There was no anti-infantry attack quite as horrifying as a plasma strike, which unleashed such a searing blast that anything inside the impact zone was flash-incinerated, while anything nearby by was merely knocked down and immolated. John had seen direct hits reduce concrete bunkers to swirling clouds of white-hot dust and near-misses leave men standing on smoking pegs of charred bone.
	...
	The artillery blanket continued to intensify and creep across the jungle slope toward John, flooding the right side of his faceplate with blinding strobe light. The plasma rounds were the least of his concerns. The Mjolnir armor he and his Spartans wore would protect them from anything short of a direct hit. Besides, once the Covenant had flattened the jungle, Blue Team wouldn’t have to wait for the bridging vehicles to enter a predetermined firing zone.
	...
	Plasma rounds incinerated everything within a twenty-meter radius of the strike, with an even larger secondary damage ring. The concussion wave alone increased the mortality risk of a maneuvering infantry soldier tenfold. Linda would be okay in her Mjolnir armor unless she happened to run directly under an incoming strike—but in a barrage this heavy, the chances of that happening were high.