7

What did I do to deserve this? Why is this happening to me? None of this is my fault!

As the pain faded, Zero's mind returned from the dark place it had fled. He opened his eyes, seeing nothing but the cold stone cell and metal door that had always been there.

I'm going to kill them. Hot anger rose in Zero's chest. He was going to make Haru and Marco pay. Not just for what they'd done to him here. Over the years he'd known the couple, they'd racked up quite a debt with him, and getting him thrown in prison was the least of it.

Brisk footsteps sounded outside the door, and it opened suddenly. Marco stepped in, talking on his radio.

'Yeah. Yeah, he's here. I'll get him- alright. See you at the bridge.' He pointed at Zero. 'Get up. We're moving.'

'I don't think I can,' Zero said, trying to pull himself up. His battered muscles protested violently, and he fell back to the floor.

'You're pathetic,' Marco spat. He bent over and took Zero's arms, pulling him to his feet. 'I thought we trained you to take worse that what I gave you.'

A memory surfaced in his mind- two, in fact. Similar images of Haru in front of him, delight on her face. One decades old, another barely a day fresh.

Marco dragged Zero over to a bench in the hall. 'I'll be back in a moment,' he said. 'Don't go running anywhere.' Marco walked off, chuckling.

Zero closed his eyes, fighting off a wave of nausea. Bad memories were bubbling back now, of the times when he had thrown his lot in with Marco and Haru. They'd spoken of great ambitions, of intentions to make Aspertias a better place. Their actions were starkly opposed to those speeches.

'Here's your old armor,' Marco said, putting a box down beside Zero. 'Put it on. Quickly.'

With Marco's help, Zero managed to dress himself in his armor. The power assisted joints made it easier to stand and move, and it provided a feeling of security he'd been missing for a long time. Just being back in the white-gold suit made him feel better.

Marco checked a palmtop, frowning. 'Hold on a minute,' he said. 'Haru wants me to-' he cut off suddenly. 'Huh.' The Spartans eyes closed, and he took on an expression of concentration.

Quite suddenly a pair of Blackheads appeared behind Marco, swords held at the ready. Zero jumped in fright, backing away quickly. Marco opened his eyes and laughed.

'Do you like them?' he asked. Zero stared at him. What the hell?

'Are you- controlling them?' he asked, shocked.

'Yep,' Marco said. 'Turns out that's what they're for.' He turned to the pair of black-clad beings. 'There's a certain beauty about them, when you've been inside their heads. They're such simple beings.' he walked up to one and ran his hand along it's armor, touching lightly on it's sword. 'And so deadly. Why, I believe it was this very sword that ran your girlfriend through. What was her name again? It began with a... V?'

Zero froze. No. No. NO! He shook his head. 'You're lying. No.'

Marco laughed again. 'You should have seen it. Oh, how she squealed.'

The anger rose again, hotter and brighter than it had been before. Where earlier it had been squashed by his fear of Marco, it now pushed through and suffused his body, heating up his muscles and clearing his mind. Zero clenched his fists and drew himself up.

'You killed her?' he asked quietly.

'It was as though I drove the sword through her myself,' Marco said.

It was as though a pane of glass had shattered in Zero's head. All of a sudden his mind unfurled, spreading through the space around him. He could sense the Blackheads, see easily how to take their minds for his own. All around he could sense the minds of other Spartans in the building, and beyond in the city. He only cared about one, though. Marco's mind blazed in front of him, easily recognizable.

'I only wish I had-' Marco spun mid sentence, eyes wide behind his visor. 'Shit, it actually worked?' he said breathlessly.

Something else snapped in Zero. With a wordless yell he charged at Marco. Simultaneously he pushed at Marco's mind with the force of his will, battering against the burning light. The luminous thread that linked Marco's mind to the Blackheads snapped.

Marco stepped back, looking suddenly scared. He reached out with his own mind to seize the Blackheads back, but Zero overpowered him, taking them for himself.

'Time for you to hurt' Zero shouted, ordering the Blackheads to attack.

Marco spun, ducking under the first swipe and punching the Blackhead hard in its groin. As the Blackhead staggered back he pushed through it and began sprinting down the hall. Zero gave chase, his pet blackheads following. As he ran, he noticed the myriad other threads that left Marco's mind snapping as it contracted. In his fear, the other Spartan was losing control over his Blackheads. Zero reached out and took them over, implanting only one command in their minds- Kill.

All hell broke loose as Marco reached the end of the hall and burst through the doors. Gunfire erupted throughout the building at the same time as the cries of fear and pain began. One by one the lights in Zero's perception began to wink out of existence.

He burst through the doors at the end of the hall and saw Marco sprinting for the stairs in the corner. A trio of Spartans stood in shock some way into the room; they started to move towards Zero as he sprinted through. There was no time to lose- Zero sent one of his pet Blackheads at the trio. With a single flourish of its sword it cut them all down.

Zero swung into the stairwell, jumping down an entire flight as he sought Marco. Though dimmed, he could still clearly sense the other Spartans mind several flights below. He ran down the stairs as fast as he could, the two blackheads following obediently behind. Marco abruptly left the stairs at what seemed to be the bottom. Zero reached it a few seconds later, bursting through the doors to see what appeared to be a motor pool; at the end was his quarry, mounting a chopper. With a burst of its engines, the exotic bike flew out of the doors and into the city.

Don't think you've escaped, you fuck. Zero pushed the thought at Marco's receding mind as he raced for a second chopper. I'm going to make you pay.

8

At Tomalon's insistence, Vivian had come along to the war meeting. Her rank technically allowed it, but she hadn't been planning on attending- Vernon's attitude to her since she'd arrived at the Steel Templars had been dismissive at best. Though he claimed it was out of respect for her skills, she knew that her promotion had been solely to appease Tomalon. He had been a respected commander when in charge of the Vermilion military, winning fame after having to take it over unexpectedly during the Striker wars.

So she stood in the corner, presenting her opinion only when asked and otherwise keeping silent. Vernon was going through his contingency plans in the case of a Blackhead intrusion past the Ghost Wall he was constructing at the end of the peninsular. Some of the ideas were quite surprising- a wholesale evacuation to the Isle of Pramos had been suggested by one general. Even more surprisingly, Vernon had actually considered it before turning it down.

'The Ghost peninsular is our home,' he said. 'I will not abandon it to the OCP.'

And so the debate went on. The plans were hashed out; contingency walls were to be built on all the causeways, the rear clan bases expanded in case the forward ones were lost. A port was to be constructed on Churel, to allow easy importing of goods in the event of Nasces falling. Land was to be turned over to crop production and the old mines to be reopened; work rosters to be drawn up. The Ghost Alliance was to be fully self sufficient in all but the most advanced goods. Vernon was preparing for a siege that might last a lifetime.

The meeting was winding down when an aide hurried into the room and ran to Vernon's side. Vivian leaned forward, straining to catch what was said.

'A call for you, sir' the aide was saying.

'I'm busy,' Vernon replied, brushing the aide away.

'He said to tell you his name,' the aide persisted. 'Alcor.'

Vernon paused, looking thoughtful. Vivian exchanged a glance with Tomalon. Could it be that Alcor? She couldn't think of any others. It was an uncommon name, to say the least.

'Put him on,' Vernon said eventually. 'Play it through the speakers, but only relay my voice back.'

The aide nodded and hurried to the command table, tapping in commands quickly.

Static began to play out of the speakers. 'Alcor?' Vernon asked.

'Ah, Vernon,' a familiar voice said. 'Thanks for taking this call on such short notice. I'm sure you must be very busy.'

'Quite,' Vernon replied. 'What did you want?'

'I'd like to ask a favor,' Alcor said, for it was clearly the Alcor Vivian knew. 'I need you to intervene in Nasces for me.'

The assembled officers began to mutter among themselves. Vernon ignored them, continuing to speak. 'I was considering it,' he said. 'But why?'.

'If Nasces is allowed to fall to the Blackheads, it will be a disaster for us all,' Alcor said. 'But most of all for you. There are thousands of cores in Nasces- an order of magnitude more than the OCP already controls. If it captures those cores, it will be powerful enough to overrun all the surviving Northern Clans. I don't want to see that happen.'

'And you want me to do.. what, exactly?'

'Oh, it won't be you doing the hard work,' Alcor said. 'You are aware of the Anchor. I assume? I have a team of skilled agents preparing to capture it. On it is a weapon capable of destroying the cores of Nasces.'

The muttering intensified. 'The Builders have a weapon that powerful?' Vivian asked Tomalon in a low voice. 'Why haven't they used it yet?'

'I'd heard rumors,' Tomalon replied quietly, 'But everything related to Ash Mesa is kept so tightly under wraps that we never hear anything concrete.' He grimaced. 'It sounds like exactly the sort of thing Thompson would have wanted, though.'

'So why do you need us?' Vernon asked. 'It seems like everything is being taken care of.'

'The problem is that the weapon won't be in position to fire until after the Blackheads have entered Nasces,' Alcor replied. 'And if they are allowed to cross the SolNas bridge...' he let the point hang.

Vernon was silent for a moment as he massaged his forehead. 'So you want me to defend the SolNas bridge until your team is able to destroy it?'

'That's the gist of it,' Alcor said. 'Helping with the evacuation might be a good idea as well.'

'You make a good argument,' Vernon said. The slightest hint of a smile played on his lips. 'But how do I know I can trust you? The Builders haven't exactly been helping Nasces of late.'

'Do you have any respect left for me?' Alcor asked in a hurt tone. 'I would not betray you.'

'So you say,' Vernon replied. 'Very well. We will be there.'

'Thank you. When the time comes, I will be there to help you out too.'

'I look forward to it,' Vernon replied as Alcor hung up.

The muttering stopped as Vernon looked out over the assembled Spartans. 'This meeting is adjourned,' he said. 'Get some rest. We begin preparations at seven tomorrow for deployment at three. After all, we've got a city to save.'

9

The Ash Mesa research facility lay several hundred miles north of Cressat, some way into the Central Wastes- a vast expanse of red rock and sand, broken here and there by strange windswept rock formations. Somewhere in the middle stood the Tu'ce peaks, where the clans of the same name had their bases, isolated from most of the outside world. Looking out of the Pelican's cockpit, Gigolo couldn't imagine that any Spartans could make their homes in such a desolate environment.

A single paved road cut through the monotone landscape, traversing the shortest possible distance between the Solidade-Cressat highway and Ash Mesa. Alcor hadn't been able to give Lucas the exact co-ordinates of the facility, so the pilot had simply followed the road. It wasn't the fastest route, but it saved them possibly getting lost.

Gigolo checked the HUD's clock again. We've still got time. Stop panicking. The Blackheads were due to enter Nasces about seven that evening, and would probably be across the Solar Straits less than two hours later t if nobody stopped them. That gave them plenty of time to make a rendezvous with the Anchor and pull off their plan. It also left plenty of time for things to go wrong.

'We're about five minutes out,' Lucas said from the pilot's seat. 'I'm broadcasting the IFF signal now. Keep your visors down; the last thing we want is you being recognized.'

'I know,' Gigolo said tetchily, checking his own IFF tag. Alcor had supplied them with a set of fake tags, one for the Pelican and more for the three Spartans. Supposedly they were high enough clearance to get them into Ash Mesa, if not actually to the spacecraft they were going to steal. Elesa had come up with the idea of posing as Black Runner scientists, coming to observe their allies space program, and Alcor had said it was good enough.

'There it is,' Elesa said, pointing. A small brown blob on the horizon began to take focus through the heat haze, resolving into a large concrete strip dotted with buildings. A pair of holes in the concrete surrounded by equipment marked the spaceships they were to steal.

'Black Runner vessel, identify yourself,' came the hail moments later. 'SAM systems are tracking you.'

'This is the Black Runner pelican LM23,' Lucas read off a script. 'Transporting Black Runner observers to the Ash Mesa space program.'

'Your visit is not scheduled,' the response came. 'Please explain.'

'Check again,' Lucas replied, adding a note of confusion into his voice. 'This visit was arranged months ago.'

'I'm looking... I'm sorry, there it is,' the voice said. 'Please use the southern landing pad. Enjoy your visit.'

Lucas breathed an audible sigh of relief. 'I have to say I didn't truly think Alcor would manage that,' he said. 'Hacking into a mainframe as secure as this one seemed beyond even him.'

'He was around when it was designed,' Elesa said absently. 'He put in a backdoor for just such a purpose.'

'How old is he exactly?' Gigolo asked.

'I don't recall. Over three hundred, certainly.'

Gigolo whistled, impressed. 'I hope we live to be that old.'

'It only seems impressive to you because you're so young,' Lucas laughed. 'Wait till you've hit a hundred. Life gets better from there on.'

Lucas brought the Pelican over the landing pad and touched down on an empty space. The three Spartans stepped out, blinking in the harsh light. From the ground Ash Mesa looked truly enormous- the buildings were scattered randomly miles apart across the sun-baked concrete. It was a good half mile from the landing pad to the nearest one.

Lucas stopped by the side of the Pelican as they made to leave. He put a hand to it's side tenderly.

'What's the matter?' Gigolo asked.

'I've come a long way with this bird,' Lucas said quietly. 'Surprisingly far in just a few days.'

'Uh... do you want a moment alone with it?' Gigolo asked, trying not to snigger too obviously.

'I'll be fine,' Lucas snapped suddenly. 'You wouldn't understand.' He strode away, not looking back.

Gigolo had worried they'd have to walk to the spaceships, but as they set out a Warthog came across the tarmac to meet them, and pulled up alongside.

'You're the Black Runner delegation, right?' the driver asked, hopping out of the vehicle. 'I'm sorry about the trouble earlier. Must have been a glitch in our system.'

'It's no trouble,' Lucas replied smoothly. 'I hope it has been fixed now?'

'Yeah, the techies think they've found the cause,' the Spartan said. 'Anyway, my name's Tsubasa. I'll be showing you around, I guess. Can I see your ID?'

'Of course,' Lucas said, gesturing to Elesa and Gigolo. 'I'm Leo, chief researcher at the Black Runners. These are Eren and Giselle.' He handed Tsubasa an ID chip, which the Builder scanned.

Why the fuck did Alcor have to pick the stupid names for us? Gigolo sighed. He'd just have to try and remember to respond when his name was called. It wouldn't be for very long anyway, no matter what happened.

'Looks just fine,' the Builder handed the ID chip back to Lucas. 'I'll drive you to the R&D facility. It's the building a few miles to the north-east.'

'Actually, could we take a look at the spacecraft first?' Lucas asked as they got into the Warthog. 'I think it would be most helpful if we could see the fruits of the research first.'

'That's fine too,' Tsubasa said. 'We don't give tours often, so there's no set route down. You just tell me what you want to see.'

'Thanks,' Lucas said. 'I appreciate it.'

They set off across the concrete towards the launch pads in the distance. Despite the appreciable speed the Warthog was capable of, it still took them some time to cover the distance. Lucas and Tsubasa made idle chatter in the meantime, the Scorpion's easy charm keeping the Builder preoccupied. Gigolo and Elesa sat in the back, tense. Gigolo found his hand straying to the cloaked weapons on his back and hip. His sword and shotgun were hidden there, along with Elesa's Sniper and Lucas's rifle. Alcor, again showing his skill with just about everything, had shown Gigolo how to use his armors built in cloaking to cover specific parts of him.

'I wasn't aware the Black Runners were taking an interest in research,' Tsubasa was saying. 'What fields do you all specialize in?'

'There really aren't enough of us to specialize in anything much,' Lucas replied, keen to keep the conversation away from their non-existent scientific knowledge.

'Surely you've got an interest in something specific though?' Tsubasa pressed. 'My research mainly covers the applications of shield technology, for example.'

'Well, if I had to pick something I'd say aerodynamics and aircraft propulsion,' Lucas replied hesitantly. 'As you saw, I'm a keen pilot. I like to look at areas that apply to that.'

'Ah, so you'd be interested in the rocket propulsion facility we have here?' Tsubasa said eagerly. 'It's quite impressive what they're able to do with fairly basic fuel types. Why, just a decade ago the Sabre fighters would never have been able to get into orbit. Now we use them all the time.'

'I'm eager to see just what you've accomplished here,' Lucas replied, keeping his voice strictly neutral. 'Rocket engines are quite different to the sort I'm used to.'

'Of course,' the Builder said. 'What about you back there? Eren and Giselle, was it?'

'Optics,' Elesa said quickly. 'Scopes and...'

'Ah, fiber communications? I'm afraid we don't really study that here. I believe there's a facility on Calmn which does, though. A fascinating field from what I've heard.'

'Uh, yeah,' Elesa agreed uncertainly. 'That.'

'And you, Eren?'

'Cloaking,' Gigolo said after a moment's thought.

'So quite similar to Giselle, then?'

How in the world are optics related to Cloaking devices? Gigolo wished he knew how the technology he used daily worked. 'I'm more into the, ah, applied parts of it,' Gigolo said.

'Uh huh. I thought I saw a cloaking module on your armor. Are you field testing it?'

'Yeah,' Gigolo said. Mercifully the conversation turned away from their back stories as Tsubasa began to ramble on about his own research. Gigolo tuned out, trusting Lucas to be able to hold the conversation. He had an uncanny knack for making up bullshit on the spot. Gigolo just hoped Lucas didn't go too far; they'd not had time to prepare any sort of back story beyond what they had already told the Builder.

Oh please, don't fuck this up, Gigolo pleaded silently. This is our only chance.