AN: The last section of this felt like typing practice, not writing. Ah, well. Enjoy-and I you don't review I will destroy you. Bwahaha
"Are we there yet?" Jack asked over his cards. Sheila sighed.
"Nope," Jorge sighed. "Crap. I fold,"
He set his cards down. Jack grinned.
"Well, that's good, 'cause all I had was a pair of aces," Jack set his cards down, and Jorge grimaced.
"You just have to completely control your every expression-everything that can give away your bluff," Jack said.
"Yeah, yeah," Jorge muttered. Sheila grinned wickedly as she laid down a three of a kind.
"See, she's learning," Jack muttered conspiratorially. "Are we there yet?"
With Dr. Halsey's 'loose ends' tied up, the Commonwealth had been on a two-week slipspace voyage to Damascus Materials Testing Facility, in the Chi Ceti system. Jack had been fairly stressed out in the beginning of the trip-the first encounter with the Covenant. Sam's death. But as boredom settled in, Jack relaxed. He could handle the situation when it came, but worrying pointlessly would accomplish nothing.
"We should be arriving any minute," Li said as he stared at the crap hand he'd folded a few minutes ago.
"But we aren't there?" Jack said.
"No,"
"Damn," He said.
Most of the Spartans were loitering here in the Commonwealth's bunkroom. Playing cards, reading, exercising-Sam was sparring with Kelly, Sam toning down his strength, and Kelly her speed, to make it more even. Jack dealt a new hand to everyone.
The viewscreen that John was sitting next to clicked on, showing Chi Ceti's sun. While Jack had read the books, it didn't click until the intercom spoke:
"Spartan-117, report to the bridge immediately," Dr. Halsey's voice said.
Oh, crap! Jack's pulse raced.
"Now we're here," Jorge said with a smile.
John pressed a button on the intercom.
"Yes, ma'am," He turned to Sam, "Get everyone ready, in case we're needed. On the double,"
"Affirmative. You heard the Petty Officer. Dog those cards. Get into uniform, soldier!" Sam hollered in a good drill-sergeant voice. A month ago Jack would have been pretty annoyed with getting shouted at, but he understood now.
"Good timing. My hand sucked," Sheila said as Jorge swept them all into a container.
Jack averted his eyes-particularly from Sheila-as everyone stripped to their underwear and put on their ODST BDUs. They strapped on sidearms, grabbed grenades, and kept their rifles ready. Then-nothing. It was typical military-hurry up and wait. Jack's foot tapped against the floor. Li sat crosslegged. Jorge and Sheila paced.
The intercom said with John's voice:"Sam, muster the squad in Bay Alpha. I want that pelican loaded and ready for drop in fifteen minutes,"
"We'll have it done in ten," Sam said back. "Faster if those Longsword intercepter pilots get out of our way,"
Everyone was ready to go-they grabbed ammo crates, medical packs, fuel for the pelican, and everything else that could be useful.
Jack, in a moment of clarity, grabbed a container of vacuum seals. They were sticky, flexible sheets that, when properly applied, could hold against vacuum for up to an hour. No one else grabbed any, for some reason. Maybe they didn't think they would be worth it-they grabbed obviously useful things, like rations and BDU repair kits.
By doing this, I'm probably going to save Sam's life, Jack thought. Jack wondered if he had any right to change the storyline-then he grabbed another vacuum seal container.
It's complete and utter crap that Sam is supposed to die here, Jack thought. I'm not going to let it happen.
In a long line, Spartans sprinted through the cramped corridors of the Commonwealth. Dodging beams, rafters, plasma conduits, and power lines, they ran faster than Olympic athletes could run with a clear path.
They finally got to Bay Alpha. It held a dozen Longswords and three pelicans. One was specially designated for the Spartans-it had lighter armor and bigger engines, as well as a light layer of stealth coating.
They were loading it up with supplies-not in the crew compartment, or the cockpit, but in flush, small sections lining the sides of the pelican. Jack had never seen them before in the games; they reminded him of the sections on the sides of school buses, where students sometimes put their heavier stuff, like their instruments if they were in band.
Jack was just shaking off the memory from home when the collision alarm sounded. Everyone dropped what they were doing and held on to something sturdy. Nothing happened. Then a chaotic series of small, resounding thumps.
Pulse lasers-oh my God, Jack thought, the battle is happening right now!
A different series of thumps-ordered this time. Sequenced. The Commonwealth was firing Archer missiles. Jack stumbled and felt a sense of vertigo-the ship had cut engines and spun around, tracking the Covenant ship.
"Go, go, go!" Sam hollered as more pulse lasers pounded the Commonwealth. The Spartans packed the pelican double-time.
Jack's feet slipped and he fell to the deck as a sound like a million lightning strikes at once sounded in the ship-and the floor flew five feet to the side. The Commonwealth had fired a MAC round. They were less than fifty feet from the gun-Jack's head hurt from the noise.
The last of the supplies were loaded up-it was all the Spartans could do but hang on as another MAC round fired. Immediately after the mini-earthquake, Jack jumped over to Sheila.
"You ok?" He asked. She hung on the side of the pelican with a look of pure terror on her face. Jack joined her-grabbed her hand. She clenched so hard if felt like his bones were breaking.
"We'll be alright!" Jack yelled. Jack racked his brain. What happened after the second MAC hit?
Oh my G-
The ship jolted twenty feet to the left-pressing Jack and Sheila hard to the pelican, which was nearly torn free of its lock on the deck. Plasma impact. Air rushed out of a hallway-Jack's ears popped-the door automatically slammed shut and sealed. Fifty feet away, the part of the MAC that was visible was fine-but a hundred feet farther along the gun, there was nothing but molten metal.
The intercom crackled to life.
"Longsword Squadron Delta, this is the Captain. Get your ships in the black, boys, and engage the enemy ship. I need you to buy us some time," The Longsword pilots without broken limbs got up. One of them got to the intercom.
"Roger that, sir. We're ready to launch. On our way,"
The Spartans watched as eight of the dozen Longsword pilots stumbled back to their birds and took off. Jack knew none of them would make it back. He squeezed Sheila's hand.
If he remembered the story right, then the battle was over-for now.
Sheila looked almost as embarrassed as Jack-both red in the face, with Jorge and Li standing between them. Jack shook off the feelings that came over him in the heat of the moment. They were stupid, and nothing could ever happen between them. He felt very stupid.
He tried to distract himself by wondering how he'd missed this-he'd read the book, but didn't remember the Spartans going down an elevator for fifteen minutes. They were all crammed into the small elevator, going who knew how far into Chi Ceti 4.
Finally, the doors opened to show a large room. In the center, three techs and at least a dozen AIs were working. Halsey cleared her throat-the AIs vanished and the techs turned around.
Jack felt like he was in nerd heaven right then. Because, at that moment, he noticed the scores of mannequins-on each of them was a beautiful, pristine, absolutely nergasmicly awesome suit of MJOLNIR Mark IV armor. Green, luminescent armor plating covered a layer of matte black undersuit.
Gold visors and thick plating-thicker than in the Mark V, because these armored exo-suits didn't come equipped with shields.
"Project MJOLNIR," Halsey said. "The armor's shell is a multilayer alloy of remarkable strength. We recently added a refractive coating to disperse incoming energy weapon attacks-to counter our new enemies. Each battlesuit also has a gel-filled layer to regulate temperature; this layer can reactively change in density. Against the skin of the operator, there is a moisture-absorbing cloth suit, and the biomonitors that constantly adjust the suit's temperature and fit. There's also an onboard computer that interfaces with your standard-issue neural implant,"
Made of ninety-nine percent fifty-carat industrial-strength awesome! Jack thought gleefully to himself.
Halsey gestured, and the schematic collapsed so that it only displayed the outer layers. Jack saw a lot of complicated electronic things that he didn't recognize-but he knew the big thing in the backpack was a mini fusion reactor.
"Most importantly, the armor's inner structure is composed of a new reactive liquid metal crystal. It is amorphous, yet fractally scales and amplifies force. In simplified terms, the armor doubles the wearer's strength, and enhanced the reaction speed of a normal human by a factor of five,"
"There is one problem, however. This system is so reactive that our previous tests with unaugmented volunteers ended in… failure,"
She nodded to a technician.
The hologram vanished, and was replaced with a flat video. It showed a marine being suited up in the Mark IV. "Power it on," Some guy said. "Move your right arm, please,"
The arm moved blurringly fast-and shattered. The marine shuddered and screamed, convulsed-every movement brought the sound of cracking bones. His own pain-induced movements were tearing him apart.
"Normal humans don't have the reaction time or strength to drive this system. You do. Your enhanced musculature and the metal and ceramic layers that have been bonded to your skeleton should be enough to allow you to harness the armor's power. There has been… insufficient computer modeling, however. There will be some risk. You'll have to move very slowly and deliberately until you get a feel for the armor and how it works. It cannot be powered down, nor can the response be scaled back. Do you understand?"
"Yes, ma'am," Everyone said.
"Questions?"
John raised a hand. "When do we get to try them, Doctor?"
"Right now. Volunteers?"
Jack's hand was the first hand up-almost before she'd asked for volunteers. Halsey smiled.
"Alright, Jack, since you seem so eager,"
Jack blinked. Of course he wanted to try it… but before everyone else? He cautiously stepped forward. The three techs carted over a large suit of MJOLNIR, and Jack's pulse spiked as he stepped out of his BDUs, and he saw Sheila avert her eyes. The techs began removing pieces of the armor-the green plates would go on last, so they went on a nearby table. One tech stuck a front section of the left ankle on Jack's left ankle while another put on the back section. They linked the two parts, and at that moment Jack's fear evaporated. Matte-black pieces were put on, linked to the whole, and in a few minutes, Jack had the full undersuit on. It was heavier than the entire ODST suit, but it was very flexible. It didn't limit his range of motion.
The plates were much heavier. Each one weighed a couple dozen pounds, and Jack was struggling to stand upright under the heavy armor until the last piece clicked in.
"Breathe normally, but otherwise be completely still," Halsey said. A tech turned the suit on.
The weight vanished. The underlayer warmed, cooled, then matched his body temperature. A tech put on the helmet.
Oh my God.
It was almost exactly like Halo: Combat Evolved. Motion sensor, targeting reticule, health monitor-the only noticeable difference was the absence of a shield indicator. It was like he was playing Halo with the TV filling in his entire vision. It was incredible.
"Everyone move back," Halsey said.
They shuffled back, wide-eyed.
"Listen carefully, Jack," Dr. Halsey said. "I want you to think, and only think, about moving your arm up to chest level. Stay relaxed,"
Jack took a deep breath, and was glad to see the armor wasn't so tight that it constricted him. Then he focused-and his arm sprang up so fast that it seemed to appear in front of him out of nowhere.
"Holy sheepshit batman," Jack whispered.
The Spartans gasped, and Sam clapped his hands.
Jack just blinked.
Halsey started to slowly teach Jack how to go through the motions, gradually making the movements more and more complex.
Jack found himself grinning like an idiot as he ran through an obstacle course, while everyone else suited up. He punched concrete blocks, making gravel. He threw knives, jumped over a ten-foot wall. He hefted a weight that was nearly as heavy as a warthog. He dodged machine gun fire, or just let rounds bounce off.
Jack felt like an expert as he coached the rest of Gold Team on the suits. He didn't sound anything but enthusiastic to Sheila, despite the whole holding-hands thing.
"Spartans, so far, so good," Halsey said over the speakers. "If anyone is experiencing with the suit or its controls, please report in,"
"I think I'm in love," Sam said.
"You aren't the only one!" Jack easily did a backflip. It was amazing how great these suits were.
"This is how we'll kick the Covenant's ass," Sheila said. "This is it!"
"Do we get to keep them?" John said.
"You're the only ones who can use them, Petty Officer. Who else could we give them to? We-one moment, please," A tech handed her a headset.
"Report, Captain,"
"We have contact with the Covenant ship, ma'am. Extreme range. Their slipspace engines must still be damaged. They are moving towards us via normal space,"
"You're repair status?" She asked worriedly.
"Long-range communications inoperable. Slipstream generators offline. MAC system destroyed. We have two fusion warheads and twenty Archer missile pods intact. Armor plating is at twenty percent," Static hissed. "If you need more time… I can try to draw them away,"
"No, Captain," Halsey looked over the Spartans. "We're going to have to fight them… and this time we have to win,"