Chapter Fifty-Two: Leap of Faith, Part Two
Walking through the remains of the fight wasn't any easier than those I'd been involved in in the past. Even the heat was something I'd experienced many times before in abundance. So once the last remaining stragglers of Storm troops were disposed of, I slung my rifle behind my back for a moment to roll up the sleeves of my uniform jacket, instantly feeling a little better as a light ocean breeze came in to pick up the slack. The sweat was already beading on my forehead beneath my helmet, and I could feel that my T-shirt under the jacket was damp. There wasn't a whole lot I could do about it until we were back aboard the Suave Affair, though.
Hopefully, that would be soon. I glanced up at the horizon again and saw the ruins once more in the distance. That was our last destination here - the final piece of the intricate Khan puzzle we'd slowly been uncovering since our arrival. What we found there could determine what would happen to the planet after we left.
But of course, we had to actually get there first.
As I stared down at a few of the casualties from the battle in the dirt - both Marine and alien - I brought my weapon down off my shoulder and opened up a general COM channel to my Marines.
"This is Major Cooper. Now that the Remnant has been dealt with, we've got an open shot at the ruins. So let's go check them out, Marines. As before, the 'Hog will scout the terrain ahead, make sure there aren't anymore enemies hiding out near the objective area. It's highly probable, so stay sharp. Next will be us, then the Scorpions. Our air support is also still on station, so if necessary, we can call in a strike. But we have to be careful about that around the site - I want whatever's left over there to be kept intact. Is that understood?"
Acknowledgment lights winked green across my HUD. I nodded to myself inside my helmet.
"Good. For now, I want the 904th to hold here with your assigned vehicle elements. One battalion up there will be enough, and I want us to have a fallback point in case anything unforeseen crops up near the ruins. Captain Warfield, make sure your battalion is prepared for that, and set up a perimeter around the crest of this hill for now. Be on the lookout for anything."
"On it, Major."
"For the rest of you - namely the 8th Engineers - we're up. Lieutenant Lloyd, you're also coming with us."
"I will, ma'am," the spook replied.
"All right. Let's get going then. There's still plenty of work to do on the island. Cooper out."
It was sad to see the effects of Kilo Squadron's air assaults and the Scorpion tanks' blasts on the land. The dead, mangled Storm bodies and haphazardly strewn vehicle parts I didn't care so much about, but it struck me as somehow wrong that we'd left the once-beautiful island landscape ravaged by our fight. A couple of palm trees stood just four feet off the golden-tan ground, their tops blown away just like the enemy corpses nearby from the successive explosions; all that remained were charred stumps sadly sticking up from the earth.
Besides the displacement of alien bodies, equipment, and the local flora, the terrain itself was blackened as well. Several scattered craters carved out deep gouges in the grassy, sandy dirt of the hilltop, transforming the calm, quiet paradise into nothing but yet another bloody battlefield.
As I stepped up closer to the edge of the drop onto the beach below on my right, I felt a momentary sadness grip me as I looked out towards the water. By all accounts, at least thanks to the weather, it was still a gorgeous clear day here on Qamar. It'd been us and the Storm with our weapons and warfare that had tainted it. I began to wonder if this was why the alien bastards had tried so hard to keep things on the island under wraps. Maybe to them, we'd just desecrated holy ground. I was almost sure of it. That would definitely have explained the tough resistance on the mainland, and how hard they'd tried to keep us off "their" turf.
But I still didn't think that that alone was enough to justify an attempt at taking the whole planet. I understood protecting the ruins themselves, but not the entire sphere around which they were placed - especially considering that during the War, the Covenant hadn't bothered to spare the other half of Khan from a brutal glassing. Something bigger than that was here, and I knew all the answers lay up ahead.
After moving back from the steep drop, I continued on my way again, gun held a little looser in my grip now but still ready to use in case of trouble. I was walking alongside my aide, Staff Sergeant Porter, and his squad - all of whom were very conspicuously forming up around me for protection - when I came to a halt again and hailed the spook.
"Cal, it's Major Cooper. Go ahead and move up to my position, Lieutenant - it's all clear so far. I've got a few questions I want to run by you before we approach."
"Yes, ma'am," came the reply. "Moving now."
The Naval officer did a good job of jogging up to me fast, something that was both appreciated and necessary considering I didn't want to be stopped out here too long without knowing what was going on at the ruins. Since the battle had ended we hadn't seen or heard so much as a peep from anywhere else on the island, but like when we'd first touched down, I knew the silence didn't mean an absence. It could just as easily mean that there was more to face up ahead, and that they were in hiding. So I went with my gut and kept my guard up.
"You asked for me, Major?" Lieutenant Lloyd said when he reached me. By now he was gripping his own rifle tight in his hands, too, noticing that I wasn't looking as relaxed as I should be given the fact that we seemingly had the island to ourselves.
Yet still, despite the victory, I just couldn't shake the bad feeling I had.
"I did," I answered, then waved at him with my free hand. "Walk with me."
"Sure thing, ma'am."
I took him over to the edge of the drop off, where I'd been a few minutes earlier. From there, I slung my DMR on my good shoulder and pulled out my field binoculars from one of my cargo pockets, motioning him to do the same. "Come on, Cal. I know you brought some of that ONI tech with you. Put it to good use."
I said it with a small grin to try to lighten the mood, even though we both knew this was serious business. I'd never ignored my instincts before, and as Lloyd had said to me himself the night I'd gotten drunk in the rec room aboard ship, they'd rarely steered me wrong. The lieutenant did as I asked without a word, and studied the ruins too through the zoomed in sights.
"See anything yet?"
"No, ma'am," the spook replied. "Quiet as a damn tomb over there, and a lot less movement, too."
"Same. Looking at the size of the ruins, how many ex-Covies do you think could still be holding out in there?"
I saw Lloyd shrug in my peripheral vision. "The ruins don't seem terribly large on the surface. A company's worth of Storm troops, maybe? Probably more like half that, ma'am." He finally brought the binoculars down and sighed. "But that's just an extremely rough estimate. For one, we don't know how large the original building actually was - obviously, the ruins are only what's left of it, not what it used to be. Second, we really have no clue what's underneath us. If that thing stretches beneath the ground - and I know from ONI's files that these things typically do - it might even be as large as the whole island."
Shit, I thought. "From your experience, what could we have going on under the hood?"
"A large chamber could easily fit underneath this hill, Major. Or it might just be a series of pathways with secret exits throughout the island." He glanced up at me from his boots. "It's really a very smart set-up on their part if that's what they've got to work with. That way, your enemy would never know your true number, nor would they know where to expect you to pop out next. The Remnant could even be coming up behind us right now and we'd never realize it because it'd all be happening underground."
I blew out a breath. "Wonderful. So we might just get surrounded soon and have another large-scale fight on our hands?"
"Not necessarily, ma'am. Could also be there's not much down there and most of what we see up top is all there is."
Snorting as I put my own binoculars away, I found myself shaking my head. "You know I don't buy that, Lieutenant, and I'm sure that neither do you. Our best bet is to hope our approach rattles a few feathers and that whatever's hiding out by the ruins comes to us. We just have to make sure we do it in a way that we're prepared for whatever emerges."
The ONI operative cocked his head to the side and looked at me. "What are you expecting to find exactly, Major?"
"I don't know, Cal," I responded sincerely. "But I do know that I don't like what I've seen here on Khan so far. Suicide attacks, an attempt to take the mainland and the whole damn planet, a suddenly increased force of Storm troops appearing out of thin air with no signs of a transport ship anywhere in space to drop them off." It was my turn to give him a look this time. "None of it adds up so far. But I know in my gut that the answers are all here on Qamar, right underneath our noses. And they're in those stupid fucking ruins."
Coming up on the ruins, I had a fleeting moment where I wondered why the place that held such a great religious significance to the Storm didn't look all that sacred to me. In the Inner Colonies I'd been to, back on Earth and my homeplanet of Mars, churches and synagogues and temples and mosques were all pretty clear about the fact that they were important to someone - the intricate designs, the colors, the ornate windows, the blatantly front-and-center symbols. These ruins didn't hold any of that for me. They only looked like so much rubble, like what I'd seen dozens upon dozens of times before in my campaigns against the Covenant when we'd been sent in to help out a city under attack, only to find most of it already gone before we came in to bolster it. And above all, it felt alien.
For some reason, all the thoughts on the Remnant's religious motivation made me think of Hayden. He'd never been a very spiritual person himself, but now that he was dead, the thought came to mind: I wondered what he would've done here in my place. How he would've handled the initial landing on Qamar, and the approach to the ruins now. I figured he probably would've done a better job than me.
I swallowed down the sudden lump in my throat and pushed the painful, intrusive thought aside. My best friend was gone. I'd never see Oliver again. Whatever he may have done differently in this situation was lost to the wind now, nothing but a passing blip in my brain. And that made the harsh ache in my chest at his absence hurt deep.
It was funny. I'd been able to more or less recover from a bullet to the chest. But this was going to take much, much longer to heal.
A voice through the open COM channel brought me back to the present then.
"Major, it's Sergeant Cody in the 'Hog up front. We've got some, uh, strange activity over here, ma'am."
I glanced up in the head vehicle's direction in an instant, rifle raised. "What kind, Sergeant?"
"I don't really know yet, ma'am, but they're not former Covenant."
My blood ran cold. "Flood?"
"No, ma'am. Not them, either. I just noticed the things flying around now near the ruins. But they haven't attacked us so far."
"'Things', Cody? You want to be a little more specific?"
"They're almost like...small helicopter things twirling around, Major. Better if you see it."
I was already zooming in on the ruins with my weapon's scope as he said the words, but I couldn't make much out beyond some buzzing shapes. We were still too far out. "Link me into your helmet feed, Sergeant."
"Yes, ma'am. Right away."
I crouched down lower into the grass on the hill and motioned for Staff Sergeant Porter and his squad to tighten up around me as I focused my attention on the images coming through my HUD. I couldn't do that and keep a sharp eye out for trouble at the same time, so to keep from having to escape death by the skin of my teeth for the umpteenth time, I chose caution over multitasking. What I saw through the live video feed was intriguing.
Flying around just outside what looked to be the ruins' entrance were two small drones. They didn't appear to be organic, but they were still alien - to us at least. I'd never seen machines like that, and wondered if they were maybe holdovers from when humans still had control over the island, or whether they were new low-tech AI entities the Storm had employed as security around their sacred site. Given the fact that weren't attacking us on sight, however, made me question the obvious assumption. But I still didn't want my Marines lowering their guard around something foreign.
"Cody, I see it now. You say they haven't done anything to appear hostile to you yet?"
"That's affirmative, ma'am. We're not quite at the ruins' doorsteps yet, but so far they haven't paid us any mind."
I let out a sigh. This could get complicated real fast. "Well, we have no choice but to continue the approach, Sergeant. We still need to know what's inside. If these things are some kind of monitoring device or something, we'll find out quick. We just have to be ready for it. Move it up slow, Marine, and make sure your gunner's prepared for whatever comes next."
"Got it, Major. We'll let you know shortly."
"Right. Cooper out."
Anxiousness swept through me as soon as the connection cut. The live feed blinked off my HUD and was replaced by the normal view of what was in front of me once more, but I couldn't help but feel like some sort of conflict was imminent. I hoped I hadn't just sent the Marines in the scouting 'Hog to their deaths.
To keep my mind off my worries, I got into motion myself again. I looked over at Staff Sergeant Porter while I straightened. "Josh, I think we might have some trouble up ahead. Nothing reported yet, but I'd like to give that 'Hog some backup just in case."
"Understood, Major." My aide adjusted the grip on his SAW. "If I may ask, ma'am, what did they find?"
"Something new. I want to be sure that - "
That's when I heard the sound of the Warthog's mounted fifty cal open up at a frenetic pace out in front of us. A few seconds later I heard a muted explosion, like a hot metal pop, and then another. In a matter of seconds I was lunging forward, trying to get closer to the entrance of the ruins where the sounds had come from, but Porter caught me just as quick and grabbed hold of the back of my torso armor to stop me.
"Major, please, wait for us! It's not safe!"
I gave him a hard stare in return. "Then move it, Staff!"
Running up with Porter's squad around me this time, we got to scene just in time to find two smoking heaps of metal lying near the idle 'Hog. The Marines inside all looked panic-struck. There was no sign of the flying things anymore, so I guessed these were it. I looked to the sergeant still sitting in the passenger seat.
"What the hell happened here, Cody?"
"They started to fire once we got closer, ma'am! Some sort of...orange laser thing. We had to take them out before they killed us!"
"Dammit. Now everyone that might be in this damn place know we're here."
Acting fast, I gave orders to Porter and his squad to take cover just outside the entrance, with the staff sergeant in the middle gripping the SAW. Crouching down in the rubble beside him, I pressed my back hard against the ancient pieces of building and opened up a general channel. "8th Engineers, you better haul ass to the ruins, now! We've encountered some sort of new hostile machine and we don't know yet if they're just AIs with security protocols or if they're something completely different. Approach with caution, but get here fast! Tankers, we need you up, too! Cover our six!"
It was just as I was hunkering down myself once the connection cut, bringing my DMR to bear and facing the entrance in anticipation of more enemy troops showing up, that I saw more of the flying drones appear. They came up out of the entrance in twos and immediately began to fire on our position...but this time, they weren't alone.
Something else appeared from the ruins, too. Something tall I'd never seen before in my life, and something that was neither Storm nor Flood, though they reminded me vaguely of Elites at first glance.
I didn't end up getting a good look beyond that, because now we were too busy trying not to get shot. And fighting back.
Tagging one of the flying things first with my DMR, I squeezed off a series of bursts and yelled loud over the noise, "Marines, return fire!"
The drone I was aiming at exploded quickly enough, raining down hot debris on our position as my bullets overtook it, yet the others remained unscathed. In seconds I heard the Warthog's fifty cal rattling hard again behind us, and then Porter opened up with his SAW right next to me. Still, that big tall alien thing was headed right for us. And firing pulses of light rounds from a gun I'd never encountered before today.
For a moment while I ducked back behind my cover to reload, I wondered if this was how the men and women who'd first fought the Covenant on Harvest all those years ago had felt. Terrified, and way out of their element, facing a new threat that they had no idea what capabilities it possessed, or if their counterattacks would work.
But then I realized that we had more than a leg up on those who'd come before us. We had almost thirty years of warfare with the Covenant under our belts to assure us that we could face an alien threat head-on and win. Humanity hadn't won the war without help, but I knew we could pull together again if we had to. And for now, all that mattered was winning this one fight - not an entirely new war.
"Keep firing, Marines!" I shouted as I aimed my sights on the big guy now. "Keep firing!"
With the fifty cal's help, most of the drones had bitten the dust around us now, nothing but bundles of smoking scrap metal like the first pair that had greeted my Marines outside the entrance. But that didn't mean that those that were left were going to flee because of that. They were machines, not people or ex-Covenant, and so they were unfazed by those kind of psychological cues.
Even as I pulled the trigger then, I was struck by something odd. The drones seemed to be circling the big thing that had emerged - obviously allies. Was it an AI that was part of the security protocols here, too? Mechanical helpers the Storm had created or enlisted for their own cause? Or was it something I hadn't even thought of yet?
My mind ceased going places in an attempt to make sense of what was going on in front of me when the tall, sentient robot went lunging through the air. Surprising all of us, it leapt clear over me and Porter and the rest of his squad posted at the entrance, and went instead directly for the Marines on the 'Hog - the object that was causing his flying friends the most trouble. Opening up with the odd weapon in its hands, it made quick work of all three men in the vehicle, including the gunner. By the time the rest of us had turned to help, the others were already screaming in pain as the new gun ripped into their protective gear with no remorse. And then they were dead.
My eyes went wide at the sight of three Marine bodies hanging limp from their harnesses inside the 'Hog, their blood splattered across the interior and dripping down onto the grassy dirt-sand below. It wasn't that I hadn't seen dead bodies before. It was the manner in which they'd died - and how fast.
Staff Sergeant Joshua Porter reacted to the deaths first, letting out an enraged howl I hadn't heard from him even in Voi five years ago, and he opened up again with a devastating hail of bullets at the thing that had just killed a whole fireteam in the blink of an eye. The alien machine tried to fight back, and the drones in the air did what they could to cover, but the rest of the Marines and I made equally quick work of them to protect my aide.
Once those were down, the tall thing was damaged and had nothing left to help itself. A final volley of lead from all of us finally put it down, and it suddenly warped into a thousand bright orange fragments of light, then disappeared.
The only thing it dropped in the sandy dirt was its gun.
When it was all over, the remaining Marines and I simply sat there catching our breaths for a long time. Even I didn't know what the hell to say. So many questions were floating through my mind now that it'd take a nuke going off to stop them. Or at least a very large explosion.
Of course all eyes were on me in the sudden silence. The bodies of three of our Marines lay bloodied and lifeless behind us, and the collection of still-warm metal parts were strewn everywhere around the entrance. And then there was the bizarre-looking gun lying on the ground where the big mechanical fighter had once stood.
A lot of weird shit, and only one major.
"Ma'am?" a bright-eyed corporal from Porter's squad crouched next to me asked. "All due respect, but what the fuck was that?"
"I have no idea, Corporal," I answered.
"Uh, orders, ma'am?" another Marine asked.
Gingerly, I risked getting up a little higher from my position and looking around. Nothing else emerged from the entrance, or the rest of the ruins. Maybe it all really was just a leftover security detail, I thought. Or maybe it was a new watch dog mechanism the Remnant have developed. Maybe it's not all as big and far-reaching as it seems.
But then there was that nagging feeling I had in the back of my mind again, telling me none-too-subtly that none of this felt familiar. It felt new. And I really have absolutely no clue what this is. But maybe the spook does.
Turning to face my men, I said, "Your orders are the same, Marines. Engage and take out all hostiles. We need to fan out and make sure the rest of this area is clear before we go in. You see something bad, shoot it. After that, we'll set up a secure perimeter and I'll send a team in to investigate what's going on inside, if anything. And from there, we should figure out what the hell we just fought." I glanced at Porter. "That starts with you, Josh. Make sure the entrance is green."
My aide nodded slowly. "Yes, ma'am."
"Pick up that gun, too. I want to make sure our spook sees it when he gets here."
"Right away, Major."
As things slowly began returning to normal, I opened up a COM channel to Lieutenant Lloyd first, making sure he was on his way up along with additional Marines. After that, I got on the horn to Willis.
"Talon?"
"Yeah, Coop. I'm here."
I snorted. "Where are you off to, Captain? Sightseeing?"
"No, ma'am. We're here and ready when you need us. Just thought you wanted to keep us away from the ruins is all. Collateral damage and such."
I shifted my stance. "To be honest, I'm less concerned about that right now than I am at what I just saw."
"What's that?"
"No clue. That's the thing. I'm getting our spook to come check it out. Maybe he's seen this kind of thing before."
There was worry in my husband's voice now. For me, and for the rest of us. "Natalie? What exactly did you see?"
"I could send you my helmet feed. That'd be easier than describing it."
"Was it the Flood?"
"Nope. We've dealt with that before. This wasn't it, thank God. Wasn't Covie, though, either."
"A new breed of alien?"
I chuckled at that, but it was mostly humorless - because organic or no, he could be right. "Will, I said I don't know. And I'd rather not jump to conclusions right now. There's a lot this could be, so just let the ground teams handle it. We'll figure it out and I'll let you know, okay?"
A long pause followed, then a resigned sigh. "Fine. What did you need from me, then?"
"Could you do a quick flyby over the ruins? Make sure there's nothing hiding out anywhere ready to bag us?"
"Sure thing, Major."
"Thanks, Talon."
"And Natalie?"
"Yeah?"
"How are you doing? Are you okay?"
The smile that came to my face was a weak one, but there nonetheless at his concern. "I'm fine, honey. Just a little weirded out."
