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Rebirth - The Ragnarok
Posted By: Shadow/Archangel's Blade/KnightmareWolf/Spartan415<Shadowolf16@aol.com>
Date: 11 August 2003, 8:19 PM
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NOTE: As some of you might be noticing, my chapters have become more and more assuming, and therefore, will be impossible to understand if you haven't already read the past chapters. I know that it is a very annoying way to do things for you that are new to the series, but it helps keep things flowing, and that's how I want my chapters to work.
They were like a mass of locusts, swiftly moving along the streets, taking up every single possible space that could be spent on a living creature as the enormous "army" of Covenant civilians flooded towards the military complex, staring at the ruined building entrance and listening to the numerous gunshots and explosions that occurred throughout other subsidiary areas of the heart of the city. Not a single hand was there to push them back from their overwhelming curiosity, for all were spent in keeping one dangerous foe from escaping the confines of the spiraling base.
::What has transpired, friend?::
::It appears that the rebels had planned a counterattack against the military. There are rumors of a human in that building there as well, though such not very likely.::
::You speak truly.::
The many moments of intermittent gunfire, and explosions were counteracted with a short, yet potent silence from the levels above. Not a single sound was made from the base for seconds on end, and the crowds quickly hushed to a silence in an involuntary response to the quietness that had met them. In a succeeding moment, a whole floor was gone, shattering into nothing. Glass and shards of metal flew out from all parts of that horizontal thread of a floor, raining death upon all the sightseers that looked from below. Chaos was dispensed quickly on the ground, and the watchers had now run from their interests in an elevated purpose of saving their own hides. A pure black plume of smoke ignited in a mix of fiery red and orange around the entire shattered floor as a lone figure flew out from one side, in perfect diving form. Strands of black flowed behind his body as his diving arc drastically deepened. Though the threat of death still loomed over the civilians, all had the curiosity to watch the figure seemingly float down towards the ground. Plasma rifle blasts were made from within the confines of the base, sending additional illuminations out to the sky, but to no avail, for the dark figure was moving far too fast and erratically for any hint of accuracy to take place. All watched, and were shocked to see the figure simply vanish in the air, the instant disappearance of the opaque dark color a vivid image in their minds. All sounds and gunfire seemed to stop in the shock of the disappearance. All eyes were fixated on where the figure once was, and the civilians' heads were fixed in a unison position. Time, it seemed, was at a standstill.
"Get me a ship."
"How demanding. How about just a little break for my databanks to replenish their calculating efficiency? I just got you out of maximum security military complex, and all you can make is demands?"
"I really wish you acted more like a machine. Then I wouldn't have to have these damn arguments with you."
"Ha! You know you'd be dead form the sheer amount of boredom of life. Besides, I've found us a ship. It's a Covenant rebel ship that has been impounded by the Covenant military. With all the attention focused on the recent dismantling of the military base and the search for your worthless hide, the impounding station should have very few guards and the like."
"Why that ship? Why can't I simply steal a ship from the military hangar?"
"You're an idiot. We need a small ship that will be difficultly detected, and can make hyperspace jumps. Besides, the statistical background of this ship is impeccable, what with its present condition. Not to mention the amazing hull design that is very effective at warding off all forms of bludgeoning damage. Of course a level 4 hacking device could have erased the historical records of the ship's past involvement with the military, and restored it to a perfect record in civil matters. Though why it is in the impound would be a problem to thus explained reasoning. The traditional interc..."
"I got it, I got it. Now, just tell me where that damn impounding station is."
"Would you like me to point?"
"NO! Definitely just tell me the coordinates and bring up a R-5 zoomed map on the datapad. I don't want another fucking wall incident."
The alleyways were the best bet considering the very hostile situation on the main roads, and the farther he got from the whole big explosion thing, the better. He would have to keep in constant movement if he even wanted to have the slightest chance of living though, even if he was moving away from trouble. The entire planetary army was likely right on his ass, and he needed a quick way of escaping unseen. It took but a few minutes for him to make his way through the alleyways to the impounding station, with the exception of a few elites that he had to dispose of. Standing on the outside of just another futuristic device, which what seemed like a laser fence intent on keeping troublesome civilians away. He activated the targeting reticule on the datapad, and began scanning each ship, searching for the location of this rebel fighter.
"How much time before the search parties find their way to my location?"
"We have three minutes tops. No need to scan. I found the ship, and there is only one guard that we need to rid ourselves of. By the way, the ship name is the Ragnarok."
"What?"
"I'll explain the meaning of the name later. Just place a small charge at this laser fence generator here, and we're in."
EVA marked in a targeted spot on one of the numerous poles that were spitting out the lasers, each pole generating a laser into the other, essentially creating a very long fence around the compound, that "bended" at each of the generators. It effectively created one long multisided polygon that surrounded the entire base. He sprinted from his hidden position next to an abandoned business building and pulled out a RCT-29 explosive. It wasn't powerful, but it didn't seem like he'd need much to take out the generator that he needed to hit. He nailed the RCT right on the pole and dove as the explosion tore the pole in half, leaving a nice little space that lacked in the precise laser deterrent. He was in, and the ship was parked there in the impound right in front of him, slowly bobbing up and down on its hover systems. It didn't seem like much of anything. Its main hull was something of a vertically elongated circle, with two dorsal fins on top and bottom with the slant pointing backwards rather than forwards, effectively leaving the other straight half of the wing to be facing forward. The side wings were simply very long sections that were positioned forward rather than sideways. What the result was something of a thin but very forwardly long wingspan that was perfectly for making the ship a small target. It all looked something like a metallic, sleek fish.
"That was easy."
"I'm deactivating the attached security system, and opening the cockpit doors now. I'm also downloading the schematics, so you can actually fly this thing out into space."
"I can handle it."
"It's a hundred years in the future at least, and you're telling me that you can handle an alien ship that's far beyond your experience?"
Shadow gave out a sigh, its intention to express annoyance, though it seemed to come out more to relieve stress and exhaustion.
"Just activate the console and the drive systems so we can get out of here. I'm feeling wrong about this. If they see us leaving, we'll have the whole fleet on us."
"They're activated and...uh-oh."
"What now?"
"A Covenant patrolman is reporting on the military band that he's seeing some odd commotion at the impound. They're bound to send at least one investigation team."
Without a response, Shadow looked down at the controls, trying to obtain a bearing on the quite hazardous situation. The console was lit up with numerous alien labeled devices and odd contraptions. He couldn't even find a throttle. In his confusion, EVA realized that if she didn't provide assistance, there would be some very real problems in the near future. Namely, a whole Starfleet meeting them in space.
"That button there, and here. The throttle will come up to your right and the EMS console on your left."
"Right. I knew that."
He first pressed the two buttons that he was told to activate, and it seemed that he was ready to go. He activated the vertical thrusters, but nothing came out. No sound, no beep of failure, not even an attempt to break free from the ground. Shadow's eyes opened in surprise and urgency.
"Cockpit."
"Working on it. It seems that the impound had a secondary security system. It'll seal it in a second."
"Open it. Now."
She couldn't understand his urgency, but she knew that he rarely ever said anything without reason, and she immediately dived back through the system and flipped open the cockpit. An alien yell in the voice of an elite was roared out as the cockpit swung open, sending the elite flying from where he was previously on the cockpit window.
"Close it, and get us out of here. And while you're at it, block the planetary transmissions if you can. I don't want to deal with a fleet."
"Done, done and done."
She was quite an amazing AI, even in this future time. The ship rumbled to life, and its thruster lifted them off the ground.
"The ship is registered to a Covenant "civilian", so as long as we don't cause any trouble, we won't have any problems."
"Right."
Before time was up, they were beyond the holds of the atmosphere, passing through the last of the gaseous visual blockage and into clear space. He half expected to be met with a huge number of ships as the mist cleared the cockpit windows, but he was met with nothing but the deep blackness.
"We made it."
"Strangely enough. I've punched in the coordinates of this Uzumri, though its at the rim of known space, and it'll take a number of days to get to."
"Supplies?"
"Checked the inventory before we launched. We have enough for two weeks...or a few hours at the rate you're eating candy bar."
He smiled at their recently accomplished endeavor and at EVA's slightly entertaining sardonic nature. He felt his forearm, feeling the bandage that was around it. It would heal in time for their arrival at this Uzumri ship, or at least enough to be functional. He looked back to the planet, as alien from space as it was on the ground. He smiled once again...and then they were gone.
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