Part One
"Jamie," was called and barely heard over the tangle of wires that insulated the room. Many, many wires surrounded simple human hands, sautering copper together in a reconstruct.
"In a moment," Jamie replied, and cut some black electrical tape to wrap around the new connections. It was in place quickly, if not carefully, before Jamie ran downstairs. The family members and guests waited at the bottom of the stairs. She greeted a few aunts and uncles, her last surviving parent, and a few others before she reached Steven– an old friend from when she was younger.
"How is it on the other side of the planet?" She asked him.
"It's the same as all the other sides," he replied as if he'd actually visited them. She knew he barely had enough money for leisurely travel. Many people spent any extra money like that in a patriotic attempt to aid the war efforts.
"I figured you'd say that," She almost took time to look down, but her eyes led back up with a "I finished the radio, though, and it's linked to that old satellite."
"That old UNSC one? I thought you could get in trouble for that!" He whispered, almost angrily and almost to hush her– but also intrigued.
"Oh fool, they're not using it, I've monitored it for weeks. They're not even checking up on it," She spoke aloud as if almost to assure him that it wasn't a secret.
"I'm pretty sure that's also illegal," Steven laughed.
"All I need now are your coordinates and we'll be talking over the coolest old fashion radios our money could not buy."
The celebration continued as dull as it had started, and somewhere in the farther sides of the atmosphere, something much more important was happening. Fleets of covenant were moving in, but even with slip–space they had only just begun their journey from where they loaded up the ships. It could be weeks before they'd actually arrive on Reach.
The fleets were still relatively undetected, especially to the Reachlings who still felt as if the war was far–off. They hadn't felt the heat on their personal home front just yet, and wouldn't until it was too late to stop it, let alone escape.
But the party would roll on. It would roll on until small favors were handed out and all finally left Jamie's house– all, save for Steven.
"You got those coordinates?" She asked as she closed the door behind the second–to–last visitor.
"Yeah," he sighed, "I'll punch 'em in for you."
But, speaking of the fleet in the farther reaches of space, there was a particular ship near the very end of the lineup that was of particular significance. It mostly carried a plethora of low ranking soldiers– those who barely deserved the taste of battle and served no tactical help to be deployed anywhere else in the order but last to clean up the mess the rest of the fleet makes before the planet gets glassed. They'd be lucky to see a fight, let alone chance lady luck for the honor of dying in battle properly. Of course, the grunts on board were thankful for that fact.
It contained mostly grunts and jackals, but had a few low ranking elites on board, and a Field Marshal Ship Master Elite to look over everybody. The field Marshal was named Sama'i Gamee, and shared a bunk with the lowest ranking Elite on the entire ship– Ilamaj Zuri, a basic Sangheili Minor. The captain's quarters that Field Marshal Gamee previously inhabited were trashed by a war–crazed "Unggoy," who's severed head was promptly displayed just out of arm's reach above the Grunt's barracks the next morning.
The Field Marshal was stuck with Zuri because he was the only Elite with a convenient extra bunk, since Zuri's last roommate was impressively shoved out of the airlock– which caused a second Grunt's head to be removed and displayed next to the first one. There were three above the Grunt's barracks, total. The third used to belong to the Unggoy who broke the age–old translation and code–cracking device on board the ship by chewing the wires out. Of course, that didn't matter as much strategically, as the ships near the front of the fleet were the ones decoding human military transmissions and relaying orders anyways.
The machine worked by basically typing words in and it'd spit translations on the screen in a dialogue that the user would understand. But, of course, it didn't work anymore.
Zuri wanted it to be fixed though, because despite it being an incredibly glitchy and old piece of junk, he wanted to know what the human military transmissions were, regardless of the orders he'd receive from the front of the fleet.
"These damned wires," Zuri fumbled with the back of the device. He was hoping to fix it to the smallest degree, even.
"Having trouble, Zuri?" His commanding officer asked as he entered, which made Zuri jump to his feet in surprise and drop whatever wires he was holding.
"Honerable Gamee, my apologies, I did not notice you!"
"Be eased, Zuri, there's no consequence. I hope that machine is running soon, after all. I'd want to know if we were detected."
"If I may, sir, we're never detected," Zuri looked to his CO with what could only be interpreted as a grin. He also took his commanders verbal queues to heart and returned to trying to repair the machine.
"Careful, Zuri. Though we know their intelligence is inferior, they're rumored to be much more useful than Unggoy," the commander moved across the room to check out the rest of the computers on the main deck. "You're welcome to move the machine to your quarters if you think you'd make more progress," Field Marshal Gamee nodded in his fellow Sangheili's direction before walking away to attend to checking up on the rest of the ship.
Zuri felt compelled to follow Gamee's advice in the matter and figured he'd be less interrupted by the rest of the crew– and any other potential awol–minded grunts who felt the need to try and give an old fashion coup d'état every other evening.
It wasn't too much of a struggle to move the entire console with Zuri's strength, and it soon took up a large space in the quarters where he and Field Marshal Gamee slept.
As soon as it was set down, he started looking at the wires again. He accidentally pulled two apart, cursed, and hoped he wouldn't need those. With that wire out of the way, though, a glimmer of metal made him spot a group of wires far in the machine that had obviously been chewed by slobbery Unngoy teeth. He figured those would be important, but found himself cursing again because he didn't have a tool to fuse the wires back together.
He looked around curiously to see if there was anything in the room to use instead of having to go get one somewhere else on the ship and his eyes fell on his commanding officer's Plasma sword mounted on the wall.
He could use the heat to easily put wires back together, wouldn't have to leave the room, but would also be risking trouble for the misuse of a sacred sword. His Commanding officer could walk in the room at any moment, but before Zuri could work out the pros and cons, his hands were reaching for it. He looked toward the door, nervously as he reached for the first set of wires.
With it in his hands, he easily fused the wires back together in the front and was about to work on a second set when the door slid open. There his commanding officer stood, holding a clipboard. Gamee looked at Zuri, looked at the plasma sword, then back to Zuri. He shrugged and walked by Zuri to retrieve something out of a drawer. Zuri practically held his breath before hurriedly turning back to the wires to repair the last of them and put the sword back. No matter how calm Gamee looked, Zuri felt he was in helluva trouble.
After that, he found a few wires that could plug into the ships main interface, and output them into the wall behind him. The machine whirred to life and caught the attention of Gamee.
"Is it running now?" He asked as he headed for the door again.
"I'll figure it out," Zuri grinned. He was happy he got anywhere with the machine. He looked to the Field Marshal as he left, but Gamee wasn't smiling back at him.
"I expect nothing less," and the door closed.
The rest of the ship must have been in terrible order, too, for Gamee to be so angry. In the short time Zuri had spent with him, he learned that Gamee was the cheeriest Sangheili he'd ever met.
Zuri turned back to the machine. He knew it at least turned on now, but there was no telling how the machine would act now. He didn't know if the translations would be damaged or maybe it would fail to pick up any messaged whatsoever.
Hello?
Words popped up on the screen. It was the only thing to show up, the rest of the screen was black.
Are you there?
The words now showed up under the previous ones before disappearing. He shrugged– impressed that he received anything at all. He wasn't sure what he was receiving, though. The interface should have had two sides, one with a translation and one with the original transcript. This, however, just showed random translations. It could either turn out to be useful or useless like that. He tried to type commands into the terminal to pull up another window or interface, but nothing else would appear. He typed "Pull Dialogue" into the terminal, hoping the computer would respond.
What?
More translations popped up on screen.
Who is this?
Zuri thought for a second. He had no idea who was sending this transmission. Still, he figured it wouldn't hurt. On Jamie's end, a little dialogue box was the only part of her radio that was working. She was curious why the radio wouldn't receive the audio from the 'other radio,' as she had assumed it was, normally.
"I am Ilamaj Zuri."
Am I not supposed to be on this channel?
"I sure don't mind."
Oh, how are you, Ilamaj?
"Zuri, please. I'm fine, please identify your person."
I'm Jamie Trell, a civilian, bored out of my wits.
Zuri paused for a second to think. He thought it strange that a civilian would have such an odd name, or have any sort of name close to having an 'ee' suffix without being military personnel. He figured it could be some kid playing on a radio somewhere in the universe. Hell, he didn't even know if he was talking to a Sangheili or a Jiralhanae or an Unngoy or some sort. Still, he was curious what device or satellite they were using.
"How did you reach me, Trell?"
I hooked up this radio for long–range, I guess you picked up my signal.
"You hooked up a radio? A civilian?"
Yeah, all by myself. It's not that impressive.
"It's a wonder you're not in the military– or are you?"
I'm not very athletic, so I'm not military. They only want the best.
"That makes sense. So why hook up this radio of yours?"
I was trying to contact a friend who lives far away, but it looks like I found you instead.
"Lucky you."
Yeah, sorry about that.
"It's not much of a problem, I was trying to fix a machine that translates human speech."
Jamie laughed on her end, seeing nothing wrong with misunderstandings. She wasn't new to not being able to understand herself, too.
They get hard to understand, don't they?
"Extremely, and they're so… stupid."
Don't be so negative; they're not that hard to deal with.
"I guess your right. You sure know a lot for a civilian."
I'm the smartest girl I know.
"Girl? I've never heard of a female setting up a radio that could contact a military ship."
I did, though. You're on a ship? How's the war going?
"It's going according to plan, so far. We're waiting to land soon. It will be weeks."
Is it boring on the ship?
"Extremely, and the crew is less than acceptable."
That must be torturous.
"Yes I've been on this same ship for months with no sign of battle."
That long with a bunch of idiots?
"Not exactly, my commanding officer is of much respect, but as I said the crew is less than acceptable."
That's good. Maybe you and your CO can become friends.
"It makes me want to die in battle."
Zuri stared at the screen a little too intently, waiting for a reply. He hoped to impress the female with talk of an honorable death.
It can't be that bad.
Zuri was disappointed, assuming she was still talking about the crew and ignoring his comment about battle. He performed the equivalent of a human sigh.
"Trell, you are strange."
I'm told that often, but people usually call me Jamie or Jay.
When Zuri thought about it, her name was strange, too. He considered her being an Unggoy, but then thought again. An Unggoy wasn't that smart, and neither were most the other covenant races. She had to be Sangheili and female– a male Sangheili would be on a ship or a battlefield at the moment. He didn't want to consider that the female would dare work outside her assigned or proper roles. He knew for a fact that no Sangheili woman would be assigned any sort of mechanical radio– especially not a grade radio that could reach him, but he pushed that aside because he wanted someone to talk to.
He pushed aside any red flags in his mind, and figured that at worst, it could be a Sangheili on one of the other ships messing with him. His stomach dropped when he thought about how they'd know his name, but he figured he could always claim it was yet another rogue Unngoy who stole and took hold of the machine.
"Jay it is." He typed.
So can I call you Ilamaj instead of Zuri since we don't have to be so formal?
"I guess."
Ilamaj sounds so exotic. I'm surprised we speak the same language.