Chapter 11: There and back once again
Unknown City, Arann, Febraury 14th, 2553
Having spent several days on the Spearhead following their encounter, The Squad had decided upon a course of action. Which, however had led to them all (Excluding the Lekgolo and the Unggoy) being stuck inside a large Bar in the city. John did not feel confortable without his MJOLNIR in such an exposed situation such as this. All he had was a magnum strapped to his hip, to avoid giving himself away (He had to admit that a Spartan in full MJOLNIR would have raised an eyebrow or two,) but that didn't mean he had to like it.
Not being one for alcohol, he took a sip from a glass of water he had ordered. He was sitting alone in one of the furthest back tables, using the shadows to conceal himself. He job was to watch over all of the Squad and help them if necessary. He glanced across the room and located all the members present in the partying.
Thel was sitting beside Sarah (The woman from ONI, whose name they had discovered with great difficulty), more or less being her bodyguard while she asked the more devious looking Brutes questions on the rumors of whatever it was in deep space, and more accurately, where to find it. They were at a table with three Brutes, All deep in conversation.
Zhab was sitting with a group of other Jackals, all of them gambling on some holographic game. The Squad had a certain amount of money that they could spend during a mission, and then it would be pulled from wages. John wondered if Zhab would lose everything that night.
John finally spotted Jimaenius with a group of Brutes, also conversing with them. The other ONI member, the Jackal, was nowhere to be seen. He shook his head and leaned back into the shadow.
"Heeeeyy, is anyone sitting here?" Someone asked.
The Spartan looked up to see a Sangheili staring down at him. The Sangheili was swaying, apparently drunk. John was surprised that that was possible, but he said nothing. Another thing that bothered the Spartan was the fact that the Sangheili was speaking English, albeit a drunken version of it.
"Thanksss…" He muttered and slumped in the chair on the other side of the table.
The Chief watched him suspiciously from the other side of the table. He remained silent as the Sangheili gestured for a waiter bring him another drink which he downed quickly.
"Have you heard the rumors?" The Sangheili muttered drunkenly. "'Bout the deep space… thingies with the loyalist remenant groups
The Chief sensed an opportunity to pick up some information of his own on the deep space rumors, and he shook his head, not saying anything.
"Well, I ain't heard much, but anyway I heard from some Brutes down in Guriod City, on this very planet to be precise, (Now this would be actually be in drunken speak, but anyway, I digress) that they've found something big. I'm presuming some old covenant station or perhaps some Forerunner thingy… They didn't clarify that much. But whatever it is, they think it'l give 'em some advantage over the GA- Now, if you'll excuse me…" He suddenly turned and called for another drink.
The Chief sat in silence as the Sangheili drank away once again. When the Sangheili had finished the glance, the Chief spoke.
"Interesting. Tell me more."
"Ah! Yes! Back to them. I ain't got much to tell you besides that, but I have to say, I'm curious about what it is out there. Maybe they're just lying. Wouldn't put it past 'em. Them Brutes are a cretinous bunch of liars…" The Sangheili grumbled.
They were interrupted by a smashing of glass from the other side of the bar. The Chief quickly glanced acroos the bar to see of any of the Squad were involved with whatever had smashed it. Sure enough, the group of Brutes that Jimaenius was talking with had started the fight. One of them had walked into a Sangheili who had been taking a drink. The Chief felt his hand fall slowly grip his Magnum.
An argument had sprung up already between the two groups, with some beginning to draw weapons. Jimaenius had also drawn his, though probably only for self-defense rather than attack. John saw that Thel was watching the events unfolding, with a look of unease written on his face, which John had learned what that looked like from studying Thel's subtle expressions during the Sims back on the Spearhead. The two locked eyes briefly, confirming that both were ready to intervene if they had to get Jimaenius out of there.
The Bar was quiet as what appeared to be the leaders of both groups had an argument, then suddenly, The Sangheili drew his energy sword and slashed at the Brute, only for the sword to be deflected by the blade of the energy mace of the Brute. The bar exploded into chaos as both species went to all-out war in the Bar. The Chief heard the crackle of plasma bolts, and instinctively ducked. A mostly-melted class whizzed by his head. He quickly shifted and took cover behind a flipped table. Most of the people in the Bar had little to no armor, so most shots that connected took down the targets. The Chief drew his pistol and raised it, shifting himself out of cover to examine the bar. It was a madhouse. About sixty percent of the people inside were fighting. The two leaders that had started it were still fighting in the center of the chaos, the Brute beginning to overpower the clearly inexperienced Elite, who was rapidly retreating.
John suddenly heard something shift behind him and turned. There was a single unarmored Brute with a spiker raised staring at him. Evidently having something against humans, he opened fire. The Chief could see this coming, and was on his feet and moving fast than the Brute could have predicted. The Ape's eyes widened as John closed the distance and sprang upwards, while not going as high as the MJOLNIR would have allowed him, he still sprang over the Brute's head. He landed in a kneeling position and fired a shot from the pistol, taking down his attacker in a single shot. He heard something in his right ear, and once again ducked as the lifeless body of a jackal was thrown overhead. It's killer, a Sangheili, roared at John when he noticed him. John raised the pistol and fired five shots, taking down the Elite before he had even shifted his weapon.
John spared a few seconds to locate the rest of his Squad. Jimaenius was running to the door, avoiding the shots fired at him by and angry Elite. A carbine round slammed into the back of the Sangheili's head, taking him down. Zhab was, of course, the source. The two ONI informants had already left the building. Thel was dueling with another Sangheili. Thel twisted as his opponent lunged and he slid the split in his blade down the length of his opponent's blade. He twisted it, disarming the opponent. He then kicked the Sangheili in the groin, which took him down. Thel turned and slowly headed towards a hole in the wall of the Bar, and stepped out and into the night.
John was by now probably the only one of the Squad that was left in the bar. The Chief suddenly heard the humming of a plasma grenade. The grenade slammed into a fall a few meters away. The Spartan once again took cover. The wall exploded. John jumped over the wall and began sprinting towards the hole in the wall, keeping low to avoid plasma shots whizzing through the air.
Even outside, the chaos from the bar could be heard. The hole that the Chief had exited through had opened out into a back alleyway. The Spartan took off one of his shoes and took an out a magazine for his pistol and reloaded the pistol. He began his trek to find his way back to the main street and his way back to the Spearhead. Personally, the Spartan hoped that they had found out everything that they needed to know on this planet. The Chief did not like having to look over his shoulder every five minutes to ensure that there was not a hostile staring at him, ready to attack him.
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Unknown City, Arann, Febraury 14th, 2553
"What exactly is it?" Zhab growled, tightening the pressure on the Jackal's neck.
"I-I don't know! I don't know!" He yelled out desperately. "All I know is where it is! That's all I know! I swear!"
Zhab was not exactly a big Kig-yar, but he could look pretty frightening when he wanted, plus he was the only one who had a gun in this situation, which he had pressed against the chest of the Jackal he was interrogating.
"Then where is it?!" Zhab asked.
The Jackal stated a series of coordinates. Zhab repeated them several times, to get them into his head.
"Is that all you know?" Zhab asked.
"Y-yes… yes!" The Jackal repeated.
"Good." He growled, and whacked the Jackal in the head with the Carbine butt.
The Kig-yar crumpled at his feet. Zhab didn't exactly have a reason to like the Jackal in particular; that Jackal had cost around 4,000 GA credits in the gambling that they'd been doing before the bar fight. Well, they weren't lost exactly, seeing as Zhab had "reclaimed" his loses when the fight had gone out of control.
"You made it out in one piece, then?" A deep voice rumbled from behind Zhab.
The Jackal gave a faint grin, or at least the Kig-yar equivalent of it. It was Jimaenius, of course.
"Yes, I did. I didn't walk away empty-handed, though. I may have… acquired some additional winnings." Zhab said with a grin.
Jimaenius snorted. "All you Kig-yar are the same."
"Anyway, Let's get back to the ship before the rest of the guys in there come wanting it back." Zhab replied.
Jimaenius sighed, but the two began the long trek back to the ship.
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UNSC Spearhead of Dawn, SH – 536, Arann, Febraury 15th, 2553
The majority of the Squad was present in the bridge of the Spearhead. They were finally finished on this planet. Both Sarah and Zhab had stumbled across the coordinates to whatever it was they were hunting for, and now the two ONI informers wished to go and see what exactly was out there before they reported to ONI what it was. Thel wanted to get off of this planet anyway, but he still wasn't sure if he wanted to go to another Covenant Loyalist base.
All the same, Cortana and Vala were in the process of shaking down the Spearhead's three reactors to prepare for launch. With them having landed for several days, the engines and reactors were shut down to save some energy, so it took around and hour to bring them all back online.
"How long until we're ready?" Thel asked.
"2 minutes until we're good to go." Vala replied.
"However, the slipspace drive is ready to jump as soon as we get up." Cortana stated.
"Good. Good." Thel replied, turning around and examining one of the consoles in the bridge.
He still actually had no idea what most of them did, though he had figured out how the engine console and was gradually learning the shield system. Even though Cortana and Vala could control the ship by themselves, It would always be handy to be able to take manual control if the AI were not present or were unable to control the ship in an automated fashion.
Everyone, except the Lekgolo were present in the bridge, all waiting for them to get underway, having just concluded the argument over weither or not they would go to the coordinates.
"Shipmaster?" Someone asked over the intraship COM, presumably the Lekgolo, asked.
"I'm listening." Thel replied.
"This is Engineering. The reactors are all functioning at full capacity. We are ready for Launch."
"Very well. All hands stand by to launch." He took his seat at the captain's chair. "Vala, open the hangar door and detatch moorings. Cortana, engage thrusters for twenty seconds. Full power."
The ship rumbled as the thrusters heated up, and the moorings detached. The ship began to rise as the thrusters kicked on. Thel mentally ticked down the seconds that the thrusters were on to know when to tell Cortana to engage the main engines. Not that he probably needed to, but he felt better giving the commands in the first place.
"Main engines on, 55 percent." He ordered as he counted to nineteen.
The engines roared to life, and Thel sagged slightly in his chair for a second before the gravity systems countered the G-force. The bow of the frigate leaned upwards. It took about ten minutes for the ship to leave the planet's atmosphere. Thel glanced over his shoulder to notice that the Unggoy, Zhab and Jimaenius had left the bridge.
They could have jumped immediately, but Thel wanted to get a bit more distance between them and the planet before they jumped away.
"Are there any other ships nearby?" He asked.
"No… Hold on a second; There's some kind of… Unknown Covenant ship just left a station in orbit. They seem to be on a similar course to ours, though not on a full intercept course."
Thel turned and glanced at the holotable, which had a detailed radar of all ships around Arann. He watched the unknown ship's course for a minute, then shrugged it off, although he felt somewhat uneasy looking at it. He shook his head.
"Make ready to jump to the coordinates." Thel said, settling back in his chair.
"Aye, lining up and engaging slipspace reactor." Cortana replied.
Outside the viewscreen, in front of the ship, the slipspace rupture engaged and expanded in front of them. Thel glanced back at the holotable for a second, and the holograph faded as the ship left that dimension. He leaned back and closed his eyes for a second, then looked up. Outisde the ship, the blackness of slipspace suddenly dissolved into a light blue tunnel.
Thel suddenly stood up.
"What the…" He began.
"Scanning… A large change in the properties of slipspace has been detec-" Cortana began, the suddenly paused.
"Unknown signature detected behind us." Vala announced.
Thel turned to a viewscreen on the right. It quickly flashed to a rear shot of the ship, showing a black speck at the end of the blue tunnel.
"Another ship detected." Cortana suddenly stated.
The other three on the bridge suddenly stood up in shock. Thel turned back and shrugged at them, not knowing what was going on.
"It appears to be the other ship from Arann. They're rapidly gaining on us." Vala announced.
"It's just like Reach again." Cortana said, almost to herself.
"What are you tal-" Thel began, but a warning cut him off.
"The ship has closed to 30 kilometers, detecting several plasma buildups along the hull, they're charging weapons." Vala said.
"Charge out own weapons, make ready to fire." Thel growled, turning back to the holotable.
"20 kilometers. Warming up weapons." Vala stated.
"Wait!" Cortana suddenly shouted, actually materializing on the holotable, "If you fire, the plasma will cause more problems to us than them; Plasma here has different properties here!"
"How is that possible?" Sarah asked from behind Thel.
"I don't kn-" Cortana began, but Vala interrupted.
"5 kilometers!" She yelled, flashing the rear view on the central viewscreen. The unknown design ship loomed before them, glowing red in several places as plasma prepared to discharge.
"Evas-"
Thel was too late, the ship fired several plasma lances. As they lashed towards the frigate, suddenly, they all turned away and disappeared into the blueness.
"What?" Thel asked, for one of the first time in his life, he was speechless as the plasma disappeared.
"That's what Cortana was talking about." John snarled, stepping forward towards Thel.
"Returning fire." Vala announced, and there were several thuds as the plasma missile pods fired.
"Wait-" Cortana began, but it was too late.
The plasma missiles spiraled towards the cruiser behind them, before suddenly veering off in random directions. Thel snapped is lower jaws as he thought hard for a second, then an idea came to him.
"If we can't destoy them, we'll outrun them." He sprinted across the bridge and headed for the COM microphone.
The Spearhead suddenly lurched to the right unexpectedly; Thel fell and hit the floor, recovering with a flimsy roll.
"Report! What on Sangheilios was that?" He asked.
"Plasma impact on the shields. Holding at 97 percent." Cortana reported. "There's already a lot of plasma floating around in here. We need to get out of here."
Thel grabbed the mic and keyed Engineering.
"We need everything you got. Overdrive all reactors and divert to engines." He ordered.
"Very well." One Lekgolo replied.
The engine's pitched slowly increased. The Covenant ship began to fall behind, still firing widely at them. Then it suddenly closed the gap once again. The Spearhead rumbled again.
"Shields down to sixty-eight percent!" Cortana announced.
"How are they keeping up with us?" Thel asked, checking over the reactor monitors, which stated they were all running at 150%, running high in the redline zone.
"I think that, because we're creating the ether, they're perfectly able to keep up with us without straining their engines because we're creating the tunnel, they're merely following us." Vala replied.
Slipspace was ablaze with orange plasma; with it flying everywhere. Thel glanced across the bridge, staring at several screens, all flashing red warnings.
"Damn it." He muttered. "Only one way out. Strap in."
He took his seat and the other three did the same.
"Vala, Cortana, Fire at will." He growled.
There were several rumbles and bangs as the ship opened fire with its weapons. Another plasma round slammed head on into their shields. Their shields had fallen to 13%, with its integrity very low, some small plasma traces were coming through small gaps and burning small holes in the Titanium AAAA plating.
"Their shields are gone! They're falling back, but the plasma is still present." Cortana announced.
"Wait until they drop out then drop us out a second later." Thel growled. "Cease fire all weapo-"
A heavy plasma lance suddenly smashed through their shields and slammed into the undercarriage. The Spearhead twisted awkwardly, but still maintained its course.
"The reactors are failing! They can't handle the overdrive!" One of the Lekgolo suddenly yelled over the COM.
"Bring them back into nor-" Thel began, but was once again interrupted by another plasma impact.
The plasma torpedo slammed into the right engine carriage. The Spearhead spun, spinning around one-hundred-and-eighty degrees and scrapping the edge of the ether. The ether suddenly shattered, and the Spearhead fell into darkness. Thel was jostled around and slammed the back of his head into the back of the chair, and everything went black.
The Sangheili came back to consciousness with a jerk. The air was cold around him, and he couldn't see anything. Not even any stars out the main viewscreen. The gravity systems were online
"Hello? Anyone?" Thel asked.
"You're awake." John muttered.
"Yes. It seems so. Where are we?" He asked.
"Unknown." Cortana said, appeaing on the holotable, with Vala appearing beside here. "All scanners are down. We're operating on our internal power. We have about an hour before we shut down. All the reactors are gone. We've been stuck here for about an hour as well."
"So, we're stuck." Sarah said, sounding annoyed.
"Yes." Cortana said.
"It's all that crystal's fault." John growled, turning on his helmet lights. "I warned you that it would do something. Now we're stuck in the middle of nowhere with no power."
"What crystal?" Sarah asked.
Thel drew the crystal and stared at it. It glowly grey, another light in the darkness that surrounded them.
"This one." He whispered.
"You never reported this." Sarah accused. "We read your files before we arrived."
"We all have our secrets." Thel muttered.
John sighed angrily. Something about the crystal had inherently angered him from the very start. Thel resolved to ask John about it if they got out of this. But John's accusations had awoken another thought.
"Maybe… If it got us here, then it can get us out of here." Thel said, holding up in front of his face.
"I seriously doubt that it will do anything." Cortana replied.
Thel ignored her and drifted to the nearest console. He planted the crystal upon it. The glow lit up the dead consoles. Thel thought as he did; trying to reach his mind out to it in the way that he had caused it to light up. It felt almost instinctual, the way he did it. But, after five minutes, nothing had happened. He sighed, accepting defeat, and released the crystal. It drifted across the console, occasionally scraping off it.
"I guess not." He muttered.
Then he heard a whump. A flash of grey lit up the bridge. He spun himself around and stared at the crystal. It was fixed in the air above the console. Suddenly, it gave a pulse of grey energy. This energy lit up the bridge again; it flowed throughout the consoles in the bridge.
"What the…" John began, when it gave a final pulse.
The pulse flowed through the circuits, and everything lit up. Outside, slipspace contorted and flashed from blue back to a normal black. The engines were roaring at full capacity once again, and gravity was restored.
"All systems restored!" Cortana announced. "All reactors are offline, but we still have power…"
The crystal behind them glowed continuously, powering the ship all by itself. For about ten seconds, the ship continued as though nothing had happened, and then, as quickly as it started, the slipspace drive died and stars winked into life al around them. Gravity died, but the lights and some systems remained on.
"Report!" Thel ordered, drifting back over to his chair.
"Reactor one and two are offline; reactor three is operating at a 30 percent capacity maximum. We've arrived at the coordinates. Running scans on the nearby planet. We are on an intercept course, which we will arrive at in three days and twenty hours, closest approach in four days and fifteen minutes." Cortana reported. "Scanning the nearby planet. It's a gas giant, with 3 satellites…"
Cortana's voice died as she said that.
"What is it?" Asked Thel.
Cortana said nothing; she merely brought up a picture of the planet, zooming in and enhancing the image on a satellite in orbit of the planet. For a second, Thel didn't know what he was supposed to be seeing, then it suddenly hit him. This was what the they'd come for, what the Covenant had been after.
It was a Halo.
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Heheh. Apologies if this update seems a bit short or rushed, I was writing this on a deadline. But whatever. R&R, I guess (Only recently figured out what that meant, lol) Anyway, borrowed a bit from FTL Kestrel Adventures at the end there, lol. Anyway, see you guys later.