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The Fall Of Firebase Bravo by Rachel Docherty
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the fall of firebase bravo - part one
Date: 2 November 2007, 8:00 pm
Private David Barrett was dimly aware of a harsh screeching sound, plucking at his eardrums. His head was fuzzy and he couldn't feel his legs. With a great deal of effort, he opened his eyes, and realised with a stab of fear that he was lying on his stomach on the ground, and the weight on his back was the corpse of his superior officer. Panicking, Barrett tried to roll over, but the stiffness of his joints and the deadweight of the Lieutenant made this difficult. It took Barrett a good while to claw his way out from underneath the body, and he forced down the bile that rose in his throat as he pushed the corpse away. As he stood up, he realised that the death of his team mate wasn't his only problem.
He blinked in disbelief at the carnage that surrounded him, as far as the eye could see. Where their base had been, before the surprise Covenant attack, there were piles of corpses, the bodies of the men and women who had fought of the waves of enemies attacking Fire Base Bravo.
Barrett limped forward, taking a sharp breath, his leg was stinging painfully. Looking down, he noticed a large burn-mark surrounding a substantial rip in his fatigues just above his right knee. The skin was blackened and cracked, and as he moved his leg, the skin split, oozing scarlet blood. Barrett swore, and shouldered the discarded 99C-S2 AM sniper rifle that lay by the badly burned body of a marine.
Barrett grimaced, stumbling towards body after body, hoping to find someone, anyone left alive. The thought that he was alone in this field of the dead was choking him as he absent-mindedly policed for sniper rounds.
It wasn't just the base that had taken damage. The hillside around the base had been hit by the Covenant plasma blasts, and the grass and stubbly trees had burned away, leaving the ground glimmering like the surface of a mirror. Now Barrett really knew why they called it 'glassing a planet.'
After a half an hour of searching, Barrett had found no other survivors. He slumped to the ground, the rifle sliding from his shoulder and landing on the hardened mud with a loud clap. He tried to remember what had happened before he got knocked out, but that screeching noise still rang, albeit distantly, in his ears. He gazed up into the sky, shielding his eyes to try and locate the source of the noise.
Three Covenant Banshees were circling the forest in the distance. Suddenly the heat of the fight came back to Barrett and he could hear the yelling of the marines in his ears. The Covenant had come in huge numbers, wave after wave of Grunts squealing and firing those needles, they stuck deep into the bodies of whoever they hit, and exploded, ripping the person's innards apart. But it hadn't just been Grunts. The UNSC troops could deal with Grunts, sometimes they even fought them off completely, but there were Jackals too, and a type of alien that Barrett had never seen before, nobody had. Hulking, huge bipeds, when they had come lumbering over the cliff towards the base even the Sergeant had turned pale. The bigger ones had huge plasma cannons, which almost seemed to be a part of them. They blew through the marines, raining bolts of green plasma down on the base, destroying the UNSC defence.
Barrett had been holding back the waves of grunts with a small group of marines, who were the best snipers they could get hold of. The ammo had been running low and Barrett was down to his last three rounds when the low wall in front of them had been hit by a streaking plasma blast from a circling Banshee. The marine in front of him had been propelled backwards, dead on impact, and the force of his body hitting Barrett must have knocked him unconscious.
Barrett knew that the only reason he lived was because he had been hidden. Hidden under the body of a fellow soldier. He hung his head and contemplated the best course of action. When the marines had been dropped in, the Covenant had launched a ground attack on Cote d'Azur, a major population centre on the planet. Barrett knew that if he had any chance of surviving, he had to find his way to Fire Base Alpha and join up with the second platoon of marines. Shaking his head, he tried not to think about what he would do if he reached the base and there was no base.
Barrett decided that the only way to get to Firebase Alpha would be to cut through the dense jungle. He knew that it would probably be crawling with Covenant troops, particularly at night fall, but he could only hope that the fact that he was alone would mean he passed through unnoticed. Barrett counted the rounds he had policed, he had five magazines. He would have to be very careful not to miss. Wincing, he rose from his dusty seat on the dirt and headed out towards the jungle edge, where the greenery starkly contrasted the burned up brown earth of the base.
The Fall of Firebase Bravo - Part Two
Date: 5 January 2008, 5:25 pm
Barrett pushed his way through the thick foliage. The smell of the slimy mud festered in the air, so thick he almost choked. In places the mud was inches deep, and his boots sank into the filth, throwing him off balance. He shrugged the rifle further up his shoulder and grimaced as the pain in his leg beat through him.
He thought about all the men and women who had died protecting Firebase Bravo and rage bubbled in his blood. The UNSC had been unprepared for the sheer numbers of Covenant troops. He thought to himself that the damn ONI spooks could at least spot a Covenant battle force with their recon, but then again, he thought, the spooks were never on the frontlines. To them, him and all the marines just like him were a disposable commodity. As long as the Covenant never reached the inner systems, never found Reach, ONI were content to let hundreds of marines die.
A noise in the jungle up ahead snapped Barrett from his thoughts. He stopped abruptly and dropped low to the ground. The noise was horribly familiar. Grunts.
Barrett looked around him, his heart pounding. To his left, the ground started to slope sharply upward, and the top of this 'ledge' was covered in dense green ferns. Barrett gritted his teeth and sloshed through the mud unbearably slowly, trying not to make any sounds. The only fact which comforted the marine was that the Grunts didn't sound like they were getting any closer.
Barrett crawled his way up to the top of the slope, and started to slide forward on his belly, parting the ferns quietly with his fingertips. Below him, a rustling creek ran through a large depression. There were three Grunts that he could see, huddled around a battered looking Warthog. They chattered and squealed, hitting the jeep with the butts of their plasma pistols. As far as Barrett could see, the Grunts were pretty green, and didn't seem to have a superior officer hanging around them.
Barrett rested the sniper rifle on the ground and looked intently through the scope. Zooming in, he inspected the Warthog. The windshield was completely blown out, and there were plasma scorches all down her right hand side, but apart from that, the jeep looked intact. Barrett knew that if he could take out the three grunts quickly, he might make it to the jeep and be able to get on the com link. He scoped in on the nearest Grunt, watching it as it stared at the Warthog like an inquisitive animal. Holding his breath, Barrett squeezed the trigger. The rifle snapped backwards in recoil and the Grunt dropped silently to the ground. It took the other two Grunts a minute to realise what had happened to their comrade. A minute too long. Barrett popped the second Grunt's methane tank and it squealed hysterically before choking to death. The third Grunt starting firing wildly into the air, chattering and emitting high pitched squeaks. Barrett silenced it, the sniper round hitting it square in the chest. He counted himself lucky the things weren't well armoured.
Barrett reloaded the sniper rifle and raised himself up on his elbows. He couldn't see any more movement in the forest, and the only noise was the gentle rushing of the creek. He started to move down the harsh edge of the slope, lowering himself down slowly and using tree roots as handholds. Reaching the bottom, he took a second look around. He still couldn't see anything, and there were so many animals in the forest that he damn sure wouldn't hear anything. The Warthog was close now, and he hobbled faster, the mud sucking at his boots.
Barrett reached the abandoned jeep, and sank into the seat. He felt relief at just touching the familiar rough-edged metal of the jeep, something human in this stinking, menacing jungle. Barrett tried to start the jeep, the engine screaming in protest at being turned over. The Warthog sputtered and coughed, and died. Barrett kicked out in anger, catching his foot on the centre console.
'Dammit.'
He held his head in his hands and sat there. The wind died down completely, and a light rain shook the leaves overhead, but Barrett couldn't bring himself to move. Thoughts that he had been keeping at bay all day suddenly rushed into his head. He was going to die in this jungle.
Barrett didn't know how long it was before he slid out of the useless empty shell of the Warthog and started moving through the rain forest. The trees were closer together in this area of the jungle, and with the creek running through there was not much dry ground to walk on. Several times he slipped and his legs gave way underneath him. After dragging himself upright for a third time Barrett noticed the pain from the plasma burn on his leg had gotten a lot worse. The crawl up the muddy slope where he had taken out the three grunts had filled the cracks in his blistered skin with a brown, stinking filth, and after falling on to the riverbank, he could barely distinguish the mud from the wound. Barrett grimaced and decided he'd better stop to the clean the injury.
As midday passed, the humidity climbed and the thick jungle air became oppressive. As Barrett filled his bottle by the creek, with what he hoped was fairly clean water, he noticed huge footprints set deep into the thick mud. They were obviously from the huge aliens he had seen, small shrubs and plant life had been crushed into the dirt, and all around the huge depressions the creatures had left behind there were scores of Grunt tracks.
As he rinsed the worst of the mud from the cracked, sore skin on his leg and ripped the sleeve of his fatigues to make a makeshift bandage, he tried to ignore the fact that the tracks were heading in the same direction as him. Towards Firebase Alpha.
Barrett could smell the smoke before he saw the base. His heart sank in his chest as he lumbered slowly towards the dirt track which lead up the Alpha HQ. His arms and legs ached, and his chest felt like it was on fire. He had long ago given up trying to lug the sniper rifle, and he dragged it along the ground, its long barrel digging into the pliable dirt.
He pushed his way through to the dirt track and saw the preliminary defences of Firebase Alpha. The concrete bunker had been blasted away, and the ground was peppered with blast holes and Grunt tracks. Barrett felt dismay wash over him, but it couldn't quite extinguish the dim hope that someone up there might still be alive. Looking up, he squinted at the top of the hill. There was a signal flare, which meant there had to be marines.
Barrett picked up his speed, pushing past the pains in his leg. He passed the main barracks and the Command Office, both were burned to the ground. He kept going, his legs buckling underneath him, when he heard the all too familiar sound of a Pelican dropship overhead. Looking up, Barrett gazed in confusion at the singular dropship. It was heading for the centre of the base.
Up ahead, he could see a low granite bunker, surrounded by sandbags. There were marines outside. Only ten or so that he could see, but they looked as if they'd pushed the Covenant back. He started yelling and waving his arms, struggling to lift the heavy sniper rifle high over his head. Two of the marines standing and watching the dropship as it made to touch down saw him and jogged over. One of the marines had a bandage around his head and a patch covering one of his eyes.
'Jesus Private, you make it all the way from Bravo?'
Barrett nodded dumbly. Looking past the marine with the bandaged eye, he saw the dropship touch down. The launch ramp dropped into the scorched dirt of the base, and a dozen heavily armoured figures marched out, they looked as alien to him as any of the Covenant troops. Barrett stared at them wordlessly, the other marines turning to follow his gaze.
'Who in the hell are they?'
Barrett didn't know any better than the other marines, but he felt like something in this battle had changed. The tables were about to turn.
The Fall of Firebase Bravo - Part Three
Date: 17 August 2008, 12:28 pm
Barrett looked at himself in the jagged shard of mirrored glass that was propped up against the barrack wall. His face was caked in dried dirt and blood, the two substances mingling so much it was hard to tell which was which. Scooping some water in his hands from a dirty plastic dish, he tried to get the worst of the dirt off his hands and face, before taking a look at his leg.
Rolling back his fatigues, Barrett could see the plasma burn properly. The blackened skin was encrusted with the filthy mud from the jungle floor. Barrett shuddered and tried to rinse the wound with some of the water from the dish. He was pretty sure that was gonna get infected.
After cleaning it up the best he could, he wrapped his leg in the bandages he'd been given and rolled the leg of his pants back down. Barrett caught his reflection in the mirror again and sighed.
His service in the UNSC had aged him, he'd seen too much, and looked much older than his twenty-five years. His dark hair, though shorn to stubble, still showed a little premature grey at the temples, and his deep-set blue eyes were dulled and devoid of any inner light that might have once been there. They had more lines around than he remembered. Barrett grimaced, a little glad that his parents couldn't see him now, he looked like a man who'd lost everything, he thought, which wasn't too far from the truth.
He had had a pretty sheltered childhood, growing up on Paris IV, one of the UNSC's colonies. He had wanted to join the marine core for as long as he could remember. First it had been the rebels, threatening Earth's colonies, and now the Covenant. Barrett had heard all the stories before he'd signed up, marines signing up and being shipped out to boot, never coming home. The stories hadn't put him off though, to protect Earth and her colonies had seemed like the biggest and most important responsibility of all. To him, the UNSC meant honour and pride. He remembered the day he left clearer than anything else, sticking out in his memory, all contrast and noise. His mother had never wanted him to go. She had cried and cried and begged him to stay. That had been the last time he'd seen her. The Covenant had laid siege to Paris IV in 2549, and Barrett knew inside that she was gone. The grief inside him had turned to bitter rage, and he had continued his service, needing to know that he was hitting the Covenant back. The UNSC had become his family, and wherever they were stationed was his home, although Barrett thought, after seeing the huddled groups of marines settled in the cloying dust around the firebase, nursing gaping plasma wounds, some blinded or deafened, Barrett had to wonder whether the UNSC that he knew would still have a place in its 'family' for those broken, torn-up soldiers, or whether they'd have a place anywhere at all.
'Private Barrett!' A voice from the doorway tore Barrett from his thoughts, and he snapped a salute without thinking. Looking at the origin of this voice, he realised it was the young marine he'd seen at the entrance to the base, with the bandaged eye. The man laughed.
'I don't think salutes are necessary Barrett.' He leant against the doorframe, scratching at his head where the bandage met his military stubble.
'The Corporal sent me to make sure you're mobile. We've got to round up the soldiers that can move around and get them together at the Pelican. We're dusting off in approximately ninety minutes.'
Barrett felt his face crease in a frown. He considered whether it was inappropriate to voice his worries, but he decided that in his situation, military etiquette was not the highest priority.
'How is that possible? The Covenant'll take Cote d'Azur. We'll lose the planet.'
The marine looked at him with his good eye, evidently sharing his concerns.
'Apparently, those guys we saw come down on the dropship are NavSpecWep.' He paused and folded his arms. 'They're gonna either take back the city or destroy it.'
Barrett wiped his hands down on the leg of his fatigues, 'They are gonna have to be some powerful force to take back that city.' He limped over to the doorway, picking up his adopted sniper rifle from the dirt. The barrel was caked with filth, the mouth of the gun stuffed with plant material and dried mud. Barrett wiped half-heartedly at the dirt with his hands.
'I know how you feel Barrett, but you saw those guys come down the landing ramp.' The marine paused for thought, 'I've never seen anything like them before. Corporal Harland says they move like ghosts.' He bit his lower lip, and folded his arms across his chest. 'The camp's full of talk. They think they're Spartans.'
Barrett felt his heart lift a little as he thought again about those figures in that strange, pearlescent armour coming down the exit ramp of the dropship. He had heard the rumours on their last tour of duty. The Spartans were supposed to be military miracles, super-soldiers. People said they would end the war. Up until today, Barrett had never seen one, not even in a picture, they were like urban myths, it was always a friend of a friend that had seen them, someone posted somewhere far away. He had been beginning to wonder if they even existed, or if it was more UNSC propaganda to raise morale. But the more he thought about it, the more he wanted, and needed, to believe that today he had seen a Spartan. He had heard the stories of their engagements. Talk buzzed around the marine core that no Spartan had ever been killed in action, that they were nothing short of invincible. If the marines were right, and those soldiers he had seen were everything he'd heard about, maybe they'd have a chance of getting off this rock. Barrett looked up, his mouth a flat sombre line.
'I hope they are everything they're cracked up to be. For all our sakes.'
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Barrett could feel the Pelican dropship shuddering as it accelerated away from Firebase Alpha, kicking up dirt and ash from the ground-up mud. He gripped onto a handhold and gritted his teeth, feeling the familiar rolling sensation in his gut at the sudden altitude change. Barrett felt himself glancing at the rear of the dropship, he couldn't stop looking at the Spartans.
They were silent, and fast. That was the thing that surprised Barrett the most. After seeing them come down the exit ramp of the Pelican earlier that day, he'd expected a lot of things, but not this eerie, isolated silence. They moved fluidly as a team, and made the thick, metal hide of their odd pearlescent armour look graceful. Barrett knew he was staring, but he couldn't look away.
One of them had been wounded taking back the city. His arm was burned off from the elbow down, ending in a raw, coagulated stump. But yet he was still alive, he had even been coherent enough to salute the Spartan leader, the Master Chief, when he'd boarded the dropship. Barrett had heard all the stories, but he was beginning to believe what they said about the Spartans. Maybe they were invincible.
He heard the huge sonic boom of the warhead detonation, and the Pelican's engines struggling to compensate for the shock wave. Blinking rapidly, Barrett looked away from the sky as it turned white. The bomb had gone off. All the Covenant troops, and Cote d'Azur, were dust. A small squad of Spartans had done what platoons of marines couldn't. Sigma Octanus IV was a win for the UNSC.
Barrett was dimly aware of a voice coming from somewhere in the dropship saying that they were going to dock with the UNSC Leviathan. He felt his spirit lift. They were going to jump to Reach, they were going to be saved, after all.
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