Nine: Steel Combat Boots
Fortunately for them, there was no sabotage of the Ascendant Justice-Gettysburg, and because there was no sabotage, there was no need to stop at Eridanus Secundus for repairs. They made very good time to the Hierophant's location through an anomalous form of Slipspace that seemed to change from moment to moment as the crystal shifted and whirled under no power but its own.
Halsey watched it eagerly and recorded every second, but the Spartans ignored it in favor of listening to Cortana's briefing. "We are presently on a collision course with the Unyielding Hierophant, ETA six hours, mark. Based on transmissions I've intercepted, the Hierophant is a mobile space station, roughly thirty kilometers long, and it looks something like this." She sketched out a rough image of it: a figure-eight-shaped construct with a rotating ring around its narrowest point, joined to the station by filament-like tubes. "The simplest way to destroy it would be a repeat of Halo. The entire power network is linked to provide stable flow, so when one of the reactors starts fluctuating on its way to critical, the station's security protocols will attempt to stabilize the power output by making the others fluctuate in sync, dragging them all into criticality."
"And how do we reach it? We can't drop out of Slipspace in this ship; it'll be obvious something's wrong."
"Dropships. One or several, depending on how many Spartans are being deployed; the strike team will have to be small enough to have a low risk of detection but large enough that the loss of one or even a few members won't stop the survivors from succeeding. But anyway, dropships are incapable of staying in Slipspace under their own power; the field will deteriorate, and they'll transition back to realspace, although I imagine it will be a very bumpy ride.
"The Covenant's dropships are considerably more resilient than the UNSC's anyway, and with some additional reinforcements, you'll be able to survive reentry. Your flesh is enhanced but still so fragile, organics."
"What about extraction?"
"Transmissions indicate the station is in the Tau Ceti system. Plenty of places to hide. The Justice-Gettysburg can drop out further in system and wait for your signal, then do a pinpoint jump to pick you up. Or, if you can manage it, you can steal another dropship and come to us."
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The Spartans started reinforcing one of the Spirit dropships right away. Four teams of Spartans - Blue, Gray, Black, and Gold - would be infiltrating the Hierophant, while the others searched as much equipment as possible for tracking devices and other nasties. They wouldn't be able to search everything, but every little bit meant that there was one less vector for the Covenant to inflict harm.
Cortana, meanwhile, was doing some reinforcing of her own. She'd split off one of her personality spikes, one that was positively gleeful over the thought of killing so many Covenant at once, even though it would mean her death as well. She worked to shore up the spike's code so she would last long enough to do so, then transferred her to Fred's armor.
Then she sat back and watched the Spartans continue prep work, wondering if they would need to sacrifice the Ascendant Justice and the Forerunner crystal this time as well. There was always a chance things could go wrong; she could add an extra bit of insurance. Just in case, she shuffled some of the Huragok over to the Gettysburg under the guise of doing repairs to improve the ship-to-ship connection and reactor output.
While that was happening, she opened a private COM channel with the departing Spartans. "Ten minutes to the drop zone; begin final preparations."
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The warriors' exit from Slipspace was bone-jarring, teeth-rattling, and utterly disorienting. For all their reinforcements, there was nothing they could do to smooth the ride, and the dropship bounced and rolled, spinning out of control on every quantum filament they hit. The Spartans hung onto their safety harnesses for dear life, praying to whatever higher powers existed that none of the straps snapped and sent them rattling around in the pod.
When Fred pulled up everyone's vitals, he saw that they were erratic but well within normal parameters, and the radiation leaking through the lead-lined hull was livable, though not ideal.
The dropship decelerated with a jolt so sharp that it sent all the Spartans slamming against their harnesses and the backs of their pods, leaving them stunned until the hissing of Cortana's bloodthirsty clone roused them. "Large volume of COM traffic, F- through K-bands. Three hails so far."
"How are you receiving anything? The hull's been lined with lead."
"Numerous hull breaches detected. COM traffic is also unusually strong due to close proximity to sender. Awaiting orders." The last part sounded almost sullen.
"Stand by." He unstrapped himself, then moved over to ease open a hatch and peer out. His vision was blocked by the silver-blue hull of a frigate, but once it moved aside… "How many?"
"Two hundred and forty-seven warships," she answered eagerly, "Based on your field of vision, total population estimate is five hundred ships."
Jai let out a soft and heartfelt expletive, which everyone privately agreed with. Five hundred ships - it was the largest Covenant fleet yet encountered. There was no way humanity could survive if that showed up at Earth.
"You said they've pinged us three times?" When he received an affirmative, he continued, "Tell them our engines are crippled and we need assistance to move. Try to get them to take us to the Hierophant for repairs."
While she did that, the Spartans checked their gear and armor, making sure it was still functional. Some of it wasn't, so they would leave it behind, but most was, most importantly their armor.
The dropship jolted again, weaker than the drop from Slipspace. Fred slipped a fiber optic camera through a crack in the hull and watched as the ferry carried them through the fleet to the Hierophant.
The station looked almost exactly like what Cortana had shown them, save that there were dozens of ships docked with the station. That really drove home how big the station was; if even it alone achieved Earth orbit…
The Spartan moved away from the hatch. A few minutes later, artificial gravity pulled them to the deck, atmosphere hissing in through the cracks. All the Spartans got ready to shoot their way out if they had to, but it wasn't necessary; the first Covenant they encountered with a couple of Huragok coming to fix the dropship. There were more in the vicinity but no other Covenant, so they left the aliens to their work, scrambling up a catwalk overhead for some cover. When they swept for threats, they only found a pair of Grunts moving barrels of coolant. The Spartans let them be; their disappearance would be noticed.
Linda spotted a holopanel, and she and Cal covered Fred while he made for it. He inserted Cortana's chip and darted back behind a plasma coil the size of a Warthog. "I'm in," the construct announced, "I've secured and encrypted the intra-team COM."
"Good work. Where's the reactor?"
"Seven kilometers further into the lobe. The system is isolated from the rest of the station, however; you'll need to take me with you. I can leave a copy in the system to keep track of things for us, but it could have aberrations in its code that I cannot correct."
"That's a risk I'm willing to take. Go ahead."
Twenty seconds later they were following her directions through to the reactors. Linda, Cal, and Naomi, their spotter, climbed to the rooftops in an open section of the station to provide long-range cover fire, while the remaining Spartans hurried across a plaza toward the reactor complex.
The copies had continued to duplicate exponentially within the system, relying on numerical superiority to overwhelm the Covenant AI, but one of them still managed to pass along the original's pre-recorded warning about the Brutes. Provided Kelly could stay out of their reach, she said, they should be able to sneak up on the aliens and kill them, but they might be wearing power armor with shields.
Fred was the first to spot them. They were taller than the Sangheili and seemed more akin to humanity than any other alien race they'd encountered. Even so, they were Covenant and therefore the enemy.
At his signal, the Spartans readied their weapons; those with captured plasma weaponry came to the forefront - and opened fire at another signal. One of the two went down almost immediately, shields overloaded and a bullet between the eyes, but the other was slower to die. It charged them in a red-eyed rage, and the Spartans dove out of the way, still firing. They put as many bullets into it as they dared, then when it expired, they kept moving.
The reactor itself lay beyond; it was an impressive complex of five hundred and twelve smaller reactors aligned in perfect rows and columns eight deep. Each of the smaller reactors was easily the size of a Pelican. They glowed a seemingly benign blue, but that just meant that they were producing a lot of power.
Cortana directed them to a console at the base of the reactor cube. "I'm in. Not too many counter-intrusion measures here, so I can proceed with the overload whenever you like, but keep in mind that it will take ten minutes for the whole thing to blow."
Fred did some quick math, then told her to proceed with the detonation.
And then they ran for the shuttle bay.
There were Banshees circling the area, Elites and Jackals and Grunts running this way and that; their translators said that a Field Marshal was yelling, "The Demons! They have to have left it in this area; find it! We cannot let them destroy the holy light!"
"Cortana?!" Fred shouted over the COM.
The AI didn't verbally respond, but a vidscreen opened up in one corner of their HUDs. It showed a simulation of the crystal from Reach, apparently in a closet somewhere, embedded in a block of C-12 with a timer showing the same countdown they were racing against. Text followed; all it said was bait for ships.
"Luring the Covenant in close with the promise of glory for saving the 'holy light'," said Serin, "Clever. Let's make it count."
"Agreed. Double-time, Spartans!"
The snipers and spotter rejoined them, and they gunned down everything between them and the shuttle bay. Once they were there, Kelly took the lead and bolted for the nearest dropship. By the time the other Spartans caught up with her, she would already have the engines hot. She drew near -
-and vanished.
"Whiskey tango foxtrot!" Vinh, who'd been closest behind her, skidded to a stop and lifted his weapon, aiming for the spot she'd disappeared - right as she reappeared.
"Come on!" she cried, "It's the crystal - come on!"
She ran back through, and this time they saw the ripple in space that marked her passage. The other Spartans followed one at a time, as fast as they could, and found themselves in Doctor Halsey's makeshift lab on the Gettysburg, the scientist looking just bewildered as they were.
Once they were through, the ripples vanished - and so did the crystal itself.
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[What the hell was that?]
'Uh, we appear to have acquired a major cleaving of the Mother Crystal, boss.'
[What?]
'Major cleaving. Mother Crystal. It just showed up in my lab.'
[...what - and I cannot possibly stress this enough - the fuck.]
'My sentiments exactly, boss.'