Episode 06: Transcendence

Previous episode:	Episode 05: Where the Third Life Shines
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Episode 06: Transcendence
Series overview
Series:	Hunt the Truth
Season:	Season 2
Episode specifications
Episode:	06
Air date:	October 26, 2015
Run time:	18:58

Episode 06: Transcendence was the sixth and final episode released for the second season of the Hunt the Truth audio drama. The episode was originally released on Soundcloud on October 26, 2015 - the day before the release of Halo 5: Guardians.

Official summary

“

Maya risks it all to spread the truth, the anomaly is revealed, and a new hero rises on Laika III.

”

Plot summary

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Audio transcript

• Dasc Gevadim: Our flesh is but the shell of a satellite, circling-

• Maya (Voiceover): It was happening. The event had begun. With Dasc and his followers suspended in the air all around us. I turned to Mshak.

• Maya: Mshak. We need to go. Now.

• Maya (Voiceover): But he didn’t answer. He just stood there looking up at the hovering rocks all around us. His mouth wide open.

• Mshak: We’re gonna die

• Maya: No. No we’re not.

• Mshak: We’re gonna die.

• Maya: Listen. Where is Bostwick?

• Mshak: We’re gonna die.

• Maya: Mshak!

• Maya (Voiceover): I didn’t have to wait long for an answer. I could hear the Warthog growling and tearing through the woods. It burst through the foliage and spun out right in front of us.

• Bostwick: Let’s go!

• Maya: Bostwick!

• Bostwick: Come on, get in!

• Maya (Voiceover): I grabbed Mshak and we leapt into the Warthog as Bostwick hit the gas, leaving Dasc and his disciples behind us. The levitating rocks and twigs pelting our windshield as we sped down the twisting mountain road toward the city.

• Mshak: WHOAH! Okay, um, how about we let the anomaly kill us… and not your driving?!

• Maya (Voiceover): We didn’t have time. There were hundreds of thousands of people in that city, and they had no idea they were standing on a sleeping giant.

• Bostwick: Okay! So, what’s the plan?

• Mshak: Even if we get there before, y’know, the big, bad thing gets big and bad, how do we get everyone out? It’s an entire city! We can’t just pull the fire alarm!

• Black-Box: Mshak, there may yet be genius buried inside your mediocre synapsis! While it’s true that there isn’t a fire alarm to pull, there is another type of alarm.

• Maya: The Covenant air raid system!

• Maya (Voiceover): We didn’t need to invent a way to evacuate the colony because the UEG had already done it. During the war, when the Covenant were steamrolling humanity and glassing colony after colony, an evacuation system had been put in place.

• Black-Box: If you can get to the old shuttle port on the outskirts of the city, I can override the colony AI and simulate a Covenant attack. The warning systems would trigger and evacuation procedures would begin immediately. Every available ship would automatically be engaged.

• Maya: Bostwick, look out!

• Maya (Voiceover): She slammed on the breaks just as the Pelican dropship descended right in front of us. The rear bay was wide open and, yet again, I was dealing with the UNSC’s finest.

• Wiley: Step out of the Warthog with your hands on your head!

• Maya: Ughn. I’m so sick of the pricks!

• Bostwick: What do we do now?!

• Black-Box: We could go with them.

• Wiley: Step out of the Warthog!

• Maya: Can we BB? You know just as well as I do what they do with traitors.

• Black-Box: Yes, of course, but, if we just-

• Grey: Incoming!

• Wiley: Evasive action!

• Maya (Voiceover): It happened in an instant. A 65-millimeter Argent V missile flew right over our head and winged the right engine on the Pelican, sending it screaming towards the ground. I looked back and saw Ilsa, towering out of the back of her modified Warthog; puffed up seemingly growing bigger and scarier with every moment. The ODSTs can handle their own, but it didn’t seem like anything could stop Ilsa.

• Wiley: Command! We are pinned down and taking fire!

• Mshak: I’m beginning to think she’s not going to give up…

• Black-Box: How very astute of you, Mshak.

• Maya: We gotta go!

• Maya (Voiceover): Colony AI handled millions of systems and subsystems and was responsible for protecting every human life on the planet. Maybe if Mshak had a week he could hack into something that complicated, but we didn’t have that kind of time.

• Maya: BB, can you handle this? If you disobey ONI you won’t suddenly disappear in a puff of Blue smoke, will you?

• Black-Box: I have significant operation authority. And I don’t see this as disobeying orders. I see this as saving lives via measures roughly compatible with mission objectives.

• Maya (Voiceover): Everywhere I looked gravity was playing tricks. A city bus floating three feet in the air. Water curling up out of a storm drain like a charmed snake. More than once I felt a momentary weightlessness as the Warthog began to leave the ground and then quickly fall back down. We were close to the epicenter of this thing. People were scrambling. I remembered the crater on Conrad’s Point. A vast and lifeless hole. It was just a matter of time before that’s what this place would become

• Maya: There. Up ahead.

• Maya (Voiceover): Bostwick pulled the Warthog into the old shuttle port, past rows of civilian ships. I looked up and saw and old control tower with a massive radio dish looming overhead. That’s when everything started shaking. I lost my balance and fell backwards just in time to see the earth pitch sideways, split open, and swallow several transport ships whole.

• Maya: We have to get the message out now. BB, can you hack us into the local system?

• Black-Box: Yes, but not from here.

• Maya: What? We’re at the tower we can just-

• Black-Box: The control tower at the shuttle port only broadcasts radio waves to satellites above.

• Maya: What?!

• Black-Box: It transmits no signal locally.

• Bostwick: Then why are we at the shuttle port?!

• Black-Box: Because we are leaving.

• Maya: What?! No, not yet. Where's the local address system?

• Black-Box: It doesn’t matter. I reviewed the local seismic data, Maya. I’m sorry.

• Maya: You lied to me!

• Black-Box: We’re too late.

• Maya: You lied to me! And now all those people are just going to- Agh!

• Maya (Voiceover): The city was tearing itself apart. Asphalt cracked and spiked in ragged chunks. People were scattering. Some clawed and fought each other to get to safer ground. Other just looked… shell-shocked. And then, the fight spilled into the city.

The UNSC had taken tactical positions along the streets. But they weren't shooting at us. The NCA were there in force and pushed back harder. Ilsa Zane charged one of the ODSTs, slamming into him like a battering ram.

• Ilsa Zane: GET UP!

• Maya (Voiceover): The NCA had them pinned down and Ilsa was killing everyone in sight. We were trapped.

• Bostwick: Come on! We can fight our way through!

• Maya: No. There’s no time. This place is coming down.

• Bostwick: There’ just gonna cover it up! All those people are going to have died in vain. ONI’s just going to erase it all like it was nothing.

• Mshak: We need to get on the ship, we don’t have time for this!

• Maya (Voiceover): But Bostwick was right. Everything we’d been through, everything we’d seen. It was going to be like none of it had ever happened. The city in front of me was… was about to become the galaxy’s latest unmarked grave. I tried to move. My feet wouldn’t listen. They were rooted to the spot. It was like my body realized it before my mind did.

• Mshak: Maya, we have-

• Maya: I have to stay.

• Maya (Voiceover): Everyone turned to look at me. They must have thought I was crazy, but I felt calm for the first time in a long time.

• Maya: If we leave now, the truth dies on this planet. So I don’t let it die. I’m gonna broadcast it out, show everyone in all the other colonies exactly what happened here. Make it so crystal clear that they can’t ignore it.

• Black-Box: Maya, you suddenly sound a lot like Benjamin Giraud. I hope you remember what happened to him.

• Maya (Voiceover): I’d stabbed Ben in the back. But if I hadn’t, if his message had actually gotten out there… Suddenly it all seemed so simple. I had to tell the truth—full stop—and let everyone else sort it out.

• Black-Box: What do you hope to accomplish? Panic? Terror? A civilization ripping itself apart? People killing each other in the streets? The Office of Naval Intelligence is not the thoughtless behemoth you believe it is. There are delicate calculations being made. Distasteful calculations, yes, but rational, logical calculations in the service of the greater good. If this news spreads, you’re condemning a dozen more worlds to chaos. Whatever these anomalies are, how will the UNSC face such a massive threat if all of its systems are paralyzed with infighting and fear?

• Maya: Well, maybe it’s time people got to make those calculations for themselves.

• Black-Box: Your broadcast won’t reach anyone. When the anomaly hits, the entire planet will be cut off. Just like Conrad’s Point.

• Maya: Exactly.

• Maya (Voiceover): On Conrad’s Point, the anomalies had blacked out all modern communication. But Ari had been able to go low tech. Use old fashioned radio waves to cut through.

• Maya: I can use the old control tower. Bostwick, Mshak, you need to take the ship. Get it into orbit high enough that you’ll be safe, but low enough that you can hear my broadcast and relay to the other colonies.

• Mshak: Maya, that’s suicide. You'll die down here!

• Bostwick: Well, she won’t be alone.

• Maya: Bostwick, no. I don’t need you to-

• Bostwick: Oh, just shut up! We’re doing this together.

• Mshak: I don’t believe it.

• Bostwick: This is my choice.

• Mshak: You will never make it out. We’re still too close to the epicenter! This whole place will be destroyed.

• Maya: Then I guess you better get going, Mshak.

• Black-Box: I don’t imagine I’m being given the option to get on the ship myself?

• Maya: What, you don’t want to come?

• Black-Box: To the epicenter of planet-wide physical and electromagnetic devastation? Where else would I rather be?

• Maya (Voiceover): The ship’s engines came to life. Mshak turned to me, frustrated. But then-

• Mshak: Hey, Maya? Y’know. Of all the people who’ve tried to kill me recently, you were the nicest.

• Maya (Voiceover): Mshak took off as fast as possible, while Bostwick and I hauled ass up the old control tower. The ground was shaking again. I didn’t know how much time we’d have.

• Black-Box: Maya, you realize you’re sacrificing yourself for nothing. ONI will find the broadcast. They’ll block it, discredit it. In the end, no one will believe you.

• Bostwick: That’s why you have to make them believe you. Make them feel like they’re really here. Seeing everything you’re seeing. If FERO tells them what they need to hear, they’ll listen.

• Maya (Voiceover): We took the winding tower steps two at a time and emerged in the glassed-walled control booth. The old gear was still running. I looked out the window one last time with the city in ruins. I put the microphone to my lips.

• Maya: Um, hello. You… you may not know my voice. Um… In the past I’ve always hidden it. Distorted it or let someone else speak for me. Braver people than me, people like Benjamin Giraud. My name is FERO. Or at least that’s how most of you know me. I’m standing in a control tower on the planet Laika III, just outside the city of New Headmark. The disaster, the event… whatever you want to call what’s happening. It is not the first and it won’t be the last. They- they start with gravitational disturbances. Small at first…

• Maya (Voiceover): As I gazed out over the city, all the destruction and death, I caught a glimpse of the battle raging in the streets. It was the UNSC fighting Ilsa’s NCA. As thousands died around them, these two groups weren’t there to save anyone. They were here to destroy each other. I’d been drowning in their war for far too long. Neve