SO!
I'm not dead Yay!
You'd think this Quarantine would make me upload more considering the streak I had going, but a Writing block combined with all the school projects (online classes are quite annoying tbh), general laziness, and a certain Racoon, and you have my reason for keeping that cliffhanger for much longer than necessary. But hey, it's here now, and I managed to get my mom to finally catch up on Vol 7, so that's something I guess.
Yadayada, I don't own anything but the story, Halo is owned by Microsoft and RWBY by RoosterTeeth, feel free to review, I always could use the feedback on if you have any problems with my style of writing. But hey, concidering weve hit, what is it now? Over 300 follows, and 200 favourites, I must be doing something right.
Enjoy.
"What problem?" Ruby asked the monitor, everyone was on edge.
"There's an infestation, and they are overrunning the main chamber, I try to get rid of them, but they always seem to have one that gets away and the whole process starts anew," it explained, "I can't use the full quarantine protocols as there are important ecological samples on this planet,"
"Wait." Cortana spoke up, "Are you talking about Flood?"
"A construct," strange, I did not detect you, "As to your question, that would be preposterous,"
"No flood samples were left with me, and the Halos were fired 100,000 years ago, or at least 100,000 years in realspace. So how would the Flood be here? Is there another outbreak?"
"No, there isn't." She reassured, "We just had a couple close calls."
"Wonderf-"
"What was that you said about 100,000 years in realspace?" Ruby picked up, causing the group to stare up at the monitor expectantly.
"It is probably best if I show you, Reclaimer,"
And suddenly, they were teleported away.
The process was a little disorientating, and had RBY, looking around, but Arbiter and Chief didn't make much movement so the others settled down pretty quickly,
"Woah…" Yang looked up and around in awe, they were in a large control room, much like that of Halo or The Ark,
"Welcome to the Silent Cartographer," the Monitor told them, as they approached the center platform. The biggest difference, was the large sphere or Remnant, along with its moon in orbit, it had a large bubble pulsing put from it.
As the Chief took out Cortana's chip and inserted it into the system, it surprised both of them that the Monitor did not protest.
"Ok, let's see here…" she muttered, and before long, the model zoomed out to encompass the sun, and the bubble pulse was still emanating far to the other side.
"This Shield Installation, uses Slipspace to slow down time inside of the bubble you see in order to keep certain sensitive materials stored here safe," the Monitor explained, "Unfortunately, this infestation has caused a malfunction in the drives that were in charge of this, and as a result, it can stop the time-slow altogether, or speed it up, at erratic rates."
Cortana continued to search the system as the others took in this information.
"So, while it has been over 100,000 years since the firing of the Halo Array, the time passed within this system has been closer to 150,000 years."
The display zoomed in on Remnant again, closing in on the Cartographer building, which is apparently deep within the crust.
"In fact, I believe we just entered another period of time acceleration, a side effect of this is that the system becomes inaccessible from the outside, unless you know the slipspace coordinates."
"So, is that why I'm older than I should be?"
"I'm sorry, Reclaimer?"
"You know that little girl you teleported off this planet 12 years ago? I'm her."
"I see…" it paused, "Well, yes it would be, we entered a time-slow phase shortly after you left, and it lasted quite a while, so that is most likely the case."
"So if it isn't the Flood, what's causing all of this?" Blake asked, arms crossed as she watched Cortana work the console, and looked up at the Monitor.
"That's what I'm trying to find…" Cortana muttered to the group, scanning her eyes over a model of the network of rooms within the installation. "Ah…"
"What is it?" The Chief asked her,
"Well, when I read the archives on High-Charity it talked about this, but I thought they got rid of them all… Well, depending on how you look at things it's good and bad. The infestation is a Lekgolo Colony."
At that Ruby groaned, "I stayed here to get away from this bullshit, and it still follows me."
"Well, these are the less intelligent kind," Cortana replied, "They like the compounds most Forerunner structures are made from, and so, they tend to eat most Forerunner technology, the Covenant almost wiped out all of them, before an Arbiter discovered a species that didn't eat them, and got them to join their ranks to eradicate the rest."
"Well, it appears the Prophets made yet another mistake." Arbiter growled, angry at the reminder that they disgraced the rank or Arbiter.
The display finally zoomed in on the rooms affected, the main chamber, the slipspace control room, and a small series of air ducts.
"How did you scan the air ducts?" The Monitor asked, "All the sensors went offline centuries ago."
"They were just disabled," Cortana replied, "You haven't been doing a good job of monitoring have you?"
"False!" It protested, "I have been diligent about the care of this installation since the firing of the rings! It has been kept immacul-" it cut itself off before letting itself droop, it made a sound akin to a sigh before continuing, "The initial outbreak happened about 30,000 years after the rings fired, when there was a surge of energy, it was a mass extinction on the surface, seemed to have somehow caused one of the Lekgolo to appear in one of the ducts, it multiplied quickly, and by the time I had noticed, it had already gotten into the slipspace room, and were beginning to get to the main chamber, every time I tried to get rid of them, they just kept coming back, to the point where they ended up destroying all the sentinels at my disposal,"
"So you just gave up in the hopes that a Reclaimer would come to fix it." Ruby surmised.
"Well, yes, but since the Librarian instructed that Humanity would not find this system for another 200 years in realspace, and all of the Reclaimers that came here were all extremely young, and hurt, I sent them to the closest system that Human contact had been established, in the hope that they would heal and come back when they were healed, and with reinforcements. Evidently, they did not."
"You haven't been paying attention to the surface have you?" Ruby asked the monitor.
"No, my primary directive is to take care of the technology stored here for the return of the Reclaimers in order to aid them in the reclamation of the Mantle, why would I be concerned about the surface when there have been matters to attend to here?"
Cortana zoomed out again, "Because it would seem that Humans have been setting up civilizations for the past 1,500 years, under your nose,"
The Monitor spluttered and looked at the data,
"Oh... Oh my."
"Indeed," Cortana replied.
"Right," Yang said, stretching, "Shall we take care of this infestation or what?"
"We may as well get started," Ruby said, "Take care of this and then see about seeing if we can recover anything."
"Don't we have to retrieve your armour Spartan?" Arbiter asked Ruby, as Blake and Yang were getting themselves ready,
"No, we don't," she replied, "Another bonus the Monitor of Reach gave me was my own pocket dimension."
She suited up, like Cortana, and the Arbiter looked in fascination.
"That's handy," Cortana replied, as a plasma rifle also appeared on her back,
"Yup, now, let's go get rid of these pests."
Following the Monitor into the main chamber, they found several pedestals with various Forerunner artifacts on them, it was like a museum of their technological prowess, but a lot of them had very clearly been damaged in some way, bits were barely holding together, and the pedestals they were suspended on via some form of gravitational manipulation, were reduced to spindly structures very clearly not their intended shape. Small fragments were on the floor, along with other shavings, some even still suspended in the place supposedly where they were supposed to be, but clearly originally a part of something no longer there.
"See what they have done to this place?" The monitor lamented, "This used to be a grand feat of Forerunner technology and architecture, now it's just a pile of rubble and ruin."
"I reckon there's still stuff that could be salvaged from this," Cortana interjected, "Our previous encounters with Forerunner tech didn't exactly allow us to study much," she told the orb, "We were forced to destroy much of what was there to prevent a much larger catastrophe."
The monitor paused for a moment, "I see… well, you would still have been able to glean much more from the intact artifacts than what those wretched creatures have left."
As he said that, it was almost on cue that a rumbling sound was heard. Behind a wall that a corridor was, a mass of something was bulging and convulsing, it moved towards them like a wave of flesh, as it drew closer, the Spartans at first, before eventually, everyone else, could make out the individual worms that made up its structure. As it drew closer, the pile seemed to rear up, rising to be about 30 or so meters in height, and about 5 meters wide, before seeming to bend down to look at the small party.
The worms that made it up were swimming underneath its skin in a way that caused Blake and Yang to reel in disgust, chirps and growls seemed to emanate from it, before it stopped changing its overall shape for a moment, looking down at the team of individuals, who had their weapons pointed at it, Chief and assault rifle, Arbiter, a Covenant Carbine, Ruby a plasma rifle, Yang and Blake with their personal weapons.
A stare-down seemed to happen then. It must have been only for a few seconds but they stretched impossibly long, and to each, it felt like minutes. Before it was broken by the monitor exclaiming towards the mass of lekgolo,
"You have caused enough damage to my facility, it is time for you to begone!" And blasting it with a laser from its optic.
The result of which was the mass reeling in pain and anger, as several worms fell, before hunter sized masses dropped from the form and began charging towards the team with roars of anger.
"Well, that was helpful!" Ruby yelled at the lightbulb, before beginning to fire upon the forms that were shambling towards them at quite fast speeds, their club-like appendages, flailing erratically about them, trying to hit the team somehow.
They all began to fire upon the Lekgolo forms and dodging their attacks, Blake and Yang were doing a lot more of the latter, not used to fighting such creatures. But despite that, they were felled rather quickly, either ripped to shreds by the projectile-based weapons used by Yang, Blake, and the Chief, or blasted apart by the monitor and Ruby's plasma, and the micro explosions caused by Arbiter's radioactive projectiles putting too much strain on individual worms.
"Well, one thing's for sure." Ruby said after a while, with more forms being produced by the mass, "They fall a lot easier without the Nanolaminate plates."
"Indeed Spartan," Arbiter agreed, though, he was not met with anything as a response.
The massive Lekgolo Colony seemed to realize that this was going no-where, so it let out another unearthly cacophonous howl, and the remaining forms turned to look at it, before reforming into its mass. The bulk then retreated back down the corridor it showed up in.
"This is what it always does." The Monitor told them, irritated at the colony, "After a small-time it retreats into the other chambers, dividing itself amongst them. Unfortunately, one is under vacuum, so as to not compromise other technologies, which despite this, are mostly still intact, so it remains that way."
"They can survive vacuum?" Blake asked, surprised at the revelation.
"They were originally found on an asteroid belt," Arbiter supplied, "I believe they had caused a small moon to disintegrate and form a belt around the planet with how much they ate, so yes, they survive in a Vacuum."
"Well, that means we're going to have to split up," Cortana said, "Chief and Ruby, into the Vacuum chamber, Arbiter, take Blake and Yang to deal with the rest."
"Oh no." Ruby but in, "I'm not leaving my team with him."
"Your suits are the only ones that are rated for vac-" the Monitor tried to reason, but was cut off.
"I don't care, you may trust him sir, but I can't just hand over my team to him knowing what his kind has done to ours."
"Do you not think I feel shame?!" The Arbiter suddenly yelled at them, "That I do not regret my actions dictated by the prophets?!" He glared at Ruby's visor, "Do you believe that I still take pride in all of the suffering that I caused, of the innocent's dead by my hands? I know that I am the direct cause of billions of lives taken because of a lie, with 7 worlds dead because of my orders." Yang and Blake gasped, with Ruby just silently fumed, her visor glaring back at the Sanghili.
"I tell you this Spartan, The Prophets did do one thing right. They were right to brand me with the mark of shame," he put a hand over the left side of his chest, "The only thing that stopped me from ending my life like so many of my brothers have, and undoubtedly will when the find out the news, is to hopefully reform my people, so that such acts will never be committed again. I do not try to act like those lives I ended were not wasted, and I give you my word as the Arbiter of the Sanghili, that your companions will not be harmed. If you find me wrong, I will give you no resistance in striking me down if it means you will leave your grudges behind.
I am not asking you to forgive, merely allow us to better ourselves from that tragedy."
There was a pregnant pause, Arbiter had at this point bowed down to the point where Ruby was a foot over him, with Yang and Blake internally screaming at the situation, and Chief, ready to intervene if Ruby, who looked like she could have wisps of smoke appearing any moment now, did anything drastic.
It seemed like minutes passed before Ruby spat out her answer.
"Fine…"
