Knox: Damn this one's heavy.

King: No kidding. Be that as it may, I feel it might just have been necessary. You'll all see what we mean. Anyway, let's get moving and see where this takes. Hope you enjoy the chapter.

Inspiration: Halo: Reach

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With the learning out of the way, it was time once more to view a strange new world.

The screen opened to a vast sky, not a cloud to be seen in the expanse of blue. There was nothing more than the blue sky above. Then, something broke the scene. A single white streak across the sky, like that of trails following a jet. After a moment, the streak seemed to curve away in the sky and fly to the side. As it flew, they heard someone speaking through an unseen radio. "0-7-2! Redirect course clicks! We can't risk the engines in the upper atmosphere!"

"6." This voice was different, almost ethereal. "6?" But it was still recognizable as one Jaune Arc.

Nora tilted her head, "Why does he keep saying six?"

"6!"

The radio voice continued, "Bravo-Foxtrot-0-7-2, do you copy?! Redirect now!"

"6?! RUBY!"

The scene suddenly snapped to show Ruby sitting in a cockpit of a what seemed like a plane. She was dressed in a set of red power armor with black accenting around her legs and arms.

Coco raised an eyebrow. "Huh… that almost looks like an early version of that one we saw with those Flood things."

Ruby thought back to the man called Jaune-117, "Does that mean I'm awesome like that?!"

Ruby took a breath before turning to look back at her current copilot. Sitting behind her was the familiar form of Jaune Arc. He had similar armor, though modified for his needs with heavy weapons. "Don't go spacing out on me here."

Ruby took a few breaths before nodding. "Right. Sorry. Helmets on." Ruby placed her helmet on, a sleek design for common use within the Spartan Program (the Mark IV(b) Class Mjolnir helmet).

Jaune placed his own helmet on, a modified Grenadier variant with extra armor to defend against incoming attacks.

Ironwood raised an eyebrow, "At least the armor looks decently designed."

Coco nodded, "And you can see where one leads into the other. It's obvious that the armor from the Flood one is an upgrade of those versions in some ways."

Ruby flipped a few levers and ran through the launch sequence.

The camera pulled away through the cockpit to show the sheer scale of the ship holding them. This was the UNSC Sabre Fighter.

Winter had a small conniption, "That is NOT a fighter!"

Ironwood nodded with a groan, "It's far too large. Not to mention the lacking maneuverability. It would be lucky to go one direction."

Ruby took a breath, "Alright. Strap in and get ready. Launch sequence is active."

The thrusters sparked to life before erupting with enough force to burn away anything unlucky enough to be in the way. Thankfully, the facility was designed to prevent any damage this way. Soon, the ship slowly rose off the ground. This soon increased in speed until the ship rose up through the base and into the sky. It continued to rise into the sky, becoming nothing more than a streak in the sky.

"Um… where's it going?" Ruby looked around the group.

Ironwood's eyes went wide for a moment, "Wait… that can't be right."

"What?"

"Is it… is it attempting to leave the planet?"

Oobleck gasped, "That can be done?! How is it possible?"

The camera snapped to the cockpit of the ship again as the Sabre rose above the clouds. Soon, the very shackles of gravity were loosed and the ship had done what those in the audience had never believed possible in their own world, it left the atmosphere and was among the cold vacuum of space.

Everyone was stunned. Sure, they'd seen space vehicles in this before, but they'd never actually seen the process of leaving the planet. It was quiet, no one having any idea where to begin with what they saw.

Ruby flipped another switch in the cockpit, "Ditching primary thrusters."

Ruby blinked, "Ditching what now?"

The massive lower section of the ship flew off and freed the fighter from its bonds and letting it fly freely in space. The ship flew off quickly and off toward a giant space station being swarmed by Covenant Banshee fighters.

Ruby took a breath with a nod, "You ready, Jaune? Things are going to get a little bumpy." Ruby pushed the levers of the ship forward and the Sabre flew forward again.

The Sabre was an excellent machine for combat in space. Vulcan machine guns and tracking missiles make short work of the shieldless Banshee units. To further the advantage, Ruby was an excellent pilot, having tested the Sabre project. She knew the ship far better than anyone else, so she was able to weave through the incoming attacks with little effort. Any stray shots that did hit the ship bounced off the energy shields. The Sabre flew through and cleared the area around the station long enough to continue their real mission. As Ruby docked the ship temporarily, she opened the canopy and allowed Jaune to stand and float his way off into the space around him.

"Woah." Ruby was awestruck at the scene, as was many in the audience. They'd never seen the weightlessness of space before. It was rather awe-inspiring. At least, for what little they saw. They had no idea about the true horror therein.

As Jaune floated forward, he found himself looking toward their target. A Covenant cruiser that will act as a makeshift bomb casing to destroy the Super Carrier not too far off.

Sienna went over the plan in her head and nodded, "That may actually work. Radio in a fuel request and set off a tank as they approach."

Ironwood sighed, "And people wonder why we have so many checks…"

Jaune's eyes fell upon the planet below, the planet of Reach. To the UNSC, it was a vital outpost to humanity in the galaxy. To his team, it was the mission: defend the planet from all incoming dangers and ensure the safety of the citizens below. To him, it was home. This was the planet he was born on, grew up on, and fought tooth and nail for. He saw himself living out the rest of his life on this world. He was born here, and he persisted that he would die here. As his visor's motion sensor rang out, he looked back up to the Pelican drop ship that would be ferrying him to the cruiser. As he grabbed the Pelican, he saw Ruby's Sabre fly off toward the cruiser to disable the engines.

Ruby's Sabre had enough firepower to knock out the shielding and destroy the engines from behind. With the Pelican finally ready to take off, he heard her through the radio in his helmet, "Engines down. We're ready for you."

Jaune nodded as he watched the Sabre, "Copy that. I'll meet you at the hanger."

The camera shifted to the inside of the ship to show a series of Grunts and an Elite scrambling within the hanger of the ship. Above them, a figure appeared and jumped down through the energy ceiling and onto the Elite's head. As its plasma rifle flew up, Ruby grabbed the weapon and used it to gun down the Grunts around her. She moved like a storm through the Grunts emptied the room soon enough.

Ruby gasped, "Oh my gosh! I'm so cool!"

Yang chuckled, "Getting a big head, don't you think?"

"You know what I mean!"

Ruby stood up straight again as the Pelican flew through the barrier to the outside and landed onto the platform. Ruby tossed the rifle and approached the ship as Jaune jumped down from the cockpit. "What took you so long?"

Jaune let out a chuckle, "You try flying this thing instead of your fancy fighter and then ask me what takes so long." Jaune offloaded his personal chaingun from the Pelican.

Ruby started to geek out again, "Oh that's so cool! Heavy caliber rounds complete with belt feed, balance compensation, and even a blast shield for defense!"

Coco smirked, always happy to see others with her style of weapon.

Jaune set the gun onto a system on his back to allow him to move freely and use his hands to unload the ship and prepare the engine resting on the back. "Get to the bridge and send out the refuel call."

Ruby nodded, knowing that Jaune wasn't what one would call a speedy fighter, much less mobile than the others thanks to his armor. She ran off with the standard issue assault rifle and a magnum pistol at her side.

As the doors opened to the hall connecting the hanger to the bridge, Grunts jolted up seeing Jaune towering over them. She killed them in systematic fashion and moved quickly to complete her mission. Ruby, current callsign Noble-6, was one of a few Spartans listed as Ultra Lethal, so this level of security was hardly a challenge.

"Oh!" Nora made an exaggerated eureka motion, "That's why he kept saying 6!"

Yang whistled, "Ultra Lethal~ That sounds crazy."

Ruby tore through into a side battery to control the guns. More Elites were waiting and two charged her with their swords. As Ruby ducked the first, she grabbed the second by the arm and guided his blade into the first. She took the dropped the sword of the first and ran the second through as well. Using the second as a shield, she fired from behind the alien corpse with her magnum to rip through the rest of the Covenant team.

The scene on the bridge showed them running around, trying to reroute the power and get moving again. A Jackal at the door heard something odd and looked toward the door, hearing an odd hissing.

Ironwood counted down in his hand, mentally shouting, Breach!

The door exploded inward, killing the Jackal, and acting as enough of a shock for Ruby to dive in and behind cover nearby. Grunts tried to fire into the cover, not being the smartest, but suppressing Ruby from moving too far. But that was fine. Ruby tossed two plasma grenades, both of which landed onto Grunts. Said Grunts ran around in a panic, ending up taking out clusters of their own in their fear-fueled scramble.

Winter sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. "I don't know where to begin with that…"

The Elites on the bridge roared, but Ruby moved quickly and used their own sword against them, killing two instantly and gunning down the third. One remained, however. This Elite was adorned in golden armor with his helmet clearly being more ornate than the others. He roared and drew his blade, charging Ruby. Ruby fired her rifle to whittle down his shields, but this was an Elite General. His shields were stronger, and his body was far more trained than any other beneath him. The General leapt up and slammed his sword into the ground Ruby had occupied only a moment earlier. More shots took his shield further, but it proved difficult to get that to stick. As he charged again, however, Ruby was ready. She kicked up a Needle Rifle for the Elite to slash through, disrupting the containment magazine, and causing all of the glowing Needles to burst and explode in the Elite's face. As he flew backward, Ruby tossed the plasma grenade onto his chest and let him explode.

Mercury laughed a bit, "Damn, that was nuts."

Ruby had to moved quickly before any of the Covenant ships around caught on to what was happening. She fired off the signal for a refuel, broke the console enough to be usable while still sending out the signal, and ran back to the hanger. A few Covenant ran in to fight her, but they were easy pickings for Noble-6. As she burst into the hanger, she found Jaune defending the Pelican from a Covenant onslaught.

Jaune gunned down a group of Covenant and called up to Ruby, "Get down here and help me clear the area!"

Ruby charged in and fired into the alien crowd. One Spartan was a threat to the Covenant before them. Two was a horror. As Jaune fired his Chaingun from his heavy stance, Ruby jumped through the aliens and ripped apart anyone left.

Port let out a jovial laugh, "Excellent teamwork~! Truly a grand team."

Glynda nodded, "Considering how the two are moving, it's even more impressive. It's clear that the two aren't long time teammates. Small details in how they move tell me they must have met recently and became a team."

The students were amazed by that. Not only from their teacher's impressive eye for details, but also at how good their teamwork was despite how soon they'd met. Even the 'closest team' RWBY needed months to move that effectively together. Sure, they did fairly well against the Nevermore during initiation, but that was one very large, very easy to manipulate opponent. Against anyone more skilled or smarter, it wouldn't have been so easy.

The hanger was soon empty save for the two Spartans. Jaune brought his gun to rest as he let out a heavy breath. "That looks like the last of them. Group up and let's get this going." Ruby ran over as Jaune moved to the console for the engine. "I don't trust this is over, so watch my back." As he typed into the console, a pink Needle suddenly stuck into the ship's side and burst. "Damn it! Move!" A group of Jackals wielding Needle Rifles ran in, firing wildly to hope for a kill. Ruby moved quickly again as Jaune tried to finish his work.

"What's happening?" Velvet got a little worried now by the burst. "Will they be able to escape?"

Ruby wiped the floor with the Jackals as Jaune growled in frustration.

An AI, sounding remarkably like Penny, called out to them, "Distance is closing on this vessel's contact with the Covenant Super Carrier. Seventy-Six seconds to contact."

Jaune groaned, "Yeah, yeah. I hear you." He smacked the console and sighed, turning back to Ruby, "So, I've got good news and bad news. This bird took fire and her thrusters are toast. Which means the only way off this slag heap, is gravity."

Coco's glasses lowered, "They're… they're going to jump?"

"But they'll die!" Velvet shouted.

Ruby was fairly calm about that. "What's the good news?"

"That was the good news." Jaune sighed and pulled his helmet off, dropping it onto the floor beside him. His face was painted in somber lights, "The bad news is that the timer's shot. I'm going to have to set it off manually."

Everything went quiet. Was he saying what they thought he was?

Ruby looked between him and the console, "That's a one way trip."

"It's one we all make eventually." Jaune reached under his armor and pulled off his dog tags, snapping them off his neck. "They're going to need you down there, so don't bother trying to argue. Reach has been good to me." He held his hand up toward her, awaiting her hand to follow suit, "Way I see it, it's time for me to return the favor."

Ruby was quiet, thinking over what was really being said. She knew Spartans were all destined to die in battle eventually. She took a breath and met his hand with her own, taking the dog tags into her own between them.

Jaune nodded slowly. He grabbed the waist of her armor and lifted her off the ground. He slowly moved back to the barrier and held her up slightly. "Tell them to make it count." He tossed her out of the ship to fall back to Reach. Ruby's armor protected her from the vacuum and the combination of armor and her augmentations would keep her safe on reentry. As Jaune watched her fall back to the planet, he took a heavy breath and turned back to the engine.

Jaune thought back to things they'd seen previously. "In the end… we just have to have faith." It was a heavy reminder of how heroes sometimes don't make it. And it was clear this was going to be another such moment.

Jaune looked out over the ship as the Super Carrier, a ship far more massive than the cruiser he was in, flew over him. He took a breath, hearing Penny tell him it was 10 seconds until endpoint. Then at 5. 4. 3. 2. 1.

The camera moved to show things from Ruby's helmet cam. The ship began to glow before the center of the giant ship was torn apart by a slipspace rupture, creating a purple orb that tore everything apart around it.

Another series of Woah statements followed suit.

The camera moved to show the scene from a satellite camera nearby, going into static from the slipspace burst. Then, they heard people talking through the radios.

"Did you see that?!"

"Slipspace rupture detected."

The camera came back online to reveal another Covenant battle cruiser appearing within the planet's defenses. Then another. And another.

"It has to be the entire Covenant Fleet!"

Everyone was a little scared. They had hoped this would be the end. They knew they would have to have faith, but it was rare to think about what would happen if that faith wasn't quite playing out.

The camera went to static again.

As it did, they heard the voice of Neptune through the speakers, "Big guy always said he'd die on Reach. He thought he died saving the whole damn planet."

With a sigh, they heard Sage replying, "We should all be so lucky…"

With that, the static fell away and the screen turned off again.

Jaune gripped his chair tighter than before. It was hard to think about that without getting more than a little concerned. You just have to have faith. But what if it isn't enough?

Raven huffed, "This is why you shouldn't bother trying to play hero. It'll just get you killed for nothing."

This broke something within Yang. She slammed her hand onto her chair and stood defiantly, "SHUT UP!"

This caught everyone, Raven included, off guard.

Yang took deep breaths and growled, "You think you know what a hero is like?! What would you know?! You only care about yourself! I bet you couldn't care about anyone else if your life depended on it!"

Raven decided not to let that slide, "You watch your mouth! I left in accordance with the Tribe's traditions! You came after me, hunting me down. It's making you force yourself to become stronger."

"And that's why you abandoned us!"

"I didn't abandon anyone!"

"Then what do you call running away from your family?!"

"You would be dead if not for me!" Raven pointed toward Neo, "She'd have run you through if I hadn't been there to scare her off!"

"And what? You think I should say 'thank you' and just sit back down like a good daughter? Fuck that!" Yang's eyes became a deep red in her anger.

King and Knox appeared, about to say something, but someone happened to beat them to it. Ozpin slammed his cane against the ground, echoing through the theater and silencing everyone. The Headmaster of Beacon stood slowly and turned to the two. "I make it a point not to involve myself in the lives of others; and, if I must, I do whatever I can to remain neutral. These are your lives to live, not mine to sway. But it seems I must finally need to give my two cents to a situation."

Raven growled. If she could throw a punch, she'd have socked the Headmaster right then and there, "Shut it, Ozpin! I know what you really are! You think we're all just pawns in your damned chess game against Salem and the Grimm!"

"Raven. Has there ever been a time when I forced you to do anything? Any time I ever counseled you toward a course in life? I gave you a choice, and you made yours. But we're not talking about you here. Ms. Xiao Long has proven herself to be an exceptional student and, in time, I'm certain she will stand as a great huntress. But this isn't because you left her. Not because she's willing to search Remnant for you. She became this strong through the bonds she's made throughout her life. Her father trained her, her sister gave her something to protect, her uncle inspired her to do great things, and since coming to Beacon her team and her friends have continued to spur her on to greater heights. Not once has she ever so much as mentioned you."

Raven seemed to back away for a moment. She feared only two things in this world, Salem and Ozpin. She had long trusted that Ozpin was a neutral force, one that would leave her alone to her own devices. Yet here he was, picking a side.

Yang calmed a bit seeing her mother back away from the Headmaster. She was still angry enough that her eyes were red, but at least she wasn't about to explode on anyone.

Ozpin's tensed muscles relaxed a bit, even if it had been forced upon him by the theater's magic, "I don't know why you returned, but it sounds like there's unfinished business to be done. So, you can either sit down and wait for the opportunity to take care of it, or you can leave through the door again and have it haunt you once more. The choice is yours, Raven."

The Bandit leader shook, grinding her teeth together. She knew she couldn't challenge Ozpin openly, not to mention she'd likely be sent off to that fake camp to be left alone again. She, albeit reluctantly, sat down again with eyes cast away from the group.

Yang took a few deep breaths and sat back down with a huff.

Ozpin looked up toward the fireballs and nodded before sitting down again.

Knox sighed, "Well… that happened."