The Razor Backs Chapter 2

The Razor Backs Chapter 2

The Razor Backs Chapter 2


It had been three days since The Scurge had jumped to assist the planet Ansgar, in its fight against the covenant.

Mike awoke from his sleep, he stood up and put on his overcoat. He walked over to the door and punched in a key code so he could get out. He walked down a hallway and walked to the bridge, he reached the door and it opened upon his appearance, he walked in and saw only Flame sitting at the nav station. "Hey Flame how much longer until we get to the planet?" he asked him.

"Actually I was about to get a skeleton to wake you guys up, we are about to re-enter normal space." He started tapping a lot of keys.

Mike pointed to an ice skeleton. "You there wake the others and tell them we are about to re-enter normal space, and tell them to get to the bridge." he told him.

The skeleton nodded and walked off the bridge.

Mike sat in the captain’s chair and waited for them to re-enter normal space. Out of nowhere all the stars appeared and in front of them was a deep blue planet. "Is that Ansgar?" Mike asked Flame.

"Yes it is and we are about twenty-thousand kilometers from the planet." he replied.

"Tell me when we are one-thousand kilometers away."

"Why?"

"So I can be first down." Mike said proudly, because he didn’t have to be in a drop pod to survive.

The rest of The Razor Backs slowly dragged their feet into the bridge and sat at their stations, all except for Tim who stood next to the door.

"What’s that?" a skeleton said, he pointed towards a covenant destroyer.

"A Covenant destroyer." Flame said.

"Joker charge the MAC's." Mike said.

"Sir, that’s overkill." Tim said.

"Dude epic, charging." Joker said.

"Tell me when they are ready." Mike said to Joker.

A few minutes passed and they hadn't noticed the rather large ship just sitting there.

"Hey Mike the MAC's are charged and waiting for your order to fire." Joker said, his finger hovering over a button just waiting to push it.

"Fire six of the MAC's I have a plan for the last one." Mike ordered.

Joker pushed the button and six super-rounds shot out of the MAC's. They all hit and one barely missed the reactor.

"Re-aim and shoot for the reactor." Mike ordered.

Joker moved a control stick and pushed the same button and another round shot out and hit the reactor dead-on, the ship exploded in a giant cloud of super-heated ionized liquid. It cooled into a solid clump.

"Good shot Joker." Mike said.

"Thanks man." Joker said with a smile. "If you don’t mind I would like to return to my project." He said while pointing at the door with his thumbs.

"You go right a head Joker it will be big I just know it will." Mike told him.

"Yo Mike we are a thousand kilometers away." Flame told Mike.

"Thanks man, you get into your pelican and grab Joker to, I am going to get you a LZ." Mike got up and walked out of the bridge. It took him five minuets to get to the hanger where the Razor pelican was, instead of getting in it his eyes turned half blue and half black. He used an ice lance to pull himself out of the ship; he landed on the hull and aimed himself at the planets surface.

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"Wonder what he meant by I’m going to get you an LZ?" Tim asked.

"Huh...that."Flame said, he was pointing out of the front viewport, they could clearly see Mike.

"Well then don’t wait for us." Tim said, he sounded kind of pissed.

"Oh shit, he's heading towards the covenant controlled areas." Flame yelled. "We have to get to the UNSC side fast." he ran towards their pelican and Tim followed. "Tim get in there isn’t any time to wait for Joker." Flame commanded.

Joker walked in. “I think I will ignore that last statement." he said.

"Dude just shut-up and get in." Flame said.

Joker hopped in and so did Tim. Flame jumped into the cockpit and strapped himself in. "Hold on back there." he said as he hit the throttle and they rocketed out of the hanger, slowly making their decent to the UNSC controlled side, so they could help Mike.

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Mike was traveling through the atmosphere at an alarming rate; he was on fire and not caring at all. He made it through the clouds and he immediately saw hundreds of thousands of covenant. He pulled off his coat and started to slow his decent with his dragon wings, he bundled up his coat and put it in a small sac that had a lot of grenades. He pulled out five, primed and threw them, just to get their attention; he had slowed down quite a bit and was within grenade range of them. The five grenades flew towards them and impacted on the ground with a solid thud, after a couple of seconds they exploded taking out about twenty elites and grunts altogether, more grunts than elites. All at once anti aircraft fire started at the air but they really didn’t know where the bombs came from so they all missed.

Mike folded his wings and fell, about halfway down he put on his coat again and braced for impact. He impacted on the ground and killed three brutes, he jumped up out of the cloud and froze two ice blades and waited for an attack. It came.

Four elites jumped through the cloud of smoke and charged Mike. One slashed at his midsection and another started to shoot at him with a needler, the third one primed a plasma grenade and threw it, and the last one grabbed a brute shot and started to shoot.

Mike quickly blocked the slash with his left blade and decapitated the attacker with his right. Then he quickly brought up his right blade and let it take the needler hits for him, then he threw it through the attacker’s skull. He used his other blade to take the grenade for him, the grenade stuck to it and he threw it at the one with the brute shot. The blade whirled through the air and hit the elites left foot, then the grenade exploded showering him with plasma, and killing him. He ran up to the grenade thrower and grabbed his arm, his eyes turned another third brown and he threw him through a tree. He pulled out his sniper rifle and started to shoot any who dared stand against him.
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"Alert there is a human raid in progress, all warriors arm yourselves for combat." a speaker sounded within the base. At once all the elites in the building jumped up and started getting combat gear. All except for one female who was sitting in a room typing on a data pad. She was typing data on human’s levels of stress before they break and die. She looked out of her window and could see this lone human kill hundreds of elites, she thought he was kind of good looking for an infidel, she then shunned these thoughts and returned to her work. She glanced over and saw a brute walk behind the human and slammed his gravity hammer into the back of his neck. The human just fell unconscious. She was shocked that he wasn’t dead. The hammer had a large dent in it. She looked at the hammer and said, " Holy crap! What the hell is he?" She got a small view of his face. "He looks good for a human. I must make sure he doesn’t die. I have to go and make sure they don’t break him." She whispered, she got up and ran into the prison room they where going to put him in to await his arrival.
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"I repeat identify yourselves." The com on the pelican said. Flame reached over and turned it off. He moved the pelican a little bit faster to the base.

"Oh just shut the hell up." Tim said from the co-pilots seat.

"Tim what the hell are you doing in the co-pilots seat?" Flame asked him.

"I don’t know, trying to help you." He replied.

"You fail seeing as I don’t need any help right now." Flame said.

Joker was sitting in the back tinkering with a couple of bombs, taking out the wiring and making a huge bomb of sorts. He almost blew them all up three times, but he managed to control the bomb and stop it. He thought he saw a small movement in the corner, but he didn’t see anything there so he dismissed it and continued his bomb-work. A small figure was sitting there watching his every move. Joker looked back at the area after seeing more movement; he got up and walked over to the area. He reached out and grabbed a small child clad in photo reactive armor. It squirmed in his grasp and tried to kick him.

"Whoa, calm down little guy or girl whichever you are." Joker said to it.

"I am a boy." He said.

"Ok then what’s your name little boy?" Joker asked him.

"My name is Clayton, I am the last surviving Spartan-III, and I have been with you ever since that one dude killed Stillings. When he jumped out of the ship I figured I should follow you instead of him, so I snuck onto this pelican and waited for you. You scared the crap out of me with that super bomb over there." Clayton said. "And stop calling me little!" He yelled at the end.

“Alright fine I will stop calling you little, just hold your drawers on a minute.” Joker exclaimed. “Now leave me alone with my bomb I need to concentrate.”

“Ok then.”Clayton said, he wandered around the small craft and walked into the cockpit.

Tim noticed him and yelled, "Stowaway! Get him." and he lunged towards Clayton.

Clayton barley tried to dodge Tim and dodged his lunge, he grabbed Tim by the back of the neck and shoved his face into the floor.

"Take it easy dude I’m on your side." Clayton said.

"Liar!!!!" Tim yelled at him.

"Well he is telling the truth." Joker said from the cargo hold. All of a sudden there was a loud thud.

"What the hell was that?" Tim asked.

"Go check it out." Flame said.

"Yea." Tim said to Clayton.

"I meant you Tim." Flame said.

"What me, why?" He argued.

"Just do it." Flame commanded.

"Fine, think you could let me go now midget-man?" Tim said to Clayton.

Clayton let him go. "My name is Clayton." He sounded irritated.

Tim stood up and walked out into the other area and saw Jokers unconscious body laying on the floor, then out of nowhere a big steel club smacked against Tims head, knocking him out to. There was another thud as he hit the floor.

"That didn’t sound good." Clayton said.

"Your turn dude, go check it out and keep your eyes peeled, I’d go but I’m the only one who can fly this ship." Flame said to Clayton.

"I won’t let you down man." Clayton said.

He headed for the small door and had a flash of the future. He saw a hand grab him from the left and choke him to death then discard his body and shoot Flame in the back of his head with a needler. He immediately ducked and pulled out his rather large serrated knife from his boot and shoved it into the gut of an elite. Immediately the active camouflage failed and he became visible, and fell onto Clayton.

"Hey Flame help me out over here!" Clayton struggled to get free.

"Cant right now I’m trying to fly here." he sounded irritated.

Clayton’s foot was close to Tims head, he lifted it and kicked him in the head rather hard.

Tim shifted, "Not now mom it’s only 6:20, just five more minutes." Tim said while shaking his hand at his foot.

"Tim you lazy bastard get this elite off me!!!"

"Wha...?" Tim got up and grabbed the dead body off of him.

"Thank you Tim." he got up and shook himself off.

"No problem, do you know why my head hurts so much?"

"Nope not a clue." Clayton was smiling behind his faceplate.

"Ok then." Tim walked over to a bench and sat down, then put his head in his hands. "Man I’ve got a major headache."

"Take some painkillers then, dumbass." Flame said from the cockpit.

Tim walked over to a small machine and punched a button and it injected some blue fluid into his arm. He immediately looked better. "Thanks for the advice." he said to Flame.

Flame just kept flying.

Tim went back to his seat and pulled out his rifle and held it in his lap.

"Damn that’s big!" Clayton exclaimed.

"What it’s just a mini-gun custom fitted for one man operation." Tim said proudly.

"That’s nothing compared to what I have." Clayton said.

"Oh, and what’s that, a pea shooter." Tim started to laugh.

"No this." Clayton pulled out a huge great-broadsword from seemingly out of nowhere.

"HOLY SHIT!!!!" Tim jumped at the sight of this huge blade.

The sword was twice as big as Joker, and he is the tallest of the group.

"I bet it cant stand up to a plasma sword." Tim said.

"Nope it can, I’ve custom built this blade with veins of liquid helium so it won’t melt." Clayton said proudly.

"Wow..." was all Tim said.

Clayton sheathed his sword and it disappeared, he then sat down on the floor and started to meditate.

"Where'd your sword go?" Tim asked.

"It's special made to disappear when I sheath it." A voice in Tim's head said.

"What the fuck!?!?!?" Tim exclaimed.

"Telepathy." The voice sounded like Claytons.

"Is that you Clayton?" Tim asked.

"Yep." The voice sounded proud.

Tim was silent.

"Hey back there buckle up and get ready for entry to the atmosphere!" Flame yelled.

Tim buckled himself in. The straps around Clayton floated themselves together and buckled him in.

As the ship entered the atmosphere it started to lurch and rock violently.

"Oh shit we forgot about Joker!" Tim exclaimed.

Right as he said that Joker's body flew towards a steel pole and his leg hit it rather hard, there was a grisly crunch as his bone was broke. He regained conscience, and started to yell and scream.

"Painkillers please." He said.

"You'll have to wait until we get to the base." Flame said from the cockpit.

"Son of a BITCH. But my leg hurts now." Joker yelled.

"You know what where here." Flame said.

He gently set down the pelican and as soon as he opened the ramp a small squad of Helljumpers swarmed into the ship and pointed their rifles at the crew, all except for Clayton who was gone.

One of the Helljumpers walked towards the cockpit and said to Flame. "Identify yourself!" and poked him with his rifle.

Flame looked at him and said, "I am Flame leader of the Razor Backs, we where sent here to help you. If you would please get that gun out of my face, and get my squad mate some medical attention that would be nice."

The Helljumper stood straight and saluted Flame and said, "Sir, Yes Sir." He turned to the others. "You heard him get moving."

Four Helljumpers brought a stretcher for Joker and carried him off to the medical bay. Flame looked at one Helljumper.

"You there, Come here." He said.

He walked up. "Sir?"

"I need to organize a rescue mission to get someone who was dropped behind enemy lines, he didn’t get in deep about three miles in so I need you to bring me your CO. Got it?"

"Yes sir, I won’t let you down." And with that he ran off.
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("Hey Mike" Velo said.)

("Wha? What’s going on Velo?")

("You where captured by the covenant.")

("How?")

("Brute hit you behind the head and knocked you out, matter of fact your still out cold.")

("Oh yea I think I dented his hammer, badly.")

("I have some interesting news for you.")

("Oh and what’s that?")

("Your going to be interrogated, your now naked, and a female elite wants you to live, oh yea and she thinks you’re attractive.")

("What the hell, a female elite cares about me?")

("She is right in front of your body and she can’t stop looking at you, and did I tell you you’re naked.")

("Son of a bitch. You think you could wake me up, I want to talk to her.")

("Sure thing, but this is really going to hurt you.")

("What are you going to do?")

("You'll see.")

Mike awoke to a sharp pain in his groin. "Son of a bitch, Velo you suck, ow my nuts."

"Who is Velo?" A smooth female voice said.

"Somebody you will never see, because he lives in my head." Mike told her.

"Oh, you've been out cold for about 4 hours."

"And let me guess you where starting to get worried."

"Actually...how did you know?"

"That you want me to live and you think I’m attractive." Mike tapped his head. "Velo's been watching you for the entire time I was out."

"I am amazed that he found all that out, while you where unconscious."

"You think you could help me get out of here?"

"That’s not possible, escape has never been successful here, and all who try fail and die."

"Well then it’s good that I’m different."

"But if I help you then I will surely die."

"I will take you with me."

"But your people will imprison me, even if I did help you escape."

"Don’t worry if they try to take you I'll stop them myself."

"But if they come in a large force."

"I can stop them simply and effectively. So you gonna help me?"

She paused for a minute. She was about to answer when a large brute walked in. "Time to leave the prisoner to himself." He said.

She nodded her head and got up and walked away. The brute threw in Mike's overcoat and shut the door.

Mike hastily put the coat on and looked through the pockets and found his spare clothes, he hastily put them on and looked through the inside of the coat, all his guns and ammo was there, but his sniper rifle was missing. "Damnit, they must have taken it after I got knocked out." Mike figured he would just get it back when that female was going to help him escape. He was amazed he hid his wings so effectively. He put on his coat and hid them. He felt hungry and pulled out a smoked turkey sandwich and took a big bite out of it. "Mmmmm smokey." He quickly ate the rest of it. He decided to lie down and take a nap. But before he did he thought he would explore around the base a little bit. He reached into his coat and pulled out a little robot, he looked at it and said, "Good morning Stone Rex I need you to go looking around here for my sniper rifle and anybody talking about me, can you do that?"

The little robot nodded, it looked at him and a mechanical voice said. "But how do I get out?"

Mike smiled, "I'll make a way out, just make yourself invisible." He set it down on the floor and it disappeared.

("Scorch." Mike said.)

("Ya." He replied.)

("I need to get sick, find a disease that’s potent and lasts awhile, can you do that?")

("I’m disappointed that you think I cant, I can but you won’t like it.")

("Just do it.")

("Ok then here goes.")

("Wait I've got a better idea, use some germs to cut a hole in the wall so Stone Rex can fit through.")

("Ok I need control.")

("Oh wait I'll just use this vent.")

("Ok then what am I supposed to do?")

("There will most likely be guards out there so I want you to follow Rex and make some guards sick so it can slip by unnoticed.")

("Oh ok gotcha, I don’t need control for that, let me just work my magic and.")

Mike coughed up a wad of purple phlegm and it moved to the vent. "That tasted horrible." He wiped his mouth with the side of his hand.

Stone Rex moved to the vent and followed the phlegm out. Mike pulled out a little video monitor and saw a live feed of what Rex saw and had a little sound from it.

It meandered through halls and found a room with a guard, the phlegm moved forward and barley touched its foot. He immediately fell to the ground spazing. The door opened as another guard came out to see what was wrong. Stone Rex moved into the room while it had the chance and found an elite and two brutes talking, on the table infront of them was Mikes sniper rifle. Mike turned up Rex's speakers so he could hear what they where saying.

"This inferior weapon is capable of taking out our tanks with one shot, imagine what we could do if we reverse-engineered this into a plasma based weapon we would be able to destroy anything in our way with just one shot, we would be able to take planets without having to 'cleanse' them." The elite said.

"He is my prisoner I captured him and his weapon so it my decision on what we do with him and his weapon. I for one see no point in his 'rifle' I am more interested in why he isn't dead after I hit him in the back of his head with my hammer, he clearly isn’t human, maybe he can be turned against his own race and can build us more of these 'rifles' but made of plasma instead of metal so that way we can win this war that you are clearly losing." The Brute said, Mike knew it was the one who hit him he could see the large dent in the hammer where his head had been hit.

("Scorch." Mike said.)

("Yea?")

("Hit the brute with the dented hammer with the phlegm.")

("Can do.")

The wad of phlegm moved towards the brute and touched him on the foot. He immediately fell to the floor and started to spaz.

("Nice job Scorch.")

("Thanks Mike.")

"Hey Rex, come on back to me so I can hide you 'cause they are going to think it was me."

There was a confirmation beep from Rex as it headed back to Mike. Mike put the view screen back in his coat. A few minutes later Rex came back through the vent and jumped into his coat to. Mike decided to take a nap and leaned over and fell asleep.

Mike had been asleep for about five minutes when a brute barged in. "INFEDEL!" He roared.

Mike moved his head. "Yes?" he said.

"What did you do to my brother?!" He shouted.

"How could I have done anything if I've been in this room the whole time?"

"I know you did something."

"No idea what your talking about, However I might be able to help."

"How can you help in a problem you didn’t cause."

"You clearly don’t know what I am."

"Oh and what are you."

"I am very complicated, but I can help, for a fee."

"Never I will never ask help from and infidel especially if I have to pay it."

"Suit yourself, you might want to say goodbye to your brother then."

The brute looked at the floor and shook his head. "What do you want?"

"My Sniper Rifle." Mike leaned forward after he said that.

"Never, you would use it to kill us all when we least expect it."

"If you give it to me I promise I won’t use it. I just feel lonely without it, that’s all."

The brute considered this for a minute. "Your price is steep, but I will give you what you seek, but first you take care of my brother."

"I want my rifle first then I will take care of your brother."

"Fine." He looked out the door and yelled at a grunt. Five minutes passed and it came back carrying Mike's sniper rifle, it could barely hold it. The brute took it from it and threw it at Mike.

Mike's hand reached out and grabbed it and put it into his overcoat.

"Take me to your brother." Mike put his hands into his pockets and started to follow the brute. Before he left the room he made sure to put on his hat. "Lead the way."

They walked through a small amount of corridors and security gates. Mike got scowling glares from most of those they passed, Mike just smiled to himself. He was stopped by an elite who noticed his smile.

"What are you smiling for human." He growled at Mike.

"I'm learning."

"Learning what?" He sounded puzzled.

"Ways of escape."

"HA, human that’s not possible, many have tried and they all failed horribly at escaping this place, we made sure our prison is escape proof. If you want to try then your more than welcome to you'll just end up dead." He said and walked off.

"We'll just have to see about that." Mike said softly. He managed to attach a small communication link so he could call him when he escaped.

They walked to a med-ward and the brute pulled him to the side. "You will wait here until I call you."

"Ok then but hurry he might die before then." Mike sat down and crossed his hands.

The brute walked in and about ten seconds later yelled. "Infidel you may enter now, and hurry!"

Mike walked in, he looked at the brute and said, "You can stop calling me infidel now."

"And why should I do that?" he asked.

"Cause I could just walk back to my cell and let your brother die.

He was silent. "Fine human, just hurry and heal my brother."

Mike walked up to the brute and looked him in the eye. "I do this because I can, not because I’m being forced to, remember that I could've just let you die."

("Scorch when I put my hand over his arm make the poison leave through the pores in his arm and make it enter my hand. Then Amber will cleanse anything left behind, if there is anything left behind.")

("Ok Mike." Scorch said.)

Mike put his hand over the brutes arm and a small stream of purple ooze started to flow out onto Mike's hand into a purple ball.

The brute who was watching eyes grew big as he saw this orb of venom form on this humans hand and flow out of his brother’s veins.
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A general walked up to Flame and said," I am General Mack, I am the commander of the forces here. Now you said to my man over there that you need to organize a rescue party to retrieve a soldier of great importance."

Flame looked up. "Yes we do, his name is Mike and he is greatly needed to obtain the other half of the planet."

Sakuya popped out of Flames shadow. "And he is very important to me, I will help get him back."

General Mack looked at her. "What makes you qualified to help in this rescue mission little lady."

"I can shadowmeld, I also can't die, and I am uncannily accurate with knives." Sakuya said.

"Oh well lets see just how accurate you really are." He pointed to a Helljumper. "Throw a knife into his left nut."

The Helljumper heard this and had a shocked look on his face. He turned around and started to run. Sakuya reached into her overcoat and pulled out a small knife about the size of a finger and flung it into the man. He fell clutching his groin. General Mack walked up to him and moved his hand to see that Sakuyas knife was firmly planted in his left nut. General Mack looked up and said, "I'll be dammed, she's really accurate." He turned to Flame. "Just tell me what you need and it’s yours."

Flame looked at him. "I need twenty men who are stealthy, I also require a tank for Joker."

"And I need a handgun with a few clips for it." Sakuya piped up.

Flame looked at her. "Why you good with a handgun?"

"Somewhat." She replied.

"Ok just give me a couple of minutes to organize my men, and to get you your tank and then you can leave." General Mack said. He turned to Sakuya. "You can use my pistol, it’s an old as hell gun but its reliable, it’s saved my ass a couple of times, hope it comes in handy." He pulled out a revolver from his holster. He held it out handle first. "Here take it."

She took it from his hand carefully examined it. "I need bullets and some practice shooting and reloading this thing."

General Mack looked at her. "Right this way, I'll show you how to use this gun effectively." He moved his arm and they walked off towards the shooting range.

Flame looked at Tim. "Hey where’s Clayton, I haven’t seen him."

"Well I don't expect to find him anytime soon, he's good at camouflage."

"Good point, maybe he's near and he will come out of hiding."

"Oh fine I'll come out of hiding." Clayton appeared next to Tim. "I need a rifle, no I need a sub-machinegun, yea that would work especially if I customized it with a silencer and hand grip." He looked at Flame and Tim. "I'm going to the armory to see what they have, I might just get an assault rifle, but customized." He waved to them and walked off.

Tim looked around and said to Flame. "I’m going to go show off my mini-gun to any women that are here, and want to listen to an odd fool." And with that Tim was gone before Flame could object. So he was just left at the pelican sitting there, left to think about how he would assault a covenant base with twenty men and a tank.

"Well Mike might be able to bust out of the entire thing, I guess we'll have to just show him the way back." He said to himself. He decided to lay back and take a nap.
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Clayton had managed to make his way to the Amory by asking random people how to get there. He was surprised to see that it was empty. He walked in and said, "Hello, anybody here?"

"Who’s there, and what do you want with my section of this base." A female voice answered.

"I just want an assault rifle with some customizations." Clayton replied.

A figure appeared behind him and put a hand on his shoulder. "Then why didn't you say so, you came to the right place. Name your gun and I've got it." And after she said that she was behind the counter.

"Do you have an M4A1 custom?"

She pulled a rifle out from under the counter. "Is this what you’re looking for?"

Clayton walked up and picked up the rifle, he was shocked. "This is exactly what I wanted. Do you have a laser, flashlight, scope, and attachable grenade launcher?"

She pulled the assorted parts that Clayton asked for and put them on the counter. "Yes, what type of grenade do you want?"

"White phosphorus, and a couple of regular grenades."

She put two cases of WP grenades and a box of grenades on the table. "Take what you want, I'm never gonna use this stuff, and I can't sell it cause it’s so old. Need anything else?"

"A 50 cal. anit-matter sniper rifle?"

She pulled the large rifle from under the counter. "Want ammo for it?"

"Of course I do why wouldn’t I...actually this sniper rifle is just too much, I don't need it."

"Ok then." She put it back under the counter. "Anything else?"

"I almost forgot I need a suppressor."

She pulled one out and fitted all the parts together. She held the finished rifle up and handed it to Clayton. "There you are, here’s hoping this will help wherever you are. Take this too." She put an M870 on the table. "I want you to give this to Flame, I know his shotgun is getting to old to function without him cleaning it constantly. If he asks who gave it to you just tell him it’s a gift from someone who knows too much about the guns around her."

Clayton picked up the M870 with his M4A1. "Ok I'll tell him if he asks. You got a shoulder strap for this." He held up the M4.

"Ah I've got only one." She pulled it out from under her counter and fitted it onto him. "You look dashing, well seeya."

Clayton slung his rifle and held the shotgun in his left hand and waved to her with his right as he walked away.

It took him five minutes to reach the hanger where Flame was. He walked through the door to see a Scorpion main battle tank sitting next to the Pelican. He noticed Joker sitting happily in the driver’s seat. Clayton looked concerned at this sight, he looked at Joker. "Can I trust you to not blow all of us up?"

Joker looked at him. "I can't make any promises."

Clayton noticed Flame talking to General Mack. And then he saw Sakuya sitting on the back left tread of the tank. He walked up to her. "Hi, I’m Clayton, what's your name?" He held out his hand to shake.

Sakuya shook his hand. "My name is Sakuya, if I seem a little off it's because my love is being held captive in the base where we are going. Mike why did you have to leave me, I feel so venerable right now."

"Well if there’s anything I can do to help just ask and I will do the best I can."

Sakuya jumped off the side of the tank and hugged Clayton. She released him after about a minute. "I needed that, thank you Clayton."

Clayton was shocked. "Well anytime Sakuya, just tell me if you need any help." She let go of him. "I got to go give this shotgun to Flame now, seeya." Clayton walked off towards Flame.

Sakuya thought to herself. "Why Mike why couldn’t' you just study a map just once, so you'd know where enemies are." Sakuya put her face in her hands. She decided it sit on the tank. Flame walked up to her.

"Hey what’s wrong?" He asked her.

She sat bolt upright. "Nothing just thinking about something."

"You where thinking about Mike's safety, weren’t you?"

She looked saddened. "Yes, I miss him." She started to silently cry.

"Hey don't cry, I guarantee we will get Mike back for you." Flame tried to comfort her, but this made her cry harder. "If you’re going to cry can you do it in the shadow world, your making us all slightly depressed."

"Ok just come closer to me please." Flame did as she asked and she melded with his shadow. Flame turned around to face the Helljumpers and the tank.

"Where’s Tim?" Flame asked.

Just then Tim came running out of a hallway, and in one bound he jumped over the tank and hid.

Joker looked at him. "Dude what are you doing?"

"SHHH... I don't want them to know I’m here."

"Who?" As soon as Joker said that an angry horde of women came running out of the hall.

Their leader looked at Joker. "Where is that dirt bag Tim?" She shouted.

Joker pointed down another hallway. "That way, oh and as he ran by he called you all fat pigs."

That seemed to enrage them even more, they ran off so fast that they left a dust trail.

Tim looked at Joker. "Thanks for the added bonus there Joker."

"Anytime Tim." Joker said with a smile.

Flame looked at Tim. "Good now that your here we can leave. Squad move out." They all started to move and Joker started up the tank. They rolled out into the icy wasteland of Ansgar.

They had been walking for an hour. Joker decided to shoot some tank rounds. He arched the barrel of the tank and fired off a round. A Helljumper next to the tank looked at him like he was crazy. Joker fired another round. "That should do it."

A Helljumper looked at him. "Dude stop wasting tank ammo."

"Well those where my custom built tank rounds, half explosive, half napalm."

The Helljumper just looked away. "Whatever."

As they moved on they came to a bombed out covenant camp, it looked like a recent bombing.

"Good job Joker." Flame said.

"Thanks Flame." He turned to the Helljumper. "And you called this a waste of ammo, hahaha."

The Helljumper just grumbled. As they walked they encountered very little resistance. They came to a valley and decided that Joker should go up on ridge to cover them. Joker started to move up be started to get shot at by covenant as soon and he started. Half the squad moved to cover him. They moved extremely well, within a couple of seconds they killed all but one elite. Flame walked forward and fitted his tranq rounds into his shotgun. He shouldered it and fired into the elite. It fell with a dull thud. Flame looked to the Helljumpers. "Bind him and call the MP's to pick him up." The Helljumpers did as he commanded. After it was all done he called for the navigationalist. He looked at him. "How far until we get to the base?"

The nav man looked at his charts. "Another mile. Maybe"

As soon as he finished his sentence they heard a deafening roar.

"What was that?" Flame asked.

Sakuya appeared next to him. "That was Mike, someone stabbed him in the back, literally."

There was another Roar and the valley shook.