Bornstellar left the Batarian alone with the monitor, his memories would be extracted and any valuable information would be used, the rest would be discarded. He walked into a different cell, this one contained a human, a survivor from the attack that had been rescued but she was in poor condition, near death when she had been found. One of his Prometheans took her and brought her back with them, she was a soldier, a warrior. He nearly laughed when he heard that, after all the Humans the Didact had fought had been male, they didn't allow females into their ranks of soldiers, these humans however did.
The human was awake and panicking—or so his readouts said, she was in far better health now than she had been, that was good. He walked into the holding area where she was suspended, the Lifeworkers had done their job and healed her, now he would take her in and find out as much as she knew, although he planned on being nicer to her than he had been to the Batarian. The human had dark red hair, a feature he hadn't seen on one before. She studied him as he walked in with emerald green eyes, her face showed a slight mixture of shock and fear but it quickly faded into an emotionless blank state—one that would have made a Promethean look emotional.
Born deactivated the constraint field slowly and allowed the human to be lowered to the ground safely, she kept staring at him, wondering what he'd do next.
"What is your name human?" he asked, he knew humans had similar feelings on names as Forerunners did, they were special, friends and family would call you one name—a pet name, while others would call you by a formal name, like Riser. Born was happy to note the little Florian was considered a friend, although he was probably old now, if not dead.
"Corporal Elizabeth Hopkins. You?" she said after a brief hesitation, her face still blank. The corners of his mouth twitched upwards to form a smile, "I am Bornstellar Makes Eternal Lasting. However many call me Didact, but please just call me Bornstellar." He replied, Elizabeth raised her right eyebrow in response but said nothing.
"The Lifeworkers healed you in the days after your rescue; however I cannot allow you back to your civilisation, not yet." She seemed almost distraught at the news, although her face remained passive her heart rate picked up and her body secreted several chemicals as she became more stressed at the news.
"Why not?" she demanded to know, Born found it slightly amusing to see a human demand anything of a Forerunner but he wasn't surprised. "Everyone thinks you are dead. No one knows you are here, no one knows we are here. Forerunners have not yet engaged in contact with your… Citadel Council, and nor will we for some time." Born replied, he kneeled down so he was almost eye level with her, something Riser had taught him was that humans preferred to make eye contact while talking, so did Forerunners but with humans he had to lower himself, after all he was larger than any of them.
"Where are we?" she asked eventually, Born rose and motioned her to follow, she did. He led her through the facility where he had put everyone that was taken. She did little to hide her awe and wonder as she past many things that caught her attention, mainly the various monitors that floated about or the doors as they simply dissolved out the way and reformed behind them.
Soon he led her to a balcony that overlooked the Capital, the city, the planet was always in motion, never ceasing. The star at the heart of the system was slowly falling behind the horizon, turning the sky a beautiful purple, a nearby nebula was lit up the sky with even more colour. The sight caused Elizabeth's breath to catch, an odd human trait he had noticed during his travels with Chakas and Riser. The Council building was visible from their current position, it hung hundreds of meters in the air, suspended by anti-gravity generators, an ocean had been lifted up and its contents now lived near his personal estate while Lifeworkers studied the creatures that inhabited it.
"Whoa, that's… incredible," Elizabeth whispered, and it was, even for Bornstellar.
"We are at the Capital, one of only a few planets my people inhabit now." Born said.
"What does your name mean?" Born asked, trying to make her more comfortable and to shift the topic, "My mum used to tell me it meant 'God's promise'" she answered without thinking, although she immediately flushed with embarrassment at letting her training slip.
"God?" Born questioned, she shrugged before replying, "Yeah, according to Christianity God created the heavens and the Earth in seven days and created humans in his image," she said the words but did not believe them.
"I can assure you no god created humans, and certainly not in his image." Born said, perhaps revealing too much too soon. Before Elizabeth could say anything, and she wanted to, a small Falco-class shuttle approached, catching her attention.
"The answers you seek will be answered, I promise you that. However it will take time. For now I request you travel with me, we have much to discuss." Born said, motioning to the shuttle. Elizabeth was hesitant but she got on and took a seat that made her look even smaller, as he entered, the shuttle took off towards its destination.
"Where's the pilot?" she asked, he gave her a questioning glance and she made rudimentary motions with her hands, "Ya know, the guy who fly's the shuttle?" She added.
"My Ancilla controls the shuttle, there is no need for a physical pilot." He replied, she seemed momentarily shocked and then scared.
"You mean an A.I don't you? A.I's are dangerous, they'll want to wipe out all organic's in the galaxy, just look what happened to the Quarians and the Geth!" she hissed at him, his Ancilla made a remark about its 'total plan for the destruction of life'. Bornstellar was not impressed by either party, this human; this little creature dared insult Forerunner technology. Meanwhile his Ancilla seemed to have forgotten all that had happened during the war with the Flood and how it had perverted Forerunner's own Ancilla's and Monitors against their creators.
"You should only speak of things based on fact, not the tales of idiots." Born replied, he knew of the 'Quarian' and 'Geth' war, it was just a small bit of information that had been gathered from those he had tasked with getting information. Before she could utter another word and argue with him he simply raised a hand and signalled that it was over.
Elizabeth watched the massive man, Bornstellar he had called himself, as he signalled an end to the conversation; she was both scared and angry. She was in a flying vehicle, an alien vehicle that was being controlled by an A.I and she had no way of escape. She was in unfamiliar land and had no way of escaping the planet and getting back to Council or Alliance space.
She was a prisoner no matter how you looked at it, and she was forced to go along with the freakishly human like giant. Although she had to admit the things she saw were beautiful beyond measure.
When the shuttle landed and she got out two round drones followed by several different drones that had three arms attached, they took up an escort position next to her and Bornstellar. He seemed perfectly at ease with their presence and so she forced herself to relax slightly, although she never dropped her guard. They had landed at the large building she had seen floating from a distance, it turned out the large dome shaped building was hollow and contained a massive building at its centre, it was all perfectly symmetrical and everything was either smoother than a babies back side or sharp and angular, one design often flowed perfectly into another. The entrance they approached—was just one of many entrances she noticed had twelve blue and purple crystals that formed delicate symbols.
"They represent the twelve systems early Forerunners inhabited very long ago; the crystals are from the ships that carried us to this new home. It is our way of remembering our ancestry, although much of that has been lost." Bornstellar said as he noticed she was looking at the crystals.
"You mean this isn't your home-world?" he shook his head but said nothing else on the matter, leaving her with more questions.
She was lead through a large assortment of corridors and hallways, eventually she was led into what appeared to be a viewing box, like from one of the old Earth theatres. As she stepped on the platform it rose high up into a massive amphitheatre that reminded her of something she had seen in an old science fiction vid. There were more stands just like hers, in total there had to have been five hundred separate ones. Each was filled by a single 'Forerunner', she noted all of them wore different armour, some wore the same but she took note of five or six different types, some much more elaborate than the others.
The centre of the room was a platform that had five separate highlighted circles that had different symbols inside of them, around a holographic map of the galaxy that was far more detailed than any hologram in Council space. "You're in the Council Chambers, the first none Forerunner to hold the honour. Here you will be called upon to testify about what happened on your planet. I must leave you alone here, I am needed down there, my place on the Council." Born said quietly, she had forgotten about the giant being. He disappeared before she had turned around and when she looked back at the centre of the room he was stood in one of the circles, his face obscured by a helmet of some sort.
Shortly after more figures arrived on the centre stage and took their place, Elizabeth knew that what happened here today, what she said to these people, would change the fate of the galaxy forever. And hopefully it would be for the good.