Hunters in the Dark (HALO)

  CHAPTER 2

  * * *

  William Iqbal sipped carefully at the cup of tea that one of the attendants had brought into the conference quadrant of Serin Osman’s office. He paused a moment, as if coming to a great decision, and then sipped again. “You know,” he said finally. “I would like to say that this is unexpected. However, if you reference my work from January of 2553, you will see that it very much is not.”

  “Doctor Iqbal,” said Osman, of no disposition to allow the scientist to launch into some manner of lengthy speech. “We do not really have the time for this.”

  Iqbal did not respond to her. It was unclear whether he hadn’t heard her or had simply chosen to ignore the statement. He was looking over a hard copy of the peer-reviewed paper he had published shortly after the war, of which everyone in the room had a copy. “I was writing about the Excession of Voi, and I concluded by saying, ‘This may be the greatest archaeological boon we have ever received as scholars, but it is certainly the most perilous. Be careful.’ And now, here we are.”

  “Yes, but where exactly are we?” Osman said sharply. “That’s what this meeting has been called to determine.”

  The gathering was being held in a large corner within Osman’s office dedicated to conferences, deep in the bowels of Bravo-6. This HIGHCOM facility consisted of a series of tall buildings above an incredibly vast complex of structures buried deep below. Interestingly, the entire site had remained undamaged when the Covenant had assaulted Sydney, Australia. No one was quite sure how that had happened; some higher-ups boasted that even the Covenant was loathe to screw with the headquarters of ONI.

  They were seated around a long conference table. Iqbal, of course, was a self-satisfied prig as far as Osman was concerned, but there was no denying the man’s knowledge when it came to matters such as this, and his extensive knowledge of all subjects related to xenoarchaeology, a study that he oversaw at Edinburgh University.

  Seated next to him was Captain Annabelle Richards. Richards served under Osman as head of Special Operations, after spending years serving in the Navy during the war. She sat stiffly, with her legs crossed at the ankles, and she did not seem any more enthused about Iqbal than Osman was.

  Next to her was Admiral Terrence Hood, who had for some time headed the UNSC’s Navy and was viewed as a father figure by many in the branch. Hood and Osman had an odd relationship. Osman knew his reputation as an excellent and by-the-book officer—older and clearly wiser than Osman was—and so she was never openly reluctant about his involvement. And there was no question that he had to be involved in something like this current situation with the Zeta Halo, but part of her hated to admit that Hood would bring something to the table that she couldn’t figure out on her own. She wondered if that was held over from her mentor and predecessor, Margaret Parangosky, who had a similar relationship with the man.

  The Army and Marine Corps were represented at the far end of the table. The Army’s representative was General Crystal Speakman. Osman was familiar with her record as a bitter foe of the Covenant and a formidable strategist on a dozen conflicts among the inner colonies. She was as aggressive a warrior as Osman had ever seen, and on that basis alone, it made Speakman someone whom Osman could easily peg and leverage if needed.

  The Marine Corps general was a white-haired man named Van Zandt, and he was the polar opposite of Speakman in many ways. Van Zandt had lobbied for years to engage the Covenant in peace talks, even when the alien threat was busy glassing colony after colony across all of human-occupied space. His contention had always been that the Covenant was far too powerful for them to hope to defeat using armament, and that diplomacy was the only viable way to end the battle. He had received very little support from his colleagues at the time, and the fact that he had fundamentally been correct in the long run, at least when it came to the Sangheili, had not done a thing to endear him to his fellow officers.

  The last person at the table was Doctor Bob Casper, the gentleman who was the overall head of the Zeta Halo operation. He was a tall, striking man. Osman would never have guessed that he was a scientist; he looked more like career military.

  “I know it’s obvious, what I am about to say,” Osman began. “But I still feel the need to emphasize that the subject of this meeting is top secret. And that in itself is an understatement. There is simply no way that we can permit news of what we have discovered to be circulated. Is everyone clear?”

  “Of course,” Hood rumbled. “The inevitable panic it would create, the pointless attempts to flee—it would lead to widespread unrest.”

  “I’m still unsure of exactly what we’re discussing,” said Speakman, tapping the table with clear impatience.

  “I believe,” said Osman, and she shifted her attention back to Iqbal, “that the doctor here was about to inform us of his findings.”

  “Indeed,” said Iqbal. He shifted through some notes, although Osman tended to think that those actions were merely for show. “First, allow me to say that I have utter confidence in Luther Mann. He lectured on his findings on Trevelyan over a year ago at Oxford. He’s dedicated to his studies and knows what he’s talking about, and there is simply no one who is more educated on the subject of the Forerunner culture or language than he is.

  “On March 8, 2555, at about 0900 hours, Luther was alerted to the fact that a numerical reverse progression—a countdown—was occurring on the Zeta Halo, in a corridor connected to one of the installation’s atmosphere- and climate-control centers. He immediately reported his findings to Director Casper here,” he nodded toward Casper, “who in turn reported it to ONI, as per protocol.”

  “On a hunch,” Casper picked up the narrative, “I contacted my research counterparts on the other Halo rings we’re monitoring, and they discovered identical countdowns were occurring on every single one. Preliminary checks indicated that they are all in exactly the same place on the numbers.”

  “And where would that be?” said Osman.

  Casper checked his datapad. “At the current rate, and according to Doctor Mann’s calculations, it will hit zero in exactly four weeks and three days.”

  “And what happens then?”

  “That is a matter of some debate, but there’s at least one compelling argument.”

  It was Iqbal who responded: “The Array will be activated.”

  “He’s right,” said Casper.

  “And how do you know that?” asked Van Zandt.

  “Because,” said Casper, “I spoke with Henry Lamb, Luther Mann’s engineering associate. They acted on a well-founded hunch, and Henry has traced a steady pulse that is incrementally increasing—this pulse runs straight to the Zeta Halo’s control room, which had remained hidden on this particular ring until now, and then into its ignition circuits. It’s the equivalent of a steady fuse that will draw consistently closer as time progresses. When it reaches sufficient strength, the activation circuits will be triggered. This, connected to the fact that the numbering sequence is almost identical to the one encountered by some of our ships that managed to get near to Installation 05 when it was initially activated back in ’52.”

  “Well . . . there must be a way to intercept them,” said Admiral Hood. “A means of shutting them down, like they did at the other ring.”

  “Lamb says there isn’t, and I tend to believe him,” said Casper. “This wasn’t initiated from the Halo installations themselves, using the conventional Index reunification process as was done in the past. The rings have somehow come online some other way, so it’s not like we can simply remove a key from the ignition this time around. Luther’s already tried a number of things on Zeta, and any attempt to shut down a single pulse simply causes it to reroute.”

  “How about shutting it down at the source?”

  “I suspect they haven’t found the source,” said Iqbal.

  Casper nodded. “That’s correct. The source hasn’t been located on Zeta Halo. Nor has it been found on any other installation. The signal to activat
e came from another extrinsic source, and we’re still trying to figure that out. To be honest, this is where the trail gets a little murky. We don’t have a lot to go on.”

  There were startled looks from a few present for Casper’s announcement. Even Admiral Hood looked a bit shaken. Osman managed to keep herself together, and that was with effort.

  “It seems rather obvious to me,” said Iqbal. “When Installation 05’s own activation was halted by the sudden removal of the Index, our data indicates that all of the rings in the Array entered some kind of fail-safe, call it a stand-by mode . . . unable to be individually activated. It appears the installations were originally designed to activate in correspondence with each other. In other words, once one of them was activated, its supraluminal signal would trigger another, and that one would trigger another, until all seven had come online, blanketing the entirety of the galaxy. When the fail-safe event on Delta Halo took place, all the rings became effectively inert, and the only place they could be activated was the Ark—Installation 00. Now we still observe the safety protocols on all of the rings we’re monitoring, as though there could very well be a way to activate them . . . but in all this time, there’s been no evidence to suggest that the stand-by protocol has been overridden. There seems to be only one logical conclusion to this: if someone or something is determined to make certain that the Array is activated—meaning all sentient life in the galaxy is obliterated—they probably did this from the Ark.”

  “Except that makes no sense,” said Admiral Hood. “Wasn’t the reason the portal went offline in the first place because the Ark was damaged by a replacement Halo’s activation? No one knows what’s left of it or if any of it actually survived. But even if we presume the Ark is still around and functioning, if its intent is to set off the Halo weapons, what’s the point of providing a countdown? Couldn’t it be done immediately?”

  “Perhaps not,” said Speakman. “Perhaps it requires time for the machinery to work up to its activation.”

  “It never has before, at least not like this,” said Osman. “Based on the historical reports, there has never been any aspect of the Halo activation that’s required an extensive amount of time to spin up. As far as we can tell through anecdotal data, at least.”

  “And we’re pretty confident that no one observing any of the installations did anything to cause this,” Casper chimed in, “so we have no way of accounting for why this activation process is so protracted compared to the other times we’ve experienced it.”

  “Then let’s not look a gift horse in the mouth. Tell me what we do know,” said Osman. “Tell me how we stop it.”

  For some reason she expected a lengthy silence as the people surrounding her stared at each other, everyone hoping that someone else had the answer. It was, to Osman’s mild surprise, Captain Richards who spoke up first.

  “The Ark,” she said. “We send a team to the Ark.”

  All eyes turned toward Richards for a moment. “That’s a bit more complicated than you’re probably aware,” Iqbal responded. “First of all, as Admiral Hood just indicated, it may not be in the same state it was when we left it. And second, Installation 00 is over two hundred and sixty thousand light years away from the center of the Milky Way. Leveraging the best slipspace technology we’ve got currently at our disposal—I’m talking about crystal-mediated, Forerunner prototype engines, of which we’re still early in the testing—we’re looking at about a nine- to ten-month travel time. And again, to an installation that might be in extremely rough shape. Our best bet is to pursue an intervening solution from the Halo rings, even if the Ark is the source.”

  “What about the portal in Kenya?” continued Richards. “Wasn’t that how we got there before?”

  “The portal’s been inactive for a long time. We’ve exhausted all possible options trying to get it up and running again, even if only for research purposes.”

  “Maybe not all options,” Hood noted, looking at Osman. “What about the Elites? It was the Covenant who activated the portal to begin with.”

  “Them? I don’t know. I’m not comfortable involving the Sangheili,” Osman said “Especially not on something like this.”

  “Also,” Iqbal said, “keep in mind that the Covenant used a Forerunner keyship, the Dreadnought, as they called it, from their ancient history. Without that, getting the portal back online is more than likely impossible. I mean, it’s the very reason the portal was designed in the first place. So that only one kind of ship could activate it, and we have no idea where that one ended up.”

  “We don’t, but the Sangheili might,” Hood responded. “We should reach out to the Arbiter and see if he can provide assistance. There might be something we’re missing and we don’t really have a long list of alternatives to choose from.”

  “I’m still not comfortable with it,” said Osman. “Director Casper, do you think your people can help here? What about the gentlemen who found the activation sequence to begin with?”

  “Perhaps,” said Casper. “We can call Luther and Henry back home, get them down there, and have them go over it with a fine-toothed comb. I suppose if anyone from our side can bring the portal back online at this point, it’s them.”

  “Are you sure it’s a good idea to pull them away from the Zeta Halo? Maybe there’s still something that can be done from there,” said Speakman.

  Casper nodded. “Positive. Make no mistake: we will still have teams working to stop the countdown from Zeta and the other installations. But sending Doctors Mann and Lamb to the Excession would seem to be the most positive step to take. And if, or rather, more hopefully, when we get the portal up and running, those two are definitely on a very short list of people I’d recommend sending to the Ark on this expedition. Luther’s studied the data on the Ark’s topography extensively—at least what we have on file from the Dawn’s sensors—and he’s the most well-versed in their languages. Henry’s right up there with him, when it comes to engineering and systems protocol.”

  “With all due respect to Doctor Mann,” Iqbal said, “let’s not get ahead of ourselves. The portal’s inoperable. We’ve had people working around the clock at the Excession site for over two years now, spanning a dozen scientific disciplines. I fail to see what he’s going to bring to the table.”

  Van Zandt spoke up. “I agree. We’re going to need outside help on this. I don’t care how much of an expert in this material Doctors Mann and Lamb are. This isn’t our technology; it’s the Forerunners’, and right now we’re not in the driver’s seat. I concur with Admiral Hood. We need the Arbiter.”

  “I completely disagree,” said Osman. “There’s too much risk.”

  “No, I think you’re outnumbered here, Admiral Osman,” Hood said with a faint smirk. “Let’s face it: it’s their galaxy as well. It’s entirely possible that the Elites will be able to bring contributions to this issue that we cannot even begin to imagine. Unless there’s some solution that I don’t know about, we’re going to need them.”

  “Are you absolutely sure about this, Admiral?” Osman asked pointedly, looking directly at Hood.

  “We’d be risking a lot by not approaching the Arbiter. Remember, he had his people groundside on the Ark with the Master Chief. They know it better than anyone, Doctor Mann included. They also might have a solution for cracking open the portal. Like the general said, we’re not in a position to be picky about how this gets handled. There’s too much at stake. Beggars can’t be choosers.”

  “Okay, so if we get the portal activated,” Speakman proposed, “and we assemble a team, one part us, one part them, what next? How long would it take us to get there?”

  “Back in ’52, when the portal came online, it took us almost a month,” Iqbal responded. “That was with dozens of Covenant ships, lots of mass and nav limitations. Things have changed. A single ship, fitted with the right Forerunner-seeded slipspace tech, could probably make it to the coordinates in two, maybe three weeks.”

  “All right,” Osman s
aid after a moment. “Admiral Hood, contact the Arbiter and see what he can do. Richards, I’m going to want you to oversee the operation to get the portal activated and the expedition.”

  “Me?”

  “Yes, you. It’s too risky to parse these things up under separate management. I want someone who I can trust to keep me apprised as matters progress.”

  “Then I’ll need help,” Richards told them. “I don’t have a ton of direct experience dealing face to face with the Sangheili . . . at least in a diplomatic context. I’ll need an intermediary of some sort; someone who really knows their race and how to interact with them.”

  “Doctor Mann knows quite a bit about their species,” said Casper.

  “He should be focused on his work,” Osman said, casting a wary eye at Hood. “He’s not going to have time to run interference between UNSC personnel and the Sangheili if, or rather I should say, when tensions rise.”

  Casper thought about it briefly and then said, “I know someone in ONI who might work. She’s a professional diplomat and extremely fluent in their language and culture. If there’s anything to know about the Sangheili, she’s the one. She’s interacted with them a number of times already and can easily interface between them and Captain Richards.”

  “Who?” said Osman.

  “Her name’s Olympia Vale.”

  Osman immediately pulled up Vale’s specifics on her datapad. She scanned them quickly and then nodded, looking up at Casper. “Can she be trusted?”

  “You mean with the knowledge that the fate of the human race could depend on her discretion?” asked Casper. “Yes, I think so.”

  “You think so?”

  “Fine. I know so,” Casper said more firmly.

  Osman sat back in her chair. “Normally I’d prefer to use the experts I know personally in this field, but that’s not possible right now. I’d also want to take a month to have her thoroughly vetted, ONI or not, but I don’t think we have that sort of time. Richards—recruit her, right away. She’ll just have to be good enough.”