Chapter 7: Mountain Glenn
January 28, 2682; 0900 Hours
Remnant, Beacon (Headmaster's Office)
"Why must you turn everything into a blatant display of military bravado!?" Goodtwitch demanded, glaring down General Ironwood from behind her glasses. "Not everything is a contest of measuring d-" She found herself cut off by Ozpin.
"Glynda…" He chastised, turning around in his chair. "I believe we have a way to address this situation in the Southeast without sending in a mass of soldiers."
"You can't possibly be thinking of sending students, Oz." Ironwood sighed. "That'd be suicide."
"Students, led by a soldier." Ozpin corrected. "One far more suited to missions like this."
"And who would that be?" Ironwood asked, seeing Ozpin and Glynda share a knowing glance.
Ozpin produced a scroll, and tapped out a few commands on the interface. A few moments later, the elevator in the back of the office pinged. Ironwood watched an almost unnaturally tall young man step out of the elevator, wearing the normal uniform for Beacon students. Just under his collar, however, seemed to be a black bodysuit of some kind. Ironwood knew that posture and that walk. This young man, despite the Beacon uniform, had indeed received military training. He recognized him, even if just barely. He was at the Tower checking up on his teammate after the breach.
Ozpin addressed the newcomer, locking eyes with him. "I know about the promise I made to you when we first met, but this is a matter best tended to by someone of your talents, Major."
"Major?" Ironwood asked, confused.
"Apologies, James." Ozpin said, glancing over to the General. "Despite our friendship, this was something that I had to keep… under wraps for a time. How familiar are you with the old story of our origins? The ones that tell of Humans on Remnant hailing from another world?"
"Oz, don't be ridiculous." Ironwood chuckled. "I know that there's truth to every legend, but that one's just too far out-there."
"Is it?" Ozpin asked, looking to the Major.
"General Ironwood…" The Major began, locking his hands behind his back. "You hold a position of power here on Remnant, and my superiors have given me clearance to share the same information that I have with Ozpin, with you." At the General's attentive look, the Major continued. "My name is Major Ivan Chesnokov, United Nations Space Command Special Forces Operator. Serial Number: C-124-008-1. I've been sent here by the UNSC Office of Naval Intelligence to better understand the culture and society of our lost colony mission, launched just under three hundred years ago. If you have any questions, I'll do what I can to answer them."
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January 28, 2682; 1030 Hours
Remnant, Beacon (Team RWBY Dorm)
"Where's Ivan?" Ruby asked, looking to the rest of her team. "He was supposed to meet us here after we picked our mission!"
"He said he had to go talk with Ozpin about something." Yang shrugged, kicking her legs back and forth as she waited. "He's still got a half-hour before we leave. He'll be here."
Right on cue, the door clicked open and the SPARTAN in question stepped inside. He was still wearing his Beacon uniform, but something was different. He had black gloves on his hands, which seemed to run under his sleeves as well. "Ivan!" Ruby declared, happily. "What were you talking to Ozpin about?"
"Something pertaining to our mission." Ivan answered, electing to keep a vast majority of the actual talking-points to himself. "I got your message about which mission you all chose, and Ozpin's allowing me to lead it."
"Wait… what?" Weiss asked. "We're supposed to be shadowing a professional Huntsman."
Ivan glanced over to Blake. "Blake… I think it's time."
"Really?!" Blake asked, drawing confused looks from everyone else in the room.
"What do you mean?" Weiss asked, eyeing her teammate.
"It's time for me to share a little secret with all of you…" He said, walking over to his bed and pulling the five metallic containers out from under it.
"You're finally telling us what's in those?" Ruby asked, excitedly.
"That, and then some." Ivan nodded. "Let me preface this by saying that I'm sorry it took me so long to share this with all of you. I just had to be sure that I could trust you to keep this a secret. We've reached a point where I can't exactly afford secrecy anymore."
"What do you mean?" Yang asked, watching Ivan place his gloved hand against the small scanner on one of the boxes. The crate opened with a pneumatic hiss, and four retention locks clicked open. He flipped the lid off, and produced his MJOLNIR GEN-2 Helljumper-pattern helmet, complete with the black visor. Everyone's jaw, with the exception of Blake's, fell open. Blake had a smile on her face.
"Oh my god…" Ruby muttered. "That was you?! In Forever Fall?!"
"Yeah…" Ivan nodded, placing the helmet down.
"I thought you were a transfer student from Atlas!" Weiss declared.
"Not exactly." Ivan clarified, opening another crate and producing the chestplate for his armor. It still had his nameplate, rank markings, and SPARTAN designation etched into the black surface.
"Those are military ranks…" Weiss added. "You're a soldier?!"
"A Major." Ivan clarified. "And before you ask, no… I am not from Atlas, Vale, Vacuo, or Mistral. I've been cleared by my superior officer to share this with all of you, so long as you keep this strictly between the five of us." Now, even Blake was stunned. All of them nodded fervently, signaling that they could be trusted to keep this quiet.
"Alright…" Ivan continued, sighing. "Again, I'm sorry for lying, even if by omission." He took a deep breath, and began his explanation. "My name is indeed Ivan Chesnokov, but I am a Major in the United Nations Space Command. I'm a Special Forces operative sent to Remnant to gather intelligence on this planet's culture, history, and society to pave the way for re-contact with the Unified Earth Government; or the civilian government that commands the UNSC. This will be happening very soon."
"How soon?" Ruby asked.
"A few days." Ivan answered. "The fleet's already en-route."
"So what do we do?" Blake asked.
"We wait." Ivan answered, producing the rest of his armor from the various crates. "And just operate as normal."
"Why did you keep this secret for so long?" Ruby asked.
"I was bound by operational security measures." Ivan answered. "Going around telling everyone that I'm an alien would've caused a panic, and would have made our job a lot harder."
"So you being here, being our friend, was all just an act?" Yang asked, her tone sounding betrayed.
"No!" Ivan answered a bit too quickly for his liking, but he decided to roll with it. No sense in lying to them any more than he already has. "None of that was an act. I am your friend, and I would happily take a bullet for any of you. That rank plaque on my armor doesn't mean I don't care. I do care… about all of you. I wouldn't be sharing this with you if I didn't."
Try as they might, none of Team RWBY could find anything disingenuous in Ivan's words. If anything, that was probably the most genuine thing he's ever said. Weiss was the first to break the silence. "Just like I said to Blake… I don't care." She said, looking to the SPARTAN. "You've been with us for months, and I don't really care where you come from. All I care about is that I can still call you a friend."
"Same here." Yang nodded. "We've been through too much together to just drop it here."
"Yang and Weiss are right." Blake nodded. "You shared the secret… part of it, at least, with me. You kept your promise, helped me at the Docks, and you've always been there for us… even when we didn't realize it. It'd be wrong to stop trusting you."
Ivan glanced over to Ruby, who simply smiled at him. "You shot an Ursa that was about to attack me. You're cool in my book." She gave a thumbs-up, earning a smile from Ivan.
"Thanks, girls…" Ivan said, surprising even himself with the emotion behind his words. He felt real, genuine sorrow for lying to them. In all of his admittedly short career with ONI, this was a first for him. "Looks like Ozpin was right putting me on your team after all…"
"And we're glad to have you!" Ruby happily declared, darting over and slamming into the SPARTAN, wrapping him in a hug. Ivan quickly found himself in the center of a group hug that even Weiss joined in on. He did his best to return the gesture.
"So…" Yang said, not long after everyone untangled themselves from the embrace. "What's so special about that armor of yours?"
Ivan chuckled. "Quite a bit. You've already seen some of it."
"Yeah, Mister Invisible." Ruby giggled.
"Do all of you guys get that armor?" Blake asked, watching as Ivan started to remove his uniform. Underneath was his black hydrostatic gel layer, the base that all of his armor connected to.
"Nope, just my division." Ivan answered, tossing his uniform onto the bed and setting to work on assembling his armor by hand. It was a grueling process, but there was no other option for him.
"What is your division, exactly?" Weiss asked.
Ivan remained thoughtful for a moment, trying to decide whether or not to tell the truth. He shrugged. "Eh, it's public knowledge anyways." Ivan said, reaching over to his chestplate and tapping the C-124 etched just above the heart. "I'm in the SPARTAN Corps. We're the most effective special forces operatives available to the UNSC."
"What makes you guys so special?" Yang asked.
"A few million Credits' worth of augmentations." Ivan explained. "Along with the armor, which costs about as much as a small starship."
"Augmentations?" Weiss asked, confused.
Ivan turned his head, pushing his hair aside and revealing the metallic surface of his neural implant. "Whoa…" Yang said, surprised. "That looks like the thing above Ironwood's eye."
"It's a SPARTAN-Pattern Neural Lace System." Ivan explained. "One of about two-dozen augmentations I've received."
"You can just tell us all of this now?" Weiss asked, surprised by the transparency.
"All of this is public knowledge in the UEG." Ivan shrugged. "You can just type 'SPARTAN' into a Waypoint search engine and it'll spit all of this information out at you."
"What does that neural thing do?" Ruby asked.
"It's kinda like an IFF, and it lets me interface with my armor and the Tech Suit." He flexed his fingers, showing that his black bodysuit was in fact the Tech Suit. "It shows the aiming reticle for any weapon I pick up, flags me as a friendly on UNSC systems, and lets me interface with computer systems."
"And these other augmentations?" Blake asked, wanting to pry as much information out of Ivan as possible.
Ivan let out a whistle. "Man… there's a lot." He pulled his chestplate over his head, the various moving parts whirring as they connected with the rest. "My bones are almost unbreakable, I can breathe toxic air for up to an hour, I'm strong enough to survive wearing this armor, I have natural night vision, I can run at sixty kilometers an hour without the armor, my heart can beat at around five hundred beats per minute, my body heals faster, and lots of my organs were either enhanced or completely replaced."
"Whoa…" Yang said, stunned. "They just… do that to people where you come from?"
"It was all consensual." Ivan shrugged. "I knew what I was signing up for."
"How many people are like you?" Ruby asked, watching Ivan attach his armored gauntlets to his Tech Suit.
"Afraid that bit's classified." Ivan answered. After finishing with his gauntlets, he reached into one of the larger crates and produced the various parts to his sniper rifle, laying them all out and starting to assemble the rifle. "I can say that normal soldiers are nowhere near as augmented as we are."
Before any more questions could be asked of him, his eyes darted over to Ruby's backpack. He thought he saw the pack move for a moment, and it was confirmed as the fuzzy head of a small corgi popped out of the pack, barking happily. "Uhh…" Ivan said, looking to Ruby. "Where'd that come from?"
"Oh, our dad sent him in the mail." Ruby explained as if it were a simple thing.
"Hold on a second…" Ivan held a hand up. "Your dad sent a dog in the mail?"
"Yeah, he does stuff like that all the time." Yang dismissed the stunned SPARTAN's question.
"Your dad or your dog?" Ivan asked.
"That's what I asked!" Blake declared, earning a laugh from Ivan.
"Man, you guys are weird." He chuckled, sliding a full magazine into his sniper rifle.
"Pot calling the damn kettle." Yang laughed.
"Fair enough." Ivan smirked, attaching the rifle to the magnetic strip on his back. He grabbed his Battle Rifle from beside his bed and did the same. He reached into his nightstand as well, producing his M6 SOCOM and an M7S SMG. He attached the handgun and the SMG to the magnetic strips on his thighs.
"Got enough guns there, Ivan?" Yang asked, watching the SPARTAN strap an entire armory's worth of weapons to his person.
"Not quite." He answered with a smirk, grabbing a few spare magazines from the crates for each of his weapons. He grabbed three 40mm grenades for his underslung launcher, and slotted them into compartments in his combat harness. "There we go." He smirked, grabbing his helmet from the ground and tucking it into the crook of his arm. "Ready to roll?"
"Hell yeah!" Yang happily shouted.
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January 28, 2682; 1149 Hours
Remnant, Vale (Mountain Glenn)
"Alright, we've got three days before we're due back at Beacon!" Ivan shouted over the roaring engines of the aircraft they were occupying. "Should be more than enough time to thin out the Grimm here, and get our mission done in the process!"
The relatively short flight from Beacon to Mountain Glenn was coming to an end, as they were a few minutes out from their designated LZ. He had shared what information he could with the rest of Team RWBY regarding the UNSC's impending arrival, and that seemed to have put their minds at ease. Now, instead of being apprehensive at the thought of the UNSC showing up on Remnant, they seemed to be looking forward to it. At the very least, they wouldn't be able to go around telling people that aliens would be showing up in a few days while they were here in Mountain Glenn.
"Well, you're in charge for now." Ruby noted, looking to Ivan. "Where do we start?"
"We'll comb the place, sector by sector, until dusk." Ivan said, watching as the Bullhead began its automated descent. "We'll find a place to hole up for the night, and then rinse and repeat." Seeing that the ground had grown close enough, Ivan waved a hand. "Go, go, go!" He shouted, jumping from the side of the VTOL and landing on the cracked concrete with a heavy thud. The rest of Team RWBY fell to the ground beside him, deploying their weapons as the SPARTAN fell to one knee and scanned their surroundings with his thermal optics, eyes darting down to his motion tracker.
"Anything?" Blake asked, scanning the East.
"Motion tracker's clear." Ivan answered, standing upright and holding his Battle Rifle in a low-ready.
Ivan glanced over to see Ruby letting Zwei, her corgi, loose from her pack. He watched as the small animal started sniffing at the pavement, pointing itself North and beginning to bark. "What is it, Zwei?" Ruby asked. Zwei simply barked in response.
"Hold on…" Ivan said, looking down to his tracker again. He saw a large group of signatures, roughly a hundred meters out, closing in on their position from the North. "We've got a pack coming in, due North." He declared, bringing his rifle to bear.
Weiss smiled, the cylinder of her rapier rotating to load a bundle of Ice Dust. "Now we get to see you in action for real."
"Please…" Ivan began, looking down to the heiress. "Do try to keep up." He cracked a small smirk beneath his helmet, engaged his armor's thrusters, and took off in a full sprint towards the herd of Grimm.
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January 28, 2682; 1840 Hours
Remnant, Mountain Glenn
"So, Ivan… what made you decide to be a soldier?" Ruby asked, walking along the path next to the SPARTAN. She had thought he was impressive before, but with this armor… he was on a whole different level. After he explained to them that he didn't even have any training with his Aura, yet managed to keep up with the Huntresses-in-training, she was astounded. She had seen this completely 'normal' man dance between Grimm with ease, rounds rattling off from his rifle. He had even crushed a Beowolf under his feet after slamming into it with the assistance of his armor's integrated thrusters, a shockwave knocking three others back. "I mean… there has to be a reason you guys exist, after all."
"A reason we exist?" Ivan asked, scanning the buildings as he walked past them. Weiss, Blake, and Yang were off securing a camp for the night while he and Ruby secured the perimeter.
"Like… there's gotta be a reason you SPARTANs are around." Ruby explained.
Ivan thought for a moment. There were a myriad of reasons for him joining the UNSC, but he had yet to truly give his reasoning for joining the SPARTAN Program any meaningful thought. He shrugged. "This place pretty much sums it up."
"What do you mean?" Ruby asked, confused.
"I mean, just look around here." Ivan gestured with his off-hand. "All the destroyed buildings, all of the lives lost… this is why I do it." His hand returned to the grip of his rifle. "One of Humanity's greatest heroes, a SPARTAN, once said that a soldier's duty is to protect Humanity, whatever the cost. That's why Mountain Glenn failed… there was nobody strong enough, or willing enough, to protect it."
"In short, I'm a SPARTAN because there are still people that need protection, and there's nothing else I'd rather be. I would readily and willingly give my life to save another. Every SPARTAN would." Ruby looked up to the SPARTAN, seeing that he had finished. Truth be told, she had nothing that could follow that up. With a heavy sigh, Ivan nodded towards the building the others had gone into. "C'mon, it's getting dark."
Ruby fell in behind the SPARTAN, stepping into the decrepit building and climbing a few flights of stairs. As they reached the fourth floor, they saw that everyone had set up their bedrolls and had started a small fire in the center of the room. "So…" Yang said, looking at Ruby and Ivan as they entered. "Who's taking first watch?"
"You all rest, I'll handle the watch tonight." Ivan answered, locking his Battle Rifle back onto the magnetic strip.
"Are you sure?" Blake asked. "You won't be tired?"
"Augmentations, Blake." Ivan smirked beneath his helmet.
"Oh… yeah." Blake hummed.
"Get some rest, all of you." Ivan nodded. "You did good today. We'll start at 0600 tomorrow."
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January 29, 2682; 0237 Hours
Remnant, Mountain Glenn
"Anything you can find on potential locations for their operations?" Ivan asked into his comms.
"Mountain Glenn is a big place, SPARTAN." Merlin answered, the shrug almost audible. "But, if I had to hazard a guess, the tunnels beneath you. The underground transit tunnels are cut off from the rest of Vale's network, so it would be the most advantageous position."
"Thanks, Merlin." Ivan responded. "Any word on the Fleet's arrival?"
"ETA is around 0600 tomorrow." Merlin answered.
"Composition?" Ivan asked, scanning the street below with his thermal optics.
"About what you'd expect from a fleet this far into deep space." Merlin answered. "In Spirit of Fire, two Everest-Classes, three Autumn-Classes, and an escort formation of Destroyers and Frigates."
"Bishop's bringing the Flagship of the fleet?" Ivan asked, confused. The report on the fleet's impending arrival was woefully lacking in the information department. He chalked it up to another case of ONI being secretive.
"Appears so." Merlin answered.
"Alright, thanks buddy." Ivan said, having finished with his questions for the night.
"Always happy to help, SPARTAN." Merlin responded. "You're lucky I don't sleep."
Ivan chuckled, closing down his comms with the Avalon. As he scanned the area with his thermals, he saw a small blip on his motion tracker, registering as directly below him. He glanced down, spotting a dog-shaped thermal image, followed closely by what appeared to be a short human girl. He deactivated his thermals, confirming it. Ruby was chasing after Zwei, who had taken off towards the inner city.
The SPARTAN let out a heavy sigh, looking over to the sleeping members of Team RWBY. "Up and at 'em, girls!" He shouted, startling all of them awake.
"Wha-?!" Yang half-shouted, scrambling to her feet. "What is it?" Everyone else started standing upright alongside her.
"Ruby took off with Zwei, looks like he's found something." He motioned out of the window he was sitting in. "I'll see you on the ground." As Ivan dropped out of the window, landing with a thud a moment later, the three others took off after him.
As the three Huntresses hit the ground behind him, Ivan took off in a run in the direction he saw Ruby and Zwei head off in. After a few moments of running, he saw two dots appear on his tracker. Just before rounding the corner, one of them disappeared off of his sensors. "Shit!" He thought to himself, his thrusters boosting him around the corner, rifle raised up.
Instead of finding Ruby lying on the ground, he found Zwei standing on the edge of a large sinkhole, looking into the abyss and barking. He looked up, spotted the SPARTAN, and started barking out for him. "Oh shit…" He muttered, seeing Crescent Rose on the edge of the sinkhole. He turned to face the three others that rounded the corner. "We've got a problem."
"Ruby!" Yang declared, seeing her sister's scythe lying on the ground.
"C'mon!" Ivan beckoned, sprinting towards the hole in the ground. Upon reaching the edge, he bent down to grab Ruby's weapon before jumping in, engaging his thrusters to slow his descent. The rest of Team RWBY was but a few steps behind him.
He landed on a hard concrete surface with a relatively light thud. The fall wasn't too far, a few dozen feet at most. As he looked around, he saw that he was standing atop a building, which seemed to be a part of an underground city of sorts. He spotted Ruby on the ground as well, slowly coming to her senses and attempting to stand back up.
Before he could move to help the young Huntress to her feet, he heard a heavy clang from behind him. In an instant, he wheeled around to face the noise, his suppressed magnum being flung into his waiting hand by the armor's magnetic strips. "Freez-" The two White Fang members didn't have a chance to finish their order before a pair of M6 rounds embedded themselves in their skulls. Yang, Weiss, and Blake all landed alongside the SPARTAN just as the two corpses hit the floor.
"Ruby!" Yang declared, rushing over to her sister and helping her to her feet. "Are you alright?"
"Yeah…" Ruby nodded. "I'm good."
"Thank God…" Yang hugged her sister tightly. "You scared the hell out of me!"
"Wait!" Ruby began looking around. "Where's Zwei?"
"He's right here." Weiss said, setting the corgi down carefully. He gave a happy bark and ran over to Ruby.
"Ohh, Zwei!" Ruby happily bent down to hug the small dog. "You're okay!"
While the Huntresses were busy tending to Ruby, Ivan took the chance to scan the area. Lo and behold, he spotted a tram line down on the bottom level of the large cavern, surrounded by a few squads of White Fang. Through the open door of a freight car, he could see the familiar image of Roman Torchwick shouting out orders to the Faunus. Two of these Faunus seemed to be carrying something onto the car.
Bringing the Battle Rifle's scope up to his visor, he looked through it. The object was vaguely cylindrical, with wires protruding from the ends. There appeared to be a keypad and an LED display on the face of the device. "Everyone, eyes on." Ivan declared, waving a gesture in the train's direction. "White Fang foot mobiles, two dozen." He explained, momentarily forgetting that he was not commanding a team of SPARTANs. "Torchwick's in sight."
"Wait, really?!" Blake asked, darting over.
"Affirmative." Ivan nodded, putting the Battle Rifle back on its magnetic strip. He produced his Sniper Rifle, zeroing in on Torchwick's head. He keyed into the FOB's comms network. "Lieutenant, patch me through to Ozpin."
"Copy that, Major." The Lieutenant acknowledged. After a short time, he heard Ozpin's voice over the comms. Right now, he was rather glad he had given the Lieutenant Ozpin's contact information to deliver the briefing packet all those months ago.
"Ivan, what is it?" Ozpin asked. "Your lieutenant said it was urgent?"
"I have Torchwick in my sights." Ivan answered. "Capture or kill?" All of Team RWBY looked to him in surprise.
"Capture would be preferred." Ozpin answered. "General Ironwood would like him taken in for questioning."
"Understood." Ivan answered, closing the comms. He turned back to Team RWBY. "Alright, you four encircle the train." He began. "Keep your heads down and stay out of sight. Wait for my signal."
"Your signal?" Weiss asked, confused.
"A really big fucking explosion." Ivan answered, activating his active camouflage module. He slung the sniper rifle back over his shoulders, and leapt the fifteen meters between the top of this building and the nearest one. Upon landing, he continued his sprinting and repeated the motion for another three buildings until he was finally close enough to the tracks for his liking. He dropped to one knee, producing his Battle Rifle again. He reached into his combat harness, grabbed a 40mm grenade, and tucked it into the tube of his underslung launcher. He activated his VISR module, keeping an eye on the four Huntresses as they moved to encircle the train, keeping their distance enough to go unnoticed. Once they had all gotten into position, he lifted the Battle Rifle up, switching the reticle over to the grenade launcher's rangefinder.
He let his suit's systems handle the calculations, adjusted his aim accordingly, and let the high-explosive grenade fly with a soft thump. The grenade sailed through the air for about a second before impacting directly on the tracks. The explosion snapped the already-weakened and rusted train tracks, throwing dust and shrapnel in all directions. A mere moment after the explosion, Team RWBY sprang into action.
A series of shots from Crescent Rose rang out, each of them dropping a White Fang member. A hail of explosive rounds from Ember Celica flew through the air, tossing the bodies of the enemy around with each successive impact. Blake and Weiss darted out from their cover, engaging the White Fang in close-quarters. Ivan jumped from the edge of the building, using his thrusters to hover in the air for a moment as he rained down bursts of gunfire from his Battle Rifle. As he fell, he locked his armor and thudded against the stone ground, sending cracks webbing their way out from beneath his feet.
It took but a moment for the last of the White Fang to fall, leaving a stunned Torchwick standing on the edge of a train car with five weapons pointed at him from all sides. Ivan saw his hand twitch on the grip of his cane, and he cut him off by putting a burst of fire into the weapon, knocking it out of his hand. "Well…" Torchwick said, his voice rather calm given the situation. "That's new." He said, looking to the hulking mass of power armor that was leveling a rifle against him. Ivan kept his finger on the trigger, even after Torchwick had raised his hands above his head.
"Lieutenant, get me Ozpin again." Ivan said into his comms. After a moment, he heard the connection go through and didn't wait for Ozpin to acknowledge the call. "Ozpin, the target is secure. Tell Ironwood to get an Explosive Ordinance Disposal unit to my current location immediately, along with some shackles."
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January 29, 2682; 0538 Hours
Remnant, Mountain Glenn
Ivan watched as Torchwick was led onto an Atlesian Bullhead by a pair of Knights, grumbling about 'watching the hat'. The Atlesian Military had set up a small base in Mountain Glenn, meant to hold back any Grimm that might try to attack. "Nice work, son." Ironwood complimented, making his way over from a group of Atlesian soldiers. "We've cleared out all of the bombs, and secured the caverns. You've done the Kingdom a great service."
"Just doing my job, General." Ivan shrugged, removing his helmet and tucking it under the crook of his arm. "I trust you'll lock his ass up and throw away the key?"
"Your trust is well-placed, Ivan." Ironwood chuckled. The General seemed startled for a moment, then pressed a finger into his ear. "Go ahead?" He asked, listening to the comms unit in his ear. "What? Slow down, soldier… Understood, secure the wounded and pursue."
"What's going on?" Ivan asked, looking to the General. As much as he would have liked for it to be the case, he wasn't keyed into the Atlesian comms network.
"There's another combatant loose in the caverns." The General explained, sighing. "Apparently it's a short woman wielding a parasol?"
"We secured every inch of those caverns and my tracker didn't pick anything up." Ivan defended. "Strange…"
"Indeed, but she'll be in-custody soon enough." Ironwood said, very sure of that fact.
Just as the General finished his sentence, Ivan's own comms unit bleeped from his helmet. He quickly threw it over his head and keyed into it, seeing it was from the Avalon. "Go ahead, Avalon." He beckoned.
"Major, we've detected five Slipspace ruptures in-system!" The Lieutenant-Commander of the vessel shouted, her voice panicked and frenzied. "LIDAR paints them as one CAS Assault Carrier, two CCS Battlecruisers, and two CPV Destroyers! IFF reads Covenant! They're on a direct vector for Remnant, ETA: twenty minutes!"
Ivan's blood ran cold at that. The Covenant? Here? His training immediately took over, and his demeanor shifted in the blink of an eye. "Go dark, I repeat: go dark!" He ordered. "Pull back to the asteroid belt and await further orders!"
"Copy, Major!" The Commander responded, the line cutting a moment later. Ironwood, Team RWBY, and all of the soldiers looked to him with concern. He had left his vocal systems open.
Without a moment of hesitation, he keyed into FOB Alpha's comms. "Lieutenant, we have hostile fleet assets in-system!" Ivan declared. "Disable all electronic equipment and get the Darter in the air! I want Fireteam Omega and all available Marines in Vale immediately!"
"Understood, Major!" The Lieutenant acknowledged, the sounds of frantic movement coming over the communications. "Omega's gearing up now! We have eight Marines en-route. ETA: five minutes!"
"Acknowledged!" Ivan half-shouted into his comms unit. "Go dark!"
As the comms cut, everyone was now looking very concerned. "What's going on?" Ironwood asked, being the first to break the short silence from everyone else in the small encampment.
"General, I don't care who you piss off, but you need to put every single asset you have to combat stations!" Ivan declared, his visor staring down Ironwood. "Get the fleet at Beacon in the air, and start evacuating Vale!"
"What is going on?!" Ironwood asked.
Ivan suddenly remembered that these people had no idea what was coming. Deep down, he was sad that they had to see this. "This planet has twenty minutes before you come under attack by the Covenant. Twenty five if you're lucky! Now, you can either listen to me, or waste more time!" Ivan shouted.
Ironwood's face went pale. "I'll get it done."
