Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ Within the Pale White Light ❯ Sand in weird places ( Chapter 2 )

AN: Well here I am. Its been awhile since I’ve come out with anything new. Even longer since I was seriously about it. I’m trying to find my muses again. Maybe if this story goes well I’ll get my ass into gear and work on some of my other stories.

Really have no idea where I’m going with this. I just love crossovers.

Got a few idea’s but that’s about it. Also I know right now there are a lot of original characters. Master Chief and maybe some other Spartans ARE going to be a big part of this story. I just haven’t gotten that far yet. Right now I’m messing around with some of those random marines that seem to be everywhere in the games. :P

Connor Simmons was what you would call a nice guy. Although he wasn’t a farm boy by any means. He had born and raised in the northern Midwest, right smack dab in the middle of corn central. He had lived in the suburbs. In a nice clean white house.

His mother was a doting housewife, his father a college professor. They were high school sweethearts, dated almost 6 years before they got married.

He was the only child in this loving home.

Maybe it was the perfection of his childhood that had led him to join the marines.

He parents hadn’t liked it one bit. In fact the ensuing argument was the first time that Connor had ever heard his father actually raise his voice at him. Sure there had been fights at his house especially during his early teens but this…this was true anger.

He had actually thought his father would hit him.

No son of his would be a murdering low life…blah blah blah. His father had went on for a good ten minutes. Simmons had had no idea his father hated the military so much.

The rant had ended with a absolutely no Core man was welcomed in his home.

He had left, leaving a raging father and crying mother behind. Two years later the Covenant had made itself know and here he was 5 years after that. And in that 7 years he’d not gotten so much as a card from his parents although he continued to write to them.

Simmons sighed sadly as he cradled his left arm.

It was badly burned. God they weren’t shitten when they said that plasma burns were particularly painful. It felt like his arm was on fire…had been on fire for almost 3 hours now. He wanted to scream to cry and basically just let the pain overwhelm him.

However that wasn’t a luxury he had. He had to remain calm for the civilians.

Their entire platoon had been wiped out. The covenant had hit hard and fast. Ground troops, phantoms and ghosts…not the mention the air support.

The marines hadn’t really stood a chance.

He didn’t remember much after his injury. He had passed out from the shock and the pain. Tucker had said that him and Church had grabbed him and ran.

He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Running away from the enemy was a cowards way, but then again from what they had told him there was no hope. The covenant had dropped some sort of bomb that had killed everyone. They luckily or not so luckily had been behind a destroyed tank. It didn’t work but it did give them just enough shelter to survive…although it had burned his arm to a terrible burnt crisp.

The next thing he remembered was waking up in that damn cellar.

Tucker and Church had stumbled into the shop by accident. There had been a patrol of grunts that they had to hide from and fast.

That luck had saved their lives.

Not the life of Jim’s wife.

Simmons lowered his gaze. He had never met the woman while awake. But he owed her his life. She had given everything to save the few people she could.

Jim had resisted and in the end Tucker and Church had forced the old man into the hole.

The hole that they all expected to die in.

Then when things couldn’t get worse…something weird happened.

Simmons looked up to stare at the four weirdo’s that had saved their lives.

Ok lets see if I remember. Shikamaru, he’s the leader from what I can tell. Then there’s the one in orange…um Naruto I think. He carrying the weird looking guy. Hmm don’t remember his name. And then there’s Hinata.

If it had just been the three men Simmons wouldn’t be following them blindly like they were doing. He didn’t trust Shikamaru or the others. But there was something…different about Hinata.

She had tried to comfort Jim. She had actually taken care of the body, covering it up and moving it out of the way. She was the one that had found them.

Simmons studied her from the corner of his eye. She was kind of pretty in a little kid way. She couldn’t be older than 16.

She had dark hair and the palest skin and eyes he’d ever seen. In fact if he didn’t know better he would have said she was blind. She didn’t even had pupils.

Yet when she looked at him he just knew she wasn’t blind. When she looked at him if felt like she was seeing everything. Like she was looking through him.

Kind of creepy.

“Hey Simmons. How you holding out?”

Simmons gave Tucker his best smile, which wasn’t much, more of a grimace than a smile.

“I’m doing ok.”

Tucker gave him a look that said he didn’t believe a word.

“Riiight. Well it could be worse. I think.”

They walked in silence for a few minutes.

“Its starting to get dark.”

Simmons nodded.

“Do you think they plan to stop? We can’t risk moving at night. The grunt and Jackals…”

Simmons trailed off. It was a well known fact that the night after a large battle the Covenant let the Grunts and Jackal roam free to feed off the dead.

Tucker nodded his eyes roaming the rooftops for enemies.

“They don’t seem to worried about running into trouble. I asked that Shikamaru about it earlier. He just said that Hinata would see trouble way before it became our trouble.”

Simmons frowned. He wondered if Tucker felt the same creepy feeling he got whenever Hinata looked at him.

“Hey they’re stopping.”

Both Tucker and Simmons came to a stop. They tensed up as Shikamaru lazily made his way over to them.

“Naruto scouted a hotel up ahead. He says its under construction and thus deserted. We’ll stay the night there.”
he didn’t mention it was probably the only place they could sleep that didn’t have bloodied corpses to clean up first…but then again he didn’t need to.

Tucker nodded relieved.

“Some of the covenant prowl at night as well.”

Shikamaru raised an eyebrow.

“alright we’ll lay traps.”

With that he simply turned away and kept moving.

_______________________________________

The sun was setting and the covenant were starting to stir. The lower classes were restless nervously waiting for the on coming feast. There was a sense of excitement and hunger in the air.

What few elites there were all sneered in disgust at the crowd gathering.

The elites didn’t eat humans. They considered the meat worse than trash. They would revert to cannibalism before an elite warrior would consume a human. They could stop this with a word. No matter how hungry the grunts and jackals they would obey the elites. In fact most elites would prefer to do so. It was bad enough being on a human world. But now they had to deal with the likely riots that would break out within the lower classes. However it was tradition…the prophets will that things continue this way.

After all it solved a big problem for the higher ups of the covenant.

How do you feed an army in hostile ground where it was dangerous and costly to ship goods.

The answer? Let them eat off the dead.

The elites saw the wisdom in this…didn’t mean they had to like it though.

The sun set…and the stampede began.

Uiyah was the leader of a small group of grunts. He smiled as he took a deep breath of methane. Yes this was the highlight for his people.

They risked their lives, being little more than cannon folder for the covenant and in return they were giving this small favor.

The chance to roam free, free of the prophets, and free of the violent tempers of the elites. During the night of a battle his people reverted back to their instincts. The way they used to be before they were ripped from their methane rich home world.

Here they could eat and maybe…just maybe pretend to be happy for awhile.

“Ootewa. Take point…we’ll go to grid 7. We should avoid the heaviest traffic there.”

Ootewa nodded the street lights of the city illuminating his face. That was all he could do. Two years ago a human projectile had slashed him in the throat, destroying his vocal cords. He was insanely lucky, despite the disfiguring wound. Not only did Ootewa survive the fatal wound, he somehow had survived the jackals and Elites.

Jackals didn’t care what they ate as long as it was meat. Hell Uiyah had seen on numerous occasions jackals eating grunts and even the elites if they could get a hold of them.

And the elites didn’t stand for weak or sickened Grunts. They usually cut the wounded down where they stood, or laid…whatever. Uiyah didn’t like elites, but he didn’t hold this habit against them. The quick death was usually better than the Jackals.

Ootewa gestured to the other grunts and they followed.

They stayed alert despite the chaos amongst them. Most of the grunts were already fighting for food. They all ran out of the strong hold and instantly went to the first thing they saw.

Uiyah was smarter than that. After all he was a veteran of many battles. Something that most Grunts couldn’t claim.

“Keep moving…ignore them idiots. There is an entire city of dead.”

On point Ootewa kept his head up chin high in pride. He couldn’t lower himself to this and neither would anyone in his unit. They would behave like warriors of the covenant even if Ootewa had to rip them apart first.

Some of the others in his unit…newbies shifted slightly their stomachs grumbling.

One started to whisper in a tone that was less than respectful.

“Have something to say gruntling!”

The grunt startled.

“No nothing sir….”
He paused as he licked his lips. Hunger was making him less cautious.

“Just…why aren’t we eating? I‘m hungry.”

Uiyah wanted to slap the silly gruntling. He growled dangerously, something he’d picked up from the numerous elites he had to deal with everyday. He rather liked the effect it had on his own troops. All but Ootewa cowered instinctively away from him.

“Tell me Gruntling what do you see?”

The rookie frowned as he looked around him.

“Grunts feasting.”

This time the grunt didn’t get by with the smart allic comment. Ootewa smacked him upside the head. He then grabbed him by his methane tank and spun him around, forcing the unlucky grunt to face his squad leader.

“Really? What I see is a thousand grunts fighting over scrapes.”

Uiyah took a step forward jamming his plasma gun under the gruntlings jaw.

“Listen you’re new to this unit. So I’ll give you a break.”

Uiyah smiled.

“You do what I say when I say it and I don’t want to hear nothing that doesn’t sound like yes sir. Do you understand?”

The gruntling shook his head violently.

“Y..eess si…sir.”

“Good.”

Uiyah re-hostler his weapon.

“Ootewa.”

Ootewa nodded.

“Lets go. Noi take point until Ootewa comes back.”

The gruntling tried to join the rest of the squad but was held fast by Ootewa.

“what? Wait…Sir!”

He said his voice getting even higher from fear.

Uiyep didn’t even turn around as they walked away.

“I said I’d give you a break. Ootewa’s good at breaking things.”

It was almost an hour later when Ootewa returned…without the rookie. No one in the unit even blinked an eye. They had respect for the two vets in their mist. Not many grunts survived past a few battles. Both Uiyep and Ootewa’s record were almost as good as some of the elites. The grunts in this unit knew exactly who to trust and whom to follow. After all they had all at one time or another had their lives saved by said commander.

Uiyep nodded and gave his second a small smile.

“alright.”

Uiyep said as he looked around.

“Nio pick two and do a perimeters sweep. Make sure no humans are alive to surprise us.”

The grunt nodded and quickly picked out two. It was extremely unlikely that any humans had survived but he didn’t dare voice that.

“Ok lets set up here. I’ll take first watch once they get back. Then…We can eat.”

All the grunts smiled widely. They wanted to scream and shout, jump around and feast, however they contained themselves knowing that their leader wouldn’t approve.

Suddenly Ootewa drew his gun, the others being well trained followed suit without even seeing what the enemy was.

It was then the screaming started.

“NIO!”

Uiyep gasped as he recognized the voice of his second favorite. The grunt was a younin that had been transferred after the battle on Harvest. He was a quick learner and a loyal grunt.

“You three! GO!”

Three Grunts ran forward the rest dividing to go left and right to flank the enemy.

Is it a human? Can’t be, the elites came through here. I know I double checked the routes they took. Has to be humans…what else could it be?!

Uiyep and Ootewa ran to the left going as fast as their legs would take them down a narrow alley. Hopefully this would take them behind the enemy.

The screaming had stopped, but that didn’t make him feel better the silence was deafening in that creepy kind of way.

Uiyep stopped taking a moment to catch his breath before he stuck he carefully stuck his head out from behind the wall. What he say made his jaw drop.

It was a Human! Uiyep could clearly see him despite the darkness and the contrasting harsh light of the street lamps. Although not as sharp as a Jackals eyes Grunts were well equipped to see in the dark. After all the swamps of their home world was shrouded in darkness most of the time.

Ootewa tapped his shoulder, turning slightly Uiyep glanced to where he was pointing.

Ok make that two humans. But the second on was either dead of unconscious. It wasn’t moving.

The other however was defiantly awake. At its feet lay Nio and the two grunts he had taken.

Good Prophets…what the hell.

The grunts were laying in a pool of their own blood. Not one had drawn his gun. Not only that it looked like the bodies had been ripped apart.

Humans can’t do that…can they?

The human staggered as if injured. He…it was male right? Uiyep could never tell them apart. Anyway it was breathing hard, its stance low to the ground as if it could barely stand. Its hair was cut short and was the darkest red Uiyep had ever seen.

Its not dressed like their fighters?

It staggered again, turning slowly. Uiyep suddenly swallowed as fear nearly choked him.

Its eyes…it has to be a demon. HAS to be!!

The humans eyes were wide, rimed in black and the iciest pale shade of jade green he had ever seen.

“Draw back…you hear me. All units draw back.”

Uiyep hide behind the wall again. He gestured to Ootewa and they both retreated to what he hoped was safety. This was something beyond him. He needed to call in the elites.

“this is unit 456. Come in this is a code alpha red!”

Ootewa’s eyes grew wide as the other grunts started screaming. They hadn’t been able to back off before being spotted.

“This is a code alpha RED!”

Static met Uiyep’s frantic ears. Finally someone answered, Uiyep sighed in relief as it turned out to be Rittemma. He was a lower elite that he’d worked with before. Wasn’t bad for an elite, not as violent or hateful toward those that had proved themselves in battle.

“What’s your….”

The elite trailed off as he heard the screaming in the background.

“Situation is hostile…FUCK!”

Rittemma startled as the curse word exploded over the comlink and then it went dead.

What in the prophets hell?

He doubled checked the scanners. There shouldn’t be any problems? According to the scanner unit 456 was in grid 7. Two teams of elites and a hunter pair had personally gone over that section. Hell Rittemma remembered that Uiyep had come up here before dark asking about the safety of that sector.

Rittemma’s brain raced as he quickly sent some orders for a rescue team. Something wasn’t right about this. It if had been any other grunt he’d probably left them to fend for themselves and then send someone to investigate. But this particular grunt and his unit were well known even within the elites as being one of the best. If something was wrong with them…then something was seriously was wrong.

“Unit 456...I’m sending some elites as well as a hunter pair to your location.”

Nothing but static met his eager ears.