Halo: Divine Wind E-Book

Troy Denning

• Herausgeber: Titan Books
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Seitenzahl: 498

Beschreibung

An original full-length novel set in the Halo universe and based on the New York Times bestselling video game series with the latest entry, Halo Infinite, out in 2021! October 2559. With the galaxy in the suffocating grip of a renegade artificial intelligence, another perilous threat has quietly emerged in the shadows: the Keepers of the One Freedom, a fanatical and merciless Covenant splinter group, has made its way beyond the borders of the galaxy to an ancient Forerunner installation known as the Ark. Led by an infamous Brute named Castor, the Keepers intend to achieve what the Covenant, in all its might, failed to: activate Halo and take the last steps on the path of the Great Journey into transcendence. But unknown to Castor and his new, unexpected ally on the Ark, there are traitors to the cause in their midst—namely the Ferrets, composed of Office of Naval Intelligence operative Veta Lopis and her young team of Spartan-IIIs, who have been infiltrating the Keepers to lay the groundwork for Castor's assassination. But with ONI's field operations now splintered and cut off by the Guardian threat, Veta's original mission has suddenly and dramatically escalated in scope. There's simply no choice or fallback plan—either the Ferrets somehow stop the Keepers or the galaxy faces an extinction-level event….

Leseprobe

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Leave us a Review

Copyright

Dedication

Historian’s Note

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Thirteen

Fourteen

Fifteen

Sixteen

Seventeen

Epilogue

Acknowledgments

A Special Note from 343 Industries

About the Author

DON’T MISS THESE OTHER THRILLING STORIES IN THE WORLDS OF

THE FERRETS

Troy Denning

Halo: Last Light

Halo: Retribution

Halo: Divine Wind

RION FORGE &ACE OF SPADES

Kelly Gay

Halo: Smoke and Shadow

Halo: Renegades

Halo: Point of Light

THE MASTER CHIEF & BLUE TEAM

Troy Denning

Halo: Silent Storm

Halo: Oblivion

Halo: Shadows of Reach

ALPHA-NINE

Matt Forbeck

Halo: New Blood

Halo: Bad Blood

GRAY TEAM

Tobias S. Buckell

Halo: The Cole Protocol

Halo: Envoy

THE FORERUNNER SAGA

Greg Bear

Halo: Cryptum

Halo: Primordium

Halo: Silentium

THE KILO-FIVE TRILOGY

Karen Traviss

Halo: Glasslands

Halo: The Thursday War

Halo: Mortal Dictata

THE ORIGINAL SERIES

Halo: The Fall of Reach

Eric Nylund

Halo: The Flood

William C. Dietz

Halo: First Strike

Eric Nylund

Halo: Ghosts of Onyx

Eric Nylund

STANDALONE STORIES

Halo: Contact Harvest

Joseph Staten

Halo: Broken Circle

John Shirley

Halo: Hunters in the Dark

Peter David

Halo: Saint’s Testimony

Frank O’Connor

Halo: Shadow of Intent

Joseph Staten

Halo: Legacy of Onyx

Matt Forbeck

SHORT STORY ANTHOLOGIES

Various Authors

Halo: Evolutions: Essential Tales of the Halo Universe

Halo: Fractures: More Essential Tales of the Halo Universe

TROY DENNING

BASED ON THE BESTSELLING VIDEO GAME FOR XBOX®

TITAN BOOKS

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Halo: Divine WindPrint edition ISBN: 9781803360140E-book edition ISBN: 9781803360157

Published by Titan BooksA division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd144 Southwark Street, London SE1 0UPwww.titanbooks.com

First Titan edition: October 202110 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2021 by Microsoft Corporation. All Rights Reserved. Microsoft, Halo, the Halo logo, Xbox, and the Xbox logo are trademarks of the Microsoft group of companies.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

For Matthew McCarthy

HISTORIAN’S NOTE

This story takes place in October 2559, a year after the events of Halo 5: Guardians, as the AI Cortana commands a host of Fore-runner Guardians and uses them to impose martial law on key interstellar civilizations across the Orion Arm of the Milky Way galaxy. It begins a few hours after the events depicted in Halo: Shadows of Reach.

ONE

2205 hours, October 12, 2559 (military calendar)

Banished LichPegoras

Translocation Interstice, Reach/Ark Slipspace Portal

A sliver of flame creased the darkness ahead. It did not roil or roll or swell in front of the viewport. It merely hung in the black opalescence of slipspace as though it had always been there, a long red ember trapped in the folds between space and time.

Castor had never seen such a thing, not in a thousand transits. Slipspace was a collection of nonspatial dimensions, where complex matter existed only inside carefully tuned quantum fields. Battles were impossible because location was indeterminate and weapons could not be targeted, and because energy radiated back into the spatial dimensions the instant it was released.

But he knew a plasma strike when he saw one.

“Disappointing.” The comment came from the blademaster Inslaan ‘Gadogai, who was standing with Castor near the back of the open flight deck. A sinewy Sangheili with a gray-blond hide and gangly limbs, he was tall enough to peer over the shoulder of the pilot standing at the control plinth. “I had not expected to die until after we reached the Ark.”

“We will not die,” Castor said.

He and forty of his followers—the Keepers of the One Freedom—were aboard a Lich transport craft stolen from the Banished warmaster Atriox, transiting a slipspace portal that connected the human planet Reach to Installation 00—also known as the Ark. Like most beings in the galaxy, Castor had never been there. But he knew from the Psalm of the Journey that, with a surface area many times the size of most inhabited worlds, it was the largest and most sacred of the remaining structures left behind by the holy Forerunners. “It is too soon.”

“A dokab commands many things,” ‘Gadogai replied. “Fate is not one of them.”

“Fate favors the worthy,” Castor said. “As do the Ancients. They will not let us fail, so long as we do not fail ourselves.”

“What a clever way of saying we are on our own,” ‘Gadogai said. “Have you ever considered that the Forerunners are simply gone? That the only remnants of them are the constructs and antiquities they left behind?”

“Never. Their presence is the fire in my heart. It burns within me now more fiercely than ever.”

And so it did. They were mere days from doing what the Covenant had failed to do in nearly three and a half millennia: initiate the Great Journey by lighting the Sacred Rings that had been arrayed across the galaxy by the ancient Forerunners.

The very prospect seemed enrapturing to Castor, and the grace of the gods permeated his entire being. His massive frame felt swollen with divine might, his perceptions sharper and his reason more piercing than at any time in his life.

“The Faithful of the galaxy will soon know Divine Transcendence,” he continued. “And we are the Chosen who will deliver it to them.”

“Slayers of the infidel quadrillions,” ‘Gadogai said dryly. “What an honor.”

Castor bared a tusk. “Do not mourn the unbelievers.” He had seen ‘Gadogai taunt death often enough to know he had no fear of it, so the Sangheili’s only concern had to be the untold number of heretics who would perish when the Halo Array was activated. “They must die so the worthy may ascend.”

“Yes. ‘The galaxy will be cleansed by a Divine Wind,’ ” ‘Gadogai noted, quoting from the Psalm of the Journey. “I do remember the teachings of my youth.”

“Then you must embrace them,” Castor replied. It had long troubled him that ‘Gadogai did not honor the Forerunner gods of the Covenant. Instead, the blademaster placed his faith in the mysterious power that he claimed all beings carried inside themselves—and extolled it as the source of his incredible fighting prowess. “There is still time to turn from the Path of Oblivion.”

“I wish that were so.” ‘Gadogai turned his gaze forward again. “But here in slipspace, there is no time.”

Castor started to demand an explanation, then realized what ‘Gadogai was looking at. The plasma strike had changed from a sliver to an oval, not growing any larger or brighter, just rounder. The flames remained as still as mountains, their ragged edges now silhouetted against a royal-blue crescent on top and a dirt-brown crescent on the bottom.

Sky and ground.

“We are about to emerge from the portal,” Castor said, “straight into the fire.”

“And I was afraid you hadn’t noticed,” ‘Gadogai said.

“What?” The question came from Feodruz, who was standing on the right side of the viewport. Wearing blue-and-gold power armor, the stocky Jiralhanae was commander of Castor’s personal escort and one of the Keepers’ most ferocious warriors. He was also one of Castor’s oldest surviving war-brothers, having fought at his side for more than a decade during the War of Annihilation. “We are flying into a plasma strike?”

“Obviously,” ‘Gadogai said. “That is what we’re looking at.”

“I mean . . . how?” Feodruz asked. “Who could do such a thing? Who would dare?”

“The Banished, of course,” ‘Gadogai said. The multi-species confederation of raiding clans and pirate bands had counted the Keepers among their number until just a few hours earlier, when Castor and his dwindling group of followers had stolen Atriox’s Lich and fled into the portal. “The warmaster did warn us that we would find only death on the Ark.”

“I have not forgotten.” Feodruz gestured out the viewport. “But how could they know we were coming? Or when?”

“Atriox alerted them,” Castor said. “That can be the only answer.”

“It is certainly the likeliest answer,” ‘Gadogai allowed.

As remote as it was sacred, the Ark was located more than a hundred thousand light-years beyond the galactic edge. Swift communications across such far-reaching distances were not normally possible, but only three months earlier, Atriox had somehow contacted his former mentor—whom he had left in charge of Banished forces still inside the galaxy—and ordered him to open the slipspace portal on Reach.

Could Atriox have discovered something on the Ark that allowed him to transmit messages across such a vast distance almost instantaneously? It would hardly be the first time someone had unearthed a sacred Forerunner artifact capable of doing what mortals deemed impossible.

After a moment, ‘Gadogai added, “Death is the price of betrayal in the Banished.”

“And it was Atriox who betrayed us. Never forget that,” Castor said. He had been promised that after the slipspace portal on Reach was found, the Keepers of the One Freedom would join two other clans in using it to travel to the Ark. But when the moment of truth came, Atriox had . . . a different plan. “He betrayed the gods. It was my sacred duty to defy him.”

“Oh, it was your duty,” ‘Gadogai replied. “That will be a great comfort as the plasma burns the flesh from our bones.”

“That will never happen,” Feodruz said. “We are a great distance from the plasma strike. By the time we arrive, it will have dwindled to nothing.”

“We have already arrived,” said the Lich’s pilot, a young captain-deacon named Krelis. He had the same mottled gray fur and curled tusks as his father, Castor’s lost war-brother Orsun. Fearless and talented, Krelis had commanded one of the Keepers’ Seraph squadrons against the UNSC infidels on Reach. “We arrived the moment we left the planet.”

“Then why have we been transiting slipspace for”—Feodruz paused while he checked the integrated chronometer on his left vambrace—“over three hours?”

“Because our Lich is inside a quantum bubble,” Krelis said. “The hours you have been counting since departing Reach exist only inside this place. Outside, there is no time, because there is no space.”

Feodruz cocked his head sideways, scowling. “Then what is there?”

“Eleven nonspatial dimensions of . . . nothing,” Krelis said. “At least nothing we can perceive.”

“Then what are we moving through?”

“Nothing,” Krelis repeated. “In truth, it is wrong to think of us as moving at all.”

“What is wrong is for you to think that you can bait me with such nonsense.” Feodruz turned his glower forward again, where the plasma blossom continued to grow rounder without becoming larger. “I know what I see. We are a long way from that strike.”

“And yet, we are not,” Castor said.

Astronavigation was difficult for the uninitiated to understand—it required an observer to embrace an apparent contradiction: that vast distances could be crossed without actually traveling vast distances. Humans enjoyed explaining the paradox by speaking of curved space and gravity wells and shortcuts through nonspatial dimensions.

Castor thought of it in a holier way—namely, what he had seen aboard the Sacred Wheel of Erudition at Ulumari. A slipspace transition was a compression of space, one that collapsed distance into nonspatial nothingness. The more energy applied, the quicker and more complete the collapse. To an observer watching from normal space, a transiting vessel simply vanished from its origination point and reemerged at its destination. There would be an apparent delay, but only because time was relative; it passed at different rates for different celestial bodies, depending on how fast they were moving in relation to the galactic core.

To the observer in normal space, the difference between the rate at the origination point and at the destination point was experienced as a delay between disappearance and reappearance. To a passenger aboard a transiting vessel, it was as passing hours and days. But the time the vessel actually spent in slipspace did not exist—slipspace was nonspatial, and time could not exist without space.

Castor’s understanding of slipspace was imperfect, of course, for the minds of mere mortals could not perceive the hidden truths of the universe. Once he activated Halo and joined the Fore-runners in divine transsentience, such secrets would be revealed to him in perfect clarity. But until then, he would have to place his faith in what he had seen at Ulumari.

“Krelis is right,” Castor said. “We will exit the portal into the plasma strike. We already have.”

Feodruz peered back at Castor, his irritation with Krelis warring with deference to his dokab. Finally, he nodded acceptance, then asked, “Can we evade?”

Castor looked to Krelis, not giving the answer he already knew himself. After the heavy losses on the planet Reach, young Krelis was the best pilot the Keepers still had, and it was important that Feodruz learn to trust him.

“We can try,” Krelis replied. “Once we have completed our transit.”

“Then that is what we will do,” Castor said. If they attempted to maneuver before completing the transit, they would leave slipspace prematurely—and since Liches did not have slipspace drives, that would leave them marooned many light-years short of the Ark. “There is room around the edges. You can find a way through.”

“The Ancients will guide your hands,” ‘Gadogai remarked. “As long as you believe in that sort of thing.”

Krelis caught ‘Gadogai’s eye in the viewport reflection. “Now is a bad time to mock the gods, Blademaster. Our fate is theirs to decide.”

“Who is mocking?” ‘Gadogai said. “I hope their fire burns in your heart as fiercely as it burns in the dokab’s. It can only improve our chances.”

Krelis gnashed his tusks, and Castor realized that ‘Gadogai’s “encouragement” was not helping. He turned to the Sangheili. “And the guile of an unbeliever can only diminish them. I need you to descend to the lower deck and secure yourself in a crash harness. Tell the others to do the same.”

‘Gadogai remained where he stood. “I prefer to die here, where I can see it coming.”

“Which you surely will, if you continue to distract our pilot,” Castor said. “You are a Keeper now.” The unspoken part— and I am your dokab—hung in the air between them. “Do not shame yourself by disobeying my command.”

‘Gadogai turned his long head so that he could study Castor with both oblong eyes, then finally snicked his mandibles.

“As you wish.” He retreated to the rear of the flight deck, but paused before circling around the partition to descend the ramp. “I will keep watch on your humans. Someone should.”

“They are not my humans,” Castor said. ‘Gadogai had certainly never been fond of humans, but his hatred of them had grown more pronounced over the last three months—to the point that Castor was reluctant to trust the Sangheili with them alone. “They are Keepers of the One Freedom, just as we are. And we will have need of them on the Ark.”

“Have no fear,” ‘Gadogai said, speaking over his shoulder. “If any humans die before we reach the Ark, it will be your gods’ doing . . . not mine.”

He stepped around the partition, leaving Castor alone on the flight deck with Feodruz and Krelis.

“At last,” Feodruz said, sighing. “Dokab, I am . . . uncomfortable. His blasphemies offend the gods.”

“They offend us all,” Castor replied. Noting that the plasma blossom had nearly unfolded into a full circle, he retreated to the partition at the back of the flight deck, then extracted a crash chair and secured his own harness. “But it is better to have him with us than against us.”

“I am not convinced,” Krelis said. “If the inchal was willing to betray Atriox, he will betray us. He has no loyalty.”

“It is not his loyalty I value,” Castor said. “It is his wisdom.”

* * *

The blademaster emerged from the well at the bottom of the ramp and paused at the forward end of the hold, his saurian gaze scanning the crowded transport deck of the stolen Lich. A menacing Sangheili with large oval eyes and slender mandibles, he carried no weapon and wore no protection but a fine sateel tabard belted at his narrow waist. Still, Inslaan ‘Gadogai was a former member of the Covenant’s Silent Shadow and the most feared warrior aboard this vessel, and Veta Lopis wondered if it had been a mistake not to order his death when she had the chance.

“Secure your crash harnesses.” ‘Gadogai addressed them in Old Sangheili, an irreverent conceit to species pride that brought growls of umbrage from the twenty pseudo-ursine Jiralhanae scattered through the bay. Most Keepers of the One Freedom could converse in a variety of Sangheili dialects and other species’ languages, but they tended to shun Old Sangheili to avoid inflaming the still-smoldering tensions over the interspecies civil war that had destroyed the Covenant several years ago. That the blademaster could issue orders in it without drawing an immediate challenge from resentful Jiralhanae was a testament to his fierce reputation. “The dokab commands it.”

The hold filled with the clank and clatter of partition walls being extended and crash chairs extracted, followed by the jangle and crackle of different kinds of hardware being latched and tightened. The Keeper assemblage consisted of various species, and the air was rank with their odors—furry Jiralhanae musk and ashy Sangheili tang, the musty funk of the Kig-Yar and the acrid zest of the little Unggoy, even a whiff of human brine.

Rather than retreating back onto the flight deck once the command had been relayed, ‘Gadogai crossed to a partition wall on Veta’s side of the hold and stopped in front of an occupied passenger saddle.

“You must hurry to your own seat.” ‘Gadogai motioned the occupant, a young Sangheili in blue-and-gold combat harness, to leave. “We do not have long.”

The warrior dipped his oblong helmet in acknowledgment, then palmed the quick-release in the center of his restraint cage and rushed aft to find a new seat. ‘Gadogai straddled the saddle and latched the two halves of the cage in front of his chest, then pressed his back against the partition as the curved bars drew tight against his torso. His choice of seat put him across from Veta at a diagonal, three meters away and at the focus of a perpendicular cross fire formed by herself and the three members of her undercover Ferret team.

It was a taunt. Had to be.

‘Gadogai was too cunning to place himself in such a vulnerable position by accident. He wanted Veta to know he was not intimidated by what she had done a few hours earlier on Reach.

It had happened on the landing terrace of a Forerunner transport installation, where a small company of Keepers— including Veta and her Ferret team—was quietly boarding the Lich that had just carried the warmaster Atriox through the slipspace portal. ‘Gadogai had observed what was happening and tried to talk Castor out of hijacking the craft, but the dokab was determined to go to the Ark and activate the Halo Array. The matter had come to a boil when Atriox noticed the confrontation and ordered the blademaster to bring him the head of his old war-brother.

But Castor had been prepared for trouble, and he had had Veta’s brood covering him from inside the Lich. As Atriox departed, a trio of red targeting dots had appeared on ‘Gadogai’s breast, leaving him to choose between obedience and a chestful of steel-jacketed rounds. Knowing that the penalty for disobeying Atriox was also death, the blademaster had realized that his only hope of survival was to drop his plasma sword and join the Keepers.

Or so he claimed. Veta knew better than to trust anyone who had ever been part of the Silent Shadow.

After Veta and ‘Gadogai had been staring daggers at each other for a moment, she spoke to him in standard Sangheili. “You’re a faithless coward. I should have had you killed when I had the chance.”

‘Gadogai swung his mandibles up to one side, the Sangheili equivalent of a shrug. “Your mistake, human.”

“That was obedience, not a mistake. Feodruz feared you would kill the dokab before our bullets killed you. He was wrong, but a Keeper submits.”

In truth, Veta had been tempted to ignore the order and hope Feodruz was right about the blademaster’s speed. But it would have taken more than Castor’s death to prevent the remaining Keepers from flying the Lich through the portal. The dokab’s followers were just as fanatic as he was, and Feodruz had nearly forty warriors at his disposal—and little tolerance for disobedience. Her only real choice had been to obey Feodruz and stay alive, so her team could look for a chance to destroy the Keepers later.

‘Gadogai continued to glare at Veta, his mandibles open just far enough to display multiple rows of sharp teeth. His hostility was going to complicate her team’s mission, and she could not escape the feeling he was aware of their duplicity.

It was a feeling she and her team knew well. The Ferrets had penetrated the Keepers more than two years earlier, through an allied doomsday cult calling themselves Humans of the Joyous Journey, then spent the next eight months gathering intelligence for the Office of Naval Intelligence. When the UNSC finally launched a massive eradication campaign, Castor had surprised everyone by seeking refuge with the Banished. Hoping to get lucky and take out Atriox himself, ONI had ordered the Ferrets to extend their undercover mission and lay the groundwork for an assassination attempt.

No such luck. Shortly after the Keepers joined the faction, Atriox and his flagship, Enduring Conviction, had vanished. Then, in a move no one saw coming, a human AI named Cortana suddenly rose to power, seeking to subjugate the entire Orion Arm of the galaxy, using a host of Forerunner Guardians and an army of human AIs to turn interstellar civilization into a nightmarish surveillance state.

The biggest problem for Veta and her Ferret team as a result was the complete decimation of ONI and its field operations. Their undercover support prowler disappeared, which also meant the clandestine comm station to which they delivered their intelligence—along with the Owl kept on standby in case they needed emergency extraction. Most critically, the covert restocking runs stopped, leaving her Spartan-III subordinates with a fast-dwindling supply of the specialized meds they needed to stay healthy and effective.

Veta began to look for a good way out, but escaping from a vast organization was difficult—especially when it required hijacking a slipspace-capable vessel filled with hundreds of warriors. Their first decent opportunity had come just a couple of months earlier, when a surprise message from Atriox sent the Keepers to Reach, of all places.

The Ferrets had begun preparations to self-extract, intending to disappear into the planet’s glasslands after they learned what Atriox was planning. Instead, their eavesdropping intercepts caught Castor plotting to go to the Ark so he could initiate the Great Journey.

Self-extraction stopped being an option.

Veta didn’t know a great deal about the Ark, but what ONI had told her scared her stiff. One of the largest Forerunner installations yet discovered, it served as a sort of biological repository for an untold number of galactic life-forms—a vast library of creatures and the genetic material necessary to remake them. While the hubris of holding countless species in some sort of zoological archive was disturbing enough, it was the Forerunners’ reason for establishing their cosmic menagerie that she found truly horrifying. According to ONI, the Ark also served as a control facility that could trigger the simultaneous, galaxy-wide destruction of all sentient life.

And that was exactly why Castor wanted to go there.

The “Great Journey” was zealot-speak for “the End of Everything,” which was what would happen if Veta’s Ferret team allowed the Keepers to find the Ark’s control room and activate Halo. Overlapping bursts of supermassive, cross-phased neutrinos would roll across the entire Milky Way galaxy and destroy every sentient creature.

Like the Covenant before them, the Keepers believed this “sacred act of destruction” would elevate all worthy believers to divine transsentience alongside the Forerunners themselves. But the truth was nothing so rapturous. The UNSC had learned years ago that the Halo Array—seven enormous ringworlds forming a network of neutrino-blasting weapons scattered throughout the galaxy—was a defense of last resort against the Flood, a particularly virulent parasite that reproduced by infecting the minds of intelligent species. Firing the array would starve the Flood by destroying the beings upon which it preyed—and that was all it would do. Kill just about everything.

So Veta had made the hard choice to continue undercover with her team until the Keepers were destroyed. For a time, it had appeared she would be able to make that happen on Reach, after the Spartan Blue Team arrived on the planet, pursuing a mission of their own. But it had proven impossible to make contact until the portal to the Ark was already open, and by then it had been too late for Blue Team or the UNSC to stop the Keepers from going.

Before leaving, Veta had managed to slip a message outlining the situation to Spartan Fred-104. That brief meeting had probably been both her greatest joy in the last two years and her saddest moment. She and Fred had developed a close relationship while working together since the Ferret team’s inception. Seeing him again while undercover and unable to properly say good-bye had been one of the hardest things about leaving the galaxy, second only to the knowledge of what her decision would probably mean for her Gammas. But she had had no choice, and there was no fallback plan. Either her Ferret team stopped the Keepers, or everything but the sponges and placozoa went extinct.

‘Gadogai finally closed his mandibles and glanced up and forward, his head rocking slightly as he looked toward the flight deck. Sangheili mannerisms were hard to read, but Veta’s training in nonverbal alien cues suggested anticipation. Something was about to happen, and the Sangheili had been sent down to make sure the situation on the lower deck remained under control.

“The dokab seems rather fond of you,” Veta said. She needed to figure out what Castor was worried about . . . and in turn whether ‘Gadogai’s choice of seat was something she needed to worry about. “Apologize for your blasphemies, and perhaps he’ll let you ride up above again.”

‘Gadogai’s attention snapped back to her. “How do you know what passes on the flight deck?”

“I don’t.” Veta hid her alarm behind an air of smugness. Her taunt was more on-target than she realized, but she knew how to deflect. She’d been trained in it. “I know you. Every third thing you say is blasphemy. You just can’t help yourself.”

“True enough.” ‘Gadogai glanced around, his gaze lingering just a moment on each of the Ferrets. “But there is a reason I chose to sit here, among your brood.”

Veta cocked her head slightly. “I’m sure you expect me to ask why.”

“There is no need to ask.” ‘Gadogai lifted his mandibles, then fixed a single oval eye on Veta’s face. “I am here to watch you die. All of you.”

Realizing her team would already have their hands on their sidearms, Veta didn’t bother to reach for her own. She was just a typical human, a well-prepared ONI operative, albeit a bit on the small side and not even enhanced for speed and strength. But her three team members—Ash-G099, Mark-G313, and Olivia-G291—were fully augmented Spartan-III super-soldiers, trained from childhood to fight, kill, and prevail. An ex–Silent Shadow warrior would make short work of Veta, and might even be a match for any one of her Ferrets. But against all three, working together and under her command?

“That’s not going to happen.”

An almost imperceptible pulse ran through the ship, and ‘Gadogai’s gaze drifted forward again.

“Oh, I think it is.”

Veta rose into the shoulders of her crash harness and found herself straining against the torso restraints, which meant that the Lich had rolled into a steep dive.

Which meant it had returned to normal space, which meant they had reached their destination and would soon be landing on the Ark.

So why were ‘Gadogai’s mandibles parted in delight, why were his eyes fixed on her, why was he pulling forward against the g-forces to—

—there was no impact, just fingers of flash fire reaching into the hold and shards of foreign black fuselage spraying like shrapnel . . . and what looked like a pilot’s seat-assembly tumbling aft, trailing screams and smoke and the smell of charred flesh. A fissure opened in the deck between Veta and ‘Gadogai, its molten edges dripping into the service bay below. Another rift melted into the overhead. And yet, neither breach extended all the way through to the exterior hull.

It seemed the Lich was still intact.

The passengers, not so much. Kig-Yar screeched in agony as severed limbs tumbled away, Unggoy chests jetted flame from erupting methane tanks, a human Keeper was impaled by a canopy fragment. A Jiralhanae head bounced aft and disappeared into the rupture between Veta and ‘Gadogai.

But the Lich was still in flight.

Which was too bad. A catastrophic disintegration would have been the surest way to stop Castor and the Keepers, and it wasn’t like Veta and her Ferrets expected to survive the mission anyway. Even if they did, they would almost certainly be marooned on the Ark for the rest of their lives—lives that promised to be hellish and short for Ash, Mark, and Olivia.

As Gamma Company Spartan-IIIs, they had undergone an additional round of biological augmentations to elevate their pain tolerance and shock resistance. The extra enhancements improved their chances of surviving when wounded, but the trade-off was a rigid protocol of pharmaceutical “smoothers” to keep their brain chemistry stable. Without those meds, Gamma Company Spartans quickly sank into a paranoid psychosis that divorced them from reality.

The team was down to three smoother doses between them— enough to get them through one more day. Veta estimated they had just over a day before her Ferrets’ mental states began to deteriorate. Full psychotic breaks would start coming in no more than forty-eight hours. After that, the Gammas would become a deadly threat not only to Veta, but to themselves and each other.

So, yeah, Veta would have been fine with the Lich breaking up.

A pair of tremendous clangs sounded deep in the hold as the mysterious seat-assembly bounced off the gravity-lift housing and smashed into the rear bulkhead. The occupant’s wails were audible even above the rest of the cacophony, a raw, high voice, shrill with pain.

‘Gadogai’s gaze remained locked on Veta. “Soon, it will be you I am hearing.”

It took a few seconds to comprehend the Sangheili’s meaning. He hadn’t come aft to kill Veta’s team himself. He simply knew what was about to happen and wanted to spend his last moments watching the humans die—the ones who had forced his hand on Reach.

Only they weren’t going to die. Not at that moment, anyway.

The cries of pain were all too sharp and thin to be coming from the Lich’s Jiralhanae pilot, and the craft itself remained under control. Veta still didn’t even see any hull breaches. It was as though the blast had erupted spontaneously inside the cavernous transport bay, producing the flames and the shrapnel and the seat-assembly out of empty air.

She looked aft and found the assembly lying against the bulkhead. Strapped into a pilot’s seat was a figure with shriveled hands curled in front of the torso. The flesh on the arms and one exposed shoulder were pitted with black-edged burn hollows.

A human female, in agony.

What . . . ?

Veta felt herself sink into her seat as the Lich pulled out of its dive. The thud of firing plasma cannons reverberated through the hull, and she slammed against her harness restraints as the huge transport began evasive maneuvers.

She glanced back to ‘Gadogai, but he looked just as puzzled, his eyes locked on the forward bulkhead and his mandibles hanging half-open. Whatever was happening, it was not what he had expected.

Veta used an eye-flick to signal Ash and Olivia to cover her, then removed her crash harness and nodded for Mark to accompany her aft in search of answers. Like everyone on the Ferret team, he wore basic blue Keeper armor over a gold tunic and trousers, and he maintained the look of a Joyous Journey zealot, with his head shaved on both sides and a narrow fall of black hair hanging down to his shoulder blades.

Together, they made their way aft between rows of seated Keepers, Mark barely swaying against the Lich’s erratic juking and jinking, Veta staggering and almost losing her feet until he grabbed her arm and held her steady. The charred seat-assembly was sliding back and forth across the deck, rebounding between the boot soles of an irritated Sangheili and the shin greaves of an indifferent Jiralhanae. The wails of the occupant had subsided to a constant high-pitched moan.

As Veta and Mark drew near, the indifferent Jiralhanae used a boot to trap the seat-assembly against the deck, then gave Veta an expectant look.

Veta inclined her head to him. “Many thanks, Path Brother.”

She knelt beside the seat and grabbed the frame to steady herself, then leaned down to inspect the pilot. The woman wore a fireproof flight suit that had not been quite up to plasma standards, exposing seared flesh where the material had disintegrated at the wrists, neck, and knees. Strapped to her left thigh was a pressure-sensitive kneeboard designed to be written on by a fingertip, but the screen was so full of scratches and smears that it was impossible to tell whether it contained any notes. The shattered faceplate of her helmet had allowed flames to pour in, and now her face was a blackened mess Veta could hardly bear to look at.

Both the woman’s helmet and flight suit bore UNSC eagle-and-globe insignias almost as old as Veta was. On her collar tabs she wore the silver bars of a naval lieutenant, and the name tab above her breast pocket read MYKLONAS. Her eyelids had burned away and her corneas were cloudy, so it seemed likely that she had no idea she was inside a Banished Lich . . . or how she had come to be there.

“Lady?” Veta asked.

Myklonas started, then turned her head vaguely in Veta’s direction and croaked a single incomprehensible syllable . . . probably meds. That was what Veta would have been asking for, were the situation reversed.

She made a show of searching the pilot’s body and seat-assembly, in part to glean information and in part so the Jiralhanae next to her would not see that Veta knew exactly where to look for the medical kit. Myklonas wore the badges of both an atmospheric and orbital combat pilot above her name tab, but the fleet and vessel patches had burned away, along with the right shoulder of her flight suit. A tangle of melted chute lines lay on the deck behind the seat, and there was a burst canister of what looked like an emergency oxygen supply attached to the seat front under her legs. Stamped into the side frame was a part number: MA B-65 ESS S30B #03357.

“MA” was Misriah Armory, “B-65” the designation for the Shortsword suborbital long-range bomber. Veta wasn’t sure what “ESS” stood for, but “S30” would be Series 30, indicating the seat had been manufactured in 2530—practically an antique, as military equipment went.

So . . . the Keepers had emerged from the slipspace portal at the Ark, and the pilot of a thirty-year-old atmospheric bomber had appeared inside their Lich in a flash of fire and shrapnel. That sounded like a midair collision . . . except for the part where the Lich was still flying and intact . . . and the part where an outdated UNSC Shortsword atmospheric bomber was operating a hundred thousand light-years beyond the galactic edge.

Clearly, Veta needed to reevaluate some of her assumptions here.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Mark drop one hand toward his M6D sidearm, then pivot so he was perpendicular to her. She glanced back to see ‘Gadogai stepping up, his legs spread wide and reacting to the Lich’s evasive maneuvering with an easy grace.

The Sangheili peered over Veta’s shoulder. “UNSC,” he said. “Of course.”

“You don’t sound surprised,” Veta said.

“I am surprised that we are still alive,” ‘Gadogai replied. “Is that not enough?”

“Surprised? Or disappointed? You knew there were UNSC forces on the Ark, yet you failed to warn the dokab.”

The Jiralhanae who had pinned the seat-assembly to the deck emitted a low growl and leaned against his crash harness.

‘Gadogai ignored him and continued to look over Veta’s shoulder at the pilot. “Again, I must ask: How do you know what passes on the flight deck?”

The Jiralhanae’s glower shifted to Veta, but it was worth any suspicions ‘Gadogai might raise to confirm the UNSC’s presence on the Ark. Operational support was the last thing she had expected on this mission, but that had suddenly become a realistic possibility—as had replenishing her team’s smoother supply. All she had to do was find a way to make contact—and not get caught.

Veta allowed ‘Gadogai’s question to hang in the air for a moment, then said, “I was speaking of before we left Reach, Blade-master. A warning that comes too late is no warning at all.”

“Before we left Reach, my loyalty was to Escharum and Atriox. It was in their name I warned Castor not to trust humans.” ‘Gadogai clacked his mandibles sharply, then added, “Pity he failed to listen.”

“The dokab trusts only the Faithful,” Veta said. She withdrew a med kit from the pilot’s thigh pocket, fumbled with the latch, and sorted through the contents. “Which is why he will never trust you.”

She extracted the polly-sue pen and pretended that she had to figure out how to operate the dial, then opened it to maximum and jabbed the tip into Myklonas’s exposed shoulder. It was enough polypseudomorphine to suppress the woman’s respiration and stop her heartbeat, and that was the best Veta could do for her. If the Lich somehow survived its fiery arrival at the Ark, the last thing either of them needed was for a dying pilot to start giving up UNSC intelligence during a game of Tossers.

The Lich rolled so hard that Mark and ‘Gadogai were thrown into the laps of the passengers still harnessed into their seats along the port-side partition, and Veta had to hold on to the seat-assembly with both hands to keep from flying into the Jiralhanae pinning it to the deck. A chain of cannon strikes clanged through the craft’s belly, then a trio of fist-sized holes opened in the deck as three 20mm autocannon rounds punched through the metal and vanished into the overhead.

An instant later, Castor’s deep voice bellowed from the bulkhead intercom speakers. “Path Sister Aita and Blademaster ‘Gadogai, come up at once!”

“Aita Gomez” was Veta’s undercover alias, chosen because it was similar to her true name and she would respond to it naturally, yet different enough that it would not trip a recognition alarm in any ONI agent databases the Keepers might have penetrated.

“I have need of you on the flight deck,” Castor continued. “The Great Journey depends on you!”

TWO

2212 hours, October 12, 2559 (military calendar)

Banished LichPegoras

Terminus Basin, Translocation Portal Epsilon, the Ark

Veta lurched onto the flight deck and winced at the sudden brightness. Beyond the viewport, she saw a swirling web of missile trails and flame tails, balls of roiling fire and blinding blossoms of plasma. Castor and his Jiralhanae crew stood at their stations or sat harnessed into enormous crash seats they had extracted from the wall, the dokab roaring into the microphone wafer on the comm disk affixed to his hairy cheek, Feodruz sliding his thick fingers over a fire-control panel, Krelis palming the back side of the control plinth guidance orb, trying desperately to pull up the Lich’s nose.

A momentary jolt of fear changed to relief as Veta recognized the likelihood of a quick and fiery death. Pegoras was under attack, and at more than a hundred meters long and half that in width, it made an easy target. The Keepers and their quest for the End of Everything were about to vanish in a ball of white fire, and if she and her Ferret team vanished along with them . . . well, mission accomplished. She’d be happy to take the certainty of stopping Castor over the prospect of a galactic death wave. They all would.

Bracing herself against the cabin wall, Veta advanced to clear a path for ‘Gadogai. Castor had called them both onto the flight deck, and it was important to maintain her cover as an obedient follower until her team finished the job . . . and there were no more Keepers.

An arm-length section of what appeared to be black aileron protruded from the overhead, and another piece from the partition on the other side of Castor. There didn’t seem to be any tongues of peeled-back metal or gaping holes surrounding the fragments, nothing to suggest there had been an impact when they arrived. Veta had noticed a couple of similar penetrations as she climbed the ramp and advanced through the upper hold. It was as though the fragments had simply sprouted inside the Lich when it exited the slipspace portal.

She had heard of similar phenomena when a vessel exited slipspace into a location occupied by something else. Basic physics dictated that two objects could not exist in the same space at the same time, so what usually followed was an instantaneous conversion of matter to energy—an explosion that made thermonuclear detonations look tiny. But a drastic imbalance between masses sometimes resulted in a few zeptoseconds where the quantum states were out of phase; by the time the phases aligned, the smaller objects would be embedded in the larger. Or, as in the case of the unfortunate Lieutenant Myklonas strapped into the pilot’s seat-assembly that had appeared on the lower deck, simply appear inside any hollow spaces.

Veta moved forward, into an inertial dampening field that protected the pilot from the mad g-forces of evasive maneuvering, and caught her first glimpse of the Ark. Her limited ONI briefing had described a massive and majestic installation more than 120,000 kilometers across, about ten times the diameter of Earth, but the Lich had emerged from the portal only a thousand meters above the surface. From such a low altitude, the Ark looked no more intimidating than most of the planets she had inserted onto as an ONI operative—and less so than some. All she could see was a broad, smoke-filled valley ahead, flanked by two steep ridges of mountainous terrain whose crests lay about even with the Lich.

Coming up the valley were a strange assortment of attack craft, outdated UNSC Nandao interceptors and obsolete Baselard strike fighters that were brushing wingtips with original Covenant Seraphs and Banshees. The UNSC craft seemed to be hanging to port, escorting a flight of Shortsword bombers. The Covenant craft were staying to starboard, flying top cover for a wing of equally modern Phantom and Spirit transports. The two groups were weaving into and out of each other’s formations, exchanging sporadic bursts of cannon fire. It seemed pretty clear that while unhappy about each other’s presence, their true interest lay in the slipspace portal from which the Keepers had just emerged.

As the Lich continued to descend into the valley, two echelons of old AV-14 Hornet and AV-22 Sparrowhawk aerodynes appeared about five kilometers ahead. They were a few hundred meters lower than the Keepers, flying just above the smoke blanket, coming head-on and firing toward the ground. The Lich’s nose was still down, so whenever there was a break in the miasma of oily fumes, Veta could see that the formation was providing close air support for a UNSC combined-arms force of armor and mechanized infantry.

Some of the tanks, primarily M808 Scorpions, were already exchanging fire with an enemy Veta could not see. That foe was presumably the Banished, defending the slipspace portal that Atriox had used to travel to Reach.

A stream of plasma bolts flashed past from behind the Lich, forcing the UNSC aerodynes and Covenant transports to peel off in opposite directions. Veta steadied herself on the wall and leaned forward to glimpse through the corners of the viewport. Still, it was impossible to see who had arrived to offer the supporting fire—but it had to be the Banished, protecting a craft they assumed to be one of their own against the two different enemies coming up the valley.

Castor growled into his microphone wafer, his voice so guttural and raspy that Veta barely understood his Sangheili.

“Have I not told you?! The warmaster has no time for your questions.” Castor listened for a moment, then continued, “ Atriox will explain the trouble later.”

Competing assaults by UNSC and Covenant forces was about the last thing Veta had expected to meet when the Keepers emerged from the portal, but maybe it shouldn’t have been. Her Ferret team’s eavesdropping devices had captured several conversations in which Castor and his advisors discussed a war against the UNSC on the Ark, and there had been mention of Atriox’s forces on the installation recovering the shards of a slipspace crystal known as the Holy Light from a Forerunner ship that had been used by the Covenant’s High Prophet of Truth to flee High Charity at the end of the war. So it certainly seemed possible—if incredible—that there was a force from the original Covenant marooned on the Ark along with the Banished and the UNSC.

Still, the size of the conflict was at odds with the limited ONI briefings Veta had received regarding the Ark. Because the installation was so remote and difficult to reach, it had been visited in the modern era by only a handful of relatively small expeditions, all so clandestine that Veta had been informed of them only because of the Keepers’ interest in the Great Journey and all things Forerunner. The briefings had been decidedly short on details, but she was pretty sure that had any of the expeditions reported back to ONI that there was now on the Ark a sizable Covenant presence or a deployed UNSC strike force equipped with outdated equipment, she would have been ordered to watch for any indication that the Keepers were also aware of it. That there had been no such order suggested that ONI had been in the dark about the current situation just as much as anyone else.

Which only made sense. Despite the mystery as to why UNSC and Covenant forces were here to begin with, both sides were clearly trying to seize the Banished’s slipspace portal, most likely because they had no other way off the Ark. And it seemed probable to Veta that the two groups had not even been aware of one another. Had they realized they would be fighting each other as well as the Banished, they would have avoided using the same attack lane.

More importantly, it sounded as though the Banished believed Atriox was aboard this Lich—a reasonable assumption only if they didn’t know of Castor’s defiance on Reach. Whatever method Atriox had used to transmit his original message from the Ark, it was not something he could replicate from Reach—at least not easily.

That was a lucky break for Castor, and a bad one for everyone else. The dokab had a long history of close calls, running back to before Veta had joined ONI, and she knew him to be capable of leveraging even the tiniest bit of good fortune into a clean escape.

All of this meant she had a lot to sift through here, playing the hand she was dealt while making sure no one at the table was about to draw out on her.

A flight of Nandaos came diving out of the UNSC bomber formation, pelting the Lich’s dorsal hull with cannon fire. Muffled screams sounded in the troop hold, then Krelis rolled the craft onto its side so Feodruz could return fire. It shook and dropped like a rock, and Krelis barely managed to swing it back into proper flight position.

So not everything was going the Keepers’ way.

Castor grunted something incoherent into the microphone at the corner of his mouth, then tore the comm disk off his cheek in frustration. He covered the microphone with his palm and spent a moment thinking, then leaned toward Feodruz.

“We will not fire on the humans any longer,” he said. “Attack only the Covenant craft.”

“As you command, Dokab,” Feodruz replied. He was standing to the starboard side of the viewport, at a fold-down weapons station. “But if the humans see no deterrent, they may grow even more—”

“Only Covenant craft.” Castor turned to ‘Gadogai, who was now standing on the flight deck next to Veta. “I am talking to Let ‘Volir. The baskaluv seems to be in command here.”

“Always the long worm slithers to the top,” ‘Gadogai said.

Let ‘Volir was the Sangheili shipmaster of the Enduring Conviction, the assault carrier that had spirited Atriox and his forces to the Ark more than a year and a half earlier, according to fragmented ONI intel.

“The folly of prizing loyalty above Faith.” Castor kept the microphone wrapped in his palm. “ ‘Volir believes we have come to the Ark because Atriox is wounded and on board. He is suspicious that he cannot speak with the warmaster himself.”

‘Gadogai ticked his mandibles together, then said, “An injury to the warmaster is the most likely reason for Pegoras to return.” He stepped closer to Castor and extended his hand toward the comm disk. “That, I can work with.”

Castor did not yield the device yet. “ ‘Volir must withdraw the escort he sent.”

‘Gadogai glanced forward toward the raging battle. “Are you certain, Dokab? From all appearances, we will not last long without it.”

Castor’s gaze drifted toward Veta. “I have a plan for that,” he said. “It is the Banished escort we must escape. If it is still with us when ‘Volir discovers Atriox is not aboard—”

“Oh, he is not going to discover it.” ‘Gadogai took the edge of the comm disk. “I am going to tell him.”

The air grew acrid with the musk of Jiralhanae alarm, and Castor showed his fang tips. “Explain.”

“Let ‘Volir is too cunning to be deceived,” ‘Gadogai said. “So we must let him deceive himself.”

Castor fell silent for a moment, then finally released the headset. “So long as I am not the one being deceived.”

“How would that happen?” ‘Gadogai asked. “Fate favors the worthy.”

Veta saw Krelis glance toward ‘Gadogai’s reflection in the viewport and snarl, but the young pilot was too busy dodging missiles and tracer rounds to voice the anger caught behind his fangs. His palms remained on the back side of the guidance orb, squeezing it so tightly his huge knuckles had blanched, and still the Lich’s nose refused to come up.

Good.

‘Gadogai affixed the comm unit to the side of his oblong head, then slid the microphone and speaker wafers around the disk to the appropriate locations for his species. He began to speak in Sangheili so rapidly that Veta could barely follow it.

“The warmaster is not aboard. We are here on another matter.” ‘Gadogai fell silent for a moment, then lowered his voice to a raspy whisper. “You dare speak my name over an open band?”

Another pause.

“It was called the Silent Shadow, Shipmaster. If you ever name me over a battlenet again, you will learn the reason.”

As ‘Gadogai listened, he extended his free hand toward Castor and touched both thumbs to both fingertips, signaling success.

“We require an escort,” ‘Gadogai said, still speaking into the microphone. “The two talons you have sent already, plus two more.”

A longer pause.

“Because the warmaster wishes it!” ‘Gadogai snapped. “Would we have returned were it not on his orders?”

‘Gadogai tipped his head back and looked at the overhead.

“Had he wanted you to know of our assignment, he would have instructed me to inform you. All you need know is that because of the chaos you are making of the portal’s defense, we require escorts.”

‘Gadogai caught Castor’s eye, then raised his hand and made the success signal again.

“Of course we have an authorization string,” ‘Gadogai hissed. “I will have it transmitted immediately.”

He covered the microphone, but kept the comm disk in place and said nothing.

After a moment and two near misses by Covenant plasma bolts, Veta finally asked, “What about the authorization string?”

“There is no authorization string,” ‘Gadogai said. “I was lying.”

“Lying?!” Feodruz bellowed. “We have enough craft shooting at us!”

“ ‘Volir is too cautious to fire upon us.” ‘Gadogai kept his gaze on Castor. “For all he knows, I am here at Atriox’s command.”

“Did I not command you to rid us of this escort?” Castor demanded.

“Which I have,” ‘Gadogai replied. “ ‘Volir is fighting two enemies at once. When the authorization string fails to come, he will recall his craft to defend the—”

‘Gadogai stopped to listen to the comm, then uncovered the microphone and began to speak again.

“We have transmitted it. If you withdraw our escort now, the warmaster will have your head.”

Castor grunted in satisfaction. Leaving the blademaster to continue the exchange unsupervised, he turned to Veta and motioned her into the space between Feodruz and Krelis.

“The Journey is in your hands now.”

“How so?” Veta asked.

“You will speak to the humans on our behalf.”

Veta hesitated, sudden trepidation mixing with her attempt to keep the Ferrets’ charade running smoothly. “I will do everything I can, Dokab. I might be more convincing if I understood who they are.”

“They are UNSC infidels,” Castor said. “Can you not see that?”

“Forgive me, Dokab,” Veta said. She was in no particular hurry to save the Lich, and any intelligence she could glean on the UNSC would only increase her chances of securing help once the Keepers were destroyed—or of eliminating the Keepers herself, if that proved necessary. “I mean, how they came to be here. It does not take a soldier to see they are using equipment as old as I am.”

“It is not known,” Castor replied. “Escharum once said they arrived on the Ark soon after Atriox.”

Ah, Escharum. Atriox’s old daskalo—a Jiralhanae mentor. He’d been left in charge of Banished forces when the Enduring Conviction departed. Veta already knew from her team’s surveillance that Escharum had not fully trusted Castor, communicating only what was necessary for the Keepers to carry out their assignments. But clearly, a few details had been passed along beyond the range of the Ferrets’ eavesdropping devices.

When Castor did not elaborate, Veta asked, “What happened after the infidels arrived?”

“What one would expect. The humans became an obstacle, and a war began. The fighting continues to this day.”

That might explain the Banished’s general animosity toward humans, but not the fight here against the Covenant. Those forces had almost certainly come from the Forerunner Dreadnought that Escharum had mentioned when he ordered Castor to take the Keepers to Reach to search for the Ark portal, and Veta couldn’t afford to ignore the likelihood that Castor intended to make contact with them now. Stopping forty Keepers was going to be a tall order for a four-person Ferret team as it was; if Castor formed an alliance with the Covenant, it would grow all but impossible.

“What of the Covenant talons?” Veta asked. “The Covenant is as devoted to initiating the Great Journey as the Keepers are. Surely they would protect us from the UNSC.”

“Not while we are in a Banished craft,” Feodruz remarked. “They are not so foolish as humans.”

“It is so,” Castor agreed. “They would destroy us the instant we turned toward them, and nothing I could say would prevent it. You must delay the human attack.”

“For as long as you can,” Krelis added. “The forward attitude repulsors are no more. Even without evading fire, we will be on the surface in five centals.”

“So soon?” Castor asked. In times of stress, he and the other Jiralhanae sometimes reverted to the old Covenant measurement systems. A cental was a hundredth of a time unit, which worked out to be about thirty-six seconds. Five centals, around three minutes. “In one piece?”

“If the Ancients will it,” Krelis said.

Veta moved forward into the space between Krelis’s control plinth and Feodruz’s fold-down weapons station, as Castor had ordered a few moments before. Now that she was at the front of the flight deck, she saw that the Lich was being accompanied on each side by a mixed talon of Banished Seraphs and Banshees. Both groups were beginning to open their formations, preparing to peel away despite ‘Gadogai’s sham protests to Let ‘Volir.

Feodruz passed a comm disk to Veta.

“This is the human emergency channel,” he said. “They will know we are the craft transmitting.”

Veta took the disk by wrapping its microphone wafer in her hand. “What do I tell them?”

“That we are escaped prisoners,” Castor said. “They will never listen, but a human voice will confuse them and buy us a little time.”

“A little time is what we need,” Krelis said. He banked to port, angling away from the Covenant forces and toward a rocky ridge rising from the smoke on the far side of the UNSC aerodynes. “That, and the favor of the gods.”

It was a better plan than Veta would have liked. With the escorts peeling away and the Lich turning to leave the battle space, the UNSC would no longer see it as a high-priority threat. They would probably keep firing at it just to make certain it left the area . . . but once it was out of range, pursuing it wouldn’t necessarily be on the agenda.

Veta affixed the comm disk to the side of her head—it would have covered her entire face, if she allowed it—and slid the microphone and speaker wafers into the correct position for her anatomy.

“Mayday, mayday!” she began. “Lieutenant Myklonas declaring emergency!”

The transmission wasn’t even close to proper military parlance. But Veta’s undercover persona was that of an alienated cafeteria manager, so using the correct codes would have drawn unwanted scrutiny—and stood the risk of fooling the UNSC commander into believing it was a legitimate message.