Inside the base, Chief, Alyosha and their respective teams waited for Snow White, Linda and the Rookie, one private Johnathan Doherty, to start explaining the situation. The eerily mistfiying beauty of the Pilgrim Nikke seemed to have taken a hold of a couple of male Marines, who were staring. Chief, Sam and Will, meanwhile, remained composed. Snow's auburn, glimmering eyes swept over the present soldiery, then stopped and widened as her gaze locked onto Pinne. She even mumbled her name, "Pinne...?" which caused the blonde shotgunner to slightly twitch, surprised.
"I-Is something wrong?" The girl asked awkwardly, cradling her shotgun. Snow White thought to herself that if it was Pinne, she would probably remember her. If not her name, then her face and gear at least. The deadpan face Snow White wore was probably unnerving enough to the Product 23 as it was, plus the fact that most Prod. 23s looked alike, being Mass Production models...
So, Snow, shook her head, "No... You just remind me of someone I knew..."
"If I had a credit for every time I heard that from a Pilgrim, I'd have two credits," Pinne chuckled awkwardly, garnering a few laughs from her comrades, some of which were scrutinizing Snow White right back. The Pilgrim hummed and furrowed her brows, but decided against pressing the matter further, simply turning to the Master Chief and Commander Harris.
She spoke, "I'll admit it's good to see more of Linda's and the Rookie's friends up and about."
"Yeah," John replied, "Thanks for the rescue back when we were fighting Chatterbox, by the way."
Waving it off, the girl told him, "Don't mention it. We're all after the same goal here..." then hummed and scratched her chin, "I know you were looking for me. Decided it was better not to lead any of you on a wild goose chase while the situation in the North is developing. I came here to ask for your help after witnessing firsthand how capable all of you are at fighting. And after Linda vouched for all of you."
John looked over to Linda and gently tilted his head to the right, as if asking Linda a question. Snow White, meanwhile, made mental notes to herself in regards to each of the Spartans' minute movements. Each twitch and micro-shift in their position tended to denote their emotions where faces concealed by helmets couldn't. Gripping the dog tags wrapped around her neck as she watched the Chief, she could feel the strength and experience of the man.
The Sniper beside her shrugged, "I merely told her about our work."
"Even that's enough to start up a legend for a Pilgrim, eh?" Alyosha snorted. He looked over to the Rookie, who was sat with the Marines and exchanging small-talk with them. The ODST turned to face them and sat down beside Snow again, while the young woman was scrutinizing them again. The good Commander, however, decided to be smart and push things forward, "So, what do you need our help for?"
"... As I'm sure you've all probably guessed, Chatterbox is here," The Pilgrim replied as she straightened up, leaning her back against the wall and crossing her arms to her chest. She told them, "I'm gonna ambush it and get some info out of it before I put it down for good, but I'll need the help of you and your Nikkes to do this, provided you want to remove one of the enemy's assets from the field."
She was more military-minded, thankfully. She did seem to have a want to remove it more out of a personal gain than anything, too, but nobody commented on it. Niner, however, stated, "We'll be able to take it down, though if I can suggest the Chief and his Spartans stay in the rear..." only to get a look from them. She raised her hands defensively, stating, "We've nearly lost you once, sir..."
"A fluke, Niner," The Spartan shot back, then sighed and looked over to Snow White. The girl cracked a slight smile that she hid quite well behind the collar of her armored poncho. The other girls of LUCKY STRIKE chuckled at the sight of Niner being a lil' embarrassed thanks to her concerns, but she was less than happy to be joked about. Snow sighed, then looked to the Spartan.
Chief and Alyosha exchanged a quick glance, before the Commander said, "It'd be nice to get a Smart Rapture out of the way, honestly. Bastard broke my leg a while back, so it'd be good to return the favor if you're sure we can trap him," as he tugged at his collar and wrist cuffs, making sure his uniform and winter jacket were on straight. Snow nodded as she looked over to Linda.
"We've been tracking it for long enough to know its movements," The redhead sharpshooter replied, "Suggest we leave the Rookie behind with the Marines to keep this base safe, though. You don't mind a little escort, right, doctor?"
Halsey shook her head, then replied evenly, "I would appreciate the continued company of UNSC Staff indeed. If you truly seek to hunt this creature, however, may I ask that you bring me samples of its form so I can study them and see what makes it tick? Any form of supposedly semi-intelligent creature that can mimic human speech could potentially prove to be a boon in understanding and defeating these things."
"I'll make sure not to chop more off its body than I need to," Snow replied as she hefted her gear. She told them, "We oughta move now, before the trail I have goes cold."
"Right," Chief replied as he and the rest of his squad immediately started packing their kit. Nikke and Spartan alike prepared to depart, weapons at the ready as they moved out with Snow. The white-haired woman looked to Halsey and the other normal humans they were leaving behind, then sighed and nodded to them. Doctor Halsey, meanwhile, made a mental note to examine Snow White if she was to come back with the Spartans.
As they walked out into the snowy landscape in battle formation, Rapi commented, "We've only met one Pilgrim before, as I'm sure you've figured out from your interaction with Pinne," which caused the heavy-weapon-toting sharpshooter to cock her head back and look at the young woman. The Pilgrim Nikke nodded, with Rapi adding, "Her name was Scarlet. Do you know her?"
Snow cracked a smile, "You met the drunk swordsman, then. Must've been on a good day."
"She actually kept me and Kelly safe," Sam shot back as they marched. The Pilgrim nodded, giving a gentle thumbs-up with her machine hand. She looked over to Chief and the Lucky Strikes as they and the Counters moved up. She had wanted to comment on the fact that the latter team's commander was moving with them as well, but it was perhaps a little too late to try and convince the unarmored human he wasn't really suited to being in the middle of a fight.
Sammy, the Nikke, added, "It's nice to know that the Pilgrims are all they're made out to be and a lil' more, heh..."
"Agreed," Pinne smiled. She looked over to Snow with a hint of familiarity and said to her, "Now, if only I knew why all of'em look a lil' scared of me whenever we meet, I might be able to change that, heh..." which enjoyed success as a joke due to the fact her comrades all burst into laughter at that. The only ones who really didn't were the Spartans, all of which were maintaining a stoic attitude.
Noting this was the case, the Nikkes set up in combat formation as they advanced, with forward scouts, shooters and everything. Delta walked up to Snow White and Linda and said, "We can probably set up an ambush with a good base of fire farther ahead and snipe at Chatterbox when it arrives, though we may need a distraction..." which got both women to look at her. Linda nodded, then turned to Chief and made a 'come hither' move.
Chief joined them up front and stated, "I heard. I, Will and Sam will be the distraction. When he comes after us, lay into him with everything you've got."
"How fast can you all sprint?" Snow asked as she started doing a thorough check of her equipment.
Chief shrugged, "Fifty miles per hour at minimum," and Snow whistled at that. Good enough, it seemed, good enough for the distraction. He asked, "Snow White, was it?" and got a nod. He told her, "The Commander is going to be in the rear line with you, Linda and Delta. Keep him safe," before looking back at a seemingly-disgruntled Commander Harriss. He took a step back to join the man and told him, "Safety first, sir."
"I know, Chief..." He sighed, "I know. I just genuinely wish I wasn't useless beyond giving a few commands."
"Organizational skills are just as important as having combat prowess," Chief shot back as they walked up-hill. He murmured, "It's why I never accepted being promoted straight to Admiral. Or, well... One of the reasons. I'm good at maintaining squad-level tactics, not fleet-wide..." and that got a snort out of Alyosha. He looked to the Spartan with a little awe.
"Didn't know you were set to become an Admiral in the UNSC, Chief," Layla quipped, smiling, "Feeling a little under-dressed as your personal guards now."
Despite the muted, distant chuckles of some of his comrades, Chief waved the quip off as if telling her to keep it on the down-low. Pinne shot back, "Wait 'till Kelly hears about this one, heh. Honestly, I think the Admiral bars would suit him well... If he wore'em over his armor," and that got a lot of laughs out of the gang, with even the other Spartans busting out in short laughs before regaining their composure.
Chief rolled his eyes, while Cortana, who had so far been chuckling in his head, told him, "It's a rather cute image to think about. Y'know, you wearing your rank bars over your shoulder..." to which Chief didn't reply. He had refused Lord Hood for a multitude of reasons, the aforementioned zero desire to command Naval forces included. He also just... Didn't want to do more paperwork than he was already being forced to do.
Cortana, meanwhile, hummed as she felt a little something shift in Rapi's NIMPH. She connected to the girl and spoke, "Huh. Damn, I can actually connect to Nikkes on their network..." which caused Rapi to jump a little. Cortana told her, "Relax, Rapi. You okay? I saw you looking a bit funny at Snow White just now..." while she was working in the background to see what made the young Nikke tick. And indeed, there was a small, but noticeable shift in her NIMPH whenever the girl looked at Snow White. Almost as if...
Nah, no way... There was something different about her NIMPH, alright, but, really? To recognize her?
Rapi replied mentally, "I'm alright. Just concerned, is all. Please warn me the next time you do that, because this feels really weird..." Though her tone sounded far less monotone. Far more surprised. It was almost as if a different version of Rapi was talking to Cortana via the digital mind network. She added, "By the way, can you do this for every Nikke?"
Cortana smirked, "Perhaps," only to see the girl turn her head toward them. A short chuckle later, the girl was working even harder.
She wondered, however, how Kelly and co. were faring, considering they were probably out and about again.
Flood Containment Zone
... Not particularly good. Kelly was not doing that good, honestly.
The deeper she pushed into the area, the weirder and more oppressive the ambience got. Yes, the infection was centralized to the Missilis building where the crashed Condor resided, but that didn't really mean anything when the damned, heavy green smog that usually seemed to accompany the Flood began to settle in around her, presumably the Spores spreading out slowly across the remnants of this part of the city.
As she sprinted through, the only audible sounds were her own thundering footsteps slamming against the concrete in rapid succession... And the creepy wails and screams of what seemed to be humans. They echoed throughout the place like echoes, a freeze-frame of the last moments of this settlement. Her Motion Tracker, which she'd boosted tenfold since entering the place so as not to be surprised, showed no movement.
She turned a corner to the right on a T-intersection, avoiding the closed-off and ruined buildings permeating the central industrial park as her mind wondered just how many thousands had the Flood managed to infect. How many people resided in this hellscape, under the control of a Gravemind that was slowly but surely being born. How many security and Mass Production Nikkes were at its whims.
She slowed her sprint as her motion tracker finally picked up movement. A singular dot that flashed on and off, an unknown. She slid into cover beside a thick concrete wall at a cross-intersection's northern road. She stepped in something wet and looked down to see the first marks of biomass appearing. A small speck of pus-filled goo that she'd just set a foot down on.
Sighing, she peered past the wall slowly and froze, her heart sinking...
... Grotesquely disfigured and stumbling, a humanoid figure twitched erratically as it moved one foot back and forth, unsure if to proceed or not. An 8ga. shotgun not to different from Pinne's own sat in one hand, while the other looked like it'd been torn off, flood biomass encompassing the stump from which sickly pale, yellowish goo flowed onto the floor. The body remained almost unchanged, with even the armor, torn and damaged by bullets as it was, attached. One would almost mistake the creature for a damaged Product 23 MP Nikke.
Almost. If it wasn't for the bulbous protrusion that had replaced most of the head of the Nikke, with only the Goddessium endoskeleton of her face barely peering through a thin veneer of pulsating flesh, like a skull. Her mouth hanged open, revealing where the Infection Form had burrowed its way in. The skull cap had been burst open by the infection latching onto the central nervous system and brain of the Nikke, which were pretty much all that remained of her human form pre-transformation.
The machine, the poor thing, stumbled back and forth, her mind seemingly on a loop as if she was still fighting the infection. Or as if Rigor Mortis had set in. It twitched, body creaking and crackling audibly, the noise travelling all the way to Kelly through the oppressive fog and sending a chill up her spine. Past the infected Nikke, she could make out several more silhouettes with similar damage.
A horde of dormant, infected Nikkes of various types. She understood John's fear of the damn things. No report could ever hope to...
Kelly wondered. She climbed to the top of the wall, slinging her shotgun onto her back. In a feat of balance only achievable by the Spartan, she slowly walked on top of the wall, edging her way past the horde. The mutilated corpses of the Nikkes all looked damaged. Some had infected tentacles pouring out of their bodies, their hands barely holding onto their firearms. Others had neither arms, nor legs, they themselves implanted into the walls as vectors to spread biomass. Some even had their faces still, morphed into pained, final expressions of pallid fear while their nervous systems were being overrun.
All twitched. Their voices, distorted, carried through their damaged vocalization devices. Screams of those damned to endure the immortality given by the Flood to their soldiers and infection vectors. One Nikke, a Soldier FA whose infection form peered out of her chest, was on her knees on the floor, her distorted voice continuously whispering a chilling, deep, "He... HeLP... Me..." mixed with the gargling of the Flood biomass growing within her.
Kelly momentarily stopped to thank whatever deity had deigned them fit for existence that Humans couldn't vocalize like this. She couldn't imagine facing any of their comrades with this kind of nightmarish voice coming out of them. And she started praying she never had to face any of their Nikke comrades infected like this. It was horrifying to even consider.
As she moved past the horde stealthily, her mind started wandering. She was still listening and looking for any potential dangers, but she couldn't help it.
Syuen.
The little rat did this. Her or her predecessor. They'd brought a crashed Condor filled with infected from her world here, to study. They cracked it open, brought about the destruction of an entire sister city to their own Ark. Missilis was broken in so many ways, but to want to study something like this? For what? To weaponize it? Obviously, they wanted an advantage in weapon production so Humanity would pay more for their survival, but this?
She sighed, pushing down a bubbling feeling of anger and making sure her helmet camera was recording everything. They'd need the evidence to bring the little bastard and her entire company to heel, provided they didn't have any tricks up their damnable, short sleeves. Which, knowing how Syuen and her type operated, they probably did. She needed Cortana to give her a good scare again.
Kelly stumbled...
She was in front of the entrance to the Missilis HQ where the Condor had been stowed, telltale fact with the emblazoned Missilis 'M' on the front. The building was large, admittedly. Thankfully, though, it only had three floors to explore. Not so thankfully, Kelly could see the pulsating biomass, both on the streets here, spreading out from below, and inside the building itself, lining the walls like a sickening tapestry of flesh, bone and pus.
It wasn't what made her stumble, though. No. A MJOLNIR armored suit stumbled ahead of them. It was a Generation 2 suit like hers. The erratic twitching present on the infected Nikke horde it stumbled through was seemingly intensified a thousand-fold. The MJOLNIR suit was orange, or so she could make out beneath the Flood biomass and tentacles that had swallowed it.
The muscle enhancements and various suites of the armor seemed to make the erratic movement worse in the Spartan. He gripped what looked to be a shotgun in one hand as he stumbled forward amidst the sleeping horde, the feeling appendages of the infected corpse scanning through the biomass-induced fog, feeling for any living thing yet uninfected by the Parasite. The IFF tag flickered, flashed, dialed and died, repeating the process as Kelly looked at the stumbling corpse.
Spartan-087 dipped behind the wall when her Spartan comrade's head turned toward her. She hoped he hadn't noticed her. Cocking her jaw, she made sure once again her suit was properly sealed, then turned off her radio transmission system and hoped the Flood hadn't learned to operate the HUD of a MJOLNIR helmet, especially not its motion tracker.
She stepped toward a crack in the wall and peered through, watching the horde of mindless Nikke zombies in varying stages of infection sitting still. The only thing moving was the Spartan itself and its comrades. She picked up two more motion tracker dots in the Missilis compound up ahead. Taking a step back as the Spartan stumbled, gargling incoherently through its helmet's speakers, toward her, Kelly found a grate on the floor.
She waited for the Spartan to pass, holding her breath, then undid the grate's pins and jumped down into the drain below. A faint laser pierced through the fog where she'd landed and she swore to herself as she saw that she'd interrupted it. Silent alarm, she prayed. One nobody was going to be able to answer. Drawing her shotgun off her back and preparing for the worst, Kelly pushed forward.
Missilis HQ
The Ark
Syuen was a busy bee. Even amidst the beautiful, ornate and technologically advanced Missilis HQ's own, Syuen's office saw activity in the form of paperwork and other such crap that was obviously necessary for the continuation of her company. And what would a good CEO do if they didn't give their signature for some of the most useless budged dependencies here and there?
Medical leave for one of the staff? Eh, why not. She'd double that guy's work shift afterward anyway. New funding request from MMR Vocational for selecting New Nikkes? Yeah, sure. She needed to see if she could somehow do with upgrading their weapons, too, but that wouldn't really come cheap. She'd have to cut off a few extra expenditures that were kinda worthless. Money for the weird scavengers they were operating clandestinely on the surface? Eh, they'd die before Missilis was contractually obligated to pay them, so sure. She'd just remove that clause from the contract for the next four idiots coming in for the Company.
It was tiresome, she thought to herself. Really tiresome, considering they'd lost a bunch of cash when the last Ark disappeared off the map several years ago. Billions of credits worth of research and even that new weapon they were researching from that weird space wreck. Damn thing had been floating in orbit for so long, it'd been bleached by the sun.
She hummed as she heard an alarm wail on her computer, then turned to face it. Hitting the notification on the touch screen, she paused. Licking her lips, she felt her heart drop. Speak of weapons and devils. She hit the PA button and called out, "Rian, get your ass up here, now..." with anger bubbling in her voice. Before long, a black-haired, glasses-wearing Nikke with two white wings on her head ran inside.
Syuen turned the screen of her computer toward her assistant before she could so much as utter a question. Wide-eyed, 'Rian', Syuen's little assistant Nikke, gasped. She looked up at Syuen next, asking with a stutter, "D-Does this mean...?"
"Yes," Syuen replied angrily, "I don't want information about this getting out of this room. We're going into Plan GOLDFINGER, because if I was gonna hazard a guess, I know for a fact Andersen, Ingrid and Mustang are gonna want my head the moment whoever triggered the alarms in Site-13 comes back with data on the Bioweapon, so let's not let them have it, shall we?"
"I-I'll... Send a message to the Wolves, then," Rian stated, "D-do you want to go-"
"Kill, blackmail and silence anyone who needs to be silenced in the CG. Hell, if need be, put Enikk on a permanent time-out until I can figure out my way onto the Central Government's board of staff," Syuen barked, gritting her teeth, "I'm not going to jail over wanting to give us an edge. Nobody's throwing me in there, you hear me, Rian?" only to get a nod from the girl. The angered CEO replied, "Good. Get to it before I turn you to scrap for MMR to research!"
Without a word, the young Nikke ran out, tablet in hand. Syuen fell back into her seat and sighed.
"Guess we're gonna have to up the ante a bit," She growled as she pulled up images of the Chief, Alyosha and their Nikkes. She murmured, "Time to send Rusty the Code," and she started typing. There was no way in hell she was going to let the Ark send her anywhere but the top seat. Missilis was the pinnacle of human technological advancement. They were going to be Top Dog in the Ark, no matter what...
And she was gonna take over from these inept CG morons. Victory through any means, regardless of ethics. For her, obviously.
They'd all see the truth, damn them.