James stood behind the pillar, gritting his teeth, holding his gun close to his chest as the armed alien shot towards where he was stood. He looked over towards his comrades near to him, some shooting their hearts out towards the creatures, some taking cover like himself. Spinning round, he shot towards the thing until his clip ran out, "Shit!" he took cover again and reloaded his weapon. "Covenant's killing us out here!" he yelled into his radio.

"Help is on the way! Hang in there, ODSTs will be dropping in one minute! Be ready!" came the reply. James nodded and yelled to his team, "Marines! ODST pods dropping in 50 seconds!" He shot towards the aliens. "A Spartan will be joining you shortly." the voice said again. James' eyes widened, a REAL Spartan!

Katherine sat in her pod. She watched as she fell through the sky. She began to clench onto tighten her grip on the handles, knowing the coming battle was seconds away. "Good luck to you all." She said into her radio. She heard acknowledgements from the others as the pods hit the ground and opened, revealing the noise of war. She leapt out and began to shoot towards the horrendously massive looking creatures. The marines watched in awe as the soldiers in black armour, the re-enforcements came to their aid. "Oh my gosh! Is that a Spartan?" She heard the other ODSTs say on the radio. Taking cover, Katherine looked around, seeing a soldier in a red armour. They seemed larger than the others, and hardly ever taking cover, advancing on the aliens with such force. "Yes. That's a Spartan." she replied.

"Why weren't we told there was gonna be one in the drop pods?"
"I dunno, the element of surprise maybe?" she yelled before turning around and shooting a creature square in the face. "Let's see to it that the Spartan gets to his destination!" she said, shoving a smaller one of the creatures back and shooting it's head off, "Damn grunts..." she growled.

James watched as the Spartan raged through the Covenant soldiers as if they were Grunts, picking them off one by one, knocking their shields down and smashing them with his energy sword. James aimed his battle rifle towards a Brute- the massive, ugly creatures, that was behind the Spartan, as if creeping up on him. James shot the Brute in the shoulder then in the leg. The Spartan span around to see it fall at his feet. The Spartan looked around towards James and nodded, acknowledging what he had done as if to say thank you. Most Spartans didn't speak much during a battle and kept to themselves when at a base. He watched as the ODSTs advanced towards the Marines behind the Spartan until they were level. One ODST looked towards him, recognising that he was the commanding officer. A female voice came from his radio, "What's the situation here then?"

"Brutes and Grunts attacking the base up there, our guess is they're going for our plan of operations." He pointed towards the tall city-like structure behind them, "No signs of Elites yet or Hunters but Covenant have infiltrated the city and re-enforcements were sent in an hour ago but we've heard nothing since and we were told to defend the outskirts until the ODSTs arrived." James explained to the female officer.

The ODST nodded, "Well you've done a good job so far, keep it up." She signalled to her squad to follow her, the Spartan following too. James looked at his team before kneeling down at a comrade's side whispering "You did good Pete.. You did good.." before closing the man's eyes, picking up his ammunition and grenades and heading into the city, "Come on! Let's help finish this..."

Katherine made her way through the city, joining in as the Spartan, herself and the other ODSTs fought the Covenant, the army of aliens hell bent on the human races destruction because of their 'heretic' ways. She caught sight something a little way away, stood up against a wall next to the body of a Marine. Dodging through the ongoing battle in any way she could, she picked up a sniper rifle. "Nice.." she whispered before setting the bottom of the rifle on her shoulder and setting her helmet against the scope. She followed an Brute until she knew his shields were down thanks to her comrades and shot him, square in the head. She smiled. Sniper rifles were her favourite weapon. Suddenly, she heard a roar from behind her, she span around to see a Brute, his arms raised in the air, as if about to rain all hell down upon her, but he faltered as a hand drew up and stabbed him in the neck three times. "Not on my watch!" The Marine grinned as the Brute fell to his knees then to the floor, dead. Katherine nodded to the Marine, "Thanks, you saved my skin there." she said. The Marine shrugged, smiling a bit before turning away and running towards the face of the battle. "I'd have smiled at you if I could take my helmet off." She said to the Marine through her radio.

"Ah it's no biggie, maybe if we both make it through this, I'll find you and we can hook up some time." he replied

"Are you hitting on me?"

The Marine laughed but did not deny. Katherine chuckled before continuing her sniping. She followed the movements of the Spartan as he advanced on the Covenant. Showing no fear in them, beating them down as they challenged him.

She watched, through her scope as a massive creature walked out, holding a shield in one hand, a giant gun in the other. The creature was bigger than anything she'd ever seen, spikes poking out it's back and little orange parts of it's body could be seen. A hunter. "I thought you said you hadn't seen any hunters!" she yelled into the radio

A deep, unfamiliar voice came through to her, "Well there's been a change of plan."

"The Spartan!" she thought to herself.

"Shoot anything orange that you can see. Except me. If you mistake my armour for orange, there'll be hell to pay." the deep voice commanded. Katherine watched through her scope as the Spartan attacked at first from afar, shooting all he could at the Hunter but the shield proved well for it. The Spartan circled the Hunter. It turned to attack him again. Katherine gasped as she realised the back of the hunter was hardly protected. "Shoot it!" the voice came again. With the compulsion of the order, Katherine shot with all her might with her sniper until it ran out of ammunition from the clip. Orange flew everywhere as the bullets snapped fast into the back of the Hunter. The hunter fell to the ground in agony, letting out a ear splitting roar. The Spartan, yielding his energy sword once again, ended the roar by cutting off the head of the hunter.

All was silent thereafter.