Chapter 3

The CIC erupted; everyone started shouting their opinions to the other, some in surprise, others in disbelief but one sound rose above the rest, laughter. Slowly the shouting died down as everybody turned to discover where the laughter was coming from. They all turned to the front of the bridge where the grey haired scientist Stephen was standing, chuckling to himself. "It's a relay!" he exclaimed joyfully "That's why we can detect manipulated mass at its centre! Of course!"

"Stephen what are you talking about?" questioned Jeff, the room now deathly quiet as everybody stopped what they were doing and looked at Stephen as he explained his idea.

"The 'object' is a relay of some sort; the orb must create a mass free corridor that allows travel from one point to another, this object is probably paired with another somewhere else in the galaxy."

"But what is the use of that when we have slipspace drives which allow us to travel at ftl speeds wherever we want to go?" Jeff asked, the 'object' now becoming less of a significant find as murmurs begin rippling through the rest of the crew as they begin discussing the viewpoint raised by Jeff.

"I don't know. We could try sending unmanned probes through to find out, but I suspect that the distance it will travel will cause it to go out of range. In my opinion, unless one of us takes a ship through the 'object' we will never find out what it does or how it works. But my theory could be wrong entirely and anything passing through it could find itself flattened into a tiny ball or transported into the centre of a black hole," Stephen explained. "You better send a message to ONI and tell them about this. We have no idea what's beyond the object but we better be prepared..."


1 Month later

A large UNSC fleet had amassed near the 'object', now dubbed a relay, including the pride of the UNSC fleet the UNSC Infinity. The plan for discovering the capabilities of the relay was simple. A skeleton crew would man the UNSC Song of the East a Halcyon-class light cruiser that had not been equipped with forerunner technology yet. They would then proceed to approach the relay and attempt to activate whatever sequence was in place to transport a ship from one place to another. If the ship arrived safely, it would then attempt to send a message to the remaining fleet telling them there is safe passage through the relay; and the UNSC Infinity would lead the charge through the relay and cordon off the area of space around the relay to ensure that it was secure of any potential threats.

1 hour before the operation begins aboard the UNSC Song of the East

Captain Hackett stood at the front of the bridge looking down at the skeleton crew that had been chosen to man the ship with him, each crewmember knew that they might only have an hour to live. But the crew of the Song of the East were consummate professionals; the UNSC had handpicked who would travel through the relay to ensure that they proceeded with their normal duties with calm and efficiency. Clearing his throat with a cough into his hand, Hackett straightened up and tried to look presentable as possible. He had never liked public speaking, but as a Captain he knew the importance of maintaining the morale of his crew. The idea of being the centre of attention made him feel exposed in a way that nothing else could. The knowledge that his words and in some cases his image would be heard and seen throughout the fleet didn't help matters. Anxiety and dread begin to well up within him, only to be violently quashed under the weight of his iron will. He was an officer in the UNSC Navy, and by God, he would act like it!

Taking a deep breath to steady himself, he began, "My fellow crewmates and members of the UNSC fleet, today we venture once more into the unknown. We do not know what lies ahead of us, we do not know if we will return. What we do know, is that we will not be forgotten. If we were to sacrifice ourselves today for the advancement of humanity, we would be remembered. But today is not that day. Today we will charge head on into the unknown, and decipher the knowledge left behind for us. Hackett out." Cutting the connection, he sighed to himself, his eyes drifting up to the relay that lay ahead of him, the pale blue glow of the orb illuminating him showing an aging face that had seen plenty of combat. A scar cut across his face, one of the many war wounds that come hand in hand from 20 years of combat on the front lines. "Ok," he murmured, rubbing his hands together in anticipation "let's get this show on the road."

"Helmsman!" he bellowed, turning his attention back to his command, "lock in a course for the relay".

The engines of the 1.1km vessel slowly growled into life as the helmsman plotted the course towards the relay. The ship, stripped bare to avoid the loss of valuable equipment such as its Shiva nuclear missiles, slowly built up its momentum as the relay drew closer. Hackett walked to the front of the bridge where the pilot sat allowing him full view of the relay. Then 2km from the relay something happened, "Captain! We're getting a message from the relay," the pilot exclaimed shock evident in his voice "It's in binary."

"Well? What is it saying then, hurry!" Hackett snapped, the relay now looming large over the bridge.

"Running it through the AI now, It is asking us to input the mass of the ship," the pilot said, turning to Hackett for orders as he was unsure of what to do.

Hackett paused for a second as his life flashed before his eyes. The consequences of discovering another race as hostile as the covenant was something he hoped humanity would never have to encounter again.

The covenant had breached the ship and civvies were running wild. Despite the chaos, the marines stayed focussed, this is why they had been drilled time and time again to ensure that in crunch time they performed. Several times, he watched groups of marines stay behind to give their charges time to escape. The ultimate sacrifice.

Hands on his pistol he followed the crowd moving towards the escape pods. There! Turing towards the movement he'd seen in his peripheral vision, he heard the sound of active camouflage dissolving and the hiss of an energy blade lighting up with white hot plasma. The Elite in his white armour lunged toward him, people screaming in fear; some marines were in a good enough position that they could open fire onto the elite without hitting any of their comrades. He managed to get off a few shots, the bullets flaring on the Elites shields, before a round managed to pierce its armour spraying purple blood onto the floor but the Elite continued its charge, heedless of its injury.

As the Elite swung its blade upwards he jerked back, causing the blade to miss most of his body, through the tip still managed to slice open his face. Staggering back, he clutched at his face, only to find that the super-heated plasma had cauterised his wound. Locking eyes with the Elite, Hackett stared into its cold, black eyes full of unrelenting rage, before raising his pistol to head height and fires three times, the first two missed, but the third bullet drove into its skull, whipping its head back. He watched unblinkingly as the Elite crumpled to the floor in front of him. Adrenaline still coursing through his veins, he took one last breath before carrying on towards evac zone without looking back...

The memory caused him to touch the scar on his face involuntarily. Shaking himself out of his reverie, he looked at the pilot who was waiting for an answer, "Use the AI to transmit the ships mass to the relay in binary." With a whirl of motion the pilot began taping out the commands on his console.

With the mass of the ship transmitted to the relay the ship changed its course so that its heading was no longer perpendicular to the relay but parallel. As they got closer, blue streams of energy began to fly out of the blue orb, attaching to the ship before disappeared from sight.


UNSC Song of the East – Position Unknown

After a brief second, the ship reappeared only to find itself in a totally different place. The sun in the centre of the system was much larger and shined blue instead of the bright yellow of the pervious system. Hackett stood next to the pilot, momentarily relieved that they had come out of this alive. Turning as he heard footsteps behind him, he saw Morgan Harper walking towards him. He'd been assigned to the ship in order to collect and analyse the data on the ships journey through the relay. Standing a head shorter than Hackett he had to look up in order to make eye contact, "Sir," he began, "I just had the VI run an analysis on the solar system that we've found ourselves in. We've managed to travel thousands of light years across the galaxy in a blink of the eye! Not even the forerunner slipspace portals could do that! I can't imagine the technology required to achieve a feat like this, it's outstanding!" the tiny scientist exclaimed joyfully, nearly stumbling over his words his excitement "if we could reverse engineer this technology, we could travel from Earth to our Outer Colonies in mere seconds! That would cut days off of the usual time. And just think of the improvements it could make to our fast response system! We cou..."

Hackett cut him off midsentence, "Have you sent a message to the fleet yet?"

"Er, yes sir, as soon as we arrived we dropped a slipspace beacon, the message is travelling via slipspace as we speak."

"Good," Hackett replied turning to the intercom "Crew this is your captain speaking, we are in unfamiliar territory and have travelled through technology that has been created by forces unknown so I want to maintain maximum awareness. Check and double check everything and get those MAC cannons running hot just in case, Hackett out."

The Song of the East was bustling with activity, having recently moved to the dark side of a nearby gas giant in order to maintain a discrete presence in the system while waiting for the Infinity and the rest of the fleet to arrive. Hackett stood watch over the bridge, though he made frequent trips down to engineering to help maintain the morale of his crew. The possibility of running into a new Covenant alone had everyone on edge.

The sound of an ensign manning one of the computers standing up caught his attention, causing him to turn towards the source of the sound. "Captain, they're arriving".

"Bring us into view of the relay and make sure the crew can witness the arrival of the fleet. " The ships engine screamed into life, breaking off its orbit of the gas giant until the relay was in clear sight.

Suddenly the relay began spinning up, its blue core flaring brightly as ship after ship began pouring through the relay led by the UNSC Infinity, proof of the UNSC's power and grandeur. The 5km long vessel was beautiful in design and above all else, the most powerful ship that the UNSC had to offer. Dozens of ships had now arrived through the relay and begun forming a defensive position around it; it was an awe-inspiring sight. Hackett stared admiringly at the fleet moving toward his lone ship for a second before turning to his communication officer. "Ensign, patch me into to the Infinity, the mission was a success and there is no sign of any aliens."

January 17th 2666

The UNSC maintained a sizeable fleet around both relays for a short while, but after intense examination it became clear that little information could be extracted from the relays. Whoever built them made sure that no information detailing their production or their creators could be found. Eventually they became non-starters and ships started withdrawing as more important missions came up. Exploratory vessels were put on the lookout for these relays but the chances of more being found were small.

Then after recent small pitched battles between the Coalition and the remainder of the Covenant Loyalists, the UNSC agreed to assist in the final battle, hoping to wipe out all of the Covenant Loyalists leaving the UNSC and Coalition with one less enemy. Nearly all of the ships guarding the relay had been drawn into the battle. All that is left is a scientific research vessel and 4 Frigates. All of these ships had been chosen to be left behind because they were due to be dismantled in the upcoming months, as new vessels with reversed-engineered forerunner technology were came online.


Aboard the UNSC Frigate Aegis Fate

"Why do we always get the dud assignments?" sighed Jessica, a tall marine with jet black hair, clad in her BDU's as if ready for combat, "Now we're stuck here babysitting the boffins as they inspect the relay."

"Haha," replied Mark a heavy set marine who had been in the force 10 years. "At first I was excited at the prospect of travelling to the outer reaches of UNSC space, guarding scientists investigating an ancient relic from an unknown species, I thought we may get to see some combat not watching the dust grow on our weapons."

"Yeah well," Jessica replied scrunching up some paper left lying in the room "At least we get some downtime, Swish!" she says throwing the paper across the room and into the bin. And that's when the missile struck...