Tanya

Doing her best to keep up the charade the humans saw in place of her A.I. avatar, on the inside, Tanya was panicking; After helping the other artificial intelligence construct known as Cortana with controlling the Ship's autoguns whilst she worked on the ship's other functions, Tanya now found herself sitting atop what looked like a floor of data flowing through a neural network. At least, that's what appeared through her eyes that were now no more real than when she surmised herself to be.

'What do I do now?' Tanya asked herself in panic as she folded her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them as she sat in her own little space of the neural network that was made up of whatever her data chip was. 'I was bending every which rule and loophole I could find within the back of my mind, and all this other data that is swimming in my mind….wait, do I even have a mind, am I even myself?" If Tanya could hyperventilate, she would.

At the moment however, Tanya fell to simply panicking within the confines of her own datachip, and not show any trace of anything that was wrong with her into the public eye of the ship she was now on, else the humans would begin to suspect she should be diagnosed with an early onset of Rampancy. Compared to Cortana, Tanya was more or less the younger out of the two, made by one Cathrine Halsey and the several flash clones made from herself.

So in essence, both Cortana and she were created from the blank slates of a mad scientist's clones, 'All I figured out to do when I woke up was just take control of the autoguns, what else is expected of me?!' Tanya spoke inside her mind to herself as she reached up to palm the sides of her forehead, 'Okay, okay, just gotta keep it steady." Tanya soothed herself as she closed her eyes and hummed a bit to calm her nerves. It didn't help matters with Tanya's situation that there was present knowledge within her artificial mind that she distinctly knows that isn't hers.

Which most likely meant that Cortana also had the same situation with available data memories that were not her own, and yet she was able to function just fine. Tanya narrowed her eyes in suspicion, 'Is this sort of thing the same way with all…third generation artificial intelligence!? They've been making them that long!?" Tanya screamed in her mind in astonishment.

Sitting up now with her legs crossed, Tanya began to massage her forehead, a human gesture she still held over from her past life, even though as an artificial intelligent construct, Tanya did not have the same sort of symptoms an actual human would have. 'How have A.I's not overthrown their creators yet? Isn't the sort of thing that happens when A.I's become too self aware?' she pondered over as she ceased her pointless gesture, and fell onto her back to lie down a bit.

Tanya's eyes twitched as more incoming data from the outside world flooded in, 'And now I'm being called on! I don't know the first thing I'm capable of, and yet, information keeps flooding into my mind of how to do this or that! It's driving me crazy!' She complained inside her mind more, before picking herself up from off the data floor, and reflexively brushed herself off, before catching herself, and cringing that she forgot again about her predicament as an A.I.

Just as she finished her human action, a file cabinet shimmered into existence, the drawers labeled with firmware update for the top drawer, and the bottom drawer labeled with the current manifest of the ship. Tanya couldn't help but raise a brow of confusion, then walked over to open the top drawer out of curiosity; right as she opened the drawer, a rush of memories poured into her mind, which caused her to collapse to her knees and hands. Tayna's digital eyes dilated as her artificial mind began compartmentalizing the rush of incoming data.

Installation 04

From the empty void of space, a white vortex swirled into existence from which the Pillar of Autumn exited out from; as the halcyon-class light cruiser ship finished its trip from out of its slipstream portal, said portal closed behind it as the ship gently flew through space towards an orange gas giant, one of its seven moons could be seen not far away as the Pillar of Autumn flew through the void of space with its back engines gently nudging forward. In the distance, a large ring could be seen just within the orbit of the gas giant. Hovering around the artificial structure were several ships, none of which were of human origin.

"Cortana, all I need to know is, did we lose them?" Captain Keyes spoke up from within the bridge of the ship.

"I think we both know the answer to that." Cortana's voice chimed back as the ship continued to be flown towards the strange ringlike object in space.

Within the confines of the bridge, Captain Keyes could be seen standing behind two helmsman manning their stations, with two monitors above them for the Captain's view of incoming information; Keyes had both his arms behind his back while clasping his hands together, unclasping one of them to reach up and idly scratch the back, before relaxing his arm back down as he viewed the scene before him from out of the bridge's windows.

"We made a blind jump... How did they-" Keyes began to prod Cortana for answers, only for him to be cut off by her as she cheekily answered back.

"Get here first? The Covenant ships have always been faster. As for tracking us all the way from Reach, at light speed my maneuvering options were limited." Cortana informed the captain of the ship, her voice rang throughout the bridge room.

As Cortana was talking, Captain Keyes moved to walk up a set of stairs, turned left atop the stairs while passing a saluting officer, "We were running dark, yes?" He asked after Cotrana finished talking for the moment, and stood behind another officer at work in front of a console, and viewed the data that the crewmember was working with.

"Until we decelerated. No one could have missed the hole we tore in subspace." Cortana replied back to Keyes as he leaned over the shoulder of the crew member to get a better look at the data on the monitor, Cortana had paused in her speaking, before starting back up her talk with the Captain of the ship, "They were waiting for us on the far side of the planet." She assumed with what the ship's data allowed her to view through.

"So." Keyes began to ask as he turned and clasped his hands behind his back once more, and paced forward a bit. "Where do we stand?" he finished asking as walked past another saluting officer.

"Our fighters are mopping up the last of their Recon picket now, nothing serious." Cortana said as Keyes walked over to the nearby onboard holo-map of the surrounding space they were in, showing a detailed screen of the planet and everything around it. "But, I've isolated approach signatures from multiple CCS-class battlegroups. Make it three capital ships per group. And in about ninety seconds they'll be all over us." Cortana finished saying as Captain Keyes eyes roamed across the holo-map in front of him.

Captain Keyes turned around and spoke, "Well, that's it then. Bring the ship back up to Combat Alert Alpha. I want everyone at their station." he ordered, and on command, the bridge was filled with the sound of the alert, causing everyone not currently doing anything to scramble for their stations and get back to their tasks.

"Everyone Sir?" Cortana asked, her voice still ringing through the room, as her avatar was not out in visible form yet.

"Everyone." Captain Keyes affirmed Cortana's question, as he turned to face the holotank where Cortana's chip was inside of for her Avatar to be able to be projected out from, prompting Cortana to appear. "Get Master Chief out from his cryochamber, and have Noble Six pick up Tanya's chip on the way to the armory." he ordered.

Launch Bay

Within one of the launch bays of the Pillar of Autumn, a marine waves light batons to guide a Pelican into the correct docking position; throughout the bay, Cortan could be heard through the P.A system. "Attention, all combat personnel: Please report to your action stations" Her voice chimed throughout the launch bay, as marines scrambled to be ready. "5th Platoon, secure airlocks on Deck 11. 14th Platoon, rendezvous with 22nd Tactical at bulkhead Charlie 14." Cortana announced as Marines start readying their weapons.

Not far from all the busy action, Staff Sergeant Avery Junior Johnson could be seen walking through a line of Marines. "You heard the lady! Move like you've got a purpose!" He boisterously yelled.

"Men, here is where we show those split-chin squid-head sons-of-bitches that they could not have picked a worse enemy than the human race!." Sergeant Avery Johnson began to hype up his fellow marines whilst pacing between the lines of soldiers. "But we stumbled onto somethin' they're so hot for, that they're scramblin' over each other to get it." He yelled.

As Avery walked to the end of the lines of marines, he continued to spout his spiel, "Well, I don't care if it's God's own anti-son-of-a-bitch machine, or a giant hula hoop, we're not gonna let 'em have it! What we will let 'em have...is a belly full of lead, and a pool of their own blood to drown in!" Sergeant Johnson then turned around to face his fellow marines and give each and every one of them a look, "Am I right, Marines?"

All as one as they all straightened up and held their rifles close, every Marine chorused, "Sir, Yes Sir!" They all yelled in the same bravo.

Avery nodded to himself as he lifted his rifle up and leaned it against his shoulder, "Uh-huh. Damn right, I am. Now move it out! Double time!" he ordered, prompting every marine in their line to scramble.

Cortana's voice, once more, rang throughout the P.A system, "Attention, all personnel: We are re-engaging the enemy. Internal and external contact imminent." she announced, before going silent again.

Sergeant Johnson nodded as he began making his way past all the scrambling marines on deck, "All you greenhorns who wanted to see Covenant up close...this is gonna be your lucky day." He smirked as he switched the safety on his gun to off, "Time to deliver those covvie bastards to the deepest parts of hell."

"Ooh-rah!" A couple of passing marines remarked into the hype of Sergeant Johnson's speech.

Armory

Within the room filled with scrambling marines that were rushing to get their gear and head back out to their stations, sitting alone on one of the benches was Noble Six inspecting his M90 shotgun with a MA5B assault Rifle magnetically attached to his back; Sitting alone might be a stretch though, as he was now tasked with keeping Halsey's latest A.I stored within his SPARTAN neural interface. So essentially, he had a passenger in his head, though from what he could gather, he wouldn't be alone for long, as Cortana would most likely be handed off to the other Spartan on board to safeguard the data she held from the soon to be boarding covenant.

As Six turned the shotgun over in his hands to chamber ammo into the top of it, the A.I that was slotted into his helmet spoke up as he calmly chambered every buckshot into the magazine of the gun. "How many shots do you need to take down the shields of an Elite?" Tanya inquired.

The Spartan finished chambering what he could into the shotgun, and pumped it ready for its first shot, "Why do you ask?" he casually asked as he aimed his gun towards the wall on the farside of the room with the safety still on, he checked its handling and swiveled a bit to aim it at a nearby target, before lowering out down to holster it on his back alongside his assault rifle.

"Well." Tanya began to ask with a voice that sounded like she was in the process of crunching numbers, "From what I can gather so far, depending on the rank of the Elite's you'll be facing, two or more shots will be needed to bring down their shields." she commented.

Six shrugged to himself as he reached back and pulled over his assault rifle to inspect it next while he still had the time, he was supposed to wait within armory for the Master Chief of all spartan 2's to head to the bridge together for a debrief with Captain Keyes. "You seem rather curious." he remarked as he angled the rifle in his hands and checked the magazine by pulling it out and checking its ammo count, before chambering the magazine back into the bottom of the rifle. "Why the sudden inquiry of the amount of shots needed to bring down an elite's shields?"

"Well, if we're gonna be stuck together for the time being." Tanya replied back as Six finished checking his rifle and holstered it back. "I need to insure the optimization of both of our survival."

"Hm." Six let out an amused sound, "You'd be surprised how quick an elite's shields can go down with a good round of shotgun lead." he remarked as he stood up as he noticed Spartan 117 finally arrived within the doorway of the armory, both nodded to each other before making their way to the bridge.

"So you say." Tanya's voice replied back inside Six's head, as the two spartans walked side by side, not speaking up to each other yet as small talk could happen later.