ooooooo
Anyone else wonder if the council would believe the cell phone popcorn trick? An audio file is all it takes to convince them of abandoning their best operative. Imagine what they would think if they ever found humanity's old youtube videos.
ooooooo
Previous Chapter Summary: Shepard & co. make it to the Dawn Under Heaven with the help of the salarians, however the salarian ship crashes in the hangar, they find brutes already on board the ship. The group rushes to save the AI Artemis from a covenant engineer. After doing so the salarians, alarmed at the discovery of an AI, pull back to secure their ship against software intrusion. The turian forces were just about to arrive at the Shanxi garrison to load refugees in exchange for a pass off planet.
ooooooo
Lieutenant Richard Hall stepped out of the turian troopship to a welcome sight. Around the hastily cleared landing zone a large group of marines and army soldiers sat waiting, weapons holstered. Anti-air weapons stood ready, including ground launch archer missiles. Various weapon emplacements had been set up in a ring facing outwards. A handful of officers stood at the front, a delegation to meet the turians probably, and actually handle the details of a civilian evacuation. Hall was surprised to see General Williams standing out in front.
Behind Hall several turians came down the ramp, General Septimus, his advisors, and Nihlus. Several turian soldiers were also exiting their ships, eyeing their human counterparts warily, and receiving the same looks in return. He made sure to walk ahead of the turian delegation, to show that he wasn't with them. As he approached the general he snapped a salute.
The general returned the salute, "I don't know whether to congratulate you lieutenant, or shoot you for treason. Either way if this works I think you might deserve a medal."
Hall nodded and assumed an at ease position between the two groups, "Thank you sir,"
The general turned to face the turians, his face unreadable, "Good to finally meet you gentlemen, wish it were in better circumstances. Our longswords can keep the enemy corvettes at bay for some time, but eventually that cruiser or that carrier will get wise. We need to evacuate our civilians as quickly as possible."
The turian general nodded, "Hopefully we have enough levo food for them to make it to the citadel. Our transports weren't designed as refugee ships."
Hall stepped in to explain, "The citadel is a huge space station in their territory, there's apparently a large conglomeration of different species there, where they should have the materials to deal with refugees." He purposely left out the part where it was entirely possible for them to refuse to help. These turians were stuck with them if they wanted to leave the system, but once back in their space other governments might not accept a group of refugees.
Williams nodded, "Wish I could send 'em to human territory, but to be honest I don't know if there is human territory any more. Well general, do you have space made for them?"
Septimus nodded in confirmation, "Empty barracks, cargo bays, firing ranges. It'll be tight, but we should be taking as many as possible with us. If only it was enough." Septimus sighed, "Which brings me to this; two of my regiments that were badly mauled by the covenant have volunteered to stay and assist your forces. They want a little revenge for their fallen comrades."
General Williams' featureless expression changed quickly at that news to a bitter smile, "If they stay they'll get that chance."
As the two generals kept hammering out the details of evacuation, Hall and Nihlus stepped to the side.
"How likely do you think it is that the council will actually do something to help us out?" Hall asked the specter.
"Unless something changes, they'll probably hide these refugees away on some remote colony, blockade the relay and stick their heads in the sand." Nihlus replied.
"Better than nothing I guess." Hall shook his head, "What's your plan though? You're above the law right? You're only one man, but I'm betting if the politicians stick their heads in the sand, you'd still be able to get a few of the military types to listen."
"What was that expression you used? Play it by ear?" Nihlus continued after Hall nodded, "I know a few members of the turian and salarian militaries who wouldn't be inclined to sit back and hope this covenant passes us by. Other than that I'm at a loss as to what we can do." The turian turned to look at him, "What about you? A human who actually knows what we're facing would help to convince them."
Hall shook his head, "No, you'll have to find someone else. I grew up on this planet, and I sure as hell ain't gonna leave her to be glassed." Hall knew he didn't have a chance at actually making a difference against the covenant, but it still felt wrong to leave his homeworld behind. The turian nodded in response.
"Stalkers!" A yell sounded from one of the soldiers stationed around the impromptu landing field. The yell was quickly followed by a mix of assault rifle and spiker fire.
Hall crouched down and cursed the fact that the turians had disarmed him. He was surprised to see Nihlus handing him a pistol almost immediately. The turian had his shotgun out and ready in his other hand.
Taking the pistol Hall immediately brought it up and began looking for any sort of flicker that would reveal a stealthed brute. Heat distortion around the turian ships made that harder than normal. Spotting something, he fired the pistol.
His target's active camo failed, revealing a spec ops grunt. The diminutive alien pitched backwards as the round went through its skull and penetrated the methane tank on its back.
The highly flammable methane caught and sprayed out from the dead grunt's armor. The spray disrupted its squadmates active camouflage, revealing a half dozen more spec ops grunts and a brute stalker.
Hall backed up while firing, trying to get away and find cover. Luckily the marines and turians standing around saw the threat and poured fire into the group of covenant special forces. The covenant soldiers quickly went down under the combined fire.
Sporadic bursts of fire sounded from elsewhere in the makeshift landing field. Hall kept his weapon up as he checked on the officers. Marines and turians had formed a ring around the two generals; all focused outwards looking for more covenant targets.
"We need to evacuate now, the covenant won't bother with sending corvettes now, one of their heavy capital ships will move in soon." Hall overheard General Williams explain to the turian. "James, get that spook up here."
Hall turned to the general, assuming he was the spook in question. To his surprise a marine ran up with another person. The newcomer wore marine body armor over what appeared to be a business suit.
Curious, Hall followed Nihlus to the generals' position. The newcomer was older and looked more like a business man than a soldier, Hall guessed he was either section two or three by his rigid military posture. Despite having graying hair the man carried himself like a rookie, not a hard bitten veteran, which implied that he worked behind the front lines.
"Alright Donnel, you get to play temporary ambassador, it's your job to keep the civvies safe wherever they're headed." The general stopped the other's response with a raised hand, "No complaints or stupid bravery, I need someone with a level head going with the civilians. Someone who is military but knows how to play political games. You fit the bill; you get to go off planet. Consider it an order."
"Yes sir," The ONI officer replied somewhat dejectedly. Hall realized he was probably a Shanxi native.
The general turned to Hall, "Lieutenant."
Hall replied quickly, "Sir!"
"I assume you're going to ride out with your turian buddies?"
"No sir," Hall replied, feeling insulted, "I grew up on this world, I'm not going to leave her behind to get glassed."
"Good, then you're liaison with the units General Septimus here is leaving with us." Williams replied with a bitter smile before turning to one of his aides, "Get the civilians up here, we don't have a lot of time left."
ooooooo
Tali sat in her bunk, away from Artemis' prying cameras, and whatever else she used for eyes. She opened up her omnitool and quickly closed it again and punched a wall. She was still pissed off at the AI. She took a deep breath to try and calm down. Being angry wasn't productive, but Artemis' comments had made it damn hard not to stay angry.
Her thoughts were interrupted by a crash outside followed by loud swearing. Tali opened her door and looked out in the hallways. The human they had picked up from the planet, Rodriguez, stood outside standing by an overturned cart and wearing a simple mechanic's vacuum suit. What looked like a set of maneuvering jets and a pane of armored plastic, along with various other odds and ends sat spilled across the floor.
She decided to interrupt the man's continued swearing, "Do you need any help?"
The human whipped around faster than she could blink, his sidearm half drawn out of its holster. He recognized her and stopped, "Oh, it's you alien girl, what was your name again?"
"Tali'Zorah nar Rayya, you can call me Tali though," She replied as she walked over to the upturned cart and began loading it back up. The thruster assemblies were heavy, but with the human's help they were soon back on and loaded. "So what are you doing?"
"I'm checking the pelican's in the bays for damage and trying to fix the ones I can," The human explained, "Just to find something to do, you know? Those ONI types are talking to those frog aliens' council. Nothing else to do."
Tali studied the human while she thought about her reply. Rodriguez looked decidedly older than either Joker or Shepard, there was some gray in his hair and his skin had more wrinkles. There were also a few ugly looking scars on his head. Rodriguez seemed to be a very different person than those two, reminding her more of the grizzled marine veterans on the migrant fleet.
"Do you mind if I join you? I could get my hands dirty, sounds like just what I need," She didn't have much more than an omnitool, but figured the human would know where any heavier tools would be.
"You sure about that young lady?" The human shrugged, "I mean they made pelicans pretty idiot proof, but they still ain't that easy to fix."
Tali crossed her arms and leaned back, "Please, I've been fixing ships since I got out of my bubble, those dropships can't be too hard to fix up."
"Good attitude I guess, but that's if we can find enough ships that are actually fixable." The human turned his attention back to the cart, "Whatever, get your stuff if you want to help, an extra pair of hands couldn't hurt." The human looked back in her direction, "Even if they are missing a few fingers."
Tali narrowed her eyes at the comment, but the human seemed to not notice, she decided to ignore it for now and followed the human down the corridor.
ooooooo
Shepard righted the last overturned chair in the briefing room. Unlike most areas of the ship, this room had been intended not to be used during combat. None of the chairs had been bolted to the ground, and during the battle of reach they had been strewn around at random. However the room suited the purposes of a meeting quite well, which is why Shepard and Joker were busy getting the place to look somewhat cleaner before they sat down to contact the council. It had taken the salarians some time to isolate their communications system from the rest of their ship. Fortunately they didn't seem nearly as perturbed by Artemis as Tali had. The salarians had agreed to work with Shepard shortly after they secured their ship from software intrusion.
Shepard stood up and stretched. He noticed Joker already sitting down at the table, "What is this? a union job?"
"I don't have to answer that question, I'm on break." Joker responded as he leaned back and closed his eyes.
Shepard's response was interrupted as the doors opened, admitting a pair of elites, Odeg, and the ultra whose name Shepard had never learned. They stood nearby in an awkward silence, interrupted only when Liara arrived a minute later.
"So, what is your name then?" Shepard addressed the ultra, hoping to break the tension.
"Quel'Foram," The elite spit out, obviously still a little hostile.
"John Shepard, most people call me Shepard," He held out his hand, but dropped it when the elite didn't take it. Shepard shrugged and turned to Odeg, "What's eating him?"
Odeg glanced at the other elite before speaking, "I fought beside his father on halo, where he was killed by Tartarus."
Shepard shrugged in indifference, unable to feel sympathy for an elite, and sat down in one of the chairs. Now they just had to wait until the salarians established contact with their superiors.
"I've been thinking…" Joker swiveled in his chair towards Shepard.
"There's a surprise." Shepard replied.
"No, seriously," Joker leaned forward, "Doesn't giving the council Earth's location violate the cole protocol? I mean, sure maybe this citadel fleet will kick the covenant's ass, and there's a happy ending for everyone. Then no one cares if the cole protocol was broken. But, unknown group of alien races, with an unknown motivation…"
"Yeah it does," Shepard glanced at the three aliens in the room, who were paying close attention. He ignored them, "Which is why I've been trying to think of a way to contact HIGHCOM without leading anything straight to earth, no luck so far, might as well see if this 'council' is even willing to get involved in someone else's war. With a…" He glanced at the elites, "superweapon hanging over their heads, they might be easier to convince. Then… well they can line me up against a wall and shoot me for all I care if the human race ends up saved because of it."
"Do you really think we'll need this council? I mean, the elites are apparently on our side." Joker gestured to Odeg and the ultra.
Shepard shook his head and looked back over at the zealot, "No disrespect Odeg, but you saw what they sent, three elites. I'm sure they were damn good warriors and all, but there's not much they'll be able to do against the covie fleet at earth. Bastards were still slipping in beneath the defense grid when we left. Three elites won't be able to do anything."
"You would be surprised human, your demon managed to completely destroy one halo already, and murdered two prophets despite the existence of our fleets," Odeg cocked his head to the side, "The Arbiter is said to be his equal."
Liara spoke up with a question, "What about this superweapon? Can it not be used to fight back against the covenant?"
Odeg's reply was cut off as the door opened again and admitted the salarian captain and Nassana. They both quickly sat down at the table.
Kirrahe opened up the discussion, "Yes, now that we are safely aboard your vessel, and the boarders have been eliminated I would like to know what exactly this prothean super weapon is."
"And, whether or not it would be a good idea for the council to get involved in this war." Added Nassana, "So, let's see this evidence, and then we'll pass it along to the council in our reports."
Shepard nodded and gestured for Odeg to step forward. After all the elite was the one who actually knew anything about halo.
The gold armored elite moved up to the table somewhat awkwardly and proceeded to speak, "Ever since the war with the prophets and the resulting formation of the covenant, we had searched for the sacred rings. This is taught to us from our very first breath." Odeg paused as if gathering his thoughts, "They were supposedly objects used by the forerunners to ascend to god hood. We were to follow in their footsteps, the so called great journey," The elite shook his head, "All lies."
Shepard noted that Odeg was flexing his hand into and out of the shape of a fist. He hadn't quite realized how pissed off the elites would be at the prophets.
"When we encountered the humans, they were declared an affront to the gods by the prophets." Odeg glanced back towards the ultra, Quel'Foram, "The ninth age of reclamation has been spent fighting the humans, and attempting to wipe them out. We… the covenant, nearly succeeded. We defeated their massed fleets here at Reach. One ship escaped; following them we found the first halo. It was destroyed when a human overloaded their ship's reactors, causing the ring to break into pieces."
The asari diplomat interrupted at that point, "But what does the halo do? For that matter, if it was destroyed why does it matter?"
"There are still six halos in existence." The elite replied somewhat angrily. He seemed to resent being interrupted. "They are weapons of mass destruction, meant to wipe out all sentient life in the galaxy."
"You really expect me to believe that? I thought you had a genuine prothean superweapon for a minute there, not a ridiculous fabrication." Nassana let out a humorless laugh.
Shepard turned and looked at the asari diplomat with a raised eyebrow, and was surprised when the salarian captain very nearly mimicked his expression.
"Please continue, how do these halos perform their function? How could they target only sentient life?" Kirrahe apparently didn't share Nassana's skeptical views.
"I do not know how the forerunners built their devices; I only know the words of the oracle. A construct made to oversee halo. The prophets had said they had been made for other purposes, but their lies are many."
"Just to clarify, construct is the covenant term for an AI. A forerunner artificial intelligence." Artemis' avatar materialized on the tabletop. She was facing the aliens at the opposite end of the table, most likely with a self satisfied smile on her face.
"Alright, Artemis, don't try and lord the fact that the forerunners used AIs over them, just move on." Shepard decided to cut off the AI before she could go on a rant.
The AI turned back to look at him and rolled her eyes, "You're no fun." Instead of turning back around, her avatar disappeared into the tabletop and was replaced by a box, showing the same two dimensional scene on all four sides.
After a few seconds Shepard recognized it as the covenant equivalent of a heads up display. In one corner a motion detector readout sat with what may have been a shield bar. In the upper left four small spheres sat. He didn't know what those indicated, but in the upper right were obviously weapon readouts. He saw that Odeg was using his current load out in the footage, a plasma pistol and a sword; each had a few unrecognizable covenant runes next to them, probably ammo counts.
Wherever Odeg had been, it was obviously dark. Shepard couldn't see anything but the elite's HUD. That darkness gave way when a massive bay door swung upwards. He realized that Odeg must have been riding in a Spirit class dropship.
The occupants of the dropship jumped clear. As the elite landed he took a look around.
"Damn…" Joker muttered under his breath.
Shepard was inclined to agree with the pilot. No less than two other golden armored zealots had jumped off the dropship, along with four elites equipped with a ridiculous looking red and gold armor, and one elite with an overly large headpiece. Shepard stifled a laugh at that elite. The huge helmet was obviously ceremonial, not to mention unwieldy, and would make the alien a major target for any snipers.
Each of the eight elites ignited their swords and stalked forward. Ahead was a blasted stone hallway. Some parts of it still glowed; large stone blocks littered the hallway. Standing near the entrance was a single human soldier, beam rifle slung on his back.
The human leaned over to one of the glowing sections. When he stood back up and turned around, there was a lit stub of a cigar in his mouth, "Took you ladies long enough. C'mon, the arbiter is already inside, let's go help him make some rain on the brute's parade."
Shepard smiled at the random human marine; the man had some guts facing down eight elites like that, even if they were allies.
What he saw next made his jaw drop in amazement. As the elites began moving into the blasted stone building, Odeg's point of view pivoted to look back out away from the building. The world itself curved upwards. Lakes, clouds, mountains, could all be seen curving up along what appeared to be a huge ring world.
"There's no way that's real…" Joker said in amazement.
"That is halo. Entire worlds built by the forerunners, in order to house the weapons needed to stop the flood." Odeg said as the recording paused.
"If true, this halo far surpasses citadel in engineering. Possibly weaker structurally, but amazing engineering marvel." Kirrahe was looking at the paused recording with interest. "Unfortunately hard to verify. However, deployment of weapon maybe explanation for prothean extinction."
"You can't tell me you actually believe this garbage?" Nassana half stood up from her seat before the salarian put a restraining hand on her shoulder.
"If fabrication, well done, and not on the part of our hosts." Kirrahe gestured to the two elites who had their hands on their weapons, then towards Joker and Shepard. "Sangheili seem to be insulted by your outburst, enough to kill, humans just as skeptical as ourselves. Please, continue."
The two elites seemed to relax, though Shepard saw that the ultra was still glaring at the asari diplomat.
The recording started up again. As the group of elites made their way through the building they ran across a couple dozen brute corpses, all killed with a variety of weapons. Eventually the group made their way down a long curving hallway that seemed to be made of glass and some odd alloy, covered in geometric shapes and designs.
Shepard noted out of the corner of his eye that Liara seemed to be paying a lot more attention now that they were inside the building. He figured it might have had something to do with being an archaeologist.
As the group rounded the corner the sound of a distant conversation came through over the speakers. Eventually Shepard was able to make out a few words.
"…what is halo's purpose?" The voice sounded like that of an elite after running through a translator.
"Collectively, the..." The high pitched voice sounded like it came from a superintendent class AI. It was a bit computerized sounding, and couldn't really be mistaken for an organic talking.
The voice was soon cut off by the deep growl of a brute, "Not another word!"
Finally the scene came into view. Shepard realized the audio pickup must have been enhanced. Either by Artemis, or by the computer in Odeg's armor. There should have been no way to hear the conversation as far away as the group was.
Five brutes stood around a control panel in front of a cavernous room. What looked like a navy officer was held prisoner in the middle of the group. The large white furred brute held a large glowing metal sphere in its hands. A lone elite in gray steel colored armor stood facing them. A human made shotgun was held awkwardly in its hands, a covenant carbine slung across his back. Odeg and the other elites walked forward slowly, swords gripped in ready positions.
The unknown human marine stepped forward and raised his beam rifle, "Please… don't shake the light bulb." When the brutes made a grab for their weapons the marine spoke again, "You want to keep your brains inside your head, I'd tell those boys to chill."
The brutes didn't seem to take heed of the marine's words until the large white one let out a short bark. The others stopped what they were doing almost immediately. Shepard figured the big one was probably a high up chieftain.
When the brutes backed off the human looked to the oddly armored elite, "Go ahead, do your thing."
The elite nodded and turned back to the group of brutes, "The sacred rings, what are they?"
The small sphere appeared to be the source of the AI voice, the lights flashed in sync with its words, which appeared to be in English, "Weapons of last resort built by the forerunners to eliminate potential flood hosts; thereby rendering the parasite harmless."
"And those who made the rings? What happened to the forerunners?" The elite asked.
"After exhausting every other strategic option, my creators activated the rings. They and all additional sentient life in three radii of the galactic center, died, as planned. Would you like to see the relevant data?" Shepard figured the AI was probably of the 'dumb' variety, it appeared far too cheerful to be discussing its maker's demise.
"Tartarus, the prophets have betrayed us." The elite kept its weapons at its side. As seen through Odeg's helmet camera the rest of the elites showed no restraint, many of them already moving forward slowly, including the one with the fancy helmet.
In a not quite unexpected move, the brute hurled the AI at the marine, bowling him over and sending his beam rifle flying. "No Arbiter," The brute grabbed the human officer's hands and appeared to shove them into the console, "The great journey has begun, and the brutes, not the elites shall be the prophets' escort."
It was like a switch had been flipped, in one moment both sides had been eyeing each other warily, the next they charged at each other yelling out war cries. The initial fight was over in moments. The white brute stood next to the console, which began moving backwards and down to a lower platform. The others really weren't a match for nine elites to suddenly rush them, and ended up skewered on energy swords, or in one unfortunate brute's case, half his head blown off by a shotgun.
The chieftain however went down a lot less easily. He had moved into a makeshift arena with some sort of powerful energy shield surrounding him. In the center a column of white light rose from the depths of the room, and continued up through the roof of the building. Machinery and platforms rotated and moved around the area in seemingly random patterns.
The elites all jumped into the middle, Odeg and the grey armored elite brought up the rear. That probably saved their lives. The brute swung his gravity hammer and the white armored elite was smashed into a pulp. He swung the hammer again and two of the red and gold ones went flying. They landed in twisted heaps elsewhere on the platform.
The fight went on and one by one the elites died from the brute's gravity hammer, until only Odeg and the gray armored elite were left.
Three shots from a beam rifle struck the brute in the head. The thing's shields went down. Almost instantly the three elites acted. The chieftain found itself cut into pieces by their swords before it could swing its hammer again.
Almost before the pieces hit the ground, Shepard saw the human officer run up to the center console and yank a piece of metal out of the holographic interface. Immediately the room started to shake wildly, the camera view began to wobble as Odeg attempted to keep his balance.
The center column of light flashed once, then disappeared. As soon as that happened the shaking stopped. Several tense moments passed by before the officer asked, "So, did we do it?" None of the elites had an answer for her question. A holographic display appeared above the console as the forerunner AI floated down to ground level with the marine holding on for a ride. "What's that?"
"A beacon," The forerunner AI gave a less than helpful answer.
"What's it doing?" The officer asked.
"Communicating at superluminal speeds with a frequency of..."
"Communicating with what?" the officer cut off the AI before it could continue with the technical details.
The monitor pivoted in air to look at the officer, "The other installations."
"Show me."
"Failsafe protocol; in the event of unexpected shutdown, the entire system will move to standby status. All remaining platforms are now ready for remote activation." The AI helpfully supplied.
The human officer looked at the display for a moment before turning back to the AI, "Remote activation, from here?"
"Don't be ridiculous." The AI said with a hint of condescension.
The marine, obviously fed up with the AI, turned to it and said, "Listen tinkerbell, don't make me…"
The officer rested a hand on the marine's shoulder, interrupting him, "Then where? Where would someone go to activate the other rings?"
The AI hesitated for a moment before answering, "Why, the ark, of course."
The camera angle shifted and Odeg turned to look at the gray armored elite walking up, "And where oracle, is that?"
The AI turned around to the holographic display. As it did so, the view shifted to a map of the galaxy. "Closest available access to the ark is in this system." A light lit up on one of the spiral arms. Coordinates were displayed below. Shepard recognized them immediately as the coordinates of sol in relation to the gravitic center of the galaxy.
"Damn, so that's what the covenant were doing on Earth." Shepard muttered under his breath.
The display collapsed back down, revealing Artemis' avatar again. "There is more, but I feel that summed it up pretty well, nice dramatic flair, a little bit of action. Some understated romance… A gun pointed at the head of the universe."
Shepard raised an eyebrow at the AI, not finding her attempt at humor funny, "I'm guessing that's how they found Earth then?"
Artemis nodded, "Most likely. Apparently there was another halo, emphasis on the word, was. It's possible the prophet of regret found Earth somewhere in that installation's files."
Shepard let out an ironic laugh, "Just our luck then, to evolve on top of some master control switch for a galaxy wide doomsday weapon."
"What was this parasite the prothean AI mentioned?" Kirrahe leaned forward in his chair, "It must have been an extreme danger if the protheans killed themselves in order to stop it."
"I have some footage of that too… it's very disturbing." Artemis' avatar disappeared again to be replaced by footage from Odeg's camera.
Shepard's attention was piqued by the AI's unusually serious tone, he settled back again to watch.
Odeg had apparently been standing in a natural valley. In the distance the curvature of Halo could still be seen. A ragged group of elites stood in a makeshift defensive camp. Every elite had signs of battle damage on their armor. One in particular seemed to have a faulty shield generator; random sparks appeared across his armor.
A terrified grunt manned a portable plasma cannon. It was shaking as it swung the weapon back and forth. Suddenly it opened fire at some target in the distance, screaming hysterically as it did so.
The camera rotated to look at the grunt's targets. Several odd looking aliens were sprinting towards the covenant position. A mix of plasma fire and what looked like UNSC small arms raked across the covenant position. Shepard wondered what kind of aliens those where, and why the hell they had the grunt so terrified.
"The parasite comes at us again my brothers! Hold fast!" A voice rang out over the din of combat; Shepard realized it was probably Odeg's voice. One of the unknowns leapt at the covenant position. It must have covered a dozen meters in a single leap, impressive even for an elite. Shepard finally got a good look at the unknown, and gasped in a mixture of surprise and disgust.
The thing wore UNSC marine garb. It looked like it was a human at one point, but no longer. Its head lolled to one side, neck obviously broken or missing. Its left arm had been replaced by a collection of tentacles; the right had a SMG in its grip. Some sort of strange growth was centered in its chest.
The thing let out a roar before striking Odeg with its left arm, sending the elite flying backwards into a boulder. Fire from the other elites managed to kill the thing. Odeg climbed to his feet and the camera angle bobbed as he nodded his thanks to another elite.
That was when the little things swarmed their position. They looked like little sickly green balloons propelled by stubby brown tentacles. The grunt died quickly, one of the things attached itself to the little alien and burrowed in, its tentacles slicing through the grunts head instantly.
One elite took what looked like a sniper round to its head, probably from another one of the larger things. One of the small squid-like creatures leapt onto the elite's dead body and started to burrow into its chest. The dead alien started to convulse, growths formed on any exposed skin, while others burst through gaps in its armor.
With growing horror Shepard watched as the thing stood up. It looked eerily similar to the earlier human-alien zombie thing, except it was an elite as a base.
Odeg cut through the thing with his sword before it could attack. The footage stopped again there. Shepard honestly didn't know what to think about what he had just seen. It looked like something dreamed up for a horror film. If he had seen that in any other situation, he would have laughed it off as a fake. He looked around the room to gauge the other's reactions.
All the color had drained out of Joker's face. Liara's eyes were wide open in shock. Nassana looked like she was waging a battle to keep her lunch down. Kirrahe's mouth was moving as if to form words, but no sound came out. The elites were the only ones that seemed unaffected by the recording.
"The parasite caused the forerunners to destroy themselves with the halo array." Odeg announced.
The salarian captain got over his shock the fastest, "Useful as shock troops, dangerous in close combat, but superior firepower should win out. Orbital bombardment also seems a viable tactic."
"When the parasite takes a host, the experiences and memories are made available to the hive mind. The flood are not an enemy to be underestimated. They can operate starships, advanced weapons, and can outsmart the best of tacticians. The forerunners with their great works of technology still could not defeat the parasite." Odeg shook his head, "The flood have been encountered on each sacred ring we have found, likely test subjects before the rings were fired."
Kirrahe stood up to leave, "If true, this is grave news, I'll file my report to the council, and have your AI forward as many video logs as she can to my ship. They will be useful in making a full report."
Shepard nodded in reply. As the salarian and asari filed out of the door he caught a few whispered words between the two. Judging by her earlier reactions Nassana and Kirrahe were discussing the validity of what they had just seen.
After they left Odeg looked at the AI's avatar. "You did not give them the whole truth," his tone was more questioning than accusatory.
The AI looked up at the towering alien, "They may have not even believed that halo and the flood exist. Do you really think they would have believed us if I had told them that?"
Shepard frowned in confusion, "Are you talking about that children of the gods stuff Odeg was talking about when I first met him?"
For the first time since the briefing started Liara spoke up again, "Goddess! I had forgotten about that. You said that forerunner technology was gene locked to the human race. That might explain it."
"Explain what exactly?" Shepard asked.
"Well, first of all, the fact that the brutes simply didn't activate the halo as soon as possible. They needed a human to do it for them. It might also explain the differences in architecture, and technology. I don't believe the protheans were forerunner. It is more likely they were different species." Liara sounded more excited and confidant as she went on. "Can you display a map showing human territory compared to Sangheili… excuse me, covenant territory."
Artemis' avatar was immediately replaced by a map of the galaxy. Human territory was shaded in a deep blue color, with a miniscule section colored gold to indicate planets still held. It took up a good portion of a spiral arm. Odeg, guessing that Artemis wouldn't have access to a star chart, stepped forward and drew out a rough shape nearby. The covenant territory was highlighted in red. Overall it was roughly twice the size of the area held by the UNSC pre-war.
"If my guess is correct," Liara stood up and gestured to the map, "This area is likely highly concentrated with forerunner relics. Possibly left behind so that their 'children' could inherit them. Most likely, they destroyed as much of their technology as possible during their war with that… thing. The ruins near your territory could be their remaining territory before they fired halo." The asari leaned back, "That unfortunately still leaves the mystery of what happened to the protheans, if they couldn't activate halo, how did they get wiped out?"
"I don't know if we'll find out anytime soon." Shepard shrugged, "But tell me if you find out. I'm going to catch a nap until Kirrahe hears back from their council."
ooooooo
AN: I'm disappointed in myself. I normally dislike when authors use the old gun cam footage trick to explain things… but then again, that's normally because it generally comes off as short and pointless. Hopefully this isn't. I don't expect to do another rewrite of something we've already seen in either game, so that should be the last of that.
Exams and projects for the next two weeks, hopefully procrastination causes me to write more… we'll see.
In other news, Section 8 prejudice came out Wednesday. A really fun five hour campaign, a pretty good horde mode, and an amazing multiplayer experience, all for the low low price of fifteen dollars… and its only $13.49 for preorder on steam. Overall a great game that's different from the standards set by halo and call of duty. Even better they managed to wedge a decent storyline into this one. I highly recommend it.