Orbit above Reach
Nearly a week of traveling through Slipspace later, the Red Horse had finally arrived at its destination. Ahead of them, a glittering orb of blue and green shone in the darkness of Epsilon Eridani's star, though the glowing glitter of hundreds of starships of both military and civilian make traveling through the place also gave the planet a certain ethereal charm.
There was one central landmass on the planet, from where several massive black stalks emerged into the heavens. They were approaching one such stalk, a massive space elevator tethered to a central Terminal station that connected to the planet below, with a lot of cargo and people going through at any time. One of the only issues most of the Abydos FTF had now was that their leader was missing.
As their ship docked with the massive terminal station and the central connector umbilical stretched out to meet their airlock, the girls could only wonder where Hoshino was. She was never usually gone this long, even if she would've fallen asleep somewhere. The hardest part of space travel was falling asleep on a ship whose engines continuously hummed…
So, what had happened to miss Takanashi…?
"I wonder where Hoshino is…" Nonomi murmured, a little worried, as she fiddled with her uniform and her bags. They'd had to relinquish their firearms again, this time under the direct orders of Captain Foucault and his men, because nobody wanted five armed teenagers walking around, toting guns willy-nilly.
"She's been avoiding us like the plague," Serika mumbled, annoyed, as she crossed her arms to her chest. Hoshino was never one to be usually this distant, even asleep. She tended to be aware of everything going on around them. Any time they searched for her, they found remnants of her habitation in a certain spot. Her room, cargo bay, consoles on the bridge, the mess, the hangar… Ugh!
"Nn…" The wolfgirl whose burns were still healing nodded in agreement, looking at the world ahead of them glow. Her own blue eyes shimmered at the sight with all the opportunities that space travel presented. It was her way of keeping her mind off of the destruction of the first human extrasolar world they'd seen. And the deaths of its people.
"Captain Foucault didn't answer anything about her either except to tell us she asked to be left alone for the trip. Something's wrong," Serika voiced more clearly this time as she approached one of the consoles. Deck crews from the station soon boarded to check on the ship, run inventory, unload Cargo, the whole nine yards.
"That much is obvious," Shiroko replied, her voice a bit hoarse. She scratched her throat, next to the bandages covering the healing burns. She'd apparently needed a skin graft in some spots of the impact. Skin grafts, thankfully, did not need to be taken from anyone's thigh. The UNSC had cloning technology, terrifyingly enough.
Nonomi replied, "I'm sure she just needed some time to figure herself out after she saw what she saw," while acutely aware Hoshino was a different kind of person when it came to processing trauma. She remembered how Hoshino was. Deep down, Hoshi had been traumatized before. Certainly not by a whole planet being turned to slag in front of them, but…
"She could've spent it with us," Serika snapped back at Nonomi, glaring at the girl with her scarlet eyes. She spoke, "Something's wrong with her, Nonomi. And it's the first thing I'm gonna ask her when she comes to this airlock," and growled a little as she scratched her arm, a shiver running up her spine as the image of the Covenant warships bearing down came back.
"P-Please, don't fight… We…" Ayane attempted to speak, though her voice cracked as tears welled in her eyes. She was by no means ready to properly speak yet, considering what she'd seen… Shiroko pat her on the head, then gently hugged her, letting her cry a little into her shoulder. The not-burned one, obviously.
Serika frowned, then nodded, "... Sorry, Ayane. I'm not gonna fight with her. I'm just… Dammit…" and yet more memories of Skopje flashed in her mind. She sighed and looked at Reach once more, praying that they never had to see another planet burning while they sped away. Especially not their own home-world.
"Nn…" Shiroko agreed, feeling the burns under her shirt gently with her hand. She twitched a little as a small stab of pain hit. Despite Ayane being in a slight shock, still, the young elf-eared girl immediately went to check on her friend's bandages. Finding them to be fine, sans a little red as the skin grafts were still taking, she sighed in relief, a shaky, troubled sigh.
"Ladies, please…" Nonomi whispered, sad that the discussion was devolving like this. Hoshino didn't deserve this kind of scrutiny, though she really couldn't say anything. Her own mind wandered as to why Hoshi had been avoiding them for this long, especially now that they needed each-other, more than freakin' ever.
"Uweh… I see I've been missed…" Hoshino greeted, surprising everyone. She seemed apologetic, bags under her eyes and looking even more disheveled than usual. Though she still smiled, her heterochromatic eyes locked onto all four of her old friends, noting the surprise in their faces as they began to register her.
"Hoshino!" All four of them yelled happily, immediately jumping to hug the FTF's team leader and the acting President, causing the girl to stumble back, a little surprised. She had expected them to immediately start screaming at her, to be angry for ditching them when they needed it most or something. She had done that, by all means, just to process her own issues and… Hide…
"Hehehe… Did you girls really miss me that much…?" She played along, though, happy to see they had, in fact, missed her.
"You worried the life out of us!" Serika gave the girl a gentle shove, a mix of angry and relieved. She demanded, "Where've you been!? How many hiding places did you even find on this ship?!" which garnered a few laughs out of the crew. Serika was not really completely angry, but she was very relieved. Their leader hadn't forgotten them.
"Are you okay?" Nonomi asked as she looked the girl over, even cupping her chin and moving her head around. Some small scars and the bags under her eyes worried the Team Mom quite a lot, but her heart slowly stilled as she smiled brightly at their tired friend. She saw in the corner of her eyes that Ayane had seen something… The girl was pale.
"We missed you, Hoshino," Shiroko spoke in her usual, low, but happy tone, her ears droopy. A moment's respite seemed to pass as the girls embraced, but the three others had soon seen that Ayane wasn't doing too well…
"... Girls…?" Ayane, however, broke the silence, her voice shaky. She pointed up at Hoshino's pink Halo. It had dimmed visibly, the girls soon noticed. And as they looked closer at it, they could make out a faint crack across the outer 'wall'. They all doubled over and froze, staring up at what was most definitely one of the most horrific expressions of change in one of their best friends.
"... I guess it's visible, eh…?" The girl tried to play a little dumb, but saw it wasn't working. From a feigned smile emerged a sad, but genuine one. She scratched the back of her head and tidied up her ponytail a bit, then her shoulders sagged as she saw the horrified stares of her friends. They weren't recoiling or disgusted at her Halo cracking. Rather, they were visibly worried to high heaven about her.
"... What happened…?" Serika inquired, whispered, as she put a hand on Hoshino's shoulder.
"... Your Oji-san is no longer sleepy, I suppose…" Hoshi replied rather sadly. She saw their whole world metaphorically fall down on their heads when she said that, the four of them staring at Hoshino with a mix of various emotions. She sighed shakily, scratched her shoulder with the opposite hand, then paused as she heard footsteps.
Captain Foucault and a trio of soldiers, one of which was a middle-aged woman who looked like she could be Ayane's mom, marched up to them, "Ladies. Sorry to interrupt you all, but I've been tasked to bring you straight to a base on the surface. If you'll follow me and my Marines," before he motioned to the airlock.
When the girls followed him onto the military part of the station concourse, they'd been greeted by decontamination rooms and a battalion of well-armed soldiers in black armors. The woman in charge of the platoon tilted her head to the Red Horse to order them aboard, then looked at the kids and told them, "Welcome to Reach," with a smirk.
Despite the silence between the five of them, the group soon boarded one of the passenger cabs for the Space Elevator, one commandeered by the military and these 'Office of Naval Intelligence' folks. Climbing aboard and being seated down on padded seats, they saw holographic displays lighting the walls with various ads, plus massive, thick windows, reinforced with more glass panes and plexi and bulletproof material.
The Captain made one motion of the hand, giving the go-ahead for the crew to begin descent and the car gently moved up at first, causing pits in the girls' stomachs, then it started moving down, rapidly accelerating down the stalk, supported by four thick stick cables at each corner of the titanium and glass cube.
Forgetting about their woes for a moment, the young women gasped at the sight of the planet below getting closer and at the sight of the massive UNSC warships orbiting. Chief among them was a ship that looked like it was about the length of a Kivotos District. The word TRAFALGAR was painted in fading, bold-white lettering on her side as smaller vessels swarmed around her.
Civilian freight also descended behind them, moving at a much faster pace down the stalk, while overhead cargo ships, civilian liners and the likes moved to and from the planet-side docks and cargo ports. As they delved into the atmosphere, the thin, pallid blue of the sky started to form. Then, it glowed a bit brighter as they passed the upper layers.
Shiroko smiled a bit, awed by the sights, while the others were simply stunned. Hoshino herself seemed amazed by the beauty of the void and the world itself. Then, they saw it below them:A massive, sprawling metropolis sat at the mouth of a river delta, the river itself flowing out into the wide ocean surrounding the continent.
All of them wondered if this was how Skopje had looked from above, too. Before the Covenant had landed and made it into nothing. Hoshino shook off the thought:Skopje was gone. It wasn't worth thinking about it anymore. All that mattered was that they would make it home and be able to tell the tale, all so that it may be remembered.
When the elevator car reached the lower portion of the stalk, it slowed considerably, though not suddenly. From a rapid descent, it became a gentle touch-down onto the platform. The Marines in escort helped the girls hump their packs over to the outside of the station, where surprised folk of both military and local civilian ilk stared at them with wide eyes.
They were all human. And all of them looked like just your average joes and janes out on their daily business. To think there was a massive, galactic war going on between them and a genocidal enemy must've been the stuff of fantastical nightmares to these people.
Arriving at the designated vehicles; An armored transport guarded by two light trucks with guns on their backs; the girls were loaded up with another platoon of soldiers and the Captain. Foucault himself pulled out a com device and spoke, "Doctor Halsey, this is Captain Foucault. We've made landfall in New Alexandria and are about to proceed via Highway 02 to CASTLE. Roger. Yes, the girls are safe."
He hummed, smiled and said, "Roger that, doctor. We'll see you soon, Foucault out," then looked at the girls. He told them, "Doctor Halsey's one of the Office of Naval Intelligence's best scientists. She's asked to see you five specifically because of the displayed capabilities," and he motioned to Shiroko, "To withstand a plasma blast is no small feat."
"Nn…" Shiroko nodded.
Hoshino raised a brow, "Those shots usually melt people, right…?"
"Explode them to a fine-ass red mist, yeah," The Marine female officer spoke, arms crossed to her chest, "You kids really are lucky as all hell," and she scratched a scar on her left eye. She saw Foucault was slightly glaring at her, then said to him, "Look, someone's gotta let these kids know what they're getting into, captain."
"We already know," Hoshino replied rather scathingly, "We saw Skopje burn down."
"I… Fair," Sighed the Sergeant, "Didn't mean to offend you."
Hoshi shook her head, "That's not it…"
"Anyways… Get some rest. It'll be a couple of hours before we reach CASTLE," The man offered, then looked back at the city fading in the distance, behind valleys and hills and mountains. As the vehicles trudged along down the highway, most of the girls had fallen asleep. Most, save for Hoshino and, surprisingly enough, Ayane, who was staring at the scenery and trying to conk out.
Driving into the Highland Mountains, the team caught sight of multiple UNSC bases. Above them, military craft flew around from peak to peak and past. As the vehicles rolled forward, the girls soon awoke with a startle due to a bump on the road. They rolled off of the highway onto a beaten path of dirt, through a field at the bottom of a valley.
Then, they went into a tunnel, a massive tunnel, so large it could fit an entire highway's traffic within. There were various checkpoints and corridors and parking spaces along the way, some occupied, some not, many manned by the local troops. They were in an underground military facility the likes of which barely existed in Kivotos, if at all.
When they arrived at their specific porthole, the girls were dismounted and the platoon of Marines moved with them. The Sergeant, who, going by the name tag on her armor was called 'Lopez, asked, "Remind me again why we couldn't land the Red Horse here, sir?" as she crossed her arms to her chest. The crew entered an elevator.
Foucault hit a button, then told her, "We'll be underway the moment we're back on the ship. Command wants us going back out there to scout for Covenant movements near the Inner Colonies, meaning we won't be staying on Reach. If you wanted to go say hello to your family while we're here, you could've asked for a replacement."
"Nah. Can't leave your ass alone, sir…" Sighed the woman, "Alright, what about the return trip? We still goin' Dirtside or are we taking a Pelican this time?"
"Pelican. We only hitched a ride with the truck because the Marines from the seventeenth were heading in the same direction and it'd have taken longer for any Echo flight to get to us," The man replied. He pulled out a datapad, then looked at the girls, watching them make sense of the elevator car and the stone-faced Marines behind them. He told Lopez, "Saves us from waiting at the dock while they load supplies and get that new macguffin to Halsey."
"Roger, sir," The woman snorted, "Section Three."
Hoshino blinked, feeling an elbow in her side. Serika leaned over and whispered, "We have to talk…" to which Hoshi nodded. She understood. There were a lot of questions still floating around in everyone's heads, her own included. The only thing she knew is that they'd gotten to Skopje via some artifact they'd dug up from the old school building that they just happened to touch wrong.
She nodded, "I know…"
"Good…" Serika replied, then sighed and shifted on her feet a little, completely uneasy being where they were. All these people were human, just like Sensei, meaning this entire 'space nation', the UNSC, was humans. How, nobody knew. Why, nobody knew either. It was just another question onto the pile.
When the elevator dinged and they reached their intended level, the group was marshaled out by the Sergeant and Captain. They walked through a hallway that was a mix of a former mine tunnel and fancy, titanium-reinforced columns and paintings. It was wide, too, and the girls could see ONI staff clad in their dark uniforms and with differentiations between sections, all milling about.
Taking a right down the hallway, they were led into a laboratory. A smooth dome-room with reinforced ceilings. Multiple humming LED lights hung off the spiderweb of supports, peering down on a sterile workspace made up of tiles, raised island tables with hermetically-sealed drawers and one hell of a mess on each table.
Half-empty, days-old styrofoam cups with rancid, cold coffee lay all around, forming an almost esoteric circle around a woman in a white lab coat, black pants, dress shoes and a cream turtleneck. She was graying, but her brown hair was still visible despite that. Audible were the clicks and beeps of the touch-screen console ahead.
Captain Foucault cleared his throat and spoke, "Doctor Halsey-" only to pause as the woman raised a hand, asking him to wait without speaking a word. She sighed and slid away one 'window' from the Console and her left hand made for a cup of still-warm coffee. She grabbed it, downed its contents and threw it in the trash, before turning about.
Despite the wrinkles and the age appearing on her face, the woman before them still retained some sort of a charm, a beauty that spoke of danger. She arranged her glasses onto the bridge of her nose, blue eyes glimmering behind the lenses as she examined the girls, starting with their Halos down to their clothes. She whispered, "Incredible…"
She then approached them, clearing her throat. Looking at the Captain and Sergeant, she said, "Many thanks for bringing the survivors of Skopje over, Captain Foucault… I've asked that the staff deliver you and your troops a briefing on the next mission. Something easy this time, from yours truly…" before she handed him a tablet.
The captain looked over the details, raised a brow, then snorted and showed Lopez. She grinned and said, "Little Shore Leave, then, ma'am?" to which Halsey nodded. She showed them to leave, which both did. The Captain, however, stopped just before the door and gave a nod to the five young survivors of Skopje, then left.
Halsey told them, "Apologies for the way your arrival here has been handled, ladies. As you can sadly tell from first-hand experience, the Covenant don't care much for any well-laid plans. My name is Doctor Catherine Elizabeth Halsey and I am at the head of a series of projects belonging to ONI Section Three. A pleasure to meet you all."
"I'm gonna guess you have what little of our files your folks managed to compile on us, so intros aren't necessary?" Hoshino replied rather brashly, much to everyone but Halsey's surprise. She stared down the doctor, her right hand's trigger finger tapping against her thigh. The Doctor seemed unperturbed by the fact the girl already knew how to wield a weapon.
"Mm. Worry not, miss Takanashi," The doctor offered, then showed them to find their seats. She told them, "I am not fond of many such formalities myself," as she sat herself down across from the team, at one of the emptier tables in the room. She offered them some drinks from a nearby fridge, most of them soft. Halsey was seemingly not one for alcohol.
"Great… Anyways. Why'd you bring us here?" The pink-haired FTF leader decided to be blunt. She heard her team gasp and looked over at them, shrugging as if to ask what was wrong. Nonomi herself shook her head, but Hoshino sighed and smiled reassuringly. She turned back to Halsey in order to continue their conversation and saw a glint of joy in the woman's eyes, though no change in her inscrutable expression.
"Straight to the point. You're far better than any ONI goon I've had the displeasure of working with, miss Takanashi… Simply put, I brought you here because you are of interest to me and to a great deal of other staff in any and all ONI outposts," Halsey offered, then sighed and said, "However, their interest can prove to be malicious."
"And yours?" Serika butted in, looking at the doctor.
"I'm here to try and make sure you girls are not harmed in the process of searching for something to stop the enemy's main armament from killing a human in one shot…" The woman replied, then motioned to Shiroko, "I've read the reports and going by what miss Sunaookami has on her body right now, I would say they're accurate. Your strange holographic headdresses can stop a plasma round," but she also noticed the bandages again and frowned.
"Nn… Not without repercussions," Shiroko confirmed, her voice still hoarse. She scratched one of the bandages, feeling itching, but Ayane took her hand off of it and shook her head. Scratching could break the scabs and cause more bleeding, or worse, not let the cloned skin bind itself properly to the young woman's wounds.
"Why would we be harmed?" Nonomi decided to ask the 'elephant-in-the-room' question.
"While I'm certain you have no reason to trust someone like me, another strange adult in the grand scheme of this entire Galactic game…" Halsey sighed deeply, taking her glasses off, then telling them, "I'm less invasive with my procedures, especially toward young ones like yourselves. How old is the youngest of you…?"
Ayane raised her hand and replied in a low voice, meek as her usual self, "I'm fifteen…"
"... Fifteen…" The woman seemed to take a moment to compose herself. She sighed, married that information with other bits of guilt in her mind, then told them all, "I see. My point exactly. Very few of us have any sort of care even when it comes to the young. Believe me…" while trying not to take stabs mentally at herself.
Hoshino furrowed her brows, then asked, "Hm… And why're you telling us this?"
"Because I am here to work on understanding you," Doc answered, staring Hoshino in the eye. She continued, "Not just your strange power, or whatever this is," before she pointed at the Halos, "But also who you are as people. Miss Takanashi, I know that look in your eyes. I swear to you that nobody who can harm you will be allowed anywhere near you and that includes the Covenant. We are safe here, on Reach."
"... For how long? How long until those alien bastards kick the door down here, too? Because we saw good people who got us off Skopje die…" Hoshino replied, unconvinced. There was way too much riding on the line here for them to just blindly accept any offer, but Halsey was down-to-earth and appreciated the gravity of the situation. Or it seemed that way anyway.
"I know. By estimates?" Halsey shrugged, then told her, "Decades yet before the Covenant stumbles here. Even more for Earth, should you wish to be moved there while I search for a way to your home," before sliding her a tablet to show the calculus. If nothing changed in the future, the Covenant were still going to have a ways to go to find all of Humanity's colonies.
"Why would you risk that for us?" The pink-haired girl asked, softening up a bit.
"Because you do not belong in this conflict. It is our war and if I can help it, not another child will perish to the Covenant's weapons or to our own hubris," Halsey replied, though she soon caught what she'd said. The determination in her eyes didn't fade for even a second, which made Hoshino pause. Doc had showed the same spine as Sensei then and there.
"... Okay. So, what's first on the docket for experiments…?" Hoshi smiled.
They were in good hands…