RECOMPOSE
by Ladywolvesbayne
So, checkpoint four on my list of 'borderline insane decisions for this fanfic', but this shouldn't be so bad. These checkpoints are becoming quite close, this has to mean something big, I guess. No much about "surprises" today, but still, enjoy!
19. SHRIEKING SUN
AUGUST 21TH 2558
LOCATION: UNSC INFINITY IN SLIP-SPACE
STRATEGIC COMMAND AISLE
11:23 AM standard time
It took him at least fifteen minutes to 'calm down' enough to get out of his quarters and another ten minutes to get inside his MJOLNIR and make it to the bridge.
The Master Chief entered the strategic command aisle alone, to see Captain Lasky standing beside the holo-table, fully recovered from his wounds. Osman was nowhere to be seen, neither Commander Palmer nor the ONI personnel that used to orbit around the Admiral. John approached and saluted, Lasky responded as well adding a tense smile; the man looked worn out and it wasn't just out of convalescence.
"At ease, Chief. I'm sorry to pull you out of your resting hours."
"No problem, sir." John held his helmet under his left arm.
"Your recon mission is all set up, isn't it?"
"Yes, sir."
"Great. We're deploying you in about twenty minutes, I will brief you in with the specs now and you can go get your gear and crew ready. The Challenger is warming up engines as we speak."
The UNSC Challenger was one of the ten strident-class heavy frigates attached to the Infinity's permanent fleet. A vessel that big needed at least twenty-five essential crewmen and an AI to be maneuvered and this wasn't making any sense anymore. The recovery mission wasn't scheduled until another twelve days, they were nowhere near New Carthage yet. John managed not to openly frown in front of the Captain, instead he chose to make the most important question:
"Does the Admiral...?"
"Know about it?" Lasky said, now serious. "No, she doesn't. She's still in cryo, but her agents are probably bringing her back by now, if their ears are as sharp as I think. You have to listen up and move fast."
John didn't like to break the chain of command but if it was strictly necessary, he was willing to. Captain Del Rio forced him to do so once, he could still remember the man's words very clearly and not only the part where the former Captain insulted both Cortana and him.
But Lasky wasn't an incompetent prick, so John kept listening.
"Sir, with all due respect... why?"
"Because I'm not waiting for another massacre to happen. That's why. Osman is making me sit on my hands as punishment for not reporting sooner about Cortana and now she expects me to neglect my primary duties as a Captain. It's my responsibility to watch over every man, woman and child aboard this ship right now. We need that damn generator and we need it ASAP. You should have left right when the Infinity set course to New Carthage, there's no point in stand by and relax inside a sixty-three-million square feet target*."
John was certain that Osman's decisions were fueled by the interest in keeping an eye over Cortana, for some reason he couldn't yet make sense of. It wouldn't be strange that the Admiral wanted to prevent Cortana from escaping, but one would think that she knew better than risking the lives of thousands of soldiers and civilians.
"I may be digging my own grave here, Master Chief, but it's for the greater good. If you come back with that generator..."
"I will, sir."
The Captain looked at him in the eye, worried. It was a risky business, they both knew that, but John was willing to make Lasky's act of bravery worth it. It wouldn't be the first time, anyway. After a long and weary sigh, the Captain turned around to face the upper screens.
"Roland, the display."
"Aye-aye, sir." the AI replied, his amber miniature popping up over the corner of the table. He saluted at John with a content smile. "How was your nap, Master Chief?"
John glared at Roland with annoyance. Did the little smartass knew something?
The AI just frowned, a bit confused by such a cold stare, but then proceeded to display graphics, photos and information on the screens. Forerunner shield-world 0313, designation Paragon, scheduled for decommission within the next five standard years; located by the UNSC eight months before and ever since catalogued deserted, no traces of Promethean life forms were found. They weren't expecting hostility, but John was used to expect the worst possible scenario. The intel was mostly what the Chief already knew from the reports Dr. Glassman's crew provided, but this time there was something else. A detailed schematic. It was somewhat familiar.
It looked like a tall geometrical column with dozens of pressure locks, Forerunner in design, no doubt. Yes, John remembered it. He'd passed by and had blown up a fair amount of similar power-cores, so it wasn't that shocking in the end.
"Dr. Glassman got this from what they could recover of your video feed the day you first encountered the Rampant Spike." Lasky explained. "The engineers esteem that a generator resembles this but we're looking for a device bigger that weights in the order of tons. That's why the Challenger, you'll need a vessel large enough to haul it back to us. The Infinity will meet you at a rendezvous point, date and time will be provided later on via encrypted comm. All comms closed until rendezvous notification except in case of extreme emergency situation, secrecy is mandatory."
John assumed there wouldn't be any form of backup. That wasn't the problem.
"Is it radioactive?" the Chief asked.
"Extremely, nobody should be allowed to go near it without proper shielding. One of this things alone should produce enough juice to power up a Forerunner engine in a slip-space jump to the far end of the galaxy and back again. You just have to make sure that it makes it to the Infinity in one piece."
John nodded quickly.
"Sir, my squad was mostly assembled considering defense and possible combat; who's driving the Challenger?"
"Sigrid can take care of the navs and manage the comms. Also I've spared a small crew to assist you if something goes wrong, just to watch over your back. Plug Sigrid in and let her do the rest."
He was about to ask if it was safe to lay such responsibility over an AI but instead, the Chief nodded and straightened his pose. He'd learnt long ago not to underestimate any AI's skills. And a SPARTAN of his class certainly had no need for regular soldiers watching over his back, but the extra hands would be welcome. John mentally reviewed his squad one more time: fireteams Majestic and Bravo for assault, defense and recon, five K-9s and four of their respective SPARTAN handlers, plus Cortana, Eleven and five engineers from Dr. Glassman's crew. And a particularly rich load of weaponry and ammo, as usual. It was quite the crowd, that for sure, but he'd been in charge of larger crowds before and this was a recovery mission, not an assassination or infiltration.
He just had to focus on keeping Cortana and the engineers working. There was plenty of SPARTAN back up to rely on in event of being attacked in a supposedly deserted planet.
"I don't have to tell you how important this is." Lasky concluded, somber.
"It's crystal clear, sir."
"Then good luck, Master Chief."
AUGUST 21TH TO SEPTEMBER 1ST 2558
LOCATION: UNSC CHALLENGER IN SLIP-SPACE
Twelve standard days travel
She didn't want to go into cryo this time and she knew how he was when on active duty, so it was entirely pointless to hang around him. He was a SPARTAN, but not her SPARTAN at the time. Why did she wanted to stay close, anyway?
Maybe, because she didn't want to be alone.
Or maybe, she didn't want him to be alone when mostly everyone else was asleep. She didn't want to think of him being alone, never again.
Whatever the reason, Cortana tried to stay focused and to do her work, plus, she tried to keep a watchful eye on John. When the Chief plugged Sigrid's chip in a port at the Challenger's bridge, her radiant Viking shield maiden figure popped up from a holo-pad beside the Captain's seat. She started talking with her rough but feminine electronic voice, shouting out ordinary routines as she took control of the systems one by one with tremendous speed. If the Chief was shocked, surprised, angry or just indifferent about the fact that he'd been working with an UNSC Smart AI all along and it was kept from him, he didn't show. Sigrid didn't make a statement either, and she also chose to ignore Cortana and pretty much everyone else.
Alas, Cortana rarely saw him rest. She knew that John didn't need sleep as much as her in this current human form, but it was puzzling to see him sitting at the Captain's chair with Charley lying on the rubber floor, at his armored feet. He looked like a war god impatiently waiting for the next bloodbath.
Besides, he only sat there if Sigrid was nowhere to be seen, for some reason.
It wasn't the right time for anything, not even for talking. It wasn't safe.
Cortana wondered what was going through John's mind every time he looked at her or stopped by to make sure that she had eaten something or slept at least six hours. Two members of Fireteam Bravo were on guard duty, but the Chief wasn't as aware of them as he was of Cortana. That made her feel very happy sometimes, and she tried to return the feeling with concealed tugs every time she passed by him.
Her head was boiling with curiosity and expectation, she couldn't wait to see how far that newly discovered intimacy could take them both.
But it would have to wait. The mission (and survival) was the main priority.
SEPTEMBER 2ND 2558
LOCATION: FORERUNNER SHIELD-WORLD 0313 PARAGON
INNER SURFACE
3:37 AM standard time
The Pelican dropped them on the inner surface of Paragon under heavy rain. The crystal-clear drops were huge as balled fists and pounded on every piece of armor and equipment like dull rocks. The squad landed on a small, grassy hill, but most of the way down from there the terrain was flooded with thick, turbulent rivers of mud. It was also very cold, but the suits kept everyone warm and safe.
The Challenger would remain in orbit around the shield-world until extraction, as scheduled. The Pelican left too, the storm was too strong to stick around.
The squad moved in tight diamond formation with the Chief and the K-9 team at forefront followed by fireteam Majestic, the scientific crew and fireteam Bravo closing the rear. They had to make their way through a path of rocks to get to higher ground and away from the flooded valley. Cortana commanded her HARPY to deploy short conical spikes on the soles of her boots to avoid slipping on the muddy terrain, as Eleven first did. He got himself an assault rifle, a belt loaded with plasma grenades and a standard rocket launcher to complement his sidearm, and he seemed happy about it.
"I see you found some toys." Cortana said, amused.
He chuckled under his narrow V-shaped red faceplate. "A shitload of firepower that I hope we won't need, but just the weight of these babies is reassuring enough."
"You should name them or something."
Eleven huffed when he realized she was making fun of him and chose not to say another word for a while. Cortana looked ahead, at John's outstanding armored back. He was carrying a rocket launcher too, but that wasn't important. Through her blue-shaded faceplate she saw the massive distant shape of a building, parts of it seemed to float around a central silvery tower. That was the squad's destination, ETA thirteen minutes according to Sigrid's TEAMCOM management link. The Pelican couldn't drop them closer because of the weather, so they had to run.
Once reached the entrance, Cortana worked her way through the door systems to open a safe passageway into the cyan-hued darkness of the antechamber. Everything was going smooth.
Even the engineers seemed calm considering that they weren't men of action; they immediately started working with the nearest Forerunner terminal as if they were back home. The group moved across several passages and chambers, some of them so huge that the roof was impossible to see, some of them dark, some others well illuminated. There was always this distant humming sound of engines and machinery running, out of sight, it was incredible that thousands of years later all that astounding technology was still fully functional.
The dogs remained calm, their sharp ears tracking every sound around. Cortana looked at John several times. He was all business directing the team, but he wasn't calm, she knew. She had a bad feeling too.
Once they found a translocation port, the engineers set it up for use.
"All right, everyone." Cortana said, the whole party was reunited under dim lights at a long and narrow chamber, a few levels below surface. "We're picking up several strong energy signatures near to the planet's core itself. The maps aren't clear, though, and the Forerunner have funny ways to depict their technology. I say we should split up and check at least four to six locations and assess the one with the most accessible point of extraction. Chief?" she turned around to look at him.
John nodded. "Fine. I already got you sorted out."
In everyone's HUDs appeared three short lists of people; two were research teams and the third was supposed to work both as guard-backup and nexus between the other two teams. SPARTANS Thorne and Grant went along with Cortana, Eleven, two other technicians and one K-9 and its handler. The Chief was set to stay behind with the third team, since he was in charge.
But before Cortana left through the port, he called her out.
Curious, she observed as John and his massive dog approached.
"Charley, you go with her." John touched Cortana's shoulderplate under the sharp brownish gaze of the enhanced dog. With that gesture he was telling the animal that she would be sticking with the woman in black and blue from then on. "Keep your ears open, cadet."
Charley barked, acknowledging the order.
"Chief, you don't have to..." Cortana started, shocked.
"I do." he cut her, and released the chain from the dog's armored collar. "I'm not going with you this time, but she is."
Behind her blue faceplate, Cortana smiled. A strange warmth crawled through her skin, making her feel oddly happy.
Enhanced breeds were developed to genetically eradicate all sort of diseases that, hundreds of years ago, could have decimated cattle. It started with chicken, cows, sheep and horses; later it became a commercial sensation with the so-called 'service dogs' and 'exotic pets'. It was a big deal back in the 23rd century but as other applications for such technology surfaced, the production of these enhanced animals was slowly restricted to military purposes.
The UNSC battle dogs had extremely sensitive senses of hearing and smell, better than any previous modified service dog. The simplified neural link didn't mean that they actually understood the words, but the animal was connected to its handler directly, providing him or her with another video feed; if well trained, the beasts were loyal and obedient, sticking to their handlers until death. Such dogs were precious to the military even when they didn't get to make much use of them on space. They were large, strong and fierce, primarily conceived for search, recovery, guard duties and rescue, although they were more than capable of killing on the battlefield.
So, Cortana understood that what John just did was truly a big deal, and not only because he was Charley's authorized handler. He transferred the control of Charley's neural interface to Cortana and then nodded.
"She'll listen to you if you make your intentions clear." John explained.
"Okay, I'll do my best. Thanks, Chief."
She touched the temple of her faceplate, as saluting.
Then, they parted ways. It was time to work.
SEPTEMBER 2ND 2558
LOCATION: FORERUNNER SHIELD-WORLD 0313 PARAGON
THIRTY LEVELS BELOW SURFACE
4:10 AM standard time
"Woha! Wait, everyone!" Cortana cried through the comm, she barely made it to grab the platform's guardrail once she came out at the other end of the portal. "There's no gravity in here!"
"Say that again." SPARTAN Thorne asked.
"There's no gravity. The momentum will just make you fly away."
"Roger." said Thorne. "We'll remain here until your thumbs up."
"I'm moving in." Eleven's voice rose over Thorne's.
Cortana wanted to throw up. With every sense of direction now invalidated, her equilibrium started messing with her. She pushed herself to land on her feet over the platform, and her stomach eased. The world made a lot more sense when you could tell which way was up or down.
The translocation port had taken her into another immense chamber, this one radiant with unidentified light sources, gigantic icicles hanging from an impossibly high ceiling. The floor was made of some reflective silvery material (which increased the lightning), but the second Cortana tried to make a step towards the bulk of stylized machinery that she could see at the center of the room, she slipped.
Eleven emerged from the port and grabbed the guardrail beside her.
"Okay, this is trouble." he said, dropping his feet on the reflective surface. "Reach the ground and think about sticking to it. The HARPY should do the rest."
The moment he said it, the soles of his boots touched the glossy floor and there was not only a hissing sound but a solid clicking. Then he took a few steps, normally. Cortana imitated him and smiled when she felt her feet attached to something, although moving required effort. It was like stomping on a thick puddle of glue.
"Suction cups?" she asked, unsheathing her pad.
He shook his armored head. "I don't think so. This floor seems metallic."
"Works for me, but besides the SPARTANS, no one else has magnetic boots. Let me check if I can get the gravity and atmosphere back on."
Cortana quickly roamed through the Forerunner network, swiping her fingers over the pad's surface with incredible speed. The more she dived into layers and layers of coding, the more obscure the meaning of the labels became, but she finally found the chamber and after a few minutes of tweaking the controls, the gravity started to run again. She fell flat on her back, feet still locked to the ground; Eleven just crouched on his knees and knuckles. They waited for a few minutes, until the atmosphere readings were standard Earth.
"Okay, team. You can come in." Cortana said, groaning.
"Roger that, we're on our way." said Grant, over the comm.
"I'm not getting any readings, just freezing cold." Cortana stood up and worked on her pad for a while. "This is the place, all right, but... it doesn't make much sense. I don't read anything. Where are the mind-blowing energy signatures, the radiation, the scorching heat, anything?"
"Maybe it's broken." Eleven shrugged.
She kept digging through the network until she reached those obscure files from before, reading as fast as she could. She frowned under her blue faceplate.
The rest of the team came out the portal, a little disoriented at first, Charley and the other dog leading the party. Together, they made their way towards the center of the room. As the SPARTANS stood guarding and the technicians started setting up their workstations, both animals ran in wide circles around Cortana and Eleven, sniffing and growling, their armored harnesses tingling. The fur on their backs was pointing on end, they were clearly upset. Breath came out of their noses in thick clouds of steam.
As the technicians worked connecting their portable computers to the terminals that surrounded the elegant hissing machinery, Cortana walked away from the supposed generator, Eleven followed her when he saw her leave.
"Interesting." she said, after a moment.
"What is it?" Eleven asked her.
"This thing here. The schematics aren't clear, but there are references all over the place to something called 'the shrieking sun'. It appears to be somewhere over... no, it's below, there's another chamber beneath this one. Massive. There must be some sort of entrance around here."
"Yeah, but what is it?"
"I can only guess. This could be important, we should look into it."
Eleven cocked his head. "Really, Cortana?"
"What?" she shrugged. "We can sniff around a little, Charley is already doing it."
She pointed out at the dogs, the two of them were standing still with their heads down, their ears pointing at something. The other dog's handler separated herself from the group and walked towards the animals, interested.
Cortana ran towards another terminal and hooked her pad in, to have better access. Eleven followed her, again, groaning. The terminal's holographic screen flooded with information, but Cortana's pad flared erratically and froze. That was odd. She lifted her head to the gleaming cyan screen and recognized a sign that appeared beside long lines of Forerunner code. It was a warning, she'd seen it before.
"That's the reclaimer's glyph." Eleven pointed out, frowning.
"You've been doing your homework."
"Should we call the Chief in, then?"
She paused for a brief moment. "We have human bodies now, don't we?"
Cortana moved her hand forward and the HARPY's armored glove retreated like streams of tiny matte-black beads over her skin, uncovering her fingers. She pressed her palm against the cold plate beneath the floating screen and the symbols flared red, then green, then cyan again. A soft hissing sound -pressure releasing- came from beneath the sophisticated silvery floor.
Every SPARTAN turned around, weapons ready.
The floor opened exactly where the dogs were standing guard. Both of the animals started to growl, showing their enormous fangs, now crouching in attack postures.
"Something is happening!" the SPARTAN handler said.
"Keep the dogs out!" Thorne ordered.
When Cortana approached, she saw a dim opening descending into the darkness below, no stairs or platform of any kind. Wasting no time, she jumped inside the hole. SPARTAN Grant missed her by a hair when she tried to grab Cortana's arm to prevent her from leaving.
Cortana thought she was going to fall forever, but after exactly five seconds she landed on her feet on solid, metallic floor. The impact made her entire body shudder, the HARPY hissed around her tightening the pressure of the protective layers over her legs and ankles. It was pitch black down there.
"Cortana, what are you...!?" Eleven shouted, over the comm.
"I need to check on something." she answered. "The atmosphere might be failing down here too, keep the dogs up there with you."
"Like we can contain these mutts!" the dog handler gasped, her voice ragged. She was trying to hold the animals back.
"You do realize this could be dangerous, don't you?" Thorne said, annoyed.
"I know what I'm doing."
She cut the link and started walking, there was only one direction to go anyway.
SEPTEMBER 2ND 2558
LOCATION: FORERUNNER SHIELD-WORLD 0313 PARAGON
THIRTY-TWO LEVELS BELOW SURFACE
4:30 AM standard time
Her armored boots clicked on the metallic surface, then she realized the deeper she descended, the less gravity she could feel. The HARPY's HUD switched from night vision to holographic recognition and instead of showing her real live footage it traced lines of the hallways and rooms with dim blue lines, contours only. A moment later it switched to heat vision, showing only blue-cold shadows. She scanned the area around her for a short while, then the numbers started to climb out of control.
She found it.
It was behind some sort of energy shielding, but the heat of it was so intense that the sensor crashed. It was as hot as a sun. Her heart throbbed. There it was. She noticed the interference that was already messing up not only with the comms but also with her armor's system. The HUD flickered, several times. She kept walking until she saw light, flooding a narrow passage. She could also hear a sound, a high-pitched cry of some sort. It was growing louder.
The shrieking sun, huh? It made sense.
Behind two sets of heavy blast doors, a blue shimmering energy shield contained not only light, but also raw power. There was a tubular casket made of glass, vertically floating over a sophisticated battery of columns and chunks of ice steaming under the heat. The ice formed nearly as fast as it melted. Another two tall devices like columns guarded the casket, there were pure energy beams flowing from one to the other in an endless cycle. The high-pitched cry was louder than ever, it almost hurt her ears.
She quickly found a terminal and accessed it with her tac-pad, reading line after line of mind-blowing data regarding the device. It was sealed shut and it would be quite hard to enter the chamber without the proper codes, but she was so excited that nothing seemed impossible anymore. That device per se was somewhat impossible to start with, and Cortana was barely scratching the surface of what that thing could do.
Energy generator? Sure. But it was also so much more.
"This is it." she muttered, amazed.
A heavy hand fell on her shoulder, but she didn't scream.
"Cortana! What the hell are you doing?" Eleven called out, angry.
"That thing upstairs is the cooling station! What we're looking for is the shrieking sun. Can you hear it, the sound of super-compressed gases boiling? That casket contains a device that replicates the fusion process of a regular star... it's like a tiny, tiny nuclear reactor and yet much more powerful. This little thing could produce enough energy to sustain an entire colony for thousands of years! I'm going crazy just thinking about the numbers!"
"You're going crazy for real, this could be dangerous!"
"It's contained, don't you see the shield around it?"
Eleven looked ahead, but then he caught a glimpse of something floating inside the anti-radiation field. At first, he thought the field was causing some sort of distortion on his systems, but the object's shape was familiar beyond any possible confusion. His blood ran cold, immediately.
"That's not the only thing around it. Look." he reached for his rifle, unclasping it from behind his back. "There's dead people in there. Dead humans."
Cortana found the object and the HARPY's system zoomed it in, flickering under the influence of the radiation. She recognized the uniforms.
"UNSC Marines... how long have they been here?" she whispered. There wasn't just one body, there were more than twenty, floating and cloaked by steam. She took pictures and ran a program through the images to identify the service numbers coded in the uniforms. A list of IDs appeared on her screen, but that was only the beginning. "Oh, God. These are people who was stationed at New Carthage's base until three days ago, according to this."
"What the hell?" he whispered, confused.
'The dogs knew.' Cortana thought, frightened. 'They smelled the dead. Oh, God.'
Her eyes shot straight to Eleven's flaming-red faceplate.
It was very clear for Cortana, there was no need to think it over. Considering the options, those dead bodies weren't the only ones trapped inside Paragon's depths. She felt her pulse drop, true fear crawling deep beneath her skin. She took a step back from Eleven.
"This is a message." she said, slowly. She stared at her brother until he felt more uncomfortable than scared, then Cortana continued: "It's obvious. Seven knows where we are going. She knew that we would be here and set this up for us to find. How does she know? How come she always outsmarts us?"
"She can predict us as much as you and I can predict her, it's not..." he started.
"No." Cortana harshly interrupted him, defiant. She unclasped her plasma sidearm and quickly pulled the safety off, pointing at the man's head. "This is not just prediction, it goes way beyond that, this is precision and cruelty. This is a leak. Seven has a mole inside the Infinity."
Eleven stood still under Cortana's threatening pose.
"Okay, we say she has someone inside." he nodded slowly, a moment later. "The problem here, as I see it, is that you think it's me."
TO BE CONTINUED
*Around sixty three million square feet it's the actual surface of the Infinity if taken from the side, I'm just ignoring the width.
Wooo! Tension, tension, tension! Dramarama everywhere!
Did you check out that 'I'm gonna fucking fry you, you dumb machine' look the Chief shot to Roland? xD I don't know what happened there but I sure don't want to be on Roland's clusters right now. Now, seriously... how the fuck does the Spike always knows everything? If any of you nails the correct answer before the end of the week, next update will be DOUBLE CHAPTER. Think, think hard. Someone or something is spilling intel outside the Infinity, make your guess.
Guest; why do I do this to them? Because I'm evil. Not as evil as other writers on this site, but still evil. Next time they won't just kiss, I promise xD -hugs-
Nico; I'm glad you're doing okay, as long as you have fun reading everything is all right! -hugs-
Wind4; that makes me very happy, really ;) -hugs-
You think Eleven is a traitor, that he's been working for Seven all along?
What would John say about this? You think he will enjoy shooting Eleven? :P
Let's meet again next Sunday and I'll give you answers! Don't forget to make your guess, leave a comment and tell me your theory!