The noon’s sun beats against the damaged bridge with an unforgiving fury.

Heat moves across its crack-ridden surface in a ghostly blur, desperately spreading against the concrete as though it was a searing liquid. Sand and grit from the city’s destruction are taken up into the wind, spreading like a swarm of insects across the face of the structure, only to scatter against the interior of the Scorpion Tank’s cockpit.

Although your eyes are fixed on the tactical monitor in front of you, your mind briefly recalls all that has happened over the past few days. Only a short while ago you returned to Cairo Station, followed back to Earth by a Covenant fleet and the Prophet of Regret. In pursuit of the San ‘Shyuum leader, your Pelican was struck down by a Scarab, crashing into the outskirts of Mombasa.

Now you find yourself scaling the injured Nyali Bridge, heading south toward the heart of the city. There, you’ll address the culprit of your misfortune – a massive insect-like vessel with an energy cannon at its prow. The Scarab is quite capable of leveling the entire city before day’s end; in order to stop the invasion, you will have to destroy it.

However, before being afforded any opportunity with the Covenant death machine, you must press onward across the Nyali, into the subway and through a trail of conservation reservoirs before reaching the city’s center. On the way, you’re going to have to deal with the remainder of the Covenant invasion force – what would otherwise be considered an impossibility.

Just like old times.

Snapping you out of the strategic nostalgia, a Ghost emerges from behind an overturned truck. Using your heavy cannon, the tank makes short work of it. You fire a single round and the Ghost is hit dead on, instantly halting its progress. In a flash of white light from a secondary explosion, the remnant of the craft becomes mere shrapnel spinning about on the concrete.

All around your tank, massive plasma mortars slam into the ground – some inaccurately distant and others dangerously close. You turn your eyes upward to view the threat. At the apex of the bridge lies a Covenant Wraith.

The hulking alien tank strafes back and forth, methodically volleying mortars at your position. Although your vehicle’s firing mechanism is much more precise than the Wraith’s, it is a slower and more difficult machine to maneuver. Eventually, given the volume and scope of the imminent battle, the Scorpion’s deficiencies will make it a vulnerable target – soon, it will become a liability.

Nevertheless, you have devised a plan.

From behind the Wraith, a pair of Ghosts jettison toward you. As they approach from a hundred meters off, you take careful aim. Instead of firing dead on, you target just in front of the leading vehicle as it closes ground. The blast knocks it upward and out of control in a flurry of smoke.

In a single, fluid movement, you open the tank’s cage and leap from its cockpit, raising your battle rifle against the tumbling Ghost. With the power-generator exposed at its side, you fire a single, three-round burst shot, igniting the vehicle in a blaze of white light. Immediately, you engage the second as it approaches. Before it has a chance to boost, you’ve already affixed a plasma grenade onto its right canard. A violent explosion consumes the Ghost – spinning its shattered chassis wildly into the air and over the side of the bridge.

Without hesitation, you launch forward into a dead run. Moving in and out of debris, you quickly cover the distance which separates you and the Wraith. The Covenant tank pulls back momentarily, hoping to draw you in so that it can charge forward, burying you under its front end.

But it’s too late; you’re already too close.

Before the Wraith’s operator is even aware, you’ve already boarded the vehicle and begun wailing down on the hatch which separates him from you. After a series of punches, the armored panel is rent. With a single deadly blow, he’s dead. Heaving the corpse out of the Wraith’s cabin, you find your place inside the machine, quickly familiarizing yourself with the controls. You move the heavy alien tank around to face the other side of the bridge, staring down at the center of the city and the Covenant’s massive assault carrier hovering a kilometer above it.

At the far end of the Nyali, your enemies stir. A half dozen Ghosts begin to rise in pairs from the abandoned toll station, all coming to greet you with their weapons. In the sky, a squad of Banshees and Phantoms appear and in the distance, a pair of Wraiths lie in wait near the subway tunnel.

For a split second, you wonder if these enemies find this moment as ironic as you do – you using their own weapon against them. Then you realize that they probably don’t. They don’t really have time to.

They’re about to die.

Proceed to The Architecture of War.