2207 hours

5008

location: classified
Ace quickly dashed across the battlefield, his powered armor sending out a clear indicator that woud alert the enemy if he didn't move faster.
well actually it would no matter how fast he ran, but the farther he was away from the people chasing him, the better.
The terrain was a dark and wet forest, a rain forest to be exact, and Ace had to constantly move to avoid getting hit on the head by a branch or to avoid ramming into a tree.
Behind him Ace could hear the wet stomping of boots on ground as the terrorist soldiers followed him, Ace was faster by quite a bit but they were many, and he was slowly running out of breath and he knew he couldn't make it much farther.
His target was an artillery cannon, a standing artillery cannon to be more exact.
Unlike the normal artillery cannon, a standing artillery cannon, couldn't be moved, so it was only used on bases and large ships, but even with this weakness they were still very very important, important enough to send a army SEAL? definitely.
It wasn't really the cannon itself that was important it was its rounds, there were several different artillery round, explosive, toxic, ranged, ect, and each one was capable of taking down an entire ship, or at least put a major hole in it.
As Ace ducked underneath a branch. nearly falling on his helmet, there was a short burst of gunfire and he winced as he realized just how close they were and he put on another burst of speed, desperate to stay ahead.
a couple moments later, he was greeted by the sight of the artillery cannon in the center of a clearing.
Keeping such a important tool out in the open may have seen stupid, but it was much harder to get the right data to get a clean shot without being able to see, and possibly having a tree block the navigation scanner.
And just in the nick of time for Ace, another minute or two and he would have been to tired to continue running.
But he didn't stop running either, he continued charging towards the artillery cannon, climbing up onto its seat and beginning to type on the tablet like surface in front of the seat.
As he did, the dome shaped artillery cannon turned slowly, the seat, which was connected to the dome. turning with it.
After turning about 36 degrees, the cannon stopped, jerking a little, and Ace pressed a button on the pad.
Just as he did this, several of the terrorist soldiers came out of the forest, the rifles and carbines held at the ready.
With one hand Ace pulled out one of his two mr-95's, fully automatic pistol from his holster, and fired at the soldiers, trying to buy himself some more time to complete his mission.
As he did this the dome opened a little, as if it was a round cake and someone had just taken out a slice, and spouted a large pole like thing, it looked a lot like a tank cannon, or a artillery arm.
Several bullets pinged off Aces powered SEAL armor, his energy shield holding for the moment, but it couldn't take to many before running out of power or overheating.
Ace followed where the pole was pointing, straight at a terrorist cruiser, one of the reasons he had gone after the artillery cannon first.
Even as his armors shield batteries showed critical he pressed the large green button on the bottom left corner.
And was nearly thrown off as the artillery cannon fired its deadly shell, moving the entire platform slightly before settling back into its original position.
Ace didn't wait to see the damage, he instead hopped off the seat and began to dash towards the forest again.
But was stopped by several terrorist with fully automatic rifles.
Even as Ace raised his hands to surrender they open fired, riddling him with holes.
Ace fell, and his helmets visor showed a bright red.
"TEST FAILED"
There was a small "klick" and a hiss as Ace stood up from his seat, the visor off his head.
Infront of him was calviar dune, Aces uncle, holding a clipboard and a pencil.
Dune could have always used a battlemarker, a floating white and blue ball, that could record fights and grade them accordingly, but Dune considered them stupid, and he really didn't change his mind about things.
Before Ace could get a word out Dune said "B+"
"Excuse me?" asked Ace, thrown for a second.
"your grade, B+" repeated Dune, tapping on the clipboard with his pencil.
"Are you sure" says Ace jokingly "im pretty sure that was at least worth a A"
Dune squinted, not amused in the slightest, and continued talking.
"Your grade is currently at A- and all SEALs have to have a A or above grade"
Ace knew what it meant before Dune had even said it, His original grade had been a A of course but somewhere along his career it had fallen, just enough to where he wasn't SEAL material, stupid military standards.
"The only thing that's keeping you from a C+" continued dune "is your squad leading skills, knife skills, and scouting skills, exceptionally good but now good enough"
Ace nodded, he was officially a SEAL scout, there were several SEAL mini classes and Aces running was above average so, of course, he was a scout, which meant he was always the first to go with no backup and he was the recon, not the best position to be in during a fight.
"But I guess I ought to let you off the hook, considering tomorrow" said dune, sighing, and Ace noticed he seemed a little sad.
"Is something wrong?" asked Ace carefully, curious.
"No no, nothing wrong, you'll know in the morning, Paris is waiting for you anyway in the break room.
Ace blinked in surprise, usually Paris just told him these sort of things directly, not telling others or sending a message, maybe it was important.
"Ok, but im here if you need to talk" says Ace before passing Dune and walking out the door.
As he navigated the halls to get to the breakroom, the SEAL facility was very confusing and hard to remember where to go, the break room especially, some joked that it was Dunes way of saying "go back now"
A couple minutes later however, Ace found the breakroom and saw Paris sitting on a clear water seat bag, which looked uncomfortable but was actually quite nice to ay back in and let the water cool you down.
In Paris's hand was a bottle of elixir, a purple none alcoholic drinks, which was odd since she usually drank hot wine whenever she didn't drink water.
Paris gave him a slight wave and Ace smiled replying with a small "hi" before going to the small ice box to grab himself a drink.
As he was rummaging through the ice to find something he liked Paris asked from behind him "so, have you improved you rank yet or....?"
Ace frowned sourly, and Paris probably knew that, she was excellent at reading body language.
"oh" said Paris, a lot less Cheerily "I mean, at least you haven't gone down to C rank yet"
Ace nodded but that didn't exactly cheer him up, C rank was a automatic expulsion and he would probably be put down as the average navy trooper, maybe even put in a army garrison.
"Its still not great" says Ace, frowning, picking out a soda and twisting off the cap before sitting on the water seat next to Paris, taking a sip from his drink as he pondered how exactly he was going to go back up in rank, before looking at Paris.

"You wanted me for something?" asked Ace, remembering why he was here.

"Oh, right, I wanted to tell you something" replied paris, setting her drink down to the side of her seat, and Ace raised a eyebrow, officially curious.

"So, have you watched the news recently?" she asked, clasping her hands together before looking at Ace.

Ace shook his head no, he wasn't really interested in the news considering that it was so confusing and about a quarter of the time there were people arguing about politics and such, so he instead watched comedy, drama, and such, during the few times he had the chance.

"Alright so, you remember the last Olympus class project?"

To this ace nodded, project Hera, the last Olympus project, had been basically an attempt at creating cyborg super soldiers, who would have been basically one man armies, it hadn't worked, half of the attendants we're killed during the implants of the cybernetics, and the other half just couldn't function well enough, several of the rest had been brutally scarred by the implants and incapable of battle, and the survivors couldn't adjust well enough to be effective fighters for the money that went into them.

There had been talk of dismissing all Olympus class projects, but the high council shut it down, they weren't going to put themselves in that kind of corner, but why was Paris bringing it up. unless.

"So, Nero veers, the council member for the space command, is.... well I'm going to let you guess"

"Creating another Olympus project" said Ace, not hesitating.

"Bingo, he just officially announced it two days ago, I learned about it two hours ago though, but he said he's been recruiting for the past two months and he's nearly done"

'ironic' thought Ace, 'a lot of two's in that sentence.'

"What type of enhancements is he giving now?" Asked Ace, now fully invested in the story Paris was telling.

"None" said Paris, grinning slightly as she looked at Ace's face her Blue eyes digging into Aces own green ones.

Ace spluttered, surprised "None?" he asked loudly, that couldn't be right.

"None, what he is doing though, is taking some of the best of the best, and putting them into squads, no enhancements given, except for those who already had them"

Ace fell silent, contemplating this.

"So.... that's all I wanted to tell you, anything on your mind?" asked Paris, now picking up her drink and taking another sip.

Ace blinked, at first not realizing that she had said something, before straightening and shaking his head "no, i'm good"

"Well then, its about time for lights out so, how about we go back together?" asked paris, standing up and marking the soda by squeezing her hand hard against a button on it and reinserting it back into the ice box.

"Sure" said Ace, doing the same for his drink after standing up before they both left together.

The male bunks were slightly closer to the break room then the female bunk, which meant Ace had to breakaway from Paris as he stood in the doorway to the male bunkroom.

"Whelp, see you in the morning" said Paris before lightly kissing his on the left cheek.

There was a chorus of "oohs" from the other SEAL's who could see them and Ace had to resist the urge to pull one of his knives out and throwing it at them.

"Go back to your room" said Ace glaring slightly at Paris, she insisted on doing this whenever she was saying goodbye to him and anybody else was around, even though there were no romantic feelings towards each other of course, that would have resulted in more oohs and more "get a room, or better yet, a ring" remarks.

"Buh bye" said Paris before ducking as Ace tried to cuff her on the ears, before dashing to the girls bunk room and ducking inside.

Ace rolled his eyes light heartedly, before walking inside, having to deal with the common banter about him and Paris from the other SEAL's before getting on his bunk bed, looking up at the bunk above him.

There were several scratched from Ace using his knife to carve the lightfoil, the dark incredibly light, incredibly strong, material.

Even as Ace looked at what he made he pulled out one of his knives from his knife holster on the side of his leg, and spinning it around in his hand, something he enjoyed doing when he had nothing to do.

After a while Ace stopped toying with his knife and put his knife back in its holster, pulling the cover over himself beforelaying on his side, and after a while of having his eyes closed, falling asleep

...

0120 hours

location: classified

Ace sighed as the bell rang very loudly and very annoyingly, waking him and several others up. unfortunately that included Dile, the person above him whos foot slammed down very hard on the back of his skull.

Ace. who had just begun to get out of bed and had begun to yawn, had his jaw slammed back together by a foot, sure it had on a sock, but that doesn't make it any softer when your jaw clamps shut.

Ace winced as his teeth connected, worried that he had chipped one of his teeth, but relaxed slightly when the pain turned temporary.

"Sorry bout that" said Dile in his deep slow voice, shuffling sideways before jumping down to the ground, letting out the slightest of exhales on the landing, barely audible.

"Yeah, no problem" said Ace, squinting at Dile, trying to restrain himself from slugging Dile squarely on the jaw. he barely was.

Two moments later, Ace was out of his bunk, his boots on as he followed the others to the briefing room, where dune was probably, impatiently, waiting.

Again they had to guide themselves through the halls, though it was quite easy since they did it every morning, at the same time, and stuff imprints on your memory after several years of doing the same thing over and over again nearly ever day a year, except for when they were gone on missions.

Barely a minute had gone by when they reach the briefing room, where dune was. he was for once not tapping his foot, he didn't have his clipboard either, which was odd.

Ace began to connect the dots, dune had said something along the lines of "considering whats going on tomorrow" and now he was without his clipboard, and looked slightly depressed, it was a very small puzzle but a puzzle none the less.

Dune watched as they formed a line, his eyes dark and gloomy behind his sunglasses and his mouth contorted into a thin frown below his mustache.

"What happened that got you down?" asked Paris to Dune, her arms behind her back in her, typical, standing fashion.

Dune grumbled something before saying more loudly, and indefinitely more clearly, words Ace was not expecting to hear.

"As you all know the SEAL's have had problems with the government recently, being that they deemed us obsolete compared to other sub-corps"

Ace gritted his teeth, hoping what he thought was wrong wasn't actually happening, had they actually been shut down?

"But luckily for us, Grand admiral feral has decided to keep the SEAL project going under his fleet. with some minor changes, as we switch over to the space command."

Ace relaxed slightly. so they weren't being shut down, just taken under a new wing, what was happening was actually great, sure being in the navy was nice but. everyone knew that the fun was with the space command, though the marines were in action even more.

"But with this changes, there is also going to be a change to this group of SEAL's as well. ones that will not end up with all of you serving with the SEAL's any longer."

Again Ace stiffened, his posture was becoming as changing as the wind at the moment. couldn't they just stick with the good news? but then again, that's not how the military works. completely good news was as rare as diamonds.

"About seventy percent of you are going to be joining different sub-corps, all of you shall serve aboard one of five ships under grand admiral Feral's fleet, including two light cruisers and a dreadnaught, your pays shall be the same or improved and you all shall from then on take orders from the captain of said ship."

Dune began to say the names of Ace's fellow seals. at first he thought dune had remembered there new assignments, but then noticed the white lines scrolling down his glasses and realized he was reading them telling as he told them there assigned ship and new job.

Ace mind was racing, what if he had to switch jobs? what if he stayed with the SEALs? would Paris switch? what would happen to dune?

Even as he was thinking Dune said to Paris "rose corps, the queen of hope."

Ace nodded, Paris would be good in the rose corps, she could read body language well and wasn't afraid to inflict pain on others, which was basically the rose corps job.

"Ace...." started dune before trailing off.

Ace returned focus to him, and cocked his head. it hadn't been his name that had dragged back his attention but the pause after it. dune didn't stutter.

"Is there a problem. sir?" asked Ace, remembering to add the sir in just barely intime to avoid reprimand.

"Ace.. your going to be on the bloody mary, serving as scout for.... project Demeter." replied Dune in disbelief.

Ace was stunned for a second, 'no that couldn't be right, he couldn't be a part of a Olympus class project.'

"dang" muttered Paris "project Demeter"

"Are you sure that's what it says sir?" asks Ace carefully, not fully believing it

Suddenly Dunes face and body stance turned sour "Im not making stuff up, what did you think I mean object demigod?"

Ace recoiled slightly "no sir, sorry sir."

Dune nodded "good. the ships are within orbit, they've already sent down transports, to the launch bay ,double time."

Whatever the others had been thinking was instantly abandoned as they began to jog towards the launch bay, four steps a second, after all that's what double time means when your a SEAL.

Even as they jogged Ace's mind was completely abandoned of where they were going, instead his feet just followed the familiar trail as he lost himself in his own thoughts.

"Scout for project Demeter" thought Ace, as if he still couldn't believe it, how could anyone even think to hire a SEAL who was in fact, Failing his own classes, surely they had higher standards, surely-

Unless of course politics had its place in it.

"mother" muttered Ace, scowling darkly. she had probably gotten him into this through her political power, and now Ace was going to suffer being inadequate compared to the other. which meant he was going to be the one they had to save darn it.

"Something on your mind" asked Paris, falling into place next to him "actually that could be anything, anything bad on your mind?"

"My mother probably got me into this mess" muttered Ace darkly, how could she do that to him?

"Well that's a good thing. isn't it?" asked Paris.

"No its not" said Ace, glancing at her. "all of the other members will have gotten in by skill, I will have gotten in through politics"

Paris nodded, hopping on his train of thoughts "and that will make you less respected and everyone hate you."

"Right" replied Ace, nodding shortly even as they turn left down another hallway.

"Well don't worry, even if you didn't get in thanks to skill, your still pretty darn good, especially with knives"

"I guess your right" muttered Ace grumpily, Paris was right, but was he seriously that good of a scout, to where they would pick him out of tens of billions of soldiers to be a scout?

They continued the jog in silence, Ace silently grumbling, and Paris silently dancing in her mind. she got the best job she could ask for besides being a SEAL.

As they reached the launch bay, there were five different troop transports already docked.

The design of the standard Pangean troop transport as similar to a tadpole. a large green and black body for carrying the troops with a lock slender tail, used to be clamped onto on a ship so that the transport didn't roll away or 'go punch mars'.

As soon as Ace saw the end of the tadpole his brain flashed back to the day in college when his military professor had told them all the term, and of course, Ace's brain began going over the lecture

"The term 'go punch mars' had been created when humanity had first began to colonize other planets, even though Mars was the second planet to be colonized, it had been the first one where a serious wreck had occurred."

"Apparently some tired deck man, one of the people who make the ship turn smoothly, make sure the airs ok, report status, ect. had fallen asleep and his nose had punch the release button on a landing rocket. which had luckily, already finished its testing so no one was onboard. and the release also included a gently punch from a metal square that pushed the rocket out of the bay and onward to mars."

"The planet hadn't been fully terraformed yet and the rocket began hurtling down towards mars storm eye."

"The next day, after everyone had fully awakened, it was found that the rocket was not where it was suppose to be and was indeed. a wreck on mars."

That was several billion dollars down the drain, but apparently one person found humor in it and remarks.

"Well, at least it went out punching it in the eye"

And that's how the term was coined, all thanks to one sleepy deck man.

'Yes, that's info dumping, but when you info dumb, you info dumped hard' thought Ace, remembering when he had first been taught the term and its history in class.

Each transport had its name in big bold white letters, and the name of its ship in smaller, orange colors.

The one on the left to the middle on, had the words bloody Mary beneath the ships name (whatever it was wasn't important enough to grab Ace's attention)

Ace looked at Paris who was looking at him.

"so" says Ace

"Oh come on Ace, you couldn't think of anything to say other then 'so' during the entire like. two minute walk" says Paris raising a eyebrow

Ace shrugged, he usually didn't plan talking ahead "I guess we'll be going to different ships now."

Paris smiled "guess so, well. it was probably inevitable, but hey, we still have each others number, call me sometimes"

In stead of saying the normal sure, Ace folded his arms and raised a eyebrow playfully. "don't you mean you call me?"

"I meant what I said" replies Paris, mimicking Ace.

Ace rolled his eyes before uncrossing his arms and patting her on the head, he was allowed to do this because he was two inches taller then Paris and if she got to kiss him, he got to pat her on the head.

"Well bye" said Ace, wondering whether he should be the one to leave or paris be the one to leave.

"bye" said paris, who decided her self and walked to her dropship.

Ace stood still for a couple seconds before boarding the bloody Mary's dropship through the now opened door that was jujst behind the pilots seat and just infront of the rows of eight seats that made the ship look almost alike to a Van from inside, even as Ace observed this a couple other SEAL's. five to be exact, boarded, forcing Ace to get into a chair.

Even as ace got himself bolted into the liftoff chair, which was very alike to those chairs the used on theme parks on the more.... dangerous rides. the pilot counted them, nodded, and then took off.

Dropships didn't have there own gravity, which meant that Ace was pushed back into his seat as they flew up at a high angle, pushing through the gravity and wind.

Ace gritted his teeth as if that would help him, thought it actually did distract him so it possibly helped?

Within ten minutes they had exited the planets gravitational pull and Ace sighed as the ride became a lot smoother.

The relief didn't last, a minute later and Ace saw through the clear blue, square shaped viewport. the bloody mary.

Even though it looked small from the distance it definitely was not once you got close to it, or measured it.

It was a mark two dreadnaught, which followed the same design as mark one and mark three dreadnaughts. shaped like the standard piercing round of the military, smooth and somewhat larger at the front before slowly becoming pointer before becoming the deadly tip, while the other end was cut straight and smooth, two kilometers long and a quarter mile tall.

Guarding it were two gk-12 defense frigates, each of the bottle shaped ships were slowly orbiting the Bloody mary, doing the normal defense sensory, like all defense frigates, they had better stealth sensors then most capital ships.

the drop ship approached the belly of the ship larger where the launching bay was, it was inconvenient and you had to be good to get a fighter through it, but the dreadnaught wasn't designed to carry fighters so. why bother making the side entrances of a carrier.

The drop ship slowly pulled under the open bay entrance and slowly rose, its bottom thrusters giving a small burst of flames before pausing and letting the momentum carry them.

But as soon as the top began to enter the bloody Mary, the pilot set the bottom thrusters at seventy percent blast and the ride became a lot more rough.

The dropship did not have gravity, the bloody Mary. did.

it took them a couple seconds but they got aboard safely which was good, many pilots used the term "if you can get up and shoot, your in the clear" a adaptation of the old "any crash you can walk away from is a good one"

As the pilot continued to adjust the dropship to the new gravity he/she also lowered the landing wheels.

Another odd thing about most dropships was that they also have treads like a tank or a strider, which meant that they could land the troops and then ride along side them, providing cover and, since even the average dropship had at least a singular bottom mounted 40mm lance gun. provide extra fire power.

The dropship moved to the left a little so that it wasn't over the by entrance, then they slowly landed.

Ace sighed as the ship touch downed on the phaliq floor.

There was a second of chatter from outside as they cleared everyone out of the way, but the door soon opened and Ace unclipped his liftoff chair, lifted the securer, and got up and out.

Inside everyone was busy, the docking bay was very large but it was large enough to have enough people working n it to make you feel over whelmed.

Navy trooper fireteams and there officer did the average patrol to make sure everything was ok, there black suits and red unclear goggle like visors, along with there grim faces, making them look very ominous and professional.

The one person who stood out to Ace was the female in the white and blue uniform, the white signifying her as amongst the admiral ranks and the blue showing that she was either a beta or alpha admiral, and. considering just how many advancements had been made to the ship. extra drop ship space, holographic banners, and probably more yet to be seen. on her way to being a omega admiral.

What was odd was that she looked young, possibly in her mid thirties. even if she had gone to one of the primary systems grand navy academies, she would only be a lieutenant, which mean she was either quite competent, or more likely, she had strings to pluck.

Even as she handed a square like military pad to another officer, this one in the more common greyish green of a officer below the rank of admiral, she began to walk to the drop ship.

After the uniform the second thing Ace noticed was, well, her skin tone, it wasn't because he was racist but it was just one of the more noticeable things.

Even though humanity had long since left earth they still used the terms of race as they did during there primitive time on earth. and Ace identified her as Mexican. her hair silky, long, and black like a empty night sky.

Her eyes were a piercing dark blue, though hers. unlike Paris's eyes, seemed unnatural, which meant that she probably had her irises layered on. another piece of evidence was the fact that her pupils had a couple gold flakes in them whch shined in the artificial light.

As she walked up to Ace she paused only a foot infront of him. she was the same height as Ace or at least extremely close.

"So, your commander Ace" she ask in a smooth, cultured voice, it had been a statement not a question.

"Yes ma'am" replied Ace, his hands straight on his sides in typical fashion when a commander was present.

"I assume you've recently discovered your, new assignment"

Ace nodded, the way she said 'new' sounded more like she was interrogating him then asking a freindly "get to know you" question.

"Then I guess i best tell you my rank" she stood straighter and her height over him improved to the point where Ace had to lift his head slightly, despite the fact the he was already at his height max.

"I am beta admiral Ara chronos, captain of the Bloody mary, commander of its daughter and son ship the talon of destruction and risen prophecy." a thin smirk appeared on her lips "creator of the three pronged spike"

Ace took a involuntary step back "the. th-three pronged spike?"

The stutter wasn't of fear but out of wonder, the three pronged spike was a move the nearly every commander, whether the one in charge of the ships or the one piloting it, had performed.

The three pronged spike required at least three ships, preferably ones with bombers and fighters, three ships would line up, there AI's getting the ships as close as possibly before gunning the engines into preferably a think enemy defense or attack force.

once the ships got inside the enemy (they usually did considering that even frigate hulls, one of the smallest classed command ships could usually last about twenty minutes under direct fire from one or two other ships) they would break apart with the ships in the line going some direction inside the enemy force, launching fighters, shooting 36cm guns, launching bombs from there bomb chutes, everything to wreck enemy forces while fighters, bombers and attackers, along with the other ships, staying close to the enemy ships so that the enemy couldnt all shoot at them at once without destroying there own which they rarely did.

the lead ship would however usually be the strongest and go for the command ship of the enemy which was usually in the back taking tactical advantage and do its best to destroy it.

the move was genius and nearly unbeatable without taking substantial damage, every teacher taught it, grand admirals applauded it, Ai's called it suicidal yet effective wish was better then anything the high council could give.

The smirk turned into a all out evil-ish grin "so i supposed you've heard of it." the admiral supplied.

Ace gulped and nodded, sweat appearing on his brow "yes, yes i have ma'am"

She nodded and the grin ceased to exist "Good, your new teammates have already proven troublesome, ive got the idea your going to be less of a problem"

Ace nodded, and began to open his mouth to ask what kind of trouble, but was cut of when the admiral said.

"Good, follow me" and she promptly turned around and started down a corridor.

Ace paused for a second, realizing exactly what he was getting into, one of the most elite and honorable jobs you could get, and he was in it, he should be overwhelmed, but instead he found himself wonder.

What exactly had his mother got him into.