CHAPTER 5
The engines of the Phantom struggle against the planet's gravity, its thrusters pulsating with a blue light that shines through the darkness, and we are all silent-dead silent. We hid beneath cars when we first saw the beetle-shaped purple ship in the distance, trailing slowly between the white buildings. Jane stayed close to me, gripping my chest-piece hard. It has been a few minutes since we saw the ship, but now it was right on top of us- scanning with its big red laser as it went and covering the street with a line of concentrated red light that sweeped the empty streets and the vehicles and the big white buildings. I had never seen its kind before, and didn't even hear about it till today. Under the cars we were safe from being detected by the scanner, but I was still very anxious.
I stare to my left, under the car, and see the red laser passing just beside me. Jane closes her eyes and I place my arm around her back to calm her. "Don't worry." I say. Had the car not been on top of us, the scanner would have detected our presence and dropped ground teams to "investigate". We would likely not survive such a powerful Covenant force, especially with a Phantom assisting it- blasting at us with its large plasma canon as we fight wave after wave of Covenant forces. Luckily, Cunningham spotted the Phantom and advised we hide. None of us have seen a Phantom like this before, but somehow she had known of it.
We waited five more minutes, until the Phantom was far out of our sight-line, until we came out of our hiding. After crawling out from under the car, I brushed dirt off of my armor. My squad now stood around me, gathered in a close circle. The Commander clicked her wrist touch-pad a few times and a small holographic map of New Kingston was lit between us. "We, are here." she said, pointing to a red dot around the middle of the city. "The ONI facility is 12 blocks away, here." she said, pointing to the large blocky holographic building. "I just got a report from Ascension. If we don't infiltrate the facility and wipe its systems within two hours, New Kingston will be gone along with any living civilians and a lot of public property."
"What civilians?" Frank asked. "This is a ghost town. And all this 'property' will just be blasted by the Covenant the second they deem this planet worthy of their glassing beam. They have an assault carrier orbiting Helios, and they probably intend to use it." Jane began crying again and I smacked Frank in the shoulder. It seemed he didn't care about hurting her at all. To him she was just another civilian getting in his way. He was always a prick. I thought, holding Jane close as she hugged me.
The Commander stared at Frank, as if angry that he dared question her. But then she sighed, as if giving up. "We aren't here just to wipe a few computers." she said. "This planet was deemed unfit for colonizing when humans first came here. The heats were uncomfortable, the sands were unbearably.. dirty, there was little water... We could have found ten worlds more appropriate for colonization without even twisting our little finger. But after we scanned this planet, we found something... abnormal about it. There was a large concentration of magnetic fields around its northern hemisphere, something we haven't seen anywhere before." Jane stares at her, seemingly interested.
"How does that relate to the reason why we're here?" Frank asked.
"After long research, scientists located the source of the anomaly- an artifact left behind by an ancient alien civilization. A civilization far more technologically advanced then we are today, and far older then us. This artifact may have been the only reason the Covenant came across this world- they know it's here. We're here to retrieve it, before the Covenant does." the Commander said.
"So what about the network?" Cunningham asks.
"The Cole Protocol was inflicted the second the Covenant were spotted in the system. The network was wiped immediately, as was any hint towards the location of Earth, Reach and the central colonies." the Commander answered.
"You lied to us. Why couldn't you just say the truth of our mission off the bat?" Jason asked.
"That's ONI's fault. Need-to-know only, they called it." she answered, but I didn't make me feel any less betrayed.