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The Croton Chronicles: Prologue
Date: 26 February 2004, 6:32 PM

-The Croton Chronicles: Prologue-

1527 Hours September 14, 2554 (Military Calendar)/
UNSC Frigate Spirit of Sol, location orbiting the planet Croton.

"Six months and no Covenant activity, something's up" Sgt. Mikhail thought to himself.
It had indeed been six months since the UNSC had detected the Covenant, in space or planet side. To most it seemed like this day would never come, but a few still held suspicions that the Covenant were merely biding their time.

0423 Hours September 16, 2554 (Military Calendar)/
UNSC Frigate Spirit of Sol, Location: orbiting the planet Croton.

A crewman knocked on the door of Capt. Ambrose's quarters.
"Sir, here's night watch's report." the crewman said briskly.
"Thank you son, you may go." replied Ambrose.
Capt. Ambrose had spent most if not all of his adult life in the UNSC. He had trained with the now legendary Capt. Keyes back on Reach and was one of a few men that could claim that they had been friends.

      The captain sat reading over the night watch's logs, nothing unusual, some space dust, a rogue comet, a few clusters of stray atoms. Nothing worth even reporting, but Ambrose was one of those few who doubted the Covenant had just given up and gone home. As he was getting ready to go to the bridge; the ship's main alarm started. Ambrose sat for a second and tried to recall if there was a drill scheduled for today and he drew a blank. He decided call up to the bridge to find out what was going on. Just as he keyed the COM button; the floor below him seemed to lift up and lurch sideways with a force that could have only been caused by the impact of plasma weapons.
"Bridge, this is Capt. Ambrose, report" he yelled into the COM.
"Sir, they just came out of nowhere" the voice on the other end of the COM answered. "Six, no seven, Covenant CSS-class ships just came out of hyperspace" the crewman continued in a panicked voice.
"Initiate Cole Protocol, ready all weapons, and scramble all fighter crews" Ambrose exclaimed.
"Yes sir" the crewman replied.

      Just as the Capt. had released the COM button the ship lurched again, this time with considerably more force than it had previously.
"Saxon, what's our status" Ambrose asked the ship's onboard AI.
"Well, I've got good news and not so good news" Saxon responded.
"Cut the crap Saxon" the Capt. yelled.
"Sorry, According to my readings 5 of the 7 Covenant ships the emerged from slip-space have reentered slip-space. So, according to basic arithmetical processes, that should leave...processing...2 ships" Saxon said in a rather pompous tone.
"You don't say...give me the readouts of the 2 remaining ships."
"Both ships are Covenant frigates; the CCS-Hallowed Oath, and the CCS-Righteousness and Might."
"Sir, according to UNSC reports, both of these frigates just fled from a battle over the planet Adeona VII."
"Saxon, charge MAC gun capacitors and activate the point defense cannons, I want firing solutions for both ships according to the Keyes Loop."
"Already working on it Sir."
"Sir, are you sure you want to risk attempting the Keyes Loop, we do outnumber the Covenant 7 to 2."
"Well if that's the case I want you to send each ship the coordinates, and make sure you correct each set of coordinates so that they correspond with their respective ships."
"We don't need anybody 'bumping fenders' out there" Ambrose finished.
"Alright Sir, it's your battle group" Saxon said.

      In the Spirit of Sols' launch bay marines and pilots were scrambling about.
"Move like you got a purpose marines" Sgt. Mikhail shouted at his team.
"Alright ladies we're about to go planet side. Now I know some of you have never seen combat, but that's no excuse."
"You either fight the Covenant or I'm gonna kill your pansy butt, you get me" he shouted.
"SIR, YES SIR" the marines shouted in unison.
"Good, now I want everyone on the drop-ship" he shouted.

      Outside in the empty vacuum of space the battle with the 2 Covenant frigates was going frighteningly well for the UNSC battle group. The UNSC ships had only sustained minor damage; King's Rapier had taken two plasma torpedoes to the port side but was still functional and The Pallid Dusk had lost main power after taking a plasma torpedo in the stern. After about five minutes of fighting the Covenant crews began abandoning their ships heading for the planet's surface.
"Sir, hundreds...no thousands of drop ships are heading for the planet" a crewman reported.
"Good, we've got'em on the run. Ensign, patch me through to the launch bay" Capt. Ambrose stated.
Ambrose's voice boomed throughout the cavernous launch bay.
"Alright men, it's your job to beat those Covenant bastards on the ground. Remember, you're the best of the best and I want you to let the Covenant know that, God-Speed."
"You heard the man, let's go kick some Covenant butt" Sgt. Mikhail shouted to his troops.
Mikhail spotted Sgt. John Renner across the launch bay.
"Hey Renner, you got a second" Mikhail shouted.
"Sure, what you want" Renner asked as he made his way over to where Mikhail's drop-ship was sitting.
"I'll bet you 20 bucks my squad gets more confirmed kills than yours does" Mikhail said
with a smirk
"You know you're one crazy SOB" Renner responded and then ran back over to his drop ship.

      After all of the squads had been loaded into their Pelican class drop-ships, they lifted off from the docking bay and began their decent towards the surface. During the decent the Covenant, who had apparently brought anti-aircraft plasma turrets with them opened fire on the drop-ships...needless to say a few drop-ships never made it planet-side, including the one that carried Sgt. Mikhail and his squad (but it's ok because he was a real ass and all of his troops were umm...well yeah, there you go).
"Sir, we've lost Drop-ships 449, 726, 989, and 435" Shandor, Renner's spastic radioman yelled over the roar of the drop-ship's engines.
"CALM DOWN SHANDOR" Renner snapped back.
"Alright marines we touchdown in 5" Renner yelled to his troops.
"First squad's on me, second squad you're on Gearhart."

      Two minutes before the drop-ship hit the ground explosive bolts fired and sent the back hatch flying off, this was to make sure that the marines wouldn't get bottle-necked at the back of the drop-ship. The drop-ship touched-down and tens of thousands of marines piled out of their respective drop-ships only to find that the Covenant weren't any where to be found.
"Where in the hell are they" Renner thought out loud.
"Sir, all platoons report ZERO Covenant activity!" Shandor responded.
"GOD DAMNIT SHANDOR, I WASN'T TALKING TO YOU" Renner yelled at the diminutive radioman
"Why's that boy so damn obnoxious?" he thought to himself, this time making sure it wasn't out loud.
"Alright men, I want a command post up and running in 15" Renner yelled to a group of privates who had been milling about.
"Shandor, I want you to radio in and get me eight Warthogs up here pronto, and make sure at least two of them are Pumas, we don't need a repeat of Sephor III" Renner said with a smirk.

      During the fighting on Croton the Covenant mounted a multi-front counter attack against the UNSC's other military command colonies; Grab, Parasprea, and Ehrtos IV. The entire UNSC fleet would become engaged in the largest space battle since to assault on Earth; causing a temporary cessation of all supply lines. The marines on Croton would be without re-supply until the Covenant were beaten back. They were in for a long wait.

      It had been approximately three days and still there had been no major Covenant counter attack, some believed it would never come. The marines had been dumped on Croton, the epitome of a cold and barren ice planet, over a month ago. The events that had led up the marine's deployment on Croton were odd, at best. There was something seriously strange about the space battle that had taken place in orbit above Croton just before the marines made ground fall. The Covenant task force was small, too small; only two frigates. The UNSC had shown up with two destroyers and five frigates. During the course of the battle tens of thousands of Covenant troops abandoned their ships and landed on the planet. The UNSC dropped in tens of thousands of marines to eliminate the Covenant forces that had made it planet-side. At least the marine's had one thing going for them; they weren't going to get glassed.

      After two days of intense ground fighting the ships were called away on some priority alpha 'bull crap', every thing was priority alpha now. Anyway neither Covenant nor UNSC vessel had returned in over a month and it seemed as if the marines would be stuck on Croton forever.

      The ground engagements on the surface of Croton were the fiercest and bloodiest since the fall of Reach. Nothing could have mentally or physically prepared the marines of the UNSC for what they were about to face.
"Ensign, patch me through to the launch bay" Capt. Ambrose stated.
Ambrose's voice boomed throughout the cavernous launch bay.
"Alright men, it's your job to beat those Covenant bastards on the ground. Remember, you're the best of the best and I want you to let the Covenant know that, God-Speed."
"You heard the man, let's go kick some Covenant butt" Sgt. Mikhail shouted to his troops.
Mikhail spotted Sgt. John Renner across the launch bay.
"Hey Renner, you got a second" Mikhail shouted.
"Sure, what you want" Renner asked as he made his way over to where Mikhail's drop-ship was sitting.
"I'll bet you 20 bucks my squad gets more confirmed kills than yours does" Mikhail said
with a smirk
"You know you're one crazy SOB" Renner responded and then ran back over to his drop ship.

      After all of the squads had been loaded into their Pelican class drop-ships, they lifted off from the docking bay and began their decent towards the surface. During the decent the Covenant, who had apparently brought anti-aircraft plasma turrets with them opened fire on the drop-ships...needless to say a few drop-ships never made it planet-side, including the one that carried Sgt. Mikhail and his squad (but it's ok because he was a real ass and all of his troops were umm...well yeah, there you go).
"Sir, we've lost Drop-ships 449, 726, 989, and 435" Shandor, Renner's spastic radioman yelled over the roar of the drop-ship's engines.
"CALM DOWN SHANDOR" Renner snapped back.
"Alright marines we touchdown in 5" Renner yelled to his troops.
"First squad's on me, second squad you're on Gearhart."

      Two minutes before the drop-ship hit the ground explosive bolts fired and sent the back hatch flying off, this was to make sure that the marines wouldn't get bottle-necked at the back of the drop-ship. The drop-ship touched-down and tens of thousands of marines piled out of their respective drop-ships only to find that the Covenant weren't any where to be found.
"Where in the hell are they" Renner thought out loud.
"Sir, all platoons report ZERO Covenant activity!" Shandor responded.
"GOD DAMNIT SHANDOR, I WASN'T TALKING TO YOU" Renner yelled at the diminutive radioman
"Why's that boy so damn obnoxious?" he thought to himself, this time making sure it wasn't out loud.
"Alright men, I want a command post up and running in 15" Renner yelled to a group of privates who had been milling about.
"Shandor, I want you to radio in and get me eight Warthogs up here pronto, and make sure at least two of them are Pumas, we don't need a repeat of Sephor III" Renner said with a smirk.

      During the fighting on Croton the Covenant mounted a multi-front counter attack against the UNSC's other military command colonies; Grab, Parasprea, and Ehrtos IV. The entire UNSC fleet would become engaged in the largest space battle since to assault on Earth; causing a temporary cessation of all supply lines. The marines on Croton would be without re-supply until the Covenant were beaten back. They were in for a long wait.

      It had been approximately three days and still there had been no major Covenant counter attack, some believed it would never come. The marines had been dumped on Croton, the epitome of a cold and barren ice planet, over a month ago. The events that had led up the marine's deployment on Croton were odd, at best. There was something seriously strange about the space battle that had taken place in orbit above Croton just before the marines made ground fall. The Covenant task force was small, too small; only two frigates. The UNSC had shown up with two destroyers and five frigates. During the course of the battle tens of thousands of Covenant troops abandoned their ships and landed on the planet. The UNSC dropped in tens of thousands of marines to eliminate the Covenant forces that had made it planet-side. At least the marine's had one thing going for them; they weren't going to get glassed.

      After two days of intense ground fighting the ships were called away on some priority alpha 'bull crap', every thing was priority alpha now. Anyway neither Covenant nor UNSC vessel had returned in over a month and it seemed as if the marines would be stuck on Croton forever.

      The ground engagements on the surface of Croton were the fiercest and bloodiest since the fall of Reach. Nothing could have mentally or physically prepared the marines of the UNSC for what they were about to face.

The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 1
Date: 26 February 2004, 6:34 PM

-The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 1-

1230 Hours November 19, 2554 (Military Calendar)/
Location: Croton, planet-side (Map reference 2B)

      Renner was quite literally thrown out of his deep ponderings. "INCOMING!" is all he heard, before he was thrown into the air like a toy. He landed unceremoniously on the ground.
"Crap," he thought, "how did they zero in on our position so quickly, and where the hell did they get that mortar tank from. They should have all been destroyed in the previous battle."
He stood up and called over to Shandor, his radioman, and screamed over the COM.
"We need air support at map reference 2B; all hell is breaking loose!"
Just at that, most convenient of times, five ghosts accompanied by an entire army of grunts and a trio of banshees attacked the small recon post. After about 10 minutes of nothing but static and chatter of assault rifles Renner finally heard a pilot's voice come over the COM.
"We'll be there in ten minutes" the pilot drawled in a poor southern accent.
"You've got three, anymore than that and our opossum is cooked" Renner retorted.
"Well see what we can do, no promises."
"Fucking jet jockeys" Renner thought to himself.
He looked over to Pvt. Carl Hoffbraugh, "Get a squad equipped with M-19 SSM rocket launchers. We need to take out those banshees, they're tearing us apart."
"Already on it." Carl said.
Renner then looked over to Pvt. Tod Gearhart, "Gearhart you get your team equipped with MA2B rifles, pistols, and whatever...just set them up and keep those rocket crews safe, no matter what."
"Yes sir!" Gearhart said and immediately jumped to his task.
Renner looked around the encampment and noticed he only had two warthogs to work with, "Man, why does the universe always have to get stuck in the boonies?"
"Smitty, you and Grater man the warthogs" Renner yelled to a nearby private.
"Take full crews with you, I need you to distract those ghosts so they don't wreck havoc with our lines."
"What are you going to do Sir?" Smitty asked.
"Me," Renner said, "I'm leading the counter attack."

      At the command base a private came running threw the door, "Sir!" he yelled to Col. Jamison.
"Forward recon base Delay is getting hit pretty hard, they say they can only hold out for maybe five minutes at the most...unless they get additional support."
Jamison went over to his maps; he looked tired and aged beyond his years. The war had certainly taken its toll on him.
"There's a narrow canyon pass about five clicks south of their base, tell them to double-time-it back to that position and we'll give them all the support they need."
"Yes sir!" the private said and went about his task.
"Do really think they can make it?" a voice asked. The voice belonged to Lt. Micigger. He was Col. Jamison's right hand man. Micigger wasn't much of a soldier, but what he lacked as a soldier he made up for in ass kissing and boy was he a good ass kisser.
"For their sake I hope they can, but I wouldn't count on it" Jamison growled.
"So should we send the reinforcements, they could be used elsewhere" Micigger asked. "I don't see why not. All of the other fronts are quiet and have been for three days, this is probably the Covenant's last-ditch effort."
Jamison then sent the order out with another private who had been standing in the room. The private began handing out the orders. No sooner were the assigned reinforcements redeployed then messages from five different forward bases came over the COM. The private immediately rushed to tell Jamison what was going on.
"We've got a problem sir; we've got confirmation of attacks on five of our forward bases."
Jamison was in shock, so much so that he almost couldn't speak...almost.
"Well," he said, "now we're like the French..."
"Excuse me sir, I don't follow" Micigger said in a slightly confused tone.
"We're fucked in the ass, except this time it's not Germans."

      Back at recon base Delay the battle had gone from bad to worse; out of the fifty marines Renner had started with only thirteen were still able to fight. The counter attack he was to lead never even happened. One warthog had been destroyed during the initial assault. The Covenant had paid for the loss with three ghosts and a fair number of infantry. More importantly, the Covenant had lost all of their air support; which had gone down with limited marine casualties. The first of the three Banshees to be taken down was able to fire upon the marines assigned to its destruction. The fuel rod blast struck the group of marines dead center, killing most of the squad instantly the rest were killed when the flaming hulk of the now dead Banshee smashed into their position. The other two Banshees had gone down with relative ease; two SPNKR rockets found their targets before the Covenant pilots knew what was going on. After the initial attack is when the shit really hit the fan. The marines that had survived would have to repel attack, after attack, after attack, after attack, after a brief 5-minute break with tea and cakes, followed by another attack.

      The remaining warthog had to be pulled back in order to help support what was left of the marines.
Shandor ran over to Renner, "SIR ORDERS FROM HQ SAY WE ARE TO PULL BACK TO A NARROW CANYON PASS ABOUT FIVE CLICKS SOUTH OF HERE!!"
"What the hell, we finally get dug in and we have to pull back, this is such a load of bullshit! Tell them we will be there ASAP." Renner said in annoyance.
"Shandor, make sure those fly boys know what's going on, we can't afford to lose our air support." Renner added. "Not that we had it to begin with."
"I'LL DO MY BEST!!" Shandor replied.
"ALRIGHT MEN, YOU HEARD THE MAN, MOVE OUT!!!" Renner yelled to his troops.
He ran to the warthog and jumped into the now empty gunner seat; while the driver's seat was occupied by a one armed Grater, who in all honesty didn't seem to care that he had lost it. He remembered having sent Grater and Smitty out as a distraction; Grater in the driver's seat and Smitty manning the LAAG gun.
"That means Smitty is dead," Renner thought, "good riddance to the stupid bastard."
Renner looked up in time to see two Covenant Ghosts come over a nearby hill. Both vehicles looked as if they had been in a demolition derby. Renner was surprised that they were still intact let alone able to move. Renner aimed at what seemed to be the heavier damaged of the two Ghosts. He pulled the LAAG gun's trigger sending a high powered stream of lead-death straight for the Ghost. The bullets impacted and exploded, denting the front of the ghost over and over and over and over again. After about 10 seconds of sustained fire the Ghost finally exploded. The explosions caused a thundering echo to reverberate throughout the narrow canyon.
"And for my next trick," Renner yelled to the passenger over the whine of the engine.
"What was that sir?" The passenger yelled.
"I said you're a prick!"
The passenger, whom Renner didn't recognize, just smiled and gave a thumbs-up.
Renner set his sights on the second of the two Ghosts, which just happened to be following the Warthog. Renner pulled out a grenade, pulled the pin, and dropped it behind the Warthog. "One, two, three" Renner yelled and was rewarded with the sight of the second Ghost exploding.
"That's the last of the Ghosts" Renner said with a chuckle.
Grater continued driving and after about 5 minutes they cleared the canyon. The Warthog came to a stop about 200 feet from the end of the canyon.
"We'll set up here" Renner said.
"We can use the canyon exit as a choke point and wait for reinforcements."
The marines formed a tight semicircle around the canyon exit with the warthog in the center and waited. Ten minutes later the Covenant came barreling around the corner completely unaware of what they were about to run into. The Elites and Grunts that rounded the corner first were immediately gunned down by the small band of marines.
Renner looked at his men and thought, "I can't believe I'm going to die here."
No sooner had he resigned himself to death than a rocket went screaming passed his head "Watch your fire marine!" Renner yelled.
"Sorry, my bad!" Carl managed to say while he choked up blood.

      Renner looked down and noticed that Carl was holding his side. He was bleeding freely. The elites at the front of the advancing formation met the rocket head on and lost. Those who were too slow to get out of the way were blown into oblivion. Their finale cries echoed through the canyon like sweet, sweet music. Just then Renner saw something that put him into a near state of catatonia, emerging through the dust were ten hunters and what appeared to be two Ghosts; poorly welded together. Instead of drivers these Ghosts were carrying a plasma mortar cannon, probably salvaged from one of the Covenant Wraith tanks. Renner felt the air around him crackle with static electricity. The hunters had set the Ghost-Wraith on the ground and began powering up their fuel rod guns.
"NO," Renner thought, "they're going to wipe us out with one gigantic salvo and there is nothing we can..."

      Renner's thought was interrupted by a high pitched scream. The scream was followed by two consecutive explosions that sounded like rolling thunder. A majority of the hunter guard was obliterated.

The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 1.5, It's half as good but twice as fun
Date: 26 February 2004, 6:38 PM

-The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 1.5, It's half as good but twice as fun-

      Two high velocity missiles had just impacted on the Covenant lines. Blood, death and the smell of burning flesh filled Renner's nose. Renner looked up in time to see three longsword interceptors go screaming overhead. Support was finally there ten warthogs most of them customized out of necessity came to support Renner's bloodied team, accompanied by sixty marines. "Oooorahh" the whole squad yelled. Renner looked for a good warthog to ride, He finally decided on the one that had two mounted M-19 SSM rocket launchers were the chain gun had been. He surveyed the area and it looked like something out of "Road Warrior©", each warthog was different, some had almost nothing except for maybe a mortar or a grenade launcher others were armed to the teeth like the "Stinging Pig", which was basically a warthog chasse with tank treads for its rear wheels, and the main tank gun was attached were the chain gun used to be; it was also covered head to wheel with hunter arm shields that had been 'liberated' after numerous battles. It also came equipped with two anvil missiles. The "Stinging Pig" could take a huge amount of damage and dish out some major pain. "Okay," Renner said "we're going to chase down those Covie bastards and kill them all. Do you get me?!" "SIR YES SIR" they shouted in unison.

      They quickly reached what was left of recon base Delay.
"Air support must have followed them for a while" Private Hillock said (that was Renner's new driver he liked the kid, he had some serious skills); "there are way too many dead for your men to have pulled that off."
"You'd think that wouldn't you marine" Renner spat.
"Let's keep moving, the Covenant aren't going to wait for us."
The first trouble they ran into was a squad of jackals, a dozen thuds echoed through the lines, man wailed. The passenger in Renner's hog was hit twice his flesh melted to the metal around him and he was fused to the inside of the warthog.
"EWWWWW," Hillock said, "that smells horrible!"

      Renner just aimed his rocket launches and compressed one of the triggers sending a missile streaking towards a pair of jackals. In a desperate bid for survival they put up their shields to deflect the blast but it was all in vain, the missile slammed home and the jackals were vaporized. All that remained was an arm and a few bits of burnt flesh. Then all the marines opened up on the remaining jackals. The battle lasted all of two minutes, tops, now they had wounded, this would slow them down considerably. Renner whistled to two snowmobile like vehicles which immediately came over to him.
"We're going to go ahead, everybody else goes back to recon base Delay and see what you can salvage, Hillock you're driving."
"Yes sir" Hillock said in a less than enthusiastic tone.
They reached a small Covenant base about ten minutes later.
"Give me you sniper scope" Renner yelled to Andrea.
"Yes sir" she huffed.
He looked through the scope; the place looked horrible. In the center seemed to be a crashed Covenant ship, maybe a stealth class. It was too small to be anything else. The troops posted around the base looked half dead, malnourished, and extremely tired. There were broken plasma conduits everywhere and it seemed as if the Covenant were using them for warmth and to cook there food...or something. Their dead were in a large pile next to what seemed to be a medical tent.
"This is pathetic," Renner whispered to his team, "this place is badly demoralized and low on supplies with just a little more support I think we can take them."
Just as if on cue ten marines came over the ridge, it was everybody that was left of his old squad, Renner couldn't help but crack a smile.
"Okay were going to divide into two teams and pincer move them, Andrea you command team two I'll take my own squad, remember attack quickly and without mercy if you want to win."

      Five minutes latter they were in position, "CHARGE!!!" Renner yelled over the COM channel. Everybody started yelling "BAHHHHH!!!" and it sounded like a whole battalion was coming down the hill. An Elite jumped from behind a rock, aimed his plasma rife right a Renner's head and pulled the trigger. The plasma rifle made a pathetic PFHT sound and the Elite groaned. The Elite just dropped his gun a put his hands up. "What's going on here," Renner thought, "the Covenant never surrender."
The Elite then sat down and put his hands behind his back. Renner shot him in the head five times just to be sure, it was strange he almost felt bad or maybe it was just the rations talking.

      About half an hour latter the covenant forces were all detained in there own downed ship, lucky for the marines the ship's brig still worked.
"Try to fix this ship and scavenge anything you can, we'll also have to find away to either secure this area or transport the prisoners. I'm up for any suggestions."
"Well," Grater said, "we could bring in engineers and see if they can fix this thing, or try to air lift it out."
"Do you honestly think our engineers can repair this ship when the Covenant couldn't" Renner asked,
"Hey you just asked us for suggestions you didn't say they had to be good ones" "Touché" Renner admitted.
"That air lift idea actually has some merit to it, what do you think the vessel weighs?" Renner asked.
"You're asking the wrong man I'm just a grunt, do you get it sir, a grunt" Grater said laughing hysterically.
"Yes...very funny," Renner said as sarcastically as he possibly could.
"Then get me a DAMN engineer!" Renner yelled.
"Yes sir." Grater went running.
An hour passed and finally an engineer came up to Renner.
"What do you need?" the slightly disgruntled engineer asked.
Renner just glared at him and asked, "How much do you think this Covenant vessel weighs?"
"Well since I have no idea what materials were used to build it, what it uses for reactor fuel, or how many people are on it...but given this planet has approximately earth's gravity I'd say...100 to 120 tons easy."
"Well how many longsword interceptors would it take to move this beast?" Renner asked. "Well given that an interceptor has about," his voice trailed off and he began mumbling to himself and started counting on his fingers. After about 90 minutes he seemed to have an answer.
"Well if I'm right and this is a big IF, it should take about fifteen longsword interceptors give or take a bit" the engineer said with a shrug.
"Well thank you," Renner said looking for the man's identification badge, "Private... (not really sure what it says he mumbled something barely audible)."
"Not a problem but don't thank me yet," the engineer walked away.
"Shandor!" Renner yelled.
"Yes sir!" he came running
"Get me fifteen longswords over here ASAP, and calm down."
The longswords, who were supposed to be there in ten minutes took five hours, mostly because they were engaging Covenant forces and getting lost, mostly getting lost. The marines were now mopping up most of the Covenant that were left. The longswords finally arrived and they dropped thick heavy lift cables down and the engineers quickly began attaching them to the downed Covenant stealth ship.
"Okay, let's move this bitch." Renner shouted over the COM.
The longswords began lifting the ship into the air, the cables went taught, there was a long groan then the ship suddenly lurched off the ground.
"Let's get it up high and back to HQ" an engineer yelled over the COM.
The longswords moved off with the vessel at a pretty good clip.
"Sir," Shandor said, "they are requesting you at HQ for a debriefing on this battle!"
"Well let's not keep them waiting."
"Saddle up boys we're moving out, oh and Shandor CALM DOWN!!!"

      They arrived at HQ in half an hour. Renner stepped up to the gate and looked around; the place more resembled a junkyard than a command post. Everything that had been scavenged was now in large piles. Looks can be deceiving, if you looked long enough and hard enough you would find this place was a formidable fortress. The whole surrounding area was a network of lotus mines, and automated guns. The inner circle was nothing but bunkers, trenches, mini-guns, rocket launchers, even a few shade turrets that had been captured. It was also the only base with true artillery, which was a big ass gun that fired 180cm high velocity rounds, air support and functioning scorpion tanks. If you didn't spend the better part of a day that was required to see that it was a formidable fortress it looked just like a junkyard and didn't smell much better, at least not to Renner but neither did the private that had just saluted him. He walked down to the command shuttle, which was basically an over sized Pelican that couldn't fly or defend its self. "What a piece of garbage," Renner though to himself, "well at least it fits the surroundings."
He entered through the broken and permanently open door and saluted Jamison. Jamison returned Renner's salute.
"You pulled of a real piece of work out there today so we're promoting you to Staff Sergeant."
"Thank you sir" Renner said.
Renner just stood there, still in shock.
"Now on to a more pressing matter, come over here and look at this VID screen."
"What is it?" Renner asked.
"It's a large vessel of unknown origin."
"So what does this have to do with me, why should I even care?" Renner sat staring at the screen like a frog caught in a hailstorm.
"Because we're, and by we're I mean myself, are going to send you and your sorry ass out to blow that thing to hell and back!"
"Okay," Renner was now thoroughly confused, "what if it's a friendly ship?"
"I won't have any of your lip solider, unless you want to be up on charges of insubordination" Jamison snapped.
"Oh no, anything but that" Renner said as mockingly as possible.
"Just assemble a team; you'll be moving out at about ohhhh 600."
"What ever you say you stupid monkey turd" Renner said with a growl.
"WHAT DID YOU SAY?" Jamison roared.
"Umm...err... ahhh...nothing sir" Renner said and just slinked away.
He found his squad out side, drunker then hell. Hillock was with them. He was being properly initiated into the squad, this consisted of having everybody else in the squad punch him five times.
"What a bunch of retards," Renner thought, "but they are my retards, guess I'll have to deal with it."

      The rest of the night was a blur of drunken stupors. They went around setting of false alarms and even stole a warthog and went jumping off the junk heaps, Leo and Carl both got injured when the warthog did a barrel roll and landed upside down. Hal seriously injured Jackson when they tried to use two rocket launchers strapped to Jackson's back as a jet pack. The results were less than stellar; in fact it was a miracle that they even survived. Shandor was screaming like a small child. So much so that Renner, Grater, and Duke almost beat him into unconsciousness. Tobias and Tom were attempting to go sledding down a huge pile of junk. Tom slipped off the makeshift sled and caused a large avalanche of garbage that looked really cool but incapacitated both men. Trevlosavich and Manny got into a drunken brawl; the fight was at best pathetic. Manny was never a good fighter nor was he particularly strong which of course means he had the strength a newborn kitten. Trevlosavich did his best not to hurt Manny but failed miserably when he repeatedly punched him in the face. Needless to say both men were detained to the brig. The next morning they mounted up and three warthogs went flying into the horizon. Hillock who was only seventeen was still a little bit buzzed he couldn't drive worth shit and repeatedly crashed into just about everything humanly possible.
"Stop!" Renner yelled, "Hillock I'm driving now."
"Fine sure just take away my glory," Hillock slurred and fell out of the warthog.
They crammed him into the passenger seat and strapped him in.
"Just don't puke everywhere okay."
Hillock gave the thumbs up and they sped of to the crash site.

      They arrived about five minutes latter.
"What the hell is it?" Andrea looked to Renner for an answer.
"Does it really matter were just going to blow it all to hell." Renner said with a smile.
"Who has the nuke?" Andrea asked.
Grater sat holding the thermonuclear device as if it were a baby,
"I do all 150 megatons worth." Grater overflowed with glee
"Isn't that just a little over kill?" Hillock urped.
"Hell no, if your going to do something you best do it right." Grater responded.
Hillock cocked his head "but what the hell does that have to do with my question I asked if it was over kill not if we were doing it right?"
"Shut up you stupid piece of sperm jerky," was Graters only response.
"Well let's get this over with." Andrea let out a visible sigh.
They quickly sped to the crash site. Renner began looking around for an opening,
"What the hell is wrong with this picture? Can anybody tell me?"
All the marines just shrugged. Click click.
"What the hell was that?" Duke asked to no one in particular.
"Well probable just a," Renner started in on a long boring lecture, "Wait a minute this is going to be bad."
Three high power plasma explosions sent three warthogs rocketing into the sky.
"Everybody okay?" Renner yelled.
"Were fine all except Durger he bit it big time."
"What the fuck is that?" Andrea yelled. She tossed Renner the scope.
"Oh shit on me shit on me." Renner gasped.
"WELL IF YOU REALLY WANT ME TO SIR." Shandor attempted to be funny.
"Kill yourself you moron." Grater shot,
"Well what do you see boss?"
"A whole lot of trouble, their covenant alright but there some special unit, there wearing black armor rimmed with gold, they are all elites... no wait there are two hunters really big ones and a third who is about 16 foot tall he's ginormis..." Renner was cut short, ten Elites formed out of thin air around him.
"Oh shit," Renner yelped.

The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 2, At least we're not dead...yet
Date: 26 February 2004, 6:40 PM

-The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 2, At least we're not dead...yet

      The nearest Elite clubbed Renner and he was thrown into unconsciousness. When he awoke he found himself in a cell.
"If being captured wasn't bad enough," came the familiar, if not grating, voice of Shandor, "this purple is cruel and unusual punishment."
Renner's vision began to clear and he found that he wasn't the only one in the cell, his spastic radioman Shandor was with him.
"Aw c'mon, I'd rather be dead than stuck with him," Renner whispered to himself. But he also had to agree with him, the purple that bathed the cell was nauseating...at best.
Soon the voices of a number of marines could be heard, most were grumbling about being caught, some were frantically trying to come up with plans for escape, and a few...well actually only one was panicking.
"WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE! THERE'S NO ESCAPE!" Shandor yelled.
"Stow it marine or god help me I'm gonna...." Renner was cut off as an Elite in spiffy looking black armor trimmed with gold turned off the force field that acted as the door to Renner's cell and yanked him out by his collar.
"HEY! WHAT THE FUCK! LET GO OF ME YOU STUPID BASTARD!" Renner yelled as he was dragged through the corridors of sickly purple...well he didn't know where he was, that however would soon change.

      Renner was taken into a huge chamber, inside the chamber there was a huge curved table. He was dragged to his feet by the elite that had removed him from the Covenant holding cell and almost immediately incredibly bright spot lights came on revealing people...kinda, behind the table. Renner couldn't believe it, he had only heard rumors of what the leaders of the Covenant religion looked liked and sure enough these three creatures fit those descriptions to a tee. Behind the table sat three Covenant Prophets, each one had on an ornamental head dress, flowing robes, and seemed to float in midair (no doubt another gross misuse of Covenant technology). The middle Prophet, whose headdress was significantly bigger than those of his counter parts, began to speak. Renner was immediately forced to bow (in reality he was shoved to the floor by the elite standing behind him).
"Why have you come to this planet?" the Prophet asked in surprisingly good English.
"Why do you think we came here, to kill you and the rest of your entire fucking race before you kill us!" Renner retorted and spat.
He didn't get away with his remark; the elite behind him punched him hard in the kidneys, lucky for Renner he was already on the floor.
The three prophets began to mumble to each other in an alien language that Renner could have never hoped to understand.
"Z'arlemee, bring the human some food." The prophet ordered the elite that had brought Renner into the chamber. Z'arlemee knew better than to refuse an order from a High Prophet, so without hesitation he brought Renner a small tube of something and a canteen that had been taken from one of the marines when they were captured.
"You must be hungry, eat." the prophet directed Renner.
"Never, I'd rather die first." Renner shot back.
The high prophet waved his hand and Z'arlemee grabbed Renner by his jaw, forced his mouth open, and squeezed the contents of the small tube into his mouth. The content of the small tube was the foulest thing Renner had ever tasted yet it seemed to give me renewed vigor.
"What you just ate was a vitamin paste designed specifically to rejuvenate even the most tired soldier" the prophet said.
Renner spit out as much as he could onto the chamber floor,
"Fuck, they weren't kidding when they said the bad tasting shit was good for you" he mumbled as he tried in vain to cleanse his mouth of the foul tasting paste.
"Wise words for such a simple species" the prophet said.
"Why the hell am I here? I didn't know the Covenant took prisoners" Renner asked after having given up on getting rid of the foul taste in his mouth.
"We don't, to us it's a weakness. But this was a special circumstance, and special circumstances require different methods."
"What the hell are you babbling about?"
"You're here because we both know that your forces are vastly outclassed in space and that our ground forces have been unable to gain anymore ground and in fact are losing ground." the prophet said.
"Then what the hell do we have to talk about, we both know the score." Renner responded.
"Since the fall of your military HQ on the planet, I believe you called it Reach; your forces have been dwindling. It has been my suggestion, since before this cursed war began, that our races should be at peace but others have decided that your race is not worthy of the gifts of the gods. So, I suggest that both of our forces immediately declare a cease-fire."
"You're talking about a truce between the Humans and Covenant? You've got to be kidding!? My marines would never go for it, neither would I for that matter." Renner responded in a stunned tone.
"I expected this kind of response. So, in exchange for a truce I and the other prophets on this planet have decided that we will willingly surrender ourselves to your forces. You will also be returned to your men."
Renner was shocked, up until now he thought he'd seen everything; he'd seen millions die when the Covenant mercilessly glassed a planet, he'd seen the ferocity and viciousness of Covenant troops, and he'd seen many of his good friends die right in front of his eyes.
"I'll give you 1 of your hours to decide, take him away." the prophet waved his hand and Z'arlemee dragged Renner back to his cell.
Back in the prophet's chamber, "Do you think he fell for it?" one of the lesser prophets asked the high prophets.
"I don't know. I wouldn't put it past the humans to see right through our plan." the high prophet responded.
"You honestly think that the humans are developed enough to understand the complexities of our plan? The High Prophet Almighty himself has said that the humans are under-developed." the lesser prophet asked.
"You don't know what you're talking about. The High Prophet Almighty summoned the counsel of prophets before this war ever began, it was there that we decided to proliferate the idea that the humans were under-developed and lesser evolved than we are. It's all a lie, the humans could have been the greatest allies we would ever have if it hadn't been for that glory seeking fool that we sent to make first contact in the system the humans call Harvest."
"You mean that the humans could be..."
"SILENCE," The high prophet yelled, "those things are not to be discussed within these walls."
With that the high prophet sent everyone out of the chamber, leaving him with his thoughts. The high prophet thought to himself for a very long time, most of his thoughts were centered on whether his plan would work and if it did could the humans pull it off like he had planned.

      Back in the holding cells Renner was still in shock over what he had heard not more than 10 minutes ago.
"SIR, ARE YOU OKAY SIR!" Shandor continually asked.
In a flash Renner had gone from shock to anger, and stood up and grabbed Shandor's shoulders and slammed him into the wall.
"If you don't shut the FUCK up I'm going to make sure that you don't get out of this alive. You get me soldier." Renner said through gritted teeth.
"I'm.....sorry....I...uh...." Shandor stuttered.
"Alright, we have to get out of here. Those Covie bastards are planning something...something big" Renner said, after having let Shandor fall to the floor.
"What are you talking about sir?" Shandor asked.
"The Covenant are trying to broker a planet wide truce. It sounds too good to be true, and it I think it is." Renner said.
"The Covenant want peace" Shandor said, in a rather loud voice.
"Not so loud Shandor!" Renner whispered, "I don't want the rest of the men to know."
"What are we going to do sir?"
"You speak French Shandor?"
"Yes sir, why?"
*"First, we have to get out of here, where ever here is. Second, we need to 'requisition' us some weapons. Third, we need to find that nuke....I want to leave the Covenant a little present"* Renner said (in French), he then continued to outline his plan. It was a daring plan....actually it was an insane plan, and it just might work.
About an hour later...at least it seemed like an hour. The high prophet that had talked to Renner earlier that day came into the cell block, beckoned all of the Elite guards out of the room and then floated over to Renner's cell.
"I'd like to talk to you" the prophet said.
"If you've come for my decision, it's NO" Renner responded in an insolent tone.
"I haven't come for that" the prophet hit a few buttons on his chair, "there, now we can talk. I've turned off the monitoring devices."
"What do you want now?"
"I want you to help me get out of here."
"How the hell am I supposed to do that, I don't even know where here is."
"You're in a Forerunner facility on the second largest continent on this planet."
"Then how do you explain the Covenant holding cells?"
"We've made some...alterations."
"I'm sure you have...."
"As a gesture of good faith I'm going to release you and your men." The prophet keyed a few more buttons on his chair and all of the force fields turned off.
"You really want us to get you out of here?" Renner asked. He was again shocked by the way this Covenant acted.
"Yes, I do. What I told you in the counsel chamber had been the truth; I do believe that we should have been allies instead of enemies. I don't believe in our reasons for fighting this war, I would like to offer my knowledge and services to your people."
Shandor, who had been asleep until the force fields went down, was standing there in complete shock. Again the prophet keyed a few buttons on his chair and a panel in the wall silently opened and a rack holding plasma rifles and plasma pistols emerged from the opening.
"Here are some weapons; with these I hope you will help both me and your men."
"Alright, we'll help you....but first you have to tell me where they took our weapons when they brought us here, I've got a surprise in store for your old buddies" Renner smugly said to the floating prophet.
"Okay" Renner said, "let's get to those weapons."

      In a split second the whole seen changed, twelve religious guard elites ran into the brig. "Your holiness," the head elite began, but said no more. "Ung," was all the elite could get out as three green dart shaped projectiles flew threw his body and imbedded themselves in the far wall.
"You'll pay for that," another elite yelled.
The only response was a deep laugh and the clacking of mandibles.
"Crap," Renner thought, "this is going to get really ugly really fast. We've got to get out of hear."
While hiding in a corner he heard the high pitched whine of small projectiles and the scream of dying elites.
The prophet was amazed that these were his high guard, undefeated and damn near invincible, being slaughtered like sheep. His thought of amazement were cut short, an elite dived in front of him but to no avail the projectile passed straight through him and capped the prophet square in the head.
"Damn those lesser prophets," was his last thought, for in that second he knew who had caused his death. "But how...these were defiantly not their troops...," and he was sent to paradise.
Renner stood up from his fetal position.
"Well they look dead...so what the hell just happened?"
"Who gives a shit," Hillock said.
"Yes," Grater said as he ran over and put on the dead prophets crown, "let us take it as a sign from the gods." He said crossing his eyes and waving his arms around. "I want peace with the humans."
"Bullshit," Hillock laughed.
At that point everybody started laughing, no sleep, and fighting the covenant will do that to you.
Then they heard the same deep laugh as before, but not a sinister one this time. An elite in solid dark green armor appeared before them.
"You aliens are really too much," He said in perfect English, "too bad I'll have to kill you."
"Are you sure about that?" Renner said.
"Way to be our fearless leader, that will show 'em," Hillock snorted.
The elite just laughed, and so did Shandor.
"What's wrong with that one?" The elite pointed to Shandor.
"Him," Renner said pointing again at Shandor, "he's just missing a few important chromosomes, if you are going to kill us kill him first."
"Well he really doesn't seem to be a threat, so he'll die last and you first," the Elite laughed to himself.
His plans for torture and death were cut short, when three hunters bounded in, they were led by the same oversized one Renner had seen outside.
"TIHS," The elite yelled, which means shit in his own language.

      The big hunters' arm shot out and grabbed the elite's head. There was a brief pause followed by a crunch; the elites head popped like an over ripe grape. In the ensuing battle the hunters took multiple hits, the two smaller hunters went down rather quickly but the big guy just stood there. He dropped his shield, paused for a split second, and shot a quick jab with his right hand hitting a, now visible, invisible elite across the room.
Abruptly the shooting stopped.
The elite stood up to face his would be assailant.
"NO WAY!" Shandor yelled, "DID YOU SEE THAT, HE SMACKED HIM OUT OF THE AIR LIKE A FLY!"
"Shut up you fucking retard," Grater said while simultaneously punching Shandor in the face.
"Everybody just keep quite so that we can get out of hear in one piece!" Renner screamed.

The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 3, This is where the fun starts
Date: 26 February 2004, 6:43 PM

-The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 3, This is where the fun starts-

      The hunter couldn't believe it, there is no way the elite should have survived that blow he thought, by now the rush of battle had run out and he was freely bleeding.
The elite looked around to get his bearings and find what the hell had just hit him. He touched his head to find to his amazement part of it had been crushed, and that his left mandible hung from his jaw completely shattered.
When the elite had finally gotten his bearings, the two combatants began trading blows.
The faster elite had the advantage and was pounding the hunter's armor hard enough to dent it.
"Time to finish this," the elite said pulling a small blade out of its sheath.
"I agree," the hunter growled.
The elite went to stab the hunter but could find and opening (religious guard hunters have overlapping armor which makes them damn near impervious).
"I think not," the hunter said and punched the elite square in the chest.
The elite flew back and crashed into a pillar. The hunter was on him in a second and grabbed the elite, twisted his right arm, and broke it. Then clutching the elite's body in his other hand, grabbed the other arm and, proceeded to remove the elite from his arm.
"Have mercy," the elite begged putting his broken right arm up in surrender.
The Hunter finished the job with a quick blow to the elite's head.

      Renner seeing that the coast was clear walked out into the center of the room.
"Lets get out of hear marines, everybody double time it out of the room."
"Who the hell were those green bastards?" Grater asked.
"MAYBE THEY WERE LEPRECHAUNS," Shandor said in all seriousness.
"No...just no," Hillock said.
"Look they were tough whatever they were. Their only marking was a black ring on their backs."
"Who gives two shits, let's just find the nuke and set it to blow this place." Renner said.

      Fighting there way out was a piece of cake, resistance was pathetic almost the entire covenant crew had been wiped out by the black op elites.
"My baby..." Grater yelled.
"I see you found your thermonuclear device." Duke chuckled.
They were cut short by a covenant prophet.
"Who is your leader," he commanded.
Renner quickly shoved Shandor forward.
"He is!" Renner yelled.
"Something has gone terrible wrong, we need to talk." The Prophet said holding down his disgust.
"SURE" Shandor screamed "anything to help."

      So there they stood, face to face to face to face to face to...oh you get the idea, with a covenant prophet.
"If you truly wish to help us," The prophet began, but was quickly cut short from a plasma bolt hitting him in the head.
"No way" Grater said, "Shandor you actually did something right."
"It was an accident" Shandor whined "I didn't mean to shoot him it just kind of happened."
"No, no you did the right thing." Renner assured him.
"Or maybe it was a her," Shandor said as he went off into his own little world.
"Let's just find away out of hear," Renner said.
"Grater why don't you disarm that nuke, we're not in the covenant ship anymore" he hesitantly added.
"Fine" Grater said kicking the floor a little depressed.

      It took the better part of three days to escape from the forerunner structure; to the marines it seemed like one long hellish nightmare. They had only lost a few people. They tried their best to keep out of the ensuing chaos caused by the Covenant troops fighting their own black op units. Finally they reached the exit after fighting a tooth and nail battle to escape, Andrea came up with the casualty list.
"We lost Duke, James, Frank, and Shelly." She said showing no emotion.
"Guess we won't be seeing any girl on girl action now." Grater said, and gave Andrea a cat call. This was, regardless to say, a bad idea. Grater was rewarded with a swift kick in the balls and a hard punch in the face.
Seton walked over to Grater and punched him as hard as she could.
"What you don't consider me a girl?"
"Not really," Grater said apparently not in his right mind.
This time he was kneed in the balls punched and repeatedly kicked in the stomach.
The remaining marines couldn't contain themselves and they fell over laughing at Grater's misfortune. However this soon ended when Grater pointed out that he was still holding the nuke.
"As I was saying, there are only five of us left." Andrea finished.
"Well shit" Renner said completely unaware that Andrea had been talking to him, "I say we find the covenant ship it can't be to far away."
Just then static came over Shandor's radio and the familiar if not nauseating voice of Jamison, the same asshole who had sent them on this stupid mission, came over the radio.
Renner grabbed the hand set from its resting place on the top of the radio pack.
"Sir, we need help, my team has taken heavy losses and we need EVAC."
A different voice then came over the line.
"Roger that we'll get you out of their ASAP, but we have some major problems of our own."
The next five hours consisted of setting up the nuke, swimming in a hot spring, beating on each other, and Hillock trying to get Andrea to take of all her clothes.
"OH MY GOD" Shandor screamed as he was thrown, none too lightly, into a shallow hot spring.
Hillock was still talking to Andrea and getting punched once in a while for his troubles.
Renner just sat thinking to himself, "Why couldn't it always be like this, no covenant, a roaring fire, friends to share stories with, Shandor getting the crap beat out of him regularly." He almost hoped the EVAC wouldn't come. There was only one problem; they only had two days rations left. But at the moment he didn't care, he was in heaven.

      Jamison frowned, "We've lost three recon bases in twenty minutes, pull the rest of the recon bases back to more defendable positions"
"Yes sir," Micigger said, "permission to speak sir?"
"Go ahead," Jamison said "It's not like it's really going to matter."
"Well I would like to know were the hell the covenant got all these troops from, I mean we had them on the run and I doubt they have a ship in orbit or they would have glassed us so what's the deal?"
"I didn't want to tell you this...but."
"But what?" Micigger said getting very impatient.
"Well this planet has (he ponders for a moment looking for the right worlds) formations from an advanced race, our scientist have been extracting and trying to adapt some of the technology."
"So that's why we had so many ships in orbit for an H class planet."
"Exactly," Jamison continued, "apparently the covenant were doing the same thing and we both slipped past each others noses, so it is possible to surmise that the covenant could still be slipping in troops or they had a lot more to begin with, either scenario is not good."
"Well it looks like the fighting has stopped for the night" Micigger said more to himself than anybody else.

      The next morning a pelican touched down.
"Time to go marines" Renner barked.
They all came sprinting back, first came Grater he was in nothing but his boxers.
"Sorry sir was in the middle of trying to drown Shandor, and I didn't want to miss the bus."
Next came Shandor bruised, beaten, and soaking wet but somehow still in high spirits.
"ME AND GRATER WERE JUST HAVING A GOOD TIME."
"I'm sure he was." Renner said letting himself a small laugh.
Next came Hillock with a black eye and a bruised arm.
"I got her to take her shirt off sir."
"Good for you" Renner said.
Finally bring up the rear was Andrea and Seton.
"Your men are pigs" the said in unison.
"Well at least they like one of you," he offered.
He hopped into the pelican and they were off.
"So, now what?"

The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 3.76, The sea may be a cruel mistress…but trees hurt more
Date: 26 February 2004, 6:46 PM

-The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 3.76, The sea may be a cruel mistress...but trees hurt more-

"So, now what?" Grater asked as he sat fiddling with what was left of his left arm. Then it suddenly hit him, like a bad case of Montezuma's revenge.
"HOLY CHRIST ON A CRACKER!!!! WE HAVE TO GO BACK!!!"
Renner looked up with a puzzled look on his face.
"What the hell are you blathering about now Grater?"
"BETTY!!! WE LEFT BETTY BEHIND!!!"
"Who the hell are you talking about?" Renner asked.
"THE NUKE...WE LEFT IT!!!" Grater responded.
A chilled silence fell over drop-ship "Spanky 123"... save for the deafening roar of the engines.

      Renner leaped out of his seat and ran to the cockpit of the pelican where he found the drop-ship's pilot, Vocar Felpings Emmanuel Geoffrey Wendell XIII, fast asleep at the stick. Upon seeing this Renner lessened his pace and began moving as stealthily as possible. And as gently as he possible could, Renner woke Vocar up.
"WAKE THE FUCK UP!!!!" Renner yelled at the top of lungs...which was significantly louder than the drop-ship's engines.
"WHA!!!!" was all Vocar could get out before he fell out of his chair.
"I said we have to go back. We left the nuke."
"I'm sorry sir but my orders don't say a damn thing about turning this bird around."
Upon hearing this Renner slipped into a blind rage, pulled his pistol from its holster and jammed it into the temple of the indignant pilot.
While all this was going on Grater was still whining about leaving "Betty" behind.
"I can't believe I left her behind. How could I have been so stupid?" Grater whimpered.
At this point tensions in the drop-ship had reached a record high. And wouldn't you know it Shandor decided he had had enough of Grater's whining. He got up, walked over to Grater, grabbed him by the shoulders and with all the strength he could muster, which wasn't a lot, slapped Grater across the face.
"Get yourself together man!!!"
With no sign of hesitation, Grater grabbed Shandor by the neck, all the while mumbling about leaving "Betty," and quite literally threw him out the open back of the drop-ship. You could still hear Shandor yelling in protest as, with the grace of a dead carrion bird, he skipped across the pine canopy below.

He finally came to rest against the trunk of a huge tree that broke through the canopy like a monolith on the moon. Shandor had stopped, briefly. But gravity would not be denied its say. Therefore Shandor immediately fell, hitting every single branch as he plummeted toward the unforgiving ground. Fortunately for Shandor he happened to fall into the hands of a well armed Covenant patrol.

      Back in the drop-ship Grater was getting the third degree from Renner and the rest of the squad.
"I can't believe you just fucking threw him out the back" Renner said.
"Well...he touched me" Grater responded, "but it was funny though."
"That's not the point" Renner said, "you just chucked him out the back."
At this point Andrea piped up.
"Do you think he survived the fall?"
"Not if we're lucky" Hillock added.

      On the ground Shandor was just waking up from his unscheduled mid-flight nap.
"I hurt all over. I can't belie...uhh" he was cut short by the butt of a Covenant plasma rifle.
The Elite that had just relieved Shandor of his burdens of consciousness stood staring at the body of the human that lay on the ground before him. He then made an odd comment, which was overheard by a Grunt by the name of Belyap.
"Lucky little monkey...if anyone else had found you you'd already be dead."

      In the pelican Renner was thinking about what course of action to take.
"Well that clinches it...we're going back" Renner said as he looked intently out the open hatch at the back of the drop-ship.
"WOO HOO!!! We're gonna get my nuke back. We're gonna get my nuke back!!!" Grater chanted as he jumped up and down like a small school boy.
"No...we're not. We're going back for Shandor. However if we somehow stumble across our misplaced nuke we will retrieve it...but we're not going to go looking for it.
"Hey Vo, I want you to..." Renner was cut off as the drop-ship's pilot leaped out of his seat and in a few moments was directly in Renner's face...well his chest anyway seeing as how Vocar was easily a foot and half shorter than Renner and looked remarkably like Shandor.
"MY NAME IS VOCAR FELPINGS EMMANUAL GEOFFERY WENDELL XIII!!! It's not Vo, or Felps, or Manny, or Geoff, or even Lucky."
"It's Vocar Felpings Emmanuel Geoffrey Wendell XIII and don't you forget it" he snapped.
"Alright...Lucky" Renner retorted as he raised his pistol, which he hadn't yet re-holstered, "get your ass back into that pilot's chair and find a clearing that you can set this flying tin can down in."
Renner then spun on his heals facing his company.
"We're going after our man."
This statement was met with half-assed groans of approval mixed with discontent.
"What's this...that doesn't sound like the kind of response a soldier gives" Renner said.
"YESSIR" the entire squad yelled as they snapped to attention.
"That's better, now let's go find Shandor."
"Sir, permission to speak freely" this came from Seton, who had barely said two words since the squad was evacuated.
"Why don't we use Shandor's homing signal to find him, Sir?"
"You mean this" Grater interrupted, throwing Shandor's vest, which housed his homing device, at Seton.
"Well, when you put it that way" Seton responded...slightly saddened.
"No, we're going to set this boat down and we're going to go find Shandor the old fashioned way."
"We're going to use satellites?" Hillock asked.
"No, we're going to go search for him using what God gave us."
"So...we are using satellites?"
Upon hearing this Renner walked over to Hillock and pistol whipped him.
"No, we're going to slowly walk through that pine forest looking for him."
"Oh, ok. I get it now" Hillock somehow managed to get out.
"Alright pilot, take us down" Renner yelled up to the cockpit.
"But sir, using the satellites would be a million times easier" Vocar responded.
"We can't use the satellites...because there aren't any god damned satellites" Renner said. By now it was obvious that all this talk about satellites was wearing on Renner's nerves.
Just then Andrea stepped in.
"But sir, there are satellites. I've got the uplink right here."
Renner just stood there completely silent for what seemed like a long time.
"You mean to tell me that all this time we've had access to a satellite network and nobody told me."
"I thought you knew sir."
Several grumbles that sounded remarkable similar began to rise from the rest of the squad.
"Alright then, we'll use the satellites."
"Lucky, get a fix on Shandor and get us as close as you can."
"Yes sir...oh shit."
"What's the problem" Renner asked.
"Well it seems that your man is being held in the middle of a Covenant base."
"That's impossible, the Covenant don't take prisoners."
At this point Hillock casually reminded Renner of what they've been through recently and was pistol whipped again for his troubles.
"Alright then, change in plan" Renner muttered.
"Lucky, I still want you to find us a landing spot as close as to that Covie base as you can without being seen."
"I'm going to take my squad and we're going to try and sneak into the base."
"This is where you come in"
"Where I come in sir?" Vocar asked unsure of what Renner had in store for him.
"Yes, I want you to buzz the base a few times with all the guns this thing has blazing."
Renner then turned to address his squad.
"In the confusion we're going to sneak in and, if all goes well, get Shandor and get out before anybody notices."
"Now, let's get this crate moving" Renner ordered.

      The pelican began to slow down and then without any warning did a 180 degree spin in mid-air. This little maneuver threw everyone inside against the inside hull with a great deal of force. It then sped up so fast that everyone inside was forced to hang on for dear life for fear that they too might enjoy the same fate that Shandor had and be introduced first hand to the affects of gravity.

      It was a short hop back to where Grater hurled Shandor out the rear of the pelican and wouldn't you know it there was a clearing nearby. Nearby being 3 clicks, but that's not important.
"Alright Lucky, set us down in that clearing."
"I'll signal you when we're in position for you to start your buzz runs" Renner yelled to Vocar over the sound of the engine.

      Vocar let the pelican drop like a rock for the last 60 feet to the ground. This caused all of his passengers to go weightless for a second and then slam back into the floor as he hit the air breaks two feet above the ground. It was obvious to any mildly intelligent person that this was Vocar's revenge on Renner for calling him Lucky.

      Renner's squad hopped out of the back of the drop-ship and quickly headed for the safety and cover of the tree line. Not only were they afraid of being spotted by any Covenant in the area but they were afraid that Vocar might decide to start his strafing runs a tad early...and on them instead of the Covenant. They then started making their way through the dense pine forest towards their objective completely unsure of what they may find.

The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 5, If a big purple dinosaur can be your friend why not a big blue Ali
Date: 26 February 2004, 6:47 PM

-The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 5, If a big purple dinosaur can be your friend why not a big blue Alien?-

They headed into the forest, "I'm picking up covenant transponder signals." Andrea said to Renner. "Okay here is the basic jist of my plan, Grater, Andrea, and Seton you go to the left and do a feigning attack, then myself, Hillock, and Carl will charge up the center, Blue two you will then use this moment to counter attack, then my team will grab the active camo and covertly retrieve Shandor."
"May I interject?" asked Hillock.
"Ooooh, that was a big word for a little man." Renner laughed very amused at his own wit.
"Well sir," Hillock started "there are only six of use tactic seem a bit out of the question, why don't we just have Felp up their shoot the hell out of the covies then we can mop up the rest?"
Renner proceeded to give Hillock a blank stare for a good solid ten minutes, and then continue with his plan.
"Screw this." Hillock belted and proceeded to put Felp on the line. "We need you to blast the crap out of the covenant base oh Felp old buddy?"
"Fine whatever," came over a very disgruntled voice, "but my name is...."
Hillock cut him of by cutting the com link. Twenty minutes into Renners great plan explosions started going off.
"Let's take them!" Yelled Grater. With that everybody charged the covenant base like a group of lemmings. They didn't come across much it seemed old Felp had some anger issues to work out.
"THIS PLACE LOOKS LIKE A BATTLE FIELD!" yelled a most irritating voice.
"You can't be serious he actually survived." Grater said dumb founded.
In fact to put it bluntly Shandor looked better than they had left him, he was happily sucking down a tub a purple past and looking around like he had never seen a crater before.
"Holy crap you survived!?" Renner yelled.
"Yeah so?" said Shandor "and just a side note if you ever get the chance to fall out of a pelican most defiantly do it, it was awesome up till the falling and hitting a tree part."
"Dualy noted," Renner said.
"I wasn't notified the covenant fed prisoners."
"Oh this stuff," said Shandor, "it rocks you want some."
"Oh god it smells like vomit and Grater's feet." Renner said gagging on his own bile.
"You should meet my new friend his name is Yaashoon or Yeeshany or Yooshoony or something like that." Said Shandor quit confused and trying to look at his own mouth like a newborn child.
"What kind of stupid name is that?" Seton said.
"I think it's a very good name," said a blue elite standing behind the crowd of seven.
"You fricking tard," said Grater clubbing Shandor like a baby seal.
Shandor's only response was a muffled "Grapf" and a satisfying thud on the ground.
"So you and Shandor are friends," Renner asked the elite, "well my friend you have very bad taste in friends."
"Not exactly," said the elite, "I tolerated him at best. The man creature was below average intelligence...even for your species."
"No, he is just retarded, and god hates me so now he is my radio man." Renner said almost crying.
"Well let's salvage what we can pick up the moron and get back to base." Hillock said.
"Okay Yaashoon welcome to the team, yes I know I should be a little more cautious but I've got a good feeling about you."
It only took the well trained team a matter of days to do clean up, shortly after the loaded up and headed out. The trip was filled with rude jokes, dry humor, a few beatings, and repeated threats of throwing Shandor out again and not retrieving him. Just before touchdown at witch Shandor would scream his usual "TOUCHDOWN!!!!" like he was a football announcer. Hillock looked over to Yaashoon who had been quite most of the trip, and posed the most dangerous of questions.
"Hey Yaashoon, drink?"
"What is this drinking?" The elite asked most perplexed.
"Oh you're going to find out baby you're going to find out."

      Elsewhere, in the space around croton another massive battle was about to began, a planet that had only been a minor human outpost was now found to contain forerunner technology, something the humans had to get their hands on, But people like Renner on the ground earth would be destroyed and the end of existence would occur before the planet was captured. So three prototype Earth ships classified as Hellbenders were sent to the sector, they had weapons and shields similar to those of the Covenant with the exception that their reactors couldn't take nearly what was required of them. Problems arouse two days into their trip. After several serious malfunctions there was only one ship left and it was forced to be recalled. It seemed that Croton had sadly fallen back in the hand of the inept if not slightly psychotic and retarded marine forces. God save us all.

The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 6, Take your orders and shove em'!!!
Date: 26 February 2004, 6:49 PM

-The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 6, Take your orders and shove em'!!!-

      It had been five hours since Renner and his squad, heavy one brand spanking new Covie buddy, had returned to 'The Junkyard' and it had been nearly five hours since Renner's debriefing had started.
"...and that's why we were late, we had to go back and rescue Pvt. Shandor" Renner said, concluding the tale of the adventure his squad had just had.
"And that's where you meet this 'Elite'?" Jamison, Renner's CO, asked.
"Yes sir, as I said before, he's the reason Shandor is still alive."
"Alright Captain, we're through here, I want a written report on my desk tomorrow morning first thing."
"Yes sir."
With this Renner stood at attention and somehow managed a salute. He would have rather taken out his pistol and put a full clip into Jamison's head but protocol prohibited such things, especially when it was in your CO's office. Renner walked out of Jamison's makeshift office into the makeshift waiting room where his personal errand boy sat behind a makeshift desk. Everything was makeshift in 'The Junkyard'. Renner started the long cold walk back to the barracks where his squad was being housed, and of course it was makeshift too. Before Renner had made it half way across the compound a runner, who aptly enough was named Pvt. Runnings, began to yell for him to stop.
"SIR, WAIT SIR!!!"
'Maybe if I don't acknowledge him he'll go away' Renner thought.
"SIR, I'VE GOT ORDERS FOR COMMANDER JAMISON FOR YOU!!!"
Upon hearing this Renner stopped dead in his tracks.
'Great, just what I need, another assignment'
"Whew, I'm glad I caught up to you," Runnings said "I've got important orders for you from Commander Jamison."
Renner just stared at the young Pvt. like a cow stares at an oncoming train.
"Sir, are you okay?"
"Oh, yeah, I'm just fucking dandy" Renner said as yanked the envelope out of the Pvt.'s hand.
He opened the envelope and took out the orders that it contained. They read as follows:


       General Orders from Commander Jamison to Squad Leader:
       Your orders are as follows:
       - Depart HQ via Pelican @ 06:00 hours
       - Proceed to map grid A5
       - Longitude: -81.4394
       - Latitude: 41.0342
       - Secure and inspect possible Forerunner ruins in the
       vicinity.

       Primary Objective:
       - Secure any Forerunner technology by any and all means.

       Commander Jamison


"You've got to be shitting me" Renner said out loud.
"Excuse me sir?"
"Just thinking out load, you can go now Private."
The private snapped to attention and saluted.
"For Her" he said with great enthusiasm.
"For Her" Renner said, with zero enthusiasm.
'For Her' had become a popular slogan with new recruits ever since the fall of Reach.
Renner continued the long cold walk back to the barracks, now he had to think of a way to tell his squad that their rest was about to be cut short.

      When Renner got back to the barracks he found that his squad had found several ways to keep themselves occupied. In one corner Seton and Grater were taking turns punching each other, presumably to see who would be the first to pass out. On her bed, Andrea had a stripped down MA5A assault rifle. She appeared to be cleaning it, why she would clean a self cleaning weapon was beyond Renner's comprehension. Finally, in the center of the room stood Shandor, Hillock, and Yashoon they all appeared to be playing some sort of game with what looked like a Needler.
"Alright, so what you're saying is that if I can hit you with just one of these pink needle things I win?" Shandor asked.
"Yes, but you must do it within five of your minutes" Yashoon responded.
"That sounds easy" Hillock added.
Yashoon handed the Needler to Shandor and took a few giant steps backward.
"Go ahead, try and hit me" Yashoon said to Shandor.
Telling Shandor to shoot at something, in any case, usually ended up with him hurting himself. So, Renner just stood back a watched. Maybe he'd get a new radio-man out of this whole thing. Shandor stood and leveled the Needler at Yashoon and, in what could only be described as the dumbest thing he'd ever done, Shandor pulled the trigger. Shandor has barely even touched the trigger when out of what looked like the muzzle of the Needler dozens of bright pink crystal needles flew with mediocre speed. The needles flew in a tight group for about five feet then they started to separate, that's when the shit hit the fan. The needles broke their formation and began to spread out farther and farther. Several of the needles had 'locked on' to Yashoon and were streaking towards the big blue Elite at a lethargic pace. Yashoon easily dodged the needles that came flying at him, they were not a problem. The real problem was the other 75 needles that were flying about the inside of the barracks. Several of the needles embedded themselves in the titanium-A battle plating that made up the walls, ceiling, and floor of the barracks and exploded with tiny pops. The rest of the needles had broken off into several groups, each group having targeted somebody in the barracks. Everyone scattered as the needles flew towards them, beds were flipped over and used as makeshift barriers. About 30 needles embedded themselves into one of these barriers and exploded with tremendous force, the bed was torn to shreds. The needles that hadn't yet found their targets detonated in the air, each one with its own tiny pop.

"THAT WAS AWESOME!!!" Shandor yelled, still standing in the middle of the room holding the Covenant weapon.
Renner, emerging from behind the bed barrier, walked over to where Shandor was standing and with the coolness and level headedness that had earned him the title of Captain, he began to choke Shandor and showed no signs of stopping.
"YOU DUMB SHIT!!!" Renner yelled into Shandor's face.
"WHAT THE FUCK WERE YOU THINKING!?!"
At this point Yashoon pulled Renner off of Shandor.
"It is my fault, I allowed him to use my weapon."
Renner stood there in shock; he couldn't believe what had just happened. The Elite had saved Shandor's life, again. There were no words that Renner could think of to counter the alien's statement. There was dead silence in the barracks for about five minutes. Then, as though he were talking to a child, Renner finally spoke.
"Well, don't let it ever happen again."
"SQAUD, FALL IN!!!"
Upon hearing this, the entire squad, all five of them made there way to where Renner was standing and stood at attention.
"Alright ladies, we've got new orders from Jamison."
"We're going to recon a possible Forerunner facility 12 hours north of here."
Groans could be heard from the squad.
"Why us sir?" Andrea asked.
"Because the Universe hates me, mostly because Jamison hates me."
"We don't move out until 0600 hours, that gives you plenty of time to rest."
"Sir, what about Covenant activity?" Hillock asked.
"No intel has been provided, so we're going in blind, unless Yashoon can tell us something."
"I have no knowledge of this facility, it is likely that the Covenant don't know about it either" Yashoon said.
"We've been working on his English" Shandor added.
"Did I give you permission to speak?"
"No sir."
"Then shut the hell up."
"Alright, everyone get some rest and be ready to move out at 0530" Renner said addressing his squad.

      Renner's squad immediately went back to what they were doing with the exception of Shandor, who had been ordered to clean up the mess he had caused. Renner on the other hand went over to the desk that had been placed in the barracks and began to fill out his mission reports, accident report, and proper requisition forms needed to get a new bed for Shandor who was forced to give his up after having totally destroyed Hillock's.

The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 7.1, With enemies like these, who needs enemies?
Date: 26 February 2004, 6:51 PM

-The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 7.1, With enemies like these, who needs enemies?-

      Renner decided that he was going to need everyone in his squad fully operational for the upcoming mission. Seeing as how Grater was lighter by the weight of one arm, it was remarkably clear that he would have to be fitted with a robotic arm. Renner woke everyone an hour early so that they could all get checked out at the makeshift hospital before leaving for their next mission.

      At the field hospital the medical staff, which consisted of three doctors and a single nurse best described as a 'Broonhilda'-type, stood in utter amazement as Renner's squad walked in followed by an Elite.
"Doc, what can be done about Grater's arm?" asked Renner as he stepped through the door. Unfortunately the doctor was still in shock over the group that had just walked in to his field hospital and failed to respond. "I said," Renner repeated, this time leveling a pistol at the doctor's head, "what can you do you about this man's arm?"

"I guess we can give him a temporary robotic arm," the doctor answered in a manner that suggested, even to a person of a mildly low IQ, that he hadn't noticed the pistol in his face.

"Great. Get to it," Renner replied as he put his pistol away.

      The doctors immediately went to work fitting Grater with the clumsiest, bulkiest, piece of crap they could scrounge together. The end result looked like an arm that had been covered in super glue and shoved into a bin full of scrap metal. With a proud look on his face, Grater asked, "So, what d'ya thinks of my new arm?" Muffled groans of approval rose up from everyone in the rest of the squad except for Shandor. When he got a look at the arm he walked over to Grater, placed his hand on Grater's shoulder, and uttered the stupidest thing anyone had ever heard him say.
"How's it going Sparky?"
Grater jumped off the table, and, with his new arm, slammed Shandor into the wall with enough force to create a man-sized dent. "What'd ya say jack-ass?" Grater growled.
"I said your arm looks spiffy."
"That's what I thought."
With that, Grater let the man go. No longer supported by Grater's mechanical limb Shandor fell to the ground and began to cry.
"Alright, enough already, we've got a mission we need to get ready for," Renner commanded. "I want everyone to head over to the armory and gear up."

      The armory was the only building in the compound that didn't look like a blind, retarded four-year-old had put it together. The armory appeared to be a single piece of solid Titanium-B battle plating, 12 inches thick at the narrowest point...the door. Inside, however, was another story. When Grater entered a look came across his face like the kind you'd find on a kid in a candy store. He immediately went over to where the three Havoc tactical nukes were sitting.

"I want one of these!" he said.
"Alright, but you better not lose it this time," Renner responded.
"You know, when you say it like that, of course it's going to sound bad."

      The rest of the squad did their shopping and were finished before Grater had even picked which variant of the standard issue AR he was going to use.
"For God sakes man! Just pick one already!" Andrea yelled.
"You can't rush these things," Grater replied, "Picking weapons is like picking fruit"

      Eventually Grater chose the MA5B, but, that not being enough, he had to pick up a shotgun as well. "I could take on the entire Covenant army all by myself," he said while shouldering both the shotgun and the AR and resting his leg upon his new Havoc nuke.

"Sure you could...and I'm the Space Pope," Hillock retorted. Grater shot Hillcock a look that would have killed the man had he been equipped with laser vision.

"Alright, time's up! Everybody out," Renner bellowed.
The entire squad filed out through the massive armory door, leaving Yashoon and Renner behind. "What's the matter Yash?" Renner asked.
"I do not wish to offend, but have you not captured Covenant weapons?"
"Sorry bouts that chum, no can do."
"Then I will just have to use," Yashoon shuttered, "human weapons."
"Alrighty, might I suggest this?" asked Renner as he offered what looked like a MA5B on crack.
"What is this?"
"It's a Battle-Rifle. Nobody here likes them because they're too big, they have a slow rate of fire, and they look really gay with that scope on the handle."
"Thank you," Yashoon said as he took the rifle, "but what shall I do about armor?"

      Renner hadn't thought about that. Yashoon had voluntarily given up his armor as a sign of good will and because the shield didn't function anymore—mostly because of the shield. Renner wondered what the alien would use for protection. Then it came to him. "AHA! I think I have the solution to your problem," Renner exclaimed.

      15 minutes later, Renner emerged from the armory, and, in a very dramatic show, he called for Yashoon to follow. Yashoon emerged from the armory and, as one, the entire squad gasped. "Holy sheep and all that is fleecy!" Seton exclaimed. Yashoon was dressed in what looked like the standard issue UNSC battle armor, except that the armor he wore had been heavily modified.

"How'd you manage to do that all in the span of 15 minutes, boss?" Grater asked.
"That's a secret. Now everyone, let's get on that drop-ship. The faster we get this mission done, the faster we get to come back for some R&R."

With that everyone hauled ass to be the first one to get onboard the drop-ship. Everyone, that is, except Yashoon.


-11.5 hours later-


      The ride in the drop-ship had been relatively quiet. This is, of course, the reason Shandor decided to ask another of his completely retarded questions.
"ARE WE THERE YET?"
"Shut the fuck up Shandor," Grater groaned.
"But are we there yet?"
"I told you to shut up."
"You haven't answered my question yet."
"If you make another sound I'm going to throw you out the back of the drop-ship again."
"Beep."
"Alright, that's it, you're a dead man!!!"
As Grater got up from his seat he attached one end of a length of cord to the structure of the drop-ship. "I told you that if you made another sound your ass would be flying the rest of the way." Grater grabbed Shandor, and, with the slyness of a fox, he attached the other end of the cord to the hooks in Shandor's body armor and threw him from the drop-ship. Everyone in the drop-ship stared, open-mouthed, as Grater went back to his seat. Renner, of course, just sat there like nothing had happened.

      Soon the crew could hear a strange sound coming from the outside of the drop-ship. Upon closer inspection it was found to be Shandor 30 meters behind the Pelican, dangling and screaming, "WOO HOOO!" The crew decided that Shandor should spend the rest of the trip in his current state.

      When the drop-ship touched down at the LZ, Shandor was there waiting. Actually, as he had unfastened the cord from his armor too soon—15 meters too soon—he wasn't so much waiting, as he was crumpled up on the ground and unconscious.
"Wake up." Renner yelled as he kicked Shandor in the side.
"Ugh!"
"Quit your bitchin', we've got work to do."
The rest of the squad filed out of the pelican, and a very good question came to Seton.
"Sir if I might interject?"
"What the hell does interject mean?" Renner glared as if Seton had tried to trick him.
"Never mind," Seton responded "I was just wondering what do we do if we come across something really heavy we've, got nothing to lift it with?"
"We call in a heavy lift team." Renner just stared at Seton in total shock, "You're not allowed to talk to Shandor anymore, that's an order."
"Yes sir." Seton said with the same enthusiasm as when you lose a rabid dog.

      Five hours latter after trudging through barren tundra the crew finally came across what they were looking for a small door that resembled a sewer lid.
"LOOKS LIKE THIS IS OUR BUS STOP." Renner yelled over the howling wind.
"WHAT!" The entire squad yelled back.
After twenty minutes of charades and poor hand signals, they finally decided to go down the hole so they could here what Renner had to say. They were rewarded with what smelled like a sewer and looked like a grease pit, and a hard punch by Renner and the bottom of the ladder.

"Okay everybody let's follow that smell." Renner spat.
His order was met with responses of; "Oh joy", "My ass smells better than this place.", "What?", and vomiting.
"Well I'm glad you're all happy, I see a light up ahead we should be out of this shit pit in about ten minutes." Renner answered.

      Ten minutes turned into two hours, but they did get out and into an almost perfectly spherical room aside from the fifty foot floor they stood on. Sitting a few feet away was a small box witch could be best described as an old 19" T.V. with one corner smashed in, and that is exactly what Shandor thought it was and went to pick it up when the thing piped up.

"Hello my name is Bif101 I run and maintain this facility."
"Gaaaaahhhhhhhhh," Shandor screamed and dropped Bif101, "it's possessed!"
"No. no. no. no I'm n. n. n. not." Bif101 responded
"Oh crap a busted AI." Hillock groaned.
"Look" said Renner "that busted TV monitor knows this place better than anybody so were going to need its help."
"Fine have it your way but trust me this is a really bad idea."
"Noted but we don't really have a choice so let's just get this over with." Renner ended the conversation and walked over to Bif101.

      By this point Bif101 and Shandor were in an intense conversation about how scary shadows are.
Finally Yashoon spoke up. "Shandor shut up, monitor lead us to the armory or if that is not possible to the mainframe."
"You finally grew some balls" Grater smacked Yashoon on the back.
"What?" The elite looked completely puzzled.
"Oh yeah right never mind." Grater said slapping the elite on the back again and having a good laugh at his expense.
He was honored with a punch to the face and verbal warring never to touch the elite again, Shandor began to laugh and was kick by Renner, witch sent Shandor into a fit of wailing and crying.
"So, Bif101, you going to take us somewhere?" Renner queried.
"Yes follow me" Bif101 said merrily, and proceeded to sit on the ground and make grunting noises like a fat man who fell on his back.
"Okay let's go" Renner said a little bit more than annoyed.
"Right away sir" Bif101 responded, this time the AI managed a few sparks, some smoke and a scraping noise.
"Okay Shandor pick him up and go exactly ware he tells you to." Renner order.
"YES SIR" Shandor said and happily pick up the monitor .
"Follow me" The monitor said, and opened a door that was previously invisible.
You could tell the AI's programming was going into overdrive, and Bif101 went into what could be best described as a computer seizure, and started shaking, sparking violently, and screaming.
"Oh god, oh god, oh god, oh god." And then fell out of Shandor's hands.
Renner looked over and uttered two words "Oh Christ."
"No shit," Hillock said, "this is going to be a long, long mission."

The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 9, Into the belly of the beast…and it’s not feeling too well
Date: 26 February 2004, 6:53 PM

-The Croton Chronicles: Chapter 9, Into the belly of the beast...and it's not feeling too well-

      As Bif 101 led Renner and his not so merry band of misfits through the Forerunner facility he talked about the facility's functions, whether anybody was listening to him or not. After about an hour and a half of hearing the retarded TV monitor babble about how advanced the Forerunner were Renner finally got fed up.
"As you can see this installation was well conceived..."
"Would you please shut the tanj up for just one minute" Renner asked Bif in a slightly miffed tone.
Bif just sat there completely silent.
"Now, are we anywhere near the armory?"
"Oh, hello. I am Bif One Zero One; I am the monitor of installation Zero Two Five. I am so glad you are here as I have not had visitors in quite some time."
Renner just stood there not knowing what to say. After about five minutes Renner decided to ask again.
"Are we anywhere near the armory Bif?"
And again Renner's query was met with the same reply. So, in true human fashion Renner tried the only other way he knew to communicate. He spoke louder and slower.
"ARE...WE," he yelled pointing to himself, "ANYWHERE...NEAR," he yelled as he made a huge circular motion with his hand, "...THE...ARMORY," he finished with a gesture that looked like he was either having a seizure or firing an assault rifle.
"Oh no, we are not currently located near this facility's armory."
"Fuck this, I give up" Renner said in a huff.
Shandor had stood quiet the entire time, all 60 seconds of it. For Shandor this was an endurance trial, decided to speak up.
"Mind if I give it a try Sir" Shandor asked.
"Sure, go ahead, knock yourself out."
Shandor proceeded to set Bif down on the ground and began what would turn out to be a very long and very painful conversation to those within earshot.
"So, Bob, are we anywhere near the armory?"
"If you'll follow me I'll gladly show you the way."
Bif began to hum softly and spark from his dented corner. After about five minutes of this Renner walked over to Bif and kicked the retarded TV monitor as hard as he could.
"Shandor, pick up our 'guide' and have him tell us the directions."
Shandor followed Renner's orders and did what he said.
"How about you tell us how to get to the armory instead" Shandor asked.
"Oh, very well. You humans are a fickle species" Bif said in a new, if not poor, British accent.
"Go down this hall. It's the first door on the left. You can't miss it."
The trip to the armory lasted about 25 seconds. Renner and his team had been at the end of the corridor standing not more than 40 feet from the door the entire time. The funny thing was that the word "ARMORY" was blatantly scrawled above the door in English. When Renner reached the door nothing happened.
"Hey, aren't these supposed to open automatically" he asked Bif.
Bif said nothing.
"Ben, could you open the armory door please" Shandor asked.
"Ok."
With that the door remained closed. Bif 101 started to spark and make popping noises. After about 5 minutes he began to shake so violently that it caused Shandor to drop him, denting one of his 'good' corners. After about 10 minutes Bif stopped shaking and the armory door slowly slid open. Shandor walked over to Bif and picked him up. This apparently startled the dilapidated TV monitor.
"Oh, hello. It's nice to meet you. My name is Bif One Zero One. It's nice to finally have some visitors as I've not had visitors in quite some time."

      After introducing himself for the umpteenth time, Bif and Shandor started talking to each other as if they had just met. Again, the conversation somehow ended up on the topic of how scary shadows were. Bif and Shandor's pseudo-intellectual conversation ended with a loud bang, a few pops, and the smell of burning circuitry. Bif 101 was fine, although how long this remained true was anybody's guess. The loud bang and the smell of burning electronics came from a small door about two feet above the armory door. From this door emerged five more machines resembling old TV monitors. The only difference between Bif and these new machines is that these new machines had a large, spinning, bulky block that protruded from the bottom of their cases.
"Ah, good, it's about time you showed up" Bif blurted out.
The only response Bif got were a few pops and an increase in the smell of burning electronics.
"What the hell are those" Renner asked.
"These my good sir are Mark One Sentinels" Bif answered in his faltering British accent.
"What exactly are these hunks of junk for?"
"Why, they are going to help you to combat The Flood of course."
Upon hearing this Renner took a step back.
"You're shitting me right?"
"I do not believe I am capable of that."
Hillock decided that this was as good a time as any to interrupt. So, he interrupted.
"Sir, what are The Flood?"
"Well The Flood is a macro..."
"SHUT UP BIF" Renner yelled.
"Imagine your worst nightmare," Renner paused, "...and then mix it with the shit they serve in boot."
Everyone in Renner's squad shuddered, that is everyone except Yashoon. Hillock noticed a slightly puzzled look on Yashoon's face, or at least he thought it was a puzzled look.
"They used to serve us this stuff that would take the rust of a Warthog's bumper back in boot camp" Hillock said to Yashoon thinking that this would clear everything up.
"No wonder you humans are losing the war."
"What do you mean?"
"You serve your troops such delicacies, it's a wonder you humans have lasted this long."

      Renner was still talking to Bif completely unaware of the beating Hillock was taking at the hands of Yashoon. Apparently Hillock had insulted the Elite after hearing his comments about the human war effort.
"So, how'd The Flood get loose?"
"It seems that in my attempt to open the armory door I accidentally opened the containment area door by mistake."
"Troops listen up," Renner yelled, "I want everyone into the armory double time."
"I want everyone geared up for the fight of their lives."

      Renner and his troops immediately moved into the armory. Unfortunately the armory was no bigger than a small walk-in closet with every square inch covered in weapon racks. Even with the apparent lack of space there were still several ooos and awes heard as Renner's team moved into the cramped space. Everyone was able to find some new kind of weapon in the tiny armory. Grater had found some sort of plasma gattling-gun. Bif 101 had informed him that the ammunitions backpack contained a small fusion power plant that provided nearly inexhaustible ammunition. Andrea found a plasma Sniper rifle and enough ammo to choke a person. Renner found what looked like a MA5B, the only exception being that this new weapon fired depleted uranium shells at a super high velocity. The best part about Renner's new weapon is that it was also capable of firing standard MA5B ammunition. Several of the other troops including Hillock and Yashoon found advanced versions of Covenant Plasma Rifles and Pistols. It wasn't until Shandor said something that Renner remembered something more important than the location of Earth.


      "Under no circumstances is Pvt. Shandor allowed to handle, operate, or
      in any way touch any alien weapons. He has a propensity to destroy
      these weapons and poses and serious risk to his wellbeing and the
      wellbeing of those around him."


"Oh shit" were the only words Renner was able to get out before a loudest explosion he had ever heard ripped through the tiny armory.

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