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// Prologue- The Cold Dead 
// Story: Marcus 657 
// by John 117 
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	Marcus sighed as he leaned his body against the crumbling concrete wall. I'm getting really tired of this shit. Does it ever end? Crouching down, he adjusted his grip on the sniper rifle. He turned around to face his enemies. A blue Elite leading a small squad of Grunts and Jackals came into view at three hundred meters’ distance. He held his breath, squeezing the trigger slowly, ever so slowly. They hadn’t seen him yet, so well-camouflaged was he among the rubble of a former hospital. The shine of the alien tech and glow of the weapons made them obvious as lightning bolts. There was no way he could miss. There was no way they could hide. Marcus applied more force. The trigger broke- the weapon fired! CRACK! He sent a 57 caliber round hurtling at the Elite. The projectile found its mark, tearing through the shields, armor and flesh. The alien’s skull exploded and it tumbled to the ground, lifeless. Now to dispose of the rest…

The little ones panicked and scattered. Some tried to maintain discipline. For their efforts, Marcus eliminated them with his predictable ruthless efficiency, just as he had been taught to do as a child. The small squad was reforming and began to charge at the hospital, seeking their attacker. There was no cover, so he could take his time. Marcus reloaded and allowed the aliens to line up. With each shot, he killed a Covenant soldier and the ones behind it. The mag went dry. Tranquility returned to the meadow. Suddenly, a flicker of red appeared in the corner of his vision; multiple contacts on the motion tracker.

Marcus put his sniper rifle away and shouldered his assault rifle, taking a grenade into his hand. The Spartan pulled the pin, but was careful to keep the spoon depressed. He could hear the enemy. Alien boots crunched on the ground and alien tongues clacked unintelligible languages. The group was directly behind a ruined wall that had once stood behind the receptionist’s desk. They were blissfully unaware that their fate had been sealed. Marcus released the spoon, counting silently in his head to two. Suddenly, he hurled the explosive through the gap, bouncing it off the ceiling and exploding it against the floor, killing two Grunts and a Jackal.

Vaulting into the opened, Marcus let loose a burst from his assault rifle, downing two more grunts in pools of blue blood before emptying the last of the mag into the surviving Jackal. The last Grunt bolted in vain, trying to find sanctuary within the burned-out halls. Marcus drew his combat knife and calmly chased it down. He ripped off the struggling alien’s mask and then spun it around to face him. Marcus stabbed it through the neck, and then ripped outwards. The grunt was screaming! Marcus kicked the wretched beast viciously, dropping it to the floor. Lastly, he cleaned his knife by flicking it twice in the air.

Marcus surveyed the area, beholding the carnage that he and the Covenant had caused. Littered around him were dozens of bodies of both Covenant and humans, although most were human.  Most of the human bodies were disintegrated. The more intact specimens had entire large sections charred and burned away by plasma. The scene reeked of death, gunpowder, and ozone. Different expressions littered the faces of the dead. One face, a gown-clad civilian woman’s partially melted by plasma, had a look of absolute horror etched onto it. She had been clawing desperately at the wall to get out in her last despair. Another face, belonging to a man wearing a suit with a scarlet beret, whose ribs were exposed, showed only inhuman rage. Even in death, he had not dropped his ancient means of defense, a Kalashnikov AKS-74U rifle. Testament to his determination, a pile of spent 5.45x39mm shell casings and magazines were at his feet, and at least more than two dozen slain aliens of all kinds cluttered the hall, including a pair of hunters That explains the mysterious gunfire I heard earlier, and why they took so long to flank me. Rest in peace. Whoever you were, you were one tough son of a bitch. He and the woman wore matching rings on the fourth fingers of their left hands. Some smaller body parts were littered around the room with the woman. Perhaps it was from their child? The idea and image made Marcus feel nauseous. He gently shut their eyes, pausing for a few moments to pray that they had been reunited in Jannah.

The faces had always haunted Marcus. Yes, one did grow numb eventually, but it still hurt. He wasn't like the other Spartans; they could normally shrug it off and pretend to ignore it; continuing on with the mission, but not him. They stuck with him, and dug down into his core, twisting it up and around. I wonder how many other will be left like this on this God-forsaken planet. 

Marcus had been stationed on Torquaturus IV to try and stop the Covenant. Admiral Cole had been the one officially charged with the task, but Marcus and his comrades knew that it would be up to them to do the heavy lifting. Survive was a total lie; it was all about delaying the inevitable. They had held in the first few ground engagements. Denied an easy victory, the covenant withdrew their ships and the glassing began. The planet burned. For three weeks- twenty-one days and nights, the sun was obscured by smoke and the night illuminated by red flames and bright beams of death. The cruisers eventually vaporized the oceans, quelling the fires just the previous night. Now, Torquaturus IV was a dying, smoldering shell of a world. These were the final days of the battle in the last places not yet turned to glass.

There was no time to be sad; Marcus had a job to do. He climbed to the highest point of the hospital’s ruins, doing his best to avoid looking at the horror. The smell created hellish memories anyway and forcibly reminded him of so many other scenes like this one. He passed the maternity ward on his way up. He covered his visor; it was too much.

At last, standing on the roof, he opened communications. "Marcus 657 calling on pelican 349-12. Do you copy? Over." There was a short pause then a response.

"We read you, 657, over." the pilot responded.

Marcus spoke, "Request immediate evac from hostile forces, over.”

"Request granted, evac will be 10 klics from 657's position, rendezvous will be in t-minus 30 minutes. See you therem 657- 349 out." The line went dead. Marcus shouldered his rifle and began the long hike to the evac zone. He walked through blood-soaked fields, now also soggy with water.
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As Marcus neared the landing zone, he could see the pelican circling in. He watched as the troop carrier landed and the rear hatch opened up. A squad of marines was in it. He paid them no heed; his attention was on a tall, slender figure in MJOLNIR armor toting an SMG. The figure gave him the Spartan finger wave and greeted him, "Well hey there, Spunky, how's the front been treating ya?"

"Oh just fine, Emilia. I nearly got my ass shot off, as usual,” Marcus responded. He returned the traditional Spartan greeting; two fingers over the visor, in a sort of mock smile salute.

"And your squad?" she asked him. Marcus just shook his head, disappointed in himself. He felt his hand shaking again. He stifled it by balled it into a fist. This was no time to let such things take over. Spartans were created to protect others, true; to die so that others might live on in their stead, but no Spartan was perfect. He didn't seem very good at keeping anyone other than himself alive no matter how hard he tried. Emilia and Marcus boarded the pelican and sat down in the chairs. The rear hatch closed with the usual whirring and hissing of motors and hydraulics. With that, the pelican lifted off on a course for low orbit where Admiral Cole's flagship, the UNSC Atlantis, sat awaiting their arrival.  As they cleared the overcast cloud layer, a Covenant cruiser came into view.

"Pilot, where did that thing come from?" shouted Emilia, looking out through the cockpit windshield. It was bearing down on them quickly.

"Unknown ma’am, but its headed this way. Power fluctuations are being read though out the ship. It gonna’ jump!"

Just as the pilot finished, energy surges could be seen forming along the cruiser's lateral lines. Blue lightning could be observed emanating from them, indicating the formation of slip-space ruptures. The Spartans and marines strapped themselves in. A Marine to the right of Marcus was praying and holding a cross tied to his dog tags. Marcus put his hand on the man’s shoulder.

The pilot gunned the Pelican, trying to put as much distance between them and the cruiser as possible. If the jump happened while they were still in the thick lower atmosphere, then the storms resulting from a slip-space jump would tear their small aircraft apart! They had to make it! Unfortunately, it was all in vain; the cruiser was gaining on them and they were still much too low. A man cried out, “Mamochka prosti!” Marcus thought of his own mother. How was she? Did she still live? What would she if she knew what he was and what he had done? Would she even care?

Just as they were about to clear atmosphere, the cruiser jumped! Multiple things happened simultaneously. Marcus, trying to save himself the only way he knew how to in a situation like this, locked his armor. It was a futile effort against the infinitely greater energies of the cruiser. The Pelican began to rip apart! A hole was ripped into the hull of the dropship and marines were torn from their seats into the open air! They were killed by the chill and brutal winds long before their bodies would hit the ground. And then a bright white light filled up the disintegrating Pelican. The last thing Marcus remembered was holding onto Emilia's hand for dear life as the Pelican ceased to exist.