Chapter 7: Caelum One

Beta Read By: Trusty McGoodGuy


The second Locus landed on this rock, he knew he was going to end up getting more than he asked for, but this whole situation was just downright bizarre and ridiculous.

Within the course of a single week, he had been in at least four combat engagements, discovered an entirely new species called 'faunas,' had this 'aura' power unlocked from inside of him, and been captured by what appeared to be the most advanced military on this planet.

And all of this was because of the decision of an alien A.I.

"Obviously enough, I have many questions for you." Ironwood commented, interrupting Locus' train of thought.

Before the mercenary could respond, Ironwood swirled through a cluster of holographic locks and keypads. A dull screech of metal against metal could be heard immediately after.

"You'll need to wait out here, Winter." Ironwood said.

"Yes, sir." The operative replied, diligently.

As the two entered the darkened vault, the clicks of old, rusted-out lights could be heard. Dim, yellow light flowed throughout the long-forgotten room, accompanied by the annoying buzz of electricity.

"As hard to believe as it still is, literally everything we have on you tells me that you are not indeed of this planet. Therefore, I believe that it wouldn't be beyond reason to show you everything Atlas currently owns in terms of a space program." Ironwood began.

The vault itself was enormous, revealing what appeared to be an old, rusted-out crew capsule for a primitive spacecraft by UNSC standards. The room was decked with aged scientific equipment that looked like it belonged in a museum. There was one thing that caught Locus' eye, however.

The armor.

A feeling of deja-vu crept over Locus. He had seen this armor before, but he couldn't quite put his finger on where. It looked to be standard UNSC operative armor, though it was much more worn down.

There were some minor differences between his armor and this one. This armor was dented, cracked, and burned in some areas, and the helmet was missing. The paint scheme was so dull that it had all but faded away with time.

"Look familiar?" Ironwood prodded.

"Where did you get this?" Locus questioned.

"That's classified. What matters is whether you recognize it or not." The general shot back, changing the subject.

"It looks to be of UNSC make. I can't be sure who this belonged to, though." Locus answered.

"You can answer that later. For now, there's is something more important that I need you to see, or rather hear." Ironwood responded, strolling over to what seemed to be communications equipment. Locus couldn't be sure due to the fact that it was so strangely primitive compared to the rest of the equipment he had seen.

"I want you to listen to this, and I want you to listen very carefully." Ironwood ordered, pressing his finger down on the play button of an ancient tape recorder. As the tape began to play, two voices could be heard.

"Atlas control, this is Caelum 1. We have now entered the exosphere. Awaiting command, over."

"Roger Caelum, switch to manual control for the thrusters."

"Switching now."

"Activate thrusters 2,3, and 6."

"Activating…"

Suddenly, a feminine voice from the spacecraft's end popped up, interrupting the conversation. "Sir, I'm picking up a signal on the external scanners. It's consistent, likely extraterrestrial."

Both officers on the end of the line were in shocked silence. An extraterrestrial signal could only mean one thing.

Alien life.

Without warning, a deafening roar of static could be heard from the spacecraft. Electronics could be heard powering down whilst the crew was in a frenzy, frantically trying to figure what happened.

"Caelum 1, report. What's going on?" The ground control officer questioned.

After a small bout of distorted chatter in the background, likely the captain commanding his crew, the second voice came back on the line.

"I don't know! All the ship's controls just suddenly stopped working! Main thrusters are offline, and we're losing altitude quickly. Permission to switch to auxiliary thrusters, over." The would-be astronaut replied through the static filled receiver.

"Granted. Prep the chutes. If you fall below 30,000 feet, hit the parachute release." Ground control commanded.

"Prepping chutes now. Switching to auxiliary thrusters, now. Altitude is 110,000 feet and falling.

A long and tense silence filled the line as the crew capsule descended from 110,000 feet to 50,000.

Suddenly, the array of electronics that had lost power earlier in the flight could be heard powering up back to life.

"Atlas control, we have power again. We're just about at 30,000 feet, releasing chutes, over."

"Sigh...copy that, Caelum 1. Mission failed."

CLICK

A hollow silence filled the vault as Ironwood took out the tape and put it back on the table.

"That mission was four decades ago, and it was the first of only three spacecraft we sent up. The other two missions happened exactly the same way, except they didn't hear the signal. As for the crew who picked up the signal, they were sworn to never talk about it to anyone." Ironwood revealed in a monotone.

"If you're asking me if I created that signal-" Locus began.

"I'm not." The Atlesian interrupted. "I'm simply asking whether or not you know anything at all about this signal."

"...No…" Locus responded.

"Then I trust that you will keep it confidential as to what you've heard here?" Ironwood inquired.

"Of course." Locus assured.

"Good. Since you don't know anything about the Caelum 1 signal, we'll move on." Ironwood replied, marching over to the vault control panel, closely flanked by Locus.

"Where are we going now?" The former charon operator questioned as he tapped his foot in anticipation.

"Your appearance at this time was not the most auspicious thing we could have asked for. However, since you downloaded that data, things have become much more...complicated." Ironwood explained.

"We?" Locus briefly interrupted.

"Even if you are telling us the truth when you say you have not stolen that information, we can't be 100% sure that you didn't read any of that information before it was deleted." Ironwood continued.

"Where are you going with this?" Locus asked, suspicious.

"Just giving you a warning. If you have read it, you can either come clean right here and now, or you end up right back in that cell." Ironwood shot back.

"I did not read that information." The mercenary replied sternly.

"...For your sake, you'd better not be lying to me. Dismissed." The general concluded.

And just as soon as one Atlesian had stalked off, another one found herself in Locus' presence.

"The rest of your equipment is being held in the contraband room. Report to the briefing room in 15 minutes. Dismissed." Winter commanded in her usual cold, indifferent tone.

No response was given from the mercenary, it wasn't necessary. Locus turned to follow the directions leading to the contraband room which his equipment was being held in.

After retrieving and equipping his recovered armor and weaponry, the mercenary proceeded to the briefing room.

The second he opened the door, Winter was overlooking him as if he were some street thug about to attack her.

"Is something wrong?" Locus wondered.

"Oh wonderful. Your bio says that you're occupation is being a mercenary. As if we didn't already have enough of those on base." Schnee shot back, annoyed.

"I wasn't brought here on my own will." Locus pointed out logically.

"Well...I suppose you have a point." Winter said reluctantly.

She continued as she slapped a paper down onto her desk. "Your first mission will be overseen by a huntsman by the name of...let's see here…." The Atlesian began, flipping through the pages.

Stopping on one page and pulling it out from the rest, her expression fell as she looked the piece of intel over.

"Oh dear...I almost feel sorry for you." Winter responded, concerned.

"What is it?" The merc questioned, impatient.

Worry tinged her words as she spoke. "It seems that you have the misfortune of being paired with a huntsman infamous for his lack of discipline. Qrow."

"Wonderful." Locus replied in sardonic tone.

A moment of silence was the only thing hanging in the air before the Atlesian continued dejectedly. "Report to logistics for re-assignment, that is all", was all she replied with before turning back to her work.

As he walked away from his new C.O., Locus found the hallway to be crowded with all sorts of personnel. From soldiers to scientists, all scurrying about to complete their own objectives.

Suddenly, all activity stopped as the Atlesians in the hallway noticed Locus. Unnerved, Locus continued to walk through, bumping into so of the people along the way.

Right now the mercenary wanted nothing more in the way of conversation, and kept to himself as he followed the signs glinting in the artificial light.

Locus continued to follow sign after sign…

Again

And again

And again

Until the ex-charon operator realized that he was, in fact, lost.

"Um...excuse me, you're that new guy on base, right. I think you're lost." A young feminine voice questioned from behind him.

And apparently this fact was not lost on the people around him.

"What do you mean by that?" Locus responded monotonically.

Immediately, the young scientist became timid, pushing in her glass nervously. "I'm sorry. I don't mean to be rude, it's just that you passed logistics twice now. You go down the hall, take a left, then right, then you're there." She pointed out helpfully.

Locus was about to give thanks to the scientist when he realized something.

"Wait...how did you know I was heading to logistics?" The mercenary interrogated as he instinctively tensed up in a defensive posture.

"P-Pershing told me…" She replied anxiously.

Locus had just realized that both he and Pershing were assigned to Logistics at the moment. The first thought that crossed the merc's mind is that he should have a "talk" with the faunas.

At least that was the idea before he realized he couldn't.

"Look, I don't know what the specifics of what happened between you two. Most of us don't. What we do know is that he screwed you over." She mentioned, as if reading Locus' mind.

"And?"

"What I'm trying to say is...don't start anything bad with Pershing. Please?" She pleaded.

"...Why?" Locus decided, realizing that effort would be wasted.

"Pershing and I are...friends, I guess you could say. I know him well, sure he's not the best on following protocol and the like, but he is a good person. He only shot you while you were down because he was under orders, not for some sick pleasure." The scientist testified.

"...Alright." Was the mercenary's response after a considerate pause. 'Friends', he didn't believe it was just that for a second.

"Thank you. Now how about I show you the way to Logistics so you remember in the future." The scientist said as she began walking down the brick and metal hallway.

"Right." The operator agreed, following after her.

As Locus was shadowing the Atlesian, he noticed that the architecture here was vastly different from the other places he had seen on this planet. Everything here was made of hard metal, instead of the decorative stone he'd seen in places like the city.

A vast armory of various weapons passed Locus. Blinding artificial light flooded his vision as his metallic boots collided with the concrete floor. There it was. Through the crystal clear window, Locus could see a room with a full spread of CPU's and monitors, all being operated by one person or another.

"We're here." She pointed out.

The mercenary only nodded to the scientist before he headed inside. The second he stepped through the creaky wooden door, a new person was already speaking to him.

An older man instantly approached Locus, his circular glasses, bald head, and green uniform giving away the fact that he was a logistics officer. "Ah hello there Mr…..Locus. You must be one of those hired guns the ASTF is so fond of"

"The ASTF?" The alien asked.

"Atlesian Special Task Force. You know, the guys who kidnapped you." The L.O. replied nonchalantly as he continued. "Ah that reminds me! You're here for re-assignment. Here take this." He remembered, handing the operator a keycard, as well as some papers.

"What-"

"What are these? What you're carrying is a keycard to hangar 4, where a bullhead, as well as anyone else who will be accompanying you, will be waiting there. Since you're new here, I also took the time to print out a map of the base. Minus the classified parts of course." The logistics officer explained.

"...Do you have any idea of what I'll be doing in my assignment?" Locus replied, slightly hesitant.

Pulling out a small slip of paper, the L.O. quickly skimmed through it before responding "Ummm no. It says here that whoever you're meeting on the bullhead with brief you on the way. Must be some hush-hush classified stuff."

"Thank you." Locus responded as he turned to leave.

"Yeah yeah. Good luck on not dying." The L.O. shot back as the mercenary strolled out the door.

Oh ho ho my sweet BUHJESUWE-ARR. (Pronounced buh-gee-zoo-we-are)

I haven't checked yet, but we are either extremely close, or have already passed the amount of follows and favorites of my old version of this story.

Thanks guys.

Also you guys might be wondering

"Oh my Jesus, Writen. Why in the Christ haven't you updated in 72 generations?"

Freshman year. High school. 'Nuff said.

Seeya next time

-Writen