Chapter 25: Fural
Fural and the others had escaped the city, whoever was still left there wouldn't last much longer. Both the volume and strength of the Flood's forces had increased significantly. In the tight halls around High Charity's shell, things were much worse. The station was rapidly losing power, so it became nearly impossible to see anything, and there wasn't any room to manoeuvre whenever an attacker appeared.
The only reason they had survived as long as they had was due to the Mgalekgolo escort that Jors had acquired, who took up so much space that they ended up being a slight inconvenience to the group. The mountainous colonies of worms slowly moved at the front of the group, while Fural and Jors watched their backs. Rahg and his Kig-Yar stayed between them.
Distant screams and shrills came every few seconds as the parasite grew stronger. It seemed that with every being who was infected, every combat form they faced was harder to take down. Luckily they hadn't faced any more of the huge tank-like forms, Fural didn't think they would last at all if they did.
"Lots of movement ahead," Rahg warned them. "Can't tell if Covenant or Flood, could be both."
The Mgalekgolo pair sprinted ahead, the world shook with each step they took. A bone-chilling screech sounded ahead as Flood forms began to swarm the corridor. Nothing was coming up behind them, so Fural and Jors turned to help the Mgalekgolo. The Flood forms dodged the Mgalekgolo's beams, and weaved between cover as if they weren't mindless monsters.
Whatever voice had spoken to Fural, and had interrupted Truth's broadcasts, must have been some kind of entity controlling them. The Flood on Alpha Halo were nothing like this. The infected Sangheili and Jiralhanae fought as if they were still living, still normal. The two Mgalekgolo blocked incoming fire from the Flood's weapons with the shields on their arms, Fural and Jors took cover at their sides and fired into the swarm.
Infection forms popped, carrier forms exploded, and combat forms fell. The corridor ahead was a mess, and it would have been impossible to get through without the Mgalekgolo. A few infection forms made it past the Mgalekgolo, and Fural slammed his foot into one with enough force to make it pop.
Jors frantically fired at the slithering infection forms as they made their way across the ground, the way he moved made him seem panicked. He hadn't fought the Flood on Alpha Halo, so this was all new to the pilot, but he managed to destroy the infection forms before they could get close to him.
One infection form made it past Fural, and jumped toward one of the defenceless Kig-Yar. One of the Kig-Yar had already been infected, one whose condition had been rapidly declining due to Rahg's refusal to put them down, and Fural didn't want to let another one get infected. He reached out and grabbed the infection form just before it could touch the Kig-Yar, and he dug his fingers into its sides. He slammed the thing into the ground, causing it to explode and spray him with its viscous blood. Thankfully due to his shields, none of it actually got on him.
The constant hum of the Mgalekgolo's beams firing had been burned into Fural's brain; he could still hear them even after they had killed all of the Flood in the corridor and stopped shooting. Rahg rushed up to the Mgalekgolo's side and used his targeting headgear to scout the way ahead.
"There's lots of heat signatures ahead," Rahg told them. "But I don't see any movement. No Flood or Jiralhanae."
"I'll take what we can get," Jors sighed.
"Hold on," Fural said. "What are the other heat signatures?"
"I'm not sure," Rahg said slowly. "It… Looks like a Yanme'e hive, but I don't see any Yanme'e. There shouldn't even be a hive down here."
In one of Truth's broadcasts, he had mentioned something about the Flood turning High Charity into one of their hives. He didn't know that the Prophet may have been talking about a literal Flood hive. This is so much worse than what happened on Alpha Halo.
"Is there any other way around?" Fural asked.
"Yeah, but going around will take too long," Jors said. "The longer we stay on this station the harder it will be to get out. Besides, we can handle a few Yanme'e."
"It's not Yanme'e, Jors," Fural said. "We're entering a Flood hive."
"Wherever we're going, let's stop waiting around and go there," Rahg interjected.
"We need to go through it," Jors said.
"Then I will take the lead," Fural said. He stepped past the pair of Mgalekgolo and drew his sword. "No flesh can withstand my blades."
There was a silent nod of agreement between Jors and Rahg, and the two Mgalekgolo blankly stared at him. They didn't have faces, so they were incapable of expression, but Fural could tell they were waiting for him to go ahead. Fural slowly moved through the corridor ahead that led through the Flood hive.
Though the lights were out, Fural's sword illuminated the area around them and allowed them to see. When he looked up, he saw what Rahg was talking about. Huge masses of what looked like dead flesh covered the ceiling, and coated the decorative pillars holding the place up. When Fural squinted he could see arms, legs, and internal organs melded with the mounds of flesh. A pair of Unggoy legs stuck out from one of the masses, and a Kig-Yar's head was visible inside another.
On Alpha Halo, Fural had seen the Flood gathering piles of uninfected bodies, though back then there wasn't time to figure out what they were doing that for. Now he understood, though he still didn't know the real purpose for spreading the biomass. He preferred to keep it that way, he didn't want to learn more disgusting things about the Flood.
"None of this was here when I came through here," Jors whispered as the group slowly moved through the hive.
"The Flood spread fast," Fural said. "And with all the fighting, there's lots of bodies getting left behind."
Every corridor they turned down had progressively gotten worse. More heaps of biomass lined the walls, and even the floor. Down one corridor there wasn't even any of High Charity's architecture visible. The dead flesh squelched under Fural's feet with each step, which made him not want to keep moving. He felt like he was going to throw up, only he didn't have anything to throw up. He was glad he hadn't eaten in a while.
"Are you sure this is the only way?" Rahg asked, Fural could tell in his voice that the Kig-Yar was just as uneasy as him.
"Like I said, it's the fastest way," Jors said. "At least that I know of."
"What about the Conviction?" Fural asked. "If things are this bad here, how do you know that they haven't gotten your Phantom?"
"I left a crew to defend it," Jors said. "Some of my best. Last I heard they were doing fine."
"And when was the last you heard from them?"
"Just after we got off the transport tube."
"Alright… Let's just hope they're still doing fine."
The next door opened to a concourse that had once been teeming with life. Now it was pitch black, and covered in heaps of biomass. Fural could see bodies that hadn't been fully absorbed into the masses, bodies of Sangheili, Kig-Yar, and Unggoy that were all rotting and falling apart. He could also hear the sound of gunfire in the adjacent rooms to the concourse, where survivors continued to battle the Flood.
It had been a while since Fural had last seen a living Jiralhanae. If they had all already fled the station with the help of the Prophets, that didn't surprise him. The beasts had run like the cowards they were, and left the Sangheili with the mess that Fural assumed Truth created. There was still no justification for this, maybe Truth had simply gone insane for some wild reason.
The sound of plasma weapons firing came closer, and another door to the concourse opened. Two Sangheili Minors, and a Major backed through as they fired at a horde of approaching Flood forms, Fural could see that the Major's shields were down. Before he could do anything to help, something shot through the Major's head, killing him instantly. Another Flood form that Fural hadn't seen before pushed through the door and lunged at the two Minors. The creature was simply a mound of flesh with short stubby legs, and a huge tail that had glowing shards of heated bone sticking out of it.
Jors and Fural blasted the thing with their plasma rifles as it tackled one of the Minors, the creature seemed like it could take much more fire than most other Flood forms as it shrugged off most of their shots. The thing only began to melt apart once their rifles reached the stage of overheating, and Rahg had to finish it off with two shots from his beam rifle.
"Stay down!" Fural shouted to the two Minors as the Mgalekgolo fired through the door, cutting the rest of the approaching Flood forms apart with their plasma beams.
When the area was clear, the two Minors slowly stood up and stared at Fural and his group. They seemed surprised to see any other survivors, let alone a group with a pair of Mgalekgolo following them around.
"Thank you," one of the Minors said. "We heard there was a ship here, so we wanted to get it and leave this place. Were you heading for it too?"
"That 'ship' is my Phantom," Jors said as he lowered his plasma rifles and let them cool down. "The Undiminishing Conviction."
"Do you have room to take us?" the other Minor asked. "We need to get out of here!"
"Yes, there's room for us all," Jors said. "We need to get moving quick, if you knew about the Phantom then the Flood will know as well."
"The Flood are mindless zombies, they don't know anything," the Minor said.
"That simply isn't true," Fural growled.
"This is a great argument to have once we're out of here," Jors said. "We need to go, now."
Fural stared down at the dead Major. He had been shot by a projectile produced by a Flood form, which meant his body was slowly getting infected. In a few minutes, the Major would be back on his feet with the intent to kill them all. Fural approached the Major and ignited his sword again, he really didn't want to do this but he had no choice. The two Minors stepped back and stared in shock as Fural furiously cut the dead Major's body apart, into too many pieces for him to be brought back as a combat form.
"What the hell are you doing?" one of the Minors asked.
"Making sure he stays dead," Fural breathed. He stepped away when the Major was little more than a pile of flesh.
"Come on," Jors said, "the hangar is just through here."
The door slid open as they approached, and there they faced the hangar where they could finally escape. Surprisingly, the lights were still on in the hangar, so they could see everything that was happening.
The Undiminishing Conviction sat on the other side of the hangar deck, where a Kig-Yar and an Unggoy were left defending it. Two more Unggoy rushed toward the Conviction as they were being chased by a horde of infection forms. The Unggoy who was already on the ship commandeered a plasma cannon and was blasting every Flood form in the hangar before it could get anywhere close.
"I was expecting your crew to be a little larger," Fural said.
"It was larger," Jors sighed. "They must have gotten infected."
Through the hangar door Fural could see the battle still raging between the ships of High Charity's fleet. Cruisers and carriers fired on each other with plasma beams and energy projectors, plasma torpedoes graciously weaved through the ships, and fighters swarmed around the station in what was quite possibly the largest dogfight of all time.
Fural wondered if the Flood had gotten onto any of those ships, or if it was still just the Jiralhanae and Sangheili fighting each other. If the latter were true, he wondered how many of them even knew what was happening on the station.
Fural stowed his plasma rifle, and grabbed his carbine from his back. He, Jors, and the Mgalekgolo sprang into the fight. Infection forms and combat forms leaped at them from every angle, but together they were able to take each one out. More combat forms came from the direction Fural had come from, and they were vicious as they fought back. The Flood definitely knew that they were there to take the Phantom away.
"Get the Kig-Yar on board first!" Fural shouted.
Rahg and his Kig-Yar rushed for the Phantom, the Unggoy gunner helped Fural and the others hold off the approaching Flood. The Kig-Yar that had been infected fell over just before they reached the Phantom, and they rolled along the floor writing in pain. It was obvious they weren't going to make it from the beginning. Fural could see the realisation that he was right in Rahg's eyes. As Fural turned back to the approaching Flood, he heard the sound of Rahg's beam rifle firing, though it wasn't the approaching Flood that he had just shot.
"Alright, let's go!" Jors shouted.
The two Minors sprinted to the Phantom and climbed in next, followed by the two Unggoy and the other Kig-Yar in Jors's crew. Jors rushed in next, and then Fural jumped through the doors after him. They weren't out yet, but being in the Phantom was enough to make Fural feel relieved.
Jors rushed into the cockpit and took control of the Phantom, he activated the gravity lift and brought it to the Mgalekgolo so they could enter as well. It would be a significantly tight fit, but they weren't going to leave anyone behind if they could help it. But before the Mgalekgolo could enter, one of them suddenly and violently exploded. Fried worms and shards of metal from its armour showered the hangar.
"Rocket launcher!" Jors shouted.
Jors deployed the Phantom's plasma cannon and fired into the group of approaching Flood. The other Mgalekgolo turned away from the gravity lift and let out a loud, angry roar. The bond between Mgalekgolo pairs wasn't something Fural understood well, but he assumed it was something similar to how he and Dom were. The Mgalekgolo was no doubt furious at the death of its brother.
Another rocket flew at the Phantom, and Jors carefully dodged it. The Mgalekgolo rushed into the swarm of approaching Flood and began to tear them apart with its sheer strength. It slammed its shield into the rocket launcher wielding combat form, and severed its body in half.
"We need to go now!" Fural shouted. "That Mgalekgolo isn't going to come with us!"
"But I promised them I would help them escape!" Jors shouted back.
More Flood broke into the hangar and jumped onto the Mgalekgolo, they began reaching into the exposed parts of its armour and ripping the worms out of it. It managed to fire its beam cannon one last time before it fell apart, and the rest of the worms scattered around the hangar before the Flood could kill all of them.
"Go!" Fural shouted again.
Jors didn't object this time. He sealed the Phantom and pulled out of the hangar, though they weren't able to finally leave High Charity behind just yet. The Phantom flew close to the station to avoid getting shot by one of the cruisers, and to avoid the fighters swarming around the station. The Phantom's systems had no way to discern which ships belonged to the Sangheili and which ones belonged to the Jiralhanae.
"Approaching the Blade of Ages," Jors said. "According to the Huragok, the ship and the docking bay are free of the parasite for the time being."
"Then we have little time," Fural said. "Get us aboard and prepare the launch sequence."
The Phantom approached the Blade of Ages's hangar deck, which was opened by the Huragok to let them in. Jors set the Phantom down in the hangar and rushed out, Fural and Rahg followed him to the control room. They didn't have time to tell the other survivors about what was actually going on.
Fural took his place in the command chair while Jors reached navigation. Rahg monitored the sensors and the ship's stealth systems.
"Can you believe it…" Jors said frustratedly. "We don't have clearance to leave."
The door to the control room opened, and an Unggoy stepped through. Fural usually had a tough time telling Unggoy apart, but he could tell that this was the one who had been manning the plasma cannon and gunning down Flood in the hangar. Jors turned when he heard the Unggoy enter.
"Zimling!" Jors shouted. "Take the weapons station!"
Zimling? This is the Unggoy Jors told me about? According to Zimling's file, he had been trained in the special operations division of the Covenant military. But he wore the harness of an Unggoy Minor. There was no time to question it.
"Do you have a plan?" Fural asked Jors.
"I always have a plan," Jors replied.
Zimling rushed to the weapons station and eagerly accessed the console. He gave Jors a thumbs up. The way he moved was unsettling. After everything that had just happened, Zimling seemed to be having fun.
"Weapons ready!" Zimling shouted excitedly.
"Destroy the docking clamps, and the tube," Jors said. "I'll pull us out of here."
Zimling eagerly nodded. Fural felt the command deck vibrate as the corvette's weapons fired. Rounds from the ship's plasma cannons burned the docking tube apart, and the beam emitter severed each of the clamps holding the ship in place. The ship began to move just as it was freed.
"Engaging stealth systems…" Rahg said. "Uh… This isn't good…"
"What now?" Fural asked.
"The ship does not have active camouflage," Rahg said nervously. "We can mask ourselves from enemy sensors, but they can still see us if they look hard enough."
"It'll have to do," Fural said. "Just get us out of here."
The Blade of Ages turned away from High Charity, and flew toward the battling fleet. Fural's anxiety worsened as they got closer to the fleet. He still couldn't tell which ships belonged to who, but any one of them could fire on his little corvette and obliterate them all. All it took was for one of them to see them.
"We're gonna have to get close," Jors said. "Once we're clear of the fleet we can jump to slipspace."
Fural closed his eyes as they passed a group of cruisers firing at each other. A trio of Seraphs zipped past the Blade of Ages, another squadron of Banshees flew uncomfortably close to them. The anticipation was somehow worse than what he felt onboard the station. If even one cruiser spotted them, it could blow them out of the sky for good.
"Almost there," Jors said, gritting his teeth.
Alarms began to blare on the command deck. One of the cruisers broke free of the battle and was now pursuing them. It launched a squadron of Seraphs to intercept them before they could jump to slipspace.
"We need to jump! Now!" Fural shouted.
"I know, I'm working on it!" Jors shouted back.
The ship shook as it took fire from the fighters' plasma cannons. The cruiser got close to them and fired on them with its pulse lasers. Their shields wouldn't hold for long, and if they tried to shoot back they would be dead.
"Rahg, disengage stealth systems," Fural ordered. "We need more power to our shields."
"On it, Blademaster," Rahg replied.
Fural watched the cruiser's torpedo silos light up as they prepared to fire. A salvo of torpedoes launched from the cruiser, and were on their way to intercept them. Each torpedo was like a bright flare, a tiny red sun on its way to destroy them all.
"Jors!" Fural shouted.
Their surroundings disappeared for a brief moment. They had entered slipspace, and exited again several thousand kilometres away from High Charity. They could still see the station behind them, and the raging battle between the ships of its fleet. The pursuing cruiser and plasma torpedoes were nowhere to be found.
"Are we clear?" Fural asked.
"We should be," Jors said. "I'll plot another jump to take us out of here."
"Blademaster!" Rahg shouted. "Picking up impulse drive signatures!"
"Gods dammit," Fural cursed. "They're still following us!"
The ten Seraphs that had launched from the cruiser appeared at their sides. Whoever was chasing them was very quick. They opened fire at the Corvette's rear in an attempt to break through their shields and disable their engines.
"That cruiser will be here soon," Fural said. "And at this rate, those fighters will take out our slipspace drive before we can jump again."
"Permission to blow them up?" Zimling asked. The Unggoy still wasn't concerned at all about their situation.
"No," Fural said. "Firing means we need to lower our shields. We cannot take that chance."
"I'll deal with them," Jors said. "I can take them out."
"Are you sure?"
"You know who you're talking to. Just do as I say, when I say."
Fural nodded, and Jors left the control room. He had no idea what Jors was planning to do, one Seraph against ten was pretty much suicide. But Jors was a good Phantom pilot, it wouldn't be surprising if he was a good Seraph pilot as well. Fural accessed the ship's internal cameras, and he watched Jors enter the hangar deck and clear everyone out. The pilot climbed into one of the landed Seraphs, and he wasted no time in flying out of the hangar.
Jors swung around the side of the Blade of Ages and took out one of the Covenant Seraphs in a surprise attack before they realised they were in any danger. Every one of the Seraphs broke off and chased after him. It was hard to keep track of the fast moving fighters as they moved through the empty space around the Blade of Ages, even when there wasn't anything else nearby.
Jors pulled a dangerous turn in his Seraph that could have easily torn the ship apart if it were done in atmosphere. He managed to take out another Seraph while avoiding most of their fire. He swung back toward the Blade of Ages with the Seraphs on his tail, letting them shoot him and damage his shields.
"Now can we shoot back?" Zimling asked.
"Yes, just make sure not to hit Jors," Fural said.
The Blade of Ages's shields lowered, and Zimling fired the ship's beam emitter. The Unggoy was able to slice two of the Seraphs in half before they returned fire on the corvette. Three of the Seraphs released their fuel rod payloads and destroyed a section at the front of the corvette.
"What did they just hit?" Fural asked.
"Forward thruster," Rahg answered. "Not essential right now, but we will need that fixed eventually."
"The Huragok can handle it," Fural said.
Jors destroyed another Seraph. The enemy was down to five. Rahg's station sent out an alert, and Fural ordered Zimling to deactivate the ship's weapons. The corvette's shields were brought up just before another attack from the Seraphs could hit.
"Rahg!" Fural shouted.
"High velocity stream detected," Rahg said, his voice panicked.
In the next second, the Covenant cruiser reappeared next to them. It wasted no time firing on the corvette with its pulse lasers. It fired on Jors too, but he was able to dodge a few of the beams. His fighter's shields were almost down, he would be dead if he lost them.
"Fural, I'm going to do something very dangerous, but it will take care of our fighter problem," Jors said through the ship's comms.
"What is it?" Fural asked, sitting up in his seat.
"Lower the shields on the hangar doors," Jors said. "And get ready to bring them back up the instant I tell you to. If you're even half a second too late, this won't work."
"I got it," Fural brought up the hangar door controls on his console. The doors were already open, but he hovered his finger over the button to close them.
He watched Jors bring his Seraph around the corvette's bow, the Covenant Seraphs following him very closely. Jors aimed his Seraph at the entrance to the hangar in the corvette's side, and the Covenant Seraphs followed him in nearly a straight line.
"3… 2… 1…," Jors counted down. "Now!"
Fural pressed the button as Jors's Seraph flew straight through the ship, entering one side of the hangar and leaving the other. The hangar shielding cycled, and came back up as the Covenant Seraphs followed him. The entire ship shook as three of the Seraphs exploded inside the hangar, and the other two slammed into the shield outside. The camera in the hangar deck went offline before Fural could see the extent of the damage.
"Alright, bring them down again, I'm coming back," Jors said.
Jors landed in the hangar, and made his way back to the control room as they continued to hold off the cruiser's attacks. Fural was surprised to see his friend acting like nothing had just happened as he returned to the navigation station.
"Jump calculations are complete," Jors said in between deep breaths. "Let's get the hell out of here."
The Blade of Ages entered slipspace once more just as the cruiser fired another salvo of torpedoes, and this time they would be away from High Charity for good.
Fural and Jors stood on the hangar deck and stared at the damage. Destroyed Seraph parts were scattered all over the hangar, and floor and the walls were bent and scorched. Easy to Drift was already working on repairing the place, but the lone Huragok wasn't going to get much progress done on its own.
"Hell of an idea," Fural said.
"It just came to me in the moment," Jors replied.
Fural sighed and sat down in the corner of the hangar deck. For the first time since Jors was kidnapped by Sparatus, Fural actually had a moment to rest. He could go to sleep, but after the nightmare he experienced on High Charity he really didn't want to. Even facing off against that cruiser was a nightmare, he hadn't expected to survive.
It was all thanks to Jors that they had gotten out of both situations. Without him, Fural would have faced the same fate as his brother. Now they were on the run from the Covenant, something Fural never expected to happen in his lifetime. But at this point, the Covenant was no more. Without the Sangheili, there won't ever be a true Covenant again.
"I'm not really good at this stuff, but… If you hadn't been there, I would be dead," Fural said softly. "You really saved all of our lives."
"Just doing what needed to be done," Jors said. "And you're my friend. My brother. You don't need to thank me."
Fural nodded and eventually stood up. He approached the destroyed Seraphs and inspected their wreckage. He didn't know what he was looking for, but he just needed something to distract himself. It was hard to tell due to the scorch marks and the crumpled hulls, but they were all Morsam-patterns, similar to the ones on the Blade of Ages.
Fural found one that was more intact than the others, and he climbed on top of it. The remains of the cockpit's hatch were melted into the hull, so Fural used his energy sword to cut his way inside. He was taken aback by the site of the pilot's charred remains. It wasn't a Jiralhanae inside, it was a Sangheili. They had been pursued by a Sangheili cruiser, and each Seraph had been flown by a Sangheili.
"Jors!" Fural shouted as the pilot was on his way out of the hangar.
"What is it?" Jors asked when he turned around.
"These ships…" Fural said. "They weren't Jiralhanae ships. Sangheili attacked us."
Jors made his way over to the destroyed Seraph and climbed onto it to look inside. The pilot looked at the charred Sangheili corpse in disbelief and disgust. Why did they attack us? Fural wondered.
"They must have thought there were Flood on this ship," Jors said, answering the question Fural hadn't even asked out loud.
"Why didn't they at least try to hail us? To know for sure," Fural asked.
"I don't know…" Jors sighed. "And it's too late to find out now."
Jors climbed off of the fighter's remains and made his way back to the door. The pilot had gone through too much to worry about why they were being pursued by Sangheili, they both had. Fural silently followed him and left the Huragok to continue cleaning up the mess.
"Let's just continue on our way," Jors said. "We must leave this all behind us."
Fural hadn't even been able to leave Installation 04 behind him, there was no way he was going to be able to let any of this go. But either way, there was no use in worrying. It was only another question that Fural would never find the answer to.
The Blade of Ages exited slipspace at the edge of a system nearly a day after Jors had made a blind jump. They were very far from High Charity now, too far for anyone to have tracked them. Despite all the time it had been, Fural still couldn't bring himself to sleep. He still hadn't gotten over his nightmares from the experience on Alpha Halo.
But in that time he had gotten to know the other survivors. The two Sangheili Minors were named Endo and Kress 'Lethumee, and were brothers. They were some of the freshest recruits in the Covenant military that Fural had seen, they hadn't even gotten the chance to fight humans yet.
The two Unggoy that they had rescued were named Dunyap, and Jinjin, which was a little confusing because Fural already knew an Unggoy named Dunyap who died on Alpha Halo. And when he asked Zimling why he didn't have his SpecOps harness, the Unggoy's response was that he left it at home. Fural didn't ask the Unggoy anymore questions after that.
The Kig-Yar civilians were huddled in the ship's crew quarters, and Rahg had been tending to them since the escape. They were lucky to make it out with as many lives as they did, and there had been no more infections since the one Kig-Yar had gotten wounded.
Nobody knew what was going to happen next. Jors's idea was to find an uncharted world and settle down for a while. Fural partly agreed with him, as they all needed a break after what they just went through. But he didn't want to settle down for long. He was extremely angry at what the Prophet of Truth had just done to the Covenant. It was his fault that the Flood invaded, and that the Covenant was now completely fractured.
Fural just wished he could have gotten to join the fighting at Erde-Tyrene, which was his entire purpose for commissioning the Blade of Ages and having Jors build the crew in the first place. Why does this always happen to me? he wondered.
The Blademaster sat in the command chair trying so desperately not to fall asleep. Only Jors and Kress remained in the control room, as Kress had taken Rahg's position watching the sensors. Zimling had left to go to sleep since there was no reason for them to need weapons. They were completely in the clear, which was what Fural thought for a moment.
"'Nasamai," Kress said. "Something is jamming our sensors."
"Ugh, what is it now?" Fural asked.
"I've just lost navigational control as well," Jors said. "Working on getting it back."
"It looks like the ship's systems are… Fighting off a virus?" Kress said, confused.
"Any idea how that got aboard?" Fural asked.
"No clue."
Fural sighed. Just when he thought they were finally alone, something else had to happen. At first Fural thought it was the Sangheili cruiser that had somehow sent a virus to his ship, but that wasn't something they usually attacked with; and why was it just now triggering? It couldn't have been the Flood either, unless there was another thing that Fural didn't know about them.
"Hold on, I've just regained control of the sensors," Kress said.
"Navigation is back as well," Jors said.
"Weird… The virus is gone now. It just disappeared."
"Jors, where the hell are we?" Fural asked.
Jors sent the data on the system to Fural's command console. It was labelled as C-125, an uncharted system in the Covenant fringe space. Only one of the worlds there was habitable, the fourth world from the sun. Maybe it isn't as uncharted as we thought.
"Plot a course for C-125-4," Fural said. "Scan the surface as well. Something has to be there that wants its presence known."
"Understood," Jors said. "It will be a while before we get there."
"I know," Fural sighed. "I'll remain here."
Jors nodded. He and Kress left the control room, and Fural continued to watch the monitors. The peace and quiet was starting to feel odd and unsettling. After everything he had just gone through, it was challenging to adjust. He wondered what Jors and the others were feeling, but he didn't want to ask. He sighed again, and continued to try not to fall asleep as the Blade of Ages approached the 'uncharted' world.
Fural and everyone who knew how to fight left the Blade of Ages on the Undiminishing Conviction, and they landed in a clearing on the planet. They were in the middle of a vast forest, the only landmark of which was a very tall mountain which was at the very centre of the continent.
"Keep watch by the Conviction," Fural ordered the others. "I'll take a look around."
Fural left the landing site and searched the area around them. It had been a while since the last time Fural was in a forest, or even on real ground for that matter. The last time he had stepped foot on real ground was when he killed his brother.
The forest was oddly calming, and the air felt much different than it did on High Charity. It was so much more fresh, and cold. Gone was the smell of the city, and the distinct artificially freshened smell of starships. Being in an actually natural environment was just what Fural needed.
The sun was setting in the distance as Fural searched through the foliage. He was on his way toward the mountain, as he figured that whoever or whatever was on the planet would be there. He could tell he was right when he heard the rustling of movement in the foliage, which he could tell wasn't from an animal.
Fural reached for his carbine and turned toward the noise. He was face to face with another Sangheili, one he had never seen before. He wore the harness of a Field General that seemed to be covered in mud and patches of purple paint. He could see in the General's rough face that they had been there for a long time. The two aimed their weapons at each other, and they both lowered them slowly at the same time.
Fural was thankful that he wasn't facing down a Jiralhanae, but this Sangheili was odd. And their simple presence there was odd as well. Fural for sure had a lot of questions, but it seemed the General had questions as well.