Halo_ Evolutions - Essential Tales of the Halo Universe - Eric Nylund [141]
“Get to cover,” John yelled as he brought his BR55 to bear, spun on his heel, acquired a sight picture of his target, and put a single bullet through the neck of the green-clad Grunt. Private Jemison’s MA5B flashed to his shoulder and fired off a long burst as the first shot from the fuel rod gun sailed past the Spartan and the Marines and slammed into the tunnel wall a little more than twelve meters away. The nearly decapitated Grunt reflexively fired a second shot, which impacted the roadway less than a meter away from where it was standing. The resulting explosion killed half of the aliens that were visible in the tunnel, including their commander—an Elite in red armor.
The stray first shot had dug a four-meter-wide hole in the wall and dumped a literal ton of smoking, shattered concrete out onto the tunnel floor. Dark, brackish slop lazily spilled out, accompanied with a stomach-curdling stench—making it very clear that an opening had been punched into an adjoining sewer line. As if on cue, brilliant purple light washed along the walls as the massive, bulbous form of a Wraith slid into view from behind an abandoned commuter bus. Its carapace seemed to crack open—broad curving plates folded out of the way of its deadly plasma mortar.
“Crap,” Jemison howled as he backpedaled. “Corporal, what do we do?”
A tall, broad-shouldered redhead hopped down out of the back of the lead troop carrier and motioned with her left hand toward the opening in the wall. “Jump in that hole—it ain’t no worse than it is out here! Move it!”
Jemison continued to back up until he reached the edge of the rubble, all the while firing burst after burst from his assault rifle into the advancing enemies. Corporal Palmer approached the Spartan, tapped his shoulder, and shouted, “You wanna come, big guy?” She moved through the rubble to the breach, motioning for the rest of the squad to follow. And in they went, one by one.
John shouldered his rifle, took one step back toward the way he had come, and fired a burst into a mob of Grunts that had swarmed in past the Wraith, killing two and forcing the rest to scatter and dive for cover.
“Chief, you should probably follow those Marines—they look like they need the help—and there are three more Wraiths on the way,” Cortana said thoughtfully.
As the walls of the tunnel reverberated with the sounds of the charging plasma mortar John dashed over to the rent in the tunnel wall—firing three more bursts from his battle rifle back at the advancing enemies as he went—then turned and disappeared into the breach. He had made it no more than thirteen meters when the mortar round slammed into the opening, sending a wall of concussion and heat that drove him to his knees and caused his shields to overload and drop. John got back to his feet, but Private Jemison, the second-to-last man to make it into the breach, was lying facedown in the now boiling muck—his organs ruptured and bones splintered from that same blast. Howls from the darkness told him that Jemison wasn’t the only casualty. He ran past Private First-Class Locke, whose split and blistered flesh and raw bone were visible through smoldering holes in his BDUs. He stepped over Private First-Class Galliard, who had been felled by a piece of rebar that entered just below the nape of his neck and exited through the bridge of his nose—the still-glowing chunk of steel protruded from the sewer wall ten yards farther ahead.
When John reached the flow-through tunnel below the spillway, the remaining Marines skipped their eyes past him and looked back down the tunnel.
“Where the hell’s the rest of my squad?” demanded Corporal Palmer as she stepped forward. “The Wraith?”
“Affirmative,” John replied flatly. “They were killed in action.”
“Then we’ve gotta go back.”
“We’re going forward.”
“No we’re not.” Palmer’s brow furrowed. “We are not just gonna leave them lying back there in this goddamn sewer!”
Cortana spoke to the entire group over their helmet-integrated