Arrival at Reach

1214 Hours, May 8, 2517 (Military Calendar)\Reach

Reach was the backbone of the UNSC's construction of starships. When Lofwyr was contracted to begin building ships with the Shaw-Fujikawa Drive, he knew that the best way to do that would be to section out an entire planet for the job. Lofwyr chose Reach, a planet mostly populated by Polish and Hungarian descendants. He had his company move most of their construction houses to the building. Saeder-Krupp hired out many mining companies to begin mining for the minerals he needed for the construction. He worked with many shipping companies to ship the minerals over in order to smelt the ore down, a process he made sure was preformed on Reach itself. The whole planet became a construction zone, at least beneath the surface. Above, it still looked like a planet where Hungarian farmers tilled the land. Shipyards were scattered around the deserts of the planet itself and more secluded places, leaving the fertile land for the farmers. After all, it was their planet first. Still, when Malcho lost the contract, and Lofwyr began his operations on Reach, the Feathered Serpent plotted to snatch back the ship contract. This was his chance to find something wrong with whatever Lofwyr was doing on Reach and rub it in his face. Malcho wanted the ship contract back. But he did have one upper hand in things, Lofwyr's ships could not function without Malcho's precious plasma created by highly efficient hydrogen fuel cells. Malcho's company perfected the art of breaking the bonds of water in order to make hydrogen a new means of clean energy. Lofwyr needed Malcho's energy to run his drive, so the two often were fighting the great paradox battle. Malcho needed Lofwyr's ships and Lofwyr needed Malcho's power. It came down to which company held the true sway over Reach. Without Malcho, Lofwyr could not power even his construction sites for the ships. But without Lofwyr, Malcho could not find means of shipping his supplies across the colonies.

Malcho also had another upper hand in things as well. A section of Malcho's company mined for minerals that Lofwyr needed for ship construction. There was one place where Malcho's company discovered a new type of mineral that could be used in making the slipspace drive more efficient in traveling. Malcho dangled that in front of Lofwyr's nose several times when he began mining for the mineral. The area he mined for this mineral was a moon known as Pandora and the mineral was jokingly named Unobtanium. Malcho would have Lofwyr wrapped around his finger once he refined the ore fore better and faster, and even more stable drives for ships. He could steal away the contract again with a new and improved slipspace drive brought on by the refinement of Unobtanium. However, mining for the mineral was a bit hazardous because of the sentient, aboriginal and indigenous creatures known as the Na'vi. But, Malcho pressed on, wanting to beat Lofwyr at his own games.

As Malcho made his way through the corridors of the ship, he stopped ever so now and then to gaze out a window at the blue-green planet of Reach. Orbiting the planet were to natural satellites, two moons. One looked more like an oddly shaped planetoid rather than a perfectly spherical moon and the other looked like a gas planet complete with rings. The gaseous planet striped with blues, golds, greens, and some violets. A halo of streaming energy came off the planet being caused by the surrounding nebula interacting with Reach's magnetic field. Malcho saw at the northern rim of the planet was a massive crater filled in with water. It was one of the few distinct features of Reach.

He turned away and made his way up to the bridge. Already Kiryuu was standing near the captain's chair looking out towards the forward window of the ship. Captain Alexander sat at his chair, looking out over the planet. He turned back when Kiryuu turned around towards Malcho.

"Ah, Mr. Malcho," said Alexander. "Glad you could join us. Welcome to Reach.

"Lofwyr's pride and joy," said Malcho. "And I get to desecrate it with my presence. Oh, the excitement overwhelms me. The moment we land, I'm taking a picture of myself kicking up Reach dirt and sending it to him."

"Malcho," said Kiryuu. "Where we'll be going, there aren't any cameras aloud."

"Mierda," Malcho sighed. "I was hoping to send him a nice framed picture of me sunbathing on a beach and saying that he can't be here and I can."

"We have a shuttle for you to take down to the planet," said the captain. "Lieutenant, you can show our guests where the shuttle bay is."

"Yes, sir," said the lieutenant.

"And of course, Nix, I'm sure you want to say something to Mr. Knight before he leaves," said Alexander.

"I do," said Nix. "I will miss you, Grandfather. It was so much fun to spend all that time with you. We should do it again."

"Mr. Knight may be a bit too busy with this very secret project he is about to work on," said Alexander. "He may not have time."

"What a shame," said Nix, puckering his lips in a pout.

"If I am through with my part in this project," said Kiryuu. "I'll ask for the Spirit of Fire again to take me back to Earth."

"Will you?" asked Nix. "That would be wonderful. Good bye, Grandfather."

"Follow me, sirs," said the lieutenant.

"I wish you both luck," said Alexander.

"Thank you," said Kiryuu. "Let's go, Malcho."

"Sí," said Malcho. "Let's go. I just hope this trip was really worth it."

0

Kiryuu strapped himself into a seat on the Pelican. Malcho strapped himself in the seat opposite to him. Kiryuu could sense that the Feathered Serpent would much rather be in his true form and fly to the base, but he knew that people would notice him if he did. It was all about secrecy now. Malcho stared out the back, trying to capture as much as he could of the alien landscape. The trees were so different on this planet. The sky held a greenish tint to it, unlike the brilliant sapphire blue that Earth's sky was. He never seen a sky so different before. Malcho could still see the glow of the two moons in the sky. The ringed moon was especially interesting to look at. He was here, he was here on Reach–and Lofwyr was not. Kiryuu let loose a deep chuckle.

"Still thinking about Lofwyr?" he asked.

"Caramba, I should have kept my guard up," said Malcho. "You nosy bastard."

"I couldn't help it," said Kiryuu. "Besides, even if you did have your guard up, I would have calculated that you were still thinking about Lofwyr. It isn't hard to figure you out, Malcho."

"You know me best, Kiryuu," said Malcho, grinning sheepishly.

The Pelican flew over a set of mountain ranges in the arctic quadrant of the planet. It was secluded from the rest of the planet, which made it perfect for the secret training that was about to take place. Kiryuu made good notes about the location, linking up remotely to the satellites around Reach to give him an exact position of the base. It was indeed far away from any settlement on the planet. The project was going to be code-named ORION-II. However at the last minute, Kiryuu received a notice that it was going to be called SPARTAN-II, meaning that the original SPARTAN project was the ORION project he and Malcho helped out on in ver last bit of the 2400s. Kiryuu recalled the roster for the original SPARTANs. Marines, naval personnel, all of them loyal to the UNSC. However, some of these augmented super soldiers did in fact defect to the side of the Insurrectionists. Dr. Halsey wanted to make sure that did not happen again. Still, Kiryuu did not like the idea of using children. For all he knew, Dr. Halsey did not have any child of her own, or at least any she was in contact with.

"Sirs," began the co-pilot, looking back at the two passengers. "We're about to land."

Kiryuu looked out again and saw the ground rush up towards them. They were nearing a landing pad in a valley surrounded by rock. He thought he could feel some warmth coming from the area, which seemed odd for arctic conditions.

"What's that warmth?" he asked.

"Geothermal activity, Mr. Knight," said the pilot. "This place is covered in it. Keeps the valley warm. Because of that, trees grow lush here."

The Pelican gently set down and Malcho and Kiryuu got out. They looked around, noticing that the angular, cold-stone base was set in a temperate forrest. It looked like a hidden world. The trees appeared to be loosing their leaves though, and Kiryuu assumed it was because it was autumn.

"Magnificent," said Malcho.

They turned around to see several ODST Marines along with Dr. Catherine Halsey walking up from an opened steal bulkhead door.

"Mr. Knight," began Halsey. "Mr. Malcho. Good to see you."

Kiryuu's dark eyebrow cocked up in disgust when he saw her. Malcho scratched his nose and snorted. Halsey could feel the animosity coming from them.

"I see," said Halsey. "This is how it's going to be, eh? Get used to it, you two. You'll be here for a while."

"Well, where are our...science experiments?" Malcho asked.

"They are not here," said Halsey. "They will arrive in September. This will give both of you a chance to set up shop before they arrive. I have brought over several specialists from your branch offices in Reach to assist you in the project. Now, if you both will follow me."

They followed her into the enormous doors. As the doors closed behind them, Halsey issued the two their ONI ID badges.

"You both are to wear these at all times," she said. "With them, you can enter the areas of the base that are restricted only for your access. You will have set codes to the doors to your labs. You both will have your own quarters. Mr. Knight, I have set yours up so that you may recharge when you need to."

"I can also digest human food to power my cells," said Kiryuu. "Thanks to Malcho's generous investments in more efficient and cheaper ways of fueling me."

"I see," said Halsey. "Also, Mr. Knight, don't try to hack your way into areas you are not allow to be in. If you don't have the code for it, then you shouldn't be there, so try your...little tricks in getting the code."

Kiryuu chuckled darkly.

"I mean it," said Halsey.

"I shall be on my best behavior, doctor," he said. Kiryuu's gold eyes flashed at her sinisterly.

Of course you'll snoop around, projected Malcho.

Yes, I will, said Kiryuu. And I have ways of doing it without fiddling with door locks. I can just view what's on her screen when she opens her computer.

Just be careful, amigo.

Halsey looked back at them, noticing their fixed gaze at each other. Her eyes narrowed when she realized they were having a telepathic conversation.

"And that will also stop!" she called, breaking their link with each other. "I'll not have any sort of 'secret' conversation between you two that I can't hear with my own ears. No telepathic communication is allowed here."

"And how will you monitor us?" Malcho asked. "You can't possibly know when we're speaking telepathically to each other when we're not in sight."

"Then I'll build a P-wave sensor in the building, making sure that you two will aren't having any sort of 'private' conversation. And if I have to, I will create a dampening device for any sort of psychic connection."

"You can certainly try, muchacha," said Malcho. "I can easily break any sort of psionic dampener once I sense that it has been turned on."

"How would we be of any use for your lobotomizing experiments if our psionic powers are dampened?" Kiryuu asked, placing a calming hand on Malcho's shoulder. "That's the other reason why you brought us here, isn't it? We're the only psychics capable of doing what you want and are able to leave Earth."

Halsey sneered at the two for catching her on the oversight. Kiryuu chuckled again, leaning down at her.

"Remember, doctor," he began, his handsome voice lowering to almost a faint whisper. "I can out think you."

"If you were able to out think me, then you wouldn't be here," said Halsey.

"I am only here because you've blackmailed me," said Kiryuu. "But knowing there is a trap is the first step in avoiding it. For these next few years, you have better stay out of my way."