Ok here is the second chapter of Remnant Solution. I would again like to thank my editors for their help in making this story and the actual process of getting it uploaded and story boarded out.
I would also like to point out that I will be changing the tags a little. This story was a Scifi Humor, it will now be a Scifi only because I can't find another tag that fits well.. I feel that after writing this chapter that fits better and will portray it in a more accurate light. If anyone has any recommendations for what tags would fit for what is going so far let me know.
Lastly, this chapter is also longer than anticipated. I was shooting for five thousand and ended up getting around seven thousand. The average should both take longer to write and be a little shorter.
Hope you enjoy, and thank you for taking time out of your day to read it.
Sincerely SE
Alessandra West
Infinity Hanger
Fireteam Delta had assembled in one of the Infinity's many hangar bays to prepare for the briefing. They had also been joined by a handful of crewmen and women from various postings, most of them Aless didn't recognize save for the cook and the man who had been on duty in the armoury the day before.
Dakota, the guy trying to dig up information on Ben, and… what was his name? Daniel… that sounds right.
There was a wide range of people in attendance from combat personnel to engineering crews, to even a few scientists and researchers; again, most of which Aless didn't recognize, only able to tell their positions by the uniforms they wore. Most of them had given a friendly nod to her and varying levels of greetings to Ben, not all of them friendly.
Aless saw the Pelican float into the hanger and set down with a soft click of metal on metal. She watched as two men and one woman disembarked from the pelican… all of them wearing ONI uniforms.
Great. Another black ops mission that never happened and will likely be a moraly grey area at best. My favorite.
Aless had spent most of her career working with, or for, ONI. From her early training days to the time just before her reassignment to Delta. She thought she was finally free from their organization entirely… clearly not.
"Colonel Baker, I presume?" Commander Palmer gave a salute.
"Please, drop the formalities commander. I'm not here on official ONI business." The colonel was of average height, though he still had a large figure, and he spoke with an accent that Aless couldn't identify.
The commander gestured towards the three Spartans standing at attention and one Spartan standing at ease. Ben, of course, was the odd man out.
"This is Fireteam Delta, the team assigned to the mission." The commander switched her focus to the group of crew men and women also standing at attention. "And these are the additional personnel needed for the Token's crew. All good at their jobs and some of the finest crew members the Infinity has."
"What have you told them about the mission?" The Colonel interjected with a speedy mass of words that Aless took as either annoyance or nervousness.
With ONI it could easily be both and neither at the same time.
"Only that they would be gone for some time, figured you would want to fill them in yourself." The commander didn't look annoyed or frustrated by the colonels sudden interruption.
"Thank you commander, and I do apologize if I seem agitated. This mission was very… sudden. I have lost more sleep over this than almost any other op I've worked on… not that I was gonna sleep anyways but you get the point." He turned from Palmer and looked out over the assembled crew. "I would also like to apologize for the abruptness of this mission. I understand how hard it is to make a decision on such short notice and I thank you for your willingness to cooperate."
Aless amused herself at the thought of Delta actually saying no to a mission, it would never happen.
"This mission." The colonel stopped to look around and verify that the hangar was abandoned except for the mission participants. "You can never tell a living soul what you do. Your files will be adjusted to accommodate this and you will be rewarded handsomely by the Office of Naval Intelligence. If you don't remain silent however… well, thankfully that's not my department."
The words washed over the crowd while the colonel stopped for a moment to let the gravity of the situation sink in.
"If you wish to leave, now is your opportunity. No one would blame or hold it against you."
He stopped again to let the crowd think, and to Aless' liking, no one left.
"Good. Now, you will all be transferred over to the Token, a Phoenix-class colony ship, and will be going out past the outer colonies to an Insurrectionist stronghold. Upon arrival you will force a malfunction of your slipspace drive core and go in for repairs. Be warned, these Insurrectionists are very well equipped; not only with UNSC gear and ships, but covenant as well. This particular cell has allied themselves with the Keepers of the One Freedom, a Covenant splinter faction that works with humans." The Colonel stopped for a moment and rubbed his hand over his face before continuing. "Worse yet the Insurrectionists chose this specific plannet to make a stronghold due to its Forerunner presence...we believe they found something important. Over the last four days the Insurrectionists and Covenant faction have pulled in every ship and soldier they had near the planet and set up a defensive perimeter."
The colonel paused and seemed to slip into deep thought for a moment.
"What did they find… Sir?" Ben was the one to break the silence.
"We think it's a weapon."
"If it's a weapon, then why not send in the fleet, take the world by force? We have the firepower."
"The weapon is being kept in a densely populated area we would have to bomb from orbit to neutralize before it could become a threat to any invading force. Estimated casualties are in the millions."
Silence washed over the room again. Aless couldn't find fault with that outcome, try as she might.
If it really is a weapon then the enemy can't be allowed to have something of Forerunner construction. What are a few million lives in comparison to the the safety of thousands of worlds?
Aless was disgusted with herself; not for what she thought, but how casually she thought it. Would it be for the greater good? Yes. Would it save more lives than would die? Yes. Did that make it okay to throw away the lives of millions? Aless didn't know, but hated herself for the thought. She turned her attention back to the ONI officer to distract herself.
"That's why you're here. We don't want it to come to that." The man forced a smile on his face. "We don't want to end so many innocent people's lives."
"What if we fail?" Aless was the one to break the silence this time. Her voice showing more emotion than she would have liked. Most people seemed to miss that, except for Ben, she could see by the way he looked at her. While everyone else was focusing on the ONI man in anticipation of his answer, Ben was looking at her. Truthfully the emotion was nothing more than a small waver, something only Ben seemed to notice, even she missed it until he pointed it out while he was drunk.
"You won't, because you can't. If you fail we will be forced to sabotage a reactor near the facility, causing it to go nuclear. The weapon can not stay in their control. There is no room for failure!" The man was looking over the entire crowd, not talking to any person specifically, thus keeping attention off of Aless, much to her relief. Until he looked at her directly. "Is that understood?" And everyone snapped their attention to her.
"When do we ship out?" Ben was the first to jump to her rescue, diverting everyone's attention to him. Something he was far more comfortable with.
"You'll be transfering over to the Token within the hour." The man turned to look at Aless again and waited another moment in silence. "If there are no more questions I recommend you all get ready to be sent over to the Token."
The crew members in the hangar spread out to gather their duffle bags and footlockers. Aless and Ben had already taken care of that before the meeting, and Jax and Roberts were quickly checking through their gear to be certain it was all there. Ben walked over to Aless.
"Wonder what the device is." Ben took a position leaning against a wall to talk to Aless
"It's a weapon. He just said that." Aless wasn't sure if Ben had been paying full attention or not.
"No he didn't. He said they thought it was a weapon. For all we know it could be the Fountain of Youth or maybe a really big coffee machine." Ben leaned down into his own personal bag. Aless leaned over to get a look at what was inside, only to be disappointed when he covered it up.
"Its alcohol isn't it?" Aless let out a sigh
"I only packed mission critical and essential items. What do you take me for, a rookie?"
"Just because you say it's essential doesn't make that true."
"Really? Huh, who knew. Yep it's booze." Ben stood back up and went over to pick up his weapons locker.
"At this rate you might actually die of alcoholism before you're killed in action. That's impressive for a Spartan!" Aless believed if anyone was gonna do it, it would be Ben.
"I'm here for a good time not a-" Ben didn't get to finish that sentence before the two were interrupted by someone, the Quartermaster from yesterday. He held something under his arms, that something being a weapons crate with one word sketched across the top, Jezebel. Aless heard Ben's fist clench.
"MacDavis, West." The Quartermaster nodded to both her and Ben before continuing. "The machine managed to fix it up and I thought I should get it down here before you shipped out."
Ben gasped.
"You actually did it? Sweet! Hand her here." Ben quickly realized there was a problem. In his one hand he had the crate with all his other guns, and the other his alcohol. Ben looked like he broke before he turned to Aless. "Would you… would you carry her for me?"
Aless was a little shocked, not that Ben had to much of a choice, but he never let anyone touch Jezebel… Never.
"Sure." Aless took the crate from the Quartermaster and thanked him before heading towards the pelican.
The flight over to the Token was short, cramped, and quiet. The pelican was filled a little over what it usually would have been due to the gear and personal belongings of all those heading over to the ship from the Infinity. Upon arrival Delta was greeted by an ensign who informed them that the captain wanted to see them as soon as possible. Delta stopped by their barracks to drop off their stuff and made for the command bridge.
"Delta, I presume. Welcome to the Token, I'm captain Martin. I've read your files so no need for introductions. Your team has quite the service history, Roberts." The captain got straight to the point and spoke in a swift sharp tone that seemed to rush the conversation forward.
"Thank you sir." Roberts gave the expected response.
"We'll be heading to the Regnar system soon, at which point you four will go down to the planet and extract the Forerunner weapon by any means necessary. Is that understood?"
"Yes sir!" Delta responded in unison, save Ben who just gave a half hearted salute.
"Get your gear situated in your quarters and then get prepped for cryo. It's a long ways to the Regnar system. Dismissed!" The captain gave a nod and turned to face his holo-table. Delta left and made for the section of the ship reserved for cryo sleep.
Benjamin MacDavis
Token Hallway
Fireteam Delta made their way to the cryo bay in silence. Except for the passing conversations Ben started. Nothing more than a greeting or a few sentences, but he always loved meeting new people. They had a certain innocence to them. Not that they hadn't done bad things in life.
Everyone has baggage, especially if you're UNSC or ONI.
Ben shuttered at the thought of what the people on his team must have done before his introduction to them. He had dug up all he could on Aless and Jax, he didn't care enough for Roberts. Ben knew enough people, and he had some family connections that got him what he wanted on his new team. Their history was… spotty to say the least. Ben would never judge, or even tell them he knew. He had done his fair share of dirty work, but new people had no idea about that stuff, and he had no idea about theirs. A fresh start… for a time at least. People always found out of course, either by rumor or Ben himself. He had a habit of talking while he was drunk, he couldn't help it.
Delta reached the cryo section fairly quickly once Ben was distracted in thought.
"Delta… up on the left, pods fourteen, fifteen, seventeen, and twenty-four. Sorry about the spacing. Hard to accommodate the sudden influx of crew." The woman in white fatigues gestured them towards the left with a friendly smile. Ben let the rest of Delta head to the pods while he stayed behind to speak to her.
"Name's Ben. So, how goes the popsicle making?" Ben extended his hand out to meet hers.
"Ashley. As for the 'popsicle making', you Infinity boys and girls made my job all the harder." She gave a soft smile to indicate it was of no real concern.
"Oh, what can I say, we take up… Infinitely… more room." The woman fell silent. "... I'll admit, not my best."
"They warned me about the puns." She finally let out a slight chuckle.
"Really? I thought they would have said something about my dashing good looks first." Ben went to put a hand on his chin only to realise he was still wearing his helmet.
"They also mentioned that." Ashley gave a coy smile and tilted her head to the side. "You should get going, we head out in 5 minutes."
Ben turned around and made for his pod.
"We're gonna get something to drink when I wake up. Assuming you don't freeze me in a position that will cause me to cramp, that is."
"I'll hold you to that."
Ben went to join the rest of his team. Jax and Roberts had already gone into cryo. Roberts chose the pod farthest away, twenty-four, while Jax chose seventeen. Leaving Aless and Ben to have the ones right next to each other. Aless had opted to wait for Ben.
Aww, she wants to tuck me in. How sweet.
"You ready for a nice long nap?" Ben stretched and faked a yawn.
"After you." Aless gestured to his pod and moved for her own.
"See you when we get up." Ben got comfortable in the pod, as comfortable as one could in a metal tube. He felt the warm touch of consciousness slip away as his mind did the same.
Alessandra West
Cryo Bay
Aless awoke to a sharp hiss, signalling the opening of the cryo pod. She took a second to get over the dizziness and gain her bearings before dropping out of the pod. She landed on her feet and stayed standing with mild assistance from the railing in front of the pod. She looked over to see if Ben was up yet, he was. He was also taking a swig from a flask he kept attached to his belt.
"Nothing like a little whiskey to get over that cryo sleep hangover." Ben's voice had the hallmark of someone having their morning coffee.
"I don't think that's entirely healthy." Mixing the chemicals from cryo sleep and alcohol seems like a really bad idea.
"Oh, I know it isn't, and yet, here we are." Ben attached his flask to his hip and gestured for Aless to follow. "Captain wants to see us."
"Wait." Aless looked around and down the row to see if Jax and James' pods were open yet.
"They are already there. I elected to wait for you to wake up sleepy head." Ben picked up on her line of thought quickly. He secured his helmet before turning around to finish speaking. "Come on, don't wanna keep the captain waitin'."
Aless and Ben quietly walked back up to the bridge. She couldn't tell how long they were out for or how close they were to the mission zone, but judging from how sore her muscles felt and how quiet the crew was she could tell they had been out a while and were at least getting close.
Wonder how many of the Token's crew have killed a person before. Killing covies is one thing, but a Human? I've heard thats a lot harder.
Aless couldn't personally tell the difference. A kill was a kill, nothing special or to feel good about, just a kill. She had heard that killing left a lasting impact on the person, ranging from nightmares, to PTSD, to drinking habits, or even mental breakdown entirely. She considered herself lucky none of those ever came up.
Her and Ben made it to the bridge without interruption. Upon arrival Aless saw Jax and James standing around a holo-table talking with the captain. It was the Captain who noticed them first.
"West, MacDavis, We were just discussing the strategy for which you will gain access to the Insurrectionist facility and the weapon. Care to join us?"
"We'd be excited to boss, and you can just call me Ben, rolls off the tongue better."
"I'll keep that in mind. Anyways, the main facility is here." He pointed to a large hexagonal shaped building on the holo-table. "Our intel says that the weapon is being kept in a sub-basement converted into a makeshift research lab. For the most part the planet's real strength is it's fleet, relatively little in the terms of ground support. Making your jobs all the easier."
"Standard smash and grab?" Ben seemed to finally be feeling a little bit of the hangover from either the cryo pod or the alcohol.
Serves you right for drinking seventy percent of the time.
"A little bit harder than you make it sound but yes, that's the premise." The captain stretched his arms out across the holo table. "The largest resistance will be the security checkpoint here, you'll have to remove them without raising any alarms."
"So we sneak in up to that point, take out the guards, gun it for the weapon and then make our way out? Are we even sure that this artifact can be moved by a Fireteam?" If the situation had been something other than a mission briefing then Aless would have been surprised by Ben's serious tone and lack of jokes. He joked with nearly every situation, even the actual combat aspect of a mission, but when it came to planning he was straightforward, and in Aless' opinion, a decent tactician.
"He raises a fair point. What is the estimated size and weight of the weapon?" James was always more than willing to work with Ben's tactical side when it came up. He found it easier to get along with apparently.
Can't say I blame him, Ben is a real pain to deal with.
"The weapon is far too large for you to carry, however, the design prints are available on a much smaller Forerunner data storage device. You'll need to scuttle the prebuilt one they have as well as the prototype they built."
Aless listened carefully to the rest of the briefing. Once it was done she turned to Ben.
"I need to give something to Roberts. Meet you back at the quarters."
"Sure thing." Aless turned to leave. Catching a glimpse of an envelope with countless official stamps and barcodes, the parcel she gave to Ben when she got back from the supply depot back on the Infinity.
Benjamin MacDavis
Token Command Bridge
"Roberts, we need to talk." Ben didn't hate Roberts, he didn't hate anyone.
"Can't it wait? I need to finalize some details with the Captain here."
"It really can't, and it won't take but a moment." Ben pulled out the envelope Aless had given him and handed it over to to Roberts.
"What's this?" Roberts slowly opened the envelope pulling out a series of papers. "Are these-?"
"Yep… medical discharge papers. You'll finally get what you always wanted." Ben expected to hear the man's voice take on a happy tone or for him to dance a jig or something. Instead he just stood there.
"Medical discharge for what?" James' voice was low and monotone.
"It's all in the paperwork. I'll be headin' out now, Sir." Ben gave a solid salute and left.
Hope Aless doesn't take it too hard.
James Roberts
Token Command Bridge
James held the paperwork in his hand, checking it over and over to make sure it wasn't a fake, or some kind of joke from Ben. That was something he had come to expect from him.
Nothing. They're real.
James had felt a split second of relief and joy when Ben had handed him the papers. He was finally going to be free from the troublemaker… then he saw the reason why Ben was being discharged. On the paper he held in front of him, he saw the citation for cause.
Malignant Neoplasm. Of all the things I thought would kill you Ben… I never thought it would be cancer.
For the first time in James' history with Ben, he regretted being so hard on him. He thought back to all the times Ben had thrown himself into the fray without second thought, and now there was a fight he couldn't win. James felt sick for a moment at the thought of how Alessandra would respond.
Alessandra West
Token Hallway
"Sounds pretty easy." Pretty standard stuff, nothing we haven't done before.
"Could you not tempt fate Aless?" Ben said as he exited the command bridge. He was always a superstitious man, believing in curses and hexes and good luck charms. He kept one on his person at all time, a small cross attached to his dog tags. Aless never asked where he got it, in truth she didn't care.
Oh please, what could possibly go wrong? Stop getting so jumpy. This is standard at worse.
What could possibly go wrong?
Benjamin MacDavis
Regnar System pelican on route to The Token
"You just had to say it, didn't ya? 'What could possibly go wrong?'" Ben was piloting the slightly damaged, unarmed pelican toward the Token's hangar bay. Multitasking that already formidable challenge with talking to Aless. Talking would be a nice word for it, in reality he was more sarcastically yelling at her through the cockpit door.
"Oh no! This one is not on me! No one knew about the scorpion! How could we?!" Aless meant this rhetorically, but Ben thought it worthy of comment.
"You jinxed it!" The pelican shook violently to the left. "Shit. Jax, give me twenty percent more power to the left thruster on my mark… Mark!" the Pelican did a swift jerk to the right to account for the lower output on the thruster itself.
"I think they're gaining." Aless not so helpfully said.
"Do you wanna fly? I swear I will turn this pelican around and ram the fuckers!" Ben only mostly meant it. "Roberts, got that thing secured yet?"
"Just about. How much time do we have?" Roberts had to shout even through the radio to be heard over the roaring of the engines.
"Thirty, maybe forty seconds. Aless, get over here and take the controls! I've got an idea." Ben waited to see Aless in his peripheral vision before standing and running into the back of the pelican.
"What are you doing?" Roberts was in the back of the pelican securing the 'small' Forerunner data storage device. It was really not that small, it took both Ben and Aless to move the thing. Regardless of the weight, they had gotten it to the pelican and had the bird in the air before the Insurrectionists knew what was happening.
"Get a hold of something sturdy and open the back! Im gonna use Bulldog to try and take down some of our not so friendly friends!" Ben had to shout to be heard over the engines in the back. The Insurrectionists couldn't afford the high grade ships the UNSC had, settling for a lower grade, and all round worse civilian models for most of their transport needs. Except for the ones following them
"We aren't in atmosphere anymore, the force will pull you out!" Ben was physically shocked for a second at the response. Mainly because it wasn't a definitive no.
"Either get in the cabin or grab something. I'm opening the bay door." Ben moved to the panel and looked over to see whether he was gonna go into the cabin or stay. Roberts grabbed a hold of one of the bars and nodded in his direction.
The sudden depressurization nearly pulled Ben into the vacuum. The only reason he didn't move was because his boots were mag-locked to the floor. He took a second to let the silence wash over him.
Followed by a smile spreading across his face, and he turned, shouldering his Hydra launcher. Ben took a moment to lock his targeting reticle to the engines of the two closest pelicans. While the rockets were strong on an infantry level, they didn't have the power to take down a pelican unless the rockets found their targets; the engine's intake manifold was the ideal target.
Ben released four rockets at each pelican's frontal weak point. The closest pelican took all four into its right intake manifold and twisted in a violent shake before going cold. The second pelican, being farther back, had more time to react and threw its nose down, taking two rockets to its heavy armour plating while the other two struck home. The pelican's wings were engulfed in smoke for a moment before sputtering out a fireball. The pelican fell behind, unable to keep up with its speed crippled, while the other two pursuing pelicans pulled off to go after their fallen comrades.
Ben closed the bay door and began the pressurization sequence as they closed in on the Token. He could already imagine the scolding from Roberts before he turned around.
"Nice shot." Roberts didn't look at him but instead turned around and gestured to the cabin. "Get up and relive Alessandra."
"Sure thing." Ben knew Aless had experience and could fly a pelican, he was just better.
Ben walked into the cabin to see they were already pulling into the Token's hanger.
Aww, but I wanted to fly some more.
"How did she do, Jax?" Ben looked at the copilot's seat.
Jax held up his thumb.
"Jax says you need some improvement if you wanna be as good as me, but not bad." Ben gave Jax a nod in thanks for the compliment.
"Yeah… Let's go with that." Aless flipped a few switches to shut the pelican down and stood up, heading for the doorway towards the troop bay of the pelican.
"I'm fairly certain th-" Ben didn't get to finish that before the ship shook violently and a loud voice came over the intercom system.
"All combat personnel to your posts. This is not a drill." The familiar voice of the captain alerting them that they weren't out of danger.
"So Roberts, where do you think they'll need us?" Ben walked out into the troop bay of the pelican.
"Jax and I are gonna get this to engineering, they have an isolation center set up so it doesn't affect any systems. You two need to get in contact with the Captain and see where he needs you." Roberts and Jax picked up the Forerunner artifact and carried it out into the open hangar bay.
"Yes sir." Aless responded before sprinting off in the direction of the door with Ben in close pursuit.
"Spartan C412 to bridge, do you copy?" Only static could be heard over the radio. "Spartan C412 to bridge, do you copy?" static. "Ben see if you can reach the bridge."
"Spartan C094 to bridge, anyone there?" Ben's radio responded with a broken voice covered by static.
"The… not… evacuation…" The voice was faint and easily overpowered by the static of the radio.
"Repeat your last, we didn't catch that." Aless' radio finally caught the signal.
"Dam… clear… now…" The static continued. "Is this any better?" A female voice came over the radio
"We read you, where's the captain?"
The voice on the other end stayed silent for a few seconds.
"The captain was on the bridge." Ben knew what the woman was saying the second he heard her voice. The mix of sadness and the knowledge that you have a job to do, and if you don't do your job more people would die, a bitter sounding tone. Aless missed the meaning.
"We can't reach him. Mind putting use through?"
"Who's acting captain right now?" Aless slowed down slightly letting Ben pass her as she caught onto the meaning behind the woman's words.
"The highest ranking officer still alive is..." The woman's voice stopped for a moment. "The head engineer."
"And where are they? We need to know where the most at risk parts of the ship are." Aless had regained her composure.
"Your talking to her. The uh… the place that will most likely need your help is the hanger you came in on. I'm getting reports that some boarding parties are already there."
Ben and Aless stopped to look at each other before they turned and began to run back to the hanger they had just left.
"Heads up, Roberts and Jax are on route to you with artifact. Have the isolation chamber ready when they get there." Ben let Aless take the lead as he worked to reload his Hydra.
"Will do, and good luck you two." The radio crackled as Ben and Aless switched to the Delta Fireteam channel.
"Roberts, this is Ben, do you read me?" The radio was silent for a moment.
"I heard. We will get this dropped off in engineering and meet you at the hanger. Roberts out."
"Well… nice to see someone has it under control, right Aless?" Aless tilted her helmet back enough so that she could see Ben. He was glad they were wearing helmets because he didn't think he could have looked her in the face.
I'll tell her once we get out of this. She deserves to hear it from me.
James Roberts
Token Engineering Bay
"Where do you want it?" James and Jax had to lug the heavy Forerunner artifact through the Token to the engineering bay the hard way, due to the elevators being out.
"Put it over there in the red square." The acting captain pointed to a glassed off part of the room. "When you do that one of you head to the hanger, I'll need one of you to help me secure it."
The woman was typing away on one of the terminals among a mess of books and broken down components. James and Jax set the weapon down in the secured area before moving out and closing the glass door behind them.
"Go help in the hangar, I'll help her and meet you there." Jax appeared to hesitate for a second before sprinting out the door. James turned to the woman. "What do you need?"
"For the most part it's a one person job but I need you to turn that key at the same time and pull that lever when I tell you!" The acting captain gestured to a terminal on the far wall.
James walked over to the wall and waited for her to gesture for him to turn the key.
"Turn the key in… 3… 2… 1… now!" James turned the key and heard a sharp crack as the shields snapped into place around the weapon.
The woman looked at a terminal and then to the artifact, and back to the terminal. Her eyes were wide as she sprinted towards another console.
"Pull the lever now!" The woman's voice sounded stressed and concerned.
James pulled the lever and turned to look at the weapon. It was glowing with a soft orange color, and a holographic control panel flickering in and out of existence.
"It's powering up! We need to shut it down before it does anything!" The woman ran to the glass door, opened it, and went through, latching the door behind her. "Go over to the terminal and turn off the shields, I need to interact with the interface directly."
James wanted to protest the idea but knew time didn't permit it, and she was his superior. He ran over to her terminal and pulled up the isolation shield controls. James began to power them down before a bright flash blinded him, and a shockwave knocked him off his feet. He had to force his eyes open. When he did finally manage to open them he saw nothing. The Engineering Bay was nowhere to be seen, from what he could tell he wasn't on the ship anymore. The first thought to run through his head was that he was in space, until he realized he didn't even see any stars. The solar system that was so close mere seconds before was now gone.
Am I… am I dead?
James noticed a few faint lights twinkle into existence in the dark, stars. Then he saw more, and more, and a far closer star fade into being. He saw scrap and parts of the ship he could only assume used to be the Engineering Bay. He reached out to grab the terminal that floated close to him, it was nothing more than a piece of metal without a power feed, but it still had it's hardware, something that could prove useful yet. He took a second to gain his bearings before trying to cue up his radio.
"This is Spartan James Roberts, code B186 to Token, do you copy?" The helmet radio was silent. Not with static, but completely silent. He ran a suit diagnostic and found that the radio was malfunctioning, the suit couldn't determine why.
James felt his body jerked by a sudden force of gravity. The jerk turned him around to see a lush looking world slowly fade into existence, and that it was suddenly getting a lot closer. As he was pulled closer and closer to the planet he braced himself for the imminent forces, heat, and pain of falling onto a planet from orbit.
James tried to resist the G-forces from knocking him out, but failed. A slow darkness surrounded his vision until he was forced into unconsciousness. The last thing he saw was a snowy landscape slowly grow below him, and what appeared to be a city.
Jackson Rodriguez
Unknown location
Jax wasn't prepared for the strange pulse to throw him off his feet, let alone outside of the Token. As he tumbled through space his suit began to beep that his oxygen was running out quickly. He was not surprised by this. Shortly after losing sight of the Token he had been struck by, presumably, a piece of its hull, cracking his visor. He judged that he had maybe four minutes of oxygen before he would run out.
It was with knowledge that he was relieved to feel the familiar pull of gravity. He was never a fan of a rough landing, but had been known to do so back in his ONI days.
Hope the others got it under control.
Jax thought about what he was gonna do once he landed. With his helmet cracked the way it was he was unable to make out any distinguishing landmarks on his way down. He couldn't tell when he was gonna land, but he would know when he hit it.
The sudden change in force and relatively quick stop would have killed him, if not for his armor.
He wasn't sure how long he laid in the crater, not more than ten minutes before he heard a rumble steadily getting louder. He went to stand up only to be met with a sharp pain forcing him down. The VTOL landed with a group of people disembarking.
The lead of which was a man with orange hair and a cane.
Great… who doesn't love a fight after falling from orbit?
Jax pulled out one of his energy swords and kept a hand on the part of his body that was bleeding. The group of men raised their guns and got closer, much to their mistake. He lunged at the first man severing his weapon before moving to cut him in half.
Don't make this too easy.
Benjamin MacDavis
Token Hangar bay
The intercom was blaring out a warning barely audible over the gunfight going on between the Token's combat personnel and the boarding party, who was mostly taken care of except for a few stragglers.
"Evacuation protocol has been activated! All crew members get to life pods or transport ships immediately!" Ben didn't know the man by name, but figured it a prudent time to get moving.
"Aless, it's time to move! Go get Jax and Roberts while I warm up the pelican. I'll get as many of the crew as I can." Ben motioned for the motley crew of ODSTs and marine fire support he had with him to move to the nearest pelican. "I'll wait for two minutes before I head out! Jax should be able to fly the other one if you don't make it!" Ben turned to Aless to see her nod and run for the door.
Ben took a moment to make sure all the borders had been dealt with before yelling an order.
"Alright, get on the pelican and strap yourselves in!" Ben sprinted ahead of the men and jumped into the pilot seat.
By the time he got the pelican fired up and ready for take off, the troop bay had been almost filled with the men and women from the hanger, with just enough space for the rest of Fireteam Delta.
Ben felt the ship shake and looked back, much to his dismay. He saw a strange pulse of orange light shooting their way and decided it was probably a good time to take off.
Jax is a good pilot and will be able to get Aless out safely… or I'll kill him.
Ben barely got the pelican off the ground before the pulse jutted it forward. His head smashed into the panel in front of him blurring his vision for a second. He could have sworn he saw through the wall of the pelican for a moment, but attributed that to a concussion or his eyes messing up due to the hit his head took. Whatever the case, he was far too busy trying to fly the now falling apart pelican to think too hard on it.
What the hell was that blast?
The main systems of the pelican were faltering and flipping between functioning and not. He judged that he needed to land as quickly as possible to do the needed repairs. He saw a planet appear in front of him, as in suddenly when there wasn't anything a second ago.
Did… that's not… am I still drunk?… Fuck it, to the magical planet we go!
Ben queued up the ship's internal intercom system. "This is your pilot speaking, I just want to inform you that we are experiencing slight technical difficulties and will have to make a layover flight. We know you have no choice in your flight options, but we thank you nonetheless. The stewardess should be coming by with pillows and peanuts very soon." Ben heard a few laughs from the men in the back.
Ok, let's see if I can land this thing.
Ben began the descent into the planet's atmosphere following a large chunk of what must have been the Token. The chunk of debris was giving off a homing signal on a frequency Ben knew as UNSC.
Hope it's the bar.
Alessandra West
Unknown location
Aless took a moment to gain her bearings. Her head hurt from the sudden force of the blast and apparent fall from space. She didn't remember much after seeing the pulse going through the hallway except for a couple of flashes of darkness.
Aless' body hurt all over, from her feet and legs to the top of her head. She heard some rustling nearby and quickly went to jump out of the crater. While she made it out of the hole no problem, she horribly misjudged the landing and smacked into the ground with a hard thud.
Aless looked up to see a girl wearing a pair of sunglasses and a beret staring down at her.
"Hell of an entrance there! You gotta show me how you do that." The girl lowered her sunglasses to look at Aless.
Aless looked at the girl's dark brown eyes through her helmet, her head began to feel heavy, rapidly falling into a concussion induced sleep.
IMPORTANT NOTE: When I wrote this the first time I did a quick search to see if cancer existed in the Halo universe. the article I found didn't say anything about a cure and so I went with the assumption it wasn't cured. After the fact I had it pointed out to me that it was curable and directed to an article based around that. I dont want to have to rewrite several section of the story to accommodate so here is what Im gonna do. Im gonna break the universe. No cure for cancer exists. Lets just say cancer evolved past what it was and became something all the more dangerous, with cancer being the closest example. That is all.
Authors Note: Ok and that was the second chapter. Hope you enjoyed and any and all criticism is appreciated and encouraged.
We finally have our characters in the world of Remnant, and the other half of this crossover. The transition, to me, feels weak. I would have tried for something better but my editors said they thought it was good and covered the idea well enough. On the upside its rather unique in comparison to the stories I have seen and read, that I again recommend reading.
I would also like to apologize if the cancer bit brought up feelings or memories for any readers.
Sincerely SE
