Welcome to the prologue of my first ever Mass Effect crossover! This first chapter is only Halo but this will get you introduced to the main character.

Please leave a review and tell me how I did so far, thank you.

Enjoy this story! :)

Psychological Evaluation [08/34/53] CURRENT HANDLER: CMDR TROTT, JASON (1123-3455-JT)

SUBJECT: Spartan III Operator Alpha-198 (ONI Beta Five Division)

DOB: 03/28/24

Gender: Female

I was suprised by the amount of black ink with A-198, they classified her name, for crying out loud! Reminds me of B-312.

SPARTAN Operator A-198 is a lone wolf in every sense of the word. She rarely interacts with ship crew or team members unless absolutely necessary. From the files given to me by her previous handler this wasn't always the case. She was a member of Alpha Company Fireteam Ferret along side A-292 and A-344 specifically.

After Operation: SWINDLER [See attached file] she was pulled from her mainline company along with her team to be inserted separately into combat theaters.

She assisted SPARTAN IV Fireteam Cutthroat [See attached file] on a recent operation to the former outer colonies and, from the after action report from SPARTAN operator Palmer it was found that she routinely disregarded her orders and engaged enemy combatants in a prolonged shootout that cost the unit the element of suprise and alerted the enemy to their presence. Never the less the mission was a complete success.

Post mission briefings showed A-198 only disregarded orders when the presence of Covenant hostiles was confirmed. It's possible that A-198 has something of a bloodlust when dealing with aliens. This will hopefully be tested BEFORE the next mission.

She has also displayed a very noticable disregard for the moral and ethical consequences of her actions on missions and has routinely used allies as bait or decoys without their knowledge to enable her to slip by enemy positions. This hopefully will not be an issue for the next mission.

FINAL VERDICT: Cleared for active duty.

UNSC Outer Colony Victoria, 10:00 hrs, October 30th 2553/UNSC Military Calendar/Military Standard Time

The colony was cold, A-198 thought, cold and lifeless. It had every right to be cold and lifeless though, considering the state it was in. 8 years had passed since the attack, since this colony and everyone on it had breathed their last. A-198 was now trekking along a highway, passing the shells of cars and trucks with the occasional remains of a military checkpoint dotted here and there. A-198 wordlessy passed the gray remains of a M12 LRV, its green paint gone and replaced with its grey frame.

She wondered how it could have survived out here in the open, with nothing to cover it or keep it from being burned away by the glass.

That's all this colony was now, what all of the colonies that came into contact with the Covenant were. Glass.

A-198 wondered if the vehicles former occupants even knew their last moments would be in that car, that the green armoured reconnaissance vehicle that they depended on so dearly would be their tomb. A-198 doubted it as she ran an armoured encased hand over the hood, the skeleton of the driver staring at her with long dead eyes.

She gave the hood a final pat before continuing on, her trek brining her ever closer to the capital city.

Once, the boulevard A-198 walked along had been bustling with people, businessmen, children, happy families just going about their day. Not so anymore. The boulevard was filled with wrecked cars, twisted pipes and upturned tables and furniture. The remains of a streetcar was turned on its side, blocking a fair bit of the road up ahead. The city loomed to the left and the once beautiful coast on the right.

The former colony was said to have better coasts than Arcadia, New Barbados and Heilis combined, perfect for romantic getaways, family vacations or just a good swim. Not anymore.

Arcadia had been destroyed in 2546 when the Covenant finally had enough of the little colony, glassing her before the UNSC Navy could stop them. New Barbados had been glassed in 2552 alongside Reach, Tribute, Heilis and New Jerusalem with countless other colonies being cut off from Earth and each other.

A-198 continued her journey, her soft breathing her only companion as her armour attempted to counter the barrage of toxic particles left behind by the attack. Her eyes wandered to her air supply however she had more than enough.

The lone warrior entered the city proper, her hands gripping her weapon tightly as she walked down street after street, alley after alley. She was met with only silence. No birds chirped, no wind rustled the dead leaves. No children played in the park and no cars drove. It was pure, utter silence.

A-198 had been just 4 years old when the alien Covenant had attacked her home colony of Medusa in 2528, killing her family in the opening shots as the civilians, panicked and scared swarmed the evac ships while the Army and Marines fought a losing battle against the monsters on the ground. In orbit it was the same with the evacuation ships having to dodge not only alien fighters and capital ships but the bodies and wreckage of their own.

Neither Aliens or humanity owned Victoria now. No man was the new owner of the dead world and like always he wasn't a good caretaker.

This was exemplified by the debris of a skyscraper, it's mighty frame collapsed into the surrounding streets and other buildings.

In a way one could argue that the destroyed skyscraper symbolized humanity. When it was standing it was tall and proud, a beacon for all to see. Then the war came. It's body cracked and withered as assault after assault hit it over and over. Then it toppled under the strain of just staying alive.

But where the skyscraper failed humanity succeeded. The war was over, humanity had survived. The cost of doing so, however was enormously high.

23 billion souls had died in the 27 year long human-Covenant war.

Almost every single human colony no longer existed in its former capacity. They were all shells, glass like Victoria. Even Earth, humanity's cradle was scarred. A-198 kept walking, her gaze on the rooftops and windows as she watched for snipers.

A-198 found her objective a little over an hour later.

A three storey parking garage filled to the brim with cars and trucks. Some still had paint though chipped and faded. A-198 ran a hand along the door of a green four door sedan, it's windows cracked and damaged. A-198 spyed the remains of a car seat for an infant in the back and instantly decided to continue on, shaking her head to clear the images that had formed.

Even here, thousands of miles away from the beams the city died.

The first beams had hit the planet's one large ocean, boiling it and causing shockwaves and earthquakes to ripple outwards, flattening towns, villages and coastal cities. No one was spared as the air turned toxic and unbreathable and buildings collapsed on each other.

A-198 ascended the parking garage quickly and efficiently, coming to the third storey less than five minutes later.

The sky had gone from a light gray in the morning to almost complete blackness and yet she saw lights on the horizon. A-198 went prone and slowly crawled to the lip of the parking garage and turned the zoom function in her helmet to maximum.

Her mission was to preform recon on a suspected rebel base and assist a larger UNSC force in taking it. The base miles away, however was definitely not affiliated with the rebels.

Tall purple spires dotted the skyline with guard towers placed along a 10 meter high wall, most likely electrified. The hiss and whine of what could only be Covenant machinery could be heard for miles around.

The lone SPARTAN wasn't sure where all this material had appeared from. The Covenant had been fractured after the battle for Earth and their ships, supplies and gear was scrapped or was being fought over by the former Covenant races.

This base was much to well equipped to be scavengers. The SPARTAN III wondered if these were the Covenant Separatists she had heard about from an after action report after the battle for Earth.

The Elites, for some reason or another broke away from the Covenant, fighting the brutes over whatever Elites fought over. A-198 didn't care to ask what they were fighting over as she didn't care. Not that she had the clearance, anyway.

She gave the base another once over, deducing that, these couldn't be Covenant Separatists and it most certainly wasn't scavengers. It was possible she was dealing with that group of Elite rebels calling themselves the 'Storm' Covenant that had popped up recently near the border.

Either way this was bad, very bad.

A-198 headed into the garage's stairwell, her temporary base of operations to radio the Sahara-class stealth ship in orbit and get in contact with her superiors.

There would be no reinforcements tonight. Victoria was tormented with deadly, fast winds that could take down a Pelican in seconds, never mind a Falcon.

After a tense and very one sided conversation with her superiors she had been given new orders. Her orders were to wait until dawn when a flight of Falcons could be mustered and deployed then attack the base with ODST's and the Falcons as support. They would enter the base and find out what was so important to the former Covenant on-planet.

Then A-198 would kill them all.

She spent the next hour watching the rebel Covenant base from the roof of the parking garage, her features concealed by a tarp she nailed into the withering stone. She monitored patrol patterns, guard shifts and convoys until her mission clock read 20:00.

She stood up, retreating into the garage proper to set up motion sensors and antipersonnel mines at key junctions.

A lone operator had to be extra carful when setting up camp, a bevy of extra mines, sensors and warning signals were needed to compensate for the lack of another soldier on watch and this was no different.

A-198 placed mines and sensors at doorways, ramps and under cars before moving the remains of luggage and boxes to form a make shift barricade around her sleeping area. She checked her armour's air supply and the air's toxicity level before leaning up against a wall next to the stairs, turning in for the night. Her weapon, An M7 suppressed SMG with a red dot sight and a flash light, as always leaned beside her, safety off.

UNSC Colony of Victoria, 05:54 hrs, October 31st 2553/UNSC Military Calendar/Military Standard Time

A-198 woke quickly, her weapon in her hands and sweeping the surroundings in seconds. Something had tripped the trackers.

She stood up, her grey/black MOLNJIR Mark V armour making no sound as she gained her bearings.

Her helmet was of the RECON variant, made to minimize her profile and infrared signature. She had added a CBRN module to better deal with Victioria's harsh environment. Her left shoulder was of the CQC design to give her arm and shoulder better protection from attacks from a flank while she was shooting. Her right shoulder was an OPERATOR variant specifically tailored for solo operatives while her chest was covered with ammo pouches, an extra radio and a small rucksack attached to her lower back/waist. Her belt held all manner of grenades, from High Explosive to Incendiary to various smoke and gas grenades.

A favorite of hers was the M23 Python poison bomb. A light weight, black, cylindrical grenade that released a cloud of extremely toxic poison for 10 meters in all directions. Technically illegal though when the Covenant showed up previous jurisdictions when dealing with enemy combatants were thrown out the window.

She had a small personal medical kit on her left thigh and an extra knife below it. An M6H sidearm was magnetically attached to her right thigh as a back up weapon. Her left wrist held a UGPS/Locator and her right wrist was the sheath for a knife. Her knee armour was apart of the GUNGNIR class of armour systems. the entire armour suite held the properties of its RECON helmet and as such she was almost invisible to radar and thermal imaging sensors.

Her armour was painted a charcoal grey with black stripes dotted here and there in no particular pattern. The only part of her armour that was coloured differently would be a dark yellow Griffin hand painted onto her CQC armour.

Some Marines questioned having the mythical bird painted onto her armour but they would never know its significace, it's meaning. A-198 painted it to remind her of the people who had never let her down...and who she would never forget.

She briefly looked to the mythical creature from behind her gold visor as she exited her sleeping area, her suppressed M7 SMG held tightly in her hands as she swept for targets.

She headed for the tripped sensor, finding nothing to indicate a hostile presence. Another soldier or Marine might have just assumed the sensor malfunctioned and take the needed steps to fix it.

A-198 was most certainly not a Marine.

She eyed her motion tracker in her peripheral vision as she pulled out her M6H sidearm, switching the M7 to her left hand so she could hold the M6H in her right.

Her motion tracker blipped red just outside her effective range and a sensor nearby also went off.

She wasn't alone in this decrepit parking garage on this long dead world.

She slowly walked forwards between two wrecked cars, her motion tracker blipped again.

And again. And again.

She mulled over what she could be facing, realizing neither option was pleasant.

She could be fighting Spec Ops Elites, the former Covenant's most valued troops equipped with personal shield systems, plasma weapons and invisibility.

Or Brute Stalkers. Ape like shock troopers that utilized energized spikes as ammunition for their weapons. They also possessed invisibility. And they were damn hard to kill.

Her weapons didn't have the power to punch through shields or armour as fast as she'd like. She'd chosen her gear on the prospect of fighting human rebels, not seven foot tall aliens.

She continued walking, eyeing her motion tracker as it filled with unseen contacts. She changed her IFF status from green to yellow, pinging the ONI prowler in orbit to notify them of the hostile encounter, hoping they'd send reinforcements of some kind or a better weapon.

The blips came closer now and her motion tracker looked like it would be engulfed by the mass of red dots.

She rounded a corner, eyeing a mass of old piled up cars. She swept her weapons over each one but found no contacts and thus she turned to continue her search.

That's when all hell broke loose. She was tackled from the side by an unseen force, ripping both weapons out of her grasp as it shoved her into a wall. The force of it almost drained her shields.

She kicked the thing repeatedly, attempting to dislodge it. She succeeded as she hit its groin, forcing it back and allowing A-198 to press the advantage. She unsheathed her knife located on her wrist and quickly plunged it into the invisible figure's, an Elite's, eye.

The alien recoiled visibly as its shield systems and invisibility generators stuttered and died as blood poured from the wound. A-198 didn't let the thing recover, charging it and shoving it to the ground as she unsheathed her other knife and quickly slashing the Elite across the stomach before stabbing it in the throat. As it fell A-198 pulled both her knives out of it's now spasming body and lunged for the nearest weapon, her pistol.

Two more Elites materialized behind a destroyed car and a support column respectively. Both fired bright blue blobs of searing hot plasma from their rifles, two of the rounds splashing against A-198's already weakened shield systems. She lunged behind a nearby pillar, her motion tracker identifying two large yellow blips approaching fast. A-198 fired at the Elites, forcing them back towards the open roof of the parking structure.

Both Elites were goaded back onto the roof with A-198 hot on their heels. The lone operator had picked up her SMG while she followed, peppe ing the two aliens with 5.5mm caseless ammunition as she placed her pistol in its magnetic holster, holding the M7 SMG in both hands.

She heard the whirring of propellers and saw two black UH-144 Falcon Gunships appear out of the fog. The Elites saw them to.

"This is Blackbird 1-1 to SPARTAN operator. I have positive ID on hostile foot mobiles. Permission to fire, over?" The lead pilot asked.

A-198 sent a trio of green acknowledgement lights to the two aircraft as she sighted both Elites. They were looking around confused and unsure of what to do in the face of the human firepower.

The first Falcon fired its chin mounted machine gun, hitting one of the Elites with a burst of fire that turned it into paste as it tried to escape.

Both helicopter's side gunners, all Orbital Drop Shock Troopers or ODST's, as well as the second Falcon's chin gun opened fire on the second Elite as it rushed straight towards the two gunships, jumping the five meter distance and two meter high difference in hight easily.

The Elite landed on the roof of the second Falcon, cackling with glee as it fired its plasma rifle into the left propeller, causing smoke to belch out.

"Blackbird 1-2 its on your roof! Swerve! Swerve! Shake it off!" The first Falcon pilot yelled to his comrade over the radio. "Pinto kill that son of a bitch!"

A-198 saw the rear gunner on Blackbird 1-1, presumably Pinto, facing the Elite attempt to fire. He managed to fire two 12.7mm rounds into the Elite but the Elite was already moving. It fired at the pilot's canopy, breaking it and burning the pilot alive.

The Falcon lurched to the right and would have hit the other gunship had it's pilot not flown upwards. The Elite on the second Falcon jumped towards the parking garage to escape the burning aircraft.

A-198 aimed and fired a burst from her SMG, causing the Elite to fall mid jump. It plummeted to the ground screaming.

Sadly it wasn't the only one.

Aside from the now dead pilot everyone inside the second Falcon, that is the two side gunners and the five people in the troop compartment, were relatively unharmed. A-198 rushed to the side of the roof as the Falcon fell out of the sky, intent on catching anyone who jumped.

Two Marines did jump, the first quickly grabbed hold of the railing on the parking garage and A-198 hurriedly pulled them up.

The other wasn't so lucky.

The Marine misjudged his jump and was caught in mid air by the spinning Falcon. The force of the impact shattered bones and crushed nerves as the Marine's armour crumbled under the weight. In another instant the Falcon and its passengers were out of sight of the roof, the Falcon crashed into the second storey of the garage before flipping and exploding in a bright ball of fire as it hit the ground.

Every single member of the crew barring the single Marine A-198 had hoisted up was dead. A-198 mutely stared at their IFF tags in the right corner of her HUD. Her fist clenched and unclenched as her breathing became hoarse.

She had failed. Those eight men and women had paid the price for her failure. They were mentally added to the list of hundreds upon hundreds of others like them. Soldiers, Marines, Civilians, ONI spooks but most importantly Spartans.

SPARTAN III Alpha Company specificly. Her friends, her family.

"Your Fireteam is your family." Lieutenant Commander Ambrose had told them on their first day of team exercises. "You will eat with them, sleep with them, kill with them...you may also die with them."

But A-198 hadn't died with them.

While the members of Alpha Company were sent on the suicidal Operation PROMETHUS she was sent to Reach. There she received new armour, new weapons and a new posting as a commissioned Leiutenant in the Office Or Naval Intelligence's Asymmetrical Action Group, Beta Five Division.

She would have rather been with her company, her team even if it meant death in the worst way possible. And so she felt very responsible whenever a human in close in proximity to her died. She had to make it up to her team. Her eyes drifed to the Griffin painted on her armour once more.

If she couldn't save the Falcon she would avenge them instead. She set her eyes on the purple towers in the distance, Banshee flyers were circling around, on alert due to the gunfire.

The other Falcon deposited its load of troops and then sped off into the sky.

A-198 gratefully accepted an M395 DMR and ammo from one of the Marines before she left the parking structure and headed towards the base. Her squad following close behind.

When she finished with the Storm Covenant there would be nothing left of them to find.

UNSC Colony Victoria, 16:12 hrs, October 31st, 2553/UNSC Military Calendar/Military Standard Time

A-198 silently stared at the six remaining ODST's as they eyed the perimiter fence of the Covenant camp. They had slowly made their way across what remained of Victoria's capital city, dodging hostile foot patrols and Banshee flyers like the plauge.

The six Helljumpers had followed every order A-198 gave them to the letter. While she hadn't worked with them before she had handpicked them from ONI's files. All of them were Asymmetrical Action Group members specializing in disrupting Covenant operations during the war and all of them had stellar records.

"Eel Tee!" One trooper by the name of Dowes shouted over the comms. The Spartan turned to face the man. "Covvies are changing shifts!" The former SPARTAN III Alpha company member nodded, readying her M395 Designated Marksmen Rifle.

Like the M7 SMG magnetically attached to her armoured thigh the rifle was suppressed though the suppressor was internal instead of external. Unlike the normal rifle every member of the team using the rifle possessed modified variants. The magazine size had been increased from 14 to 35 rounds and every weapon had a smart-linked 'Blunderbuss' automatic shotgun attached on the underbarrel.

The shotgun, a relatively new development from ONI R&D was made to counter Covenant shield technology and make close quarter fights, which the Covenant preferred, easier on UNSC infantry. Initial testing showed a marked improvement on dealing with Elites and Brutes and many units in the UNSC Army's primary SPECWAR Force, AKA the UNSC Army Airborne or 'Rangers', had used the shotgun to great effect on numerous planets with the weapon outright replacing the antique 'Beehive' round fired from their underbarrel grenade launchers.

While none of the men currently under A-198's command were Army Rangers they knew how to use the Blunderbuss like pros. Even so, A-198 would have preferred a sqaud of the jetpack wearing soldiers to her current company. Disliking the Marines brash, gung-ho attitude. From her dealings with the Army's special operators they were much more reserved, quiet, calculated.

A match made in heaven. A-198 thought.

However as ONI had little to no pull over the Army brass Rangers were out of the question. So A-198 had to settle for the Marines instead. The troopers were the best of the best, to be sure but they were so...reckless.

"Sergeant Hunt get your men ready. We'll rush the gate in three." A-198 said,

The big ODST nodded. "Copy, ready on three."

A-198 paused briefly before counting. "One...two...three." When she had finished she broke into a dead sprint which, propelled by Her MJOLNIR armour made her a blur as she rushed the fence. The ODST's following, running for all they were worth.

The former Covenant changed shifts every three hours. The change was quick, precise and easily used to enter the alien juggernaut's bases. The alien troops left their posts at the sound of a shift change instead of waiting for the next group of troops to relieve them. As such this allowed UNSC operatives to gain entry to bases almost unhindered. It seemed that these rebels kept the old system.

A-198 quickly grabbed a rope attached to her armour and threw it over the fence. Upon making sure it could hold her weight and that the line was secure the ODST's began climbing. A-198 climbing up last.

When the group were safely on the other side of the fence and in the hostile base A-198 motioned them forwards with a barrage of hand signals. Time was of the essence.

The ODST's would find and cripple key base systems, the motor pool, air pad, fuel depot and barracks while A-198 would head to the command centre to kill the base commander and find out why the aliens were here in the first place.

Both groups set off, the Helljumpers sticking close together and covering their sectors as they headed for the motor pool.

A-198, on the other hand dialled up her motion tracker and sensors so she could see the hostiles before they even heard her.

The base was suprisingly empty considering its size. A-198 roughly assumed it was about the same size as prefabricated fire bases deployed by the Marines for planetary assaults. A part of the Spartan's mind wondered where the Covenant were. Surely there'd be at least a few patrols here and there...right?

"Sergeant Hunt, report status." A-198 asked over the comms, wondering if the Marines had come into contact with enemy patrols.

"We found a good number of Covvies in their barracks, ma'am. They're dead now."

"How many? I want numbers, ranks." A-198 queried. Place is a ghost town. She thought.

"Mostly Squid Minors and a couple of Majors. No Dogs or Kestrels. Company strength."

"How'd you take them out?" A-198 asked. That was quite a feat.

"They were asleep, ma'am. Or atleast a few of them were. They fired off a couple, no casualties yet. Though they know we're in here."

A-198 chuckled inwardly. "Good work, trooper. Go slower if you have to and keep an eye out. Keep me posted." The comm clicked off, ending the conversation.

The lone Spartan continued onwards, her path taking her to the enemy command building. Twice she had to stop to allow an enemy patrol to pass or risk being discovered. Like the Sergeant said they wee on alert and gripped their weapons tightly.

Finally, after what seemed like hours but, according to her mission clock was only 15 minutes A-198 laid eyes on the enemy command building. It was the tallest building in camp and its giant spire shot up into the toxic, desolate sky.

A-198 briefly remembered when she was four asking her mother what was up there, in the sky, she remembered it clear as day.

"Mommy?" She had asked as the mother and daughter sat on a grassy hill overlooking the town they called home. A checkered blanket was separating them from the grass and a freshly emptied box of hot donuts between them. The night sky shown brightly and stars were everywhere.

"What's up baby?" Her mother had replied, turning her head to look at her daughter.

Her mother was a kind woman, always there for her daughter. A-198 distinctly remembered her mother always wearing a large amount of makeup,though she never knew why.

"What's up in the sky?" The four year old asked, pointing a small pale finger at the stars. Her mother hadn't replied, merely giving a sad, small, barely unnoticed to the four year old. Two days later A-198 had gotten an answer to her question.

A-198 shook her head clear of the memory, focusing back on the camp.

The space around the camp was clear, smooth ground telltale sign of glassing. No doubt it had been given a touch up by the Covenant occupiers when they returned here.

A-198 would make sure it was the last time aliens stepped foot on this soil. She briefly wondered if these former Covenant knew where they were standing, what they were standing on.

She doubted it as she prepared to breach the front door of the building, her DMR held in her right hand up and aimed at the rough estimation of an Elite's head while she prepped a flashbang grenade in her left hand. The door opened automatically and A-198 threw the flashbang, waited for it to detonate before charging in.

She saw Elites and Grunts manning moniters in a circular formation similar to that on a ships bridge. She fired her rifle, catching an Elite with its shields down and dispatching it with a headshot, she then quickly killed a trio of grunts before dealing with the last elite. This one had its shield up but no weapon. It died all the same.

The only hostile remaining was a lone grunt, cowering in the back of the room. There was no ranking officer present meaning they were in another part of the base, most likely their private quarters.

The Spartan III rounded on the lowly grunt when she saw there were no further hostiles.

"Can you understand me?" She asked, irritated that she needed to even speak with the alien. The grunt stared into her gold visor fearfully as its image was reflected back at it.

"Me understand you demon." It stated in English. A-198 paused, it spoke without a trace of fear in it's voice.

"What are you doing here?" A-198 queried. "What are you looking for?"

"Me don't know. Me just follow orders." The grunt stated.

"That's a lie. You're in the command centre. You must know something. Tell me or I start hurting you." A-198 stated, letting some of her internal anger slip out. To speed things along she unsheathed her knife, slowly cutting the Grunt on its left arm. The Grunt winced behind its mask but didn't speak. "Talk!"

"Me no talk! Me follow orders!" A-198 began sawing its arm off with her knife causing the Grunt to scream in pain as it was tourtured.

"Talk!" She yelled.

"Sangheili want something in ground! Me no no what!" The Grunt yelled. A-198 tsked as she continued cutting.

"Not good enough. Who knows?"

"Leader knows! Leader knows!" The Grunt yelled pleadingly as A-198 reached the bone.

"Where is your leader?" A-198 pressed as she began hacking at the bone.

"In private room! In private room!" The Grunt wailed. It even pointed with it's uninsured arm to a door on the left, by the left side moniters. A-198 sheathed her knife. "Demon no kill me?" It asked.

"Thank you." A-198 said as she snapped the Grunt's neck.

She made her way to the door, ready to enter.

Most Covenant officers quarters were soundproofed and as such A-198 doubted anything that happened in the last five minutes was heard by the occupant if the base was the same as when the aliens had been the top dogs.

She entered, finding a single gold armoured Elite holding a crystal of some sort in its three fingered hand. It looked up, suprised to see the lone Spartan standing in the door way.

"A demon this far in my base. This is unexpected. I hoped you would have been killed by my patrols. I assume you come for this?" It held up the crystal.

A-198 had originally landed on this long forgotten world to deal with human rebels, not Covenant forces though the Elite didn't know that. A-198 nodded.

"This is an artifact of the gods themselves demon. I will not part with it willingly." The Elite stated, standing up and slowly reaching for the energy sword hilt on an early table. A-198 wondered if it's shield was turned on. "This artifact will crush you pathetic huma-"

A-198 fired a quartet of 7.62x51mm rounds at the Elite's skull, satisfied to see it drop lifelessly to the ground moments later as its shield sparked. The Elite wanted that crystal meaning ONI would want it as well.

A-198 picked up the crystal with her gloved left hand, tossing it up lightly before catching it and placing it in one of her many ammo pouches. She headed back into the main command centre to see what else she could pillage.

After looking for a total of ten minutes she found nothing of note, mentally wishing not for the first time she had an A.I to help with cyber-warfare and infiltration. She'd put a request for one when she got back. A-198 thought.

The lone SPARTAN made to leave the room when she heard an explosion from another part of the base. A-198 went to a crouch as she radioed the Helljumpers.

"Sergeant Hunt report status."

"Covvies jumped us ma'am. We lost two to the initial ambush. We're falling back now."

"Understood, we've got what we came for. Fall back to the initial entry point and hold until I arrive."

"Copy that."

A-198 broke into a run as she retraced her steps through the base, occasionally coming into contact with Jackels or Grunts that she dispatched with lethal precision.

She made record time to the initial meeting point, finding the ODST's in a pitched battle with Covenant forces. She quickly lended her assistance, killing three Elites before they could respond to her suprise attack. Two more turned to face her and she fired the Blunderbuss shotgun, the rounds burtsing mid air and showering the Elites with lead, overloading their shields and filling them with holes.

"Fall back! Call for Evac and head to the city! Move!" She yelled yo the Marines, who quickly followed her orders, preform ing a tactical retreat up the rope and outside the walls. A-198 being the last one out of the base.

The five UNSC personnel ran like the wind, never slowing down as Covenant Banshees and Wratihs strafed them and bombed them.

Lone of the Marines was frantically calling for Evac, yelled for all she was worth into her radio.

Occasionally plasma would splash over A-198's shields, bathing her in a bright gold glow. The group dodged Covenant hostiles on the ground and the air as they headed for a three story residential complex. They somehow made it unscathed to the building, A-198's shields notwithstanding.

"How long for Evac?" Sergeant Hunt asked the female Marine, a small woman by the name of Welkin.

"Four minutes, tops."

"Dig in, prepare for hostile contact. Someone get an IR flare up on the roof." A-198 said as she braced her rifle on a window, ready for Covenant reprisal for their base incursion.

The first sign of an Elite came at exactly two minutes until Evac. A-198 killed it quickly, focusing on the Elites while leaving the Grunts and Jackels to the Marines.

The battle was quick and bloody, the UNSC losing two more Marines to the alien onslaught, Sergeant Hunt among them. That left three UNSC personnel on the ground to brave the covenant.

A-198 ran out of ammo for her DMR as the Pelican dropship breached the cloud layer, firing it's chin mounted auto cannon at the alien hostiles, killing dozens as it landed.

Two Marines jumped out of the troop bay, covering the surviving trio as they double timed it to the dropship.

As soon as A-198's form was in the bay the Pelican took off, closing it's door and letting everyone but the pilot breathe a sigh of relief.

The Marines took off their helmets, patting eachother on the back and thanking the Pelican crew.

A-198 kept to herself, keeping her armour on until she reached the armour bay, the technicians removing it piece by piece until the only thing covering A-198's pale, skinny body was the black body suit. She made sure one of the ONI spooks got the crystal, the man thanked her before leaving the bay as the last of her armour came off.

She thanked the technicians before retiring to her quarters, removing the body suit and leaving her nude completely. She didn't care, though. In cryo everyone was naked and she had long gotten past caring about her modesty.

She found a pair of fatigues and undergarments and quickly dressed herself, knowing she would need to debrief with the ONI commander. When she was presentable she left her quarters she headed back to the armoury, wondering why she forgot to grab her tin.

Reaching into her armour's right breast ammo pouch she found a battered, steel tin. She grabbed it and brought it back to her quarters. She found a pen and quickly wrote VICTORIA in capital letters. She placed it on a shelf with dozens of other tins.

Each tin held a handful of dirt from their respective colonies. Each colony had been lost to the Covenant and she had fought on each and every one. It was her way of remembering why she fought. Why the SPARTAN III's were created. Why her company died on some moon that would never be named.

After doing a quick bit of mental math she counted 117 tins. One Hundred Seventeen colonies she had personally fought on. A-198 flared up in anger briefly, wishing she could have saved even one.

She shook her head as the intercom blared, calling her to the debriefing room.

She made sure she would remember to ask for an A.I as she gave the tins one final look before exiting, wondering where she would go next and who she would have to kill.