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“No, ma’am. As far as I could see, they were left alone.”
“And this one,” she said. The image changed to his firefight with the gigantic armored aliens. “At anytime did you see these things interact with the other Covenant species?”
“No, ma’am—” The Master Chief reconsidered. “Well, in a manner of speaking, yes. If you couldreview the recording at time minus two minutes from this frame, please.”
The holo paused and then blurred backward.
“There,” he said. The video played forward as the Master Chief and Fred examined the crushed Jackal inthe museum.
“That impression in this Jackal’s back,” he said. “I believe it is the armored alien’s bootprint.”
“What do you mean, son?” a new man asked. His voice was older and rough.
“I can only offer my opinion, sir. I am not a scientist.”
“Offer it, Master Chief,” the same scratchy voice said. “I, for one, would be very interested to hear whatsomeone with firsthandexperience has to say . . . for a change.”
There was a rustle of papers in the shadows, then silence.
“Well, sir—it looks to me like this Jackal simply got in the larger creature’s way. There’s no attempt tomove it, and no deviation in the path of the following footfalls. It simply walked over the smaller alien.”
“Evidence of a hierarchical caste structure perhaps?” the old man murmured.
“Let’s move on,” the woman again spoke, her voice now laced with irritation.
The holo image changed yet again. A stone object appeared—the rock the Master Chief recovered fromthe museum.
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“This stone,” she said, “is a typical igneous granite specimen but with an unusual concentration ofaluminum oxide inclusions—specifically rubies. It is a match for the mineral specimens recovered fromgrid thirteen by twenty-four.
“Master Chief,” she said, “you recovered this rock—” She paused. “From an optical scanner. Is thatcorrect?”
“Yes, ma’am. The aliens had placed the rock in a red metallic box. Visible spectrum lasers werescanning the specimen.”
“And the infrared pulse laser transmitter was hooked up to this scanner?” she asked. “You are certain?”
“Absolutely, ma’am. My thermal imagers caught a fraction of the transmission scattered by the ambientdust.”
The woman continued. “The rock sample is roughly pyramidal. The inclusions in the igneous matrix areunusual in that all possible crystalline morphologies for corundum are present: bipyramidal, prismatic,tabular, and rhombohedral. Scanning from the tip to the base with neutron imagers, we produce thefollowing pattern.”
Again, a series of squares, triangles, bars and dots appeared on the view screen—symbols that againreminded John of Aztec writing.
Déjà had taught the Spartans about the Aztecs—how Cortés with superior tactics and technology hadnearly obliterated an entire race. Was the same thing happening between the Covenant and humans?
“Now, then,” the first male voice interjected, “this business with the detonation of a HAVOK tacticalnuclear device . . . do you realize that any additional evidence of Covenant activity on Cote d’Azur hasbeen effectively erased? Do you know what opportunities have been lost, soldier?”