Hello people, I have had this idea swimming around my head for about a year or two now, and I finally got around to writing it up. Personally I think my writing skills have degraded since I last posted a story, which are on indefinite Hiatus and have been for the better half of the year.
Moving on. This is a crossover between Halo, Mass Effect and Crysis. Something which may sound a little wrong on paper, but I can make it work… I hope. I try to keep everyone's favourite characters in character, but if I get it wrong please inform me as I'd appreciate the help.
If there are any flames by the time you finish reading, please hold them to yourself. I'd appreciate constructive criticism if you have any to offer. Now please continue and I hope you enjoy, More than Human.
Halo belongs to the Microsoft Corporation, Bungie and 343 Industries. Mass Effect belongs to Bioware and Electronic Arts. Crysis belongs to Crytek and Electronic Arts.
More than Human
Chapter 1: A Hero's Grave
Alcatraz tiredly stepped into the Ceph's spore infested Lithoship. The bodies of the four Ceph Guardians littered in the crevice behind him, electricity sparking from their heavily damaged Exo-suits.
Every fibre left in his body told him, he was finally there. He could barely register what Gould was saying to him over the radio. All he knew was that he was finishing what Prophet started.
Alcatraz plunged himself into the inky black spore. Almost immediately, he could feel the effects, the air was so choked with the spores that he could barely move his arms and legs. Holding his hands in front of him like a shield, fear washed over him when the tips of his fingers suddenly burst into flames. The burning sensation reached all the way through the Nanosuit, instinct kicked in and he willed the Armour mode to engage. A moment later, the major weaving began glowing with a dull blue hue.
The hardened and reformed outer-layer provided a brief pain-free period for Alcatraz. However, it wouldn't last long enough for him to reach the main conduit. In seconds, the suit's energy levels had been drained by eighty-percent.
Another second and he collapsed on all fours. The burning was back, now much more intense than before. The pain driving further inwards, he crawled towards the edge. His burning hands grasped the ledge and with his last bit of strength, Alcatraz pushed himself back up into a standing position.
Looking through the spore, he could see the walls of the conduit. They too, were burning, as he painfully looked around, he realised that the entire conduit was burning. Looking back down, he heard Prophet's voice.
"This is it Marine, time to finish what I started."
Giving a very shaky nod, Alcatraz jumped.
His feet barely leaving the floor, he felt a considerable weight crash into him. Painfully, Alcatraz twisted his torso to see his assailant.
Gripping his shoulders was a heavily wounded Guardian. Its helmet was shattered, revealing the gelatinous features of the alien. This time, Alcatraz was too weak to fight back, let alone win. In a horrifying slow-motion, the Guardian raised an arm and brought it crashing down on Alcatraz's spine. The claws weren't able to breach the suit, but it cut into the deep layers.
In mere seconds, the dense spore had caused the Guardian to let go, suffocating as it went.
The Nanosuit's altered spores quickly dispersed and began altering the airborne spores. But the Guardian's strike stalled the release, letting only half of the rewritten particles out.
The alteration spread fast through the Ceph spores, yet it wasn't fast enough. It only managed to convert two thirds of the total spores before it was released.
By then, Alcatraz had fallen unconscious, blissfully unaware that he kept falling, right into the heart of the Ceph ship, where the very air reached temperatures below Absolute Zero.
The Ceph ship held more secrets than most dared to dream however.
XXXX
The first thing that Alcatraz felt was weightlessness. The next feeling that hit him was the frigid temperature; it was so cold that could feel it through the suit. His visor was completely frosted over; he couldn't see a damned thing. He raised his hand and wiped aside the ice. Once he could see, he immediately knew that he was not where he should be. The walls were wide, but still confining and militaristic.
The suit AI, SECOND, helpfully notified him that the suit was equipped with small hydro -thrusters for the very reason of being in zero-gravity areas. For the umpteenth time, Alcatraz wondered just how much that Hargreave bastard actually knew about the Ceph. Although on the upside, at least the back-stabbing old bastard was dead.
For the next few minutes, Alcatraz spent his time drifting through could empty corridors. That was, until he came across a window. Gazing out of it, he was frightened.
There were stars and with endless amounts of black between them. For several minutes, he just floated there, stunned. He was looking out into the abyss, a part of him was questioning his sanity, and another tried to convince him that he was dreaming.
He was snapped out of his trance when a barely audible voice screamed through the empty corridors.
"John, wake up! I need you!"
Alcatraz whipped his head around, looking for the source of the new voice. He knew that the voice wasn't talking to him, his name wasn't John.
Pushing himself away from the window, Alcatraz decided to keep moving. It'd keep his mind off of the fact that he was in space and that he had no idea where he was. If he kept moving, it would also stop him from frosting over with whatever air particles were left in the environment.
Alcatraz kept pushing himself through the empty hallways, examining everything as he went. The walls and ceiling definitely reminded him of a naval vessel, though he wasn't expecting them to be so wide. Usually Navy ships had very narrow hallways; it helped with structural integrity and was easier to seal off in case of a hull breach.
His thoughts strayed from architecture when he came across something very unfamiliar to him. Floating in front of him was a rifle of sorts. It was of a bull pup design, although there weren't any sights that he could see, but there was an ammo counter along the top rail. Despite it being a bull pup rifle, it was quite large. He could only imagine the size of the bullets this thing fired.
Most rifles he had used fired a 7.62mm NATO round. From the barrel of this gun, he imagined that it fired something much larger.
Alcatraz snapped himself out of it and continued on. For a while, he explored aimlessly, making random turns and focusing on trivial areas. All the while the voice grew louder and more desperate. Now that he could make out more of the voice, Alcatraz could safely say that the voice was female, although most of what she said had little to no context. She kept asking someone to wake up, whoever it was, Alcatraz new what to call them. John, Chief, Spartan. The voice used the names frequently.
Still the fact remained that Alcatraz had no idea of who they were.
XXXX
Shepard stretched herself out on her bed. Her hair was messy and unkempt, mostly likely from a bad night's sleep. It hardly mattered though; she was on a mission to save humanity. And while the medical professional of the ship, Doctor Chakwas, advised that Shepard get some sleep, Shepard was being plagued by nightmares recently.
Two figures were most prominent in her dreams. The first was Lieutenant Kaiden Alenko, a biotic soldier that she had worked with on a previous mission. She was forced to leave him behind while a nuclear device went off. While she had lost Kaiden, another friend of hers, Sergeant Ashley Williams, was saved along with the Salarian task force she was assisting.
Both people had haunted her. Shepard had only reunited with Ashley recently, on a planet called Horizon. Shepard was there to stop the Collectors, a race of bipedal Insect-like creatures hell bent of abducting entire human colonies.
The reunion wasn't that pleasant to say the least.
Shepard shook her head; it wasn't time to get dragged down by bad memories. She took a shower and got dressed before heading down to the CIC deck of her ship, the Normandy.
As she stepped out, she was immediately greeted by Yeoman Kelly Chambers, her personal assistant and the ship's shrink.
"Good morning Commander, have a nice sleep?" She greeted.
"I'm fine, Kelly. How's the crew?" Shepard answered, walking onto the platform overlooking the Galaxy map.
"Nothing to report, but Joker would like to talk to you," Kelly informed, gesturing to the cockpit further down.
Shepard watched the Galaxy map, tracking their progress through the Terminus Systems. "Well I won't keep him waiting then." She replied, stepping down and walking towards the cockpit.
Hearing her approach, Joker turned his chair around so that he faced Shepard. "Commander you won't believe what EDI found." He turned his chair back around so that he was back at the controls. He typed a few things in and brought up a playback screen with an oscilloscope. With a little twirl of his wrist, Joker hit the play button.
"Mayday Mayday Mayday- this is UNSC FFG-201 Forward Unto Dawn requesting immediate evac. Survivors aboard- prioritization code Victor zero five dash three dash Sierra one one seven."
The message repeated itself a few times before Joker hit pause and turned back to Shepard. "Don't know about you, but I haven't ever heard of a ship called Forward Unto Dawn."
-It is also worth noting that the signal does not match any encryption signatures in my database nor does it transmit in any other language- EDI added.
Shepard put a hand on her chin in thought for a moment before answering. "I've never heard of an organisation called 'UNSC'." She said with a puzzled expression. Turning to the holographic projector she continued. "EDI, any matches or ideas?"
-Judging from the UN in the anagram, it may be related to the United Nations. Other than that there are no matches-
'Great, an unidentifiable ship in the middle of know where.' Shepard thought. Sighing softly, she spoke. "Joker, take us to this Forward Unto Dawn. But if this ends up as a trap get us out of there. I'm going to go check on everyone and tell them about this."
A little over an hour later, everyone had gathered in the conference room.
"So," Garrus began. "A call for help from an unlisted ship from an organisation that doesn't exist…That's new." Garrus sarcastically summed up.
"Scarface has a point." Jack agreed. "This is obviously a fuckin' trap."
"Commander, we're within visual range of the ship." Joker reported over the intercom. "EDI's sending a scan over to you guys."
A second later, an orange holographic projection of the Forward Unto Dawn appeared on the table in the centre of the room. It was EDI that pointed out the obvious.
"The ship does not match any known design or silhouette from known databases." The AI reported. "It is also several times larger than the Normandy."
"Are we talking, like as big as the Destiny Ascension?" Kasumi, the resident thief, asked.
"I speculate that if the ship were intact, it may be larger than the Destiny Ascension."
"If it were intact?" Shepard's question rang through the now silent room.
"Bigger?"
"Unknown design, possibly a vessel from undiscovered species?" Mordin questioned, talking very fast.
"No, the distress beacon had a message recorded in English." Shepard reminded. "EDI, what do the scans show?"
"There is a single life sign moving about the ship. Though I am unable to determine what species it belongs to. Also a small amount of electricity is being used in this area." A small blip appeared near the top of the ship's hull while another blinking blip was moving about.
"Life form may be potentially dangerous, capabilities unknown, possible new technology." Mordin listed off in quick succession before take a deep inhale. "Too many variables, advise caution."
"Agreed," said Miranda, Shepard's executive officer. "If we choose to investigate this, it would be better to split up into two groups; one for the power drain and another for the life form."
Shepard nodded in agreement. "Ok, Mordin and Grunt are with me, we'll go for the life sign. Garrus, Tali and Miranda, will take the power drain." Those selected nodded, even Grunt, the living battering ram. "The rest of you will stay with the shuttle and secure our LZ. Joker, bring us in."
"Aye aye, Commander."
XXXX
Deep inside the Forward Unto Dawn, a frozen figure began to wake and flex.
"Thank god Chief."
XXXX
So begins another new project.
Updates may be slow as I tend to only write bit by bit. But hopefully this has intrigued you guys enough to return when I do update.
-Krimzon