Chapter 7: The Showdown

Flashback continued

“How could this happen to me??!” Suzy thought angrily, her mind clouded with hormones and rage. “I mean, I’ve made my mistakes… but this night goes on as I’m fading away!” She sobbed repeatedly into her pillow, hoping and praying that her (internet) true knight in shining armor would bust through her door, wearing white armor and rescue her from her evil father.

As she looked out the window into the darkening night, she suddenly realized it: “He can’t keep me in here forever! I can escape! I can climb out this window and go see Jacob…” She sprang out of her bed, grabbing her backpack, texting machine that would enable her to text to all of her friends about her latest emotions around the galaxy, and some less important stuff like clothes and food.

End Flashback

“Yeah, I was pretty upset about the whole deal, but eventually I made it to SAX. I never got to meet Jacob, though… do you know where he is?” Suzy said to the strange man sitting across from her.

“Errr… about that,” MacMillan said, scratching his head awkwardly. He then removed Keyes’ Flood-ified head from his duffel bag. “Yeah, back at SAX I threw him in a closet and told him not to join the military. But he did anyway, that stubborn lad, and I had to take him out a couple of minutes ago.”

“EEEEEEEEEEK! ZIGGY TIGGLES MIZZLY JAKEY!!!!!”

The discovery of her beloved Jacob’s death, along with the realization that his ears were bigger than radar dishes, was too much for her: she fainted.

“Guess I’d better get rid of this,” MacMillan thought as he chunked Keyes’ Floody head out the back of the helicopter.

“Big Bird! Job well done again, lad!” MacMillan said jovially as he entered the cockpit, patting Big Bird’s shoulder.

“Roger that, sir. Seeing that Johnson is long gone, I recommend we jump forward two days to the Control Room on this Installation, where Johnson is supposed to be. If we’re lucky, we can catch the Chief there, too,” Big Bird said as he took the helicopter into the sky.

“Sounds like a good call, Big Bird. Take us there. Also, the girl’s out cold in the back seat again.”

“This must be pretty rough on her, sir.”

“She’ll be fine, just keep an eye on her.”

“You got it, Captain.”

The Sea Knight accelerated into the familiar flashing light, and when the duo regained their senses, they were in the cold dark of a snowy region above the Control Room of Halo.

“Put me down on the ground near the base of that big structure,” MacMillan shouted as he left the cockpit, moving towards the storage section of the Sea Knight to outfit his ghillie suit with white camouflage.



Sergeant Johnson shuffled between the enormous, snow-covered rocks in the frozen riverbed. He was cold, wearing his standard slacks USNC marines issue uniform. He paused, breathing into his hands to thaw them ever so slightly. They needed to find shelter from this biting cold, and soon.

Suddenly, Johnson heard something that sounded like rocks moving off to his left. “Hey, boys! Y’all hear that?” he whispered to his three inferiors (in both greatness and rank). A chorus of “no, sirs” reached his ears.

“I heard something,” he growled. “Fuji, go check it out,” he nodded towards the rocks that he thought the noise came from. Private Fujikawa shuffled, muttering, out of the creek bed and towards the rocks. He looked around and, seeing nothing, turned back around. No sooner had he done it than he was on his way down into the snow, knocked out cold. There was no sound, no plasma stream, no reason for his hitting the snow unconscious.

“SNIPER!” Johnson shouted, signaling his whole squad to hit the ground.

“Stay cool!” the Sergeant barked, his eyes not shifting from the area where Private Fujikawa still lay face down in the snow, still on his belly.

Johnson didn’t know what was going on, but he did know, as he shuffled, crouched, towards his downed private, that they had to get out of this canyon fast and find real shelter. He glanced back towards his squad, a mistake this savvy veteran rarely made, and by the time he looked back, the private was gone. There were no imprints on the snow except for where his body had been, there was no evidence whatsoever of where he went. He was simply gone.

Then, something caught Johnson’s eye in the snow: a small, cloth piece of a string-like material that blended in almost perfectly with the snow. He bent down and slowly picked it up. Realization quickly kicked in.

“EVERYBODY MOVE!!!!” he thundered, sprinting past his squad and waving wildly for them to follow. Both of them took off after him, looks of fear plastered on their faces.

“Sir, why are we—“ *Thump* Private Henderson’s protest was cut short as his body hit the snow.

“Keep moving!” Johnson ordered his quickly-downsizing squad.

“Sir, we can’t just leave him!” Corporal Kovacs shouted.

Before Johnson could respond, the rumble of an avalanche could be heard from on high. The Corporal and Sergeant both looked up at the tons of ice, snow and rock that came crashing into the creek some ways behind them. They doubled their pace, not knowing how far the avalanche might continue down the canyon.

They both made it out of the riverbed and broader valley after moving uphill for some time. They entered a tree-covered area with snow two feet deep before Johnson rounded a huge timber and motioned Kovacs to join him. Both paused for several seconds as they tried to catch their breaths.

“Sergeant… there’s something out there,” Kovacs stated ominously. Johnson rolled his eyes at his Corporal’s astounding revelation.

“Look…” he began, still regaining his breath. “He’s after me, Corporal. You gotta get out of here.”

“What? Who’s after you?” the shocked Kovacs responded.

“I don’t know, Corporal. But I’m gonna find out. Don’t you worry, I can take this guy. But you gotta go, find the Chief, he’ll know what to do.”

The Corporal nodded solemnly and took off deeper into the woods and the dark of the night. Steeling himself for a fight, Johnson noticed the snow picking up extremely quickly to blizzard-like proportions. He took a deep breath and rounded the tree, looking back to the riverbed.

Johnson slowly walked towards the frozen creek, assault rifle shouldered and ready. Barely able to see his own breath in front of him in this blizzard, he heard the howling wind coming through the canyon and into his face. It was loud enough to keep him from hearing almost anything in this weather, and so it was not his hearing nor his sixth sense that saved him, but his feet feeling the ground shaking.

MacMillan came right up out of the snow that he had buried himself in immaculately, and, knife flashing, went right for Johnson’s head. His target swing his weapon to catch the knife, which got stuck in the rifle’s plastic stock. Johnson then swung the rifle to smash MacMillan in the mouth, sending the hunter sprawling backwards and into a tree. Johnson sent a spray of rifle rounds into the tree as MacMillan ducked and kicked a slew of snow into the Sergeant’s eyes.

Johnson stumbled back down towards the frozen river, tripping on a tree root buried into the snow and trying to regain his sight as he hit his back, still sliding downhill. The wind’s howl was deafening, the blizzard had reached whiteout conditions. Johnson sprayed another quarter clip back towards the trees as he regained his footing and took off into the creekbed, hardly able to see a yard in front of him.

MacMillan, hot in pursuit, couldn’t see Johnson either, and so hurled a concussion grenade ahead of him into the blizzard. Johnson didn’t see it as it landed five feet in front of him, smashing the ice. He didn’t have time to stop his full sprint as he tumbled into the icy waters. Surfacing and trying to reorient himself, he swung his assault rifle, its parts already freezing, wildly around. Seeing no target, he attempted to begin climbing out.

“Oi, lad,” the ghillie-suit clad man shouted over the snowstorm as he walked up behind Johnson, pistol out. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

Johnson knew he was beat. Climb out, and he would be shot. Stay here, he would freeze to death. He had only one thing left to do: hope for a miracle. He whirled, yanking his M6D from its holster, and, shockingly, managed to get one shot off that nicked MacMillan’s left shoulder before MacMillan ended the Sergeant’s colorful life.

Spinning the pistol on his finger, MacMillan walked off, out of the canyon and through the woods to a clearing.

“Big Bird, mission accomplished. Johnson’s dead. I’m ready for the Chief.”

“Roger that, sir, but there’s a problem: if I’m reading this Halo book right, the Chief has teleported across to the other side of Halo into some Flood-infested Covenant ship. I’m not sure we have the energy right now for that kind of long jump.”

“Alright, lad, then have you got a better idea?”

“Actually, sir, I do.”

“Let’s hear it,” MacMillan said as he took shelter against the wind behind a rock.

“We do have the energy for a shorter jump: towards the middle of the ring. That’s where most of the Covenant fleet is currently residing. If we can get in there, we can take out the Arbiter while he’s still the Admiral of this Covenant fleet. I’ve already found his flagship.”

“Oi! Good idea, Big Bird! I’m dropping the marker right now, so any time you can get me out of this storm would be nice…” the Captain said as he chucked the marker into the snow.

“Can do. Oh, and sir? Keyes’ girlfriend hasn’t stopped crying since she woke up.”

“Ah,” MacMillan thought for a couple of seconds. “I think I left me brandy in the chopper. I was planning to save it for the end of the mission, but if it gets bad enough up there, you can use it…”

“Thanks, sir. I’ll be there in 10 minutes. Over and out.”