"Commander," the station A.I's voice crackled through the launch control offices speaker, "I am sorry but the flood have disabled remote launching of the HAVOK warheads, manual launching and detonation is required," she informed the spartan, "might I suggest a team of marines is assembled to travel deeper into the facility, and sacrifice themselves to stunt the spread of the flood." Logically it made sense to the officer, but it wasn't her style, activating her neural interface; her sergeants, a fay of a man, callsign popped up.
"Jackal, Evac is secured, all survivors collected and we're just waiting on you," he said, the commander smiled, "Ma'am what's your ETA?" he asked worry filling his feminine voice.
'I'm going to miss that cute voice,' she thought, "Dustoff lieutenant," she unsteadily commanded hearing a squeak of a 'what' in return, she steeled her nerves preparing to lie to her closest friend, "the flood have infested the systems and locked me in, and I'm too deep into the facility for you to breach," she told him, "the HAVOKS are armed and about to launch, so dust-off and get the survivors out of here," she ordered leaning over the desk tears dripping against the inside of her visor, "that's an order, Harper," the steel of the desk sheared with her weight as she pushed off, turning off her comms she let out a ragged breath. "How do we do this Advisor?" she questioned grabbing her sr99 and the m90 from the security locker, she walked over to the corpse of an elite combat form and pulling an energy sword out of its crushed and extinguisher-impaled corpse.
"I will need to go with you, there are several steps which need to be followed precisely," The A.I told her, "manual activation simply requires I be installed directly to the silos hardwired backup computer system," the A.I explained, "and if that fails, then you attempt to activate the missiles by hand, that scenario is an uh-oh due to chance you won't able to launch them in time." Advisor deadpanned, getting a groan from the spartan.
Jackal made her way down the hall rifle at the ready for the infected, she yelped as she was tackled from the side, "KILL US!" she thought she heard choked out in a desperate scream, as she watched her rifle grind against the concrete floor, she reached for her magnum but something caught her arm, drawing her knife she slashed at the flood grappling her which dropped to the ground taking the spartan with it. Jackal embedded her knife in the monster but was unable to remove her blade from its spongy body, letting go she grabbed a chunk of debris and started to smash the beast as the other pulled on her helmet from behind, slowly the flood loosened its grip as she spun and struck the other, a sickening, wet, crunch sounding from the creature. She let her emotions out while dismembering the flood beasts, taking deep breaths as she screamed into the void of the hallway, she nearly puked as she noticed they weren't single humans making the combat forms, they were chimeras of covenant and human. She panted and attempted to wipe away her tears, instead, she just drug her bracer against her visor, exhausted she tossed the now murky brown chunk of rubble to the side and looked around at the two dismembered, amalgamations of security, maintenance, and covenant bodies, holding her nausea back she reached for her rifle, before seeing the blip on her visor grabbing the m90 she shouldered it and pulled the trigger as the third flood made itself visible.
"Please tell me we're close to the silo," she begged to no one in particular, happy when her companion highlighted an elevator shaft securing her rifle to her back and tossing the now empty shotgun to the side she pried open the door and saw the bottom half of the elevator, crawling under it she looked at the expanse below her, "if this elevator crushes me, I'll kill you." Jackal said to the A.I before dropping, locking her armor.
"Acceptable terms." she heard fill her helmet as she struck the ground.
Jackal slowly walked to the computer access and inserted Advisor, "All friendly ships out of orbit, no signs of your fireteam commander," Advisor announced quietly and Jackal accepted what was next, "beginning launch countdown," she said, causing the spartan to drop to her knees and let out a mournful wail, "Just kidding there's no need for a countdown, I thought the humor would cheer you up," Advisor told the soldier as the missiles launched, Jackal quietly laughed between her tears, one remained in its slot, "Goodbye commander, it was an honor to serve with you." the A.I said, a sad tone taking over her simulated voice.
The spartan closed her eyes and let out a sigh, "The honor was mine Advisor," she said, pulling a picture out of an empty utility pouch, and running her thumb over the fellow spartan, "I'm sorry for doing this Harper," she whispered holding the photo close to her chest, staring at the speaker one last thought crossed her mind, "fucking glass our asses."
"Detonating, Anubis Silo HAVOK variant V missile." Advisor said, and Jackal felt nothing as she was disintegrated.