CHAPTER 03
0735 HOURS, 17 JANUARY 2546 (UNSC MILITARY CALENDAR)
ASTEROID FIELD, 205 ZETA INDI SYSTEM
"Are the Spirits still coming?" David asked through TEAMCOM.
"Still ten minutes until they move up from the asteroid," Graves told the team. "Stand by."
David nodded and made an effort slow his breathing, taking a small amount of satisfaction when TEAMBIO showed his heart rate and blood pressure decreasing slightly. After several more minutes, his pulse had slowed and he felt calmer. Good. His head was clear; it would have to be.
"Sixty seconds until the Spirits are visible."
"Understood, Scavenger One. You'll need to take out all of the warships before Reaper can be deployed. Prepare to move."
"Forty-five seconds. Scavenger, perform one final check on your booster subsystems- no good if you short out now."
David didn't even bother- the lights had been green for the past thirteen minutes- there was no way they were going to change all of a sudden without any cause. Glancing left and right though, he saw Logan, Celia and Sierra checking their instruments. Jacob was, of all things, checking the chamber on Shadow of Night again. Hayden simply stared straight ahead into the rocky asteroid right in front of them. Sierra straightened slightly.
"Thirty seconds."
David checked his suit integrity one last time, just to be sure. If the slightest hole opened up in his suit, it would take anywhere from less than a second to over a minute for the depressurization and temperature to kill him. One way or another, he wouldn't make it if a breach occurred.
"Twenty seconds."
David blinked and inhaled deeply- he only just realized that he'd been breathing more quickly in the past few seconds. Closing his eyes, he swallowed gently. But not gently enough.
"David- you all right?" It was Jacob.
He cleared his throat. "I'm fine. Throat's just dry."
"Should have hydrated before the op, Two. We'll deal with that when we don't have a timer running. Ten seconds. Here we go, Spartans."
Yes, David thought. Here we go. The six Spartans rose ever so slightly in their booster frames, edging up until the asteroid and the Covenant ships appeared in their field of vision.
"Five… four… three… two… one… here they come. That's- different…"
It wasn't three Spirit dropships that ascended from the surface. Twelve vessels with U-shaped hulls and glowing fields of blue energy stretching between the elongated portions rose from the asteroid's surface and moved with inexorable pace towards the ships.
David clicked his com once. "Window's open. Let's move."
"Took the words right out of my mouth, Two. Scavenger, go."
As David felt the acceleration from his booster frame pull him back in his seat, the frames of the other members of Scavenger shifted and moved relative to him. They were flying in coordination with one another- not in a simple formation. The arrangement shifted and flowed like a flock of birds, each ready to move on their own vector at a moment's notice, but still graceful in relation to the rest, still complementing each other's movements.
As they closed in on the dropships and destroyers, several points on the larger vessels moved- and began to glow.
"They're charging weapons…" Celia warned.
"Relax, Cee. This'll be just like Harvest. We can just lose 'em in the storm…"
"Of what, Hayden? Sarcasm?"
"I was thinking Spirits, but suit yourself."
Brilliant balls of blue streaked from the Covenant ships, leaving similarly-colored trails in their wake. Scavenger broke the tight flying formation they'd been in, but remained synchronized in their movement. The guided plasma tracked them, weaving and winding as if mimicking their exact flight pattern with a single second's delay. But it was to no avail; after several more seconds of flying, Scavenger caught up with the Spirit dropships.
"All right team, let's lose that plasma- but don't blow too many of the Spirits- we need them to let us in."
"Best idea you've had all day, Sierra." Hayden immediately broke off from the group and weaved back and forth between the Spirits, the plasma torpedoes on his tail looking like tired birds in comparison.
"Scavenger! Break formation!" Sierra yelled into TEAMCOM, and the team did so, winding and turning among the formation of Spirits. It was fairly obvious the tracking plasma had to be manually guided, as every so often the plasma projectiles made slight twitches and deviations in their flight path that would not happen if the plasma's guidance had been automated. After several minutes of evading the plasma-
"Yeah! Take that, split-faces!" Hayden whooped as one of the balls of plasma collided, quite by accident, with one of the Spirits, incinerating the dropship without much ado. As if a switch had been flipped, the Covenant destroyers ceased fire- it didn't take a genius to figure out that even the Covenant did not appreciate friendly fire. The Spirits did not open fire with their cannons either- the risks were too apparent. Despite the lack of enemy fire, Scavenger did not fly in a straight line- they weren't going to give the Covenant a chance to open fire again. They continually weaved and shifted between the Spirits, never giving the Covenant destroyers or the Spirits a clear line of fire.
"Should be peaceful from here on in," Celia commented.
"Don't get too comfortable, Five- they're probably assembling a security detail in the hangar bays, which is one of two things they could do right now," Sierra replied calmly.
"Welcoming committee, huh? I like it." David could practically see Hayden's smile.
The Spirits split up, with several moving towards the hangar bay of each destroyer.
"Sierra?" David asked.
"Straight ahead, Two. Use the cover, even if it is reduced."
"Copy that."
Scavenger compressed their flight paths, limiting their maneuvers into a smaller volume now that they only had three Spirits to cover them. After several more seconds-
"Seraphs!" Logan called.
"What'd you expect? Flying Grunts?"
"All right; Four, Six- cut the chatter. Our LAAGs are no good against Seraphs, and we've only got one Gauss shot each, so avoid firing if possible- and if you have to shoot, make it count."
"Copy that, Sierra."
"Roger, boss. Ready to kick some serious butt."
"Stay close to the Spirits! It'll keep their trigger fingers up a little longer…"
The four insect-like Seraph fighters rolled and angled around the cluster of Spirits, trying to get a clean shot at one of Scavenger's booster frames, but the Spartans continually shifted their position, denying the enemy any opportunity to end the mission prematurely. Despite the commotion about them, the Spirit dropships continued to plow resolutely on towards the destroyer, prompting a remark from Jacob.
"Idiots," he growled. "If these were Pelicans, they'd have pulled out of the run by now…"
"Rock crabs…" Celia reminded gently.
"Focus!" Sierra yelled.
Scavenger continued to juke and jink, trying to remain evasive, biding their time as the Covenant Spirits moved along their planned route, seemingly oblivious to the Spartans, as they did not maneuver or open fire. Even as he maneuvered, David saw in the TEAMBIO readouts that the entire team's pulse rates were slowly rising- this tension was not good for them. The more worked up they got; the higher the chances were that they would slip up. And it only took one mistake for all hell to break loose. He felt a drop of sweat coalesce on his face; in the weightless environment of space, the tiny ball of water did not slide down his cheek as it might have done if he'd been back on Harvest. Instead, it simply sat there just off his right eyebrow, giving him the mounting temptation to wipe it away, which he might have done if the helmet on his head wasn't the only reason he wasn't currently sucking on vacuum. Again, he slowed and deepened his breathing, taking a slight comfort in the sound ringing in his ears.
The lead Spirit dropship approached the destroyer, and the hangar bay opened up to admit the vessel. Something went off in David's mind- he couldn't quite place it, but it had something to do with what happened next.
"NOW!" Sierra yelled across TEAMCOM.
David leaned forward and accelerated. Like six Gauss rounds, Team Scavenger's booster frames streaked forward into the hangar bay of the destroyer, which now gaped open. Time seemed to simultaneously crawl and race for David- in reality; only several seconds separated his initial acceleration and his entrance, but David felt like he had an eon to work out one crucial fact- that he was moving at hypersonic speed towards a wall. Free of prompt, David cut the power to the primary thrusters and slammed the control to the braking jets. The sudden deceleration launched him forward in his seat and caused the steering apparatus to crack underneath his sudden motion. Despite his action, the vehicle continued to rocket towards the wall. Taking the precious half-second the braking had bought him, David leapt from his booster frame and tucked his arms and legs, going into a roll as he hit the floor and came up standing. A thunderous crash signaled the end of his booster frame- he'd have to find another way down to the surface.
He checked the readouts on his heads-up display, nothing that his pressure sensors still read zero. The Covenant hadn't reset the shields over the hangar bay yet, and as such there was no atmosphere in the room. His suit's air cycling capabilities had been supplemented by an additional unit attached to his booster frame, so he hadn't used up all of his suit's air in the flight. He still had twenty-eight minutes of air left- more than enough.
David ran over to a console that stood by a closed door and hit the only switch present, opening the doors.
As the door rushed open, a blast of air hit David with the force of a sledgehammer as the ship's internal atmosphere began to vent. He was forced back, but grabbed onto the edge of the door's control panel before he could move too far, catching hold by the very tips of his fingers. He grunted as gale-force winds rushed past him, carrying the odd Grunt or unsuspecting Elite into the spacious hangar bay- and into the vacuum.
After several seconds of trying to secure his grip against the howling rush of atmosphere, a deafening grinding sound pierced his eardrums as massive metal alloy doors finally closed the breach. At the same time, the door David had opened slammed shut, and a faint hissing noise from somewhere above him signaled that the hangar was being repressurized. He got to his feet and pulled his M90 shotgun out, surveying the scene. What was once his booster frame was completely gone, and was likely hurtling towards the asteroid below the ship by now. The rest of Team Scavenger, boosters and all, were resting on the hangar bay floor, next to the remains of a Spirit dropship. Much of the metal on the Spirit was blackened, and small fires still burned here and there.
David walked over to the rest of his team, noting with some satisfaction that not one of them seemed hurt. He also took relief when he heard the clink-clink his boots made against the metal floor- the complete silence of space had unnerved him, to say the least.
"Emergency doors? Why didn't they just turn on the shields?" Logan asked of no-one in particular.
Sierra shook her head. "Don't know- someone on the command bridge must have panicked."
"Sloppy," Jacob remarked. "If this had been a UNSC ship, the AI would have sealed the breaches before they ever became a problem."
David nodded his assent- boarders had obviously not been expected, although it puzzled him why the Covenant hadn't prepared for their arrival. UNSC ships had been boarded only sparingly by the Covenant, who generally favored obliteration, but the correct protocols were always ready to be initiated if necessary, whether or not the ship was likely to be boarded.
Sierra pulled back the bolt of her MA5B rifle and turned to the rest of the team. "All set?"
Five acknowledgement lights blinked green.
The six Spartans went through the recently opened door, which was shut again. Seeing no need for carnage right away, Scavenger used the more control console located by the door- 'the easy way', as Hayden termed it. Once on the other side, they immediately took up position around Celia, who pulled a small object with multiple metallic 'petals' out of her pack. Within two seconds, the team was on the move again.
"Settings?" Hayden asked.
"Proximity and motion," Celia replied as she touched a small red button attached to the top of her gauntlet. "If that door opens, the LOTUS goes up."
The team advanced in silence for several more minutes, until-
"Damn," Logan muttered. "Three doors. Which one do we not take?"
Sierra paused for a moment, thinking. "We take the one in the center, see if that leads us to the bridge."
"What about the engines? Coms?"
"We won't take out all three ships on our own, so we'll commandeer this one and see if we can't take out the other two."
Hayden turned to Sierra. "Who are you, and what have you done with Sierra?" The response to his flippancy was a punch to the shoulder, which Hayden didn't seem perturbed by.
The door directly in front of them didn't open, though. To their left, a hissing noise revealed a corridor- complete with half a dozen Elites and twice as many Grunts. The air seemed to vibrate as their charging weapons emitted telltale whines.
Without a second thought, David primed all three of his fragmentation grenades and tossed them into the corridor. Hayden and Sierra rushed forward and took firing positions on one knee while Jacob fell back. Logan slammed the door control, sending it swooshing shut just as dull thumps reverberated through the walls and floor. Nothing moved for several moments.
Logan put his hand to the door control console again, and at a nod from Sierra, pressed the control. David was immediately taken aback at what three grenades had done. Three blackened rings in the floor marked the spot where the grenades had detonated. The bodies of Elites and Grunts littered the corridor, islands of armor and flesh in a slowly-spreading sea of multicolored blood. The Elites' personal body shields had clearly taken the brunt of the blast; tiny metal shards from the grenades glinted in the blue-white light of the destroyer's interior. The Elite warriors had relatively few embedded in them- the Grunts were another story altogether.
"All clear," Hayden reported.
Logan sealed and locked the door leading down the corridor, and once again activated the holographic control that would open the central doorway.
After several more minutes of travel through unnervingly empty passages, the team arrived at a cavernous room filled with Covenant aliens. Silently, each readied their weapon, but a 'Stop' gesture from Sierra held their trigger fingers in check.
Only two Elites stood in the room, and no Grunts or Jackals whatsoever were present. However, dozens of bizarre aliens floated back and forth between various instruments and displays, extending delicate filaments from their bulbous forms as the consoles pulsed and glowed in a multicolored display.
"Where the hell are we?" Jacob whispered. Being the team's sniper, he had the quietest voice of everyone in Scavenger- David had to strain to hear it, even with the audio-enhancing components in his helmet.
"We're in the ship's nose- sensor suite, probably," was Sierra's equally silent response. "Hold up- I've got an idea. We take out those Elites- quietly."
Five acknowledgement lights lit up. Scavenger crept up to the Elites, making less noise than a slight breeze. Hayden, David and Sierra moved towards one that stood towards the right, while Logan, Jacob and Celia took up the left. Both of the Elites were clad in red-grey body armor, and while this rung a bell in the back of David's head, he brushed it aside. It didn't matter what rank or affiliation these Elites had; they had to die for the mission to succeed, and that was all that mattered.
When they were two meters from the Elite, Hayden and David leapt forward and tackled the Elite's legs, sending it tumbling to the floor in a heap. Sierra then pounced on its back and drew a razor-thin line across its throat with her combat knife, immediately ending the warrior's life. Several meters away, a thud accompanied by a wet slick told a similar story for the other Elite.
David rose and pulled his assault rifle out, although he honestly wondered if he'd have to use it, given that the floating aliens did not seem the least bit alarmed or even aware of the fight that had just taken place. True, some did stop and observe the aftermath for several seconds, but most simply continued to work on the instruments.
"What's up with those things?" Hayden asked, going so far as to walk up to one of the creatures and prodding it with his M7 submachine-gun. The thing's large black eyes opened wide and it trilled loudly, although to David it seemed more out of irritation than alarm. Nonetheless, he leveled his rifle at it, only lowering it when Sierra looked his way and shook her head.
"If they wanted to hurt us or trip an alarm, they'd have done so. I think they're neutral- they just work these instruments. I doubt they even care which side they're on."
Hayden snorted. "Yeah, they're so indifferent they'd side with an alliance of genocidal alien fanatics. And what's to say these things don't control plasma cannons somewhere on the ship that's going to fry us? I say we pop them right here."
David half-expected Sierra to shoot Hayden on the spot. Instead, she sighed and opened the TEAMCOM channel.
"Dead end. We have to find the ship's bridge, and this isn't it."
"Any ideas on where that might be?"
"If it's not in the nose, Four, then it's in the center of the ship. We should have checked there first… should have known the 'Prophets' had no stomach for a fight." She tweaked the ammo counter on her MA5B for a second, and headed straight out of the room, Logan, Celia and Jacob hot on her heels. David made to leave as well, but Hayden grasped him by the shoulder and whispered, with TEAMCOM off, "Are you kidding?"
"They don't look hostile, Hayden. I think we're fine."
Both of them left the room at that point, but David was fairly certain that Hayden looked back several times. It was strange to see him so paranoid; but then again, they were on board a Covenant warship.
As they moved through the bowels of the Covenant ship, David couldn't help but notice the interior's layout. The high, arching corridors and passages were a good five meters tall and several meters wide- a waste, he thought. Not only did it make key points of the ship harder to effectively defend against boarders, but it also used up more resources- resources that had the UNSC possessed them, would never have been taken for granted. A cloud passed over his face as he considered the one resource humanity did seem to take for granted, and tried hard not to lump himself into that category.
Far too many lives had been thrown away in this war. It was not simply the dead and the maimed, or those marked out for such fates; it was those who were meant to survive- those trained- no, those made for survival. Even as he heard his footsteps alongside those of his team, he considered the future. Even if they survived the war- even if they somehow won, what was next for the Spartans? They would never, could never fit into society. Even Class II, less of a stretch than the original Spartan-IIs, was simply different from humanity as a whole. David and his fellow Spartans could punch holes in sheet metal, reach speeds that made professional athletes look like toddlers, and ascertain the eye color of a Marine two hundred yards away with the naked eye. What could they do if they ever lived through this war?
David shook his head- there was time enough for that if he ever survived. As one of the more accommodating DIs had put it, he'd 'cross the bridge when he got to it', or some variation of that. Colloquialisms had never been a strong point in Spartans.
In the meantime, Scavenger had arrived outside another security door. Sierra sighed in frustration, while Logan went the extra mile and actually aimed a kick at the solid metal door, sending a series of resonant echoing clangs reverberating down the corridor. David nodded towards Jacob, and the two Spartans took up rear-facing positions. If Sierra and the others needed time to open that door, he and Jacob would give them all the time they needed- short of trying to hold up Hunters.
Unexpectedly, the door chimed once and slid open. Perplexed by his team's unusual speed and silence, but determined not to look the gift horse in the mouth, David turned around. The smile he had been wearing left his face as Scavenger came face to face with two Covenant Hunter pairs. A sickly green glow suffused the room as four fuel rod cannons charged up.