Hello everyone to the next chapter of the Gambling Noble State, or (GNS) for abbreviation.
I already had some issue's with the first chapter in terms of either some repeated words or maybe just certain mispelled words that I may of had. So I will try to fix it and add some new sentence's if it doesn't look proper.
But an issue I am probably going to have is the romantic relationships I want in the story. But that just drives me to write about the two experiences even more than writing the action and witty dialogue that I have in store later.
The two serious relationships I have in this fic is in the description, also I love the Carolina X Washington pairing, no offense to to York x Carolina.
But the other relationship I was gonna do as a funny one was probably Tucker x Sister because who doesn't love that relationship, and I could turn it into some humor for that one.
Also I have a special plan with Washington, but don't worry I am not going to completely change him, but his character is gonna be important in this story.
P.S: I will be constantly editing throughout the creation of this story, and will be trying to correct the issues that will be noticable in the chapters.
Without further ado, let's get started.
Chapter 2: Sin City Slicker
Mother of Invention Bridge
July 18, 2572
Dr. Leonard Church was a lot things. A creator, scientist, and leader in some cases.
But a great diplomat he was not.
"Unidenified Prowler confirm your situation of being either hostile or friendly or I will order this ship to terminate you in the next five minutes." He said into the regular radio frequency the UNSC runs on for communication. He was hoping for a reponse so he can probably know what this ship is doing out here in the middle of nowhere.
Yet there was no reponse back to the call on comms.
It was strange was this person blantly ignoring the call or was their a communitcation error on the other end, either way its ignorance like this that gets the Director annoyed. With his patience waning he spoke again.
"Unidentified spacecraft confirm your identity immediately or we will fire on your location." He said with more irritation showing in his voice, until he heard one of the on terminal crew members.
"Sir, we have checked and analyzed the entirety of the ship and have concluded that their electrical power, communication system, and steering mechanics are offline, but however only life support and ship's internal gravity system are operational, but bioform scanners indicate one confirmed lifeform on board the Prowler vessel." He said to the Director, and with that report he was curious, So the ship could not communicate back to them. Maybe they should get a retrieval team to bring in this ship? It could be a trap being set by the Insurrectionist faction? Either way he wasn't really certain what he should do in this situation.
"Director, I think it would be wise to help this certain indivdual, it could help our standing with the UNSC subcommitee. This favor of helping them could benfit us for future endeavors." Aiden said, Leonard was thinking this over in his head, and he couldn't really help it but see mostly positive results with this idea, especially with the newly known chairman Malcolm Hardgrove could owe Project Freelancer for this favor, and it could be beneficial for the project in the future.
With a defeated sigh he decided they would help this ship along with a repair job, then they would be on their way to leave a report to the UNSC for some "Special Favors" as a reward for this rescue of a UNSC personell, with his resolve clear he slicked his peppered hair back with his hand, then said in the comms.
"Prowler be advised we will be docking you into Hangar Bay 1 for hull and communication repairs." Leonard said, as he was heading out of the bridge and towards the hangar bay to see what this ship is and who this mysterious person was. "Four Seven Niner you and another pilot report to your Pelican's, use your tow cables and move this Prowler class ship into the hangar bay." he said as he was heading down there himself.
This is probably the nicest thing that he was doing for some stranger, but he hoped this choice wouldn't bite him in the dick.
Cause he could deal with less cockbites in his life.
The Freelancer locker room was fairly empty right now, except for two indivduals.
"Tch, why'd the mission get put on hold." The platinum blond haired woman complained as she slammed her locker shut, looking at the other person in question.
"Because South, their was a last minute emergency situation that we had to make for an unknown ship." The dirty blond haired man said, as he looked at his sister with an exasperated look on his face. His sister has been asking this question, but in different ways of formatting the sentence.
However everytime he gave the same answer to her when they were both putting on their armor for the past five minutes.
Cause if she was gonna play this 20 question's bullshit he was definitely willing to mess with her.
Because that's what siblings do, other than embarass the hell out of each other.
"We should of told that ship and whoever's on it to get off their lazy ass and piss off so we can get this misson started." She told her brother North with a little bit more bite to her tone. Her armor had a primary coloring of a light purple, and secondary coloring for the shoulder pieces and thigh area's are light green.
However contrast to her sister's coloring, North's armor color was a bit more of a darker purple than his sibling, with a more forest green for secondary markings on his shoulder pieces and thighs.
"I'm sure whoever the Director saved will be worth a little bit of time off the mission." North said, siting on the bench putting on his final leg attachment armor pieces.
South just scoffs and paces in a short line waiting for her brother to hurry up so they can get on with the mission, she was more than eager to prove herself on the field and move up the leaderboard standings.
"You know what your problem is North, your too patient one of these days someone's going to light an explosive under your ass without you noticing and your gonna blast off to some uncharted moon to crash on." she said to him as she put her helmet on.
"What? like that camp instructor that you put firecrackers under when he was telling a story." Her brother said with a smile on his face, with a small chuckle he shook his head and put on his helmet a well, looking back at South for a retort.
But she just stood their with her arms folded and moved her head to the right in the air replying back.
"That dumbass deserved it bro, should told us something else more interesting instead of standing their babbling about ghost stories." she said defending her actions that day. Both brother and sister started to walk out of the locker room towards the elevator to take them to Hangar Bay 1 to see what the issue was.
"Yeah yeah whatever you say sis." North said nonchalantly, as they went down the hall towards the elevator for the hangar.
As North went down the hall, he was just shaking his head in pity for the poor sap that South was probably gonna try to pummel.
Cause if there is one sin that was always universal in a woman's mind, especially the case with his sister was.
Don't keep a lady waiting.
"Especially the ladies on board this ship" He thought, as he knows another firery haired freelancer that probably was thinking the same thing as his sister was currently.
So this person without even knowing him brought down a shitstorm upon himself, already commiting a sin in the eye of Agent South Dakota, and he wasn't even on the ship yet.
He was already feeling sorry for whoever was on board that vessel.
The Director and Counselor were in front of the ship in Hangar Bay 1, with a squad of freelancer soldiers to his left and right for protection.
Leonard was curiously looking at the design and its strange look, the ship in question had a sleek design, not like the usual space frigate's or cruisers that are giant and bulky out in space. Since it was marked as a UNSC ship their had to be some kind of military use they could get out of it, but the ship looked too small to go into space combat if it were to fight would get destroyed in an instant if it tried to take on the bigger ship's, and its too big to be a fighter ship for dogfight's so what use would the UNSC have for it.
Then he wasn't really taking into account one big factor that he realized now: stealth.
The ship could possibly be a stealth craft for infiltration usage and quick slipspace jumps under the radar from detection of an enemy ship, with its sleek build it could probably sneak up on an unsuspected frigate and could leave a team of assassins to clean up the crew from the inside, and with that thought the Director was thinking of the benefit's the ship could provide.
"This "Prowler" could benefit Project Freelancer with its missions, with this ship we could run stealth ops against our enemy without detection and it would be like we were never there." He thought, now if the person in question would come out they could "negotiate" something for the ship in question.
The Director could just write a report to the UNSC about something happening to the individual like "friendly fire" or some other bullshit to tell the military of the missing person, hey he was pretty good at making up excuses for cover-ups when it comes to accidents.
But he could have the outside of ship analyzed later, for now he needed to see what was inside the ship and talk to this person that was on board.
"Someone get this ship open." Leonard ordered, as he finished the command some technician's started investigating the ship to find a way to open the back door.
A few minutes later of searching they find a sort of square outline next to the opening of the ship, they unscrew it to see a panel grid with flashing lights and mechanics for secruity purposes, and with swift efficiency the tech's got to work to unlocking the door.
Leonard was waiting along with the Counselor, impatiently waiting for the ship's door to be opended, however he changed his gaze from the ship to the elevator as he heard footsteps from that direction, to gaze upon the familar agents that he was suppose to send on the secert mission today.
"The Twins" as everyone dubbed them strided towards him with a purpose as South came to stand at attention first, followed by North next to her.
"At ease agents, I will inform you about your objective, after I finish my business with this individual." He said, with a hint of annoyance, not at his agent or his soldier's, but because of this hidden visitor. He just wants to know who's in this ship so he can start with mission and not have to deal with any back talk from any of the agents.
The Director was hoping that Agent South Dakota wouldn't try to make a conniption about the delay, but someone was about to beat her to the punch as he saw another agent come towards the gathering of people.
Wearing a Rogue style helmet with Mark VI style shoulders and chestplate with a cyan coloring all around the armor, the number one agent, Agent Carolina was walking towards the Director, probably to get a reading of the situation right now.
"What's going on? I thought that we had a mission planned for deployment." She said to the Director, demanding an explaination from him for the delayed mission that should be going on currently.
"We have delayed that certain mission for a emergency vehicle from the UNSC showing up, from an unknown direction in slipspace." He responded, with his hands behind his back and looking away from her, looking at the Prowler still miffed about its appearance.
He heard her growl in annoyance knowing he was about to get some kind of backtalk from his daughter, but he was just as frustrated if not more and he was not in the mood for her attitude.
"Sir, I feel like we are wasting valuable time with this unknown ship. While this is going our enemies could be preparing for our infiltration if we are found out." She said, with a irritated tone towards him.
The other solidiers backed away from the man turning around and meeting Carolina head on looking straight at her helmeted face, both North and South backing up slightly from the pissed off leader of Project Freelancer.
"Leave these decision's to me Agent Carolina!, or do you not trust my judgement." He shouted at her, green eyes shining with anger for the lack of faith from his best agent.
"No Director sir, I trust you completely sir." she said without missing a beat, no quiver of fear or hesitation in her voice.
"Good,t hen I suggest that you keep your comments to yourself and let me make these important decision's." He said, turning around to see that the back door was beginning to open from the Prowler.
With the job done and ship free to explore, The Director spoke up again.
"Agent's search the ship for this survivor and secure any type of equipment or armorment from it if any." He ordered to the three agents behind him.
Without another word all three agents walked towards the ship and as they got into the entrance of the back door, they saw a redish mark on the floor and noticed that there was a trail of those redish marks leading towards the front of the ship. They were bloodstains, and for some reason it put them on edge.
The agents, now on alert decided to hold their weapons, Carolina with a M6 Magnum, North with dual SMG's, and South with a Shotgun. They started moving up towards the stairs and into the main body of the ship.
Carolina was in front, she looked around the ship from the top of the stairs and saw that there was a door in the back, and there are 3 door on the left, 2 doors on the right, and one right in front of her for the cockpit. Still following the bloodstain trails went into each direction stopping right at all seven of the doors, which was a little odd to see the bloodstains going to each door.
She looked back at her two teammates, she decided to split them up to check each of the directions that the bloodstains were going to.
"North, South there are 7 doors with the bloodstain trail, South you go to the right side and back door to sweep and clean the room, North you do the same for the Left. I will check the cockpit for the survivor, Mark?" She said.
"Sync." they said at the same time.
"Sync." she said after them.
Then they decided to go their separate ways searching the ship's indvidual room's.
With that said Carolina went toward the cockpit and the door opened before to see three seats that really close in proximity to each other, two terminals on the left and right side, with the flight control's in the front of both.
Carolina started her investigation of the ship already by confirming the survivor was not in the cockpit, however she was pretty curious because she has never really seen this kind of ship.
She decided to check the left side terminal for anything they could use for infomation.
The computer terminal in front was flickered online when the ship was hacked to get into it. She saw the bluish screen have a strange symbol show up on it to signify an organization called the Office Of Naval Intelligence (ONI) on the screen.
"Who in the hell is ONI?" she thought, she never heard of this organzation, but she knows the UNSC the owner of this vessel, but never heard of this organization before.
Maybe its a special ops or Black ops group?
Regardless she saw the terminal was rebooting and saw that the software was ready, so Carolina sat down in the chair and decided to research.
She was looking at certain options from the terminal that had information that was titled in specific folders in bold letters.
From top to bottom the files were titled with bulging words: WEAPONRY, ENHANCEMENTS, PERSONNEL FILES, EXPERIMENTAL INFORMATION, and WAR LOGS.
This was interesting information that can be useful to find out what happened here and maybe who was here, but before she was able to get into the information files she heard a comms unit go off and heard South's voice.
"Guys, I found the survivor he's in the first room to the right of the cockpit." She said.
"Copy that South is he hostile?"Carolina replied.
"Negative, he is in a stasis pod and unconscious." South reported, with that told to her Carolina got back up from the chair and left the cockpit and seeing North outside the door as well.
"Find anything interesting?" She questioned him, curious if he found anything useful like she did.
"Yeah, the first door to the left next to the cockpit is a mini armory that held some weapons, and... some unique little treasures. Other than that last rooms were just a Captain's Quarters that looked untouched, and the typical Dinning/ Rec Room." North said, while they both walked into the room that South was in.
The room had three cryopods, two that were empty, but the third on the far left was preoccupied by the only person that was on the ship.
The other two freelancers got a good look at the person in the capsule. The 3 freelancers can't really see this person's face clearly, but they can see he is in armor with a Steel-black color, with some blood red coloring on his shoulders and thigh areas. The other two wanted to check out the room further for anymore clues of this mysterious person. They saw some bench's on the other side of the room away from the pods, both the freelancer were able to see the helmet that was there. Carolina picked up to observe it was steel gray color, but saw the golden visor had a spider webbed crack badly going down the middle of the faceplate.
"Any report that he's gonna wake up." Carolina said to the other twin in question, putting the helmet down and turning back to the the matter at hand.
"Not unless we forcefully get this guy out of cryosleep."South said, still observing this strange man.
"Then let's wake the man up shall we, North get working on that computer terminal and turn off that cryosleep directive so we get some more anwser." Carolina replied back looking at the agent to start working, without a word North was in front of the computer terminal, and stared at the screen for any kind of bioscan and got a clear identity of the person in question.
"Spartan B-312 is currently in cryosleep would you like to decompress pod and awaken ahead of schedule from current time?" North read out to his other teammate's to tell them what he saw on the computer terminal looking at them both. Carolina and South both nodded toward's North as he pressed "Accept" on the screen.
They all backed up a bit when they heard a hiss from the chamber and saw that the pod's glass window slowly decompressing the air, the glass going to the floor in a slow vertical manner.
The Freelancer's finally got a good look at the person's face, it was dirtied from his forehead down to his cheeks from dust and red spots on his face signaling some kind of scorch damage. They noticed a gash on the left side of his face on the top his eyebrow that looked a bit frozen, but started to heal up. They looked at his shoulder cuff and saw a whitish part that contrasted to the black inner linings of the undersuit of the armor. The person's skin color was a bit tan now that color was coming back to his facial feature's.
The "Spartan" in the pod started to stir and open his dark brown eye's to the world, putting the agents on alert and raised their weaponry just in case he was hostile.
Six wasn't really familiar with his surroundings at first, because if he remebered correctly you usually feel groggy and sluggish when you wake up from cyrosleep, but also you feel a bit refreshed when you sleep for 2 weeks.
Well he still felt like hammered dogshit.
Also what you usually don't see is three individual's that are on a Prowler that only you are on and should be the only passenger on the ship until the ship automatically wakes you up to tell you have reached your destination.
So with his vision coming to focus he noticed the obvious elephant in the room.
That there were people on board the ship that only he should be on, and with that said they must be intruders.
But Six was smart enough to see the situation at hand and he wasn't an idiot to notice that there were weapons pointed at him right now. With him at gunpoint he couldn't really do much when he didn't have his shielding unit backing him up when he didn't have his helmet on.
Regardless Six decided to play it save and not move from the pod just yet, but to look at the three humanoid figures in question.
The three intruders looked strange with the armor they were wearing, two appeared to have a similar armor model to that of a Spartan II, with very strange purple coloring, but the other looked way different with light blue coloring and a armor model he was not familiar with. But still if their was one thing for certain the armor they were wearing looked like Mjolnir power armor which meant one thing.
He was looking at more spartans right now. He felt a little bit more comfortable now that he precieved that, but there was a old saying that he followed when dealing with this kind of situation.
Perception is not reality.
So even though they are wearing the armor, they still could be hostile.
"Hey, who are you? State your buisness." Six heard, finally deciding to come back to the world of the living, he craned his neck to look where the voice came from. He heard the aqua colored spartan speak up to him.
Well if he was gonna get anywhere without having guns pointed at him with these people he might as well sound off like always.
" I am Spartan B-312, from Beta Company of the UNSC Navy and Army." He said without hesitation as he listed off his identity from practice. The 3 agents in questioned looked at each other quickly a little bit confused on what a spartan is.
"Are you people UNSC offcials? Did they send other spartans to my location when I finally made it to Earth?" He listed off the questions towards the freelancers. But they spoke up afterwards that and asked a question that really confused him.
"We are not UNSC offcials, Earth is still light years away from this location, and what do you mean by other spartan's?" The teal one anwsered all the questions that Six asked, but was confused of that last anwser that turned into a question. How could they not know what spartans were, they are wearing Mjolnir power armor, the biggest call sign for spartans.
"Well aren't you a spartan squad?" Six questioned, the teal agent still had the magnum trained on him, but the other 2 people lowered their weapons.
"No we are special agents of a corporation called Project Freelancer, I am Agent Carolina." She said, introducing herself to Six. He was starting to relax now that he knew who at least one of these people were now that she had given her name
"Ok Agent Carolina now that you have me at your mercy, I just need some anwser's to where I am right now. I will comply to whatever you need from me for now, without breaking certain UNSC protocol." Six spoke in a calm voice to try to diffuse the situation, right now hostility was not going to solve anything except causing him to get killed.
Right now he needed anwsered, and apparently these agents felt the same as Carolina lowered her magnum and motioned with her other hand to wave at the side, signaling to move.
"Come on we need some anwser and I'm sure you have your own question's for us as well, we will take you to the Director of Project Freelancer so you can talk, North walk in front of him to lead him, South follow behind him to make sure he doesn't cause any trouble if he does, you know what to do." Carolina said with a commanding voice and decided to turn towards the door and decided to leave the cryo room.
With no hostile feelings from the other two, Six finally got up from the pod and stood to his full height, he was tall compared to the other two agents in the room standing at a height of 6'9, a full head taller than North and South hitting up to his neck in terms of height. The darker purple agent standing front explaining to Six who he is.
"Alright big guy follow me we are going to meet the Director out in the hangar bay, Name's Agent North Dakota, but you can just call me North. The person behind you is my sister South, and probably pretty pissed at you right now so I suggest treading lightly." The agent said in a friendly kind of way, South behind him just scoffed it off and ignored her brother's comment.
While Six just gave him a confused look on his face, and a raised eyebrow from the introduction. That was strange this person, gives off a relaxed, friendly vibe. Just like that he reminded Six of another person like this when they first met.
"Jorge." Six thought, as he remebered Noble 5 fondly as he was a brother-in-arms fighting to protect his home. Regardless he can feel the similarities from this Agent compared to the Spartan II. But getting out of that certain memory of Jorge he responded to North at least give some kind conversation.
"I suppose you heard my name, but people just call me Six." He said to North, he was just trying to make these people understand who he is without going through his entire serial number, that's what he did on Reach and he might as well do it here for now to make things easier. But he heard a snicker behind him from the other agent.
"So what? your parent's name One and Two." South said with a snarky tone in trying to be smart. Six looking back at her with a blank stare, not saying anything, but thinking about her comment and came to a conclusion about this person.
"Well isn't she the most pleasant person I ever met." He thought with some kind of annoyance, he's dealt with people like this before when he was a Lone Wolf, but he always knew when someone was full of themselves and their ego was the size of a planet, but it made it all the more sweeter to put those people in their place.
Unfortnately she was probably one of those people and he would have to tolerate her for now.
"Ignore her, she can be a handful when things don't go her way, you know how children can be." North said smirking behind his helmet, noticing the glare of South's visor on North's probably staring angry laser beams into him. Six silently chuckling at the jab the agent gave her sister. "Let's get going Six we don't want to keep the Director waiting and have feeling you are a bit curious to where you are now." North continued, as they made their way to the door to leave.
"Good, maybe I can start getting some anwser's while I'm here." As the trio started to walk out of the cryo pod room, going to the main hall of the ship and down the stairs to the outer door of the Gobi.
When he was out of the ship he took in his surroundings of the giant hangar his ship was taken to, and looked towards the energy shield that helped keep the cold, vaccums of space at bay when he looked at the door outwards, but curiosity aside for now he turned his head back around to see a squad of solider's with ODST looking armor, armed with assault rifles in their hands. Besides already knowing Agent Carolina to the pair's right crossing her arms. In front him was two men, one with a dark skin tone and a shaved head, while the other was a pale-ish man with glasses on and salt and pepper slick back hair, with a goatee of grayish hair. His stance with hands behind his back and straight posture just screams authority to Six, but before he could go into more analyzing of his appearance the pale man spoke.
"You must be this "Spartan" that Carolina spoke of to me, my name is Dr. Leonard Church and I am the Director of Project Freelancer. I am very interested in getting to know you." He said with a his southern accent clear and precise, with his arm raised out in front of him.
Six shook his hand with a semi strong grip appreciating the jester, while explainig himself to the man in front of him. "Likewise sir, I am just as confused as you are Director, but I hope we can go somewhere private to discuss these matters and I will try to explain to the best of my ability, and maybe you can fill in the blanks to the mystery that we are having." Six said showing no wavering or fear in front of this man.
"Very well, will discuss these matters in one of our meeting rooms, and I hope you won't mind one of our Agent's accompanying you to the location. For safety precautions, but you are free to choose the Agent." He said, and with that he turned around and decided to head to the elevator door. When that happened Six was thinking of what the Director said and the decision he's giving him. He's smart to give him a patrol agent to take Six toward the meeting room because he doesn't fully trust him, but also showing some trust to give him a pick of who he should take.
"Smart and very clever Director." Six thought as he knew who he was going to pick. He turned to the dark purple freelancer to get his attention.
"North I guess your my escort, lead the way." Six said deciding quickly, North chuckled and continued to walk towards the elevator with Six following in stride next to him.
"Alright man, let's get going. I feel honored that your taking me as your date." he joked, and Six couldn't help but chuckle at the implication.
Somehow he knew this guy would say something like that, and if Six was honest he kind of wanted to get to know North.
But more importantly this talk with the Director is going to be important, and would probably be wise to have someone like North with him to listen to his story when talks go down.
"So that is the most you remember of your travels, son." Leonard said, looking at him sitting in a chair with Six staring back.
The meeting currently had been going on for an hour and a half now, and Six had a lot to explain from when he was on Reach.
He was willing to comply with the Director telling him his experience first and then requesting how he got to this ship after he was done explaining.
He told the whole experience from the beginning, how he was deployed to the planet to form the sixth member of NOBLE Team, to the Covenant making first contact for the The Winter Contigency, and that was only the beginning.
As time went on he was telling them how the battle was back and forth for the UNSC to overtake the alien threat,and they thought that victory was at hand and were about to wipe out the last resistance's of the Covenant when they destroyed the Spire.
But truthly, it was the end of the line for the UNSC instead.
Telling the people in the room the Covenant started jumping from slipspace, dozens of cruisers toward the planet to give them reinforcements to glass Reach.
The Director was very curious and interested to hear how the tale ends with Six making it off this planet in the first place with so many enemies around him and backing humanity in the corner.
Six continued the story as the war for Reach was now losing one, and with each major hit that Noble gave the Covenant, they hit back harder blow for blow.
As a result his team started disappearing in front of him with each confrontation, making sacrifices for the greater good. By the time that he got to the UNSC-Pillar of Autumn to deliver the experimental AI from Dr. Halsey, Six was the last one left from Noble other than Jun that was told to go to Castle Base to protect Halsey.
The Director was really attentive from the part that Six was explaining about this Dr. Halsey creating the AI, it was very interesting to hear and he will ask his question about it when the Spartan was finished telling his story.
In his final stand he told them that he was swarmed with wave after wave of Covenant forces and was running out of ammo by the time of clearing out the crumbled facility.
He knew the location of one of the hidden base from the Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI), and decided to take his chances with restocking for weapons and maybe find a spacecraft so he could go and warn the Earth defense forces of the planet's fate.
Then he told them of his luck of finding the previous prowler that took him to Reach was still in the hangar bay, ready for transport. So with limited time left he readied the ship, held off the Covenant forces coming from the hangar enterance, and took off right before dusting the facility to make sure those forces didn't alert any more to his location.
"After I put in the slipspace coordinates for Earth, I put myself into cryosleep to get some rest, after patching up my injuries. So that's as far I remeber." Six said, concluding the entire converation.
It was like an old war veteran telling a story to some marines, for North that stuck around he was thinking it was miracle that this guy is even still breathing and living as they speak, for the Counselor it seems that their was a lot grief and longing in his tone we he got to the second part of the story. The Director however was thinking of a different thought for this soldier.
"He's definitely an asset I could use in this project." He thought, because he could turn the tide of this conflict that the Project was facing and can crush their enemies with an iron fist. "He has had experience fighting the alien threat, he would know weaknesses and how their technology works." Thinking of actually recruiting this soldier to the project.
But for Six, the story was for a different purpose besides telling his side of the story. He wanted people to know what happened to his team down on Reach and remeber their sacrifices they made for the greater good for humanity.
"So now that I told my side of the story Director, could you tell me how I got here and what's going on? More importantly does the UNSC even know I exist anymore?" Six questioned. He remebered the questioning tones of the freelancers as he refered to them as spartans, but didn't like the fact that these people have no clue what spartans were and that his trip to Earth was interrupted.
"Well to answer what's going on son, when we were flying in this sector we saw your ship jump out of slipspace right in front of us, but the way you jumped was way different from usual slipspace enterances that we are used to seeing, instead we saw a certain wormhole make a tear in the space in front of us and your ship came floating clearly towards us. We checked your ship and tried to hail you and contact your prowler vessel, but you were in cryosleep and certain functions of your ship was offline, so we decided to tow your ship to see if there was any problems since we saw you were in a UNSC class vessel, also since we are partnered with them. " the Director said to him.
"What about my involvement with the UNSC? do they know who I am?" Six said, concern starting to rise in his chest for the anwser. So far this talk has only proved their was an accident with the slipspace engine and he didn't like where this conversation was going.
" I spoke with the UNSC commitee chairman Malcolm Hardgrove, and unfortnately for you Noble he has has no "Spartan's" on record or on any roster of the UNSC. When I asked about your service number and told them your identification it was not in the database what so ever, so no you aren't part of the UNSC that we know." Leonard told him factually.
With that revelation revealed to him, Six was starting to lose a bit of hope for his chances of telling Earth's defenses or helping defeat the Covenant.
Six almost felt like he was in another universe.
"It almost feels like I have been wiped off the face of the universe, and someone actually killed me." Darkly thinking of his situation, but maybe the computer terminal in the cockpit of his ship could tell them and prove the current UNSC that Spartan's exist and that he was still part of ONI and the UNSC.
"I have a computer terminal in my ship that could prove the truth to the UNSC about my existence. Maybe you could send those to this Malcolm Hardgrove for confirmation." desperately wanting to prove his case, it was a long shot but he doesn't want to be marked as AWOL from the military, he couldn't bare the thought of him doing fighting on Reach for no reason and being left hung out to dry. The Director made a "hmm" noise signalling he was thinking of his plea, but was looking at him like he didn't have good news to share.
"I'm sorry son, but even if I did send your files to the chairman I don't think he would really believe your story or care enough to just give your position back. You have to face fact's that you don't mean anything to the UNSC that you know if he dropped an important soldier like yourself." Dropping the cold hard truth on Six. Meanwhile he just sat their in his chair looking at the Director in the face, slowly feeling defeated at his proclamation towards him feeling he was probably right.
Six kept his composure on the outside as all spartans try to do, but on the inside he was like a man lost at sea in the middle of a hurricane. He felt lost now that he was no longer part of the humanity's last hope, but he had so many questions floating in his head.
What's going to happen to him?
Where is he going to go?
What was his purpose now that the UNSC shrugged him off and didn't know him?
But more importantly.
What does he do now?
With this information he looked down at the table and started shiver slightly now that he felt like he had no purpose, no drive now that he knew that the army just abandoned, hell even ONI couldn't help in this situation because of he didn't have any military clearance in the first place. Noticing his change in posture and body action the other people felt a bit concerned about his well-being.
"Noble Six, are you feeling alright?" Aiden said in a soothing voice, trying to help the distressed man feel calm again.
"Yeah.. just a lot to process right now." He replied back, then feeling a hand clasp on his uninjuried shoulder and looked up to see North giving him a reassuring smile.
"Hey man just try an take a deep breath, you just got back on your feet and been through a war that honestly in my opinion should of claimed your life. So just relax man you need to just think about the possabilities that you have now Six, you are literally free to do what you want." North said, trying to cheer him up. "So try to think of the positives in this situation instead of the negatives." He continued, and honestly in Six's mind it put him a bit at ease for this situation.
North was right their are other things to do instead of despairing and thinking about his current fucked up situation, he closed his eyes, took a deep breath and let his mind be at ease for now.
"Thanks North, that kinda helped out in this situation, but I still think its going take some time getting use to this not being part of the UNSC anymore." North just kept his smile on his face crossing his arms. "Hey man, no one ever said it was going be easy, but I think you can figure this situation out." He said, still trying to reassure Six with his positive attitude. However both men heard someone clearing their throat and turned their attention back to the Director.
"Well maybe there is something we can do with your talent's Noble Six, we may be able to help you find a clear goal if your willing to listen." The Director told him. Six looked at him with curiosity in his brown eyes hanging on his word. "Ok Director I'm listening." Six said, with his armored gloves in a dual fist formation and leaning forward ready to here the man out.
"I never told you what Project Freelancer was about until you told your full story of your time on the planet Reach, but now I feel a bit more comfortable with telling you about what we do here. Basically in short we are fighting an enemy, mankind is in trouble from a group called the Insurrectionists, a group of terriorist that are using alien artifacts to terrorize the public and trying to eliminate Project Freelancer." Leonard said. Strange it almost sounds like these Insurrectionists were like the militia group's Six was hired by ONI to make vanish, guess these guys have same problem.
"Hmm sounds like you have a similar issue with rebels and terrorist, like the UNSC had before the Covenant started burning our worlds." Six said, trying to connect similarities to what he went through and what the Director was going through. "However the rebel faction was trying to liberate the United Earth Government (UEG) and the UNSC from planet colonies, usually using acts of terrorism and other caustic chemical warfare that put the lives of the colonists in danger of being killed." He continued.
"Interesting we have a similar enemy, but for different reasons. The resistance here is denying us researchable artifacts that could turn the tide of an alien invasion of human colonies. I must also say that we have another similar enemy in terms of fighting against aliens that are trying to destroy mankind just like this Covenant did to your planet Reach." The Director said, and as he finished speaking Six's was mindset was determined to make the Covenant pay for what they done to his homeworld.
"Just what are you getting at Director, why continue to tell me your issue's of this Resistance and alien threat." Six questioned, looking at his glasses intently to see any kind of insincere emotions that was playing on his face, but Leonard looked back at Six with a deadly serious look in his green eyes.
"When we found you drifting Six we thought you were a UNSC representative checking up on our progress to Hardgrove, but of course that was not the case. So since your not on any of their records as a Spartan and they basically tossed you aside, I want to make you an offer of joining Project Freelancer." Leonard said, laying all out on the table for Six.
Six, however was very confused with this offer. Why would he want him to join the orginization, he doesn't even know his skill set.
Plus they just met, how can he trust him with anything.
The only thing Six could say was this "Why me?" with a some curiosity laced into his voice. The Director let out a dry chuckle.
"The UNSC doesn't trust you enough with your information to take your word as truth, but I can help you with this transaction into getting back with the military because of my connections with chairman Hardgrove." Leonard explained, but then continued to talk afterwards. "Plus there is something I see in you, you have heart son and I know you want to help make a name for yourself as Spartan and working with us will truly show everyone what a Spartan can do."
Six kept thinking about it, he did want his kind to be known throughout the colonies, but not as a symbol of fame and fortune, but of hope and guidance throughout humanity. He wanted people to believe that things were going to be alright even in the darkest hour.
"Just to set the record straight I don't do this for the fame and glory, that's not what we were made for and that's not what my fellow brother's and sister's died for. We were made to protect the survival of humanity, to give hope throughout the colonies we swore to protect, but more importantly we were made to payback the alien bastards that had taken our homes and people away from us when we couldn't defend ourselves. If you let me be that protector of humanity and let me get payback I will join your cause." Six said with determination. The Director could see in his eyes, a fire with conviction promising that protection for his fellow human.
A promise he saw refreshing compared to his other agents that he had let into this project, with his demands heard it was time to lay it all on the table and reel in this solider towards Project Freelancer's cause.
"I can see your conviction and drive towards these goals, and they are admirable traits for what it is worth I will happliy assist you in your goal, if you help me with this project I will see to it that mankind will be protected from extinction, and you will be at the forefront of this movement to make sure that this threat will not happen again." The Director said. Saying the right things to finally convince him to join.
Finally with all of the talking done and all that was that was out finally thought through, Six had made his decision.
With all of the tension in the room hanging from Six's neutral look, he took the form of a small smirk to show what he was going to say.
"If those request are granted then I will accept your offer and join the project, but there are a few more things I need before I am fully integrated with the project." With the anwser finally out, North's smile widened, excited to here Six join the project, The counselor was typing on his datapad probably waiting to input Six's information. The Director didn't really show any outward emotion with Six joining the project, but inside he was elated that he joined, because now they had a new solider and a new type of ship they could use to their advantage, plus all the information, weapons, and armor enhancements would be benefical to the any of the agents and to the Director himself.
Its like he was digging in a gold mine and he hit paydirt.
"Of course son, but these requests must be within my jurisdiction in order for them to be approved." Looking at Six with the expectation of his requests. "The first is a personal request for my team, if we can go to the planet Reach sometime during the end of the project I would like to memoralize my fallen comrades of NOBLE Team by requesting a statue in their honor and valor to protect humanity and building there on Reach." Six said, as he pulled out three dog tags from Jorge, Kat, and Emile and placed them on the table.
The Director thinking this an easy request nodded speaking up on the matter, "Of course Noble Six, they will be remembered." He said, feeling the slight pain of loss from a certain someone he was thinking of that gave her life for the good of the military, before shaking it off and coming back to the conversation. "So what else would you like to discuss about."
Six looked at and took a sigh of defeat and spoke up. "I am going to need a replacement in terms of armor, and I recall that there was a new suit of armor that was in the Prowler back in the mini armory. If I can go have that and replace the one I am currently wearing I will not only give you my old armor for experimental testing, but the entire reigns of the Gobi and all of its other equipment." Six was basically trading an entire ship and old armor that could prove useful for testing, all for a brand new set.
Nodding his head Leonard agreed to the terms. "That can be arranged, now are their any other requests that you wanted to tell me?" Now about out of patience he hoped that Six was done with his demands from him so that he could start with his mission briefing with the Twins and Carolina.
"No that will be all for now, Sir." Six said, giving the Director the respect of an CO by standing up and giving him right handed salute.
"If that is all this meeting is finished, Agent North Dakota I will be meeting with you and your other two teammates in 10 minutes to discuss your mission. In the meantime Noble Six, the Counselor will take you through basic medical exams and other test for your evalution and we will need a description of your skills, so we need to access the terminal on Prowler to look up your file." Leonard said. Six dryly chuckled about that leaving the Director confused.
"Good luck with that sir, most of my file was covered in black ink from the Office of Naval Intelligence. They were trying to my keep existence a secret from the enemy to make it seem like I didn't exist ,that I was an anomaly no one knew about. As for skills, let's just say I was marked a "Hyper-lethal asset" to ONI and to the UNSC as I was a special case from the Beta Company." Six said, with a dark look on his face. Slightly startling both North and The Counselor from the blank face he was giving Leonard.
The Director looked at him strangley expecting an anwser. "What does this"Hyper-lethal" status mean, compared to your regular Spartan unit." He said.
"ONI wanted my skills because I was basically a Jack-of-all-trades at any kind of task, as for the status comment let's just say a regular Spartan III is your typical specialist in that type of skill and is your capable solider. I have been reported for making entire Insurgent miltia's and Resistance groups disappear whenever I am deployed." Leaving that comment hanging in the meeting room, making the Director quite impressed for his record, and the other two very nervous when he meant making those groups "disappear".
The Director in one of his few times smirked smugly about using this Spartan in any kind of situation to get rid of the Resistance for good. "Leonard it feels like you just hit the lottery." He thought to himself before speaking again. "That is a bold claim Six, one that I am impressed with. But the bigger question is can you back up that talk by taking out our enemy when we deploy you." He said challenging Six's character and skills, something that the Spartan didn't really appreciate
"Sir, you tell me the objective I will complete it, you tell me to assassinate an enemy VIP, and his neck will be snapped into a 180 degree fashion without anyone knowing who did it, you want a Resistance gone, I will make them disappear for you." Six explained with deadly seriousness lacing his tone, because he has done these types of things for ONI when they wanted someone or a multitude of people gone.
"Don't worry Six we will ask for your skills when we are ready to send you into the field, and its a shame that your version of the UNSC thinks you are dead from your deployment of Reach because they will be missing one hell of soldier." The Director said feeling a little sorry for Six's situation, but it was nothing to dwell on he is here with them and he was here to serve. Meanwhile Six chuckled at that comment, about to tell him the story that his Drill Instructor told him.
"Funny you say that sir, because there has always been a saying that my trainer said. It didn't matter if you were a Spartan II or III when you fell in battle he said, "Spartans never die, they just go Missing In Action", and for me I think they know I am still out in the field just fighting another fight." Six said. " It was suppose to inspire hope towards the soldier's and fighters out there to keep fighting because a Spartan will come and support them in these dark times of fighting the Covenant." a smile plastered on his face when he remembered Kurt Ambrose's words spoken to him.
"Son, it sounds like some words to live up to, so you make those people proud with this work we are going to do and with you by our side we will see humanity rise up and repel the alien invasion to live another tommorrow." Leonard said with more passionate in his voice then he ever thought. "Now one last thing we need to give you is your agent name, we base it on the United State's names in North America from Earth, so you will have your pick from these states here." He said motioning Aiden to give the datapad to Six.
Six looked at the pad and saw picture of the U.S and saw some that are greyed out and other's that were blue and blinking to show that they were available. It was a tough decision for him to make their were so many option to choose from and he didn't know which one to choose.
But then Six was thinking back to what brought him here in the first place, his lucky break and if he rembered correctly he made a gamble and it paid off with him leaving Reach with his life intact. He also studied up on certain city's on Earth's continents in case he had be deployed to areas for jobs ONI wanted.
One of those was the original Sin City and gambling location Las Vegas, and it was located in Nevada. Six was just thinking about all the luck he had before he ended up here and was thinking of making a little luck of his own.
"Fuck it, What's the harm of making your own luck." He thought he made his decision with a touch on the datapad, and gave it back to the Director to look at his decision.
"Well it seems that we are done here. Welcome to Project Freelancer Agent Nevada we hope to see you strive and succeed in this establishment." He said, raising his arm and recieving a handshake from the newly dubbed agent.
"Thank you sir, I won't let you down." He replied with conviction. No longer was he named Noble Six, that name died today in this meeting room.
He was now the gambling Sin City himself, Agent Nevada.
End Chapter.
That was actually a really fun chapter to write, but of course I need to lay out some concern you guys might have.
It felt like my hands flew through typing this up and it certainly helped when I had some Halo GMV to listen to, it felt like it inspired me to write Six as lost when he was just dropped off the map like that.
Also what I'm trying to do with Six is write him to talk a bit more and be a little bit more personable in terms of his character, because Spartan III's were definitely different in terms of personality when it came to comparing the II's. So I'm giving Six more personality and charm in his dialogue as we get into later chapters.
Also I feel like I am slowly trying integrate a certain writing style, but if any one has suggestions either PM me or write in the comments and I will take your suggestions.
Grif: "WRAP IT UP."
IronGiant9000: "Excuse me?"
Grif: "NOBODY CARE'S."
Irongiant9000: "Nevada, take care of him."
Agent Nevada: "Yes, sir" Grabs Battle Rifle and start's firing.
Grif: "AH STOP YOU FUCKING JACKASS" starts running away with Nevada in pursuit.
Anyways what I want to explain was that I needed to get Six's new name up and running this chapter because there's gonna be some more action later and I wanted to at least get that established so we can continue.
Unfortnately Six isn't gonna get a mission next chapter and I won't make a full description of the blackout base infiltration yet, because he's not going to be on that mission for now and its going to lead up to this next chapter for what I have in mind when we get to the mission.
However fear not my dear reader's, as there will be some action next chapter and let's just say its gonna go "South"real quick and will be the "Maine" event for that chapter.
*Cricket's chriping*
Well... anyways with that said, don't worry I will get to explaining Texas in the later chapter's, same goes for Carolina and her character development with our dear Nevada.
Another big
So without further ado, I will see you guys next chapter.
Next chapter: Triple Down Trouble.