After losing over a hundred pages worth of material, as well as having to redo this exact chapter three times due to file loss... I am finally back on track (Thank God).
If you notice any, grammatical mistakes, story errors or just have some good ol' fashion advice... by all means comment.
"You asked me what I believe. I believe in completing my mission at all costs. I believe great threats require great sacrifices. From the beginning, Spartans were a weapon of last resort. We were built for combat… and raised for war. Spartans never die but the equipment can be replaced. My life was always an evolving lie. Now I've made my choice. MY path is clear."
-Chief Petty Officer Spartan 117 speaking after the death of Cortana
Diary of Jane Shepard- 10.13.2559
\\BEGIN ENTRY
Six weeks.
Thirty-nine days to be exact.
Since Sparta.
Four hundred and seven.
That's how many died at the school.
Sixty campus personal.
Two hundred seventy three cadets.
Thirty four ODSTs. Including my father.
Forty Marines.
Yet after all this time, I can still see their faces. My dad's face.
What was he thinking in his final moment?
Two hundred and sixteen confirmed aliens.
Fifty various robotic combat platforms.
Eighty seven various alien "slaves".
Sixty four "batarians".
Only fifteen captured.
Was it worth it?
I can still see their faces.
In the dark.
In my nightmaes.
SAVE ENTRY/
From: Operative Kleanu
To: Operative Vasir
Subject: (Council C17x- P3) Human
Kleanu: The broker requests analysis of humans
Vasir: Can you be a little more specific?
K: Technology, war industry, capabilities, prisoner…
V: They represent a minor threat at best. Information recovered from the mind of human prisoner (File Attached: C1007x-P3-NS) has revealed their military capabilities and little over recent history. The prisoner, along with nineteen other humans (four related) were recovered from an unidentified vessel on the outskirts of the colony Vatu. From what I understood, they are the first species to originate from the Dark Arm of our Galaxy. The species the prisoner was a part of was attempting to find a new home after a large war, one that I only had a small glimpse of. After failing to respond to the colony's perimeter warnings, a turian frigate was authorized to disable the vessel with a tactical pulse strike from its GARDIAN Pulse Array. Unfortunately, the strike to its engines resulted in chain explosion that instantly killed nineteen of the humans, leaving four in a critical injury state. Three would later die from their injuries onboard a hospital ship and one human (the prisoner) would be the only one to make a full recovery.
STG Operatives would later appear to investigate the sudden arrival of the new species and provide the means to translate the alien's language through an "informal interview". Council diplomats soon arrived in an attempt to speak with the human. It was met with violent aggression (likely stemming from the informal interview) resulting in the injury of one asari diplomat and an attempted escape. Despite our best attempts to defuse the situation and attempt peaceful conversation with the "human", results were always met with an unexpected and extreme violence. With no other options at hand, he was forcibly subdued and placed into an isolation cell.
While the prisoner was being interrogated, Council Scientists were investigating the wreckage of the human ship. Two Hierarchy Scrapers' discovered the ship's FTL drive (We know it was an FTL drive because the human identified it as so after a little "diplomacy"), along with other unimportant human equipment in the wreckage. Unfortunately, the research ship that was attempting to analyze the ship disappeared in a large radiation-filled explosion that resulted in the disappearance of the ship and its crew. Attempts to probe information of the FTL drive from the prisoner were… fruitless.
K: With the death of the human prisoner. We assume there was other knowledge retained.
V: Yes, the mind melds I did on the human were not consented or authorized by the Council. However, it was necessary due to his lack of cooperation. To prevent any political fallout, I staged an escape that made it seem like the prisoner was planning since his imprisonment, subdued him and ultimately force melded with him, he survived the process long enough for me to gain an adequate amount of knowledge of his life and experiences.
K: How will his species respond to the recent attack on their colony?
V: Analysts and xeno-sociologists predict that they will likely respond with a large warfleet and attempt to backtrack the location of the Phoro-class vessels through the usage of the Mass Relays. I disagree. They are more likely to send reconnaissance ships around the galaxy, using their FTL drives to find populated planets around mass relays and recon them from afar. They are a cautious species, slow to trust. I expect them to introduce themselves by directly visiting one of these planets after investigating our civilization long enough… or they'll attempt strategic military strikes if they deem us hostile enough.
K: The last answer was most concerning, what has led you to believe this?
V: They have been in some war spanning tens of solar cycles. I only have small glimpses of the war, images and the emotions that come with them. Planets turned into black glass, land turned into ash. Entire cities lain to siege, people dying in droves to lances of reptilian aliens, some having their limbs cut apart by blindingly bright flashes. I can feel the angst, fear, the hopelessness as a large ship, bigger than anything I have ever seen, lays siege to a city. I also feel the anger that comes with the images of other human soldiers, but I do not understand why. The damage and war seems similar to the memories passed on to me by a matriarch's memories of the Rachni War. And if its anything like that... well... pursuing diplomacy would be our best option.
K: What are the contingency plans in preparation for the human's appearance?
V: The turians have deployed a single fleet in Relay 314's system in the event they come through that specific area. Two turian battlegroups are always on standby and within a single jump-distance away. The salarians of course, have likely assigned numerous spycraft and STG Operatives to the Dark Arm. But rumor has it that half of the ships have completely gone off grid. Unknown to all but the highest of Citadel leadership, the Commandoes and Matriarchs of War have already been deployed to the last known locations of the missing STG.
K: The broker appreciates your assessment. We will contact you when we need you again.
V: Under- [Kleanu has logged off….] –Fucking two bit son of a clanless turian whore
-End Transmission-
HIGHCOM Facility Bravo-6, Office of the UNSC Security Council
Sydney, Earth
October 10th, 2559
"I apologize but I didn't catch that. He did what?"
The tall, lithe form of ONI Lieutenant Desan Greymore coughed before repeating his report. "Sirs, Spartan Lieutenant Frederic-104 has requested two days of leave."
The Commander's grey eyes swept briefly across the faces of the four most powerful military leaders in the UNSC in an attempt to figure out what they were thinking. Surprisingly, Rear Admiral Serin Osman and the Section Zero Head were the easiest to read, their faces betraying the confused state that they were in. Lieutenant Desan Greymore had been in charge of setting up SPARTAN Blue Team's main deployments, and with the sudden request from SPARTAN-104 catching him off guard; he just was not quite sure how to respond. He immediately opened a Priority One communications link to his boss, the Head of ONI's Section Three for guidance.
He received it, but not before the Omnipresent Section Zero did, who in turn flagged the key words: SPARTAN, 104, and LEAVE. In less than an hour, Commander in Chief of the Office of Naval Intelligence Serin Osman, the Core 4, Fleet Admiral Lord Terrance Hood, and Director Catherine Elizabeth Halsey were all made aware.
Hence the assembly before him, which consisted of the CINCONI, Admiral Hood, the Head of Section Zero and Dr. Halsey, all in hologram. To s
It was fucking scary.
Rear Admiral Osman's voice found its way into his ears. And like a storm over the water, the air became cold despite the fact that they were more than three-hundred light years away.
"Did you inquire the location or reason for request?"
Commander Greymore cleared his voice once, "Yes ma'am. Jovian Moons, Titan. He stated his attention of visiting someone there."
The Mediterranean looking woman raised a single eyebrow. He could hear her inhale deeply as she considered something. To his surprise, she simply closed her palms together before saying "That will be all. We'll contact you when we have an answer."
The blue hologram of the man disappeared, leaving the four seated members on the curved table to talk amongst themselves.
To no one's surprise, Dr. Catherine Halsey was the first one to speak. Her holographic fingers came to the bottom of her chin, "Peculiar. Who on Titan is important enough for him to request leave."
Serin Osman slumped slightly into the back of her chair before holding her hands. The glaring face she had earlier was gone, now replaced by the smallest of smirks. Her answer was brief, "A girl."
The coughing sound that originated from the center of the Admiralty table caught the attention of everyone. For the first time in what felt like decades, someone had actually caught Fleet Admiral Lord Terrence Hood laughing. Unsure of how to respond to strange and unusual action, the three others sat quietly, puzzled. Admiral Osman's answer did not make sense unless…
When the bellowing sound came down to a chuckle, Lord Hood turned towards the lab-coated hologram of the SPARTAN Director, "I thought your indoctrination and augmentation procedures eliminated the need for a sex drive Catherine?"
Her only response was to sit there, contemplating the possibility. They did the math, created projections and spent years predicting the possible side effects and outcomes of every augmentation. The Catalytic Thyroid Implant theoretically suppressed the sex drive that would come with the SPARTANs as they grew and aged. What Admiral Osman was suggesting –and it would be the first time she ever heard of it- was that the dissolvement of the platinum pellet in the left thyroid gland could not completely prevent the sex hormones from working. In other words, even technology could not overcome some aspects of human nature. The biggest problem however was not the ineffectiveness of the thyroid implant itself, but the psychological condition that could derive from what would be a new (at least to the SPARTAN)… experience. And that was without including the possibilities that the other SPARTANs augmentations may be unknowingly suffering from similar issues or worse, late term-rejection.
But at the same time, this may not have anything to do with rejection or any kind of issue. Perhaps it was a long-term side affect, augmentation on a SPARTANs scale for this long? It has never been recorded, much less anaylzed, perhaps this was the way things were meant to happen.
It was not until Halsey looked around the room that she noticed everyone was staring at her.
The Head of Section Zero, a one Admiral Jack Harper, narrowed his eyes as he watch Halsey contemplating something, "It seems the good doctor has something to share." Aware of how Halsey spoke when something important was on her mind, the Admiral rested his hands on his head and prepared for the incoming lecture.
But to his surprise -as well as the others- she gave a one sentence reply that summed up her idea on how to move forward.
"I don't know."
Despite Admiral Osman's attempts to keep her face straight and expressionless, she would find herself smirking widely to Halsey's out-of-character comment. She could act like the same old doctor that Osman knew all those years back, but overall she was a completely different person since becoming the Project Head of the SPARTAN-IV program.
In a way, it only made sense that the "mother" of the original SPARTANs would be the "mother" of the new ones. And since her involvement, the SPARTAN-IV program had achieved wonders and a high success rate that made up for the fuck-up that were the first two classes of SPARTAN IVs. More than ten of them had gone AWOL in the past few years, with over fifty SPARTAN-IVs being decommissioned after the discovery that their bodies had undergone severe stresses and damage from undergoing "imperfect augmentations". As it turned out, the very optimistic demographics and test phases had not accounted for the long-term effects on individuals with "common-day genetics", not the superior genetics of previous SPARTAN-iterations. While the candidate pool was much wider than previously before allowing for some adults to undergo the augmentation process, the entire procedure suffered from random, dangerous, long-term side effects.
And that was without including what were private corporations' ramshackle attempts of Powered Assault Armor production. With less than five complete schematics to work off of and nearly no funding due to the fact that feeding civilization took importance over Powered Armor research, the power armor that was created in Halsey's absence was of inferior quality at best compared to the Mark V.
With Halsey's retrieval from Trevelyan that all changed.
Catherine Halsey had fixed the issues of the SPARTAN IV program in less than two years. Starting by firing half of the scientists who convinced the Admiralty board that "anyone could become a SPARTAN" was the way to go, she took charge of the SPARTAN-IV program in 2554. She convinced Lord Hood that if given less than the amount of resources used to build a single cruiser, she could solve the issues of program costs as well as create what she called "Real Spartans". Many armory corporations, who attempted to pitch in their own MJOLNIR products to the SPARTAN-IV program, dropped out as Halsey outdid most of them with bare resources. SPARTAN candidates left as Halsey's new guidelines forced many to drop out. The changes had brought her many enemies: people such as General Madsen, Senator Andrew Del Rio, numerous corporate chiefs and bureaucrats who all shared a dislike for her strict selection parameters.
Before SPARTAN Musa- 096's unfortunate demise, he too disagreed with Halsey over a great number of things.
However, Osman could not deny that Halsey had singlehandedly shaped what was the most influential branch in the UNSC. Through hundreds of thousands of hours she had created and perfected the 2nd Generation of MJOLNIR in the form of what was commonly known as the RECRUIT armor. Through rigorous training courses led by Musa-096 and Jun-A266, she had remade the SPARTAN IV in the image of the SPARTAN IIs.
And now they had to discuss the possibility that one of the original SPARTANs may be undergoing something that was ruled out as impossible. An indicator that even the SPARTAN IIs may be undergoing long-term issues with their own augmentations.
"Who is the girl on Titan?" asked Lord Admiral Hood.
The CINCONI had to wait to answer his question. It had been years since Osman last checked on her, trusting her subordinates to take care of her like Osman ordered.
"Her name is Veta Lopis, she was previously a Special Investigator during the Gao Conflict. Over the course of her investigation, she had worked closely with SPARTAN Blue Team, providing key intelligence and assistance when facing numerous obstacles. Despite opportunities to assist hostile forces, she had sided with the 717th Xeno-materials Exploitation Battalion and aware that we need more specialized personal in our force, I offered her a position from with ONI. For the past seven years, she had been instrumental in the identification of two insurrectionist agents in the SPARTAN Branch as well as the solving of multiple military murders within the inner colonies. Capture of the rogue Artificial Intelligence on Luna? That was her."
Lord Hood and his close friend, Admiral Harper seemed to consider that for a few moments. They both shifted in their seats when Halsey began her own inquiry. "How many times has she worked with my SPARTAN?"
The answer was retrieved in a matter of micro-seconds thanks to the specialized Neural interface in the back of Osman's skull. The request for retrieval was handled by one of ONI's many dedicated dumb artificial intelligences, the files were gathered and copied directly to Osman's brain, and she smiled when she became aware of them.
"In the past seven years, there were a recorded twenty-seven encounters between the two of them. With a theoretical thirty-three due to the proximity of one another at certain times. Intelligence on sight has also determined higher perspiration, faster heart rates, and other basic signs of attraction during these encounters. Based on these factors alone we can positively determine that the two of them are attracted to one another. However, the physiological analysis of the two has determined the relationship to not be based on physical investment-" She tilted her head slightly at the aging doctor. "-but emotional security."
Like the other three in the room, she paused at the realization of what the report was stating. Frederic Ellsworth, a man who been destined to be a supersoldier since he was a child. A man who been taught to suppress the normal feelings and thoughts that came with being human and to follow any order he was given to the bitter end. A man who been indoctrinated into believing that the day he stopped fighting would be the day he died. A human being who had his humanity stolen from him in the pursuit of the greater good... Had broke his training, his indoctrination, and did something perfectly human… he found a pleasing feeling in the presence of another person.
And nobody flagged that.
Somebody is definitely getting fired for their incompetence.
Seeing the chance to lighten the mood, Admiral Harper happily pitched in his own thought. "I didn't know your SPARTANs were capable of making candlelight dinners."
Everyone, even Osman smiled at Harper's remark. Despite Harper's well intended comment, Osman could not afford to have the topic change when they were on something so serious.
Bringing everyone's attention back to the issue at hand, Osman shifted the room back to the topic. "How exactly do we proceed? If this relationship, if we can even call it that, is allowed to continue it may compromise the training and mindset that has been so carefully engraved into Frederic-104. It may cause emotional instability or worse… after all we have to account for the affect the death of someone close can do to people. Just look at what the Spirit of Fire incident did to Douglas-042. His combat capability was reduced to zero percent with the loss of Red Team and his left arm. It wasn't until we reintroduced him to Blue Team that he managed to move past his losses.
Admiral Jack Harper ran his hand through his well-groomed silver hair before coming to his own conclusion. "I have to agree with Admiral Osman's assessment. If we allow this relationship to grow and pester it may backfire on us. With the Systems Alliance winning Andesia, rumors of the SA infiltrating Conrad's Point, and still no contact with the 2nd contact aliens, taking a SPARTAN off the playing field seems... illogical."
Halsey frowned. "We have no evidence to suggest that Ms Lopis's relationship could negatively affect Fred. If anything allowing it would allow us to gain a better understanding of how my SPARTANs are responding to the world of today. A bridge between today's world and the wars of the past decade could assure my SPARTANs some reliable mean of adapting to impossible concepts, such as peace. From what the batarians we captured have told us, a response seems unlikely anytime soon, they were working covertly. Regardless, the moment we need Fred, he will answer. So I see no harm in letting him a day or two off." said Halsey.
Osman knew that the truth lie deeper than that. Halsey felt sorry for the loss of her SPARTAN's humanity, she wanted all them to survive to live another day… even if that meant taking them off the battlefield. Osman did not doubt that Halsey would easily trade a hundred SPARTAN IV lives if it meant bringing back a single SPARTAN II.
The final choice would lie on the aging form of the great and wise Fleet Admiral. From the comfortable padding of his plush, leather seat, the aging hero known as Lord Hood made his decision the way he has always done it, direct and without the bullshit
"SPARTAN Lieutenant Frederic has never asked for anything else besides the next mission for the past thirty years. He has led the greatest field asset that has ever been in humanity's possession with dignity and served the UNSC with nothing less than 100% integrity. Not once has he failed in the completion of a single mission, and for the first time since his activation he asked but for two days. And you are telling me we should deny him less than a week of leave on the basis that allowing him to share time with a young woman could compromise his duty to the UNSC? I have my answer. Tell Commander Greymore to get his-"
Lord Hood never finished his order, for as soon as he said "his", one of Osman's aides came flying through the door. Following behind her were two MPs in exoskeletons, there hydraulics and servomotors hissing and groaning as they made their way into the room.
The aide looked exhausted and disorderly as she tried tucking her long, black hair behind her ears. Her other arm was trying to simultaneously hold and shuffle through dozens of papers and folders, dropping some and crinkling the others.
Catherine Halsey looked at the opposite direction of the woman before saying to no one in particular "What the hell?"
The scene would have been humorous in Hood's opinion had it not taken place during the middle of an important discussion. Unless Admiral Preston Cole was just found, Hood could not think of any possible excuse for the interruption. But what had him even more surprised was that this was one of Osman's aides, normally she would only have the very best around her at all times.
Admiral Jack Harper cleared his throat as loudly as he could in an attempt to get her attention, "Uh hmmmmmm."
Despite the not so-subtle hints, the woman still trying to gather up papers from the floor, this time, doing so on knees. This time, one of the MPs was trying to help her in her attempts, as she dropped all the files in her arms too.
Lord Hood could already sense the seething rage from Serin Osman at the act of insubordination. Hood already had his money on Osman's head blowing up from the awkward situation.
And not a moment later, she did just that.
Launching up from her seat, Osman yelled "Specialist Treynor, unless you are here to tell me that you just created a viable means of immortality, you better give me one good reason for me to not throw your ass out!" The woman stood up at attention to the commanding voice, her face red from embarrassment and her eyes laced with fear. Getting yelled by your sergeant was one thing, getting yelled at by the CINCONI herself was the difference between life and death.
"Sorry sir- I mean Ma'am. And sirs. Sorry, but I was working on our Emergency Communication Protocols when my station received a flagged Black Five-Clearance, Eyes Only, Priority 1 alert. Our Artificial Intelligences had shut down all UNSC outgoing communication networks, ONI Database, waypoint, ECHO, all of it until I could get the message delivered."
Admiral Osman opened her mouth to say something but bit back her words at the final moment.
"What was the message Specialist?"
She took one deep breath before inhaling.
"Protocol SAR Victor 05-3-117-Alpha has been enacted by Daedalus. They found her sirs... They found the Forward Unto Dawn."
CSV Graceful Shara
Classified Operation near Dark Arm (Site of cataclysmic event)
Galactic Standard: 12.11.2187
From the confined viewing quarters of the Citadel's newest stealth frigate, a ominous salarian in black and gold armor watched as two large freighter ships weaved between a field of grey metal. Blue lights and orange sparks could be seen everywhere as dozens of engineers and welders cut, separated and melded gigantic slabs of metal from cracked superstructures and warped hulls. Fellow aliens in vacuum suits floated around, carrying entire crates or industrial tools.
To most organic species, the entire scene looked chaotic, a collective of random activities with no shared purpose in a ship graveyard.
But to the salarian eye?
The scene looked similar to ants crawling around in a mound, organized and efficient. From his small hiding spot, on the edge of the ship, the salarian could see seven engineer teams, four of them were currently taking apart a two hundred meter long piece of a dreadnought-sized vessel. As it rotated, the sly salarian was exposed to what the Citadel xeno-archeologists had presumed to be the ship's portside. Bold white letters were written across the hull spelling out " UN C HAL" before being abruptly cut off. The rest of the ship's hull was nowhere to be seen, likely lost to space. With the paint faded off the few remaining letters, it was impossible to discern the meaning of what was written on the ship.
Impossible that was, until fellow Spectre Tela Vasir showed up.
The Salarian had read the incident report leading to the death of the sole human prisoner under Vasir's guard during a reconnaissance mission of the nearly discovered alien species known as humans. Officially, the report given to Citadel Council stated that the prisoner had died from a fatal gunshot wound during a daring escape attempt. The Council, while saddened at the blood that was spilled, happily took her answer as it was, reviewing the autopsy report handed to them to make sure it matched with what was told.
It did.
He of course knew better than to trust the modified report, he himself had edited a few things as to protect the Council's image. The brutal and bloody details of a mission did not need to be known. It helped them sleep at night.
As for Vasir's report, it did not take much to uncover the truth. After reviewing the original, unmodified autopsy report, the sly, salarian Spectre had come to discover three obvious and important issues discovered in the human's body: first that the human was shot twice, once in the leg, which immobilized him and another in the back, opposite of the chest cavity. Second, that there was a short, but noticeable period taken between each shot. And finally, that the nervous system of the human was so thoroughly fried. The damage was irreversible and definitely lethal- almost as if he had been exposed to ten neural shocks at once… or had undergone a forced mental symbiosis.
He also gained access to the autopsy report given to the Council, which had featured heavy editing from the coroner who was under orders.
Vasir's orders.
He could not help but admire her creative use on something like that. The benefits, while enormous, were outweighed by the sheer fact that had she gone too far, Tela Vasir would have likely overloaded her own nervous system. Additionally, due to the extremely taboo nature of a forced mindmeld, had anyone seen her doing so, the galactic populace would have likely called for her Spectre Resignation and life-imprisonment. But since she was not seen…
Spectre Vasir was now rated as the Citadel's best advisor over anything human. Ever since her arrival last demi-cycle, Tela had achieved more advancements and made more discoveries in four days than what the Citadel Exploratory teams had in over two cycles. She had filled in the missing letter of the ship's title, and translated the completed acronym. "UNSC" stood for United Nations Space Command. It was some kind of human-military entity. Tela was hesitant to provide details but what he understood was that they had been recently involved in many destructive wars. The most recent involving another alien race or empire, which resulted in nearly the destruction of their race.
Which was not hard to believe, considering past conflicts like the Rachni Wars or recent events like the Theseus Incursion.
He flared his nostrils.
The entire Theseus System was on lockdown with the turian 5th and 27th fleet standing guard near the relay. Curious that the damage it did to nearby ships was similar to what was seen here.
Curious indeed.
But there were more important matters to attend to.
Within the empty space of the observation room, Spectre Jondum Bau was being debriefed by the three most powerful salarian beings in space. Three drones projected the fuzzy images of the Salarian Councilor, the High Dalatrass of Sur'Kesh and the cloaked figure of the STG Spymaster. Together they commanded all of Salarian space, deciding the ultimate fate of the species politically, economically and militarily.
It was rare to see one, much less two of the elder salarian together at once. But to see the three heads of Kesh'kemr together?
Anomalous.
The cloaked spymaster continued talking, "Unusual activity in turian space. Observational Spycraft reports change in turian patrols near Terminus System: two dreadnoughts and six prime-cruisers covertly moved to unknown location. Homefleet Titan also given secret orders before deploying to unknown location."
Spectre Jondum Bau eyes narrowed at the final sentence. The Titan Fleet consisted of the largest collection of primecruisers in the turian military, making them effectively the single most powerful fleet in the galaxy (if you excluded the three-thousand strong quarian heavy fleet). Last time they left Palaven's home system was during the krogan rebellions and they did return until it was over.
Jondum flared his nostrils. "Last deployment was two thousand years ago. Twice the size of usual turian fleet and features most primecruisers in Galactic Space. Secret deployment calls for much concern. Possibility of sanctions due to unauthorized deployment with Council permission. Very Risky. STG have any clues as to location?"
As if expecting the answer, the Spymaster answered him "Sources indicate alien transmission picked up at edge of terminus system by turian communications outpost. Nearby STG Spycraft discovered three demi-cycles ago radio transmission to be of human origin. Here is copy of received."
White static filled the room causing Jondum to cover his hypersensitive cartilage horns in response. But as the signal adjusted, the noise slowly began to form into patterned, audible clicks, and eventually the noises turned into words.
"Mayday, Mayday, Mayday. This is UNSC FFG-Two Zero One Forward Unto Dawn, requesting immediate evac. Survivors aboard. Prioritization code Victor Zero Five dash Three dash Sierra Zero One One Seven. Mayday, Mayday-"
The updated translator took a while but every word was seamlessly translated, providing Jondum with a clear and concise understanding of what the female voice was saying in the distress signal. Three things were gained from the translation:
1) FFG likely meant frigate
2) There were survivors abroad the ship at the time the distress signal was being sent out
3) Unless all human ships utilized prioritization codes in their emergency beacons, this peculiar ship was very important
The Salarian Councilor would be the final one to speak, "As you have realized by now. The turians are making a grab for a human ship, any intention of sharing knowledge is deemed unlikely. We've limited the location down to a period of seven-light years, we believe the turians are also unsure of its exact location. Any direct political confirmations with the turian councilor over the human ship would only backfire against myself, as he has plausible deniability in this situation. Hence, our decision to select you as our observer. Your Spectre authority will allow you to go anywhere you need to. Your ship will protect your interests as well as your existance. Your identity will prevent you from being acted against, and in the event they do attempt anything... I will be able to confront the turian hierarchy over your absence. Spectre Bau, do you accept your mission?"
The question was rhetorical of course; the possibility of a choice was nonexistent. You did not have the three of the most powerful galactic leaders (or in the Spymaster's case, the most powerful intelligence leader, second only to the Shadow Broker) make an offer only to be told no. Denial would likely result in the removal of birthing rights, along with the degradation and shunning of his family.
So Jondum did the only thing he could, he looked into the soulless black eyes of the Salarian Spymaster before asking, "When do I begin?"
ONI_External_Access_Network/Event/Critical/2553/Black-4/Kilo-5_Incident
-Coming later-
Codex/Organization/Turian/Military/1st "Titan" fleet
Named after the mythological Palavenian titans, the ancient deities that wandered Palaven's lands and flew through its skies, the legendary 1st 'Titan' Homefleet is the single largest fleet in the turian armada.
Originally created in response to the discovery of the Citadel Council's military capabilities, Titan Fleet's sole purpose was to act as the guard of Palaven in the event of an attack on the Trebia System. Fortunately for the Citadel Council, the Titan Fleet did not see any combat until the start of the 1st Krogan Rebellions, where they were instrumental in the defeat of powerful Warlords such as Shiagur, Graken Dhal, Kulle Serok, and their armies. The fleet's motto derived from the war, "Until the job is done."
Aware of the large amount of power held by the lone fleet, the Citadel Council forced the Titan fleet to either disband or stay in their home-system forever. In exchange, the turians would given an invitation to the Citadel Council for their bravery and sacrifice. To this day, the Titan Fleet remains stationed in the Trebia System.
Despite the handicaps, the Titan Fleet has not suffered any issues in combat effectiveness. Ships and crew are constantly replaced by the best the turian military has to offer. Primecruisers swarm the space in the Trebia System with the occasional dreadnought finding its way around. To this day, the invasion of the Trebia System is still considered impossible even by the most optimistic of the STG.
Author's notes: The process of creating this chapter was very costly (time-wise). After losing about four chapters worth of material for this story alone, I'm happy to have finally been finished with this... this thing. Some things worth mentioning, the whole Fred 104 and Veta Lopis thing was more of a nod or easter egg to last light. To clarify, it was a one time deal, unless I feel the need to bring Veta Lopis into the story, this will likely be the only time you have a mention of her. Sorry to disappoint you guys, but I'm not doing any romantic stuff. A little suggestive content here and there, but nothing worth writing about.
Blinded in a bolthole: the armored historical Leonidas
NightWithMoon: No mate. No they're not. :)
Welsh Guy: Glad you enjoyed it
Ferduran: I would be more than happy to answer any further questions if the answer above does not satisfy your query.
Outcast's Redeemer: I plan on doing just that. Theres three significant events in this story that I will give codex entries for: The Kilo-5 Incident, the Rise of the Systems Alliance (which is actually a rebel group in this story), and the Ghost of Requiem.
Hunter139: We're kinda putting two universes together and trying to blend it seamlessly. So you gotta give me a little artistic license. If Halo found its away around it, I'm pretty sure a civilization with a bigger economy would be capable of solving some of the issues. Don't get me wrong, its not like everyone has it. Only the most wealthiest of planets do, Khar'Shan has some, Thessia has one, and two asari colonies do too.
By the way, the Spartans of Sparta are not SPARTANs. As for the whole building ship-idea, how about feeding masses, building the shipyards to build ships, creating arcologies for people to live in. A huge portion of resources were dedicated to the creation of a few "Salvation Projects" designed to keep humanity going in the event Earth fell, the Infinity being one of them. Theres only so much to go around and I feel thats one thing 343i kind fell on.
Comments? Criticisms? Flames?