Eliza stared impatiently from the outside of the armory cage, silently wondering how exactly it was that a simple arms and equipment pull could take the better part of an hour. At least it hadn't been anything so insufferable as doubt as to her clearance, she mused. All but one item was gear that had been stored under her name, albeit while she had been in training. There'd been a brief moment how questioning how a mere Lance Corporal outright owned a set of power armor, but as it hadn't been relevant to the fact that the armor, along with the weapons, had been recorded under her name by no less than DAW Materials Group personnel, it had been more of a curiosity that Eliza hadn't felt interested in indulging.

"Corporal Lockheed?" a young tech called from behind the cage, interrupting Eliza's idle clacking of the receipt chit for the Grappleshot module she'd purchased for installation into her gauntlet armor.

"Aye?" she replied, wondering if there had been some sort of complication.

"I need you to follow me for suiting. This way, please," he explained, opening the door that separated the arms room from the rest of the building, then motioned Eliza to follow him inside. "Your armor is too heavy to be moved with a hand cart, and we need to monitor you while you suit up."

Eliza resisted the urge to roll her eyes, having donned her armor a number of times without anyone other than Veska to observe. "That's na th' only reason I'm bein' brought back this way, is it?" she guessed as they walked to the back of the arms room, then halted in front of a featureless metal door with a security panel beside it. The tech said nothing, but simply touched the panel, prompting the door to slide open to reveal a surprisingly large room lined with containment pods. As Eliza walked deeper inside, she could see that the pods held suits of ÆSIR armor, or were empty. The tech halted in front of one pod, then gestured to it.

"Get suited up, the Major will be with you shortly," he stated as Eliza stepped towards the pod. Within was her own armor, largely untouched since the last time she'd seen it, though the Confed emblem had been stenciled on the right pauldron in subdued colors, and "LOCKHEED" had been similarly stenciled across a three-inch portion of the upper left of the chestplate. Eliza gave a curt nod, then opened a panel at the base of the pod, surmising that the deployment collars of her techsuit would be held there, and allowed herself a faint smile as she was proven correct.

It didn't take long for Eliza to don her armor, in large part due the her need to have armor that didn't require highly specialized equipment to don or remove, though her intimate familiarity with every square centimeter of the suit surely hadn't hurt. The weight felt slightly off with the addition of the Grappleshot module affixed to the outer section of her right gauntlet, perpendicular to the particle beam cannon she'd built by reverse-engineering a Machine Empire carbine, but the artificial muscle layer of her armor helped to make it negligible. She'd simply need to grow accustomed to the additional weight, she knew.

"Someone was busy.." she remarked idly to herself after sliding on her helmet and locking it in its seals and allowing the suit's BIOS to power on. Code streamed across her HUD, displaying system diagnostics, including some notable additions to her communications and navigation programs. Ultimately, it was a software update, but one that made her suit no longer simply a hunter's armor, but a soldier's.

"Corporal," the voice of Major Howell echoed across the stark chamber, and Eliza immediately turned on her heel and snapped to attention, only to be waived off before she could salute. "At ease, Lockheed. There's been an addendum to your mission profile," he explained. Eliza didn't say anything, expecting that Howell would do so soon. "Regarding Ek'noz Station, if the creatures are too heavily entrenched, your mission is to extract the station's data core and destroy the station." Motioning to a small metal hardcase resting on an anti-grav cart, he stared into the reflective visor of Eliza's helmet. "This change came thirty minutes ago, so ARC-Nine hasn't yet been briefed. I expect you to see that they are aware of this. I pulled a lot of strings to get this team on your mission, Lockheed."

"Understood, sir. I'll be makin' my way ta th' Prowler once I have th' rest of my weapons. Sir, one last question?"

"Yes?"

"I was informed Veska would na be accompanyin' me on this mission. Do ye know why?"

"I would imagine that the Materials Group is studying her, given the unusual design involved, and implications regarding military hardware," he answered. "But I don't know exactly why. I suppose you're welcome to try asking after your mission."

Eliza frowned slightly, but said nothing. She didn't especially like that particular situation, but there really wasn't anything she could do about it. "Understood, sir. Any additional orders?"

"If you need to extract the data core and destroy the station, your next standing orders are to return to Reach with the data core so we can analyze potential infestation sites. If you're unable to retrieve that data, we'll have no choice but to negotiate with the Banished. That is all." With that, Major Howell turned on his heel and made his way back to his office, leaving Eliza to collect the remainder of her weapons, all stored on a rack behind the pod that had contained her suit.

Eliza paused as she eyed the Havok she'd been assigned to safeguard, and very likely deploy, then hefted the hardcase in one hand, as the maglocks on the back of her armor were currently occupied by her own personal hardcase, containing no small amount of spare ammunition, as well as no less than half a dozen grenades of various types and several breaching charges. With the paperwork already done, she didn't need to stay any longer than it took to walk through the arms room and out of the DAW armory. Reaching the airfield, however, still took time, and it was nearly 1300 by the time the armor clad woman set foot on the boarding ramp of the Prowler.

"Lance Corporal Eliza Lockheed," she stated as she saw the first of the members of ARC-Nine, pausing to check her HUD to see who she was addressing. "Chief Bram. I'm told ye and yer team are one of th' best we've got. I hope I'll be worth th' bother," she added before stepping further inside into the cargo hold to secure her gear. "Incidentally, how much have ye and yer people been informed as far as th' mission objective? My briefin' was by myself."

Eliza perked an eyebrow as she listened to the members of ARC-Nine speak, though she said nothing, and with her faceplate hiding her expression, there was no way to tell just what the woman was thinking. Something felt off about how young the team sounded, but she set that train of thought aside for the time being. A five-day Slip jump would leave plenty of time enough for that. Instead, she gave a short nod and hastily seated herself before the Prowler could take off. Young supersoldier pilots sounded like exactly the sort that would gun the engines hard enough to put Eliza on her ass if she were foolish enough to still be standing when takeoff started.

"Some things really are universal," she muttered when, not even a full minute later, she was proven correct. "Command's pretty sure there's a nest on Ek'noz Station, aye," she confirmed. "Given what those creatures are capable of..well, it's na th' Flood, but they're still a critical threat. Strong as hell, fast, hard ta spot, and jist all around unpleasant. Oh, and their blood is some sort of superacid, so shields are yer friends. Th' Yaujta apparently hunt them fer funsies, but that's another bag of crazy that's na relevant unless a hunter team decides th' station is a good place ta visit," she explained. "Major Howell gave me orders ta clear th' station if possible, but unless practically all th' population died conventionally, it's gannin ta be packed ta th' gills wi those bug things. Ta that end, our most likely course is ta go in, pull th' station's data core, plant th' Havok, and exfil. And a suggestion? Have th' AI hold position and board th' station EVA. I doubt any of us want a hitchhiker of our own." Eliza hesitated for a moment as she recalled the additional warning of what potential objectives might be involved, then decided against saying anything about that particular detail. Besides, there wasn't any reason to think ARC-Nine would even be involved in seeking out the Banished to gain access to the dead hunter's black box.

"On another note, does Faala always take off like a bat out of hell, or is this jist fer me?" Eliza wondered.

"Jist takes a bit of practice, that's all," Eliza replied to the pilot, taking care to keep her puzzlement out of her voice. They sounded young enough to be fresh out of training, not one of the top ÆSIR teams in the entire Confed. There were answers to that, of course, she knew, but that was still speculation. "I doubt ye'll need ta practice that much wi a larger bird, given what ye said."

Turning her attention back towards Markus, she listened intently, measuring in her mind how much he'd need to know, and how much he was in fact authorized to know. Her capabilities, why she'd been fast-tracked into DAW's command instead of serving as a standard intelligence specialist for a Marine unit, would become apparent soon enough. "I'm hear coz I'm th' only Confed service member that's been inside a hive and lived, and as such, I have both hard intel on th' creatures and experience wi fightin' them. Assumin' ye saw th' vids, which were fram my helmet recorder, ye'll know they can take down a fully grown and equipped Kromus soldier in close quarters combat. That means our standard jarheids would be gannin into a slaughter. Bear in mind also, they can partially defeat motion trackers, and while our armor can probably hold against blows even if shields collapse, their blood is acidic enough ta eat most metals away in under a minute," she explained. "If I had ta guess, they'll have th' hive built in a perimeter around th' command core, where all th' station brass were based. Unfortunately, that means a gauntlet run fer that data core.I think ye can start ta see why yer team was called up fer this mission, now, Chief."

Eliza fell silent then, before reaching up to unlatch her helmet. While wearing her armor for extended periods of time didn't bother the Witch per se, she saw no need to keep her head enclosed when there was no reason to. "So, there's yer hows and whys. Probably should mention, I am one of a very few in th' Spur trained in th' use of exotic energy manipulation. Fancy way of sayin' magic. Relevant coz most of what I know has practical use in a military operation, and ye jist might want ta be fully aware of options before we're up ta our necks in murder bugs fram hell."

"I'm na briefed on th' Triangalum matter, but possibly. Magic tends ta be fairly flexible, once ye know how it functions, and essentially, it only needs ta follow th' law of conservation of matter and energy. I'll get ye a summarized list of specific effects I am versed in shortly, possibly access ta Sierra Echo Hotel 311078-2, if ye've na already got access, as that footage may provide more helpful information on what I'm referrin' ta," Eliza replied as she studied the other soldiers intently. Despite the fact that she couldn't see their faces, she felt certain they had a number of questions regarding what she was telling them, even if they hadn't said much about it yet. Certainly, the Spartans she'd met on the Event Horizon hadn't batted an eye, but one had been UNSC era, and as such, had likely dealt with far more unsettling things, and another had returned from the dead. Modern supersoldiers had yet to be thrust into the realm of the metaphysical to the best of her knowledge, and these ones sounded younger than most. That point again. Eliza chewed her lip absently as her thoughts turned inward at that it'd taken Eliza the better part of a year and highly unusual circumstances to end up with DAW, and she was still only an E-3. A CPO was several ranks higher, and to her knowledge from her time in basic training, it took close to 10 years to attain. Eliza then slid her helmet back on and pulled up the files she been given on ARC-Nine. She relaxed slightly as she reviewed the ages, but only just. Had she not seen with her own eyes that ÆSIRs weren't the only supersoldiers in Confed's arsenal, she wouldn't have even given it a thought, but now, that possibility lingered in her mind. It was possible everything was legit, she knew, but given how DAW had shown no hesitation in strong-arming her to the point that it was easier to simply enlist than be at their constant beck and call, other possibilities were certainly on the table. Mission performance would almost certainly give her those answers, though and so the Witch allowed the matter to drop, giving no explanation for her behavior unless any of ARC-Nine asked for one. "Sendin' that data file now, Chief."

Eliza had wondered herself of the possibility that people might still be alive, though after more than a year dealing with the creatures that she had herself seen on TC-611, she had serious doubts that any civilian population was still alive. Still, people could be remarkably resourceful when backed into a corner. The question warranted proper consideration, not merely because it would have been wrong to simply purge the station without any attempt to rescue those that had endured so much, but because such survivors would have more practical intel on the creatures than anyone else alive.

"If there's survivors, we canna take many on our ship, but there's bound ta be plenty on-site. Who else knows how ta run a security bypass ta commandeer a civilian ship, coz I doubt any of such potential survivors have that particular skill. Wi any luck, th' creatures arna intelligent enough ta compromise th' atmospheric containments in th' hangar bays or dockin' spires. Otherwise, there's na really much we can do, fram what I'm seein'. Ye happen ta have intel on that, Chief?"