Legacy of the Precursors, Chapter 1: Lost
Legacy of the PrecursorsChapter 1: LostNot until we are
lost do we begin to find ourselves...-Henry David
ThoreauNoble Six was not a fool;
he had fought the enemies of the government for as long as he could remember, both
human and alien. And so as he saw a marine become enveloped in a blazing
cerulean explosion, scattering charred flesh and bone into the ashen night air,
he realized one very important fact.This was to be where his
service ended.Reach...the pride of the
UNSC and once thought to be an impenetrable fortress world, was nothing but a
molten graveyard, home to the fading remnants of the surviving UNSC forces gradually
beginning to dwindle out of existence as they fought with a terminal ferocity. They
were like beacons in the blackness, snuffing out one by one until only the dark
would remain. This was the twilight
years of humanity. Hope was dead, and it
had been so for many years. What had once started off as a vicious fight for
survival gradually deteriorated into a desperate gambit to hold the enemy back
for another year, another month, another day, another hour....another minute, the
amount of human life spent on a daily basis to stop the inexhaustible march of
the Covenant was beyond obscene. Thousands perished, almost hourly, and there
was no end in sight that did not entail the extinction of humanity.The Spartan-III dashed
behind the smoldering wreckage of a warthog LRV and emptied his MA37 into a
pack of grunts charging past the hulk of a charred out scorpion. As his weapon
barked its deadly song, a rain of bronze shellcasings cascaded from the
ejection port and piled around his boots, sending puffs of ash into the air as they
disturbed the thin layer that seemed to cling to everything.This ash was the
leftovers of Reach's funeral pyre.The M118 7.62x51mm FMJ
Armor-Piercing projectiles pin-cushioned the small squad of dwarfish reptilians
and splattered their luminescent blue blood all across the dimpled concrete of
the exterior of the mountain base he decided to use as his last stand. His assault rifle
clicked dry and he growled, standing up to leg it back to the molten doors of
the facility, chased by a fusillade of green and blue glowing spheres of liquid
light. Inside the doorway to the highland complex, a pair of surviving marines
laid down a withering barrage of rifle fire in an attempt to keep the covenant
of the spartan's back. Six slipped through the
doorway as he felt a short burst of heated plasma fire splash across the shields along
his plated spine and they dropped to a dangerous level. As soon as his armored
bulk passed the heavy doors, they slowly grinded closed, sealing with a dull
resonating boom and buying them all some time to set up their last holdout point.
The spartan stood in front of the door and reloaded his rifle, slamming a new
mag in and pulling the bolt. They only had a few minutes to prepare for the
enemy's arrival. Their plasma weapons would soon take care of even the meter-thick
Titanium-A doors.Once they breached the
barrier, they would swarm in and kill every last human left alive in the
facility. But before that happened, Six intended to give them all a gift, the
spartan way.He turned to the two soldiers
with him; they both were just unassuming men. Survivors where there would soon
be none. And yet they had endured hardship and suffering to the same lengths that
he had gone through during the failing war for Reach. And they still stood with
strength and courage, willing to face their ends with honor and integrity. These two men impressed
Six, far more than any spartan he had worked with. They were not augmented like
he was; nor did they have the training, endurance, and equipment bestowed upon
spartans. And besides all these differences, they stood with him even after
everything they suffered through, loss, pain, and things much more unendurable.Yet even that aside,
they were strained to their limits and they had fear etched into the crevices
in their aged faces and wide eyes. Both men were experienced veterans, both of
the insurrection and of the early days of the Covenant war. "W-what do we do now
sir?" The older of the two asked. He clutched his shotgun in trembling hands and spoke with a nervous fervor. "We fight, and we die."
Six replied humbly in his gravelly tenor. For the spartan there was no other
option, nor should there have been. He had been recruited at a young age and trained to give
his life for his government. The choice for him...was simple.Both men nodded
uncertainly, they understood his response but lacked his conviction. "Right,
sir, of course, sir..."Six rolled his
shoulders. "Here's the plan. On the sixth level of the compound, there is an experimental
slipspace drive. We will go down and tamper with it. My fellow spartans did
something similarly before. The end result will be a lasting memory for the
Covenant...there is no coming back from this." He added softly.The two men nodded solemnly.
"We understand, sir.""Good, follow me." Six
walked past the two marines and down the barren hallway. They passed down
several floors and stopped at an armory. There, they filled up on ammo and Six
grabbed a few other things. Once they were topped up, they traveled down another
floor and arrived at a large empty laboratory. In the center was a massive
device plugged into a wall feed with a dozen thick black cables. Papers and
equipment were scattered across the floor and empty coffee cups littered the metallic
tables. It seemed that the scientists had been evacuated, post-haste.The power was off for
this level of the facility so Six had to close the heavy steel doors himself,
trapping both him and the marines inside, which didn't matter much considering
that they were not planning on leaving anyways. "Set up a barricade."
Six ordered as he walked past the two men and began to tamper with the device.
The marines began to flip the tables in the room and place them a few meters
from the door in a semicircular wall of thick steel. Meanwhile, the
spartan-III tore of a panel on the center of the machine and reached his
gauntlets inside. It was good that he had learned how to tamper with slipspace
rectors beforehand or this wouldn't have been a viable final mission. He ripped
out a wire and began to intertwine it with a diode near the heart of the device.
His plan was to create a feedback loop inside the experimental drive and cause a
deadly resonating cascading detonation of raw energy. That in itself would
level the mountain and kill most of the Covenant on this continent. It would be
his final act of vengeance. If they wanted Reach, they better be willing to pay
the price for it.Soon, as he began to
work, noises were heard on the other side of the bulkheads, words spoken in an
alien tongue. "Contact, sir, we've got covies on the outside!" One of the
marines shouted, shouldering his rifle and aiming at the doors. Six picked up the pace,
trying to get the machine primed before the Covenant managed to break through.
But time was not on his side; the door was turning a molten cherry color and melting
in the center. Even as he was turning
of the last cascade failsafe, the door bubbled outwards and exploded, showering
the room in liquefied steel. The marines ducked, but Six was splattered. His
shields ignited and deflected most of the damage, but he felt the intense heat,
even through the thick layer of blue and white MJLONIR. Inside stormed three
elites in eldritch silver armor, wielding bright swords composed of pure plasmatic energy. They were met
with a blistering hail of assault rifle fire. The one leading the charge had
its shields shattered and it was riddled with bullets, gurgling in spite as it
thudded to the floor. The other two made it
past the fire and one swiped down, cutting through the barricade. The two
marines stumbled backwards, trying to stay away from the elites and their
deadly blades. Six saw this and finished
what he was doing before he charged into the fray. Just as one raised its
sword, intent on bringing it down on the helpless marine underneath its hooved
foot, he collided into it.Six sent both of them
falling to the floor in a heap. It roared, splaying its mandibles in anger, and
tried to cleave its sword into his shoulder. Six caught the blade and
redirected it to dig into the steel floor. With his other fist he socked it in
the head, dazing the beast. A cry of pain alerted
the spartan to the death of one of his men. He whipped his helm around to see
one of the marines hoisted into the air, impaled by an energy sword. The elite
barked a mocking laugh at the man as he squirmed on the blade and screamed,
like a bug under a pin. Soon, his protests died
and he went limp. The elite continued chuckling as he lowered his blade and
dropped the soldier to the ground with a scoff. "Pitiful creature..." The elite
muttered in contempt as he turned around, the software in Six's suit
translating its words.Six snarled and turned
from the elite he was fighting, scrambling off the floor and charging the
alien. He wrapped a gauntlet around its throat and elicited a surprised grunt
from the monstrous alien. Then he grabbed the kukri sheathed on his shoulder plate
and rammed it into the elite's side, burrowing the blade in to the hilt. The elite warbled in pain and
tried to shake him off, but it was to no avail as he repeatedly slammed the
kukri into the alien's side until it fell to its knees. Six lowered his helmed
to the side of the elite's mandibled face and whispered. "Pitiful creature..."
Before clamping his armored bicep down on its windpipe and twisting his arm sharply
to the right. There was a brutal series of pops
and the elite shuddered before going limp. Six stepped away from
the now dead alien and turned to look for the last remaining marine, only to
see the elite he had left alone, spearing him to the floor with his blade. The
soldier fired his handgun into the elites face as the alien twisted his energy blade
into his gut, rounds deflecting off of its shielded helm. Before the marine could
finish, he died, arm falling to the deck and releasing the magnum to clatter
away. The elite looked up from
his fresh kill and looked to the spartan as he ripped his blade from fallen
soldier's stomach. "It would appear Demon...that it is just you and
I now." His low guttural voice filled the now empty room. Six remained silent and
simply grabbed the hilt of the energy sword from the fallen alien under him and
activated the blade, wielding both it and the kukri in either hand.The elite tilted his armored head and bowed, reptilian eyes gleaming with what could be considered either amusement or bemusement. "And so it shall be. You will fall by my hands." The elite
roared and charged him, Six snarled and sprinted full force at the elite. The two titanic forces
collided violently.The elite lowered
himself under the spartan's swipe and shoulder bashed him, carrying the
spartan with him to slam into the slip space device. Six's brain was rattled
inside his head underneath his helm and he dropped the energy sword. The
spartan smacked his gauntlet against the elite's helm. And the alien socked him
in the gut in return. The heavy fist lowered his shields dangerously and it
warbled in rage.Meanwhile, the machine
was picking up in intensity; the small inaudible whine that was building up could
now be detected by the spartan and the elite's ears.That is if they were
not busy wailing on each other. Both combatants were so
absorbed in trying to kill the other that they paid no attention to the
machine. Light began to radiate out of the exposed panel on the side of the
machine as Six brought his kukri down into the elite's shoulder, sparking off of
his shields. In retort, the elite
slammed his fist into the spartan's helmet, bringing his full force to bear.
Six was knocked to the floor by the machine and scrambled back to his feet, scowling
at his opponent. But before their bout
could continue, the machine's high pitched whining could no longer be ignored
by either party as it reached a crescendo. Both looked at the device as it
detonated, blinding both of them in a harsh blue light.**********The mountain imploded,
shaking the entire continent and causing devastating earthquakes as the
tectonic plates shifted, tearing jagged gaping holes across the surface of
Reach. Countless Covenant soldiers and even surviving UNSC forces were caught
in the wave of destruction that ravaged the continent. When the dust cleared
and everything settled down, a good ninety percent of all Covenant ground
forces on the planet had been killed and the rest could not be found. It was a
debilitating blow to the enemy's armies. Millions had been fighting on Reach's surface.
Six's final act of
defiance would resonate through time and shift the direction of the war, add
that to the package they had delivered and victory became a very real possibility
for humanity. But his sacrifice and contribution would never be told. No one
had been left alive to record it. But, perhaps Six's
reward was not remembrance, but something he would never have thought possible...a
chance, at something more.