Thanks for all the nice reviews.
Disclaimer: I don't own Halo or Mass Effect. Halo belongs to Bungie or 343 Industries now, Mass Effect belongs to Bioware.
Here is the rewritten chapter 5.
This chapter might seem tenous as I had a hard time of what to think of ideas for this chapter. I mainly got my mind set on action right now. I wasn't too proud of this chapter as I feel that I am rushing a pairing in this chapter, it was the only thing I can come up with since my other idea had them arguing but that is going to seem like Gaterkeeper's fic. Don't worry this will be the only pairing rush for awhile.
Chapter 5: A Little Background Information
The Normandy SR-2 conference room
"Lets hurry this up." A rather unpatient Jack complained in a harsh tone.
Inside the conference room of the Normandy SR-2, Commander Shepard and Miss Lawson were currently ready to debrief Jack. Now out of his N7 armor, Shepard leaned against the rails with his arms folded across chest. His eyes were dead set on their newest pickup, Jack.
Jack herself was also leaning against the wall, but in a more slouched lazy way, with her arms folded across her barely covered chest. The convict had a very bored and agitated look on her face, as she awaited the debriefing. Her eyes vigorously followed the Cerberus cheerleader when she walked in front of her.
"Welcome to the Normandy, Jack. I'm Miranda, Shepard's second-in-command. On this ship we follow orders." Miranda appointed as she stood up straight with her hands folded behind her back. A stance that usually demanded respect.
Respect that the Cerberus officer would never get from Jack.
Subject Zero scoffed at the formalness and looked at Shepard.
"Tell the Cerberus cheerleader to back off, Shepard. I'm here because of our deal."
Shepard raised an eyebrow at Jack's comment, while Miranda squinted her eyes in anger.
"Miranda will let you in the system. Let me know what you find."
An evil grin grew on Jack's face after she heard Shepard. She directed her crooked smile at Miranda and leaned away from the wall, as she got right up in the Cerberus officer's face.
"Hear that, precious? We're going to be friends. You, me, and every embarrassing little secret." Jack mocked.
"Oh no. This won't end well." Shepard thought nervously, but ready to step in to separate the women if a fight ensued.
Miranda unfolded her arms and tightened her fists. She absolutely hated the idea that Shepard let the convict roam around in Cerberus systems, while she was on the job. Miss Lawson knew it was a complete breach in security, and the convict would no doubt wreak havoc with the freedom she had aboard the ship. But she kept her feelings aside and remained professional.
True, she would love nothing more to send Jack back into another cell, but she knew that the suicide mission depended on Jack and her powerful biotics. So for the time being, she would keep herself in line.
"I'll be reading down in the hold or somewhere near the bottom. I don't like a lot of through traffic. Keep your people off me. Better that way." Jack said as she was about to leave the room.
When Jack opened the automatic door, she nearly ran into a seven foot green dark armored Spartan. This caught the convict quite off guard.
"Wha? Watch it!" Jack shouted as she shoved her way around Chief.
John-117 only glanced over his shoulder at how Subject Zero furiously stomped her way towards the elevator.
"Master Chief, its good to see you. We have a lot to discuss."
Chief was brought back to attention when he heard Miranda call him in a formal voice.
The Master Chief walked into the comm room, with the door sliding shut behind him.
Shepard picked himself off the rail, and walked to the left side of the table in the room. The ex-Spectre knew the Spartan wasn't much of a talker, but he was going to get him to open up as much as possible.
Miranda regained her composure from her nasty encounter with Jack, and folded her hands behind her back while standing up straight. She was very interested to learn all she could about the Spartan and his technology.
"We need more information on you, Chief. It's hard enough to trust someone with a gun in the field. Especially if you don't know too much about their past." The former Spectre said.
"Sharing your intel with us will make it far easier and more comfortable to trust you. It may also benefit the mission." Miranda added.
Miranda was secretly excited to learn about the Spartan's technology, and though Shepard was well prepared for a long discussion that could be hard to understand, Master Chief was not ready. Like most of his Spartan brethren, John-117 was stoic and not very talkative. Chief followed orders and gave them simplistically. He would almost prefer to face a raging pair of Hunters than go through a long, exhausting debriefing.
Luckily for Master Chief, he had a very trusted A.I.
"Chief, place me on the terminal in this room. I can upload some of our history to their A.I. without her finding out about me. This will be easier and you won't have to talk that much. You can go back to the dark lonely space filled with guns that you call home. Don't worry, I won't tell them any classified stuff, a girl has to have her secrets."
John-117 couldn't help but to smile. His computerized best friend had once again helped him dodge another proverbial bullet.
"My suit can upload some of my universe's history to your ship's A.I."
The Commander and Cerberus officer shared a very brief glance between each other and then turned their focus back on the super soldier.
Shepard sighed. He had hoped to get the strange recruit to talk more, but Chief had found a way to slip past even that.
"Go ahead, Spartan."
The palm of Master Chief's right hand emitted a small blue glow. Chief then reached out and touched the table in the communications room.
It was then that both Shepard and Miranda's omni-tools activated. They sifted through the data for a moment and then gazed back up at Chief.
"Thank you, Master Chief. This information will be very helpful to us and the progress to the mission." Miranda commented with a sly but genuine smile.
"The Illusive Man will also be most interested in this data." The Cerberus officer thought to herself.
"I will look over the data later. Your done here, Spartan. You can go back to your quarters." Shepard said.
Chief nodded his head and had started making his way to the exit when Miss Lawson spoke up once more with her thick Austrailian accent.
"You never gave us your name."
Chief stopped dead in his tracks after he heard those words. One of the biggest secrets of a Spartan was their name. It was one of the few and treasured things that the super soldiers remember about their past before their strict training.
"I know this is hard for you Chief, but if you want to earn their trust you will have to give them your name." Cortana spoke inside the MJLONIR armor.
Chief look down to the ground. The only ones to ever call him by his real name was Cortana, his fellow Spartans, Dr Halsey, and Chief Mendez. Any others that say his name, just felt wrong to him. But he needed the trust of Shepard and the others. Chief raised his head back up.
"It's... John."
Both Miranda and Shepard smiled when Master Chief finally gave out his name.
"Huh, both of us have the same first name. I guess its a small universe after all." The former Spectre thought to himself as he folded his arms across his chest.
"Hmmm the name kind of fits him. And it is little more information to add." Miranda thought.
The Master Chief then walked right out of the room.
"That went well." Shepard commented.
When he did not hear a response from Miranda he looked over to her, only to see her fiddle with her omni-tool.
"I assume you are going to send that to the Illusive Man." Shepard said as if he knew the Cerberus officer's next action.
Miranda's heels clicked with the floor when she started to walk out of the room.
"Of course." Miss Lawson said mere seconds before the door closed behind her.
Shepard's Quarters
A few hours later after the debriefing, Shepard was well relaxed in his quarters. He laid back in his bed with a datapad in hand. The Commander had downloaded the information from the Spartan earlier into the datapad, so it would be portable and he could relax at the same time. He also used the data to update his personal codex. Shepard held a personal interest with the Spartan entry since it gave him some additional background info on Master Chief and what he was capable of.
Spartan-II
Elite soldiers produced through mechanical and biological augmentation. Picked from the best that humanity had to offer and received extensive military action of all branches. Meant to subdue insurrections in their infancy, without substantial military casualties. Designed to minimize civilian casualties and avert civil war. Substantially reduced the cost of conventional means of pacification.
When the Human-Covenant War began and the alien invaders began decimating the Outer Colonies, the Spartans became humanity's best hope against the technological superiority of the aliens. Upon the arrival of the Covenant assaults, the Spartans became the first major UNSC response to the alien threat. The Spartans continuously proved highly effective against all threats; their heroic rearguard and delaying actions saved countless human lives from the genocidal Covenant onslaught. Their prowess was well known among the Covenant, who came to fear the Spartans as Demons.
In 2547 the SPARTAN-II program was revealed to the public in an effort to boost morale among the UNSC. Inevitably the small number of Spartan-IIs dwindled as casualties were sustained. As the exploits of the SPARTANs were a major propaganda boom to the UNSC, to maintain the illusion of the Spartan invincibility, when Spartans were killed they were listed as 'Missing in Action.'
Through their outstanding performance on the battlefield, the Spartan-IIs were awarded with nearly every medal the UNSC had to offer. The only exception being was the prisoner of war medallion as no Spartan had ever been captured.
UNSC
The United Nations Space Command (UNSC) is the military, exploratory, and scientific agency of the UEG. The UNSC was formed in the 22nd century, a time when remnants of old cultural ideologies clashed for supremacy in the Sol System. The UNSC served mainly as overseer of UN military operations in space.
After initiating massive militarization propaganda throughout its off-world colonies, through the UNSC, the U.N. defeated Communist and Fascist forces in a conflict generally known as the "Interplanetary War", which consisted of several side-battles that took place on Mars, the Jovian Moons and the South American rainforests. Although the Interplanetary War brought a great deal of suffering to both the colonial population and the residents of Earth, it also united humanity's military forces into a common armed force by the end of the 22nd century.
Prior to the Covenant attack on Harvest in 2525, humanity was in chaos. Battles on multiple fronts and planets evolved from a group known as the Insurrectionists who wanted independence from the Unified Earth Government. The UNSC fought constant battles against the Insurrectionists. When the Human-Covenant War began and the alien invaders began decimating the Outer Colonies. When the war began, the UNSC became humanity's greatest protector.
This fact allowed the UNSC to override civilian rule and establish itself as humanity's primary government. Although the Unified Earth Government was more open to step down, the Colonial Administration, the arm of the UEG ruling over the colonies, resisted the UNSC's rise to power, and was thus stripped of its power.
By 2552 A.D., Earth was the last remaining major human bastion, and fell under attack by the Covenant forces. The Human-Covenant War finally came to an end after a UNSC and Covenant Separatists force eliminated the Covenant leadership.
Covenant
The Covenant Empire, also referred to the Covenant was a religious hegemony made up of collection of eight alien species that controlled a large portion of the Orion Arm in the Milky Way galaxy. They waged a genocidal campaign against Humanity for twenty seven years.
With superior technology and numbers they pushed humanity to the brink of extinction in a ruthless campaign.
They were defeated due to many factors, the most crucial of which was an internal conflict when a portion of aliens broke off from the Covenant.
Shepard closed the entries and laid the datapad next to him on his bed. The former Spectre folded his hands behind his head and let his eyes get lost in the ceiling as his mind wondered. There was some interesting information in it, but it still felt like it wasn't the whole truth. It was pretty clear that there was more than just the Chief in the Spartan program, but he had never specified where his Spartans were or how many participated in the program. Perhaps that's why he didn't want to talk about it. Maybe they were all dead. This would explain his reluctance toward teamwork with anyone besides his Spartan group.
He had to admit that the UNSC had some impressive technology for its lack of element zero.
Lost in thoughts such as these, it was particularly jarring to hear EDI say,
"Commander, the Illusive Man wishes to speak with you."
Shepard sighed.
"He always knows when to call at the wrong time." The former Spectre miserably thought to himself, as he tried to resist letting a loud groan.
"Thank you EDI." He said with the best show of enthusiasm he could muster, which wasn't much.
Shepard dragged himself with tired feet in the elevator to go to the comm room once again.
Normandy SR-2 comm room
The desk descended into the floor as Commander Shepard made his way into the center of the comm room. The holo view extended around him, leaving him to face the Illusive Man. The Cerberus leader's eyes glowed with the same eerie, mechanical blue color that held much information.
The Illusive Man had another cigarette held between his fingers. The Cerberus leader took a good draw from the cigarette, and exhaled the smoke.
"Shepard, I heard you've gotten a new recruit from that unknown vessel. Miranda forwarded all available information, as well as the video of your interview."
The Illusive Man took another drag from his cigarette.
The ex-Spectre folded his arms across his chest in annoyance. He doubt he would ever learn to get along with a terrorist.
"We sent you all that we know about the derelict frigate." Shepard scoffed.
"The ship was an unexpected windfall. I've got a science team en route to do a more thorough analysis, but I want to talk about your new shipmate instead."
Shepard kept a straight face, though the person in front of him was trying his patience.
"What about him?"
"You seem rather quick to trust the Spartan. It was clear that he agreed to join you purely out of having nothing else to do, and that may prove to be shaky loyalty."
"He's spent nearly thirty years fighting threats to humanity. I doubt he'd shoot me because the Collectors offered him a better deal and he has proven himself to be very effective in a fight."
The Illusive Man took another drag from his smoke.
"I'm not saying he'd actively try to betray you, Shepard. I'm saying that you may find someone with such long and brutal combat experience frequently questioning your decisions on the battlefield, which does not lend itself to an effective team. You need to find some way of making him realize that you are in charge, before he attempts to subvert your authority. Even if his combat prowess may prove to be worth it, he could always prove to be a hazardous to the mission."
"I don't need you to tell me how to lead my team." Shepard spat with hatred.
"As always, the judgement is yours, but be careful Shepard we don't need a stranger compromising the mission. I'm sure we both have much work to do, so that will be all... for now." He pressed a button on his chair, and the hologram faded into nothing.
"Glad that's over. But... he might be right about the Master Chief. He just sent us information about him, no real talk or anything. There has to be more about him. I will have to work on it later, for now I got to find Okeer." Shepard thought.
"EDI, plot a course for Korlus, we've got a Krogan Warlord to recruit."
"Affirmative, Shepard."
Meanwhile in the Cargo Bay
John-117 was in his quarters and for once without his armor on. The MJOLNIR had taken heavy damage from Guilty Spark's laser, which warped the chest piece, so repairs were much needed, along with some cleaning. Fortunately, the parts and kits he had brought from the Dawn could fix the damage. He needed his armor at full combat status in an unknown universe.
"Chief, I know your armor is like your second skin, but you need to take care of your real skin first. You need to go to the med-bay, you haven't had your wounds treated since before the Ark." Cortana said to her long time friend with concern.
"We'll see." The Spartan responded.
"Ugh!... You are so hard headed sometimes!" Cortana groaned.
From behind John-117 heard the elevator door open with familiar high heels clanking against the floor.
"Miss Lawson." The Master Chief guessed.
A few minutes earlier Miranda's POV
"I need more information on this Spartan, he is holding some back." Miranda sat at her desk with her hands together close to her mouth.
The data that Chief provided to her was valuable, but she needed to know everything about everyone after all she is a Cerberus Informant. Master Chief has destroyed her bugs and cameras, so she had no way of spying on him in the cargo bay.
"I think it's about time that me and him have a one on one talk."
Miranda got up from her chair and proceeded to the elevator. She was going to confront the soldier face to face... or rather helmet. The super soldier seemed pretty uncommunicative, but maybe she could make him talk for she does have a way with words.
The door to the elevator finally opened and the Cerberus officer stepped out.
"Chief I would… like…"
But Miranda didn't get to finish her sentence at the strange sight before her. In clear sight, she was staring at the Master Chief without his armor. He had military cut hair, brown eyes, and a plain but rugged face with a few scars on it, incredibly tall and very muscular and was wearing a black tight rubber suit. Miranda stood there and stared at him with an open mouth.
"Is there something you need, ma'am?" Chief asked.
The Cerberus officer blinked a few times and woke up from her trance.
"Huh?... Uh... yes, I wanted to thank you for saving me back on the Purgatory, your fighting style was rather impressive."
"Flattery is one of the best ways of getting someone to open up." Miranda thought in confidence.
"It's what I do." Chief said calmly, while his hands continued to repair his armor.
Miranda walked up to the table and took the seat in front of the armorless Spartan. Miranda took a quick glance at some of the weapons and devices the Master Chief had.
"Maybe I can get him to talk about some of his equipment." Miranda thought with her hopes of getting valuable data.
Normal POV
"I thought this would be a good chance to talk, one on one." Miranda said rather sweetly.
But the Spartan refused to respond, leaving room for the biotic to continue.
The Spartan was able to rub off a scorch mark from the laser's intense heat. He stared at Miranda for a moment, which seemed like a sign for her to leave, but she stood firm.
"You have the most advanced piece of armor that I have ever seen. What are you doing with it?"
"Repairing it," the Spartan simply replied.
Miranda looked over the features of Master Chief. She did silently admit that he had a rugged attractiveness. The tight black suit he wore showed off his muscular aspects very well.
In all honesty, she'd begun to wonder if what waited under that armour was actually flesh and bone. Her eyes did a cursory sweep of his face, cataloguing each feature clinically, admitting that the proportional symmetry did conform to the ideals of attractiveness. That was something she knew a lot about.
"Those are some pretty bad burns on that armor. What happened?" Miranda asked the augmented soldier.
"I was betrayed." Chief stated as he thought how Guilty Spark shot him and the Arbiter and killed Avery Johnson. The answer probably raised more questions for Miranda.
But his tone of voice lead Miranda to the conclusion that he wasn't about to give the initmate details away to anyone, let alone a stranger like her.
"I read the reports you sent me that were about you. They were valuable, but vague." Miranda said to the Spartan.
Chief just continued to fix his armor, feeling less than little need to reassure her.
"He seems like a simple enough guy, straight up. Maybe all he needs is a little quid pro quo to get him to open up enough for me to gain access to his armor."
The idea of opening up about herself to anyone chafed against her every self preservative instinct, but... so far none of her manipulations had worked on the giant. As if he were stone, as if none of her charms had even affected him. It was a frustrating situation, and it was rapidly calling for desperate measures. Information was power and as much as she wanted to keep her own advantages a mystery, she was beginning to realize that Chief wouldn't give her anything unless she gave him something in return.
"If I can just get him to trust me..."
It would be a weakness she could exploit.
And so, wrestling against the whispers in her mind warning her not to, she began to speak.
"We both seem to have a few things in common. We are both genetically augmented. I was genetically engineered to be a specimen of human perfection. Everything, from my intelligence, physical constitution, biotic abilities, even my appearance was designed before birth to be excellent. I heal faster than other humans and I will probably live half a lifespan longer. It seems like your augmentations are more... potent than mine."
Master Chief looked up from his task and stared at Miranda Lawson, surprised by this sudden, seemingly out of character remark. She just watched him steadfastly through those enigmatic blue eyes that seemed to be daring him to do something.
'Genetically augmented, huh?'
He supposed that it wasn't unreasonable to believe her; question was why she'd felt the need to tell him at all or why she thought he'd even care. Despite this, though, he felt a strange, betraying restlessness in his chest as he looked at her and wondered what 'genetic augmentation' meant in this universe and if they actually were anything like his own.
"To make the most of my abilities, I was intensively trained. I can shoot a mech's head off from a hundred meters away or just as easily crush it with my biotics." Miss Lawson boasted, while she raised her fist that glowed with a light blue.
'A warning?' he wondered, watching her carefully as the strange glow around her hand died. If it was, it was uncalled for: he was already fully aware of the destructive potential of biotics. Maybe it was a demonstration.
"However, with these gifts came a burden growing up." Miranda ceased using her powers and lowered her hand to the table.
For the first time since she'd begun speaking, Chief saw a flash of... something through her eyes. She held his gaze stubbornly, but despite this there seemed to be an indefinable unease on her face as she continued in a softer voice.
"Despite my accomplishments, my perfectionist father never showed approval or pride towards me. He always expected more and better from me, forever chiding me to be greater than I already was. He also imposed a very strict lifestyle on me, and forbade me from making friends and having a social life. I bet your life wasn't that much different."
'Ah...' he thought. He understood now.
Miranda didn't strike him as someone who looked for sympathy. But then again, she hadn't struck him as someone who'd willingly give herself away either. So... if she didn't want sympathy, was this whole thing some strained attempt at bonding?
Even though she didn't say it, he could hear the words between the lines.'We're the same'.
"A little bit." John-117 admitted uncomfortably as the memories of his extreme Spartan training flooded back into his mind.
"We are both great in combat. I have seen what you can do, and it was very impressive." Miranda complemented.
"Thanks." Chief replied.
Her mind screamed and pleaded to her to stop to speaking. But something... different told her to continue, a diverse voice urged her to keep telling him things she always kept secret.
"I didn't have a mother, only a father who was extremely influential, wealthy, and ego-maniacal. He created me by using a modified copy of his own genome, he wanted to create his own dynasty. I couldn't allow that to happen so I ran away. I eventually approached Cerberus and joined them in exchange for protection. I knew of them since my father sympathized with their human-centric agenda and was a major backer. When I enlisted with Cerberus, he stopped pursuing me, but severed his ties to the group."
The Spartan continued to listen, while Miranda took a deep breath and exhaled.
"Despite the past dealings with my father, I do agree with Cerberus' desire to help humanity. I also enjoy the opportunity to work with people as smart as me and the amount of latitude their clandestine operations afford me. I was given an objective, all the resources I need, and nothing more. I have advanced far enough to become one of the few in the organization, much less the galaxy that meets and answers directly to the Illusive Man, who appreciates my abilities."
"We are a little similar." Chief finally admitted.
He, too, had dedicated his life to the advancement and preservation of humanity. Though he expected his duties required more gunplay and less corporate wrangling than Miss Lawson's. "Latitude" in the Chief's case typically meant deciding whether to kill a battalion of Covenant grunts with a sniper rifle, a plasma grenade, or his bare hands.
The Spartan was opening up, her plan was working. Despite the fact that the victory made her want to smile, Miranda was distracted by the sound of her own voice, admitting those things to a stranger.
"I never intended to go this far", she thought.
She'd never even considered revealing the truth about her father but... somehow once she'd begun talking she hadn't been able to stop. Maybe it was the blank expression the Spartan had worn the whole time, taunting her into giving away more than she'd been willing to. It was... strange.
"Whatever," she halted her meandering thoughts suddenly, locking them away until she could formulate a logical conclusion for them later.
"All that matters is that it worked."
"I have told you about me and you have seen our weaponry. Maybe you can show me some of yours?" Miranda searched deep into his eyes looking for an answer.
The Spartan sighed and got up from his seat.
"Alright, but only one. Come with me, ma'am. I will send the data to your omni-tool."
This time, a grin did manage to break onto her face. She had always loved the taste of success. She got up from her seat and followed John.
"You can call me Miranda."
The Master Chief held up one of the weapons. The omni-tool's codex then read, Type-25 Directed Energy Pistol also known as the Plasma Pistol.
Miranda saw that there was a large amount of data on the gun, so she decided to read over it once she gets back to her office.
The Cerberus officer put away her omni-tool and looked up to the Spartan.
"Thank you Chief, your information was very helpful. I will be sure to keep in touch."
Chief simply nodded his head at her.
Miranda entered the elevator and turned around to see the Spartan watching her. Before the door closed, her eyes made a curious sweep of that unexpected face once more and something unexplained thudded in her chest.
"That was... interesting." Miss Lawson thought.
She admitted that she'd gotten a little carried away with the discussion. Originally she intended to relate to Master Chief and get him to show her a weapon, but she ended up opening up to him instead.
"He made me go against my plan. Without even saying anything at all. Why did I do that? What made do it?"
As the doors closed and his face was taken from her sight, she sighed and reached a hand up, running it through her hair. What the hell had that even been? There was obviously no way someone like her had actually been affected by the Chief. So why...
Back with Cortana and the Master Chief
"Wow she was right. You two do have a few things in common. She kind of reminds me of Dr. Halsey, working for a secretive organization, cold to some people, leading projects, and very smart. I think she is beginning to like you big guy." Cortana started speaking to John,
"How so?" Chief replied.
"The increased heart rate when she saw you, being friendlier to you than others which is what Dr. Halsey did too. She constantly stared at you and lost focus sometimes."
Chief didn't respond.
"You really are hard headed sometimes. You know that right?"
Shepard's Quarters
"Shepard, we are closing in on Kolus." EDI informed through the intercom in the Normandy,
"Thanks EDI, tell Jack and Mordin to gear up and get ready for the mission. Get Zaeed too."
"I am starting to like the extra back up." Shepard thought as he began to put on his N-7 armor.
"And tell Jacob to give a tour for the Chief of the Normandy. He might need a layout of the ship."
Alright finished with this chapter. Next chapter is going to be a little more bonding between Chief and some other crew members, while Shepard, Zaeed, Mordin, and Jack are on the mission! Also recruiting Kasumi, and starting her loyalty mission.