[IC] Eternal Galaxy: Shards of Starlight - Part I

[Cucoo5]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur

"Very well. You have permission to land."
Then another younger officer took over. "Landing bay M-413 is available for you to land. You may proceed with your approach."

[S121]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur
Landing Bay M-413

With the Commander's permission, John soon made his approach and landed in the landing bay.

As soon as he landed, John pulled Cortana's Crystal Data Chip out of the AI Holodeck and left the ship.

"Now where to?", John quietly said to Cortana as he looked around the landing bay.

"I'm not sure, but someone should arrive shortly.", Cortana answered as she began to look through the suit's parameters and capabilities, scanning each and every function for later.

All of a sudden, John and Cortana heard an alarm go off in the landing bay.

"What was that?"

"I won't know until I'm plugged into the ship's systems."

"It might be time to get back on the ship.", John commented.

[Kristia]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur


The white haired greeted the group "My name is Mara, pleasure to meet you" she said with a calm smile

Hearing the sudden siren made her worry "Say.. what´s the situation over there?" she asked referring to the alarm

[Cucoo5]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur

"Oh that's just the alert that a training session is about to begin." Kiara answered as Joe ran to the M-level hangar. "It's a regularly scheduled system that all the Maverick pilots make a big fuss about."

***

A group of Maverick pilots started to file into the M-level hangar. They ran past, taking no heed to, John as they assumed he was simply a normal occurrence. As they went by, one could hear them talking amongst themselves about the training session.

[S121]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur

"Training Session?", John said in slight confusion.

"Looks like a false alarm. We should go and see the commander now.", Cortana said to John.

John shook his head and continued out of the landing bay.

He didn't know where exactly to go. He was used to the UNSC's protocols, but he had no idea about Delta's. John figured that he would need to go see the Commander, so he decided to walk to the Bridge.

[Cucoo5]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur

As John was leaving, Navarre saw him and noticed his strange armor. "You must be the one from Nexus. Milady always had a habit of sending anyone that needed to find a way forward with their lives to Commander Sullivan and I." He said with an emotionless tone that if one listened carefully could hear a faint tone of longing...
"You came here for training, correct? Then I will train you with the rest of the Mavericks." Navarre spoke each word with definitive precision. No faltering, no hesitation.

[Kristia]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur

"Well then, seems everything is fine" Mara said and took some tools to repair some parts of her

The bioroid calmly removed the synthetic plating of her arm and started taking care of some wires.

(Looks like the flow is going smoothly, and my surge of strength didn´t damage the gyros of my arm") she thought will repairing her arm

[S121]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur

John turned around and looked at Navarre.

John was used to hearing the calm and emotionless tones of other Spartans, so he could hear something in Navarre's voice.

"I'm ready to start as soon as possible... Is there something wrong about it?", John asked, referencing Vavarre's choice of words about being sent here and tone.

[Koishi]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur

---

Mima kept reading through, eventually coming to a section about types of spirits. The very first one was Evil spirits. She glanced through the description.

"An evil spirit is one conifned to this world for evil purposes, or due to a youkai intervening at the Sanzu River." she whispered to herself. Another familar felling arose in her, and pain shot through her head again. She endured though, prepered for somthing like this, and simply closed her eyes this time, and relaxed.

---

Mima's Flashback
Gensokyo

---

Mima floated in the air, while another floating purple haired shrine maiden stood on a flying turtle opposite to her.

"You, you stole the Hakurei Orbs!" the shrine maiden pointed at Mima.

"Oh, did I? I simply borrowed them and used them to their full potential, unlike you, Reimu Hakurei. You honestly don't understand your own powers, do you?" Mima replied.

"Well, yeah...of course I d-" Reimu was then interupted by a laser grazing her. "The hell was that for?!"

"If you knew how to use your powers, you would have seen that coming a mile away. You're sqandering your potential, little girl. I'm giving it purpose." Mima retorted.

"If I have to fight you, I will, evil spirit!" Reimu yelled.

"Then let us get this over with, I have humanity to destroy." Mima smirked, firing a huge laser at Reimu, as her memory started to fade.

---

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur

---

Mima opened her eyes.

"I was... evil?" Mima said to herself.

But how, she thought. She was only seeing glimpses of the past, not the full story. She had to have some sort of reason... right?

[Cucoo5]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur

"Nice to meet you Mara...and is that a prosthetic? If you want I can take a look at that. I am a medical officer as well as an informational officer."

***

As Navarre led John back into the hangar bay he was just in, he answered his question. "Nothing...old habits. I was Lady Avonna's personal guard before I chose to follow Commander Sullivan. I know her as well as I know myself."

[Kristia]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur


Hearing the offer, the bioroid pondered about it Well.. yea it is a prosthetic" she said hoping they wouldn´t notice that she was way more mechanical than organical.

She took the tool out of her arm and closed the plate "Im only making some weekly maintenance on the muscles and nerves, but thanks for the offer" she smiled

[Cucoo5]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur

Kiara then held Mara's head still as she took a sort of scanner device and looked at Mara's eyes. "Hmm...the nanobots are doing ok... Mind if you look to the left? I can't tell if the blackness is because of the nanobots flooding them or are they also prosthetic? Have you made sure to eat foods high in electrolytes?"

[Kristia]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur


The sudden movement of the woman made the bioroid fidget in reaction, but she had to answer "They.. are prosthetic too, and yes Im taking care of myself" she said looking to the left

"So.. how far or deep have you gone in prosthetics?" Mara asked to Kiara

[S121]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur

John thought about what Navarre had said and thought about it.

(So that explains the tone. Why was it almost sorrowful, or longing?), John thought.

John didn't think too much into it. It would not be right if John pried into the personal life of everyone he met. Right now, he needed to train.

"When do we start?", John asked Navarre in calm tone with the slightest traces of impatience.

John wanted to finish the training as soon as possible. The sooner he finished, the sooner he could gather the Ancient Relics and go home.

[Cucoo5]

Helios System
Delta Division Flagship | Excalibur

"I learned everything I could. Ok, so your eyes are prosthetic...ok good. I was worried that it was a sign of a Bioroid augmentation gone slightly wrong." Kiara then pressed a finger against the side of Mara's throat as though taking a pulse. "Flow is good...The nanobots aren't binding in your blood vessels. Ok. How about you drop by my section in the Medical ward for a check-up later? You might have bioroid augmentations but you're still human." Kiara smiled with a truly friendly smile that was the very definition of caring. "Promise me you'll drop by later, 'k?"

***

"As soon as you fall in line with the others." Navarre kept walking down the line of Mavericks who stood at attention and in unison responded to him.
"Lieutenant Navarre, Sir!"
"At ease. This training session will put all of you into a situation that you are most likely not comfortable in. In this session, Squadron leaders will be put into the back seat while others take the lead. We have divided each of you into separate squadrons." He turned to where the newly recruited Hunters were. "We'll start with your Squadron, Captain Aion."
"Captain? When did I get the promotion, sir?"
"By request of your fellow Hunters."
Joe nudged Aion. "Merry Christmas, Arrow."
"Thanks..." Aion then turned his attention back to Navarre.
"You will assign one of your squad mates to be a temporary leader. Then you will be assigned temporarily with another squadron." Navare then turned to John. "You will be going along with Captain Aion."
Aion turned to John and then back to Navarre and nodded.

***

Nero walked up to Mima from the darkness and placed a hand on her shoulder. "You alright?" He sat down in a seat next to her. "Remember, my study has access to some deeper aspects of the Archives that you won't find here...some things are kept secret from the general populace."