第80页
The skirmish took mere minutes. His shield indicator pulsed a warning yet again, and he paused at the top of the ravine to allow it time to recharge. His gun swept the area, and noted the circular structure that dominated a small depression at the top of the ravine.
His shield had just begun a recharge cycle, feeding off the armor’s capacious power plant, when the pair of Hunter aliens burst from cover and lobbed fire at his position.
The first blast struck him square in the chest and sent him tumbling backward. The second shot was stopped by a thick-trunked tree. A trickle of blood pooled in the corner of his left eye. He shook his head to clear his blurred vision and rolled to his left. A third shot kicked up a plume of soil where he had lain just seconds before.
The Chief tossed a frag grenade, counted to three, then sprang to his feet and sidestepped to his right, firing all the way.
He’d timed it perfectly. The grenade detonated, and the flash and smoke briefly confused the aliens. His rounds bounced from their thick armor plates. In unison, they spun to face him, their weapons glowing green as they charged for another salvo.
Another grenade detonated in their path and slowed the Hunters’ advance. They fired through the smoke and the crash of their weapons thundered through the low ravine.
The Hunters moved forward, eager for the kill—and realized too late that he’d doubled back and closed in on them. His assault rifle barked and tore into the gaps in their armor at close range. They screamed and died.
The Master Chief followed the terrain as it gradually sloped back down to the west. He dealt with a brace of sentries, then located his objective: a way into the massive structure that loomed above. The human saw a dark, shadowy door, slipped through the opening. He felt the gloom settle around him.
His biochemically altered eyes quickly adjusted to the darkness, and he moved deeper into the structure, pausing only to feed a fresh magazine into his assault rifle.
One level below, Zuka ’Zamamee listened. Someone was on the way, the desperate radio traffic testified to that, and it seemed safe to assume that it was the very human he had set out to kill. The fact that the transmissions ceased amid the clatter of human weaponry attested to the fact that the armored human was here.
But would he enter the trap? He had carefully seeded references to the map room into the stream of battle updates. If the humans had tapped into the network using the downed ship’s AI, then they would have no choice but to send this fearsome soldier to find it.
Yes,the Elite thought, as his highly sensitive ears heard the scrape of a booted foot, a mutedclick as a new magazine slid home, and the subtle rasp of armor.It won’t be long now.
’Zamamee looked left and right, assured himself that the Hunters were in position, and withdrew to his hiding place. Others were present inside the cargo module as well, including Yayap and a team of Grunts.
The Master Chief hit the bottom of the ramp, saw the alien cargo modules that populated the center of the dimly lit room, and knew that damned near anything could be lurking among them. Something—instinct, or perhaps only luck—caused his heart to beat a little faster as he put his back to a wall and slid sideways. Something wasn’t right.