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Eve Part 1
Date: 31 October 2002, 11:54 pm
For a normal human, waiting for five long nights and days, staying completely still, awake and alert in a pile of mud, would be impossible, even for the most routine snipers. But this sniper was no ordinary human... if human at all.
1600 hours UNSC standard time
August 25th
2527
Remote colony Planet Sakuro
Population: 1.3million
Up in the sky yellow flashes of MAC-guns blazing and ship reactors breaching could be seen. Lieutenant Major Spartan 121 knew from experience that within a few hours, the air would be filled with UNSC fighters, sweeping the area clean of any armored vehicles and structures whilst marines would be sweeping the ground on this peninsula, if not the entire continent of this F-sized planet.
What she also knew, from scanning ONI Intel Satellite photos of the area, was that the fanatic rebel colonel Arthur Estriks finally was on his way to the rebel EVAC coordinates from his private bunker in the rebel camp which was about 50 klicks further into the forest.
Estriks was a war scarred hero within the rebellion. He had had several, though lucky, victories over UNSC forces in space- and ground conflicts. He was once a highly respected and decorated Longsword pilot in the UNSC. Tragically, his ship got damaged at the battle of Betelgeuse Alpha, and Estriks went into repertory arrest when his oxygen supply ran out. When he woke up in a hospital frigate a week later he was changed, never again to be the man he once was. The doctors found nothing physically wrong with him, so they signed him out of sickbay. Only a few weeks after his apparent "recovery" he became paranoid, convinced that the UNSC had sent assassins after him to kill him, for reasons only he himself knew. He joined up with the rebellion with the objective to make the UNSC suffer for "trying to kill him".
Later on, he started a terrorist group within the rebel alliance, which he and his followers called "The Fists of light". In the beginning of his career within terrorism, no one took him seriously. Mostly due to the fact that he only threatened with different terror attacks, and that some day everybody would pay. When nothing happened, it's not surprising nobody took him seriously. He would get his revenge though.... In 2519 he set off a nuclear charge, without any notice or threats, in Renêrsburg on the planet Vega Sipher in the Vega system. It was one of the most densely populated areas in the galaxy. Over 6 million people died. Since then, nobody's been able to capture - or kill him. However, ONI recently got information from an agent who had infiltrated a rebel ship and stolen files which would prove vital in finding several hidden rebel bases. The name "Arthur Estriks" and his whereabouts popped up in those files.
And now Major Lieutenant Spartan 121, or Eve - that was her real name - had been assigned to capture, or, if necessary, kill him. FLEETCOM had told her to keep a low profile, they only wanted to capture him, not slaughter a whole platoon of men. It was better if they could tell the story about the great rebel "hero" who vanished without a trace.
It was all in her briefing.
A small light flashed on her HUD, telling her she had to contact the command ops. Almost three hours had passed since Eve checked in with HQ.
-"Commander Nikkelson, do you copy?" She said with a solid voice. "Affirmative, Lieutenant Major, what's your status?", a voice said after a few seconds. The commander on the other side of the COM sounded nervous. "Status is all clear down here, but any minute the warthog will be here. Hopefully with Estriks" She swiftly answered. "Hopefully? Are you not sure?!" He yelled out. The man definitely seemed stressed to the bones. "No, the new satellite photos showed more structures, people and vehicles, so I am not sure it's him. It might be just an ordinary marine." She said with a calm voice. "Is everything all right up there?" She asked the commander. "We're taking fire from a -" Static sound engulfed the commander's voice."- cruiser that just -" More static sounded on the COM."-on our flank-" He paused and yelled out orders about sealing hull breaches, he then continued. "-What?? A -" After that, the only sound that could be heard on the COM was the infinite noise of static reverb.
She had lost contact with HQ. The command was on the UNSC Juggernaut "Requiescat" out in orbit just outside the planet. She began to think the worst.
-"Something must have gone terribly wrong up there...those Juggernauts are virtually impossible to destroy. Maybe their COM just went -". She raised her guard immediately as she heard the roaring noise. It was the distinct sound of a warthog sliding and bouncing as it drove on the muddy road. The vehicle was about 2kilometers away, closing fast on her position. It would be an easy target once it came into view.
She had dug down on a small raised area right after a long straight, after which the road took a fast turn into denser terrain. She had a superb line of sight over the straight section of the road, ready to take on a whole platoon of men and vehicles with her bobby traps and sniper rifle. She did however, prefer using the latter means of combat.
The noised was getting louder.
She rechecked her targeting reticle and sniper scope one last time to make sure that all alignments were perfect. Her primary weapon was a matte black long-barreled rifle named the SRS99C-S2. This gun was favored amongst the sniper designated Spartans. Her backup rifle was an MA5B loaded with AP rounds and equipped with a silencer and sniper scope.
She was ready...
The warthog appeared in the middle of the road, straight ahead from her position, skidding from left to right in the wet, deep mud. Black smoke plummed from the vehicle, and it seemed to handle very unsteady, with the driver struggling to keep the jeep on the road.
There was so much dirt on the windshield that Eve couldn't see the driver with her normal optical mode. She switched to infrared, targeted and fired; all within a split-second. She hit right where she had aimed, on the right side of the vehicle, not to harm the driver. The jeep quickly made a right turn, skidding into a tree and catapulting the driver out of his seat. The power of a rifle firing a bullet at 1500m/s was nothing to play with. All the armor on the right side of the warthog had shattered from the impact, leaving only scattered titanium-debris on the road.
The man lay face down in the mud, seemingly unconscious. He was about 150 meters away. Eve packed up her gear double time and jogged over to the man with her MA5B steadily held with both hands. Half-way she could see the man was a real mess. His lower right arm and hand looked scorched and carbonized. It looked like the man had been hit by an energy weapon.
He also had a big piece of armor-shrapnel from the warthog in the same arm which seemed to have torn off an artery in the upper arm. Blood was everywhere around him. She turned him over. It indeed was Estriks. He was still alive, but delusional, whispering sentences that made no sense to the Spartan.
Suddenly he screamed;
"They wanted me and my men, but I wouldn't let them have me! I wouldn't let them have me!"
"Who are 'they'?" Eve asked.
"Don't you know?? The damn UNSC... they sent the assassins to kill me, but they didn't succeed, you hear me! They didn't ....-"
Estriks reached out to try and grab Eve's gun but fell short, his arm fell to the ground and the life slowly drained from his eyes. Eve could tell he was dead, she couldn't hear his heart beating any more. He had lost too much blood for there to be any hope of resuscitation in the field.
With no COM, no extraction point, and Arthur Estriks dead, Eve knew she had to find a way out of this place.
Something wasn't feeling right...
End of part 1.
Written by Henrik Ölander-Hjalmarsson, aka 'RazorCow'
I want to give thanks to 'Freddo' for correcting linguistic errors for me and helping me with some various things... Thanks mate!
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