Samus walked in, almost as if on cue. Behind her stood two Choujin wearing metallic colored robes. And two holograms, flecks of lights orbiting their heads. One was female, algorithms running along her purple form. She had short hair that came down to her shoulders. The other was comprised of green light. He had short hair that was slicked back. John could make out the insignia of a captain on his shoulder. Beneath the both of them were two pads that hovered a few inches above the ground. They projected their images to nearly human proportions.
The female glided over to the Master Chief. "Ah, you seem to be in working order. Their engineers say that it will be a few hours before they are finished with repairs to your suits."
"Exactly, while you're waiting, you can access nearly any part of the structure that you want to. You can even go to the surface if you feel like it. You will be provided with a temporary data pad, it will alert you when your suits have been repaired."
She waved them out, they watched her, one of them spoke up. The Master Chief recognized her as Saundra, "Can I ask a question?"
"Sure."
"How come these suits have numbers on them?" She waved down to the number sketched in white over her heart, 015, her Spartan number.
Samus stared inquisitively at the number, then noticed it was the same for each of them, "That is where your name should be. No matter. Anything else?" Samus sensed still unabated curiosity from her.
"Yes, why do we all have different colors?"
"The color scheme is supposed to best fit you. The information can be added to your data pads for you to read at your leisure. Anything more?"
"No."
Samus stood at the edge of the door and gracefully gestured the hallway beyond the frame. "Then you may leave."
Cortana looked around at the wary Spartans and left, beckoning them to follow. The Master Chief stood resolutely in his spot.
Samus shook her head recognizing why, "I've already told them." She gestured to a small table hidden by a wall, the holographic curtains barely peeking out from behind the edge. "They decided it best to directly transport her. They'll let you know when she's conscious."
The Master Chief nodded, he was not going to have any of his squad forgotten. He followed Cortana with little other reason to stay. The rest of the Spartans followed. One of the Choujin that had come with Samus followed the nineteen Spartans who left the room, albeit reluctantly. The male hologram, and the other engineer remained.
The Choujin had a quick conversation in their native tongue. Then one of them led Samus to one of the beds at the far end, this one had quite a bit more machinery then any of the others. It also had been the only one unused by the Spartans aside from the one Linda currently occupied.
The Master Chief stood looking at the Spartans, his Spartans. They had been left with the promised data pads, the Choujinese scripts handily translated to their own language. They all stood at a laid back attention. He had finally gotten the story of what had happened on Reach from them and was amazed that so many of them had survived the landing.
"You can wander around if you want to. But I want you to travel in pairs. We'll trust them for now, but there's no point in making ourselves extra vulnerable." A big group would be too dangerous and too much of a target, but loners were easily picked off, although they seemed friendly, the Chief didn't quite trust these people quite yet. He nodded his head, "Dismissed."
"Master Chief sir, I don't mean to point out the obvious, but there is an odd number, sir."
The Master Chief looked at the speaker, Spartan 142 Alapison. "I know, I'll go with Cortana. Dismissed." This time he said it with some more force, waited for them to all leave, and then left as well, Cortana trailing behind him.
"Well, I don't know why you didn't make a group of three. I won't be much help in a sneak attack, although I doubt it. I had a moment while I was being transferred to this holo-pad to gather some information. It appears the Choujin are interested in peace, from what I got."
"And how could you know that? English isn't their first language."
"I spent most of the time getting a translation software." She stated simply, "This language is intriguing."
"Can you translate what they said earlier?"
Cortana pulsed blue for a moment, "It only works on their scripts, it's a series of symbols, I wouldn't know where to begin unless I could get access to their computers again."
He made his way back through the complex to the room they had first entered. Now it was eerily silent, and empty. He walked through and both sets of doors opened for him.
He breathed the air; it felt good, fresh. He then decided to wander around near the entrance, so he wouldn't stray too far.
A few minutes later another person walked through the doors; she looked around and stretched. She was not one of the Spartans, but another human entirely. She wore a jumpsuit similar to theirs, however. The formfitting blue cloth moving around her almost like a second skin. Pink geometric figures raced along her spine, a diamond settled between her shoulder blades. Where the Spartans had numbers, there was a small amount of Choujinese script, presumably her name.
She wandered through the surrounding area, the Choujin she encountered quickly moving out of her away. She wanted to laugh at the irony of it all. The last time she had seen these Choujin, they had almost looked down at her. Now they viewed her with awe and revere almost like she was an elder herself, yet the elders were still above her.
When she reached the outskirts she noticed a small stone tablet. Interesting, she had never seen that before. She moved with fluid grace to the tablet and looked it over. Engraved in the stone was script describing one person, below the writing was a human that she recognized instantly. She closed her eyes and sighed, a severe anger welling up inside of her. There was no use weeping for the dead, so emotions like that had left her, but still, she would see to it that Ridley paid dearly for what he had done. She clenched her fist, then let it fall limp, forcing the anger to the back of her mind.
"Is there something wrong, Lady?" The green AI called out to her, floating his way to her.
She turned and smiled faintly at the AI, "No, nothing, Adam." She swiped the back of her hand against the standing stone, over the figure. Then she brushed blonde strands of hair out of her eyes and swept them behind her left ear, longer rebels that weren't in the high ponytail she kept clumped together and framed her Japanese features.
The AI looked over at tablet after she had left, the human image was a likeness of him. He paused for a second wondering why he had a grave on a Choujin inhabited world, especially one like that. Interesting, he'd have to look into that.
A movement caught his interest and he noticed the Chief and Cortana moving in the direction Lady had gone. He followed.
The other Spartans wandered around the area casually. Two of them, 134-Latisha and 044-Anton, traversed a bit further from the area above the ground that the others had decided to stick to. A small path that led to a cliff had caught their interest. The path was worn, but well kept. In a few minutes they came to an area full of the grave tablets that the human had come across, although each of them had one Choujin per tablet, instead of humans. They didn't understand the scripts, but they figured that this had to be a grave of some sort. The both of them were about to leave when they noticed something strange. Quietly they moved to get a better look at the strange glow that was forming.
The Master Chief spotted the human and tried to figure out who she was. She wasn't one of his Spartans, that was for sure. Still, she appeared to be human from the back, she wasn't Choujin, and that was what confused him the most. She turned around, blue eyes glinting slightly. He recognized her face, it was tantalizingly familiar, but he just couldn't place it.
"One of the guests." She said aloud, to no one in particular, "How are you?" She offered him a quick bow, like the one Samus had given the Choujinese medics. That fluid motion was familiar as well, different from how the natives here did it. He shrugged it off; he'd have time to figure it out later.
"Good." He said simply.
She nodded and looked pointedly at the numbers on his chest, "Do you have an actual name, or are you just a number, one-one-seven?"
Her left wrist spasmed slightly, she felt something electric pulsing in it. She looked up at the Master Chief apologetically and pressed at the side of her wrist, under her skin. A short conversation was held inside her mind, while that was going on, she looked distantly up into the sky.
‹Honored Elder?›
‹Hatchling, we have discovered something most perturbing. Please come to the science dome, with the one they call 117.›
‹As you say, Honored Elder.› She turned to face the Master Chief, "Please, follow me. The Honored Elders wish to speak with you."
The Master Chief was vaguely relieved, it seemed as though she had forgotten about her earlier inquiry. He followed about a meter behind the Japanese woman, and thought. She was too tall, over six feet. He had never seen a human female naturally reach that height. The way she walked, familiar. A fluid grace, it was...that was it. She walked, moved, and spoke in the same manner as Aran.
However, for everyone one question one could answer, two more popped up. This was the case for the Chief. But if that was the Hunter, how come she was so familiar with these people? And why did they call her Newborn? Actually, he had been wondering that for a while, but now these questions were more prominent in his mind with that one question answered.