Halo: Predator Lost ch4 First Contact
Sparks erupted in a showering display, bright enough to blind a mole. For in the last twenty-four hours Winter worked tirelessly at repairing key thrusters for atmospheric flight. While the use of welding reduced their air supply, this was partially remedied by scavenging and releasing the oxygen supply from the remaining thrusters deemed too badly damaged for use.
Throughout this time, probes had been detected scanning the vessel. Origin of who made them unknown since coms were down. Still more things began to be noticed, at least by Scythe who busied himself by going through the ship's navigation systems and logs, trying to find anything that nearly caused them to be destroyed.
The first thing to notice was the lack of a rescue craft. Elder Nova's mother ship wasn't far from Yeager one, so it should have taken just half a cycle. Faster still with a warship and distress signals often receive a quick response. Next was the navigation system, the system had conducted a scan and accounting for stellar drift, noted a discrepancy. Predator vessels last hundreds of years and everything in space is constantly moving. As such the navigation systems were designed to automatically scan and update every hundred years or before every jump into FTL. In this case, a new scan had to be done after a diagnostic and the end result was something Scythe was still trying to figure out.
Slam, "Winter get up here, we have a new problem.". This was driving Scythe up the wall since by all accounts the ship had somehow time traveled roughly five hundred years. The data logs on the phenomenon didn't make sense either.
Popping out of the maintenance hatch, Winter finally came out. Let it be known that his armor was a dark grey before, now it appeared almost black. "Let me guess more trouble from our new friends?", Scythe gave him a look which spoke an obvious no, quite impressive despite a mask on. "Okay then, I've done what I can, for the ventral thrusters, which should help our deceleration. I also welded the joints of the landing gear to give extra strength while landing. So then what is the new problem?"
"I need a second opinion, the navigation system which upon doing a scan, had to update our charts by five hundred years which doesn't make any sense." For the first time in his life Scythe was beginning to worry, time travel was theoretical but even if they did time travel, there is zero sense for any Yautja not to answer a beacon.
Winter upon doing his own checks confirmed Scythes results, their new neighbors make sense now since after five hundred years more races would've begun to colonize the cosmos. This also presented few options, since it has been more than enough time for a rescue party to show up given how close they were to Yautja ships and planets.
"Okay besides this huge issue, what else has been happening Scythe?"
Scythe activated external screens and showed more ships, one was an obvious transport ship, while the other two much larger vessels clearly had weapons. Their broad wings and huge angular tail looked like an atmospheric craft flying in space. still, they were flying as an escort."The lead ship in front of us has been using some form of signal lights in order to communicate with us but I haven't figured out what it is or what they are saying since we use a different system."
Winter looked carefully at the signals, then a light popped on followed by the urge to go nuclear but fought off the urge. "I know who we are dealing with, that signal is in morse code and it's saying please follow us. As for who we are dealing with, they are human. Now Scythe, I'm in no hurry to die and protocol is at an impasse since now the humans are interstellar capable and thus more of a threat. They are also now to be respected and treated as equals thus allowing trade and negotiations. The decision is yours. we either blow ourselves up or take a chance these humans won't kill us and dissect our technology."
The air was running thin, no help was coming, and now thanks to Winter's obsession with oomans, the risk of getting killed went up. The fact Winter had higher status and could easily make the decision shows how much trust he has. Still, neither wanted to die, so he made a difficult choice. Sitting in the pilot seat and grabbing the controls, Scythe adjusted course to follow the smaller vessel, with the computers now translating the code.
"Winter, lock down the ship and strap in, we are in for a rough ride." Steeling himself Scythe buckled in and began prepping the ship for a hard landing.
"Command this is Ucon, looks like our new friends somehow got our message and have adjusted their course to follow us. Be advised we aren't sure how they are going to land, request the largest the landing strip be utilized."
"Ucon requested granted, all available craft are being removed in preparing for worst-case landing"
"Copy that command, course laid in, beginning our reentry descent."
Strapped in the aft compartment again. Winter feels the ship beginning to shake upon entering the thermosphere, followed by a gradual heat build-up of the belly and nose of the ship. knowing Scythe will be focused on piloting, Winter accessed the systems in the engine room and began using what few systems remained functional to keep everything from going kaboom.
Meanwhile, Scythe's nerves were on edge, more so now than the last two hundred years of his life, not even his chiva could compare to this. Finally entering the mesosphere, the shaking got worse, then alarms started to sound from various systems before going green. likely Winters doing from engineering. "Please Paya let me live and if not then not like this." In front of him, a city was off in the distance growing rapidly. the terrain was rocky with green hills and water not far from the settlement. It was now obvious, the ships were leading him to a runway. The problem was they were coming in too fast
Right now the only good thing was the wide body of the shuttle, which provided some form of lift and would make crash landing easier. The problem was stopping and praying the sheer volume of ordinance, which could vaporize them and the settlement, wouldn't go off when they hit.
"Come on, come on, activating forward thrusters... Now!" Seconds upon being activated, the tremors in the ship continued to get worse followed by the sound of moaning as metal contorted even more from the stress
"Flight Control, standby fire suppression systems, the unknown vessel is coming in hard, be advised I'm going to attempt a ballsy maneuver to slow it down. Ucon out".
"Okay ready the grapplers and standby to go full reverse burn." stated the pilot.
"System ready but just to be clear, this system was designed to lift tanks, not ships right?" stated the copilot nervously.
"Indeed, on my mark, 3... 2... 1... mark!" Four magnetic tethers latched onto the shuttles hull follow by the pelican elevating its engines and going full burn
Sure enough, the added force may have been just enough as a minute later the pelican's tether snapped, causing the craft to flip and nearly smash into the rear engines.
"Winter this is Scythe, hitting the ground... now". Like a bullet skidding across a flat rock, the shuttle slammed onto the ground crushing its belly. The runway erupted in a shower of sparks and fire as the sound of screeching metal, and the roar of engines could be heard for miles. Then finally after two miles of travel, the ship came to a total halt. The engines shutting off within a minute of stopping, followed by the distinct sound of silence.
Breathing hard and finally relaxing for the first time in what felt like a month, Scythe released his death grip on the controls and relaxed in his seat. "I'm never doing that again, thank Paya, and thank the engineers who built this ship. Power levels down to ten percent and dropping, life support critical. commencing depressurization. Winter, begin downloading the ship's memory into your wrist computers, then wipe the core before the power runs out, this shuttle is toast." Scythe starts the gradual process of shutting down all remaining systems.
Outside, local news crews along with UNSC personnel begin showing up as UH-144 Falcons, both civilian and military start landing and provide overwatch. Ucon heavy and Falcon33 are the first to land on the tarmac near the alien shuttle, just as steam and hissing are heard, as the ship depressurizes and cools down. The runway had a massive black skid mark with chunks of debris running its length.
"Breaking story, this is Algolis news and we bring you coverage live from the Algolis spaceport. This is your host Adam West and today marks a new first contact since the arrival of the Covenant. Specialist Mayweather and Lieutenant Owen have been selected to greet these new visitors as they were the ones who discovered the vessel entering our system. Now as you can see here, the UNSC is taking zero chances, and should the new race prove hostile, then lethal action will be taken within moments. In order to reduce potential tensions, only when a weapon is raised and only under the order of Mayweather or Owen will our own forces engage. This is Adam West staying on.
"So we've got air but the outer hatches are jammed both from the distortion and from the impact, thankfully the doors have exploding bolts on them just in case. The oomans though, at least two of them are close and not aware of this and we don't want to risk angering them. Judging by the volume of weapons surrounding us. Winter, are you listening?" Scythe asked upon hearing the distinct metal clicking sound that can only come from Winter, turning around he saw the cause.
Grenades, knives, shurikens, plasma casters, ammo, and his signature weapons being checked and loaded the M2 Browning and his Barret M82A3 rifle all were being attached to his new armor. "Yep I'm listening, just tap on the outer hull to stand back then blow the doors. If the humans can't be reasoned with and they get hostile, activate the fail-safes and implode the ship. Also, you may want to gear up before doing that." In less than five standard minutes Winter was ready to take on an army which he has.
Taking his advice, Scythe proceeded to gear up for ranged combat, though unlike Winter he lacked the hardpoints on his armor to attach the bigger stuff and hesitated with the grenades, in truth, should things go hot, one will distract while the other detonates the ship. Finally, ready Scythe proceeds to the out hull, using a Yautja hammer he sends the signal via morse code.
Outside, with M6s on in their thigh holsters, and wearing casual dress uniforms Spc, Sara Mayweather, and LT Mike Owens waited until they heard banging in the hull. ... - .- -. -.. / -... .- -.-. -.-
"uh, what is with the banging, are they in need of more help". Asked Sarah.
"No Specialist, they are using morse code just as we were on them, and its saying stand back. Sgt Black, pilot of Ucon heavy"
"Thank you, Sargent, let's get clear" Ordered Mike
"Okay Winter, time to play diplomat, activating the bolts, now".
Outside a small section likely a door was blown off the ship with such force it tumbled to within a foot of a Warthog. The blast caused many troopers to raise weapons only for the LT to waive them down.
Gulping, and sweating buckets, Sara was now hoping these beings weren't hostile. The UNSC was already loosing against the Covenant, any more enemies would mean a quick extinction. So very carefully she and Owen moved to within thirty feet of the Opening and what came out, suddenly had everyone confused.
Robert C. Now that is a review and yes you are very correct but I'm not going to say which part.
Happy Fourth of July 2021 everyone I hope you're having an awesome holiday
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