Composed

“Get up, Hollister. Your brother’s already outside.”

Kevin Hollister obliged the command and stood at full height, towering over his diminutive guard. Nonetheless, the smaller man was still in charge, an air of smugness around him and the black body armor he wore. The man prodded Kevin with his Assault Rifle - An MA5D to be precise - and Hollister walked toward the door that led out of his cell. It slid open with a hiss, and the two men walked out into a hallway where two more security guards were.

They wore the signature black armor and insignia of ONI - The Office of Naval Intelligence. The place was patrolled by them day and night. Kevin didn’t even know how to tell day from night anymore. He was on Ivanoff Station, an orbital station embedded in an asteroid orbiting one of the rumored ringworlds called Halos mentioned back on Earth. It belonged to ONI, and Kevin and his brother were imprisoned here in their black site.

Walking out of the hallway into another corridor, he caught sight of his twin brother, Roger. Roger simply nodded to him; prisoners weren’t allowed to speak unless given permission. They were escorted through a maze of metal walls and floors by the three ONI personnel, stopping outside of a large gate. The Hollister brothers had been through it many times, so it was old news to Kevin. One of the guards walked over to a console near the door and put their hand on it, lighting up the panel and opening the door. What lay behind it was classified to most station personnel. This was where the black site prisoners were sent to do labor for ONI, in the attempt to redeem themselves from this life, as said by the Office. The Hollister brothers knew by now that that was a lie, and that they could never escape.

Walking into the area where other prisoners were already waiting, two of the guards followed them inside, while the third one stayed behind to seal the door. “Alright, prisoners, permission to speak,” spat one of the two guards, loading a magazine into his MA5 in the common case of an attempted breakout. The other guard leaned back against the wall, unholstering his M6H sidearm. As the prisoners started milling around to get to work on making war tools for ONI, Roger came over to Kevin.

“Greetings, brother. I’ll need your assistance with my little project. Not the known one, but the one hidden from even the overseer.”

Kevin knew what his brother was talking about. Roger had been constructing a device that he said could help them break free from Ivanoff, but had kept it very discreet as not to attract attention from the overseer, Professor Lambit. She was one of the only scientific minds aboard the station that knew of the black site; most of the station’s personnel were oblivious to it. She ruled over the prisoners with an iron fist to keep them in line.

The pair walked over to Roger’s workstation, where Kevin took a cover off of their table. Underneath the cover were many tools and parts. “Let’s get to work,” Said Roger.

The thing was, that Kevin wasn’t really the smart one in the duo. Sure, he was clever in his own rights, but Roger had the real brains. Kevin was the brawn. Kevin was still considered a ‘scientist’, but the main reason he seemed to be stationed here was to help out Roger. His brother worked much faster with him assisting, and Kevin seemed to be the only one that could make sense of Roger’s fast chatter on a daily basis.

Kevin and Roger had once been bright boys, with a good chance of going to a respectable college on Earth, but one wrong turn changed their lives forever. After getting involved in an underground scheme with Insurrectionists, they had loved the experience and wanted more dangerous assignments. It was like an addiction to a drug. They experimented for the Innies and such, until their capture after the close of the Human-Covenant War. Their once-kind personalities had hardened, and they only looked after each other. Anyone else was a potential enemy.

“Wrench, please,” Asked Roger, but as Kevin went to grab it a tremor caused him to lose his footing. Roger stopped his work and looked down, right as another shudder threw him onto his back. The whole station seemed to shake right then as a glowing orange wall broke through the walls like a ghost, steadily advancing across the room. One of the other imprisoned scientists tried to run away from it, only for the wave to pass right through him and keep on going. After it had exited out, Professor Lambit and a trio of guards came into the room via a balcony to investigate what had happened.

“Alright, which one of you set off the alarms?”

Looking left and right at the prisoners, she focused her eyes on Roger. “Hollister, it was you wasn’t it? You and your brute of a brother!”

Roger just shook his head. “It was not me ma’am, or my Jiralhanae of a brother.”

Before Lambit could retort one of the guards grabbed her arm. “Professor! We’ve got security alerts all over the place! Boarding parties are coming in through the hangars! The security stationed there says Covenant!”

Everyone in the room stopped where they were. “Covenant? You mean Split-lips and the like?”

“Yes, Professor!”

“We need to get out of here now!” Shouted Lambit, motioning for the guards with her to move off the balcony and out of the room. “But what about the prisoners? We can’t just leave them here in case they give vital information to the Covenant!” Inquired the guard.

“Leave them. The only way the Covenant are breaking through the doors are if they destroy the whole station.”

This caused a wave of murmurs among the prisoners; they weren’t just willing to get left behind here. They started to move towards the two guards on ground level, but the ONI personnel were prepared. They drew their weapons, and that was enough to change the crowd’s minds. Kevin stepped back towards Roger, only to realize his twin was no longer there. Whipping his gaze around the room, he caught sight of Roger standing behind the guard with the MA5D. Roger picked up a wrench and whacked the man in the head with it, knocking him cold. The other guard turned around to see what had happened, and beared witness as Roger hefted up the assault rifle and heaved it towards Kevin.

“You know how to handle an MA5D, Kevin, so deal with him.”

Kevin instantly knew what to do. He dropped to the floor to avoid the guard’s shot from his Magnum, and aimed the loaded assault rifle at them before holding down the trigger. The first few bullets didn’t do much, but the rest of the barrage went straight into the his body, spurting blood across the walls. Kevin stood up as the man fell to the ground, reloading the MA5 as Roger hurried over and grabbed the M6H, pushing another magazine into the chamber.

Kevin then heaved up the unconscious guard and walked over to the door’s panel, pushing the hand against it. The large door opened up, and Kevin dropped the body, sprinting outside of the area along with Roger tailing behind. Whatever the other prisoners decided to do, it didn’t matter to him.

They ran, and kept running, navigating through the labyrinth of Ivanoff Station. Multiple scientists and guards were running around aimlessly, many towards the hangars to evacuate. That was where the Hollister brothers needed to be. As they made their way to the desired location, they came to a corner where they ran into a familiar face. Professor Lambit stood looking at them, her mouth agape. Behind her were two of the three guards with her earlier. They leveled their assault rifles towards the twins, and Lambit rearranged her face into a mischievous smile.

“Well, well, well. You two will be perfect body shields for the Covenant. I can do whatever I want with you, seeing as you have escaped your containment area. And with the disarray around here, I have no threat of punishment to myself. Looks like the end of the line for you two.”

“I guess it is,” Roger stated. Something was off though, so Kevin took his turn to speak. “Wait, where’s your third guard?”

Lambit’s smile faded. “Dead. That’s all you need to-”

The professor’s chatter was interrupted by a plasma bolt that seared right through one of the guard’s chest. She went down screaming, and Lambit dove to the floor. The other guard ducked and fired his MA5 towards whatever it was that shot the other ONI trooper, before scrambling to cover. He fired multiple bursts at the approaching enemies, and Lambit got up to run.

“I don’t believe you will be going anywhere,” Said Roger as he put the professor in a headlock. “Kevin, finish off her protection.”

“I don’t always need you ordering me around, Roger,” Retorted Kevin as he loaded another clip into the assault rifle and let loose a barrage towards the ONI security guard, mowing him down. As soon as the guard stopped firing, a roar came from down the hall, coming closer. “Wort, Unggoy!”

“Well, it looks like our time together is over, Professor. Hope the Covenant are as hospitable as us.” Roger dropped Lambit, walking over to a nearby door. As it slid open, Lambit got to her knees. “Hollisters, you can’t leave me here, please!” She begged.

Kevin simply shook his head. “Roger, we can leave her here. She would have done the same to us.”

“Well said, Kevin!”

The two brothers walked to the door, and as they were about to pass through, a pair of small, squat bipeds wearing gas tanks and holding sidearms came into sight, with a large saurian creature Kevin knew as a Sangheili following close behind. The twins ran through the door and closed it before the Covenant troops could get wind of them, and they continued on, ignoring the screams behind them from Professor Lambit as the Covenant executed her.

After several minutes, the brothers stopped as they realized they had taken a wrong turn and ended up in a weapons closet. “Damn, this wasn’t the way,” Kevin realized. Roger sighed and turned around, when it happened. Everything glowed, and Kevin felt weak. So weak... He fell to the ground, looking up to see his brother. Roger normally kept his cool, but he was screaming out loud as he dropped to the floor. Kevin groped around for his rifle, as if it could protect him anymore though. Then the pain started. It felt like someone was dissecting him, peeling off each layer of his body one by one. Roger was now writhing around, his skin melting off into orange flakes. Then his muscles, his horrible muscles, they followed suit, and the only thing left was a skeleton, still somehow alive. ''This must be punishment for what we did. I didn’t believe in karma before, but…'' Kevin looked at his own hand and realized that he was undergoing the same process. Kevin tried to speak some last words to his brother, but his voice box was probably reduced to fine particles by now. He looked towards Roger and saw his skeleton turning into ash, and knew it was the end. Then, he died.

Kevin woke, and was mildly surprised that he was alive. ''It must have been a dream. I’m still in my cell.'' Kevin opened his eyes, and realized he didn’t have eyes anymore - He didn’t even have a body! Everything was a scarlet abyss, and around him were so many grotesque forms. Then he heard the voice - A voice so ancient it must have surpassed the stone age. But it was in his head, it seemed like it was only in there. ''Humans, you have been composed. I am the Didact, and you will be my Prometheans. This is atonement for your sins, killers of our children. You are now mine.'' Then, there was a flash of blinding light. The next thing Kevin knew, he was inside a carapace. He understood everything now. His name wasn’t Kevin, that was just a shard of the past. His name was Zevezin now. The Didact was his master. He still kept his personality, and memories, but - Wait…

“Roger?”

There was a shift in the walls. Another carapace, emblazoned with gold stripes, detached itself and stumbled over to Zevezin. “Roger was in the past. I am Chravezin now. I will be Chravezin forever. Tell me, brother, what is your new name?”

“Zevezin,” He said.

“Interesting. We have been composed, Zevezin. I now know everything about our objective. We have been lucky enough not to be separated from each other, and we were granted the highest position of Promethean Knight Commander out of necessity. We have a new life, and with it, purpose.”

Zevezin nodded. It was all coming to him as well. “Well then, Chravezin, brother. It seems like we have been gifted to escape from Ivanoff Station. Let the twin Knight Commandos do their work with loyalty.”