The Remnants of Reach

Master Chief and the others stepped out of the Pelican and into the moderately temperate conditions of the hangar bay as several other Pelicans followed. It was so much better seeing all of the live people wandering throughout the room rather than confused corpses meandering about, looking for its next meal. The eerie metal sheen of the walls reflected back almost perfectly, the group. Stephan was inserted into a ship panel by Master Chief. Stephan left immediately for the control room.

His figure appeared on the holo-pad on the command deck, far from the others. He pulled up several commands and a data area. He recorded the account on the Spirit of Fire as well as recounted the encounter on Harvest and the Shield World, which he had copied from the command hub in the original ship. As he finished, Madelyn appeared next to him. At about a proportional half foot shorter, Madelyn looked up at him with a smirk.

"So, how'd the mission go?" She asked kindly, with her sweet candy voice.

"I saw shit you would never believe or want to know." Stephan said, still recording data. After finishing, he explained the situation to Madelyn, who held a composure of intrigue, yet also complete inattention. As if she heard but didn't respond.

"Well, I'm glad your back." Madelyn said, her avatar hugging his. Stephan stuck his arms out in surprise, and also embarrassment. He returned the gesture for a few seconds before the Captain, Cpt. Tulia, stepped in on them.

"Did I walk in on something?" she asked, her voice much deeper and near tenor rather than a woman's proper alto. The two broke apart, virtually blushing. She walked around and sat at one of the terminals. Stephan waved goodbye and disappeared from the holo-pad.

Stephan immediately caught up with the group, who were in the training room, testing up on the newbies' skill set. They were very close combat capable. Stephan watched from a distance at first as Douglas and Smith went at it. Smith sent a punch at Douglas' exposed chest, but it was a trick, as he then grabbed Smith's forearm, and kicked him in the side of the jaw. Stumbling back, Smith then charged again, this time sliding on his back. His legs wrapped around one of Douglas' shins and pulled him down to the ground. Douglas caught himself in push-up form. He gave himself a quick thrust, rose off the ground, and landed on Smith, stamping his foot into his chest.

Douglas stood, whilst Smith was curled in a ball. Douglas stepped off the ring and put on a noncombat uniform after removing the tape on his fists. "Next round." Grutsky said. "Jerome and Johnson." Johnson leapt up first, his tanned skin already wet with sweat from watching the former match. He took the chance to lift Smith over the ropes and throw him on the ground. A loud thump followed by a groan was all that came from Smith. Jerome grabbed the top rope. He jumped up and curled in his legs to go over the rope. Landing on his fists, he put up his taped fists. "Go."

Now Stephan had come up closer to the holo-pad that was overlooking the ring. Jerome stood still, glaring at Johnson, and vice versa. Johnson finally attacked first, charging with a fist raised. Jerome went to block, but Johnson then tucked under and head-butted Jerome's gut. Jerome doubled over Johnson and grabbed his shoulders with an extreme pressure. Before Jerome could be pinned on the post, Johnson reared back, roaring out in pain. With his arms still around Jerome, he couldn't block the next move. While his eyes were still closed, Jerome jammed his fist directly into his forehead without hesitation. Johnson dropped him and stumbled back, a large bruise having developed quickly. Johnson threw a punch, but Jerome grabbed his fist and pushed it to his left. As Johnson started spinning, Jerome grabbed his face, fingers tightly curled around his chin. Jerome jumped and lifted him above Johnson's face above himself, and on the way down, drove it home. Johnson belly-flopped off the mat and tumbled over onto his back during the second bounce. Jerome lifted his foot and feinted curb stomping Johnson, who flinched and raised his gloved his fist in defeat. Jerome lifted him up and helped him off the ring.

"Final round, Aria vs. Alice." Grutsky announced. "Come on, put us a point on the board at least." Alice ran towards the ring and jumped. As she approached the corner post, her hands were planted firmly onto said post, and she performed a front flip onto ring, her taped fists were up and ready in a second.

"Really, do I have to do this?" Aria said, as she climbed over the rope, no tricks used.

"Yeah, we need to compare the Spartan 2 to the 4." Smith said from the bench, still catching his breath. "Whew, Douglas got a few lucky strikes in there." Aria charged first, moving to punch her thigh. Alice ducked under, but Aria jumped up, becoming parallel with the ground and pressed against the top rope. She turned upward and rocketed into the air, pulling a back flip. Still getting up Alice didn't see the foot first missile strike. Aria landed on Alice, pounding her back into the mat. Alice's arms came back grabbing Aria's leg and push her off. As Alice stood up, Aria spun around to her back and landed her heel into the back of Alice's knee, sending her onto said knee. Alice caught herself as Aria made a motion to kick her in the gut, but Alice got herself up quickly. With Aria's leg in the air, Alice grabbed it and pinned it her on the ground, one leg up and both shoulder's pinned. Aria's other leg came over and kicked Alice in the elbow, buckling her grip. As her arm went up, both legs tucked in, then out, lifted Alice about 1.5 meters into the air and into the ropes. Barely catching herself, Alice grabbed onto the ropes and nearly rolled over the top rope. Aria came over and gave her two dead arms which lost grip and Alice was out. Alice tumbled over and caught herself feet first.

"Come on, how about Grutsky and Master Chief?" Johnson said, now standing with a cool to hot pad on his forehead.

"Sorry to interrupt your 'testing', but you're match with the One and Only will have to wait. Our next target is within an hour away in Slipspace. We're going to make the jump soon, so you should get into the armory and suit up." Stephan said this all without stopping. He looked around the room, peering at the saviors of a lost soul. Their next target was a very special Spartan 2. Part of the undercover military group, Noble Team, they were going off to save the only surviving member, lost on Reach. His mission was to guard Dr. Halsey, but they got separated. He had sent out a distress signal probably about a week ago that had just reached the ship. It was from an originally underwater fort, but thanks to the mass glassing of the planet, the wildlife and water was just begun to return to the surface. The atmosphere was finally returning from its plasmatic state, allowing the process of gasses transferring in the ecosystem to start back up. Some water had returned to the planet. Sweet ecological succession on a planetary level. Most of the planet would probably look like the boreal forest on Earth at best.

Either way, if they had received the message, it would only be a matter of time before the Covenant received the message. Plus, there had been Covenant on the planet after glassing, looking for something specific, like a Forerunner artifact. They could still be on the surface and preparing to hunt him down for sport, or just revenge. The smooth, nearly silent, sliding metal could be heard as the ship emptied its radiation stores, so it could remain to move quietly. The ship then jolted as it entered Slipspace.

He popped into the Armory to witness the attachment of armor onto the Spartans. As each stepped up onto the panel, it was a similar process. Each would step into the machine, some more timid than others, and allow it to lift them up. Already wearing the under armor of their suits, the machine would place and then magnetically attach each piece on, until the process was complete and the Spartan would step off. The reflective walls definitely threw him off, as it did to each troop. The only thing ever orientated in the confusing and mysterious structure of the ship were the ONI officers that wandered its halls every solar day.

About an hour had passed by the time they had finished the process and were in the hangar. A loud thundering erupted throughout the echoing ship bay. Through the light shield, he could see the chaotic atmosphere of New Reach, as some called it. Several atmospheric adjusters had been added into the atmosphere to help accelerate the healing of the planet already, mostly from emergency Slipspace deployment ships, which flew by about two years after it was lost and dropped them in.

Of the ones not shot down by either Covenant or the always churning lightning field had helped quite exquisitely, helping to guide the growth of life and return of water, which would have taken possibly centuries without it. He stood straight with his arms tucked behind his back as Master Chief removed the chip from the holo-pad and into his helmet module. Stephan immediately tapped into the COM, which was mostly just the Spartans chattering amongst themselves. "So, are we getting packed into one of those?" Jerome asked, pointing his thumb at the Pelican.

"Nope sorry, but due to the severely crippled thunderheads, we have to pack into ODST pods." Johnson said this professionally. "Risking a Pelican would be suicide if it got hit and dropped like a rock. Plus that's extra lives on the line."

"Then why did we come here?" Alice said, quite irritated.

"I was just following Grutsky." Smith said. They all looked at Grutsky, who shrugged in confusion. They made their way to the bottom floor, where the pods awaited them. A small team of ODST's got them situated into the pods, two to a pod. Smith and Jerome, Alice and Johnson, Grutsky and Douglas, and finally, Master Chief and Aria.

The lead ODST approached the command HUB. "Preparing launch." The hatch opened under them revealing a thick overcast of thunderheads, which the pods were prepared to fire directly into.

"Is this really necessary? You know, dropping through a lightning filled cloud gathering." Douglas said.

"Get ready…"

"I don't really think so." Stephan said over the COM.

"Drop!" The pods were rocketed out of the hangar and down towards New Reach's surface. The pods were constantly gaining speed and jolting about. They moved swiftly and quietly across space, and at a much quicker rate than a Pelican. It would only be a matter of time before they would be on the surface, moving toward Jun, the lost survivor of Noble Team.

As they entered the clouds and bright flashes of lightning began erupting around them, Master Chief and Aria stayed stoic in the pod, Master Chief in back with his arms around Aria in front. Stephan checked on the other pods. Alice was twiddling her fingers and Johnson flashed his eyes back and forth behind his visor. Grutsky was blinking rapidly and Douglas was cracking his knuckles and neck. The story was different in Jerome and Smith's pod. Jerome was fairly unemotional, standing with teeth gritted and fingers tapping the metal to an unheard song. Smith however, was creating quite a ruckus over the COM. "Holy sweet mother of fuck!" He screamed as a loud crash of lightning erupted in front of their pod.

As Stephan returned to his own pod, A bolt of lightning erupted through their pod. The onboard lights flickered out and Stephan's camera view corrupted, forcing him to view it first person. Even worse, one of the rockets keeping them straight had quit and another overloaded, casting a trail of smoke out into the air as they plummeted off course. If you were looking out a broken window in the facility, you would have seen three pods headed straight for the roof, and one rocketing off into the chasm below. The effect of the missing rockets were instant. The first three pods punched into the roof and let them out through a stabbing attachment on the end. Master Chief's pod instead missed the building completely and instead plummeted a few thousand meters further into the chasm before striking into the side wall of the chasm.

Stephan remembered seeing several Unggoy and Kig-Yar heading for the facility's support cords. He also saw Spirits and Phantoms drifting overhead and towards the structure. A massive fleet of Yanme'e and banshees were also moving to surround the base. These were the last things he remembered before the pod impacted the side. The glass door wasn't ejected for another 2 hours. Master Chief and Aria were out cold. Stephan could only watch through the visor cams as Spirit and banshee alike crashed down around them. He even saw a Yanme'e drop and Unggoy, still alive, down into the pit and watched as its gas tank exploded from the pressure of crushing it. The now dead corpse then rocketed into the air before dropping back down and rolled to the bottom the chasm, exactly 1 kilometers further down. For reference, the sea level was about 1 kilometer above the flat plain that was ocean floor. The base was then .75 kilometers into the chasm. Then, the pod was another 2.1735 kilometers into the chasm and another kilometer to the bottom.

OOOOO

2 hours later… Master Chief and Aria were finally awake, the pod having a Spirit wrapped around it. Master Chief and Aria checked their clocks, then Aria busted off the glass cover. The group moved out onto the slope and saw corpses and crashed ships scattered. Kig-Yar and their sniper rifles were scattered across the plain, as if some sniper had been watching over them. The squad advanced up the hill to see the cord on their side was still attached. So far, only one had been broken, making the building lean partially to the north. They hoped up onto the cord and ran for the wall of the structure dangling in the air. They were quickly suspended high above a mere puddle of water when compared to the once great chasm. A rocket flew directly into the wall, punching a hole into the thick walls. They climbed into carefully, as to not disturb whatever was in there. They looked left than right. Strange signs that only a Spartan would recognize were scattered along the halls, as to direct them somewhere. It was a tribute to Samuel, who had been the first Spartan to die. They followed the signs into an open hallway, with several Sangheili and Jiralhanae fighting over what it meant.

You could hear the heavily accented English garble versus the barks and yips. BR-55 in hand, Aria fired several bursts into the two arguing. Neither was killed, but both turned to them. One with a Plasma Rifle and the other a Spike Rifle, they opened fired. Both Spartans ducked back behind cover. Several other sets of footsteps could be heard from the hallway. Master Chief rounded about the corner and fired his shotgun, chucking a round into the first Jiralhanae, who then buckled forward and dropped back. The Sangheili stopped and backed up, until Aria joined and fired the BR-55 into its face, crackling each individual mandible. It dropped into a pile. The others opened fire. Master Chief ducked under, slid on his shins up to the one remaining Sangheili, and opened up a round into it's leg, which was blown clean off. It yelped and fell to one side as it bled dry on the ground. The Jiralhanae turned and ran to report to higher officials, but the BR-55 cracked twice, scattering its brains upon the ground. With arms raised high, it dropped its gun and face-planted onto the metallic floor.

"Ok guys, according to the cameras, the marks lead to the cafeteria." Stephan said as he slapped up a waypoint on the HUD. "I also marked something else that might disturb you." Recovery icons appeared on their HUD. They followed the recovery waypoint around the corner and down the next hallway. Several corpses of Covenant were scattered across the ground. They came into the shower room of the building. The bathroom section had several dead, curious Unggoy in the room. Each shower stall was empty, except for the last two. The first had bits of concrete on the ground and holes through which bullets and been fired at something in the next one.

When they pulled back the curtain for the corner shower stall, they saw Douglas holding his M6 pistol in one hand, and his other arm was around Grutsky, who had a fairly large hole in his shoulder from where a Needler had punctured his armor with the pink crystalline explosives, then detonated. "Kill…me." Grutsky groaned out, his blood pooling on his Douglas' armor and the floor. "Please, I-I've b-be-en like th-th-this f-f-f-or *cough*… some dry-heaving… 10 minutes."

"I can't leave him, plus I don't have a med-kit." Douglas said, his words were soaked in worry.

"Come on, let's get him to the cafeteria, our target probably has some." Aria said as she lifted up the poor sod and carried him along with Douglas. Master Chief turned around and begun to follow the waypoint to the cafeteria. They turned a few more corners, and with Douglas' M6, he put a cap in any Unggoy that stepped in their path. Several had just been walking around, unaware of anyone's presence. A few jumped and squeaked, while others tried to fire Plasma Pistols or a Needler. The trail of blood was growing, so they had to run. They began to completely dodge the Unggoy. The squad pulled through a sliding door to the mess hall, which was covered in corpses. Huragok, Yanme'e, Jiralhanae, Sangheili, Kig-Yar, and even Mgalekgolo. They were all littered in front of the door leading into the kitchen, whose glass was broken and bulging slightly inward toward the kitchen.

They looked from a distance and into the room. A table covered with utensils sat in the middle. Several counters were scattered around the room. Some had sinks and others had trays on them. A large, burnt out drink dispenser was sitting the in the corner. The once sheening metal was now rusting and quite disgusting. The cupboards were mostly all hanging open and different food containers were scattered about the floor. Sitting on the table in the middle was five med-kits, one opened up. As they approached the door, a shot rang out, which startled them all. Grutsky had actually passed out at this point and did nothing.

"Noble Five, hold you fire." Master Chief said into the room. They held themselves firmly, waiting for a response of some kind.

After 30 seconds, they heard shuffling of metal on metal and, "How the hell do you know my position? What are you, a new actually intelligent Elite?" He said this with an untrusting coldness.

"No, we're your family." Aria said this with a surprising warmness in her voice. But the figure inside did not budge.

"My family died with Reach long ago." Again with the cold in his voice. He almost sounded like he didn't want to be rescued.

Stephan 'sat' in his place, taking all of this in. He couldn't automatically open the door, as it was buckled inwards. Jun had busted all the cameras in the kitchen, so he couldn't even see him. Plus, the security systems of the facility were offline. He could do nothing if the negotiation took a turn south. Fortunately, it didn't.

"This is Master Chief speaking. I tell you now Spartan 266, Jun, Noble 5, or whatever you call yourself now, get out here NOW!". There was nothing for awhile, then the Spartan stepped in front of the door. His trusty sniper rifle was in one hand, the other was pressed against the door. His emerald armor and pale visor shimmered in the sunlight flowing through the open windows. His camo straps were still wrapped around his neck.

"Is it really you?" He asked, his fist now wrapped around an edge of a door. With silent recognition, Master Chief nodded calmly