Well it nice to see not everyone is forgotten about this story. Thanks you all for the reviews.
Minor Itch: Noted. Will do that from now on.
Let's not waste any more time then
Disclaimer:
I do not own Halo or Mass Effect.
This is AU so do not complain about the storyline being "Non-cannon" or something as like that.
My English is HORRIBOL so please forgive my grammatical mistakes.
Act 1: Sly deal
January/11/2662
Milky Way/Minos Wasteland/ Caestus system
Near planet Temerarus
Onboard the UNSC Forward Unto Dawn.
Cargo Bay 9
"You're what?" The surprise in Gadas voice was absolute.
"A Specter. Can't you hear?" The reply came from the armored giant sounded a bit annoyed.
"But what species are you? What is that armor? And what kind of weapons are those?" Gadhas mouth briefly became a mass accelerator on its own right as all the questions in his head started to come out altogether.
"Ok to answer your first question, I'm an Asari. It's this armor that is huge." The figure replied. "And the answer to second question is this is an alien armor, I found it in this ship. Same goes for the weapons."
"What are you doing in here? Is this some kind of trap?" Gadha and his people quickly begun to scan the bay for more contacts.
"Oh it's a trap alight, but not for you guys, for me." The figure, or as it claimed the Asari replied. Her voice contained a fair amount of frustration. "Two days ago my ships warp core gone critical while I was maneuvering through the fields. I managed to dump the core and maneuver it here. My ships backup went dead as soon I landed. Now I'm stuck in this place."
"Wait. If you got stuck here two days ago, how the hell you're still alive?" Boka, who was till now was just observing the situation quickly pointed out the obvious gap in the story. "You're suit shouldn't provide more than 5 hours of oxygen."
"Her armor." Gadha filled the gap for the Asari. "It's nothing like I've ever seen. She probably salvaged it form this ship, along with the weapons."
"Glad to see someone here has a functioning brain." The Asari said. "Yeah I found it in one of the armory of this ship. Great thing, has its own oxygen generator of some sorts."
"Cortana, that's a bit too much." Chief, secure in the knowledge they Batarians won't hear him as Cortana taken over the outer coms, spoke up.
"Chief, in front of them is a 7 feet tall behemoth with energy weapons in its hand. They'll buy anything I say right now." Cortana hastily reassured him.
"So what you want form us?" Baka asked, "Transportation?"
"No shit sherloc…I mean yes." Cortana would bit her lip if she had one right now but fortunately for her, the Batarians ignored it.
"Humm, since it was obviously you who wiped out the ships core and likely responsible for Alpha and Bravo teams "disappearance", why we would help you?" While Gadha's voice was relatively hostile, there was also a tone of interest in it.
"They opened fire just as I popped up to say hi, what am I suppose to do?" Her voice was contained a sizable amount of frustration. "And I have no idea who the hell was boarding so I took precautions."
"Even if we choose to ignore those, what can you possibly offer to us?" Gadha already had a clear idea what is the reply going to be but he decided to ask anyway.
"A sizable amount or credits, a clean sweep of your records and for you First office Gadha, the Torment." While the reply stunned everyone else Gadha let out a small smirk under his helmet.
"And how do you planned to do that?" Boka asked.
"This ship contains an arsenal of advance weapons. And according to Alpha and Beta leaders log, the crew is a royally pissed at you captain. If you people get out of the shuttle with these weapons, most of the crew will side with you." The Asari or to be more civilized, Cortana replied.
"And where do you come in this plan." Gadha resisted his urged to roll eyes upon hearing Boka's question.
"I'm have a pretty clear idea how to use these weapons, two days in a wrecked alien ship gives you a perfect opportunity to try out new toys." There was a bit of sarcasm in Cortana's voice. "And unless you guys forgotten, I took down two heavily armed squad all by my own. And you guys could really use some heavy muscle."
"Fair enough," Gadha said. "I assume you want us to take you to the citadel and give up this ship?"
"As I already said you'll be well compensated for that." Cortana replied.
"Not good enough," Gadha declared. "We are going to keep half the weapons and this ships FTL drive."
"You can keep some of the weapons but not the FTL Drive." Cortana voice contained a hefty amount of anger. "That will go to the citadel and that is not for negotiations."
"Fine." But you're going to share what you learn from it with Batarian Hegemony. "Gadha countered."
"Ah, a pirate with strong patriotism." The amusement in Cortanas voice was pretty clear. "Interesting. Fine I'll recommend it to the council but I can't do much more than that."
"Then we have a deal." Gadha said after while lowering his weapon. "Let's begun to load the shuttle with weapons, we don't want be short on our main advantage."
"Follow me." Cortana said after lowering her hand.
"Gadha is it really wise to agree with her?" Baka slowly whispered in a private comm. "We have no idea if she's going to keep her end of her bargain."
"Don't know about her but I know I won't." Gaha replied.
"You won't?" Boka was so surprised that he stopped walking for a moment.
"Ofcorese not." Gadha said with a grin in his face. "As soon we have control of the ship we'll wait for her to take that armor off. She's wearing it for two days I'm sure she's anxious to get out of it. As soon as she dose…"
"We're going to give her the end of the bargain in our terms." Boka finished the word with a grin of his own.
"Told you they can't be trusted." Chef said after hearing the hacked conversation.
"Yeah well on their defense we are not going to keep the end of our bargain either." Cortana replied.
Chief smiled as he realized something. "Well, he stated, they should know it is not wise make a deal with the Demon."
Cortana made double sure that the outer com lines are secured as her laughter would make the Batarinas jump if they weren't.
Act 2: The giant gyro
January/11/2662
Milky Way / Orion Arm / Exodus Cluster / Utopia System
Near planet Zenon
Onboard the ITSS Prometheus.
Commander Katyusha Petrova hides a yawn. She transferred into Imperial Border Security Fleet form the Armada hoping to see some action, but unfortunately for her, so far it's been the same old story. In last two year of service in IBSF, she only had chase down two smuggling freighter whose captains surrendered as soon as she reached as close as 5000 meters. She lets out a sigh. Well that's the gift and curse for commanding a fast ship which has three MAC in the nose. She thought.
She looked around the bridge. Everywhere seems to be a feel of lull. Like her, the crew is also becoming bored form routine missions without any kind of excitement whatsoever. At least you get some monthly training excises in the Armada, she thought bitterly. In IBSF excises take place in only twice a year while the scale is actually bigger than that of the Armada, the given objectives are nowhere close to posing a challenge. Two more months, she though, then I'm going back to the Armada…
"Sir, we got a priority transmission from the survey ship Pathfinder in Asguard system." Felix Tinker, the ships communications officer, suddenly reported.
"Then again…"
Straighten herself on the chair, Katyusha looks towards the young blond male, "what it's says?" She asked.
"It seems the ship found some kind of alien space installation there," Felix stated. "It is consist of two fifteen-kilometer long curved metal arms surrounding a set of revolving, gyroscopic rings five-kilometers across. These rings seem to contain a massive, blue-glowing core of element zero. That thing became active as soon as they started scanning it."
"What is their status now?" She asked with slight concern in her voice. The Pathfinder is one of the oldest survey ships in service. It's a refitted Phoenix-class colony ships. While it's rather heavily armed for a survey ship, in this scenario, it's likely way out of its depth for any unforeseen and potentially violent incident.
"They are keeping a distance of 10000 Kilometers from the object and holding positions." "And Commender," Suddenly Felix's voice became bit startled.
"What is it?" Katyusha immediately noticed the change.
"Apparently one of the ships escort fighter got slingshoted by it to the other end of Milky Way." The sudden announcement left the entire bridge crew dumbfounded for a moment.
"It did what?" Katyusha's first officer, lieutenant commander Valdmir Boris, shot out the very question that currently dominating everyone's mind.
"One of their fighters got close to inspect the object," Felix continued. "As soon as it did, it got stuck by some short of energy discharge from it and seemed to be catapulted into lightspeed. While there was some debate at the start about what happened to the fighter, five minutes later it reappeared near the structure. According to the pilot, He found a similar device at the destination and used it to travel back."
"Exactly how far did he travel?" Katyusha's mind was filled with more questions then she can count, but she decided to ask the question that is likely everyone is wondering about.
"According to the pilots chart log, they ended up in a system in…." Felix trailed of in disbelief for a moment, "Hades Gamma cluster, Crab Nebula." He finished the line in a barely hearable voice.
Silent once again filled the bridge.
"And there's more," Felix's voice became somewhat emotionless after being hit by countless waves of unbelievable information. "That thing does not look like a Forerunner made object, in fact, it bears a noticeable resemble with the alien outpost found in Mars during 2550."
Katyusha slowly returned to her chair and sat down. Her mind is spinning faster than a Puma's wheels in full throttle. She needs some breathing space.
"Orders, Commander?" Boris, while suffering from similar effects he decided to pull back His Commander into reality after waiting five long minutes.
Pulling herself together, Katyusha begun to give orders in her characteristic calm and controlled manner. "Boris, put the ship in alert one, Helm, set a course for Asguard and Kika,"
"Yes Commander?" The ships AI, who is modeled after a shy young Showa-era Japanese girl popped up in the commander chair's holoprojector.
"Make sure this ship is ready for a battle." Katyusha words were short, but the weight it carried briefly made Kika to disregard her shy character and give a straight answer:
"She will be."
Acknowledging with a nod, Katyusha looked at the pitch black hole started to form in front of the ship.
She smiled. "Screw Armada." She thought. "This is where the action is."
Act 3: Never trust the demon
January/11/2662
Milky Way/Minos Wasteland/ Caestus system
Near planet Temerarus
Onboard the Batarian shuttle.
Chief scanned his surroundings. This shuttle is obviously used to transport slaves. The entire room is practically a large container with one stair leading to the Cockpit. Two of the Batarian are guarding the door and there is a machinegun up there to which is likely use to keep the slaves in line. Gadha, Nola and the pilot are in the cockpit while the rest of the crew are with him.
"Well Chief, let's begin phase two." Chief acknowledged Cortana's invitation and begun to walk for the stairs.
"Wait where are you going?" One of the guards grading the door immediately challenged the armored figure as he reached the top floor.
"I have to speak with Gadha." Cortana once again took up a responsibility of talking.
"Talk what?" Despite his attempt to look tough, chief can clearly see the fear in the Batarians four eyes.
"That is none of your business." The ice cold voice of Cortana quickly made the poor sod to reconsider his stand.
"Hey! I thought you're going to teach us how these weapons works." One of the slavers shouted from downstairs.
"I will do that as soon as I'm done with Gadha," Cortana replied. "In the meanwhile, take your picks."
Nodding to the reply, the slavers begun to scavenge through the weapon pile.
"They sure look excited." Cortana commented as they passed the door.
"Can't blame them, some of those weapons are nothing like they ever seen." Chief replied.
"Too bad they won't get the chance will they?" There was a bit of amusement in Cortana's voice.
Replying with a nod Chief approached Boka. Who was standing in what can be best described as armory of the shuttle.
Chief approached him. "Looks like you took a plasma rifle." Cortana commented in a friendly tone.
"Yeah well you still don't taught me how to uses these though." Boka was quick to point out.
"True. Here let me show you." With that Chief closed the distance as Cortana begun to instruct Boka.
"Now, hold the rifle like this. There is a small notch in the upper side of the handle and that is the trigger. This thing can get overheated very easily and when they do you don't…"
While Cortana kept Boka occupied, Cheif discreetly pulled out a spike he dislodged from one of the spike grenades. Boka didn't even had the time to realize what happen as the spike went through right through his brain via the neck joint.
Chief gently put down the body to make sure there is no loud noise and start heading for the cockpit.
The cockpit had a side by side arrangement with Gadha sitting on the co-pilot seat. Hearing footsteps, he turned and asked: "What are you doing here?"
"Came to see if our deal is still in one peace." Cortana replied shortly.
Gadha snorted. "Now why would I break a vow?" While his voice sounded as innocent as that of a little boy, his cocky smile told Chief that the thought has indeed crossed his mind.
"Stop playing innocent, it doesn't suite you." The annoyed tone in Cortana's voice made Gadha drop his smile as he turned for the controls again.
"Well I'm about the contact the Torment. You want me to add something?" Gadha asked.
"Ask him is there any heavy defense in the hanger. And if there is, what is the best way to neutralize them?" Chief told to Cortana.
"What kind of defense you guys installed in the hanger, and how we can naturalize them?" Cortana asked Gadha.
"Well there are two heavy automated turret on the roof but don't worry, I have their access code," Gadha replied with the guff smile. "I can disable them or can program their IFF to shoot anyone who is not going to join our little "revolution"."
"Cortana, we could use those." Chief said.
"I need those access codes. Just in case you don't have the funny idea of ripping me to shreds." Cortana said to Gadha.
"Well aren't you paranoid?" Gadha commented with an amused tone. "Anyway here, the last thing I want that you're blowing away my head because of a stray shot. Speaking of that, why the hell you're using the Alpha leader's omni-tool? Gadha was clearly surprised."
"I lost mine while putting on this armor." Cortana quickly handled the situation.
"I see." Gadha said. "Anyway I'm about to contact Torment…."
"Cortana, those guns makes the hanger a nice kill zone." Chief quickly pointed out to Cortana,
"You should tell them that you found something,"Cortana said. "It'll sure gather some crowds. The more people in the hanger the more manpower we will have on our side. And those turrets will also serve as a nice persuasion tool."
Humm. "I like that idea." Gadha said. Opening a channel to the Torment, he said, "This is Gadha, access code 3-Yak-Haramzada-2-Bodmise, I have found something, meet me at the hanger bay!" While the excitement in his voice was forged, it sure was convincing.
Turning off com. Gadha relaxed. "Well now that's over," he said, "anything else you want to say?"
"Yeah." Chief said on the outer com. Both and Gadha and the pilot was about to jump out of their chair but discovered that a pair of metal covered hands are wrapped tight on their necks.
"I don't deal with slavers." With that declaration, chief snapped both of their necks.
"Well that went well." Cortana commented.
Pushing aside the pilot's lifeless body, Chief put his left arm on the control panel. There was a faint golden shimmer as Cortana downloaded herself onto the control panel.
"We need vent the cargo bay." Chief said as he sat on the pilot's chair.
T"here is a good chance the Torment's sensor will pick it up," Cortana said with a concerned tone. "And besides, there is a much more efficient way available. Her voice suddenly recovered her usual cheerful tone."
"Let me guess, the cargo bay doubles as a gas chamber." It wasn't hard for Chief to figure it out, as something like that is pretty standard in this line of business.
"Yep and guess what, it works almost instantly." For a moment Chief found Cortana's tone to a bit too cheerful but decided to ignore.
"Do it." He said.
The people in the cargo bay were getting anxious. They already chosen their weapons and were eager to try them. But their teacher, an oversize armored Specter, has yet to come back from the cockpit. Some of the started to wonder what is going on.
Suddenly, they all started to feel their lungs burning like wildfire. Their hand became numb, their legs refused to take their weight. They all fell in the floor chocking for air.
It is difficult to say what they all though in their last seconds. Some though about taking vengeance, a few thought about their loved ones, while other wondered what did they do wrong and why they were betrayed. In 5 second however, all their thoughts faded away as their lifeless boys lays besides the weapons that they were so eager to train with.
Back onboard the Torment, Slavers of various races Asari, Batarians, Turians and even a few Korgans, gathered to see what did their first officer brought from the mysterious alien ship. When the shuttle entered the hanger bay, a lot of them rushed to the hatch to be the first to see the alien artifacts.
When the Door opened, they saw a 7 feet long armored figure, encased in a charred dark green armor with a white alien marking on its chest. It was wearing a green helmet that had an orange visor that has no sense of life in it. In the figures hand was a three barreled weapons which started to spin as soon as the door completely opened.
"Time to clean this ship." With that declaration, chief opened fire.
Codex Entry (Humans –Military- Terran Imperial Fleet): Miranda-class corvette.
Profile: (http)(:/ /)(media).(moddb).com(/)images/members/1/5 80/579031/Blackbird.(png) (Remove the brackets and spaces)
Length: 241 meters.
Height: 41 meters
Weight: 110 meters.
Displacement: 62,659 tonnes.
Aviation facilities: 1 small Hanger facilities.
Armaments: Block 1, ACW Era:
8x Archer Missile pad (38 missiles per pad).
2x Harpoon disruptor torpedo bay (12x missiles per bay)
3x 5 inch Mark 3 mod 2 Hull mounted Magnetic accelerator cannons.
90x HAVOC tactical nuclear mine.
Block 2 Imperial Era:
8x Javelin Missile pad (38 missiles per pad).
2x Rapier disruptor torpedo bay (12x missiles per bay)
3x 5 inch Mark 3 mod 2 Hull mounted Magnetic accelerator cannons.
60x MAYTHEM tactical antimatter mine.
Defenses: Block 1, ACW Era:
5x 50mm dual chemical reactionPoint-defense guns.
7x Agent V missile pad (150 missiles per pad).
Energy shielding.
Kinetic barriers.
Block 2 Imperial Era:
5x dual GaussPoint-defense guns .
7x Agent VI missile pad (150 missiles per pad).
Energy shielding.
Kinetic barriers.
Crew: 80 (1 If operated by an A.I.)
120 Marine & ODST.
Complement: 1 squadron of starfighters, 12 other crafts and 24 vehicles.
"The older Charon class frigates are plane suicidal. The refitted Paris class frigates are bloodthirsty. But the new Miranda-class corvettes, they are both suicidal and bloodthirsty. If you see a group of those heading you way, you better hope that the Forerunners heed your prayers."
-Unnamed Brute Fleetmaster.
Miranda-class was a radical departure from typical UNSC doctrine. While typically UNSC preferred to avoid close range confrontations and favored long range volley exchange, the Miranda-class was designed to the exact opposite. Designed to for close range assault, it job was to rush in, fire its ordnance and get the hell out before the enemy can react. The ship was simply put, overpowered, overgunned and was very hard to detect thanks to its numerous stealth futures. All these came at the cost of a hefty pricetag however, as one of these corvettes build cost were almost equal of that of a Peacetime Paris-class frigate. This with the radical concept initially led to the ships facing much criticism and opposition and only 10 were ordered. However, their excellent performance at the start of Operation Overdrive led to UNSC ignore the all the opposition and order full production. Thousands of these corvettes were produced throughout the war and afterwards and by the end of the war it practically replaced all other Corvettes and frigate in the frontline service. It heavy armament of three 5 inch MAC and disruptor torpedoes made it an excellent ship for countering enemy light warships and when fighting in group, they were lethal even to the biggest ships of the Covenant Navy. A popular attack move against capital ships was a group of 4 to 6 Miranda corvettes will punch a small hole in the ships defensive shields. Then 1 or 2 Miranda that were following will quickly close in and jettisons their complement of HAVOC mines over the hole with the mines onboard thrusters pushing them inside before the gap is closed. The explosion was usually strong enough to destroy a ship outright or at very least would knock it out of combat. The move was initially called "Pattern suicide" but later officially called "Attack move Defiant" after the lead ship of the strike group that invented it. A century after its debut, the Miranda is still in production and the most numerous ships in the Human Navy and currently active in every brunch of human military. A replacement of the ships has been on discussion for more than half a century but like the Banshee, it's large numbers and upgrade potential means its replacement isn't going to enter service anytime soon.
Notable Miranda-class corvette:
UNSC Miranda (K-1444): Lead ship of the class. Destroyed during the Battle of Reach.
UNSC/ITSS Defiant (K-234): Leader of the strike group Defiant. Decommissioned and now preserved as a museum Ship on planet Reach.
ITSS /SSV Krusk (K-752): First Block-II Miranda-class corvette. Joined the Alliance Navy during the rebellion. Destroyed while carrying Alliance dignitaries.
PS: Yes I reversed the location of the Mass relay obvious reasons.
And again please forgive my grammatical/spelling mistakes.
And finally,
Please R&R.