We Came, We Saw, We Conqured

Charon Industries

A few days later I was walking around what I had been told was Armonia. I wandered my way into the training center and sat watching Tucker, Simmons, Grif, and Caboose training their lieutenants. They were getting help from Ryan and Rae.

Epsilon popped up next to me to say something but flashed green.

"What was that?" I questioned.

"That was the end of a very long and very annoying decryption process."

"Ye've got the manifest?"

"Fuck yeah I got the manifest. I am processing it right now."

I pulled out my datapad, so he could show me what he found.

"Well, not the most dramatic revelation, but I believe we have our culprit."

"Who is it?" I asked.

"Charon Industries. Big umbrella company that got a hand in every major market you can think of. Even messed with cryogenics a few years back, but it looks like their largest profit comes from weapons and technology they own most of the stuff of the ship."

"Sounds familiar."

"Yeah, Project Freelancer stole some assets from them once or twice, and managed to destroy quite a bit of private property in the process."

"Ye mean the Resistance? I thought they were a UNSC splinter group?"

"The soldiers were all UNSC. But according to my records, they've been hired on to act as Charon's private security force."

"Is that legal?"

"Tch. I doubt it. Looks like Charon and the military started getting really buddy-buddy around the time that...oh."

"Epsilon?"

"Where's Dr. Grey?"

"Huh?"

"The lunatic, what's she doing?"

"She's...treating the space pirates the guys captured."

"Perfect. Tell her I want them to give me all known radio frequencies used by the mercenaries."

"Why?"

"I need to make a call."

I eyed him for a moment before getting up and running to find Grey. Once I found her, I explained what Epsilon wanted. She was more than happy to get them for me. Once I had the frequencies, I went and found the guys to explain it all to them. A few hours later we had a nice little letter written up.

"Colorful Space Marines Stop Corruption," Epsilon told Control, "You know, I really love the picture they used for this thing but I gotta say I like the description even more. Pictured above, the Red and Blue troopers of Project Freelancer receive a full pardon from UNSC Oversight Chairman and Charon Industries CEO, Malcom Hargrove. I can't imagine you liked that second bit very much though, probably not very good for business. Am I right, Chairman?"

Hargrove scoffed, "On the contrary, you'd be surprised as to what can come of a merger between politics and corporations. If you're here to negotiate a surrender, I'm afraid I must inform you that your ship has set sail. Quite literally in fact."

"Actually," I said, "we were just hoping to read ye a letter."

"It's just a little something we put together for ya," Wash said, "Considering we'll probably be seeing a lot of each other over the next few weeks."

"Take it away Church," I stated.

"Dear Chairman," Epsilon read, "It has come to our attention that you have declared war on the planet Chorus. We regret to inform you that this is a really shitty idea. Not only have you managed to annoy the people that you failed to kill, time and time again, you've also found a way to piss off an entire planet. Now they may have the best equipment and they might not be the best fighters, but as you're aware, they've been fighting for a very long time. And now that they're not fighting each other, they're more than happy to dedicate all of their time to fighting you. So, dear Chairman, to you and your idiotic mercenaries, we would like to say: bring it on, motherfuckers! We're not going anywhere. From your friends, the incredibly badass and sexually attractive, Red and Blue soldiers of Project Freelancer. P.S.; suck our balls."