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I saw more than my fair share of dead aliens and dead co friends

Mason died in my arms on Asmara after one of the snake-headed Covenant Elites speared hiy sword before I got off a near point-blank shot with athe debris; I could slassy eyes and asked for his hed up blood and just

stopped being

Kiko was stabbed in the face by the apelike Brutes on another world, the nae, muscular, hairy aliens, they could snap a neck with their bare hands Rahud died froy artillery

I was pro since stopped learning names; I didn‘t want to form any attachments

Maybe that‘s why I never rose above squad leader

I had beco the eney would killfor the day I could be buried In the dirt

The steady stream of defeats led to the creation of the Cole Protocol No ship was to return directly to any of our worlds, particularly Earth, but instead execute random jumps in slip-space to throw off any potential Covenant shadowers

―Where was that order for all the glassed Outer Colonies!" I‘d shouted, standing up in the middle of a mess hall

I ree, staggering around and vo was really, really wrong This wasn‘t the usual slow routine of getting unfrozen and waking up fully as ere briefed for our next assign shadowy in the dim red Everyone on deck hurried around nervously, and I could hear the un

―We‘ve been ambushed by a Covenant cruiser You‘ve all been flash unfrozen," the officer on deck said ―Just in case"

Keeping us on ice let us all go through the long slipspace routes without eating up supplies and sucking down oxygen Or getting bored out of our erous, and only for e boarded Either way, so, maybe out of panic A third of the unfrozen ODSTs on deck died

Clearidas ed to escape But my men didn‘t

A waste

AFTER ALLthese years of co apart But I had no home, nowhere I really wanted to be, no one to see

So I soldiered on, battle after battle

I al out trench on Skopje, an Inner Colony world Unlike hly built up urban areas, roads, and railways It was an entire civilization sprawled across its island continents

From the trench, if I turned to look behindin the sun over a red marbled museum But back in front: mud

We were sent in to protect the headquarters of a shipbuilding corporation during the evacuation of their shipyards The machines, tools, and personnel that could be saved would be relocated to Reach, to continue building parts for the war effort

Our headquarters were the halls of a nearby cityzone and held all the quickly placed antiaircraft batteries

―This is the fallback point, there is nowhere else to go," ere told ―So you hold the perimeter at all costs "

Covenant air support dared not attack us directly, not for several blocks So they threw Grunts at us Thousands of the our loose peri theardens We let the Grunts charge us across the muddy field

They‘d pushed us back, but we still siot close enough to hit their methane tanks and watch the in positions, we slaughtered the And after waves of screaher up in the

Covenant food chain: Jackal snipers, Brutes rushing the line, and then finally Elites, flashing their energy swords as they got in close enough to the ot cut off, communication lost, and I found myself crouched in between talls offor the Covenant to leap in with us

This would be it We‘d go down fighting in the ht

But instead, in an explosion of reen armor landed between us ―Follow old visor ordered

Then it leaped over the edge into the fray, plas the powered armor

We followed

The arged off Grunts like they were annoying mosquitoes, tackled Brutes face on, and was an equal iant castle, like souns uns on the parapets pointed down

Inside ere left by the giant armored man

―What the hell was that?" I asked the Marine in the courtyard

―Special ONI project They call theineered to be the best, armored with the best

Haven‘t you heard the ONI announce the ith these sons of bitches running through the Covenant soon enough!"

The ODSTs weren‘t the cutting edge hard-asses anymore

I‘d just seen the future of warfare I wasn‘t in it

I didn‘t have time to dwell on this, because suddenly an all-too-faenny? Is that really you?"

And I turned to see Felicia standing with a BR55 slung under one arm and a canteen in the other

―Felicia?" There rinkles in her tanned, leathery face But all these years would do that We‘d just been kids the last tigedclench, and then she shovedbelieve you‘re alive!"

I was just as stunned ―What are you doing here?"

―Holed up, sa actual quarried rock froy weapons don‘t vaporize the rock; they justfor soet us the hell out now that they took the ed scar across her cheek, and a nasty burn on the back of her neck frolimpse of her bars: She‘d risen up to colonel

We compared notes and found that we‘d been in a couple of the saether, separated only by thirty or so et you aboard my detail, if you want," she said ―And I proain"

―Crap, Felicia, that was a long, long tio A lot‘s happened since then"

―I know You actually saved my life, you know"

―How‘s that?"

―I would have gone back I would have been sitting on Harvest in oddamn aliens dropped the ham to that I didn‘t want to think about Harvest

―There were some survivors from the first attack," Felicia said ―Did you ever look to see"

―My father wasn‘t on the rolls, no"

Felicia nodded ―Mine, either" Then she leaned in ―Look, I‘ll get you a transfer to the Chares, the cruiser I‘m aboard And once up there, there‘s soued I hadn‘t felt this energized in years, so busy with keepingon one task at a tiy and friendship

You know, to tell you the truth, I was scared Did I dare reach out to her again?