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The Battle of Artemis VI by Frucka
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The Battle of Artemis VI - Episode One, The Beginning
Date: 10 October 2004, 8:34 PM
ARTEMIS VI - 2168
Nine-year-old William was playing with his remote-control Warthog when his mother told him to go to sleep. He didn't want to. He was having fun, sitting there, imagining he was in the UNSC. Imagining he was helping his father fight the Covenant. Reluctantly, he put his car and the remote on a shelf and went into bed. His mother kissed him goodnight and shut the door. He was still dreaming of being a Marine with his father when suddenly, he heard a dull thumping noise outside his bedroom door. Curious, he went to open it. His mother lay dead with one of the Covenant needles poking through her throat. A second after he saw it, the needle exploded and left a bloddy gash in his mother's throat. He got scared and cried. He then heard footsteps and saw two Grunts approaching him. One of them had a plasma pistol in his hand. William ran up to the Grunt and tackled him, but even though he was the same size as the Grunt, it was far too strong for him. It punched him in the head and fired its pistol at his face. But the pistol's power core was drained. The Grunt squealed as the boy took the pistol and cracked the methane case with it. The Grunt shivered, fell, and died. The other Grunt was furious, and primed a plasma grenade. He threw it at William, but William had seen battle holos that his father left in his closet. He knew to duck and run as far away from it as possible. It exploded and ruined his remote-controlled Warthog, along with the books on the shelf and the shelf itself. The Grunt yelled something out and a red-armored Elite came to him. The Elite was holding something, but William didn't see what it was. William leaned to the left a bit and saw the horror in the Elite's hand: his father's severed head. William let out a cry and reached onto the wall where an antique AK-47 sat in a case. He knew that he'd regret it later, but he shot the Grunt dead. He turned it to the Elite, but the Elite was holding a needler. The needler fired twice. One round hit a hologenerator, presenting a photo of Preston Cole. The photo flickered and died out. The other round hit the AK-47's magazine and melted it. One bullet remained, however. William was about to fire in a section his father told him was unshielded, but two three-round assault rifle bursts hit the Elite in that area and it died. William looked for where the fire came from and saw a man leaning against a wall. The man was his father's best friend, Georgie. He was the man who killed the Elite. Georgie had a bad burn on his forehead, presumably from a plasma pistol or plasma rifle. William ran up to Georgie and asked him what happened. "Your father and I came back from our mission early. We were about to surprise you and... UH!" William clutched his burn in pain. "And then this Elite decapitated your father with a plasma sword. I took it and decapitated the Elite. Then a Grunt shot it and it deactivated. I had to shoot the Grunt with my assault rifle. We saw two Elites and two Grunts entering your house. We knew they were trying to either kill you guys or get something. I followed them in. I managed to kill one of the Elites, but he was a blue-armored one. A weakling. Before I got him, he... he..." William interrupted, "He killed my mom." "Yeah. He did. But I got him real good, don't worry. Then one of those Grunt things shot me in the forehead with his plasma pistol. I heard your door open and I wanted to come and help, believe me. But my head stung too much." "Don't worry, I handled them alright by myself." "We'd better get some help. I'll go to the rest of the Marines. Stay here, son." Georgie left and William rested his back on a plant pot. He had changed his mind. He never wanted to fight the Covenant again. Never.
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Georgie double-timed it back to the station. He saw his buddies Fred and Vincent guarding the entrance. They let him in but looked very unhappy about something. One of them looked like he had recently cried. Georgie only knew one other person. He was a good sniper named Kevin. Georgie rang Kevin's quarters door bell. There was no answer. He rang it again. Still, there was no answer. A security personnel passing by looked at Gerogie for a second, then at the quarters entrance, then shook his head and left. Georgie knew what this meant, and it explained why Fred and Vincent weren't very happy. Kevin was dead.
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William was fast asleep, leaning against that same potted plant. It was nearly morning. Then William woke with a start. He had heard something. It sounded like alien chattering, and very familiar chattering at that. He got up and tiptoed to the front door. Through the glass, he could see three Grunts and an unknown alien on a Ghost hovercraft. They were examining a house next door to William's and they pulled dead bodies from it. The alien in the Ghost would then shoot the bodies, frying them. The Grunts would step on the fried bodies and they would crumple up into small chunks, small enough to dispose of as garbage. William had a sinking feeling the aliens would come for his house next. He saw the Grunts walking nearer to his house, stopping at points in the road where dead humans lay, disposing of them the same way they disposed of the people next door. Finally, after five minutes of watching this, William felt he had enough. He tiptoed into his father's bedroom and pulled out the only thing his father left behind before he departed on his last mission: a fully loaded submachine gun, or as the Marines called it, an SMG. He took it with him and ran out the front door. The aliens turned and saw him, leveling their weapons, but they were too late. William shot two of the Grunts dead in a matter of seconds. The alien in the Ghost sped over to him. The remaining Grunt took cover behind a small shed on the roadside. William aimed his gun at the Ghost's plasma cannons and fired. He shot one of them and it broke off, but the other remained perfectly intact. The alien fired the weapon at William. William jumped to the left, out of the way of the fire. He saw a dead Elite and a needler lying at its side. He took the needler and shot its whole clip at the Ghost. It exploded and killed the alien inside of it. The Grunt behind the shed burst from his cover, leveling an overcharged plasma pistol at William. He let go of the trigger and the ball of energy flew towards William. William jumped but the bolt caught his left shoulder. Blood poured out and William's vision blurred from the pain. But it quickly went away and William felt a cold, numb feeling in his shoulder. He felt the SMG pulled from his grasp, heard the rattle of fire, and the dying scream of the Grunt. William looked up first, and saw Georgie. He looked at his shoulder and saw that it had been filled with biofoam. He wanted to touch it and see what it felt like, but Georgie told him not to. William got up with the aid of another man. He looked at the man and saw that he was Vincent, another one of his father's friends. In a Warthog to his right was Fred, a man who William met once in the Marine base on Reach. He had left the base three days before the Covenant attacked and glassed the planet. It was hard to believe that Reach was gone. His father loved to take William there. He'd even let William fire guns at targets. But none of this was as great as the last day William spent on Reach. He had met a great warrior, one who had killed tens of thousands of Covenant single-handedly. He didn't know his name, but he did know that he was one of the Spartans. He was the one they called the Master Chief. But it didn't matter. The Master Chief was probably dead now. Reach was gone, and he was probably on it when it was glassed. William's thoughts were interrupted when Vincent said, "Bastards are gonna glass this place soon. We gotta get out of here!" Fred scowled and said, "We gotta fight! Show these devils what humanity really is!" Vincent yelled again that they must leave, and Fred argued with him for three minutes. Neither Georgie or William tried to stop them. The argument was interrupted by a deep roar, the sound of needlers firing, and three screams. William looked behind him and saw a massive alien shooting and punching his neighbors to death. One of the people he shot was William's best friend, Sarah. William felt a sudden urge to get revenge and hoisted himself into the Warthog's gun. It was a very large chaingun, so large and powerful that William couldn't identify what type it was. He didn't care though. He aimed at the massive creature as best he could and fired. He quickly let go of the trigger, however, when the force of the gun rattled his body. William felt dizzy. Just half a second of gunfire rattled him that hard. Fred motioned Georgie and Vincent to get in the Hog. Vincent was making his way to the passenger seat, but was stopped in his tracks by three needles sticking through his chest. They exploded and he dropped dead. Georgie ran to the gunner seat and pulled William out of it. He put William in the passenger seat and took off his armor. He covered William in it. Then Georgie hoisted himself into the gunner seat and fired at the alien. It's armor was too strong, however. It also had a large metal shield and used it to block most of the chaingun fire. Then, suddenly, the chaingun fire stopped. William looked back and saw why. Two needles were sticking through Georgie's body. They exploded and he died, still grasping the chaingun. The alien raised his arm and fired a large green bolt from it. It hurdled the Warthog into the air. Fred was unharmed, but William's arm was burnt off. He cried and held the stub that was left of it. The Warthog managed to land on its wheels and Fred accelerated to a dangerously fast rate. He was in range. He could hit the alien and kill it. He was almost there when suddenly, a needle hit one of the wheels and it leaked air. The car slowed, bumped, and grazed the alien's shield. The alien raised its shield and used it to split Fred's head in two. William was still crying, clutching what was left of his arm. The alien raised its shield and was about to lower it when it roared and fell to the ground. A man lying on the ground, almost dead, held a hunter's rifle in his hand. He had shot the massive alien in one of it's unarmored sections. The man then smiled at William and died. William attempted to get out of the Warthog, but he could not. He was in too much pain. He'd just have to pray and hope some Marines would cross his path and help him.
TO BE CONTINUED IN:
The Battle of Artemis VI - Episode Two, Raid on the Louis and Clark
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