[b]AURORA
Within the Vault[/b]

Mak'shaL stared coldly at the walls of the tunnel in which the elevator descended. He seemed to have spaced out during the descent. Nyugen opened a secure comms with his squad leaders and sent a short encrypted message. "Be careful. Watch the others." It wasn't much, but he didn't want to risk the Gensathi decoding their message. He waited for a few seconds, but they didn't move. That either meant they didn't decrypt the message, or they simply didn't want to act without command. He slowly shifted closer towards the middle of the group, hoping that he could organize a breakout attempt better if things go sour.

And they went sour fast. A few minutes into the descent, they psychich force seemed to have all but left their bodies and the troops were starting to regain their vigor. The covenant troops seized this oppurtinity to try and break out. Despite being locked in a close space with little space for their unwieldy weapons to be properly used, the manaics still decided to face the Hirule. Nyugen shouted into the intercooms as he readied his pistol: the only weapon he could use in such a crowd. "Phalanx formation!" The Vixar began to power up their shields and line up, but they had little time to properly organized themselves. As the first of the Jiralhanae began their assault, the Genshati on the outside of the circle opened fire indiscriminately. At the same time, Mak'shaL pulled out two iconic batons from under his robes and unleashed a flurry of attacks at anyone near them. "Hit the dirt!"

With the Hirule and the Genshti shooting at the others in the elevator from both sides, there was little chance to survive. However, both Misa and the captives were kept safely behind the Genshati lines, their safety ensured by the captors. When the Genshati stopped firing, most of both forces lied dead on the floor. Nyugen and about two dozen Vixar still drew breath, crouching with their heads down amongst their dead allies. Nyugen didn't see the covenant forces, but he was sure they took heavy casualties as well.

He could only sense the elevator slowing down, as it amde it's final descent into the Gashathi Sancturay. Light flooded the shaft as the elevator descended into the middle of a grand hall dressed in white, supported by 30 meter tall columns decorated with ancient motives. The room was extremely big, from one end to the other about 200 meters long. The walls were lined with machinery and cryo-pods containing the servitor races. Mak'shaL stepped off the elevator, and gestured for the survovrs to follow. "I must see to final preparations. If you imbeciles have learnt anything from the death of your comrades, you won't try anything stupid until I come back." He headed off towards a massive gilded ddor in the distance, and the Gensathi escorted the rest of the group off the elevator for safekeeping.

[hr]
DESTINY ASCENDANT
Main Hangar

Kindal could not beleive how stubborn this alien was. But so be it. If this "Covenant" wanted to do this the hard way, then Kindal will give them the fight of their life. The Overseer wished to talk to Muriel, but she had already left to make plans for the future. Kindal turned towards the Kyrians and bowed deeply. "Despite this meeting's failure to achiev progress, I hope that we can develop friendly relations in the future. The Gashathi are ALWAYS looking for allies." 

Once Kindal was inside the cockpit of the Corvette he could finally relax his muscles. He seated himself in the central chair and took of hiss mask to remove his breathin and translator gear. He took a deep breath from the air before adressing the pilot. "Are we ready to go?" The pilot signaled with his thumbs up, and the ship shook for a second as the magnetic docking clamps disengaged. Kindal didn't hear what the pilot was saying, but he was sure that he was consulting with flight control. Soon enough the ship finally began to move and left the hangar. They didn't go too far from the ship when the familiar sound of the SDD began to echo through the small ship. The warning lights truned on, and Kindal made sure to tighten his safety belts.

The transition from point A to B was seamless. One second he was looking at the strange alien architecture of the [i]Destiny[/i] and the other second he was enjoying the sight of the familar curves that made up the [i]Gem[/i]. The Corvette stopped moving as it spooled it's engines. Kindal quickly sent a point-to-point message to the [i]Gem[/i] as he was waiting for their arrival at the home base. "We're switching to plan B. Initiate phase 1 of Operation "Fallen God"."