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Pride Before The Fall
Prologue


1700 Hours, August 12, 2548 (Military Calendar) /
UNSC Prowler Anansi, en route to (uncharted position),
co-ordinates [CLASSIFIED]

"Exiting Slipspace in three… two… one …"

Lieutenant Commander Gilchrist felt the Anansi decelerate as it re-entered normal space. On the main viewscreen, the black void of the slipstream erupted with smears of light, which condensed to form constellations of stars and the reddish haze of a hydrogen cloud.

"Transition complete," reported the navigation officer. "Shaw-Fujikawa generators shutting down."

"Any anomalies?"

The navigator, a Junior Lieutenant called Davis, checked his instruments. "We came out of Slipspace about thirty million clicks off-course, but that's to be expected for a long jump like this one."

"Anything else?"

"There is one more thing, sir." Davis brought up the ship's Slipspace logs on his screen. "According to our records, we exited Slipspace ten point five three minutes earlier than our initial calculations predicted."

"Hmm." Gilchrist thought for a moment, before shaking his head. "It's probably nothing. Like you said, this was a long jump. Make a note of it anyway. Maybe the astrophysicists back at FLEETCOM will be able to make something of it."

Human Slipspace technology was hardly exact. Even with a Third-generation AI, SF calculations were scarcely more than very-well-educated guesses. These sorts of inaccuracies cropped up from time to time. On the other hand, Shaw-Fujikawa technology was temperamental, and it never hurt to be careful.

Gilchrist activated the intercom. "Lieutenant Herman, I want a status report on the reactor and Shaw-Fujikawa drive."

The Anansi's engineering officer answered over the inter-ship COM. Herman had to speak up over the low hum of the reactor coils.

"Aye sir. All reactor readouts are in the green. SF engine is dormant – no leaks detected. I can't tell you more without shutting the reactor down and doing a complete inspection."

"Belay that - We don't have time. Just make ready to go online, and keep me posted on the SF drive's status."

Gilchrist turned to Operations. "Double check stealth protocols are online."

"Stealth protocols enabled and running," The lieutenant on Ops replied. "Ablative baffles locked, engine dampers secured. All external power systems are offline. We're in the dark."

Gilchrist settled back in the command chair. "Nav, plot a course to our original destination co-ordinates, as fast as possible while still remaining dark. Ops, set passive sensors to maximum sensitivity. Prepare long range scanners for a wide sweep, but don't go active until we're sure we're alone out here."

"Aye aye, sir." Davis' fingers danced across his console. "All engines answering one quarter speed."

The Anansi's thrusters came to life, and the small ship accelerated forwards. One of the Office of Naval Intelligence's fleet of stealth ships, or "Prowlers", the Anansi was nearly invisible to both electronic and organic eyes. Prowlers were widely believed to be the slowest, least armoured and lightest armed ships in the fleet. Their only hope of surviving all-out combat was avoiding it. To this end, Prowlers were usually small, equipped with the most advanced anti-detection systems in the UNSC. When a Prowler went "black", it was nearly impossible to detect, short of running over it.

"Sir, I think I've got something."

It was Lieutenant Fletcher, on Communications.

"Scanners are picking up something." She tapped a few keys, frowning in concentration. "It's some sort of radio signal, but it's so weak I can't identify it."

"Show me."

The secondary viewscreen snapped on to show a series of sluggishly fluctuating lines.

"Whatever it is," Fletcher continued, "it's broadcasting on every frequency – Human, Covenant, and even some others that nobody uses."

"Are you recording this?" asked Gilchrist.

"Yes, sir. Recording equipment already active."

Suddenly the lines on the screen flattened. "Signal's dropped out. Reacquiring… there." The signal reappeared on screen.

"Any idea what it means?"

"Negative, sir. It almost looks like some sort of encrypted text transmission, with the remains of what might be an audio component, but there's so much interference I can't make anything out very clearly. I've never seen a signal so badly degraded before."

Gilchrist leaned forward. "Amos, what do you make of this?"

A small hologram sprang to life in the holo-tank beside Gilchrist's chair. It took the form of a young man, tall with black hair, wearing a long white lab coat and a cool, thoughtful expression. The only feature that distinguished it as an AI's avatar was its eyes – they phosphoresced a bright blue.

"Analysing." Amos' voice came over the bridge speakers. "Lieutenant Fletcher is right – there is a badly corrupted audio packet imbedded in the transmission. This confirms that the signal is not a natural phenomenon. Signal does not bear any resemblance to any UNSC codes, current or otherwise, nor to any known Covenant cipher. Decryption and translation software come up with nothing. Also, degradation suggests that whatever is broadcasting this signal, its power source is starting to fail." Amos crossed his arms. "Insufficient data for a more thorough analysis. In short, I have no idea what it is."

Gilchrist turned to Fletcher. "Can you isolate where it's coming from?"

"Trying." Fletcher frowned. "Interference is increasing. I think the signal's dropping out again. Damn, there it goes! Attempting to reacquire." She sat back and shook her head. "Sorry, sir. It's gone. The closest lock I could get was somewhere to our starboard, elevation roughly fifteen degrees."

Gilchrist thought for a moment. "We haven't got time to investigate this now. We haven't got much time before we have to return to Bastille. Mark this position. We can mount a proper search later if we come back. Meanwhile, keep the scanners active. Nav, stay on our current heading."

*****

Twelve hours, thought Gilchrist. Twelve hours and nothing on any of the sensors since that signal. He stared through the main screen, at the starry expanse of deep space. Had he made a mistake ignoring the only apparent sign of life in this sector for light-years?

Maybe Jeaves is wrong and there's nothing here after all. Gilchrist sighed. Another wild goose chase.

Gilchrist remembered Vice-Admiral Jeaves giving him this assignment, back on Bastille. He'd walked into the control room overlooking the cave. Jeaves had been standing at the window, staring at the Pillars, their soft blue glow colouring his face. The Vice-Admiral had seemed preoccupied, and didn't even notice Gilchrist for a moment. His body language had broadcasted impatience and frustration like a beacon...

"Ah, Lieutenant Commander, welcome back. I've been meaning to talk to you. At ease."

Gilchrist joined Jeaves at the window.

"Well, Gilchrist? Did you find anything in the Reach libraries?"

"Not much, sir." Gilchrist shook his head in frustration. "At first, I couldn't find a single match in the any of the Archives, not even with the deep access you granted me."

Jeaves raised an eyebrow. "At first? So you didn't come back entirely empty-handed?"

The LC smiled. "No, sir. Amos found some trace ionisation in one of the Archive memory crystals. It was very faint, almost forty years old. We couldn't salvage much information - only a reference to an excavation by an ONI Xeno-anthropology team, on planet XF-063, in the Zeta Doradus system."

"Zeta Doradus? I've heard of the system, but I was under the impression that it contained no habitable planets."

"I'm not surprised, sir. Someone authorised a full system-wide purge of any material with even a reference to XF-063 in 2511. However, there was enough residual information in the memory crystal for Amos to do a deep search, which turned up a few partially-deleted files." Gilchrist stood a little straighter. "I'm afraid we had to... bypass a few security systems along the way."

Jeaves looked surprised. "You hacked into the ONI's archives?"

Gilchrist nodded. "Amos is equipped with most of Dr Halsey's latest intrusion software. Anyway, there was little readable information left in the files, but what remained was very interesting. It seems that back in 2491, the fifth planet in the Zeta Doradus system was earmarked for colonisation. Then in 2511, a routine survey team uncovered the ruins of a highly advanced non-human civilisation. Naturally, ONI snapped this up immediately and erased all traces of the planet and its location from the UNSC records. One of the major findings on XF-063 was an extensive series of hieroglyph-like symbols, carved into almost every surface of the alien ruins."

Jeaves' eyes widened. "No..."

Gilchrist handed Jeaves a wad of printouts. Each one was covered in lines of rounded letters.

"This is just a fraction of the different symbols found on XF-063. Amos ran a check. They are an eighty-seven percent match to the symbols we've found here. Hell, there are about fifteen hundred direct correlations. It's almost certain they were made by the same civilisation."

"A spacefaring race." Jeaves' eyes were alight. "We've always suspected... what about their translation efforts?"

Gilchrist shook his head. "I'm sorry, sir. I couldn't get any more out of the file fragments we recovered."

Jeaves sighed and turned back to the window. "Who authorised the purge?"

Gilchrist hestiated. "Vice Admiral Parangosky."

"Aaaah. I should have known." Jeaves shook his head ruefully. "First she pulls the plug on Project DIADEM, and now this. It's almost like she's planned her petty revenge forty years in advance."

Vice Admiral Parangosky was the head of all Section III operations, and technically Jeave's superior officer. The two had a rivalry that went back decades. No one knew when or how it had started. Parangosky was a cold, ruthless woman. They said that only one person had ever crossed her and lived. Gilchrist knew firsthand that that person was Victor Jeaves.

Gilchrist changed the subject. "How are the extraction operations going, sir?"

"Very well. We've finally made some progress while you were away. We broke through the outer barrier, and ever since then we've been harvesting data by the truckload, but it's the decryption and translation that's causing trouble."

"Sir?"

Jeaves looked frustrated. "It's easy enough to get the information out, which is a mystery in itself. The AI's have discovered huge, immensely powerful defence routines buried in the core and the outer barriers, but for some reason they've remained dormant, even though we've been rooting around in there for almost two months now."

"Maybe they're malfunctioning."

"You'd think that, wouldn't you, considering how old these things are, but I'm not convinced. I believe it's more that, for some reason, the system doesn't consider us a threat. Somehow, it seems to think we belong here. Nevertheless, I've told Kane and the other AIs to tread carefully."

The Vice-Admiral scratched his head thoughtfully and continued. "Like I said, finding the data is easy. Understanding it is something else entirely. The encryption is so advanced, so complex, that we're almost having to make up the de-crypto software as we go along. I can't imagine how advanced the people who built these things must have been. Simply cracking the code on the outermost firewall has pushed our own encryption technology decades ahead. God only knows what we'll find as we go deeper."

"What have we managed to translate yet?"

"Now, that's why I wanted to see you. We've managed to partially decode one of the deeper data nodes, and this is what we got."

Jeaves handed Gilchrist a dataslate. On its screen was a long sequence of numbers. Near the bottom of the display, there was a series of symbols. They were rounded, circular with different arrangements of spokes radiating from their centres, and were coloured an angry red.

Gilchrist indicated the numbers. "These look like co-ordinates."

Jeaves nodded. "They are. Out near the galactic rim, in the middle of a particularly large patch of empty space."

"What about these symbols? They look similar to the glyphs on the walls of the cavern, and those found in Zeta Doradus."

"Yes, they're defiantly the same language. Unfortunately, we're having about as much success translating these new characters as we've had with ones on the walls. Kane is working triple-time on our latest translation software as we speak."

Gilchrist was quiet for a moment.

"I think I see where this is going, sir."

"I thought you would."

Jeaves turned back to the window. "I don't like sending you out into the middle of nowhere before we decode the rest of this data, but I think we're running out of time." He turned back to face Gilchrist, his expression bleak. "I take it you've heard about the sightings of Covenant scout ships at Jacaranda and Port Laurence?"

Gilchrist looked around sharply. "I heard that Port Laurence was being evacuated, but Jacaranda..." He shook his head. "Christ, that's practically next door!"

Jeaves nodded grimly. "I know. That's why I need to send you out now. Take a Prowler and one of the AIs and go to those co-ordinates. Anansi should have been resupplied by now, and you seem to work well with Amos. You have thirty-six hours to investigate the area before you head for home. If you meet resistance, retreat immediately and call for help."

Gilchrist saluted "Yes sir. Understood."

"Very well. When we decipher those symbols, or if we uncover any more data that concerns that position, we'll send another ship to inform you and help if necessary. I'm going to start preparations for an emergency evacuation, just in case. If you get back and we're not here, or the Covenant are, fall back to Archernar." Jeaves smiled dryly. "Observing Cole Protocol, of course."

Gilchrist glanced back as he reached the door. Jeaves had turned back to the window. He seemed totally absorbed with the view, his fingers absently tracing patterns on the glass.

"Sir, something strange is happening." It was Tate, at the Ops station.

Tate's voice snapped the Lieutenant from his thoughts. He frowned and sat up straighter in his chair.

"What is it?"

"Sensors are picking up extremely high-frequency vibrations in the hull." Tate's fingers danced across the controls. The Lieutenant looked confused. "The computer can't isolate the source. It's not coming from anywhere inside the ship."

All of the computer screens on the bridge flickered with static. The bridge lights dimmed slightly, before brightening again.

"The vibrations are interfering with our electrical system, and their intensity is starting to increase."

Gilchrist could feel it now, a slight shiver through the arms of his chair.

Amos materialised in the bridge holotank. "Background radiation levels increasing. Still within tolerable limits."

A warning siren filled the bridge with a dull wail. Warning lights started flashing red on the crew's consoles. Gilchrist looked up abruptly.

"Report!"

"Vibration intensity is increasing exponentially! I still can't locate where it's coming from!"

"Energy spike! Background radiation levels just tripled!"

The bridge was visibly shaking now. The lights started flickering again, and static washed over the viewscreens.

Collision alarms started blaring out of the bridge speakers.

"Contacts!" yelled Tate. "Sensors picking up multiple contacts, range less than a kilometre! Two, six, fourteen… God, there's hundreds of them, and more keep appearing!" The Lieutenant's voice had an edge of panic in it. "They're all around us, sir! Every direction!"

"Put them on screen!" Ordered Gilchrist.

Tate tapped his keypad furiously. The main viewscreen flickered to a view of space.

"What the –"

The screen was empty – nothing but stars.

"What in god's name…" breathed Gilchrist.

"That's impossible!" Tate's voice wavered, but whether from fear or the shaking of the ship Gilchrist couldn't tell. "The sensors…"

"Amos, run a system check over the sensor suite."

The AI's luminous eyes flared as he analysed the data.

"System check complete." Amos frowned, sounding slightly troubled. "Sensors operating at 90% efficiency, no faults or errors detected."

"Then, how do you explain that?" Gilchrist pointed towards the star-filled viewscreen.

Amos crossed his arms, one hand on his chin, seeming to be looking into space. He dropped his arm and shook his head. "I can't. I've never encountered anything like this before. No one has."

The viewscreen flickered with static, and then went dark. Seconds later, it cracked and shattered, spraying the bridge with shards of plastic.

The Anansi juddered, and Gilchrist heard a series of dull thumps.

"Hull breaches on deck five and six, section three, and deck nine in section five. Sealing now."

"What caused them?" Gilchrist had to shout over the rattling of the ship.

"It's the vibrations, sir!" Tate shouted back "They're causing faults in the viewports!"

A sharp splintering sound filled the bridge. Minute cracks started to form at the edges of the bridge's window.

"Fractures detected in bridge viewport. Closing emergency shutters."

Amos turned to Gilchrist as thick titanium plates lowered over the windows. The AI's form flickered and jumped, and his voice sounded distorted.

"Lieutenant, radiation levels are approaching the danger zone. Any higher, and it will begin to affect the crew."

Gilchrist clenched his teeth to stop them from chattering together. Amos' distorted appearance was troubling. If the AI was malfunctioning, they might never get out of this mess alive. He thought back to the control room on Bastille, back to those alien symbols. Bright red, he thought. Like warning signs.

"Amos, are you all right?"

"I'm fine. The vibrations are interfering with the holotank's projector matrix."

"Shut off your Avatar. It's just wasting processor cycles, and I need you at your best."

"Aye sir." Amos' virtual form faded from the holopad.

"Can you identify the source of the radiation?"

"Calculating…done. Bearing two three five degrees, elevation negative one four degrees, distance forty thousand, one hundred kilometres."

"Navigation, plot us a course directly away from that point and get us out of here as fast as possible."

"Yes sir!" Davis typed fervently at his console, waving away droplets of blood from a cut above his left eyebrow. "Bringing us about. Stabilising. All engines ahead full."

Suddenly, the floor bucked violently. Gilchrist was thrown from his seat as his harness snapped. He tumbled through the air and slammed into the bulkhead. The bridge lights flared, and went dark. Moments later they were replaced by the dull red glow of the emergency light strips. Gilchrist pushed away from the wall and turned towards the single viewscreen.

"What's happening?"

"It's the SF drive!" cried Tate. "The Quantum Acceleration Matrix is going crazy! Radiation count in Engineering just increased tenfold!" Another alarm sounded, and Tate's head whipped back to his screen. "Radiation is aggravating the fusion coils! Core temperature is rising rapidly! The coolant system can't cope. Computer predicts meltdown in forty-five seconds."

"Emergency vent!" Gilchrist barked "Shunt the drive plasma to space!"

"I'm trying, but there's no response from engineering. I can't raise Lieutenant Herman on the COM.

"Sir, spatial activity detected behind us. Something's moving back there. Putting it on screen."

The last remaining viewscreen snapped to a view from the aft cameras. There was nothing at first, then the bridge was filled with blue-green light.

Gilchrist squinted. "Amos, what the hell is that?"

Before the AI could answer, the deck shuddered again. The emergence lights flickered madly.

"Still no response from engineering!" Tate all but screamed. "The reactor's going critical!"

The tortured, moaning shriek of twisted metal filled the air. There was a crash, and the sound of shattering glass. Someone screamed, and the bridge was plunged into darkness.

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