The Ringworld
Prologue : The Hearts
THE YEAR IS 2553.
One year has passed since the terrible war took place upon Halo, a ringworld inhabited by a dormant race of infectious obscenities.Captain Jacob Keyes, the Pillar of Autumn, thousands of armaments and veichles, and over 2,000 marines, are all dead.From the carnage, only a super-A.I., a member of the SPARTAN experiment, and a single UNSC ship, survived.With this in mind, the aged Admiral Preston Cole decided that a reshift of Military Operations was in order.
The hundreds of shipping companies available were merged together one after another until only two remained ; one, situated on the Moon, was used for Military use, the other, upon the Earth, was used for commercial use.
With this major save in money, a new line of "Superships" or "Megaships" were constructed.After a year of unbroken work, the first ship emerged.It was called "El Corazón", but later changed to "The Cardiac".
With several other ships such as "The Capillary" and "Arterius" already in construction, The Cardiac was currently being loaded with supplies.The angst-ridden new company owner, once excited by this expansion, is beggining to feel the immense strain a leader of such a big company would eventually come to feel.
JANUARY 1st, 2553(MILITARY CALENDER), 2130 HOURS, LUNAR CREATIVE, SHIPBUILDERS
The Cardiac, was a Supership, the premier in a new line of excellence.It was built by The Hearts, a well-established shipping company based on the Lunar base Libra.After a major buy-out, the military base upon the moon became a gigantic factory, belting out the new line of megaships, equipped with an unbelieveable array of armaments.The leader of this now goverment-owned company, Harold Arcvik, stood in his office upon the moon, looking out into space.
He frowned as the Earth spun into veiw.
This isnt right, he thought.This industrialism.This disgusting pollution...and so close to Earth...
He turned round and sat upon his desk.Heh, I'm forgetting.There arent any planets left away from Earth, now...
His intercom lit up, his AI, Arathon, appeared above it as a 3-D holo-image.
Arathon was dressed up in Medieval Clothes, and was to be coupled with another AI to be the AI onboard The Cardiac.
"A visitor to see you, good man!"Arathon cried.
"Send him in"Harold asked.
The door slid open, and the soon-to-be-Captain of The Hearts, Captain James Uvac, entered.
"Sir!"he shouted, saluting.
"There's no need.I'm only a civilian after all"Arcvik informed him.
Uvac half-lowered his arm."But sir"he began, "You've been offering imperative service to the military for a long while now.Personally, I count you among the finest men I've ever met, Civlian or non-"he told him.
"Thank you"Arcvik said."But...well, what is it that you have come to see me for?"
As Uvac begin, Arcvik studied him.He was tall, young with large curly-black hair.He detailed in his mind that this was far beyond regulation, and would have to be trimmed down.He had experience as both a Leftenant and Liutenant aboard two now-lost ships, serving two now-destroyed planets.He was kind-hearted, and suffered terrible loss, when both his father, brother and fianceé had died upon his first outing as Leftenant.He was soon promoted and moved to a different ship, where he seemed to recover.
"Well, I've just been wondering, erm..."he searched for the right word."Ahem, Harold... "
Harold Arcvik supressed his grin, nodding for him to continue."The weapons aboard the ship"he retrieved a file from inside his pocket and unfolded it.
It read :
BREIFING FILE/PRIORITY/ENCODING/SECURITY CODE : BETA RED/CAPTAIN JAMES UVAC.
THE CARDIAC ARMAMEMENTS LIST :
TWO HEAVY-DUTY MAC CANNONS
ONE PLASMA-POWERED CENTRIFUGE CORE PLASMA LIQUID CANNON
100 QUICK-FIRE CLOSE-RANGE 20.00mm FIVE-BARRELED MACHINE TURRETS
35 SUPER ROCKET PODS
ONE HYPER-LASER CANNON
10 SUPER-LASER CANNONS
50 SMALL LASER CANNONS FOR CLOSE-RANGE USE
Footnotes : The new Hyper and Super-Laser cannons proved to be extremely useful in long and short range combat as unlike rockets there is no "give-off", as such.In tests in controlled enviroments(and vaccums), accuracy was at 900%.
ARMOUR SPECIFICATIONS :
12 METERS OF LIQUID TITANIUM, GRAFTED AND HARDENED ONTO SHIP
PLASMA-GENERATED OUT-SHEILD
FAIL-SAFE BLAST DOORS
DIAMOND PLATED CENTRAL CORE ENGINE, CONTROL ROOM, ELETRONICS/AI CONTROL CENTER
STORAGE CAPACITY :
500,000lbs of meat.
650,000lbs of fruit and vegetables
1,000,000 litres of drink
100 tonnes of weaponry
1000 tonns of veichles
Many other small articles may be ommited, and are to be registered by ship's marketer.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION :
Admiral of THE HEARTS fleet, Admiral Mitchell Price
This ship is the finest of our day.Though ships may be built in the future, in my predicted opinion, for at least fifty years this shall be the main ship in the UNSC's grand fleet.In it's maiden voyage to drop off a certain SPARTAN upon a ringworld codenamed "INSTALLATION 03", along with another SPARTAN for a secret covert mission, and a second objective to drop off fifty UNSC M.A.P.E. officers, (Mental and Physical Elite), I shall accompany this ship.
THIS SHIP WILL CARRY 10,000 MARINES OF DIFFERENT RANKS.THERE WILL BE 5000 LOWER CABINS, 2500 HIGHER CABINS, 2000 ELITE CABINS, AND 500 LUXURY CABINS.
TRAVEL SPECIFICATIONS :
200,000,000nnps, (NAUTICAL NOTS PER SECOND)
SLIPSTREAM HYPER-NAVIGATION
GRAVITY-SIMULATION FOR MOVEMENT, NON-GRAVITY FOR STATIONARY PROCEDURES.
IN-BUILT LANDING BAY TO CATER FOR 200 SHIPS OF ALL SIZES
IN-BUILT HYPER-HOPPER, TO QUICKLY DROP OFF AND PICK UP SHIPS OR PEOPLE
VACCUM BAY
Arcvik surveyed the familiar information.
"A fine ship..."Arathon commented.
"Truly"James agreed."It's in a different class to regular ships.I did notice a few plasma weaponry and defences in there, though..."
"Yes"Arcvik picked up, standing up and walking round his desk to his filing cabinet.Out of it he pulled a blueprint for the ship and a few documents behind it.It was all very old fashioned, this "paper-business", but Arcvik liked it."It's strictly classified, but a Covenant cruiser ran aground a few years back.We locked it up and studied it.We've managed to sucessfully copy and enlarge some aspects of it.Of course I made sure it was incorporated into our ship.I'd be stupid not to"
"That's..."James started, breathless and extremely surprised."Well, where will this lead us now...any more little "incorporations" planned?"
Arcvik noticed some sort of resentment in his comrade's voice."No, we havent the funds unfortunately.It took a lot of begging for me to get this done, but it paid off"he turned from the blueprint to James, smiling, "So?Did you come to chat about Plasma?I've got plenty of information on it if you like"
"Sort of, sir"he said."I mean, this technology killed the fathers, the brothers, the friends of our marines.Those sheilds shattered their dreams when their weapons failed upon it.I dont think they'll go down well with-"
Harold Arcvik held up his hand as a sign of quiet.He paused for a while, thinking about things.
"Mr.Uvac, I feel that this is from your personal opinion, and not the overall wellbeing of your crew"
James Uvac began to speak again, but Arcvik stopped him.
"These weapons will save lives, Uvac.Now please.Leave"
FEBRUARY 21st, 2553(MILITARY CALENDER), 0630 HOURS, THE CARDIAC, IN ORBIT AROUND THE MOON
Leftenant Sean Rane whistled at his headed towards his post as 2nd Military Officer aboard The Cardiac.
It was his maiden voyage, but Rane had proved his skill so profoundly he was promoted instantly after he passed with honours and flying colours at ESOTE (Earth's Space Officer's Teaching Base).He was very smart, and quick quick, but lacked strength.
Instead of going on to be a Sergeant on the UNSC's ground service, he offered himself uo as a Leftenant aboard the UNSC's new "Star Line" of superships.And so here he was, heading for the bridge to meet up with his other crew members.
"Sir!"he cried, as the bridge doors slid open.He was greeted by more official presence than he had first expected ; in front of him stood Adirmal Mitchell Price, Captain James Uvac, Commander of Operations Anna Waynewright, and a collection of Lefttenants and Liutenants.A First Class Petty Officer walked up and down the rows of computers, inspecting them, some empty, some occupied.
Each computer had a thin black bar across the top of the screen which had the names of the operators imprinted upon it.
NAVIGATIONS OFFICER, LIUTENANT PICKER
SECOND NAVIGATIONS OFFICER, LEFTENANT PARKER
COMMUNICATIONS OFFICER, LIUTENANT RULD
SECOND COMMUNICATIONS OFFICER, LEFTENANT MEDI
ARMAMENTS OFFICER, LIUTENANT HREIDICK
SECOND ARMAMENTS OFFICER, LEFTENANT RANE
Ahh yes, Rane thought, staring down upon his desk and smirking.
"Take your seat please, officer Rane"the Captain politely asked him.Rane did so, but before he accquainted himself with the controls, he surveyed the vacated computers.
ARMOUR COMMAND, U.N.I. LEVEL 4, LEFTENANT SMITH
COMMANDER OF OPERATIONS, COMMANDER WAYNEWRIGHT
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE COMMANDER, U.N.I. LEVEL 4, LEFTENANT ROSEWATER
INTERNAL COMMUNICATIONS, FIRST CLASS PETTY OFFICER UVAC
The final four, as now empty computers, were all new posts to Sean Rane.
Armour command?He'd never heard of that.The armour usually took care of itself, I mean, what can you do with 2 meters of titanium alloy?And a Level 4 UNI officer?That was very suspicious to Rane.He began typing in his details.
NAME : SEAN MICHAEL RANE
AGE : 26
RANK : LEFTENANT, LOWER ARMAMENTS OFFICER
Command of Operations?Well it did seem that there were quite a lot of things going on in the ship at once : docking and leaving of ships, repairs and modifications to ship, marines and soldiers moving from deck to deck.He could see why this was here.
Again he hit a snag, though.Artifical Intelligence Commander?A Commander of A.I.?
This was perticularily unusual.And again, a UNI Level 4?That was unheard of.He had once heard of this post were a ship was transporting three AIs between places.That meant....well, exactly how many AIs were they carrying?
The most ridiculous seemed Internal Communications.Internal what?! was all that flowed through Rane's mind.Obviously the ship was more used than he thought, and an answer to that silly post came up as he finished with his details and a list of the weapons on board appeared.There was a massive array : it would take hundreds of men to control it all.Obviously this Officer Uvac person ordered them around.He could see that would be a very hard job...but nonetheless a silly one.
And...then he noticed the name."UVAC" - that was definately a rare name.Shared by the Captain and this Petty Officer?They were obviously related.Therefore, this person had no talent - just another leecher, leeching off of relative's power.Dispicable...
"Petty Officer, take your seat!"Anna Waynewright called, and Petty Officer Lucy Uvac. took her seat right next to Rane.
She had long flowing black hair, which was curled slightly.She was tall and slender and white, and very beautiful.But his growing resentment of this post meant their relationship was doomed to failure.
"Hi"she said.
"Yeah hello..."he grunted back.She looked at him, and then snapped back to her post.
A petty officer.Here.She'd better not...
"Welcome, all!"James Uvac cried.He had obviously pulled some strings, as he had hair far beyond regulation, and that of his relatives."I hope you've all accquainted yourselves with the way things are run here aboard The Cardiac!"
There were general nods aboard the ship.A pod was seen coming in from the moon towards the ship's docking bay.
Anna Waynewright headed towards her post beside Lucy.They nodded at each other, and J.Uvac continued speaking.
"You may have noticed here aboard The Cardiac, operations are quite different from those you've been on-"he paused, and Rane was certain James' eyes flickered towards him, "-or read in the textbooks"he held this on for effect.
He wasnt incinuating that he, Rane, had no talent?
"But this is a new line in ships, and hopefully from now on this will be the way things are from now on.We have two important goals to complete, and in six hours we shall be commencing our journey to complete the first objective.
Our mission is this : we must pick up a SPARTAN upon inner colony Smerion VI, and then drop him off on a secret ringworld instillation called Halo Instillation 03.Then, we will drop off thirty volunteers upon a small space station in orbit around Inner Colony Smerion VI"
Sean Rane NEVER question his officers, but these instructions seemed a little inconclusive : wasting all that time going back and forth?
"Are we all understood?"James Uvac asked.
"Yes"the group said in unison.
The doors again slid open, and joining the bridge officers and filling the two empty seats were the UNI officers : Gordon Rosewater and Roger Smith.With those UNI crew members in position, Captain Uvac cave the command to have the engines heated to seventy-five percent capacity.
"Yes, sir!"Leftenant Parker cried, saluting.He typed in the commands, and the engines began to heat themselves for their premier journey.
"Break orbit after seventy percent heat"the Captain said.
"Sir, were going to be breaking orbit in two hundred seconds"Liutenant Picker said.
"Thank you, Picker"he commented.The great ship rumbled, heat and pressure building inside the great engines.
"Thrusters at thirty, fourty percent"the Leftenant of Navigation murmured.
The others watched, having next to nothing to do.
"Capacity reached.Breaking orbit.Enroute to Smerion VI, sir"the Liutenant reported.
There was a creaking noise, and then a whoosh, and the ship turn on it's side, blasting towards Smerion VI.