Thel 'Vadam overlooked his bridge crew as they moved abut their duties He didn't want to leave John, but had to as the Storm Covenant began to make moves on objectives that ne needed to counter. As Arbiter, he was allowed access to some very classified, but not too classified information. Just the stuff that politicians and Arbiters, like him, needed to know. The 'ultra classified' information was for the Hierarchs' eyes only.
That was something his council was still going over because there was a lot, which wasn't a surprise. Thousands of years of secrets piled up, and would take a while to go though and disseminate. But there was one thing that got the council's attention and demanded his attention. A Forerunner relay station had been found by the Hierarchs several years ago. The reason why it was dismissed? It wasn't. A small strike team had been sent, only one returned talking about machines that burned the strike team and presented a set of symbols. Those symbols gave the location of a Forerunner installation which gave dire warnings.
Warnings, which, the Hierarchs seemed to take note of and not pursue. The question was why? Thel had read them, but was unsure as to how they meant 'Danger! Keep Away'. It was more than likely that there was something else that he was missing. He was a warrior not a scholar. But the actions of Jul 'Mdama's Storm Covenant made it clear that they were looking for something. The question was what?
"Shipmaster, we are exiting slip-space," one of the helmsmen said.
The shipmaster, Tus 'Zanom, nodded as he leaned forward as the ship existed slip-space. No alarms went off, but sensors buzzed as they detected the relay station and several Storm Covenant ships around it. Holographic images came up showing the disposition and formation of the enemy ships Thel looked at the floating images.
"It's a raid," he noted and Tus nodded.
"They aren't staying, I have a feeling that they will get what they need, destroy the base and leave," the shipmaster added.
Thel's brow raised at that. "Would they?"
"I've been fighting the Storm Covenant for years. If it furthers their goal, they would offer children to the Flood," Tus said earing more than a few odd looks. "They will destroy the station to cover their tracks,"
One of the officers nodded. "That they will do,"
"Do we have scans of the inside?" the Arbiter asked, but got a shake of the head from the Shipmaster.
"Forerunner technology is hard to map at this range," one of the crew said. "Sorry Arbiter,"
Thel just grunted in annoyance and affirmation as he remembered his ships had a similar problem scanning the ring. But then again, it may have had jamming systems while a relay could be small enough not to.
"Prepare a stealth ship with your best warriors. And make sure that one of them can read Forerunner," he said.
The shipmaster nodded in response.
OOOOO
Kelly sat in her office going over the plans for the armour modules. Fundin had been cleared with a bonus if she could find a way to integrate the tech into marine armour. Something she wasn't hopeful about doing. But several engineers loved a challenge and took it on. Which was fine, she didn't need all of them for the project. Looking over some of the funding allocations, her door knocked.
"Come in," she said, not taking her eyes off of the screen.
A man in a finely made suit walked. "Miss Spartan," he nodded as he walked in. "I'm Dax, and I'm here to help you in your case," he said as he sat.
"Thanks," she said turning to look at him. "I would offer coffee, but…" she shrugged. "My kind don't need them,"
Dax laughed and nodded. "It's fine," he smiled. "I represent many Spartans, and I've come to expect certain things that don't apply to Spartans. Coffee being one of them. So, if you can explain what happened,"
Kelly nodded and relayed the story. Dax stroked his chin with concern. He didn't lean back, but she did, letting him think. He knew the law better than her, so he needed to mull over the implications and laws associated with it. After a few moments he spoke up.
"Well, the main problem is that it can be seen as an unprovoked attack," he muttered and held his hand up to silence Kelly who, while wanted to speak, stayed silent knowing that it wasn't the best idea to speak up yet. "However, given the fact that they were armed, looking for you and were paid does give you a lot of ammo in case they take this to court, which is… unlikely at best,"
She frowned at that but let him continue. "The evidence against them is pretty high, and they have several prior convictions and outstanding warrants. The fact that they have black market firearms also doesn't help them,"
"So, I'm in the clear?" she asked and he nodded.
He smiled. "For the most part. I can see them claiming the unprovoked attack angle, but that can be counter with all of the other facts,"
She nodded. "So, nothing to worry about?"
He smiled with a nod while sliding a letter to her. "Yes, I just needed to clear up some of the information," he stood and nodded. "If you need me, my contact number is in there," he indicated to the letter before walking out.
As soon as the door shut, Kelly picked up the letter and opened it. A small card fell out with the lawyer's number on it, but as she turned it over, she found a message on the back written with a series of dots and dashes. Turning the card around she made out the number three before turning around again and began to read every third character.
'Hit likely internal,' she read before wiping the message clean and leaning back after a quick lick of the thumb. The message whipped away quickly.
Likely internal? That was ominous and would have been better served with internal affairs or HR. But if he didn't inform them, that mean that someone powerful was after and had a lot of pull with the company and outside the company. It was clear what she was seeing, a warning about who to trust and who to confide in. More ONI like bullshit, but she did have friends. She leaned back as she began to plan her next move.
OOOOO
John slammed and destroyed the combat form that tried to seek up on him. It exploded as he used his wight and momentum to crush it against the wall. Taking its shotgun and loading a shell into the chamber, he turned and fired one of the 12 8 gage shells at a combat form who tried to pouch on him. The ball bearings shredded the combat form into pieces before breaking into a run, making his way though the corridors of the command-and-control station.
He didn't have much time to get to the pelican the next level above, but the flood was moving and advancing fast made it difficult for him to make any kind of quick moves. They seemed to stop him in every corridor, every room, every corner. It was minor for now, but his main question was: Why were the flood here? They weren't on the ring, and Dana and Cortana did a scan on the main areas where the flood would be. No Empire structures were found.
And that wasn't just due to the fact that they couldn't detect any structures, but that there were no supply reports, no indications that supply runs were being made, nothing to indicate that structures were anywhere close to potential Flood labs. The questions were how and why? As John advanced, the 'why' started to be a thought but formed into a horrific idea. A MAD weapon. Mutually Assured Destruction. The more he thought about it, the more it started to make some form of sense.
The Empire, from what little he knew about it, was an oligarchal totalitarian government in which freedoms were restricted and power was only given to a few. One thing that was sometimes observed was that whenever a faction approached to taking a world from the Empire, the Empire destroyed the world. But this only applies to ones where they were fully entrenched in. They would detonate several Shiva tactical nukes at key locations like tectonic stress points, volcanoes and unstable land to maximize the damage does to the planet to make it uninhabitable.
An extreme form of asset denial. It was also somewhat petty in that they were saying 'If we cannot have it, neither shall you'. It made a weird sort of sense that they would use the flood as the ultimate denial of assets. But that provided a darker question, did they have Flood on all worlds. He turned the corner and dived out of the way of a combat from firing a rocket launcher at him. Tossing a grenade into the room, he quickly reloaded the shotgun. But he only managed to get 5 shells in before the grenade detonated.
Moving around he brought his shotgun up, unloading three shells into the closest form and one into another at the far end of the room before bringing his assault rifle up checking for more targets. Once he was certain the area was clear he brought his shotgun back up and reloaded.
"Dana, do we have information about the core Empire worlds?" he asked.
"Negative, we have had no information coming form their territories," she replied.
"Issue an immediate scouting order to the fastest ships to the core Empire worlds. Check for Flood infection," he paused. "Alert the other factions, make sure that they reinforce their borders against the Empire, let them know our suspicions,"
"Understood," was all Dana said as he coked the shotgun and began to move.
He hoped he was wrong, but being sure was something that needed to happen. Otherwise firing the rings may not be the worst idea. As he moved though the corridors, he began to notice the lack of Flood forms. But there was plenty of flood growth growing in the corridors. That made him frown. That didn't normally happen, was something else going on? He paused again.
"Dana, you have the data from the mainframe, right?" he asked.
"Yes, I have about 68% of the mainframe downloaded," she confirmed.
"Check them for any Flood labs or anything about the Flood," he said as he ran towards the hanger.
"Understood," she conformed and fell silent.
John entered the hanger to find it empty of Flood forms, or indeed any Flood. They were either planning something or they were focused on the other living people in the station. Either way John moved to one of the Pelicans and began the startup sequences. Once ready he made a scan of the ship, found nothing and took off. Shutting down all non-essential systems, he diverted all power to the engines. Pushing the Pelican to it's limit.
The dropship shot out at speed away from the command-and-control station along with several other ships of various types. But mostly dropships. As he flew towards the Infinity, railgun and mac rounds shot out. Taking out a couple of the dropships without warning. After doing a quick scan, John saw the reason why. Flood forms had taken control of those ships. So, the fleet was taking them out to prevent further infection.
It wasn't ok with him, but even a single flood spore could destroy a species. He mentally readied himself for a long and uncomfortable quarantine. Activating the autopilot, he relaxed and breathed readying for a good few weeks of doing nothing. Something clattered behind him making him turn. Several infection forms had come out of the stowage compartments. Reacting quickly, he activated the self-destruct and ejected before the ship exploded.
He cursed before turning on his beacon to get picked up. Not looking forward to the berating Parisa was likely to give him. Or Cortana for that matter.