HEADHUNTERS
By PseudoFiction
It was simple… at least, the concept was simple. Execution had been a little more tricky. If they pulled it off this combat insertion would be their Mona Lisa. Their Hadron Collider. Their Shaw-Fujikawa slip-space engine.
It just couldn’t get any better.
But that’s what they did after all. Tricky was their forte. If it wasn’t tricky, it was boring. If it wasn’t dangerous, it was pointless.
They were Spartans. Insanity was what they did.
And nobody could disagree launching yourselves across a few billion kilometres of stellar space at terminal velocity without any kind of control system at a comparatively tiny target was insane. But as mentioned before, Marko and Ishmir lived for it.
At least, Marko did. Ishmir was the more composed one. He liked to think things through. He was the planner; always cool as a cucumber and ready to use logic and reason over emotion.
Marko was the hothead of the duo. He was all for racing in guns blazing, jumping out of drop-ships and fucking up someone’s day. Thought he would never admit it out loud so he could pretend to fit in with civilised society, he didn’t fear losing the war. What he was afraid of was that one day the war would end.
In short, Spartan-IIIs Marko-G301 and Ishmir-G314 were polar opposites. And strangely that made them all the more compatible as headhunters.
The headhunters from Gamma Company, the third generation of humanity’s Spartan-III supersoldier shock-troop programme, were usually selected based on compatible personalities. A personality test had become mandatory so command could secretly peel off headhunter pairs for high risk operations in enemy space. Headhunters were essentially armies of two.
Marko and Ishmir would be famous for being the most incompatible headhunter pair – if only the Spartan-III program wasn’t the UNSC’s dirtiest little secret, and the headhunter pairs were kept secret from even the other Spartans in Gamma Company. With an astounding compatibility score of two out of three hundred points, their team up should never have happened!
If only for the combat simulations. In the field, Marko and Ishmir were inseparable. They always knew what the other was thinking. They had each other’s backs through thick and thin. To the point one could sense when the other was about to run out of ammo and reload, and so shifted fire automatically to cover.
All command had to worry about was the two of them having at each other whenever they were out of combat. In truth, they would bicker… often. They were like and old married couple… as a matter of fact, it went on record that they were worse.
But putting them in a headhunter pair was a no-brainer. That way they got to work with each other in the field doing what they did best. Getting the job done. And at the same time they didn’t bother the regular Spartan teams from Gamma Company.
Everyone was a winner… everyone except the Covenant, against whom Marko and Ishmir were pitted.
Hence the reason they were flying through space at a speed reserved for insanity, pointed at a pinprick glowing in the distance without any way of correcting their trajectory and connected by a hard-line and an equipment crate strung between them.
Though even then, they couldn’t help bicker among themselves.
“... and there is the part I don’t get,” Marko complained.
His voice was carried through the hard-line connecting them and projected into Ishmir’s helmet-comm. Wireless communications, even short burst transmissions ran risk of being picked up by Covenant sensors. If they were detected, their risky stealth approach would be for naught. A hard line strung between them though? It acted as a tether keeping them within arm’s reach, a tow for their gear, and best of all it made their communications undetectable. Unless of course a Covenant elite walked right up to them and plugged in directly.
If that actually happened though they’d have to question all aspects of reality and logic.
Marko continued, “this dude creates everything, right? The whole universe? What about the Covenant? He make those fugly assholes who love to kill our asses too?”
Ishmir shrugged his armour’s bulky pauldrons lightly. “Maybe He created the Covenant to test our faith,” the Spartan answered. “To test us. To guide us back into His grace in an age where we have turned our backs on Him.”
“Your bible tell you that?”
“No. I simply interpret it to be so.”
Marko paused chewing his tongue for a moment, thinking about that statement. “What if you’ve interpreted wrong?” he argued.
Ishmir’s chuckle echoed in Marko’s helmet as the more spiritual Spartan smiled under his helmet. “I have faith that He would not let that happen.”
Shifting his gaze sideways to Ishmir, Marko gave his partner a good look at his customised faceplate. Scratched into the domed visor was a freaky looking smiley-face with empty eyes and a stitched up smile.
“Dude, there is just no point arguing with you.”
Like their personalities, their armour configurations were completely different. Whereas Ishmir – being the most responsible of the two – was given some fancy looking gear, Marko was clad in the basic army-green SPI MARK-II armour other Spartan-IIIs would be outfitted with. Though in spite of that, Ishmir opted for very little personal customisations, whereas Marko was dressed up like an old-school tribal warrior.
The green panels of Marko’s armour were chipped in places revealing brushed titanium under the paint. His visor was dressed up with a spooky looking smiley that had taken hours of painstaking care to carve with the large dagger strapped to his shoulder. There were even several strings of steel cable wrapped around his wrist and pauldrons, strung with several hooked alien teeth he’d bashed from the faces of his enemies. Trophies he’d collected after and even during the heat of battle.
He’d collected an alien scalp once, but he admitted it was super gross and decided not to keep it.
Ishmir on the other hand was clad in dark crimson armour much resembling what average ODST shock-troopers would wear. The differences were mainly in the internals. Long range motion trackers, improved VISR sensors and the piste-de-resistance; an interactive camouflage module. A unit that worked with the stealth plating on his armour to render Ishmir completely invisible to the casual eye.
Besides the cool gadgets, he had one personal souvenir. Beside the serial number stamped into his chest-plate, there was a small silver crucifix, the symbol of an ancient religion called Christianity.
Religion wasn’t really a big thing in the twenty-sixth century. But Ishmir was into it. And not just Christianity. He was into everything. His bunk back home on Onyx was dressed up with Stars of David, Catholic rosary beads – he had a bible, an Islam quran and all sorts of other freaky old stuff Marko was pretty sure served no practical use.
Everyone needed a hobby. Marko’s was killing stuff. Ishmir was into spirituality.
Looking up, Marko squinted through is visor’s maximum zoom at the dot they were racing towards. It had grown into more than a dot as they came into range. Sleek purple hull plates took shape. Twinkling running lights were visible in the darkness of space. The long structure hung perfectly still in their path, a tangle of sleek arms wrapped around each other at the heart to create a monstrous mechanical nest around which a swarm of sparkling ships drifted lazily. Behind it, a large Earth-like planet, mostly blue broken up by green landmass with stark white poles perched on the ‘top’ and ‘bottom.’ The moon hung several thousand kilometres from the planet’s only moon, a satellite orbiting a satellite with the sun blocked from view on the other side of the planet.
That artificial satellite was a Covenant space dock. A station that served as a refuel, re-arm and repair station right on the edge of UNSC space.
“That is the objective, right?” Marko asked.
“How many Covenant docking stations do you think are out here?”
Marko shrugged. “I’m just saying. It looks nothing like an uneven elephant to me. More like...” – he squinted – “two squids kissing.”
“Intel states it’s called the Unyielding Hierophant,” Ishmir corrected.
Since the station’s discovery, the UNSC had been scrambling together a task force to take it out. It was within a single slip-space jump range to Earth. And if the Covenant ever did uncover the location of the human homeworld… that would be incredibly bad for humanity.
The operation was deemed suicidal. So headhunters Marko and Ishmir were selected for the task. They relished the opportunity to go toe-to-toe with the Covenant, despite the odds.
“Po-tay-toe, po-tah-toe. I’m more concerned about how many squid-heads are aboard that thing.” Marko snickered almost eagerly, clearly not as concerned as Ishmir with the repercussions if their mission to destroy the Unyielding Hierophant failed. “You remember the Amarillo System? Man, I must have killed like fifty elites on that op.”
Ishmir rolled his eyes. “You had a tank. It was only natural.”
“I’m hoping to break that record.”
“Why don’t we just focus on getting there first? No use getting excited if their sensors pick us up and blast us out of the sky.”
Marko’s expression sank hidden behind his visor. “Oh. Yeah... that’d fucking suck.”
As they continued hurtling towards their objective, an hour of silence passed. Though Marko was clearly not thinking about the usual concerns a soldier would have approaching a massive enemy strong hold holding enough hostile troops to put their odds at about a thousand to one against.
As the alien space station was looming close enough for them to make out the colossal capital ships docking with the structure, Marko sighed.
“Are you as bored as I am right now?”
Ishmir gave a chuckle. Typical, he thought to himself.
“We could play a game,” Ishmir suggested. “Describe in as much detail as possible your partner in as few words as you can. Player using the least words wins.”
“Sounds good. I’ll go first. Ishmir, you’re a; creationist, superstitious, smug, peace-loving, hippy-motherfucker.” Marko paused a second, quietly counting to himself before adding, “five words.”
“I would complain that your assessment is inaccurate, but I don’t mind. You’re going to lose anyway.”
“Alright, God-fucker. Put your mouth where your mouth is,” Marko laughed confidently. There was no way he could be beaten.
“Psychopath, one word.”
That was one of the ways apparently. “… okay, you get that one,” Marko muttered looking away from his partner.
“How about a round of I-Spy?”
“Nah.”
“Sore loser?”
“So sore I think my vitals just twitched,” Marko chuckled as he slowly extended a hand in front of him and pointed ahead at the growing Covenant space station. “Check it out. I think we’re getting pretty close. Gear up?”
“Agreed, we’re only a few hours out.” Reaching down he grabbed the hard line tethering them together and pulled the equipment crate strung between them within reach. Soundlessly flicking open the clasps, he swung it open to reveal the weapons and stacks of ammunition and explosives inside. “Shotgun or battle rifle?”
Even though he was asking, Ishmir was already holding out the shotgun for Marko. The other Spartan took it without even thinking.
“Gimme the shotgun. I wanna get in nice and close, so I can see the life drip out of ‘em when I drop ‘em.”
“I know you so well,” Ishmir said with a slow shake of his helmeted head.
As he was preparing his own weapon, a long barrelled rifle mounted with a mid-range battle scope, Marko piped up with some actual concerns. It was a shocking enough development, Ishmir nearly dropped his battle rifle into deep space.
“You think we were launched on the right course?” Marko asked. “We might just miss the target altogether.”
Chuckling with a smile, Ishmir slid his rifle over his shoulder and let it lock diagonally across his back with an unheard metallic ‘click.’
“I have faith,” he said. “As should you.”
Sensing he’d just stumbled headlong into a religious faith themed lecture that would likely consume the next few hours until they hit their objective, Marko rolled his eyes. “Oh, brother. Me ‘n my big mouth.”
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A halo fic centred around a headhunter pair? That sounds promising!
I'm going to read it right...17,346 words total....tomorrow.
looks inter- 17,346 words.........
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3976998 Agreed
Liked the story but no pony would take on swerving that fast... Maybe rainbow dash would
Good work nailing down their ages. Usually everyone assumes they're about 40, but not this one: You knew they were teenagers.
Good work.
That was fun. I like Marko, he seems like a nice guy.
This is a prime example of a good fic. You have the Headhunters personality nailed to a T.
Why is this so funny?
I wish for sequel.
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Yeah, I was aiming to do this story in ten-thousand, but I got a little carried away. I've been toying with the idea of breaking the story up and putting each section into it's own chapter. Might make it more digestible.
3977471
I admit Twilight did swerve pretty hard pretty quickly. Can't say I'm perfectly happy with it myself, but as you can see above, I was aiming to keep the story fairly short. Something to work on in the sequel I suppose.
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As much as I love Halo fanfiction (there's some seriously good stuff out there) the one thing that always annoys me is how Spartans (threes mainly) are always portrayed like adults while in reality they aren't. In the actual canon I believe the S3s weren't even teenagers, so I didn't quite nail it, but I like to think I got pretty close.
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Hope you enjoyed the story as much as I enjoyed writing it. Marko is a pretty cool guy if not a little bit of a maniac
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Because potty-mouth Twilight Sparkle is fucking hilarious!
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As do I. I had so much fun writing this I actually plan to do a sequel sometime.
3982262 I know Fanfiction writers get ages wrong every time. In Ghosts of Onyx, the threes were forced into puberty and had their growth accelerated, so the SIII's were mainly anywhere between 12-16 years old.
3982262
Then I shall await for your awesomeness comrade.
3982262
You are SO fucking right, my friend! Shit like that is fucking hilarious!
So, I got around to finally reading this...and I didn't like it much I'm afraid.
I felt the interaction between the Spartans was forced. The concept was neat, but I think you went about the wrong way. Instead of creating characters that are opposites of each other, you should have focused in creating interesting characters and only then figure out how they interact with each other.
In another of your stories for example: Versus Equestria, Rabbit and everyone else interacts pretty wonderfully, and that is because they are all great characters.
I only really found the bits between Twilight and the Spartan to be funny.
It wasn't a terrible story, but it didn't do much for me.
Glorious
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This is fucking brilliant!
I like buddy cop style stories. This one is no different, though it felt more like the buddy cop aspect was more between a naive Twilight Sparkle and an immature Marko than between Marko and Ishmir, it still works for me.
Goddammit Marko look at what you've done.
Now Twilight has the vocabulary of a sailor.
It soo good...I wish here more.
5146707 Hey, my father was a sailor. She would've told someone to stick something somewhere that Celestia doesn't dare shine.
You know, if you said that about anyone other than Spartans or Astartes, people would say you were just wanking your characters. Instead, since they are Spartans, we just nod our heads and go "eeyup".