Parallel Visages

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"Ikora, any updates?"
"None, Captain. I still haven't been able to decipher what that artefact did or where we are. I'm certain we're still on Earth, but it all looks very… wrong.”
Tyler sighed. He surveyed the area, viewing through the scope of his BR85HB sniper rifle as it relayed its optical feed to his helmet and tagging points of interest with NAV markers.
Thirty minutes ago, he and the rest of GAUNTLET were tracking down the movements of a Covenant ground force in the countryside of New York in the United Republic of North America. Whatever remnant faction they belonged to, the fact that they could bypass Earth's defences and slither their way towards the surface made them nothing short of dangerous. A possible terrorist attack on the UEG homeworld was a threat of the highest order, and GAUNTLET was the first to respond to the call. 
Twenty minutes ago, his team spotted the enemy unearthing some ancient ruins buried underground. After eliminating a scouring party, GAUNTLET finished off the little sniper detail stationed around the zone and moved in with extreme precaution. Finding multiple entrances to the structure, the team split up to cover more ground while sneaking their way into the building. Their new GEN2 MJOLNIR armour sets were nothing short of impressive, and the incorporation of recovered Type-3 active camouflage modules worked tremendously to their advantage.
Ten minutes ago, Tyler stumbled upon a suspicious-looking device in the centre of the room. Jutting out from the ground connected to a complex system of partially-unearthed runners and beams of unknown lustrous material, the object stuck out like a sore thumb. It was covered in a lot of sand and dust, but the lustre and glowing sigils made it painfully obvious the relic was Forerunner in origin. A hologram hovered in the middle of a circular hole in the relic, displaying an unmarked map of Earth in three dimensions.
Tyler moved in to inspect, but he heard a metallic click simultaneous to his forward motion. Before his heightened reflexes could react to what had just happened, the relic's dull lights brightened, its distinctive humming increasing in volume until it let out a large pulse, and then another, and then a third one. Caught by the waves, Tyler's armour systems seemingly malfunctioned in response to the waves, disorienting him. But just as quickly as the waves erupted, just as promptly did silence engulfed the room.
Tyler opened his eyes. 
The relic looked like it had been shut down like someone yanked the power cable and killed any semblance of a functioning machine. The sigils died out in brightness and looked like nothing but paler patches of blue on the rest of the relic. But that wasn't the most peculiar change Tyler noticed at all. The entire room was suddenly much more vivid in lighting like it was almost… mid-day?
Tyler shook his head around before lifting his left arm and opening his clenched fist. "What just happened?" asked Tyler, confused at the sudden change of reality around him.
A blue figure emerged from his open palm, resembling a lady dressed in a brown explorer jacket and pants, her hair wrapped back in a ponytail. Ikora quickly assessed her surroundings, her face sporting a stunned look.
"I'm… not sure. We arrived here at the cusp of dusk, so why is the entire room lit as if it were afternoon?" replied Ikora. She had taken the words right out of his mouth. Tyler wondered if that was a mere coincidence, or if she could read his thoughts. She's in my mind after all, thought Tyler for a second before he reminded himself that was just plain incorrect.
Ikora interrupted his thoughts, "I'm hailing the rest of GAUNTLET for a sitrep". The acknowledgement lights in his helmet, however, did not activate like he expected them to. Tyler opened a COM channel on the UNSC standard frequency, "GAUNTLET, this is Tyler. Do you read?"
No response. 
"We should probably head out, see what's going on", Ikora added.
Tyler nodded and lowered his hand before equipping his weapon again. He saw no movement on his tracker but hesitated to move without turning his camo on. Now's not the time to play risky games, especially not after being so befuddled with his immediate environment.
Not long after leaving the structure, Tyler noted blips on his radar right as he spotted some sort of paramilitary unit. Except their insignia was something he had never recognised before. Wearing green and yellow fatigues and matching helmets, their uniforms and weaponry almost looked outdated yet futuristic simultaneously and yet distinctively human. 
Tyler didn’t have time to inspect further before the four figures opened fire. Their weapons shot some type of energy bolts, likely plasma, judging by their temperature and heat signature. Did they belong to an insurrectionist cell hidden on Earth? Were they able to reverse-engineer Covenant plasma weaponry? All these questions would have to wait. 
The MJOLNIR armour's energy shields took the brunt of the blasts, and he noticed the shield bar on his HUD drop to a quarter. Before the meter could drop any further, three of the soldiers were already dead, their robes punctured by the bullets fired from Tyler's BR in quick succession. The fourth soldier couldn't react in time as Tyler threw himself at him, lifting his knee and connecting it with the soldier's chest. His ribs cracked audible as the soldier was launched several meters across before hitting a tree, his body slumping forward as it rebounded.
Damn, maybe I should've kept him alive to ask further questions, surmised Tyler, but what's happened has happened. He'll have to seek answers elsewhere. Tyler picked up the fallen energy rifles, prompting Ikora to scan them and catalogue the information for later analysis. Moving away from the bloodied mess, Tyler scoured the rest of the area.
Which brought him to this moment. The two of them had enjoyed some relative peace as they tried to observe their surroundings. In the far distance, he could spot a human settlement, correction, a military base, and tagged it. 
Guess that's where we're heading then.
Before the SPARTAN could move, he saw his motion tracker bleep. Something was coming for him, fast. He turned around to see a circular disc speeding through the air at impossible speeds, aimed straight at him. Within a fraction of a second, Tyler brought his forearms up and maximised his shield strength around his gauntlets as the disc struck. 
Whoever threw it was not human, judging by its velocity and impact as his shields dropped by a tenth. The disc, however, bounced back into a different direction, characteristics, unlike any metal he'd known. It fell to the ground, and Tyler zoomed in. It was unmistakably a human shield, circular in shape and brightly adorned in red, white, and blue. At its centre lay a white star, and the entire object had signs of wear and tear. Before he could inspect it further, a strange whirring sound attracted the shield and lifted it off the soil, like it was pulled by a magnet.
Tyler traced the trajectory as he spotted the silhouette of a man grabbing it like he had called the shield to him, and it complied. He observed this new figure, wearing drab blue fatigues and a similarly-coloured helmet, in contrast to the green soldiers he encountered earlier. However, this one was not holding any weapons, and he definitely didn't look like he intended to attack the SPARTAN first if he wanted to. He rested the shield on a red bracer on his left arm, and it stayed put in its location. That's where the magnet could've possibly been hidden, thought Tyler.
On closer observation, the man's fatigues were not only blue but also red and white, matching the colours on his shield. The uniform was undoubtedly military in nature, and so were his boots. His lower midsection comprised several vertical bands of red and white, and above it, right on his chest, was a white star similar to the one on its shield. 
As Tyler's gaze went upwards, he looked at his head. His helmet had a special letter painted on its front, a bright white 'A'. And his face…
Tyler froze. He fixated on his face, and the portrait greeted him back like a hazy reflection. Even with his delayed reaction time, Tyler took longer than he should've as he focused on the man's facial features. He was so engrossed and dumbfounded at what his eyes were comprehending that he was taken aback when the figure spoke back.
"Look, son, I don't know which new superhero you'll claim to be, but I'm hoping you won't shoot at Captain America."
Captain America. The words echoed through Tyler's mind as he tried to piece it all together. Was he also part of a militia, perhaps different from those he had encountered before? A Captain? That would mean they're the same rank, assuming their military rank structure was adjacent. America, like the United Republic of North America? The nation on Earth where he was deployed to intercept a possible alien terrorist force in the first place. Tyler struggled to work out the chronology of events; everything happened so suddenly.
Superhero? What the hell is a superhero?
He recognised this officer, this so-called Captain, as an ally, and Tyler promptly lowered his rifle. By all logic, he shouldn't trust this person, but something in Tyler urged him to holster his weapon, and he did so. As he did, however, the other man spoke again. 
"That's a good start; now I know you're not a threat. I noticed you take down those HYDRA soldiers over there, and guessing by their bodies, I don't think they were much of a challenge for you. Now, who are you exactly?"
His voice was similar, too similar… to his own? Who was this mysterious man full of unanswered questions?
Tyler replied to his query, "This is SPARTAN-A319, Captain in the UNSC NAVSPECWAR division. Identify yourself."
The officer looked flabbergasted at Tyler's response as if he had never heard of a SPARTAN before. Or even know what NAVSPECWAR meant.
"What, you don't think I'm the real Captain America? I suppose there are too many imposters running around nowadays", said the man as he lifted his arm and holstered his shield on his back, hanging on some hook, though Tyler wondered if he had a similar magnetic holster there too. The man brought his hands to his chin and lifted his helmet.
Tyler's heart sank as he looked at the unmasked officer. His eyes, his shape, his entire face in fact, in pristine condition, mirrored him exactly. It was like looking into a mirror, except the mirrored reflection moved on its own and spoke in words Tyler didn't understand, nor did his reflection understand his own words. 
He was a doppelgänger of himself, an eerily accurate visage to his own.
The urge returned, this time impulsing Tyler to remove his own helmet. Usually, that would be a sight to behold the battlefield, a Spartan removing his helmet outside the comfort of his fellow squadmates or the familiar surroundings of a home base. Spartans showing their faces was out of the ordinary: it was one of the many factors contributing to their myth as robotic titans engineered for war. But nothing about this meeting was ordinary.
And so Tyler did as his mind commanded him to and removed his helmet. A battle-hardened face emerged, sporting a light stubble and longer-than-regulation hair. As long as it fits in the helmet without hassle, Tyler didn't mind trimming it. He brought his helmet ahead and down, holding it in his hand as he rested it on the side of his body.
The officer's jaw dropped. Tyler realised he was going through the same emotions he did, except all at once because his helmet covered all of his face while the officer's mask left his lower jaw exposed. The man took several seconds before he could come out of shock and try to form a sentence with his mouth without speaking gibberish.
"Oh, you gotta be shitting me."
***