Halo: The Cole Protocol (18 page)

Thel kept an easy lope going, covering the ground so fast that any Unggoy who noticed a wavering in the air would surely shake their heads and dismiss it as a trick of the light.

They slipped in through a series of giant airlocks, where Unggoy still had to wear their harnesses and tanks.

Thel looked around. “This is Kig-Yar territory,” he whispered to Saal. It made sense that the lesser aliens were here in a re-purposed old ship, mounted near the lip of the falls. It made for a commanding view, because although the Unggoy felt like this was their world, Thel would imagine that the Kig-Yar saw it differently.

Saal found a lone Unggoy, and an empty room in the back of what had once been the large hangar bays of the Kig-Yar ship.

It didn’t take long to get the Unggoy to give up the location of Reth.

“The cockpit room, at the very top.”

Saal snapped the Unggoy’s neck and they took the emergency maintenance tubes up through the ship. Thel panted heavily and his mandibles were wide open, his tongue flicking the air, by the time they arrived at the top.

Four Kig-Yar guarded the cockpit’s doors, but two of them were looking out the windows down to the launch pad, bored, their plasma rifles slung over their backs.

They never had a chance to turn and see what attacked them. The two Sangheili were in their midst in a split second, firing point-blank into their faces with their own plasma rifles.

The other two Kig-Yar had a second to squall loudly before they met the same fate, and Thel blew the cockpit doors apart with a grenade.

Inside the carpeted, lavishly furnished room sat a single Kig-Yar, his large eyes staring at the shimmering flaws in the air before him. Thel shut his invisibility off.

“Sangheili,” the Kig-Yar hissed. “Damn you, what have you done? Do you know who you cross?”

“You are Reth?” Thel asked.

“Yes,” the Kig-Yar said.

“You let Unggoy breed without control. You pretend to be a voice of the Prophets here. You are a heretic.” Thel raised his plasma rifle and struck Reth in the head with it.

“Pick him up,” Thel ordered Saal. “Let us return to the shuttle.”

A loud warble echoed across the corridors. Thel looked around. “That sounded like an alarm.”

Saal walked over to the front of the cockpit, Reth slung casually over a shoulder. “It is. We should call Zhar, have him fly up here. We can get outside onto the top and get him to pick us up there.”

Thel stepped forward to stand next to Saal and looked down. Saal murmured into the air, talking to Zhar.

“Zhar needs just a minute. Too many Unggoy inside the shuttle.”

Hundreds of feet below in a courtyard formed from the superstructures of three or four mothballed spaceships, thousands of Unggoy streamed out. The crowds ran to surround the building they were in.

“They cannot enter,” Saal said. “Almost all of them have no harnesses or air. The methane mists out there let them breathe. Where are their harnesses?”

Thel looked at the unconscious Kig-Yar on Saal’s shoulder.

“The Kig-Yar either have not made them many, or are keeping them under lock and key.”

“But why?” Saal asked.

“Because they cannot leave Metisette, or even attack this Kig-Yar structure in the center of their own keep, if they have no tanks.”

“Doesn’t help us right now,” Saal said, looking at the quadrangle fill with Unggoy. “Enough Unggoy seem to have harnesses to cause
us
trouble.”

Thel turned and looked back down the corridor, hearing the sound of Unggoy screeches. “It tells us who’s really in charge of all this.”

“The Kig-Yar.”

Thel looked back at Reth’s limp form. “Yes. That one in particular. Wake him up. We may have to put a gun to his head. What is Zhar’s progress?”

Saal cocked his head, listening to an update from down below. “Zhar is closing the ramp and warming the shuttle up.”

“The timing will be tight,” Thel said. He walked over to the doors with his plasma rifle up and ready. “Be ready to blow the windows out when he gets airborne.”

“My honor,” Saal grunted. He set Reth down and slapped the Kig-Yar’s face. “Wake up,” the Sangheili zealot growled.

CHAPTER

THIRTY

ASUNCION HABITAT, INNER RUBBLE, 23 LIBRAE

Keyes watched his people being herded toward gates. They huddled together and stared down at their feet as they moved forward. Men in gray uniforms, rifles slung at the ready, moved about the edges, pushing the crew back into line toward the five checkpoints the rails led everyone toward.

The
Midsummer Night
had been docked with an asteroid. From the cargo bay they’d all been herded out at gunpoint, down a long corridor in the endcap of the habitat, and walked out into the interior.

But the tall rails, all enclosed in chicken wire with razor wire wrapped around that, effectively prevented them from walking out into the habitat until they’d passed through five stations. Humorless-looking officials stood by small podiums in the stations with computer pads.

“Stay
single
file,” a guard shouted.

The lines formed up, people jammed against each other, wondering what came next. They were face-to-face with the enemy: Insurrectionists.

Captured.

A woman in a black uniform with yellow trim walked up to a dais mounted over the gates. She brushed back a long lock of black hair, then folded her arms at the small of her back in a sort of parade rest.

When she spoke her voice was amplified so that the entire crowd could hear her. “Welcome to the habitat Asuncion,” the woman said.

Keyes leaned back and looked up at the far side of the asteroid’s interior, far on the other side from where he stood. Patches of gardens and trees could be seen. It was odd, seeing something almost pastoral in a megastructure like this.

“And welcome to the Rubble,” the woman continued. “My name is Maria Esquival. I am here to help orient you to your new situation.”

Keyes was surrounded by his remaining bridge crew. Lt. Dante Kirtley had folded his arms and was watching the woman, but Junior Grade Rai Li checked out the crowded crew, looking worried.

Behind Keyes loitered a handful of ODSTs, with Faison standing in their midst. He raised an eyebrow at Keyes.

Maria Esquival continued her speech. “After the destruction of Madrigal, as we escaped into the asteroids and rocks here, we had some very tough decisions to make about who we would become: refugees struggling to exist, fighting over scraps? Or a civilization?

“We chose civilization. We worked hard to build the Rubble. We worked hard because we knew we had something to build. A world like nothing the UNSC has ever known, with its strict hierarchies and militaristic command.”

Keyes looked over at Dante, who rolled his eyes. “More Insurrectionist bullshit,” the comms specialist muttered.

“Free of the trappings of being a colony, we reinvented ourselves from the ground up. The Rubble is a technocracy. All of its municipal functions, all its laws, are voted on by our members. Some of us are Insurrectionist, some of us are refugees from Madrigal. Others are miners who were here from the beginning. Some are smugglers who made it here from the Inner Colonies. All are welcome.

“We mean that. All are welcome to have the right to vote. This includes you, crew of the
Midsummer Night
.”

Esquival paused to let that sink in. In the crowd, Kirtley leaned back toward Keyes. “They all vote on everything. Like even security? That’d be insane.”

“Because we believe in freedom, the Rubble invites you to join our democracy. You have a choice in what happens next to you. You can choose to turn your back on the imperialist nature of the UNSC. Many of you may have come from Outer Colonies. Colonies that fell to the alien Covenant while the UNSC took their time to enact methods of dealing with the aliens. Colonies that you know were not as well protected as they could have been, because the UNSC’s loyalties are to Earth first, the Inner Colonies next, and the Outer Colonies last. Here in the Rubble, you are equal among all.”

Rai Li sniffed. “How many crew you think are going to buy that crap?”

Keyes looked out over the crowd of heads. How many crew were survivors of border colonies, or had family in the Outer Colonies?

He thought of his sister for a second, a twinge of pain at the thought of her dying without UNSC protection, out there alone in the Outer Colonies.

Or maybe, Keyes suddenly thought, maybe they’d survived. Just like the Rubble had.

The idea captured him for a second, and then Keyes shook himself. No, he had to remember what the Covenant was really about. The Rubble was some strange anomaly…

“Too many.” Keyes rubbed his jaw, thoughtfully. “And can you blame them? We have no options. We’re stuck out here. Behind the lines. They might as well start trying to find allies, figure out what the new game is. We’re refugees, now.”

His eyes burned. He hadn’t slept since they’d been boarded, running from place to place to make sure things went smoothly.

Now it was over.

Everything was over.

He’d read about POWs in past wars, unlucky bastards who’d been the first shot out of the air and stuck in a camp for the length of a war.

If he lived, he’d be one of those footnotes.

Maria Esquival cleared her throat. “But, as you are UNSC, and have a checkered background, there are some concessions that have to be made when integrating you into the population of the Rubble.

“You will have to swallow a motion tracker, in the form of a pill. This will let the Rubble’s AI monitor and track your location. You will have to report for counseling and you will be assigned a case officer who will review the integration process. However these things are a small price to pay for your freedom.”

Keyes wished he had his pipe to fiddle with. He had to leave it aboard the ship, along with any other personal effects or objects as they were moved to Asuncion.

“Those of you who wish to become citizens, have only to ask when you reach Processing. You will be split off to a separate location. Those of you still loyal to the UNSC, who refuse the pill, we will, of course, be forced to jail you.”

With that, Esquival turned around and left her perch. The large lines staggered forward.

“A lot of them are asking for citizenship,” Faison said from behind Keyes.

“Can’t blame them,” Keyes said. “One can understand what’s going through their minds.”

“You’re not going to do anything about it?” Faison asked.

“We’re trapped. We have nothing. What do you want me to do? They’re doing the rational thing.”

Faison grabbed Keyes by the shoulder. “Either we’re soldiers or we’re not. Defeat or not, we should never forget that, Keyes.

Give them a speech. Say
something
to counteract all that, because whatever this is you’re doing right now, this isn’t leadership. Where’s the man who had us all jump out of that freighter?”

Say something.

Keyes cleared his throat, then jumped up onto the railing. He wobbled for a second. “Crew of the
Midsummer Night,”
he shouted.

The snaking line paused. And Keyes suddenly felt like a blank sheet of paper. Nothing came to him.

Faison punched his shin, and Keyes sucked his breath in. “Crew of the
Midsummer Night,
we have had a hard blow, I know. Some of you, after hearing all this, will have a hard choice to make.

“Just know this. No matter who we are, or why we give our service, we all joined to fight a common enemy. The people here, although they fled the destruction of their own world, think that the Covenant can be allies. The same creatures that destroyed their world. I think this is an illusion. So I hope that you will, if the time ever comes, stand by my side again if the need calls for it. With no hard feelings. I will not be joining their citizenry. I remain ready to fight the Covenant and protect humanity, as I swore to do when I joined the fight. As did you all.”

Keyes got back down.

There was only silence. Rai Li finally shook her head. “That was an awkward speech.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Faison said. “What mattered was that he gave it.” And Keyes knew he was right; he was stumbling toward being the leader they all wanted . . . and needed.

Keyes grabbed Faison by the shoulder. “By the way, why are so many ODSTs at the front of the line? They look like they’re going to be citizens.”

Faison nodded and looked Keyes in the eye. “Well, of course.

You know the Helljumpers: first in and all
that.”
He gave the last word in emphasis.

Then he winked.

Keyes got it. He could still trust Helljumpers to be Helljumpers. Faison was just making sure he got men out into the general populace in case they needed them out there.

“You’ve got company,” Lt. Kirtley said.

Maria Esquival and several black-clad men pushed through the crowd of crew toward Keyes.

“Lieutenant Jacob Keyes, I gather?” Esquival said.

“Yes ma’am,” Keyes replied.

“No more speeches.”

Keyes laughed. “I thought we were all equals here.”

Esquival tilted her head. “You just announced you gave up the right to citizenry, right?”

“Yes…”

One of the black-uniformed men punched Keyes in the stomach. Faison stepped forward, but Keyes waved him back as he coughed.

“Then I’m pleased to report I’m under no obligation to treat you as a citizen, Lieutenant Keyes.” Esquival smiled. “The problem is, you have a position of power over your men. Such speeches, while admirable, are given from that position of power. Many possible citizens might feel compelled to go to jail who wouldn’t otherwise.”

“It’ll all end,” Keyes said. “When the Covenant gets bored of whatever game it’s playing here.”

Esquival sighed. “You’re so sure of yourself. The war with the Covenant is something the UNSC somehow started back on Harvest, we’re sure of it. This is not our war, we just got caught up in it. It’s
your
war. While you all fight to the last man with your brotherhood of arms, we’ve built something here. I don’t know if the UNSC has noticed, but the Covenant is comprised of a number of varying races. Many of these were allowed into the Covenant. We here in the Rubble are looking for ways humanity can
join
their ranks. As a junior race, perhaps. But we’re adept, Lieutenant Keyes, we’ll work our way up.”

Keyes shook his head. “You conspire with the enemy.” Esquival sighed. “Take him and his bridge crew to the jails. Get them out of here.”

They zip-tied his hands, and then led him off. Several junior officers started applauding, but it died out nervously after a few seconds.