- MaxRealflugel
- |
- Elder Mythic Member
November 7th 2552 (Forerunner shield world)
Linda returned to the camouflaged doorway with the doctor in tow, her heavy technical case was being carried by Kelly.
Despite the weight of the case, her speed had not in anyway been affected. It was as though she was carrying a box full of air.
Dr. Halsey stopped at the edge of the field and placed her hands on her hips until she caught her breath. Even when her Spartans moved slower than usual it was still hard to keep up with them.
The area in front of her was noticeably different, but only because she knew where to look and what it was.
The Covenant version of the active camouflage system was very similar to this Forerunner version and it was possible that the Covenant had probably adapted the alien technology at point in the past.
Catherine had seen its deadly effectiveness from the surveillance footage taken by her Spartans on operational deployments, and the terrified first-hand accounts of survivors. But this version just seemed more polished than the Covenant version; the spatial distortion around the edge of the field was not as great as that on the Covenant system. If her Spartans were to be equipped with this kind of technology they would be even more deadly.
After a brief look at the surrounding area, Catherine slowly walked into the camouflaged field and was immediately greeted with the Forerunner doorway and a pair of inquisitive Spartans, in this case Fred and Olivia.
The door was typical of the type of the technology that she had seen before. The switch to the right of the entrance was illuminated by a single red light, an obvious indication that it was locked.
Kelly set down the technical case next to Dr. Halsey and backed away slowly so she could watch her work. The Spartans were faster and stronger than any other Human but they were always dumbfounded when watching the doctor perform technical miracles.
Catherine pulled three, multi-coloured coax cables from the case and attached them to face of the switch. After several minutes of adjustments and a flurry of command inputs on her data pad, the light changed from red to green.
The Spartans quickly moved Catherine and her equipment away from the entrance and readied themselves for some much needed exploration.
Fred pressed the switch and the two sections of the door silently parted, before they cautiously entered the shell of the Dyson-sphere.
May 18th 2866 (Location Unknown)
John cautiously waited as Cortana trawled through the immense wealth of information that was now available. Her glowing skin was covered in the usual collection of unrecognisable hieroglyphs, except this time they were racing across her at an unbelievable speed.
John quickly realised that the amount of information that she was processing was far greater than he had initially imagined.
“Cortana.” Asked John
No answer came from her as she increased the speed of her processing until her blue body became a mind-numbing blur.
“Cortana!” bellowed John
Cortana rapidly shifted from her previous pace of processing to a more familiar gentle glide of blue lines and shapes. The expression on her face conveyed the depth of data that was now available to her.
“What have you found?” asked John in a relaxed tone
Cortana’s eyes repeatedly darted left and right, as though reading some invisible lexicon of information. Eventually she refocused on John, who was standing expectantly in front of the main Forerunner console.
“The amount of data here chief… is beyond imagining,” Cortana struggled to convey the information she was now in possession of. “I know everything about the Forerunners. Their history, the Flood and the wars they fought.”
“Wars?” enquired John “How many times did they fight the Flood?”
“They weren’t at war with just the Flood there was another enemy, before the Flood. It was because of this old enemy that they created the Flood, to fight for the Forerunners not against them.” She explained
“I think you should start at the beginning.”
“Over three million years ago the Forerunners were at war with an equally advanced species that they simply called “The Enemy”.
But this enemy was different to the Forerunners, even though both sides possessed advanced technology, The Enemy had the ability to partially adapt to possible threats. Their bodies and the armour they wore were capable of absorbing or deflecting some forms of energy, kinetic force and even deadly viral infections.”
Cortana paused briefly as though catching her breath, even though she had no need for oxygen.
“The Forerunners didn’t create the Flood by accident they made them to fight. The Flood are capable of killing and infecting even the hardiest of defenders, and they proved to be too much for this enemy.”
“So what happened to this enemy?” John asked
“I don’t know. A lot of the entries that are present in the library have been corrupted by the amount of time that has passed since this planet was constructed, and there other areas that I can’t access because of this. The same goes for the sensor systems and the camouflage technology.”
“So what’s this planet for?”
“At first I thought that this world was a prototype, designed to fight the Flood, but it’s not. This planet was designed and built as a defence platform, to be used against the Forerunners old enemy, a good old fashioned fortress or outpost. But instead of a world surrounded by ships and orbital platforms, the Forerunners have gone a step further and enveloped the entire planet in a kind of camouflage so that it wouldn’t be found in the first place.”
John began to think of the possibilities of the technology available here. If Humanity had discovered a world like this during the war, then a lot of lives would have been saved.
“If this was a world built to fight this…enemy, then does that mean the Flood won’t be contained here?”
“I’m not sure chief; they were present on every other Forerunner structure. But then the Halo’s were designed with the Flood in mind and their research program was continued until the very last moment. Then the rings were fired all those years ago.” Replied Cortana
John looked over at the pale faced Forerunner at the centre of the room, his stillness made John somewhat uneasy.
“What about him?”
“Before they used autonomous monitors, the Forerunners facilities were guarded and maintained by live members of their society. At the time it was the most reliable method of ensuring the operational status of wherever they were.” She explained
“So how do we wake him up?”
“We can’t chief, he’s in some kind of temporal stasis field. By all accounts he’s not even in this room; he’s separated from us by a bubble of slip-space. However, if the computer system was running properly I could probably access his monitoring directive, and speak to him.
“If the systems on this world are so corrupted, why has the monitor not dispatched a couple of sentinels to fix them?” John enquired
“I don’t know, he either doesn’t want to or he’s unable.” Replied Cortana
Cortana closed her eyes and went into another blur of processing, her skin made for a dizzying sight. After several minutes passed she returned with a way to solve their dilemma.
“I could re-boot the whole system that should fix most of the glitches and reset the security and sensor directives.”
“You want to re-boot a planet?” said John with a hint of sarcasm
“I know it sounds extreme, but it may be our best way of finding out where we are.”
“Do it.” Stated John
Cortana closed her eyes again and then the lights suddenly dimmed. A faint vibration emanated from beneath Johns feet, but it was nothing of concern. Then everything suddenly went dark.
John activated his night vision and he could see the rest of the room again, but Cortana had vanished from sight. He was suddenly filled with concern once again.
But as quickly as the darkness had descended it was immediately lifted and room was illuminated once again and Cortana reappeared at the computer console.
“Re-boot complete…all systems online…defence program active…sensors active…archive active. Everything’s back on chief now we can find out exactly where we…-“ Cortana cut off in mid conversation and looked around as though scanning the massive data files once more.
“What is it?” asked John
“The whole planet wasn’t just shielded by a camouflage field; it was immersed in a form of slip-space as well. But the faults that were present in both enabled us to see and land on the planet. But there were rips and tears in the field that distorted everything. That was why I was only activated at the last minute instead of from a safe distance. The sensors that I had working on the Forward unto Dawn were unable to detect the planet, but we entered through one of the slip-space gaps. After that everything was distorted, time, space everything.” Explained Cortana with a tone of excitement
“So what does that mean?”
“We weren’t drifting in space for 314 years chief. We were only out there for twenty four days.” Replied Cortana
John felt something that he had not felt for a long time, happiness. Earth would still be there and there was hope once more for his team to be alive.