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Conscription by Kalexon



Prologue of: Conscription
Date: 11 July 2006, 6:18 pm

1405 Hours, August 5, 2552 (Military Calander) Puyallup, Washington, Earth.

Two orange clad Grunts entered the garage of the house. waving there plasma pistols around. All that was in here was a car (2548 Toyota Hybrid) and some outdoor toys.
Even though the garage seemed empty enough one of them could have sworn he had seen one moving around in the garage, and he thought it was important enough to wake his sleeping partner. Gantly, who was already annoyed at being woken up was even more so when he saw the garage was empty, relatively speaking. "So what is it you saw again? Because I don't see any humans, perhaps I misheard, because there's just some of there living equipment," Gantly spoke up.
Yisip spoke defensivly "I swear I saw one moving around, it must be hiding." At that moment a long, skinny projectile shot out from the shadows and hit Yisip's breathing divice. The straps around his head broke and the device fell to the floor. The Grunt fell to all fours and began to wheeze loudly, he tried to look for the device so he could put it back over his mouth but already his vision was going dark.
Then another projectile shot out of the same place and hit Gantly in one of the parts of his chest not covered by armor. within ten seconds both Grunts were on the floor, dead.

When he was sure it was clear Mark came out of the shadows holding a bow with a quiver of arrows on his back. Mark bent down and removed the arrows from the breathing device and the other Grunt's corpse. Mark then was about to leave when he had an idea. He put down his bow and quiver out of the way and then went back to the Grunt bodies. He looted the holsters for the plasma weapons and figured out how to put them on something. They used some sort of clip type thing that it attached to there armor.
Mark looted both the weapons and there holsters. Then went back to his hiding spot and grabbed a backpack.
Over the last week a group of Jackals had moved into the first and second floors of the house. Mostly they just stayed in the living room, dismantling the TV and Stereo, but they sometimes did little patrols in the house to see if anyone was hiding out. Which there was, but they didn't know that. So Mark had been forced to live in the basement and garage. He had however been able to sneak upstairs twice without being detected, he had used that time to raid the pantry and kitchen and had stored all of it in his backpack. Now it was time to get out of here. With the guards they had set to watch the outside of the house he should be able to get out.
And that he did. He ran as hard as he could across the yard but had to stop and hide almost at once. An Elite was was making it's way around the house, with the Jackals that had taken over the house trailing behind him. And just when Mark thought things couldn't get any worse a dropship touched down. However it didn't unload any troops. Instead it waited for the troops to board. Mark sighed in releif, now he wouldn't have to worry about being seen since all of the Covenent warriors were being transfered to another place.
Mark waited while the the troops jumped aboard. Though soon his gaze began to wander. He spotted the dead grunts, just out of the site of the other Covenent. Not bad for a fourteen year-old, he thought, a bit of a smirk crossed his face.
Finely the last of them boarded the dropship. The dropship rose a bit then flew off the direcion it had come. There was only one problem: The Elite was still there. The smirk gone, Mark thought for a second and then had an idea. He drew both plasma pistols and aimed them as best he could towards the Elite. He then pulled back on both triggers and held it. As expected the pistols began overcharging. Suddely the Elite looked over at him, having heard the faint whine of the pistols overcharging. Mark released both triggers, one and then he waited a second then released the other. The effect was the first overcharged shout corrected it's course, making up for Mark's poor aiming and slammed into the Elite's shields, causing them to overload and fail, then the other one hit him in the face, melting his flesh. The Elite yelled in surprise and pain. Then he suddenly stopped and fell to the ground. Mark quickly holstered both pistols, ran over and scooped up the Elites plasma rifle, and then he took off, not bothering to look behind him once...



Contription (1/2)
Date: 15 July 2006, 5:08 am

Mark looked around the woods, listening for any sign of Covenant. He had been on the run for three weeks now, after fleeing his own house he had moved into the woods in the area. He had had to come out of the woods several times though to scavenge food and other supplies from stores. Unfortunately the Covenant had taken over the local Mall, so Mark couldn't use that. And scavenging operations were risky, while the Covenant had taken little to no interest in the stores, he still had to get into and out of the store undetected and with additional supplies. The last time he had scavenged he had nearly been shot seven times. Not a very comforting thought but he was running out of food. Water wasn't a big issue. One of the first things he had grabbed from the stores was camping equipment, which included a small tent, several large water bottles, and a water filter.
       There, a sound. Sounded like the noise traps he had put up around the camp, which consisted of dead wood, dried out leaves, and twigs all bunched up together. No, that was simply something setting it's foot on a leaf. crack! There, that was the sound trap being set off. Mark dived behind a tree and listened. There was muffled cursing, but not of a human. Mark recognized it as a Jackal's voice, or more accurately, Jackals voices. Two of them. Mark risked a look around his cover and was reward to see two Jackals standing a few feet away. As soon as they saw him they opened fire. Mark quickly dodged back around the tree again. At least mark was caught without a weapon. He had left the Plasma Pistols he had captured in the tent but he still had a Plasma Rifle looped on his belt. He drew it and waited for an opportunity to fire his own weapon. Suddenly the fire stopped. Mark thought about using now to return fire was thought better of it when he heard the familiar whine of a Plasma Pistol being overcharged. However when they released the shots he knew they wouldn't be able to use there weapons for a short while because the battery would be to overheated to fire. Sure enough the Jackals dumbly released the overcharged shots into the tree. Mark then burst out from his cover. Both Jackals were trying to cool there respective weapons as fast as possible so they could fire again. Mark brought his Plasma Rifle up and shot one of them in the torso four times. The Jackal let out a sort of high grunting sound and died. Mark swiveled in place to fire at the next enemy but he was smart enough to bring his shield up. Mark fired against that for a second, the Jackal stumbled backwards a bit from having energy blasts slapped up against his wrist. Mark used shot him in the head. The Jackal fell, his face still smoking. Mark stepped over the corpses and started for his camp. Then thought better of it and first stripped the Jackals of there wrist shielding and weapons, hid there bodies, and then headed back to camp. He'd have to move again for the tenth time this week. For the last few weeks simply surviving had been a real challenge. One that had strained him to the utmost.
       Mark hid most of his belongings, the tent, his sleeping bag, pillow, everything besides the Plasma Rifle, Two Plasma Pistols (and there holsters) and one of the shield generators he had stole from the Jackals. He attached it to his left arm to free his right arm to hold a weapon. He kept it off though, as not to attract any attention. He also took two backpacks to carry supplies in. Mark set off at a fast pace. He needed to be back by dark and it was already mid afternoon, and he did not want to get caught after dark with the Covenant crawling all over town. The way he took however when the trees began thinning enough so he could see all the way to the road had been wrong because there was a group of Covenant patrolling around. Mark got ready to bug out when something stopped him. The patrol started shooting at something. Something in the air. Mark squinted through the trees and saw two UNSC 'Pelican' Dropships hovering about fifty feet above. The passengers in the belly of it were firing down at the Covenant forces trying to clear the LZ. Mark was relieved. Finely he could get the hell out of here. Everyday life wouldn't be a constant struggle to survive. But the Marines were having trouble clearing the area. And if more troops came it would force the dropships to fly off and search for a clear area to land. Mark began trying to think of a plan to help that wouldn't mean a high risk of being killed. He idly stuck a hand in his pocket and his fingers brushed against something smooth and round. Mark dug into his pocket and withdrew three Plasma Grenades. He had collected these over the weeks of hiding, although he hadn't wanted to use them as they would make a high level of noise that might draw unwanted attention, but now..? Mark considered the risks. If this worked he might be able to get a ride the hell out of this place. If it didn't work he'd probably be dead. Mark stood up and began dodging from tree to tree until he was within throwing distance of the patrol. The dropships looked ready to get out and Mark was not going to let that happen. He quickly hit the button to activate them and threw them one after the other. The grenades landing in the middle of the patrol but only a few noticed them. A few seconds later they detonated and sent the whole patrol flying. Mark watched as the dropships slowly descended and touched down. Troops began filing out. But then something inhuman came out. At least to Mark's eyes. The thing stood more then two meters tall and was wearing some sort of green plate armor. It took him a second to recognize the thing as the one he had seen again and again on the news. Mark wasn't so sure now about approaching the dropships but he knew they were his only way out. Mark slowly came out of his cover. When he came into view there was a flurry of motion and every single gun was pointed at him. Mark slowly raised his hands.
       Mark saw the disbelieving looks on the faces of the Marines as Mark came out into full view. "It's a friggen kid?!" One of them shouted.
       "Lower your weapons. I said lower them Marines!" A man shouted. He came forward to get a better look at him. "What's your name son?"
       "Err, Mark,"
       "And what exactly are you doing here Mark?" Mark told them about how he hid in his house's garage when the Covenant had invaded. How he had escaped and had been on the run for three weeks now, and he ended with finding them. "So it was you who caused the little 'welcome' door mat, eh? You accomplished more then could be expected of you. But we need one last thing from you,"
       "What do you need?"
       "We're here to take back this area from the Covenant. And we'll need a guide who knows his way around here, and you're the last civilian left it seems,"
       Mark thought about his words for a minute then asked "Who are you?"
       "Me?" The man smile "Name's Johnson,"





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