(I made this early to make up for the last chapter being lost. Enjoy)
Hermes Station
Primary control room
Hammond Doyle read yet another alert from the monitor. He never could remember the kid's name. Same long and German probably.
These 'robonoids' as he was told they were called by Admiral Sierra-009. They had been appearing out of small Slipspace portals for the last few days. The damn things we're nearly impossible to detect. Apparently Homeworld Slipspace drives were even better then these 'Covenant' he was also told to watch out for. Thankfully he hadn't seen any bulbous purple ships yet so that was a good sign.
He decided he finally had enough of these damn robots. Theoretically they could keep shooting them down with 50 mm or missiles if they got to far for several hundred years. But he would both be long past his new 150 year lifespan and would get very tiring for both him and the crew.
"Let it go. I want it investigated." He said to the crew aboard the control room. All of the personnel turned to look at him as if he'd grown a second head.
"What, are you gonna sit around all day or are you gonna get a fucking pelican ready." He said to them. They all immediately went back to their jobs.
______
Lance corporal Max rider was rudely awaken from his sleep. He angrily looked up to see none other than his big brother Jimmy at the door to his room. His brother was dressed in his BDU's. His short brown hair and blue eyes standing out in the shadow he made in the doorway.
Max felt the bed shift next to him. He looked to his right to see his girlfriend of almost 4 years next to him sleeping peacefully. She was a scientist aboard the station.
"Good to see you up finally." His brother said with a smug grin on his face.
He turned his legs to rest on the floor as he rubbed his eyes to get the sleep out of them. "Why'd you wake me up." He said with a mild but of irritation as he finally looked at his big brother with his identical blue eyes.
His grin was replaced with a more neutral expression as he told Max why he was rudely awoken. "Commander Hammond he's ordered us to investigate the orbs that have been appearing out of Slipspace for the past few days. He also wants Maria to be the science officer that does the research work. Were simply there to act as bodyguards."
Max turned around to wake up Maria. Her green eyes fluttered open and her scarlet hair covered her eyes as she woke up.
"Good morning beautiful." She heard Max say next to her.
"Why are we awake right now. I had a late night at the lab. Those robonoids aren't simple." She said to Max.
"Your investigating the robonoids that have been appearing. We're going to be providing security." She heard Jim say from the door.
She bli med for a second before she immediately got a huge grin and grabbed her work clothes and headed for the bathroom in the blink of an eye.
"Guess she's on board." Max said with a chuckle as he turned back toward his brother.
"Meet me in armory 3 in half an hour." Jimmy said as he closed the metal door and left.
______
After breakfast with Maria, Max had put on his BDU's and made his way to the armory. Once there he saw Jimmy already in his ODST gear and he was finishing the examination of his BR55 battle rifle. He finished racking the bolt as he saw his little brother enter.
Max immediately went to his locker and started to switch from his BDU to his ODST under suit.
"How's Maria been?" Jimmy asked him.
He finished putting on his undersuit and started to add the armor plates before he replied.
"She's like a kid in a highly advanced candy shop with these small and big robonoids. Apparently they've only began to understand how they work. But she's whole heatedly on board with researching it." He had finished adding his leg armor and began to work on the chestplate.
"I can only imagine how she's gonna react when we go see a functioning one." Jimmy said as he laughed to himself.
"Oh that's a guarantee." Max said with a smirk as he finished adding his arm plates. He then turned back to his locker and picked up his helmet.
He put it over his head and twisted it. He heard the clicked it locked into place. The HUD flickered on as he reached in and grabbed his M45E shotgun. He slid the pump back as he loaded the twelve 8 gauge rounds. He is the pump forward as he attached it to his may plate on his back. Last piece of equipment was his brand new M6G handgun. He grabbed a magazine, inserted it and chambered a round. He grin grew on his face as he looked over the handgun. It was apparently just starting to be manufactured and he got one of the first ones. If made his brothers M6C SOCOM feel inadequate. He quit his fanboying of the weapon as he strapped it to his hip and grabbed a few magazines and 2 dozen shells and put them in his ammo pouches.
He exited the armory with his brother following closely behind him. He turned left and went to a stall next to the armory. He went up to the requisition officers table and asked for his SPNKr rocket launcher.
The officer quickly came back with the double barrel 105 mm rocket launcher as well as four rockets.
He quickly put two into the tube and put it in safe. He then deactivated the warheads on the other two and hung them and the launcher on his back.
"I still do t know how you carry almost a hundred pounds of gear like it's nothing." His brother said to him.
He depolarized his visor and looked at his big brother so he could see his smirk. "I always was stronger than you."
Jimmy rolled his eyes under his visor. "Come on, wouldn't want to keep Maria and the pilot waiting.
Max smiled and followed through the grey and orange hallways. He ratherliked the asthetic of the station. Watching the orange lines cross with the grey/white panels of the walls. There were armored bulkheads at every hallway junction and one about every hundred feet. He stepped past several that remained open almost constantly as they made their way to the hangar.
They went down one kf the main elevator's of the station that ran alongside the main elevator that transferred goods, cargo and vehicles from here to the surface.
The fact that the elevators were made with transparent Aluminum made the ride all the more breathtaking. He had been on these elevators several hundred times and it still took his breath away. Especially since this one showed the enormity of the hangar they were entering.
Hangar 3 was the Hermes largest. Stretching to a good portion of it's hangar space. It was at least 300 meters long and 150 meters wide. It even had a Blitz class Corvette parked. It's 120 meter length being the largest vessel he knew that could fit. He was mesmerized by it's both sleek armor plates and twin heavy plasma cannons coming out from the thick wings on the back. Apparently it was the first of it's kind and reverse engineered from ancient Homeworld ships.
He was knocked out of his wonderment as Maria tapped him on the back of the helmet. He turned to look at her.
She had her long hair done up in a large ponytail that trailer down her white labcoat slightly. Her torso was covered in a light orange sweater and she wore a worn pair of blue jeans that hugged her frame nicely.
"I'd say you like that ship almost as much as you love me." She said to him with a smile.
"I can't tell which I like more." He said with the biggest of smirks through his depolarized visor. She hit him playfully in the shoulder plate. But he hardly even felt it as the hydrostatic gel layer in his suit hardened a bit before it went back to normal.
"Come on you two. We need to get moving quickly if we don't want to lose that marble." Said Jimmy.
The group of 3 then moved toward a pelican that had it's thrusters running. They walked up the ramp and it closed behind them. The three then buckled their quick release seatbelts and they felt the engines roar louder as the pelican lifted off the ground and took off out of the hangar. They could feel as they passed the oxygen energy barrier. The blue barriers covered the hangar exits for vehicles to exit but for air not to.
The pelican then took a steep dive as it descended through the lower layers of the atmosphere. The trip was mostly uneventful as they needed the impact zone. The pelican slowed down around 2 thousand feet and came to a near stop around 30 feet. It lowered it's hydraulic landing gear and lowered gently to the ground. The soldiers and scientist unbuckled and disembarked the dropship.
"Radio if you need support or if you need a pickup." The gruff female voice of the dripship pilot said over their radios.
"Copy." Jim said over the comms.
"The impact point is just a couple hundred feet away from here." Jim said.
The three then walked through the desert sand for a minute until they saw the impact site.
The site itself was a crater in the sand about 50 feet wide and almost 10 feet deep at the center.
"I didn't realize how big this particular robonoids was?" Said Maria as she woke down the divot to examine the large orb.
The two soldiers quickly followed after her and got out their primary weapons in case something happened. Max particularly holding his finger just in corny of the shotguns trigger. Not wanting anything to happen to her.
Maria pulled out both a datapad and a scanner. She quickly connected the scanner and carefully walked around the orb.
"Huh, surface scans only show what we already know Bout these things. Their made with same sort of rock and metal like material designated 'crystalline'. It also has properties to shapeshift since it's circuitry is inlayed within the material in a way we don't yet understand." She said in a dumbed down version for them to understand.
Just as she finished this sentence the marble popped out a set of large legs and stood up.
Surprised the two ODST's raised their weapons. But before they could have Maria move she attached something to the robonoid. Whatever it did caused Sparks to dance across it and make it go still.
"What was that?" Jim asked.
"A prototype holding device we made to keep these things immobile. We didn't want to destroy it." She said to them as she read some readings on her datapad.
Max put his shotgun at ready position as he edged closer to it. "Seems like it was trying to go somewhere." He said.
"Are their any gem sites around here?" Asked Jim.
Maria looked up from her tablet. "No the only thing around here is..." She trailer off as her eyes widened. She then climbed up on top of the marble as if she was going to ride it.
"The only gem thing around here is a warp pad. So it most likely was going to use the warp pad to travel to it's destination." She said with a large smile as she tucked the scanner and datapad into her pockets.
Jim just looked to Max. Max in turn just shrugged his shoulders and climbed up next to Maria.
"Your girlfriend is crazy." He said as he lifted his helmets speakers. He then followed suite and climbed up on top of the marble.
"Alright boys, welcome to alien orb express, next stop somewhere." Said Maria as she took off the restraining device.
The robonoid immediately started moving. It stumbled a bit as it regained it's sense of balance. Max had to hold onto Maria and Jim before he almost fell off.
It immediately took off with it's stubby legs in the direction of the warp pad.
"This is so much better than a horse!" Max heard his brother about with an excited voice. The robot went surprisingly fast to it's destination. It only took about 30 seconds to get to the warp pad.
It stepped on the Crystal pad.
"Are you sure this is safe?" Max asked Maria.
She turned to look at him. "I have no idea." She said with a large smile.
"Oh boy." Jim said as the was activated and they were travelling.
The trip was surprisingly pleasent as they travelled through the white beam.
"Interesting, it appears these pads act as some sort of Slipspace drive. That explains why we can travel so fast. And the area these streams travel in is sorrounded by a Slipspace bubble to keep everything stable."
This did not sit well with the two ODST'S. Because they knew how dangerous Slipspace can be. Especially the different laws of physics and radiation.
Thankfully they didn't have much time to think about it as they reached their destination. But their destination even made Maria nervous.
"The Kindergarten." Said Jim. Command had only discovered this place a while ago due to an adventure by Admiral 009's nephew when he found the location of this place. They had been prepping a team to go and explore it later on in the year.
The robonoid then stepped off the pad and walked to the edge of the small cliff. This scared the three riders but they calmed down when the robonoid stuck to the side of it.
The robonoid then continued deeper into the Kindergarten. Jim scanned the sorrounding area with his battle rifle in case anything activated. And Max kept his shotgun at ready in case anything jumped out at them.
The robonoid then abruptly stopped. The threethen carefully jumped off the top of it just in time to see it open a pit in the ground. The robonoid then proceeded to shapeshift into an upside down pyramid that slotted into the hole.
"I think that's our enterance." Said Jim as he walked on top of it and gave it a cursory tap of his foot to confirm it's strength. Max and Maria then stepped on and the robonoid then started to descend into the ground.
"Imgoj g to signal the pelican for standby in case somehti g goes south. Because comms are going to get spotty under here." He said to the others.
Maria scanned the sorrounding area as it opened up into a large chamber. Just as on the way down the facility appeared to be carved into the rock. Green wires or pipes were everywhere. At the center of the back wall stood a gem power source. Around it stood a hexagonal metal structure.
As the gem pyramid slowed to a stop it sprouted some of it's material into a walkway that connected them to the bed.
As it did this green lines appeared on the walls as the facility powered up. A column appeared on the floor with the indent of a hand with a yellow diamond in the middle.
"This doesn't bode well." Jim said.
Max and Maria then noticed that the bottom of the byrsmid then liquidise and collected into a drop. It fell to the floor and created a regular sized robonoid. It then walked up the side and proceeded to jump and plop itself on top of the column. It lit up and caused the walls of the bed to light up.
A screen then sprouted out of the power gem and formed into a vision of peridot as two large green hands came out of the side.
"Down now!" Jim whispered.
The three then ducked by the ledge between the bottom of the chamber and the hex. Peridots screen thing then started moving.
"Established projection link with control room. Plus robonoid has successfully landed on earth and entered control room in facet five. Will proceed to preform status check of kindergarten." Peridot finished as the screen moved toward the back wall.
"We can't let her start this place up! The Crystal gems said that it would destroy the planet if it reached it's apex." Whispered Maria.
"Then what do you suggest we do. We can't let her turn the entire world into the wasteland, not over my dead body!" Said Jim
"Can we try talking to her?" Asked Max.
Both Maria and Jim looked at him dumbfounded. "What, do you have any better ideas. We need to know EXACTLY what she's doing." Said Max.
Max looked at Maria. "Got any better ideas?" He asked hopefully.
"Sadly, no." She turned to Max. "Dont do amythingstupid please. I don't know what I'd do if you got killed."
Max then looked directly at her. "I don't plan an going anywhere." He said.
He then took his rocket launcher off his back and handed it to Jim. "If things go south." He said as he climbed up into the platform.
"Checking for all operational injectors, checking in aberations in perimeter." Peridot said as two holes appeared in the ceiling on opposite side and the hands slotted into them.
"This gem tech is simply archaic." Said peridot as 6 columns appeared from the ceiling of the hex.
"I personally prefer the style of UNSC tech myself. Althougb it is pretty advanced and stylish in its own right." Said Max.
All the columns and holes dissapeared in the ceiling. The hands and screen then turned around quickly and peridot looked directly at the armored ODST. Max simply parked on his M90E and size bluntly. "Hello, I'm Max."
Peridot then updated her log thing. "There appears to be an infestation of 'max' in the kindergarten." Said Peridot
Max then brought his hand up in the air in mock offense. "Hey, I'm not that had."
"And tell me, are there any more 'max' in the Kindergarten." Asked Peridot
"Nope." He said as he popped the p.
"Hmm tell me, are humans still the dominant species of the planet." Asked Peridot
"Yes. And it ain't gonna be any other way." Said Max
"Hhmm." Said peridot as she updated her log.
"Now, let me ask you something." Max said Max as he brought up his shotgun up and rested the top of the barrel on his shoulder. "What the fuck are you up to."
Peridot, obviously not hearing this word before simply turned the screen back to what she was working on. She raised one of the hands up into a fist and tried to smash him.
"Now!" Max yelled as he rolled out of the way and sprinted to the side of the hex.
Jim in an instant jumped up to the hex and aimed the SPNKr at the hand. A rocket fired out of the tube and in an instant impacted the hand. There wasn't much left of it other than a few shards. Then Maria jumped up and threw something that impacted the other hand. It stuck to it and blinked blue twice before a small EMP disabled it and it fell to the ground.
Peridot, shocked turned the screen around. "What did you do, how did you do that. The red eye didn't see anything on this planet strong enough to do that before it was destroyed." Peridot said
"Yeah, it was destroyed by an Onager railgun before it could even get close. Although it did take a couple shots since the damn thing was so large." Said Jim.
"How did you humans get this advanced. Only five thousand years ago you just had primitive copper tools." She then turned to Max. "Who are you!"
Max brought his shotgun and aimed at the screen. "We're the UNSC. And we defend Earth and all her colonies." He fired a shot as he finished. The hardlight screen shattered as the 8 gauge buckshot impacted it.
Max then brought his shotgun down and racked another shell. "Well, that was a thing."
Maria then walked up to the column and moved the robonoid off. She then took out an AI datachip and inserted it into the top of the podium. The universal connector microscopically changing it's shape to fit the Homeworld port. It activated and hologram of what looked like Theodore Roosevelt appeared.
"Oh my, this technology is simply amazing. And she said this was archaic. Oh my and so many data packets to go over." The AI said excitedly.
"Teddy, what can you tell me about this place." Asked Maria.
The AI stopped his excitement and red over the purpose of the control room.
"It seems like this place overlooked the kindergarten as well as a project called the 'cluster'. I would tell you more but it appears some of the data is corrupted and that is one of the corrupted bits. I tried repairing it but all I found out is Homeworld experimented with artificially fusing gem shards together." Said Teddy.
Maria pondered this. "Any other experiments we should know about." She asked.
The AI then flicked through more data packets on the hologram. "Nothing of importance that I can see. But they are vast so I will need a few hours to fully go through them." He said.
"Alright, copy everything. I want to get out of this place as quickly as possible." Said Jim.
"It's already done." Said teddy. He transferred his programming back into the chip and Maria yanked it. She then put the chip into the robonoid and saw that Teddy was able to access the robonoid as well. The material then wrapped around the chip to keep it there.
"Alright, looks like we've got a live specimen." Said Maria.
"Step aboard the pyramid gents, oh and please watch your step." Said Teddy. The two ODST'S then walked back onto the pad. The walkway then wrapped back into the main mass and the pad then proceeded to float back up.
By the time they reached the top the pelican was waiting for them. The pilot was leaning against the ramp with her helmet covering the entirety of her head.
"Waiting long?" Jim asked.
"Nope." Said the pilot simply as she walked through the troop bay and armory and into the cockpit. The three entered and get in their seats. Teddy then shapeshifted the robonoid back into it's original shape and walked into the ramp. He then sat down at the door to the armory and the bottom of the robonoid then squashed and melted to the floor to secure itself.
The ramp then closed and they took off back to Hermes Station to inform the Commander.
(Thought you guys might like a bit of a different perspective)