Alternate Reality
Chapter 1: "Jump"
Location: Outreach, Inner Sphere, Aboard Talon class drop ship Skippy, attached to Jump ship Buzzard.
Time/ 21:43 GST
------------- Year: 3073 -----------
"What's our status?" A commanding voice echoed from a man as he leaned over the railing of a catwalk that looked down upon a maintenance/ storage bay that was usually given the title of "mech bay".
This man was named Specter; he was a mercenary commander, and a seasoned warrior from the FedComm civil war. He was light skinned and topped with short brown hair, with angled features and numerous scars; it was hard to believe that he was in his mid twenties. His bright eyes investigated the mech bay below him and silently counted the large number of mechs that graced every available piece of space there was.
It wasn't long until a technician came running up, wiping his sweaty hands through his grubby hair. "Sir! We will have all set and ready within moments, we are ready for jump!" The tech announced while standing straight.
"Good." Specter replied, he leaned back and walked off the catwalks towards the elevator that would take him towards the bridge. The walk was short since Talon drop ships are relatively small, and Specter, otherwise known as John Anderson, strode crisply into the immaculate bridge.
Falcon, a.k.a. Aisa Thastus, Stood stoically to the side looking indifferent to all around her. She briefly acknowledged John's presence by nodding and then returning to ignoring all.
Charles Harding, John's second in command, code-named Beowulf, stood leaning against the back wall. His quiet smirk stayed still and his eyes lit up as he noticed John standing in ironed fatigues. Charlie, as John called him, stroked his chin that was peppered with short stubble and lost himself in thought.
The ship's captain looked over his shoulder and hailed him. "We are ready to jump in ten seconds and…" There was an audible screech of metal as they noticed a piece of asteroid hit the jump ship's engine.
"Sir! We're about to jump! That asteroid could have done anything to mislead us!" The captain's words were lost as the inescapable jump accelerated them into what they couldn't find out.
"Emergency lights." Groaned the captain.
"Yes sir." One of the officers cried before the glimmering red lights showed what they were looking at.
"I need a damage report, and fast! Justin, tell me where we are now!" Every one was scurrying to their posts, and it wasn't long before Justin's answer came, with relief and confusion.
"Sir? We're still outside of outreach, but something's very wrong…" His shaky voice gave off the impression of bad news.
"What is it?" The captain calmly replied.
"Look at the planet!"
John followed the captain's gaze and looked out a view port to see something very disturbing… It was a dead planet; it looked like it had been hit with a giant sledgehammer. Pieces of the planet floated aimlessly in giant shards of rock and pure glass.
"What happened?" The captain asked worriedly, "Did we do that?"
"Unknown, but I do doubt that we could do that." The science officer declared.
Aisa left the bridge without being noticed; personally she was not too sad about seeing an Inner Sphere planet destroyed, especially since it was filled with mercenaries. So she left to her own business, which usually consisted of books, or practicing in the simulators.
Charles shifted from side to side wondering what was going on, all the crew of both ships were still.
And just as John was about to ask what they should do, their radars picked up an unidentified signal, everyone was immediately alert, and in motion once again.
"Sir! Unidentified ship is hailing us!" The comm. Officer announced.
"Then reply!"
"Yes sir!" The comm. Officer wiped his brow and opened a channel. "This is Northwind Highlander drop ship Skippy, Captained by Reynolds Walker. Please respond." The communications officer felt sweat beading on his forehead as the screen came to life and an alien face came into view.
"Hello human, if you do not mind, I think we would like to 'examine' your ship, we do not recognize its configuration." The voice came from an alien with a really long neck and a face that held a tall crown and looked, even though alien, very haughty.
The science officer was alarmed; he stood straight and almost screamed at the captain.
"Sir! They seem to be powering up kind of torpedo weapons! They seem to be made up of plasma!"
"Then send a reply!"
The weapons officer swiveled his chair and began to target the ship. "PPC's armed, lasers 1-5 are charged, and that Arrow IV Cluster launcher we had installed is ready and locked. We are in PPC range, close to attack range."
"Target their weapons!"
"Yes sir!"
John looked on, but before another second went by, an idea sprang into his mind.
"Charlie! Gather you lance, meet me in the Mech-bay!"
John left the bridge as he heard the captain give the order, the missiles and PPC's noticeably left the ship, but John didn't get to hear how it went. He ran at top speed until he reached the lounge where his lance which consisted of Bullseye, Hannibal, and Falcon, he hurriedly motioned for them to follow him and ran off.
The lights seemed like streaks as Specter ran through the corridors and reached his destination. The doors parted and showed him through to see just what he wanted.
He noticed Beowulf and his lance standing by and ran up to them.
"Ok team… We've been through worse than this, and we are going to help the flyboys as they do their thing. Got it?"
No one said a thing, this allowed for him to continue. "Get into some power armor we're going right in with jump jets, they'll allow us to fly our way in to see these aliens' insides look like." John ran over to the racks and started to seal himself in, he called a tech other get it geared up.
They all got dressed up in power armor, fit up with jump jets and a large laser in the left arm, and a high-powered machine-gun in the right. The arm also had extendable claws that could help them climb, and dig into their enemies. Specter made sure he would be maneuverable and he was airtight. Soon after he stalked towards the nearest airlock. The room depressurized as the door opened and began to suck them out.
Specter opened his comm. And began to order to his troops. "Stay in formation, and watch out because we are still firing at their ship. Follow me; I think we can get in by, ripping a hole in its hull… ok? Right, there is still a diminished shield, so keep shooting ahead of you and I'm sure we can get to the ship."
They were already drifting in the void, gliding slowly towards the Covenant ship. John released a little bit of his jets and started going a little faster, he powered up his large laser and his arm started to glow green. The beam of pure energy burned from his arm and into the shield, it sparkled and dissipated with all the continuous fire from the ship and his men. Specter's lance and Beowulf's lance loomed closer to the alien metal, and they reached out with their claws and latched on.
"Use your lasers to warm them up a bit, then tear them and climb in." Specter smiled as the replies of his men echoed in, and he once more powered up his laser.
They were about to fire when he noticed something nearby on the ship, what looked like a vehicle hanger.
"Wait! Maybe we can get in there without locking down all the doors. Follow me, we're inside of the shields, so move!"
They inched closer to the shield and got ready to move as soon as a fighter or other ship decided to go. Their opportunity came sooner than expected, a ship, which they later came to know as the seraph, powered up, and bumped into something by the shield, it powered off, and allowed them all to rush in.
They were just barely fast enough, for just after they jetted in, the force field was fixed and the room was pressurized and given gravity once more. They all clattered to the ground guiltily and readied their weapons. So far, the room was clear, so Specter motioned for his lance to move to the far door, then ordered Beowulf's lance to go to the door at the opposite end so as to cover greater ground of the ship.
Specter leaned toward the purple-lighted door and it opened to reveal something revolting… a giant ape that looked like it was from a nightmare and fully armored. It snarled and then barked something totally alien and raised a gnarly looking weapon and fired a round projectile at specter's chest.
The grenade ricocheted off and into the wall, where it first dented it and then blew a huge hole into the purple rounded metal.
His lance all replied by raising their guns and pelting the beast with Machine gun rounds that left the shredded monster in a heap. Falcon walked over to it and knelt by its head; she then became disinterested and stood up again. They trudged on and deeper into the unknown ship.
"Look at these halls, they almost seem unneeded in their design, like…" Hannibal never finished; his commander quickly cut him off.
"Quiet on the comm. I don't care about your observations, just follow me." He ordered while he flattened himself around a corner and peeked his faceplate around the edge to see the hall, though he himself was interested in the almost ornamental design of the ship's layout and structure.
One patrol slowly stalked up the hall, four of the brutes, and six "jackals". Specter stepped out to their surprise and disintegrated three jackals with his laser, and then with his claw he charged one of the brutes. He gripped its chest and stuffed his machine gun into its belly and killed it despite its best attempts.
His lance methodically took down the others as they kept their cool and silenced the room. They continued on, the halls leading on and on until they reached a different type of room. This one had holding cells, and a whole lot a guards. They all fired their lasers into the beasts killing four of them, one each, then they brought up their machineguns while they waited for their lasers to charge.
Specter's shoulder was being violently shaken as he threw the gun around the room. One beast saw its brother go down and charged him, specter's bullets had no effect, and so he readied himself. The berserking monster came on him with the force of a skyscraper and threw him across the room and landed on top of him. Specter reached his claw up to the creature's face and squeezed around its neck, but it didn't give up beating him until the head rolled off as a result of the razor sharp claw.
Humbled, Specter pushed the heap off him and leaned against the wall, glad for the support.
Specter groaned, "That hurts," His voice slightly humbled and scratchy as he pulled himself towards one of the cells to see what was in them. And to his surprise he saw aliens in one side and humans in the other side of the room.
Gator nervously asked what they should do, but Specter only breathed for a few moments before replying.
"Let's see how Beowulf's doing." Specter paused as he switched channels. "Beowulf, this is Specter, what's your status?"
"Sir. We are safe, and in what appears to be some kind of control room, but we have no understanding of how this works so, we have just resorted to hold the area. You?" He answered with a hint of annoyance.
"We are in a holding room, maybe these prisoners will be willing to help us." Specter said brightly.
"Ask them." Gator suggested.
"Sure, sure, let's do this." Specter replied as he walked over to one of the alien holding cells, this alien was definitely different from the ones he had been fighting, this one was tall with an elongated neck and four fingerlike mandibles, double jointed legs and hooves for feet, Specter addressed him in the best way he could imagine, talking.
"Well, hello… Sir… Would you be willing to assist us? We have no knowledge of how this technology works." Specter didn't know if he had offended it, in fact he couldn't tell anything by looking at it. So he waited for an answer.
"Human..." The alien growled deeply and spat out the name as if in disgust and stared at Specter.
"Oh! Right… Let me introduce myself; my name if John Anderson, and you are?" Specter hastily replied while he powered of his suit and jumped out of it.
The alien was wearing a golden suit of armor huffed and then decided to give an answer. "I do not give my name to those undeserving of hearing it." One of the recently released humans pointed at the alien and yelled. "Don't trust it sir! It just wants out, and then it'll kill us all!"
The alien looked angered and banged a fist against his force field. "How dare you insult my honor you filth!"
Falcon leaned against the wall and just ignored everyone. "If I wait, they will calm down and get to business." She thought and kept her cool. While Specter put on his armor once more and ran between the marine and the alien as they were threatening to punch at each other through the shield.
"Guys! Guys! Calm down! We need to get out of this heap!" Specter looked at the marine and asked sternly, "Will you be willing to follow my orders?"
"Yes Sir!" The frustrated marine saluted.
"Good, and you!' Specter glared through his visor at the alien, 'Are you willing to get along and help me out?"
"I am only willing to claim my ship... dare I utter these words... and let you leave me in peace" Xan Zalconee glared and then addressed Specter once more. "Now release me from this cage!"
"Grab a weapon and follow me." Specter ordered as he sent a marine to open up the cages. "Order your men not to fire at us, you'll have plenty of targets." He added.
They all gathered into a formation of his choice and stalked towards the door
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Hello everyone! This is my first story that has anything to do with Halo; I hope that this has some possibility. And I hope you all enjoy it, please give me tips, critiques, ideas and any opinions you have.
God bless and thanks for reading.
-Tremble Wolf
