help. If you could actually provide me with a few extra clips from one of your men's SMGs before I go, it would be much appreciated."
The marine in charge gathered up what extra ammunition he could from the weapons of the wounded soldiers and handed them to the SPARTAN. "Good luck, sir. Give those Covenant b*****ds hell."
With a curt nod, the man in the MJOLNIR armour turned and sprinted down the corridor, looking for any remaining Covenant forces aboard ship. Hopefully, he would get to them before they had complete control of the ship.
***
More to come... :cool
NOTE TO THE READER(S):
In case anyone is wondering, the SPARTAN referred to in the story is not the Master Chief. I know the initial setting -- that of a Cryogenics Bay on board a UNSC ship -- is reminiscent of the first game, and most readers would immediately think of that. However, that was not my intent.
I simply wanted to start the story off in a familiar environment, though not the same as experienced by players in the first game, with the identity of the SPARTAN deliberately being unknown to the reader(s).
Although, I will say there's a possibility of this SPARTAN being one of those few that was off-planet when Reach was destroyed by the Covenant, and has now been brought back to Earth after the news of Reach's demise.
I don't want to give away too many details, as that would ruin some of the upcoming parts of the storyline I will be posting here, but I hope what I did divulge above helps to answer a few things.
[BEGIN STORY]
A fleeting moment of consciousness, of being encassed in some sort of metal chamber. Then, a loud explosion, and the sudden sensation of being weightless, of floating through space. The moment of consciousness ended with a harsh, jolting thud, of hitting something solid. Then, consciousness faded away...
***
When he finally came to again, he awoke to find himself lying haphazardly on the cold, hard steel that served as the deck plating for the room he was in, next to one of the bulkheads that double-served as a support brace for the catwalk overhead. Everything was trembling, and he could hear muffled explosions and yells from outside the room.
Struggling to his feet, he took in his surroundings: the shattered glass on the deck from the control room above; torn, burnt pieces of metal from what was the cryogenic chamber he had been situated in. There was a large hole in the far wall, where one of the canisters holding the chemicals used in the cryogenic process had been. He surmised it had somehow exploded, and it was that resulting explosion that had ripped apart his cryogenic chamber and thrown him to the other side of the room.
Amidst the debris scattered about the deck, he was pleased to see there had been no one else in the Cryogenics Bay when the explosion occured. That, of course, raised the question of just where everyone had gone to, as it was standard UNSC procedure to unseal the occupants in the cryogenic chambers and then calibrate them and thier MJOLNIR armour for reinstatement to active duty.
The lack of qualified personnel to partake in these procedures, and the obvious damage sustained not just here but most likely elsewhere, meant something had gone horribly awry during his cryogenic awakening.
The SPARTAN, in his standard-issue green MJOLNIR armour, made his way to one of the doors leading out of the Cryogenics Bay. He tried pressing the button on the control panel to the right of the door, but aside from a slight hiss from the door's hydraulics, followed by a heavy clunking sound, nothing happened.
Sighing quietly under his breath, he calmly braced himself against one side of the doorframe, his foot propped up on the opposite side, and sliding his gloved fingers into the crevice between the doors, used all of his biologically- and MJOLNIR-enhanced strength to pry the door open.
With an ear-splitting protest of screeching metal, the doors slowly inched open. Once they hit the half-way mark, they opened effortlessly the rest of the way. The SPARTAN wasted no time in sliding through the doors into the adjacent hallway.
Out on this side of the Cryogenics Bay, the scene was far worse than what he witnessed inside. There were plasma burns and scorch marks on the corridor walls, holes where equipment had ruptured and exploded, small fires angling out of said holes, and bodies lying on the deck plating. He noticed there was some purple and orange blood sparsely splattered on the deck, but the amount of red human blood was far more thickly dispersed.
Also, on this side of the Cryogenics Bay doors, he could more clearly hear the yells from UNSC soldiers nearby, as well as weapons fire and distant explosions.
Not wasting anymore time assessing his surroundings and the situation -- it was quite evident that wherever he was, his UNSC counterparts were under heavy assault from Covenant forces -- the SPARTAN quickly looked amongst the dead bodies for any weapons, finding a standard M6D Pistol and an SMG. Checking thier ammo count and chambering a round in each for his expected confrontation with Covenant forces, he sprinted down the corridor to aid assistance to whoever he came across.
Out of habit, his eyes shifted to the bottom-left corner of his visor to see if he could pick up any FoF markers in the vacinity, but all he could see was a blank circle. It dawned on him that as the calibration hadn't been completed on his suit's systems it was most likely that none of the data-stream features of his Heads Up Display would be in working order. Again, he sighed quietly to himself as he made his way through the corridors.
***
It didn't take long for him to come across a group of marines ducked behind a hastily-assembled barrier, consisting of heavy metal crates. They were using the barrier for cover from incoming Covenant weapons fire, quickly popping thier heads up every now and then to take pot-shots at the Covenant troops further down the corridor. None of them seemed to take notice of the six-foot-tall figure in full-blown MJOLNIR armour as he slid past them and proceeded down an adjoining side corridor which would take him closer to the Covenants' position.
Quietly, yet quickly moving down the side corridor, the SPARTAN could see a sporadic blue reflection on the wall of one of the short corridors that branched off of the one he was in, leading back into the main corridor where the marines were going head-to-head with the Covenant. Obviously, the reflection coming from the Covenant hand weapons as they fired at the marines bunked in at the other end of the hallway.
Crouching, he carefully peeked around the corner and saw two Elites, accompanied by three Grunts. Out of instinct, the SPARTAN reached for his waist to grab and prime a grenade to throw at the Covenant. As he hadn't been properly brought out of cryogenic sleep, he hadn't been given the standard assortment of weaponry he would usually have to rely on. Sighing once again, he let the SMG hang to his side and grabbed the Pistol with both hands.
Not being able to use the Zoom feature, which was one of the components integrated into his HUD, all he could do was eye-ball his intended point of impact. Aiming the Pistol at the neck of one of the Elites, he inhaled and fired a single round.
A deafening bang echoed in the closed confines of the corridor walls as the solid metal projectile left the barrel of the gun, flew threw the air and successfully lodged itself in the unprotected neck of the Elite. The gargantuous blue-armoured alien let loose a blood-gurgling scream as he dropped his Plasma Pistol and grabbed frantically at his neck. A moment later he fell over onto the deck plating, motionless.
This, of course, alerted the other Covenant there of another target, and the remaining Elite and one of the Grunts turned thier attention to the new attacker, while the other two Grunts continued to fire upon the marines holed-up further down the corridor.
The SPARTAN quickly withdrew around the corner, taking a few steps back as bright blue Plasma shot past, scorching the far wall. As he was checking the status of his weapons, without warning the other Elite jumped out from around the corner and glared at him. The red-armoured Elite screamed something before charging at the armour-clad human.
Bringing up the Pistol to fire again, the SPARTAN was dismayed to find the firing mechanism had jammed somehow, as when he pulled the trigger, all he heard was a faint clicking noise. He immediately dropped the useless sidearm and was about to bring the SMG to bear when the Elite charged into him full-speed, using his Plasma Pistol as a sort of bludgeon to hit the green-armoured figure on the side of the head. The combined full-frontal charge into his chest and the side-swiping back-hand to his helmet resulted in the SPARTAN being thrown up and away off the ground, landing about ten feet back down the corridor.
Quickly jumping back on his feet, the SPARTAN brought up his SMG and fired a few short bursts at the Elite, the bullets ricocheting off the alien's armour and flaring his protective Plasma Shielding. Realizing the futility in the gesture, he discarded the SMG and prepared himself for a hand-to-hand combat confrontation with the angry six-foot-plus-tall Elite.
As the screaming alien charged him once more, at the last moment the SPARTAN quickly side-stepped the Elite's aggressive charge and slammed his right fist into his opponent's face as he ran past, sharply snapping the Elite's head to the right. Caught off-balance by the SPARTAN's move, he flew right past the armour-clad figure and didn't have enough time to react before the SPARTAN laid a well-placed low-kick to his left ankle, snapping the bone just below the protective shin armour.
Stumbling downward, he was now at just the right height for the determined SPARTAN to wrap his arm around his neck. Placing his other hand on one side of the Elite's head, in one quick motion he abruptly snapped the alien's neck to the left, and the Elite dropped to the deck plating with a loud clank of metal on metal. It took some effort, as the Elite's neck muscles were rather tough, but he managed. Breathing a little heavily, the SPARTAN reprocured his SMG and picked up the Elite's Plasma Pistol and headed back to where the Grunts were still positioned.
The Grunt that had turned on him in unison with the second Elite was now firing back at the marines with the other two; clearly, the ugly dog-like alien thought that the Elite would have more than dealt with a single UNSC soldier, armour or not. That complacency worked out to the SPARTAN's advantage, as the three Grunts were so focused on the marines down the hallway that none of them saw the hulking figure come back around the corner and emerge behind them.
Being of the lower warrior caste in the Covenant heirarchy, it didn't take much effort at all for the SPARTAN to eliminate them. The one closest to the side corridor found his air tank hose disconnected, ending up on the deck gasping for methane, his planet's natural atmosphere, that was no longer seeping into the respirator on his face.
The next one simply collapsed from a hard hit on the top of the head from the Plasma Pistol the SPARTAN was now wielding, the vertebra at the base of his skull crushed. The last Grunt standing suddenly found himself thrown to the deck with a heavy weight on his back, the SPARTAN having tripped him and placing his booted foot on the little creature's back, firing a short burst from his SMG into the back of the Grunt's head.
With this immediate threat now taken care of, the SPARTAN called all-clear to the marines at the other end of the corridor. Slowly, cautiously, they popped thier heads up above the protective barrier with thier weapons raised and ready. Seeing that the Covenant group had indeed been eliminated, they casually, tiredly stood up and eyed the armoured UNSC super-soldier at the other end of the hallway, who was now walking toward them.
"Report", was all the SPARTAN stated to the weary-eyed marines.
"Well sir, we were on our way to dock with one of the defense platforms in orbit over Earth, before heading down to the planet's surface to help aid the UNSC forces fighting against the already dug-in Covenant forces down there, when suddenly a large Covenant fleet appeared out of slip-stream and without hesitation commenced an attack on our ship.
They threw everything they had at us, just enough to bring down our defenses so they could send over a handful of thier boarding vessels. Once they got on board, all hell broke loose. We were heading to help fortify the bridge when we took heavy fire from this group. Thank god you came around when you did, sir. We took a few casualties and were starting to run low on ammo. Didn't know how much longer we could hold them off."
The SPARTAN nodded at the marine, quietly lost in thought for a moment.
"Okay, this is what I want you and your men to do. Take the bulk of your group and go, as ordered, to the bridge to help fortify that position. Hopefully the Covenant will not have gained control of that critical area yet. Assign two of your men to take the wounded to the Infirmary, make sure thier injuries are tended to. Those are your orders."
"Aye aye, sir!" The marine acknowledged with a sharp salute. The SPARTAN returned the gesture and turned to head down the corridor.
"And just where will you be heading, sir?"
"I'm certain there are other such encounters as this elsewhere throughout the ship. I'm going to see what I can do to help. If you could actually provide me with a few extra clips from one of your men's SMGs before I go, it would be much appreciated."
The marine in charge gathered up what extra ammunition he could from the weapons of the wounded soldiers and handed them to the SPARTAN. "Good luck, sir. Give those Covenant b*****ds hell."
With a curt nod, the man in the MJOLNIR armour turned and sprinted down the corridor, looking for any remaining Covenant forces aboard ship. Hopefully, he would get to them before they had complete control of the ship.
***
More to come... :cool
NOTE TO THE READER(S):
In case anyone is wondering, the SPARTAN referred to in the story is not the Master Chief. I know the initial setting -- that of a Cryogenics Bay on board a UNSC ship -- is reminiscent of the first game, and most readers would immediately think of that. However, that was not my intent.
I simply wanted to start the story off in a familiar environment, though not the same as experienced by players in the first game, with the identity of the SPARTAN deliberately being unknown to the reader(s).
Although, I will say there's a possibility of this SPARTAN being one of those few that was off-planet when Reach was destroyed by the Covenant, and has now been brought back to Earth after the news of Reach's demise.
I don't want to give away too many details, as that would ruin some of the upcoming parts of the storyline I will be posting here, but I hope what I did divulge above helps to answer a few things.