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Present Darkness, Prologue
Posted By: russ687<russ687@hotmail.com>
Date: 14 November 2004, 5:58 AM
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Present Darkness
Prologue
Forward to War
0400 hours, November 21, 2552 (Military Calendar)
UNSC Carrier Stanton Bay
In orbit above Planet Red Dawn (Codename), Theta 1440+90 System
The sound of footsteps echoed though the steel hall, breaking the silence and sending slight foreword to the two armed guards at the end of the corridor. This portion of the ship was unusually quiet, with no crewmembers or Marines moving through the maze of hallways that crisscrossed Deck C17 of the carrier. The silence was unsettling, but the nerves were already raw for everyone aboard the ship.
Major Jody Foster consciously forced his hands to loosen their clenched form as he walked toward the doors at the end of the corridor. He walked steadily and kept his head up, despite the feeling in his gut that made him feel conspicuous for no apparent reason. He passed under the bright white lights as his vision narrowed to the senior ranking Marine guard at the double doors ahead of him.
In a war where nothing resounded louder then the cries of the dying and the constant fear of death, nobody was at ease; especially with the situation they were in. Foster recognized both those facts of this war, but the turmoil went deeper with him. He had the unenviable job of, in all practical reality, sending young men to their deaths.
United Nations Marine Corps, Intelligence, Tactical Interdiction Section; Foster held the least favorable position in his Battalion. While his duties were invaluable to the success of future missions, it was not something that seemed necessarily right. He was usually stuck between winning a campaign against the Covenant, and determining the fate of those Marines in his unit.
He pointed to his identification badge clipped to his BDU fatigues, and the senior ranking guard opened the door, coming to attention and saluting as the Major walked past. Foster moved straight into the darkness of the GFCIC and onto the C3I section.
The red operating lights of the Ground Forces Combat Information Center filled the space around him as the double doors closed. Screens and consoles emitted a wide array of lights as Navy and Marine personnel operated their own respective areas of the GFCIC. Large digital screens on the walls showed the tactical displays of the system and planet they were orbiting, and others showed different map layouts of the areas of interest on Red Dawn; the planet affectionately codenamed after being discovered. The large room was quietly busy with nearly thirty personnel operating the computers that fed information out to other ships and ground units.
Foster quickly stepped up a stairwell leading to the Command, Control, Communications & Intelligence section that dominated the area overlooking the GFCIC from above. He looked about and found his person of interest: Second Regiment, Third Battalion Commander Lieutenant Colonel Theodore Nodern.
The CO waved down Foster's salute and turned back to stare at the display showing the logistical and personnel status of his Battalion.
Foster pushed the deep feeling in his gut aside and pulled out the manila folder from his clipboard. "Sir, we have located the Covenant supply line."
Nodern scratched his day-old unshaven face and looked at the Major. "This isn't the same crap those Navy pukes were trying to feed me earlier?" The tone of the forty-four year-old Marine was flat and deep; the look in the seasoned officer's eyes portrayed an air of authority that no one would test.
Foster shook his head, handing over the folder. "No, sir. This was taken directly from one of our own recon birds just under an hour ago. The craft was lost shortly after transmitting this information back to the forward air observer, which would safely allow me to conclude that this supply line is also heavy defended."
The older man quickly read through the papers. "Always a good indicator that we've found what we're looking for." Nodern closed the folder and handed it back to his Intel Officer. "I don't have time for the creative writing assignment someone scratched up in ten minutes. Tell me what we're looking at."
Foster grabbed the folder, then took control of one of the screens and quickly zeroed in a map. "The Covenant fuel supply line extends from the known mineral deposits eighty clicks northward on a roughly direct path towards a loading base where their transport ships take it up to the orbiting tanker ships, that then in turn exit the system in slip-space.
"Now that we've secured the system, they're dispersing those materials so we can't strategically capture or destroy them, but regardless we can still track down these resources with some ground forces and make sure that the Covenant don't get a chance to ship them out of system later on. But let's not forget that they will be sending in ships to try and reclaim this system, so it's only a matter of time to get in there, destroy as much as we can, and get out."
The Battalion CO nodded at Fosters assessment. They had caught the Covenant off guard, leaving them with complete space superiority, but they would be sending in ships to reclaim this system, and when that happened they would need to be done and gone.
"The current time frame is anywhere from five to ten hours before we start having Covenant ships enter the system." Foster said, reciting the estimate done by the UNSC Fleet's Intel Officer.
Nodern remained silent, contemplating what moves to make. They were already sending two Battalions of Marines to secure the mineral deposit zones, where the Covenant were extracting those resources from, and another two Battalions to deal with the Covenant Garrisons that dotted the nearby areas. It was his job to put his ODSTs right on top of the Covenant and track down the missing resources that had been scattered once they attacked the planet.
And this all in turn boiled down to Major Foster's information about where to drop the Marines.
The Lieutenant Colonel reached over and grabbed his Data Pad and BDU cover, then turned to his Executive Staff working nearby. "Get our Company Commander's online. Tell them to standby for drop coordinates." His Operations Officer quickly acknowledged the order and went to work.
Foster took in a deep breath. He had found where to send this Battalion; he had found where they needed to go to get their job accomplished. But he still had the same feeling inside him. How many would die in the next few hours?
He knew that trying to answer that question would be impossible. He looked at the screen at the names of all the people in this Battalion; spread across, organized in their units, filling the screen. Marines he would never know or meet.
How many would die today from his own assessment?
Foster turned to follow his CO out of the C3I section and down into the GFCIC. Only time could tell.
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