Halo: The Search

Chapter 20

January 23rd, 2557
(Victor Huff) "Another round." I took a few steps back from Vex. We were standing in the training room. It was like a tennis court, without the net or markings.

At the moment, no props were up. We were just practicing at hand to hand combat.
It was all I ever did most of the time when I wasn't shooting something or running a mission. Denver stood at the edge of the arena watching me.

"Go!" At Denver's bark, I stepped back with one foot, getting in a defensive stance. I held both my fists up towards my face, staring down Vex.

He crept towards me with a predatory stance. What threw me off every time we fought was how fast he was for his size.

He speedily performed a sweep kick, which I had no choice but to back away from. His legs were long and I couldn't advance towards him. This was a scenario I tried to work around all the time but I always ended up on the floor.

Right after finishing his sweep attack, he delivered a quick punch towards my gut.
I stepped back with one foot and then came back at him with a powerful kick towards his face.

He swung his arm upwards under my leg. My leg flew up over his head and I fell backwards. I used this momentum to roll backwards and distance myself. Vex had other ideas though. He was already charging at me.

I brought up my knee towards his gut and he side stepped the attack, now standing right beside me.

He threw a punch at my face and I blocked it with both arms. I was staggered by the force of the blow and realized I was too close to him. Taking advantage of my clumsiness, he put his leg behind both of mine and brought his forward.

I was swept off the ground and at his mercy. His elbow connected to my chest, sending me into the ground from pure force, all the air escaping my lungs in a haggled cough.
I rolled away, quickly getting up before Vex could recover from his own heavy attack.

Before I could regain my senses and take a deep breath, Vex was up and in front of me again. He began delivering a flurry of blows towards my face and body.

I dodged all blows, planting my feet firmly into the ground. I couldn't process what was going on and felt myself turtling from the array of attacks.

Vex reared back his arm for one powerful blow and all I could think of was protecting myself. I held both arms in front of my face. No blow came.

I heard a scowl behind me and my eyes widened. Vex delivered a kick to my ribs from behind. I fell on the ground, not catching myself. He grabbed both of my arms pinning them behind my back.

I was completely wiped out. "Well... you died." Denver's matter of fact tone served as a slap on the face.

I groaned and Vex got off of me. "You got too defensive and weren't even looking for openings: especially near the end." I sighed, nodding at Vex.

"Another round." I took a step back, looking at him. He stared back, unsure if I should go again.

"Sir!" Alice came out the door that led into the viewing room. She rapidly descended the staircase, jogging towards Denver.

"We found one." I stopped what I was doing and we all looked at her in surprise. No words were spoken as she ran back up the stairs. We followed her to the command room where Venezia projected from the holo table. Tye was typing into a data pad, connected to the table.

A red marker pulsated on the planet. Denver tapped it and live video footage of the marker popped up. Sure enough, this was a prison.
Dead brutes littered the ground and the cells were empty.

"It's abandoned." Denver said with a sigh.

"Look closer." Tye tapped a few buttons and it zoomed into one section of the prison. Elites were checking the cells with a few grunts littered behind them, who poked the bodies of the brutes. Jackals were ahead of the elites, their shields raised defensively.

"There might be even more than this at the prison. They possibly raided the area and took the prisoners for themselves. Signs of fire mean recent signs of battle." Tye proved a point.

There were small chunks of rubble littered across the prison. Spikers and brute plasma rifles were all across the ground. Scorch marks from grenade blasts coated the whole area. The prison was pretty beat up. It was a stone structure with multiple caves that were obviously mined by hand. One way shields covered each entrance to what were presumably cells for humans.

Tye zoomed out on the prison. Around it was slight civilization. A huge metal warehouse was outside the prison, holding who knew what.

"A lot of the structures of Venezia look human..." I stated, thinking out loud.

"They're human made structures. Covenant and Brutes have taken over many of these structures for themselves and they built off of them." Garret's tone was a bit dry, mentioning that they used to belong to humans. Tye moved the camera view beside the warehouse. There were a couple phantoms and ghosts parked there, looking out of place amongst everything else.

"Alright, gear up. You're going to investigate for survivors and not engage with the enemy. If there are no human traces around there, see where the enemy is going to go. This doesn't look like the place they live at. They're on a scavenging mission and are most likely reporting back to where they actually live. There may be humans where they report their findings." We all stared at Denver readily and he dismissed us, pointing at the door.

"Go."

We walked to the locker room, passing through the commons and multiple hallways along the way. I put on the classic battle uniform, given to all men in the UNSC. I went to two crates, one labeled 'MA37 Assault Rifle,' and the other 'M392 DMR.'

I grabbed each weapon and went to the deployment room, where pods were lined up. We each stepped in and the doors closed on us.

"Three...two...one..." the pods deployed and I heard Vex over my headpiece grunt in pain.
I grinned, shaking my head. "You hit your head against the top of the pod every time we deploy."

Vex huffed. "Your species is cursed with midget creations."

While were falling, I went through my rituals for prepping for a mission. I took a deep breath, staring down at my armor. I wondered when I would get ODST armor like the others. I also dreamed of being a spartan. I felt like I had proved so much, yet I had so much room for improvement.

This was where I zoned out. Why did I want to become a spartan? They didn't exactly have the best induction processes in the past. Did I really need that status to make a difference? The only difference I wanted to make was to save my mom and bring us back together. The more times I deployed though, the more things I saw that marauded my thoughts, begging to be fixed. The world was in bad shape and I was finding it hard to ignore its cries for help.

I pursed my lips, staring at the ceiling of my drop pod. For now, I just wanted to find my mother. If she was here, I'd be going day and night searching for her.

The thrusters in the pod came to life, slowing down my speed. I jerked slightly when I hit land. The door to the pod hissed and I kicked it open, taking my DMR off my back and pointing it in front of me.

I looked around, seeing everyone else come out their pods. Miles away was the prison. "Alright, we got ground to cover, let's go!" Tye, being the squad leader, took point. We went off towards the jail, not wasting another moment. Hopefully our entrance wasn't noticed by the Covenant.

The area around us was another setting of cracked dirt landscape with pebbles everywhere and shriveled up weeds. Across the horizon where the prison was, we saw a break of greenery and forestry, which seemed to be the second constant environment Venezia had to offer.

"If we weren't trying to be stealthy, we could just drive there..." Garret looked at me, running by my side. We were both in the back and Vex was in front of us. Tye and Alice followed in front, side by side.

"Relax, running builds character." I raised my eye brows in serious doubt and began pacing my breaths, running towards the small outline of the prison.

This was a step closer to finding my mom.