Scene Ten; Treacherous Repercussions

The end of the corridor opened up into a broad chamber surrounding the main battery core of the super carrier. Engineers worked busily on the various parts and pieces of the mechanism, disassembling and reassembling as they saw fit, maintaining the working order. Watching a pair go past, a large Unggoy sat with arms crossed on top of one of the bigger support beams. He could see a lot of the bay from there, and it kept him out of reach of any Jiralhanae who happened in. What he didn't see, though, was the other end of the blade who's point suddenly thrust out from behind his throat and into the air beyond.

The grunt gurgled quietly before tumbling forward, landing with a hard smack on the floor right in front of a passing Engineer. Nonplussed, the creature just scooped the body aside and continued on past, uncaring that the Unggoy hadn't died of natural causes.

Watching the Engineer depart, the grunt's killer slipped quietly from the perch down to the floor, and quickly scampered across it. At the center of the room, a detonator catalyst was placed and activated. Right as they turned to depart, a Brute stepped through the door, armed as though expecting to see unwanted company. There was nothing to see, though, not when the company slipped around the Jiralhanae guard like a zephyr of air and out the door. Moments later, a cloaked craft detached from the hull, and made wake for distance from the super carrier.

A heartbeat passed, and the pilot turned to look as the carrier's rear segment imploded as the hull around the area blew outwards, burning into the engine compartment as the singularity generator consumed the craft from the inside. A faint smile appeared on the Sangheili's face as she turned to the comn.

"Hey, Ace! It works."

"That's great, Kitty… what did you use it on?"

"I found this stationary carrier… it was just monkeys and their ilk, I figured no one would mind if I did your test there." EvilKitty told him, adjusting some of the equipment.

"And did you take readings, this time? I'm running out of those things, you know, and I still haven't got any decent description on their function.

Kitty grinned, crossing her arms over her armored chest. "Yeah, this time I remembered to have the scanners on before I set it off. Say… when do I get to test one of these babies on a planet?"

Uh… never?"

She pouted. "Aw, come on! They're so fun!"

"EvilKitty, you have more brains than you betray. Think about it a moment. What happens to each ship you hit with these devices? Do you really want to start erasing whole planets in the same manner? This is touchy science as it is."

She sighed. "Alright, alright." She watched as the last of the ship disappeared, the last little flicker of burning atmosphere and vaporized hull slipping away into a lightly sparkling anomaly that had formed in the middle of where the super cruiser had once been. "Well, that was the last one you gave me, and now I have the readings you wanted. Now what do I do? I'm bored out here."

"No one can get bored quite as fast as you can, EvilKitty… it's a singular talent of yours. Let me look through my notes and see what is in your area." Something ruffled in the background, so Kitty drummed her claws on the comn. "Augh! Don't do that, yeesh. Well, I have a remnant of a scan from somewhere spinward of your location. You want to check that out?"

Kitty shrugged. "Sure, why not. What is it?"

"It's a planet with Forerunner stuff embedded all over it. There was a really little energy signature on the surface somewhere on the southeastern hemisphere that I thought I might check out someday when I didn't have so much else to do. You know I'm still working on that weapons' permutation for Warbirds."

Kitty made a purr noise, as she steered her craft along the course plotted through the data she'd just been sent.

Acetylcholine blew a tired sigh at her for it. "You're sure you're up to handling possible Flood containment facilities? Some of them are so old they aren't contained anymore."

"Sure, no problem. As long as it isn't a Gravemind or a genuine infestation, which I doubt, considering it hasn't made any news that a whole colony went missing. They got to have people to turn into food in order to have combat forms, you know. And a real army means a whole lot of people got et."

"Yes, EvilKitty… as if I couldn't have figured that out on my own."

She giggled happily. "See! I'm not totally lost on the science stuff."

He just sighed.

"What's our last known updated member count, do you know?" EvilKitty asked, after a moment of silence in which she fully expected he'd cut the transmission but he didn't.

"Um. A hundred fifty one. That's a rough guess… I only glanced at it."

"So that's all that have come back or all that we know the locations of, or what?"

"Well… I do know that directly following her promotion Aardvark left. She's out there somewhere just like you."

EvilKitty got quiet for a moment, speculative, wondering what, if anything, she would say to her fellow should the past ever be brought up between them. There really was no justification for attacking Aardvark's honor in an attempt to wound Lone, but the words had been spoken before Kitty had realized her cross-wired brain had just damaged a friendship she hadn't meant to harm at all.

"Hello? You still there?" Ace asked.

"Yeah, I'm still there." EvilKitty mumbled, all the tone and inflection gone from her voice. "If I recall correctly, didn't the Admiral tell her not to leave the base until further notice? Because she'd been recently fitted with a new arm, and stuff?"

"Those were her standing orders, yes, but between you and me, who here has ever known a day when that female ever really followed orders? She gets the job done, don't get me wrong, but she does everything her own way. Makes at least one person mad every day. I'm sure today is the Admiral's day. Or tomorrow, depending on how long it takes him to realize she's gone… he's not slow, but he is elsewhere and last I looked, rather dead-set on some task I didn't catch. I heard there was some faction out in beta cluster raring for Mirratord heads. Know anything about it?"

"Uh, no. It's all news to me." Kitty shook her head, focusing on the screen ahead of her and trying valiantly to see it while her mind whirled with all the sudden new information. "I'll contact you when I make planetfall."