Chapter 3: We Deliver

Chapter 3: We Deliver is the third chapter of Halo Infinite: Memory Agent.

Transcript
''Note: For the sake of the transcript. "The Lieutenant" is referred to as their actual name "Parisa".''


 * Narrator: "Halo Infinite: Memory Agent, part 3."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Oliver, there are no records of me at all in the UNSC Archives?"


 * Oliver: "Affirmative, Lieutenant."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Access my personnel file."


 * Oliver: "I'm sorry, Lieutenant. None exist for me to access. I simply have your registry identifying you as 'Lieutenant'.""


 * Lieutenant Parisa (Internal monologue): "I'm a ghost… No, worse. I'm a suitcase. Naval Intelligence fills me with coded intel, ships me off only to have me do it all over again. If I survive. Maybe I'm being punished for something. Did I commit a crime and my sentence is a life of espionage? No… That doesn't feel right. The Master Chief brought something amazing out of that civilian in New Mombasa. If he's so great, maybe he'll shed some light on me. Maybe he can-"

Digital beeps.


 * Oliver: "The aft shift inducer has begin venting trihydridehexazine."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Is this a critical failure?"


 * Oliver: "This is a traceable chemical compound, which could make us more likely to be discovered by enemy scanners. Additionally, the aft control configuration appears to have become laden in ice in the absence of this anti-freezing chemical. Can you provide a visual inspection?"


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "I'll take a look."

Footsteps, then a door hisses open.


 * Oliver: "Do you see it?"


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Yeah, and I can feel it, too. There's a couple of centimeters of frost covering the aft control… thing. What are you gonna do about it?"


 * Oliver: "Given my lack of appendages…"


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Okay, what am I supposed to do?"


 * Oliver: "You must eliminate the frozen material. There is a specialized tool next to the console."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "It's a screwdriver."


 * Oliver: "Yes."


 * Lieutenant Parisa (Internal monologue): "State-of-the-art. Funny. The sharp edge on the business end of this thing is all worn down. Heh. I wonder how many times I've had to do this before."

Scraping against the ice.


 * Lieutenant Parisa (Internal monologue): "Stabbing this ice feels… good! I have definitely done this before. Maybe not just with ice either. Whoa, I don't want to think about that. Focus on the mission."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Oliver, play another archival recording. Someone in uniform who served alongside the Master Chief."


 * Oliver: "Accessing the UNSC Archives. Playing a mission report from Captain Carol Rawley, call sign 'Foehammer'. From the battle of Installation zero-four, dated September 20th, 2552."


 * Carol Rawley : "Whoo, I just flew the strangest mission of my life, so bear with me. This after-action report is going to be a little punchy. This is Echo four-nineteen, on a sortie from the Pillar of Autumn crash site. It all started when we made a blind slipspace jump from Reach. We were following Cole Protocol but the Covenant was right behind us. We ended up in this place, this ring. Since then, I've been scouting for survivors, providing air support, and keeping the Master Chief supplied with all the best goodies the UNSC has to offer. You know our motto: We Deliver! I wasn't sure what to make of him at first. I'd heard the talk about those Spartans, kept on ice most of the time, kept to themselves the rest, but as soon as we made contact with the enemy, and I saw him in action, what can I say? I was a fan! Best fighter I'd ever laid my eyes on. But let me tell you: he's a whole lot more than that. He needed a lift to the control room of this ring, and that AI of his, Cortana, had the bright idea of the brilliant idea of performing an aerial insertion from underground. Flying the Chief in through tunnels, underneath the surface. Look, I'm the best pilot in the fleet, and I can open a bottle of beer with my wingtip in a hurricane, but my gut was telling me it was better to risk the anti-air fire and go over the surface. I'm still the ranking officer and I sure as hell don't take orders from some damn AI, so it was my call. That's when the Chief came out of his shell. He hasn't been too keen on talking, but it turns out he's hiding a silver tongue underneath that golden visor of his. When it came time to do the mission their way, he played me as easily as he could field-strip an assault rifle. Ha! I mean, he pushed my buttons, told me it was probably better taking the exterior route because maybe I wasn't up to the task of navigating those tunnels. Ha! Which really pissed me off! So I said, hm, I'd show them. Once we were in the tunnels, he practically held my hand and made me feel like I could fly this Pelican through the eye of a needle. Next thing I knew, I was dropping them off to make some Grunts wish they'd never left whatever godforsaken rock they came from. You know, at first I wasn't sure how human the Chief was under all that... machinery, but he sure knew what take this human tick, and it takes one to know one. I'm going to resupply at the Autumn and will reconvene with the Chief again shortly. But log this mission a success. Foehammer out."

Digital click.


 * Lieutenant Parisa (Internal monologue): "Oh-ho, she is my kind of pilot."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Hey, locate and play the next log from Captain Rawley. I can't wait to hear what else she got mixed up in-"


 * Oliver: "Carol Rawley was killed in action on Installation zero-four, September 22nd, 2552."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Oh… Two days… Huh, that's all she lasted after that. How did she just seem so… alive?"


 * Oliver: "You have cleared a sufficient amount of ice from the console."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Great."


 * Lieutenant Parisa (Internal monologue): "There were 6481 first-person accounts on the Master Chief. I wonder how many of them are still living."

Footsteps, a door hisses open.


 * Lieutenant Parisa (Internal monologue): "I mean, even with all the times the Chief pulled someone from the fire, war catches up with everyone. Eventually, the odds don't work in your favor."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Oliver, update on our survival statistics now that we vented an invitation to the enemy."


 * Oliver: "We now have a 44% chance of capture, 36% chance of fatality."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Hey, how high have those stats ever gone in our past missions together?"


 * Oliver: "The average Naval Intelligence field operative have a varying success and survival rate. A typical statistical regression-"


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Cut the double-speak, I want to know about my missions. How perilous is this life of mine?"


 * Oliver: "Past missions are classified."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Even for someone who is there and can't quite remember them?"


 * Oliver: "Especially for someone like that. Take solace. You are here. You survived despite the odds."

Alarm.


 * Oliver: "Proximity sensors activated."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Now what?"


 * Oliver: "A Phaeton squadron has spotted us and has plotted an intercept course."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "A what? What's a-"


 * Oliver: "Enemy ships inbound."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Brevity appreciated. Can we outrun them or outmaneuver them?"


 * Oliver: "Negative on both."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Okay, what else is in this sector?"


 * Oliver: "The nearest astronomical object known is a gas giant planet less than point-zero-zero-six AU from this location."


 * Lieutenant Parisa (Internal monologue): "Gas giant. I can use this, I just have to channel my inner Foehammer."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Oliver, get ready to update those probabilities. I want you to steer us right toward that planet."


 * Oliver: "On what trajectory, Lieutenant?"


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "A collision course. Once we're caught in its gravitational pull, fire a single thruster to set into a controlled spin. Then shut down all systems, including life support. And yourself."


 * Oliver: "There are significant risks associated with this plan."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "But if that squadron thinks that we're uninhabited space junk on our way to burning up in its atmosphere, it might just lose interest in us. Doesn't that improve our chances?"


 * Oliver: "Of evading capture, yes, significantly. On evading death, it does not."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "And capture is the worst kind of failure. Correct?"


 * Oliver: "That is correct."

Digital beeps.


 * Oliver: "Course set. You will have to manually restart the engines and ship systems or risk actually burning up in the atmosphere of the planet. By my calculations, based on the gas giant's gravity well, this shuttle should be able to fall for the duration of 47 rotations before it is pull too low to recover."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "47. Copy."

Digital beeps.


 * Oliver: "The Phaeton squadron is about to come into visual range."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Alright. Put us into the spin and cut the engines."

Heavy muffled sound, then the whining of reactors winding down.


 * Oliver: "Controlled dive initiated. I recommend you shut down all of the systems now."


 * Lieutenant Parisa: "Shutting down!"


 * Oliver: "Oh, and Lieutenant? Good luck."

Statics and clattering of the ship's hull, gradually replaced by bird singing and children's laughs, suddenly interrupted.


 * Lieutenant Parisa (Internal monologue): "Huh? Oh my God! Was that… a memory?"