Fireteam Glory Part 136
Booth woke up to a commotion. She had fallen asleep last night as she had been watching the entrance to the large Covenant encampment. Clearing the fog from her mind, she remembered that she had seen several Shadow transports leave the night before. They had disappeared into the jungle before she could see who and what was onboard. She had fallen asleep shortly after that, so she had missed any other potential convoys or patrols leaving. There was shouting from behind her, which drew her attention. It was a little distant, but it sounded like a fight had broken out. She turned around and saw several Covenant Brutes struggling with human prisoners in one of the other pens. Cass walked up to her left, and Santos was on her right.
“What’s going on, gunnery sergeant?” Booth asked Cass, who was staring intently at the brawl occurring in front of them.
Cass gestured at the Brutes. “They came over just a few minutes ago and began inspecting the prisoners before trying to grab one. The rest of the people in there jumped them when they tried to do that and, by the looks of it, the Brutes are winning.
Booth looked back to the fight, seeing now that several people now lay on the ground curled up in pain or restrained by Brutes. She could see that a couple of them were wearing military fatigues. One person seemed to be putting up a real fight, having been grabbed by two Brutes. She watched as the mysterious person was dragged out of the pen kicking and screaming, then was taken to the edge of the encampment. There was a large gathering of Brutes nearby, which she saw was led by the massive War Chieftain. When the Brutes had arrived at the entrance, they let the prisoner go as they began to bark and howl. They fired their weapons at the ground near the person’s feet and sent them sprinting into the jungle. The War Chieftain’s pack of Brutes began to snarl as they stomped their feet and fired their weapons into the air, but they stayed in formation behind their leader. After ten loud minutes of Brute howls had passed, the War Chieftain barked a single gruff order and led the pack forward in a ravenous tide of bloodlust and rage. They ran into the jungle screaming and whooping, spreading out as they vanished into the trees.
Booth looked at Cass and Santos, who shared her look of shock and anger. “They’re holding us as prey for hunting games.” Booth said as she looked back to the jungle. “We’re going to be used as game for a hunt.” She knew that the Brutes were cruel and primitive in their actions, but this was new to her.
Cass recomposed herself with a more stern face. “It would seem like it. That means we have limited time to figure out a plan to get out of here, and get everyone else out at the same time.”
“Do you think they’re going to take more than one a day?” Santos was still staring at the jungle when he asked the question.
Booth could see a hint of true fear in his eyes, which meant he was terrified of the thought. “We’ll just have to wait and see, as much as I hate to say that.”
A faint and eerie howl echoed across the jungle, sending shivers down their spines.
Looking for an excuse to ignore the distressing new development, Booth looked over to where Teresa had gone to sleep the night before. She was still there, tucked into her knees and laying in the mud. Walking over and sitting down next to the sleeping medic, Booth lightly reached across and shook Teresa by the shoulder.
“Hey, wake up.” She whispered gently as Teresa began to stir a little. “Get up, come on.”
Teresa mumbled a little and sat up, stretching her arms high into the arm with a small sigh. “Good morning, Elizabeth.” Teresa said meekly as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes. “Where are we?”
Booth quickly ran all the possible ways to answer that question through her head, but a good answer didn’t come to mind. “Well, we’re certainly not where we want to be. That’s for sure.”
Teresa’s eyes sharpened a little and she looked at Booth with a small amount of confusion. “What do you mean? Wait… I remember, I think.” Teresa’s face shifted to sadness and pain. “Ivanoff… Lawrence… the Brutes.” Her voice became a little weaker and raspy as she swallowed a lump in her throat.
Booth looked down and away. “Yeah, I know. But we can’t worry about that right now. We’re trying to come up with a plan to get out of here, and we’re going to need you to be ready to go.”
Teresa looked at her with a mixture of panic, anger, and remorse. “How can I not think about Lawrence and Ivanoff? We lost two of our friends just last night and you want me to not think about it?” Her tone had gained a bitter edge as her anger grew. “We’re trapped in a Brute slaughterhouse and I’m supposed to just roll with whatever death wish of a plan you come up with!?”
“Teresa, just wait a-” Booth tried to respond.
“No!” Teresa snapped. “There’s no point! We have no weapons, no food, no supplies, and we’re deep in hostile territory! Even if we made it past these energy barriers, we’d be cut down by those towers before we could even grab weapons!”
Booth tried to think of a response, but suddenly shouting began behind her. She turned around and saw that Kip had walked over to the rest of the group and was in a shouting match with Santos. Moving to see what the ruckus was about, she didn’t stay to watch Teresa sit back down and glare at her before breaking down into sobs once again.
“What’s going on here!?” Booth yelled at the two bickering men.
“Oh my piloting skills were the problem, were they!?” Kip shouted at Santos, face twisted in rage. “Because you sure were helpful strapped in the backseat doing jack all!”
“I never said that, you airhead!” Santos screamed back in reply. “You came over here in a bad mood and I jokingly asked if you had hit your head on the way down!”
“I did hit my head on the way down, along with injuring my arm! So thanks for asking!” Kip’s face was red with anger. “And by the way, your medic did nothing to remedy that! She just sat there crying while my arm felt like it was on fire!”
“She just lost two of her squadmates! Lay off of the doctor!” Santos angrily hissed.
“What do you think I’m going through!?” Kip roared. “I lost one of my closest friends yesterday! How do you think that’s affecting me!”
“Oh, I have no clue how it could be affecting you.” Santos said sarcastically. “Please, enlighten me!”
Booth tried to step in before things got two out of hand. “Will you two knuckleheads shut up?” She glared at both of them. “We’re all going through a lot right now, but this is not the way to handle it!”
Kip redirected his anger at her. “Of course you would say that! You sniper types are all the same, so disconnected from anything resembling an emotion!”
Booth knew not to take the insult personally, but her mouth moved faster than her brain and she retaliated before she could stop herself. “At least I do hard work, flyboy!” Immediately realizing what she had done, she tried to correct the mistake. “Wait, I didn’t mean-”
But the damage had already been done. Kip was furious and took a swing at Booth, which she quickly leaped away from. She dodged a few more hits while trying to reason with the man. Before she could go for a move to put a stop to Kip’s attacks, Santos stepped in. He charged Kip from the side and tackled him, sending them both crashing into the mud. Santos ended up on top and immediately moved on his advantage, landing several blows on Kip’s face. Kip quickly kicked Santos off and stood up, getting ready for the next attack. Booth looked at Cass, who was already sneaking up on Santos from behind. By now, the fight had drawn the attention of several Brute guards, who were now shouting and cheering the fight on in their alien tongue. Booth moved into position, watching for Cass’s signal. When Cas gave the signal, they leaped onto their targets at the same time, placing them into a headlock in Booth’s case and grabbed one under the arms in Cass’s case. Santos responded to Cass’s sudden ambush by trying to smash the back of his head into her face. Cass saw the attack coming and quickly spun Santos around so he was facing her, knocking him to the floor with a single punch to the face. Booth knocked Kip out by doing the same, but not before he got into a position to elbow her in the gut. When she let go of the unconscious man, she doubled over in pain for a minute.
The Brutes were still snarling and whooping, but many had stopped when the fight seemingly ended. Booth looked up and stared at all of the massive aliens looking back at her. She hated them, she couldn’t wait to get out of this cage and kill them for taking pleasure in the prisoners’ suffering. One Brute standing behind the wall she was next to growled at her, revealing its massive yellowed tusks. She stared harshly, not intimidated by the display, until the Brute got bored and left. When the Brute had left her sight, she turned her vision to Cass, who was checking to make sure they hadn’t done any serious damage to Kip or Santos. The pain in her midsection was fading now, so she stood up and walked over to Cass. All the while, she thought about how they were honestly going to be able to escape, if they would all kill each other or be used for the hunting games before they could even try to escape. No matter how she looked at it, she didn’t see a lot of good in the situation.
Lawrence looked at the trees surrounding him. They were a lush green color, far different from the duller greens of the evergreens in the Northwest where he lived.
He stopped for a moment. Just the thought of home sent his mind racing like mad, drowning in so many different thoughts that it was hard to even tell what he was trying to think about. He wondered if Seattle had been attacked by the Covenant yet, if his parents had followed his instruction and retreated to the old vacation home when the news of a Covenant attack broke. He knew his father was a serious believer in the strength of the UNSC military, so he knew there was a chance that they were still at the apartment waiting for any communication from him.
“I can’t even know if they’re safe.” he said to himself angrily. “I’m stranded in a jungle with no communication, no food, and nothing to defend myself with! My team’s scattered and Ivanoff is…” the sentence got caught in his throat. Ivanoff’s death was still fresh in his mind, and he couldn’t think about it without having to stop himself from starting to cry a little. His gloves were still stained dark crimson from Ivanoff’s hands. Still, it did remind him of something else. He checked his backpack and found the small box Ivanoff had given him. It was still intact, at least from the outside. Opening the box, he gently took out the old photograph of Ivanoff, his wife, and his daughter. The picture was still in good condition, which relieved him a little. Their smiling faces seemed to speak to him, like they were telling him to keep going. He decided to take the advice.
“I’ll make sure your sacrifice wasn’t in vain, Ivanoff.” he said as he put the photograph back into the box and put it in his backpack. Pushing aside the panicked thoughts in his mind, he refocused on where he was. The smoke was very close now, to the point he could faintly smell it. From the black columns rising into the sky, Lawrence could tell that a large fire had been ignited at the crash site. He figured that he could make the rest of the journey through the jungle now.
“The only problem is,” he thought to himself as he inspected the river,“how do I get across?” He was on the wrong side of the water, meaning he would either need to swim across or find another path. The current looked like it was gentle enough, but even with drowning not being a concern, he didn’t know if he wanted to get his gear wet again. Further down, he saw a part of the river where it looked like it got a little shallower. There were large rocks peeking out from the water’s surface, which would allow him to get across with taking another swim. Quickly running over to the rocks, he saw that the river only went up to his knees.
“It’s not ideal, but it’ll have to do.” He put his feet into the water, his body tingling a little as the cold water shocked his warm body. The jungle was humid, which had made him miserably hot and sweaty. He would happily invite a chance to cool himself off a little. The current got a little stronger when he got in up to his knees, so he used the rocks as supports to keep himself upright. When he reached the other side, he stopped for a moment to drink from his canteen. It was halfway empty now, but it was so hot that he was constantly thirsty. He also felt his stomach growling again. He was out of MREs, so he hoped that the Pelican still had some food in it or that he could catch up with the rest of Glory quickly. The beautiful, lush undergrowth was nearly up to his waist when he entered the jungle, and the tree canopy overhead blocked a lot of sunlight, leaving the forest floor somewhat dim.
“Well, I guess I had better get going.” He said to no one as he went deeper into the jungle. “Might as well be ready for trouble.” He said, taking his combat knife out of its sheath. He slowly began to make his way west, towards the crash site. If all went well, he figured he could be there in about forty-five minutes.
Trying to keep himself in high spirits, he said something he thought would be encouraging. “Just stay focused, find the team and don’t worry about anything else. We’ll all be okay if I can just find them.” It did make him feel a little better, but still he had a small seed of doubt within himself.