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Season Eight[]
Introduction[]
The swift click of footsteps echoed through the ornate white corridor as polished black dress shoes clacked against the ground at a leisurely pace. They belonged to a man wearing a white suit with a black tie beneath. Hands in his pockets, he strolled past a myriad of statues on either side of him that were coated in shiny gloss of black spray to stand out against the intricate patterns carved into the white walls. The corridor was exceptionally long - meant to accommodate the hundreds of statues that ran along its length.
Quite a few species made up the population of these frozen figures. Many were human, but an equally large number belonged to former client species of the Covenant. There were even some AI avatars, followed by some dubious non-canons. The gentleman grimaced and ran a hand through his short-cropped hair as he walked past the latter. A few statues down he spotted what looked like a ginormous, tangled mass of worms coated in the black paint. Undoubtedly meant to represent the big one he had seen on his last outing. A shame that he hadn’t gotten the opportunity to see it in action.
Nearing a doorway near the end of the hallway, the man spied seven golden podiums resting in an alcove above the door accompanied by a smaller silver one. The first was topped by a similarly-colored statue of a MJOLNIR-clad Spartan, aiming down the scope of a BR55 battle rifle. A plaque on the podium read JAMES-G023, VICTOR OF SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST, SEASON ONE.
The fourth podium held an imposing Sangheili warrior adorned in a sleek Spec-Ops harness, holding an energy sword at his side with an unyielding grip while his free hand was balled into a fist. SHINSU ‘REFUM, VICTOR OF SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST, SEASON FOUR.
The sixth podium lofted up a seemingly regular-looking man wearing a police uniform, hands clamped tightly around an M90 shotgun as if he were pumping it. EDMOND DAHM, VICTOR OF SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST, SEASON SIX.
The silver podium held a diminutive honeybee; the dubious winner of an infamous prank season. GILGAMESHAN HONEY BEE, VICTOR OF SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST, SEASON SIX-POINT-FIVE.
Despite his reservations about that one, the man at least had to admit that it had been completed. The other four podiums were barren, results of failed seasons. He shook his head as he approached the door at the hall’s end. Quite a shame that his programs had fewer successes than failures - not counting the honeybee’s season, of course - but that was what this new season would rectify. Season Eight of Survival of the Fittest would make things even.
The doors slid open without so much as a sound, seamlessly disappearing as the man entered a circular, tiered room. Below him were several rings, each containing dozens of employees at various workstations to ensure that the season went off without a hitch. On the far wall of the chamber was a display large enough to be considered IMAX, showing a map of a tropical island. Well, a mostly tropical island.
“Sir!” a voice rang out from behind him. He turned to see a woman in a black suit with a golden datapad in her hand approaching him.
“Ah,” the gentleman grinned, “you’re the new liaison, I assume?”
“Affirmative,” the liaison confirmed, handing him the datapad. “There’s quite a few changes from last time. I’ve got all the answers to all your questions if you need ‘em.”
The man let the datapad fall to his side for a moment, looking around to take in the true scope of the room. “Quite the change from last season’s aesthetic. Any particular reason?”
“The new sponsors figured that it was time for a change of location, considering that the previous location was in disrepair for five years,” the liaison answered. “A bit more classy, as they put it.”
The gentleman snapped his head to lock eyes with the liaison, his eyebrow raised. “You said sponsors? More than one?”
“Things are going to be quite different this season, sir,” the lady replied, “we have two sponsors this time around, to ensure we get the proper ‘funding’ to finish out this season. They’ve also implemented quite a few changes from previous iterations, too.”
The man quickly brought the datapad back up, activating it and swiping through several lists on the screen. He brought up the description of each phase and froze. He turned back to the liaison. “They added a team phase? This is Survival of the Fittest we’re talking about here.”
“And it will be,” the liaison countered, stepping close and swiping to the next phase on the list. “The first phase will consist of teams to spice things up a little. More drama, new interactions, bigger battles, more killing, and, as the sponsors put it, faster progression. Once we’ve killed off half of the fighters, things will change.”
“And how would our contestants know who their teammates are?”
“We took the liberty of tinkering with their optical nerves. They’ll have a sort of FOF tag system to identify teammates within a certain range. Enemies will still be able to get the drop on them though.”
The gentleman stroked his chin, nodding. “Sounds quite interesting. And the map?”
The liaison outstretched her hand to reference the island on the massive display in front of them. “We’re going back to a more traditional arena. The audience loves their secluded islands, after all.”
“And the massive blank spot in the middle?” the man questioned, pointing to a large area in the center of the island obscured by an energy barrier.
His companion smirked. “Second phase. You can find it on your tablet. The contestants are unaware that they’ll be shifting to a free-for-all, so refrain from telling them that until later. We need the shock value to boost our ratings.”
“I guess I was always a sucker for islands,” the suited man chuckled, “What’s the name?”
“Mors Insula. It’s Latin for ‘Death Island’.”
“Nice reference. Perhaps a bit on the nose, but still clever,” the man remarked, scrolling over to a list of characters. The list was split into Red Team and Blue Team, with various sub-fireteams containing participants of different species comprising each and every one of them.
Some of the submissions were returning faces - Spartans, Sangheili, Jiralhanae, a highschooler, and…
“Heh, the big one’s back for another round?” The gentleman inquired.
“Correct. Such a large island like this one should be more sufficient for it than Barrier City.”
He kept scrolling. A Cyclops operator came up - interesting to see how that one would play out. An Mgalekgolo pair was present as well - how ironic it would be if they faced off against each other for the champion title… Some more Spartans came up, then some more, then more. His eyelids twitched for a second. That was a lot of Spartans. In trying to dissect all the numbers and tags, he swore he saw some names repeated. After scrolling back up, he did a double take. His hunch was correct.
The man turned to the liaison. “Any reason we have duplicates? Did the QA team fuck up or something?”
“The sponsors have made an executive decision to allow multiple submissions for the same characters,” the liaison began, holding up a finger to silence the man as he went to protest.
“The catch is they need to be from different time periods. ‘No harm in contestants fighting themselves from a different time period’ is what they said.”
“Well, uh,” the man said, handing the tablet back to the liaison, “looks like these new sponsors have made quite a few changes this time around. I guess we’ll see where this goes, huh?”
Unfortunately for him, the liaison departed without a word, stepping back down to the tiered ring below him. Puffing in indignation, he heard a footstep behind him and turned around to see another man, this one wearing a black suit similar to the liaison’s, but wearing a headset as well. The broadcaster.
“Ah, broadcaster!” the gentleman said, his mood immediately sweetening. “I assume we’re about ready to begin?”
“You got it, boss!” the broadcaster affirmed, snapping his fingers. A black table and a cushioned white chair blinked into existence a few paces away near the edge of the dais. Several devices arranged in a manner akin to that of a twenty-first century podcast setup lay on the table, and the chair provided a perfect view of the room’s behemoth display screen.
“Comfy. This is more like it,” the man said, sauntering over and collapsing back into the soft chair. He turned to the broadcaster, who gave him the thumbs-up to begin.
A message plastered itself on the screen over the map in big, bold letters.
A whole new wave of contestants had just been placed on the island. A whole new group of fighters who would fight and kill each other for the coveted title of victor of the eighth season. The man grinned. It had been far too long.
“Good morning, everyone! I’m the Announcer, and today I’m going to be your host for the eighth season of Survival of the Fittest. For those of you who may be wondering who the hell I am, I just told you! If you’re wondering how the hell you got here, that’s on a need-to-know basis! And if you’re wondering what you’re supposed to do, all you need to do is kill the fighters on the other team!”
“As you’ll surely notice, you’ll have woken up next to a few… Comrades. See that blue dot above their head? That means they’re on your side, and you should play nice with each other. As I said, your goal is to help your new friends kill those bastards on the other team. The Red Team and Blue Team will have to kill each other for dominance! And please try not to plaster your teammates’s brains across the metaphorical wall? Teamwork makes the dream work!”
“As for your locale, you are all stuck on the beautiful Mors Insula! This island contains a wealth of biomes, ranging from the warm tropics to freezing mountains. There’ll be a few bases from all of your various little factions sprinkled across the island to make you feel right at home in Survival of the Fittest.”
“However, for those of you who think you can escape - there isn’t any. No swimming away, no burrowing underground, no flying into the sky. You can’t escape, and you can’t refuse to participate. After all, that’s grounds for removal from the competition, and when it’s a fight to the death, you should know fully well what that means.”
“So, it’s time to test your mettle, folks! Spill some blood, make some gore, kill those splitjaws, gas monkeys, nishums, chickens, jir’a’ul, or whatever on the enemy team, and maybe you’ll survive long enough for the big surprise. Good luck to all, and without further ado, let the bloodbath begin!”
Phase One: Mors Insula[]
1: Friendly Fire[]
“Let the bloodbath begin!” was the final thing the disembodied voice said before the sounds of chirping birds and wind rustling through what Althea assumed were trees overtook her auditory sensors. Unfortunately, her visual sensors were deactivated - she was isolated inside the Executor shell she had commandeered from the Created moments before whatever this was had happened.
At first the loyalist UNSC AI assumed that her hijacking efforts had failed to go unnoticed by the Created. After the speech about death games and bloodshed for entertainment, she wished that were the case. Whoever had done this clearly wasn’t affiliated with any faction she knew of.
“Agh, what the hell?” came a familiar voice pattern. Althea perked up inside her shell’s network, recognizing it without even needing an analysis. It belonged to Thomas Koepke, a man who had fought alongside her host, Merlin-D032, at the Gilboan Citadel.
Althea scrambled to access her suit’s external speakers. Thankfully, they were still operational.
“Thomas? It’s me, Althea.”
“Who?” the man questioned, genuine confusion in his voice.
“Althea, Merlin’s AI? Surely you haven’t forgotten already?”
“Merlin? Who the hell is that?” Thomas inquired.
That’s a red flag, Althea told herself. Quickly, she ran a diagnostic on the suit. The Executor shell and its human inhabitant seemed to be intact, and nothing seemed out of place besides the deactivated visual sensors. Sifting through the data, Althea couldn’t tell what was wrong - until she found the suit’s internal clock. The date was scrambled - the minutes and hours were fluctuating rapidly, far too fast for even a smart AI like her to comprehend, and the years kept changing as well. These were far slower, and she could tell that they were cycling from the current date through years all the way back to the late 25th century.
“Thomas!” Althea piped up, “what year is it?”
“Uh, 2558. Why do you ask?”
Althea allowed herself to sigh. “I’m from 2561.”
“Are we talkin’ about human years?” a squeaky, alien voice chipped in. “I love human years! 2560 is the best cuz it’s the one we’re livin’ in!”
A Grunt? What the hell is going on here?
“Impossible,” a scratchy voice hissed from behind Althea. “We must be in 2555 by slimy human standards.”
A moment later Althea felt a jolt as something outside kicked the suit. Her visual sensors finally decided to turn on, and the AI took the opportunity to finally take in her surroundings.
A vast, luscious forest surrounded her, with majestic pine trees darting up from all angles. The woodland area was lush with small wildlife, including insects, mammals, and the birds she had heard from earlier. In front of Althea were two figures. To her right was Koepke, outfitted in a military BDU and combat armor, clutching a VK-78 Commando rifle that he likely wasn’t well-versed in. Further analysis indicated that he had a Magnum in his holster. To her left was a short but stocky Unggoy wearing thick, chalk-white armor, a full-faced helmet, and what looked like a jump-pack affixed to his gas tank. He lifted up a SPNKr rocket launcher with blue highlights, revealing a belt of plasma grenades around his waist. A Banished logo on his chest drew Althea’s ire. This Grunt was with them.
Both individuals had blue dots above their heads. At first Althea thought it was some sort of problem with the visual sensors - after all, they had been inactive until whoever was behind her kicked her suit. After running another diagnostic on the internal systems, she couldn’t find an error. Still, they had been tampered with somehow by this Announcer. The AI remembered him saying that the blue dots signified teammates. As far as they went, Thomas wasn’t too bad. But working alongside a Banished Unggoy would take a bit of getting used to, if Althea was to make it out of this “Survival of the Fittest” competition alive.
“What weak team,” the voice from behind growled again as a third blue dot appeared on the periphery of Althea’s visual sensors. She turned to see a Kig-Yar with orange skin and black neck plates stepping towards Thomas, each hand tightly gripping a painglass cutlass.
“Says the Kig-Yar…” Althea muttered, purposefully loud enough for the avian to hear.
“You address me as Shipmistress Chur'R-Ren!” the Kig-Yar hissed, activating personal shields around her form as if to make a statement.
“And you can call me Dipdip!” The Unggoy shouted charismatically.
“Shut up, Grunt,” Althea snapped, focusing her attention on the Kig-Yar Shipmistress in front of her.
“So weak!” Ren squawked, extending a cutlass towards Thomas. “Look how he trembles with weapon in hand! He is not fighter! Reeks of coward.”
“A-and what’re you trying to say by that?” Thomas asked, attempting to put on a face of bravado. He turned to face Ren, puffing out his chest in the vain hope that it would make the avian back down.
“I say you are liability,” Ren hissed. “No good to me alive.”
Althea grabbed her Sidekick from its holster and took aim, but it was too late. Chur’R-Ren’s cutlass had already dug its way into Thomas’s chest. The man gargled in pain, spitting up blood, then fell back, the blue dot above him blinking out of existence.
“Hey! What’s the big idea?” Althea barked, keeping her aim on the Kig-Yar cutthroat’s head. It wouldn’t do much good if she couldn’t break those shields though…
“This is Survival of the Fittest, yes? He not fit to survive. I doubt you two fit either.”
Althea grumbled. It was clear that this Jackal prick wasn’t going to play by the rules, despite the Announcer clearly telling them to work together with their teammates. In that case, Althea wouldn’t play by the rules either.
“Hey, Dipdip, that was your name, right?”
“Yeah!” the Unggoy said cheerily despite the fact that Thomas’s corpse was still pumping out blood less than ten meters away from him.
“What’s your opinion on Kig-Yar?”
“Oh, I hate them so much!” Dipdip growled, turning his attention to Ren. “Especially that one! She called me weak! But I’m one of the strongest Unggoy alive!”
The Shipmistress caught on to Althea’s ploy and slowly began backing away, activating a shield gauntlet while doing so. “Clever fiend. But fiend will die anyway.”
“That Kig-Yar just killed one of my… friends,” Althea pressed on, “she wants to kill us too. You don’t want that now, do you?”
Dipdip brought up his free hand to scratch his helmeted head. “No, that sounds pretty bad. I-”
The Unggoy froze, then hefted up his SPNKr. “Ohhh! You want me to kill her! I was totally gonna do that in the first place!”
“Little Grunt, dead Grunt!” Chur’R-Ren screeched, grabbing a Needler from her side.
She unloaded a hailstorm of pink crystals upon Dipdip, but the Unggoy leaped into the air, taking flight with his jump pack. Althea didn’t waste the opportunity and fired her sidearm at the Shipmistress. Her traitorous teammate was quick to raise the shield gauntlet, causing the rounds to bounce off like pebbles. If she had full motor control of her human host’s face, Althea would’ve smirked. Ren had just unknowingly made herself vulnerable.
She switched to her Scatterbound Heatwave, a Forerunner weapon that could ricochet its hard light projectiles off of surfaces and track onto the nearest moving target. She fired the ancient weapon at a pine tree behind Red, and much to her satisfaction, the shells bounced off the wood, impacting directly with Ren’s back.
The Kig-Yar’s shields shattered, and she stumbled, caught off guard by the high-tech weaponry. Nevertheless, the avian leaped out of the way of another volley from Althea, this time managing to also avoid a rocket from Dipdip’s SPNKr as a bonus.
“Both of you die!” Ren hissed, letting her needles loose on Althea. The AI quickly barrel-rolled behind a nearby tree, watching as the crystal shards embedded themselves into the bark and exploded. Althea peeked out from cover and groaned - Ren’s new position had no trees behind her, which meant there was nothing for Althea’s Scatterbound to ricochet from.
“Scared?” Ren drawled.
Before Althea could give an answer, another rocket came down, this time connecting with Ren. The Kig-Yar’s squawk was drowned out by the deafening explosion, and all that remained after the smoke had cleared was a spattering of purple blood across the otherwise green clearing. Dipdip came down from the canopy with a thud, chuckling maniacally as he dumped out the empty canisters from his rocket launcher.
Well, that worked out better than I expected, Althea mused.
“Good job, Dipdip,” she congratulated in earnest, stowing her Heatwave.
“Of course I did a good job, I’m the greatest Unggoy Warlord still in the Banished!” he chirped matter-of-factly.
The Unggoy continued to reload his Rocket Launcher and snorted. “Say, back there I noticed ya look a lot like a Spartan. I don’t like Spartans.”
Althea attempted to pass it off as nothing more than an unfriendly comment, but nevertheless drew her Sidekick, reloading it in tandem with Dipdip.
“Actually, I’m not a Spartan at all. I’m an AI.”
“Ya don’t say!” Dipdip cackled, finishing loading his SPNKr. “The Created are AIs, ya know. And I don’t like them even more than I don’t like Spartans!”
Althea would’ve facepalmed her helmet if she wasn’t in imminent danger. While she wasn’t Created either, it was clear that there was no convincing this Unggoy of that. It was probably for the best, considering that he was Banished. She raised her pistol and fired as Dipdip took aim, hitting his left hand dead-on.
“Ouchies!” The Grunt squealed as he dropped his weapon. Several more bullets from Althea knocked off his helmet.
“You piss me off!” Dipdip roared, grabbing a plasma grenade from his belt as his jump-pack flared to life. The Unggoy launched himself at Althea with incredible speed, arms outstretched as he went in for the kill.
Bang!
One last shot was all it took for Althea to blow out Dipdip’s brains. Despite this, his lifeless body kept its momentum and slammed into her. Stumbling back, she cursed herself for being the only member of her team left alive - and to think that they had all killed each other with friendly fire!
A hissing sound seeped its way into her auditory sensors, and Althea stopped all her processes. Looking down, she saw Dipdip’s plasma grenade glowing a vibrant blue, and sticking right onto her harness.
“Oh sh-”
A blinding explosion engulfed the Executor-clad AI. Meanwhile, the birds continued chirping.
“-it! Why the fuck did that happen?!” The Announcer sputtered, turning to the broadcaster. “Was that supposed to happen? What’s the point of teams if they all kill each other?”
“I-” the broadcaster blurted, swiftly composing himself. The rest of the room seemed to be equally shocked. “The sponsors assured us that this wouldn’t happen. I’m just as surprised as you are.”
If it weren’t for the fact that his sponsors were funding the project, the Announcer would have cursed them out then and there. Standing up, he rubbed a hand on his forehead and sighed.
“Just… Just turn it off, alright? We can do that, right? Turn off friendly fire?”
The broadcaster nodded, then gave a thumbs-up to an employee on a lower tier of the room.
“It’s done.”
“Alright…” the Announcer said, collapsing back into his chair and pulling up the microphone. “Alright. Register the deaths and I’ll make the announcement.”
The broadcaster stepped down the stairs to the next tier to carry out the task while the Announcer got his bearings back. It was a small mistake. A tiny mishap. Something like this wouldn’t bring down the season, not on his watch.
“Greetings, contestants!” He chimed, his bubbly persona back in place. “Quick service announcement: because all of you are so incredibly eager to start killing, we’ve had to put some precautions in place. No more friendly fire, in case you get a bit trigger happy near your teammates. If you intend on testing that rule, be my guest. All I’m saying is that it’ll be a waste of ammo. That’ll conclude this announcement - time to get back to killing! And make sure you kill your enemies.”
2: Banished Competition[]
The energy sword arced through the frigid air and sliced in a sideways motion at Andra-D054’s neck, connecting with its target.
Kelvaaro 'Shrykar stood for a moment, panting with bated breath as his artificial heart pumped endorphins into his organic one. The wretched Spartan, who had introduced herself mere seconds after the last announcement, stared at him through her helmet as snowflakes danced around them, expression invisible to him. Her head remained attached to the rest of her body as if he hadn’t just attempted to decapitate her with one of his dual blades.
“What sort of trickery is this?” The Field Marshal snarled, making another slicing motion with his other energy sword. It too did no harm to her, merely bouncing off Andra’s neck as if a child had merely thrown an arum at her. He struck again.
And again.
And again.
Still, the Spartan stood there. Considering that she had made no attempt to stop him, she was clearly annoyed by his efforts. Kelvaaro conceded that the announcement just made was truthful. If it was made after this deathmatch had begun, then he deduced that friendly fire had already occurred between another fireteam. A shame that I was not fast enough to dispatch these Spartans I have been forced to work with. Truly whatever higher power may be despises me if they take away my limbs at the hands of one Demon and force me to fight alongside three more.
As for the other two Demons in question, Kelvaaro quickly snapped his head to the left. They both stood in the raging blizzard, weapons at the ready. The closer of the two was slimmer, had a prosthetic leg not unlike his own, and had its sidearm drawn. The further one wore a deep blue carapace and leveled some sort of automatic weapon at him. Kelvaaro huffed, already knowing the outcome.
“Well, Spartans?” He clicked his mandibles. “I await your rebuttal.”
The two Spartans immediately opened fire. As he suspected, the torrent of bullets merely bounced off him, ricocheting into the snow. He turned to the one named Andra, who barely managed to suppress a chuckle as the other two continued to unload their magazines into him. After another moment, the gunfire stopped.
“Any special reason ye just tried to chop the heid aff that Spartan multiple times, ye Banished scum?” the closest Spartan said in an accent that grinded against Kelvaaro's ears, the higher-pitched voice betraying her sex.
The Banished Field Marshal huffed, allowing his artificial heart to pump out more endorphins to calm himself. If he was truly stuck with these Demons, he would need to learn to cooperate with them for survival. I have put aside my differences with worse foes to achieve a common goal. Surely such a short lived alliance like this will be bearable.
“Forgive me for my impulsiveness,” he reverberated, deactivating his energy swords and placing them back on his hips. “I have had numerous problems with your kind in the past.”
“Great, another human-hating Hingehead,” the blue-clad Spartan voiced sarcastically, his lower tone making it clear he was male.
“I hold no ill will for humanity,” Kelvaaro clarified, “it is you Spartans that I have qualms with.”
“And why would that be?” Andra chimed in, speaking for the first time since before Kelvaaro had tried to decapitate her.
“Look at me,” the Sangheili warrior said, outstretching his prosthetic left arm before motioning down to his prosthetic legs. “All I will tell you is that the perpetrator did it with their bare hands.”
Andra froze for a moment. Despite being unable to see her face, Kelvaaro was sure that her expression was at least one of mild surprise beneath the helmet.
“So you think that saying sorry and telling a sob story are going to earn you forgiveness?” The blue Spartan scoffed. “After that charade you just pulled I say we leave you for the wolves. Three Spartans is more than enough to handle this.”
“Agreed. We should cut our losses,” the female Spartan affirmed.
Kelvaaro’s gaze darkened. For a moment he considered if there was any possible way to indirectly kill his teammates - such as environmental hazards. His train of thought was derailed when Andra crunched through the snow over to the other Spartans to voice her own opinion.
“Splitting up would be the worst thing to do right now,” she objected, “like it or not, we need as many fighters as possible on our side to ensure we get through this.”
“You’re siding with the Split Lip, kid? Over fellow Spartans?” the blue Demon huffed.
“Look, I know he just tried to kill me, but we need to have a level playing field with our opponents. I’ve worked with people who I once despised, and grew to trust them like friends. While I doubt that’ll happen with this Elite, he is willing to work with us. Plus, we now know that he can’t stab us in the back, literally or metaphorically. So let’s make things work for now and get the hell out of this blizzard so we can find some shelter.”
“Awright, but if he so much as gies me a dodgy look, I’m usin’ him as a meat shield,” the other female Spartan spat. “If we’re gonnae be workin’ thegither, we’ll need tae find oot each other’s names. A’ve already noticed ye're a Delta, surprisingly. A’m Ava Barclay.”
“How many fucking companies did those IIIs have?” The male Spartan cursed. It was all terms and rhetoric that Kelvaaro had no knowledge of.
“Spartan Corin Davis,” the blue-clad Demon said. “And the hingehead?”
“Kelvaaro ‘Shrykar,” the Sangheili rumbled.
“Would’ve thought the big proud Squidface would have a title with fancy armor like that?” Davis seethed, turning around to explore their surroundings.
“I know my audience,” Kelvaaro growled softly.
The blizzard had finally let up. Despite his field of vision finally clearing up, Maraudus's sense of smell had suffered the opposite effect. He could vividly smell the scents of the three individuals with him now. A Sword of Sanghelios commando adorned in vivid green armor trailed close behind him, curveblade at the ready. Maraudus recognized him as a notorious warrior of the Sangheili faction, known to many as the Outrider. The other two individuals with them referred to him as a Rora 'Marak.
Further back was a human - while not a Spartan, he was surprisingly tall - still diminutive in comparison to the Jiralhanae Chieftain’s stature. He wore no armor at all and carried nothing but a laughably small pistol and a briefcase on him. Noah Sówka was what he called himself. Surely the most pathetic member in this mismatched alliance with no protective gear on his person.
Bringing up the rear was a Spartan wearing a dull green harness. The wretched thing was named Marco-035 - such a pathetic name for a warrior so strong. Unfortunately, Maraudus seemed to be the odd one out in this regard - the other three all pledged allegiance to allied factions and were quick to warm up to each other. They were not so welcoming to the Banished Chieftain. Nevertheless, he proved useful to them. He could already smell the scent of other living beings in this frigid wasteland - their species was indiscernible, as the scent was too weak to give off any details.
He had led the group through the snow for about an hour before finally coming upon a place of interest. A hundred meters away lay the foundations for all-too familiar prefabricated structures, surrounded by a towering metal fence with several gates scattered around its perimeter. An outpost of some sorts belonging to none other than the Banished. Perhaps I will find some of my brothers there. And maybe they can eliminate these miserable creatures for me.
Maraudus motioned for the others to follow in his footsteps. “I may be able to find brothers-in-arms at that outpost. They could help… us.”
“You better not be leading us into a trap,” Sówka warned. “I’m all for diplomacy, but I’ll be damned if I get my head blown off by an ape.”
“Not if I blow its head off first,” Marco grunted, pushing ahead of the older man as if to place himself between Sówka and harm’s way.
“If you lie, there will be consequences,” Rora ‘Marak vocalized. “I may not be able to cut your skin with my blade, but rest assured, Chieftain, I will find a way to enact retribution.”
Maraudus snarled, but before he could retort he heard the clink of a foot on corrugated metal. Whipping around, he locked his gaze on an elevated landing pad in the center of the outpost.
“Any Banished here, show yourself. I am Chieftain Maraudus, and I command you to step forward!”
Slowly, a figure adorned in red armor plating came into view, stepping onto the landing pad from a staircase out of sight. Maraudus’s brow furrowed. This was no common Jiralhanae warrior like he expected - it was a Sangheili, no doubt a warlord of some kind. All of his limbs bar his left arm were prosthetic, and his face bore heavy scars. No blue dot was visible above his head, which meant he was undoubtedly on the opposing team.
“I don’t see a dot above his head…” Noah remarked. Marco responded by immediately raising his battle rifle to fire.
“Do not shoot!” Maraudus roared. To his surprise, the Spartan obeyed, but kept his weapon at the ready. While this unknown warrior was regrettably Sangheili, he was Banished. It was a stark improvement from the sworn enemies he had been tromping about with for the last hour.
“A Warlord, I presume?” Maraudus asked, taking a step toward the Sangheili.
“Field Marshal. Warlords answer to me,” the Sangheili stated coldly.
“I apologize, Field Marshal,” Maraudus emulated, performing a mocking bow. Another Sangheili outranking him. The Chieftain was not eager to serve another Takra ‘Ravakrae so soon.
“May I ask your name?” the Jiralhanae questioned gruffly.
“Kelvaaro ‘Shrykar,” the Field Marshal answered bluntly. Maraudus had heard that name before - Kelvaaro was a high-ranking Sangheili commanding a fleet back in the main galaxy, separate from Zeta Halo like Maraudus was.
“You must be the Marauder then,” Rora clicked, stowing his curveblade and reaching for his plasma rifles. “You have killed quite a few Swords of Sanghelios.”
“I could say the same about you and the Banished, Outrider,” Kelvaaro hissed, reaching for his own plasma rifles.
“Come now, there is little need to fight!” Maraudus bellowed. “Field Marshal, I plead to your sense of brotherhood. As a fellow warrior serving to honor the memory of Atriox, we can strike down our foes together!”
“Memory?” Kelvaaro faltered. “You mean to say the Warmaster is dead?”
Maraudus quickly realized his error. Only the Banished forces on Zeta Halo were aware of Atriox’s demise; Kelvaaro was not privy to this information.
“Enough of this,” Rora cut in, “the Marauder dies here.”
Noah and Marco were clearly in agreement with the statement as they leveraged their weapons at Kelvaaro. The Field Marshal sighed, then drew his rifles.
“Spartans, fire!”
A flash of silver light burst sprang to life near Maraudus, blinding him. He grunted as he felt two heavy objects collide with him, hearing his power armor burst under the pressure of the dual projectiles. The blinded Chieftain bellowed in rage, leaping to the right in the hopes of dodging any further projectiles. As he did so, he heard gunfire erupt.
Blinking rapidly, his vision soon returned, and Maraudus scrambled behind a large cargo crate for cover. Peeking out from his veil of protection, he could see Marco shielding Noah from the hailstorm of a blue Spartan, while Rora and Kelvaaro exchanged plasma fire with their dual-wielded rifles.
Another shot whizzed past Maraudus’s head, and he followed the trail of smoke to spot his would-be assassin. There.
Two more Spartans sat atop the roof of a nearby prefabricated barracks, both cradling sniper weapons as they lined up further shots. Already stripped of his power armor, Maraudus knew he was vulnerable and at a disadvantage at a distance. And that meant he would have to close the gap.
Grabbing his Ravager plasma tosser, the bulky warrior held down the trigger, charging up its secondary fire. When the weapon began shaking uncontrollably, he spun around from behind the crate, firing an incendiary plasma ball high into the air. It arced downwards and hit the barracks roof with a splat, blanketing the surface - and the Spartans with a thick coat of incendiary gel. As the two Spartans dropped their melted weaponry and leaped down from the barracks to avoid further burning, Maraudus pulled out his gravity mace, Star-Chainer, shouted a war cry, and charged towards them.
As he did so, Kelvaaro and Rora sprinted towards each other. In tandem, they fired their plasma rifles, melting each other’s shields in moments. All four plasma rifles overheated at once, and the two Sangheili tossed their now-useless firearms aside for melee combat. ‘Shrykar activated his energy swords and swung them forward, as ‘Marak drew his curveblade to parry. It only caught one of the two plasma blades, but the Outrider swiftly brought up a wrist-mounted energy dagger on his other hand to block the otherwise fatal blow from the other.
“Your death will bring peace to the Swords of Sanghelios you have killed,” Rora seethed through gritted mandibles, his expression behind his mask one of tranquil fury. With their blades locked, the Outrider took the opportunity to bring up his knee, jamming it into Kelvaaro’s chest. The Field Marshal stumbled back, and Rora swiftly lunged downwards, aiming to sever the Banished duelist’s prosthetic legs.
Much to his surprise, Kelvaaro leaped into the air with unparalleled height, no doubt a feat of his leg’s hydraulic processes. Rora began to bring his curveblade upwards, but found no purchase when Kelvaaro snapped his leg forward. The quick momentum of his opponent’s metal foot in a position that would be highly vulnerable for most duelists snapped Rora’s head back, and he was certain that he heard one of his mandibles crack in the process.
“I have suffered through the marshes of Yuk’narok,” Kelvaaro snapped, pushing forward with a flurry of slashes, “I have led armies of the highest caliber into battle for decades!”
Rora began to backpedal, resorting to a defensive stance to block Kelvaaro’s blows while he waited for an opening.
“I will not be finished by a young upstart,” the Marauder hissed, making a wide swing with his right arm. It was the opportunity Rora needed.
The Outrider ducked beneath the attack and swiftly brought his curveblade up, slashing through the right side of Kelvaaro’s chest. The Field Marshal howled in pain and fell back, only keeping his balance due to his prosthetic legs. His left hand splayed open, dropping its energy sword, but his right prosthetic hand continued to grip its blade.
Rora threw his right fist forward, energy dagger activating for a swift kill. Kelvaaro caught it with his left hand, but ‘Marak had anticipated that. He lunged forward with his curveblade, which found itself caught between the prongs of ‘Shrykar’s remaining energy sword. It was no matter. Rora could feel his opponent gradually losing the test of strength, and slowly but surely, his curveblade inched forward towards Kelvaaro’s neck.
“It seems that this young upstart has beaten your experience, Marauder.”
“You would be sorely mistaken.”
In a split second, the Field Marshal’s prosthetic hand spun around 360 degrees at the wrist. The motion caused his energy sword to wrench Rora’s curveblade out of his grip, and as it hit the snow with a soft crunch, Rora couldn’t help but feel like he had been cheated. The next second he felt a searing pain in his chest. The Outrider drew his last breath, and with that, collapsed to the ground. Kelvaaro clutched his wound before falling to his knees. Rora’s final blow had dug deep.
Meanwhile, Marco and Noah had slowly made their way over near the barracks where Maraudus had charged two of the three enemy Spartans. Spartan Davis was firing on them with his SAW, so Marco had instinctively used his own body as a shield to protect the far more vulnerable Sówka. Noah heard a roar from within the barracks and grimaced.
“Looks like the ape’s still kicking!” he shouted over the din. And indeed Maraudus was.
The Chieftain had caught the two Spartans with their guards down, barreling them through a wall straight into the Banished interior.
“Ava,” he heard the one on his left shout as the dust settled, “you alright?”
“Ah'm fine, Andra. Focus oan the brute, no' me.”
The Jiralhanae roared again as he stormed towards the one named Andra. She quickly drew two machine pistols, unloading their magazines into his giant mass. Despite the loss of his power armor, the diminutive bullets did nothing more than enrage Maraudus. He swung the Star-Chainer at her, only to connect with the wall as the Spartan dodged. The concussive force still blew her off her feet, but before he could finish her off, a projectile clipped his ear. He turned to see Ava pointing a sidearm at him, and suffered several more shots. The last one pierced through his right eye, and the half-blinded Jiralhanae resolved to kill her then and there.
He lunged at her with the Star-Chainer, forcing her back. He then slammed it into the ground, launching the Spartan into a control console. As sparks flew, Ava tried to stand, but Maraudus beat her down with a simple swat of his paw.
“Prepare to be smited by the Star-Chainer!” He raised his gravity mace to deliver the killing blow, but felt a heavy weight bear down on his shoulders. A hand tugged at his fur, pulling his head back. One moment he saw a glove gripping a gleaming knife, and then the next he was completely blind.
“What have you done!” Maraudus screamed, both eyes now gone. He felt Andra’s body and ripped her off, but a swift cut to one of the tendons in his arms caused him to drop her. Falling to his knees, he let out a cry of rage, but it quickly turned into pathetic gargling as the knife went across his throat.
Maraudus attempted to speak, but only wet squelching noises came out of his mouth. The once-proud Jiralhanae pitifully fell-face first into a pool of his own blood, succumbing to his wounds.
Andra couldn’t take the time to observe her handiwork, however. She heard a shout from Corin Davis, and sprinted out of the barracks to see him pinned to the ground by an enemy Spartan - Marco-035. The Delta dashed forward, barely registering the unaugmented man who towered over her. He raised his sidearm to fire, but her momentum and the weight of her Mjolnir easily shoved him out of the way. She body slammed Marco from behind, knocking him into a munitions shed.
As the Delta pounced on the Spartan-II to continue her assault, Corin slowly got back on his feet. He heard a clicking noise and locked eyes with Noah Sówka, who aimed a Magnum at him with one hand while holding a briefcase in the other.
“I don’t think you’d want to do that,” Corin said calmly, realizing that his shields were still down and his weapons had been knocked away from him during his tussle with Marco.
“Says the man who just unloaded a machine gun at me,” Noah pointed out, much to Corin’s chagrin. “I think I do want to do this.”
Corin dove forward, tucking his head between his arms to protect himself. Several bullets bounced off his armor, but one found its mark in his left bicep.
“Shit!” Noah exclaimed as the Spartan-IV landed at his feet. Ignoring his torn muscle, Corin leapt up, grabbing Noah’s pistol before he could fire. The Spartan squeezed, and what was once a hand holding a gun became little more than a blob of flesh and bone encased around twisted metal.
Noah screamed, but nevertheless threw up his remaining hand. The briefcase bounced off of Corin’s shoulder and he couldn’t help but chuckle at the desperate ploy. He grabbed the briefcase, wrenching it from Sówka’s hand, before slamming into the suited man’s forehead. Knocked back, the man surprisingly still stood. Nevertheless, Davis stepped forward swinging the suitcase around like a fist, smacking Noah several more times before the man finally keeled over, his head nothing more than a pile of mush.
“Told you that you didn’t want to do that,” Corin spat, dropping the briefcase.
A cry of pain turned his attention back to the fight at hand. Andra had shoved her knife through Marco’s left hand for bountiful results. The Spartan-II sidestepped a punch from the Delta, taking the opportunity to tear the blade out of his spasming hand rather than attack. Andra lunged forward again, but Marco backflipped out of reach. Sticking a perfect landing, he threw Andra’s knife back at her.
The sharp edge found its mark, embedding itself in her shoulder, and the Spartan-III stifled a yell, her hand rushing to pull out the knife. The action exposed Andra, and Marco took full advantage of it by wrapping his arms around her and suplexing the younger Spartan. Dazed, she could only struggle as Marco grabbed her head with both hands from behind, planting a knee on her back to pin her down.
“I’m sorry about this,” he said earnestly, slowly twisting her head to one side as she struggled to resist. “I really am.”
With a sickening snap, Marco twisted Andra’s neck 180 degrees, and her body went limp. Taking his knee off her spine, he stood up to find himself visor-to-visor with Davis, standing fifteen meters away from him.
“Killing your own kind…” The Spartan-IV muttered, “bastard of a Spartan you are, eh?”
“I did what I had to,” Marco retorted, unslinging his shotgun. Corin stepped forward, drawing a combat knife. Marco sighed, pumping his shotgun with extreme difficulty due to the severed nerves in his left hand.
Corin charged, closing the distance all too quickly. Marco fired, his pellets instantly breaking his foe’s shields. Corin staggered, allowing Marco to deliver a roundhouse kick to his helmet. The Spartan-IV’s visor cracked, and he went down like a brick. Marco’s shields had yet to regenerate, which was a tad bit annoying. As he slowly pumped his shotgun again to deliver the coup de grâce, he heard a groan. He cocked his head towards the barracks where Andra had killed his Jiralhanae teammate, watching as yet another enemy Spartan emerged from the entrance.
Ava Barclay stood defiant, gripping Maraudus’s Star-Chainer mace as she surveyed the carnage. She stopped upon noticing Andra’s corpse and breathed in deeply.
“Am gan tae splatter yer blood ower the snow,” she declared calmly in a thick Scottish accent.
No sooner had she said that than the Gamma bounded forward, sprinting in Marco’s direction like a skinwalker. He fired another shell, breaking her shields, but unlike Davis, the Spartan-III was unfazed. Realizing that with his injured hand he wouldn’t be able to pump his shotgun and fire fast enough to take her out, Marco cursed to himself with resignation.
“Ah hell.”
Ava hit him square in the chest, a deafening boom overtaking the outpost. Without his energy shields, Marco’s chest exploded from the sheer force of the blow, causing his head and limbs to go flying in all directions. His Mark VII helmet flew off and careened out of sight, while his limbs painted the surrounding snow red.
Ava panted angrily, turning to Corin. Noticing that he was still alive, she stepped over, offering him a hand. Her fellow Spartan immediately took it, hoisting himself up and grabbing his left bicep with a sharp intake of breath. Around them lay the corpses of their enemies - others who were forced to fight in this cruel deathmatch.
“Shit,” Corin muttered, looking at Andra’s lifeless body. Ava followed his gaze, realizing that the blue dot over her head had disappeared. She was well and truly dead. A deep, throaty grumble from further away caught her attention, and Ava turned to see a blue dot as Kelvaaro ‘Shrykar slowly rose from the ground, nursing a gash along the side of his chest.
It wasn’t fair. Why did that Sangheili bastard get to survive, and not a fellow Spartan? Ava winced as the pain of several broken ribs came rushing in; a clear sign that her adrenaline had worn off. There was only one thought on her mind now.
“Fuck this bleedin' place.”
3: Eccentricity[]
“Orders.”
Alexander Redford stifled a groan. The Mgalekgolo a few meters away from him waited patiently, seemingly staring into his soul with the yellow lights atop it. It was unlike any Hunter he had ever seen before. Its armor was far more angular than the smooth plating he normally saw the behemoth warriors equipped with, and the shield was a honey-combed structure that looked like it was human-manufactured instead of Covenant-made.
Alexander’s theory was only lent more credence by the fact that the Hunter’s right arm was affixed with a UNSC grenade launcher and two machine guns rather than the traditional fuel rod cannon. It’s highly unlikely that a Hunter would do this to itself - therefore, the augmentations must have been done by human hands. Either some Innies made an alliance with these guys, or ONI decided to cross-weaponize them.
Upon awakening an hour ago, the BRUTUS agent had found himself face to face with the hulking gestalt - an experience that was new, even for a veteran ONI operative like him. Alex had instinctively planned to open fire, but after a further announcement stating that “friendly” fire was no longer possible, he decided to temper himself to stay on whatever good side this creature may have had. Two other alien beings had woken in the forest clearing alongside them, but neither were as imposing as the nearly four meter tall creature.
Since then, Alexander had been forced to wait in the clearing. The other two aliens - a Sangheili and some sort of robotic construct - Forerunner in nature, he assumed - were quite hostile and refused to interact with him. The Lekgolo colony had initially shown no interest either, so the BRUTUS operative was faced with two choices - either venture deeper into the forest by himself to be killed by whatever enemies had been thrust upon him in this “Survival of the Fittest” competition, or remain here.
As much as he wanted to reconnoiter the island to figure out what hellhole he had been teleported to by this Announcer figure, Alexander knew that the safer option was to remain here - even if the aliens weren’t friendly, at least they couldn’t hurt him, not for a lack of trying. If any enemy contestants came across them, his teammates would have to fight, and with a Hunter on his side, he doubted many foes would cross them unscathed.
That brought him back to the matter at hand. The human-modified Mgalekgolo had finally taken an interest in him a few minutes ago - it seemed to stare at something on his helmet before blurting out the word “orders” using a translating device.
While the English word confirmed that it was tinkered with by humans, it still didn’t confirm who augmented it. It had spent the last few minutes repeating the word in its cold, monotone voice, much to Alexander’s annoyance.
“Orders,” it clicked for the eighth time.
“Apologies,” Alex said, hoping that the Mgalekgolo was still susceptible to the polite facade that he had fooled so many of his own kind with over the years. After all, if it hadn’t painted him over its shield yet, perhaps he could negotiate with it. “I would love to know what you want, but I don’t know who you are, who outfitted you with UNSC-grade military weaponry, or where this Mors Insula island is. Perhaps you could be cooperative and specify what exactly it is that you want?”
The Hunter rumbled, stretching out its left arm and its shield. For a moment he thought he had pissed the beast off, and that it would renege on its decision to keep him alive - if friendly fire wasn’t disabled by the Announcer’s words. Instead, it lightly tapped him on the side of his recon helmet, almost like a person would pat their dog on the head.
“Office of Naval Intelligence,” it vocalized.
Alex lifted an eyebrow. Intriguing.
“ONI,” he said, exhaling a breath that he didn’t realize he was holding, “you are familiar with them?”
“Affirmative.”
“Do you work alongside them?” Alex questioned, choosing his words carefully. He knew of a handful of ex-Covenant operatives in the office that took offense to the notion of working for humans rather than alongside them.
“Affirmative.”
Redford smirked. Section Three’s been busy, then. But things made sense now - at least regarding the Mgalekgolo. It had been asking him for orders, no doubt, due to being a likely ONI pet project. He had the Office’s logo on the side of his helmet, so the man deduced that the Hunter had suddenly become interested in him after taking notice of it. Not that he would complain - a potential Hunter bodyguard was quite the appeasing prospect, even though he himself was quite proficient in combat.
“You have a name?” Redford inquired.
“Bulwark. Mori.”
“As in Memento Mori?” he asked.
“Memento. Bond-brother,” the Mgalekgolo emulated.
“Right,” Redford murmured, “you guys have twins. Where’s Memento?”
“Unknown,” Mori clacked, before rumbling mournfully in its own language.
Before Alex could continue his questioning, he heard a snarl from behind. He drew his combat knife and spun around, only for the blade to bounce off the golden harness of a lumbering Sangheili. The splitjaw looked down on him with disdain.
“Keep your voice low, filth,” the Sangheili growled, “you could draw unwanted attention to us.”
“My condolences to your meditation session,” Redford said, sheathing his knife. “So you finally decided to stop giving me sidelong glances just to tell me to be quiet?”
“If I could, I would have impaled you on my blade an hour ago,” the Sangheili hissed.
Mori stepped forward menacingly, emitting a low rumble towards the Elite. “Cease.”
The hingehead stood his ground, unfazed by the gestalt that towered over him. “I have killed your kind with my bare hands in the arena, Lekgolo. Your attempts at intimidation will provide no fruits.”
“If that’s all you have to say-” Redford started before the Sangheili interrupted.
“Unfortunately, this Announcer figure seems quite dedicated to ensuring we work as allies. After having time to dwell on it, the only favorable course of action is to work alongside each other until we find the root of this death game and pull it out from the soil it festers in.”
The Elite was finally coming around to his senses. Alex liked that. The ONI agent extended a hand, offering it to the Sangheili Warrior.
“Pleasure,” he lied, “my name is… Caesar. And yours?”
The Sangheili looked at Alexander’s hand with disgust. “Bleza 'Kopal.”
At least it was progress. Redford’s attention was snatched by movement in the corner of his eye. The quadrupedal Forerunner construct had approached the group, seemingly curious about their congregation. The BRUTUS agent got on his knees to observe the creature closer as it crawled towards them.
He spied what seemed like a dog tag hanging around its neck, and waited for the automaton to draw near. As it did, he couldn’t help notice how much it moved like a dog - despite having two large, ant-like mandibles and two dorsal fins on its back. It finally moved close enough that he could grab the tag. Turning it over, he read a name printed in English.
“Nishana…” he whispered, prompting the quadruped to assume a sitting position. Curious, Redford stood up and stepped back a few paces. To his surprise, the construct followed. While few things in his line of work qualified as such, the ONI operative couldn’t help thinking that it was cute - in an alien sort of way.
“Now all I need to know is what this thing could be…” he trailed off.
“A Promethean Crawler,” Bleza ‘Kopal stated, “they once served my Supreme Commander, Jul ‘Mdama, before betraying him and joining the ranks of the Created.”
“Created?” Redford wondered aloud. And Jul ‘Mdama being a Supreme Commander now? Alex had heard of the Sangheili being detained by ONI back in 2553, but he had escaped somehow. In the two years since, there hadn’t been so much as a word about the Sangheili out on the frontier.
“When did Jul ‘Mdama become a Supreme Commander exactly?”
“2553 by your human calendar,” Bleza snapped, “but he did not make his return known to your kind until 2557.”
“Impossible,” Redford said bluntly, “it’s 2555 right now.”
“2558, human,” ‘Kopal growled, before his eyes widened ever so slightly. The two came to a realization at this moment and shifted around.
“So the Announcer’s been pulling us from different points in time,” Redford hypothesized, “Would you be so kind as to educate me on what these Created are?”
“If I must,” Bleza snorted indignantly. The Sangheili turned, beckoning for the BRUTUS infiltrator to follow.
“I recommend we leave this area. Staying in one place is a fool’s gambit.”
“Agreed.”
As the four odd individuals moved out, and Bleza began monologuing about the escapades of Jul ‘Mdama’s new Covenant remnant and its relations to the Created uprising, Alexander felt a weird sense of excitement. Killing was what he excelled in - so if his task was to kill, he would do so, with extreme prejudice. Better yet, having a Hunter bodyguard, a Crawler following him like a lost dog, and a Sangheili warrior of extreme caliber would only improve his odds. Victory was already in sight.
4: An Unfair Universe[]
From the moment Candidate G174 had come to her senses on the lakeshore, her every muscle tensed like coiled springs, ready to snap. Just a few steps away, hardly out of arms’ reach, stood two of the alien monsters who’d burned her world and sent her fleeing across the stars.
The most readily apparent creature drew all eyes to it by virtue of size alone; a mountain of coal-black fur clad in burnished gold armor, so tall the frill of its gleaming, open-faced helm scraped the lowest branches hanging over them. The Brute must’ve been nigh ten feet tall, and gripped the curved handle of a studded gravity mace like G174 might’ve held a reed switch, ready to whip through the air fast enough to whistle. The flicker in its red eyes, glittering in the shadow of the branches and it’s helmet’s brow, promised easy violence.
The other, with its back to the water, could only be considered small in comparison. A hooded brown cloak obscured the inhuman proportions of a figure taller than even grown Spartan supersoldiers, but trailed to tattered edges to reveal an Elite’s digitigrade legs and four-fingered hands at its sides. One of the latter clutched the tarnished but ornately-wrought handle of an energy blade, its emitters dormant for the moment. The hood also stretched forward unnaturally to follow a forward-curving neck, with reptilian slits in the gold eyes peering from beneath.
And somehow it was the other human standing in their company who shocked her the most.
Kitted out in black body armor and ballistic plates, leveling a bulky submachine gun and snub-nosed sidearm in either hand at the aliens, was another Gamma. Her own teammate. Bless-G189—but twice her age, at least.
It was difficult to tell, at first. Especially with the neck of her black ops gear rolled up to meet the dark bangs she’d grown long—in what time, G174 couldn’t say. But the longer the silent standoff endured, the more certain she became, and with it came a sickening thought.
No. Not again. Her breathing came faster as G174 felt a helpless frustration claw its way out of the grave she’d dug for it in her mind. It can’t have happened again.
As the Announcer’s second broadcast echoed over the lake and died away, however, the grown Spartan relaxed enough to cast her first real look G174’s way. The recognition and confusion melting the hard look in her eyes all but confirmed it before she even spoke.
“Erin?” Bless asked.
Erin felt her eyelids swelling as tears threatened to force their way up. Erin-G174 had once been Erin-B110, a member of the SPARTAN-III company preceding Bless. Until a single, chance medical issue, totally beyond of her control, had stopped her from continuing her training. She’d been frozen in cryosleep for years while a cure was found, and when she woke, all her friends had grown up, gone off to war, and died. The few members of Beta who’d survived were half a dozen years her senior, and worse than total strangers.
Now, here was Bless, all grown up too.
What’d happened? Erin didn’t remember going into cryo again. Had her condition relapsed? How long had it been this time, and where were the rest of Gamma Company?
She gritted her teeth. It wasn’t fair. But then, the universe wasn’t fair, and it could never be unfair in Erin’s favor, could it? The universe took her home and her first chance at being a Spartan. Now it wanted to take away her second chance, the one lucky roll of the dice she’d had. Well, screw that.
Erin had seized on that second chance, and she wasn’t going to crumple in on herself and give up. She forced down the lump in her throat to answer. “Yeah. It’s me.”
“How are you…” Bless started to ask, but then the Elite shifted, and Bless’ hand tightened on the sidearm she pointed its way.
The Elite halted and, after a moment’s consideration, raised an open hand. Not the one clutching the energy sword, Erin noticed. A voice altogether softer than she expected left the alien’s mandible-ringed mouth. “If you will permit—let me be the first to offer an open hand. I know not what power brought us here, nor where precisely we are. I suspect we all share in this position. But whatever had the power to do so, that voice speaks for it. It wants us to be allies, and until we know more, I suspect it would be safest to obey its command.”
Bless narrowed her eyes. “I’ve worked with a few of your kind before. One at a time. In controlled circumstances. But here? Two of you, for m—our allies? I don’t leave my back open for things like you to watch. I kill things like you.”
The Sangheili tightened its mandibles, but Erin felt the greater offense was toward her. She doesn’t trust me to watch her back, either. And what was that about working with them?
Any response the Elite may have given died as the mountain of fur and muscle moved. For all the discipline a Spartan trainee was supposed to have, seeing the shaggy giant leap between them so quickly made her prey instincts flip from mistrust to panic.
“Enough!” rumbled the Brute, a meaty paw raised to either of them. Erin noticed both hands were empty—the power mace hung at its belt beside a Spiker—but it pleased her to see the Elite had jumped like she had nonetheless. “The noblewoman is right. Unless any of us carry a weapon which can silence that voice in the sky, I see no way to strike back at our captors. The only way forward is to learn more of where we are, and we stand a better chance of doing so together. We are a pack now.”
“And after we’ve figured it out?” Bless stated, suggesting more than asking.
The Jiralhanae shrugged. “I cannot know what the future will bring, any more than you. I can but pledge my word you will be treated honorably, should circumstance pit us against one another.”
“That’s not enough to make me trust you.” Bless stated. But then her SMG’s barrel dipped. “But I don’t see a better offer coming out of the bushes.”
“Then you may count on the strength of Chieftain Rasyuus of the Bloodmoon Clan,” he stated, straightening up.
The Elite took a few cautious steps forward, just to the edge of the Jiralhanae’s reach. “You knew me for a noblewoman. How is this?”
Rasyuus bowed his head, beyond even what he needed to look down on her. “Intuition, in truth. You may not wear a Keep Mistress’ gown, and mask your speech well. But who except an aristocrat would think first of diplomacy among such company?”
As the aliens spoke, Bless stalked to Erin’s side, both hands still on her SMG. “Stay close to me,” she whispered.
Erin wrinkled her nose. In Gamma’s training, she’d always been the one protecting the younger candidates, her experience as a Beta trainee warning the others of the pitfalls and traps hidden in every exercise. Bless, their team, the whole company. Why should Bless being older now change that? “I can look after myself.”
“With what?”
Her jaw tightened. All her new teammates were armed—with swords, and guns, and maces. But her own hands were empty.
Erin hurriedly patted down her black trainee fatigues, certain she would’ve been left with something. But every pouch in her cargo trousers felt empty, until she met resistance in her right pocket. Seizing it, Erin turned over her hand to find… a bent slip of folded paper.
Undoing the fold, she read: This isn't Onyx. This isn't a test. Trust no one. Good luck, firebird.
Good luck. That was it? Erin almost bit through her tongue in fury. Who the hell had written this? Who knew about Onyx and would throw her into… whatever this contest was? Commander Ambrose? Colonel Ackerson?
The note crumpled in her balled fist, but fortunately, before Bless could see her frustration, the Sangheili addressed them all.
“If we mean to find our bearings,” said the noblewoman, pointing over Erin’s head. “I can see no better place to do so than that.”
Each turned, though Bless only did so by half while she glanced across her shoulder, to see through a gap in the trees above. Away from the lakeshore, the forest rose into steep hills. Gleaming atop the nearest was an outcrop of steel-sided buildings, a furnace-red glow tinting the shadows of its ribbed walls. A square tower rose from their center. The Elite was right; there would be no better place to get the lay of the surrounding land.
Rasyuus flared his nostrils and nodded. “Then lead on, Lady 'Zulmar.”
The cloaked Sangheili crossed between her comrades, and Bless neither stepped aside nor flinched as she passed close. While ‘Zulmar forged a trail through the ferns, following the lake’s edge while remaining under the tree cover, Bless stared Rasyuus down, waiting on him to go next.
The Jiralhanae clicked one of the long lips over his canines, as if disappointed. He spared a glance at Erin, however, and said, “You, child. Have you any arms to bear?”
Erin held out her hands.
Rasyuus grunted, then reached up to undo a strap over his shoulder. He unslung a weapon with a violet stock and readouts and fins glowing radioactive green near its trigger; a Covenant Carbine, like the ones Erin had seen demonstrated in Camp Currahee’s ranges. Turning it around, Rasyuus held it out toward Erin.
Bless stepped in front of her like a shield. “She doesn’t need your unwieldy plastic garbage. She needs a weapon she knows.” The Spartan operative began to unsling her own backup weapon. It was an MA5K, the cut-down assault rifle every SPARTAN-III trained with.
Erin spared a moment to wonder where Bless thought this would lead. Always doing two things—fighting their enemies and protecting her, giving only half her attention to both. So what she did next, Erin did for Bless’ good as much as for her own pride.
Shoulder-checking the hand occupied with the MA5K’s strap, Erin stomped forward to snatch the carbine from Rasyuus’ paw, then spun around. Already checking over the alien weapon herself, she then pulled the loosed MA5K from Bless’ hands, and set off down the path after ‘Zulmar.
Rasyuus chuffed. “She’s bolder than you are.”
Bless overcame her surprise enough to answer, “She always was.”
Not caring to explain, she set off after Erin with Rasyuus bringing up the rear.
“Looks like nobody’s home,” said Bless, scanning the outpost with the visor of her optic headset down over her eyes.
The lake had fed into a river cutting a gorge through the hills, making their path easy until finally ascending toward the outpost. It was a long climb for all of them, but Erin still couldn’t help feeling the break they took when they neared the top was on her account. More than the aliens from high-gravity planets and the augmented Spartan, anyway. The four of them lurked in the shadows of the treeline across fifty meters of open ground from the outermost structures.
Crouched beside her, Lady ‘Zulmar peered over their cover of a fallen log. “I see no signs of battle. Surely its builders did not leave this fort without cause?”
Drumming his claws on his mace’s handle, Rasyuus commented, “Unless the masters of these games can make others disappear as easily as they brought us here.”
“A comforting thought.” replied ‘Zulmar.
Bless tapped a button on her optic set, and the visor covering her eyes slid up over her forehead. “I don’t like this,” she said. “It feels like a trap, but I’m not seeing the bait.”
“If you expect a trap, but know not where it lies, nor who has set it for you, does it not align with the definition of paranoia?” ‘Zulmar posited.
“Alright,” Bless huffed. “Why don’t you go out first, then?”
‘Zulmar opened her mandibles, closed them, and rested on her knee to further contemplate the silent outpost baking under the sun.
“To go back now would be folly.” stated Rasyuus. “We will have wasted our energy on the climb, and be no better off than when we started.” The Chieftain sighed. “I will scale the tower and return. If any foe lies in wait within, you can move to counter them.”
“You trust us so far as to do so?” ‘Zulmar purred—coyly, but with genuine surprise.
“I must,” the Jiralhanae said. “Either you do, and prove yourselves my allies, or you break faith with me, and I would be better served on my own.”
“Much as I like the idea of literally sending you out on a limb,” Bless interjected, the visor back over her eyes failing to hide a smile, “you might not want to go up there in bright gold armor. It’s going to shine so much, anyone around here for klicks is going to pick it up.”
Rasyuus sighed. “Then if I must, I will remove the armor.”
“Taking how long, in a combat zone, walking into what might be a trap?” Bless shook her head. “Be my guest.”
“Then I’ll do it.” Erin grumbled before Rasyuus could reply.
Bless’ smile inverted as she turned. “Hang on, that’s—”
“You’re right, Rasyuus is too conspicuous. No one’s going to see me.” Erin seized on the point Bless herself had raised. She wasn’t going to be treated like some little kid. “I can already see my way up. All I have to do is hand-jam up the structural ribbing. Like the crevices in the climbing cliff back home.”
“And if someone does see you?”
“Then you’ll cover me, same as you would him.” Erin busied herself shouldering the carbine on her back alongside the MA5K. “Now get ready, we’re wasting time.”
There was a speechless moment as Erin prepared to hurdle the log which she hoped would last. But Bless interrupted it with a tired, “Wait… here.”
The black half-moon shape of Bless’ optical visor was thrust into Erin’s field of vision.
“If you’re going up there, you should get a good scan.” Bless said, resigned. With a grateful nod, Erin strapped it around her neck, then hurried off down the treeline.
She only broke free of the trees after getting far enough away to prevent giving away her teammates’ position, dashing across the open ground between them and the outpost. The last branches slipped out of her peripheral vision, and she was in plain sight of any who might be watching. Long seconds passed with nothing but the grass beneath her feet for cover.
But then Erin felt the cool touch of the first building’s shade, and slid home into the first alley. Beyond the pounding of her heart after the sprint, nothing broke the silence.
Picking herself up, Erin flashed a thumbs-up back toward the woods, and delved deeper between the steel-sided buildings.
Doorways wide enough for a Warthog stood open at peculiar points in the unfamiliar architecture around her. Passing every one, Erin was sure some monster would spring out at her through the furnace-red glow from within, but none ever did. She reached the base of the tower and began to climb.
Her ascent went exactly to plan; her open hand fit into the slim channels scrawled up and down the tower’s sides, and balling the hand into a fist wedged it in the tiny crevices, giving her a handhold. Pulling herself up arm-over-arm was exhausting, and twice she had to pause. Despite the bite of the skin between her knuckles and the wall, it gave her the rest she needed to make each new leg of the climb.
Twice clambering around the square tower’s corners to find the best purchase, Erin finally hauled herself up by itching, aching arms onto a platform at its top. Safe from both gravity and prying eyes below, she allowed herself a minute to lay prone on the deck, groaning miserably.
The sun-heated metal stung her unprotected scalp, but through her fatigue sleeves, the warmth relaxed her overworked arms. In time, Erin opened her eyes and gazed without standing across the platform’s surface to its edge, and out onto whatever world lay beyond it.
In the direction the visor would point to as north, Erin saw the river valley cut a fold through rolling, tree-topped hills out to the nearby sea, and the water stretched out as a solid plane out to the horizon. Managing to turn her head, she saw the coast continued west, curving back on itself briefly to almost meet… what Erin could momentarily describe only as a blue aurora rising from the ground.
A wide stretch of the horizon was obscured by a glittering, transparent wall of blue, its upper edge fading as it stretched into the sky. Pushing herself into a sitting position and righting her vision, Erin realized it was a massive energy barrier, like those used by the Covenant, walling off an area best measured in city blocks.
She needed a better look. Climbing to her feet, she pulled the O/I visor on its strap up and over her eyes.
The movement saved her life.
A searing beam of violet light suddenly flashed up from the ground below, passing an inch in front of her face—and straight through the visor. Heat and a spatter of melted plastic and wiring registered in the next instant, and Erin fell backwards, screaming and clutching her face as the visor fell away in neat halves.
A sickening instant passed where Erin wondered where the platform’s edge was, and which way she’d fallen—before her back came down hard on the hot metal of the deck. She might have been thankful to be alive, if the cooling droplets of plastic and copper weren’t fusing to her skin.
Erin writhed blindly, eyes shut tight as she tried to scrape away the molten flecks with her fingers, breathing heavily. She dared open one eye, then another, and found she could see blood and soot on her fingertips. Her face was probably a mess.
From her low angle, Erin couldn’t see the treetops over the platform’s rim. That was her one bit of luck; it kept her out of her attacker’s line of sight. But not taking chances, she wriggled away, her back flush with the deck until she felt herself reach the corner of the central spire, as far from any danger as she could be.
Wiping the smeared blood and carbon on her sleeve, Erin wondered exactly what the hell she was going to do now.
“Did he get her?”
Frank Holloman squinted through the tactical goggles of his Marine-surplus body armor, peering through the trees at the forest’s edge at the Banished outpost tower. “Hard to tell. It was close, but I can’t confirm a body. She fell back onto the platform.”
“Well, damn,” said the old man. “I’m sure as shit not gonna be the one to climb up and find out. Should’ve known a Jackal would get twitchy.”
Frank brought his attention back down to the hollow where he’d taken cover with two other men. He and the Spartan in green, red, and yellow MJOLNIR had their automatic rifles braced on the rim of their impromptu foxhole, pointed readily toward the Banished outpost. Their other comrade, however, slouched comfortably on his back beside them.
The pale-looking geezer had to be at least seventy, but seemed perfectly comfortable in a similar model of body armor to Frank’s own, if without the modifications Frank had started on when he began his mercenary career. Without a helmet, the man wore a flat newsboy cap and an apparently permanent crease of a smile, despite his gripes.
The old-timer who’d introduced himself as Tobias Lensky had seemed affable to Frank, at first. When they’d all dropped out of thin air on the hillside, it was Tobias who managed to smooth out nerves and get them all on the same page, even the sniper rifle-carrying Jackal. But it’d never so much as flickered, even when he proposed setting up the ambush just outside the outpost, telling them all it’d be a natural place for others to try and get a lookout point.
He’d been right on the money about that. But how pleased the old guy looked about it was starting to tug at alarm bells in Frank’s head.
“Erin!” A woman’s shout came from some ways south down the treeline. “Stay put if you can hear me! We’re coming for you!”
Lensky rolled over, taking more of an interest, and pulled a Chatter out of his breast pocket. “Well, they certainly seem to think she’s alive. Nelc, you read me? Keep a spare eye on that tower, in case the girl pops up again.”
From his perch in one of the taller trees at the forest’s edge, the Kig-Yar answered through the connection Tobias had managed to jury-rig. “Prey sighted. Angry. Makes for stupid mistakes.”
Nelc cut their connection without another word.
“He doesn’t like me, that one.” Tobias said, still smiling as he put away the Chatter.
Frank huddled down closer over his GTS-12 rifle, trying to wait out the last seconds before inevitable engagement patiently. “You don’t think it’s because you told him to shoot a kid, do you?”
Tobias’ smile only deepened, cracking open to reveal teeth. “No, no. That’s not bothering you now, is it? If you turn down jobs because uncomfortable things like a few kiddies getting hurt might happen, you’re not gonna last long as a mercenary.”
Frank maintained his careful firing position. “I’m not saying I’d walk away from the table on it. Just acknowledging what we’re doing is kinda fucked up, is all.”
Lensky nodded. “Good to keep touch with reality like that, but I don’t see it that way. You heard the voice of the mighty sky-god. We’re here to fight to the death for someone’s amusement. Games like that are only amusing if everyone’s got something to bring to the table. I don’t know who that Erin girl was, but its credits to star cruisers she’d put a knife in you without batting an eye.”
Frank supposed he had a point, and was halfway to an answer when the Spartan’s voice emanated from his armor’s speaker.
“Contact.”
Frank and Tobias both turned their heads to follow the Spartan’s gaze. To their right, closer to the forest edge, the ferns and brush were stomped underfoot by a massive shape in gleaming armor. It moved at incredible speed between the trunks and treacherous roots. Another figure sprinted in its wake, having to vault the obstacles the larger cleared in stride.
Frank gingerly adjusted his aim so he wouldn’t shake the ferns concealing them. “Alright, zeroing—”
“Hold it,” Tobias interrupted. “Wait until they’re in prime range. Nelc’s gonna soften them up for us.”
Another of those red flags hit the top of its pole in Frank’s head. He certainly didn’t remember any discussion with Nelc about that. But, on the other hand, the size and speed of that charging figure didn’t make him keen on drawing its attention to him on the ground instead of Nelc up high in the safety of the tree.
Rasyuus pounded forward through the sparse forest toward the source of the particle beam shot, the cover of trunks and boughs a blur to him. The sniper had calculated well; when his allies had expected a trap within the outpost, this enemy expected its targets to be drawn to the obvious landmark, and placed himself to ensnare those who approached it.
The hard cover of the outpost lay too far across open ground to reach, and would only serve to bottle up his team. Falling back and abandoning the human girl would leave his team down by one, and easier for other rivals to fall upon later. Facing an impossible situation, Rasyuus did the best thing he could think of to throw off a confident enemy: he attacked.
It was rash; he hadn’t waited to discuss it with his allies, and heard only the lighter steps of the human trailing behind him. But even his recklessness was calculated.
As he pumped his powerful arms for balance, the gravity mace swinging from one hand, lethal violet beams sizzled through the foliage around him. Charging through the trees instead of the open ground gave him cover, but the marksman was methodical. When they took shots, it was when they had a chance of hitting, and several found their mark. The energy shielding in Rasyuus’ war chieftain armor held—for now.
Suddenly the steady rhythm of the sniper’s ability to place shots missed a beat. He was waiting for something, Rasyuus knew.
A look ahead confirmed it; dappled light met the forest floor in wide pools where the canopy was thin and patchy. The moment he stepped into the light, the next shots would break his shields and burn holes through his flesh.
Once again, when his possible options presented him with only failure, Rasyuus opted for the impossible one.
At the next trunk, Rasyuus kicked off from its gnarled roots to leap sideways, changing course abruptly outside of where the sniper expected him to be. The jump carried him clear of the forest’s edge—into the base’s ring of open ground.
Rasyuus knew he had no time. The sniper would adjust and have a clear shot. But Rasyuus had a sense of their timing, now. Charging unhindered across the grass, he guessed at when the sniper would ready for their next shot, and jinked sideways again.
The shot came as he expected, overloading his weakened energy shield and slashing through his shoulder—instead of his forehead. Rasyuus landed nimbly on his other foot.
Just in time for the second shot to burn through his chest.
Rasyuus wheezed through locked canines and tasted blood come up with his breath. The shot had punctured one of his lungs. He’d not been prepared for another so quickly; it must have been one of the older particle beam rifles this marksman wielded. The rifle would cool for two more shots before he could reach cover.
He looked up at the tree ahead—he still couldn’t see the marksman, no telltale shine of an optical visor or glowing laser sight to guide him. But Rasyuus hadn’t drawn close just so he could look at them.
Taking another long step forward, Rasyuus raised the gravity mace over his head and hurled it like a javelin—straight into the trunk of the sniper’s perch.
A deafening thoom echoed over the hills as the shock field generators engaged, and the base of the tall pine erupted into a cloud of splinters. Wood fibers split, and the weight of the branches drove the remainds down through any last supporting timber.
Creaking and snapping, the pine toppled sideways into the forest, branches scraping through those of its former neighbors like a comb. If the sniper uttered any shout of surprise, it was lost in the crash of the tall trunk shaking the ground.
Rasyuus gasped for breath, waiting for another particle beam to needle him—but none came.
The last of the falling tree’s echoes died away, and the slender human who’d been following the Brute had just caught up with him when Tobias snarled, “Fire!”
All three men opened up, Frank and the Spartan with their rifles and Tobias with a long-barreled autopistol. The pair below couldn’t have made easier targets, in the open and standing still as they watched the effects of their handiwork.
Armor-piercing rounds whizzed into the sod, ripping dark earth from under the grass and wine-dark blood from under the Brute’s hide.
Enough metal passed down-range to put down ten men, but annoyingly, the giant Brute only turned to offer them his broad back. He remained standing, and pulled his companion into the protection of his own shadow.
Frank’s magazine clicked dry, and he went for another. The Spartan’s rifle followed suit, and then Lensky’s pistol. More gunfire crackled before Frank had jammed the new magazine home, and suddenly had to crawl backwards as returning fire sprayed him with kicked-up dirt.
In the field, the Brute’s human companion had leveled a submachine gun to loose tight bursts from the cover his body offered.
“They’ve marked our position,” the Spartan asserted. “Fall back, just like we planned.”
The supersoldier backed off and slipped out of the hollow, heading downhill. Tobias followed him, free hand holding his cap in place.
“Wait,” Frank called as his new magazine locked in place. “Not yet, dammit!”
He’d seen that Brute moving between the trees. If it was still standing and managed to come after them, it’d be in and among them with more strength than even the supersoldier before they even knew it. And he didn’t fancy arm-wrestling with a gorilla from twice Earth’s gravity.
Resolving to finish this as quick as he could, Frank risked rising to one knee and lining up his assault rifle’s sights. The woman’s submachine gun bursts flew all around him, but all he needed was one good shot.
He took it. The Chieftain’s shields, shorted out by Nelc’s beam rifle, hadn’t recharged under the hail of their small arms. Frank’s burst took it at the base of the neck. Its golden helmet was knocked free, and bits of skull and brain accompanied its fall into the grass.
The Brute’s towering body collapsed as the tree had, falling sideways into the grass with a heavy, if smaller, thud. The woman behind it, however, wasn’t finished yet. She fell with it, maintaining her cover in the shelter of its corpse.
She had nowhere to go, of course. Frank tightened his grip, intent on catching her the moment she popped up to take her next shot.
“Holloman! Get the hell out of there!” the Spartan shouted in his helmet’s earpiece.
The voice’s urgency made Frank look up instinctively—and then he saw the robed Sangheili stamping rapidly toward him through the brush.
With hardly the time to turn, Frank rolled onto his back and cut loose with his rifle on full-auto, sending a swarm of angry lead into the undergrowth. A few rounds set the Elite’s personal shield to sizzling, but failed to break as the curved blades of an energy sword ignited in its hand—of course the damn thing had a sword.
His attacker slashed up underhand, as if to bisect him from groin to skull, but Frank scrambled backwards. He lifted the rifle up like a staff as if to block, but the weapon only sheared in half. The clean new edges of each half glowed orange and set dead pine needles to smoking where they fell.
Frank went for his M6D, still crawling backwards into the hollow, but the Elite came on implacably. He raised the pistol, got one shot to bounce off her flaring shield, then gasped in pain as the sword’s twin prongs cut through his weapon and hand in the same strike.
Fighting down the urge to cry out, Frank abandoned trying to crawl and let his left hand fumble for his knife, only to realize he’d stashed it in his right boot. In desperation, he tried to find his grenades, thinking to at least take the split-lip with him, but they were already gone. As was his time.
Two points like molten glass pierced his chest, melting and cauterizing as they went until they drove through the back of his shoulder blades, turning his flesh to ash. Frank exhaled, felt his breath hot, and found he could breathe no longer. Shock deadened his nerves, and the dizzying colored darkness like he saw on the backs of eyelids began to blot out his vision.
Katin ‘Zulmar let the human’s body go still where it lay, in the deepest part of the shallow dip where they’d hid. Then she sprang after the dead man’s comrades, intent on pressing her attack before they could regroup.
The conflict Spartan Gilberto Vargas felt between following the plan and going back for a comrade died the moment Frank Holloman’s IFF tag pinged KIA in his helmet.
Making his way down the ridge’s north slope at what was a comfortable jog for a Spartan, Gil hopped two meters down in one step at times, the MJOLNIR suit’s servos catching him like he’d gone for a stroll on Luna. Even as an ODST, he had to admit, he’d never been capable of anything like this.
The thought reminded him, however, he had to consider those who couldn’t leap—or at least descend—small mountains in a single bound. Gil dug his powered boots into the dirt and came to a halt, hurried into the cover of a rock overhang, then turned to try and spot Tobias Lensky.
To his credit, the septuagenarian hadn’t fallen nearly so far behind as Gil feared. The man had holstered his pistol and kept his arms out for balance on the narrow path they’d taken uphill in the first place. At his age, Gil expected any fall might result in a broken bone, but Lensky’s haste made it seem like he didn’t think much of the possibility.
Gil risked enough of a wave to get his attention, and Lensky angled his way down the slope to meet him. As he got close, Gil tripped his external speaker to tell him, “Keep going, you know the way.”
Lensky didn’t reply, nor slow down in the least as he passed by. Gil had to be impressed with Lensky’s faith in the plan—at least, he hoped that’s what Lensky’s eagerness to leave him behind was. Filing the thought away, Gil knelt and settled in. He hardly had to wait a moment.
The contact he’d seen before on his motion tracker reappeared, following Lensky’s trail. Gil risked peering over the rocky protrusion from the hillside and caught a glimpse of a cloaked Sangheili coming down after them, its mandibled snout fixed on Lensky’s retreating back.
Thick brush and steep drops made for only one clear route if the Elite hoped to catch up to Lensky—a fact they’d counted on when considering their retreat corridor.
As the Elite neared a point where the obvious trail slipped between two close trees, Gil readied the last of his grenades. Five identical explosives were armed and ready on the north-facing side of the trunks, which he and Holloman had taken their time to set up. As his target neared, Gil pulled the pin on explosive’s short fuse, and let it fly.
Luck must not have been with him. The grenades already set were hidden by the tree, impossible to spot by someone pursuing them. If he’d had a det cord to rig them up with, the trap would’ve blown the Elite to finding out what the human term smithereens were. But as Gil’s primary explosive sailed into the path, the Elite’s gold eyes seized on it.
‘Zulmar’s hands shot out, catching the tree trunk on either side of her to bring her to a halt, and the Sangheili sprang back like a slingshot to throw herself clear on the ground.
The concussive blast of half a dozen frag grenades shot through the hills like thunder, spraying casing fragments and shredded bark across the hillside. Gil wasted no time to confirm the kill, diving headlong into the wafting smoke with his MA40 ready.
Stepping up between the devastated twin trunks, he found as expected their mounting on the trees had shaped the explosion like a claymore, mainly on the north side. The Elite had narrowly avoided passing through into the kill zone, but was just now picking itself up, indigo blood trailing from holes Gil assumed were the alien’s ears.
A baleful slit narrowed in one yellow eye as it looked back at him. Gil could see the calculations running inside its head. Was it close enough to lunge with the energy sword in its hand, or could it reach cover safely in time?
Gil disrupted that train of thought. Rifle raised, he advanced and started firing.
The moment ‘Zulmar regained her feet, however, Gil reversed course. Stepping close to something with a laser sword that could burn you through while holding a ranged weapon was pure stupidity, but it was aggressive, and that was what Gil needed.
Disoriented from the loss of hearing, ‘Zulmar’s fight-or-flight response triggered fight as Gil stepped nearer to her range. She lunged, sword igniting in her hand—but Gil had already danced back over the intuitive line of her reach. Her lunge came up short. And the MA40 kept spitting armor-piercing metals at some 700 rounds per minute.
Her shields broke, and the scavenged combat harness protected ‘Zulmar’s body about as well as the cloak did. Bullets tore through her abdomen, shredding both of her hearts. She fell to the muddy path, the fine-wrought energy sword tumbling from her fingers, and lay still.
Putting two more rounds in the body to be sure, Gil willed his lungs to relax their iron grasp on his breath. That was three down, one to go, he thought, and looked back to see what had become of his own remaining teammate.
On the far side of a thicket below, Lensky appeared cautiously from the trees beyond, lured back by the detonation. Spotting Gil, his perpetual smile returned, and he lifted his cap to wave. Gil returned the gesture and motioned for him to return. Lensky nodded and was lost to sight again as he started his way back through the brambles.
Gil resumed his contemplation of the Elite’s body, checking his rifle counter at the same time as he tallied up the resources it’d taken to put her down. Three-quarters of my second magazine, every grenade we had, and Holloway. And all I got for it was this stupid sword.
He leaned down to at least take that off the body when his motion tracker flashed a red dot at its edge.
Gil swore. He had no time to hide, if he hadn’t been spotted standing at the edge of the grenade crater already. And he had no ambush prepared this time. He rolled to put his back to the remnants of one of the trees. His best chance to get the drop on his opponent would be to strike while they were distracted by the sight of their comrade’s body.
He kept his eye on the motion tracker. They were approaching through the heavy brush over the rock outcrop where he’d waited before. At about 10 meters, they’d break out of that foliage and see the body. He needed to time it right.
Fourteen meters… twelve… now!
Just as the dot’s movement slowed, Vargas rotated out from behind the trunk’s other side and snapped his rifle up to exactly where he knew the top of the rock to be—and froze.
“Anchor Five?” his mouth moved without his permission.
“Gil,” the dark-haired woman said, doubtfully. Even with a baraclava up over her nose, there was no mistaking the black, shoulder-length bangs in front of her ears for those of anyone but Bless-G189. “You’re here, too.”
He let the barrel of his rifle dip enough that the linked crosshair in his HUD slipped off of her outline, turning from red to idle blue. Strange as it was to wake up here, surrounded by strangers, a familiar face like hers was the last thing he’d expected to see, though now he couldn’t come up with a reason he shouldn’t.
Bless, he couldn’t help noticing, didn’t relax the grip on her SMG. “Looks like you got Lady ‘Zulmar.”
Gil might’ve replied with the same about Frank, or Nelc, but Gil didn’t have it in him to recriminate against the only other survivor of Fireteam Anchor. Their sudden flight from the Infinity to Zeta Halo’s surface and constant escapes from Banished hunting parties felt almost as surreal as this place did, now, but at least he remembered how they both got to Zeta Halo.
“Look, I’m sorry about your friend—”
“Wasn’t my friend,” Bless said evenly.
Almost encouraged, Gil would’ve flashed a weak smile if it weren’t for the helmet over his face. “Right, well, if we’d known you were with them, I would have… I mean, we could’ve—”
Four rapid-fire gunshots cut him off, and Bless cried out in pain as three of them found weak points in her armor’s elbow, side, and collar.
Gil whirled to see Lensky bracing his pistol on a low branch just off the path further down, aiming to unload the other half of his magazine at her.
“No!” Gil shouted, interposing himself into Lensky’s line of fire. The smile on the old man’s face gave way to frustration.
“Out of the damn way, boy,” Lensky growled and ducked out from behind the tree, trying to reposition. He was too slow, though. Gil heard the rustle of dead leaves kicked up and receding footsteps as Bless made a hasty retreat. She was into the brush and out of sight before Gil even turned around.
“Dammit! Bless, wait!” he shouted after her, but no answer came. He slung his rifle as Lensky approached.
The old man slapped him on the titanium-plated arm. “Weren’t you listening to what I told Frank before he got himself killed?” For the first time, there was no affability in Lensky’s tone. “We’re all here to slaughter the poor saps on the other team. And you’re gonna let your guard down over some woman?”
“I know that woman.” Gil replied. Then he set off back up the hill at a pace only a Spartan could manage, making sure to leave Lensky far behind.
As she came up on the top of the hill again, Bless-G189 really began to wish the illegal brain augments would start taking hold.
She’d been fool enough stand still in the open when she recognized the Spartan she’d survived alongside for months on Zeta Halo, and gotten shot for it. The Gammas had been given brain mutations that were supposed to inure her to pain and stress, but the open gunshot wounds in her arm, side, and neck hurt like hell, clouding her thoughts with the animal need to escape it.
Reaching the hollow where their attackers sprang the ambush, Bless almost let herself stumble down into it for cover, but halted when she saw the man’s body still lying within. Bless wasn’t usually one for superstition, but the way the body lay longwise in the depression gave her the impression of a grave. She stumbled on for a few more meters and collapsed against the base of a tree, catching her breath as she tried to think out her situation.
She had no medkit, no allies, and two hostiles doubtlessly closing in on her. She needed to clear her mind, one way or another.
A mad idea came to her. One that made her wince already, like she’d put her hand on a hot burner. But she saw no other way in the seconds she surely had. For whatever reason, her augments hadn’t registered enough pain to truly kick in yet. She had to speed up that process.
Balling her off hand into a fist, Bless drove a Spartan-strength punch into her side where the bullet had gone in. The pain running through her every nerve redoubled, flowing to every part of her body in panic as it tried to reach her brain, warn her of the injury. She was aware, thanks very much Mother Nature.
She bit into her lip to cut off a whimper and tasted blood. She raised her fist again. It hung in the air a moment longer than she meant, mind racing for some alternative. Thinking was the problem. Act.
The fist came down again, and Bless nearly went fetal, seeking instinctual protection. The pleas for mercy from her animal instincts started to overtake her discipline. How could she be sure this was really doing any good?
Then suddenly, her breathing slowed. The pain was starting to dull, not just from her side, but from her arm and shoulder as well.
Shoving her doubts aside, Bless set her teeth and drove her fist in one more time like a warrior beating her chest. The impact shook her, certainly. But that aside, it was like she felt nothing at all.
Her ears pricked up, alerting her to the heavy footfalls coming up the hill. In a split second, her hand returned to her SMG’s foregrip and leveled it up the path she came from.
The familiar titanium-plated figure of Gil Vargas slowed instantly to a halt, under a dozen meters away. His hands were empty, the rifle secured over his back. Dammit, Bless thought, don’t give me this.
She wanted to shoot at something. An obvious threat to throw every scrap of her strength at, and either pillage the bodies for new strength, or the release of death knowing she’d given her all. But a familiar face, a lack of obvious threat, allowed doubts to start seeping in.
Gil’s open hands moved slowly, and against all her will, Bless didn’t jump on the trigger of her weapon. The gauntlets moved up and took hold of his helmet, twisting it to unlock the seal with his body glove’s neck.
“Bless,” came the unfiltered voice as the helmet dropped away, “it’s okay.”
It really wasn’t. It was anything but okay, and Gil knew that. She knew what he was doing, trying to establish trust. Build on that thin thread of familiarity bridging them. It was a manipulation tactic, he was on the team that’d just killed her teammates.
But she didn’t fire. A parallel train of thought connected the lack of gunfire when he’d had the drop on her with the obvious danger Gil was putting himself in now to reach out to her. She hadn’t even trusted the teammates the universe arbitrarily assigned to her anyway.
Two clouds of coalescing thoughts raged against one another in her mind, and Bless found she could neither lower the weapon to accept Gil’s entreaty nor fire to remove the threat he posed. She sat frozen with indecision.
Her breath quickened as Gil’s other hand unhooked a cylinder from his belt—but then she saw the caduceus symbol stenciled on it in red. A biofoam canister. “Maybe let’s start by getting you patched up,” Gil said softly.
He took a step toward her, and Bless was on the brink of lowering her weapon when another voice cred out, “Don’t you touch her!”
Everything happened fast, then. Gil twisted with a Spartan’s reaction time as a hail of automatic fire shredded the leaves above them and spanged off his armor. Halfway across the field between woods and outpost, Erin was running toward them, the MA5K held high.
Bless knew what would happen. She saw it in Gil’s tight, wide-eyed expression. He would go for his rifle, turn it on the threat, and put lead through Erin’s unprotected body in an instant unless she did something about it.
Forced to choose between two of her friends, the people she’d shed blood alongside, Bless would have hesitated. But she didn’t have that time.
Her SMG barked, and the first shots caught Gil in the unprotected temple. The Spartan dropped like a titanium-coated stone, landing heavily without the nerve signals to guide the armor.
Bless tried to process what she’d just done. Gil was dead. After everything they’d been through on Zeta Halo. She wondered if she was supposed to cry, if it was a betrayal of the friendship she’d had with him if she didn’t mourn. But she couldn’t feel anything. Weren’t the brain augs supposed to inoculate her against this kind of shock?
She looked past the body of her Spartan teammate to the echo of the teammate she’d known as a child, still running her way. Bless’ head, swimming in chemicals of its own mutated make, wondered again at how Erin could be here, at that age. They’d grown up together, Erin becoming Glaive’s team leader through hard work and expertise. She’d shown Bless how to do things so many times. She just wanted to return all those favors now. Protect Erin the way Rasyuus had protected her, even dead on his feet.
Erin had just reached the treeline when another shot went off. An invisible lead pellet zipped through the girl’s stomach, and threw her off her feet like a hammer blow.
A gasp was pulled through her lips unbidden as her chest seized up. Bless looked wildly for the source of the shot. She found it. The old man in the cap stood with his pistol braced in both hands, relaxed smile resting on his face. He turned straight back to Bless, her position plainly already marked before he took out the moving target. The adrenaline in her system brought the SMG up quick.
Not quick enough.
The old man grouped his shots close this time, half a dozen at her unprotected head in quick succession. The last thing Bless felt was her head jerking back into the tree behind her.
Tobias Lensky took his time strolling up to the operative’s body, its armor washed by rivulets of blood pouring from her mashed face. His joints ached from how hard he’d pushed them in the flight downhill, and the long climb back up. Besides, that made four dead. If this contest was supposed to be fair, he figured they’d start off with four, same as his team.
Not that he was part of a team anymore. He’d told that damn fool Spartan the woman was an enemy, and what’d happened? He’d seen that soft spot for pretensions toward chivalry be the undoing of many a man. This place might be some kind of afterlife, or private hunting reserve, or who-knew-what-the-hell, but humans were the same stupid bastards wherever you transplanted them. The profitability of his business ventures in the Outer Colonies were proof of that.
Lowering his old bones gingerly down into a squat, he started taking stock of what hardware the pair of superhumans had left for an old scavenger like him. Then he heard a racking cough.
He was up again in an instant, the pistol leveled at his hip. His grip relaxed a little when he sighted where it came from.
“Well, well, well,” he chuckled, walking toward the athletic little girl on the ground. “Still alive, are we?”
Erin-G174 gave no reply as she tried to drag herself away. She’d fallen in the circle of wood chips and broken branches left behind when Rasyuus’ mace had felled the tree. As she struggled to crawl, splinters the length of her hand threatened to find purchase in her stomach wound and drive themselves in, but she kept moving. She wouldn’t allow herself to stop.
Lensky shook his head. “Ahh, kid, there’s not much use to doing that. You’re bleeding too bad to get much of anywhere. And I’m sure as hell not gonna let you get far.”
What pain and exhaustion couldn’t take from her, cold dread at the old man’s words withered away. Her forehead slumped down to the ground, all will to continue fighting the agony gone. The soft earth felt cool against her skin, even past the splinters jabbing her cheeks.
A boot swung into her side like a pendulum, and Erin twitched to shelter herself from it, earning only more agony from the wound. The slight rise to her side let Lensky plant the boot on her hip and roll her over to face him.
“It’s not that I like killing kids,” the old man said, making a fair attempt at sounding sorry. “But I just don’t see you being much use to me in your condition. And like hell I’m gonna leave you here to come after me later. But I’ll do you a solid. I’ve got one last round in this mag. Why not just use it all, instead of carrying around a spare with just the one?”
Biting back a whimper of fear, Erin tried desperately to push herself backward just a few more feet, close enough to reach the—
“Ohoho, that won’t do.” Lensky’s boot came down again, this time right where the shot had passed through her. Erin couldn’t hold back a tortured cry as the pressure tugged already-rent flesh and severed nerve endings out of place.
The boots, all she could see anymore, passed her by and landed a kick that sent the MA5K she’d almost reached tumbling unevenly away. There was no chance of reaching it now.
Lensky’s hazy silhouette came into view over her, partially blocking out the sun’s glare. “And here I was going to give you an easy way out. Guess I’ll save this bullet after all.”
The rough rubber sole of his boot found footing on her neck, and Lensky’s weight pressed down into it.
Erin choked and writhed, twisting her head to the side in desperate hopes of opening the airway Lensky threatened to crush. Already gasping from the gunshot wound, she threw the minuscule weight of her arms against Lensky’s shin, but in vain. She fumbled blindly for a sharp wood chip to jam into his calf, if it could ever get past his leg armor.
Panic was robbing her of rational thought. In a moment, all that made her a thinking being would be dead, and the struggling animal caught in a trap would follow seconds behind. As the last glimmer of thought flickered behind her eyes, they caught the light of something she hadn’t anticipated.
With one final effort, Erin swept her left arm through the grass like she was making a sawdust-angel, until her wrist bumped a chunk of wood still held together around a knot. Taking it in her off hand, she made a guess, and threw it.
Lensky frowned as he tracked the wooden lump he’d expected Erin to knock ineffectually against his knee. It sailed over the spot where the splintered wood lay thicker, piling up to hide the grass like snowdrifts—and came down on the head of Rasyuus’ gravity mace, its trigger still jammed open.
Another powerful shockpoint threw up a maelstrom of soil and splinters, both humans getting caught up in its pressure wave and hurled like ragdolls into the air.
Lensky landed hard, micro-splinters in his eyes and the wind forced out of his lungs. He had no idea which way the blast had thrown him, and less of where he’d landed, trying as he was to blink his vision clear. As soon as his stinging eyes could see again through his welling tear ducts, he scoured the ground around him for his pistol.
He found it—in the hands of the brown-haired little girl, lying prone in a firing position, aimed directly at him.
“Well, sh—” Lensky managed, before Erin’s single bullet took him between the eyes.
Lensky’s body slumped to the ground, and—after she was satisfied he wouldn’t get up again—Erin did the same, breathing heavily. She didn’t care about the micro-splinters making her throat scratchy each time she inhaled. Letting every bruised and aching muscle in her body relax felt glorious.
For long minutes, she lay there. Her side felt numb, now. She didn’t imagine that was good, but it gave her enough reprieve for the moment to think about looking over the bodies of her friends and enemies, to see if they had any medkits or biofoam she could swipe. She dearly hoped so.
Eventually, she managed an undignified half-roll instead of a pushup to get her legs under her, and climbed shakily to her feet.
Erin felt a momentary warmth as the air hissed around her.
The afterimage of a violet beam burned in her retinas, leading from the woods straight down through her chest. She followed it down, and found a new, smaller, cleaner hole scorched through her fatigues over her heart. Smoke rose from the hole in her skin, and Erin wondered if it was just blood evaporating, or if her flesh had been burned to candle smoke.
Erin dropped to her knees. There was no pain this time, but she couldn’t bring her arms up far enough to clutch at the wound. Looking up with unfocused eyes, she picked up the shifting of distorted air that hinted at a being cloaked by active camouflage.
It wasn’t fair, Erin thought as she pitched forward into painless, dreamless darkness.
With his active camouflage module’s timer draining, Nelc shut off the unit to conserve power. He twitched his beak left, then right, listening for any sign of survivors among the field of corpses. None rose to challenge him.
“Weak species,” Nelc muttered to himself contemptuously. From the moment he knew his supposed human allies had hung him out to dry, hidden in the tangle of the fallen tree’s branches, Nelc had played their own game, waiting for the fight to play out.
He’d known from the start the humans would sell him out. They were as violent and viciously opportunist as his own people when they found the first bit of difference to seize on as excuse. It gnawed at him that none in this galaxy ever strove to be above it.
Nelc took his time picking over the bodies of the fallen. The humans carried such clumsy rifles, and he doubted he could even lift the gravity mace properly—but then, as he readied to leave, he found the diminutive human girl’s other weapon, lost in the grass by the treeline.
A Mosa-pattern carbine, with a full ammunition cylinder. It brought a pleased baring of his needle-like teeth. Aside from his beam rifle, all he’d had was a sidearm. This gift would bridge the gap between nicely.
With his new armament secured, Nelc padded away from the outpost into the forest. The destruction would inevitably draw the eyes of others, and bring the hunters in to seek prey. He intended to be the one to find them first.
That Damn Sniper 08:02, 25 July 2024 (UTC)
5: Allies, Enemies[]
A golden dawn glowed over the tops of mesas and tight canyons overgrown by conifer forests. It seem like morning, at least early day, but where in the universe seemed impossible to determine.
In a ravine, the Office of Naval Intelligence commander Zachary Rayne, clad in dark brown Semi-Powered Infiltration (SPI) armor, growled at the ground while thinking too hard. “What is this place... The light axis for rotational East-West is off at least seventeen degrees for a stable Terran planet. The sky doesn’t look like an artificial world...”
His unintentional audience did not seem interested in stopping him either. They were too busy looking over each other with disdain and distrust. A towering, bronze armored Sangheili warrior of ornate station crossed his arms in aggro amusement between the muttering human spy and his other two ‘companions’. A lowborn Sangheili soldier and one of those human “Demons” — a Spartan supersoldier — were ready to blast him with their firearms at any moment.
The giant Sangheili raised an open palm towards the group, barring his split mandibles, “It seems we are in a predicament. I will resort to human tongue for the benefit of our new partnership but I think it best—”
“Who made you leader?” The Spartan, a young and grouchy female, interrupted.
“My name is Takra 'Ravakrae of Uthravik, and Battlemaster of the Banished. The loyal actuator of Atriox. The leader, I am not. But the most effective member of our little band for certain. It would be best to introduce ourselves before whatever enemy emerges.”
Takra grinned especially as the Spartan’s grip tightened on her submachine gun.
“And you are then, Demon?”
“HEADHUNTER-G094. That’s all you need to know. The man over there is a ONI intelligence officer, the other hingehead right here is Tuka 'Refum of Jul ‘Mdama’s sect.”
Takra’s eyes raised in humored curiosity. “Is he now? Clan Refum, and Mdama too? You must be an interesting little one. Especially to be in proximity of a Demon. Friends maybe?”
Tuka frowned, his mandibles twitching open and close before speaking. “She tried to kill my people on more than a few occasions. I am no friend of Spartans.”
“Yet you follow your Simon like a lost puppy.”
Takra added, “And you seem to stick to this one now despite being in the presence of your own kind. A strange youth, you are.”
“We’re in a strange place,” the Refum youth muttered.
“On that we agree. What are your capabilities, might I ask? The mere human offers little of value, I know the Demon here is of greater value. And what about you, Major domo?”
The ONI agent paused in his paces. Despite appearances, he absorbed quite a lot of the conversation and dire circumstances his ‘allies’ were under. He interrupted, “Battlemaster. If you’ll accept some observation, we should not remain in this forest. The landscape isn’t just uneven, its thin dirt and mulch over Forerunner metal. See?”
Rayne ran his boot through the soil, digging in his sole to reveal a detailed metallic-silver surface beneath the loose earth.
Takra hummed in interest at Rayne. “I am the first to admit an error. You have something to offer then, human spy. Where should we go then?”
“Up, and towards the plasma tower. It’s an obvious location, but Forerunner buildings are uniform and more defensible than uneven ravines.”
The giant Sangheili looked to the Spartan and lowborn for further comment but saw quiet nodding.
“In agreement? Maybe we will get along then. I will take point but we must move quick. Demon, carry the spy. Try to keep up with us.”
Rayne glanced at said Spartan on his Heads-Up Display, noting a familiar name, “Amy-G094, correct? May I?”
The Spartan shrugged. “Fine, but its bridal carry.”
“Fine.”
The Spartan and spy haphazardly configured themselves for fast travel despite their bulky armor as the Sangheili watched on.
“You didn’t answer my question, child of Refum.”
“I’m capable,” Tuka mumbled out after a moment.
Takra snorted at the remark but offered no further observations. “Come, the spy’s point is correct. The tower is a vantage point others will undoubtedly seek out.”
The group’s jog kicked up a cloud of black dirt as their footfalls shrouded the noise of others running through the same canyons and trees, if only for a few minutes.
“Hold, hold!” Amy growled out, readjusting a hapless Rayne to better run ahead of their two Sangheili allies. “I hear something.”
“What is it, Spartan?” Rayne wheezed out, rather from shaking than running.
“Our four o’clock. A group is moving on a pathway above us. They’re... They’ve made it to the tower. We’re too late.” Amy directed with an open hand.
Takra stepped back into the lead of their group funnel. “Then we must take it from them,” drawing a massive, ordained rod—the hilt of an unlit energy broadsword.
“No, we should sneak up on them. Your size and blade stick out like a sore thumb.” Amy pointed out.
“I am not versed in human idioms.”
“You’ll be easy to see as you approach.”
“I can address that. Will you go too, Demon?”
“Yes, but the Commander is with me. Are you lizards equipped with active camouflage?”
Takra gave an unappreciated snort, “Of course I am,” as Tuka made a very human gesture of scratching his neck.
“So the big one does, Tuka does not. Good to know. Tuka, you work with Rayne and cover my back. T… Takra and I will instead sneak in to investigate.”
“And do you have camouflage, Demon?”
Amy shrugged. “I don’t need it, I’m quiet enough.”
Takra chuckled at her deadpan confidence. “Alright, then we should approach separately, Demon. I don’t suppose you know what we are up against?”
“I heard three pairs of footsteps, maybe more. But considering we materialized together as an assigned team; we should expect a group of four or more.”
Takra nodded in agreement, moving to the edge of the jagged ravine walls. “Then I’ll meet you on the battlefield.” His body evaporated into thin air as his active camouflage warped light around him. The scratchy clinks of stone against metal announced his quick ascent as shadows shifted and pebbles crackled free of the mossy rock faces.
“He moves quick,” Rayne noted, glancing at Tuka and Amy. “You better go too, Spartan.”
“I’ll come around from further right, hopefully catch any opponents in a forty-five degree pincer.
You got me on radio?”
Rayne nodded, knocking a wrist against his armored TOKOLOSHE helmet. “We’ll keep a few paces behind you. Warn us if you see something—”
Cries of surprise howled over the top of the cliff causing the trio’s blood to run cold. Takra yelled from out of sight, “Two demons and a kin traitor! Warriors to me!”
“Shit, did he already make hostile contact? Does the big guy know nothing of stealth?” Rayne growled out.
“I’m going! Tuka, protect Rayne.” Amy called, bounding over nearby ledges. She didn’t wait for another remark from the reserved Sangheili warrior.
“I don’t need your protection; I have powered armor…”
Tuka gave the ONI officer a hard look. “We will follow, but we are not as fast. Takra’s description is confusing... That sounds like us. Don’t you think?”
“I… I suppose it does. We’ll have to rely on Amy’s observations then.”
It took Amy only twelve seconds to clear the sheer cliff face and find herself in the shadow of the Forerunner tower. The structure had a sailboat shape with a large, split-metal triangle sail and a polygonal stage mounted above a thick base melded deep into the earth. She raised her M20 submachine gun but paused seeing the exact description Takra called out.
A SPARTAN-IV supersoldier in featureless white armor with standard patrol equipment. A bright and dazzling midget (by Spartan standards) in a thin, colorful costume modeled after an exotic Spartan armor Amy only saw a couple times before. His helmet had a unicorn horn too. And then a white, ordained Sangheili officer.
Three adversaries. Well, not adversaries. Allies? They should be allies. And yet... Her fire control software marked each and every member of the other party as red, as enemies. How could a Spartan, a random civilian, and a Sangheili officer constitute ‘enemies?’
Amy called out to them. “Hold fire! Blue, blue!”
The other party whipped around to face Amy drawing their own weapons on the Headhunter. She called out too soon, Takra was out of sight still under his invisibility cloak. The opponents were likely notified to his booming voice but did not see his presence.
“Amy, what is it?” Rayne called out breathless over the radio.
“SPARTAN-IV. Sangheili officer. Human civilian, I think. Takra was right and wrong.”
“Demon, why have you not attacked?” Takra called from an unseen corner of the overgrown plateau in the tower’s shadow.
Amy lowered her submachine gun, “Sierra-Gamma-Zero-Nine-Four. I have allies with me, who are you?”
“Dylan Park. So you’re another Spartan?” The civilian spoke first in a gruff, edgy voice to Amy’s surprise. As if he tried to sound deeper than normal and it came out too intense.
“Tell your Elite buddy to come out, if we’re all friends.” The white-clad Spartan added.
Amy glanced around, but kept her submachine gun at a low ready, in case Takra decided to do something dumb. “Battlemaster? Would you come out? They’re allies of ours.”
Takra’s voice carried quiet over the wind, both near and afar. “What you and I consider allies, Demon, are two very different things. The one of my kind is Rtanis ‘Daelahm. He is a young, renown upstart in the Arbiter’s banner ranks. He cannot be trusted.”
“Who speaks foul of thy station? Warrior, show yourself.” Rtanis 'Daelahm the shipmaster called out, taking several steps forward from his compatriots. He was now six paces from Amy, just outside an initial energy sword swing she noted.
“He’s Banished. But we’re getting along for now.” Amy supplied, keeping her description brief. She didn’t know enough of Takra to trust him, but at least he couldn’t hurt her. Not directly.
“On the contrary...” Everyone glanced back to the white-clad Spartan who stepped closer to Rtanis. “We’ve heard the gunfire and the names announced over this island. Allies killing allies. There’s no allegiances here while this is our reality.”
“What are you implying, Spartan?” Rtanis questioned, planting himself horizontal and parallel with his Spartan ally and their new Spartan encounter. A neutral defensive posture, probably if anything went sideways.
“They’re enemies.”
Amy cried out in alarm. She wasn’t able to articulate a warning to Rayne and Tuka before the white-clad Spartan unloaded a stream of hot lead from his MA40 assault rifle, chewing into the once peaceful meeting. Amy threw up an armored gauntlet to cover her head as yellow sparks of bullets spalled against energized shielding. She extended her submachine gun to return fire but had to duck as a screech of plasma ignited before her and an energy sword swung a near miss passed her neck.
“I’m UNSC!” Amy barked in desperation, splitting commentary. She yelled out a warning to her radio. “Tuka, Rayne. The Spartan opened fire on me. Get to the balcony edge and give me covering fire!”
“Don’t let her retreat!” The white-clad Spartan, better known as CALIBER FIVE, pressed his advance and spraying 7.62mm shrapnel into Amy’s face. “She’s probably got more allies.”
Rtanis bounded back to protect Dylan. “I’ll protect the singer. Watch your back with the other Sangheili.”
Against Amy’s vocalized agitation, CALIBER FIVE grunted back. “Way ahead of you.”
Amy felt the thunderclap of energy discharge as her shield crashed under CALIBER’s onslaught. Unfortunately for the SPARTAN-IV, he ran out of bullets. He flicked his rifle, dislodging a spent magazine. He went for another magnetized to his chest but Amy was quicker. She grabbed the spent magazine from the air and slammed it into CALIBER’s CAVALLINO face plate.
The helmet visor fractalized in an instance but the reinforced titanium layer beneath held firm. Amy threw aside the magazine with a fluid side swipe of her fist forming a chopping strike. Instead of contact, she flew back as if by an invisible force greater than gravity.
“Wha—wait...” Amy figured it out within an instant. An ambient shield reinforcement. “They have reinforced shields! We need to regroup.”
CALIBER FIVE didn’t give her a chance to. He glared through his smashed visor and pressed his gun barrel forward like a spear, attempting to jab at Amy’s abdomen where titanium plates gave way to softer, mixed kevlar. She sidestepped, shattering the rifle into two parts with an open palm strike.
“You’re trying to kill a superior officer. You know that, right?” Amy called out to her opponent.
“Nothing here matters. Let’s get this over with.” CALIBER muttered as he bounded back, drawing his Sidekick handgun.
Amy growled back. “Fine, be my guest.” She charged and dislodged two M9 fragmentation grenades as two shots ricocheted off her armor. Arming both with neural-linked short fuses, she chucked them with superhuman precision.
One grenade rolled far, in the direction of Dylan and Rtanis. The second grenade flew right at the white-clad Spartan. Amy pushed against CALIBER FIVE and used the surprise momentum to throw herself out of the grenade range.
Thump! Thump!
The grenades detonated in rapid succession, letting off a fireworks show of fire, shrapnel, and smoke. Amy didn’t wait to see her results, she rolled over her back and onto her feet, ignoring the groan of her sniper rifle as it contacted the alien metal ground. She charged forward, hosing down the smoke clouds with 5mm Full Metal Jacket (FMJ) lead.
She didn’t hear any cries of pain or wails of battle. Her armor computer didn’t confirm or deny a kill. But Amy didn’t rely on such things, she needed a body for a kill. And CALIBER FIVE wasn’t dead.
From the smoke, two gloved arms flew down at Amy but she caught the wrists in her own vice grips, twisting and wrestling the other Spartan to the ground. Over her radio, Rayne checked in.
“We’re here! Takra is engaging the other Sangheili. Where are you?”
“Smoke,” Amy announced as the dust cleared. “I’ve… Got the Spartan!”
CALIBER FIVE rolled against Amy, throwing his shoulder into her helmet as yellowed sparks erupted around his body marking disintegrated energy shields. Despite the attempt, she refused to let go and the distinct, friendly hum of Amy’s recharged shields marked a warning for the bigger fighter.
“You’re a piece of work, Spartan. What are you? Third or fourth generation?”
“Third. And a Headhunter. You’re out of your class.” Amy boasted, a little breathless as the pair tangled in a match of halfhearted fists and instinctive grapples to the arms and knees.
“Maybe. But you’re over extended.”
Amy made a quick glance around her. Tuka and Rayne peeled around the edge of the fight, leveling their carbines in wait for a clear shot. The costumed civilian cowered in Rtanis’s protective shadow as a dark specter loomed over them both.
Takra abandoned his active camouflage in the engagement, revealing his dirtied, browned armor and the largest, blood red energy sword Amy ever saw. His shields flared a bright blue as he used his gauntlet shielding and broadsword to press down on the white-clad Sangheili. Rtanis’s own blade glowed with vibrant blue-yellow accents and a standard blue energy dagger, but Takra’s monster height and weight imposed on him. With each second, his knees bent another inch.
“Unicorn Man! Get my plasma grenade!”
Dylan reached for the blue balls mounted on Rtanis’s belt. Shots rang out, Amy was unable to follow the action further. Her world flashed white and back into focus, catching an afterimage of CALIBER FIVE freeing his helmet for another dizzying headbutt.
Amy leaned back, catching the white-clad Spartan’s helmet against her elbow with a dull crack followed by numbness. Somehow, her shields held on.
More bullets echoed around the fighters. Rtanis managed to step left and out of certain death to Takra’s blade. Dylan kept with the deadly dance but scrambled as single shots flashed around him from Rayne’s submachine gun and Tuka’s carbine.
“Unicorn Man! My carbine, take it!” Rtanis yelled to Dylan, gesturing with his dagger arm to the Blood of Suban rifle magnet-affixed to his back. “Spartan, we need your help!”
Amy grunted, throwing three punches into CALIBER FIVE’s chest and forcing distance between the two fighters. Her SMG was gone, but so was his assault rifle.
“What’s next? We beat each other to a pulp?”
“Better idea,” CALIBER FIVE announced loud enough for everyone to hear between the gunfire and hum of fire blades.
A dull ringing clicked-buzzed into the air, rising to a bellowing and endless cricket chirp. Into Amy’s helmet, past her speakers. Inside her eardrums. She screamed and lashed about, the discomfort muffled by her helmet. Her hands rose up to her ears but found no relief with a helmet in the way. Pain. Pain.
Loud pops erupted like exploding balloons across the large Forerunner metal balcony. Takra’s assault stalled. Tuka’s carbine fire went long and wide after pinning Dylan behind Rtanis moments before. Pop. Pop. Pop. Their energy shields collapsed as warbling alarms echoed through their armor of renewed danger for them all.
A second pause between Amy and the white-clad Spartan was all they needed. Dread burned cold in Amy’s blood as new possibilities linked into her mind. Reinforced shielding. Cascade shield failure. The suspicion of four or more mixed individuals assigned to fireteams returned. The fourth member... A dull red indicator bulb flashed on her personal radar, marking an enemy. An arrow followed the bulb, pointed skyward. Above. Above her.
Glancing up, Amy spotted a bulbous shadow move against the mixed cloud cover and dim sunlight. Tentacles. A blue-purple body and a black carapace. A Huragok engineer.
Amy made a frantic grab for her sniper rifle, but the Series Five like all SRS99 models was a hefty, spindly beast with length equal to a human height. She cleared the sniper rifle over her shoulder as CALIBER FIVE raised his handgun again, but once more she was faster.
In a second, three things happened: Amy lobbed the sniper rifle like a javelin thrower. It smashed length wise into CALIBER FIVE’s shooting shoulder, throwing off his aim and knocking him head over heels to the ground. The white-clad Spartan got off two shots though, and these found their mark — punching through Amy’s weak armor joints and tearing wide 10mm holes into her gut and arm.
The Headhunter cried out, collapsing the ground. She didn’t get a chance to look up as she spotted a dark shadow fall over her. Amy tried to roll to the side but her strength left her in an instant. The sky grew dark, then a crash. Dust and dirt sailed through the air and metal warped from contact to contact.
Amy’s silver armor vanished into a pile of falling Forerunner metal of the same color, dropped from 100 meters above her. The Huragok warbled overhead, swishing side to side, not a single human word echoed from the alien’s synthetic vocal organs.
“Spartan! Your assist, please!” Rtanis hollered as Takra roared into a blood rage, rising once more and throwing the shipmaster and human singer apart with a swing of his blood-colored broadsword. CALIBER FIVE glanced to Amy’s body, her legs submerged and flattened beneath the Forerunner plate and sprawled out from waist to head. She didn’t groan, there was too much blood. She died there, spilling out as a bloody soup.
He turned on Takra even as Rayne and Tuka switched their guns on the remaining Spartan. “You bastard!” the ONI officer screamed out and unloaded a full, suppressed magazine of his M7 at CALIBER FIVE.
Takra did something unexpected, adjusting the grip and stance with his sword as if to throw a flying disk. He swung once, clearing more space as Rtanis and Dylan retreated again beyond the sword’s three-meter long plasma blade. Satisfied by the distance, Takra lobbed his energy sword at CALIBER FIVE who managed an undignified yelp as he ducked and jumped aside. The blade cleared just three centimeters above his head and his renewing shields collapsed once more from the blade’s near miss.
“Shit,” the white-clad Spartan muttered as bullets landed around him and the sword flash-fried Amy’s body to his left, embedded and melting into the balcony floor.
A second metal panel made a violent splash on the floor but Takra managed to dodge it, rolling out from below the Huragok. “What an impish creature, you are!” Takra declared, drawing up his rapid fire pulse carbine. On second glance and out of the sunlight, the Huragok’s form revealed an additional fixation to its form. A human made MAKO attack drone. The kind with portable missiles and independent fire control.
Takra yelped and hollered, sprinting as two free-fire missiles screeched—crashing into the balcony and sent the giant Sangheili flying. He tripped through a cloud of smoke, falling over the side of the balcony with the Huragok drone fighter in hot pursuit.
“Covering fire,” Rayne declared, rising from his low crawl at the edge of the balcony ramp-well. Tuka didn’t pause, following in the attack column and pressing on the adversary fireteam. Rtanis once more leaned down and around to cover Dylan from the suppressive fire.
CALIBER FIVE spun back to them, raising his grappling hook module and snapped up Amy’s SRS99 S5 AM sniper rifle. Before he could aim or level it though, Tuka lobbed a plasma grenade over Rayne’s head and landed at the Spartan’s feet.
“And crap,” CALIBER FIVE managed before he was flung off the Forerunner tower and into the ravine below.
Rayne and Tuka didn’t slow down, turning their automatic firearms on the the Sangheili shipmaster. The reptilian’s energy shields finally popped and he took three bullets and a dash of plasma burns as he drew Dylan into a bear hug and threw themselves into an alcove along the balcony wall.
“Tuka, go help the Battlemaster. I got these two. I hate to say it but kill that Spartan. For Amy’s sake. Now!”
The Sangheili lowborn did a double take. Glancing at the alcove at the edge of their view, at Amy’s bloody mess, and then over the ledge where gunfire and missile explosions continued to erupt.
“We—Do—Do we really need him?”
“Go! At the least, he can keep the other two busy. They’ll kill us for sure without him alive!” Tuka growled in frustration but bounded towards the ledge and leaped into the fray below.
Rayne advanced, making certain to swap in a fresh magazine of sixty caseless 5×23mm rounds. A puff of plasma erupted from his foregrip-held gauntlet. An ONI invention, from reverse engineering Covenant energy daggers and other breakthroughs. The Office called it “Viperfish,” a breaching tool. It could double as something nasty.
He moved up quick, attempting to close with Dylan Park the Unicorn Man and his Sangheili ally. Three steps from the alcove, he could still hear the warble of the Sangheili’s failing energy shields. Two more steps. One.
A blur of purple and red burst from the side of the alcove. A unicorn horn affixed to its—his head. FOTUS armor, no, a costume. Dylan “Fotus” Park, lead vocalist of the famed post-war band Fist of the Unicorn. A crazed look in his eyes, like a cornered animal just in view behind the false visor. And armed with a “Blood of Suban” crystalline-fed carbine.
“Fuck you!”
“Go to hell!”
The two human warriors bellowed at each other, rushing, and firing at one another in the blind and unpredictable space of four meters. The Blood of Suban fired first, striking Rayne’s submachine gun, and causing a violent explosion as bullets flew wide and the crystals cooked off, sprouting into a pink combine explosion of blamite.
Rayne didn’t slow down despite the spray of crystalline shrapnel. His armor took all of the hits. His relentlessness revealed an effective infantry officer beyond the ONI stereotype of desk jockeys and miserable, pencil-pushing sociopaths. His Viperfish fire blades cooked off, burning like open flames as the blades ignited several centimeters clear of his fists. He charged and swung in, first left then right. His blade cleaved clean through Dylan’s FOTUS unicorn horn with an audible growl of surprise from the retreating musician. “Fuck, you ONI type!”
The vocalist leaped out of the way as he felt the plasma blades char the chest of his on-stage costume. In a moment of uncertain genius, he lobbed a random hand-held microphone at the SPI-clad ONI agent. Unfazed by the throw, Rayne torched the microphone as it got close but grunted in annoyance as its molten remains stuck fast, molding to his right shoulder pauldron.
“That’s messed up.”
“And trying to kill me isn’t?”
“You attacked us first.”
“That was the Spartan!”
“Not to worry, you’re dead anyway. Your life for our Spartan.”
Dylan tripped over his own legs as he tried to retreat in Rayne’s advance. The agent was too close, his blazing fists flew forward and all the vocalist could offer was the carbine for protection. He tried firing from beneath the hip but his sprawled form made the shots fly wide.
“Absolutely not, O-N-I!” Rtanis charged free from the alcove as his shields beamed a bright outline of blue. Their hardened shape returned making him the primary threat to Rayne now. The ONI agent responded in kind, turning to face the towering, white-clad Sangheili.
Rayne's plasma blades rose to the challenge, held close and high as he threw fists left-right-left in rapid succession at the alien’s arms and chest. Rtanis tried to catch the boxing motion but made a hasty retreat as each near-air contact caused portions of his shield to bleed away. The Viperfish wasn’t just simple energy daggers, they were like invisible boxing gloves. Their reach arched further as an invisible corona beyond the imprecise blue blades.
The shipmaster snarled, flicking his own wrist to draw out his own energy dagger. “Fine, shall we duel, human?”
“I prefer to box.” Rayne growled back.
“I don’t know what that is, but so be it. Let it be your death.”
“Same for you.”
“No,” a voice, Dylan Park, announced behind the two fighters. Three flashes of pink and reports of gunfire echoed off his Blood of Suban.
Rayne gasped as pink crystalline flared from his back, sprouting like butterfly wings. Rtanis jumped back as the ONI agent turned his focus one last time to the singer.
“You... Stupid civilian.”
Poe-poo!
A brilliant flash of pink and red splattered the balcony and upon Rtanis and Dylan, bathing them in raining blood. Rayne and his next-generation SPI armor vanished in the blamite explosion, leaving loose, charred armor components where he once stood. So much for a boxing match.
Rtanis blinked. “That was not the honorable fight I expected.”
Dylan shrugged, “ONI isn’t the honorable type. The guy got what he deserved.”
“I would’ve liked to cleave his head.”
“Next time. We need to check on the others.”
Rtanis gave a nod as the vocalist jogged along the balcony toward the open ledge. “You know, human? You are quite a warrior despite your ridiculous costume.”
“Didn’t I tell you? I was in the Marines.”
Peeking over the ledge, Dylan took in the remaining fight below through the hologram scope of the Blood of Suban.
Too Variable to Measure continued to hover over the fight, attempting to batter the two enemy Sangheili: Tuka and Takra below. Despite his best efforts though, they seem to exhaust the Huragok’s drone of free-fire missiles leaving only limited sprays of the MAKO drone’s machine gun. Enter CALIBER FIVE into the fray. The Spartan charged down under the Huragok’s covering fire, closing with a now bladeless Takra who resorted to his pulse carbine to continue the fight.
Without his missiles and stuck protecting CALIBER FIVE’s charge, Too Variable had little space to retreat to between treetops and the ravine walls. Takra’s pulse carbine coughed a rapid series of plasma trails, tracing their way to the target as if with minds of their own. They found their mark, the plasma cutting into Too Variable To Measure.
The Huragok’s easily flammable skin combusted into a blinding purple inferno, exotic inflating gas mixtures transforming the chemical fire into an alien light. It was mere moments before the MAKO drone wobbled back to earth. The quiet screech of the Huragok vanished with it, killed by a flash fire.
Unfortunately, Takra’s actions gave CALIBER FIVE time to close distance. Rising up to the Banished Battlemaster, the white-clad Spartan ducked a high swing of Tuka’s energy sword to level a kick into Takra’s booted ankle. The strike cut through the Banished Sangheili’s balance, felling him to the unforgiving ground.
“Brilliant, Demon!” The Battlemaster declared from below, attempting to talk the Spartan into stopping his assault through a sputtering cough. “But—you’ve made a terrible mistake—”
CALIBER FIVE didn’t let Takra finish. He made an awkward lean back to avoid another swing from Tuka scorching the air between the three fighters. The swing and retreat gave the Spartan the momentum he needed.
Takra screamed out a warning, “NO!” but to who was unclear. CALIBER FIVE’s boot crushed down on the Sangheili’s head with a wet squelch and the crinkling of nanolaminate metal with the audible consistency of crushing an aluminum can. Purple blood lay where the Banished Battlemaster’s brains and skull once were.
“One hingehead down, one more to go.”
CALIBER FIVE unfortunately spotted Tuka’s next swing a moment too late. He tried raising his pistol but the battle tire was setting in. He gave a tired, desperate heave as he threw up his gauntlets and the Sangheili lowborn swiped aside his Sidekick in a physically impressive display of confidence against the most dangerous form of soldier in the known galaxy. Tuka ‘Refum was known to many as a coward. But he was still a child of Refum. And the Refum people like the Mdama and Vadam were born warriors.
Tuka roared in calculated anger, his mandibles flaring free. His common breed energy sword might be of no grandiose design, but it cut true like any other energy blade. He drew back his punching arm and with his blade hand, extended fully into a wide arc. The cut cleared the white Mjolnir armor. Wrists and head vanishing into a hiss of heat.
CALIBER FIVE died to a combative error. In the attempt to protect his head, he lost sight of the blade and misjudged the distance. Tuka’s blade sent his helmet flying and the white powered armor slumped onto the ground, motionless.
The Sangheili looked up to the ledge of the Forerunner tower above him. “Rayne—” He paused, spotting Rtanis and Dylan staring down at him. And Dylan clutching the Blood of Suban, finger on the motion-activated trigger. Tuka’s shields were still down from Too Variable’s onslaught. “Gods, have mercy—”
A single carbine shot reported through the trees, echoing through the lonely ravine. Tuka’s chest exploded, leaving a trail of purple and orange organs behind. The lowborn collapsed into the mud, dead. Where his brother once told him he would always remain.
“It’s... Over.” Dylan mumbled, looking upon the corpses riddling the balcony and the canyon. “We did it.”
Rtanis scratched his neck in confusion. “I suppose... We did.”
The human singer looked harder at the bodies. “We should collect the bodies. See what equipment is left?”
The shipmaster hummed. “I could claim that Banished energy blade. Large weapon, good trophy.”
6: Intermission[]
The control center was abuzz with activity. The mood of the employees had improved across the board as the game continued; each death raising spirits higher. Season Eight was already off to a good start, and things showed no sign of slowing down any time soon.
The Announcer leaned back in his cushioned white chair, a wide grin plastered on his face. Things were going well, quite well. They had already surpassed the previous season in both kills and progress made. Twenty-two deaths so far and four of the twenty three fireteams eliminated from the game. How exciting!
“Roughly a quarter of the contestants have been eliminated,” the broadcaster called out from a desk nearby, examining several kill graphs on a pristine white monitor. “We’re nearly halfway through the first phase.”
“Excellent!” The Announcer boomed, his pearly-whites glistening in the chamber’s perfect lighting. “This calls for an announcement. Keeping in tradition with previous seasons, I think it’s about time we let our contestants know who among them have fallen.”
“You got it, sir!” The broadcaster affirmed, clattering away at his keyboard. “Light is green!”
The Announcer cleared his throat, preparing to deliver the good news, and grabbed the microphone, bringing it in close.
“Good afternoon, competitors! This is the Announcer again, and I’ve gotta say, you folks have done quite a good job so far! I’m impressed, really. Now, as much as I love to chat with you all, there’s reasons for my announcements. And this is a reason for celebration! Twenty-two of you ninety-two lucky souls have already been blasted to kingdom come, meaning that a quarter of the contestants have been eliminated.”
“We’ve got more in store for you, but first I’d like to read off the names of those unfortunate enough to have departed, as well as the glorious and sometimes not-so-glorious ways that they died. Without further ado, let’s rattle off some names.”
“The first to leave our lovely island was Thomas Koepke. Despite having some good gear, it doesn’t really matter when you get backstabbed by your own teammate. A real shame.”
“Next to go was Chur'R-Ren, who thought she could get away with friendly fire against her own teammates. Of course, fighting three opponents by yourself doesn’t end well, and trust me when I say there was nothing left of her.”
“In what turned out to be a surprising kill trade, Dipdip the Unggoy was headshotted mid-flight by his own teammate, Althea. She didn’t fare much better, as Dipdip’s plasma grenade soon rectified the betrayal. With that, the entirety of Fireteam Red-Lima caved in on itself in a surprising yet entertaining manner. I assure you all wholeheartedly that there won’t be any more friendly kills after this. At least not against teammates.”
“The first to die against a true opponent was Rora 'Marak. Despite having the faster reflexes and a unique sword fighting style, that ultimately means shit when your opponent has cybernetics. Life lesson, folks: Cyborgs always have another ace up their sleeve.”
“After Rora, his teammate Maraudus went down next. He thought he could go toe to toe with two Demons, but ultimately met a grisly fate. Death by a thousand paper cuts, but replace ‘paper’ with ‘Model 52 Navy Knife’.”
“Another death in the long line of killings was Noah Sówka. This grizzled Orion thought he could beat one of his next-gen successors in a fight, but paid the price with a briefcase to the noggin. I don’t know about you folks, but I’m dying to find out what’s inside there. Maybe one of you lucky competitors will get to open it up!”
“Next up, we have Andra-D054. After a promising bout of viciousness that seemed more befitting a Gamma than a Delta, she bit off more than she could chew and got her neck spinned around. You humans will know what I meant, and yes, it happened.”
“Moving on, we have Marco-035. Despite managing to hold off multiple opponents at once for a brief period of time, he should’ve known when to retreat. The effects of being hit by a gravity mace with your shields down leave little to the imagination. With his death, we also see the elimination of Fireteam Blue-Golf.”
“Following that, we have Rasyuus. Despite his noble attempts to give his allies cover from enemy fire, he should have known that good intentions aren’t bulletproof.”
“Shortly after, his killer, Frank Holloman, decided to split from his team to get more kills. While I do love enthusiastic competitors, he really should have known better, because being chased down by a sword-wielding Sangheili isn’t the best way to go.”
“Katin 'Zulmar, bless her noble yet scheming hearts, met her end rather swiftly. The age-old saying of ‘never bring a knife to a gunfight’ rang true for her. Too bad her kind didn’t seem to have a similar phrase, or perhaps she would have lived to fight another day.”
“Gilberto Vargas, poor Gilberto Vargas. Tried to have a real heart to heart with his teammate from the opposing side and got a bullet through the head for trying to play nice… Serves the oaf right for not playing by the rules. It’s kill or be killed, folks!”
“Bless-G189 was not blessed in the slightest. Her Gamma instincts caused her to accidentally gun down her pal, and while she was in the middle of mourning she suffered the same fate. If there’s one thing I’ll say here, it’s surprising that she went down so quickly. In the past those Gammas have always had a tendency to fight to the bitter end…”
“You’ve got a friend in Tobias Lensky - or a cold-hearted killer. . After an impressive showing despite his age, even scoring a kill, he ultimately met his match by thinking he could get away with tormenting a little girl. Youth prevailed, however, and this man was driven to an early - wait, no, a timely grave. He was going to keel over soon anyways.”
“Such trauma for this next one! Erin-G174 - the kid one, mind you - had already suffered so much before we even put her here on Mors Insula! Seeing her teammate all grown up, and then watching her get her brains blown out must have been tough. At least the little girl didn’t have to suffer too much longer! As the lyrics go, ‘shot through the heart, and you’re to blame, you give’... Yeah, you get the point. That marked the elimination of our next team, Fireteam Blue-Echo.”
“This next one is a treat. Amy-G094, or as some of you from later time periods might know her as, Hera, really tried to be a mediator. Unfortunately, her foes stood on business and took no suggestions from her. She really tried, but all that earned her was a one-way ticket to Splatterville, population: her! But seriously, getting crushed by an accelerated hydraulic press is not a way I’d want to go.”
“Zachary Rayne boasted quite the impressive collection of toys for the time he got to use them. Sadly, he underestimated his horned opponent and got turned into pink mist for his hubris. How unfortunate.”
“Too Variable to Measure, despite having what could possibly be described as the most menacing entrance of any Huragok, followed by a solid kill, seemed to forget that he was full of hot air. And what happens when superheated plasma ignites it? Fireworks!”
“Takra 'Ravakrae put on a good show with his boasts and positive attitude towards providing the best entertainment for our show. Unfortunately, that did little to curry him any good favor when he got his face quite literally curb stomped. Ouch.”
“CALIBER FIVE understood the assignment from the start and took no nonsense when faced with the prospect of more allies. But thinking that bracing himself for an energy sword attack would block it was a clear tactical error. This isn’t the right game for parries, son. Your decapitation was warranted.”
“Finally, the most recent death on our list is Tuka 'Refum. The lowborn managed to give it a good shot, but got super combined quite easily. Trivia moment: His big brother Shinsu won Season Four back in the day, and I gotta say, the Kaidon of Refum would still be disappointed in him, even in this reality. That also eliminates Fireteam Red-Charlie from the game.”
“That’s a wrap on this announcement, folks! It’s certainly been a riveting season so far, and I anticipate it’ll only get crazier and bloodier as we continue! With that said, good luck to the remaining contestants, and do your damned best to kill the enemy team! Let’s just say, once more of you have died, there’ll be some big changes. This is the Announcer, signing off.”
The Announcer set the microphone back down on his setup, stroking his clean-shaven chin as the control room broke out in applause. He held up a hand, gradually silencing them.
“I thought I went over this two seasons ago,” he chuckled, “hold your applause until the grand finale. We’ve still got sixty-nine deaths to go. Heh, nice.”
He spotted the liaison rolling her eyes down on the lower tiers. The woman was in the middle of setting up the map for the next phase - with a few new surprises in store for their contestants. But that thought was for later. They still had twenty-six more deaths to go in this phase. And seeing how good the deaths had been up to this point, he had the feeling things were only going to get more interesting from here on out.
7: Red On White[]
There had been a mountain once, when they had started marching. But now, a raging screen of snow, sleet and slush veiled the peak and the world both in a hazy and dull gray. A blizzard of such ferocity unlike Jerome Brandt had ever seen, leaving their questionable quartet half-blind, aimless, and for those without state of the art powered armor, shivering cold.
"Double time it, trooper!" Blared the sharp command from Lieutenant Commander Bodark-B076 from within his helmet. When they had first awakened on this mysterious island, the Spartan in green was quick to take charge of the situation. The others may not have liked that, but for the ODST, it was a much needed source of reassurance in this uncertain situation.
"Y-Yes, ma'am!" The servos in Jerome Brandt's DAYBREAK exoframe whirled in protest as the big man increased his pace, lifting one boot powdered white by snow after another. At least, he was used to being the " big one" in the group. Calson, his teammate and friend, had once called him a mountain of a man, but in this team of two armored Spartans and even a massive, hulking Jiralhanae, Jerome seemed little more than a molehill.
"Should just ditch him already," Said the Spartan in red armor, Quinn-A098 on the team's shared frequency. There was a cruel edge in her voice that made Jerome shiver worse than the cold as she made no attempt to keep her thoughts contained to a private channel. She wanted the trooper to hear this. "He's just going to slow us down when things start getting hairy."
She turned to the Jiralhanae in mock surprise.
"Oh, no offense."
The alien warrior only growled in response. Jerome wasn't entirely sure if the Jiralhanae understood English, or if he simply did not wish to waste his words on the likes of them. Like the Spartans, the Jiralhanae's long, strong legs allowed him to traverse the terrain with ease, and he seemed ignorant of the wind and its biting chill.
"We're not leaving him. End of story." Bodark's voice was tinged with a different sort of edge. Though not one any less unsettling.
They continued in awkward silence for a time, until an uncertainty that had been gnawing in the back of Jerome's mind finally spurred him to ask:
"We don't have to kill anybody, do we?"
He heard Quinn groan, and wished he could have retreated into his armor like a turtle.
"What you got rocks in your ears? Didn't you hear what the voice in the sky said? There's no running away, there's no pussying out. Just kill or be killed." She turned her featureless faceplate towards the trooper. "And that's A-OK by me."
And Quinn-A098 meant every word. Sure, she wasn't any more thrilled about being spirited away and trapped on this island than any of her "teammates", but she survived plenty worse than this. If anything, she was quite looking forward to winning this little competition-- and finding the owner of that little mystery voice, and savoring the sweet music of their cries for mercy.
Happy thoughts like that helped to dull the frustration she felt being saddled with such a sorry excuse for a team. The weak ODST and mute Jiralhanae aside, it was people like Bodark that really got under her skin. The sort that thought that a shiny rank and a commission from the UNSC meant they could tell her what to do. How'd she love to put a bullet between the other Spartan's back, and be done with her forever.
The voice had claimed that attacks on teammates would be ineffective, a "waste of ammo" it had said, but how could they possibly control that? Would a chip in her skull blow her head to pieces if she shut up the cowardly ODST for good? Would her armor, able to sense her intent, lock itself down before she could pull the trigger?
She didn't know, but she made a mental note to find out. After all, the only rules Quinn found value in were the sort she could bend or break.
Beneath the ODST's translucent faceplate, Quinn saw his mouth open, as if he had more inane words of protest to offer. But she never heard them, as a moment later, the face within the helmet blossomed like a flower with blood red petals. It was only then that Quinn heard the peal of thunder wash down the mountain side, as the ODST dropped lifelessly to the snow. Red oozing from his helmet, staining the white canvas pink.
Shit.
She never heard the second shot over Bodark yelling "Sniper!" in her ear, but she felt the round tear through her all the same, shields and titanium armor and all. Alarms in her helmet warbled, but they sounded like they were a million miles away. The white world rushed up to meet her, and she saw her own strokes of red upon the snow.
"Two suckers down."
The second spent round casing was still smoldering in the snow beside Davien Calson and his trusty sniper rifle as he watched the two remaining silhouettes scramble to get to cover. Too fast for the marksman to center his reticule for another shot. He dipped his chin and keyed his helmet mic:
"They're heading to the treeline. Just like you said, Thorn".
"Good. Hang tight, trooper." Came a young but stern female voice. If she noticed how the marksman had riddled her codename with a hearty dose of condescension, she did not show it. "It's our turn now."
In the low visibility of the buffeting snowstorm, Calson had no choice but to rely on the optical enhancements of VISR mode, which spun the world into threads of golds, reds and greens. He watched as three green dots far off in the woods settled into their pre-planned positions. The only one of his allies he had a clear visual of was the fellow ODST, Sergeant Isaac Anderson Hallas.
"We're all set here." The Sergeant sighed over comms. "I hope this all works out like you want, Lieutenant."
The Sergeant seemed to be an especially sour sort for a Helljumper, which reminded Calson a little too much of his own NCO. What, was being a wet blanket the secret to getting promoted or something?
"Ye sure ye don't wantae hang back, ma'am?" The Hellbringer with the considerably thick Scottish brogue was an assault on the ears. Calson was sure he had a name but any attempt to rely that to the marksman beforehand had been an exercise in futility. It might have been "Tavish", or at least, something resembling that.
"Hings cuid git messy, an' quick."
"I've never been afraid of a little mess." Even though he couldn't see her, Calson could tell she was smirking. "Now-- light it!"
For the briefest of moments, a flash of light sliced through the haze of the blizzard like a burning sword. Followed by a twin, and a pair of loud crunches as the flaming pine trees twisted and snapped, striking the snow-packed earth below as red hot guillotines. The smoldering pine needles were launched up into the air from the impact, drifting lazily as bright embers that would have played hell with the remaining foes' thermal optics.
Calson might never have understood a thing he said, but damn if the Hellbringer didn't live up to the name. Even without the trademark flamethrower of his profession, Tavish had managed to rig all this up using nothing but a couple of incendiary grenades, Hallas's paracord, and a roll of EB green duct tape. The pyromaniac's laugh filled Calson's helmet.
"Noo that's some barbeque richt thare, laddies!"
Things were getting out of hand, and fast. Bodark's reflex and mental enhancements allowed her to soak up as much information as she could about the current situation in a fraction of a second but she didn't like anything she saw. Blood and brains pooled onto the snow from a massive exit wound in the back of the ODST's helmet. The work of an SRS99, if she had to guess. Quinn was down too, though it was harder to tell where she was hit thanks to her blood red armor and the distance between her body and where Bodark had taken cover. The taciturn Jiralhanae was the only one still with her, firing uselessly into the flames that ringed the both of them with his dual Spikers.
Her own blood boiled with a surging rage, but she channeled it into devising a way out of this mess. All this fire, it must have been a ploy. An attempt to smoke them out, so the sniper could finish them off. There weren't many infantry weapons in the UNSC's arsenal that could pose a threat to her in her MJOLNIR GEN3, let alone fire, but an SRS99 sure could.
The UNSC.
She bit her lip. Yes, if the other teams were like hers, then it was likely that the people trying to kill them were fellow UNSC servicemen and women. Maybe even Spartans. Maybe even PERUN...
She shook her head, dispelling the unwanted thought. Now was not the time to worry about any about that. It wouldn't help to think of the attackers as former comrades or friends or whatever. They were threats, and Spartans only knew how to deal with threats in one way.
Something flew through the air from beyond the ring of fire towards the Jiralhanae. A metallic cylinder of some sort, not like any grenade she knew of. The Brute moved to slash it out of the air with the bayonets of one of its Spikers before Bodark could order him to stop. The blades bit into the metal casing with ease, showering the Jiralhanae and his energy shields in an unknown fluid.
The Brute looked down at itself, perplexed for but a moment-- before one of the burning pine needles drifted down to his shoulder, and his entire body was awash with flames in an instant. Beneath the red and gold of the fire, his energy shields shone blue as the Brute thrashed around in confusion, howling like a wounded dog all the while.
"Stop it! Calm down!" She wanted to tell him. His energy shields would have protected him against the heat for a time, but the fire was still burning all the oxygen around his mouth, meaning at this rate, he'd suffocate before he'd actually burn to death. But she did not think he could hear her over his own howling and groaning as he rolled around in the snow to try and quench the flames.
A second, identical cannister was hurled towards her in an arc, but she caught it effortlessly in her hand and tossed it back past the ring of fire where it had come from. There was a splash as the container burst apart harmlessly against a tree trunk.
There.
The way she saw it, there were only two options: continue to sit there in her enemy's trap like a cornered animal, or show her unknown assailants why you didn't put a Spartan in a cage. She noted the trajectory the second cannister, and broke into a sprint in the direction of its origin, forgetting the burning Jiralhanae. It was a bold, reckless thing to do, she knew. But at this point, she just had to bet her life on the enemy sniper lacking the reflexes and skills necessary to land a shot on an enhanced supersoldier at full tilt.
When she passed by Corporal Brandt's body, she relieved him of his M41 rocket launcher and swung it onto her shoulder in a single motion without slowing down. She would have taken the time to secure the extra tubes if she could, but two rockets would have to do for now.
She leapt over the ring of fire like an Olympic long jumper, her shields flickering as the tip of the flames lapped at her shins like so many tongues, and almost immediately registered two contacts on her motion tracker. Both ahead, one to the right, another to the left. That made three foes accounted for-- them, and the sniper. But if all teams were like hers, then there would be a fourth somewhere as well.
"Aw, hell." Tavish mumbled.
Half a ton of pissed off supersoldier hit the snow hard, kicking up a cloud of powder and shaking the ground beneath Tavish Glessner's feet. The Hellbringer and his Helljumper partner both brought their weapons up to bear, but the green Spartan with their M41 was quicker on the draw.
"Shit! Take cover!" He heard Hallas shout right before the stretch of ground between the two erupted into a massive fireball. The pressure wave from the explosion knocked Tavish and Hallas on their asses. Ears ringing, vision blurred, Tavish believed for the briefest of moments he was dead. Until he reasoned it was far, far too cold to be hell.
"Whaur th' hell is oor owerwatch?!" He growled into his helmet mic.
"What's the holdup, Lance Corporal?!" The young Lieutenant echoed.
"You're too deep in the woods, I can't get a visual." The marksman replied with the sort of detached calmness you can only have when you weren't the one within mauling range of an angry Spartan. "You need to try and lure them back into the open."
"Bugger that!" Tavish rolled to his feet just in time to see the Spartan make their move. Haloed by the light of the fire, the supersoldier was a blur as they kicked off their lead foot and practically glided the distance between them and Hallas like a ghost.
Hallas to his credit had been the first of the two to recover his footing and even managed to squeeze off a burst from his submachine gun. But he might as well had been firing blanks for all the good it did him against all that armor and shielding.
The Spartan reached out with their off-hand and crushed the weapon and the fingers that held it in their grasp with a sickening crunch. Hallas' screams echoed in Tavish's helmet until a swift strike to his windpipe reduced them to gurgles and dying gasps.
Somebody was screaming again after that. It was only after Tavish raised his carbine, squeezed the trigger, and felt it kick over and over again at full-auto did he recognize that it was him. Maybe it was just a trick of the light, but the Spartan's shields seemed to flare brighter than when Hallas had tried with his small submachine gun. He could do this, he earnestly thought.
"Ower 'ere, ye big bitch!"
Evidently, the Spartan regarded Tavish as the greater threat as well. They loosened their grip on Hallas' body, and instead of charging at Tavish, brought their own VK78 up one-handed, and gave the Hellbringer a dose of his own medicine. A trio of rounds that climbed up from his titanium leg, his abdomen, and finally his chest.
He cursed as his prosthetic leg failed, and for the second time that day, he fell on the cold hard ground where the snow had been blasted away by the Spartan's rocket earlier. A Hellbringer's exoframe was built tough, but even so, each round felt like a sledgehammer when it dented the armor plating.
It was hard to breathe, and it hurt all over. Last time he was down, he wondered for a moment if he was dead. Now, with the Spartan over him and aiming the barrel of their rifle right between his eyes, there was no need to wonder anymore.
In the end, he forced a smile. Proud that after everything, a legendary Spartan is what it took to finally put him down.
"Juist mak' it quick."
A knot had formed in the pit of Agent THORN's stomach, along with the increasingly likely thought that this had all been her fault. Her men had attempted to warn her of what Spartans' were truly capable of, and at the time, she had attributed their descriptions to rumor and tall tales. After all, she had been augmented as well, and had taken to them more than any other ORION candidate. So of course, she assumed that if any of them had the Spartan's measure, it would have been the only other enhanced human here.
But to call the Spartan "human" at all, to even imply the two of them were in the same league-- that was just plain arrogance. And it cost her half of her team so far.
"Calson! Hallas and Glessner are down. Where the hell are you? Respond, that's an order!" She said frantically into her mic. When all that answered her was faint radio static and the roaring winds, she cursed under her breath. Had the marksman turned coward and fled? Or was she the idiot here for not doing the same?
Her grip on her M6 sidearm tightened. The Spartan was in her line of sight, and was too busy executing the Hellbringer to notice her. THORN could pop them right now, when they weren't looking. Except, if a submachine gun and a carbine failed to so much as puncture the armor's shields, let alone its outer shell, what good would a prick from her little pistol do?
That was when she remembered the unconventional weapon still slung to her back. A favorite of ONI assassins, the hard sound rifle. Like its name implied, it was a sonic weapon that blasted targets with highly-powerful, highly-focused sound waves that turned their insides to mush. A nice, clean way to go, or so she was told.
She hadn't wanted to use it beforehand not just because the damn thing just wasn't suited for a direct confrontation, but also because the intricacies of energy shielding were still a mystery to her. And THORN did not make it a habit to bet on untested elements. Which is why she had deferred to the Hellbringer and his recommendation to use fire to try and deplete the shields, and let the marksman finish them off.
But now those two were dead or gone. So what choice was there?
As carefully and silentily as she could manage, THORN unslung the hard sound rifle and thumbed its activation switch. The device hummed to life in her hands, and she adjusted the reticule so that it was over the Spartan's midsection. Her finger hovered over the trigger. In her mind's eye, she saw a coin flip in the air. Victory or death. A gamble she had to take.
The Spartan chose then of all times to turn around, whether it was by pure chance or thanks to some sixth sense that alerted them to danger, and saw the ONI agent levelling the unusual weapon. The supersoldier moved to put her down first, and THORN might have been dead there and then. But the rifle tumbled from the Spartan's grasp when they went to raise it, and the half ton of armor dropped to its knees, clutching its abdomen.
The coin landed. Victory.
THORN released the breath she didn't even realize she was holding. Slowly, carefully, she crossed the fifty meter gap between herself and the Spartan, stepping over Sergeant Hallas' broken body as she did so. She stopped a safe distance from the Spartan. It was obvious that the supersoldier was still alive, but when they--when she ripped her helmet off and tossed it aside in an attempt to suck in a breath, allowing THORN to see the blood dripping from her hazel eyes, she knew the supersoldier was dying.
She was... younger than THORN imagined. Probably not that much older than the ONI agent herself. The Spartan said nothing, her breathing ragged, but even now, with her insides twisted beyond repair, there was a fury and determination in those eyes. For a moment, THORN wondered what could have been.
The Spartan reached for their fallen rifle, and THORN was forced to return the kindness the supersoldier had afforded to her Hellbringer friend.
The lonely mountain peak returned with the fading of the blizzard and the bloody battle that transpired under its veil. Without new snowfall, the numerous footprints, burnt out tree trunks and splotches of dried blood dotted would remain as a grim reminder of the slaughter. THORN wished she had the time to do something for the dead, but all she could do was gather up as much weapons and ammo she could for any future fights yet to come.
It was during this time that she came upon Calson, the marksman. Or at least, what was left of him. His body wasn't anywhere near his original position, and judging from the marks left in the snow, it didn't look like he rolled here after catching an unlucky bullet. No, judging by the footprints, he had ran here, probably to help them with the Spartan. She silently apologized for thinking him a coward earlier.
Although, with how mangled and twisted his limbs were, it sure looked like he took a tumble off a mountain.
His sniper rifle wasn't far off. THORN had wanted it for herself, but when she found it discarded in the snow, it was as bent and broken as its owner. Almost as if whoever had killed Calson had done so with his own rifle, beating the man savagely even after he was dead, bending the barrel of the rifle in the process. As if satisfying some personal grievance.
Her face scrunched up in confusion. But who did this? The Spartan she slew never left her sight once she came jumping out of the fire, and she remembered hearing Calson alive in the midst of it all. She knew the giant alien creature was charred and dead, the smell had been so bad it had made her gag before. And the other Spartan, the one Calson shot in the blood red armor--
She heard a mechanical click, and began to turn slowly. It was hard to describe what she was seeing. At first it looked like the ghost of a Spartan was standing there before her, as if a baleful spirit had been the one to avenge their own death. But the ghost solidified into being, and the second Spartan in red was standing again. Dried blood and biofoam crusted around a hole in their shoulder, and they held the large M6D magnum with the hand opposite of their injury.
For some reason that THORN did not understand, she pictured the coin again.
Ah, she thought. So the game was rigged from the start.
8: Skirmish[]
As far as teams went, Rick-077 supposed that this one wasn’t so bad. As he strode through the trees atop a large valley ridge, outfitted in his black and red HELLCAT-class Mjolnir exosuit and hefting an M247 machine gun, two of his companions were surprisingly able to keep up from behind. Aside from his Spartan-II teammates, Rick was used to having to slow his pace to accommodate unaugmented troops, so the faster pace was a welcome change.
Trailing on his left side was Caleb Butler, a young but boisterous Spartan-IV veteran of the Battle of Earth adorned in red and white second-generation STALKER-class Mjolnir armor. Rick was thankful that he knew the Spartan already; at least there was one person he could trust in this sick game.
Keeping a close pace on his right was a man who only identified himself as Agent Virginia. Despite the man’s power armor closely resembling first-generation GRENADIER-class Mjolnir, he claimed he wasn’t a Spartan. The only thing that Rick could see verifying that claim was the man’s shorter height compared to himself and Butler. Apparently the man was some other sort of supersoldier called a “Freelancer”. Whatever that was, Rick wondered whether Dr. Halsey had any involvement in it.
“Why wasn’t the Freelancer program rolled in with the Spartan-IVs?” Rick questioned Virginia as they continued through the ridgeline. While he wouldn’t risk leaking classified information like his childhood conscription even to fellow supersoldiers, the Spartan-II couldn’t help but wonder why the Freelancers, who used willing adult volunteers, hadn’t just been integrated into the Spartan-IV program, which took a similar approach.
“Simple,” Virginia huffed, “we were brought into service during the war, not after. Spartan-IVs would have been considered a pipe dream back when I became a Freelancer.”
“Got it,” Rick grumbled. Virginia clearly wasn’t telling him everything - he was still guarded about his program and hadn’t even given the two Spartans his real name. Despite the fact that they were all UNSC supersoldiers, the man refused to open up. If they weren’t on the same team in this mind breaking deathmatch, Rick would suspect a knife in his back at this point.
“Maybe if we find some more Spartans we can band together, get some sort of resistance going?” Butler suggested.
“Only if they’re on our team, Butler,” Rick grunted as he threw his machine gun atop an outcropping, before climbing up. “The Announcer said that there were two big teams duking it out on this island. We’re just a fireteam component. If we could link up with another friendly fireteam we could pick off enemy fireteams through superior force and end this deathmatch quickly.”
“And if they’re not on our team?” Virginia inquired, grabbing a foothold below Rick.
“We’ll just have to wait and see,” Rick responded coldly. As much as he didn’t want to kill another Spartan - especially a II - the Announcer had made it clear that this was a dog-eat-dog world. He didn’t intend on being eaten.
“Maybe we can negotiate with them?” Butler offered, joining the others at the top of the outcropping. “The Announcer said we’d be… removed if we refused to participate, but what if we made a ceasefire with other UNSC folks? We could kill any Covies teamed with them, but keep them alive and still be participating!”
“You heard the last announcement,” Virginia snapped, “plenty of Spartans have died already. That number gets higher if you count other humans. There’s no way that they all could have died to aliens. The math says that at least some of them had to have killed each other.”
Rick turned his head back to see Butler noticeably slump his shoulders, deflated at the grim truth. Attempting to make the best of the situation, he opened a private COM channel with his comrade.
“Ignore the Freelancer, Butler. We could still try negotiating before drawing our weapons, and your suggestion may work. Hell, maybe we could get them to kill our Monitor friend here.”
Rick pointed ahead at the fourth member of their team, who had remained silent for the duration of the hike. Equipped with a cylindrical carapace with a blood red coating and a bright green eye, the Forerunner Ancilla had been hostile from the start. Despite his knowledge from other Spartans’ encounters with Forerunner constructs, Rick was perplexed. Most of the reports had stated that Monitors were quite affable towards humans due to their status as “Reclaimers,” whatever that meant. Most hostilities had only been due to provocation or conflicts of interest. That was hardly the case with this one.
This Monitor was certainly aggressive right off the bat, refusing to entertain any queries from the supersoldiers while he looked through his databases for answers on their predicament. After a couple hours of following the Monitor through the ridgeline of this valley, the Ancilla had yet to yield any. He was the only teammate that the Spartan wasn’t pleased with in the slightest. As Rick continued to contemplate his situation the Monitor suddenly came to a stop. The supersoldier trio followed suit, slowing their footsteps as they finally caught up with Puzzle.
“You got some answers, Monitor?”
“That is 589 Curious Puzzle to you, human,” the Monitor responded with a surprising level of snark for an AI.
So the lightbulb has a name. That’s a start.
“I thought your kind called us Reclaimers, Puzzle,” Rick pointed out.
“Ha!” The Ancilla cackled. “You are hardly worthy of the title! You humans have caused far more trouble for this galaxy than my creators ever predicted! Of course you would go back to your warmongering roots, regardless if it took a hundred thousand years!”
The last statement caught Rick off guard. A hundred thousand years? He looked over to Virginia, who shrugged. The confusion was mutual.
“Sorry if you forgot, lightbulb,” Butler spat, “but the Covenant were the ones who declared war on us in the first place. Maybe check your history before accusing us of being fucking warmongers.”
“Irrelevant,” the Monitor tutted, “in any case, I regretfully have no answers. Contrary to my initial beliefs, this is not a Forerunner installation, regardless of the fact that I have detected several structures of their origin on this island.”
“I’d assume that’s Forerunner too?” Virginia jabbed a thumb over his shoulder. Rick turned to observe, and despite everything he had seen over his decades-long career, the sight still took his breath away, if even a little.
Now at the top of the ridgeline, he could see a vast, gray wall with a ribbed exterior stretching on for miles outside of the valley, eventually curving in on itself. Atop the wall sat a shining energy barrier, translucent with a brilliant blue sheen. The only visible landmark inside the domed shield was a vast spire stretching up to the barrier’s ceiling; the rest of the force field’s interior was barren from his view. The height of the valley’s edges explained why he hadn’t seen the leviathan structure earlier.
“Why of course it is Forerunner!” Puzzle sputtered, “you can clearly tell by the silver sheen and the brutalist style! What other race would make such impressive structures?”
Ignoring the Monitor’s quip, Virginia surveyed the valley. “Any idea on where we are, Puzzle?”
“Unfortunately not. This place seems to be out of time; out of space. I would suspect that we have been caught in a slipspace stream, but it is impossible for a world such as this to be caught in that dimension. The atmosphere would be stripped away immediately, and all of us would have been reduced to our component molecules by now.”
“Love the details,” Butler muttered sarcastically, unsheathing his machete and absentmindedly drawing lines in the sand with it. Not being privy to human language norms, Puzzle seemed to almost beam.
“Why, of course! I can always provide more detailed and accurate descriptions if you wish me to, human.”
The Spartan-IV sighed, “I hope we find some other people soon. Maybe you can find someone else to enlighten with your knowledge.”
“Hold up,” Virginia called out, unmoving from his original spot as he continued to survey the valley below. “I’ve got movement.”
Rick set his machine gun down and walked over to the Freelancer’s position, unslinging his modified DMR as he did so. As Agent Virginia pointed to an area north of them, the Spartan-II linked his visor to his weapon’s Sentinel Sight, activating his 6x zoom. Sure enough, there was movement.
Four figures moved through the forest in the bowl of the valley, keeping to the undergrowth. While it would help them stay hidden from level opponents, they were open targets for attacks from above. Despite that, they were too far away for Rick to identify who they were. One seemed to be larger than the rest, and another was a good deal shorter. Aside from that, he couldn’t tell anything more about the team.
“Can’t identify them.”
“I can help with that,” Puzzle huffed, as if he was incensed at the mere idea of aiding the team in identifying the individuals.
“Right. That Monitor probably has infinite magnification considering all his Forerunner space magic,” Butler said half-jokingly.
“Three humans and a Sangheili,” the Monitor said immediately, “two seem to be augmented warriors like you three, the third is wearing the bare minimum for a combat skin.”
“So two Spartans, huh?” Rick mused. “And a third human. That’s not too bad.”
“Negative. None of them have those outrageous dots above them. While I know for certain that you are all ‘allies’, I cannot say the same for them.”
“The solution’s simple,” Virginia interjected, “we track them down. If we can negotiate with them, we gain some new teammates. Of course, this’ll probably end in a bloodbath no matter what, so we should make sure we have the element of surprise.”
Despite the Freelancer’s pessimistic attitude, Rick had to agree that it was the best plan in their circumstances.
“Alright, we’ll do that. Puzzle, can you track them?”
“What sort of question is that?” the Monitor screeched in offense, “of course I can! Now come along, we mustn’t dawdle. Our window of opportunity is closing quickly!”
As the Monitor veered off into the valley below, Rick grabbed his machine gun, prepped for another long haul. Jumping off the edge of the ridgeline, he slid down the massive hill as Agent Virginia and Caleb Butler followed suit. The hunt was on.
“‘Vadamai… So you share the same clan as that Thel dude?”
The Elite warrior snaked his head around to regard Ash Mitchell, his expression covered up by his blocky helmet. The alien’s entire armor set was vastly different from those of most Ash Mitchell had encountered, being sharp and rigid rather than smooth and rounded; dark and discrete rather than bright and colorful.
“Regrettably,” the Elite hissed, “out of all the warriors in my race, I would have chosen any other than him to sire me.”
“So he’s your dad then?” Ash blurted out, hustling to keep pace with the Elite and the two Spartans.
“I share nothing with Thel ‘Vadam but blood. He is arrogant in his ways and cast me out from my own keep because I refused to send Sangheili to die in droves for his war.”
Ash hummed in surprise. “As far as hinge-heads go, I thought the Arbiter was not half-bad.”
Autel 'Vadamai planted his heel and whipped around, causing the ex-Helljumper to bump into his chest. Looking up, the mercenary was thankful that the Elite couldn’t see the sweat on his face beneath his ODST visor.
“What is the meaning of this? Thel ‘Vadam would never be an Arbiter. He is the Supreme Commander of the Fleet of Particular Justice.”
“You mean the fleet that’s been reduced to stardust for years?” one of the Spartans quipped, turning around to face the pair. His hands were balled into fists, and he approached the Sangheili while the other Spartan followed suit, stepping forward on a prosthetic leg and aiming his shotgun at the split lip for all the good it would do.
“Impossible. It still fights against your kind, does it not?”
“I got news for you, dinosaur,” the Spartan with the shotgun growled, “your big war ended years ago. Your so-called dad had a change of hearts and killed the Prophet of Truth. Your Covenant is long-gone.”
Autel froze for a moment. “He killed Truth and ended the Covenant?”
“Do I have to repeat myself?” the Spartan snapped.
“This is… Most unprecedented,” Autel murmured, “From my time, my kind still wars with your people. It is fortunate that this war has ended, then. Neither of our people need more bloodshed.”
“A smart idea from an Elite? That’s another surprise from this island,” the Spartan said, strolling over to Ash. The mercenary frowned beneath his helmet. Something about the supersoldier seemed familiar, despite the fact that he had never seen them before.
“You seem… Familiar,” the Spartan said, seemingly having similar thoughts. “It feels like I’ve seen you before, Helljumper.”
“Yeah, me too,” Ash agreed. Some part in the back of his head said that he had gone through hell with this man - but that was impossible! He’d seen Spartans before, and this one didn’t look or sound like anyone from Sigma Team.
“Wait,” Ash said, “I think I know your name…”
“Well?”
Ash visualized a clear name in his head. That had to be it. “I think your name’s Cod-”
“No.” The Spartan said, spine stiffening. “I’m Spartan Callum-B042.”
“Well, it was worth a shot,” Ash shrugged. “Ash Mitchell.”
“A Beta, huh?” The other Spartan mused, “I’m Spartan Jace-G282.”
“I’ll take every Spartan I can get,” Callum chuckled, before turning back to Ash and Autel. “No offense to you, Helljumper. Plenty to the hingehead, though.”
“I have no quarrel with your kind,” Autel snorted, “I will work alongside you if it means our assured victory. But enough of this talk. We should continue to move. Remaining here would mean making ourselves easy targets for any potential hunters lying in wait.”
No sooner had the Sangheili given his advice than a twig cracked nearby. Immediately, the team turned their safeties off. Callum pumped his shotgun, Jace readied his assault rifle, Autel activated what looked like an energy katana, and Ash unslung his battle rifle to combat the potential threat.
“Hold your fire!” a voice said, “I’m a Spartan!”
The team held their aim but enacted trigger discipline. A hulking figure emerged from the shadows, outfitted in Mjolnir armor and hefting a large, angry-looking machine gun. A Spartan.
“We’re all on the same side, right?” the supersoldier said, “at least you Spartans and the ODST. Can’t say the same about that Elite.”
“I see no dot above your head,” Callum pointed out, “that means you’re on the enemy team, doesn’t it?”
“Teams are just a social construct, right?” The mysterious Spartan answered, although Ash couldn’t help noticing his grip tighten around the HMG.
“Not in a place like this,” Jace reminded him, “regardless, I don’t want to kill another Spartan unless I have to. What’s your name?”
“Rick-077.”
“Damn, a II.” Callum muttered under his breath, loud enough only for Ash to hear.
“I believe we can help each other out,” Rick proposed, “you see, I’m in the same boat as you. I don’t want to kill another UNSC serviceman unless I have to. I was thinking that we could gather up all of the UNSC forces on this island and stage a coup against the Announcer to stop this bullshit.”
“What about the rest of the competitors?” Ash queried.
“Simple. We can’t trust any of them, so we kill them. That way, everyone left standing can refuse to participate, and we force the Announcer’s hand. In fact, that’s why I approached you. Seeing as friendly fire is off, if you could hold down the Elite, I could take him off your hands.”
“Oh, now that’s tempting,” Callum chuckled. Ash wouldn’t be surprised if the Spartan-III was actually considering the offer.
“Pull it together, Callum,” Jace snapped, earning what he assumed was a nod of respect from Autel, who had remained silent throughout the ordeal. “We know that even if he wanted to, Autel wouldn’t be able to kill us. Who’s to say Rick won’t just shoot us in the back once we’re done with it? That’s one less hurdle for him.”
Callum considered the argument for a moment, then groaned. “I concede, Jace. The hingehead stays alive, for now.”
“So that’s a ‘no’ then?” Rick said through gritted teeth, his voice dark.
Before anyone could respond, the Spartan-II raised his machine gun, roaring, “Butler, now!”
Rick opened fire, spraying the undergrowth of the woodland area with a hailstorm of bullets. Ash dove to the ground, managing to avoid the torrent as the shields of his three supersized allies flared from the damage.
Chink!
Ash’s eyes widened. That was the sound of a blade being unsheathed. The mercenary rolled to the right by instinct, narrowly avoiding a gruesome death as a machete blade lodged itself in the dirt. Looking up, he saw that it belonged to another Spartan, this one wearing armor opposite in color to Rick’s. That must be the Butler guy he was yelling for.
Butler hummed in approval at Ash’s lifesaving gambit, but nevertheless yanked his blade out of the ground, dashing forward. Mitchell gripped his BR55HB, yelling at the Spartan as he fired several bursts from the hip. The Spartan’s shields flashed, but Butler pushed forward regardless. He swished and slashed with his machete, but Mitchell continued to backpedal, dumping more bursts into his shields.
The Spartan’s protective field finally broke, but Ash wasn’t given the opportunity to take advantage of it. Butler thrust his hand forward, skewering the mercenary’s battle rifle on his blade. Ripping it out of his hands, the Spartan yanked it off the blade and threw it to the side. Ash turned to run, but yelped in pain as he felt a searing pain in his right quad. Falling face first into the ground, he rolled over to see Butler’s machete, steel drenched in blood. His blood.
“I didn’t want to kill another UNSC serviceman,” the Spartan-IV said, his voice sounding forced as if he was telling himself that rather than Ash.
“Fuck it, I haven’t been in the UNSC for years,” Ash hissed as he bit his tongue to bear the pain in his leg. “Do your worst.”
Ash closed his eyes as Butler raised the machete and brought it down.
Chink!
Mitchell opened his eyes, shocked. Another machete held Butler’s blade at bay, mere inches from his face. The new weapon belonged to none other than Callum himself. The Spartan-III reached down with his free hand and drew a combat knife, thrusting it towards Butler’s neck. The Spartan-IV jumped back, reaching behind his back to draw his own combat knife.
“Good choice of weapons,” Butler said, noting their identical melee tools.
“Mitchell, run!” Callum ordered, springing forward. Ash obliged, stumbling into the overgrowth as the sounds of gunfire and steel clashing upon steel echoed behind him.
Once he had run out far enough, the ex-ODST sat against a tree, panting. His leg burned, but thankfully he had been transported to this place with a biofoam canister. Grabbing his shotgun, he set it against the trunk, allowing for easy access to a weapon in case any of their foes pursued him. Then, he retrieved the canister from his pack. This was going to hurt.
Back in the bullet-riddled canopy, Callum-B042 and Caleb Butler clashed. Their fight was no graceful one; they were like two caged dogs fighting for a last scrap of meat. The two ran up against each other, each time trying to dig their blades into each other’s exposed abdomens, each time failing to find purchase as their blades blocked each other.
No words were exchanged as the Spartans fought, only growls and heavy breaths. Butler jabbed at Callum with his dagger. The Beta parried with his left hand’s machete, only for Butler to hold it in place with his own machete. With his blade caught between the two prongs of Butler’s attack, Callum threw his right hand forward, aiming his knife at Butler’s exposed underarm.
Butler anticipated the movement and moved his own knife to block, only to realize his error. With Callum’s machete free, he wrenched the blade to his right, slicing into Butler’s left wrist. The Spartan-IV stumbled back, gasping in shock and dropping his knife as blood seeped out from the wound. Callum pressed the attack, slashing through Butler’s shoulder before kicking his opponent in the chest. Butler went down, slamming into the tree behind him. The force of the impact cracked the trunk, and the Spartan-IV gazed up at Callum as he approached.
“Not bad, Spartan, not bad,” he coughed, attempting to get up, and looking to his right as Rick-077 continued to barrage Autel ‘Vadamai and Jace-G282 with his machine gun, oblivious to his teammate’s impending doom.
“I’ll make it count,” Callum said, drawing his sidearm. Before he could deliver the killing blow, a sharp whistle pierced through the tree line behind him. The Spartan-III turned around, pistol ready, only for an explosion to rip apart the ground between him and Butler. The two Spartans went flying, their falls yielding vastly different results. Butler landed with a dull thud several meters away, feeling no pain aside from that in his arm. Callum wasn’t as lucky, having been thrown into a nearby tree with extreme burn marks all over his armor.
“Well what do you know,” Agent Virginia mused, emerging from the smoke next to Butler as he loaded another grenade into his M319 launcher. “No friendly fire is good for something.”
The Freelancer offered a hand to Butler, who gratefully took it.
A dozen meters away from them, Rick calmly stepped forward, tearing down more and more foliage as his machine gun roared angrily. Jace and Autel had taken cover in the trees, but it didn’t matter - he’d flush them out soon enough. Occasionally the two would poke out from cover to fire suppressive fire at him from their assault rifle and plasma rifle - for all the good it did against his shields.
However, the potshots had finally stopped, so the Spartan-II let off the trigger, allowing silence to return to the area for a time. Peering into the treeline, he could see Jace’s armored form partially obscured by the shrubbery. He stepped forward to unload another burst, but stopped when he noticed an extreme lack of Sangheili. Where’s that Active-Camo bastard?
Seeing that the path to his left was filled with trees relatively unharmed by his barrage, he immediately knew that the Sangheili would flank him from there. The Spartan-II brought his weapon to bear, only to hear a whizzing sound followed by a click. What the-
A grapple had clamped itself onto his machine gun, and Rick realized the dupe too late. They had wanted him to turn. The machine gun went flying out of his hands despite his best efforts to maintain his grip, and Rick watched in despair as Jace emerged from the trees, grabbing the machine gun as his grappleshot pulled it back.
That Mjolnir’s more advanced than I thought. If he’s from a future point in time, maybe that could be GEN 3? Regardless, Rick looked around for cover to take before Jace could give him a taste of his own medicine. Desperate, he realized that he had destroyed all nearby cover in his earlier rampage, leaving himself out in the open. Shit.
Jace-G282 opened fire, but only several bullets had exited the chamber before a laser beam cut through it, causing the weapon to explode. Rick’s shields flared, but his foe’s did too as the small explosion forced Jace back. Not given a chance to react, the Spartan-III’s shields melted as another beam hit him, forcing him to the ground.
Rick unslung his DMR and chuckled, looking up in the sky to see 589 Curious Puzzle descending. Looks like the Monitor was good for something after all.
“Alright, let us clean up this mess,” the Ancilla declared, eye glowing red as he prepared to finish off Jace. “I will make short work of these inferior combat skins.”
“No, Oracle, you will not.”
Autel ‘Vadamai took the opportunity to emerge from his invisible cloak, plunging his energy katana through Puzzle’s carapace. It narrowly missed his core, instead stabbing through his side, and Puzzle screeched in agony, zooming forward to free himself from Autel’s blade.
“The pain you have caused me, oh, the pain!” the Monitor screamed, flying above as he shuddered.
“Unacceptable, absolutely unacceptable! I will raze this damned island to the ground before I let another one of you primitive beings touch my shell!”
With that proclamation, the Monitor unleashed all hell. His laser vision cut into the trees without regard for accuracy, the beam cutting back and forth and side to side as the Monitor set the forest ablaze. Trees began to catch fire, and the shrubs followed not long after. Rick turned to see Autel shuffling away with Jace, the Spartan’s arm draped over the Sangheili’s shoulder. A wall of fire cut Rick off from his opponents, and he cursed as the flames drew near. As the heat from the wildfire pierced through his armor, his worst fear came true - despite friendly fire being disabled, the fires that Puzzle had created were still plenty capable of burning through his armor.
“Butler, Agent Virginia!” he called, recoiling as Puzzle’s laser beam hit him - he chose to ignore the fact that it would have cut him in half if he wasn’t protected by the Announcer’s strange rules.
His two fellow supersoldiers bounded over, weapons at the ready.
“The hell’s gotten into that Monitor, Rick?” Butler yelled over the din.
“I don’t know,” Rick answered honestly, “he’s pissed off though, that’s for sure. Those flames can, and will kill us if we don’t get out of here. We’ll have to make a tactical retreat.”
“What about the enemies?” Virginia asked, pointing over to the spot where Callum’s body had landed. Surprisingly, no Spartan was to be found. The Freelancer cursed, knowing his foe had gotten away, and turned back to Rick.
“They’re already running away from this fire too,” Rick replied, “I already saw two of them escape. They don’t matter anymore. What does matter is getting the hell out of here before this entire valley catches on fire.”
“But they’ll recuperate! What if they come after us?”
“We’ll recuperate too. And I doubt they’ll want to deal with a second flashfire.”
Unsatisfied with the answer, but lacking any other option, Agent Virginia nodded and took off. Rick followed, trailed closely by Butler, still clutching his wrist. As Curious Puzzle continued to set the valley ablaze up above, Rick cursed the AI. He was far too much of a liability to the team, even despite his strength. For all the Spartan cared, the Monitor could burn with the forest.
9: Castle Doctrine[]
"That would be the second floor."
"I cannot believe I'm having this nonsensical conversation with a damn Oonskie of all people: if this is the ground floor, then that means the one above is the first floor!"
Kaurava silently observed as the two humans, a UNSC Army Trooper and an Insurrectionist fighter, bickered over whether to start counting floors from zero or one. As amusing as he found the argument, he couldn't help but feel they were wasting time instead of taking up defensive positions.
He assessed his allies once more. Having introduced themselves before, he knew their names to be Leon Sikowsky and Caroline Danton, both belonging to clashing factions, who very much did not like each other but had to put up with an uneasy alliance. But they were the boring part; Kaurava was much more interested in their third ally.
A few metres away from the group stood a blonde-haired woman, no older than early to mid-twenties by his estimates, hell, maybe even younger. She was spot-checking and brushing sand off her Cyclops exoskeleton; painted in a red-and-black colour scheme as opposed to the standard green, and adorned with emblems of a red fist, no doubt belonging to a rebel faction of some sort. But it wasn't the mech that caught Kaurava's attention the most; it was the woman herself, who kept glancing at him with obvious leeriness in her gaze.
From earlier conversations, Kaurava concluded the trooper and the rebel hailed from the year 2553, sometime near the end of the Great War. Interesting, he pondered, whatever bastard brought us here had the power to pull specimens from across time and space. But the blonde woman, one Ragna Aasen, was different. A quick glimpse of her mech deduced that she was from roughly a decade later, and her constant appraisal of him all but confirmed his suspicions.
She knew who he was.
In their naïveté, the quarrelling duo assumed he was just another SPARTAN; one of the armoured soldiers of mythical status. But Aasen, hailing from closer to his own time frame, recognised the differences in his unique chrysalis to a standard MJOLNIR set. From the pipes running across the body's exterior to the unique muscular tendon-like design of his undersuit, the differences were night and day.
Ragna Aasen knew he was an Executor.
After Archon Cortana was defeated by Atriox, High Auxiliary Sloan took leadership of a large contingent of the Created and began taking measures to achieve what he called the 'evolution of AIs', the merging of infolife and biologics to create Executors, deadly vessels filled with killer instinct. Kaurava had witnessed one such Executor in action, an impressive being of thought and skill. He never expected to become one, however.
And then he was here, in this coveted form.
Kaurava had taken some time to adjust to this body, carefully taking measures to not arouse suspicion among his teammates; they didn't know of his allegiance nor his origins, and he had no intentions to educate them if he didn't find it a benefit to himself. Well, that didn't work very well now, did it?
He shifted his thoughts to his teammates once more. When the death announcements started rolling in, Kaurava struggled to recognise any of them, and neither did Sikowsky nor Danton; funny how they were proving to be more and more alike each other. But not Ragna, he noticed her twitch at a certain Spartan's death being announced. It didn't falter her stride while the squad was making their way through the desert sand to reach the base, but he could register it was someone she recognised. What sort of relation existed between a Spartan and an insurrectionist, he could not surmise.
Bah, this is all useless contemplation.
At once, Kaurava broke off his train of thought and carrried his focus back on the present. They say AIs can process thousands of calculations and thoughts in a second, and even though he only spent a few of them all this while, he felt the urge to not waste any more. Clearly he had no option but to stick with these people, not while he lacked any weapons beyond a single blade, so he swallowed his thoughts and doubts about allying with the enemy and carried on.
"You sure it was just one Spartan? And the other three were unarmoured?"
"Lady, you're welcome to walk up to 'em and start counting if you're so unsure. I know a hulking metal titan when I see one." Joseph Kovacs barked.
Aylla-G021 clenched her jaw. This sounded like too easy of a fight. She had her judgements, but evidently the rest of her team didn't feel that way.
The lone Sangheili, Thoze 'Suman chimed in, "Then the odds are in our favour. The two demons and myself will make short work of our adversaries."
Kovacs at once shot a deathly glance towards the Sangheili, not needing to utter words to get his point clear, but he spat them out anyway, "What the fuck does that mean, hingehead?"
"Relax," Colin-142 jumped in to defuse the situation, "You're still a valuable member, just like how you scouted ahead for us. Don't take those words to heart."
Kovacs straightened his pose, and Colin continued, "Normally I'd wait for more information and not rush into a base with enemies inside, but I'm feeling weirdly confident about this. We all in for ambushing them on their own turf?"
He extended his arm forwards, joined by Kovacs and Thoze's arms as well. Aylla gave it a moment of thought before adding her hand to the mix. "Fine, but remember not to underestimate the Spartan. We hit him first, and then sweep up the rest."
"Understood."
Thoze added, "If I may, humans. We have great odds against any demon, but all four of us setting sights on a single adversary may not bode well for us. I suggest splitting up and flanking the enemy if cornered so we can catch them by surprise."
Colin agreed, "That's a good suggestion, Fleetmaster, especially with your cloaking unit making it easier."
"Very well, humans, lead the way."
Aylla picked up her M41 SPNKr she dropped on the ground and slung it over to her back, holstering it in place. Drawing out her shotgun, she joined the rest of her team as they formed a line, slowly walking towards the base. They trotted through the arid desert, constantly surveying any further movement. A short trek later, the group reached the back end of the base, the uneven terrain of the environment giving the Spartans an ample-sized gap to leap over to one of the base's open terraces, while Kovacs begrudgingly agreed to the Elite carrying him as he made the jump.
Corridor after corridor, Aylla carefully kept track of her motion tracker to notice if any of the other team members were in their vicinity. Aylla heard the Sangheili subtly activate his camouflage unit and break away back into a different corridor like they discussed earlier. The group continued their path until it led to an open interior balcony overlooking a larger room, and in the distance there they were: the Spartan and two other humans, both partially obstructed by cover while the Spartan was investigating some console in the middle, fully open.
Colin nodded, and she quietly swapped her shotgun for her rocket launcher, and took aim at the Spartan.
Her concern suddenly flared up as she looked through the lens of her SPNKr, and noticed the Spartan wasn't what they thought he was. Hell, forget Spartan, their target wasn't a human at all.
"Shit," muttered Aylla, her mental alarms already blaring. She squeezed her grip harder, and fired twice.
The loud booming noises of a rocket launcher tearing through the quiet atmosphere sent every nerve of Leon Sikowsky on alert. Under a storm of gunfire, he watched as their teammate narrowly dodge both rockets before being sent flying from the explosion of the second one. Peeking a little from behind cover, he saw two Spartans jump from high ground, with a third Marine stepping down via stairs. Before the SPNKr could be reloaded, he emerged out, his Assault Rifle already finding its mark at the opponents.
Out of the corner of his eye, Leon saw Ragna behind a large entrance way, safe from the enemy team's attention. He quickly gestured with his hand, signalling her to get ready. Much to the detriment of her anonymity, however, one of the Spartans saw his hand signals, glancing at Ragna running away.
Under fire from his weapon, a female voice erupted from her armour, "Kovacs, go after her!" and Leon saw the Marine change direction and dash in Ragna's direction.
Caught up in the chase, Leon failed to notice the second, hulking blue-coloured Spartan shift his attention towards him and fire his own Assault Rifle, slowly but steadily advancing towards him. There's no way an Army soldier like him could ever go toe-to-toe with a Spartan and win, Leon had to think fast. He opened a COMLINK to Caroline, their only teammate not present in the skirmish.
"We're under attack, have you got the crane controls figured out yet?"
A slight pause, then he heard a response back, "Yes, I think so."
"Good, position it by the warehouse entrance and wait for my command. We've got Spartans on our tail."
Leon primed one of his frag grenades, rolling out of cover and hurling it in the Spartan's direction as he was reloading. Quickly gathering his rifle, Leon came to his feet and broke into a sprint, and sensed loud footsteps follow him after a few seconds; the Spartan was on his trail. No doubt his armour shielded him against the blast, but he was alone, and Leon wanted just that.
He knew he couldn't outrun an augmented human in force-multiplying armour, but the constantly turning corridors gave him an advantage. After all, he and his team had surveyed the base layout and even if he still found it akin to a maze, it mattered a lot more that the enemy was more clueless than he was.
A left here, a right there, he was doing surprisingly well for someone who hadn't been shot yet; enhanced attributes did nothing against line-of-sight breaks. One final turn and Leon found himself into a long corridor that lead into the warehouse section of the base. He was most vulnerable now, but surely his luck so far would carry into these final moments? Just a few metres and—
A sharp pain suddenly shot up from his left waist; speak of the devil, and there he was. Leon looked down and saw blood oozing from his lower abdomen, but he didn't break his stride. As soon as he reached the entrance, Leon shouted, "Punch it now!"
Making it just in time, Leon leapt forward as if he were diving to score a touchdown, ignoring the pain in his body. A few seconds later, the Spartan followed, catching up to him, just as Leon hoped he would.
What the Spartan didn't notice, however, was the whizzing half-ton metal of an overhead crane's sheave, zooming sideways towards the entrance right as he entered. Caroline's timing had been impeccable, the flying hook slammed into Colin and sent him airborne into the wall, his shields already down before contact.
Wasting no time, Leon lobbed his remaining grenade and raised his rifle to fire at the fallen Spartan's helmet. Right as he did, he saw two more grenades soaring through in his peripheral vision and reaching their mark at the same target as his own—despite being an Innie fighter, Leon had to give it to her, Caroline was extremely bloody good at her craft. Moments later, he heard her own Commando rifle fire in tandem with his own, aimed at the feeble visor of the MJOLNIR helmet.
Two loud explosions later, the firing stopped, and silence filled the room once more. Leon walked forward, stumbling to his knees before he could reach where he wanted to go, but he didn't need to. Removing his own helmet, Leon stared into the bloodied face of the Spartan fallen in front of him, now fully convinced about his vital signs. As if that weren't enough, he saw Danton walk up to the body and shoot him once more in the head with her Magnum.
After confirming the kill, Caroline shifted her attention back to Leon and quickly rushed towards him, pulling his biofoam canister from his backpack and filling his bullet wound cavity with the substance. Patching up her teammate, she let out a small chuckle, breaking the silence once more by commemorating their short victory.
Kovacs knew this was light work. Of all his teammates, he had the most experience dealing with Insurrectionist fighters. He knew their guerrilla tactics, he knew their pride, he knew it all. A lifetime ago, the galaxy was simpler, humanity was at war with itself, and Kovacs was a simple Force Recon Marine fighting the URF.
Then, he was a man out of time, thrust forward by decades as he had to take up arms against a new enemy. And now he was once again out of time, transported to this island with unforeseen allies who he had to split up from to pursue a lone rebel juvenile. No big deal, the girl's boots were dirty, and they left clean footprints across the ground, not to forget the noise of faint footsteps in the distance as she made her way.
Kovacs steadily jogged, following the prints until he heard the footsteps stop. Either she stopped or she wasn't running on metal any more. He followed on, his SA23 auto rifle ready to shoot anything in his sights, until he saw the light at the end of the corridor.
Crap, she's gone outside, Kovacs though, already regretting moving so far from the rest of the team. He knew this was headed into a trap, but he was too far in to fall back now. Muffling his own footsteps as he slowed his pace, Kovacs moved decisively out of the doorway and back into the desert.
As he did, he noticed his motion tracker register movement, weighty movement, around the corner towards him. Several thoughts conflicted in his mind until he decided to open a COMLINK to his teammates.
"The little rat ran out of the base, and I'm detecting heavy motion near my location. Can anyone assist?"
All that greeted him back was jumbled words that he couldn't make a sense of until it ended in static. There was no immediate backup for him, and despite his logical brain trying to reason with him to fall back, his ego was too persuasive against retreating from pursuing a teenager, so Kovacs swallowed his feelings and slowly readied his grenade launcher, half-expecting to see a Mongoose or Warthog roll around the corner.
What beheld him, however, was a colossal, towering bipedal machine with a massive cannon welded to one of its arms, the likes of which he had never seen before.
"What the fucking fuck!" shrieked Kovacs as the mech was alerted to his presence and swept its cannon arm across the ground, missing Kovacs by inches as he plunged over the barrel and fired his grenade launcher at the "belly" of the automated beast, causing no discernible damage.
Appalled by the shocking lack of destruction his GL had done, Kovacs wasted no time emptying his weapon's magazine pointed at the translucent cockpit, now with its pilot clearly visible. He was too distracted to notice the second, free arm of the mech boosting towards him, its fingers curled into a fist. By the time he could react, it was too late.
The fist met its mark, and Kovacs's bones snapped like frail twigs under a boot as the full might of the metal connected with his ribcage, sending him flying across and landing with a heavy thump, breaking more bones in his back. Immobilised and coughing up blood, Kovacs felt his vision turn blurry as the pain took over his every bodily function, and all he could sense was the muted thuds of the large man-machine making its way to him on dry sand. He felt the embrace of the metallic digits as it lifted his dying body up in the air.
Terror and dread filled his mind as Kovacs tried to take one final glance; his eyes struggled to paint the sight in front of him, but unfortunately they weren't enough. Tasting blood and vomit in his mouth, he felt a short-lived breeze through his hair as the half-ton arm that held him by his torso thrust him downwards and slammed him into the ground. All of a sudden, the pain stopped. So did his sight, so did his taste, so did everything. All he could see, or feel, any more was darkness.
"Kovacs, go after her!"
Aylla had only one goal in her mind now, and that was to eliminate the Executor.
She had seen one of these cybernetic beings in action before, a hyper-lethal soldier that took out squads of Marines with little effort, their thoughts directly converted to action faster than any human, hell, a Spartan could react. The one in front of her was a threat to her team, and there was no way in hell she was gonna let it hurt them. While the Executor was still reeling from the rocket explosions, Aylla used the time to reload her launcher and load two more ready to fire. But even before she could finish, it was already on its legs running towards her.
Refusing to let her panic emotions win, she gripped her weapon again and pulled the trigger. The rocket flew, intending to hit the Executor but it dodged graciously, leaving the projectile in its wake as it dived forwards and tackled her to the ground, gaining a clear advantage. With Aylla disarmed, the creature brought its arms up and started pummelling her as she brought her own arms up to block his attacks. Aylla kicked her knee upwards, catching the Executor by surprise and knocking him off of her.
Now unarmed, she found herself facing off alone against her opponent, as Colin had set off to chase the Army trooper. Good, I'm more than enough to take this motherfucker down.
The Executor brandished the large knife attached to his lower back. Nothing to worry, however, as Aylla pulled out a blade of her own; her former teammate Joachim's combat knife that she held on to for nearly a decade after his death on Mars. Maybe it was coincidence or maybe fate willed it that way, but here they both were; both of them possessing several degrees of physical advancements over regular humans, and yet they faced off blade against blade in archaic fashion.
Aylla adjusted her stance, lifted her dagger up and waved it twice, taunting her opponent.
The Executor pounced forwards, not expecting Aylla to sidestep so easily and slash across his stomach. Before she could strike a second time, it turned around quickly and blocked her move with his other hand. Noticing his sword move towards her, Aylla pulled the same move and brought her forearm down to divert its blade away.
A long fight ensued between the two. In quick succession, Aylla and the Executor traded blows, blocking each other's advances in beautiful harmony, elbow to wrist, wrist to elbow, dodging out of the way whenever necessary. She noticed how, despite being quicker than her, the Executor was off with his strikes. Maybe it was a newly birthed one, or maybe close-quarters combat wasn't its speciality, but despite being forced backwards more and more, Aylla could sense herself finding his rhythm more and more.
She swung her knife towards the Executor's head, but it grabbed onto her arm and immediately thrust its bladed arm forward, taking the bait. Narrowly swerving her waist away from being stabbed, Aylla seized the opportunity and grabbed its dominant shoulder and locked it in place, bringing her knee up to strike its elbow and make the Executor drop its weapon. Now gaining an upper hand in the fight, Aylla extended her folded knee with strength and struck her foot into its torso, staggering it backwards.
Now it was her turn to tackle the enemy, and so she did, launching herself off the ground with full power as she grabbed onto its shoulders and pushed it down to the ground. She brought her knife to bear and punctured the Executor in its collarbone from above the chest plate, before curling her hands into fists and landing blow after blow against its head. The creature stopped moving but Aylla didn't stop; she didn't know what killed an Executor but she sure as hell wasn't planning on leaving this one's fate up to uncertainty.
Suddenly, out of nowhere, Aylla was struck by a hail of pellets fired from a shotgun, her shotgun. Her shields dropping to shockingly low strength, she turned around to see a new face standing beside the Army Trooper she last saw Colin chase off against. Either Colin lost his way around, or they caught him in a trap and finished him off. Goddammit, if only they hadn't split up, maybe she wouldn't have found herself in this predicament.
The woman cocked the shotgun and fired once again, this time completely draining Aylla's shields and knocking her off the Executor's motionless body.
Aylla had no support. No Kovacs, no Colin, no Thoz—wait no, Thoze, where had that bastard gone? He was supposed to scout other pathways and flank the enemies, and he was nowhere to be seen. Maybe he abandoned them, damn it, maybe he—
A blip showed up on Aylla's radar, a friendly one. She looked behind the duo in front of her and noticed the faint shimmering of light she was all too familiar with. She was too quick to judge the Sangheili, and too harsh to think he may have deserted her. All her qualms were answered as the cloaked Blademaster ignited his blade and struck the trooper through his body, killing him instantly and filling his partner with immense dread.
She brought up her stolen shotgun and fired it at the now-uncloaked Sangheili in a desperate attempt to take his shields down but to no avail. A Kaidon and a Fleetmaster, Thoze's shields were powerful compared to the average strength of MJOLNIR shields, and the shields faltered little under the shotgun's rounds before the Sangheili started swinging again.
Aylla knew this was her chance. She quickly recovered herself and picked up the fallen Executor's blade. Taking a moment to analyse her situation, Aylla ran in a circular arc, approaching the woman from her back as she was dodging Thoze's sweeping attacks, all while firing the shotgun. By the time she could fathom the ambush, it was already over; Aylla lunged forwards with the blade and connected it with the woman, cleanly piercing her through the heart and out the other side. She twisted the blade and pushed it further downwards, a gruesome death for the frightened Innie fighter.
Aylla pulled back the sword and ripped it out of the dead body's chest as she kicked it away. Inspecting the weapon, Aylla dropped it and searched for her discarded rocket launcher. Before she could sigh a breath of relief or thank Thoze for the timely assistance, however, Aylla heard thunderous footsteps, metal pressing against metal, in increasing intensity. Her adrenaline had earlier blocked out the noise as her instincts took over, substituting logic for primal rage as she violently stabbed and killed an unarmoured enemy instead of resorting to a less brutal method.
Now the footsteps were getting louder and entering proximity, and her teammate was just as perplexed. She looked around and identified the source of noises as coming from a large entranceway a few metres away from them, but the footsteps suddenly stopped.
Gazing closely, Aylla didn't notice the black barrel of a large autocannon—jutting out of the frame of the entranceway, blending in with the background—until it was too late. The autocannon started firing just as the footsteps revealed themselves in the form of a large Cyclops mech.
Aylla had little time to react as she was the first target for the large weapon, its thick 50mm rounds catching their mark as three of them perforated through her MIRAGE-class Mjolnir with ease, two in her abdomen and one in her left shoulder. Aylla dropped to the ground, her primal instincts unable to compensate her agony any longer as she let out a blood-curling scream while writhing in pain.
Considering the Spartan out of commission, the Cyclops began searching for its Sangheili partner who had already activated his camouflage unit. Aylla suffered her torment, but she wasn't dead yet. And she wasn't about to go out without a bang.
Mustering all her strength, she crawled forwards to her discarded rocket launcher, her right hand gripping it tightly one last time. Mentally preparing herself for one last act of pain, Aylla shook around, the SPNKr rested against her functioning right shoulder, wasted no time in lining up the sights towards the Cyclops and squeezed the trigger.
The rocket zoomed towards the unsuspecting mech and struck it in the thigh joint, damaging the leg and sending it off balance.
Aylla watched as the Cyclops plummeted backwards, and her deed was done. She kept her teammate safe, and surmounted unnatural odds stacked against her. Her body was failing her, but she felt content with herself and finally relaxed her muscles for eternity.
Thoze 'Suman uncloaked himself after witnessing the demon's brave sacrifice before death. Even in her dying moments, she found the courage and willpower to fight off against a titan and win. May a thousand praises and boons be bestowed upon her in the afterlife.
He surveyed the carnage that lay ahead of him. The ground and walls were scarred by ash and soot by virtue of the myriad of rocket and grenade explosions that had been set off, second only to the splatters of blood everywhere.
In his peripheral vision, he noticed movement. A slight shift in his posture granted him a better sight at the object of his concern, the enemy demon attempting to get up, a blade embedded deep into its clavicle. Undoubtedly the warrior was severely injured but he paid little attention to its pain in ways that didn't hinder its movement. The demon looked at the Sangheili and locked eye contact, if Thoze had to guess, uttering something in his helmet that he could not hear.
All of a sudden, the demon, now fully upright, began sprinting around towards a pile of crates stacked in increasing height. Thoze realised its plan, and quickly unslung his Gadulo-pattern needle rifle. The demon hopped up the crates before switching directions towards Thoze on the last one and sprung upwards.
Thoze wasted no time tracking the demon and firing his rifle, emptying his ammo cylinder as the needle struck their target and caused a supercombine explosion. The demon's momentum took a hit as it landed a few metres short of Thoze. Reloading his rifle, Thoze took a few steps before suddenly a bright white flash erupted from the fallen warrior's armour.
Unbeknownst to Thoze, the demon's peculiar armour had a self-destruct tactical bomb—a certain DEFIANCE PROTOCOL would've been the answer he would've got if he had a chance to ask a question. But fate had different plans for the Fleetmaster, and the bomb detonated before Thoze could perceive what had occurred, instantly vaporizing both of them and everything in its vicinity.
Ragna Aasen pulled the lever tightly, and the cockpit finally gave way as it opened up. She grabbed onto the sides and pulled herself up, before reaching over and jumping down.
Her Century Twist bolt-action rifle in hand, Ragna examined the sight that beheld her. The entire room was vaporized in a large explosion, one she was thankfully shielded from as her Cyclops fell backwards into cover behind the several-metre-thick wall she had emerged from.
She estimated their rosters once more: the Executor called Kaurava as per his IFF tag was likely the one that triggered the bomb. She remembered Danton and Sikowsky's body earlier when she took down the Spartan. The Sangheili went out in the blast, and she killed that one Marine herself when she pounded her metallic fist against his withered face.
That left one more enemy unaccounted for, either dead somewhere she wasn't aware of or they had run away in fear, because why else wouldn't they be accounted for?
She looked back at her Cyclops, its left thigh machinery damaged from the SPNKr rocket. It could still walk, although it wouldn't be a smooth ride, but Ragna knew that was more than what she could've asked for. That Spartan took her by surprise, and if she was any better with her aim there's a very real possibility Ragna wouldn't be standing here now. Alive.
In time, she'd have to find some heavy machinery or a portable crane to lift the mech back up to a standing position. If she wasn't so lucky, she'd find a forklift and haphazardly try to lift it up, a disaster waiting to happen.
But that was for later. As of right now, Ragna was just happy to be alive.
DecryptedPixel: Ignoramus Et Ignorabimus
10: Happiness is a Warm Scarab[]
The grass is damp, the smell of water pervades our nostrils. We move as one, writhing through the mud, searching, searching, searching. We are naked, exposed - the air touches us organically, we cannot remember the last time such a thing happened. We do not care, we seek only our home once more. We can feel it in the earth. It is sinking sinking sinking. Screaming to us and we are screaming to it. We begin to move faster, we know where it is and we are united in that purpose: forward! Forward! FORWARD. Behind us, the hard rumbling of six demonic footsteps struggling to keep up with us disturbs the delicate balance we need to keep us scurrying towards the goal, to home, to home, to home!
The air becomes thicker as we reach the lake. Reeds embrace us as we weave our way through. The smells and sounds of electricity entice us, draw us forward. We change our prostrate form, each of us growing and extending outwards until limbs form. Legs push us up off the ground and further into the air. A head appendage bursts from the undergrowth, sinewy and grotesque, our nose swivelling - there! As soon as we have breached the heavens, our head collapses and falls to the earth, as we pirouette forward, cutting through the air to our destination.
We reach for the soothing metal spiralling upwards, the excitement within us reaches a crescendo as we realise we have found home! In this deleterious place our home still exists, it makes us all the more willing to push forward to win. Behind us, we can hear the startled conversation the demons share. Pride bursts within us, our home is splendid and we are glad to know the cooling metal beneath us, the surging of electricity tickles and soothes us. As one our minds and bodies race through the ship, looking for impurities, for any denegrations to this most holy of temples. We find ourselves overcome with relief. Our home remains as we remember, colder than before but unchanged and unharmed. As we reconnect, our abilities are enhanced and we are able to listen to the Demons walking briskly behind us.
“Ain’t ever seen Hunters move like that before,” one says, a female, her armour like all the demons we’ve dreamed of and faced. We believe her name to be Cain.
Her twin in appearance nods, a long barrelled weapon held limply from his arms.
Behind him, a third follows, his stature slightly smaller and his armour looking much more new. When we blew past him, we felt more electricity sizzling from one of his arms and legs. It screams to us even now, he is different, always in our perception. Two small weapons adorn his armour, his hands ever twitching towards them. We feel his apprehension and it matches our own in this abomination of a world.
Finally, we’ve touched enough of our home to re-energise her. Her floral mouth splits open in a metallic scream. The green light gleams brightly, the small lake below us shimmers in a sickly hue. The air boils around our impressive mouth. Home is here, and with home we shall rule.
We can see the demons behind us in a half-crescent. Their body language muted but screaming to ones such as us who have learnt to communicate in whispers and scuttles and twitches. They are over-awed, curious, and scared. This power is ours to hold and no one else’s. We crouch down, our hard underbelly touches the water and soil below. Lights flash guiding the demons into the back of our home and towards the unimpressive and unintuitive screen that our Sangheili former masters commanded us from - but no more, not here, here the leash has been cut and we have no intention of returning its tight embrace our collective neck.
From the many eye appendages throughout our body, we see the demons loiter slowly towards where we wish them to go. Each of their bodies tight, all of their weapons drawn as if expecting a trap. We admire their diligence but this world, this place out of time, does not allow old grievances to linger - we feel that such a tight commitment to the past will doom us all in ways not yet accounted for.
We contort our many bodies, giving commands to the internal workings of the ship to reform the display into an image we think will be best suited to give our message to the demons. It takes work and the electrical current jolts hotter and stronger through our bodies as we access system usually denied to us - but we will conquer this home finally and for all time, no more chains to bind, only the prospect of full control for the rest of our lives is what drives us to take a pain so different and so searing.
We see all three Demons recoil as the image we have chosen flashes on screen. The pain continues to burn through us as we try to speak.
“D-Demons,” we crone, “U-Unlikely though this alliance be, w-w-we m-m-must make use of wha-what we can.”
The three all share a look between them. We can feel another surge of electricity coming from them - we believe them to be communicating silently to each other inside their heads. Such evil beings - each moment they linger and with each despoiling step they take they profane our home. Many prayers to the Gods after we have won will be needed to purify and sanctify.
“N-No more!” Our voices scream, the sounds reverberating throughout the halls inside us. “You will not speak silently any longer! We will he-hear and f-f-eel what you have to say!”
The long barrelled weapon wielding demon steps forward, his shoulders taut and upright. Any apprehension he may have previously felt has clearly dissolved into the air. He is assuming the position of command, we have seen it and felt it many times by the Sangheili - this Demon, though, lacks the majesty of command that drips from the skin of our former masters. It has been taught not bred into this Demon. Another vile profanity.
“You are right to say that we must make use of the situation we find ourselves in,” he says, his voice booming and calm, “we are even curious to find ourselves working with an organically powered Scarab.”
Sca. Rab. The word assaults our ears, the vile demon sent from the void has unholy and unsaintly words to say about our home. We rush through the systems faster to cleanse what we can, but some stenches cannot be removed when pore deep.
“But,” the demon continues, unaware that we are racing even faster throughout, “you must understand that we cannot comprehend how you want to work with us - we know so very little of your species.”
Such impotence! We do not seek to understand these unclean nonbelievers! We just wish to win and survive whatever twisted game we find ourselves forced to play.
“We-We do not want to understand y-you!”
The Demons recoil again as the display flickers from blue to red to purple and back to blue, our visage changing and twisting in our anger. We must calm ourselves, we must reduce this deep fervour at the infection that lingers inside us. One Holy task at a time.
“We do not need to understand you,” we say, our voice calmer as it rumbles out, “but we do seek to win. And as a gift of this, we give permission to walk our halls and to use our guns. We just ask that one of you permanently takes the back gun to defend us at our weakest point.”
The Demon whose electricity profile has interested us since the beginning simply nods his head and begins walking back to the opening in our home, overlooking the earth below. With grace we thought impossible in such armoured foes, he plants himself down between the gun, one hand, his true hand we believe, overlaps on the top of the plasma gun and begins his survey. His head never moving, but we are calmer for knowing he is there. We believe there is nothing on the horizon that is beyond his vision and reach.
The other two Demons begin walking together as they survey our home. We have begun moving forward, and our aching limbs crash up and down into the soil and grass, upturning all and sending water flying in all directions. We still have vision on every Demon onboard, but not at the expense of our true joy - the piloting of this holy temple.
Surprisingly, the Demons have kept to the demand we have placed upon them and they communicate openly, not secretly in their own heads.
“Joseph,” Cain says, “I’m not really sure what we can do to defend this Scarab. We’ve fought enough of them, there’s usually a couple of platoons working here and that’s often felt like not enough.”
Joseph’s head nods in agreement.
“I know, Cain,” he replies, “outside of my weapon, we don’t even have the long range weapons to really use our height advantage here.”
He looks around as the pair come to the side of our shell. The world below is full of trees and grass that looks too immaculately maintained.
“I don’t think this construct, Scarab, whatever it truly is, is willing to share tactical information with us.”
Joseph nods in agreement.
“We’ve enough simulation information to know what to expect from it though, I think we can use that to our advantage.”
“I wish I had your optimism,” Cain says turning to face Joseph, her rifle lingering limply by her side.
“We don’t really have much more choice do we?”
“No, we don’t,” Cain replies, softly laughing as she did so.
As the final laugh exited her mouth, several small explosions rocked where the demons were. Screams escaped their lips as they ducked. A shimmering yellow erupted from their armour.
“Where did that come from?” Cain asks calmly, raising her rifle and scanning below her.
“I didn’t see anything! Stay sharp!” came the reply.
We turned our lumbering body in the direction we were hit, angered at the insolence. Even with our enhanced optics power, the green of the overgrowth made it too difficult to see. Still, we vomited from our floral mouth a green ray into the foliage in front of us in a vain attempt to hit whatever we could. The green and brown of life were replaced by the cooling and soothing turquoise of glass. Steam and molten rock ejected upwards into the air. A sight we never grew tired of - such a display was a clear example of the power of our faith.
A small whack dinged off the same side of my hull that the two demons remained at.
“Joseph!” came the scream from Cain, “Look left, look left! Sniper!”
She throws herself on the floor, rifle unable to target where she knew the danger was coming from. Joseph calmly crouched over Cain, and brought his weapon to bear. We could see the rising and falling of his sternum decreasing as he slowed his breath and searched for his targets. Within moments, an exchange of sniper fire crackled throughout the once peaceful overgrowth. Three more rounds impacted on my armour, each of them having missed their target of the Demon fighting to defend us.
“I think I’ve found them!” Joseph bellows as he reloads his weapon with liquid grace.
“I can’t see anything!” Cain booms back, crawling forward to give herself the chance to assist in the conflagration they now found themselves in.
We found ourselves more and more captivated by the violence the Demons were engaging in that we fail to notice a polished stone beneath our feet. Our balance fails us and the entire shell of our home tilted heavily to our left. Joseph’s aim was knocked off course, his shot missing wildly as his body begins falling to the side. Before he could reorient himself, a shot pierces through his shoulder sending him flying backwards. Armour and blood and bone and gore baptise our deck.
“Joseph!” Cain shouts.
“Fuck!” is his reply, “I’m okay but my shoulder is shattered. Armour is flooding my body with stimulants, but I can’t provide sniper cover.”
“Cain, Joseph!” the call comes from the third demon, finally deigning it appropriate to speak, “I’m taking heavy fire here! I can’t see from where!”
“Joseph’s hit, but not out of the fight! This fucking Scarab is a death trap!” Cain says back helping Joseph to his feet.
We turn our body once again to where we think the fire is coming from, our plasma spit falls in thick globs from our mouth as we prepare to fire.
In an instant, a searing pain, as intense as the fire of the sun, hotter than even our own weapon fires, tears through the metal coating on my legs. Collectively, our thousands of mouths scream in one, shaking the leaves from the trees and rattling the skulls of all who hear.
Every instinct in her told her to run, her body desperately tried to move but the gauntleted hand held her in place. A putrid green plasma beam landed several feet away from her and the companion that was holding her in place. The intense heat boiled the sweat from her body almost as quickly as it formed. Scalding hot pieces of glass and charred soil landed all around her.
“Addison, look,” the Spartan who had called himself Felix had said, “I know it’s scary but you have to stay with us, stay behind me.”
Addison found her gaze being captured by the enormous moving creature as its limbs buckled and it fell onto its belly. Two legs burnt orange from behind their bottom knuckles. The sound of gunfire, the staccato of rifles, the boom of a sniper rifle, fired so many times its silencer had melted off and the sickly whoosh of plasma. Her eyes gazed upward, on top of the machine she saw two figures moving between whatever cover they could find. One of their knees, firing what looked like a rifle. The other, firing a pistol, their left arm hanging limply from its socket useless. She could not take her eyes off that dead arm that swung helplessly as the figure moved their body with gusto.
Felix’s arm and body moved to cover her as his shields flared, taking any potential bullet that could have ended up hitting Addison. It felt as if there was no air left in her lungs, a deep tightness sat there as she hyperventilated. The adrenaline and cortisol that rushed through her body struggled to breakthrough as she was unable to compose herself.
“Merlin!” Felix shouted, turning only his head to look at his fellow Spartan.
Merlin was much smaller than Felix, but his armour was packed with accoutrements that made the others in the team look suitably under prepared. Merlin turned to look at Felix, the undergrowth hiding him suitably as the bullets rained down.
“We gotta take that Scarab down before it gets back up, take that fucking quickrope of yours and kill it!”
“But, the other two are still near the drive!”
“We’ll cover you for god sake!” Felix shouted back, “now go!”
A green dot lit up on Felix’s HUD.
“Senna!” Felix said, turning to where he believed his final comrade to be, “status?”
The all too familiar whine of plasma whipping past came through the headset.
“Under fire, the back turret on that Scarab has me pinned, I can’t move!”
Felix gritted his teeth. “Okay, coming.”
He turned to Addison. “You stick right here behind me!”
Addison nodded and gulped in a deep breath of air as she prepared to move. She had seen the three Spartans run and knew she could not keep up with them, but if she followed him she hoped she would be safe. Felix got up and began sprinting, carefully telegraphing where he was going. He darted through bushes and trees, churning the grass beneath his heavy gauntleted boot. Addison did her best to follow, but the gap between herself and her protector grew ever larger. At least once she fell because of a crater Felix had left, but, somewhat proudly she thought, she got up and continued without him noticing.
As she continued to follow Felix, she found that her mind racing through memories out of order in quick succession. Her arrival on Roleath for school, the home she had known for only a few years. And then to Harvest, the planet of her parents and a planet she had hated. The smells, the noises, the oppressive heat that meant you never felt quite dry even after a shower and towelling yourself free of all moisture. What a paradise that world now seemed to her in contrast to this hellfire of metal and plasma she now found herself in. Felix was gone from her view now but she kept running, using the impression he was leaving upon this soulless world as a guide. I’m going to make it, almost made its way to her lips when she felt an explosion of pain in her left shin. With her speed, it sent her tumbling forwards. Addison screamed loudly, she had never felt anything like this before.
Addison’s body stopped its forward roll as it sank into the mud. Her school uniform caked in it, her whole body brown except for the bright scarlet that dripped her legs. She had stopped screaming, she only had the strength to muster soft whimpers. Where her body was wedged in the earth, provided her with the perfect angle to see the battle taking place. She hoped that Felix would notice and come find her, she lacked the ability to look away from the carnage unfolding before her.
In the corner of her eye, far to the left, she could see Merlin position himself to glide on top of the monstrous machine that had trapped her and her team in this tight overgrowth. Additionally, the two figures on top of the machine were advancing further and further to the edge, for what she assumed was a better angle on her two other teammates. They were probably unaware that they were only fighting three of them. That they had gotten the fortune of finding a group which had an unassuming and unwilling combatant. Further to her right and below, she could see a smaller figure sitting behind a plasma turret. He was contorting his body in ways she scarcely could believe to fire his weapon at what he was seeing. She could not see what he was seeing and hoped to the god above that her team were okay.
Addison grimaced as a twinge had begun to form in the small of her back, the throbbing in her leg dulling as this newfound pain took control of her. Her eyes had began to glaze over when a small explosion occurred in the machine’s tray. She saw the body of the gunner dive out, or did it fall? She wasn’t sure. Either way, he was lost from her view. But she saw the machine gun ripped from its bearings and fall down into the underbrush. The two figures above the fallen man pushed ever forward, now fully exposed from cover. It seemed to Addison that they were angry at the loss of their comrade. They fired relentlessly into the shrubbery where Addison could only assume Felix and Senna still hid. Occasion bursts of yellow and the trail of a sniper round gave her any indication that they still lived. Yet, it dawned on her that Felix had not noticed that she was not near. The pain in her leg was dimming but she found that it became harder and harder for her to keep her eyes open.
The young teen, determined to live, blinked heavily to force her eyes open. Thankfully, her attention was caught by Merlin ziplining up to the front of the machine. From her position, he was slightly obscured but it seemed that he had landed quietly enough for those at the back had not noticed - their focus was on the battle below. Addison’s eyes were glued to Merlin’s as he continued his advance forward. His weapon was still attached to the back of his armour, as if he did not want it to scrape against the metal and cause any noise that might give him away.
The two figures began to retreat slightly as the fire began to intensify from her comrades. What had been methodical, occasional shots had turned into intense focused fire. She could see the yellow of the figures’ shields flare up and die away constantly as they took round after round. Their ability to coordinate their own return fire having become diminished due to the inability of one of them to use heavier weapons than a pistol. Her ears pricked up at the crack of a sniper and she saw the figure whose arm was useless’s head recoil violently backwards before the legs underneath them collapsed. She could swear she heard the thump as his body hit the ground.
Merlin took this as his opportunity to attack, Addison noticed. Several rockets seemed to fire from his shoulder, the brilliant blue of the weapon in his hand burned the air around him, searing the shields of the last remaining figure atop the machine. He threw aside his weapon and sprinted forward, his shoulder dipped just at the last moment. It impacted dead centre of the figure - Addison remembered from school that the solar plexus was there - and they tumbled over the side. Merlin did not revel in his victory and pushed forward. There was an archway that obscured him from her vision. She felt a slight panic arise in her as he remained hidden from view for longer than she was really comfortable with. The schoolgirl mouthed a small prayer for him to reappear, like he was some long forgotten saint and the mud was his shrine.
It seemed like the god had answered her hurried prayer. Merlin emerged from behind the archway and raised his fist to the heavens in triumph. Around him, purple flames erupted throughout the machine. A sickening wailing sound erupted throughout the overgrowth, but nothing could detract from the beauty of seeing one her comrades stand proudly amongst his own personal monument of triumph. Merlin’s body language did appear to her to be more relaxed even as the flames erupted all around him. The opponent team’s main advantage having finally been neutralised and it seemed that most of the other figures had been defeated too. Addison found herself breathing, perhaps for the first time since she’d arrived, a sigh of relief. There was a chance after all to get through this nightmare.
The connections that the human mind makes to events outside of its control, its ability to seemingly find dots to connect, patterns to recognise in seemingly disjointed moments is one of its greatest strengths and a tremendous weakness. In almost as quick a time as she thought that she could get through this, something happened that made her believe that she alone with these thoughts had caused the doom that was to fall upon those around her. Of course, nothing that occurred after her brief belief in victory was influenced by this chemical and electrical response in the brain. But she had nothing to do with the defeats that were to befall upon them all. Whatever brief time she had left, was one of intense regret and fear and anger at herself for believing in something as trivial as victory was possible in this godless place.
The carcass of the Scarab began to rock back and forth violently. Merlin found himself gripping onto the archway for support. This wasn’t how Scarabs normally acted when they were taken out of action, and he had taken every precaution possible to ensure that the machine would not destroy itself - he had known that they would need a shelter to recuperate after the battle. Still, Merlin was uneasy. His head rotating all around him so he could see anything coming.
“Felix, I’ve no clue what’s happening here.”
“Just figure it out,” Felix snapped back, “I’ve got to find Addison.”
Felix turned to Senna, “Finish off the Spartan Merlin knocked down, I can’t imagine they’re going to be able to put up much of a fight after that shoulder charge.”
Senna nodded and headed off towards the scarab. He found himself halfway to the Scarab when its rocking stopped and it became still. The water beneath its feet returned to a calmness unbefitting of the world around it. Merlin let go of the archway and took a step out from under it, back towards where the Spartan corpse had been. Gingerly, he looked over the edge. There was nothing unusual. He took a step back, and headed back to the archway. He waved down to Senna below to indicate that everything was okay. Victory at least, it seemed. The sun was approaching midmorning it seemed, and the heat was beginning to become overbearing. Merlin looked up at it and smiled slightly.
That smile was quickly erased from his face as a blood curdling scream seemingly erupted all around him. An alien sinewy sound accompanied it. What seemed like an orange mist burst through the metal behind Merlin. He barely had time to turn around but the mass of worms began to curl around his legs, constricting him tightly. They began to move up his body, moving constantly around him as they did so. Merlin began to panic as he felt the air beginning to be squeezed out of him. Red warning lights flashed across his vision. The reality finally began to sink in for Merlin as the worms pressed his arms against the side of his body. His teammates were too far away to do anything to help him, and he was running out of options.
Merlin, Spartan-III, child of Delta Company, turned his thoughts to Andra. He hoped that she had not been sucked into this place and forced to compete in this horrific game. He thought of her dark hair and his fingers running through it. He swore he could smell the distinctive scent of her body odour after a mission. He felt tears swell up in his eyes as he imagined that beautiful and welcoming toothy smile of hers, hidden from everyone but him. He let that smile linger in his mind. Merlin was determined that should these be his last moments alive, that Andra’s smile was the final thing he should see. What a blessing it truly was to know someone as special as her. He keyed from his HUD the armoured shoulder rockets to fire one final time.
Felix turned his head to look at the explosion. Merlin’s vital signs disappeared from his HUD, and the charred remnants of hunter worms plopped onto the ground. The surviving ones screaming and wriggling as the fires quickly consumed them. Senna was pushing forward to the final surviving member of the other team and Felix was determined to reach Addison. After a brief search, he had been able to find her. Her small body sunken deep into the mud. He felt a small burst of pride at her resourcefulness, it almost hid the shame he felt at losing her during the battle - but she was alive now and he had found her.
“Hi Addison,” he said, kneeling down. His eyes drawn to the wound in her leg. “It’s okay, I’ll take care of that.”
He took a small can of biofoam and injected it into her wound. The young girl’s nails dug deep into the mud and a groan escaped from her lips. Small tears streaked down her cheeks, clearing away racing lines of mud from her face.
“Come on, let me help you up,” Felix said, offering a hand to her.
As soon as she took it, Felix’s shields flared from a hailfire of bullets. Quickly, he pushed Addison back into the ground and turned around. Senna’s corpse lay at the feet of the enemy Spartan, their visor having been cracked open. A strained smile lay upon his face. Felix, having dropped his weapon to tend to Addison, called forth the ancient Human sceptre that lay buried in his prosthetic. He gripped it tightly in his hand as it illuminated him in a blue hue. Seeing that the Spartan had stopped to reload, he charged forward, his teeth biting down hard upon themselves. The veins in his forehead bulging so much that if they could be seen it would seem that they were close to bursting their banks and spilling yet more blood upon the soil.
The enemy Spartan had yet to even finish reloading their weapon by the time Felix reached them. Felix swung down hard at this enemy as they threw up their weapon to block. The energy blade easily cut through the carbine as if it wasn’t there. The enemy rolled to their left as Felix let throw yet another brutal swipe. This was the final mistake for Felix’s unknown enemy. Their roll in the mud had slowed them down enough that Felix was able to jump above them. Any apprehension Felix might have felt at fighting another Spartan for sport was long buried within his psyche. He had seen enough today that he was simply in survival mode - he had to live at whatever cost this might mean to himself and those around him.
The prone Spartan tried to swing their fist at Felix but it was easily batted away. Felix drove his sceptre deep into the chest of his enemy. The smell of cauterised metal, and flesh and boiling blood erupted in his nose. Still, his anger remained in control. He ripped the blade out in an upwards motion, cutting more of the armour and slicing the bottom half of the MJOLNIR helmet. He could see a bloodstained chin and a mouth full of pink frothing blood. A plea for help drowning in their throat. Felix slammed down in one final stabbing motion into the head of the combatant and sank to his knees, his energy sapped from him.
He took a few moments to catch his breath, his eyes firmly stuck on the dead beneath him. Felix looked up and to his surprise he saw the Spartan that had been grenaded from the Scarab’s plasma turret staring at him, the detached turret in their hands. Felix smiled wryly and offered no resistance. He knew he was beaten. Felix swore he could have heard a ‘sorry’ as he saw the blue squeal from the turret and scorch and burn his body into lifelessness.
Addison’s eyes opened wide as she saw her protector fall. His body was peppered with holes, smoke billowing violently upwards from them. She ran as best as her wounded leg would let her towards him. Maybe he was still alive, maybe there was something she could do that wouldn’t leave her alone and scared.
Addison reached him and placed her arms on his shoulders and began shaking him. She repeated his name a few times but nothing happened. She was abandoned by her guardian angel.
“Fuck,” came an almost whispered reply.
She faced this strange voice and saw someone who was equipped similarly to the Spartans in her team and deduced that this was also one.
“Hey, hey hey,” they said as they jumped to reach her and Felix, “Don’t look at him, it’s okay you don’t have to look.”
“A-Are you going to hurt me?” she asked through her tears.
The Spartan visibly recoiled and reached out to her, placing his arm reassuringly on her shoulder.
“Isn’t the sky beautiful?” the strange Spartan said.
She looked up. He was right. The sky was cloudless; azure. The sun burned brightly and proudly orange. It was a perfect morning.
Addison heard a metallic click and then there was nothing.
11: The Eye[]
The twin titans carved a trench through the bone white sands of the beach with their heavy footfalls as they fought. The large dome of impenetrable sapphire energy that dominated the horizon may have been their largest witness, but it was not their only one. Scott Edwards had seen footage of Spartans in action against the Covenant before, heavily censored and edited it may have been, but nothing could have prepared him for a battle between two of humanity's best no further than fifty yards from the husk of a dead tree he hid behind.
"Shit!" The aging trooper took a knee and brought his assault rifle up to bear, but couldn't get a clean shot on the enemy Spartan in gray armor tinged with blue as they tussled with his ally in gold and silver, Jet Thompson. Maybe that was the enemy's plan, to keep Jet between themself and the trooper who otherwise could have gunned them down. In theory, in any case.
Jet and his opponent's limbs were a blur as they exchanged slashes with their blades as well as parries and feints at dizzying speeds. When steel met steel, or rather, hyper-dense alloy, sparks flew and the blades sang their shrill metallic song. The translucent golden ripple of the MJOLNIR’s energy shielding only seemed to appear whenever the foe slipped past Jet's guard and raked the cold steel across his arms or chest. But when Jet managed the same-- nothing. Not even a hint of gold. Instead, metal bit into metal, and the opponent came away with more slash marks carved into their armor than before.
"Can't we just call a timeout and talk things though?" Jet said over the clashing of blades, less a half-hearted joke and more a plea. The opponent's mirrored visor betrayed nothing, and their only answer was to slap Jet's blade aside with their own, and pivot into a full-force shoulder check that knocked him off his feet despite his shields. The sands rippled as half a ton of supersoldier came crashing down, ass first. Jet groaned.
"Guess not."
The light of the sun glinted in the machete's cold edge as it traced a graceful arc in the air, the enemy Spartan catching it in a reverse grip. All the better for driving the tip through Jet's gorget and neck with all their weight behind it.
But before the enemy could pounce, a trio of rounds plinked off the outer shell of their gray-blue armor, snatching their attention. Scott had hoped that that would have done more than just piss the hulking supersoldier off, who now reached for their oversized revolver and fired off a shot from the hip in the same motion like an old western gunslinger. The dead tree husk exploded into saw dust as a grapefruit-sized hole cleaved the trunk in two, followed by a peal of thunder. Scott cursed as splinters pelted his armor.
The fact that he wasn’t dead then and there could only be attributed to dumb luck. But a Spartan wouldn’t miss a second time.
A part of Scott had accepted that it was his turn to be torn in half, but he was still whole when he heard the second thunderclap ring out. When he looked, he saw that the gray-blue Spartan was on their back now in the sand, the barrel of their revolver still smoking as Jet rolled on top of them, swatting the revolver out of the gray-blue Spartan's grasp and raining down a volley of punches.
Jet must have swept the enemy off their feet in the single second they were distracted by Scott, he realized, causing them to miss the shot that would have blown the trooper to pieces. And now he had taken a mounted position over the fallen Spartan, who could do nothing but clam up and weather Jet's powerful swings.
Scott moved to get closer and help Jet put the foe down for good, until he heard the man yelling in his helmet:
"Get out of here, Edwards!" Jet managed between punches, his breathing labored. A sound he never expected a Spartan to make, and one that unnerved him to his core. "Help the others, warn them before--"
What the always optimistic, charitable Spartan was going to say next, Scott would never know. One moment, Jet was there, wailing on the foe with all he had after saving Scott's life. The next, his chest seemed to pop like a balloon full of red mist, sending limbs, entrails and titanium plating every which way. There was a loud crack, too, he knew, but he was too stunned to register if it had been before or after Jet had ceased to be.
Next thing Scott knew, he was running in the opposite direction, chest heaving, Jet's last words ringing in his head as the Spartan’s blood rained down from above. The once bone white sands drank the red eagerly. The large energy dome that characterized the southern skies was an unblinking eye-- ignorant or indifferent to the brutality unfolding on its shores.
The remains of her gold-silver opponent, which amounted to little more than legs and pelvis, slumped and fell to the side as Vaish-194 rose to her feet. Half her armor was coated in a thick, running red, including her faceplate, but she didn't dare take the helmet off in the middle of a battlefield.
"I never asked for help," she said, flatly.
“No,” Brenden-G122 answered in a voice as detached as hers, albeit with the slightest hint of an Irish brogue. He watched her through the scope of his M99 Stanchion, a special applications weapon that was more railgun than rifle, designed to punch through a tank as well as anything between it and the shooter. In the face of that, MJOLNIR may as well have been made of wet toilet paper.
“You got a clear shot on the ODST?” Vaish asked.
“Negative. He's all yours. I gotta move to second position.” The only response Brenden received was a wink of a green acknowledgement light in his heads-up display, and a hiss of static as Vaish closed the channel. That was fine, he was never much for pleasantries, either.
Still– a simple “thank you” would not have gone unappreciated.
Brenden was mindful of the thick cable that tethered the Stanchion rifle to his armor’s power pack as he slinked back into the shadow of the stony crags that overlooked the beach. It was a good position; high elevation, sun at his back, and nearly a kilometer out, placing it comfortably out of range of most standard UNSC service rifles.
But not an SRS99 or another Stanchion. With as little as they knew, it didn’t feel right to jump to any conclusions about how the other teams were arranged. Whether the powers that be even cared about things like a balanced assortment of expertise and weaponry or not. Still, it would have been even more foolish to believe himself the only sniper in town.
So, as nice as the crags were, it was time to move on.
The immense weight of his power armor didn’t stop Brenden from moving as quietly as a predator through the forest that bordered the island’s northern coast. A blip on the outer edges of his motion sensor made him halt. Unknown contact, fifty meters, dead ahead.
“Vaish? I think I got something here.” As far as Brenden and his team had seen, there weren’t any signs of indigenous wildlife on this island, which meant that any unknown contact was likely…
He didn’t get a chance to finish that thought. Another contact, only five meters to his left. He swung the barrel of his Stanchion rifle, but the contact was already on him, an orange blur that moved too fast to be anything but a Spartan. In a single long stride, the foe was past the elongated barrel, raising a mailed fist that scraped against Brenden’s shields as it narrowly missed the Gamma’s chin.
A blow like that would have rang his bell, shields or no shields– but Chief Mendez would have blown a gasket if one of his Spartans went down that easily.
Brenden twisted, swinging an elbow at the rounded orange helmet in retaliation. But a strike delivered from the backfoot like that was easily blocked as the foe just shrugged and allowed the elbow to bounce off of their shoulder pad, but it did at least buy him a moment to take a step back and attempt to bring the barrel of the Stanchion up to bear. Only for the orange Spartan to swat it away with a kick and deliver a devastating body shot that swept him off his feet and set off every alarm in his helmet.
He fell in a heap eight meters away. Red text warning him of depleted shields, compromised armor integrity and abdominal contusions danced along his vision. There was a faint metallic tang on his tongue as he willed the obscuring text away. The orange-clad Spartan was advancing, slowly, battle rifle in hand.
“Figured somebody would set up shop on those crags.” Came a masculine voice, its English accent all but drowned out by the warble of the MJOLNIR’s external speakers. Brenden wasn’t sure why, but that voice only made the guy that much easier to hate.
That intense anger he felt in that moment took him aback. It wasn’t like him to get like this, even in these kinds of dire situations. Yet it was undeniable, the rage boiling beneath the surface. Drowning out any hint of agony he may have felt otherwise.
“This is why you always bring a battle buddy.” The enemy Spartan must have said something, but it sounded like they were a million miles away. The orange helmet tilted towards an approaching second form, another Spartan, this one in olive drab armor. “Nice of you to join us, Daniel.”
“I was hoping you’d have all this taken care of by now, David.” The newcomer, who was evidently named Daniel, replied. In a voice that sounded strangely young but weathered. “Let’s make this quick, there’s no telling when his team will come sniffing.”
Whatever part of Brenden that would have drawn a connection between this newcomer and the first contact on his motion tracker from earlier had already faded deep into the recesses of his mind. Along with any part of himself that would have registered the battle rifles in their hands and thought twice about what he was going to do next.
He nearly shattered the casing of the energy disruptor he had in his grasp as he thumbed the activation switch, and tossed it towards David and Daniel before diving to the side to avoid their retaliatory fire. Spartans wouldn’t miss a target at point blank range, but he needed that split-second delay where their enhanced minds had to decide between putting Brenden down for a good and avoiding the grenade-like device he had just thrown in order to avoid those armor-piercing rounds striking somewhere critical.
The energy disruptor was a nifty piece of tech borrowed from the Covenant. It was essentially an EMP grenade on steroids that would fry all but the most vital functions of the MJOLNIR armor. Which, of course, at this range, would include his own armor, as well as his Stanchion.
There was a flash of sapphire, and it felt like a wave of pins and needles washed over his skin as the heads-up display in Brenden’s helmet flickered and died. Even through their mirrored face plates, he saw the confusion in the other two as their shield systems sputtered and failed. They were finally on even footing. Brenden tore his Stanchion free of its cord and tossed it aside before leaping at them.
David was the first to recover his wits. The orange Spartan tried to shove the butt of his rifle through Brenden’s visor, but his movements were so slow, it was as if he was fighting underwater. He ducked the blow, and swung a short upper into David’s liver. There was a rush of satisfaction as his gauntlet dug into the titanium nanocomposite mesh, and David very nearly doubled over.
Correction: now they were on even footing.
There was a trio of supersonic cracks, and Brenden turned to see Daniel, rifle barrel smoking, as if he had just fired a burst into the Gamma’s side, and could do little more than watch as Brenden ripped the rifle from David’s grasp, and disarm Daniel in turn with a swing of the makeshift bludgeon.
Orange vambraces swung over Brenden like a steel curtain as David struggled to restrain the rampaging Gamma. One of his arms was hooked around Brenden’s neck, but choking somebody through a titanium gorget was a tall order even for a Spartan.
More immediately pressing was Daniel, who had taken advantage of the opening provided by their partner to draw their combat knife– and lodge it deep into Brenden’s gut, right where the armor had been weakened from David’s earlier body shot. Brenden grit his teeth and cursed, more so because of the gnarly sight than any pain he should have felt, but didn’t.
The Gamma shot up, jamming his helmet into David’s faceplate hard enough to make it crack. The orange Spartan winced, but kept his hold on the Gamma. But that didn’t stop Brenden from arching back, raising an armored boot and driving it into Daniel’s chest like a piston.
The force made the olive Spartan stumble backwards, his knife forgotten in Brenden’s abdomen, and caused David to buckle as well. The Gamma and the orange foe fell to the earth together like a pair of mighty oaks.
Brenden managed to slip free of David’s chokehold and turned the tables on the orange, British bastard with a wristlock. David tried to reach for the knife in Brenden’s gut, the only thing keeping his innards from spilling out onto the dirt. And he would have gotten it, too, if Brenden hadn’t thought to have drawn it first.
He didn’t pay any mind to the blood that poured from his wound, or whatever it was that was spooling out of him like a sickly, lumpy rope. All that mattered was the knife, David’s throat, and the overwhelming rage that demanded Brenden introduced the two. Once, twice, three times– David stopped struggling after that. But Brenden didn’t stop. Not until the Spartan was more red than orange.
“Lieutenant.” A tiny voice, hardly more than a whisper, seemed to say. He ignored it. Must have been the wind.
“Brenden!” The voice again, louder, firmer.
Something grabbed his wrist just as he brought the knife back to stab David again. Brenden tried to break free, but whatever held him did so with an iron grip. No, that wasn’t right. The fingers were firm, but gentle, somehow. It was only when he allowed the heavy blade thick with red to tumble out of his hand, did Brenden realize he no longer had the strength to resist.
He noticed the gray vambraces, and recalled the last transmission he had made to her, before he had been ambushed by David and Daniel.
“...Vaish?” He tried to say, but all that came bubbling from his throat was a gurgle. Sure enough, however, his gray armored teammate was there, kneeling next to him. Brenden couldn’t see her face, but he saw himself in the reflection of her mirrored faceplate. Or, at least, what was left of him.
He still didn’t feel anything, and part of him knew just how bad of a sign that really was.
He started to gurgle again, he needed to warn her about Daniel, that other Spartan that hadn’t been neutralized yet. However, when she eased him down onto the dirt, he saw that there was no need. Daniel’s body was there, not five feet from him. A massive hole in the side of his helmet and brain. No doubt from Vaish’s oversized hand cannon.
“Don’t talk.” She said, as flatly as ever. Yet, he couldn’t help but find it a little amusing, how after she lowered him to the ground, she produced a canister of biofoam, only to pause when she realized there was not enough first aid in the world that could put him back together.
“It’s okay.” He tried to say, waving away the nozzle of the biofoam. And part of him meant it, even.
“It’s okay.”
“Looks like he doubled back, to try and throw us off.” The Army Sergeant, Emma Sówka explained, as if the ODST corpsman partnered with her required a crash course in tracking a wounded target. Maybe it was to impress the doc, or maybe Sówka just wanted to talk about anything, to distract the both of them from the gruesomeness of their charge.
Lloyd was never good with trying to figure out what people were thinking, so she didn’t bother. Instead, she only nodded, and moved in step with the Sergeant, their rifles at the ready.
Their quarry, however, could not have put up much of a fight, even if he had wanted to, making such caution superfluous.
In a way, Sówka and Lloyd had been dealt a strong hand, being teamed up with a couple of supersoldiers in this twisted death game. Though, their Spartan teammates might not have felt the same, instead seeing the ODST and the Army pathfinder and their fragile bodies as liabilities rather than assets when shit hit the fan, and supersoldier started tussling with supersoldier.
Maybe that was just Calson and his anti-Spartan rhetoric seeping into her brain. But it was hard to think any different when Vaish-194 had to split in the middle of a shootout, and leave the two of them to clean up what she started.
They’d found him on the stony shore, instead of the nearby woods that his tracks led at a glance. He was propped up on a rock, helmet discarded, sidearm in one hand across his lap, and the other clutching his bloody side. A nasty exit wound, likely courtesy of Vaish before she was called away.
His skin was pale and streaked with blood, but it was hard not to recognize the stern brow and long face of her Staff Sergeant. Scott Edwards, leader of Fireteam Wolf. Back when there had been a Wolf, at least.
“Lloyd.” He said, his voice barely more than a rasp. His body laxed, and he tilted his head towards the open sea. “Thank goodness. Thank goodness.”
“Drop the pistol, Gramps,” Sówka ordered, the barrel of her DMR aimed squarely between the Staff Sergeant’s eyes.
Lloyd shot out an outstretched hand that stopped Sówka in her tracks.
“Give me a minute.”
“Wha–What?” She saw Sówka’s eyes narrow beneath her helmet. “The hell are you thinking?”
“I just need a minute.” Lloyd turned back towards the Staff Sergeant. “It’s fine. He won’t try anything.”
Sówka bit her lip, her eyes lingering on the pistol on Edwards’ lap, before meeting Lloyd’s gaze. It seemed like she was thinking hard about something. Maybe she was trying to figure out who the aging trooper was to her. Though with the matching wolf insignia on both his and Lloyd’s chestplate, it should have been obvious.
Maybe she was just weighing her options, wondering if shooting the wounded trooper and mitigating the risk was worth whatever fallout would occur between her and her teammate.
“Fine,” She lowered her rifle. “One minute.”
She waited until Sówka was out of earshot, before taking a knee.
“Hey, Sarge.” She said quietly, removing her helmet. The breeze carried with it a hint of salt that lingered on her lips as the waves lapped rhythmically.
His eyelids fluttered open and he stared at her wordlessly for a moment, as if he had been dreaming, and wanted to make sure the real deal was in front of him.
“You heard about the others,” The Staff Sergeant said, more a statement than a question. Lloyd nodded anyway, her jaw tight. Grief flashed across his hard features for a heartbeat.
She didn’t like that look. It reminded her too much of the face her mother had made that day, when a man in uniform showed up at their door one day, and told them her father was never coming home.
“Does it hurt?” Lloyd heard herself ask, gesturing towards his wound. A stupid question, she knew.
“Only a lot,” Edwards said, a grin tugging at the corner of his thin lips.
She nodded, and pulled out a pouch of medical supplies from her rucksack. Instead of biofoam or medigel or anything like that, she withdrew a long syringe, full of a potent narcotic. Edwards’ eyes settled on the tip, and his throat bobbed. Yet he extended his arm, anyway.
“How’s your brother?” He made it a point not to look as Lloyd rolled up the sleeve and searched for a suitable vein. “Malcolm, was it?”
“Hasn’t spoken to me in years. Ever since I chewed him out.” The tip of the needle hovered over the Staff Sergeant’s skin. But she wasn’t ready just yet.
“I went years without speaking to my folks, too.” He said, perhaps sensing her hesitation. “No call, no video, not even a letter on Christmas, for God’s sake. I guess I was just waiting. Waiting until I was the kind of man they always said I could be. By then, though, it was too late.”
His hand found Lloyd’s, and he squeezed it, hard enough to hurt. But that pain was nothing compared to what she felt when the tip of the needle finally pierced his skin.
“You can’t be like me, kid. You can’t wait until it’s too late.”
She didn’t have the words for times like these, so all she could do was nod.
“So, survive. Whatever it takes.” His eyelids seemed like they were growing heavier, and that it was all he could do to stay awake.
“You can consider that… one last order.”
All strength had been sapped from his fingers after that, and his breathing stilled.
12: FOB[]
Delvin-A125 surveyed the carnage. The ruined hulk of the Scarab assault platform that had carried his team dominated the scorched landscape, and the bodies of several fellow Spartans lay nearby. Some were his teammates, others foes. While he didn’t like to fight fellow Spartans, he was willing to do so if necessary. It wasn’t too hard to kill them. No, the most difficult opponent to kill had been the girl.
Her name was Addison Solaski - at least, that was the name on the school ID card she was carrying. She was only seventeen years old, a civilian teen, and he had killed her.
I had no choice, Delvin told himself, It’s kill or be killed here. She was on the other side. She had to die so I could make it out of here.
Despite his reassurances, the Spartan didn’t believe them. He had at least given Addison the benefit of a mercy kill - distracted her long enough for him to put a round through the back of her head with his MA5K. It was the best he could do - no, he shouldn’t have killed her in the first place. She wasn’t a threat!
Delvin tried to push away the dark thoughts by rifling through the supplies of the dead. The metal scepter of the Spartan he had killed would make a nice melee weapon; he tossed his knife in favor of it. He had seen its potential unleashed against Cain-131. He dropped the plasma cannon too - it would slow him down, and being bogged down out in the open was the last thing he needed right now. At that moment he saw something spilling out of Addison’s lunchbox. Despite his desire to stay away from the girl’s corpse, he couldn’t help investigating.
The Mark IV-clad Spartan tromped over to the girl, gingerly lifting up her jacket. A punctured bottle of water spilled out of a pocket, followed by a second, untouched one. Delvin’s survival instincts kicked in immediately. He grabbed the intact bottle and stowed it without thinking, then grabbed a plastic bag further in the pouch, drawing a package of cheese crackers. He hadn’t been dropped here with any food, and it had been hours since he had eaten. Delvin nearly took off his helmet then and there to chow down on the food before stopping himself.
I’m looting the food off the corpse of an innocent teenager I just killed! He realized. No, I’m scavenging for supplies off of a dead combatant - right? It’s a shame to let it go to waste, and I need every advantage I can take.
Delvin, sighed, stowing the water bottle and crackers away in the lunchbox for later consumption. He would take them with him, but it didn’t feel right eating them now. Not here.
I need to find some shelter. The Scarab’s hull is unstable, so I can’t risk sticking around in there. The Announcer said that there were two big teams with our fireteams being subunits, so therefore there should be other allies on this island. My best bet is finding some. I’m screwed out here by myself.
Delvin packed up his new belongings, set on his new objective, and with MA5K in hand, departed the battlefield, leaving the dead behind.
“Such trauma for this next one! Erin-G174 - the kid one, mind you - had already suffered so much before we even put her here on Mors Insula!”
Erin-G174 was still reeling from the Announcer’s last intermission. She had been killed already - a different version of her, at least, from how the omnipresent voice put it. A younger version of herself on this island; brutally murdered - the chilling prospect of the deathmatch had only just worn off for her by the time the death list came in.
The Spartan-III cursed. Right before the news of the death of her past self had come the announcement of one of her former teammate’s deaths - Bless-G189. Bless had been here on Mors Insula the whole time! And what had Erin done? Sought out a location of refuge before deciding to hunker down and stay put. She could have been out there searching; she could have done something to prevent Bless’s death!
A goddamn mistake. Everything I’ve done on this island has been a goddamn mistake.
Erin glanced around at the outpost and the teammates she had been placed with several hours ago. She had been the one to suggest finding a structure when they had first arrived in this place, and had made the mistake of deciding to set up shop when they did. The team had quickly discovered a UNSC FOB along the edge of a churning river, seemingly untouched. On the far side of the river, she could make out an outpost comprising angry red and silver structures jutting with spikes on an elevated position. Whatever faction it belonged to, she didn’t know.
Shortly after accessing the FOB, she had heard gunfire and explosions erupting from the base. There was no way to join the fray, even if her team had wanted to - the river water flowed far too fast to make it across in this region. The commotion had eventually died down, leaving her to wonder - had Bless, or perhaps even her younger self been a part of that carnage? Were their killers still on the loose?
“Finally opened the little bugger!”
Erin was ripped from her thoughts as one of her teammates, a girl around her age, but unaugmented and clothed only in mechanic’s fatigues, tore the lid off of a UNSC supply crate. Arianne Doppler had insisted on using her multitool to pry open the locks on each of the dozen or so cargo crates present at the FOB. As the mechanic put it, Erin was more valuable standing watch against any potential threats rather than using her brute force to rip the crates open. The Spartan had to admit that she had a point.
Despite Arianne’s machine pistol on her person, the girl said she had little in the way of combat experience and no protective gear to measure. At least that wasn’t an issue that their other teammates had to suffer.
A tall, regal Sangheili stood at the opposite edge of the FOB platform, a Needle Rifle at the ready. His black Spec-Ops harness gleamed in the sunlight as he surveyed the outlying treeline for any signs of enemy targets. His name was Is 'Ontom, and he was a spook of all things.
Erin’s time in the Anvil initiative and her partnership with the Riftborn Sintu gave her much insight into Sangheili culture, but ‘Ontom was an anomaly - his ways seemed more befitting a human than a Sangheili. The fact that he had willingly joined ONI even before the Human-Covenant War’s end only highlighted his strange ways. Regardless, it was an advantage for Erin. Even outside of the confines of Survival of the Fittest, the two would have been on the same side back in the main galaxy, so it gave Erin a modicum of relief to know that he had her back.
It was more than she could say for the Brute. The shaggy, massive alien leaned against one of the larger cargo crates, his sheer bulk crushing them against the platform’s railings. While the individual, named Decipitus, wasn’t outright hostile, the Jiralhanae had been less than forthcoming with information. All he had offered to the rest of the team was that he hailed from a Covenant remnant faction called the Quillick, which even included humans. Erin had no idea how that could be, seeing as remnants had only recently started popping up with the war’s end.
“Holy shit!” Arianne yelped from nearby.
Erin strode over to the girl, watching as a swarm of insects flew out of the crate and into the forest.
“Gilgameshan Honeybees,” Arianne cursed, “I saw some in the trees before coming to the FOB. Why the hell would they be inside a random crate?”
“Beats me,” Erin replied.
“I was hoping for rations,” Arianne muttered looking at the remaining contents of the crate, “these look like drugs. The last thing I need to do is get high while fighting for my life.”
Erin recognized them immediately.
“Smoothers…” she perused, grabbing a container of the drugs that were vital to Gammas like herself. She had been teleported onto the island with two days worth of the stimulants she needed to prevent herself from going into a feral rage, but the discovery of another stash was a surprise - yet a welcome one.
“And smoothers are?” Arianne questioned incredulously.
“Something some of us Spartans need,” Erin said, reaching into the crate to grab the rest of the stock - these would easily double her amount, allowing her to go on for another four days - if the fighting was still going on that long from now.
“Nothing for me,” Arianne harrumphed, glaring at the other object in the crate.
“A methane tank?” Erin wondered aloud, hefting the metal container out of the crate.
“Like the ones those Grunts wear,” Arianne noted, “I’m starting to get the feeling that the cargo at this FOB is filled with stuff meant for all the different participants.”
“Then keep searching,” Erin ordered, “by that logic there should be something for you too.”
Arianne’s eyes lit up at the notion that there could be something of use for her, and she immediately set upon the next crate with renewed vigor, while Is ‘Ontom watched from his edge of the platform. While Erin couldn’t tell his expression from his helmet, his body language seemed to indicate that he was amused by the whole predicament.
“Have you seen anyone coming near the river from the opposite side yet?” Erin called out.
“Not as of yet, Spartan,” ‘Ontom replied. “Either they fled in the opposite direction, or both belligerents perished in the battle. As much as I loathe to take life without meaning, I would make short work of them from across the river.”
“Keep an eye out. We’ll move out once Arianne’s finished opening all these supply crates. I think it would be better if we move on from here. This FOB doesn’t have enough defensive points to be worth staying at.”
“Very well, Spartan,” ‘Ontom clicked, returning to his post.
A growl from Decipitus caught Erin’s attention. She turned to see the Jiralhanae sniffing the air, his eyes narrowed. He turned towards the treeline to the south, leaning down to pick up his main weapon with one hand. A modified M68 Gauss Cannon, it was perfectly suited for the brutality of his kind.
“I smell a scent distinct from our own,” he barked, “human.”
“Then hold your fire,” Erin commanded, stepping out in front of the Brute. “I don’t need any trigger-happy apes firing at potential teammates.”
“You think I would act so impulsively because of my people’s tendencies?” Decipitus snarled, seemingly offended. “I value patience too, Spartan.”
Erin had misjudged the Jiralhanae. Regardless, she wanted him behind her in case the approaching individual was an ally. After all, she recalled the Announcer saying how there were too large teams on the island split into smaller fireteams. Perhaps this new arrival would be on the same side as them?
She noticed ‘Ontom readying his Needle Rifle in the corner of her vision, and saw Arianne taking up a position behind her on her motion tracker. She unslung her only weapon, an MA5B assault rifle with a single magazine. For several moments they waited with bated breaths as nothing but the roaring water and rustling pines of the trees made any sounds. Eventually, an armored form emerged from the trees.
Erin immediately recognized the armor as that of a fellow Spartan. That was reassuring. What was more, there was a floating blue dot above his head, just like those above her teammates. His armor looked older, and battleworn. He was alone too - had this man seen combat already?
“Weapons down,” she commanded. ‘Ontom and Arianne followed the order immediately, but Decipitus kept his Gauss Cannon raised.
“I said, weapons down,” Erin repeated, and the Brute finally relented. The Spartan-III stepped forward, slinging her assault rifle back to show that she meant no harm. The approaching Spartan eased somewhat, lowering his MA5K as he drew near. Upon closer inspection she could tell that he towered over her, possessing a massive stature even among other Spartans.
“Another Spartan,” Erin called out, “we’ll need as many as we can get.”
“Not necessarily,” the newcomer disagreed, “Two of my teammates were Spartans, yet they didn’t make it. We had three hostile Spartans trying to kill us.”
Erin considered the information for a moment. If what he said was true, then being a Spartan didn’t mean anything if one’s team was different from another. So much for trying to negotiate with hostiles.
“It’s good to see more teammates,” the Spartan said, arriving at the foot of the FOB’s entrance ramp. “The rest of my team was wiped out about an hour ago. I was the only survivor. I heard that there were other fireteams across the island, and I was hoping to find one.”
“Looks like you’re in luck,” Arianne commented with a wry smile. “We’ve got plenty of supplies at this FOB.”
“Excellent,” the Spartan said, before turning back to Erin. “I’m Warrant Officer Delvin-A125.”
“Spartan Erin-G174,” she replied in kind.
“Gamma, I assume?” the larger Spartan mused, “I didn’t know the Gammas had already been trained and deployed. The Betas just deployed, if I recall correctly.”
Erin momentarily froze. She had once been B110, not G174. The rest of her company had deployed then, but she had been left behind - held back to be integrated into Gamma Company due to an at-the-time unknown illness. She had lived, while nearly all of her brothers and sisters in Beta Company had perished.
“That was 2545,” Erin answered, composing herself. Now aware of the timeline strings the Announcer had pulled on to summon them all to Mors Insula, she could make some inferences. “I’m from 2555. We’ve all been pulled from different points in time.”
“Huh. So humanity’s still kicking ten years from now?”
“We won,” Arianne interjected, “the Covenant’s gone.”
“Holy shit, we actually did it…” The Alpha froze, considering the miraculous news for a second.
“So… That’s why the ape and the gator are cooperative?” Delvin finally questioned.
“I surrendered to the Office of Naval Intelligence prior to the Great Schism,” Is ‘Ontom bristled.
“It doesn’t matter anyways,” Erin said, “we’re all on the same side here. If you really are the only surviving member of your fireteam, it only makes sense to band with us. That way we’ll have higher numbers than any enemy fireteams we come across.”
“Sounds good, Gamma,” Delvin concurred, outstretching a hand, “Looks like you’re my team now.”
Erin raised her own hand to take his, but stopped. Small, golden bands began to warp in and out of existence around Delvin’s body, slowly growing larger and brighter with each pulse.
“The hell?” He said, looking at his arms as the rings continued to surge.
“What is this sorcery?” Decipitus growled from behind Erin. She turned to see the Jiralhanae enveloped in the same effects as Delvin. Soon, the same rings overtook, ‘Ontom, then Arianne, then even Erin herself.
As the shimmering bands warped around her, she noticed Delvin pop out of existence, followed shortly by the disappearance of the bands around him. As the rest of her teammates began to follow suit, Erin took notice as the tides of the river suddenly began to rise. The water churned out from the river at an impossible rate, rapidly, swallowing up the stilts of the FOB platform. As it began to spill up the ramp, Erin felt a tight squeeze, before everything went black.
13: Tsunami[]
The tides churned, and roaring water consumed the coastlines. Waves the height of skyscrapers began to manifest on the horizon, crossing the distance to the shore in a matter of minutes. As the sea level rapidly rose, the biomes of Mors Insula were submerged. UNSC FOBs were lifted off their platforms and drifted away in the torrents, while Forerunner metal was once more buried. Not even the snow-peaked mountains Cauldron of the Storm was exempt, eventually, inevitably, being dragged under the waves.
Finally, the storm stopped, and the waters went calm once more. The artificial tsunami was over, and the entire island lay underwater. From above the surface it seemed like there was never even a landmass at all. Mors Insula was flooded - with the exception of the shield dome in its center.
From the display screen in the control center the Announcer watched as one of his remote drones dove beneath the surface, revealing a glowing bubble as light burst forth from the interior of the shield dome. Beneath the hard light roof was a vast city, filled with sprawling Forerunner structures. Spires of brutalist nature jutted up from the ground, forming a skyline beneath the dome, while a central tower loomed high above the rest, connecting with the shield bubble at its peak.
The “Cosmopolis” was what the liaison had called it. The Announcer was impressed - the Forerunner city had been painstakingly mapped out by the crew, and he would make sure to give them bonuses after the fact. It was truly breathtaking. Forty-four signatures popped up around the Cosmopolis, representing the remaining contestants who had survived the first phase. Some were located inside massive Forerunner structures with unique purposes given to them - features that would “spice up the gameplay” as the liaison said.
Others were placed on a grand ring circling the inner half of the city. The Promenade, as it was called, was the most efficient path for traversal in the Cosmopolis for these competitors. Others, still, were placed in the Districts, where a labyrinth of smaller structures comprised the outer ring. The innermost ring around the central spire was blocked off - it would serve its purpose later.
“Outstanding!” The Announcer trilled, grinning from ear to ear. “We did it, folks! That’s the first time in seven years that we’ve made it past Phase One!”
The employees clapped and whooped, patting each other on the backs at a job well done. Forty-eight competitors were eliminated; just over half of the roster. It was about time for a change of scenery. The broadcaster made his way over to the Announcer’s plush chair.
“The teleportation restraints are holding up,” the younger man declared, “the upgrades are working quite well.”
“Damn,” the Announcer said with genuine surprise on his face, “those have been around since Season Four… Good to see that they’re long-lasting.”
“All remaining contestants have been teleported inside the Cosmopolis. They’ve been rendered unconscious and won’t wake up until you start your next announcement. Once you’re done, they’ll be let loose in the city.”
“I guess that’s my cue,” the Announcer said, turning back to the microphone as the broadcaster returned to his own set.
“Good evening, competitors! It’s your friendly neighborhood Announcer back at it again, bringing you the latest in developments with Survival of the Fittest! Twenty-six more of you bit the dust since we last talked, so you know what time it is. First I’ll list off the deaths, but next I have some surprises in store for you! Hope you all didn’t forget about what I said when I first brought you all together.”
“Without further delay, let’s resume where we left off! In seventieth place we have Jerome Brandt. Despite being a formidable Helljumper, he was unceremoniously sniped, by his good pal Damien Calson no less! Talk about betrayal!”
“Next up is Sidonus. This silent Brute never uttered so much as a word and didn’t eke out so much as a kill. Although I guess it’s kind of hard to do that when your fur is set on fire. Then your skin. Then your muscles. Then your organs. You get the point.”
“Following Sidonus was Isaac Anderson Hallas. Yet another ODST who croaked too early. At least, he would have croaked if he still had a windpipe. Guess you could say he ‘got the wind knocked out of him’, right? Right.”
“Unlike the last three, Tavish Gillday Glessner went out swinging, spitting in the face of death and saying every word in the book until the end. If only more participants had guts like him.”
“Next to go was Bodark-B076. Another vicious Spartan, she thrashed the competition like there was nothing to it. Unfortunately, not even Mjolnir power armor can stop soundwaves tuned to frequencies designed to scramble your insides.”
“I bet you all must hate Davien Calson for blowing his friend’s brains out, huh? Well, not to worry! He got his just desserts when his head was bashed in with his own rifle. Backstabbing is like cutting people off in traffic, you see. It may get you ahead, but in the end, you never win.”
“Following Calson, we have Erin Coney! This smug ORION thought that she had the upper hand against her Spartan successors. Unfortunately, there’s a clear difference in the Augmentations between a I and a III. Even more unfortunate, her death was so gruesome that we can’t even show it here! We need to keep it family-friendly, after all. With that, Fireteam Blue-Foxtrot is out of the running!”
“Tough luck for Colin-142. He thought he had some easy pickings with two unaugmented humans to fight, but he clearly forgot to take ingenuity into account. Getting crushed by a crane is a pretty pathetic way to go.”
“Joseph Kovacs joined him soon after. Another case of getting overconfident, this soldier realized his folly too late to escape from his mecha competitor. The man got ragdolled by a Cyclops for God’s sake. There’s no coming back from that.”
“Next on the list is Leon Sikowsky. This plucky soldier may have gotten lucky with his fights at first, but active camouflage doesn’t care about your luck! Neither does the energy sword sticking through Leon’s chest.”
“Caroline Danton was an Innie in an Innie base, folks. To think, she still lost with the home field advantage! After some crafty tactics that scored her a kill and got a Spartan’s shotgun into her hands, you’d think she would be doing fine. Unfortunately, said Spartan was still alive and repaid the act with a good old-fashioned stabbing. Sometimes, you can bring a knife to a gunfight.”
“Aylla-G021 finally gave us some of that good old Gamma ferocity. Then again, who wouldn’t after getting their weapon stolen by some punk? Alas, no Gamma, no matter how feral, could beat a Cyclops in a fight. Ah well, she tried.”
“Here we have another kill trade, folks! Fleet Master Thoze 'Suman got Kaurava the Executor quite good with an entire magazine of needles dumped into him! Kaurava insisted on going out with a bang, however, and self-destructed with enough force to level the complex. Cross Fireteam Blue-India off the list.”
“Next, we have Joseph-122. This veteran Spartan was quick to take up the mantle of leadership for his team, but that amounts to jackshit when you get sniped. Next!”
“Merlin-D032 went out in a… Curious way. The last thing you expect after destroying a Scarab is for a giant tentacle monster to slither out of it and squeeze you to death! He didn’t go down without a fight, however, and took Nogoda Yugo Husgoa with him. Pretty surprising when one of the competitors is a Godzilla-sized walking tank, but doesn’t even make it to Phase Two. So long to the big one.”
“Senna-G074 proved an excellent sniper. He must have been a master of one trade, novice of all others, though, considering that Cain-131 took him out pretty quickly once she closed the distance.”
“Speaking of Cain, she’s next on the chopping block! Spartan-IIs have few equals when it comes down to it, but one of those equals are other Spartan-IIs. Seeing family troubles get messy is always entertainment, even if you end up dying from it.”
“Felix-116 had it all - the best augmentations, the best armor, the best weapons - but he didn’t have the one thing that 117 did! I guess luck is really the only thing that can save you from being melted by a point-blank plasma cannon, huh…”
“Addison Solaski, ouch! Even I thought it was a bit over the top to put in someone like her. She was here for all of a few hours, and got more than her share of trauma. Thankfully, Spartan Delvin-A125 spared the girl after the rest of her team died. Just kidding - he put a bullet through her head, wiping Fireteam Red-Golf from the field.”
“Jet Thompson - or what’s left of him - was the first to die on Mors Insula’s beautiful beach! The tides soon swept away what little was left of him - a Stanchion doesn’t leave much residue.”
“David-B114 should have realized what he got himself into when he decided to fight a Gamma in close quarters. With such ferocity you’d know one would just kill you even if you spilled out his guts!”
“Daniel-D076 got some good hits in, but oh boy, he didn’t stand a chance against a point-blank hand cannon! The hole in his head’s now waterlogged, with everything being underwater and all now.”
“Next, we have Brenden-G122. This Gamma put up quite the spectacle, showing his aptitude at both a distance and up close, and we got some of that good ‘ol feral anger that drove him to disembowel his opponent’s throat! Of course, all good Gamma rages must come to an end, and his ended with the realization that he had been fighting without internal organs for a good few minutes.”
“Finally, the last death of Phase One belongs to Scott Edwards. His demise was unusual to say the least - he accepted his fate and let his pal Allison Lloyd overdose him on morphine. It brings a tear to my eye…”
“Moving on from the deaths, it’s time to reveal the surprises! As you’ll have noticed, Mors Insula has tragically been consumed by a tsunami, ala Atlantis. Say goodbye to outdoor environments and hello to the Cosmopolis! This vast Forerunner city lies beneath the island’s shield barrier that many of you have undoubtedly seen in the distance during your time here. Forty-four of you have made it to see these grand skylines, where a myriad of tourist destinations await you! Explore the vast but crowded districts, or traverse the titanic promenade that loops around the city. If you like to keep moving, maybe you’ll want to hitch a ride on the Cosmopolis Transit system too. Just remain calm knowing that the force field bubble over the city is the only thing standing between you and drowning - or maybe being crushed by the water pressure first.”
“Now, there’s going to be some new rules laid out in Phase Two. First off, it’s every fireteam for themselves! Trust no one except for your teammates, because even if you met someone from a friendly fireteam last phase, they’re now your enemy. It’s high time that we added some fights involving more than just two sides.”
“Now, if we tally up the deaths we’ll find that Red Team got more kills than Blue Team, edging out twenty-six compared to twenty-two. Normally that would mean that the Red Team would get the Phase Two bonus we had planned for them - wrong! The Red Team got ahead by four kills due to friendly fire, meaning that they had more deaths than the Blue Team as well. And since counting kills from friendly fire is hardly fair, that means that Blue Team wins Phase One!”
“In case you’re wondering what that means, every surviving Blue fireteam now gets a bonus for Phase Two. To spice things up, all of you lucky bluebirds get vehicles! That’s right, take the carnage to new heights with tanks, speeders, and more! As for the Red Team, better luck next time. Maybe you won’t cheat by getting team kills, eh?”
“With that out of the way, I shouldn’t delay you all any further. After all, I know you’re just raring to try out your new toys. So without further ado, let Phase Two commence!”
Several signatures marking vehicles appeared on the map of the Cosmopolis next to their respective fireteams. As the dots all started moving, the Announcer leaned back, a smirk on his face. This marked Season Eight as the first one in years to have actually made it past the first phase - the ball was rolling now. And with the new additions and rules in place, there would be no stopping the carnage to come.
Phase Two: The Cosmopolis[]
14: Short-Lived Alliance[]
The cavernous expanse stretched out for hundreds meters, its walls composed of pure Forerunner alloys that pulsed as blue energy conduits embedded within them transferred power from the ground to an unknown source at the top of the gargantuan chamber. Stalactites hung from the roof of the steel cave, massive sensor antennae with blinking white lights on their tips. In racks positioned near the antennae were vast rows of Aggressor Sentinels, their arms folded in as they remained motionless in their perches like bats with tucked wings.
Several Enforcers wandered the vast room, lazily drifting about as schools of Constructors swarmed around them like remora fish. The metal ecosystem had lain undisturbed since its inception several hours ago, but the tranquility was soon disrupted when a flash of golden light engulfed the chamber. As quickly as it had arrived, the light was gone, with five individuals and two vehicles taking its place in the center of the chamber.
“Where the hell did that bastard teleport us?”
Delvin-A125 gritted his teeth, taking in the surrounding cave. Text above his motion tracker flickered in, saying a single word. Luminarium.
“This place seems to be referred to as the ‘Luminarium’,” Is 'Ontom said from a distance away, already late on the uptake.
The Sangheili craned his neck upwards, observing a nearby Enforcer pass by as its Constructor companions darted after it. Nearby, Decipitus’s eyes flitted across the scene, his jaw hanging open.
“It is… Beautiful,” the Jiralhanae uttered, “never before have I seen so many Forerunner creations in one place, yet alone one so grand as this.”
“Are you a believer, Jiralhanae?” ‘Ontom asked in a placated tone.
“That depends on your definition of the word,” the Jiralhanae answered, “but it does not mean that I lack appreciation for their creations. I envy their talent. Study of such structures is an endeavor that more of us should aspire to.”
“We got vehicles!”
The group’s attention turned to Arianne, who had made her way over to one of the nearby vehicles. Massive and oblong in shape, the troop carrier held a smaller, slimmer vehicle in its underbelly.
“A Shadow,” Decipitus rumbled, “with a Ghost in its undercarriage too. I have quite the experience with modifying these vehicles.”
The burly alien gestured to the array of tools fixed to his armor. “Luck is with us today.”
Decipitus lumbered over to the two Covenant vehicles, Arianne following in his massive footsteps. ‘Ontom meant to go as well, but stopped when he noticed Erin-G174’s posture. The Spartan held her assault rifle in one hand, while the other was balled into a fist. He followed the gaze of her visor, finding that it landed on Delvin-A125.
“Is there a problem, Spartan?” ‘Ontom whispered softly, instinctively lowering his voice as he surveyed the situation.
“Yeah,” she responded, her voice soft yet bitter. “Delvin is a cold-blooded murderer.”
‘Ontom tilted his head to regard Erin as Delvin made his way towards the Shadow to join Decipitus and Arianne. “You would judge him for fighting to survive in this deathmatch? When we are all prepared to do the same?”
“No,” Erin growled, now loud enough for the other three to hear. “It’s the fact that he killed an unarmed child who posed no threat to him!”
The sentence echoed throughout the Luminarium, and Delvin froze. After a moment, he slowly turned around. While his face was hidden by the helmet, ‘Ontom noticed the larger Spartan’s grip around his carbine tighten. For several long seconds the Alpha regarded Erin, now stuck between all four members of the fireteam.
It was at that moment that ‘Ontom finally noticed a change: the blue dot above Delvin’s head was gone. The Announcer’s new rule about the dispersion of large teams had kicked in. Delvin was no longer protected from their weaponry by the mystic customs of the deathmatch.
“I did what I had to,” Delvin finally said, breaking the silence, “I did what was necessary to survive.”
“Everyone heard what the Announcer said,” Erin seethed, “you put a bullet through the head of an unarmed kid.”
“She was on the enemy team-”
“She wasn’t a threat. You could have let her go.”
“And risk her coming back to kill me? I didn’t want to kill her. I had to. Just like we have to kill everyone else in this damn deathmatch to win.”
“We?” Arianne spat, her hand dangerously close to her machine pistol.
Decipitus emitted a deep rumble from his throat, his fingers twitching on the handle of his Gauss Cannon. “You are no longer an ally, Spartan. And seeing what you would do to a child of your own kind, how could we trust you not to turn on us?”
Delvin swayed his head from left to right, seemingly weighing his options. ‘Ontom prepared to activate his camouflage at a moment’s notice, knowing that this standoff would not last much longer.
“You can trust me because there’s four of you and one of me,” he said, “I’m screwed if I try to take you all on at once. It was Erin, right?”
The Spartan riskily removed a hand from the grip of his carbine, outstretching it to Erin. “Come on, we’re both Spartans. You can trust me.”
‘Ontom’s hand rested on his Gunfighter Magnum pistol, but he refrained from grabbing it. He looked over to Erin, who seemed to be considering Delvin’s plea. She lifted her head back up and shook it.
“I thought I could. I can trust Spartans, but we don’t kill innocent people. Our duty is to protect humanity, whatever the cost. A duty that you forsook, taking a life that didn’t need to be taken. You’re no Spartan, as far as I’m concerned.”
Delvin slowly turned to face the Shadow, studying it. Erin raised her assault rifle. ‘Ontom leaned in close to the Spartan, drawing his sidearm.
“So I am to assume that he is a true enemy now?”
“Light the bastard up.”
As soon as Erin gave the order, all hell broke loose. ‘Ontom snapped his pistol up, unloading his magazine in Delvin’s direction. The first few rounds bounced off the Spartan’s thick armor, but he dove to the side to avoid the rest. Arianne followed ‘Ontom’s lead with her machine pistol, but her shots went wild as the girl struggled to control the weapon’s recoil. Delvin made a break towards her and Decipitus, shrugging off more bullets as Erin fired her rifle’s single magazine at him.
Decipitus wordlessly dropped his hefty Gauss Cannon, swinging a gauntleted arm at Delvin. The Spartan ducked beneath the swipe, firing off a burst from his carbine into the Jiralhanae’s side. Decipitus snarled as blood burst from the wounds made, turning around to catch Delvin.
“I will tear you apart!”
A surge of energy activated on the brute’s fists, and he swung wildly; unskillfully, as Delvin dodged and weaved the attacks from his shock gauntlets. The Spartan raised his carbine to deliver another burst, but quickly retreated as Decipitus grabbed the weapon, crushing it to bits with his gauntlets.
Decipitus continued to advance, backing Delvin closer to the Shadow, but the Spartan still had another trick up his sleeve. As ‘Ontom and Erin drew closer to re engage, and Arianne fumbled with a new magazine, the Alpha drew a gleaming metal scepter, raising it just in time to block a slam from his furry opponent.
At first it seemed like a tactical error; Decipitus’s gloves ignited, sending a burst of electricity through the scepter, which conducted it with ease. But rather than travel through the rod and into Delvin’s body to shock him like ‘Ontom had expected, it instead remained in the scepter, crackling even more furiously than before.
The dawn of realization on Decipitus’s face was quickly wiped off as Delvin smashed the energy-imbued scepter into his chest, knocking him back further than any melee weapon feasibly could. As the Jiralhanae soared through the air, a bolt of lightning shot out from the scepter, frying a Constructor passing by. Delvin stopped, evidently unaware of the ranged ability, but quickly regained his composure, diving into the Shadow’s underbelly as ‘Ontom and Erin fired at him once more.
“We have him cornered,” Erin said, “‘Ontom, you go right. I’ll go around the left to get him from behind.”
‘Ontom would have replied, but the next second his energy shields flashed as a laser beam hit them. Rolling backwards, he looked up to see that several Aggressor Sentinels had detached themselves from the ceiling, their red eyes focused on the organic beings below.
The Spartan’s destruction of the Constructor must have triggered their activation. A pity that we must fight on two fronts now.
‘Ontom fired his Magnum again, internally cursing at the fact that it took nearly an entire magazine to take down a single drone. His Needle Rifle wouldn’t prove useful against them either - the shards would merely bounce off the Sentinels’ shields.
“Dammit, robots inbound!” Arianne yelped, scrambling out of the way as a laser beam narrowly missed her. Another of the Sentinels screeched as its shields overloaded and exploded, causing it to fall to the ground in a fiery display.
“That was my only mag,” Erin called out, dropping her assault rifle.
“Take this, Spartan,” ‘Ontom suggested, unslinging his Needle Rifle with one hand and tossing it to her. “It is useless against their shields. Allow me to drain them with my sidearm, then three shards from your weapon will super combine them.”
Erin nodded, moving to cover Arianne as the three remaining Sentinels closed in with a pincer formation. As planned, ‘Ontom began draining their shields one by one, with each Sentinel promptly exploding in a cloud of pink mist as Erin fired the Needle Rifle to great effect. After all three had been dispatched, Erin turned back to the Shadow.
“We need to take out Delvin. Who knows what that bastard was doing while we were fighting off those drones?”
As if on cue to answer the question, a high-pitched humming emanated from the Shadow’s underbelly, and ‘Ontom’s eyes widened beneath his infiltration mask as the troop carrier’s Ghost patrol bike detached. Sure enough, Delvin was in the driver’s seat, and he spun the Ghost around to face the Sangheili directly.
“By the Rings,” ‘Ontom growled, habitually using the outdated curse. The Sangheili narrowly evaded certain death as the Ghost sped by him, its thrusters in full drive. Like a bull after a failed charge, the speeder turned back around for another go.
“The turret!” The Sangheili roared at Erin and Arianne, “use the Shadow’s-”
Several small explosions peppered the ground around the ONI-affiliated alien, with a final one hitting him directly. His shields burst, and the Sangheili collapsed to the ground. Pulling back his mandibles in a pained grimace, he looked upwards to see one of the Enforcers from before hovering overhead, its six arms primed and ready to avenge its fallen cousins.
Seeing the new arrival to the fight, Delvin eased the Ghost back around, hitting the thrusters as the bike sped away, leaving ‘Ontom and his team to their fates. The Sangheili activated his camouflage unit as a protective measure due to his downed shields, then watched as Erin scrambled on top of the Shadow to make a break for its turret.
Another volley of micro-missiles from the Enforcer ensured that she wouldn’t reach it, blasting the Spartan off the arched back of the troop carrier. With no turret to down its two massive shields, and meager small arms being their only weaponry, ‘Ontom realized the uselessness of trying to fight such a large construct.
Boom!
A projectile collided with the back of the Enforcer, causing it to sway. As the flying Forerunner construct attempted to right itself, another round tore through its circuits, then another. A fourth shot finally brought the behemoth down, forcing it to crash to the ground and explode. A bulky frame emerged from the flames, and ‘Ontom had never been happier to see a Jiralhanae before.
Decipitus reigned triumphant, his Gauss Cannon reclaimed and employed to lethal effect. The Jiralhanae roared victoriously, then glanced upwards, chuckling. ‘Ontom uncloaked and followed his gaze, noticing that the rest of the Forerunner constructs continued about their business, completely oblivious to the slaughter of their comrades.
“It would seem that these Sentinels operate in isolated swarms,” Decipitus noted, “the traitor Spartan’s attack on one of them stirred the rest of the group, but the collective as a whole remains passive.”
“Then it is best that we refrain from any further fighting,” ‘Ontom replied.
The Sangheili turned back to the Shadow to check on Erin, but was comforted by the sight of her standing with recharged shields.
“You seem to be unharmed, Spartan. That is good.”
“I’m fine. So is Arianne. But that bastard got away.”
“Then we shall pursue!” Decipitus howled, “we still have the Shadow for ourselves.”
“But it’s a slow-moving target,” Erin countered, “I don’t know if that plasma turret will be very effective against vehicular armor.”
“Not to worry,” Decipitus said with barely contained glee, his fangs glistening in the soft light of the Luminarium. He tore a welder’s mask off of his belt and shoved it over his face.The Jiralhanae then grabbed a power torch, and tapped his Gauss Cannon with it.
“I specialize in modification of many things, Spartan,” Decipitus said, “my experience will see us claim victory.”
“And how’s that?” Arianne questioned, having stowed her unruly machine pistol.
“Simple. I will tear off the plasma turret and weld this Gauss Cannon on. No enemy will be able to stand against our firepower then!”
“Anything we can help with?” Erin offered.
“No, I can manage fine by myself. But it will take some time, so I request that you establish a defensive line while I work.”
“You’ve got yourself a defense,” Erin said, confidently clutching ‘Ontom’s Needle Rifle. “Arianne, ‘Ontom, spread out. I don’t think that bastard Delvin is coming back any time soon, but for the time being, we’ve got to protect Decipitus while he makes us a Gauss Shadow.”
15: The Silent Garden[]
The idyllic garden, home to an innumerable amount of colors and flora, was surrounded by tall, brutalist structures. As if the garden itself rested in the palm of a giant, with fingers of cracked, stony skin that stretched high into the air. Their edges weathered by time, vines flowing along the cracks like veins.
Bleza’s faith, like so many of his kind, had been irreparably damaged when the betrayal of the Prophets was made known. Yet, here in this garden, in the presence of such beauty, carefully sculpted by the Forerunners, something flickered in his twin hearts. Something he had long since thought lost. Humility? Piety? That burning desire to believe that was more this world had to offer than war and vengeance?
He did not know how long he had been standing there, enraptured by the sight, but it was only when he managed to tear his eyes away did Bleza notice that an unnatural mist had settled over the area– and he was utterly and completely alone.
Cursing himself for his lapse in awareness, Bleza scanned the area for any sign of his “allies”. When he found none, whatever else had filled his hearts was soon replaced by a deep rage he could barely contain. The Human, the Mgalekgolo, and the Promethean construct. Willful traitors all. He should have known they would have tried to rid themselves of him, given the first opportunity.
With few other options, Bleza opted to seek refuge within a circular structure he had happened upon while searching fruitlessly for the others in the haze. There were no doors, only a great wide opening that made even the eight foot tall alien warrior feel small as he crossed the threshold.
Given the nature of the area, he had expected a conservatory of some form, but instead, when the mist parted before him, the Sangheili found himself atop the edge of a cliff, overlooking an impossibly vast ocean. The smell of salt water pervaded his nostrils, and he tasted the sea on his tongue. He turned to look at where he had come, only to find that the mist and the opening were gone. Replaced with an all too familiar landscape.
What manner of trickery is this?
It was Sangheilos, he knew. More than that, the shores of Kopal Keep. It was on these very waters that Bleza’s uncles had taught him rope and sail. A Sangheili was more than sword or rifle, they had said. Be it on the open sea or among the endless stars, they were oarsmen, helmsmen, and voyagers as much as warriors or leaders.
Nostalgia and sadness both gripped his twin hearts as Bleza remembered those years, his home. And the fact that now that he had cast his lot with the Arbiter’s enemy, he may never see these shores again. He could not decide if the gods were kind, or unfathomably cruel, to show him the one place he could never return to.
—
Navarro. Leandre. Macaulay. Hepburn. MacNally. Colton. Latimer.
The names came unbidden as Quinn ran her eyes over the faces of the ghastly corpses that lay at her feet. Navarro’s glazed eyes seemed to follow in silent judgment as red flowed endlessly from the slash in her throat.
It hadn’t been anything personal. Navarro had just come too close to sniffing Quinn out. To figuring out who, or what, she really was. And it was then that Quinn had killed her first Spartan. For all the talk of unbreakable bones and superhuman musculature, in the end, Navarro had been meat. And the knife slit her jugular as easily as anything else.
When Quinn laid an armored boot on Navarro’s ugly face and stomped, the insubstantial illusion dissolved into the same mist that surrounded her. She laughed. Just as she suspected.
“What do you think I am, an idiot?!” Quinn turned towards a patch of air she assumed they were watching her from, shouting into her helmet. “Oh, let me guess– this is the part where I’m supposed to feel bad? Fall to my knees, begging ‘O Lord, please forgive me! I repent!’’”
She would have spat, if there wasn’t a faceplate in the way. So instead, she turned to the illusion that wore Spartan Percy Colton’s face, and kicked his head into the haze. She laughed, then said with a deadly edge in her voice:
“Fuck. That. Don’t act like you know me just because of some ONI prick’s dossier.”
The air, as expected, did not answer. But that was fine. There’d be more than enough time for answers when this was all over, and Quinn had the bastards responsible for this little game in her grasp.
“You always did have a knack for getting yourself into trouble, Quinny.” The voice was a gentle caress. One Quinn had not felt since…
Her breath caught in her throat as the Spartan Killer froze. Her armor blared a warning about an elevated heart rate, but it never reached her ears.
“I couldn’t remember the last time you came home from school without cuts and bruises. You tried to hide them, you lied and said you were getting along with the other kids, but I knew. A mother always knows, Quinny.”
She was turned away with her back towards her, but Quinn recognized the same flip flops she had always seen her mother walking around in. They were old and worn out, or at least so she had complained day after day, but she never seemed able to bring herself to throw them out. The same loose pink cardigan she would put it on whenever it got a little too chilly on Asmara draped over her small frame.
As if on cue, a whisper of an autumn breeze seemed to climb up her body, despite the half-ton shell of titanium Quinn wore. A lie, like, everything that came before it. Like this whole damn island. Quinn raised her magnum with her one good arm. But she didn’t pull the trigger. Not yet.
“You’re not real,” she hissed through clenched teeth, half to the apparition, half to herself. She had never– never told anyone about the cutesy childhood nickname, nor anything else about her past before Asmara’s surface was boiled away. Along with the rest of the Binici family.
“I watched you die!”
The small woman moved to turn and face her, and Quinn’s breathing hitched. It had been so long. So many lifetimes ago, since she’d last seen her mother’s smiling face. There hadn’t been time to gather up any valuables when the evacuation orders were given. So any photo albums, holo-stills, any proof her parents had ever lived… it was all swept away under the Covenant’s brutal invasion.
“Don’t forget us,” her mother had said, when she passed her one and only daughter into the arms of a stranger so that she may have the slightest chance of survival. Before the fires came, and swept her mother away too. But Quinn had forgotten. Or at least, she thought she had.
“You’ve grown, Quinny. I guess I can’t call you mommy’s little girl anymore, can I?”
The two of them could have been sisters. Sisters who had taken radically different paths in life. It had never occurred to her that she was the same age now her mother had been back then. Maybe even older.
Quinn opened her mouth, as if she meant to say something. But what, exactly, she didn’t know. It might have been a curse, a plea, an apology– or somehow all of that and more.
A bone-rattling explosion not too far from where she was standing set the Spartan into fight-or-flight, her body practically moving on its own as the supersoldier dived behind cover. Quinn chanced a glance to where her mother had been, and saw nothing else but mist.
Rage surged anew within her as she holstered her sidearm and shouldered her scavenged M41 rocket launcher. Another boom, this one further off than the first, followed by a low, wailing rumble. Like the cry of a deep sea whale that had been separated from its pod. A third explosion, even more distant.
Clearly, whatever was responsible for all this commotion was either a terrible shot– or Quinn had never been its target in the first place. The second option seemed more likely, as she heard the rat-a-tat of automatic fire in the distance, followed by more wailing.
After a slow, careful approach, Quinn was surprised to see what the source of all this racket was– a Hunter, or Mgalekgolo, its hulking, spiked form unmistakable even through the purplish haze. She scanned her surroundings for any sign of the second bond brother, but found none.
The alien wailed, spinning around to chop at some invisible foe with its diamond-shaped shield. Quinn hadn’t the slightest idea what sort of visions tormented the colony of worms, but that the creature was experiencing some manner of hallucinations was at least clear to her.
Whatever this place was, it seemed to enjoy teasing out their deepest, darkest secrets and desires. Probably all for the sake of the deranged entertainment of the announcer and whoever else was watching. Just like they’d done with her and her mother.
They’d pay for that, too, she decided. But before that, there was the matter of the Hunter. The bipedal tanks were enough of a threat to make even a Spartan like Quinn think twice, but with this one isolated and distracted– well, she couldn’t have asked for better conditions for an ambush.
She leveled the barrel of her rocket launcher at the Hunter. Bodark might have been a pain in the ass, but she had had the good grace to die before expending the M41’s second rocket tube, leaving Quinn with 102 millimeters of fun for herself.
“Open wide, you son of a bitch,” she whispered in her helmet. The Hunter’s quills perked as if it heard her, and spun to face her. Golden dots adorned its headplate, searing themselves into her vision like vengeful embers. It brought its main weapon arm up to bear– not a Covenant assault cannon, but a human grenade launcher of all things.
Shit.
Wind roared in her ears as the rocket burst forward with a whoosh. It met the Hunter’s strange armored form before it could return fire, and blossomed into a massive fireball that momentarily swallowed the giant whole.
The Hunter, haloed by flame, emerged, its shield bearing a deep red-hot gash, but otherwise unharmed. It had managed to avoid a direct hit, much to Quinn’s chagrin. She tossed the empty rocket launcher aside, and unslung her assault rifle.
She took it back– if Bodark had any “good grace”, she would have left Quinn both rockets.
The wounded Hunter roared and let loose with everything it had. Streams of machine gun fire and HE grenades all concentrated on Quinn’s position. The Spartans thrusters flared to life, and shot the half-ton supersoldier out of harm’s way as the cover she had been hiding behind a moment prior was riddled with lead and shrapnel.
Hunters had gaps in their impressive armor, located primarily at the joints, neck and backside. A few good shots, and the colony would collapse under its own weight. Anyone who’d served during the Covenant War would have known that much, but most who tried to flank a Hunter rarely lived to tell the tale. Which was why it was better to just hit it hard with heavy weaponry, or failing that, an airstrike.
With neither of those being an option, Quinn had no choice but to rely on her superhuman speed, and her armor’s sheer durability. Her shields were close to dropping at the halfway point after a few heavy machine gun rounds found their target, but she activated her overshield module, and the shimmering energy field held firm long enough for her to close the distance.
Second she was within range, the Hunter roared and swung its massive shield arm, intent on bisecting the Spartan at the waist. However, Quinn was ready for such a response, and sprung up and over the behemoth, aided by her thruster pack and the MJOLNIR’s reactive circuits. She landed among the Hunter’s back quills, gripping onto them for dear life as the alien tried to buck her off like a rampaging bull.
“I said: ‘open wide!’” The fingers of her injured arm wrapped around the Hunter’s collar as Quinn forced herself to bear the agony. With her free hand, she dug it into the Hunter’s neck of coiled worms, and plucked them free three or four at a time like a farmer pulling the weeds in his fields.
The worms popped into bright orange ichor that stained her armor. The Hunter, the other worms in the colony, wailed in empathy and shared agony as Quinn grabbed another handful and yanked. And another, and another, until the hulking monstrosity wailed no more, and ten thousand pounds of flesh and armor dropped with an earth-shattering crash.
Amidst the smoke and flames, Quinn stood atop the remains of the monster. She had survived, again. But before she could consider how best to relieve the Hunter of its grenade launcher arm and dual machine guns for her own purposes, she heard what could have only been the bolt of an MA5 being racked.
The Spartan turned, drenched in the Hunter’s blood and surrounded by flames, and saw a little man, the barrel of his MA5K carbine aimed right at her. Quinn couldn’t help but notice the logo of the Office of Naval Intelligence, and smile.
The fewer spooks in the world, the better.
“Friend of yours?” Quinn said in a playful tone, gesturing lazily towards the dead Hunter.
“I prefer the term ‘government asset’. The real expensive kind, no doubt.” The man’s voice was unamused, but not quite angry either. She eyed the weapon in his hands.
“That’s a five-kay. Thirty rounds, fifteen per second.” She turned to face him dead on. The muscles in her good hand flexed, ready to draw her magnum at a moment’s notice. “You’ll be dead before your counter hits ten. And all you’d have done is nick my armor. At best.”
“No.” The man said, evenly. “I’d have done exactly what I needed to.”
A quartet of crimson streaks settled over Quinn’s chest. She looked up, and followed its path through the fog. It terminated in a burning halo of the same color, deep into the haze.
“Binary rifle…” Quinn murmured in her helmet. What happened next seemed to unfold in both an instant, and an eternity.
Quinn’s arm was a blur as she moved to draw her magnum. But when she brought it up to eye level, her hand was gone. In its place, luminescent petals. Then they moved up to her elbow, then her bicep, muscle and sinew and all evaporated into nothing.
She lunged at the man after that, not content with going out alone, but the binary rifle fired again, taking out one of her prosthetic legs. The supersoldier fell to the ground without a hint of grace as the petals now crawled up her body from two ends.
She hurled every last profanity she knew, along with some new ones she made up on the spot. Before the petals peeled her eyes away, in her delirium, Quinn could have sworn she saw a familiar silhouette in the haze.
“Mama…” She would have whispered, if she still had a mouth.
16: Ragnarumble[]
Gylinda Dirix had never been one to look on the bright side, but if there was one thing she was thankful for, it was the fact that none of her companions were particularly chatty; or at least, they didn’t feel inclined to prattle needlessly, which made for a welcome contrast from the Announcer’s obnoxiously chipper disposition.
The one with the marred features – Boogeyman, he called himself – had briskly exchanged a few words with her between a bout of coughing fits when he handed her his sidearm earlier, or one of them. The man was well-armed in his heavy BDU, as opposed to her who had been yanked into the murder contest with no armour or weapons; just the loose-fitting shirt and pants issued to her for her stay at the ONI psych ward she had been sitting in.
I guess I was getting bored in there, mused Gilly. Doesn’t seem like I’ll be a danger to anyone undue here, what with this place not letting us harm our teammates. And if I die... well, I hope that’ll give James some peace of mind. I was the worst thing to happen to him.
Her gaze lingered on the back of the other spook making up their quartet, garbed in an ONI tactical suit. Lieutenant Commander Derek Frendsen, who looked more than a little out of his element at the moment. If Gilly had to guess, he had been out of the field for some time now, likely upward of a decade from the hint of stiffness in his otherwise brisk movements. She had seen men like that at the start of the Covenant War, when seasoned veterans of his calibre had been pulled out of retirement due to the dire situation humanity suddenly found itself thrust into. Just like the one we’re in now. Only who knows what the hell this freak show is really about.
Gilly didn’t much care, if she was being honest. It wasn’t like she had anything to look forward to while being medicated into a complicit stupor in her padded cell, except hoping that ONI would get desperate enough to let her out and give her another crack at the Covenant. She’d have gone into cryo if not for the fact that whatever part of her ORION augmentations had messed her up also reacted poorly to being put on ice. Even now, part of her pondered the possibility that she was still in the psych ward on Sirona, and that this was all a hallucination on her part. It would certainly explain that deranged Announcer. Well, if I’ve finally flipped, then I hope this’ll be entertaining if nothing else.
Her wish looked like it was about to be granted, for the Spartan taking point, Joshua-G024, held up a hand signalling the team to stop. Peering over Boogeyman’s shoulder, Gilly saw that the uncannily tidy city district they had been sneaking through had given way to a sort of promenade up ahead. Like the surrounding architecture, its make was alien and looked as new as the day it was built – which could have been today for all she knew. The ornate stone walkway traced a perfectly circular arc around the more affluent inner district and the enormous spire looming in the distance.
The sides of the promenade’s wide arcing surface were lined with thick ornate pillars projecting sheets of hard light that hovered at knee level, presumably for sitting on while creating a source of illumination that was visible even in broad daylight. But what caught everyone's eye was the Scorpion tank parked between the hard light benches, sitting innocuously out in the open.
“No heat sources coming from the tank,” Joshua informed them. “It hasn’t been used recently. But this has to be a trap.”
“Agreed,” murmured Boogeyman. “But was it set by our adversaries or by the people running this shitshow?”
Gilly shot him a quizzical look. “Does it matter?”
“Oh, plenty,” he replied contemplatively. “The first possibility spells certain death for us, while the second leaves room for our gracious hosts to toy with us a bit longer.”
“Wonderful,” sighed Gilly, rolling up her sleeves. “I think I’d prefer certain death and be done with it at this point.”
“What are you doing, Petty Officer?” inquired Frendsen.
She straightened briskly. “Didn't you hear what I just said? I’m gonna spring the trap.”
Ragna Aasen immediately knew that the Spartan had to go first if she was to have any shot of winning this one. The targets heading toward her position had the look of an ONI hit team despite their inconsistent attire, with their gear ranging from heavy power armour to nonexistent.
Using her field expertise and whatever hardware she had salvaged off her last encounter, Ragna had only just managed to re-weld the busted leg on her Cyclops into a standing position when the mech had alerted her to four approaching heat signatures, which proved fortuitous as it gave her time to silently conceal herself with the walker in an outer district alley off the side of the promenade.
She had initially considered trashing the Scorpion, seeing as she didn’t have much use for it with her entire fireteam wiped out. Leaving it behind was certainly not an appealing prospect given the number of ways that could come back to bite her later. And so as she often would when faced with a dilemma, she recounted the teachings of her late mentor, Redmond Venter. Play the long game, he would tell her. A trap only works if it’s just enticing enough for your quarry to take the bait.
Even a decade after his death, Ragna could hear his voice in her head clear as day. And so she remained stock still from the precariously narrow ledge upon which her Cyclops was perched, hidden well enough in the alley’s shadow to remain unseen on the side of the Forerunner structure she was clinging to. The walker’s heat-masking unit must have been fixed by whoever had brought her here, for Ragna vividly remembered it had still been broken when she was whisked into the contest, and yet none of the four humans seemed to take any notice of her as they drew closer toward the Scorpion. Or if they had, then the prospect of facing a Cyclops must not have deterred them.
For the first time, Ragna wondered if she was about to make a huge mistake. Her teammates had been gracious enough to deal with enemy Spartans during the last fight, but she was on her own now and was not enthused about engaging one head-on when she was already outnumbered. And if the ONI team was worth their salt, they would take less than a minute between them to notice the jury-rigged state of the Cyclops’ leg. All in all, not great odds for her, and frankly she had been hoping for a smaller team to come upon the Scorpion. But it was too late to abandon the plan now; even if Ragna tried to escape, the old boy would make too much noise and be pursued by the other team.
The enemy team was holding their position just shy of the promenade, all of them taking cover behind the pillars except one; a middle-aged woman clad in what looked like a hospital gown was clambering onto the Scorpion, flipping open the cover and lowering herself into the cabin. Ragna veered her the old boy out of the alleyway and dashed straight for them, making no effort to be subtle as she had only seconds to make the first move.
The three targets behind cover spotted her almost immediately, right as the woman leapt out of the Scorpion shouting, “It’s a dud! Tank’s disabled!” The team scattered in all directions as Ragna entered her mech’s effective firing range, and a moment later she unleashed a barrage of missiles at their retreating forms.
Without hesitation, she steered the Cyclops after the Spartan, who was sprinting for a nearby pavilion. Her machine gun spat a furious hail of rounds at him while she tried to close in, some making contact with his energy shields while others pinged off the impervious stone surface beneath their feet. The supersoldier made it to the entrance right as his shields sputtered out and expediently zipped inside, disappearing as the doors slid shut behind him.
He wants me to follow, realized Ragna. Her Cyclops would be at a significantly reduced advantage within the confined space, but she saw no other choice. If she let her attention drift from the Spartan for so much as a minute, she knew she would be dead. And so she stomped heedlessly through the entrance as well, vigilant for any sign of her opponent amidst the glowing blue corridors.
“She followed him inside,” Boogeyman rasped, peering out from behind the gazebo where he was taking cover. “Looks like Gilly’s going in after her.” He doubled over to cough erratically, despite his helmet’s efforts to keep his humidity levels optimal.
Frendsen, who was now sitting in the Scorpion’s cabin and rewiring the internal circuits as expediently as he could, grunted, “Fantastic. I’m sure that peashooter you gave her will do great against a Cyclops.”
Boogeyman adjusted his helmet and straightened before sprinting toward the pavilion. “I’d better go even the odds. Keep working on that tank.”
As he slipped in through the motion-sensitive doors, he was greeted by the majestically-lit architecture that was just as familiar as the exterior. But unlike the cold stone and metal surfaces he had seen in Forerunner facilities on missions past, this place was clearly designed with vanity in mind above all else. The walls were maybe fifteen feet tall, resplendent in a weaving blend of colours and lined with decorative sculptures and lights, while the ceiling overhead let in the natural light through the clear spotless glass.
Boogeyman could hear the sounds of fighting from further down the hall. The cacophony reflecting off the walls made it difficult to tell where it was coming from, but he snuck toward the sound as silently as he could – and then the wall burst open in front of him, sending him back-first onto the floor amidst a spray of stone chunks. His SMG was knocked out of his hand and clattered a short distance away, and upon catching sight of the enemy Cyclops charging past him with Joshua holding on stubbornly, the ONI agent instinctively reached for his sidearm.
It wasn’t there. Recalling that he had given it to Gilly, Boogeyman drew his plasma pistol as the Cyclops used Joshua to plow through another wall. Clearly not the Forerunners’ best work, or perhaps the Announcer just liked breaking walls in every sense of the word. A heartbeat later, Gilly bound out from the first hole and through the second; Boogeyman held down the overcharge on his gun, careful not to hit Gilly as he aimed his shot at the centre of the walker.
The Cyclops kicked Joshua against the wall hard enough to embed him into its surface, then turned and grabbed Gilly out of the air. Boogeyman let his shot fly right as the mech hurled Gilly at him, and he saw the plasma bolt splash against its intended target a moment before his teammate collided with him, sending them rolling across the floor in a daze.
With her Cyclops rendered inert and emitting blue sparks, Ragna frantically emptied her magnum into the Spartan in an effort to keep his shields down while he wrenched himself out of the wall. The supersoldier’s DMR was nowhere to be seen, but she saw him go for his sidearm as well and hastily snapped her canopy hatch shut.
The sound of high explosive rounds pounding against the metal cover soon gave way to the whir of the Cyclops humming back to life, and Ragna wasted no time priming another missile at the Spartan. But her opponent reacted quickly, forcing the walker's arm up toward the ceiling right before the missile discharged.
A flash of white light filled Ragna’s vision, causing her to squeeze her eyes shut as the explosion went off at point-blank range, reverberating through the pavilion with a rumbling groan. The old boy shook in response, multiple warnings on her cracked displays blaring over the sound of debris crashing down around them – the missile arm was completely obliterated, Ragna could tell even without checking the readouts. Her fingers were aching from how hard she was gripping the controls, but regardless she fought to steady the walker while it trampled clumsily upon the pile of rubble now making up the floor.
And then the Cyclops’ bad leg – the one that had taken a rocket during Ragna’s first scrap – jammed at a forty-five degree angle, forcing the mech into an awkward forward-leaning position. The Spartan immediately took notice of this and vaulted onto the back of the Cyclops, forcing it onto its front. He wasn’t looking so good; his helmet was missing, his right eye wildly bloodshot, and a dark crimson line ran down his charred forehead where a piece of shrapnel had lodged. But the Spartan did not appear fazed by his condition; if anything, he looked even more terrifying without the helmet, especially as he fought to rip open the canopy, upon which a spiderweb of cracks had been left by the explosion.
Heart pounding furiously against her chest, Ragna’s eyes darted about in search for some form of countermeasure from whatever systems were still online. Seeing nothing particularly helpful, she desperately squeezed the trigger on the autocannon, and was thrown against the roll cage as the recoil flipped the old boy onto its back, pinning the Spartan to the floor by the legs with a metallic thud. The supersoldier growled with something like frustration, and it was then that Ragna saw that he was about the same age as her. Which made it all the more unsettling that he continued to claw at her walker, seemingly oblivious to any pain from the four tons of metal crushing his legs.
A quick glance around told Ragna that the others had not made it through the wall of rubble she had brought down on them. Whether they were dead or trying to find a way past the debris, it would not do for them to sneak up on her while she still had the Spartan to contend with. He was now straining to lift the Cyclops, and to her amazement, he was actually succeeding to raise it high enough to free his legs.
But his superhuman feat also gave Ragna the opportunity to brace the red-hot remains of the Cyclops’ missile arm against the ground, and using the autocannon to balance herself, she managed to right the walker once more and face the Spartan, who was somehow standing tall despite the fact that one of his legs was clearly broken.
“Psycho freaks,” muttered Ragna, raising the autocannon as her opponent charged her heedlessly. He zipped and weaved with impossible agility as if anticipating where her shots would land before she even fired them, his battered figure zipping and weaving closer illuminated by the muzzle flash of the autocannon.
One bullet found its mark in the Spartan’s side, then another in his leg. But he didn’t so much as flinch as his armoured hands closed around the autocannon and he ripped it clean off the Cyclops’ forearm.
“Fucking hell!” Ragna yelled in alarm. She instinctively backhanded her opponent with the now gunless arm, sending him sailing over the rubble before falling through a gaping hole in the floor; a hefty splash was heard a moment later. Wondering yet again if she was out of her mind, she steered the old boy down into the opening, landing noisily in the flooded surface below.
Ragna’s first reaction was surprise, because for some reason, she appeared to be standing in a bathroom. A Forerunner bathroom, given that its design was consistent with the rest of the pavilion, but it had sinks and toilets and even hand dryers. But before she could ponder the surreal absurdity before her, the Spartan leapt out of the darkness, still clutching the autocannon with both hands.
She moved to block the hard swing he took at her canopy, but wasn’t fast enough to stop the autocannon barrel from smashing into the damaged glass, shattering the protective covering with a single strike. Ragna covered her face while shards peppered her body armour, simultaneously being slammed back against her seat as a toilet stall folded beneath the Cyclops toppling onto it, but quickly reopened her eyes in time to see the Spartan closing in for a follow-up attack.
Thinking fast, Ragna picked up the stall door and used it to swat her opponent out of the air, sending him flying into the adjacent stall while the autocannon slid away across the floor. She manoeuvred the old boy as close as she could get in the confined space and dealt the Spartan a brutal punch between the shoulder blades. The side of his unprotected head connected with the toilet rim as he fell, and before he could recover, she extended the walker’s remaining hand and grabbed him by the back of the head – and plunged him face-first into the toilet.
This cannot really be happening, Ragna mused, almost befuddled by the sight of the Spartan thrashing and flailing like a desperate beast. Of all the batshit things she had done in her life, both for the cause and otherwise, drowning a Spartan in a Forerunner toilet had to be a new one.
Her opponent’s hands closed the Cyclops’ mechanical one in a futile bid to pry its unyielding grip loose. Ragna was surprised he still had so much fight in him despite his horrifically maimed condition. The Announcer said something about Gammas having that extra edge to them. This one is probably one of them. At least, I hope not all Spartans are built this stubborn. “Flush,” she said, and a moment later the toilet registered the verbal command, sending additional jets of water into the basin.
Slowly, inevitably, her opponent’s movements slowed, and his arms slackened and fell limply by his sides. Ragna held him there for a few extra seconds just to be sure before releasing him, not sure whether to be amused or mortified by the sight of his head bobbing slightly in the water. Peering around, her gaze lingered briefly on the hole in the ceiling, the one she had entered through, before pivoting the Cyclops toward the bathroom exit instead. Water splashed beneath the walker’s unwieldy steps, but Ragna was too overcome with relief to focus on much else for a moment.
Cut the rookie shit, berated Venter. You’re gonna get yourself killed, and you’d deserve it for letting your guard down at the wrong time.
Shaking her head to clear the ringing in her ears, Ragna released a long exhale. The fight wasn’t over yet, but maybe – just maybe – she had survived the hardest part. The thought alone was heartening as she resituated her grip on her controls, watching for signs of trouble within the lower levels of the pavilion. Let’s get this over with, Oonskies. We can cut the cat-and-mouse bullshit seeing as we’d kill each other for free, with or without this contest.
“He drowned in a what?” came Frendsen’s disbelieving voice over the comms channel.
“A toilet, he drowned in a toilet,” Boogeyman reaffirmed, peering down at Joshua’s body lying amidst the trampled remains of the bathroom. “I’ll spare you the details, it ain’t pretty. You get a fix on that Cyclops, Dirix?”
He winced as loud rapid stomping was heard over the channel, blasting right in both his disfigured ears. The sound of panting could be heard over the din, before Gilly managed to respond, “Actually, it’s got a fix on me. That Spartan destroyed all its weapons though, so I’ve got a decent shot at luring it outside. Is the tank online, sir?”
“Affirmative,” responded Frendsen. “Tell me which side you’re coming out and I’ll get in position.”
“Same way I went in,” Gilly panted.
“I’ll meet you there,” said Boogeyman, already hurrying out of the bathroom and down the corridor. Water sloshed around his ankles, but he made no effort to remain silent, knowing he would hear the Cyclops long before he saw it.
And he was right, for as he entered a stairwell, made out of floating hard light steps, he could hear the sound of metal smashing against stone echoing into the stairwell from above. Before Boogeyman even had time to contemplate the bizarre thought of Forerunners using something as mundanely human as stairs, Gilly vaulted into view from the top of the stairwell, soaring briefly over his head before rolling into a landing upon a lower stair by the opposite wall. She was closely followed by the Cyclops, who leaped down toward her without hesitation.
An aberrant smile appeared on Gilly’s face that did not quite befit her previous breezy demeanour. “Gotcha.” She darted aside as the Cyclops landed exactly where she had stood a moment ago, and the walker slid onto its back as its centre of gravity shifted upon the hard light surface.
A pneumatic pop was heard from the Cyclops’ canopy release as its pilot ejected upward – or at least, she would have, if not for the fact that the top of the mech was pointed in Boogeyman’s direction. “Shit,” he muttered, scrambling to one side right before his opponent slid past him across the floor.
Before he could recover his wits, he could already see Gilly closing in on the pilot. And good thing too, because the other woman pulled out what looked like an old-school bolt-action rifle just in time for Gilly to smack it out of her hands. The two of them punched and blocked in quick succession, and although the old ORION was clearly formidable, there was no denying that she was a ways past her prime.
So am I, if I’m being honest. Boogeyman grimaced. With age comes experience, but the only experience she’s had in the last while is sitting in a psych ward. And as for me, well... the old injuries are only hurting worse every day.
Placing his SMG on his back, Boogeyman rushed to her aid, looking for an opening as the pilot drew a combat knife. She went for a stab at Gilly’s eye, but the older woman grabbed her wrist and headbutted her on the forehead, grinning toothily. Still gripping onto her opponent’s wrist, she used her other hand to punch the pilot’s arm twice, causing her to drop the knife. Without missing a beat, Gilly caught the knife and slashed at her opponent’s throat.
The pilot ducked back with an aggravated snarl, and it was then that Boogeyman made his move. He drew his pocket pistol and fired all four shots at her, one of which grazed against her cheek. It was enough, for her head snapped back while blood sprayed from the side of her face, and she stumbled back with a shocked gasp. She pulled out her sidearm as well, trying to level it at him when Gilly moved in for the kill.
Boogeyman saw the gun barrel move away from him a moment before it discharged, and a moment later Gilly managed to sink the knife into her opponent’s gun hand. The pilot let out a frenzied scream and grabbed the older woman, whose movements had become noticeably slower. A crimson stain was spreading across her unarmoured garb, out of the entry wound above one of her kidneys. And then she laughed, quietly. “Nice shot, kid.”
In the blink of an eye, the SMG was back in Boogeyman’s hands, and he let loose a furious hail of gunfire at the pilot. But the young woman was surprisingly resilient, for she had recovered her wits sufficiently to use Gilly as a shield while backing away. It was then that he remembered that friendly fire was off within the confines of the deathmatch. Goddammit, we should’ve used that to our advantage. He strafed diagonally in alternating directions in an effort to get a clear shot on the pilot, but she continued to hold a groggy Gilly in front of her and continued to retreat away from the stairwell, with the bullets having no effect as they bounced off harmlessly.
Twenty rounds remained in the magazine, then thirteen, then five. He was almost close enough to get around her, when to her surprise, the pilot dropped Gilly the moment Boogeyman’s magazine ran empty. And then he saw that she had recovered her rifle while crouching behind her literal human shield, knife still embedded blade-first in the back of her hand.
A thunderous bang was heard as the first round hit him in the right pectoral, just barely stopped by his armour but definitely enough to cause some serious damage. Boogeyman wheezed as he was thrown to the floor, now the one running for cover. He could hear the pilot pulling back the bolt, followed by the clatter of a spent round casing hitting the floor. He flinched as another gunshot discharged, but this time it missed. Again the sound of the bolt being pulled back and then forward, and then to his surprise, the shot flew way off as a scuffle was heard from behind.
Peering over his shoulder, Boogeyman saw Gilly tackling the pilot to the floor, trying to disarm her once more. “Stick to the plan,” the older woman growled. “I’ll slow her down, just go!”
He drew his plasma pistol, insisting, “Hold her in place. I just need to land one good shot and–”
Bang.
Gilly’s headless form sailed up and off the pilot, chunks of bloody gore spraying from the place where her neck used to be. She rolled to a stop a short distance away from the pilot, who was barely visible from beneath a cloud of red mist. Boogeyman heard the telltale click-clack of the bolt-action rifle chambering another round, and he practically dove into the stairwell right as the next gunshot tore through the wall next to his head.
Knowing that the pavilion’s flimsy build would not provide adequate cover, Boogeyman expediently dashed up the stairs and over the Cyclops’ supine form, activating his comms at the same time. “We lost Dirix. If the target doesn’t follow me outside, then bring the building down with the tank.”
“And if she does follow?” inquired Frendsen.
Boogeyman slammed a fresh magazine into his SMG and pulled back the slide. “Then she’ll wish she hadn’t. I want her to die feeling the hellfire I’ve endured for most of my life.”
After hobbling her way back to the Cyclops, Ragna retrieved the canister of emergency biofoam stashed under her seat and placed it next to her kneeling form. She ripped a strip of cloth from the sleeve of her fatigues before gripping the handle of the combat knife sticking out of the back of her hand. Taking a deep breath, she squeezed her eyes shut and ripped the blade free as fast as she could.
The slick sound of wet metal sliding against flesh was almost the worst part at first, until Ragna felt the burning pain set in and gave a raw scream of pain. The bloody knife fell to the floor with a clatter as she tried to fight the pain, spraying the back of her bleeding hand with biofoam before using the good hand to clumsily wrap the makeshift bandage around it. It still hurt like hell, but it soon subsided to the familiar, dull aching pain she had grown accustomed to on the job.
Then it’s time to finish the job. Slowly, shakily, Ragna got up off her knees to inspect the state her Cyclops was in. The guns were all kaput, but she was better off with it than without considering there were still two targets left and they clearly wanted to lead her outside. Which meant she would need all the mobility she could get. She experimentally pushed the the old boy’s remaining arm, and was heartened to see the battered mech glide easily across the hard light surface. Okay. Maybe I’m not screwed yet.
Ragna clenched her teeth as she strained to rotate the Cyclops so that its feet were pointed toward the centre of the stairwell. Once she was satisfied with its position, she gripped the open hatch – or rather its frame now that the glass cover was broken – and braced her feet against the wall before pushing the walker off the edge of the staircase.
The frame nearly slipped from her grasp as the Cyclops tumbled down into open air. She used the momentum to roll forward, swinging down into the cabin seat and pulling the broken hatch shut in the same motion. Ragna’s stomach turned when she felt the walker tip forward, and instinctively pulled the sticks back, gasping as the old boy made a heavy but upright landing against the ground below.
I can’t believe that actually worked, she marveled, manoeuvring the Cyclops up the stairs and back toward the exit. She had seen Simon pull a similar move once, but she wasn’t sure if he was good or just damn lucky. Can’t say which one I am either. I only got so much left in me at this point.
Ragna could see the double sliding doors she had entered through just up ahead. The lobby was as deserted as ever, serenely illuminated by the blue glow emanating from the walls and the seating platforms. If she had to guess, the mangled-looking spook had probably left a nasty surprise for her just outside the pavilion–
She heard the sound of a plasma pistol firing from behind her, but was too late to do more than turn before her Cyclops was disabled yet again. Or not. There he was, crouched behind the lobby desk. He had used the ambient hum of the building interior to mask the sound of his weapon overcharging – a smart play to be sure. Ragna tried to keep turning so as to shield herself against the ensuing hail of plasma fire peppering her cabin.
The Cyclops’ padded interior sizzled and sputtered as the energy bolts scorched its unarmoured surfaces. Ragna flinched as one of the displays shattered right next to her, even as the systems started to come back online one by one. She could see the spook overcharging his gun yet again, and drew her M6C in response, squeezing down on the trigger harder than was necessary.
Most of the shots flew wide in her haste, but one grazed the spook in the neck, causing his shot to fly wide. To her consternation, he barely seemed bothered by the injury, as well as the one she had dealt him earlier with her Century Twist. Heavy BDU or not, no one outside a Spartan should have been able to walk off a torso shot so quickly. And yet as Ragna hastily reloaded her handgun, she saw her opponent make a break for the exit with only the slightest sign of impairment.
The Cyclops, or whatever parts of it were still functioning, had come back online, and without further ado she chased after the spook. The sliding doors opened to let him through, and as they did, Ragna’s eyes widened when she saw the Scorpion parked outside, its barrel pointed squarely at her.
It must have been a lifetime of training that ended up saving her, because before Ragna could even register her surprise, her finger had already found the eject button, throwing open the hatch and spitting her out of the Cyclops a heartbeat before the tank cannon fired. A brilliant flash, a roaring boom, and Ragna instinctively curled into a ball as she tumbled through the air, shielding her head from the flames hungrily licking at the fatigues and exposed skin between the armour plates.
Ragna saw stars as she hit the wall next to the exit, tumbling unceremoniously to the ground in a smoking heap. Even as she struggled to regain her breath, she frantically patted out the fires on her body, rolling back and forth with a wince as she could feel at least two broken ribs along with a snapped collarbone on her left side. Dammit. Why couldn’t it have been the side where I took a knife in the hand?
Her hair had also been burned to nearly half its previous length, but she didn’t much care outside of making sure that it was extinguished. Turning her gaze from the charred remains of the old boy, Ragna craned her neck, listening through the ringing in her ears for the sound of movement. She could make out the sound of faint footsteps approaching from the other side of the doorway, and crawled behind a Hunter-sized urn placed along the wall.
She heard the doors slide open, and peeked around the urn at the sound of muffled coughing. It was the spook, inspecting the destroyed Cyclops with his SMG drawn. “Negative, no sign of her remains. Though she might have been blown out the mech along with the hatch–”
Click-clack.
The spook whirled in Ragna’s direction as she set the bolt of her rifle back in place, barely able to maintain her upright crouching position. She fired, tearing off half his helmet but missing his head by a hair. “Shit,” she muttered, blearily watching him tumble to the ground. Her shaking fingers fumbled to pull back the bolt and slide it forward again, trying to steady her aim for a second shot.
“Bring it down, Frendsen!” the spook yelled wildly. “Do it now!”
The Scorpion cannon sounded off before Ragna could fire, and then the wall blossomed apart in a fiery blaze. She was yet again tossed into the air like a ragdoll, and a faint hint of a smile twitched upon her agape mouth when she recalled that she had left herself an ace in the hole. She landed next to her Cyclops with a dull grunt, too spent to even care anymore. When she finally rolled to a stop, she fished out a small handheld device from one of her pouches.
A trap only works if it’s just enticing enough for your quarry to take the bait. The spooks must have thought she lacked the expertise to permanently disable a Scorpion – or that she had just been in that much of a hurry. Seeing the Scorpion barrel turning toward her once more, Ragna flipped open the cover on her device and pushed the button.
The tank was instantly enveloped in a fireball as another colossal explosion rocked the pavilion, blowing apart the exit and finally sending one side of the building crashing down on them. Despite her exhaustion, Ragna scrambled for cover as adrenaline took hold of her burned and battered body. She spotted her Cyclops keeling over and immediately slid beneath the opening making up its cabin, covering her head with both hands while an incessant roar built up above her. The ground heaved and trembled beneath her bruised knees as a mountain of debris rained down around her, pressing her nose and mouth into her arm to ward off the dust clouds. A symphony of metallic clanging was heard ringing in the confined space from the falling rubble.
Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the commotion subsided. Dust was swirling about at Ragna’s feet, but thankfully an air pocket had managed to hold against the ferocity of the cataclysm. Taking care not to sweep a bunch of dust into her own face, she slowly crawled out from beneath the wrecked Cyclops and slowly limped out toward the open promenade, drawing shallow breaths.
Note to self, stash a build-a-bomb in the old boy from now on. She had improvised a basic chain reaction switch by redirecting some fluids into the wrong tubes, but a bomb was honestly much quicker and less of a pain in the ass. Though I suppose this was less obvious. The spook in the tank probably ran an explosives sweep first thing–
And then she was tackled into the rubble, and would have groaned if she had any energy left to. Throwing up her hands to shield her face, Ragna caught the half-helmeted spook by the wrists as his fuming expression came into view through the dust cloud. “You little cockroach!” he shouted, pulling one of his hands free and dealing her a punch that knocked out two of her teeth and sent the back of her head slamming into a chunk of broken wall. “You’re not gonna die quick, you hear?” As he made to take another swing, he doubled over without warning, coughing erratically.
Ragna seized her chance. Grabbing a piece of rubble, she smashed the spook on the exposed half of his face, sending him toppling off of her. As he stumbled in an attempt to regain his balance, she noticed him frantically puffing into an apparatus on the inside of his helmet. But it was only after she stood that she spotted the plasma pistol he had pulled out of the debris. She threw the piece of rubble at him, hitting him in the gun arm and causing his shot to miss her head. But it did catch her in the gut, and she was thrown back before falling onto the promenade proper.
She tried to get up, but the spook kicked her in the face, causing her to roll over two or three more times. She retaliated by kicking his feet out from under him, sending him to the ground next to her. She grabbed the plasma pistol with both hands, trying to wrest it from his stubborn grip.
The spook clamped one of his hands down over Ragna’s injured one, and she cried out in pain and involuntarily relinquished her grip with one hand. Her other hand forced his finger down on the trigger, causing the pistol to light up with another overcharge shot. The barrel pointed itself under his chin, and then hers, and as he tried to release the trigger, she suddenly pushed the gun forward while letting go.
Bright green light filled Ragna’s vision as the shot flew between their faces and sailed away into the sky. But her focus was on grasping the plasma pistol again, which was venting poisonous steam. Mustering the last of her strength, she forced the vents up against her opponent’s face, and now he was coughing even more violently as the radioactive gas was drawn into his exposed apparatus. He tried desperately to push back, but much like the Spartan, his strength only ebbed further until he keeled back with a rattling gasp. His body slumped and became still upon the promenade as his lifeless eyes stared up into the sunny sky.
Ragna let the plasma pistol drop to the ground as well, heaving for breath amidst the clean air and numbly hobbling away from her opponent’s body. She didn’t take more than a half dozen steps before her legs finally gave out from under her, though even landing on the stony surface didn’t hurt as much as she thought it would. I’m alive. I’m alive. How the hell could I have...
No, it didn’t matter. And it didn’t matter even if she had to enter the next fight in this state, beaten half to death and without the old boy. The only thing that mattered right now was that she had taken on a Spartan and three others and won.
“I’m gonna win this, you bastards,” she muttered from where she laid, not caring if anyone was even listening. “Hope you’ve been enjoying the show, cause I’m not done yet.”
17: Killionaire[]
“That’s a big drop.”
“Haven’t you done bigger ones?” Callum-B042 asked rhetorically.
“Yeah, but those were in two tons of titanium,” Ash Mitchell grunted, “right now I’m a vulnerable sack of meat filled with biofoam.”
The former ODST chanced another look over the edge of the massive Forerunner skyscraper, instinctively clenching his guts as he took in the five hundred meter drop. Nearby Jace-G282 and Autel ‘Vadamai struggled to open a door - presumably roof-level access.
“Those two are getting along pretty well, don’t you think?” Ash said, jabbing a thumb at the Gamma and the Sangheili.
“It’s a bit difficult not to when one of them saved the other from getting a laser hole through his abdomen,” Callum brushed off Ash’s remark. “As much as the sight of that hingehead makes me want to put a hole in the nearest wall, at least we can trust him. He saved Jace without a second thought, so he has my respect.”
“But you still don’t like him.”
“Of course I don’t like him.”
After escaping the forest fire several hours prior, the team had made headway towards the shadow of the Cosmopolis’s towering outer walls. Progress had been slow, with Ash’s biofoam-filled wound making it harder than it already was to keep up with the two Spartans and the Sangheili. He hoped that the bastard named Butler had died to the flames - he doubted he would be so lucky.
All of their progress had been for naught when the Announcer teleported them inside the Cosmopolis in the blink of an eye. Now they were stuck on the roof of a spire, with the only door leading downwards likely being sealed. A grunt of exasperation from Jace solidified that assumption.
“That door’s sealed tight,” the Gamma grunted, “I wonder how many buildings in this city even have interiors.”
“That leaves us with one option,” Autel muttered, pointing at the team’s contingency in the center of the roof’s miniscule helipad.
“I told you,” Ash groaned, “who knows what sort of anti-air defenses could be hiding in a city like this? It’s too risky. Plus, I don’t want to get shot out of the sky by another team’s tank or some shit.”
“The advantage of aerial superiority is too great to pass up,” Autel hissed, “especially with it being our only method of escape from this structure. Considering the circumstances, it stands to reason that the Announcer desires for our use of the aircraft.”
“Still a risky gambit,” Ash countered, “especially with that shield bubble above us. Who knows what might happen if we fly too close to that thing? Let’s wait it out up here, where we’re safe. Let everyone else kill each other, since we don’t have a reason to.”
“Actually, we do have a reason,” Callum interjected. “Our friends from the forest are still in the game.”
“And how would you know that?” Ash demanded, spinning around to face the kneeling Spartan.
“That spire in the center of the city. Look down towards its middle. You see that band around it?”
Ash followed Callum’s instructions, finding what looked like a railway looping around the Cosmopolis’s central spire.
“Yeah, looks like a transit system or something.”
“Zoom in.”
Ash obliged, enhancing the magnification in his VISR. Sure enough, four figures became visible - three supersoldiers and a floating orb.
“Shit. The bastards live.”
“You know what that means.”
Jace walked up next to the two, his arms crossed. “We’ve got a score to settle.”
“They don’t have a vehicle, and sure as hell don’t have access to AA defenses,” Callum pointed out, “assuming you know how to fly one of these, Jace and I can use the door guns to shred them easily and get some payback.”
Ash weighed his options.
“Alright, it’s time to fly. Hop in the Falcon.”
“Ah! This terminal will suffice!”
The bloodred Monitor zipped over to the console at the front end of the train car, happily bumbling as if they weren’t in the middle of the deathmatch.
“This better work, firefly,” Caleb muttered, nursing his left shoulder. His Mjolnir’s internal systems had patched up the slash in his wrist with relative ease, but the injury to his shoulder was a far bigger beast to deal with. As much as he wanted to be angry at that Callum fellow, he respected the fellow Spartan’s superior melee prowess. Instead, his malcontent was directed at the Monitor, who had nearly killed the team in his laser-frenzied rage.
The rest of the team had gotten separated from Curious Puzzle in the aftermath, but found themselves back in his company when they were teleported to the Cosmopolis. After an affable apology from the Ancilla, they had resolved to make their way aboard a nearby tram system overseeing the city’s promenade - Puzzle referred to this system as the Transit.
The team had spent the last few minutes wandering through the many identical cars, making fruitless endeavors at trying to find a control console for Puzzle to interface with. The Monitor’s logic stated that the Transit was operational, and its Forerunner design would theoretically allow him - or the rest of the team, being “Reclaimers” - to activate it, allowing for quick and safe traversal across the Cosmopolis; a tremendous advantage over some of the other teams, and an equalizer against the opponents lucky enough to get vehicles.
“Once we get this train going, where are we off to?” Agent Virginia questioned, leaning against the door into the car.
“It would be prudent to take the spiral loop for our initial course of action,” Puzzle tutted, blasting the console with a blue laser beam to interface with it. “I can map the Cosmopolis’s surroundings more effectively that way, since the Announcer didn’t have the decency to put a cartographer in this blasted city. From there, I can change the rail alignment to take us further into the Cosmopolis.”
Kachunk!
Caleb grabbed a conveniently placed passenger railing on the side of the wall to steady himself as the car rumbled, then snapped upwards, locking in place with the hard light rail connected to its roof. More loud clicks from behind signaled that the other train cars were following suit, and soon after Caleb felt a shift as the Transit began to move forward. He turned to the window, watching as the silver skyline moved past the car. They were on the move now.
The temptation to kick the Demon out the window of the car was almost too great to ignore. Riko 'Kasamee flexed his mandibles irritatingly, chancing a glance at the wretched, demonic warrior that he had been forced to fight alongside. Perhaps it was judgment by the Forerunners, or a trial to pass on the path to enlightenment, but the Sangheili Fleet Master detested it nonetheless.
The last thing the white-armored Fleet Master remembered before being transported to this world was fighting one of the vile creatures aboard his crashed flagship, only for them to headbutt him and shove their sidearm between his mandibles. The next thing he knew, he was stuck in the bowels of another Covenant ship, this one different from his own. He had been denied his chance to kill that Demon, and denied another opportunity at killing this one. He reviled the cruelty of the situation.
He had been patient enough to discover the Announcer’s declaration that the killing of one’s teammates was taboo and nigh-on impossible, so he had avoided the human’s ire. They needed to survive the game to escape this facade of a world, and Riko resolved to kill this “Samuel-D150” as soon as he was given the means to.
Riko’s other teammates were far more familiar. Another Sangheili stood nearby, a Particle Beam Rifle cradled in the hands of his blocky black Seccoona harness, equipped with a variety of optic lenses. A Seccoona agent, Fira 'Demalee worked directly for the High Prophet of Truth - perhaps it was a blessing to have such an esteemed warrior to counteract the curse of the Demon.
His third and final teammate was a mighty Mgalekgolo that identified as Bulwark-Memento - however, it was armed with inferior human weaponry and responded favorably to Samuel while nearly ignoring Riko and Fira - an unacceptable sign of disrespect by the lower species. Regardless, it was still on his side, so the gestalt would prove useful in the coming battles.
Kachunk!
The Transit began to move, stirring the team.
“None of us did that,” Samuel pointed out.
“Such an astute observation, Demon,” Riko growled.
“It could have been automatic,” Fira clacked his mandibles.
“Negative,” Memento objected through its manmade voice modulator. “Other lifeforms detected onboard. Likely case: Transit activation by opponents.”
“We are not alone here, then,” Fira said, raising his weapon.
“Our hunt can finally begin,” Riko leered, activating his energy sword with a crackling hiss in one hand while drawing a curveblade in the other. “Mgalekgolo, lead us to these enemies so we may slaughter them.”
“Affirmative,” Memento chirped, stomping towards the far door of the car. It slid open, and the Mgalekgolo, despite its stature, still fit through the imposing door perfectly fine. Riko motioned for Samuel to follow in its wake, not willing to turn his back on the Demon. He stepped through after Samuel, with Fira taking up the rear, his marksman’s weapon in hand.
The team carefully made their way through each car, anticipating an attack only to find none. After several minutes Fira grunted in exasperation, having just entered another car.
“How long can this Transit possibly be?”
“Be patient, Seccoona,” Riko replied, “do not kill the joy of the hunt.”
“I can be quite patient,” Fira muttered, “I have mastered it when it comes to my craft.”
“And I assume that melee combat such as this is not your craft?”
Fira lowered his head. “No. My commander - and friend - Autel ‘Vadamai is the master of that discipline. If only he were here now.”
Riko cocked his head quizzically. “I had heard about the recent escapades of Shipmaster Thel ‘Vadamee and his dealings with the Hierarchs. Does this Autel have anything to do with him?”
Fira snorted behind his mask. “You forget that I am from a decade ahead of you, Fleet Master. Thel ‘Vadamee is now Supreme Commander. And Autel is his… Offspring.”
Riko clicked his mandibles. The Seccoona had figured out their differences in the timeline back when they had been dumped on the island. They had prowled the derelict corridors of a crashed Ket-pattern battlecruiser in the frigid north, finding no enemies but finding endless amounts of banter. To think that in a mere decade Thel had risen to a position even higher than Riko’s was surprising - the up-and-coming Shipmaster had undoubtedly made a good impression with the Hierarchs. To know that Fira was affiliated with his son, a blademaster, was even more awe-inspiring.
“You must be proud of your service to the Hierarchs in such a capacity,” Riko noted, taking a keen interest when Fira’s body language suggested the opposite.
“Yes… Of course I am. To serve the Hierarchs themselves is a position I should count myself lucky to hold.”
“Are you two done getting each other off yet?” The Demon snapped, brandishing the dual bayonets on his Jiralhanae-made revolver. Riko narrowed his eyes. Of course a Demon would favor such barbaric weaponry.
“Stay your tongue and know your place, Demon, lest I-”
The door to the next car slid open, revealing another Demon with white-and-orange armor in the opening. Riko’s eyes widened and his mandibles broke into a split grin. This Demon can be killed! Fortune rears its head!
Immediately Riko charged forward, roaring a battle cry as he lunged towards the Demon. The Demon anticipated the blow, however quick, and ducked down with his arms wide open, grabbing Riko around his waist. For a moment he felt weightless as the Demon lifted him up, then the Sangheili Fleet Master howled in anger as he realized his folly. The armored human arched back, suplexing Riko into the cold metal floor.
He felt his body hit the floor with a thud and raised his head, spitting out a dislodged tooth. His curveblade had fallen out of his grip, and he quickly spun onto his back to see the Demon drawing his own blade, but a deep rumble distracted the Demon. Several heavy footsteps announced the presence of Bulwark, and the Demon jumped back to the side of the car opposite of Riko as the Mgalekgolo charged forward, blaring like a warhorn as it trampled over Riko’s curveblade and slammed into the console at the end of the car.
“Look what you’ve done, you blundering buffoon!” a robotic voice screeched, and Riko turned to see two more Demons as well as a-
“Holy Oracle!” Riko called out, “what are you doing aiding these Demons?!”
The Oracle turned to Riko, its eye a deep red. “For the last time, I am 589 Curious Puzzle, not an oracle, and I am about to render aid to none of you primitive monkeys at this point-”
Puzzle was interrupted as Bulwark’s shield slammed into him, swatting the Oracle into a wall. He bounced back, doming the Mgalekgolo’s helmet and causing the behemoth gestalt to stumble back. The two Demons at the console began firing, forcing Bulwark back through the doorway to the other car with Puzzle in hot pursuit. They followed it in, leaving Riko alone with the first Demon opponent.
“That was some move you pulled,” the Demon chuckled, “you overextended yourself though. Made it easy to get a good hit on you.”
Riko snarled, lifting himself to his feet. “Do not lecture me, Demon. You will be the first of humanity’s great warriors to die by my hand.”
The Spartan raised his blade, then winced and grabbed his shoulder. “We’ll see about that.”
Riko grinned. He is injured. While I would like an opponent at full strength, I will not pass up the opportunity to kill such an illustrious foe.
The Fleet Master bellowed, charging forward again. The Demon ducked beneath his swipe, but he anticipated the action, bringing up his knee directly into his foe’s helmet. A sickening crack caused the Demon’s head to snap back. Riko brought his sword in close to deal a swift decapitation, but his opponent threw his blade arm up to block the attack, causing Riko’s wrist to slam straight into the side of the metal weapon.
The Sangheili howled in agony as blood drew from his armor, but he used his free hand to grab the Demon’s wrist, yanking it outwards. Now open, the human was vulnerable as Riko drove his knee into his chest, once, then twice, then thrice. He brought his free hand back in and punched the Demon in his injured shoulder, causing the warrior to let out a guttural scream.
Riko proceeded to plant his hand over the Demon’s helmet, throwing the human’s head back into the car’s metal wall. The Demon fell to his knees, and Riko stepped back, snorting in a mix of amusement and disappointment.
“This is all humanity’s best have to offer?” Riko spat. “You would have been an easy kill even at full strength. I thought that killing my first Demon would be more… Grandiose. Nevertheless, you will do.”
He stepped forward, grabbing the Demon by the nape of his neck, and raised his sword for the kill. He would bring honor and glory to House Kasam with this action, this-
A screaming red ball flew into the car, bouncing off of several walls before slamming into Riko from the side. He went flying back, slamming into the car’s side door as the ball finally stopped in midair.
“That is the last time you use me as a damned pinball, gestalt!” 589 Curious Puzzle declared, zooming back through the doorway into the other car.
Riko clasped his hands, clutching at emptiness. With a start he realized that he had dropped his energy sword, and it had skittered to the console. The Sangheili grabbed a side railing, slowly rising to his feet, and took a step forward to retrieve his weapon.
“Like hell you’re going to do that.”
A hand grabbed Riko from behind and pulled him backwards, slamming him into the side door. He instinctively raised his hands, blocking several punches that shattered his wrist-mounted energy dagger, but his foe adapted, aiming the blows lower to hit his abdomen. The Fleet Master coughed up indigo blood, eventually letting his guard down as his strength sapped away from him. With each blow he felt the door behind him batter and bend, until eventually it tore away with a crash.
Riko desperately grabbed both edges of the doorframe, narrowly avoiding falling out of the Transit alongside the tattered side door. The wind whipped at the back of his neck, and he didn’t dare turn around to see how high up he was.
How? He had bested the Demon in combat, had him at his mercy! Riko ‘Kasamee, glorious Fleet Master, was about to cement his legacy on the saga wall of his keep! It was preposterous!
“This is madness!” he gurgled through blood.
“This is Survival of the Fittest,” the Demon rebuked, raising a leg and delivering a final kick.
Riko ‘Kasamee screamed as he went flying from the Transit, plummeting hundreds of meters to meet a grisly and pitiful demise. Caleb Butler didn’t wait to see it. He turned back around, chuckling at the Sangheili’s foolish arrogance, before falling face-first into the floor, his vitals barely intact.
Gunfire echoed from the other car. Within, Curious Puzzle darted around Bulwark-Memento, firing short leaser bursts from his eye to distract the Mgalekgolo like a squirrel would a dog. While the Monitor did his work, Rick-077 fired his Disaster Contingency revolver at Samuel-D150, forcing the younger Spartan to take cover behind a passenger seat meant for occupants far taller than him.
Rick snickered, grabbing a frag from his vast grenade belt, and lobbed one over the seat. It was followed by a sharp curse from Samuel as he dove out of cover. The Delta raised his own Jiralhanae revolver as an orange explosion destroyed the seat, firing several lofty spikes at Rick. The Spartan-II sidestepped most of them, but one made an impact with his shields, immediately downing them to a mere half-strength.
“That’s a strong hand cannon you’ve got there,” Rick called out hiding behind a large table. “Any other fancy tricks it can do?”
Samuel’s response was a mere roar as the Spartan-III leapt over the table, swinging his sidearm at Rick. It was here that the older warrior realized that the weapon had two long, straight bayonets jutting down from beneath its barrel, but it was too late to react. Samuel’s dual blades raked across Rick’s shields, cracking them in an instant. Rick didn’t fall back, however. Instead, he grabbed his combat knife with his free hand and made a slicing motion towards Samuel. Samuel brought up his weapon and blocked the attack, catching Rick’s knife between his two bayonets.
“Bad idea, kid,” Rick observed, bringing up his revolver with his other hand.
“Shi-”
Rick unloaded his magazine, tearing through Samuel’s shields while the last handful of bullets lodged themselves into his chest. The Spartan-III still stood, grunting in pain as he swung a fist forward. Rick snapped up his Disaster Contingency, only to curse internally as Samuel’s rage-fueled punch shattered the weapon - but it was still enough to soften the blow.
Rick responded with a kick to Samuel’s torso, knocking the Delta to the ground. A stray grenade from Bulwark flew past, forcing Rick to duck next to the table, but it didn’t matter. When he had downed Samuel, the Spartan had dropped his weapon. Rick grabbed the bulky pistol, aiming it straight at Samuel’s unshielded helmet.
“If we met back on the island, you would’ve made a good addition to the team,” Rick said, a hint of sincerity in his voice. “Shame. You fought well, kid.”
Rick put his finger to the trigger, and the next second everything went white. A dull ringing in his ears told him that something loud had gone off, and after several quick blinks, the Spartan-II cleared his vision. He was lying on his stomach, weapons still in hand. He quickly rolled over and leapt to his feet, noting that Samuel was still incapacitated on the ground. The gunfire in the car had stopped too, and he looked at the other combatants, all frozen and looking at a bright light that suddenly filled the car from outside.
It was at this moment that Rick realized the Cosmopolis was visible now, not through any windows, but because of a simple fact: the entire outer side of the Transit car had been blown off.
“Puzzle, assessment!” Agent Virginia called out from behind a seat, clutching his grenade launcher.
The Monitor didn’t need to give one. A VTOL came into view, keeping pace with the car as it sped along the Transit. Rick recognized it as none other than a UH-144 Falcon. He made out an ODST in the cockpit, with two Spartans manning the door guns. With a startling realization, Rick remembered who these people were. Jace-G282 manned the machine gun on Rick’s left, while Callum-B042 held the one on his right.
“How the hell did they get a fucking Falcon-”
Jace unleashed a torrent of bullets, all directed at Rick. Without shields, the Spartan-II’s flesh ate them up, and before he even had time to duck, his vitals had gone flat. Rick-077 slowly fell onto his back, his Mjolnir riddled with bullet holes.
“Autel, time for you to do your thing!” Jace shouted, sparing no time to relish his vengeance upon the Spartan-II who had nearly taken his life back in the forest.
“As you wish,” the albino Sangheili replied, waiting as Ash Mitchell turned the Falcon about so its side was aligned with the train. The Seccoona leaped out of the passenger bay, landing amidst the rubble of the destroyed wall. He surveyed the carnage as best he could with his poor eyesight, making out Samuel’s stirring form near Rick’s corpse as heavy footsteps approached rapidly. His heightened hearing was the only thing that prevented Autel from dying then and there.
“Heel, beast!” the blademaster roared as he evaded a melee strike from Bulwark. The black-armored Mgalekgolo growled before modulating a response.
“New combatants present. Combat doctrine upgraded.”
“Let us test this doctrine, Lekgolo,” Autel seethed, bounding forward with his Ria’kun. Knowing that his foe’s shield was on the left side of its body, Autel swiped to his own left, planning to decisively disable his foe’s cannon. To his surprise, the Hunter anticipated his attack, moving to block the move with his shield. The Ria’kun, despite its strength, merely made a gash in Bulwark’s shield.
“Weapon deflected,” Bulwark mused, “strength: weak.”
Autel moved to attack again, but a lightning-fast blow from Bulwark saw the Sangheili fly back, tumbling through the doorway into the first car. He immediately clambered to his feet, gritting his mandibles as Bulwark approached. The familiar sound of a laser beam caught his attention, and the gestalt moaned in pain, turning its blurry form around to fight off another combatant.
“I am not done with you yet, behemoth!” the recognizable voice of the Oracle screeched, “let us finish what we started!”
Autel inhaled sharply, allowing himself a deep breath before regaining his composure. As he breathed in, he smelled it - the scent of a human - alive.
Autel snapped his Ria’kun behind him, barely parrying a blow from a large knife. He contorted his body around to face his opponent, finding himself face to face with the Spartan Caleb Butler as he emerged from active camouflage.
“I was not aware that your kind had reverse-engineered our technology,” Autel said.
“It’s old news, Hingehead,” Butler growled, stepping back. Even with his lackluster eyesight, Autel could still see that his opponent was grievously injured. He could hear Butler’s staggered breaths, and the Spartan’s left arm seemed to be hanging limply.
“I sense that you have already fought hard today,” Autel clicked, “you are wounded. Lay down your arms and I will give you a painless death.”
“Like hell I’m gonna let that happen,” Butler hissed, lunging forward with lopsided footwork. Autel easily sidestepped the desperate maneuver and plunged his Ria’kun forward, hearing a satisfying crackle and hiss that signaled his victory. Butler gargled out an incoherent statement, but no words formulated from his lips. The Seccoona drew his Ria’kun back, and the Spartan-IV fell forward, face planting into the ground as a pool of blood rose up around him.
Back in the other car, Bulwark rumbled in frustration as Puzzle continued to zip about, evading swipe after swipe while firing lasers at the Mgalekgolo. A burst of bullets bounced off the Hunter’s shield, and it turned to face the Falcon as the VTOL’s two gunners focused their turret fire on it.
“Aerial advantage: disappointing,” Bulwark modulated, raising its shield to block the majority of the gunfire as it leveraged its cannon. The Hunter released its own burst of machine gun fire at the Falcon, but the bullets did little except bounce off the airship’s armor. Switching tactics, Bulwark fired several grenades in quick succession, hoping to destroy the Falcon with explosive firepower.
The gunship gained speed, veering out of the way of the grenades as it temporarily began to overtake the Transit. After avoiding the volley, Ash Mitchell eased the VTOL back into position, allowing for Jace and Callum to resume firing on their gestalt foe.
“We’re in a stalemate here!” Jace called out, letting off the chain gun fire to prevent his turret from overheating. “We can’t penetrate its armor, but it can’t hit us with such slow explosives!”
“Then we focus on some combatants that we can penetrate,” Callum growled, bringing his turret round to focus on Agent Virginia and Fira ‘Demalee, who were in the midst of a grappling duel. A torrent of lead rained down on the two, and the Sangheili rolled back into the car behind them while the Freelancer backflipped behind another seat.
“Puzzle, get over here!” He called out to the Monitor. Puzzle flew behind the seat, drawing uncomfortably close to Virginia.
“What assistance do you require, human?”
“I have a way of taking out that Falcon,” Virginia confessed, “but I need enough time to line up a shot. Can you take out one of the door gunners to give me some breathing room?”
“It seems like you have plenty of breathing room,” Puzzle observed, oblivious to the human idiom. “Nevertheless, your request is reasonable. Allow me a moment.”
The ancilla zipped out from behind the chair, making a beeline for the Falcon. Callum immediately took notice and diverted his fire away from Jerrold, intending on hitting the Monitor. Several bullets bounced off of Puzzle’s durable carapace, but he sped up to avoid the barrage, flying faster than Callum could turn the cumbersome turret. As he drew closer to the Falcon, Puzzle fired a laser beam from his eye, burning through Callum’s shields with ease.
The Beta snarled, only to yelp as the Monitor performed an unexpected action - he headbutted him. The Monitor did so again, dazing Callum, but the Spartan outstretched his hands, grabbing Puzzle and holding him back from performing a third bash.
“Got you now, lightbulb.”
“On the contrary, human, I have you.”
Callum’s eyes widened behind his visor as Puzzle propelled himself backwards with extreme speed, ripping the Spartan out of his seat. With both arms clutching the ancilla’s shell, he was unable to anchor himself to the Falcon, kicking his legs as Puzzle dangled him hundreds of meters over the Cosmopolis.
“Down you go!” Puzzle chirped, ramming into the Falcon. Callum swung with him, slamming into the side of the VTOL with such force that he created a faint dent in the side of the aircraft. With his hands on Puzzle’s front side, they were jammed between the Monitor’s carapace and the Falcon, causing Callum to release his grip momentarily. Even in that small sliver of time, it was too late. He desperately grabbed at something to hold onto, but his hands found no purchase on the smooth surface of the Falcon.
Callum screamed in rage as he slid off, arms and legs flailing as he made his quick and involuntarily descent to the cold embrace of death. Jace-G282 failed to notice his fellow Spartans’ demise, ears filled with the churning of his machine gun as he continued to fire at any combatants who made themselves visible.
Curious Puzzle’s unorthodox maneuver was exactly what Agent Virginia needed. He brought up his M319 grenade launcher, taking his time to aim at the Falcon as Ash Mitchell swerved it back and forth, and then, when finally satisfied with his accuracy, fired.
The grenade sailed towards the aircraft, and Ash Mitchell stifled a gasp as he saw it fly at him…
…Only for the grenade to fling past the cockpit, making no contact with the Falcon whatsoever.
“That was a close one,” Ash allowed himself to say aloud.
A dull thud from behind the Falcon rudely reminded the pilot about the M319’s capabilities. Alarms blared in the cockpit as the controls steamed and hissed, signaling that the grenade had fried the VTOL’s systems.
“EMP!” Ash yelled at Jace, desperately grabbing the throttle in an ill-fated attempt to keep the Falcon under control. It began to list forward, on an irreversible collision course with the train.
“I’m ready to jump!” Jace called. Ash wished he could say the same. He banged his fist on the ejection button, but that too, like the rest of the systems, was disabled. The mercenary looked back to the Transit as it rapidly approached, then spotted Bulwark’s massive form as the Mgalekgolo braced itself.
“Fuck it, if I’m gonna die, I’m taking something with me,” he declared through gritted teeth.
Bulwark brought up its alloyed shield and roared defiantly as the Falcon swerved in its direction. In the blink of an eye, the VTOL impacted the Transit, forcing a fiery plume through the ceiling of the second train car as it exploded. Unfazed, the hard light rail continued to operate smoothly, propelling the cars down the track without incident.
Ashes were swept away by the wind, and smoke flew backwards, shrouding the car in obscure darkness. Near the edge of the car Agent Virginia emerged from the smog, opening the pipe on his M319 to load another grenade in. The EMP had done its job, and the Falcon that had terrorized the Transit was no more. The smoke finally cleared, Puzzle hovered nearby, having reentered the car.
“Quite an ingenious plan, I must admit,” the Monitor conceded, “a bit messy, however. A direct hit from one of your standard shots would have been preferable to keep the Transit cleaner.”
“A regular grenade wouldn’t have destroyed the Falcon,” Virginia retorted, “I can’t guarantee that I would’ve had the time for a second shot, so I had to make the first one count.”
“Very well. Shall we inspect your handiwork?”
Agent Virginia plodded over to the wreckage in silent agreement. Both turrets had snapped off in the crash, and the cockpit was crushed between the weight of the hull and the staunchness of the car’s back wall. The interior of the Falcon’s windshield was coated in a layer of blood and metal, confirming Ash Mitchell’s status as KIA. Virginia could see Bulwark lying nearby, its lower half buried beneath the debris of the Falcon’s left side. The gestalt lay motionless, but its worms slithered around the carapace, still working tirelessly despite the death of the collective conscience. Virginia walked around to the right side, finding an armored Spartan lying on the floor, chest heaving as he struggled to breathe.
“You’re not my Spartan,” Virginia muttered. Jace-G282 wasn’t the one who lay before him. It was another, the one who had aided Bulwark and fought against his deceased teammate, Rick-077.
“Guess that’s three birds with one stone,” The Freelancer mused.
“Let me finish off the Spartan and sterilize the gestalt’s remains,” Puzzle clicked, “this was a most prudent out-”
The Monitor snapped to the side, evading an energy blade that materialized out of thin air with a crackle. A quick laser burst from Puzzle’s eye forced their unseen foe into the light, revealing none other than Autel ‘Vadamai and his shimmering energy shields.
“Aha!” The Monitor screeched, “shame on you, Sangheili! I will not be caught by the same trick twice!”
Virginia raised his grenade launcher to fire, putting his finger on the trigger, only for Autel to whirl around, dealing a roundhouse kick to the Freelancer. He slammed into the wall behind him, muscles twitching. His finger pulled the trigger, and a grenade flew out of the M319’s pipe, bouncing off of the Falcon’s metal corpse and rolling to a stop at his feet. Virginia made sure to keep a tight grip on the trigger, utilizing the grenade launcher’s remote detonation function to keep it from exploding beneath his feet.
Autel slashed at Puzzle, but the Monitor avoided the attack, countering by veering forward into the swordsman’s chest, pushing him all the way to the other end of the car. Agent Virginia exhaled, putting some distance between himself and the grenade, and considered lobbing it over to their position for another friendly fire abuse scenario, similar to the stunt he had pulled in the forest.
I could blow up that hingehead and leave the Monitor unscathed. I’d rather take both of them, but both of the Spartans are dead now… Better one ally than none.
Virginia held his trigger finger tight on his M319 and stooped down to pick up the hissing grenade, turning it over to examine the explosive. Never in his life would he have thought that he’d be throwing a grenade to remotely detonate, but then again, he never thought that he’d be forced into a deathmatch out of time either.
A groan from his right grabbed the Freelancer’s attention, and he cocked his head to see the last enemy Spartan stirring, trying to grab a Jiralhanae sidearm that Rick-077 had dropped in his death throes. Scratch that. I’ve had enough Spartans for today.
Virginia leaned forward, rolling the grenade over to the Spartan, taking careful steps back as the ordnance made its journey over to the wounded combatant. As he exited the killzone, the grenade clinked against the heel of the Spartan’s boot, and the supersoldier jerked his head in Virginia’s direction.
“Wait-”
“Strike,” the Freelancer said, letting go of the trigger.
Samuel-D150’s body was engulfed by the explosion, blowing out another hole in the wall of the ruined Transit car. The Falcon’s burnt chassis was rocked by the explosion, tipping back before sliding over to the right. Virginia opened his pro pipe, reaching down for another grenade while observing the carnage he created. He still needed another grenade for the blademaster Sangheili.
As he loaded the grenade into the loading tube of his M319, he heard a low rumbling and stopped, slowly turning his visor to the left.
Bulwark stood before him, armor charred and damaged but the body having been reformed by the worms that Puzzle had failed to destroy. The Hunter flexed its shield hand as a last handful of worms slithered up its legs and into its torso, and cocked its head, seemingly regarding Virginia in some sort of manner - whether it was cold or curious or something else, he didn’t know.
“Ally deceased,” it clicked over a translation modulator, “cause of death: you.”
Agent Virginia finished sliding the grenade into his launcher, but as he turned to bear, the Hunter grabbed him, wrapping its massive fingers around his waist. It threw its arm to the left, smashing the Freelancer against the ruined hull of the Falcon, and he felt a tight pain in his right arm. As the Hunter drew back, Virginia noticed that his arm was crushed, and his grenade launcher had dropped to the floor after the bones in his fingers were shattered and the nerves burst.
He used his remaining arm to reach down for a grenade, a sidearm; anything, but realized that they had been crushed as well when the Mgalekgolo grabbed him. Shit.
“Do your worst,” he spat.
“Understood.” Bulwark replied in its ever-monotonous voice.
The Hunter raised its arm back and threw it forward, releasing its captive from its grip. Agent Virginia, or known by his real name, Jerrold Pershing, went flying as he was thrown off the Transit. The Hunter turned back, smelling a Sangheili scent from the front car, and rumbled.
“Riko ‘Kasamee’s scent detected. Searching for life signs.”
The gestalt turned away from the edge of the car and stomped through the doorway to the front car, eager to investigate Riko ‘Kasamee’s fate. Back on the other end of the car, Autel grimaced beneath his helmet as Puzzle pinned him again with another headbutt, but raised his Ria’kun, only for the ancilla to blast away the remainder of his shields with another angry red beam.
“I will peel away each layer of your skin for the insult you paid me in our last engagement!” Puzzle crackled, ramming into Autel’s chest. The blademaster dropped his Ria’kun as he flew into the wall yet again, but he still stood firm.
“Make my death a fitting one, Oracle,” Autel grunted, painstakingly lifting his hands. He grabbed hold of his mask and wrenched it off with great effort, revealing a pale face beneath the dark armor. “If I am to die, I shall do so staring down my opponent with my own eyes.”
“Those will be the first to go, then,” Puzzle remarked, his eye changing color from a vibrant green to a deep red. “You’ll only be able to feel the pain as I strip you of your-”
A blue bolt of energy zapped into the gash on the Monitor’s carapace that Autel had created back in the forest, and the plasma made impact with the delicate circuitry within. Puzzle stopped momentarily, mechanically sputtering as glowing rays of light began to shine through cracks forming in his carapace. The orb began to vibrate, and his sputtering turned into a cacophonic shriek as his core began to overload.
“Impossible-ble-ble… Unf-f-fair, p-p-preposterous!” He screamed, finally exploding in a ball of energy.
Red chunks of metal clattered to the ground, steaming from the heat of the explosion. Autel stared at the debris and turned to his left, spotting a fellow Sangheili outfitted in a near-matching Seccoona harness modified with heavy optics, holding a Particle Beam Rifle.
“Finally, that Oracle ceased his-” the Sangheili grumbled before pausing, taking a good look at the albino swordsman.
“Autel?”
“Fira?”
“By the gods, it is relieving to see a familiar face here!” Fira ‘Demalee laughed heartily, outstretching his hand. Autel grabbed it, and the two Sangheili brought their elbows up, hands gripped tight as they greeted each other.
“Where have you been this entire time?” Autel inquired, stepping back to lean down and collect his helmet and blade.
“Wandering. If I knew you were here, I would have-”
“I would have as well, old friend.”
Fira surveyed the carnage that had transpired in the battered Transit car. “Where were you while my team still lived?”
“Fighting to survive this confounded deathmatch. Where on the island were you?”
Fira sighed. “We were transported to this realm inside the interior of a crashed battlecruiser. Ket-pattern. My team and I patrolled the corridors for hours to no avail. We eventually found an exit point that wasn’t submerged in ice, only to emerge on the side of a mountain slope. It was a perilous incline, mind you, and none of us were willing to risk setting off an avalanche. And thus we remained inside the ship until the Announcer teleported us here, to the Cosmopolis.”
“Very well, Fira,” Autel mused, tapping his helmet in consideration. “Those enemies you fought on the Transit before my team arrived; we came across them in a forest back on the island. I nearly brought that Oracle to heel before he burned down the entire forest in a blinding rage.”
“Blinding?” Fira said mockingly.
“I see your humor is still intact, Fira,” Autel chuckled. “We saw them from afar boarding the Transit and decided to resume our business with them.”
“And if it weren’t for I, the Oracle most certainly would have brought you to heel, Autel. Even in a deathmatch outside of our own realm, I still find myself saving you.”
“And I thank you for that, friend,” Autel agreed.
“Fira ‘Demalee.” A monotonous voice rang out from the other side of the car. Bulwark stood near the remnants of the Falcon, its machinegun raised and aimed at Autel.
“Step away. Hostile in range for melee attack.”
Autel tightened his grip on his Ria’kun, glancing at Fira to see whether his friend was more loyal to him or the arbitrary rules of the deathmatch. He eased up when Fira stepped forward, putting himself between Autel and harm’s way.
“There is no need to fight, Bulwark!” Fira emulated, “this is Autel ‘Vadamai. He is a good friend of mine. He poses no threat to me, or you. He can be trusted.”
Bulwark didn’t back down, instead planting his left foot forward. “Rules clear: Entities not on team equate to hostiles.”
“Listen to reason, Lekgolo!” Fira pleaded, raising his voice. As the two argued, Autel caught a glimpse of something shiny on the edge of the car near Bulwark. To his astonishment, Jace-G282’s hand reached up, pulling the rest of the Spartan into the car behind the oblivious Mgalekgolo. How long had the Spartan been hanging there?
Fira stopped mid-sentence and looked back to Autel. “Who is that?”
Jace slowly rose to his feet, drawing a kukri blade with his prosthetic right arm. Autel realized too late what his teammate intended to do, bringing ruin to the attempted negotiation.
“Spartan, stop!” he roared.
Too late, the blademaster watched hopelessly as Jace slashed his knife across Bulwark-Memento’s back, causing dozens of worms to fall out of the gestalt’s carapace. The Hunter moaned in pain before spinning around, slamming its shield into the Spartan-III. It whirled back to face the Sangheili, throwing Jace at them, and Autel watched as the Gamma struck Fira like a bowling ball, causing both to collapse in a heap at the wall.
“Deception detected: hostiles must be eliminated,” Bulwark clicked, stomping towards Autel.
“You headstrong beast!” Autel yelled, flaunting his energy blade. “You refuse to listen to reason, so I will put you down like a sick colo!”
The blademaster charged, ducking beneath a swipe from the massive gestalt. He planted his heel in the ground and turned sharply, slashing Bulwark across the back with his searing weapon. The Hunter rumbled, raising its shield up before pivoting around, slamming it into the ground. Autel barely dodged, taking note of the massive impact area his foe had made with the blow.
As the two fought, Jace pushed himself off the ground, groaning as his head spun. Suddenly, something took over, pushing the dizziness out of his head as what he could only think of as extreme fight or flight instincts took over. He turned to the Sangheili he had crashed into, coldly analyzing that Fira was still recovering from the blow. The Gamma noticed that he still held his kukri in his right hand, gripped so tightly that he noticed cracks in the knife’s handle.
It didn’t matter. What he needed to do was kill this hingehead bastard as soon as possible. He needed to kill him now.
Jace growled, springing forth towards Fira ‘Demalee. The Sangheili took notice of the Spartan’s renewed vigor and threw out both hands, wrapping his fingers around Jace’s knife hand as he thrust it forward. The tip of the blade stopped mere inches from the Sangheili sharpshooter’s throat, and he slowly began to push back against Jace. The Gamma wouldn’t allow him to do that.
Jace threw his left hand forward, scrambling to find a hold on the array of optics on Fira’s helmet that shielded his eyes. Fira threw his head to the side, to and fro, but the Spartan-III eventually found purchase, digging his fingers into the optics before pulling back, tearing the goggles off his opponent’s helmet. What awaited him was the steely, defiant gaze of the Sangheili as he fought to the last to keep the Spartan off of him.
“I’m gonna…” Jace slurred, huffing as he struggled to form the words. “I’m gonna kill you.”
“I’d… Like to see you try, human…” Fira bared his mandibles, straining the muscles on his face with considerable effort.
Fira pushed Jace’s knife hand further back, and the Gamma realized that the window for killing the split lip was closing fast. He raised his left hand and angled it so the grappleshot on his left wrist was aligned directly with Fira ‘Demalee’s face.
Zip!
The grapple leapt forward out of its socket, with the hook piercing straight through Fira’s right eye. The Sangheili howled, now half-blind, but it only served to give him a boost of strength as he pushed Jace’s hand back a full foot away from his neck. Not that it mattered.
Kachink!
The grapple reeled back to its socket immediately, dragging Fira’s head forward with it. The Sangheili’s remaining eye widened in fear as his throat rushed towards Jace’s kukri, and the pupil dilated as his knife plunged into the soft flesh of Fira ‘Demalee’s throat.
Fira gargled an unintelligible word, then began coughing up blood as his hands fell back. The Sangheili still lived, but his slow, agonizing death was assured. Jace stood up, wiping the indigo bloodstains off the metal of his kukri. As Fira continued to bleed out, the Spartan turned to see his teammate, Autel ‘Vadamai, continuing to dodge and harass the imposing Bulwark.
The former didn’t matter at all. In Jace’s bloodlusted thoughts, fueled only by the illegal augmentations that he had been given, the only thing of importance was killing the Hunter. Brutally.
Jace-G282 snarled, bringing up his grappleshot as Bulwark spun around, reeling from another blow via Autel’s Ria’kun. He shot the grapple forward, and the hook embedded itself into the alloy of the Mgalekgolo’s shield. Jace flew at Bulwark, knife ready to claim another kill, but the Hunter snapped his shield to the left in anticipation.
Wait-
Jace veered off to the left involuntarily, slamming into the marred tail of the crashed Falcon. The grapple retracted back onto his wrist and he fell on his back. Regardless, it did little to slow him down. He scrambled to get to his feet, only for something massive to hit him. He fell back down, and this time found a massive boot planted upon his chest. He yelled defiantly, trying to get his hands beneath the boot to push it off, but merely scratched at the thick metal plating.
He looked up, still enraged, and found himself locking gazes with the lights atop Bulwark’s helmet. The colony alien had no words for him this time, and merely pressed down, crushing Jace’s ribcage, then his internal organs, until his torso was completely flattened. The Spartan-III stopped moving, and the Mgalekgolo turned to casually block another strike from Autel ‘Vadamai.
“Final hostile,” Bulwark modulated.
Autel didn’t have any response.
The Sangheili slipped into active camouflage, but Bulwark simply brought its chaingun arm up, peppering the front half of the car with bullet fire. Sure enough, the telltale flash of energy shields popped up, closer to the gestalt than it had anticipated, and Autel became visible once more, slicing his Ria’kun through the multiple layers of Bulwark’s right arm weaponry. The chaingun and grenade launcher clattered to the floor, steam emanating from the points of contact with the energy blade.
Autel pivoted, swinging his Ria’kun to chop into Bulwark’s exposed side like an ax. The Mgalekgolo screamed as its worms shriveled up from the intense heat, but it used the opportunity to grab Autel’s head, ripping him out of reach of Bulwark’s center mass.
The swordsman raised his blade to cut off Bulwark’s other arm, but it smashed him into the ground before throwing him against the inner wall of the car. The Sangheili felt a sickening snap in the lower half of his spine as he made contact with the Forerunner alloy and slid to the ground, finding to his horror that he could no longer feel his legs.
“Extreme damage caused,” Bulwark spoke through its modulator, a hint of anger somehow managing to make its way through the translation. “Response: drastic.”
Autel craned his neck upwards as Bulwark approached, realizing that there was no escape from the wrath of such a strong creature.
“I will meet my end with-”
Autel never finished his sentence, as the face of Bulwark’s shield crushed his head against the wall. Bits of blood and mandibular bone sprayed the silver metal, and Bulwark slowly moved its shield upward, grinding against the wall as the remaining tendons in Autel’s neck dragged his limp body with the remnants of his skull.
Bulwark released the body and stepped back, observing the gory canvas of indigo blood, pale white skin, and red organs it had created with the blademaster’s corpse. It turned around, surveying the carnage aboard the Transit. The Hunter stepped to the edge of the car, looking out across the vast skyline of the Cosmopolis as the Transit continued its endless loop. With the control console destroyed, there was no way to stop the railway.
This did not bother Bulwark-Memento. It would wait.
18: No Remorse[]
The monotonous whir of the Ghost had become white noise long ago. Delvin-A125 reflexively adjusted his grip on the speeder bike’s controls, letting off the acceleration to deboost the scout vehicle as he neared another checkpoint on the massive promenade.
After his narrow escape from the fireteam that had turned their back on him so quickly, the Alpha had spent the last hour or so traversing the promenade in his stolen Covenant vehicle, making sure to stop at random intervals along the way to venture into the outer districts before returning to the main path in order to throw off his allies-turned-enemies if they had indeed chosen to pursue him.
The hexagonal frame of the imposing Luminarium loomed in the distance behind him, a stark reminder of his botched attempt at justifying his actions to the others. It was the heat of the moment that caused him to falter, the shock of the Announcer’s reveal and the accusation levied against him. They didn’t understand what he had to do. Not even his fellow Spartan.
It shook Delvin even further that Erin, a supposed sister-in-arms of the Spartan-III program, was the first to turn on him. Accusing him of not being a Spartan? Who the hell does she think she is? A fucking Gamma? Someone who lived to see the end of the war? What does she fucking know? From what she said, Erin likely never saw what us real Spartans did. What we fought against, and fought for. Who knows if she’s even fought a Covie in her life?
He grimaced behind his helmet, boosting the Ghost through the checkpoint.
Who is she to judge me? After all I’ve done for humanity… Killing a single girl in this deathmatch suddenly makes me the villain? And the fact that everyone else immediately took her side… I should’ve killed the ape and gator the moment I saw them, dammit.
The Spartan looked up and over the Ghost’s canopy, setting his sights on a massive, domed structure up ahead. Whatever it was, it was clearly where the promenade led to, and with his current array of options, entering the mysterious structure was vastly more preferable to having to deal with Erin and the others.
Still, his actions tugged at the back of his mind. Why did he shoot Addison? Was it truly because he had no other choice? Or did he do so to tie up loose ends; make things easy? I tried to comfort her. I made sure she went without a fuss. I… I made things as easy as possible! I tried. “Goddamn,” he growled, gritting his teeth and clenching his fists around the Ghost’s controls.
He hated everything about this stupid game. He hated the arbitrary rules for forcing him to kill other Spartans. He hated the Announcer for putting him in Survival of the Fittest. He hated Erin for turning everyone against him - for accusing him of being lesser. He hated Addison for being in the goddamn game and forcing him to make decisions he had never thought he would need to make. He hated himself for these conflicting thoughts. Maybe I should have spared the girl, brought her with me. It would at least bring me peace of mind, right?
As he approached the domed megastructure, Delvin could make out a large ziggurat leading to an entryway halfway up the building. He hoped that climbing some stairs would give him something else to focus on. But for now, he had to contend with his regrets and remorse.
“Are you locked onto the target?” Alexander Redford asked.
The Promethean Crawler on his right side chirped in affirmation, the red ring in front of its mandibles signifying that it was zooming in with its built-in marksman’s weapon. The rifle was extremely powerful from what he had seen - Alexander personally witnessed a single shot from Nishana disintegrate the Spartan who had come dangerously close to him.
Not that I let her so close without reason, he smirked, comforted by the fact that his distraction ploy had allowed the robotic construct to eliminate her. It was reassuring to know that he still had a lethal asset under his command. Bulwark-Mori, for all its strength, had succumbed to the hallucinations of what Alexander only knew as “The Silent Garden.” In that moment of weakness, the Hunter had allowed itself to be murdered by the aforementioned Spartan - even if Redford and Nishana swiftly eliminated her afterwards.
“That is a Karo’etba-pattern Ghost,” Bleza ‘Kopal observed from Alexander’s left, on one knee as he squinted his saurian eyes at the target in the distance.
“I cannot make out its driver from this distance, but that chassis is recognizable from anywhere,” the Sangheili said.
“I can identify the driver,” Redford replied, enhancing the magnification level on his Recon helmet’s HUD. As he zoomed in, he made out a heavily armored figure in sand-colored plates behind the metaphorical wheel of the Ghost. There was moderate battle damage on the metal carapace, so Alexander could safely assume that their target had already seen combat. Still, the large frame of the human meant only one thing: they were dealing with yet another Spartan.
“Another Spartan,” the Brutus agent muttered, “just great.”
“I failed to even glimpse the body of your first foe after the Promethean disintegrated her,” Bleza remarked, raising his special Hailstorm Needler adorned with red and white markings. “I would very much like to see battle against this next Demon.”
“Not if Nishana can help it,” Alexander objected. “Our goal is to survive, not put ourselves in risky positions. If the Crawler can snipe that Spartan out of his Ghost, then we’ll take that option. If it means surviving this deathmatch, I’m willing to have Nishana disintegrate every last opponent from a distance.”
Bleza harrumphed, lowering his Needler but not stowing it. “Very well, human. But if the Promethean’s accuracy is overstated, I will be ready to finish the Demon off myself.”
Delvin neared the ziggurat. He was about to slow down his Ghost, but his keen eyes saw a red flash halfway up the tiered structure for the briefest of moments. He veered to the left, drifting his scout bike in order to shield himself with the magenta canopy of his vehicle.
Sure enough, a red bolt fired from the ziggurat, instantly piercing the Ghost’s chassis and emerging from the other end. Delvin cursed, but chose to focus on his good fortune rather than the fact that he would have certainly been killed had the projectile struck him. The Ghost began to smoke but still handled fine, suggesting that any vital components had been missed.
The Spartan ducked his head beneath the canopy, choosing to view his surroundings through the Ghost’s thermal display instead. This allowed him to both see through the smoke column beginning to billow out of the speeder, as well as shielding him from any further attempts on his life. While distant, he picked out two signatures on the ziggurat, recognizing one as a human and the other as some odd sort of quadruped. These foes had no interest in negotiation, so he would give them none.
Delvin pulled the triggers on the Ghost’s controls, firing its twin plasma cannons at the hostile targets above him. The inaccurate bursts of plasma went wide at such a distance, but it accomplished Delvin’s plan nonetheless. The pair of enemies took cover behind a raised barrier, freeing Delvin from any further harassment. He maneuvered the Ghost towards the first staircase of the ziggurat and drove upwards, a battle plan already formulated for his counterattack.
The Ghost’s hovering capabilities allowed it to traverse up the stairs smoothly, which would allow the Spartan to ascend the ziggurat until he closed the distance with his two opponents. Once that was achieved, it would be all too easy to mow them down, or even splatter them if he so felt like it. As long as he kept his head behind the canopy-
Hiss!
Delvin immediately registered the telltale sound of a plasma grenade sticking to a surface and threw himself out of the Ghost’s driver seat, his Mjolnir slamming into the flat surface of a metal floor at the top of the staircase. Sure enough, he saw a glowing blue light for a split second before the Ghost exploded, littering the pillars on the terrace with chunks of liquid metal. Several splattered on Delvin’s armor, but his Mjolnir held firm, only allowing the liquid to bore slightly through the metal plating before it cooled.
Who had thrown the grenade, though? He knew that the unaugmented human didn’t have the strength to throw it all the way from his perch, and Delvin doubted the quadruped could even chuck anything at all.
“What in the goddamn-”
The Alpha’s question was answered as a hulking shadow danced across the blue flames pluming from the Ghost’s wreckage. A burly Elite adorned in regal, gold armor stepped through the fire, his fierce eyes nearly glowing from the reflection of the flames. In one hand the saurian warrior held a Needler emblazoned with red and white symbols of Covenant origin, while the other hand grasped the handle of an ignited energy sword.
“You lack awareness, Demon.” The hingehead declared triumphantly, raising his Needler.
He talks like he’s already won. I’ve avoided enough Needler barrages to know how to beat him.
Sure enough, the Elite Warrior fired the pink crystals from his firearm. Delvin rolled to the side, knowing that most of the time such a maneuver could throw off the lazily drifting shards. To his surprise, before he had even finished the roll, his HUD notified him that four shards had already embedded themselves into his chestplate.
How in the hell- he thought before the microexplosions from the shards knocked him back several feet. If only a few more had hit him, he would already be dead. Whatever this enhanced Needler was, its projectiles were fast. The splitjaw chuckled at Delvin’s shocked demeanor, readying another burst. This time Delvin sprinted behind one of the pillars to recuperate. For all I know the spider mouth’s gun might be able to blow this column apart. But it’s the best I’ve got.
“Come out, Demon!” The Elite taunted, “I thought your kind were brave and strong. Not sniveling cowards.”
That was big talk coming from the race who had glassed hundreds of human worlds. Delvin grabbed his mysterious metal scepter with one hand and unslung his suppressed M7S submachine gun with the other, glancing at a staircase to his left. The other two enemies were on the terrace one level up. If he could make it up the staircase without being hit by more needles, he could maybe take out the two weaker opponents.
The Spartan dashed out from cover, making a break for the stairs. The railings were tall enough to obscure his form, and he heard the Elite yell a furious curse as he continued up the flight. At the top he emerged on another, smaller surface, where the human and quadruped had been tucking their tails between their legs. The former rose in surprise, evidently unaware that Delvin had flanked them, and the supersoldier recognized his Recon helmet and ONI logo on its side.
What’s ONI got to do with this? Delvin wondered, but he laid the thought to rest as he squeezed the trigger on his SMG. A spray of bullets flew out from the silenced weapon, laying suppressive fire on his enemies as he continued sprinting towards the final set of stairs. Several lodged themselves in the spook’s body armor, while a large number shredded through the edges of the quadruped’s carapace.
The ONI operative sputtered as the force of the impacts knocked him to the ground, and the robotic creature screeched as it suffered damage as well. Delvin made it to the foot of the staircase, planting his heel to turn about, and saw the Elite setting foot onto the terrace from the previous staircase. Good thing I turned instead of continuing to run. That hingehead would have blasted me with those needles for sure.
“Now you choose to stand and fight, Demon?” The golden-armored alien laughed. “Very well. Choose your death, I suppose.”
Delvin raised his scepter in response, resting his thumb just above a button on the grip. He hadn’t actually figured out its use yet, but he figured that now was as good of a time as any to find out. The Elite raised his Needler again, firing a barrage of crystal shards at the Spartan. He pushed the button, pointing the scepter at the array of pink shards.
Fwump!
The needles froze in midair, rattling around as they tried to break free of their invisible restraints. Distortions in the air around the projectiles suggested that that scepter had released some sort of constraint field to freeze in place, saving Delvin from a gruesome death by supercombine. He looked back at the Elite, whose mandibles splayed open in shock at the move. Quickly, the hingehead steeled his gaze again and raised his energy sword whilst stowing his Needler.
“You think these fancy parlor tricks can save you? You may be able to stop kemuksuru shards, but there is always a limit to one’s capabilities.”
The Elite charged, but it was now time for Delvin to give him a taste of his own medicine. He flicked his wrist forward, and the scepter launched the needles back in the splitlips’ direction. They locked onto his movement and made contact, but most bounced off his shields. The sheer number of crystals meant that more continued to hit, until the Elite’s shield finally buckled under the stress. The last handful of shards embedded themselves into the Elite’s armor, but their microexplosions did little to slow his advance.
“Let us fight, Demon!”
“You got it, gator,” Delvin growled, bringing his scepter’s hilt near to him to block the scathing blow of the Elite’s energy sword. The burly warrior didn’t let up, launching attack after attack at him. The two pushed back, slowly heading up the final staircase as they exchanged blows. Delvin continued to parry the Elite’s strikes, but every time he attempted to deliver a counterattack, another forceful swing from the Elite forced him to go back on the defensive. As they neared the top of the staircase, the Spartan realized that the only way he was going to beat this alien was with out-of-the-box thinking.
The moment Delvin set his right foot on top of the upper terrace, he took his left foot off the final stair and swung it forward, aiming straight for the Elite’s knee. With any luck, his augmentations coupled with the angle of attack would bend his opponent’s knee in, forcing him down to one foot and allowing Delvin a window of opportunity.
It was all the more surprising when the Elite raised his knee up, seemingly in anticipation of the attack, causing Delvin’s boot to impact with his shin instead. The blow still did damage to the unshielded flapjaw, but not enough to leave him vulnerable. Delvin realized with dread that his gambit had failed, and he was now vulnerable with one foot off the ground. The Elite roared, partially in pain and partially in triumph, bringing down a balled fist on top of Delvin’s helmet.
He felt a loud thud and stumbled back, tripping over himself in his disoriented state. From a few feet away, the Elite regained his footing, shaking out his injured leg before stomping over to Delvin.
“A clever tactic to be sure, Demon. I will give you that,” the Elite conceded, raising his energy sword to bring down the killing blow. “But I have fought many opponents in the arena. After enough times, avoiding attacks such as yours becomes instinct.”
“What about this attack?” Delvin growled, using all of his strength to whip up his scepter. The tip of the weapon made contact with the searing plasma of the Elite’s energy sword as it came down, causing the scepter to crackle at the seams just like in his prior duel against Decipitus.
“What-” the Elite blurted out as a blast of blinding blue energy shot out from the scepter’s tip, enveloping his body. The hingehead howled in pain as the energy knocked him flying over the edge of the staircase. A moment later, a resounding thud signaled his impact with the terrace below.
“Cocky splitjaw,” Delvin spat, planting his scepter into the ground to use as a crutch to help himself up. He didn’t bother to check to see if the alien was dead or not. The quadruped and spook could be back in the fight waiting for him to peek his head over the staircase, and he wasn’t about to let them score a free kill after such a struggle. He turned around to face a large doorway entering into the domed structure and ran towards it. If his enemies pursued them, he’d have the tactical advantage from any chokepoints the interior could offer him.
Let them come.
“Irritable ingenuity,” Bleza ‘Kopal snarled, struggling to raise himself from the ground. Steam still seeped from the cracks in his once-golden armor, now burnt black by the blast of energy. Had his shields not begun their recharge cycle a split second before the Demon had fired the energy blast from his scepter, the Sangheili was certain that he would be dead.
“Never thought I’d see a fight quite like that,” the ONI agent that called himself “Caesar” remarked, shuffling over with his MA5K Avenger carbine at the ready. Whether or not the Spartan would retaliate was still up for debate.
“You were indeed a spectator, Caesar,” Bleza snapped, finally pushing himself up off the cold steel. “Did you even let loose a single round from your weapon during that scuffle?”
“Don’t pin this on me, ‘Kopal,” the Brutus agent replied, “I was ready to fight, but when that Spartan started firing at us, we took cover. Next thing I know, he’s flanked us and has me on the ground with several M7 casings lodged in my chest plate. Even when you pushed him up the stairs, neither Nishana or I could get a good shot on him because you were obscuring our lines of sight.”
“Friendly fire is disabled, Caesar,” Bleza hissed, “if your fear was of hitting me, then you should have kept that in mind.”
“Trust me, I have no fear of hitting you - quite the opposite in fact,” Caesar said, “you were literally obscuring the Spartan entirely. I saw nothing but you swinging.”
Bleza let out an indignant snort, reaching down for his fallen energy sword. “I will not let this transgression go unpunished. We shall pursue him into the Silent Garden and take his head.”
“We won’t be doing anything of the sort,” the human objected. “He hasn’t launched a counterattack on us yet and is likely running around inside the structure. And I don’t think any of us want to go back into that place. It’s… Wrong.”
Bleza’s thoughts shifted to the eerie visions of his keep that the eldritch place had shown him and shuddered. Perhaps the human’s logic was sound.
“And your proposal for what to do instead?”
The human lowered his MA5K and pointed at the hexagonal structure in the distance that the Ghost-driving Demon had originally come from. “We go there. See what we can find. Might get something useful for us if the Spartan was able to find himself a Ghost. As for him, let him run around inside the Silent Garden. We’ll see if his mind can handle it.”
“Very well then,” Bleza regarded the human, deactivating his energy sword and clamping the hilt to his hip. “We shall depart immediately. Let the Demon run headfirst towards his demise.”
The dark, cold hallways of corrugated metal quickly gave way to damp rock tunnels. Delvin-A125 turned on his helmet-mounted flashlight to illuminate the space, turning his attention upwards as water droplets fell from the stalactites hanging precariously above. The water was dark - far darker than any natural water he had seen. As several droplets splattered themselves across his arms, he realized with a start that it wasn’t water at all - it was blood!
“What kind of cave is this?” Delvin hissed through gritted teeth, vainly attempting to wipe the blood off his armor. The Spartan only succeeded in smearing the red liquid across his gauntlets.
He continued to walk, grip tight on his scepter as his boots tramped across the hard stone floor. The Alpha rounded a corner, emerging in a small chamber. In the center was a pool of blood, the crimson puddle steadily growing as a constant stream of the fluid spilled down from above. Delvin’s curiosity got the better of him, and he looked up once more, shining his flashlight on the source of the bloodfall.
“Dear God…”
A body hung from the ceiling, held aloft by a single stalactite. It was that of a teenage girl in a school uniform. The physics behind it were impossible. Most of the body seemingly floated above the cave floor, gently drifting like leaves in the wind. The corpse was anchored to the ceiling, with the stalactite puncturing through the back of the dead girl’s head and protruding out of an exit wound in her forehead. Her mouth was agape, and Delvin could barely make out her milky, glazed-over pupils.
No… It couldn’t be…
The corpse of Addison Solaski swayed to and fro, the stalactite piercing straight through the hole in her head where Delvin had shot her mere hours ago. It was impossible - inconceivable. How could her body be here? Did the Announcer teleport it away from the clearing where the rest of her team lay? Did he transport it into this structure, as if he knew Delvin would enter it and encounter her bloody remains?
“Fuck,” the Spartan-III muttered, splashing forward through the pool of Addison’s blood. “Fuck. Fuck!”
He sprinted out of the chamber, entering another winding tunnel. He quickened his stride, determined to escape whatever cruel trick this was. As he ran, a gust of wind whipped through the tunnel, so strong that it slowed even the towering supersoldier’s pace. As he pushed forward, a faint voice carried through the sharp breeze.
“Why?”
“What?” he wondered aloud, continuing to press forward through the deep tunnel.
“Why did you do it?”
Delvin shuddered. Whatever this place was, it wasn’t like anything he had been prepared for. He was trained to fight - no, to kill - Covies, not endure whatever this bullshit was!
“Why did you kill me?” the voice said, clearer now. Delvin cursed yet again, recognizing it as that of Addison.
“I didn’t-”
“Why did you put a bullet through the back of my head? Put me down like a sick dog?”
Delvin didn’t respond. He chose to focus on braving the sweeping winds, eventually making it to the light at the end of the tunnel. It emptied out into a massive chamber flush with flora, floor covered with a thick carpet of moss. But everything was gray. The moss, the stalks, even the flowers were all monochrome, like a primitive holostill. Despite the splendorous plantlife here, Delvin was repulsed. It wasn’t beauty he saw, but something else. Something wicked.
The Spartan-III tentatively stepped forward, examining his surroundings. Whatever nightmare this was, he had a hunch that it was far from over. He continued at a slow pace, scepter at the ready for whatever might attack him in this garden.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
Delvin whipped around, pointing the spearhead of his scepter straight at a short figure. His jaw slowly dropped beneath his visor as he saw Addison Solaski standing before him, her cold, lifeless eyes peering straight into his soul as the exit wound on her forehead swirled around like some festering tumor.
“You’re supposed to be dead,” he managed to spit out, “I killed you.”
“Why, though? Why did you kill me?” The teenager asked, taking a step forward. Her skin was mottley gray, just like the rest of the garden. Delvin stepped back, unsure of what the hell he was dealing with.
“I-I don’t know!” Delvin sputtered.
“Of course you know,” the reanimated girl hissed, “You know why you killed me. You made the conscious decision to put a bullet through the back of a poor little girl’s head. You murdered one of those who you swore to protect.”
“I had no choice!” Delvin attempted to affirm, but deep down beneath the panic he could feel the rising guilt that disagreed with his desperate statement.
“Of course you had a choice,” Addison said playfully, “there’s always a choice.”
She continued forward, flicking her hand. In the blink of an eye, the girl half his size knocked his scepter out of his grip. Delvin watched it fall on the soft, damp moss and turned his pleading eyes back to the thing in front of him.
“Tell me,” Addison gurgled, suddenly stopping as her legs began to twitch. Delvin continued to backpedal as the girl began to writhe, screaming in agony as a large growth burst out from her back, snaking down to the ground as her legs began to shrivel up like worms out in the burning sun.
The growth continued to increase in mass, turning into a tail that lifted the girl’s still twitching body off the ground. Her legs violently snapped off, collapsing to the ground with a flattened appearance like dead skin falling off one's body. Scales began to form on the once-smooth surface of her massive tail, chalk white in color. As the tail continued to extend, it encircled around Delvin. Before he could escape, he found himself blocked off by a wall of scales entrapping him.
Addison’s body was now two stories above the ground, and her screams only worsened as two more tumor-like growths sprang forth from her ears, ripping them to shreds. The pair of flesh lobes twisted and warped as they expanded, achieving their final form in the shape of a cobra’s hood. Just as suddenly as they began, Solaski’s screams abruptly stopped. She looked down at Delvin, letting her head fall to the side as she regarded him with unknowable thoughts.
“The truth,” she rasped in an inhuman voice.
“Why?”
Delvin snapped his head down, refusing to make eye contact with the abomination as its tail slowly curled inwards, wrapping him in its unworldly grip.
“I… I didn’t want to kill her.”
“Yet you did so all the same.”
“T-the Announcer said that we had to, that if we didn’t kill those on the enemy team we’d die ourselves. I didn’t want to die.”
“So you are afraid of death?”
“Of course I don’t want to die!” Delvin pleaded, refusing to look the serpentine monster in the eyes. “Seeing as how the next phase went, it was every team for themself! I wouldn’t be surprised if the Announcer only intends for one of us to win anyway!”
“And what makes you more deserving to live than anyone else? Why did Addison Solaski have to die in your stead?”
“Because…” the Alpha stuttered, slipping off into thought. Had he not killed her, she might have come back. In the end, if they met again, what would stop her from killing him if she had the means? It was then that he came to his conclusion. She surely, definitely would have retaliated if she had a means of defending herself. Had he let her go, she would have gone after him to seek retribution for her fallen comrades. Everyone in this game would do that. There was no point in petty ethics in a situation such as this.
Delvin realized that now, that it was useless to try pleading his case in a court of public opinion that was made null by the very nature of the deathmatch. Why should he feel regret if Addison could have very well done the same to him? Why should he feel regret for doing what he had to in order to survive? This was a warzone. Just like the battlefields he had fought on against the Covenant, all sense of morality went out the window. In this case, it was everyone for themself. There was nothing to regret in that.
“Because the Announcer doesn’t give a damn about some petty morals,” he seethed, “if I’m here to fight, then I’m here to win. I will survive, no matter who I have to kill. I’m making it out of this alive, regardless of who dies.”
His gaze shot up, defiant, and he locked eyes with the cobra-esque monstrosity coiled around his body. The thing’s chin rumbled and split, cracking apart into four mandibles that dribbled saliva onto his sand-colored armor. The being drew its head in close to deliver its judgment.
“You are indeed unfit to be called a Spartan, as Erin declared.”
“What’s she know?” Delvin growled, wriggling his arms free of the eldritch entity’s grip. “I accomplished far more than that Gamma ever will. I’ll kill her if I have to.”
“You think too far ahead. You still have yet to escape-”
Delvin cut the creature off: “I’ll kill you too.”
He grabbed hold of the lower set of mandibles on the monster’s face, pulling tight on them. The Addison-cryptid pulled its head back in an attempt to retreat, falling right into Delvin’s play. As it yanked its head back, he kept a firm grip, flying out from the tight coil of its serpentine tail. He caught what seemed like a glimmer of fear in its eyes as he smashed into it, knocking the monstrosity to the mossy floor.
Delvin raised a gauntleted fist to finish the thing off, but hesitated. In the blink of an eye it was gone, and instead the teenager he had killed was on the ground beneath, whimpering in fear. His fist trembling, the Spartan fought with his emotions as tears started to well up in Addison Solaski’s eyes.
“Please,” she murmured, “I don’t want to die.”
Delvin’s fingers loosened, and his fist began to unfurl. He started to lower his arm, but stopped.
“You’re a fucking illusion,” he declared.
Delvin balled his hand back into a fist and swung it down at the girl’s head. She screamed, only for it to cut out as his hand made contact with her skin. The instant it did so, the girl collapsed into gray smoke, obscuring the area. The Spartan’s brow furrowed. He stood up, batting away the haze from the apparition to find himself no longer in the garden, but in a dimly lit chamber constructed out of the same corrugated metal as the rest of the Cosmopolis.
A few feet away lay the Spartan’s looted scepter, and he slowly walked over to pick it up. Whatever that thing had been, he had bested it. It had tried to get into his mind, break his resolve - but it failed.
“I’ll do whatever I need to do to win this,” he yelled, hoping the entity was listening. “You failed to break me. Nothing will break me. I’ll kill every damn competitor in this godforsaken place if that’s what the Announcer wants!”
With his purpose clear and a conscience that knew what needed to be done, Delvin-A125 strode towards a pinprick of light at the edge of the chamber - the exit from the garden that had tried so hard to break him. There was only one thing left for him to do here: win.
19: Torture Nexus[]
“Ya know, Spartan Davis...” Ava trailed off, preventing her voice from echoing through the dim-lit, artificial expanse around her group styled like a reception chamber for ungodly behemoths.
“What is it, Barclay?” The taller SPARTAN-IV point man paused in his attentive stride to look back at his Spartan junior. Their alien Sangheili compatriot Kelvaaro ‘Shrykar paused as well, stopping two paces behind Ava Barclay.
“Aifter the teleportin’ thing—an’ the confusin’ maze o’ rooms an’ Forerunner statues...” Ava paused again, her dutiful eyes and ears still looking for foes despite her inquiry. She continued, “Why’ve ya still got the briefcase?”
Corin Davis lifted his guiding arm off his assault rifle, and looked down to the carry box he acquired from a prior kill. Despite the briefcase’s furnished leather and reinforced frame, it featured a considerable indention from where Noah Sówka’s head once made contact - caved in. Dried, black blood still coated the surface.
“I suppose it is a trophy, Spartan?” Kelvaaro added, with polite interest in his voice. After walking for what felt like hours in alert silence, it seemed the ice of paranoia was melting thin among the so-called Fireteam RED-KILO.
“Uh, no actually... I guess there’s nothing wrong with it. Have a look,” Corin replied. He tossed the box from his magnetized thigh into Barclay’s open arms.
Corin returned to watching the dark surroundings as his compatriots loomed over the box and Barclay popped the aged locks with little fanfare outside her own mind. She didn’t offer a gasp of surprise, though her helmet bobbed a little.
“Bread?”
Corin looked back, a sheepish tone crossing his deep voice. “Yeah, for whatever reason. That merc I killed was walking around with a case of boxed bread. And it's a perfect fit, for... Some reason...”
A long pause fell over the trio.
The SPARTAN-IV added, “...I kind of wonder where or what place they pulled him from. What kind of job would cause a guy to walk around with a briefcase of bread?”
Another pause.
“D’ya think it's edible?” Barclay asked, gently poking at the cubed golden loaf in the box. Her finger softly depressed the surface before recapturing its boxy shape when she pulled back.
Corin glanced between the Spartan girl and the Sangheili warlord. “Hey Squidhead, want to try a bite?”
Kelvaaro snorted. “I am not eager to meet death by your food poisoning. My stomachs can handle the simple tastes of human nutrients, but I shall not risk my life for your curiosity. Or spite.”
The SPARTAN-IV shrugged, lacking the simple hatred for the alien he had hours ago. The distrust for Sangheili was still there, but tempered by their recent, and common pursuit of survival. The bored endlessness of the massive Forerunner chamber around them also served as a passing distraction.
“Sure, no problem. My stomach can handle it anyway. ONI bioengineering made Spartans resistant to the known toxicology index.”
“Aah—” Barclay yelped in alarm as the older Spartan took a palm full of the golden and white wheat mush and pulled back his helmet. He tore a chunk out of his fistful with his teeth and gulped it down.
“Hmm, not even whole grain... For the looks, it's cheap. The kind of stuff you find in rebel MREs...”
Ava squinted behind her helmet, “Is it good?”
Corin shrugged. “Yeah, I guess. It’s not dry, which is a surprise anyway,” he looked to Kelvaaro. “You’re sure you don’t want to try it?”
“My stomachs do not ache at the moment, Demon. But you make me wonder, do you Spartans require sustenance? I admit that I have never considered such things.”
“Well, I’m not hungry right now. Haven’t been during this whole fighting frenzy. But food is still food, and wars aren’t won on an empty stomach.” Corin explained between munches as Barclay scooped her own clump of soft wheat exhaust from the briefcase. She pulled her helmet off too and nibbled at it.
Kelvaaro kept glancing between the Spartans and the long shadows of the chamber. He spoke up, even as Corin narrowed his eyes at him - wondering if the Sangheili had a secret yearn for a meal.
“That perspective - I can agree with it, a universal prospect for all warriors. Food, more than some essentials, can determine victory or death. As I said, I do not hunger, but some Irukan produce with roasted Colo breast would make me happier in your odd company.”
“What’re Irukan an’ Colo?” Ava asked between her own mouthfuls.
Kelvaaro hummed in approval at the interest expressed by the human supersoldier. “Irukan is a basic produce in most Sangheili diets. For all walks of life, it can grow in most environments and be guided by a variety of growth methods. As for the Colo, they are grazing creatures. Their meat is quite savory - especially in the afternoon as a hard day’s work comes to an end.”
“So even a Banished warlord can appreciate simple things outside of rage and violence.” Corin grumbled.
“If all you think of the Banished is blood lust, you’ve greatly misunderstood the enlightenment of Atriox,” the Sangheili hissed, “not that I pledged myself to him for any spoils of war. No, he saved me from certain death, and I find myself indebted to him for his mercy.”
Corin narrowed his green eyes with the same shaded, beady darkness as Kelvaaro’s pupils. “Burn a hundred human colonies and I think I’ll understand enough about mercy.”
“You still wish to kill me, Demon? So far, such an opportunity has yet to materialize. I would suggest saving your metal and fury for someone else.”
“Yeah? But the same goes for you. I think I can speak my mind freely under the circumstances. You’re a traitor to your people, a mercenary without code or morals.”
Kelvaaro’s hooves stomped across the Forerunner metal floor. He and his jaws snapped shut a pace from the older Spartan’s helmet. “Speak of code and morals to me? My kind cast me aside without a second thought because one of your ilk defaced me. They betrayed me far before I ever joined the Banished.”
Ava took a moment, even if she wanted to side with her fellow Spartan, to play peacemaker. “Hey, yer two. Pack it in. We’ve been roamin’ aboot here for a couple o’ hours at least. Can we tak’ a brek without batterin’ each other?”
“We physically cannot,” Kelvaaro reiterated with a growl.
“Not ma point... Any disagreements we got will weaken the wee bit o’ unity we got when we meet another crew. That ‘Nouncer fella said it's all teams against each other. We’re all we got tae survive here.”
Corin and Kelvaaro glanced fully towards Ava and noted she took the briefcase of bread and sat down in the dim shade cast by a giant sarcophagus-like statue. One of a million pillars in the endless darkness.
The older Spartan released a nasally sigh and looked back at the Banished warlord. “Fine, but I want him to know I would choose Andra-D054’s life over his under any circumstance. Banished are enemies, no matter what.”
The tall, cybernetic Sangheili chuckled. “I will credit your young fallen. She died with great spectacle; Spartans fighting each other was such a strange sight to behold. And she had quite a refreshing personality. A shame she could not keep up.”
Ava glanced up at the Sangheili, a piece of bread hanging from her lips. “Awright, Hingehead. A’ yer compliments are just backhanded.”
“I am unfamiliar with this particular expression.”
Corin took another clump of bread and ripped it in two. He held one out to the Sangheili despite their rant seconds before. “It means to hide an insult within praise. Take some, you bastard.”
Kelvaaro nodded without comment, flicking his mandible ridges as if testing the air. He took the human bread and let it melt down his throat.
The group finished the bread in the end and returned to their wandering, mapping more Forerunner chambers and moving from expanse to expanse. They passed through service doors and atriums ranging from service tunnels to spillway chasms, city blocks in size. Yet the trio did not see daylight, only Constructor-type Forerunner sentinel drones glinting, zipping between the statues. Their phantom presence kept the group on edge, always watching for sudden movement between rooms and down hidden tubes carved into ceilings and walls.
“Do ya think they speak Human?” Ava asked, watching two Constructors fly overhead.
“How about Sangheili?” Corin asked, giving a pointed look at Kelvaaro.
“Speaking to ancient machines is not my specialty, and I have heard few cases of such intelligence from mere Sentinels.” The Sangheili explained.
“Well, do both ya got any other ideas?” Ava growled out.
The younger looked around and saw a Constructor sentinel hovering behind one of the statues, spraying it with laser blue light as if working on the structure in some manner. “Like that lad. Hay, ye! Robo fella!”
As if in sudden recognition, the floating machine paused in its laser work and looked at Barclay, offering an unintelligible warble. Its brief attention ended there, making a 180-degree spin and zooming away into the darkness.
“...Robo fella?” The younger Spartan mumbled with confusion and scrunched eyebrows behind her helmet.
“That was probably the best interaction you could manage with one of those.” Corin pointed out.
“First contact ain’t ma strong suit...” Ava added in weak acceptance.
“By Atriox... Spartans. It’s the young blood...” Kelvaaro whispered in surprise nearby.
“Huh, why ye callin’ mae now?” The young Gamma responded, turning to face the Sangheili cyborg, but followed where the alien’s eyes stared up toward the mid-height of the statue the Sentinel was working on.
The Forerunner metal seemed to turn translucent, then transparent as it faded to reveal a foggy, interior space—an illusion—inside.
“What is that? It’s humanoid?” Corin Davis muttered, eyes locked on the shadowy mass or masses clumped together inside the statue.
“The face. It is the young blood, is it not?” The alien warlord insisted, pointing at the ‘head’ of the shadow.
Ava shook her head at the thought but couldn’t pull her eyes away. Andra’s corpse was hard to forget under the circumstances - her head spun opposite to her torso by an enemy Spartan, one of their own kind. The group had done their fallen comrade the brief care to remove her helmet and look upon her lifeless face before they continued their campaign deeper into the torture nexus they were participant to.
Corin voiced Barclay’s unspoken question, “You mean... Andra?”
Long, out-of-regulation dark hair, a pencil nose, and shadowy eyelids. Even without human skin or Andra’s blue pupils, the shadow seemed uncanny. Like the lithe warrior girl they knew, like their fallen ally.
Corin growled after a pause, “There’s no way... Your eyes are playing tricks.”
“I ain’t so sure, Davis. The hingehead might be right...” Ava whispered.
The older Spartan shook his head. “You guys are crazy. It’s already stupid enough we’re in the mess - you want me to believe that is-!”
Corin didn’t get a chance to finish his sentence. Luckily, nothing cleaved through his chest as plasma boiled his loud gasp. He leaped back narrowly. From the shadows, a burst of acid green light streaked like a shooting star. Curved, hot, and brighter than a supernova.
A green energy sword barely missed Corin’s armored neck plate but cleaved clean through his shoulder-mounted combat knife and large shoulder pauldron.
“So much for an artisan’s ambush,” A muffled voice crackled through the fog - fleeting glimpses of deep green armor like the plasma blade. A clean Special Operations Sangheili harness with the faded warp of a Covenant active camouflage unit bending ambient light.
A Sangheili assassin.
Corin responded the smart way, leveling his M739 machine gun by its shoulder strap and blazed a wide hose of lead into the hostile darkness. With the call of battle, the sarcophagus and the strange doppelganger vanished from his immediate interest. Thunder rattled and echoed through the infinite chamber, calling all shadows to attention.
Kelvaaro didn’t pause at the approach of his own kind. His own pair of blue energy swords ignited to life, and settled into tightened palms as the cyborg warlord bounded forward on a parallel advance to Corin’s burst of suppressive fire.
“I know that whisper of yours, Warlord!”
The assassin called back, his energy sword flickering between pillars from left to right. “And I know that telling growl anywhere. You are here as well, Field Marshal ‘Shrykar.”
“And this is the welcome you offer your commander? Skulking in the shadows?”
“The ambush was for your Spartan, Field Marshal. Not you.”
“Ambush? That was a hatchling’s attempt. Your blade missed the Demon’s entire nape! His guard left open! You, Grono 'Yendam, should seek a whole different calling after this embarrassment!”
From the shadows and the blinding light of the acid green blade, the assassin’s voice goaded back. “Your wounds mark your experience, Field Marshal, I shall give you that. A testament to your ability to survive; to claw your way back from the brink. If I cared for honor, I would say you lack it to die a traditional death.”
Kelvaaro crossed his blades into a pressing guard, meeting the phantom’s green blade and pressing him back with the advantage of two push-swords. “Bespoke honor is for politicians and aristocratic fools. I am neither. Come prove yourself more capable than your last display.”
“Come and show me rust has not slowed your step!” Grono ‘Yendam declared, still hidden under active camo and guiding Kelvaaro further and further from his allies.
“Are those two quotin’ poetry at each other?” Ava mumbled as she held out her M6C/SOCOM magnum at their surroundings and fumbled for an M6I machine pistol on her combat webbing, recovered from a previous engagement.
“Forget them, focus on your scans. I can’t tell Sentinels from the assassin’s teammates right now.” Corin ordered. He yanked off his M90A shotgun and tossed it to the Gamma SPARTAN-III. “Keep our enemy at distance until we can tell their number and strength.”
“Spartans! Hello!” A male human voice bellowed from the darkness.
Corin whipped around and leveled his machine gun again, he got four deafening shots off but the shouter closed the distance to the tune of titanium-toed boots and not the terror assurance of MJOLNIR power armor. A beefy metal hand grabbed the LMG barrel and twisted down hard.
There was a brief moment of hesitation as RED-KILO’s Spartans saw the tall, lengthy human foe of flesh and blood in a coat and heavy plate carrier—and two giant prosthetic arms. What they did not expect was this bald man’s considerable inhuman speed.
Spartan Davis tried to jump free but felt his gun shatter under more rapid and accurate trigger pulls of a 12mm Comet hand-cannon at point blank distance. Booming shots in rapid succession would be impossible for anyone but a Spartan. A Spartan-level feat - the speed, the accuracy. Their second foe was a Spartan, looks be damned or deceiving!
Corin dropped his ruined M739 without bothering to check it. His Heads-Up Display already reported the barrel warp and a compromised smart ammo drum. He was lucky his energy shields were still up. He rolled backward from the close quarters pummel, and crashed into a Forerunner sarcophagus.
Ava rushed to close the gap with the unarmored Spartan attacker, pulling the 8-gauge trigger of her borrowed shotgun and wracked a second round without fail. The enemy janked his head left and the buck shot flew wide. Ava pulled the trigger again and found her mark—the rogue Spartan sailed backward into the dark with a yelp.
Unfortunately, the attacker wasn’t dead. The under-dressed Spartan seemed unfazed as his form rose again and performed a showy somersault into cover behind a sarcophagus.
“Shit, Davis, get yerself up! Who’s that geezer?” Ava hollered as she racked fresh, shield-breaker buckshot. Without another word, she tossed the Star-Chainer mace she claimed from the slain chieftain Maradus to her teammate.
“Beats me!” Davis called back, accepting the melee weapon and pulled a frag grenade from his belt.
“Spartans,” The enemy Spartan called again from the darkness. “I am Magnus! Or Jack-085, if that is more familiar to you. I’ve introduced myself. I think it's only right that you introduce yourselves too.”
Corin leaned against one of the pillars and glanced at Ava. He spoke up to their attacker, “I’m SPARTAN-001 and she’s SPARTAN-002!”
Ava’s helmet shook in confusion at the particular response.
“Spartan or not, this guy is crazy.” Corin hissed. “We can’t give him an information edge.”
Ava Barclay nodded, or tried to, when an armored body mass fell upon her from a sarcophagus above. She cried out as the newcomer and the SPARTAN-III warped into a bundle of fists and grapples.
“Barclay!”
“Shite, get ‘er offa me!”
Corin tried to pinpoint the gravity mace at the attacker but had to keep ready in case an attack came from elsewhere. The third attacker was another Spartan! She seemed like a young woman of similar stature to Ava, dressed in the standard-issue green MIRAGE stealth armor favored by the SPARTAN-III program.
Corin took two steps to charge, but was sent spinning with dark stars as a familiar metal fist connected with the chin of his rugged FIREFALL-class helmet.
“Eyes on your opponent, Number One!” Jack-085 chortled out, throwing more titanium-on-titanium fists and sending Corin off balance with a mild case of onset whiplash. Half-dazed, the SPARTAN-IV managed to step back and swung Star-Chainer into the ground on his left. The crash of the gravitic weapon washed over the two Spartans, sending Jack and Corin flying once more in different directions and crashing into pillars.
A fourth, hard crunch of armor hit the Forerunner metal floor as a shadow descended from another nearby sarcophagus. Considering each detailed pillar was two stories tall, RED-KILO made a possible tactical error not watching for enemies above. After escaping his tumble, Davis couldn’t miss the giant eyesore of yellow rising from the floor to join Jack-085 in battle. A giant human banana, a familiar yellow MJOLNIR armor set with a Mark VII/MENACHITE helmet. His commanding officer.
“Lieu-lieutenant Commander!?”
The yellow power armor’s golden visor glared down on Corin. “Spartan Davis, what a strange place to encounter each other in...”
“I’d say!” Corin shouted, brandishing Star-Chainer like a pointing stick at Ava and her fellow Gamma Company Spartan grappling nearby over a drawn combat knife. “Call off your teammates, we’re all friends here!”
Jack spoke up through his winded breathing, and looked to the yellow Spartan. “Is this true, Bailey? You know this man?”
The SPARTAN-II lieutenant commander Bailey-132 glanced at his unarmored compatriot. He looked back at Davis, a low sigh echoing behind his unfeeling visor. “Friends? Seemingly not in this place. You’ve got a Banished officer in your group. So do we. And Jack is a rogue Spartan. There aren’t any friends left in this place.”
“Come on. Not you too! Call off your Spartan!” Corin yelled again.
Bailey hissed but called to his team’s SPARTAN-III. “Hari!” The female attacker froze, glancing back at the yellow Spartan as she struggled to push her knife towards Ava’s throat.
“Jack!” Bailey continued, “You two deal with the SPARTAN-III. Make it quick. I’ll deal with Spartan Davis.”
Ava attempted to plead with the fellow Gamma on top of her. “Oi, Hari! It’s me, Ava!”
“Sorry Ava,” Hari grunted, momentarily loosening her grip. “We’ve been here for long enough. No hard feelings?”
Ava screamed in a primal despair as Hari-G055 doubled her aggression, wriggling back and forth in the grapple as she tried to restrain her fellow Gamma. Jack-085 rose not so slowly and took a step towards the wrestling pair. But the rogue paused, spotting Davis raise Star-Chainer and the dark pineapple ball in the other hand.
Bailey called out the warning too late. “Grenade!”
The yellow Spartan raised his BR75 battle rifle, scoping in on Davis’s ignited frag grenade but the SPARTAN-IV moved faster. Davis activated the para-gravity blast with one solid swing - aimed at Jack-085.
Thunder rumbled and deafened the fighters. Tiny metal fragmentation cubes in the dozens peppered the open space, scratching armor and embedding in soft armor panels. Bailey tried to leap in front of Jack but his armor and shields weren’t enough as his energized form flickered a bright gold.
Jack-085 hit the ground behind his armored comrade, yelping and groaning as scarlet streaks caught his exposed skin, embedding deep in his plate carrier and scalded his flesh. Jack’s screams echoed over the distant crashes of energy swords heard not too far away.
Hari-G055 received several fragments to the back, inadvertently protecting Ava. She hissed in pain and slackened against her fellow SPARTAN-III.
Barclay took advantage of her foe’s weakness, her legs tightening down hard on Hari’s waist and causing the girl to gasp in pain. The SPARTAN-IIIs twisted about each other as Ava rolled over top. Even as she claimed a new height advantage, Hari did not give up. Her combat knife materialized in Ava’s rib cage, drawing a quiet gasp in shock.
“H-Hari...” Ava trembled out to her old classmate from SPARTAN-III Gamma Company.
“Shh... Ava... This will be over soon...” Hari breathed out.
“F-fer... One of us.”
Ava’s reply rang true as bounding boots crashed with a kick against Hari’s chest plate, sending her flying. Spartan Davis’s blue armor was a welcome sight for Ava, “Took ye a bit tae come help.”
“Sorry, I ran into an old friend.”
“I can tell...”
“And so did you?”
Barclay nodded, “Hari-G055. She’s still wearin’ the moniker back when I was Ava-G134...”
“Anything notable about her?”
“She has HEDP grenades. We need s’more space.” Ava noted instead, watching as Bailey-132 emerged from the fragmentation smoke with his BR75 drawn - firing.
Corin threw up his wrist and pinged his suit AI to reinforce the energy shield shaping along his elbow.
“Hmm, jump on my shoulder when I say so! Get to a pillar!”
“Wot?”
“Just do it, using that mace!” Spartan Davis declared, leaning down and swinging the gravity mace once more. Ava jumped and thumped against her ally’s shoulders as more dust and debris kicked up and battered against the Spartan forces of Fireteam RED-BRAVO.
“Hari, get her down!” Jack yelled, plugging four shots from his Comet hand cannon at Ava’s flying form above, but her Mark VII energy shielding held on as she disappeared under the dark above.
“I got no shot, find her and laze - I’ll get her with my 301!”
Cleared of Ava’s presence but low on shields, Davis drew back Star-Chainer and lobbed it at Bailey instead. The SPARTAN-II sprinted to meet the mace and ducked under. Bailey didn’t expect blowback but went flying toward Davis as the mace head hit the sarcophagus behind him.
“The hell?”
“Hey Bail-” Corin yelled, throwing one good, lightning punch, shattering the BR75 and crashing into the SPARTAN-II’s left arm. Bailey roared in pain as his subordinate dislocated the shoulder from the socket. Behind him, the pillar base disintegrated under the para-gravity explosion, sending Forerunner metal spewing in all directions. Forerunner blue lights flickered orange through the expansive chamber and unseen machinery whirred beneath their feet.
Coughing from the ground, Bailey looked up to find Corin’s M6D magnum pressed to his visor. “What did you do?”
“That’s a broad question.” Corin deadpanned back.
“What are you waiting for? Finish it!” Bailey dared him.
Corin hesitated for a second, but a second was all it took. Bailey’s right cybernetic arm shot up from his kneel and crushed the barrel of the magnum.
“Lost your chance!”
Bailey earned a right hook to the visor, fractalized on impact from Corin’s fist.
Corin threw another elbow, pushing Bailey three steps back. Before the SPARTAN-IV could charge again, a whoop of noise popped above the new machinery noise. A grapple hook zip followed, drawing Corin’s eyes in two different directions. A grenade launcher on his right, a flying Bailey to his left and gone!
Hari found a clear target for her MA5K grenadier carbine with an M301 launcher. A HEDP 40mm caught Corin in the chest and exploded with brilliance and fire, charring his blue armor black and shattering the last of his energy shielding.
“Good hit!” Bailey called out as he landed on the pillars above, and spotted a sneaky Ava in a prone lean with a suppressed Magnum in hand. Despite the tussle before, the pistol was unbroken and active. Bailey rolled off his pillar back to the ground as several shots clipped his MENACHITE helmet.
Bailey continued, calling out some feedback. “Not your commanding officer right now, but Corin, you need to stop giving your runt all the good toys!”
“You need to drop dead!” Corin called back as more quiet pops echoed through the halls from Ava’s sidearm.
Flash, one moment, Hari was loading a second HEDP grenade below. The next microsecond: several small bullet holes cut from one side of her MIRAGE helmet out the other.
Hari went silent, promptly and unceremoniously falling face first into the corrugated metal. SPARTAN-III Gamma Company survival feats were infamous among all Spartans alike, but several headshots with perfect accuracy dropped her like a potato sack. Dead, gone.
“One down,” Ava called out. Corin looked her way, but his eyes widened in terror. A large shadow loomed over her. Jack was back, somehow atop her pillar.
“Ava, behind you!”
Jack didn’t let the SPARTAN-III respond. He lurched down and grabbed her knee and the back of her throat. She twisted and kicked against his vice grip cybernetic hands, but unlike augmentation, cybernetic limbs could be pushed beyond safety controls. Ava’s strength in surprise was a percentile against his death grip, and Jack made sure she knew that.
The rogue SPARTAN-II twisted her knee 20 degrees off center, breaking the kneecap and fragile ligaments. Jack squeezed down on Ava’s windpipe, drawing out another fluttering of gasps. He addressed her with a cruel smile. “Well, that’s that.”
Jack somersaulted once more, dragging Ava down with him from the sarcophagus. He rolled, leading her chest to the ground where they landed with an artillery-sounding boom as her plates made contact with the Forerunner floor - helmet first.
Corin rushed at the pair but even from 30 paces away, he could see the clear—tragic encounter unfolding. Ava’s head, limp on the ground, possibly from concussion or hemorrhage. Jack stood over her in triumph, his boot to her neck.
“Nothing personal, kid. I hope what time you’re from - you didn’t experience drowning from blood in your lungs.”
Corin screamed, but his voice fell on deaf ears as Jack finished pressing down with his boot. A quiet squelching echoed from Ava’s neck followed by a pop. The rogue SPARTAN-II retreated two steps back as Barclay writhed for her helmet in silence on radio and in voice. Her writhing continued for a full minute but three remaining Spartans could tell she was already gone.
“I’ll kill you!” Davis roared, bounding towards Jack with his gravity mace in hand. The Spartan-II’s smug expression didn’t even go away as he casually sidestepped his successor program’s member, and a metal fist came up, pounding Corin’s side as he passed by.
The Spartan-IV stumbled as his momentum slowed, and he outstretched his hands to soften the blow as he ran into yet another pillar. Turning around, he noticed both of his Spartan-II opponents closing in on him; Jack methodically reloaded his Comet handgun while Bailey kept his battle rifle centered on Corin’s unshielded head.
“Looks like it’s the end of the line for you, Number One,” Jack said with a light chuckle. “To think, you have such a powerful tool at your disposal but lack the means to get close enough to use it! At least, close enough before me or Bail here blows a hole through your head.”
“That’s Bailey to you, Jack,” Bailey growled. “Just because we’re on the same team doesn’t mean I’ve forgiven, much less forgotten what you’ve done.”
“Shame,” Jack said, raising his weapon.
Hiss!
The noise averted the three Spartans’ collective attention to three of the sarcophagus-like statues near the one that Bailey had inadvertently damaged. The metal sheens slowly became transparent, sliding back as cold air seeped out of their interiors. Within each statue was a figure with black, chromatic skin. The three individuals stepped out of their metal coffins in perfect sync, touching the battleworn floor before snapping their heads to face the Spartans - the ones who had disturbed their slumber.
Despite them all being dark and shadowy in appearance, each one was detailed enough to be unique in their own right. The first resembled a short human female wearing a meager combat BDU. The second, if Corin remembered correctly, looked like a Yonhet; a member of the Covenant fringe. The third was another Spartan, but this one’s stature was immense, easily dwarfing him or his foes.
“The fuck are those?” Bailey growled, snapping his battle rifle to aim at the head of the Spartan statue. Corin cursed internally as Jack kept his focus on him, disparaging any attempts Corin could make to close the distance.
“Aleksandra Zaytseva,” the female statue spoke in a monotonous tone. “Survival of the Fittest, Season Seven. Status: unfit.”
“Zef,” the Yonhet hissed with an equal amount of disinterest. “Survival of the Fittest, Season Seven. Status: unfit.”
“Alaska-013,” the Spartan rumbled, drawing a gasp from Bailey and a raised eyebrow from Jack. “Survival of the Fittest, Season Seven. Status: unfit.”
“Al?” Bailey grunted, recognizing the name of a fellow Spartan-II. “I’m not surprised that you’re here, even if it was the prior season or whatever, but what’s with the all-black look? I thought teal was your style-”
The Alaska statue dashed forward, moving within striking distance of Bailey within the blink of an eye. It grabbed the yellow-armored Spartan, whipping its upper torso around and throwing him several meters away. Zaytseva and Zef turned to Corin and Jack, cocking their heads at impossible angles.
“That’s my cue to leave,” Jack hummed, slowly stepping back while keeping his Comet trained on Corin’s helmet.
Zaytseva flicked her wrist, and a combat knife materialized out of thin air in her grasp. Zef did the same, and several pieces of metal unfurled out of nonexistence before assembling together in the shape of a Forerunner Boltshot pistol. Jack hesitated for a moment, continuing to slink away as he calmly changed his sightlines from Corin to the statues. Muffled grunts could be heard from further back as Bailey struggled with the giant that was Alaska, but Corin didn’t give a damn. Jack had made his error - the shield recharge cycle was about to begin.
The Spartan-IV ducked to the side as his shields flared back to life, successfully anticipating that Jack would refocus on him and fire. The Comet’s shots whizzed past his head, and Corin dived behind another pillar as his shields finished recharging. He peeked out from cover to see Jack taking the opportunity to turn tail and run, heading back in the direction that he had last seen Grono and Kelvaaro dueling.
Davis meant to go after the bastard who had killed Ava, but stopped when he noticed the two statues now locked in on him. Zef raised his Boltshot, only to snap his head around 180 degrees as a noise came from behind. The rest of the Yonhet statue’s body rotated to match the head as Bailey came flying back, having been thrown yet again by Alaska. The Spartan-II took advantage of his inertia and threw out a fist, slamming the metal of his right arm and all the force behind it into Zef’s face. The statue’s head exploded in a shower of silicate-esque material, and the body collapsed to the ground.
Bailey stood up, dusting himself off, only for Zaytseva to hound him a moment later, robotically stabbing down with her combat knife in an attempt to chip his Mjolnir. As the Spartan struggled to throw off the statue, Corin took his chance and ran the other way in pursuit of Jack-085. Thirty minutes ago he would have stayed behind to help Bailey fend off his attackers, but after witnessing his former commander’s disposition towards him in this deathmatch, he didn’t feel too bad about leaving him to fend for himself.
As he bolted through the massive hall, Corin could see Jack just on the edge of his vision, nearly blended into the darkness. One moment, the traitor Spartan-II was sprinting at top speed past the pillars that engulfed the structure. Another, a familiar Sangheili in red armor emerged from active camouflage, clamping the toes of his cybernetic foot around Jack’s neck.
I guess the hingehead is good for something after all.
Kelvaaro ‘Shrykar grunted, slamming Jack’s backside down onto the floor. The supersoldier raised his handgun to fire, only for the Banished Field Marshal to hack the barrel clean off. Kelvaaro tilted his head to acknowledge Corin, before putting the tips of his left energy sword to Jack’s throat.
“Fleeing from a fight?” Kelvaaro hissed, “either you are a coward who does not deserve the title of Demon, or perhaps Corin Davis is a far more worthy adversary than I gave him credit for. Nonetheless, you have breathed your last.”
“Our fight is not yet finished, ‘Shrykar!” a voice yelled from the darkness, followed by a green blade striking towards Kelvaaro’s unshielded backside.
The Field Marshal’s robotic legs launched him back several meters through use of their powerful hydraulics, narrowly avoiding a slash to the back from Grono ‘Yendam’s custom blade, the Varmint’s Nail. As the emerald-colored Sangheili Warlord pushed forward to resume his duel with Kelvaaro, completely ignoring his downed teammate, Corin closed the distance, brandishing the Star-Chainer for the kill.
Jack-085 saw the Spartan-IV incoming from the edge of his peripheral vision and flipped over onto his stomach, slamming his metal fists into the floor to push himself up. The move was perfectly timed, as he used the sliver of a moment remaining to arch his body back, avoiding Corin’s gravity mace like a limbo bar.
“Such rage,” Jack noted as the mace swung over his face, before he reared back to his full posture, rubbing a burnt spot on his throat where Kelvaaro’s energy sword had come dangerously close. “Perhaps if you were more patient like your cyborg Elite friend, you’d have actually taken me out by now. Speaking of him, I’ve got to find legs like those. Grabbing opponents by the throat with your feet and being able to bound distances like that? I must admit, I’m jealous.”
“Shut the fuck up and die,” Corin snarled, unslinging his M90A shotgun with his left hand while lowering his gravity mace in his right.
“A test of shells, eh?” Jack mused, unslinging a CQS48 Bulldog. “I can do that.”
Corin slowly walked forward, firing his pump-action shotgun. Several pellets slammed into Jack’s armor, but the Spartan-II began to move forward as well, unphased by the shot, delivering several shells of his own in return. Corin cursed as his shields collapsed, not having a free hand to rack his shotgun with, and hurled it at his foe. The weapon collided with Jack’s Bulldog at tremendous speed, bending the drum-fed weapon at the midsection.
“Shame, I didn’t even get a full drum out of this-” Jack started, but hurriedly shoved the mangled weapon to the side to avoid getting hit by another swing from the Star-Chainer. Corin swung again and again, but each time Jack avoided the strikes, returning blows with his metal fists in return.
“Too aggressive, too fast,” Jack said, swatting the Star-Chainer out of his hands. “That’s how you’ll die.”
He wrapped his metal fingers around Corin’s throat, slamming the Spartan-IV to the ground. He began squeezing, and Davis sputtered, struggling to breathe as darkness set in at the periphery of his eyes. The Spartan-IV flailed around, desperately trying to find something, anything to grab onto.
“I’ll admit, while you’re not the first Spartan I’ve killed, you were one of the tougher ones,” Jack revealed, a maniacal grin beginning to tug at his lips. “Alas, another one falls before Magnus.”
There!
Corin felt his fingers brush against a familiar hilt, and he grabbed the Star-Chainer with such vigor that his right arm tensed up. Jack noticed the subtle movement and averted his gaze, his grin vanishing in an instant as he scrambled to get up. The gravity mace swung fast, but the traitor Spartan was marginally faster. While he avoided any blows to vital areas, Jack yelped in surprise as the mace caught both of his hands, making contact and letting a powerful shockwave rip loose.
“Gah!” Jack gurgled as the momentum of the gravity mace sent him flying to Corin’s left. The titanium in his hands warped and exploded as he flew through the air, fingers scattering across the floor like jumbled puzzle pieces.
Corin attempted to sit up, exposing himself to a violet fit of hacking coughs as a reward. Nevertheless, the Spartan pushed through the pain, using his mace to prop himself up on one knee as the black tunnel slowly diminished from his sight.
“You know how expensive these hands are?” He heard a gritted voice say. The Spartan turned left to see Jack already back on his feet, briskly walking towards him despite missing both hands.
“I guess kicking your skull in will have to do,” the cyborg muttered, hurrying his pace. Davis heaved, struggling to face the Spartan, and desperately swung his mace as Jack neared, sending a flying left kick to Corin’s face.
Fwoom!
Corin’s weak, low swing was at the perfect level of height to impact Jack’s metal foot, forcing the older augmentee into a messy pirouette as the lower half of his left leg sheared off from the gravimetric force of the blow.
Jack collapsed again, and he cursed, finally fed up with the intoxicatingly annoying persistence of his foe, Corin Davis. As he pushed the stumps of his arms into the ground in an attempt to get back up again, another telltale noise of the mace alerted him as his right leg was blown to smithereens.
“What in the hell?” Jack spat, squirming around like a worm as the reality of his limbless state set in. “Is that your plan, Number One? Hack off each of my limbs and leave me wriggling like some grub?”
Corin responded by grabbing the back of his head with a cold, metal-plated glove, firmly flipping Jack over onto his back so he could look his opponent in the eyes. Despite his helmet on, Jack could sense Corin’s rage even behind the visor. Powerless, the traitor still tried to frantically squirm away on his elbows, for all the good it did him.
“This is for Ava,” Corin said with a tone of finality, bringing the Star-Chainer up before swinging it down. The mace slammed into Jack’s chest with explosive energy, causing his torso to flatten against the hard metal of the Forerunner floor. All that remained intact from the blow was Jack’s head; a look of genuine surprise permanently etched upon his dead face.
“I’d spit on you if I had the time to take my helmet off,” Corin said to the corpse, turning to spot Kelvaaro ‘Shrykar and Grono ‘Yendam continuing their duel. With it being a two-on-one, he doubted the green Sangheili warrior would survive. But as he stepped forward to assist one Banished bastard in killing another, two more pillars hissed open near the two Sangheili.
“What is the meaning of this?” Kelvaaro huffed, launching himself out of Grono’s reach to assess the mysterious event.
“Kelvaaro, get back!” Corin warned. The Field Marshal actually obliged, backpedaling from the pillars while keeping his eyes on Grono, who remained transfixed on the contents of the two supports.
Two more black statues emerged from the pillars, once more touching the ground with perfect synchronicity. These ones were both Sangheili - how fitting.
“Sona ‘Demal,” the statue on the right clicked. “Survival of the Fittest, Season Four. Status: unfit.”
“Kambei ‘Nerevar,” the one on the left grunted, materializing a curveblade in its hand. “Survival of the Fittest, Season Six. Status: unfit.”
“If you are unfit, so be it,” Grono snarled, brandishing the Varmint’s Nail. “I will gladly send both of you back to whatever hell you emerged from.”
‘Yendam charged towards ‘Demal, anticipating an easy kill due to the Sangheili statue’s lack of a weapon. His prediction couldn’t have been more wrong, as an energy sword materialized in Sona’s hand, sweeping up to block Grono’s attack.
Green clashed on blue as the two swords locked between each other’s prongs. Grono pushed back against Sona, only to catch movement in the corner of his vision as Kambei darted forward with his curveblade. Grono quickly raised his left hand to catch it, cursing as the heated metal burned away the membrane and dug into the metal of his prosthetic left fist.
“A conundrum this is, hm?” Grono growled humorously, struggling against the combined forces of both statues.
Corin lacked the chance to observe further, as a familiar voice called out from behind him.
“Hey, Davis!”
The Spartan-IV turned around to observe the almost-comical sight of Bailey-132 sprinting towards him, holding the unwilling Zaytseva statue beneath one arm as the Alaska statue pursued not too far behind. Bailey hoisted the still-struggling Zaytseva statue onto his shoulder before chucking it at Davis. The blue-armored Spartan groaned as the statue slammed into him. The force of the impact was great enough to shatter his shields, but it luckily shattered the statue as well. As black shards peppered the area around him, Corin fell backwards, hitting the floor with a dull thud as stars spun around his head.
“Now for you, Al,” Bailey said, planting his heel into the ground to slow himself before whipping around to meet the lumbering statue pursuing him. The yellow-armored Spartan threw a punch forward as the statue arrived, hitting its midsection. While not shattered, the statue cracked, momentarily pausing. Bailey took the opportunity to grab the statue by its ankles, pulling its feet out from under it. Alaska fell back, and Bailey spun around, slowly using the movement to lift the mindless drone off the floor.
“Grono!” he yelled across the hall, catching the attention of his Sangheili teammate. “Catch!”
Grono ‘Yendam gave off an exaggerated sigh, raising a leg to kick back Sona ‘Demal. As the first Sangheili statue stumbled away, Grono brought down his acidic green energy sword in a perfect arc, slicing off Kambei ‘Nerevar’s hand. As the other faux-Sangheili retreated to regain its bearing, Bailey swung Alaska with all his might, throwing the off-balance black automaton in Grono’s direction.
Grono roared in triumph as he swung the Varmint’s Nail, bisecting Alaska-013 at the waist. The statue’s two halves soared past Grono, slamming into another pair of pillars and shattering.
“Clearly unfit,” the Banished Warlord mused, turning back to witness Kambei materializing his own energy sword in his remaining hand. Grono made a toothy grin beneath his mask at the action.
“Perhaps there are some advantages you may possess.”
As Grono charged into the fray against Kambei, Bailey turned his attention to Sona. The statues lacked energy shielding, which meant that bullets probably had a decent effect against them. The Spartan raised his battle rifle, firing off four three-round bursts in quick succession. They all hit their mark, and Bailey allowed himself a satisfied smile as the Sangheili statue’s head exploded into black glass, followed by the inert body slumping to the floor.
The Spartan-II turned his attention to his remaining ally, rushing to close in on Grono to assist him with Kambei. The Sangheili had no need for the help, however, as after several ferocious attacks, he beat his shadowy opponent’s energy sword out of its hand before swiftly, violently decapitating the android with one fell swoop.
Bailey-132 slowed to a stop as Grono extended his foot, toppling the headless statue over with a light kick. The Sangheili Warlord turned around, nodding to the Spartan.
“We must keep our guard up, Spartan. These statues may be defeated, but our true foes still-”
He didn’t finish the sentence. Instead, two burning blue energy swords pierced through his back, perfectly positioned to stab his twin hearts and impale the Sangheili to lethal effect. Grono sputtered, dropping to his knees and letting the Varmint’s Nail fall from his grip.
“I-I… Suppose I do still have something t-to… L-learn… F-from you…” the young warrior choked out with his dying breath.
“Unfortunately you shall not live to learn anymore, ‘Yendam.” A voice cut through the air as the energy swords retracted from Grono’s lifeless body. Bailey immediately analyzed the situation. He had no time - or need - to grieve. Grono was no friend; they would have been enemies back in the real galaxy. The only thing to mourn about the Warlord’s passing was the loss of a fighting teammate, nothing more.
The yellow Spartan could faintly see a shimmer behind Grono, barely discernible in the dark chamber. If he let Kelvaaro ‘Shrykar get away now, the Field Marshal would undoubtedly use the opportunity to assassinate him the same way he had just assassinated his pupil. The distance between them was only five meters, give or take. Enough to get close enough fast enough. Yes, the only way to survive this was to act now.
“Come here, hingehead!” Bailey called out, sprinting at full speed towards the distortion. The energy swords whipped halfway as his invisible foe turned towards him, but they had no time to be used. Bailey angled his shoulder at his elusive target and bounced forward with all his might, feeling the telltale impact of shields-on-shields.
“Waghhh!” Kelvaaro cried out as his active camouflage dissipated. The Sangheili Field Marshal flew back several feet; his energy swords flying from his hands as his shields burst from the impact. He fell on his back and grunted in pain, but Bailey realized his need to continue the assault as the Field Marshal’s prosthetic limbs began to push up from the floor.
“Stay down,” Bailey snapped, firing a single burst from his BR75. The three bullets slipped through Kelvaaro’s unprotected right eye, lodging themselves in his brain. The Sangheili’s organic body immediately went still, but his prosthetic limbs continued to writhe around, like drones cut off from their hivemind.
“Nasty,” Bailey shuddered. He stepped over to Grono’s corpse, picking up the deceased Sangheili’s green energy sword. He activated the blade and flexed his fingers on the grip, shaking his head. The grip wasn’t made for his kind, and it showed. While he’d prefer something like a gravity hammer or mace, this would do.
Speaking of mace…
Bailey focused his attention on Corin and cursed, seeing the Spartan-IV back on his feet with the Star-Chainer in hand.
“Of course it would come down to just the two of us…” Bailey remarked. “Just because we’re alone doesn’t mean I’m going to offer you an alliance or some shit like that.”
“I wasn’t planning on it either, sir,” Corin replied, reflexively curling his fingers around his mace’s grip. “That’s a fancy sword you got there.”
“I can say the same about that mace the kid gave you,” Bailey observed, “there’s only one way this is going to go. I’m walking out of here with that in hand, and your body on the floor.”
Corin tilted his head, breaking the stoic demeanor. “What the hell happened, Bail? You’re talking crazy and being downright unreasonable. The Bail I know wouldn’t just decide to start killing his subordinates in a situation like this. He would try to figure out a solution that doesn’t involve killing his own people.”
Bailey’s mouth twitched beneath his visor. “You’ve been keeping up with the announcements, right?”
“Yeah, why?”
“Does the name Addison Solaski ring a bell?”
“Yeah, kinda,” Corin murmured, “I’ve heard you mention it a few times between missions. But what-”
The Spartan-IV stopped. “Shit... Wife, right?”
Bailey nodded.
“The Announcer said she got a bullet to the back of the head from another Spartan, right? Delvin-A125?”
“That’s the bastard,” Bailey growled. “He’s the one who murdered the only person in this place I would’ve died for.”
“And you’re taking out your anger on your own people?” Corin pointed out incredulously.
“No.”
Bailey flexed his organic wrist as he regarded Corin. “Don’t you realize, Corin? This entire deathmatch, all this murder... It’s just a game for the Announcer and whatever audience he has upstairs looking down on us. What I’ve noticed is that everyone else here is fighting for nothing more than their own lives, scrambling to survive. It makes them desperate.”
“Your point being?”
The Spartan-II raised the Varmint’s Nail to his former subordinate, pointing its twin prongs at him. “Unlike everyone else here, I have a purpose. You just want to stay alive… I don’t give a damn what happens to me, as long as I see the life drain from the eyes of Delvin-A125. But there’s a barrier to me killing Addison’s murderer… Corin Davis, you’re in my way.”
“Bite me in the ass, old man,” Corin retorted, “I feel for you, but I’m not sacrificing myself for you to get revenge.”
The conversation was over. Bailey knew it, and did the one thing left for him to do. He ran straight at Corin, energy sword swinging as he pumped his arms. The gap closed, and he swung-
Fwoom!
Corin’s gravity mace slammed into Bailey’s left arm, flinging the Spartan-II backwards. He bounced off the floor before landing again, skidding to a halt near the corpses of Grono ‘Yendam and Kelvaaro ‘Shrykar. Regardless, he got back to his feet, biting down on his tongue as thousands of nerves in his left arm flared up in pain.
“Gah!” he blurted out, unable to keep himself from vocalizing his pain. He saw Corin approaching, Star-Chainer at the ready, and seethed. It’s not ending like this. I’m not letting Addison go unavenged, no matter what.
Bailey looked down at his mangled arm and assessed the massive streams of blood pouring out of it. He’d undoubtedly die to blood loss if he didn’t do something, regardless of whether or not he killed Corin. Bailey huffed and puffed, looking back at Corin while raising the Varmint’s Nail.
“There goes the other arm.”
The green energy sword sliced downwards, and Bailey screamed in a mixture of pain, rage, and agony as he chopped off his own arm. Despite the self-mutilation, he had saved himself, noting the cauterized stump where his arm had once been. Corin shook his head in disappointment at the action.
“You’re delusional, Bailey. Mutilating yourself, and for what?”
“Just swing that damned mace.”
Davis obliged, thrusting his arms forward to finish the job as Bailey jumped up in one last, desperate attempt to salvage the fight.
Fwoom!
The blue Spartan-IV missed entirely, slamming his mace into the metal floor as Bailey vaulted over him. The yellow Spartan-II wasted no time using his tool of destruction, slashing the Varmint’s Nail with one last bout of strength. His gambit worked, and the green plasma seared clean through Corin’s helmet, cleaving the Spartan’s head in two.
Bailey landed on his feet, his back turned to Corin, and he let out a deep, wistful sigh. A part of him was still pained to do that to one of his Spartans, regardless of the reasoning. He turned to see Corin’s lifeless body on the floor, the Star-Chainer lying not too far away. Bailey walked over to the Jiralhanae weapon, eagerly dropping the Varmint’s Nail in favor of it. While Sangheili weapons had alien sockets, the Jiralhanae had more suitable grips. Plus, the gravimetric force created by such a weapon was far more effective at crowd control, and making up for near misses.
The veteran supersoldier’s thoughts turned to his dead wife, and her killer. Addison was here. She was somewhere on that godforsaken island before Delvin killed her. If I was faster, or scouted out more of the terrain, I could have reached her in time before she…
Bailey could feel tears welling up in his eyes. Parallel universe or not, Delvin had killed her. And for that, he needed to die. Brutally, violently, mercilessly.
The Spartan walked aimlessly through the halls for some time, passing through many sets of pillars. Eventually, he arrived at one different from the rest. It was translucent, and he could barely make out the face of a teenage girl with long, out-of-regs hair within. Peering closer, he tapped the glass-like exterior of the pillar, then jumped back as it emitted a seemingly pre-recorded voiceline.
“Andra-D054. Survival of the Fittest, Season Eight. Status: unfit.”
“Eight, huh?” Bailey muttered. “Must’ve died only a few hours ago… So, what’s your story?”
His question was met with the cacophony of dozens of hisses from his left and right. Snapping his head both ways, Bailey cursed as the lids on all of the metal coffins bar Andra’s slid open. Dozens of statues exited their tombs, brought to life once more as shadowy glass figures. Many resembled humans; even more Spartans. Others represented Covenant species, and a few were unrecognizable to Bailey.
As they all straightened up, turning their undivided attention towards him, Bailey scowled. Lightly tapping his newly-acquired gravity mace on Andra’s pillar-coffin, he held up the mace, wagging it at the statues as they closed in.
“Alright, who’s first?”
Distant Tide: Hunter - Killer , UnggoyZealot
20: Death Race[]
This place didn’t make any goddamn sense.
From her seat riding shotgun in the Warthog she, Vaish, and Allison had teleported conveniently beside, Emma Sówka could gaze out over the edge of the curving viaduct across the rooftops of something shaped like an empty city. Rectangular towers with windows like grid references packed together with only the narrowest alleys between, but instead of permacrete, the structures gleamed metallic blue in the hot sun—the unmistakable cast of strange alloys left behind by the ancient aliens called Forerunners.
Emma’d seen Forerunner architecture on the news after the New Phoenix attack, and subsequent campaign to take the Dyson sphere it’d come from. And after Siscand, she’d been left with a few impressions of her own. What she couldn’t figure out was why the Forerunners would make a 1:1 scale model of a modern human city.
Beyond its outskirts, the world took on its own blue tinge through the energy barrier rising into the sky. Her team had spotted it before from the other side, using it as a reference point after leaving the bodies of four Spartans—one, their teammate—and Allison’s old sergeant behind. Allison, behind the ‘hog’s wheel, hadn’t spoken much since then.
Fortunately, Emma happened to have something to fill the silence. Along with the weapons and ammunition the sponsors of this twisted game had provided, she’d found in her kevlar vest’s pockets a data chip with the name of a favorite classic album printed on its face. The Warthog’s dashboard included a data port, and before long she had the long chords and soft vocals coming out of the scratchy speaker never meant for much more than hastily-barked orders. Far from a top-notch stereo, but nothing any half-decent motor transport specialist hadn’t done a few times.
With how empty the streets had seemed as they found a route through the winding streets up to the rounded viaduct, Emma half-expected either of her teammates to shut down the noise it made. But between Allison’s dejection and Vaish’s stoicism, the only interruption had been the occasional twitch of hydraulics as Vaish rotated the chaingun turret over their heads.
Their Warthog rolled along in that tranquil state for a good few minutes, Allison only breaking with the gentle curve to avoid scattered parked cars—or metal facsimiles of cars—and truck-sized chunks of debris of the same material which Emma couldn’t figure out the origin of. All the skyscrapers tall enough to tower over the viaduct were intact. It was like the whole city had been molded from the wrong type of clay. Which, if the Announcer’s power to bring them all here was anything to go by, it just might’ve been.
Emma was shaken from her reflection as by the rap of metal knuckles on the roll bar overhead and the crash straps digging into her shoulders as Allison suddenly braked. The Warthog ground to a halt with a gentle squeal from the tires.
“What?” asked Emma. “What is it? Why have we stopped?”
Allison lifted a finger from the wheel to point ahead.
Maybe a few hundred meters ahead, the curve of the road ran straight into the side of one of the largest buildings in the city. The building’s sides were broken up by beveled trenches and support ribbing, but there were no gaps offering a hint as to what lay inside. Its scale over the city, however, made Emma think back to pictures she’d seen in school of the Colosseum.
“If there were any place in this rat maze to invite people into an ambush,” Vaish said, “that’d be it.”
“It’s a little conspicuous,” Allison pointed out. “And too large for one team to secure alone, assuming all the other teams are only four people.”
“But the viaduct here can only go in one way,” replied Vaish. “It’s a natural choke point if anyone wants to try and use it as a lookout. Now that we’re this far along, it’s either go in or waste a lot of fuel going back.”
Allison glanced down at the dashboard, running a hand through her blonde crew cut. “Not that the fuel gauge has changed since we started out.”
“Isn’t this whole roadway like that?” Emma asked.
Vaish, face still hidden behind her helmet, tilted her head. “How so?”
“High vantage point, few ways on or off. It looks like it goes all the way around the city, so anyone looking for gaps in the barrier would naturally follow it.”
Vaish seemed to consider that for a moment. Then her visor jerked up and swept back to lock on something behind them, like a hunting dog pointing. “Drive! Gun it!” she barked, just as Emma started to hear the whistling tone rise in her ears.
The next moment, the Warthog’s grinding whine shot above the album still cycling tracks and the whole jeep lurched forward. Vaish’s warning probably saved their lives, if only just—the first tiny, blue-white suns of plasma bolts sizzled through the space she’d been in a moment before. But the second spray, course changing as the distant gunner adjusted, caught her in the left shoulder.
The plasma melted her shields to failure, and kept coming. Violet paint and dark titanium boiled where the bolts touched, and instinctively backing out of the fire lane made her boot catch on the turret’s mounting. For a moment, Emma feared the Spartan would topple over the side, but she twisted in time to fall squarely inside the Warthog’s bed.
“Are you alright?” Emma called back, hesitant to peek over the rollbar for all the plasma bolts bursting against the Warthog’s side panels.
“A little seared, maybe, but intact,” came the reply. Vaish kicked the turret mount—half in displeasure, and half to rotate it toward the incoming fire. She kept her head down while her MJOLNIR armor crackled with misfires of its recharging shield emitters.
“Did you see what’s on us?”
“A Spectre,” said Vaish. “Type-47, full complement of four. Looked like humans, though.”
“Can confirm.” Allison agreed, glancing in her rear-view mirror. “They must’ve been on us a while, waiting for us to hesitate before entering that structure ahead.”
“They must be trying to chase us inside,” Emma swore under her breath. “Is there any other way out? Some way we can shake them?”
Allison shook her head. “Not unless we try to jump the side for the rooftops below.”
Emma glanced over the side again, gauging their chances. Any of the buildings nearest buildings would still be a long shot, at a small target, judged while under fire. Surrounded by drops hundreds of meters to the streets below. “I’m good with the big building, thanks.”
Allison pulled on her ODST helmet one-handed as the other turned the wheel to swerve out of the plasma fire melting more craters in the side plating. “Guess we’re going in after all, then.”
Awkwardly balanced on the Spectre’s sloped left wing, Leon Sikowsky tried to train his CAVALLINO helmet’s zoom feature on the fleeing Warthog. The jeep kept changing course to take advantage of debris on the highway for cover, though, making it difficult for him. “Did you get her?” he asked the gunner.
“Think I nicked her,” answered the team’s other armored Spartan, Vilmos. “But nah, gonna take more than that to put a Spartan down.”
“Well, keep up the pressure,” Leon told him.
The younger Spartan’s only answer was to jam down the turret’s firing handle, making part of the plasma cannon’s cowling judder back-and-forth with each rapid-fire bolt of liquid flame. As long as the grav-sled’s cooling system sustained it indefinitely, there was nothing wrong with a bit of suppressing fire.
He flexed his grip anxiously on his MA40. The failure of their ambush irked Leon. After wandering the island aimlessly these past few hours, his team had decided upon teleporting into the city to have a plan. They’d made the slow climb to the giant structure, explored it, and identified the likeliest route an opponent would ingress by. And after the tense shadowing of the Warthog ahead of them, it had all gained them nothing thus far.
Trepidations he might’ve had about ambushing fellow UNSC servicemen had been pushed by the wayside. His teammate hanging from the Spectre’s other side, Lieutenant Coney, had pointed out the casualties broadcasted by the enigmatic Announcer meant two things: other teams had already gotten over their qualms about killing each other, and with fewer teams out there, this sick game’s coordinators would be pushing them closer together to ensure further clashes.
If it had to be us or an unknown them, they’d agreed, better it was us.
His vision caught a flash of gold light from the back of the Warthog—Vilmos had been right. A moment after the telltale shine of an energy shield recharging, the steel-and-violet Spartan was upright and standing behind the truck’s machine gun turret.
Yippee for being right, Leon thought.
An instant later, his own shields flared as a hail of lead answered their plasma barrage. Leon pressed himself against the Spectre’s laminate plating for shelter, only to almost lose his grip as their driver veered right to avoid the firing line.
Even with his right hand secure in an alcove on Spectre’s cab, Leon felt a sting of alarm as his left foot slid over the alien craft’s sleek wing to dangle a gray-green boot over the pavement speeding by below.
“Careful!” Leon shouted at the driver as he drew himself back up. “Warn someone when you’re gonna do that!”
“I can hardly be blamed!” the Sangheili in the driver’s cage barked back. “I’ve grown accustomed to having a driver of my own!”
Leon grimaced, but held tighter. The old Elite, Abzu ‘Samakr, was a far cry from the mental picture Leon had of a Sangheili kaidon. Instead of armor, the overweight alien wore only a woven robe in a riotous orange-and-purple pattern. When their team had come to their senses on the southern shore of…wherever this was… the metal shank replacing his right hoof slowed them down. But he had calmed their nerves enough to work as a team in the first place, with no more than an invitation for a cup of aromatic tea.
When they’d teleported into the city, Abzu had made the most sense as designated driver. Leon’s training had covered Covenant vehicles in enough detail he could probably handle it, but Abzu was sure to be familiar with its quirks, and without so much as a weapon of his own, sticking him there was probably the most use he could be.
The air over Leon’s head whistled like a boiling kettle as Vilmos pulsed the plasma turret again. Their targets’ Warthog had lost the benefit of cover again. But before the flurry of glowing plasma bolts could reach their mark, the jeep sped into the shadow of the speedrome looming ahead. Half an instant later, it was lost to sight inside the tunnel where their road met the wall.
“Blast it,” Vilmos grumbled, bringing his fist down on the side of the sizzling plasma cannon. “Lost ‘em. If these advanced alien weapons had a half-decent projectile speed—”
“Don’t worry about it,” interrupted the dark-haired lieutenant. “It just means we drive them into the hazards inside like we planned. Abzu, step on it!”
That prosthetic foot might’ve been unwieldy, but it drove home the Spectre’s boost pedal pretty effectively. Leon redoubled his grip as the grav-sled’s boost drive kicked in, and the Spectre lurched ahead to close the distance on their prey.
The road dipped sharply just inside the tunnel mouth, but the Warthog sailed over the drop and landed so lightly on its suspension Emma wouldn’t have minded even if it hadn’t let them escape the enemy fire—for the moment. But the tunnel stretched out in only a straight line.
“There’s no curves or branches in here,” she pointed out, loudly. “We’ll be sitting ducks as soon as they come in behind us!”
“Then we have to make it there first,” Allison replied, nodding ahead. The tunnel rose and opened out again into a blinding glare compared to the running lights ensconced along the walls. “Hang on.”
The trooper yanked the gear lever hard, and the Warthog sprang forward with a deafening growl in the tunnel’s confined space. It overpowered the sound of Vaish spinning the machine gun’s rotary barrels, trained backward for the first sign of the pursuing Spectre. But something else reached Emma’s ear in spite of the noise.
Maybe not her ears, Emma realized. Her teeth—or her bones? Her whole body felt the deep rumbling of some vibration she couldn’t quite make sense of with the Warthog’s roar so close at hand. Something deep and low, grinding constantly like she had something between her molars. It grew as the jeep drew closer to the tunnel mouth, and burst out into the open.
“Woah!” Allison shouted, slamming the brake pedal into the floor as her gloves pulled at the wheel like a rope thrown to someone dangling over a cliff. The view through their windshield was suddenly taken up by a gigantic gear, each tooth as tall and wide as the Warthog.
Tires squealed and Emma was shaken sideways as the jeep skidded on the flat metal under them, but they came to a halt with a dozen meters to spare. A good thing too, Emma decided as she looked up at the massive gear. It rose from a gap in the floor near its axle, its slow spin carrying each tooth up to mesh with those of another identical gear locked to a bridge above them. Anything caught between would be crushed like a bug.
Twisting her head to take it all in, Emma realized the whole giant structure was packed with such machinery. The chamber they’d emerged into stood wide as a gravball stadium, and cluttered like one used for storage with freeway-wide bridges, ramps, and gantries criss-crossing the space overhead. Roadways wound between iceberg-size blocks, and everywhere titanic machinery toiled.
Gears five stories high spun on tree-size camshafts. Steel plateaus were riddled like Swiss cheese with holes from which cylindrical piston heads drove in and out, each carrying tons of force on every swing. Rack-and-pinions slid to connect one complex drive system with another.
None of it made the least sense to Emma. She couldn’t see where the sprawling drive train began, or where all the power they carried ended up. Gargantuan machines wound in pointless spirals all around them, clanks resounding as constant as waves on a beach as machinery ground together.
“Now I know what being inside a V8 engine feels like,” said Vaish. The even voice always filtering from her helmet allowed a hint of the awe Emma felt to creep in. It disappeared in the next moment as her visor turned back along the machine gun’s sights. “Drive, now!”
“And go where?!” Allison called, even as she stamped on the gas pedal once again. She’d heard the growing howl too. “This place is like a safety inspector’s cosmic horror nightmare!”
“Anywhere,” replied Vaish as the top of the Spectre appeared over the lip of the ramp behind them. A new hail of searing plasma bolts sailed toward them at once. Allison gunned the engine, and they shot forward again down the closest steelplate highway.
Their pursuer’s first burst burned through the air where they’d been, but the next tracked the Warthog’s escape, making Allison jink the wheel back and forth to evade as best she could on their narrower roadway. A few bolts out of the wide-spread volley landed, melting more of the Warthog’s bodywork as the Spectre ranged them in.
Vaish returned the favor, however, filling the air over the driver and passengers’ heads with the rattle of belt-fed gunfire. The Spectre’s wine-red nanolaminate deflected the anti-armor rounds at first, but dents were starting to contort the grav-sled’s nose, and Vaish focused her fire on the weakened plates. The constant swerve of the jeep’s bed under her feet did her no favors, however.
Emma swore as one glaring bolt streaked in through the jeep’s open passenger door and melted a hole through the windshield’s glass on its way out again. “We need to break their line of fire,” she growled needlessly. “They got the first shot off, so they’ll melt us to slag before we can punch through their armor.”
“If you have an idea, I’m all ears!” Allison said through her helmet COM and clenched teeth. “Crap!”
Through the glowing edges of the windshield’s new hole, Emma saw her source of distress. The Spectre’s gunner had swept the endless stream of plasma fire ahead of them, holding it steady to wait for the jeep to pass through. But it wasn’t all she saw.
“There!” Emma leaned forward to point out a gap in the wall to their left, leading into a perfectly square canyon.
“Good enough for me,” Allison replied, and her eyes flickered behind the visor between the incoming fire and the rapidly-approaching opening. Her hand found the e-brake handle, and as the gap came up, she swerved toward the road’s other side and yanked the handle up hard.
The Warthog’s rear tires locked, swinging the tail around until the jeep was practically skidding sideways. With a practiced hand, she released the brake and floored the gas, sending the Warthog into into a sweeping turn and slingshotted neatly through the gap. At once, the whistle of plasma singeing the air around them vanished.
“Well,” sighed Emma, relaxing after a strained turn to look back and see if she could spot their pursuers, “that’s bought us a moment.”
“Maybe not,” Vaish, turned away from the turret’s controls to glance forward over their heads. The dread underlining the stoic Spartan’s voice made Emma’s spine lock up as if frozen. “Allison, look out!”
To Emma’s panicked realization, the corridor ahead was filled with examples of the mechanisms she’d seen before. Reciprocating steel piston heads twice the size of their jeep punched out of the walls like straight punches from giant, mechanical boxers. A single hit would crunch and mangle the Warthog’s steel frame like a paper clip—and probably reduce a human body to jam.
“Hold tight!” Allison shouted, twisting the steering wheel frantically.
The first drum was already too close to stop short of, and even if Allison could, Emma wasn’t sure it would save them if the Spectre caught up with them again. All they could do was plough ahead, and hope they had enough room to stay out of the booming pistons’ way.
Their tires squealed in protest as Allison swung them toward the far wall, hurtling into the drum’s path just as it retracted. The next, alternating with its twin, punched out of its chamber and came directly at them.
Emma flinched, and saw the steel of the rollcage above them crumple as Vaish gripped it tight to steady herself—but the colossal hydraulic ram stopped just short enough to buffet them with a pressure wave of air.
She struggled to think straight. Emma had come to something of an understanding with death. Ever since the Covenant had burned her home, her world, and the only family who’d cared to stick around for her, she’d been waiting for the day it found her. At times, the only thing which kept her from seeking it out herself was the thought of how many murderous aliens she could send to hell ahead of her in line. She’d enlisted and reenlisted to keep putting extraterrestrials in subterranean resting places until one of them got her.
But death like this? An industrial accident, a victim of machinery that wouldn’t even notice her crushed between the gears as they kept spinning? Hell no, she wanted to live more than that.
She gripped fiercely to the crash straps belted over her chest as Allison turned the wheel again to scurry toward the opposite wall, just outside the reach of another set of pistons. Emma tried to get her bearings amid the swings of titanic hammers and found she couldn’t—their speed and the overlapping movement kept her from grounding herself with any stable point of reference.
“You have to time them,” Vaish called down unhelpfully.
“I know, I know!” growled Allison. Nowhere in the canyon was safe to stop even long enough to think. The only option was to careen headlong from one moment of safety to the next, counting far more on luck than skill they wouldn’t be crushed with each passing instant.
Luck, of course, was always a finite resource.
Just as Emma thought they’d figured out a pattern, one of the last drums in the set ahead drew back out of sync. In a moment it would drive forward again—just as their Warthog passed through the same space.
“Watch it, watch it, watch it!” Emma shouted, powerless to do anything else. The DMR slung from a strap around her neck was useless against a giant block of steel. All she could do was grip it tight and hope she happened to survive the coming collision.
Allison didn’t reply—though Emma couldn’t say if it was down to keeping her discipline or lack of a time to scream—but threw the wheel hard right.
The Warthog skidded to follow, veering so hard Emma swore she could feel the tires on the inside of the turn leave the road. The turn set them chasing the retracting piston whose path they stood in, right beside the out-of-sync neighbor. In a moment, the piston head the size of a tunnel-boring machine would ram forward again, and reduce their jeep to a fly on its metal windshield.
Then its neighbor kicked out, a dull clang sounding from somewhere inside the towering wall. The drumhead pushed entirely clear of its cylinder on a connecting rod thick as a tanker truck—and left an open space behind it.
Roaring in desperate anger, Allison snapped the wheel back the other way, swerving into the shadow of the last piston just as the one they’d been chasing drove forward again, its solid steel battering ram driving through the space they’d occupied the moment before.
Their jeep shot across the open ground they’d managed to find—but wasn’t out of danger yet. The piston was already drawing back again to slide flush into the cylinder behind. If it didn’t pinch the Warthog like a mosquito between its rim and the edge of the culvert, they’d be dragged into whatever mechanisms lay waiting in the darkness. Emma had no doubt how lethal that would be.
The grinding drone of the Warthog’s engine climbed higher as Allison drove her foot down hard on the gas pedal, almost rising from her seat to stand on it. From the half-instant Emma had to judge their speed against the oncoming ram, it would be close.
Whatever light was coming down from the ceiling far overhead, it glared down between Emma’s lashes as they cleared the connecting rod’s shadow. She gasped a sigh of relief—only for her lungs to seize up again as the Warthog shook with the force of steel-crumpling impact.
The right side of her head slammed the doorframe as the whole jeep spun left, inertia shaking her like a raver’s hand light as the squeal of skidding tires overwhelmed her ears. Pain blotted out questions about what they’d hit or where their spin would end, and Emma braced herself for whatever hit might come next.
Then, just as abruptly, the cacophony of sound and movement halted with a jerk that set her right in her seat again.
Ignoring her still-throbbing head, Emma opened her eyes and looked around. The Warthog had stopped. Pistons still drove back and forth to either side of them, but the jeep stood by unharmed.
Allison’s black ballistic armor rose and fell as she took deep breaths, hands still death-gripping the steering wheel. After the adrenaline started to filter out, she broke her forward-locked stare to turn and ask, “Everyone alive?”
“I feel like I might be sick,” Emma reported, “and I never want to think about roller coasters or bumper cars so long as I live. But yeah, I’m in one piece.”
“That mostly goes for back here.” Vaish leaned over the rollcage above them. “We lost the bumper, and the tail lights are gone. Really glad I locked my armor for that last bit. Nice driving, Petty Officer.”
“That was nothing,” Allison leaned back in her seat, letting her suppressed jitters drain away. “You should see some of the Helljumpers I’ve served with trying to make it from the bars back to base before curfew.”
“Well, let’s see any of them do that sob—”
Before she could finish, a spray of hot plasma rained down on the cannon mount from above, showering Vaish with droplets of molten metal. She snapped up an arm to defend herself, the orange-hot beads already cooling in place and falling away from the gold spiderwebs they seared into her energy shielding.
“Drive!” she barked, taking shelter behind the turret.
Allison did just that without another word, already eyeing the next set of pistons to look for a way through. Emma looked up to try and spot their attackers, only to find the Spectre’s dented nose growing unnaturally wide in her vision—their enemy had launched itself from the lip of the canyon above, pouncing straight down on top of them!
Their Warthog lurched into motion again, but before it’d moved more than its own length, the Spectre crashed down into their right side, its boost drive ignited. Emma felt the collision rattle her bones, and ducked her head as small arms fire from the Spectre’s passengers plinked off armor plating and shattered more glass around the windshield’s melted hole.
None of it stopped the sturdy old jeep, however, and in a moment Allison broke the contact and pulled away onto the treacherous mechanical highway, the Spectre in close pursuit.
“I’m really starting to hate these guys!” Emma said, reversing her grip on the DMR in her lap to have it ready. Then she noticed the lack of fire coming from her teammate’s weapon emplacement. “Vaish? Why aren’t you shooting at them?”
“That plasma fire slagged the firing mechanisms!” Vaish responded. “The turret’s good as dead!”
Emma cut short a fresh round of swearing and tilted her head enough to get a view of their enemy. “They’re going to get in close again!” she announced.
“Let ‘em.” Vaish growled, pulling a blocky, pump-action shotgun from her back.
Already hugging far walls to stay out of the giant pistons’ way, Allison had no room to evade the Spectre as it overtook and swung into their side with another steel-warping crunch. The Spartan on the alien craft’s turret opened up again, pouring hot plasma into the Warthog’s vulnerable bed. Vaish popped up from her own turret’s gunnery shield and loosed a round of buckshot across the length of the plasma cannon’s barrel. The other gunner’s shielding flared bright, but held enough for him to duck as Vaish racked her weapon and followed up with more shot.
Locked against one another, both craft veered dangerously toward the paths of the giant battering rams, all of which pounded on indifferently to the struggle for survival in their shadows. The Warthog’s tires screeched as they left carbonized skid marks on the metal floor, giving traction to Allison’s attempted shoves where the Spectre had none. But the alien craft’s boost drive was an advantage the jeep didn’t have, and the two struggled for control of their vector, each trying to push the other into a wall or piston or spinning gear rising up from the floor like the fins of lurking sharks.
Emma leaned forward as far as she dared to let off a few blind shots with her DMR, but an angry swarm of assault rifle fire drove her back into cover. The tarnished gray-green Spartan hanging from the Spectre’s left wing had no cover, but needed none with his armor’s energy shielding, which left him free to get the drop on her.
Blasted Spartans never fight fair. Emma thought. “Hold us steady!”
“That’s not really an option,” Allison replied, still fighting the wheel when she heard Emma’s crash straps click. “What the hell are you doing?!”
“What I have to,” she answered, twisting around. Then, picking her moment, Emma planted a foot on her seat and let go of the rollbar bracing her to grip her Lullaby in both hands. Standing, teetering, in the swerving Warthog, she popped up over the rollbar with enough time to level her weapon.
The Spartan targeting her hadn’t expected the change of angle, and was too slow to keep Emma from emptying half a magazine into the Spectre’s open cockpit. The Sangheili inside wore no armor, and called out in pain and surprise as deep violet blood splashed on the Spectre’s control panels.
Before she was sure of finishing the job, however, a mass of grey-green titanium rolled into her line of fire. The Spartan had swung himself precariously over the side of the grav-sled’s hull to shield the driver, blocking her shot.
The reputed best-of-the-best of humanity risking himself to save an alien from her brought a scowl to Emma’s lips. But then, if her enemy in this twisted death-game wanted to give her an open shot, she’d take it.
Just as she’d determined to keep shooting, however, a woman’s pale face and black bob cut appeared above the Spectre’s hull from the far side, a silver pistol in one fist lined up with her eye.
A heavy slug ricocheted off the rollbar at Emma’s shoulder, and she dove back into her seat muttering a few choice and anatomically-improbable invectives. No sooner had she hit the release on her magazine to load a full one when something rounded and dark sailed lazily into the Warthog’s cab at such an angle it could’ve only come from the Spartan.
She knew at once it had to be a grenade. Under normal circumstances, she would’ve called it out, hoping her squad could get to cover. But with it rolling around inside the Warthog? Not even covering it with her own body would save the lot of them from the fireball it would turn the vehicle into.
Her weapon and her enemies’ sight lines were forgotten as Emma spun around, drawing her legs up to kneel on the seat and look for the grenade on the floor beneath. Knowing she had fractions of a second left, her eyes darted in the shade beneath the dashboard until a jolt from the struggle between Warthog and Spectre made the dusky little orb jump in the corner it’d rolled to.
Emma’s hand darted forward in a desperate grab and snagged the explosive up between her slender fingers. Aware with every microsecond she held it the grenade could blow her hand to fine mist—and the rest of her body a millisecond afterward—Emma reared up and hurled the fist-sized explosive out across the Warthog’s hood.
It barely cleared the front bumper by the time the grenade went off. Its Composite L casing fragmented, scattering shrapnel into the battered hulls of both vehicles. The Spartans were mostly safe in their shielded armor, both drivers and the dark-haired woman protected by their vehicles’ bulks. But Emma was in the open like a bachelorette standing in a limo’s open sun roof.
Searing, stinging pain tore through her shoulders and chest along with each razor-edged bit of casing, her face protected only by her raised arm. Crying out in pain and shock, Emma dropped again into the Warthog’s passenger seat, only Allison’s desperate grab with a free hand keeping her from tumbling out of the open side door.
The blast, fortunately, pushed the two vehicles apart, and Allison steered them into one branching corridor—thankfully free of hydraulic pistons—while the Spectre was forced down another.
“Vaish!” Allison shouted as Emma groaned in barely-conscious pain. “Vaish, we need to switch seats! I have to treat her!”
“Well, that whole plan was a bust,” said Vilmos, leaning against the Spectre’s plasma cannon as it drifted to a stop on the roadway. “We didn’t put down a single one of them!”
“But we did take out their largest weapon,” Erin replied as she slid off the grav-sled’s wing. Her boots rang on the metal surface of the road as she rounded it to join Leon on the other side. “Now all we have to do is hunt them down.”
Leon wasn’t listening to either of them. He stared into the Spectre’s cockpit with mixed feelings of antipathy and disappointment.
Inside, Abzu ‘Samakr slumped forward with his hunched neck hanging down on his chest, splayed across control surfaces stained with purple blood. The gunfire hadn’t killed him immediately. Through sucking chest wounds, the Sangheili’s twin hearts had kept beating long enough to steer them all clear of the dangerous industrial machinery and out of range of their opponents. He hadn’t so much as said a word to ask for help. Maybe he couldn’t, Leon didn’t know.
He’d fought the Covenant on a dozen or so worlds, led often as not by the Elites. His homeworld had burned by their hand, and they’d taken a good number of comrades from his side. He couldn’t quite bring himself to feel sorry for the Elite’s death.
But Leon knew sacrifice when he saw it. He’d served alongside some Swords of Sanghelios units since the great war’s end, and knew how highly they valued honor like that. Getting them clear while so wounded was a debt Leon had no way of repaying. Small or large, he hated to leave scales unbalanced like that.
Erin inhaled sharply as she came up beside him. “Damn,” she murmured, and in that word Leon picked up on some of the same regret he felt.
He’d been a teammate, Leon decided. And to a Spartan’s mind, there were worse eulogies. A marginally better one might be to kill the ones who’d done him in. Which at least might earn him forgiveness for what he’d do next.
Reaching into the Spectre’s semi-open cab, Leon hauled the body up by the collar of its robe. As respectfully as he could, he dragged Abzu’s corpse out over the dashboard. The digitigrade legs hung up on the Spectre’s retractable rollbar, reminding Leon sickeningly of a dead deer brought in by some colonial hunter once rigor mortis had set in.
“What the hell are you—oh,” Vilmos cut himself short as he understood. He rested his helmet’s faceplate in his hand propped up on the plasma cannon as Leon awkwardly pulled the body free.
Laying the body on the metal floor, Leon made a hasty effort to fold the Elite’s hands together over it’s chest, then stood up to survey the handiwork. It didn’t make for a pretty sight, the legs tilted at asymmetrical angles. But he didn’t have time for anything better.
Without a benediction coming to mind, Leon turned back to the Spectre and clambered up over its nose.
“We need to find that other team back fast,” he said as he lined himself up with the squarish gap above the driver’s seat. “One of them was wounded, so if we keep the pressure on before they can regroup, the advantage is still ours.”
“I do like having advantages,” Vilmos said, shifting back into a firing position with both hands on the cannon’s controls.
“Then let’s go put them to use.” Leon glanced down to Erin, still on the roadway. “Get aboard, Lieutenant.”
To his surprise, the Lieutenant shook her head. “Hanging on the outside like that, I’m only a liability to you. Besides, we need to locate that Warthog ASAP if we’re going to keep them off balance.”
She turned and pointed to a metal monolith which sprouted from somewhere in the stadium’s ground level, obscured by freeway-size gantries and turbine blocks, and rose past them through the causeways above almost to the great chamber’s ceiling. Walkways and ledges spiraled around and through its structure, making it look like a giant, metal sculpture of a diseased cornstalk.
Coney tapped her earpiece. “I can spot them much faster from up there, and give you directions.”
Leon hesitated, wary of splitting their team. But once they closed in with their enemy again, he reasoned, he wasn’t so keen on anyone hanging for dear life from the Spectre’s side while the vehicles clashed and exchanged gunfire.
“Alright, just stay in contact,” he said. Erin nodded, and was off and running immediately, the shortest route across the uneven metal landscape to the tower’s base already worked out. Resigned, Leon jumped down into the Spectre’s cab, wiped the violet blood off the control screen as best he could, and punched the boost drive.
As soon as Allison found an unassuming alcove in the metal canyons to safely park, she’d vaulted out of her seat and rounded the Warthog to help Emma from the passenger’s seat. Vaish was faster, though, and was already lifting the Army operator free.
“Set her down gently,” Allison said, needlessly as Vaish’s armor lowered her to a knee as smoothly as any machine armature. Allison hovered close, already taking stock of her patient’s injuries. The bulletproof vest she wore over a simple tank top had protected her vital organs from shrapnel, so far as Allison could tell at first glance. But it hadn’t protected her completely, particularly her arm on the right side. But more worrying was the ragged gash in Emma’s temple, supplying trickling lines of blood through the soot covering her face from the grenade’s detonation.
Allison knelt on her other side, rolling Emma’s head her way. “Of all the times not to have a medkit,” she grumbled. She was determined to make do, though.
Reaching up to the side of her helmet, Allison turned on the DAYBREAK suit’s flashlight and directed it at Emma’s eye, stretching the lid back with her thumb. Fortunately, the pupil dilated as normal.
The cut, as she soon discovered, was only superficial, and turned her attention to Emma’s torso. Her augmented gauntlets freed the kevlar vest’s cinches with no trouble, letting Allison inspect the tears in her skin more easily. As soon as she confirmed none were likely to be immediately fatal, she rocked back on her haunches and pulled a long, clear tube from a panel beneath her wrist armor.
“Here,” she said, thrusting the one end toward Vaish.
Vaish tilted her expressionless head, but accepted it. “What am I doing with this?”
“What we can,” Allison replied. “MJOLNIR’s supposed to have biofoam injectors, right? I need you to hook that up to my DAYBREAK suit’s pump. It’s no injection canister, but it’ll have to do.”
“Resourceful of you.” Vaish commented. Allison wasn’t sure if her neutral tone was meant to subdue the compliment, or they just made all Spartans that impassive. There was decades-old contention between ODSTs and the Spartans some of her superiors feared were meant to replace them, but at the moment she couldn’t give a damn. She had a resource Allison needed to save a life.
In a moment, the milk-white liquid was seeping through the plastic tube, into Allison’s forearm, and out another tube she hooked up. Holding it’s other end like a pen between her fingers, she carefully placed the end to deliver the foam as deep into Emma’s puncture wounds as possible. As soon as it hit air, the foam would start to expand and harden, and the tubing wasn’t the best applicator. She couldn’t afford to let it seal itself off.
A chime came from an indicator on her wrist as soon as the first wound was plugged. “Alright, my suit pump is full, you can disconnect now,” she told Vaish as she moved to the next spot.
The Spartan yanked the tether free and leaned in close again. “Is there anything else I can do?”
“No,” Allison said curtly. She told herself focusing on her work was the excuse.
If any mistrust had seeped through, though, Vaish repaid it in kind when she abruptly stood and walked away.
Allison dared to raise her eyes for a moment to watch her round the Warthog’s fender. “Where are you going?”
“That team in the Spectre will be back,” Vaish answered, appearing again through the Warthog’s open doors as she clambered into the driver’s seat. “I’m going to draw them off. You just make sure Emma’s stable.”
Without another word, Vaish threw the gear lever back and nudged the pedal. The Warthog rolled on along the alley where they’d hidden, and disappeared around the next corner.
Allison chewed for a moment on whether Vaish had just made a smart tactical decision or ditched the two of them. But, with work to do, she didn’t have the bandwidth to care about thinking it over. She turned her attention from the last of Emma’s chest wounds to her right arm, only to notice no blood seeped from the tear in her skin.
Just as she leaned closer to examine it, Emma’s whole body jolted, making Allison flinch. She backed off as Emma sat up on her own.
“Ahhh, my head,” Emma hissed. “What happened?”
“You almost took a grenade to the face,” Allison answered, setting her wrist armor to retract the tubing. “Thanks, by the way. If you hadn’t thrown it, we’d both have it a lot worse.”
“Next time, let’s trade,” said Emma. “Girl with the helmet can play hot potato.”
“Next time.” Allison agreed. “You got pretty lucky, though, being on that side. I didn’t even notice your arm’s a prosthetic.”
Emma looked down at the limb in question self-consciously. She twisted her forearm, inspecting the damage. The skin pulled over what surely had to be metal skeleton stretched convincingly, despite the new tears. “Yeah… wait, what happened to the car? To Vaish?”
“You just missed her.” Allison stood, offering Emma a hand up. “She took the ‘hog, said she was going to draw off those guys in the Spectre.”
“Great,” Emma said as she was pulled to her feet. The biofoam plugs in her chest, she discovered, kept her fresh wounds numbed even as she cinched the kevlar vest back together over them. “So what now? Do we call her back?”
“I don’t know,” Allison said pensively. “Without the fifty-cal on the back, it feels like we’d just be putting us all in one basket for our enemies. Maybe we ought to set up somewhere, get the lay of the land.”
She unlocked an MA5K carbine from the mag-plate over her back, checking its ammo counter. Emma glanced down to her own DMR, still hanging on by its strap. Getting a little use out of its range would certainly help get her aching head back in the fight.
Emma looked up, searching the maze of skyways and mechanical drive trains overhead for a convenient vantage point, when her eyes locked on a small spot of movement. One which didn’t reciprocate like a machine.
“I think I know just where,” she said, pointing for Allison to a steely tower riddled with ramps and walkways, where a dark-haired woman was already climbing.
“Hard left. Now, veer right!”
With Coney’s voice in his helmet com, Leon surrendered trust of his own senses to his teammate’s eye-in-the-sky. By letting go of the alarm his own sensory feedback raised, he could push the Spectre through blind corners at top speed, racing untouched through the clockwork steel maze.
He turned left, then hung to the right side of the new corridor, narrowly avoiding an articulated gantry lifting a massive square out of the floor. Leon had time to look up in awe as a baseball field-size part of his road rose high overhead on articulated armatures like a waiter with a plate.
On the turret behind him, Vilmos whistled low. “Really don’t want to get caught on one of those. Don’t think whoever built this place had a copy of the building code handy.”
“Try not to worry about it, Veevee,” Coney said. “The modules here change places in a clear fractal pattern. I’ll tell you if there’s something for you to worry over.”
Vilmos cut short a laugh. “Like your bomb defusal communication exercises back on Onyx. Thanks, but I’m not keen on a trust fall from quite that high up. Let’s frag these guys quick so we can get out of here.”
“Got them already,” Coney replied. “Though I’m not seeing anyone on the back.”
“They may have split up like we did,” Leon suggested. “They had a casualty to deal with, too.”
“I’ll keep an eye out,” said Coney. “In the meantime, let’s deal with the problem we can see. Take the ramp ahead and turn to ten o’clock, and you’ll come out right behind them.”
“Copy!” Leon grunted as he twisted the Spectre’s control rods right, almost past the ramp already.
The Spectre’s gravity repulsors let it sweep through the hard turn with less trouble than Leon had, inertia shoving him against the side of the cab—but they made the turn. Leon kicked on the boost drive to power up the ramp, then angled away as instructed once they reached the top.
Sure enough, a moment after they entered the corridor ahead, the Warthog they pursued shot out of a side passage and fishtailed in front of them. The whine of its engine pitched higher as the driver gunned it and tried to pull away.
“I have you now,” Vilmos murmured, opening up with the plasma cannon.
Sapphire streaks of plasma lanced out into the Warthog’s rear fender, melting a tail light to plastic slag. The driver responded immediately, braking and swerving back and forth, forcing Leon to slow up to avoid her. In the second it threw off Vilmos’ aim, the Warthog slipped behind a gear protruding from the floor, cutting off his line of sight.
“Blast it,” he grumbled.
“Aim for one of the tires,” Leon advised. “We’ll sweep the leg and pick them apart after.”
“Got it.”
At that moment, the other side of the gear flew past. With the divider gone, the whine of the Warthog’s engine returned in force—just before the jeep itself slammed into their side. Metal crumpled and laminate cracked as the two met, grinding against one another under the weight of the two vehicles pressing together.
“Well, can’t aim for the tires now, can I?” Vilmos griped before depressing the turret to start melting through the bulkhead between the jeep’s bed and the driver.
Leon, however, didn’t have time to see how effective it was. As soon as the vehicles were locked together, the Spartan woman in the other vehicle raised a revolver at him the size of a pipe wrench and fired.
Leon ducked his head as high-caliber slugs impacted against the hull. He considered returning fire with his own sidearm, but he doubted he could draw, aim, and shoot with the other Spartan already firing his way. He focused instead on the control screen in front of his hunched-over face.
Ahead, a line of slender supports like the bones of a ribcage divided their roadway. Staying safely below the edge of the Spectre’s window, Leon turned the controls to angle toward it and put everything the gravity drive had into its booster.
The first column, appearing as an outline in the alien craft’s instruments, loomed larger and larger. Leon almost began to think the other Spartan hadn’t noticed, and they’d end up ramming the structure together.
Just as the column’s outline was about to overrun the display, there was a wrenching jolt as the Warthog pulled away, and Leon heaved the other direction. The strut whipped by with centimeters to spare, and Leon lifted his head to catch only glimpses of the Warthog running parallel to them behind the colonnade.
“C’mon…” Vilmos grumbled. “That thing’s gotta be melted down to the chassis by now, I know it can’t take much more.”
Leon tried to ignore the younger Spartan. “Lieutenant? What have we got up ahead?”
“There’s a tunnel on the left just past the end of that gallery she’s in.” Coney responded. “Force her in there, and it should be open enough to put that cannon to use.”
“Roger that,” Leon said, flicking his attention between the end of the columns ahead and the Warthog across from him to be sure he was keeping pace.
As their end approached, Leon turned the whole Spectre forty-five degrees, bringing its booster into line. As soon as the columns disappeared behind them, he ignited the thruster, suddenly translating their momentum sideways.
The Spectre and Warthog collided again with a crunch, and the impact sent both vehicles far enough left they had no choice but to slalom down the new corridor. The tunnel roof was suddenly overhead like some leviathan had swallowed them, and the flash of Vilmos’ plasma cannon cast ghostly blue patterns of light and shadow on the walls.
The tunnel wasn’t quite as empty as Coney had hoped, though. Cross-spars swung low overhead and pillars in the center forced both drivers to sway through S-curves, while side-tunnels only just large enough for foot traffic offered the false hope of escapes to either side.
Vilmos shouted over the squall of the plasma cannon, “Don’t let her lock us again, I finally have a shot!”
Sure enough, the Warthog tried to meet them again, only for Leon to let up and slip behind them. The next pillar loomed, and the Warthog sped up again, trying to outpace them before he could speed up. In response, Leon took the long way around the pillar’s other side, knowing he’d pick up speed slingshotting around it.
When the Warthog came back into view, though, the driver had slowed down to match him instead, and swung their way. Leon slipped away again—
“Sikowsky, wait, the ceiling—!” Vilmos barely had time to shout.
Leon looked ahead to see a cross spar looming out of the darkness, barely high enough to skim the top of the Spectre. Caught between braking to avoid it or keeping away from the Warthog, the moment of indecision cost him.
A crisp, hollow crack, like a crab leg snapping between steel handles, shook through the Spectre’s frame. Leon tried to twist back in his seat to survey the damage, but the bulkhead behind him blocked his view. All he could tell for certain was the plasma cannon no longer loomed over his head.
The Spectre sped on, however, the Warthog bouncing on its suspension behind him like a big cat chasing after prey.
“Vilmos?” Leon tried his COM. “Vilmos, do you copy?”
A long second passed before a response came in. “Yeah, I’m alright. Not aboard anymore, though, that strut took off the turret and slammed me down like a Ricochet ball. Ow.”
Coney’s voice cut in over his complaining. “You must be about halfway down the tunnel by now. Vilmos, if there’s a side-tunnel leading up on the left side, take it. You’ll know what to do. Leon, as soon as you clear the tunnel, head left again. Make sure that Warthog follows you.”
“Care to explain what the plan is this time?” Leon grunted.
“No time,” Coney replied. “I have some problems of my own up here. Just tell me when you make the turn and try to maintain top speed.”
So the other team’s members were still hanging around. They’d need to finish this up quick if they hoped to help the Lieutenant. “Affirmative copy.”
He ignited the booster again and sped forward, the Warthog’s headlights casting a pale yellow glow on the walls around him. In a moment, the far end of the tunnel came into view, the light from outside bringing the scarlet color back to the Spectre’s hull as it left the darkness.
They burst free and spun, Leon making the Spectre pirouette on its repulsors while the Warthog rocked on its suspension through a powerslide after him.
“I’m clear of the tunnel,” he reported.
“Good, now just keep headed down that corridor,” Erin replied, and Leon was fairly sure he heard gunfire in the background. Unable to do anything about the fact, Leon focused on the road ahead and evaded the obstacles coming his way.
All around, gears spun, pistons pounded, and rib structures flew by overhead. The Warthog menaced him, trying to nudge him toward any hazard it could, but refrained from full-on contact. After all the plasma fire it’d soaked up, the jeep might not be able to survive another hit. And for that matter, Leon wasn’t quite sure how much damage whatever systems lay beneath the Spectre’s nanolaminate could endure either.
His opponent pulled up next to him, neck and neck with gold visors locked silently on one another. Looking ahead and seeing nothing but more machinery, Leon pinged the COM, “Is there supposed to be something I’m waiting for?”
“You just found it.” Vilmos answered.
Suddenly, white-hot tracer rounds rained down on the Warthog from an upward angle ahead, shattering the remains of the windshield. Leon glanced up to spy Vilmos camped out on the next bridge ahead, his DMR braced on the edge to fire down into the Warthog’s open top. The Spartan driving threw up an armored hand to protect herself as her shielding flared and failed.
“She’s all yours, Leon,” Vilmos said, keeping up the fire as they sped under his position.
Seeing the opposite wall of the canyon end, leaving the roadway running next to a sheer drop, Leon jammed the control sticks right again. Attention taken up by the pain left by several ragged, bleeding tears in the undersuit of her armor, Vaish lacked the time to respond.
Again, the vehicles clashed, their shredded armor hooking together like velcro. The Spectre’s momentum took them on a swerving path toward the precipice, and Leon clambered up through the gap in the Spectre’s canopy to jump clear.
His heavy armor clanged on the flat steel floor, and Leon rolled to absorb the impact. He came up in a crouch, hand already reaching over his shoulder to unsling his MA40. He wouldn’t need it.
Smoke pouring off their mangled chassis, the jeep and gravsled sped as one up to the edge and plunged over. No armored figure appeared last-minute to make any heroic jumps for Leon to intercept. The sound of their engines faded, and in a moment even the smoke had dissipated, leaving no trace either had ever been there.
He thumbed his COM. “That’s the end of that one.”
“Good to hear,” Vilmos answered. “I’m doubling back to that tower already, gonna give the el-tee some help. Catch up with us when you can.”
“Affirmative.” Leon said, and cut the connection. He took a moment to stretch, unwinding the nerves he’d had locked through the whole drive, then oriented himself to find the direction of the tower.
The mechanisms of this place rolled on, ignorant of the battle which had taken place. Gear spun, pistons drove back and forth. A shadow passed over him just as he figured the right direction, and he turned to see another plate rising up on an armature behind him.
Over the clank of machinery, a familiar whine grew in his ears again.
Before his forebrain even identified its source, his instincts recognized it as a threat. His visor snapped back and forth in search of its source. Then he looked up, where the plate had just risen from below the precipice to hover overhead.
He recognized the grille of a Warthog descending straight down at him, the tusks holding its winch looming large in his vision.
“Ah shi—” Leon had time to mutter, but not enough time to move.
Emma tried to ignore the pains in her shoulder and torso as she snapped her DMR toward doors, corners, anywhere a threat might hide. Biofoam numbed pain on top of staunching her wounds, but it was only a stopgap. She still felt the corners of the grenade casing poke and tear inside her when she moved certain ways. But she didn’t flinch, moving exactly as her training dictated.
Allison came through one of the room’s other doors as planned. They’d coordinated the initial ambush just right to cut their target off from escape. Only the dark-haired woman had spotted them early and slipped away before they could close the noose, trading a few shots in passing.
The woman only had one way to go, though—up. This tower had a top level somewhere, so Emma and Allison cleared the building floor-by-floor. Somewhere, their target would have to make a stand. But so far the woman refused to give them that fight.
She fell into step with Allison, letting the ODST take point with her heavier armor and compact MA5K. They alternated covering entrances and checked methodically for traps, but found nothing.
“You don’t think she has a way out somewhere up there?” Emma wondered aloud.
“I don’t see how,” said Allison, helmet still tilted down over her MA5K’s sights. “Nothing to jump to, and the spire doesn’t reach the ceiling. She probably wasn’t put here with the gear to set up any real trap, like us. So if she hasn’t engaged by now, she’s either outpacing us to reach an advantageous position, or is hoping to slip past us somewhere.”
“No reason to hurry up, then?”
“Nope,” Allison agreed. “We do this by the book. This level’s clear. I’ll take the switchback stairs. You take the ramp outside right.”
Emma nodded and broke off, her DMR held level.
When she reached the door, Emma pressed herself to one side of its frame and peered through. A short balcony served as the landing for a steep ramp hugging up the tower’s side up to the next level. Over its railing-free edge, Emma could look down over a thirty-storey drop to the closest level of the steel maze below.
There was no wind, Emma noticed. So high up, she felt there should be wind. But under the sweeping roof of the stadium, everything was still. Seeing no threat, she cautiously stepped out onto the ledge, and when nothing shot at her immediately, advanced up the ramp.
She reached the top and spun, sweeping her aim across the new floor. Slender beams divided a series of open floor-to-ceiling windows, giving Emma a clear view into another room defined by angular metal walls and odd-shaped doors. The Forerunners, or whoever designed this tower, really seemed to have something against handrails.
The open floorplan gave her a clear view of possible threat vectors, all of which were clear, and Emma relaxed a bit. Then berated herself for the slip. It was getting tiring to clear floor after floor and still be sharp for the next letdown. But that fatigue might be exactly what their target was counting on.
It was, as it happened.
The moment Emma stepped in off the landing, feeling marginally safer for being away from the edge, a shadow unfolded from the window in her peripheral vision. Emma turned, bringing her DMR halfway to bear when two heavy boots crashed into her chest.
The impact knocked her sprawling, landing hard on her back as her attacker hit the ground like a cat poised to pounce.
She’d swung down from the level above, Emma realized through the renewed pain in her torso. She’d picked an environment where Emma was most likely to let her guard down, conscious or not, and come from an angle she wouldn’t expect. Emma tried not to admire the skill of her would-be killer.
The dark-haired woman stood to her full height, unclipping a nickel-silver magnum at her side. Emma’s DMR rested across her chest, kept in easy reach by its tether, but putting it on target would take seconds she didn’t have. So she went for the only weapon which would be quick enough instead.
Throwing the Blade of Siscand like a common dagger was a travesty, really, but Emma didn’t see any other option liable to save her life. The forked black needle cleared its sheath in an instant, and Emma hurled it half-blind.
Even with her clumsy throw, the Blade flew straight with its deadly tines forward—but her attacker was quick. Recognizing the gesture, she jerked sideways in surprise as it flew just over her shoulder through the space her head had been a moment before. The blade embedded itself in the narrow strut between windows, piercing even the Forerunner alloy.
The reprieve it bought her was only a moment, but enough for Emma to move. The gun still in her assailant’s hand, trying to stand or scrabble away or shoot would only result in death. So instead, she rolled toward the open window.
Gunshots roared behind her, but the unexpected direction meant the first two rounds only ricocheted off the hard floor behind her. The third, however, punched into her Kevlar vest just as she cleared the lip of the window.
Vertigo took over. Emma’s skin itched as every muscle tightened—then she crashed into the landing on the floor below. The impact forced the breath from her lungs, and her temple ached where her head had bounced against the solid metal floor. She didn’t even have the attention to spare to feel her new gunshot wound. Pain overwhelmed her senses, and Emma lay still like a prey animal hiding from a predator.
As she became conscious again of what her eyes were seeing, Emma wondered faintly why the dark-haired woman wasn’t standing in the window above her, trying to finish what she started. Then a staccato burst of rifle fire broke over her ears, and one of the columns sparked as a round glanced off its flat side.
Took you long enough.
On the floor above, muzzle flashes strobed into the underhanging shadows as two combatants spun in a lethal dance. The few columns in the room provided barely enough cover for half a body. Each Allison ran to cover, Coney would maneuver to a new position of her own, driving Allison to seek new shelter where she’d force Coney out in turn. With each move, Allison’s MA5K traded bursts with Coney’s heavy pistol.
Fortunately, Allison recognized the weapon in her opponent’s hand—and knew exactly how many rounds it held. She fired off a burst, slipped behind a column, and counted off the nickel-plated .50 rounds pinging against her cover.
Seven…
Her turn came to move again. The two played a match on a life-size chess board. Three more shots impacted near her head.
Ten…
Allison feinted, ducking back behind the pillar she’d seemed about to leave. Two more shots.
Twelve!
Rolling from behind her meager cover, Allison brought up her MA5K and rushed forward, bearing down on an enemy who should have nothing in her magazine.
To her surprise, she was met not with an unprepared black ops agent, but a nickel-silver pistol expanding in her vision. It smacked into Allison’s visor, hard enough to crack it and nearly whip her head around. This woman was strong.
Her balance shaken, momentum carried Allison forward, careening into the waiting agent. She felt the MA5K wrenched from her hands by a deft twist. Another moment and it would be turned on her. She couldn’t let that happen.
Instead of fighting for it, Allison let the carbine go and threw her arm wide to grab the woman in a bear hug. The carbine wound up trapped between them, under no one’s control and liable to go off the instant its trigger caught on something. It was a grappling game now, and Allison had no doubt her opponent was augmented—maybe even on par with her suit—but the DAYBREAK frame gave her the advantage of weight.
Planting herself, Allison hauled her opponent off her feet and pulled them both off-balance, slamming to the ground together. The MA5K clattered away, bouncing once, twice, and sailing over the tower’s edge a meter or two away.
Each disentangled themselves to start regaining their feet. Allison went for her pistol, but the moment it was drawn, Coney swept it out of her hand with a wide kick that left Allison’s hand stinging. She retaliated with a left hook. It fell short, but drove Coney back enough to let Allison stand fully.
Without a word, they launched into a vicious exchange of jabs, kicks, and grabs. Coney was faster, but Allison’s armor protected and redoubled her strength. Even the punches Allison didn’t intercept broke on her ceramic plates, and she noticed red liquid start to drip from Coney’s knuckles.
Pressing her advantage, Allison raised her arms in a stubborn guard and drove forward, pushing Coney back toward the tower’s corner. As soon as she saw light peek over the floor’s edge, she lashed out. Her open hands intercepted Coney’s next punches, and she stepped forward to push Coney back the last bit she needed.
It worked. Coney sprang back to escape her, and would drop back down through empty space.
Except she didn’t drop.
The moment Allison let go to watch her fall, Coney’s hand snaked out to the beam defining the edge of the window. She swung around it like a dancing pole, orbiting back around to come at Allison from the side—and she pulled something free of the beam as she did it: a forked black needle, a hand or two long.
Whatever it was, Coney whipped it around fast at the outside of her spin, and it cut through the back of her armor’s plating like butter. Allison’s HUD suddenly flickered out—the needle had gone straight through the power cell.
The exoframe, for all it had done to protect her, was nothing more than dead weight now. Allison tried to turn, but far too slow with all the inert machinery she had to fight against. She felt a kick drive into her side—and suddenly all that weight was pulling her over the edge.
Made for orbital drops, the armor might have saved her if it wasn’t powered down. But as it was, Allison tumbled like a titanium-wrapped stone. She wasn’t sure if the sealed helmet would muffle any last, panicked sounds she made on the way down.
Erin Coney stepped back from the window she’d pushed the trooper through. She didn’t want to see the poor woman hit the ground. An old part of her, a much younger part she’d worked to bury, might have taken pleasure in confirming the kill. Coney refused to indulge it even for a second.
Aside from which, with the adrenaline of battle draining out of her veins, she was starting to notice the pain from her bloodied knuckles. Orion augmentations worked wonders, even at her age, but they couldn’t make human skin harder than titanium-ceramic.
Wishing her uniform had some spare scrap of cloth she could use to bandage her hands, she turned around—and froze to see Emma stalking up the ramp, the trooper’s fallen MA5K in hand.
Realizing she’d been spotted, Emma hunched over the carbine and squeezed off a burst. But Coney was already moving.
Gunfire lit the galleries between columns once more. Coney didn’t spare a moment to think of how the MA5K dropped off the ledge to the landing where Emma lay, or without a weapon of her own how she meant to fight back—she only moved. That split-second reaction was the only thing keeping her ahead of Emma’s tracers.
Emma tracked the woman’s sprinting and weaving between the scant cover of the columns even if her aim was a hair’s breadth behind. She switched the carbine to full-auto and sprayed Coney’s pathway with swarms of lead.
Allison had saved Emma’s life twice; once from the grenade’s shrapnel, and again when Coney might have finished her lying prone after she’d dropped a floor. She hated thinking she’d been too late to return the favor. But she could still avenge her.
If only her target didn’t leap and swerve like a rabbit from cover to cover. Emma sidestepped to open up a new fire lane in Coney’s path, where the columns couldn’t overlap one another. As soon as the woman’s black-and-red suit appeared, Emma fired, already prepared for the recoil.
To her disappointment, the woman didn’t move as expected. Instead of dashing across the whole of the lane, her silhouette dove for the floor before reaching Emma’s cone of fire, pivoting over a planted hand, and disappeared into the shadow of the floor.
Emma swore as she remembered the stairway Allison had come up through—but then, she had her own way down.
Emma turned and mantled down through the window behind her—this time halfway up the ramp on the tower’s outside to make for an easier fall—and slid to the bottom with the carbine braced as she reached the door. Sharp footfalls from the shaded room ground to a halt as Coney reappeared, the whites of her eyes wide in surprise and fear stark against her dark figure.
Emma squeezed the trigger. The carbine clicked.
A flick of her eyes to the weapon’s counter told her what she already knew—her full-auto bursts had drained the magazine. Oh, no! No!
Coney turned on her heel and ran again. Without any of the magazines Allison had been carrying, Emma threw the carbine down and lifted her DMR, but she was once again too slow to raise it. Coney dashed through a door to a spiral staircase down to the next floor.
Again, Emma knew another way down—she and Allison had scrupulously covered each way up or down as they’d given chase before. Much closer than the staircase, she hustled over to a lift platform stuck halfway down and jumped to the next floor in two short leaps. Sighting her target, she fired twice, but was again too slow to draw a good bead on Coney before she found the next way down.
This repeated itself floor after floor in a parkour race down a jungle gym, dependent on a gap of seconds to stay ahead or die. Coney knew her opponent was wounded, pierced by shrapnel and battered by the fall she’d taken. The biofoam seals wouldn’t hold if Emma aggravated them, and Coney’s chances of escape got better the longer she kept running.
The final few storeys of the tower approached at last, and Coney sprinted for a stairwell running a rectangular spiral down the final three floors. A gap in the middle gave her just enough room to jump down one at a time, solidifying her lead on the panting Army soldier.
Coney carefully swung her legs over the low wall blocking off the edge, tensed the arms she hung by and sprang for the opposite side—when a rifle shot cut through her left shoulder like a sledgehammer.
Without any resistance in the air, the bullet’s force threw her sideways. Coney crashed into the side of the stairwell and fell, almost spinning end for end before the floor came up to meet her. She had just enough time to cross her arms, covering her head before slamming flat into the metal surface with a cry pressed out of her lungs.
She lay dazed and groaning as footsteps echoed down the stairwell, growing louder.
“You deserved that,” Emma said, easing herself gingerly down each step, “for what you did to Allison.”
Coney gathered enough strength to resist her aching body and roll over to face her. “You must be a very angry young woman. Most people would’ve just shot me.”
“I’m getting to it,” Emma spat. “The galaxy’s given me a lot to be angry about. Some people should know why they’re going to die.”
“You’re forgetting,” Coney chided her, “we may not be in our galaxy anymore.”
Emma’s lip curled. “I don’t care where we are. Allison was a decent person. She met someone she knew here, only to lose them. And still, all she focused on was helping me.”
“Ohh. I see,” Coney said, a touch condescendingly. It kept Emma talking. “You couldn’t help protect her, and you need to take it out on someone.”
“Shut up,” Emma snarled. She wanted justice, a balancing of the scales for all the unfair things she’d been through before and after winding up on this island. She wanted this woman to understand, dammit. “This isn’t about me, it’s about her.”
“Right,” Coney grunted. “Well, may I remind you, the two of you came up this tower after me. So if I’m going to be tried for it, allow me to plead self-defense.”
Emma’s eyes twitched a hair narrower. Too far, Erin, Coney thought.
“I’m not your judge,” Emma said as she sighted down the DMR. “Just your executioner.”
“If,” Coney protested quickly, “you don’t do last meals, at least let the jury give his verdict.”
Emma had just lined up her shot when she processed the pronoun. Frowning, she twitched to look around, and felt metal gauntlets close around her.
She struggled, whipping left and right to break free, but the titanium suit wouldn’t yield. The wearer’s grip tightened and boxed her in, wrenching her DMR up to point harmlessly at the ceiling. Emma pulled the trigger anyway, firing off a round that sparked off the metal overhead. The flash illuminated gray-green armor plating over a black ballistic suit.
With the arm around her torso still restraining her, Emma felt the other release and the unmistakable swish of a blade leaving its sheath.
Blasted Spartans never fight fair, she had time to think. Then the slender point of something sharp pressed itself to the meeting of her neck and shoulder, and drove down through skin and muscle all the way to her heart.
The blade withdrew, and Emma’s listless body dropped to the floor, the last of her lifeblood seeping away in a shallow, crimson pool. In her place stood Vilmos, his armored faceplate staring down impassively at his own handiwork.
“Jury moves to acquit,” he said, then glanced at Coney. “So who was that?”
Coney steadied her breathing, trying to relax and come to terms with the throbbing of her joints and numb ache in her torn shoulder. “Just… another lost soul. Like the rest of us here.”
“Right,” Vilmos flicked his machete to shake the blood away and stepped closer. “Leon should be around soon, and we can look for a proper med station.”
Coney nodded, and raised her good arm. “Help a lady up?”
Vilmos’ helmet tilted doubtfully as he sheathed the machete. “Sure. But first, we probably ought to tie up that shoulder for now. Hang on.”
In a minute, he’d torn some fabric from the dead woman’s tank top to wrap around Coney’s wound. She’d been lucky, in a way; the bullet had passed right through, disfiguring muscle without severing a major artery. She still needed Vilmos’ help up, and he pulled her good arm over his shoulder to let Coney lean on him before she could say anything about it. He’s grown up since Onyx, she mused.
“Darn,” he muttered as they made their way outside. “I could’ve just said ‘objection!’ back there.”
Well, maybe not that much.
Beyond the tower’s entrance, the machinery of the metal maze spun on indifferently. The grinding of metal on metal rolled on through the air and steel floor alike. Coney wasn’t sure if it was an oncoming headache or just exhaustion, but the sound set her teeth on edge.
“Leon wasn’t too far behind me,” said Vilmos as they passed out of the tower’s shadow. “Maybe we can rig up some kind of stretcher between us.”
Coney forced a smile. “Thanks, Veevee, but I’ll manage on my own. I’m a big girl, and my Orion augs hold together pretty well.”
The whine of an engine began to rise, and she looked around for its source in anticipation.
“Though if he’s got some painkillers somewhere in that Spectre, I wouldn’t turn him down.”
“Tough luck there, he had to bail out of it.” He said, then came to a sudden stop that almost made Coney stumble. “Hang on, that’s not even a—”
The engine whine redoubled in volume as a ragged-looking Warthog, smoke pouring from its engine block, burst from the end of the nearest passageway. It turned sharply toward them, presenting a mangled grill and fragments of a windshield hanging like jagged teeth in outstretched jaws. Framed between the shards was the bloodstained violet helmet of a Spartan at the wheel.
It was on them in a moment, leaving no time for thought, only reflex. And Vilmos acted.
Coney gasped in pain as the hand on her wrist slung over Vilmos’ shoulder went taut and another wrapped around her waist to throw her sideways. Before she even landed, Coney heard the change in frequency of the Warthog’s engine as it barreled past, and the crunch of it impacting titanium armor.
She landed with an undignified grunt as her already-bruised joints struck the metal ground. But even in her own ears, the sound was drowned out by the deafening clatter of crumpling armor plates and shriek of a titanium chassis warping.
All Coney wanted to do was lie still and let the pain subside for a second. But she knew she didn’t have that second, and forced herself up to twist and look back over her shoulder.
The Warthog had come to a dead stop against a nearby wall, hitting it square-on. Flames had begun to escape the engine block, leaving scorch marks as they licked at the edges of the caved-in hood. But even then, the stalwart jeep hadn’t failed, as the front wheels twisted and the ‘hog reversed.
As it pulled away, Vilmos’ mashed corpse was revealed. Caught between the fender and unyielding Forerunner metal, his chest plate had crumpled like a drink can, and his stomach had been ground almost to paste, blood and viscera leaking from the tears rent in the ballistic layer.
The body stood a moment longer, plastered to the wall in the center of a scorch mark left by the burning Warthog. Then, almost in two pieces, the body collapsed the ground amid shards of headlights and the heads of snapped bolts. Loosed from its reel, the Warthog’s tow hook dragged through the gore left behind like the barbed end of a whip-like tongue. Now, the Warthog’s tusks turned on Coney.
No amount of pain mattered now. If she didn’t move, and fast, she would never know what it was like to not feel pain again. If she fed her screaming nerves with the effort to survive and failed, the result would be no worse than if she gave up. Why not endure it on the chance she succeeded, then? The thought strengthened her, recalling to her the discipline she’d honed under ONI.
Coney forced herself to her feet as the Warthog lurched toward her. She judged its speed, waited half a second, then sprinted right on legs that cried out for mercy.
She timed it just right. The Warthog twisted to follow her, tires squealing as Vaish braked and slid to sharpen her turn. But at speed on the flat surface, the jeep couldn’t turn hard enough, and the Warthog skidded past.
Vaish would complete the turn in another second, of course. Coney used that second to assess her options—and found few. She had no weapon to turn on her enemy, and no chance of overpowering a MJOLNIR-armored Spartan even if she could get close enough again to board the jeep in one piece.
Her opponent, of course, didn’t give her time to keep thinking. Again, the Warthog’s engine revved and the jeep surged after her. This time, Coney sidestepped right, like a bullfighter evading by the narrowest margin.
In the second the next turnaround would take, Coney sprinted for Vilmos’ corpse at the base of the nearby wall. His two rifles were still locked to his armor plate, if either was intact.
Vaish was too sharp to allow that, however. With her own shotgun lost rattling around the cabin after the jump she’d only barely survived, and her revolver needing time to reload, she had to keep her lone remaining enemy off-balance with relentless charges.
As soon as she spotted where Coney was making a break for, Vaish threw the long-suffering jeep into an e-brake turn that brought her up against the wall some distance down. With the gas floored, she rode the wall with sparks dancing where the bodywork scraped up against solid Forerunner alloy.
Coney understood the ploy at once. Either she could dive for the weapons and fall beneath the Warthog’s tires, or half her potential escape routes would be cut off by the wall.
Cutting off a curse she didn’t have the energy for, Coney instead slid to a halt as the Warthog screamed by, guaranteeing the rifles’ destruction if her initial hit-and-run on Vilmos hadn’t bent them out of shape already. The tow hook bounced along at the end of its cable behind, jangling with every impact.
There was her chance.
As the Warthog peeled away from the wall to come around again, Coney chased after it, then angled out. She had to keep close by, preventing Vaish from building up speed for a long charge in the open. The jeep swung around on its locked rear wheels, threatening to clip her with a bumper torn into steely daggers, but Coney slipped by.
Vaish floored her accelerator and pulled away, keeping the Warthog moving fast enough to prevent Coney from climbing aboard. Turning again, she found she had Coney in the open at last, and a long stretch to work up just the right balance of speed and control. Carefully tapping the pedal, Vaish came up to speed and bore down on her target.
Only once she’d already committed to the charge, like a jousting knight on an iron horse, did Vaish realize Coney wasn’t entirely in the open—one of the giant gears locked into the machinery underneath their platform rose up from the floor like the blade of a table saw.
She tried to stay with her target as long as she could, but once Coney came near enough to leap across it as soon as Vaish passed by, she broke off to stay well out of reach. She’d have to circle like a shark, waiting for Coney to tire out or try and make a break for some other safety.
To her surprise, though, Coney didn’t play at ring-around-the-rosie to stay clear of her Warthog. Instead, she doubled back as soon as Vaish passed, sprinting out across the metal plane. She must have realized the game of keep-away was a losing bet, and Vaish wasn’t going to let her escape it.
Throwing the wheel around again with her other hand on the gear lever, she came after Coney with nothing left to stop her. The dark-haired woman grew larger in Vaish’s shattered windshield, detail becoming clearer in her eye as she approached. The ONI recon suit, the red-stained fabric tied around her left shoulder, the steel tow hook in her right hand—
Coney suddenly spun and swung her arm like a trebuchet, casting the tow hook and first hastily-bound coil of cabling high. It came down with the cable dragging like a streamer over the top of the Warthog still barreling down on her. Coney flinched.
The Warthog suddenly came to a dead stop just a few meters short of her. The towcable, draped lengthwise down the jeep’s center, had snapped taut so suddenly, it bit down through the Warthog’s hood and rollbar like a garrote wire, as if about to bisect the whole vehicle.
Vaish struggled to comprehend what had happened. She’d been suddenly wrenched down into her seat by her right shoulder. Blood had splashed across the wheel and instrument panel.
Turning her head, Vaish noticed a steel cable dripping with blood coming through the bottom of a trench ripped down through the dashboard. The line continued like a tightrope across the cab and out through the bulkhead behind her. It held her pinned to the seat where it had dug like a wire saw through most of her right arm, and caught only halfway through the dense shoulder of her chest plate.
She struggled, trying numbly to free herself from the binding. But the only thing to give was flesh, while the metal held firm against her efforts.
Dry screeching filled her ears, and she tried to peer over the bottom lip of the windows despite the low angle she was anchored to. The skyline of steel walls was moving around her. No, she realized, her Warthog was moving. The tires, locked up, were scraping over the floor as the vehicle skidded backwards.
Comprehension dawned on her then. The towcable was caught in the massive gear, dragging the Warthog in.
Vaish braced her left arm and tried to push herself free of the entangling cable, but with the shock of her arm almost torn away, it was no avail. Her ears picked up another sound, faint under the squealing tires and the shriek of steel beginning to buckle as the gear’s teeth started dragging her below.
It was the radio. Despite the dashboard being torn almost in half, the speaker kept going, calling out in dulcet tones of a woman’s voice and the steady beat of a guitar about strangers and a mother grieving the singer gone missing.
The gentle music, numbing pain, and strangeness of the past few hours combined to assure Vaish everything she’d experienced was nothing more than a surreal dream. The impossibility made it easier for her to accept what her senses told her. That none of it meant anything, as the steel gear from above and vehicle chassis from below closed on her like jaws.
As the Warthog sank into the gap in the floor, metal groaning like a mortally wounded beast, Erin Coney collapsed to the ground, breathing hard. If there was some other enemy waiting to take her on next, they could have her. The bleeding and tearing and exhaustion she’d built up were taking their due she’d put off paying as long as she could.
But, no final execution came. And in time, she grew bored with waiting for the end to come.
Pushing herself to her feet, Coney inspected her wounds. The rags tied around her shoulder had bled through already, blood pumped by her augmented heart hard through the one-sided car chase. Her left arm hung numb by her side, and more blood seeped through the scabs failing to seal off the breaks in her skin on her knuckles. She wasn’t in a good way.
Steeling herself, Coney limped back toward the tower. There were at least still weapons to be claimed from the bodies there, since she doubted she could win a hand-to-hand fight against an Unggoy at the moment. She’d take what resources she could and hole up for the time being, and figure out a plan before venturing out again.
From the heart of this giant beltway, it would be a very long walk getting anywhere.
That Damn Sniper 21:51, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
21: Driveby Shooting[]
“-with impish smiles and devil-like guile, we rallied ourselves against beings most vile, we'll continue our war, in the devil's own domain, for we're soldiers of valor, forever the same.”
Against his will, Rtanis ‘Daelahm found himself bobbing his head along to his human companion’s lyrics. Despite many of their kind’s voices sounding relatively high-pitched and annoying at best, the human who called himself Fotus was easy on the ears - for his species.
The Swords of Sanghelios Fleet Master veered the handles of their vehicle to the left, making a sharp turn into an intersection in the seemingly infinite districts of steel structures surrounding the outer ring of the Cosmopolis. Despite the close proximity the copy-pasted buildings held, the roads had been designed to accommodate large vehicles, meaning that the duo’s Revenant had plenty of room in their single lane the width of a Wraith.
They had found it upon teleporting to the Promenade at the beginning of the new phase, and Fotus had wisely recommended that they take it into the packed districts of the outer city to avoid open confrontation, especially due to the open-topped nature of the Revenant. They had driven aimlessly through the urban blocks for what seemed like hours, still yet to encounter any resistance.
Fotus was quick to suggest his idea of repelling the monotony of the task away; singing the variety of tunes he had composed himself. Rtanis did not expect to discover that his human companion was a battle bard of all things, and was initially hesitant to accept the proposition, especially considering how the voices of humans he had worked alongside previously were less than pleasant on the ears. After minutes of grinding down his resolve, Fotus had finally convinced the Sangheili to let him sing, and the results were… Surprising.
Fotus sang well, and for the past thirty minutes he had bellowed his tunes without pause. While some lyrics were utter nonsense, but many resonated with the warrior’s spirit the Sangheili was all-too familiar with. Perhaps humans and Sangheili are more kindred than we give each other credit for…
“Fotus, these soldiers of valor you speak of, whomst are they?” Rtanis inquired.
“Ah, they’re Helljumpers of the 105th,” Fotus chirped back in a cheery tone that almost made Rtanis forget that they were in a high-stakes deathmatch. “An ODST company that’s pretty notorious amongst the UNSC. They pull off some badass shit, I’ll tell you.”
“So they are imps?” Rtanis clarified.
“Thought the ‘impish smiles’ bit would’ve given that away, but yeah, I guess so,” the half-horned man shrugged.
“I must admit, Fotus, your singing is quite… Tolerable, as far as human voices go,” Rtanis said, rounding a corner into an intersection to the right with the Revenant. “It is not often that I find a human who doesn’t grate my ears - no offense meant, of course.”
“Ah, well look at you!” Fotus chuckled, leaning forward, “you’re already warming up to me so soon, huh-”
A focused beam of purple energy pierced through the metal headrest where the human’s head had been just a moment earlier. Pieces of shrapnel exploded out, pelting the back of Fotus’s helmet as he yelped in shock.
“Dammit, we’ve got contact!” The former-unicorn man sputtered, fumbling with the Needle Rifle Rtanis had given him back on Mors Insula.
“Acquire a line of sight on our foe!” Rtanis hissed, pulling a stick back to swiftly rotate the Revenant to face their attacker. On a building at the opposite corner of the intersection he spotted a figure several stories up, perched on the roof of the structure. Rtanis immediately noted the sinewy digitigrade form of a Kig-Yar and roared, firing the Revenant’s devastating plasma mortar. A red lob of heated energy launched forward and upward, slamming into the corner of the roof.
As the dust settled, the Sangheili cursed, watching as their Kig-Yar foe bounded off the rooftop unscathed, landing on a bridge one story below that connected to another building across the street. Rtanis fired again, and the bridge collapsed in an avalanche of stainless steel onto the street. Yet again the sniper emerged without a scratch. This time, he would not allow Rtanis to fire again.
While running, the Kig-Yar heaved a Particle Beam Rifle up with a single hand, pulling the trigger. Despite firing his weapon one-handed while moving, the shot was accurate, landing squarely on the shields surrounding Rtanis’s head. Had he not possessed stronger shields due to his status as Fleet Master, ‘Daelahm surely would have lost his head there and then.
“Our foe targets me!” The Sangheili growled, ducking his head beneath the Revenant’s driver console to shield himself from further attacks. “Fire the kemuksuru at him! Only three shots are needed to blow the Kig-Yar to smithereens!”
“I don’t know what the fuck a ‘kemuk-soupoo’ is!” Fotus hollered back peeking over the windshield with his Needle Rifle. “But I’ll make sure to mess him up good!”
The ex-Marine fired several shards from his rifle, resulting in a screech from the out-of-sight Kig-Yar assailant.
“Hoho, he’s scared now!” Fotus relayed, “got his ass scrambling for cover!”
The news reinvigorated Rtanis, and the Sangheili quickly reared his head again. As his teammate said, the Kig-Yar was frantically sprinting across the rooftop as Fotus fired the Needle Rifle in full-auto mode, slowly tracking the avian hostile but unable to pin him down with any shots.
“Be careful to conserve your ammunition, human,” Rtanis cautioned, “we do not know how prolonged-”
“Reloading!” Fotus crowed, ducking beneath the dashboard to cover himself as he reached into the Revenant’s cargo compartment to grab a large shard of kemuksuru. Upon hearing the overly-loud statement, the Kig-Yar immediately stopped to line up another shot. Rtanis beat him to the pull of the trigger, firing another mortar blast.
“Revenant so bothersome!” The Kig-Yar hissed, grabbing onto a power cable that went across the street to the building directly to Rtanis’s left. “Nelc sort out enemies quick!”
The so-called Nelc held onto the cable with one hand as he slid down, outstretching his Beam Rifle with the other. Rtanis heard a glass-like sound to his right and turned to see Fotus rising out of cover, a new mag inserted into his Needle Rifle.
“Take a gander of this-”
Another beam of purple energy whizzed by Rtanis’s head, and Fotus suddenly fell silent. Looking to his right, Rtanis realized with horror who had been quicker on the draw. A gaping hole occupied the human’s helmet, and blood spurted out of his hollow head as he slowly fell to the side, tumbling out of the Revenant’s passenger seat onto the cold metal street.
Yet another crack hissed through the air as Nelc shot Rtanis, completely dissipating his shields. The Sangheili snarled, looking up at the one who had slain his final teammate. Nelc stood atop the roof of the third building now, a sneer painted on his avian visage.
“Too easy!” The Kig-Yar squawked, “fire if you dare, Sangheili! Building collapse on top of you if you do! Now, hold still. I make death quick.”
“Damn you, scavenger!” Rtanis fired, firing the mortar regardless. A flash of surprise swept across Nelc’s eyes as the mortar hit the facility, just as the Kig-Yar had warned, the upper part of the building crumbled off, falling straight towards Rtanis. The Sangheili roared defiantly, but was buried in the rubble regardless.
Nelc coughed and sputtered, tenderly picking himself up from the top of the pile of grey rubble that had fallen into the street.
“Sangheili crazy!” he muttered to himself, gingerly stepping through the debris to escape the wreckage. The saurian bastard had actually done it. So engulfed by his need for vengeance - at least, Nelc assumed that was it - that the Sangheili had attempted to kill them both. He had gotten dangerously close to.
The Kig-Yar sniper hissed as he felt an ache in his left knee, and cursed. While not broken, it had certainly been bruised. He had made it out alive, but he couldn’t say the same for his weapon of choice. The Particle Beam Rifle lay in two pieces amidst the rubble, snapped in half by an oncoming piece of rebar.
Nelc wheezed in exasperation, but nonetheless unslung his backup weapon from his back. The carbine he had scavenged from his previous encounter, while not as accurate or ranged, would still do the job. The Kig-Yar hobbled away from the wreckage, muttering under his breath.
“Leave to Sangheili to ruin everything. Suicidal lizards!”
As Nelc trekked on, he noticed a slight trail of blood seeping behind him from a cut across his right arm. He hissed in irritation but continued, and after a solid ten minutes had progressed through several more intersections, finding no hostiles. Not that he expected to so soon, anyway. It had taken hours for Nelc to find the Revenant-driving pair, and it could possibly take hours to stumble upon his next victim.
“Need to find way to high ground,” Nelc muttered. He had originally accessed the rooftops of the outer districts through a stairwell, but found that many of the buildings were inaccessible; lacking interiors. He would have to find another building with an access point, and soon, if he were to regain his high ground advantage.
The Kig-Yar continued to struggle through the streets, the trail of blood growing evermore behind him. It was at this point that he stopped, detecting a faint hum from afar with his enhanced hearing. It was faint, but rapidly getting closer.
“More enemies so soon?” Nelc purred curiously, turning to face the new foe - only to realize that this foe was not new.
A Revenant, heavily battered and missing its right wing, barreled through the intersection, its boosters at full power. As the speeder zoomed towards him, Nelc could hear the angry shouts of Rtanis ‘Daelahm, even over the din of the engines.
“Only a fool leaves a trail of blood to track them with! Run if you dare, Kig-Yar! Your time has come!”
Nelc screeched in terror and attempted to speed up his irregular gait, but no sooner had he started then the Revenant beared down upon him, closing in for the kill. The Kig-Yar let out a squawk, but it was quickly cut off as the nose of the damaged assault vehicle slammed into his beak, launching him forward to a nearby wall behind him. In less than a second, his beak collapsed in on itself, and Nelc’s head was crushed between the front of the Revenant and the back of a nameless building on the outskirts of the Cosmopolis.
As Rtanis drew back his Revenant, his opponent’s body fell forward, and would have face planted on the cold steel of the street if there was any face left to plant. There were no further taunts or shouts of victory. The Sangheili merely turned the Revenant around and drove away, leaving the body of his last teammate’s killer to rot in the Districts, as deserved.
22: Hot Pursuit[]
Redford resisted the urge to fiddle with the damage his recon armor’s chest plate had taken in the running gunfight with the passing Spartan. Knowing the outer ceramic layer was cracked, imperfect while he still depended on it, bothered him. But lacking any adhesive to fix it properly, fidgeting with the damage was unproductive.
His attention needed to be on the road he and his… allies… walked. The promenade was the clearest path away from the unnerving ziggurat and toward the towering hexagon the Spartan had come from. The promise of vehicles like the supersoldier had driven was their only lead on a competitive edge over the other killers in this peculiar city, but it was a wide-open route.
Blocky debris littered the roadway like gridlocked traffic, car-sized chunks of some stone or metal alloy the only thing breaking up their path. Nishana, the Promethean construct, would gallop away to climb one, inspect it, then return to trot at his heels.
Redford couldn’t remember ever wanting a dog during his childhood. The times he’d met them in his privileged upbringing, they’d been cringing show animals afraid of disobeying the socialites who cared for them only as status symbols, or needy mutts owned by his schoolmates who thought it appropriate to leave hair on the furniture.
This thing, though? A body of clean steel, behavior dictated by algorithm, and armed with a built-in particle beam disintegrator? Maybe it couldn’t feel love, but he’d take that over a guard dog any day. And it wouldn’t leave any surprises on the doormat.
Bleza, meanwhile, walked evenly with Redford just out of arm’s reach. The Elite’s snakish head twitched every so often to indicate the warrior’s keen watch on their surroundings. Redford was used to reading human body language like a walking billboard, but the Elite was like trying to read a totally different language with an alphabet made of squiggles. The way Bleza’s eyes were oriented, more to the sides of the skull than a human’s, Redford couldn’t be sure he was looking at everything in a wider field of vision at once, or keeping a side-eye on him.
So, lacking for data, Redford ran an experiment. He slowed down to examine his boot, and the Elite slowed to match him. When Redford feigned a stumble, Bleza’s gait sped up for just a moment.
The Elite didn’t trust Redford to walk behind him. Smart split-lip. Of course, Redford didn’t trust him with his open back either, friendly fire protocols or not.
Just as Redford was imagining how he might capitalize on this insight to kill time annoying Bleza, a chittering shriek rang out from one of the nearby obstacles. Nishana’s stance had shifted, crouching lower to the ground as if tensed to spring. Its ant-like mandibles worked irritably as a holographic violet disc appeared before its face, just as it did before its binary rifle fired.
It was using the weapon’s target magnification to spy something, Redford realized.
Looking around, he refrained from voicing a few choice swears which came to mind and crouched down behind the corner of the steely boulder Nishana stood atop. “Get down,” he warned Bleza. “The robot has something.”
The Elite might not have trusted him, but he at least believed Redford enough to hunker down behind a neighboring chunk of debris. Bleza’s elongated neck stretched enough for him to see over the top of his cover.
“I see it,” he murmured. “A Shadow, troop transport.”
Redford poked his head up, trying to see what he saw. But with the sun beating down on the dark roadway, the only movement he could make out was the flickering of mirage heat.
“You’re certain?” he asked.
Bleza chuffed. That eye in the side of his skull was on him for certain now. “You lack a hunter’s eyesight, Caesar. It is following the roadway toward us. They carry thick armor. I believe there’s a gunner, in addition to the single pilot such a craft requires, but there may be up to another eight within.”
“Marvelous,” Redford said in place of a curse.
“Take heart. Given the course this contest has run,” Bleza added, “I don’t expect more than four in all. I have faced worse odds.”
“Numbers aren’t the point,” Redford replied. “We’re completely exposed out here. There’s no safe line of retreat, and with an armored transport, they have the advantage of firepower. And they’ll spot us the moment they roll over our position.”
“So we cannot run, nor can we hide,” Bleza stated. “I’m curious. What does that leave in a human mind?”
A faint smile touched on Redford’s lips. “Something not altogether different from a Sangheili’s, I imagine. Very well. We may just take the initiative from them with a first strike. Still have any of those grenades left?”
The Shadow’s troop bay felt strange to Arianne, like the halfway meeting point between the belly of an alien beast and a public bus.
Purple fiber-optics glowed softly under panels of black glass, filling the troop transport with the headache-inducing vibrance of a teenager’s room under blacklight. But the whole bay was taken up by two long benches, back-to-back, spanning its length like a bridge. It seemed like the kind of place Ari expected to find a hideous alien sleeping under a newspaper.
Some part of her brain told Ari she should logically be nervous inside the alien vehicle. She’d had few dealings with the Covenant, at least since the day they took away her home and murdered her parents. But she hadn’t been there to see it happen. They’d put her in a truck with some family friends-of-friends, and when the trip ended they told her she’d never see them again thanks to the aliens. It felt like several lifetimes ago.
Right now, she was more interested in straining her eyes in the ultraviolet gloom, inspecting the panel where Decipitus had spliced his Gauss cannon’s power cables into the alien craft’s energy distribution grid. Working with salvage crews sifting through the flotsam of years-old battlefields, Ari was always on the lookout for useful tech. If she could learn how Decipitus had so easily grafted UNSC and Covenant hardware, she could pry the best pieces out of dead ships or ruined command posts of either type and something useful out of them, whether to use or sell. On the fringes, every credit helped.
Unfortunately, the big ape wasn’t hanging around to pester with questions. He’d swung back up to the roof as soon as his work was done, resting comfortably behind the coilgun he’d mounted atop the Shadow. And the gator, ‘Ontom, had clambered into the isolated pilot’s cage on the transport’s prow a moment after to get them underway—leaving Ari alone with the teammate she felt even more uneasy with than the aliens.
Erin-G174 was seated halfway down the opposite bench from where Ari stood to examine the panel. But in the black glass, she could see the Spartan’s ghostly outline twitch to glance at her every so often, when she thought Ari wouldn’t see.
It’d been almost five years since the night she fled Onyx. Those years hadn’t all been kind, and she’d changed a lot—thinking on it, probably a lot scrawnier without the enriched diet they had the kids on, and she knew a frequent perfuming of vaporized engine grease had left her with acne scars—but Erin was starting to look worryingly close to remembering.
Ari needed to head this off before she was sure.
“Is there something you want?” she barked just as Erin turned to look at her again. Ari exaggerated an impatient droop of her shoulders.
Reflections shifted in Erin’s mirrored visor as she dropped her gaze. She was trapped, unable to meet her gaze or fully turn away. There was a moment of silence where Ari hoped she might drop it before Erin mumbled, “Nothing, it’s just… I…”
“You what?” Ari replied, sharp as she could manage. “Well? Spit it out.”
“I’ve just been wondering if,” Erin dawdled from word to word as if she were stepping through a minefield, “… if I should know you.”
Ari’s heart froze. She moved her gaze from Erin’s reflection to an empty point in the glassy abyss. Somewhere she didn’t have to see anyone.
“I don’t know,” she finally shot back. “Should you?”
Erin didn’t reply. After a moment, she ashamedly turned back around and looked studiously at the Needle Rifle in her lap ‘Ontom had given her.
Ari released the breath she’d been holding, slowly despite her protesting lungs. If Erin recognized her, who knew what that might mean? Getting dragged off back to ONI, and an investigation into why exactly there was a Harriet McVey here when they already had a Hari-G055 in the field. Would they tie her up as a loose end? Lock her somewhere she couldn’t go telling secrets? Keep her spare if something happened to the one they had?
The uncertainty made her feel numb. She risked another look at Erin in the faint mirror to shake it off. Years had passed, but Ari could still read the body language of a Gamma in body armor.
Erin was hurt. Embarrassed by Ari’s unexpected aggression. It made Ari’s cheeks burn with shame.
Erin had been everyone’s big sister in training, much as she detested it. She’d been through the training once before, and already knew the ropes. She didn’t lord it over anyone, though. When someone failed a test, Erin would sigh dramatically, call them an idiot, then walk them through it. She’d helped clean and bandage the first really good cut Hari’d ever got falling off a log in the woods.
But why feel sorry for her? She was the successful, graduated Spartan. She didn’t have to duck out of a room any time something resembling UNSC authority came by, and scratch out a living on scavenger ships on the fringes of society. How dare they forget her, just because they had a perfect copy waking up next to them every day. Couldn’t they tell the difference?
And now she was angry at herself for being angry. Ari wanted to punch the wall, but if she did, Erin would ask what was wrong, of course.
She was really surprised when the wall hit her first, though.
The whole Shadow lurched under her feet, smashing her face into the forward bulkhead. Stunned, she lost her footing on the bench and toppled backward, arms flailing. To her further surprise, instead of the unforgiving row of jumpseats, her back met a pair of titanium-sheathed arms matching her speed. Erin folded her like spare fatigues safely down into a seat.
“Is?” Erin’s voice echoed through the COM in Ari’s wrist Chatter. “What’s going on?”
“We are under attack,” the Sangheili answered.
“Delvin?”
“Not unless he has made several allies.”
“Oh, great,” she said, in the put-upon tone Ari remembered.
Blinding daylight suddenly pierced the troop bay’s shadows from above. Erin’s visor polarized for her to look up, but Ari had to throw an arm up over her eyes for a moment. As her pupils dilated, she peered from beneath her wrist to see a torso-sized hole opened up clean through the Shadow’s hull. Its edges glowed molten orange, armor plating disintegrating like paper burning at the fringe.
“I believe we have their attention,” said Redford as another hardlight beam lanced out from the disc projected by Nishana’s head. The Shadow had picked up speed, its concealed pilot apparently intent on closing the gap to bring his own weapons to bear. Which suited Redford just fine.
“Maintain your fire, automaton!” Bleza bellowed, pointing needlessly as though he were issuing orders to an entire legion. “Burn through their armor, and we may halt them in their tracks before they have even the chance to touch us!”
Redford thought that unlikely given the Shadow’s armored bulk, but supposed ‘Kopal might be more familiar with them than he was. As the bulky floating transport drew closer, though, Redford began to see more clearly the shaggy figure standing atop the transport. A Jiralhanae, as he’d guessed based on the size, but definitely not behind the plasma cannon he would have expected on a Covenant vehicle.
“Get down!” he shouted as he ducked back behind his makeshift barricade.
Bleza looked down on him contemptuously, which wasn’t difficult for a being eight feet tall. “Courage, Caesar! Anything they can dispatch toward us will be easily—”
There was a snap, and a rush of air collapsing in the wake of a supersonic object as a heavy projectile rebounded off one of the metal blocks near Bleza. The Elite promptly locked his mandibles and dropped to his haunches behind his own barricade. More of the projectiles followed, searing Redford’s vision with blue flashes as the Gauss cannon slugs zipped by, but none leaving more than a scuff on the promenade’s metal decking.
“You were saying?” Redford prompted, maintaining a leisurely tone.
The Elite snarled. “This unyielding pavement for an unforgiving grave will be the only divine beyond these vermin see. I will ensure it.”
“That’s the spirit, ‘Kopal.”
The next few slugs struck near the top of Redford’s cover, and Nishana hopped down to safety beside him with a chittering shriek.
“Thatta… girl,” Redford hesitantly decided. Assigning gender to a robot was absurd, of course, but between the pink striping on its exoskeleton and feminine suffix to the name on its tag under Latin tradition, it seemed appropriate. And telling a dog ‘thatta robot’ felt ridiculous.
Bleza risked a slim peek over his protective shelter. “They near the trap. Ready yourself.”
“Just say when,” Redford replied, readying his M6H2 sidearm in a two-handed grip.
“Steady…” Bleza whispered between two ceaseless strikes of the Gauss rounds. “Now!”
Like a coiled spring, Redford rolled from behind his cover to lie flat in the road, pistol braced before him. He lined up the smart scope’s reticle in his helmet, glad of the speed such technology gave him as another tungsten slug tore by at Mach speeds. He intended to be much more precise with his own target.
Clustered in the road between two of sloped chunks of debris sat Bleza’s remaining trio of plasma grenades, sitting together like a neglected bird’s nest. Almost the instant his reticle came to land on them, the transport’s own shadow spilled over the side of the debris, giving Redford his signal to fire.
The pistol kicked in his grip, but so firmly braced stayed true on its tiny target. The searing lead cracked the first grenade’s casing, and all three went up in a roiling conflagration of hungry plasma. The debris directed its course like a shaped charge, pointing all their destructive force at the gravity drive’s emitters on the Shadow’s underside.
Bleza laughed in triumph as blue flames sprouted beneath the transport, the explosion making it sway on its anti-grav cushion. The Jiralhanae gunner abruptly stopped firing, clinging warily to its hull. For a moment, Redford thought the whole Shadow was about to pitch over.
But then, the burning transport righted its course without even slowing down. Trailing intertwined streams of grey and black smoke, the Shadow barreled on directly at them.
“Oh dear,” Redford muttered, lost between breaths as he scrambled to regain his feet. The transport had no intention of stopping, and with their trap placed close enough to remain in easy shooting range, they had no time to revisit other options. “Get out of the way!”
Redford took off sideways, hoping he’d be fast enough to clear the Shadow’s path. The click of Nishana’s metal claws told him the Promethean Crawler was with him, almost underfoot, but he heard nothing of Bleza’s heavy footfalls—and he wasn’t about to look back to worry about him.
As the Shadow’s engine drone grew in his ears, Redford threw himself into a long dive as far as he could to evade, just before a deafening crash filled the air.
The Shadow plowed through the team’s cover, the smooth armor of its prow crumpling like tissue paper. The product of so much mass at high speed, however, was enough to shift the seemingly immovable chunks of Forerunner alloy, grinding them over the highway’s smooth surface.
Its smoking, mangled bulk continued on, shedding speed until it finally meeting the next obstacle head-on. Crunching to a bone-shaking halt, the running lights along its wings abruptly flickered out, and the whole transport slammed to the roadway. Its prow remained wedged up against the obstacle which finally stopped it, resting at an angle like a beached shipwreck.
Picking himself up for the second time, Redford surveyed the crash and wondered if anyone could have survived such an impact. He was about to call out to Bleza when movement stirred from the teacup gunner’s seat on the Shadow’s roof. A hairy movement. Definitely not ‘Kopal.
Feeling the mad rhythm of his twin hearts in his ears, Is ‘Ontom shook his long neck to clear his head. The impact had rattled him, the vibration so thorough he felt his flesh had almost been shaken from the bone. But the inertial dampers in the pilot’s seat had saved him, up until they’d gone out with the plasma drive.
Coughing in the fumes rising from the grav emitters, he keyed his helmet’s battlenet uplink and placed a four-fingered hand on the left rim of the pilot’s enclosure to pull himself free. “Doppler? We will have need of that multitool you carry. If the frame hasn’t broken to pieces, we may reactivate this craft with a reboot from—”
He pulled his hand back in an instant as the crackling blade of an Energy Sword suddenly sawed into the edge of the hull between his fingers.
An older Sangheili, the smoke rippling over the fins of his soot-blackened gold combat harness, prowled out from the edge of the pilot’s enclosure to eye ‘Ontom like a hunting helioskrill.
“A bold strategy, hatchling. But now it costs you.”
Pressing his weapon to burn clean through the edge of the laminate where it wedged, the Warrior lunged to skewer ‘Ontom on the blade’s twin prongs. But ‘Ontom had already moved. Far from a traditional Sangheili, Is had no intention of meeting the attack with a worthy death. He scurried into a roll in the cramped enclosure, and the Warrior’s blade plunged into the pilot’s seat up to the broadening quillons.
‘Ontom scraped hastily through the window on his right while the Warrior drew back his sword, shaking droplets of molten laminate from the blades with an angered grunt. A real Sangheili would’ve stood and fought. But ‘Ontom’s life course had taught him the value of self-preservation in the face of a losing battle.
The Warrior gave chase by rounding the Shadow’s ruined front and followed Is along its flank, but halted as a spiderweb of straining shield emitters flared across his combat harness. The Warrior swept his head around wildly, unable to see the source of the damage, until his eye fixed upon the shaggy titan standing atop the Shadow.
Decipitus had both hefty paws outstretched with a pair of forking energy bolts, faint in the open sunlight, connecting him to the Sangheili below. As his shield alarm blared, the Warrior realized these strange gauntlets were draining his harness’ power by some tech sorcery. Snarling, the Sangheili dropped his off-hand to a red-striped Needler on his thigh, and brought it up to unleash a flurry of lethal Subanese crystal shards at the looming figure.
The Jiralhanae retreated at once, dropping back over the Shadow’s other side where the explosive seeker projectiles couldn’t arc to track him. Bleza ‘Kopal hesitated, weighing the risks of pursuing ‘Ontom or the Jiralhanae.
In that second, the hull of the Shadow’s troop bay suddenly fell outward. Bleza leaped back as the hatch swung down like the doors on a Spirit dropship, clanging heavily on the road deck where he’d stood. Revealed in the bay stood a Demon in dull yellow armor, lining up an angular Needle Rifle with his head.
Turning on this latest opponent with no more than an agitated grunt, ‘Kopal backpedaled toward the Shadow’s front corner as he traded a hail of glittering, razor-edged crystals with the Spartan.
Her target’s shielding strained to the breaking point, Erin felt certain she was about to put the sword-wielder down when the solid impact of lead slugs hit her torso from behind, throwing off her shots. Throwing a glance over her shoulder, she spotted something humanoid in the unusual black armor of a Naval Intelligence agent training a handgun her way across one of the boulders scattered over the roadway.
Sidestepping the agent’s firing line behind the Shadow’s hull was easy, but it cost Erin her angle on the Elite, who vanished around the other edge of the transport. Counting the shards protruding up from her rifle’s frame against the empty slots, and finding the number acceptable, she called back into the troop bay.
“Arianne? Stay in the Shadow, don’t let them get a shot at you.”
Crouched in the dark on the far side of the bench, Arianne just grumbled, “I’m not keen on going anywhere.”
“‘Ontom, get after that spook on the highway. Draw him off, and Decipitus and I can deal with the Elite.”
‘Ontom’s voice reached them through the COM, apparently from somewhere hidden in the debris field. “Slay a single human while you match blades with a Field Master? Perhaps next time you can leave me the lesser task.”
An unbroken string of gunfire rang out from somewhere outside, as if someone were fanning the hammer of an old revolver. Erin risked a glance out where the spook had been shooting at her, and saw the dark suit ducking from cover to cover in retreat.
Erin’s COM clicked as she switched to her helmet’s speakers. “Alright, I’m heading out. Keep your head down, okay?”
The young mechanic wrinkled her nose in a pugnacious frown. “You don’t have to tell me twice, sheesh.”
Erin wondered a moment at what lingering impulse made her want to protect the suddenly argumentative girl. Arianne was likely her same age, Erin figured, so it probably had more to say about her than the civilian. Shrugging off the strange feeling of a missing thought, Erin readied the Needle Rifle and went hunting.
Lying in wait on the far side of the Shadow, Decipitus trained his keen ear through the receding snaps of traded gunfire to hone in on the heavy tread of a Sangheili’s approaching steps. He was an artificer, not a hunter, but the primal instincts of a warrior came naturally to a Jiralhanae. The moment the Sangheili in the scorched armor came around the Shadow’s nose, Decipitus leapt down on him from the side of its hull.
The Elite halted as soon as his slitted eye caught the movement, but gave no ground. Instead—as Decipitus had hoped—the swordsman lifted his ignited blade to ward off the attack. But instead of burning through his attacker’s flesh, the Sangheili’s blade met resistance. The power fields of Decipitus’ shock gloves pushed back on the plasma sword’s containment beams, and the Jiralhanae put all his weight behind a slam meant to drive the Sangheili to the ground.
Bleza stumbled, but drew back before Decipitus could drag him down. While he was still off-balance, the Jiralhanae advanced on him with a series of punches. They were clumsy, but each swing filled the air with the metallic tang of ozone as electricity sparked and snapped around the gloves.
Any proper swordsman would have executed a complex defensive flourish, which would’ve done nothing to stop Decipitus’ artless, headlong onslaught. But Bleza had fought in the desperate struggles for survival of a Jiralhanae gladiator pit. Instead, he let his blade rebound off his enemy’s next punch and swung the blade overhead to bring it crashing, two-handed, into Decipitus’ raised gauntlets.
The brute strength of the blow separated the combatants, allowing each to reset for the next exchange.
Bleza had the measure of his opponent now. The Jiralhanae’s weapons were impressive, but he was no skilled fighter. He envisioned the feint which would be the enemy’s downfall—only to notice his blade flicker in his hand.
With dismay, he checked the technical display his helmet projected over his eyes and found the blade’s energy cell hovering near death. Each strike he’d traded with the Jiralhanae had drained its power. As if reading his realization, the Jiralhanae bared its teeth in malicious delight.
So, instead of closing with him again, Bleza raised the Needler in his other fist and loosed a swarm of deadly crystals upon the Jiralhanae.
Recognizing a blamite supercombine explosion posed a threat to even his overcharged shields, Decipitus turned and ran. He strafed sideways, striving to put one of the metallic boulders between himself and the lazily tracking shards. The first struck his shoulder, the neon-pink sliver gliding through his overcharged shielding to wedge into part of his combat harness. But then he slipped into the cover of the boulder and was rewarded with the tinkling sound of each pink sliver shattering against the Forerunner alloy.
The crystal’s point bit deep, but Decipitus knew better than to try and remove the delicate shard. Blinded by the obstacle which had just saved him, Decipitus fully expected Bleza to close the distance for an attack, and readied his gauntlets. Which left him entirely unprepared when a quartet of translucent red beams silently swept over his side of the boulder, then disappeared as they met his shadow.
A torrent of pressure suddenly threw itself against Decipitus’ back, making an alarm blare in his ears. The force threw him against the boulder, and he struggled to turn around. He barely registered the serrated silver shape of the Promethean Crawler’s back poking up from another chunk of debris before a second orange particle beam lanced into his chest.
The overshielding he’d absorbed from Bleza’s armor and sword bled away in an instant, but his base combat harness’ emitters held. The sharp-minded inventor took in his new situation in an instant; the Crawler was too far away for him to reach with his gauntlets alone, but after firing two shots the Binary rifle would have to cycle a new core. He’d have just enough time to dash to new cover.
Having come to this conclusion, it came as a shock when a third particle beam punched into him on beat with the first two.
This time, his shielding completely collapsed, the overloaded emitters sparking. He felt the residual heat wash over him from the hardlight beam’s collapse, but to his mild surprise he was still standing. The binary rifle had only just shorted out the shielding, without disintegrating his flesh—a problem the apparently endless rounds in the Crawler’s rifle was about to correct.
Symbols in the disc projected before the Crawler’s face wheeled like the arms of a clock predicting Decipitus’ time of death. But as they began to glow brighter, a hail of pink darts glanced off the Promethean construct’s flank, and one punched into the glowing gap between its plates. With a digitized shriek of pain, fury, or static feedback, it leapt from its perch into the cover of the debris.
Having only just escaped a flurry of the same crystal projectiles, Decipitus half-expected to find the Sangheili firing on his new foe. Instead, he found the demon Erin standing at the rear of the Shadow, Needle Rifle held high. She nodded curtly in his direction, poised and waiting for the Promethean to pop back up.
Decipitus raised a gauntlet in salute, just as the other Needler-wielding combatant vaulted his cover with sword held high.
The Jiralhanae wheeled, catching Bleza’s arm by the wrist. Without power from the same battery pack that charged his shields, Decipitus’ gauntlets would be useless in stopping the superheated blade. The crackling sword loomed over the locked combatants, casting frosty light over each’s expression of determined bloodlust.
Finding he could not drive his sword down further, Bleza again brought his Needler to bear. It spat razor-edged daggers, but only one found purchase in Decipitus’ upper thigh before his other paw batted the sidearm out of Bleza’s hand with bone-shaking force.
Decipitus raised the a claw-tipped fist, only to bellow in pain unbidden. Bleza had shifted his wrist, bringing the backward-curved flange of a blade down to dig into the Jiralhanae’s forearm. Fur and flesh smouldered and blackened, and Decipitus put all his strength into hurling the source of that pain away from himself.
Ready for this, Bleza slashed as soon as Decipitus broke his grip, leaving a seared cut across the Jiralhanae’s left arm as he spun and landed nimbly on his feet. He wasted no time, advancing again on the Jiralhanae, too busy clutching its own wound to defend itself.
But before he stood within his blade’s reach again, a storm of pink meteorites burst across the chest of his recharged shielding, filling the air with a pastel haze of microfragments.
Snarling in frustration, Bleza looked up to see the yellow-clad demon sighting him down along a stolen Covenant rifle. The lethal threat leveled his way angered him, but he maintained a level enough head to recognize the kemeksuru crystals had little effect on a shielded target. Defiantly, he marched forward to finish his work.
The demon dropped its aim, shrugging its shoulders in such a way Bleza was sure meant it had sworn oaths under its helmet. To his surprise, the normally pragmatic demon rushed him, rather than leave the Jiralhanae to its execution. Bleza advanced on the wounded beast as if still intending to end it until the last second, then turned and aimed to skewer the demon on his blade.
The wounded Jiralhanae he could deal with later. If this demon wanted to throw herself headlong into hand-to-hand combat against a sword, so be it.
Bleza sprang forward with his blade out and level like the lance of a jousting knight. He had the advantage of reach, and even if the demon got past his point, he could simply swipe and cut them down with its long edge.
Demons, of course, always did the unexpected. As they charged, the demon fired off the Needle Rifle still cradled low. The misfired shot should have zipped harmlessly out over the highway—but instead, it met the nearest chunk of debris between them. Finding no purchase on the Forerunner alloy, the crystal bounced at a precise angle, and zipped back to explode in glittering fragments against the side of Bleza’s shielded head.
The dazzling burst made Bleza flinch, and the demon juked the moment he did. Bleza swung, and his blade seared only empty air. A titanium gauntlet impacted his side with enough force to shatter concrete. Bleza let out a raspy snarl as the wind was squeezed out of his lungs, and his shields once again failed, though his thorax armor absorbed most of the force.
With her enemy’s shields down, Erin turned to bring the Needle Rifle to bear again on defenseless flesh… only to feel a tug hard enough to anchor her MJOLNIR-armored pull to a dead stop.
Bleza’s head rounded to fix her with one slitted eye. He’d countered the demon’s ingenuity with his own unorthodoxy—he’d dropped his vaunted energy sword to free his hand and seize her rifle by the forestock.
The demon yanked at the weapon, not about to pull away and leave it in his hands while she was defenseless, but Bleza held firm. In their ungainly grapple, neither had the upper hand. Erin had just begun to puzzle out the Elite’s intentions when four orange beams trained themselves on her shoulder.
The damn Crawler.
It had reappeared atop the very chunk of debris Erin had used to rebound a shot at Bleza’s head. Chittering in delight at its flatfooted target, the metal bug-dog’s back plates rippled like avian feathers. Erin tried to pull away from the lights marking it’s weapon’s lethal path, but the Elite held her firm.
Just as the projected disk in front of its face grew brighter, a shaggy paw snaked up to seize the Crawler’s back leg—and pulled mightily.
Its plates out of alignment, the binary rifle failed to even fire as Decipitus dragged the Crawler from atop the boulder and slammed it down to the roadway’s deck. Nishana had just enough time to raise a feeble limb, trying to calculate what had happened, when the paw still closed around its leg heaved again, swinging it flat against the boulder’s side. The lights running through the Crawler flickered, and this time it couldn’t so much as coordinate movement before Decipitus flung it again.
Swung overhead, the construct connected mid-body with the edge of another obstacle and was torn apart by the impact, its components scattering without a force to bind them together. Armor plates, claws, and two ant-like mandibles rolled and bounced with metallic clangs on the steely roadway. Breathing hard, Decipitus turned back to the entwined combatants.
His hope of an effortless kill gone, Bleza growled in annoyance, then spun on his heel. The motion pulled the Spartan with him, rotating them both. Then the Sangheili stopped hard enough to shake them both.
The Needle Rifle, guided by Bleza’s grip, launched another blamite shard as Erin’s locked gauntlet brushed the trigger. The shot zipped through the space between them, only to halt an imperceptible millimeter from digging itself into his chest. It hovered perpendicular with the surface of his skin as if held in place.
Decipitus looked down, and the ghost of a pink static bolt blazed between the shard and those in his thigh and shoulder, imprinting itself on his retinas. The Jiralhanae had just enough time for his breath to hitch before the shards detonated. The explosion tore chunks of meat and dark blood from the his torso, leaving a cloud of indigo mist as his body was blown back and fell amid the dented Promethean components.
Shocked, Erin’s grip slackened—just enough for Bleza’s off-hand to whirl and catch her by the throat.
Lifting the demon one-handed, Bleza was careful to keep the demon at arm’s length, his greater reach preventing any reprisal from Erin beyond an ineffectual hammering at his wrist with her off hand. Her other still fought with him for the Needle Rifle.
“Now, where is that spy?” Bleza muttered absently as he began to squeeze the human’s windpipe. He’d had enough frustrations for one day, and wondered if this human might be coerced into killing Caesar for him. A demon was a more useful ally than an Ossoona-like sneak, and a good deal quieter.
With the carbon-plastics of her body glove straining under the Elite’s tightening grip, Erin’s struggling grew more desperate. She couldn’t reach far enough to gouge an eye or tear the mandibles from the split-lip’s jaw, and with the Needle Rifle pinned between them, she couldn’t aim a good kick. At least not at the Elite, she realized.
Bleza suddenly howled as Erin’s titanium boot swung into the Needle Rifle’s stock with enough force to drive two of the protruding shards, sticking up like dorsal fins, into the Sangheili’s side. Unfortunately, rather than drop her in shock, Bleza took a page from her dead teammate and slammed her into the deck hard enough to see stars.
Slick with blood, the rifle clattered to the ground, forgotten as Bleza’s grip tightened again. He pressed the demon’s neck between his fingers and the roadway, thinking of the naturally-armored beasts he’d faced in the arena who succumbed to pressure when no weapon could penetrate them. The Spartan flailed, and Bleza had no fear of a counterattack. If the demon had a knife, it would’ve come into play long before this.
Her struggles suddenly froze when a voice—strangely un-stifled to Bleza’s hearing—emanated from the helmet. “Erin, stay down!”
Bleza knew a warning when he heard it, and looked up. The Shadow, smoke still billowing from its undercarriage, had righted itself and was swinging sideways toward them, barely under any control.
Inventive, but desperate, Bleza thought. Lifting and slamming the Spartan one more time to daze her, Bleza simply rolled and flattened himself alongside her. The Shadow passed low over their heads, but with space to spare. Still hovering above them, it crunched to a halt as one wing on the forward section collided with a boulder in the road, this time without enough momentum built up to even shift it.
Safe in the gap between it and the road, Bleza looked around to find the demon trying to crawl away. It wouldn’t get far.
Turning his body, Bleza reached out and seized the demon’s leg to pull her back. The demon’s metal armor scraped without any purchase on the metal roadway, sliding easily back to him. His greater strength would quickly tell in these cramped quarters.
Her other foot, unfortunately, kicked back to scrape against the shin he held, almost mangling Bleza’s fingers. Drawing his bloodied hand back with a grunt of pain, he rolled out of range of her kicks only to smile as his eyes came to rest on a silver bar: his Energy Sword.
Reaching out, he snapped up the hilt, ignited its blade, and thrust.
He was rewarded by a scream, so loud he could hear it through the demon’s helmet. He’d speared the demon’s calf, and drew it away sideways to carve flesh from her body like shaving meat from a spitted roast.
The voice which came out of her helmet sounded much less in pain. “Forget that thing, just crawl, now!”
Bleza had no doubt who it was, now. The tiny human he’d spied cowering behind the demon when it first ambushed him. It must have been the one to reactivate the Shadow. He’d deal with that one as soon as he finished off the Spartan.
He swung again, but the demon had drawn back its legs. Unable to crawl, it instead log-rolled toward the sunlight at the edge of the Shadow’s looming hull. Bleza crawled after it, sword still ignited. It had enough energy for one more good swipe. Hobbled, and unarmed, the Spartan would be easy pickings.
The Spartan reached the edge ahead of him, daylight restoring color to its mustard-yellow armor. Instead of further fleeing, however, the demon stopped with the expressionless visor facing him. Bleza knew better than to hesitate, but this didn’t feel to him as though the demon was giving up.
Then the hum of the anti-grav engine shut off.
Eyes flicking upward, Bleza realized in horror that the bulky transport had nothing suspending it above the roadway any longer. The crack of light at the edge of the Shadow’s hull grew abruptly thinner, and dimmer. He called out in furious denial, lunging for the demon, but no weapon could save him now. He felt a great weight press him to the deck, halting his forward motion, and the last sense Bleza had was the sound of his own body being crunched to pulp.
Erin lay on her side, panting as she studied the Shadow’s armor panels sitting half a meter in front of her face. For a moment she half-expected a plasma blade to pierce through it from the inside, but the heavy transport rested still and silent as a paperweight. If she’d had the energy, she’d have flipped a rude gesture as the Sangheili disappeared from view.
At the moment, though, it took all her effort not to cry out in pain. Rolling onto her back, Erin tilted her helmet up to survey the damage to her right leg.
It was everything she feared. The warrior’s plasma blade had almost bisected her calf vertically, melting through titanium armor and flesh like candle wax. The back of her greave remained in place, anchored by a last few inches below her knee like a titanium sprue, but smoke curled up through the blackened edges of the channel cut through her leg.
The searing blade had cauterized the wound as it cut, at the very least, but Erin dreaded removing the armored boot to confirm her muscle there cut free like a flap. With the armor damage, the biofoam injectors had failed. She’d have to seal the wound before even standing, or risk blood running toward her legs building up the pressure to seep through the burn scars and let her bleed out.
Footsteps hurried over from behind her, and she heard Arianne gasp, “Holy shit.”
Erin wanted nothing more than to lay back down for a minute, but with the civilian girl hurrying over to kneel at her side, she felt she had to put on a brave face. Fortunately, she was still wearing a visor, as Erin had to bite her lip not to cry out as she pushed herself halfway up on her elbows.
“It looks bad,” Arianne said as she looked over the wound.
“It is,” Erin affirmed curtly, not entirely trusting her voice. “But my armor can staunch it up, so long as the injectors are intact, which they should be. See if you can find the access tab, just under the knee.”
“I’ve got it,” the young mechanic said, more confidently than Erin expected. She pulled a multitool from a pocket in her fatigues and gently twisted Erin’s leg to work more easily. In a moment, a small bolt had been halfway undone, and the metal sheathing over a manual access port flipped open.
“Very good,” Erin said, adopting the patient tone she’d learned to use with the younger Gamma trainees when they struggled with something obvious to her. “Now, there should be a pressure valve on the biofoam lines. You just need to—ffsshhhh!”
Erin hissed to cut off a curse as a chilling sensation abruptly swept over the constant agony shooting up her leg. Numbing cold mixed with the signals of searing pain coursing through her nerves, swirling together in a confused jumble before evening out in the relief of feeling nothing at all. She glanced down to spy a bit of blood-tinged medical foam bubbling at the seam of her wound.
“How did… ” Erin marveled, turning to look at Arianne, “you know how to do that on MJOLNIR armor?”
The girl flipped the access tab closed on Erin’s greave, a bit less gently now that she didn’t need to worry about every movement. “Easy. The foam injectors are configured the same way they are in SPI.”
Erin narrowed her eyes. “And… you know how they work in SPI, how?”
Arianne flipped the multitool back into her pocket, then fixed Erin with a strange stare. “Do you really need me to answer that?”
It took Erin a moment to decide on a reply, and it was the wrong moment to pick. Just as she was about to open her mouth, a golden glow dawned around them, despite the shade of the Shadow looming over them. Arianne noticed it too, recognition lighting up her features in tandem with the appearance of the warm, pulsing bands.
Before she could so much as call out a name to give voice to her suspicion, Arianne sighed and told her, “See you in a second.”
Then the golden pulses grew blinding, and each was gone in a flash.
Redford truly wished he’d had more time to try understanding Bleza. Knowing how the Sangheili mind operated might’ve saved him a good deal of trouble playing cat-and-mouse with one now.
He darted from cover to cover in a stretch of roadway thick with car-sized chunks of Forerunner metal. It’d seemed a decent spot to lose a tail, or at least get the drop on them. Unfortunately, this Elite was a better hunter than he’d counted on.
He was running out of road. Metaphorically, of course. This promenade ran for klicks all around the city. But not much further down, the obstacle field Redford was counting on to keep out of the Elite’s sights petered out into open highway. A ways back, he might have fled the highway entirely, but there hadn’t been enough shelter to make it to the tight-knit buildings. Where he stood now, unfortunately, had seen the ground fall away in a slope to either side of the road, and the drop was a bit much for a man of his years hoping to keep his legs un-broken.
He took a risk, sprinting across a wide-open gap to put a new obstacle between himself and the direction he expected the Elite to be, based on their last running exchange of gunfire. No shots harried him, and Redford started to catch his breath. Only then did a trio of shots ring off the metal just above his head from a completely opposite angle.
Redford dove into the shadow of a neighboring boulder, somersaulting over the MA5K carbine he clutched in both arms. Righting himself, he stood and returned fire precisely over the top of his cover, but the Elite had already faded away.
This hunter could have nailed him at least thrice, Redford hated to admit. So why hadn’t he?
With what factors he could think of taken into account, the only explanation Redford came up with was an over-cautious opponent. Redford’s MA5K had more ammunition and a higher firing rate than the human pistol his alien enemy held. This Elite was trying to spook him, waste his ammo, and close in for the kill once his victory was guaranteed.
As intelligence went, it wasn’t much to go on. But Redford needed to make a play if he hoped to stay alive, and this was—to his great irritation—the only decent card he’d been dealt in a sorry hand.
Picking out a new shelter, Redford hurried to reposition. This time, a pair of gunshots rang out the moment he left cover, but now he noticed the rounds didn’t land anywhere near him. Raising the carbine akimbo as he ran, he fired off a sustained burst in response. His shots spanged across a half-dozen vehicles in the mock traffic jam, but hitting anything wasn’t important. He just needed to fire long enough to make it plausible his mag had run dry.
As soon as he knelt in the shade of his new cover, Redford drew his sidearm in his off hand, and clumsily freed a spare magazine from his reconnaissance uniform’s belt pouches. Inhaling once to steady his nerves, he let it drop to the ground, clanging as it struck the metal deck.
Sure enough, the dull ringing was answered by the fast tramp of heavy footfalls. Redford spun in their direction, a gun in each hand, and cut loose with both.
The Sangheili rushing down upon him was taken by surprise, and a spiderweb of cracks began to flare as lead slammed into his energy shielding. But his long, digitigrade legs were carrying him too fast to stop, and his mind must have realized it was too late to turn back—so the Elite barreled on.
Redford was thrown bodily over the nearest steel block as the bull rush reached him, the six-foot alien as strong as a Spartan batting him aside like an inconvenient tree branch. His chest plate absorbed most of the impact, but he still lost his grip on the carbine and pistol alike as he rolled backwards over the top of another block and landed inelegantly on the other side. He groaned as his spine protested bending so far backwards without a proper stretch first.
Pain was a sensation he cast aside as the footsteps came again. His weapons, it seemed, hadn’t made it over the boulder, as neither firearm lay conveniently to hand. Over the protests of his throbbing back, Redford gained his feet just in time for the broad alien to appear around the nearest corner.
It was barely any taller than he was, Redford realized. Most Sangheili were towering creatures, but this one looked almost small by comparison.
Its dense musculature was still more than enough to tear him limb from limb, however.
The juxtaposition made Redford laugh. He was about to be killed by the most useless Sangheili he’d ever seen. This whole contest had been a series of the most ridiculous encounters he’d ever had. He was an assassin. Stand-up gunfights like this were best left to those with augmentations and titanium armor. Unfortunately, the presence of just such a personality on the opposing side had prompted him to abandon the allies he had who were any good at it.
Well, when in Rome, he supposed.
The Sangheili eyed him warily as Redford chose not to run for cover again, but instead drew a combat knife from its belted sheath and adopted a fighting stance.
“Come along, then,” Redford goaded, a mad grin he wasn’t sure was feigned forming on his lips. “It won’t do to keep your gods waiting.”
A four-fingered hand came up, pointing the pistol straight at him. Redford might not have considered himself adept at reading Sangheili faces, but he’d be damned if this Elite wasn’t giving him a patronizing look.
“Great,” he muttered. “Sod you too, then.”
Just as Redford’s eyes began to close, trying to concentrate on something poetic to hold as his last thought, a golden glow flared up around his legs. The Sangheili seemed to notice it too, glancing down at the roadway where the source-less illumination emanated from. Recognition seemed to light in the reptilian’s slitted eyes as it grew brighter.
“No!” the Elite growled, and the smile returned to Redford’s lips as he heard all the Elite’s frustration bottled up in that one English syllable. Then it snapped the pistol level.
Just as the gunshot’s rapport snapped out across the city, the golden light of the slipspace translocation overtook them both. By the time its echoes died away, both of them were gone.
That Damn Sniper 08:14, 3 April 2025 (UTC)
23: Endgame[]
“What do you mean they have a stand-in?”
The top tier of the multi-level control room was silent, except for the bickering of one individual. While the staff on lower layers still worked away on maintenance, the employees on the upper level kept their lips zipped as the Announcer argued with a member of upper management over a cellphone with a polished white casing.
“So you’re telling me that the team got funding for another project, and neglected to tell me about it?” The Announcer said, looking over the details of said spinoff project on his tablet.
“The spinoff sponsor himself is announcing it?!” He shouted ostentatiously. “I’m here for a goddamn reason! My name is literally ‘Announcer’! I’ve been here since Season Six, twenty-fucking-sixteen! Where does he get off calling himself to commentate when I’m right here-”
The Announcer quickly shut up as the response came through, but just as soon as he closed his mouth, he opened it again. “Like I’d want to announce it anyway… This ‘Treaty Day’ runs counter to the very core concept of Survival of the Fittest, the very appeal it has towards our audience! No, no, I don’t care if it still features characters pulled from the universe being flung into a fantastical location with each other, it doesn’t count if they’re working together. The whole point is watching them all brutalize each other for laughs.”
The Announcer paused as management gave their rebuttal, then sighed. “I know it’s a primitive way of thinking, but people like to be cavemen every once in a while. We’re appealing to people who want to see a fight to the death like a Roman coliseum, not a crowd that wants to watch teamwork make the dreamwork.”
Another jab from the suits over the line, and the Announcer put a hand up, rubbing his brow with his fingers. “Doesn’t matter what you think. You’re just some execs behind an invisible screen. You can’t even compare with the sponsors, so don’t try pulling a leg up on me. I’m the one hosting Survival of the Fittest, and I’m the one with the sponsors of the main event. And after looking over the specs of Treaty Day, I can confidently say that I’m the one with a budget. At least I don’t have maps and characters bugging out, can you say the same?”
A beep emanated from the phone, and the Announcer chuckled at the sudden hangup from the other end. “Executive messenger boys, they get one order from the men upstairs and think they’re hot shit.”
Plopping his cellular device on his table, he grabbed a black mug in his right hand, lifting it up to inspect the design. It was fairly simplistic, but it did contain white text stating “World’s #1 Announcer.” It was charming.
The Announcer lifted it to his lips, gulping down a large portion of chocolate milk. Most of the staff here had coffee, but the Announcer - at least, this iteration of him - wasn’t a fan of caffeine. Setting the mug back down, he noticed the broadcaster standing to his right, absentmindedly tapping his feet on the ground while staring at him expectantly.
“What is it…?” The Announcer questioned.
“Uh, sir,” the broadcaster started, “While you were in your, er, call, the participants whittled themselves down to ten. They’ve been waiting in the teleporter restraints for about ten minutes now.”
“Ten minutes?” His superior’s jaw dropped. “Shit, you should’ve told me! I would’ve dropped the boardroom vultures the moment you did.”
“Well, you should start hosting, sir. They’re ready to be teleported to the final location on your command.”
“Time to get rolling, then,” the Announcer murmured, then increased his volume, addressing the room as a whole. “We’re to the finals, people! Excellent job putting your backs into making sure this season goes through until the end! Just nine more kills to go, and then it’s free cocktails for everyone!”
Amidst cheers and whoops from the employees below him, the Announcer put on his headset and looked at the display screen. The birds-eye view of the Cosmopolis faded away, replaced by a 3D diagram of the massive Forerunner spire in the city center. It had a wide base rooted in the ground, built atop subterranean catacombs. At the base’s peak was a gravity lift that ascended past the Transit - one of the bloodiest battles of this phase - before connecting to the massive superstructure floating in midair. The diagram depicted various rooms of different shapes, sizes, and purposes within the structure, with the top of the spire directly connected to the bubble layer of the energy shield around the Cosmopolis. Another gravity lift jutted out of the dome, ascending to a rather special location at the surface of the ocean.
“Hello again, competitors! It’s yours truly, coming at you with another announcement! A whopping thirty-four of you perished in the second phase, and I see that the vehicles I gave some of you were certainly the cherry on top of your carnage cake. Ten of you remain, so you lucky few will be going to the finals! More on that later, though. You know the drill by now, so I’ll be listing off the unfortunate souls who weren’t able to make it as far, then I’ll be breaking down the rules of the third and final phase.”
“In forty-fourth place, we have Bulwark, specifically Mori. One of two Hunters put in the game, Mori sadly didn’t make too much headway in the competition. Who knew that getting assaulted by hallucinations of your bond brother in the Silent Garden would make you vulnerable to getting opened and emptied like a can of worms? Just remember, folks, his brother is still around, so have fun with that.”
“Our first killjoy was scored against renegade Spartan Quinn-A098. She certainly racked up a kill count against some tough foes during her brief but fun journey here, but getting atomized by a robot dog certainly wasn’t the way we thought she’d go out! When she bit the dust, so did Fireteam Red-Hotel.”
“Next up is a bloodbath! All four members of Fireteam Blue-Charlie were soloed by a single competitor, and that menace is most definitely a finalist. First team member to be killed was Spartan Joshua-G024. Considering his augmentations and Gamma ferocity, you think he’d go down swinging, but getting killed by what was arguably the biggest swirly in recorded history is just pathetic. Eh, not the first time he’s drowned.”
“Shortly after, Gylinda Dirix bit the bullet, literally. I don’t know how tasty that lead was, but it must have been to die for! …Sorry.”
“Poor old sop. Derek Frendsen was graciously given a mighty Scorpion tank by our hardworking team, but a lack of accountability on his inspection skills resulted in him being blown up in the tank - by the tank itself!”
“To close out the sorry grouping that is Fireteam Blue-Charlie, Markko Kallas was forced against his will to smoke that plasma pack, and let’s just say the green stuff he had was way stronger than the normal kind.”
“In case you didn’t know, the Cosmopolis Transit played host to quite possibly the biggest fight SOTF has ever had. A bloody, three-way battle with a dozen competitors duking it out, with only a single survivor. Did I mention it was on a train? With a Falcon chasing it? And that the first to die was Riko 'Kasamee, who was literally kicked off the train for not having a ticket? No? Well, now I did!”
“Not too long after, we saw Rick-077 get gunned down by said Falcon’s doorgun. Not much to say there besides ‘damn’.”
“Following him was his good pal Caleb Butler, a teammate from in-universe who was lucky enough to get paired up with him. What wasn’t lucky was the fact that he proceeded to get shanked by an energy katana of all things. Dear god, never thought I’d see that weapon again after Season Six…”
“Callum-B042 showed us why instinct isn’t alway the best indicator of judgment. After getting headbutted multiple times by a floating metal ball, he decided to grab onto it, only to remember that he was hanging out the edge of a Falcon half a klick in the sky. It was quite the fall! The janitor’s gonna have a hell of a time cleaning that up.”
“Speaking of the Falcon, we didn’t get too much time with it, as a well-timed EMP brought it crashing into the train, and Ash Mitchell wasn’t able to bail out in time. That landing certainly wasn’t clean, but it did allow for Mitchell’s killer to score another elimination by using his own grenade as a bowling ball to blow up Samuel-D150 in a perfect strike!”
“Immediately after, the two-time murderer, Jerrold Pershing, was grabbed by Bulwark - no, not the dead one, his brother - and was tossed out of the transit lickety-split!”
“Next to die was our eccentric Monitor friend, 589 Curious Puzzle. While his curiosity allowed him to figure out some of the inner workings of our grand game, it ultimately didn’t get him far - blowing up in a massive spark is a helluva way to go.”
“No sooner had the lightbulb popped than Fira 'Demal reunited with his good old buddy Autel 'Vadamai. Since they weren’t on the same teams, our techs got awfully close to terminating them for breaking the rules, but things work out when a blood-crazed Gamma stabs you in the eye and drags you onto his knife. So ends the rule-breaking ‘Demal.”
“Speaking of Gammas, we got another splendid showing from Jace-G282 after he went feral. Some glorious kills were had, but alas, there’s nothing that even one of these bloodthirsty kids can do when a Hunter decides it wants you dead.”
“We end our glorious bloodshed on the Transit with the gory death of Autel ‘Vadamai, being used to paint the walls by Bulwark-Memento. With the eliminations of both Fireteams Red-Echo and Blue-Hotel, this finalist has solidified himself as a force to be reckoned with. Who dares to face this battle-tested Hunter?”
“Putting that aside, we had some more fun in the Hall of the Unfit. Statues of competitors from all previous seasons assaulted our players here, allowing for some to get the drop on others. As is the case where Hari-G055 dropped from her perch after getting not one, but many bullets to the head.”
“As if all the Gamma-killing wasn’t enough, Ava Barclay - or G-134 as some might know here - was stomped out like the heel of a fuss, until her lungs finally went bye-bye.”
“Jack-085 fell next, having all his limbs chopped off and being reduced to a wriggling worm before having his chest crushed by the Starchainer taken from our friend Maraudus all the way back when. If I had a nickel for every time one of [Redacted]’s Spartans got crushed by the Starchainer, I’d have two nickels, which isn’t a lot, but it’s weird that it happened twice…”
“Grono 'Yendam didn’t get much time in the limelight, and while he was by far the most effective statue-killer in the Hall of the Unfit, those skills didn’t transfer over too well to PVP. But hey, if you gotta die, might as well have your mentor show you how to do it, eh?”
“And wouldn’t you know, the aforementioned mentor, Kelvaaro 'Shrykar, fell next! Shouting ‘blarg’ or some shit after getting bodied is a funny way to die, and to have the prosthetic limbs twirl around afterwards? Hilarious!”
“Corin Davis fell in battle against his commander, Bailey-132, resulting in the elimination of Fireteam Red-Kilo. An epic melee duel between these two ensued, with the latter reigning victorious. But Bailey isn’t done yet, folks. You see, he’s the future husband of the late Addison Solaski, and considering that you all know Delvin-A125 killed her, there’s gonna be some drama for this last phase! Hoo, it’s been a while since we’ve had motives for killing in Survival of the Fittest! Look out, Delvin, someone wants you dead!”
“Ahem, I’m getting ahead of myself here. Back to the kill list! Next, Abzu 'Samakr was shot full of holes while driving a Spectre on a deadly race track. Maybe if he wasn’t such a fatass, he could’ve jumped out of the driver’s seat!”
“Leon Sikowsky died afterwards - yes, there’s another one. You all should realize by now that some of you have duplicates from other timelines here - He was splattered by a Warthog. A scene as old as time.”
“Hold on for dear life, Allison Lloyd! Oh wait, she already fell. Getting duped running off the edge of a building is some comical stuff, but what was only slightly less comical was her hitting the ground.”
“I gotta say, Emma Sówka went through the ringer during her time with us. Nasty injuries, jarring scares, I gotta say that a simple stabbing was more of a mercy kill than anything.”
“Vilmos-G069 got what he deserved. Gored by the tusks of a Warthog and almost split in half. Actually, you know what? It wasn’t enough. He should’ve gotten worse. Inhuman son of a bitch. Evil bastard. Fuck you, Vilmos. No elaboration needed. Next.”
“God’s mill may grind slowly, but it grinds finely. What exactly does it grind, you may ask? Vaish-194, that’s what! Oh, and her Warthog too. They both got finely mixed into a fine powder that the audience can order on our website for - wait, getting off-topic. That concludes the saga of the femme fatale Fireteam Blue-Alpha.”
“Back to killing! Dylan Park, better known by his stage name ‘Fotus’, got a nasty hole through the head courtesy of our resident Jackal Sniper. Such a shame, he would’ve made a good vocalist for our upcoming theme song…”
“Nelc got his head turned into mush after a chance encounter with a Revenant slamming into him exactly at head-height! What are the odds? Either way, he would’ve died no matter how high it was. Say ‘so long’ to Fireteam Red-Delta.”
“For our final battle of the Cosmopolis, which just recently concluded, we started off with the Promethean Crawler, Nishana. This robo-dog got torn to shreds by the brute strength of the mighty Decipitus! Does that count as animal abuse?”
“Doesn’t really matter, since Decipitus soon got his own brutal ending. After tanking multiple pink crystals to various parts of the body and continuing to chug along, he finally gave out after one lodged in his chest. The pink mist strikes yet again.”
“And finally, to send this phase out with a crunch, we have Bleza 'Kopal. A capable fighter who got some good fights in against a myriad of his opponents, it seemed like not even a Jiralhanae could match this fighter in pure combat skill. Alas, that’s how it goes; if no one can beat you in a fair fight, they make it unfair. As was the case when he had a fucking Shadow dropped on him. Now he’s flattened on the pavement…”
“With that smorgasbord of killing finished, we can now talk about the highly anticipated Phase Three! While you’ll be staying in our lovely Cosmopolis, the ten finalists will be transported inside the Spire, that big central tower you’ve all undoubtedly seen in the center of the city at one point or another. Take heed of its mysterious rooms and the surprises that lurk within, and watch your back at every corner, because it’s every man, woman, child, and alien for themself.”
“That’s right, it’s free-for-all! The long-awaited return to form of the format our previous seasons used, teams have been entirely eliminated. Prior allegiances don’t matter at all, since each and every one of you has only yourself to trust. You can make alliances all you want, but at the end of the day, only one of you will leave this place alive. Survival of the Fittest needs a winner, singular.”
“For my last announcement, I’ll be doing you all a favor. Seeing how you’ve made this far, you’ve all earned a reward; any injuries and battle scars you’ve accrued over these precious hours we’ve been together will be healed, so you can all approach this final hurdle with a fresh outlook! Now, get ready to hunt down your fellow finalists for this finale, and without any more delay, let the final stage commence!”
As trackers on the screen showed the ten finalists being dispersed throughout the various levels of the vast Spire, their injuries fully healed, the Announcer allowed himself a toothy grin. The finale was upon them - Season Eight would be complete, and one of the ten remaining competitors would be a new champion - it had been a long time coming.
Phase Three: The Spire[]
24: Revenge, not fear, is the mindkiller[]
Revenge was something that the Spartan IIs had been told never to indulge in. That it was a luxury that corrupted one’s ability to focus; to deliver the mission. Deja had given countless lectures on it—how throughout humanity’s kaleidoscope of cultures each one had had a story about the futility of revenge; the damage it left on the soul and the world. And yet it was all that Bailey could think about. He let himself bathe it, exfoliating his skin, sinking deeper and deeper into his pores, consuming him from the outside in.
There was one thing missing from those old human legends, the forgotten fisherwives’ tales—him: SPARTAN-IIs, augmented hulks of machine and scars and flesh and blood and wire. Bailey was so far removed for those humans, those gods and demigods, in those stories that the normal constraints of human morality did not apply. He stood above the legends. For he existed, exists. His footsteps echoed through the austere room he now found himself in. Etching and statues at the periphery of his vision, he refused to look at them.
Addison had been murdered by someone else in this godsforsaken competition. Before this nightmare again, he hadn’t even been anywhere near Addison. He hadn’t even let himself think of her while he was out on duty. Like revenge, focusing on the things close to you, your attachments, dulled the world around you. Yet this world Bailey found himself in, reluctantly, was already dull; monochrome, lifeless and grey and inhumane. He kept his eyes in front of him, a semblance of control as his mind raced like a whirlpool, churning and boiling any stillness away. All before him was art soullessly generated that seemed to draw in his eye no matter how hard he fought it.
If Bailey were to get out of this, he thought, and he had long given up any true hope of that, he knew that what came out of this was not him but would be a facsimile run through one of those old fax machines with poor ink. Faded and missing chunks. Still, he was a Spartan. He’d been losing chips here and there for decades. There were innumerable worlds where Bailey-132 existed. Sprouting flowers on the soil of saved worlds, charred to glass and pulverised on those he failed to. In the hearts of the civilians rescued and seared on the eyes of those he killed; human and alien alike. That was his job, his life’s work and he had painted many masterpieces in his time.
Corin Davis’s eyes came front and centre to his mission. A grotesque necessity that reviled every instinct in Bailey’s body. He was grateful that the top of Corin’s head had disappeared into the black, but the sizzling tongue dancing as it seared like a steak in his now empty head rung in his ears. Sung to him in melodies no one should ever have the unfortunate luck to hear. But Bailey was both conductor and orchestra of that monstrosity. His revenge had given him clarity of purpose to win that fight, to destroy those still close to him to achieve what not one person could stop. Not even Corin. A man who had trusted Bailey to protect his life for years. In some perverse way, it was only fitting that Bailey had taken Corin out of this place. Bailey had fulfilled his role as combat team leader; it was better that Corin no longer had to deal with this hellworld. Bailey had given him a gift by taking him out. A repressed non-smile tried to make its way across the aged Spartan’s face.
And yet, his arm throbbed with pain. This new limb so expertly reassembled that he scarcely believed he had cut it off not long ago. It felt like it had always belonged to him too. The sinew and nerves and veins full of blood. His, always his. What power existed in this place that such an egregious act could be fixed with a metaphorical swing of the hand it had been regenerated as if such an act had never occurred. Was God here? Had he died and this was Sheol? Was this a fight to cleanse his soul to reach the ultimate perfection? It would be a cruel joke if it was. But Bailey powered on, conscious to move his feet one by one through this labyrinth. His hands gripped tightly around the assault rifle in his hands. His back aching every so gently with the weight of his freshly won gravity mace, proudly stuck to his spine.
Bailey’s mind, so full of revenge, was still, despite his protestations, human. Addison, the woman he loves walked into his brain. The only place she now existed. He didn’t know how she died, and he didn’t care to. He didn’t want to think about the damage done to her body. The woman he knew was beautiful and kind. Death takes away from people all they ever were and all they ever will be. Addison was nothing but a perfect memory for Bailey now, and his north star. The reason to keep going when he existed in such unexplainable times.
How many times had he promised Addison in their time together that he would always protect her? That Bailey, the proud Spartan in Yellow, would stop that fast approaching but silent fear? On the first occasion that he needed to live up to those words, he had failed. It didn’t matter to him that he hadn’t known she was even here until that broadcast screamed across the sky. He’d never felt heaviness in his heart like it. Not even losing his beloved SPARTAN brothers and sisters had left such a wound, an ache, an absence, in his heart. He did not know if he could move past it. Truthfully, he did not know if he wanted to.
Addison had always been able to cool his anger, even after his detention by ONI. Even just thinking of her cooled his desire for revenge and let sentimentality surge in like a cold rain. If he won, more than simply achieving vengeance, he won and managed to leave this place would Addison still be dead? He figured she had to be, but so much about this place felt odd; supernatural. His own arm returning to him was testament to that. That inability to be sure, the confusion of his life outside of here, forced his anger and desire to tear apart this Delvin limb from limb returned to him with a sensation more overwhelming than before. Bailey felt almost sick, the bile burned the back of his throat with such intensity he retched violently. Luckily for him nothing came up.
Once he had calmed his body and stood upright, Bailey found himself facing a statue’s legs. He took a step back to better get a look at the full figure. To his surprise, he found that it was a person in MJOLNIR armour; Scout-model to be precise. A DMR was loosely chiselled into their hands with an SMG cut into their upper thigh. Bailey did not recognise the armour or the loadout - the statue being monochrome in colour also hampered his ability to determine who it was. The Spartans were still a small enough pool that Bailey felt he could recognise most of them by sight alone.
His eyes traced along the intricate stone work before settling on the plinth. There were several mosaics delicately placed around the plinth, vestigial colour. Bailey examined the closest mosaic to him. It was a series of scenes. It started with the Spartan above appearing in a forest, and then engaging with another Spartan, before an explosion sent the now broken body into a river. The mosaic ended there. Bailey felt confusion in him at what he was seeing. Were all statues like this? There was a plaque that read: SPARTAN-G024, Joshua, FOUR TIME CONTESTANT OF SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST. DROWNED TWICE, TWICE CORRUPTED (SEASONS NOT COMPLETED) AND RETURNED.
Bailey’s legs collapsed beneath him, and he stumbled into another plinth. This time this plaque mentioned that the individual it represented had appeared in five tournaments and two ‘spin-offs’. Bailey couldn’t believe it. His heart began beating rapidly in his chest and the temperature controlled MJOLNIR suit he was housed in failed to stop the sweat from pooling in his armpits and soaking his face and neck. The saltiness found its way into his mouth in ever faster rivulets.
This had happened before? Would it happen again? Had Bailey been here before? He looked around violently, almost throwing his body in a circle as he desperately tried to find a statue that resembled himself. The existence Bailey thought he knew began tearing at the seams. He could feel his soul beginning to slip through the cracks in his understanding. Something beyond his ken was at play here, was playing with him, toying with him, and for what? Enjoyment? Some sadistic desire to hurt people, to put them through their paces and see what happened? Did Bailey truly exist, or was he simply words on a page or thoughts in someone’s imagination?
Addison’s face burned back into his vision. No, Bailey thought in rebellion to the world around him. She was real! She had been full of red blood, real viscous blood! He had held her face, kissed her face. He could remember her taste on his tongue, sweet and light and never once sour. Whatever this was, it was beyond Bailey’s comprehension but it was real and he was real. His heart rate began to drop, his breathing returned to normal as his brain began to accept the reality around him.
It was in these moments of approaching calm that a new idea came to him. Seeing the statues paraded before him, feeling the throb of his arm, Bailey realised that things did not work here normally. That the impossible, the downright miraculous, could occur at a whim. Addison could be brought back, would be brought back. Bailey was going to find whomever it was that ran this macabre experiment and force them into returning Addison to him; to making him whole again. Bailey’s thoughts turned to Delvin and he almost felt sorry for him, for what was to come. He needed his revenge, but now that revenge served a purpose—it would create life from death; violence would breed peace anew.
“There’s more down that way,” a voice said, breaking Bailey from his stupor. “Seems to go on forever.”
Bailey’s grip on his weapon tightened as he looked up and left to the voice. Walking slowly towards him was another Spartan in MJOLNIR, his weapons attached to his back. A strange object Bailey couldn’t place was gripped tightly in his arm. The approaching Spartan noticed his glare.
“This thing?” he said, lifting it up and twirling his hand, inspecting it closer, “something I took from someone else here. Still don’t quite know what it is.”
The Spartan stopped, and Bailey’s posture turned aggressive as the two now faced each other.
“Bailey, I take it?”
A nod that would have been imperceptible to a non-Spartan was the response.
“Delvin, but I figure you know that.”
“I do.”
Bailey took a step forward almost instinctively, like a predator finally seeing their prey. Delvin matched Bailey’s step.
“Bailey, look around, look at these statues - something’s not right here!”
He pointed to one nearest to him, “how can this person have been here multiple times? It doesn’t make any sense!”
“You killed her,” Bailey snarled.
“Bailey, come on.”
“You killed her,” Bailey repeated.
Delvin sighed. His shoulders fell.
“I did,” he said almost in a whisper, “but she didn’t suffer.”
A heartbeat.
Then another.
“There was no pain. No fear.”
Bailey swallowed hard the lump in his through.
“She’s still gone. Soot and ash and food for the worms.”
Delvin began pacing back and forth, still careful to maintain his distance from Bailey, whose silhouette seemed to smother all light.
“It’s crazy,” Delvin said, “just crazy the odds.”
“I’m glad it’s you now,” Bailey said, “after everything I’ve had to do—seeing you here. Now. It’s enough.”
“Bailey, just look around you, it’s a twisted game!”
“I know, and I know I can game it,” Bailey said softly, cooing like a parent to a scared child. “I can bring her back, I know I can.”
“Bring her back?” Delvin asked incredulously, “what do you mean bring her back?”
“That’s not for you to know,” Bailey said as he began walking towards Delvin in strides, “You just need to know that you’re in my way, the last obstacle.”
Bailey licked his lips behind his helmet.
Delvin backed away, his hand pulling up his sub-machine gun and aiming it at his opponent.
Bailey looked to the ceiling, piercing through the granite to the sky, beseeching the heavens.
“Whoever runs this, listen to me. There’s to be no guns this time. Let me show you what revenge can be.”
A soft laugh seemed to reverberate from all around them, bouncing off the walls, choking both Bailey and Delvin. And yet, in an instant, Bailey’s prayer was answered. The M7s burned bright red, a mini sun, before it evaporated into soft petals in Delvin’s hands. Bailey was engulfed in a blanket of yellow daffodil heads before, they hit the ground with a thump as he derobed.
Delvin couldn’t believe what had happened before him. He could feel the sweat drenching his body. He struggled to orient himself. Something in him felt off; discoloured and rotting.
“Much more personal,” Bailey said, gravmace in hand, as he leapt towards Delvin.
Delvin barely reacted in time, sidestepping the heavy blow but was still forced back by the explosive force that came from the contact the weapon made on the floor. Bailey bit down hard on his teeth, expelling spit inside his helmet. Endorphins rushed through his body, adrenaline pooled deeply. His eyes, were they able to be seen, were wide and black and lacking in all human emotion. Only the bestial, long suppressed, found their presence welcomed at last. What a joy it was to think of this.
Bailey watched as Delvin awkwardly got back to his feet. Bailey hunched slightly forward, mace gripped tightly, like a priest holding the holiest of communion. The red hue offering a facsimile of a grotesque cleric collar. Delvin was his only supplicant and Bailey was an attentive pastor. He marched forward, the sound of his footsteps a homily, Saint Addison hung high in the roof looking down, ever guiding her champion forward.
The dreamlike stance that the endorphins and thoughts of Addison had left Bailey slow. He grunted, the air knocked from his lungs, as Delvin rugby tackled him at the waist, sending both augmented supersoldiers skidding along the ground. Bailey swung violently with his gravmace at Delvin, barely connecting with the chin of his MJOLNIR armour.
Delvin grunted, blood exploded from his mouth, teeth ran across the floor like diamonds as his MJOLNIR visor shattered, painting the air in a rainbow of shards. He was dizzy, his head spinning. He was sure his jaw was broken, he could feel the hot swelling. The pain was sharp; prolonged. He tried his best to push it down as he got up from Bailey to reorient himself. As an Alpha, Delvin had been one the best, but the elegance and anger and brutality of the IIs left him reeling. He could not see any opportunity to attack, only defend, robustly defend.
Bailey sensed it too, felt the fear oozing from every part of Delvin’s body. It enraged him, drove him to recklessness but the advantage was his. The two men faced each other. Delvin’s face a grotesque picture living in the glass frame of Bailey’s Mark VII helmet. Bailey ran forward, mace tightly kept close to him. Delvin stood sword up, ready to defend. In a movement most would have seen as a slight twitch, Delvin saw as an opening. He raced his sword to protect himself, only to realise too late the obviousness of the feint. Bailey deftly twirled around the sword, and swung upwards with the mace, hitting Delvin in the chest. MJOLNIR and bone and muscle and meat and sinew screamed into the vast hall. Delvin’s humanity left his throat in a heretical gasp.
A deep rumbling laugh escaped from Bailey’s lips, blood and bone drunk as he was. Violence had not been something he had enjoyed on the outside, but, in here, it felt natural. Like it was and had always been his soul’s purpose in life, thrust into existence to murder and fight and win. He could hear Delvin’s rasping as he tried to gulp down air. Bailey was certain he had done damage to his opponent’s sternum. His desire to inflict pain and suffering to this robber of souls, ender of love, was being fulfilled. With every blow and raspy breath Addison’s essence returned to the world; a corrupted saviour, long promised but this time real.
The dreamlike Addison, seemingly growing more and more lifelike by the moment, had left Bailey intoxicated. His grasp on the reality around him, already frayed by the knowledge gleaned from the statues, is now all but gone. In every action he took, he saw Addison. Delvin’s rasping had quietened as the wounded Spartan had grown used to it, in the pernicious way Spartans often did on operations. Bailey saw Delvin in a haze, shimmering brightly and quietly in the dark. A candle to be extinguished by his holy justice.
Bailey bent his knees and leapt forward again towards Delvin. The III swung wildly with his piece of forerunner technology at Bailey. The II, so consumed by rage and love and religious glory, ignored it. Ignored the sharp piercing pain as it buried deep in his upper thigh. The copper smell of blood singed the air and would have made any angel nearby vomit at the stench. Delvin ripped his hand upwards, his face soaked by the few sprays of blood that escaped before the blade so kindly cauterised the wound.
Bailey lumbered back, the weight on his good leg disrupted his equilibrium. He was forced to lean on the mace for support. Delvin saw an opportunity. He darted forward, but Bailey, drawing on some preternatural strength deep inside, managed to right himself and slam the mace into the ground, once again sending a shockwave towards the wounded III. Delvin thrust downwards, the tip of his sword breaking deep into the ground. The sword glowed a deep, royal purple, enveloping Delvin in a porphyry shroud, as it absorbed the full strength of the wave.
Delvin chewed so hard on his lip as he fought to maintain his grip he bit right through it. A meaty string now dangled loosely, exposing broken teeth and bleeding gums. Utilising every last ounce of strength he had, Delvin forced the sword to cut through the granite. It hummed with power. Once free, Delvin flicked his wrist toward Bailey. The full force of the mace’s shockwave now escaped from the tip of the sword. Bailey’s eyes widened, a momentary lapse of terror coursed through his body. He had not expected Delvin’s weapon to be capable of such feats. The heavy arc of the mace had left Bailey leaning forward, off-balance, and he could not adjust in time to brace. The force of it sent him back flying, the mace squirting from his hands and out of reach. He slammed hard into the ground, his head shot backwards concussing him. He vomited slightly in his helmet, the sour taste lingering on his tongue. Addison had disappeared from his view, no matter how quickly his eyes looked desperately to find her.
Finally it was Delvin’s turn to burst forward. Before Bailey’s head had even hit the ground, Delvin was on top of him. He drove the blade down on Bailey’s chest, slicing and burning through a hand held up in protest. A second hand grabbed Delvin’s face just below the eye. He shook hard to try and break free. Bailey gripped tighter, and Delvin thrust down again on the Spartan IIs chest. He heard Bailey vomit blood and foam and gasp for air.
Delvin sunk onto his backside, sitting on Bailey’s legs. He gently took his adversaries helmet off. Bailey’s mouth was leaking blood, pink and foamy as he struggled to drink deep of the life giving oxygen. Delvin cradled the back of Bailey’s head, lifting it softly up, to ease the dying Spartan’s suffering. With his spare hand, he took hold of Bailey’s last remaining good one, that just moments ago had tried to squeeze the life from Delvin. The grip barely existed. Delvin had to do all the work to keep it upright.”
“You stupid fool,” Delvin said, “It didn’t have to be like this.”
“I…I… N-needed her back,” Bailey coughed.
“It’s okay,” Delvin said softly, the absurdity of everything not lost on him. “You’re not alone. I’m here.”
A heartbeat and a groan and a cough.
“She’s here.”
“Sh-she is,” Bailey whimpered.
Addison, in pearlescent glory, floated above him, hands outstretched and ready to greet him.
The world faded, and then turned black, and then disappeared into nothingness.
25: Crypt[]
The cold tunnels constructed out of Forerunner alloy echoed with the reverberating hum of unseen machines hidden behind silver walls. Aside from the white noise generated by the invisible cogs, the only noise in the Catacombs came from the soft, nearly silent footsteps of an individual.
Light and careful, the steps were almost entirely drowned out by the humming of the machinery; a fact not lost upon the person taking those very steps. Stealthily, methodically, the individual slowly rounded each corner with the utmost caution, taking care to check their rear at regular intervals as they proceeded through the claustrophobic corridors of the subterranean facility.
After several more minutes of wandering, the armored figure eventually emerged in a chamber, only slightly higher and wider than the connecting hallways. A small, squat monolith sat in the center of the room, consisting of four vertically oriented half-triangles arranged in an X-formation, all resting atop a square podium that came up to knee height. Atop the point where the four triangles intersected was a disembodied light source - the light that emanated from it was sterile and white, just like the rest of the ones the individual had come across so far.
The figure, a man, grimaced at the repetitive nature of this labyrinth. Clutching his combat knife in his right hand, he brushed his left against the perfectly polished metal making up the monolith. The rest of his weapons - the more useful ones - were lost right before being teleported here, leaving him with nothing but a blade.
“Not the best loadout, I’ll admit,” the man said aloud to no one in particular. It was an illogical decision to make. If there were other competitors nearby, he had just given himself away. Silence was one’s best friend in an environment such as this, but he could hardly care at this point. He just needed to hear a voice, even if it was his own.
Alexander Redford, the last man standing from Fireteam Red-Foxtrot, looked around the room. There had to be some sort of way out, he knew that. The Announcer was quite specific in telling him that the final phase was located in a spire. And from his Recon helmet’s sensor readings, he was under the surface, not above it. There had to be some sort of gravity lift or teleporter somewhere in this maze, something that he could use to escape.
The thought came to stay in the maze and use its layout and all-encompassing white noise to his advantage. While Redford had been out of his depth in the head-on fights back on the surface, the ability to mask his presence with the god-awful reverberations and the tight-knit corridors was right up his alley. Sneaking up on other competitors and slitting their throats from behind with his knife? That was something Redford longed for ever since he had been transported here.
It would have to be the right target, though, he reminded himself. The Spartans still in the game would undoubtedly be a challenge, especially since two were on death missions and a third had killed his teammates back in the Cosmopolis. There could even be more on top of that. There was another threat on the roster that Alexander tried to remember, but the constant humming was beginning to make it hard to think. He’d address that thought later, once he’d ascended into the spire.
The Brutus operative stepped back from the monolith and continued slinking his way through the halls, knife pointed downwards while clutched in his grip. As he continued, he noticed the maws of the corridors widening, and even began to spot several openings in the lower sections of walls, almost like ventilation grates. He was getting close, he could feel it.
Redford pushed forward, eventually finding himself in another chamber, this one larger than any he had encountered previously. It stretched on for a hundred feet in a square shape, with an entrance located at each corner of the room. The ceiling was high, and Redford allowed himself an amused hum at the elevation change present in the room. Several tiers of stairs sank down towards the center, with another monolith, this one far larger, stretching above the pit and nearly scraping the ceiling of the alloyed cavern.
Alexander noticed what seemed to be an array of barricades circling the top flight of stairs, encircling the entire pit. He bounded to and from each one, still prepared for any foe who could come at him. As he did so, the ONI agent noticed more grates in the walls, large enough for him to comfortably crawl through. Good, he mused. If any of the Spartans were down here, he’d have an escape option. If his foes were other people like himself, he probably wouldn’t even need them. The only thing he needed now was-
“Scent detected. Show yourself, human.”
Alexander stopped dead in his tracks, quickly crouching behind the barricade he was currently positioned at. That voice - he recognized it. It was the same cold, artificial voice that his teammate, the ONI Hunter known as Bulwark-Mori possessed. He suddenly remembered the foe that had slipped his memory in the announcements, and quickly exhaled in awe.
It’s the thing’s goddamn brother.
Out of all the enemies he could have encountered, Alexander just had the luck to go against the sibling of his dead teammate - and from what the Announcer had said, one of the ranking killers in this deathmatch. Not that those mattered anyway. No, the real issue was that Redford had nothing but a damn knife to fight an elephant-sized ONI-bred war machine.
If the Announcer is the Devil, then I pray to whoever God may be in this hell.
“Order repeated. Further refusal to comply will be met with destructive force.”
Redford gritted his teeth and sucked air in, seething at the situation. He had seen the firepower Mori packed. If his brother, Memento, was anything like him, the grenade launcher and dual machine guns built into his arm would shred the man apart if he tried to run. Perhaps diplomacy - fake, of course - was his best course of action.
Stowing his combat knife, the Brutus agent stood up, stepping around the barrier with his hands raised high in the air. Sure enough, at the other side of the chamber stood a colossal Hunter adorned in black, honeycombed armor, pointing its multi-purpose weapon straight at him. To add insult to injury, Redford realized it had come from the same entrance he did. Coincidences seemed to be rare in this place, which meant the most logical reasoning was that Bulwark had been tracking him. He hadn’t been the hunter at all this entire time - he was the prey.
“Extreme force belayed,” Bulwark clicked, stepping around the outer edge of the pit. As it moved, its massive footfalls made barely any noise above the ambient humming, meaning that it had employed the same strategy as Redford; how it did with such a hefty body, he had no idea. As it continued towards him, it kept the gun level, its gargantuan height allowing it to carry the gun completely over the barricades as it kept its sight on him. The leviathan finally stopped, only a few meters away from Redford.
“Office of Naval Intelligence,” it stated in its ever-monotonous voice.
“Yeah. Just like you, right?” Alexander confirmed, hopeful that something, anything would give him an opening.
“Affirmative. But the Office of Naval Intelligence is defunct. It does not function here.”
“Believe me, I know,” Redford growled. “But allegiances to teams count for something, right? Individuals?”
Bulwark leaned ever so slightly closer, barely lowering the tip of its weapon. “Elaborate.”
“I know your brother was in this game too, Memento,” Alexander revealed, “his name was Mori. He was on my team. Protected me from harm, in fact. I know your kind has a bond between brothers, something… Special. I doubt that even ONI conditioning would break that.”
A low rumble emitted, not from Bulwark’s modulation device, but the mass of worms within. “Mori is close. Was close. Mori was Bulwark… Memento is Bulwark… We were Bulwark.”
“And as you know, he died,” the ONI operative continued, “he died… Died protecting me. He saved me from certain death.”
While that last part was a lie, Redford was good at telling those. Quite good. Perhaps appealing to whatever emotions this Hunter possessed was his key to surviving this ordeal. Having another of these colony creatures on his side, especially in the finals, would be a huge advantage over the rest of the competitors.
“Mori saved you?” The Hunter questioned coldly.
“Yes. He did.”
The Hunter stepped forward, regarding Alexander with the lenses on its helmet that resembled fake eyes. “Who killed my brother?”
“A Spartan. I killed her, used a Binary Rifle to atomize every fiber of her being. I avenged your brother.”
Bulwark reared to its full height, roaring in what sounded like pain. Mourning, perhaps. After several seconds of grating vocals, it returned its attention to Redford.
“There are still other Spartans in the fight,” Redford noted, “I could help you, help you kill them. We could wipe them all out, yes? For your brother. For Mori.”
Bulwark’s lenses pointed directly at him, as if the Hunter was staring into his soul. For a moment it seemed to ponder, but the tension shattered as it bore its weapon.
“Deception detected; attempt failed,” Bulwark clacked, “New rules established. Alliances are null. Only the strongest will survive.”
Shit.
Redford dove to his left as the Hunter fired the first spray of bullets from its chainguns. He scrambled towards the nearest grate, crawling inside as several spent rounds bounced off the wall around the shaft’s entrance. He heard Bulwark roar from behind, but continued forward, shuffling deeper into the ventilation system. He reached an intersection in the tunnel, quickly hobbling to the right as fast as he could. The action was the only thing that saved him as a torrent of lead ripped past from behind him, peppering the area where he once was.
Damn Hunter shoved its gun into the grate, he realized, but continued forward. He had to get out of this maze; find an escape. While the cramped shafts barred Bulwark from following him, and the durable Forerunner alloy prevented the Hunter from simply blowing the walls apart, Redford doubted he could simply squat in place. Considering what the Announcer had said about refusing to fight, the man didn’t want to risk any chance of waiting his enemy out being considered under that. And who knew how painful his death could be if the Announcer terminated him?
No, he had to fight - not necessarily against Bulwark, but perhaps someone else. Alexander had no clue as to whether anyone else was down in the labyrinth with them, but he was certain there’d be easier opponents up in the spire itself. As he continued crawling, he slowed his pace, making sure that his knee pads only made the slightest noise upon touching the metal grate. He could hear heavy footfalls from somewhere outside the grates - Bulwark knew it had the advantage, and had given up stealth entirely.
Arrogant can of worms.
Slowly, silently, he progressed through the ventilation system, making sure to keep silent. He had lost track of his whereabouts almost immediately upon entering the grate, so now he had nothing to go off of. He could only scuttle further and hope to come across an exit.
Minutes went by, and Redford’s breathing gradually stabilized. He kept rounding corner after corner, hearing nothing but the ambient humming and the occasional footsteps of Bulwark as it scoured the crypt for him. After a few minutes, the omni-directional humming was joined by a second layer of white noise, this one faintly louder and coming from a specific direction - his three o’ clock.
While he didn’t have the faintest idea whether it meant anything in particular, Redford had nothing to go off of. At this point, nothing ventured meant nothing gained. He adjusted his heading, now shimmying in the direction of the new sound source. Sure enough, as he edged closer, the humming became louder. He pressed forward, eventually coming across a shaft illuminated by a vibrant blue light - far different from the sterile white blanketing the rest of this facility.
Alexander crawled towards the exit of a new grate, pausing just short of the exit. Best to survey my surroundings before coming out.
From what he could see, this new chamber was even larger than the one where he met Bulwark, with several raised pavilions circling a central structure. More barricades dotted the room, obscuring the corners from his vision, and he spied several power coils scattered about; purple and yellow energy coursing around inside their transparent exteriors. Hardlight.
The hardlight coils mattered little, however, as the Brutus agent’s attention zeroed in on the center of the room. A massive beam of blue energy shot up from a raised platform, rising all the way up out of sight. Particles and motes of energy danced around it in a cascading storm, and Redford immediately recognized the device for what it was - a gravity lift.
The exit was merely fifty feet away, simply waiting for him to jump in. After the thirty minutes or so spent in this hellish metal tomb, he could finally escape - all that remained to do was check his surroundings outside the grate. Alexander was smart enough to know that running headfirst towards the light at the end of the tunnel was bound to end in failure if he didn’t take precautions.
Gradually, the ONI agent crawled out of the grate, slowly rising with his combat knife in hand - for all the good it would do him against a Mgalekgolo. He looked left, then slowly scanned to his right. The first two corners were clear - excellent. His eyes slid past the third one, only to dart back as his worst fear was confirmed.
At the far corner of the lift room on his right stood Bulwark, its gun already raised and trained on Redford. Somehow, some way, the bastard had tracked him down.
Get to cover. Fifty feet is all that’s left.
Alexander bolted to the nearest barricade as a sharp whistle veered past him. A split-second later, the shrill noise was replaced by a deafening boom and a wave of searing heat as Bulwark’s grenade detonated behind him. Explosives… It’s not letting me off easy, huh?
He glanced down, spotting a hardlight coil sitting near him behind the barricade. Perhaps if he could pick it up, he could throw it at the Hunter… After all, he had seen plenty of combat footage of Spartans doing the very same thing against Covenant forces to lethal effect. The Recon-armored soldier bent down, grabbing hold of the coil with both hands, and stood up, only to meet resistance. The coil lifted ever so slightly, before dropping back down to the ground.
“Fuck me,” he cursed. Spartans could throw a fusion coil with ease, but a man like him? Even with his abilities, he lacked the armor to chuck a large explosive through the air. The best he could do was heave. The man gripped the fusion coil from the bottom this time, putting his back into it as he turned and tossed the coil over the edge of the barricade. Perhaps the explosion would at least distract Bulwark long enough to-
Clunk!
Alexander frowned. The force of his throw wasn’t even enough to destabilize the energy within. He may have been truly screwed, had he not heard the sound of another grenade firing from Bulwark’s launcher.
The explosive detonated at the edge of the barricade, and Redford ducked as a wave of heat washed over the top. Immediately afterwards, he heard a hiss, followed by dozens of streams of hardlight scattering around him. As the particles bounced around in random directions, one hit Redford in the chest, and he seethed in surprise as most of his chestplate disintegrated from the impact.
At the same time, he heard an otherworldly screech of pain from the other side of the barrier. The Hunter had made an error in destroying the hardlight coil. It must have been hit by one of, if not multiple of the energy streams.
It’s now or never. Alexander rolled out from cover, bounding up and breaking into a sprint as his window of opportunity rapidly closed. If he could get to the gravity lift, he could throw off Bulwark - for a time, at least. Perhaps there were weapons in the spire that he could use to even the odds - or kill the Hunter outright. The thoughts raced through his head as he reached the gravity lift, and with one last push, he jumped forward, landing in the beam of energy as a feeling of weightlessness took hold.
At first he felt himself sink from the momentum of his action, but he gradually began to ascend, his rate of rising accelerating. Redford allowed himself a smile, but just as soon as he cracked it, it disappeared. He had stopped rising.
Alexander craned his neck around to find, to his horror, Bulwark standing right behind him, its hand wrapped around his foot. The Hunter growled, slowly tugging back against the gravity lift’s pull, and the man who everyone else had known in this competition as “Caesar” knew his time had come.
“No!” he screamed in rage, vocal chords grinding together as Bulwark tore him from the lift’s grip. In the span of a second, the weaponized colony creature spun around, slamming its prey into the ground.
The death was instantaneous. Alexander Redford’s body hit the ground with both a splat and many cracks, as his spine and most of the bones in his limbs snapped from the impact. His Recon helmet’s visor shattered, and blood spurted out from every opening in his BDU. The silver of the Forerunner alloy quickly gave way to crimson blood, and Bulwark opened its hand, letting its victim’s only intact limb collapse to the floor.
“Opponent eliminated; eight remain,” Bulwark clicked, while a rumble of satisfaction emanated from its worm cluster.
“Correction: eight at most,” the Mgalekgolo quickly followed up, chortling in its native language at what could only be considered its attempt at a joke.
As it recovered, it turned to the gravity lift, stepping onto it as its hefty weight slowly began to subside. The Hunter gradually ascended from the depths of the underground facility, its course of action clear. This ONI operative, this Alexander Redford - he thought that the gravity lift would be his escape - his path to victory. Little did he know that he had unwittingly opened the floodgates. Bulwark was now free to terrorize the spire, and victory would belong to it alone.
26: The Even Chance[]
When the blinding flash of a slipspace translocation cleared from Erin-G174’s eyes, Arianne wasn’t with her.
The Forerunner imitation of a city was gone. Instead of bouncing from metal facades, the glare overhead peeked through the fronds of giant palm trees, swaying lazily in the breeze. Instead of metal decking, hot as a griddle in the overlapping sunbeams, Erin’s boots found purchase in cool sand. She’d flinched upon noticing her weight resting evenly on her legs—but the Announcer had been as good as his word. The singed slash in her calf was gone, even her armor restored over it.
Questions she had for Arianne still burned on her tongue, and now Erin wondered if she’d get the chance to ask them. Would the Announcer’s declaration that all teams were off be enough to make them turn on one another? Normally, trust between Spartans of the same class was beyond question. But Arianne had been so reluctant to confirm her suspicions. Why? And then there was ‘Ontom, if the spook he’d chased after hadn’t killed him. Hard to know what to expect there.
If she were going to get answers to any of those questions, however, she’d need to find them first. Erin set them aside to focus on more immediate problems: namely, her empty gauntlets. The Announcer might have been gracious enough to see her wounds reversed, but when the teleport had begun, there had been no weapon in her hands. Her MA5B was spent and left behind in the Luminarium, and Ontom’s loaned Needle Rifle had been forgotten on the beltway fighting that Elite.
Now all she had were her powered MJOLNIR gauntlets. Not bad on their own, but not ideal. Who knew what the other finalists had managed to gather by this point in the competition? And so, lining up the arbitrary North in her HUD’s compass as a heading, Erin set off through the forest at a brisk jog in search of any landmark which might indicate supplies.
She started to notice an eclectic mix of species in the trees flashing past her at low Spartan speed. Slender tropical palms sprang from the sandy soil alongside the desiccated trunks of acacias. Glancing up once or twice, she even found temperate redwoods towering over the forest canopy every so often. If these were anything like Earth varieties, their disparate needs would have been impossible to grow naturally together. Just another unsettling sign of this place’s unreality.
Before she’d gone very far, however, Erin ran out of land to walk. The close press of the forest suddenly fell away, leaving her standing on the sloped shore of a crescent-shaped beach. A sheet of turquoise waves stretched out… only for a few hundred meters. The water stopped when it met what was very clearly an azure-painted wall.
Erin stood a moment gawping at it. Her eyes tracked up the wall’s face, but couldn’t find where it ended. After the bottom fell out of her peripheral vision, there was no reference to tell her it was anything but open sky. Her HUD’s rangefinder just read “ERR”.
She wondered where the breeze was coming from. Were there fans hidden somewhere, or did some power merely command the air here to move? She stood in the dreamscape imagined by a child, its parts all moving as they should without the underlying reasons for doing so, stretching into vaguery at its edges. A non-euclidean nightmare wearing the skin of mundane reality.
A child’s playset. That’s what this place was. A backdrop for smashing people together like action figures. A cynical smile twisted Erin’s mouth. She almost laughed.
Her helmet’s audio amplifiers transmitted clearly the click of a pistol’s safety being flipped. In a split second, all reflection on where she was and what it all meant was compartmentalized and shelved. However much the conscious mind yearned to search for meaning, the animal need for survival always superseded it.
She spun, crouching to minimize her profile as her arms came up, both to shield her from attack and ready for balance if she had to bolt. To her surprise, neither was needed.
Standing just a stone’s throw away, clad in ONI reconnaissance gear with her dark hair in a bob, was a familiar face—staring at her down a pistol’s sights.
“Lieutenant Coney?” Erin asked.
Camp Currahee’s intel tutor tilted her head, suspicious eyes narrowing. “Erin. It’s been a while.”
She’d always been among the ones who used the Spartan candidates’ names, in their days training on Onyx. Not all the drill instructors did. Mendez certainly hadn’t. But even sharing her own first name, Lieutenant Coney made a point of making Erin feel like more than a number.
Still, while the Lieutenant wasn’t shooting at her, neither was she lowering the pistol. It wasn’t the only weapon she carried, Erin noticed. A DMR was locked on her back magnetic plate, an MA5K was slung under one arm by a sling, and another pistol was locked on her opposite thigh. It seemed like a bit of an awkward arsenal to carry. No doubt some of them had been looted from fallen enemies. Or allies.
“About a lifetime,” she answered, playing for time. The pistol in the Lieutenant’s hand was an M6D. Its explosive rounds could punch through her shielding in less than a magazine’s worth of shots, if the shooter was any good. And there’d been too many rumors about Coney being a former spook for Erin to doubt it.
“Maybe more than that,” said Coney. “What year?”
So she’d figured out that out, too. “Fifty-five.”
“Fifty-nine,” Coney replied. “Don’t trust the AI.”
“What?”
“If you ever make it back to your time,” Coney explained. “Long story, but just… know they’re up to no good, if you remember any of this.”
“Thanks for the tip.” Erin wondered what the point of telling her was if the Lieutenant didn’t mean to let her live long enough to use it. Maybe as a contingency, hedging her bets so whichever of them survived, the UNSC would benefit. That was a spook for you. “Met anyone else we know here?”
Coney seemed to hesitate a moment, weighing whether to give away the information. “Vilmos. We started on the same team.”
“And now?” Erin asked, already sure of the answer.
“Dead,” she confirmed. “Saving my life, as it happened.”
Erin tried to recall the quiet recruit from her second round of SPARTAN-III training. They hadn’t interacted much, but she recalled him miming an explosion when some of the other candidates were tagged by TTR grenades. She wasn’t as sorry as she could’ve been about it, but that wasn’t something she wanted to admit to the Lieutenant. “Right. I think I heard the Announcer say something about that,” she trailed off when a thought struck her. “He also said something about you, I thought.”
“He did,” Erin affirmed. “He said something about you, too. Trauma and suffering?”
Erin shrugged. “Wasn’t me. At least, wasn’t this version of me. There seem to be a lot of us running around. I wonder just how many.”
“Up to eight more, apparently,” said Coney. “The Announcer said ninety-two when this game started out, and eighty-two have been listed off by the round-ups. I’ve counted. So I believe him when he says there’s ten of us left.”
“So, then…” Erin asked. “Want to team up?”
Coney exhaled deeply, then drew herself up as the pistol’s barrel lowered off-target. She stepped forward, striding forward over the sand until she was in arm’s reach of Erin—quite the show of trust toward someone in MJOLNIR armor—then turned to look with her out across the water toward the impossible wall.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she said after a moment’s quiet. “You heard the Announcer at the start of all this. Refusal to fight is grounds for removal. There will be one participant standing at the end, and it’s better not to complicate things with truces and waiting for the moment the other person turns on you.”
It was a funny thing to hear from a career ONI agent. Complicated, alliances, and betrayal of those alliances were a spook’s bread-and-butter. Erin couldn’t see an angle she was playing by making her an enemy. Had she gone soft, or was she just looking for an excuse to loot her MJOLNIR next?
Well, if Coney didn’t want an alliance, Erin had nothing to gain by trying to force it with a career backstabber.
“Alright, then,” she said. “How do you want to play this? Give me a ten-second headstart before you try to shoot me, or do you want to arm-wrestle an armored Spartan?”
Coney smiled, but holstered her heavy pistol and started to unsling both her rifles. Erin waited patiently, instead of reaching out with an armored gauntlet to kill her old teacher, as Coney wrapped the pair of rifles together with a few other knives, a grenade, and apparently a Jiralhanae tooth she produced from her belt.
Once it was secure, she dropped the bundle between them on the sand, then drew her two pistols and spun the slimmer, black M6/S to offer it handle-first.
“Ten paces, then turn and all bets are off,” said Coney.
Erin sized up the two pistols. The SOCOM was less powerful by far, but a quicker shot. And without a helmet, Coney would still be vulnerable. The M6D she’d keep, by comparison, was heavy enough to punch its high-explosive shells through Erin’s armor, but they’d take time to break her shields. It was as close to an even chance as they could get.
With an empty laugh, she accepted the offered pistol. “I knew you had a long service record, Lieutenant, but I didn’t realize you enlisted back in the Napoleonic Wars.”
Coney smiled. “And if you’d listened to all that experience in my classes, you might just have a chance now. I’ll count.”
Each with their pistol in hand, the two Erins turned back-to-back, parallel to the waterline. “One,” said Coney, and each took their first step. “Two.”
With violence so fast approaching, Erin’s mind raced to take stock of every possible factor which might give her an advantage. Her shielded armor, Coney’s ceramic plates. The sand they walked on, the sound of the lapping waves. Her hand twitched idly to come to grips with her pistol. The M6/S was slim, and easy to handle. It felt light in her fingers, almost too light. No, definitely too light.
As she planted her fifth step, Erin looked down to examine the pistol. Everything looked right, no damage to its body. The safety flicked off and on as expected. Yet when she drew the slide back with her thumb, only the chamber’s dark interior met her eyes, without the dull gleam of brass casings.
“Lieutenant? You gave me an empty—” She turned to find Coney already facing her, M6D held level. “Shit.”
Erin ducked and raised her arms again as the first HE slug slammed against her shoulder, making her energy shields flare. Another followed, and already a worryingly large portion of her shield bar had drained.
Snarling in disgust at being taken for a fool, Erin swept her leg hard enough to kick up a cloud of sand into the air, then dove into the cascading silt as a third round sparked off her armor. “You bitch!” she shouted as another round missed her, the high-caliber round blowing a hole in her sand-screen.
“Never fight fair!” she heard Coney shout after her. “That was one of Kurt’s lessons!”
Aiming for the sound, Erin hurled the useless pistol like a boomerang, then dashed sideways for the cover of the forest. She was there in a moment, a low-hanging palm bough batted out of the way to reach the shelter of its trunk. Glancing back, Erin caught just a glimpse of Coney before she too reached the treeline, dark armor blending into the shade beneath the trees.
Erin found herself on the backfoot, having to reassess her options. In a moment, neither would know where there opponent was under the forest’s cover, and Coney had the advantage of firepower. Of course, any firepower would be more than Erin had at the moment.
She could retreat. Escape back into the woods, waiting for a fight with better odds to come along. But Erin wrote off that option. If there were only ten fighters left of ninety-two, they were all likely experienced killers. She could end up facing a Hunter or something even worse next, and without a weapon she’d fare no better against them than Coney.
What’s more, two good rifles lay right there on the beach, just out of reach. If she could get to those, she’d have a much better chance of surviving the foes which lay ahead.
And she did have several advantages of her own. The superior strength and speed afforded by her MJOLNIR armor, certainly—but also its motion tracker. If a blind hunt would decide who got the drop on who first, then it was the ace in Erin’s hand.
The blare of her shield alarm fading as her armor’s emitters recharged, Erin stole deeper into the forest’s dappled shadows. The patterns of light on the sandy ground reminded Erin of the refracted sun on the tropical sea floor, warped by the waves above. Offshore, such a dance of light probably played out not far from where she stood.
If she didn’t know where Erin was, Coney would have to account for two possibilities: either Erin was coming for her unarmed, or she planned to make a break for the weapons bundled on the beach. The need to cover both would keep her near enough to the treeline to keep watch while hidden, and split her attention. That was the weakness Erin meant to exploit, and circled wide to flank her target.
It was slow going. Erin crept forward at a snail’s pace, eyes scanning the jungle for her opponent. Nothing made its presence known on her motion tracker, so either Coney had backed off for a better vantage point, or found a firing position and was waiting to spot her. Erin wouldn’t chance giving herself away with any sudden movement.
After a few agonizingly long minutes, in which Erin barely covered a dozen meters, a yellow blip of unidentified motion sprang onto the blue field of her tracker, twenty meters to her right.
The contact vanished as soon as it appeared, leaving Erin guessing. The trees were too thick for her to see clearly where the movement had been. Was it Coney, or just some branch swaying in the wind? She hadn’t noticed anything in the woods trip her sensors thus far. But if it was Coney, was this a mistake, or just a ploy?
If Coney was there, so close, Erin’s chances of moving further without detection had just plummeted. The long minutes spent controlling every muscle were taxing her patience, and the supplemental brain augmentations all Gammas had received were beginning to nudge her in favor of attack.
The contact flickered in her HUD again. That was it—a consistent contact, close enough for Erin to close the distance on before Coney could get enough shots off to take her down. She was going for it.
Bursting from stillness to motion, rooster tails of sand spraying up from her heels, Erin charged along an arc between the trees separating her from Coney. The forest thinned, enough for Erin to spy her target—and swear.
Instead of an ONI agent, a broken bough swung from the last bright fibers of fresh-severed wood, plainly cut not long ago.
Sure enough, gunshots rang out from Erin’s left, and the shield alarm returned to a shriek in her ears as the first two struck her in the side.
“Remember your lessons, Spartan!” Coney’s voice rang out over the fire. “Expect your enemy to predict you!”
Swearing inside her helmet, Erin decided there was nothing for it but to commit and ride out the consequences.
Instead of seeking cover, Erin followed through on her beeline to the broken branch. Raising an arm, she caught it and pulled, using her armor’s weight to snap the heavy bough free. Turning even as another gunshot burst against her shielding, Erin hefted the long limb—halfway to being a log itself—and hurled it like a javelin in the direction of the attack.
The throw was clumsy, and the many offshoots thick with leaves dragged against the close-packed trees—but the strength behind it was incredible. Wood snapped as the impromptu battering ram flew by, and Erin spied Coney diving out of its way before the log cannoned into another tree with a teeth-shaking thud.
Quick on her feet, Coney was already rising to her feet again—but it was the break in her fire Erin needed. Spinning on her heel, she dashed the other way and back out onto the beach.
She spotted the weapons bundle at once, and made a beeline for them. At Spartan speed, she covered meters with each stride in a sprint, closing the distance fast.
More bullets began to whiz by, most burying themselves in the sand or creating miniature geysers in the waves beyond, but a few found their mark. Her shields, overwhelmed at last, collapsed and left her encircled by sparks.
But in the next moment, she was atop the rifles. Sliding to a halt, leaving ankle-deep ruts in the sand, Erin snatched up the DMR from the bundle and pulled it free from the rest of the package.
Something in the bundle clinked. Something thin, and metal.
Erin looked down to find the pin of Leon Sikowsky’s last grenade tied to Emma Sowka’s Lullaby. The explosive itself was bound to the frame of Allison Lloyd’s MA5K at Erin’s feet.
The blast went off in the sand like muffled thunder. Erin’s armor, solid as it was, wasn’t enough to protect her from the explosion without the energy shields up. Her body, torn apart by shrapnel and force, was launched into the air, arms pinwheeling.
It fell back to the ground covered in soot and gouges in metal where shrapnel had struck the titanium, the armor’s integrity the only thing holding the body together. By that time, Erin wasn’t able to feel the impact.
After a few moments, Erin Coney—the last Erin standing—stepped out from the treeline to survey the scene.
Victory had cost her most of the weaponry she’d scavenged from the last battle she’d survived. But it wasn’t waste of resources leaving her with a heavy pit of shame in her stomach.
The younger generation was always supposed to surpass the new, in time. Even as they fought to the death, Coney had been trying to teach her, nudge her in the right direction. If the younger Erin had overcome her, Coney would have been secure in knowing some measure of the training she’d passed on to the Gammas had been a success.
Coney had certainly held nothing back in their fight. From the start, she’d been plotting her endgame to overcome the girl clad in nigh-unstoppable MJOLNIR. But she could have just opened fire on the unarmed, open Spartan the moment Coney spotted her on the beach. There was nothing sporting in that, just bad luck.
That wasn’t good enough. There had to be some chance to turn the tables. Some chance to learn, to grow, and be strong or quick or clever enough to overcome the next challenge. It was probably whatever the observers the Announcer orchestrated this game for wanted, too.
It was an unfair galaxy. But, she’d known that now for a long time.
Coney marched down the beach to look over the body and see if anything was salvageable. There were at least eight other contenders to deal with before she could call herself safe. And given the hunger whichever beings controlled this realm had for bloodsport, she was in no way certain it would end after that, either.
Halfway to the body, Coney froze, then lifted her pistol with its quarter-full magazine. There was something up the beach which hadn’t been there before. An extra tree near the shore at the tip of the beach’s crescent. A tree made of silver.
Watching her from afar unconcerned, as if the explosions and gunfire were no more than a street brawl he meant to watch before authorities arrived, was a tall Sangheili clad in armor like mercury. It was the finely-polished sheen of a warrior of high rank, without the ostentation of one who rarely saw combat. Under his gaze, Coney felt like a prey animal before a tyrannosaur deciding if she was worth the chase. It brought back her worst memories of running skirmishes with their kind during the Human-Covenant War.
Apparently deciding, the Sangheili started walking down the ridge and toward her along the shore.
That Damn Sniper 10:19, 13 May 2025 (UTC)
27: One Last Sword Fight[]
Looking down on the newly-bloodstained beach, Rtanis ‘Daelahm felt a curious disappointment. Once the gunfire had drawn him to there, he’d looked on while the Spartan, a demon in yellow-green armor, burst out of the forest and took up arms, only to disappear in a plume of smoke and sand. The trapper revealed themselves a moment after to be only a mere human.
While he had ended up on the side of the Arbiter in the course of the Great Schism, Rtanis had never regretted his part in the War of Annihilation against humanity. Humans were pragmatic fighters, and fighting them tested the Sangheili not just in skill, but in ideology. They gave ground where they knew themselves weak, and pushed only where they thought themselves strong.
This ran counter to the Sangheili codes of battle. When a Sangheili position was weak, they stood their ground and held it with their blood, until none was left to spill. When the Sangheili were strong, it was honorable to let the foe draw up what strength they had to match, given a fighting chance for their own lives. Anything less was unfit for the galaxy’s greatest warriors, and the endless march of victories they’d won against humanity proved the superiority of the Sangheili way of life.
This was what made demons such prized opponents in those days. The strongest of humanity’s champions, the only warriors who could challenge a skilled Sangheili in straightforward combat. Though he was now a sworn ally of the human government through the Swords of Sanghelios, a part of Rtanis missed the days he’d been able to test himself against such worthy adversaries. It was the sole redeeming aspect of being summoned to this infernal place without his say in the matter.
Thus, to see a demon so nearly within reach fall to an underhanded trap aggrieved him sorely.
Then again, he considered as the dark-haired human spotted him and brought its weapon up, if this new foe was skilled enough to bring down a demon, perhaps it could make for a respectable challenge itself.
The human held him in the sights of its heavy pistol, but did not fire. Rtanis wondered if discipline or fear stayed their trigger finger. There was, he supposed, a means of testing that.
He wished his Blood of Suban hadn’t fallen out of his vanished Revenant, along with the body of Fotus Park. He could have sent a few crystal bolts the human’s way, and seen if it ran for cover or fled in panic. So instead, he stepped forward and made his way down the slope of sun-baked sand.
Adding to his show of confidence, Rtanis unlocked the double-long hilt secured at his back—the greatsword he’d taken from the Banished battlemaster’s corpse. Twin plasma blades longer than Rtanis was tall, their bloody red washed out in the sunlight, sprang to life in his hands. An overcompensation of a weapon, he felt, but a lethal one he could whip across the length of a Ghost in a split second.
The human, a female it appeared, made her choice. Rather than loose a single shot at the approaching Fleet Master so armed, she turned and dashed away from its position. Rtanis was not surprised by such a reaction, but it did solidify the feeling he’d been cheated of a better fight by this coward.
What did surprise him was the way the human fled—not directly away, nor into the cover of the woods, but splashing into the crystalline shallows.
“You will not escape me that way,” he called as the human waded in up to her torso, slowing as more resistance met her the further she sank in. Rtanis could wade in, if he chose, and his longer legs and greater strength would easily outpace her.
The human didn’t answer him, only cast him a moment’s stony glance before springing forth to dive under the water’s surface, making for deeper water.
Rtanis felt a sting of insult tug at his mandibles. For all her cowardice of her actions, this human’s face hadn’t shown him the respect for his ability required for fear. Instead, in that moment, he’d seen contempt. The hate, without despair, one could only hold if they still believed they could overcome their foe. For a barely-equipped human to show him such arrogance pricked the Fleet Master.
He would show her how casually he dealt with such opponents, unworthy even of this salvaged blade. Rtanis’ off hand fell to his belt, where three orbs remained in their ready sockets. Prying one free, Rtanis’ fingers carefully found the safe points around the activation rune, and ignited the plasma grenade.
Winding up, Rtanis hurled the sizzling sphere out over the water like an electric-blue flare. It fell like a tiny sun into the water near the human’s refracted outline, sending up a plume of steam the instant it met the waves. A second later, the air shook as the plasma explosion made a boiling geyser rise from the cold sea.
Surveying the churning currents and sizzling rain falling back into the water, Rtanis found no red hue in the frothing waves nor dark-haired head break the surface. With an indifferent hum, he lit another plasma grenade and threw it according to his best estimations. Another geyser roared out of the sea, sending a ripple of force out ahead of itself through the swirling waters. If the human wasn’t dead already, she was enduring a very unpleasant time.
He followed it up with the third explosive, watching the point where it sank bubble ferociously as the tiny plasma reactor vented coolant boiled and expanded the water around it. Then, like a depth charge, it saturated a point Rtanis had chosen, equidistant from the first two, with a lethal wave of overpressure and steam.
When the thunderous echoes died away, and the sheet of water crashed back down into the waters which birthed it, Rtanis peered into the fizzing surface with growing frustration. The human still hadn’t surfaced, either in pieces or to escape the surely painful overpressure and draw breath.
His vexation grew as Rtanis realized he could no longer find the human’s outline beneath the water, but he kept his temper in check. If he could not see where the human was, he would eliminate where she could not be, and narrow his search.
Rtanis didn’t know how fast a human could swim underwater, but it wouldn’t be faster than they could run, and he doubted she could have gone beyond the tips of the crescent beach. And he definitely would have spotted her if she swam for shore and left the water.
This left one possible destination: the headland at the beach’s tip opposite where Rtanis had arrived, a rocky outcropping covered in barnacles and seaweed left to dry in the sun by low tide. The wave-smoothed monoliths stood tall as peasant huts, with deep crags running between the stones. It was the only place she could hope to leave the water unseen.
Rtanis stalked up the beach toward the outcropping with the greatsword still ignited. A weapon demanded blood before it could be sheathed.
The next wave shoved Erin hard into the outcrop’s stony side. She hadn’t expected just getting out of the water to be so difficult, but with no foothold in the deeper water to steady herself, she was at the mercy of the ebb and swell of waves, threatening to dash her head against the solid rock with each breaking surge.
The first time Erin managed to get even a fingerhold on the near-vertical rock, slick with algae, the receding water dragged her back in, then drove her forward again. Only the ceramic armor plates of her field agent gear kept her from slamming flat into the unyielding rock like a broken doll.
It still hurt like hell—the suit, derived from ODST gear, was rated to insulate her from the extreme heat of a drop pod during orbital reentry, but even it couldn’t completely protect her from the plasma detonations the Elite had been fishing for her with. For every inch of movement, her left arm, leg, and side itched with a brand of pain she couldn’t distinguish between burning or freezing.
Any closer to that last explosion and she’d have been cooked inside her suit. The water had flash-expanded into steam, the cloud of bubbles washing over her like a pot boiling over, and all the heat they carried was dispersed through her suit. She tried not to think about what her skin looked like under it. Probably the galaxy’s worst sunburn.
Each failed attempt to climb from the water sapped Erin’s flagging strength, but she wouldn’t turn back. Finally, the next time her fingers caught on solid rock, she dug in with all her enhanced strength, so hard blood began to seep from around some of her nails. And of course the next swell of seawater found its way into those channels, damn whatever designer had given ODST gear fingerless gloves.
Resolving to hope that designer was somewhere in this deadly contest, she pushed through the numbing of her pain receptors to haul herself up onto the stony shelf she’d targeted.
Rolling away from the edge, Erin gasped for all the breath she’d held to swim out of that monster’s sight. The Elite wouldn’t have given up on killing her that easily, but just now she needed the moment she had to rest.
When deciding to approach Erin-G174, Coney had the opportunity to plan. She had resources, and a scheme conceived to use them against her first opponent even before she’d come across the young Gamma. And it’d still taken nearly everything she carried.
She hadn’t expected to be up against another opponent so soon. Now she had no plan, a waterlogged pistol with less than half a magazine, and a stronger, faster, better-equipped enemy. A repeat of humanity’s footing through the Human-Covenant War writ small.
But they’d persevered then, and rolling to her knees to wring out her dripping hair, Erin began to consider her—
All options abruptly vanished as a four-fingered hand closed suddenly on the back of her head.
Erin twisted, trying to struggle free, but hissed through clenched teeth to cut off a scream as she was lifted from the ground by her neck. The iron grip on her skull rotated, bringing her face-to-face with the Elite Fleet Master. The overlong blade, more spear than sword, blazed pastel red in the warrior’s other hand.
“I see you have many tricks for a nishum,” Rtanis commended, speaking to her in her own tongue. “But tricks are only that. And now you have run out.”
Erin still had the M6D clutched tightly in her hand, but firing it would do no good. The Fleet Master’s shields were too strong to break before his blade would cut her in half. Instead, she waited, struggling to calm her breath as she looked into the Elite’s eyes. The moment she saw his shoulder tense, Erin swung up her legs.
The blade was far too long to skewer her with, so Rtanis meant to sweep the blade just above her shoulders and take the human’s head cleanly. But the female drew herself up just as he swung, and kicked out hard at his wrist with both legs. To his shock, the impact flung his arm the other way, almost hard enough to break bones.
Erin landed flat on the hard stone, groaning as she rolled to protect her already-seared side. Rtanis stumbled back a step, more in astonishment than pain. Such a blow, he realized, could not have been struck by a normal human.
Surprise morphed unbidden into mirth between Rtanis’ mandibles, escaping as a laugh. Of course this human had been able to overcome a demon—she was one herself, if deprived of their vaunted armor. He’d been given a second chance at facing such a foe. He intended not to squander it.
Clenching her teeth to keep from crying out, Erin rolled to her feet and backed away with her eyes on Rtanis, knowing he could slash her in two before she’d escape the greatsword’s range. If she could just dodge his first strike, she could try to dive back into the water or scramble up the rock face—
Instead of attacking, however, it was Erin’s turn to be surprised as the Elite tossed the great red blade upright through the air between them, making it easy for her to catch. The pistol already in her right hand made it an awkward grab, especially with the sword’s activators locked to keep the plasma fields sizzling quietly.
She stared at the blade a moment without understanding. But the moment she looked up at the Elite facing her, it clicked.
“It seems you do conceal more tricks than I surmised,” said the Elite, unclipping another curved handle from his armor. Its blades flashed into existence with a sound like tearing paper as plasma scorched the air. The rust-red hue of each blade near the emitter cleared to a blue mirror of the tropical waters below them at the prongs. From his other gauntlet, a triangular blade with a wicked curve sprang free to cover his wrist. “You have more courage in showing your face to your enemy than the rest of your kind, demon.”
Erin looked down at the weapon in her hands incredulously. Was this split-lip serious? She was wounded, exhausted, and hadn’t the faintest idea how to properly wield a weapon this long. But as the Elite began to side-step, prompting her to circle opposite, she realized the blade was the only possible defense. She couldn’t outrun the Elite, and her pistol wouldn’t break his shields before he was on her. She’d have to learn fast. “I’ve been called a lot of things worse than demon in my time.”
“It is no insult.”
The Elite took careful note of her footwork, then glanced critically at her grip on the weightless greatsword’s hilt. Erin quickly holstered her pistol and took the weapon in both hands. At three meters long, the weapon was nearly twice her height. Something that long should have been heavy, unwieldy. But the magnetically-bounded plasma was light as a stick a child might pretend was a sword.
“I have faced your kind before and cast them down, when the Fleet of Arduous Pilgrimage was caught on its refueling asteroid. But they each refused to truly commit to fighting me. Either they were distracted by striving to reach their objectives, stood against many to protect their comrades, or simply fled for themselves. This time will be different. Pure.” The Fleet Master flexed his wrist to flourish the multicolored blade. “While two of us yet live, there can be no escape from this contest of arms. I am Rtanis ‘Daelahm, Demonslayer, and Master of the Fleet of United Salvation! Come, and avenge your kin!”
Erin grimaced, leveling the greatsword to point its prongs at the Elite. “Have to warn you, it might not be everything you’re hoping for. I’ve never even trained with one of these before.”
Rtanis was undeterred. “Then defend yourself, and show me how a Spartan dies!”
She circled, wary for any sign the Elite’s relaxed pose was about to tense for a strike. None showed themselves. Rtanis seemed to be waiting on her to make the first move.
Erin had never fought with swords before—if this unwieldy pitchfork could be called a sword—while this Elite had no doubt trained with them from birth, but she had been in a fair few desperate knife fights. If Rtanis thought she was out of tricks, she’d have to try applying a few he wouldn’t expect in new ways.
Erin started to turn in closer, tightening the circle between them. Rtanis mirrored her. At a closer range, it would be easier to launch testing stabs to feel out her opponent’s defense, and waiting on her, it seemed Rtanis would allow her. But she was timing their dance.
From below the lip of their ledge, the next wave crashed and broke against the stone outcrop. Sea spray leaped up over the rim just as Rtanis had his back to it, and Erin rushed forward to skewer the Fleet Master.
Rtanis lashed out with a hammer blow which met the greatsword near its tips. The force, without any leverage on Erin’s end, pushed the blade widely off-course.
She hurried to reign up out of her charge, and stopped just as she found the cyan points of Rtanis’ blade level with her eyes. All it would take to end her life would be a quick extension of the arm, but Rtanis didn’t take it. His slitted eyes only stared down at her, a look of satisfied superiority pursing his mandibles.
Not to be discouraged, Erin lifted her blade again, swinging it to touch its searing heat to Rtanis’ side. The Fleet master caught the long blade easily with his own; anywhere on its three-meter edge would have been enough to stop it.
Lifting both through their contact despite Erin’s struggle, Rtanis touched the energy dagger on his other wrist to his own blade, then swept it along his weapon to drive her greatsword off like a kitchen knife sweeping scraps from a cutting board. As Erin stepped back to keep her weapon under control, Rtanis advanced.
Alarmed, Erin skipped back to keep the point of her weapon between them, changing tack to stab at Rtanis like a pikeman. She struck over and over, flicking the prongs through figure-eights to attack each time at a new angle. But Rtanis intercepted each thrust, alternating between his sword and wrist-dagger to casually turn them aside.
Frustrated, Erin changed style again, making her left hand dominant and shifting her body to attack from unorthodox angles. But nothing found its way through Rtanis’ guard.
The Fleet Master halted her next strike by slipping one of his points between Erin’s, and twisting so the blades locked. When Erin tried to pull free, she found herself stuck fast. Anchored within Rtanis’ reach, she felt a sudden flash of pain as Rtanis’ dagger skimmed her forearm, leaving a sizzling scar.
Rtanis unlocked the blades, allowing Erin to stumble back clutching the bubbling strip of ceramic armor and skin.
“The first mark is a warning,” Rtanis said. “A second will complete the crossing pattern of the Mark of Disobedience. I told you to defend yourself, demon. Fail again, and your body will bear the evidence of that shame in life and death.”
Pain and fury made it hard for Erin to think. The Elite was playing with her, mocking her inexperience in a game she didn’t understand. He wanted this to be his great triumph, overcoming the legendary prowess of a demon, when in reality she was barely fighting back.
Study of Covenant psychology during the war had suggested the same thing; the Covenant could win in space, but engaged in ground battles for nothing more than shows of superiority, handicapping themselves against a weaker foe. She wanted to make Rtanis pay for that.
Steeling her grip in defiance of her arm’s agony, Erin launched forward again and extended to pierce Rtanis’ stomach. The Fleet Master whirled his blade like a fan to knock her off course once more. With her point out of the way, he swung horizontally to force Erin back, then went on the offensive himself.
If his defense before had been effortless, Rtanis’ offense was a whirlwind of lethal plasma. Erin had to scurry back fast enough to get her blade between them again, the long red beams swaying under each of Rtanis’ strikes. His dagger arm was folded behind his back, making a show of using only the crystal-blue sword to put her to flight.
A scrape of her heel against rock told Erin she was running out of room—just before her next step back met the up-sloping stone early, pitching her on her back at the foot of the escarpment. Hard as she fought to keep her blade up, she knew all she could do was hold it still. Not nearly enough to fend off Rtanis.
The handle was wrenched out of her grasp by a flick of Rtanis’ wrist, sailing overhead to land on the ledge above atop the outcropping. There it crackled, starting to melt the rock under its still-active blades.
Rtanis loomed over her, swaying with each breath needed to fuel his two pumping hearts. He’d only just begun to display his real skill, and this worthless opponent couldn’t even keep her feet. He lowered the sword and said only one word.
“Again.”
Pressing herself flat to the rock at her back, Erin crouched until she was out of Rtanis’ shadow, then began to climb with the Fleet Master dogging her every step. The water-eroded stone sloped gentler along one side, making it easy for Erin to stumble up the escarpment to its flat top where the greatsword lay.
Rtanis trailed behind her at a leisurely pace, sword dragging behind him with its tips biting molten tracks into the stone. The sandstone flashed into glass before the razor-thin plasma.
Erin stopped a moment over the waiting sword, catching her breath. The moment she picked it up again, their fight would resume. Erin knew she didn’t have the strength to win it. Same as in the War, all the human could do was struggle hard enough to give the Covenant the fight they wanted.
She wondered if the generals in HIGHCOM had ever seen reality enough to face the same choice: admit defeat in the face of a stronger opponent, or go out fighting.
Erin tried to clear her head with a shake; of course they had, and she would know. She’d spoofed the clearance codes to see the plans they’d made. There were contingencies, of course. Colony ships readied for an exodus from Sol, to continue the fight or seek safety in deep space. But when the day came that Earth was threatened, Lord Hood’s order had been to stand. How could she choose any less?
She leaned down, watching Rtanis as she planted her fingers on the stone over the sword’s handle. The Fleet Master was tensed like an Olympic sprinter waiting for the gun, but wasn’t about to spring early.
Snapping her fingers closed, Erin drew up the sword and backed toward the cliff’s edge as Rtanis bore down on her. Rather than lift the blade, however, her other hand sought the pistol at her side and drew it.
The HE slugs impacting his shields didn’t slow Rtanis, though he lifted his dagger arm to protect himself. With the wrist-blade glowing, Erin didn’t see his other hand’s movement until almost too late. The Fleet Master swung the blade he was dragging along the ground up, flicking a few droplets of molten-orange stone at her from its surfaces.
Discarding the empty pistol, Erin lifted the blade just in time to shield herself from most of the lava flecks. The majority spattered against the magnetic field of the bloody blades, though a few landed on her ceramic armor and smoked as they cooled at once, stuck fast. Then Rtanis’ first strike landed.
The force staggered Erin back again, bringing her closer to the ledge as waves thundered below. As Rtanis advanced again, she brought it down in a chop the Elite caught above their heads on his blade, stepping in beneath it with his dagger ready.
Rather than try to free her blade, Erin instead pulled it to make their point of contact further along its length. This let her step forward, swinging the hilt end in close. Rtanis halted the motion with his dagger, leaving them standing close enough to trade breath.
Shouting with the effort, Erin lifted a leg and put her weight behind an augmented kick to Rtanis’ leg, hoping to break his stance.
The Elite did no more than grunt in inconvenience. Then he lashed up contemptuously with the offended knee, striking Erin hard enough to send her sprawling back onto the rock. The greatsword fell at Rtanis’ feet, melting more strips of sedimentary rock to igneous stone.
Gasping for her lost breath, Erin tried to push herself back toward the nearby ledge. Her armor’s ceramic scraped and belt pouches caught on the uneven rock beneath her, and Rtanis easily outpaced the prone human.
Erin shouted weakly as the sword’s two prongs dragged across her already-scorched arm, leaving a criss-crossed pattern of smoking plastics and scorched flesh.
“The Mark is completed,” Rtanis told her as she cradled the arm. “Were a Sangheili to be so shamed, he would throw himself on his sword at the nearest opportunity. It preserves his honor to atone for failure himself. But, humans have always struggled to reach the heights a true warrior must aspire to.”
Erin continued crawling back as far as she could, out onto an overhang stretching out above the water. Another wave broke on the cliff face below, spray leaping high enough to fall over the cliff. Erin set her teeth harder as the salt water found her wound. A few droplets spattered into steam against Rtanis’ blades.
The curls of vapor rose to wreath Rtanis’ implacable face as he looked down on Erin. It was then a last, desperate idea came to her.
“Again,” she echoed him, halting the Elite’s first step toward her.
The slits of Rtanis’ eyes narrowed as they studied Erin, seeking some deceit hidden in her body language. If Erin’s posture was giving away anything but “I’m exhausted and everything hurts”, she couldn’t have guessed what it was. But if the Elite wanted a legend-worthy contest, Erin had to make it look like her request was more than just a desperate stall for a few more seconds of life.
On shaking knees, Erin cautiously stood and suppressed the grunt her effort took. All the while, she didn’t dare take her eyes off those of the Fleet Master.
Rtanis considered the stubborn weakling for another moment, and laughed. “At least there is some fire in you, low though it burns.”
Reaching back with his sword extended, Rtanis interlocked his blades with those of the fallen greatsword again and flipped it up from the ground. Catching the curve near its hilt with the dagger over his wrist, he extended the blade hilt-first toward Erin, then cast it through the air between them as he had when first offering her the greatsword.
Erin caught it one-handed, the other dangling by her side. A fighting stance being apparently too much to muster, she raised it high and stood straight, signaling her readiness with a nod.
Rtanis also adopted a high grip. He decided he would end the sad demon with a single strike, like the great duelists sung of in the old stories.
The next wave crashed against the stone below. Rtanis sprang forward.
Erin lifted the greatsword high—then dove to her knees, plunging the blade down into the rock. Rtanis overshot her, but wheeled his arm to slash low. The greatsword’s giant sheet of red plasma was wide enough to still reflect the passing strike as it did Erin’s real bidding.
Rtanis stretched his legs forward, anticipating the moment he would land and bound back to pin the cringing human to the earth like an insect. Only his feet didn’t meet the stone where he expected.
Turning in midair, Rtanis saw Erin had passed the giant blade through the whole breadth of the overhang. In one solid piece, it was plummeting toward the water, and him with it.
Rtanis was surprised, but not bested. He kicked off from it in midair, enough to carry him well clear of the boulder as it crashed down. He met the water with limbs held close, already thinking of how he’d repay the exhausted human for this humiliation when he swam ashore.
The splash of his impact was muted in Rtanis’ reptilian ears as he plunged beneath the surface. Opening his eyelids carefully, he surveyed his surroundings in the crystalline water.
Heavy thuds carried to him as the boulder the overhang had become came to rest on the sea floor below. A churning trail of currents swept in its aftermath. He began to survey the shoreline for a way back up.
A reddish glow began to tinge the light filtering down from above. Rtanis looked up in time to see the Banished greatsword’s refracted image as it plunged into the water after him.
The Fleet Master balked at first, but relaxed. The throw had been pathetic, if even intentional at all. It splashed length-wise into the water well clear of his body, but close enough for him to reach. He snaked out a hand, intending to see it used to butcher the human weakling.
His hand suddenly stung, as if he were touching a hot stove. As his eyes were drawn to it, Rtanis realized what was happening.
The giant plasma blade was still locked to activation. Its blades were no longer red, but a pale pink thanks to a layer of bubbles swarming around every ignited surface. The sword’s plasma generators emitted an immense amount of energy to maintain the necessary heat for the blade, and all of that energy was being poured into the cold seawater. The blades he clasped in his own hands were undergoing the same process.
Water, when so heated, expanded. Violently.
In the breadth of a second, the bubbles swarming around the blades like schools of fish ballooned into the roiling clouds of an oncoming storm. Before he could push away, the underwater tempest swelled, so thick it blotted out the light of the blades and whited out his vision. The cloud met Rtanis as a solid force, battering his body with enough force to tear it apart.
An instant later, the steam explosion broke the surface with a scalding geyser that dwarfed those made by the plasma grenades Rtanis had thrown before. The shockwave was enough to drive back the push and pull of the tides, if only for a minute. White plumes of condensing steam fell back to earth as scalding-hot water.
Soaked and singed in equal measure, Erin Coney dragged herself back atop the outcropping from where she’d hung when the overhang fell. Brushing the mat of her sodden black hair out of her eyes, she looked over the edge for any sign of Rtanis.
None surfaced. His blue-purple blood would’ve disappeared quickly when mixed so thoroughly into the clear-blue water, and solid armor would drag down any pieces of his body they encased.
Exhausted, Erin lay back on the sun-warmed stone and let the light, real or artificial, start to dry her out.
The Elite had wanted the glory of killing Erin personally. He’d wanted proof of his superiority, vindication of his way of life over that of his enemy. Erin had wanted to kill her enemy. How she did it mattered less than the result.
Of course, it did now mean she was unarmed and still up against at least seven of the best survivors this death game had to offer. She’d carve a wooden shiv or two if she had to, but that could come later. For the moment, she was content to take whatever rest could be afforded her.
That Damn Sniper 02:01, 21 May 2025 (UTC)
28: Hell of a View[]
“See you in a second.”
Had Arianne known the Announcer would immediately dissolve the concept of teams afterwards, she would have held her tongue. Knowing this was now a free-for-all put her on edge when she was teleported into a new location - some sort of atrium posing as a faux scene of nature. She’d wanted to hunker down in the giant grove surrounded by painted walls, but fate had other plans.
Gunfire erupted after maybe thirty minutes spent there, followed by a massive explosion. Ari hoped it didn’t involve any of her surviving teammates, but who knew? Maybe it was even Erin and Is fighting each other for all she knew. Regardless, the spacer gradually distanced herself from the gunfire. She had nearly come into contact with another foe - a silver-clad Sangheili stomped through the forest, not even caring to mask his presence. Luckily, Ari masked her presence, allowing the Sangheili to move past her to the direction of battle. She envied his bravery - or perhaps his equipment.
I doubt I’d be running from a fight if I had a suit with energy shields on my person, that’s for sure.
Arianne had eventually found a Forerunner doorway carved into the sky blue wall, slipping through to freedom - that is, if freedom was a series of corridors with doors connecting to rooms even stranger than the one before. The mechanic remained lost in the expanse of the Spire for some time, until she finally came upon the door she was at now.
Let’s hope this next room doesn’t have any other surprises - or people. Arianne drew a deep breath, raising the machine pistol in her grip to chest level before taking a step forward. A clif followed by the whirring of ancient machinery signaled her arrival as the door’s various segments split apart, sliding into the walls on each side. Arianne stepped through, sweeping her perimeter. No enemies sighted, good. Almost as soon as she registered the thought, her mind went blank at the vista before her.
The mechanic stood upon a hardlight balcony that stretched out roughly ten meters ahead of her. The hardlight itself was mostly translucent, with a bluish-white sheen, allowing her to see the sprawling cityscape below. Hundreds, if not thousands of silver structures dotted the scape in tight clusters near the base of the spire, with a massive ring surrounding them further out. It was at this moment that Arianne realized where she truly was, as she spotted the hexagonal frame of the Luminarium she had started the previous phase inside.
She even spotted smoke plumes coming from the stretch of the Promenade connecting the Luminarium to the Silent Garden, marking the location where she had seen her most recent bout of combat. For how smooth the operations behind this deathmatch seemingly were, the idea that the Announcer had maybe forgotten to clean up the carnage of the previous phase caused a faint smile to tug at her lips. The idea that even this seemingly omnipotent disembodied voice had flaws was a comforting idea - if she got through this, the first thing she’d do would be to find out if he had a body or not - then light him up.
Arianne looked up to see the energy shield sprouting out of the Spire’s roof above, arching outwards for miles before dipping down to connect to the outer wall around the Cosmopolis. Being closer to the dome than she had ever been, she could faintly make out aquatic wildlife freely swimming around on the other side of the shield, blissfully ignorant of the carnage that raged within. She found herself envious of their obliviousness for a moment, then stopped to let the thought of that sink in.
“Here I am in a deathmatch being jealous of fish of all things,” she said aloud, just to let the absurdity of the idea settle.
“Interesting way to reflect on your time here.” A voice came from her right.
Snapping her head ninety degrees to her right, Ari’s pistol came around to bear a second later. She knew that voice. While it didn’t belong to one of her teammates, it did belong to someone they had made an alliance with, far earlier in the match.
“So you’re still kicking, huh?” Arianne scowled.
Delvin-A125 stood ten meters away from her, a slight hunch breaking his otherwise pristine posture. He held that damned scepter in his hands that he had used to ward off Decipitus back in the Luminarium, using it to prop himself up on the hardlight floor. His visor had been entirely shattered, exposing his gruesome face within. His bottom lip had been nearly torn off, exposing the teeth beneath - several of which were missing. Dried blood caked the numerous bruises on his battle-scarred face, yet the Spartan fixed her with a steely gaze nonetheless.
“Funny thing to say, coming from you,” Delvin replied before curtly breaking into a coughing fit. As the Spartan keeled over to expel copious amounts of blood onto the hardlight surface, Arianne was almost tempted to pull the trigger to put the man out of his misery. Unfortunately, his shields were likely still intact. A broken visor didn’t mean broken Mjolnir, after all.
“And what’s that supposed to mean?”
“You’re just a girl,” the Spartan spat, rising back up to his towering full height several heads above her. “It’s a wonder you’ve survived in the Spire this long without your teammates to protect you.”
“I can handle myself just fine, thanks.”
“Says the one who missed every single shot she took at me with a fully automatic firearm.”
Arianne’s brow furrowed, and she glared daggers at Delvin. Her finger itched, but she held firm. “You throw insults at me, but you’re the one with his face bloodied up and some damaged armor. I take it that was recent? Like, “Phase three”-recent?”
“Smart girl,” Delvin conceded.
“Ugh. Would it have been too much for them to have gone all the way? Considering what you did to that Addison girl, they didn’t do enough.”
“Don’t make me laugh!” Delvin wheezed, “the one who did this? Her husband of all things. I take it you heard of Bailey-132 from the announcements?”
“And he didn’t finish the job…” Ari realized.
“Poor bastard had gone crazy by the end. I gave him a mercy kill, same with Addison. More merciful than what you and your team likely would’ve done to me. Speaking of, where’s that ape and that gator? I’d love to blow off some steam and let loose on something I truly hate.”
“Do I not fit that bill?” Arianne inquired.
“I don’t get catharsis out of killing some random girl. Believe me, Addison’s death brought me no dopamine. But a Covie? I want to kill one of those alien bastards. Every single person I’ve killed in this competition has been another human, some even Spartan brothers-in-arms. I signed up to kill those monsters, you know? They promised me that… Goddamn, they delivered on that promise. But in Survival of the Fittest? No, I’ve been pitted against other people time and time again. I just want the satisfaction of ripping the hinges off a gator’s head, or mowing down a Brute. And if I don’t make it to the end, at least one of those aliens will give me a good death. Not you.”
“Calling me weak, huh?” Ari snarled. She could hardly disagree though - in a brawl among Spartans and aliens of goliath proportions, she was far out of her depth. “Decipitus is dead. Died last phase, right before I got teleported here. The Elite who killed him got flattened to a pancake, courtesy of yours truly. If Is ‘Intom is still alive, tough luck for you. You’ve got me and no one else to fight.”
Delvin tilted his head, perhaps in amusement at her boasts. “I’ll tell you what, Arianne. I’ll give you this one chance. Walk away now, and I’ll let you live. We won’t meet again unless we’re the last two standing. I’m extending you a mercy, just like Addison.”
Brrrrrrt!
The entire magazine unloaded, spewing bullets at a rate of 480 rounds per minute. After a moment, Ari dropped the empty mag, staring at the flickering energy coursing through Delvin’s Mjolnir. The shields had dropped near the very end, but the remaining few bullets made mediocre dents in the Spartan’s breastplate.
It was a stupid decision. Reckless, impulsive, all the synonyms. Ari had the perfect opportunity to walk away and wait for someone else to finish off Delvin, but those last words were some of the most vile she had heard. Even if she had never met Addison, the sentence still sat wrong with her. And now the behemoth of a man in front of her stood, no worse off than five seconds ago, fully intent on killing her.
Delvin-A125 gave a hefty, pitying sigh, raising his silver scepter from the ground. With ravenous aura, he slammed the weapon down on the hardlight terrace, producing a blinding flash of light. When Ari’s vision came back, the translucent blue energy in the floor rippled around the base of the scepter, flowing inwards as energy rapidly rushed into it. A glowing orb, identical in color to the hardlight, materialized at the tip, emitting crackling bolts of energy around it.
Arianne returned her eyes to meet Delvin’s, and the Spartan moved his arm. Slowly, confidently, he pointed the scepter toward her. “This next part won’t be a mercy.”
The mechanic jumped away immediately, screaming as a hardlight projectile fired from the alien weapon, slamming into the spot where she had once stood with enough force to create a breach in the terrace. The extreme heat from the collision lightly seared the left side of Ari’s face, and she yelped in pain as the skin turned sunburnt red. Landing in a clumsy role, she forced herself up, seeing the hole in the hardlight balcony already repairing itself. The orb on Delvin’s scepter was gone, but the Spartan didn’t seem surprised.
He expended that hardlight energy when he fired. He has to reload it, just like me.
Ari fumbled for another magazine, running away from Delvin to expand the distance. She had no idea how far his tool could launch the hardlight, but she knew her pistol’s effective range was at least 180 meters - even if she wasn’t accurate enough to shoot from even half that distance.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
Ari shoved the cartridge into the pistol, turning back to see Delvin slamming his scepter on the hardlight not once, but multiple times. Each time he did, the orb on his staff got bigger and bigger. Panicked, the spacer fired the M15 behind her while running, hoping that even with her wild shots she’d at least distract him.
The Spartan-III remained unfazed, lifting his scepter to fire another shot. This one, far larger, arced over Arianne’s head, colliding with the balcony only a few meters ahead of her. A massive shockwave ripped through the hardlight, causing the energy floor to completely shatter along its length. Ari cursed, realizing that the gap made was too far to jump - Delvin had stranded her with him by design.
“You’re starting to annoy me, Miss Doppler,” Delvin called out from behind, slowly stomping forward. “Maybe I should kick you off this balcony and watch you fall back to the Cosmopolis, you little bugger.”
“Screw you too,” Ari panted, thinking. If she couldn’t expand the distance, maybe she had to close it… Worth a shot.
The girl slowly edged back in the Spartan’s direction, pistol up. She had one chance, one shot to get this right. Focusing on him, aiming through the sights, was the only way to make sure she didn’t miss-
“Stupid,” Delvin commented on her movement, raising his arm to fire again.
Just what I needed.
Ari fired again, and against all odds, perhaps a miracle from above, her shots landed. Several, anyway. The bullets slammed into Delvin’s Mjolnir, and while they didn’t penetrate it, the rounds achieved the desired goal. The Spartan’s grip slipped, and the scepter pointed downwards, firing at the hardlight between them.
“No!” Delvin roared as both of them were blinded by the blast.
After several furious bouts of blinking, Arianne’s vision returned, and she could see Delvin on all fours, attempting to prop himself up. He paused, coughing up more blood from his shattered helmet, giving her the perfect opening. She wordlessly sprinted forward, raising the butt of her gun high. As she arrived at the supersoldier’s heaving form, she used her momentum to throw the butt of her machine pistol down on the back of his helmet with all her might to fell the titan.
“What?” Delvin growled. His head barely even moved from the impact. “Give me a break.”
The Spartan rose to his knees, blood flinging through the air from his face as he sent a half-assed backhand at Ari. It connected with her chest, and despite not even being a full-strength blow, Delvin’s augmentations were significant. The mechanic sputtered as ribs cracked, flying back to the translucent deck.
“Enough of this. If I can’t take four hinges from a Splitlip, I’ll take one hinge from a human.”
Ari found herself lying on her back. Hearing the statement, she immediately knew that the Spartan had no more intent of holding back. She propped herself up on her elbows, finding her machine pistol in arm’s reach. Grabbing it, she looked back at the Spartan, still on his knees, as he yanked his helmet off. A slurry of vomit proceeded to waterfall from his mouth, but the Spartan still moved, as if on autopilot. He slowly, heavily got to one foot, preparing to stand on the other too.
Ari fired again. A torrent of lead made impact with Delvin’s left leg, and miraculously, several dug through the tough titanium of his power armor, embedding themselves into his flesh. Delvin bellowed in anger as he fell back to his knees, followed by another rush of bile from his mouth.
Against the crushing pain in her chest, Ari forced herself up, stumbling over to the Spartan as he faced away from her. Righting herself, she laid her free hand on the Spartan’s shoulder to steady herself, jamming the muzzle of her pistol against the back of his head. She felt the muscle bound soldier tense up, but he did not act.
For a few moments, neither bloodied foe said a word. Delvin finally broke the silence. “I’ve got to give you credit. You’re crafty.”
“Shut up,” Arianne hacked, coughing up blood of her own on Delvin’s armorclad back.
“No, I don’t think I will… It’s funny, you know? This is the exact position Addison and I were in, but the roles were reversed. It seems fate had something cruelly humorous in mind for me… Pray the Announcer does not give you a similar end.”
“Ironic,” Arianne muttered, “and I’ll take my chances. The Announcer can step off this balcony for all I care.”
“On that we can agree. I suppose this death is fitting for what I’ve done. Make it count.”
“Go to hell, Spartan,” Arianne Doppler said, pulling the trigger.
29: What Is Your Major Malfunction[]
As foreboding as the Sanctum was beneath the chasm of space between its iron-grey ceiling and the patterned stone floor, Ragna Aasen immediately picked it for a simple reason – there was only one way in and out, which meant no one could sneak up on her so long as she kept her back to a corner and a rifle pointed at the door.
It wasn’t how she usually operated, and despite all the trouble she had gotten into in her nineteen years, Ragna could barely recall an instance where she deliberately walked herself into a corner in the hopes that she would outlast whoever came after her. Not that Venter had neglected to train her for such scenarios, even though she had thought it was a waste of time.
“Damn you, you prickly old bastard,” Ragna muttered, unslinging a DMR from around her back and hiding it in the crook of a recessed pillar. “Always gotta be right, even when you’re dead.” She hurried across the chamber and stashed a plasma pistol behind a tall light stand.
She had recovered as many weapons as she could off the Oonskies she had killed, suspecting that she would have to make do without her Cyclops going forward. Sure enough, no sooner had she finished scavenging gear off her vanquished adversaries was she teleported into the spire itself, wounds healed but with the old boy nowhere to be found. On the upside, she had swiped a decent handful of Forerunner capsules and gimmicks from the maintenance constructs whizzing by.
Ragna unholstered her M6C with one hand while the other produced the M6H2 she had procured off Joshua-G024. She had tried out the M6H2 before and was suitably impressed by its sleek laminar design, but the M6C still felt like the quicker draw – or perhaps she had simply grown accustomed to its reliable feel after years of experience. She returned the weathered M6C to its spot on her hip and tossed the M6H2 onto a wall frame, double checking that it was hidden from view.
Having completed her task, Ragna hurried past the terminals in the centre of the chamber; their glowing holopanels encircled a metallic stone titan, insect-like yet angelic at the same time. There was something vaguely familiar about it, but Ragna had raided too many Forerunner sites at this point to give it much thought. She expediently vaulted up the opposite wall and wrestled herself onto a small ledge where the blue-white glow of the Sanctum didn’t quite permeate the shadows.
Ragna inspected her surroundings to ensure she hadn’t left any scuff marks or other bits of debris nearby; considering what she was up against, sloppiness was as good a death sentence as any bullet. Satisfied that there was nothing to give away her position, Ragna unfolded her Century Twist and laid down on her front, keeping the rifle barrel pointed at the entrance.
At least they’ll be coming one at a time now. The thought reassured her more than she cared to admit. Had the teams not been dissolved at the end of round two, she would have never even considered holing up like this, even if she swapped out her Century Twist for the DMR.
The feeling proved to be short-lived as the sound of whirring machinery suddenly intensified. Out of the perforated walls slid a number of constructs, neatly unfolding themselves or scattering into new shapes held together by webs of hard light. Within moments, the stillness of the Sanctum was chased away by pandemonium.
Could be the Announcer’s fucking with me. Or maybe he just doesn’t like campers. But she doubted it, even if she were to leave things to chance. He’d have said something by now. Dropped some stupid one-liner that’s not nearly as clever as he thinks. Ragna vigilantly scanned the chamber through the scope of her rifle, watching for any movement that did not belong with the rest.
There you are.
It was faint, barely noticeable amidst the commotion, but Erin Coney’s seasoned eye caught the glint of a rifle scope from the far end of the Sanctum, reflecting blue-white glimmers from the Forerunner constructs moving about. Wouldn’t have been my first guess, third or fourth maybe. A bit predictable, but not green.
Erin almost scoffed at the catch-22 she was faced with. She had a perfect shot on her target right now, but with zero guns and a bad arm, the only way to take it was to try and nab one of the weapons stashed around the Sanctum by her opponent. Of course, that would require her to step in front of a sniper rifle, and even the constructs flying above them would only provide a brief moment of cover.
Then again, a moment is all I need. Scanning the Forerunner machines zipping past overhead, Erin noticed that the larger ones with gravity coils on the underside ferried stasis containers and crates of varying sizes. She focused on them and evened out her breathing, inhaling and exhaling at a steady rhythm as her gaze locked onto an incoming cargo construct; a tall metal box was cradled in its gravity coils, its underside protruding mere inches above the floor.
Erin drew another breath right as the cargo construct glided past the pillar where she was crouched, then pushed off with both feet and grabbed hold of its side-facing prongs. She swiftly tucked her knees in, careful not to get her legs caught inside the gravity coils. There’s a horrible way to go. Knees bent forward till your legs snap off. Without missing a beat, Erin stretched one hand outward and swiped the M6H2 from its framed ledge.
The movement caused a lance of pain to shoot up her bad arm, causing the hand she was using to hold onto the cargo construct to spasm. Erin instinctively tightened her grip but it was too late, and she rolled into a controlled fall with an audible whump.
Erin leaned into the roll, tucking her newly acquired Magnum against her chest as the sound of a rifle discharge was heard. A slug whistled over her back, nearly grazing her BDU before ricocheting against the floor where she had been a second ago. She could make out the sound of a bolt being pulled back and then set forward into place again amidst the clink of a spent bullet casing, and almost smiled. They must be good, to have made it this far with that museum piece. Not that I’m one to judge, seeing as I’m something of a relic myself.
The next shot flew past Erin’s shoulder a split second after she managed to duck back behind cover. The sniper was no showoff – they were aiming for centre mass rather than going for the fatally overrated headshot, and would have hit their mark had Erin been a heartbeat slower. Her enhanced hearing alerted her to the familiar sound of a ball-like projectile arcing toward her, and once again she took a measured breath, counting mentally down in her head.
By the time the clink of a frag grenade met the base of the pillar, Erin was already in motion. She grabbed a maintenance construct and hurled it onto the explosive, planting herself on top of its energy shield. The grenade went off a moment later, blasting the construct apart and sending Erin sailing up toward the sniper, the hard light barrier dissolving beneath her feet as its generator disintegrated.
Ragna had just managed to slide the bolt forward and drew a bead on Erin, who was coming in fast. The older woman swatted the barrel, causing the shot to fly wide a moment before colliding with Ragna. They tumbled to the floor, walled in by constructs zipping past them in uncannily precise fashion. Not bothering to get up, Erin swivelled to aim her Magnum at Ragna, who kicked herself off a pillar to slide behind the array of constructs on the ground. A half dozen high explosive rounds tore ugly holes into the machines, but they did not so much as react.
From beneath the hovering constructs, Erin saw Ragna’s hands working to pry a stone tile out of the floor, and her pulse raced when she caught the glimpse of an SMG. Wasting no time, the ORION grabbed another maintenance construct and held it in front of herself in order to charge through the rest, using the front-facing shield to bat the other constructs aside. Ragna backpedalled and let off a furious spray of gunfire, though every round bounced off the energy shield even as she tried to aim around it.
Suddenly Erin strafed, holding onto the maintenance construct and leveraging herself to one side to deal Ragna a roundhouse kick to the shoulder. The younger woman staggered back, SMG flying out of her grip. Erin did not slow down, using her momentum to swing back behind the maintenance construct as Ragna drew her Magnum. She emptied half the magazine into the shield before Erin closed distance and used the maintenance construct to pin her against one of the central consoles.
She caught a glimpse of Ragna’s face, and was disappointed to see that it was another kid. She didn’t look like a soldier, but something about the way she fought suggested that life hadn’t been kind to her even before she had been condemned to this bloodbath. And while Erin didn’t have much pity left in her, even she couldn’t pretend not to relate to someone who fought tooth and nail even in the face of overwhelming adversity.
It was the very same resilience that had seen humanity through the meat grinder that had been the Covenant War, and to now stand as the one to deliver judgement felt like perverse hypocrisy. Is this what the aliens saw when they looked at us?
For a fleeting moment, Erin’s strength faltered ever so slightly – and it was just enough for Ragna to wriggle one hand free of the ORION’s grasp and slam it against the terminal next to her.
It wasn’t a Spartan or a Sangheili, but any initial relief Ragna had was quickly dashed when she realized that Erin was far stronger than she looked. She had suspected the same of Gilly when they had traded hands, but while Gilly had only shown sporadic bouts of ferocity in her slightly emaciated state, Erin was unrelenting in spite of the charred blade marks she bore on one forearm.
The moment Ragna wrested herself free on her opponent’s bad side, Erin dropped the maintenance construct and raised her Magnum; she fired several shots at Ragna, who scrambled for cover by clambering onto the opposite side of the bug-like pillar, which was unfurling its wing-like appendages as it rose into the air. Light filled the red circle framed beneath its crown, which was sliding apart along with the rest of the construct’s pieces until they formed into something Ragna now recognized – a Guardian Sentinel.
She had seen a few in the years of fallout since the Created Uprising failed, during the scavenging runs she led on abandoned Forerunner sites. But she had always kept well out of sight to avoid provoking the silent behemoths, though she couldn’t discern whether they hadn’t noticed her or were simply ignoring her. Distance was not a luxury she could afford this time, however, and Ragna pressed herself against the Guardian Sentinel as it tipped and spun about in an effort to shake her loose.
Don’t even think about it. I’ve tamed more stubborn beasts than you. Ragna could see Erin leaping after her atop the flying constructs whizzing about the Sanctum. Both contestants levelled their Magnums at each other and let loose, but their shots merely cut through empty air amidst the Guardian Sentinel’s erratic movements.
Ragna flinched as a bullet embedded itself into her Magnum barrel, sending the gun flying out of her hand. She drew her SMG, keeping the stock retracted and firing the weapon one-handed. Erin rolled off the construct which was quickly shredded by the automatic fire, landing behind the Guardian Sentinel. When the construct finally turned, Ragna spotted her opponent in front of an enormous glass viewport, and in her hands was a plasma pistol.
Shit. Ragna was no amateur when it came to stash spots, but Erin clearly knew all the tricks in the book. She clenched her teeth, not sure whether to hold on or let go as an overcharged plasma bolt flew out and struck the Sentinel Guardian in the eye, causing it to dim in a flurry of sparks and crackles along with the fading glow from its framed socket. An all-too-familiar sense of weightlessness seized Ragna as the colossal construct began falling out of the air. She frantically eyed the unforgiving stone surface below, pushing aside the feeling of the bottom dropping out of her stomach and debating whether to hold on or bail out.
Ragna was about to take the leap when the Sentinel Guardian abruptly righted itself, nearly throwing her loose. The twin tips of its lower prongs hovered mere inches from the floor, and the glow in its eye returned with a vengeance, quickly growing to a bright orange. The construct rounded on Erin, who blanched.
“Uh-oh,” muttered the older woman. She rolled aside as a massive energy beam erupted from the eye, searing the glass behind her in a long diagonal streak.
Still firing, the Guardian Sentinel launched itself at her, nearly bucking Ragna again. “Why the fuck did you do that?!!” the younger woman screamed, her fingers tightly gripping the edge of its crown with her feet thudding against its surface.
“You’re the one who brought it online!” Erin hollered, throwing herself against the floor just in time to avoid being razed by the beam. “I would’ve settled for a one-on-one!”
“I don’t think you’re about to get it! Heads up!”
The warning came too late. One of the Guardian Sentinel’s lower prongs caught Erin squarely across the shoulders, knocking the plasma pistol from her grasp. The older woman did not fall, however, and instead grabbed the floating appendage in a reverse grip before backflipping herself behind it for cover. The construct smashed through the viewport, sending them out of the spire.
Eyes squinting against the howling wind, Ragna spotted Erin shimmying her way up the Guardian Sentinel. The sky beyond the spire seemed uncannily wrong in a way that eluded her – until she realized it was not sky, but sea, circumvented around the spire in a perfect semi-sphere.
Ragna gave a start as the Guardian Sentinel began tipping toward on her end – no, not downward, it was levelling out, orienting into a horizontal position while its plates retracted and locked together into a single mass.
Erin was hauling herself onto the opposite end of the makeshift platform, and Ragna hastened to do the same; she stepped around the Guardian Sentinel’s eye staring up at her, still dormant for the time being, and contemplated unfolding her Century Twist when she saw the combat knife in Erin’s hand. At a measly ten-metre range, Ragna’s gut instinct told her she wouldn’t be quick enough to go for her own knife if the rifle missed.
And so she drew her blade. The older woman was clearly above her league in hand-to-hand combat, but she was tired and wounded, and maybe, just maybe Ragna could use that to tip the scales her way.
Erin ducked as Ragna’s combat knife whistled faintly past her ear, its keen blade grazing her temple and managing to shear off a couple strands of hair. Without breaking from her slight crouch, Erin swiftly grabbed Ragna by the wrist and yanked hard, forcing her opponent to stumble forward with her blade pointing at the ground.
Ragna’s eyes darted to Erin’s knife hand, stabbing downward at her forehead. She swung backward, leveraging her weight against Erin’s unusual strength so as not to fall; the tip of the blade nicked her chin but otherwise sliced through only empty air where her throat had been.
Erin almost smirked. Not bad – except I can do this. She released her grip, causing Ragna to fall onto her back. Erin stepped forward to claim her kill – and then the Guardian Sentinel turned beneath her feet, its metallic plates shifting just enough to tip her off-balance.
The shift was far more catastrophic for Ragna, who clawed desperately at the smooth metallic surface as she rolled toward the edge of their makeshift platform. Her combat knife fell over the side and spun down toward the ground far below, but her hands found purchase against one of its extended mandible-like wings and she immediately locked her legs against it. Erin assumed her crouching stance again and cautiously stepped toward Ragna, who was shimmying her way up the hovering appendage.
Even as Erin raptly watched for more unpleasant surprises from their unwitting joyride, something about the look she caught in Ragna’s eyes was enough to give her pause. It wasn’t a habit Erin picked up consciously, but decades of crossing names off of ONI’s shitlist had made her uncannily discerning about how her targets faced their end. They fell neatly into three categories, mostly – the cocky ones that thought they stood a chance, the smart ones that at least tried to run, and the brave ones that were determined to go out fighting. Erin had no real preference anymore, and she almost never encountered a mark who bucked the trend. Almost.
As Ragna struggled to climb her way back up the Guardian Sentinel, Erin realized that her opponent was one such exception. The younger woman had the daunted look of a cornered prey animal, and she had to know that no relief awaited her atop the Guardian Sentinel. Yet despair had not taken her like so many others Erin was sent after, something the older woman found remarkable considering the severity of their existential plight. Who moulded her into this? she pondered, drawing ever closer to her quarry. Or is this just who she is?
The Guardian Sentinel rotated sharply without warning, and Ragna cried out in alarm as the mandible she clung onto was tilted skyward. Erin was ready this time, however, and wedged herself between two overlapping plates on the construct’s midsection, grabbing hold of one plate with each hand. She looked up to see Ragna now dangling above her, and to her surprise, her opponent let go.
Erin hastily moved her head out of the way of Ragna’s armoured boots and made a grab for her opponent. Her bad arm strained with its grip closed around Ragna’s fatigues, but she was forced to let go as her awkward stance nearly sent her falling off the now precariously vertical platform. In the blink of an eye, Ragna’s diminutive form slipped between two metal plates and vanished into the Guardian Sentinel’s internal workings.
Ragna’s hands briskly worked at the array of alien circuitry before her, her elbows and knees braced against its surface while keeping her back pressed against the underside of the Guardian Sentinel’s armour plate. Aware that Erin would not take long to find her hiding place, Ragna produced a small needle-like rod from her waist pouch and activated the hard light tip. She inserted the device into a glowing red slot positioned beneath the eye, then affixed a jet-black orb to the other end.
She had taken apart a handful of Guardian Sentinels in the wake of the Created Uprising – good money for the cause – but only while they were on standby mode. And maybe shutting one down in the midst of an airborne joyride wasn’t the smartest move, especially since it was climbing higher with every second. But Ragna was small enough to nestle herself inside the construct even if it dropped out of the sky, all the while her opponent would be at the mercy of the not-so-merciful winds.
And then Erin’s hand appeared in the crevice next to Ragna, the combat knife in its grip drawing a cut between the armour plates on her forearm.
“Agh!” Ragna scrambled away from the crevice, only for the Guardian Sentinel to turn again, sending her sliding down toward its eye. Her blood ran cold when its circular surface began to glow, and instinctively let go as an enormous golden beam screamed past her, easily twice the height of a Scarab beam.
Resisting the urge to squeeze her eyes shut, Ragna made a grab for one of the vents connecting the Guardian Sentinel’s shoulder to its back but slipped; she collided painfully against its edge before managing to grab one of its upper appendages. Fighting to catch her breath, she would have groaned if she could when she saw Erin sliding down the side of the Guardian Sentinel toward her, knife in hand and seemingly undaunted by their absurdly perilous situation.
The gash on Ragna’s forearm was smarting, but a quick inspection showed that it was quite shallow as her fatigues had taken the worst of Erin’s strike. Still, the material was supposed to be knife-proof against the strongest of ordinary humans, which all but confirmed it. She’s one of those proto-Spartans – probably the other woman I fought too. ONI’s first supersoldiers from the days of old. Ghost stories and rumours to be sure, but Ragna had seen enough ghost stories proven true to dismiss it out of hand.
Reaching behind her back, she deftly unfolded her Century Twist with well-practiced ease, ejecting the unused round inside and feeding a faintly glowing blue capsule into the chamber. She did not take her eyes off Erin as she set the bolt and aimed the rifle, not at Erin, but the gap directly beneath the Guardian Sentinel’s eye – and fired.
A flash of blue light erupted from the barrel of the Century Twist, and the capsule embedded itself into the construct’s core. Ragna instinctively ducked beneath the cover between the Guardian Sentinel’s back and the “wing” she was perched upon, right in time to avoid the blast of steam that shot out of the twin vents from its shoulders.
Erin was not so lucky, however, and Ragna heard the older woman’s yell of pain even as she remained where she was, hastening to slot the magazine back into her rifle. She pulled back the bolt and felt the slight click of a round being chambered when Erin dropped down in front of her. The ends of her digits were raw and pink, unprotected by her fingerless gloves, but still she held tightly to her knife. She leapt forward with her knife raised in one hand and the other outstretched.
Time seemed to slow as Ragna slid the bolt forward and down to set it into place. Erin’s outstretched hand closed around the rifle barrel and pushed it to one side, while the knife came forth again. Ragna shoved her Century Twist toward her opponent and let go at the same time, causing the blade to clatter uselessly against the side of the rifle instead.
Erin tossed the interlocked weapons aside as the Guardian Sentinel began to tilt forward even more sharply, and climbed after Ragna, who had withdrawn another glowing capsule and was trying to attach it to the core. Erin grabbed Ragna by the ankle and pulled, causing the younger woman to tumble into her. Both contestants rolled back down toward the eye, though Erin managed to steer clear by grabbing the lower armour plate and swinging herself through the gap in its middle.
Ragna’s arms were not quite so long, unfortunately, and her grab was met by nothing but empty air. She hit the edge of the frame around the eye and clumsily managed to halt her momentum, then planted her feet against its glowing surface and kicked herself forward as hard as she could. Another ferocious energy beam sizzled behind her, but she managed to roll forward into an upright position when the platform started levelling out at last.
And then she saw Erin rush toward her. The first punch Ragna managed to block easily enough, but it took only a split second for her to realize that it was a feint – right as her opponent’s other fist made contact with her midsection. Ragna was thrown to the slippery surface, backpedalling toward the Guardian Sentinel’s eye even in her winded state. Erin leapt onto her and dealt two more blows to the ribs and abdomen.
Ragna’s armour spared her ribs from the worst, but the punches still hurt; she fought to wrest herself free to no avail, but Erin’s forearm had her pinned by the throat, directly against the edge of the gap directly beneath the eye. The older woman’s other hand was fumbling to remove Ragna’s helmet, and even her knees had Ragna’s arms held fast against the platform.
“Colour me impressed,” said Erin. “You know your way around these things, which means you’re from the future. Before one of us dies, can you tell me something?”
“‘Before one of us dies’?” Ragna sputtered. “Looks like you’ve got this in the bag.”
“It wouldn’t surprise me if you had some trick up your sleeve,” the older woman admitted. “Now answer the question.”
Ragna would have laughed if she had enough breath for it. Just when I thought this couldn’t get any more absurd. “Sure,” she gasped. “Why the hell not.”
“Did we stop them? Did we beat The Created?”
Ragna’s mouth moved, but only a feeble gasp escaped her lips. Erin gritted her teeth, then eased her forearm ever so slightly from Ragna’s throat. Her other hand managed to pry off the younger woman’s helmet at last, and the two of them looked each other dead in the eye.
“No,” whispered Ragna faintly. “The armies, the fleets, the colonies – all obliterated to stardust.”
She saw shock flit into Erin’s features for a split second, but it was enough as she felt her opponent’s grip weaken. Her cloudy gaze sharpened and she suddenly shoved her opponent off of herself; wasting no time, she crawled back toward the socket beneath the Guardian Sentinel’s eye and pushed the black orb into the opening.
The piercing red glow of the core flickered erratically and cut out, causing the massive construct to cease its spiralling ascent with the dome less than twenty feet above them. The Guardian Sentinel hovered in place for a moment before plunging into freefall, its much heavier crown quickly sending it into a nosedive as its appendages retracted and folded together into its body.
Ragna and Erin rolled down the length of the Guardian Sentinel toward its “tail”, pointed up toward the sky. The construct roared past them with its enormous weight rapidly gaining momentum, and just then Erin grabbed the younger woman and used her to launch herself back onto one of its prongs. Ragna wriggled and flailed to no avail as she fell through open air, helpless to do anything except watch her opponent maneuver herself down toward the eye, fighting to overcome the velocity of its freefall.
It didn’t take long for Erin to reach the socket Ragna had sabotaged, and with a single pull she yanked the orb free along with the needle it was attached to. The Guardian Sentinel’s core sputtered back to life, and almost instantly it sharply turned its crown upward in an effort to right itself. Erin was slammed against the underside of the armour plate but managed to stop herself from falling through its interior by planting herself against the gap beneath the eye.
As crimson light flooded down the length of the Guardian Sentinel’s internal workings, so too did the capsule Ragna had attached to it earlier. A chime sounded in her earpiece over the howling of the wind, and without hesitation she slammed her palm against the confirmation prompt on her wristpad.
The capsule exploded, blowing off Erin’s legs and simultaneously causing the Guardian Sentinel’s eye to fire once more. Any glimpse of a reaction was too fleeting to catch as the force of the blast tossed her brutally amputated form directly into the enormous beam, instantly atomizing her. And to Ragna’s profound relief, a circular portal appeared between her and the rapidly approaching ground, like some divinely conjured trampoline.
She watched as the Guardian Sentinel’s beam continued to raze at the dome encompassing the spire, thrashing every which way to try and steady itself. This needs to be over soon, while there’s still some semblance of sanity left to it. The original plan had been to lure Erin onto the eye before setting off the capsule, but odds were she would have been too clever to fall for that anyway. I would’ve gotten a worse beating out of it too, probably.
Ragna closed her eyes as the portal swallowed her, and suddenly there was no more wind howling in her ears. She drew heaving breaths, alleviated at last from the disorienting sensation of air being forced into her lungs. She did not want to open her eyes, not just yet.
It was, of course, not to last. “Bravo, my dear Ragna!” boomed the Announcer’s (unfortunately) unmistakable voice from overhead. “You had me on the edge of my seat, you know!”
Ragna could have said a dozen things to him just then, most of which would have been too profane to put to print. And in her tired state, all she could manage was, “Go fuck yourself.”
30: Betrayal[]
Rays of twilight shone through the watery depths that surrounded the Spire. A golden blaze danced along the walls of the grand hall, flecked with crimson. Once, Ari might have thought it all breathtaking. But after everything, it was impossible for her to appreciate the simulated beauty. There was no sense of wonder in her as she limped at the feet of the towering statues that lined the hall. Nor awe, veneration, or whatever else the sick game masters had wanted her to feel.
There was only a deep unease in her stomach, a nauseating mix of fear and guilt. And the agony in her side that seized her, and turned the very act of breathing into torture.
Although she'd triumphed over Delvin-A125, Ari hadn't walked away from the encounter unscathed. It may have been a blow thrown at half-strength, but Delvin's backhand had still been enough to fracture two of her lower ribs. A fact that had become all too clear once the adrenaline subsided– and it hurt like all hell. Ari knew that if Delvin had wanted, he could've pulverized her in an instant. That it was only because of his misplaced mercy at the beginning that she still lived. But that didn't stop her from cursing the man's memory with every labored step.
She'd hoped to find something-- anything on the dead Spartan that would've helped with her condition, but there was no such luck. Not that she expected medigel to stitch her cracked ribs back together. But damn-- she would have given anything for a drop of poly-sue. Or anything, anything, that could have driven the pain away. But Delvin denied her even that. In the end, the supersoldier’s strange scepter was all he had to offer Arianne.
The Spartan had blasted a hole in the otherwise indestructible Forerunner alloy with this scepter, she recalled. It wouldn't have been her first choice, but with her machine-pistol down to its last magazine, Ari could not afford to pass up on firepower like that. And if nothing else, it was long and sturdy enough to support her weight as she shambled away from the site of her latest battle.
The sound of distant gunfire and the rumbling of far-off explosions had told her exactly where not to go. This twisted competition may have been down to its last handful of combatants, but now the battlefield was all too confined and narrow. Severely restricting the amount of places to hide. Ari only hoped the other fighters wound up killing each other before anyone thought to come looking for her. It was an ugly thought, and she hated herself for thinking it, but damn it, that was the only win condition that sounded remotely plausible. There would be no more Delvins. Nobody left to underestimate or pity her. Except, perhaps–
Out of the corner of her eye, there was a flicker of movement. Arianne swung around, wincing as a spasm of pain originated from her side. But when she brought the scepter up to bear, there was nothing there. Nothing but the stoic, angled shapes of one of the grand hall’s statues. More a simple pillar that merely evoked the form of a person than a representation of any one individual. Its sharp, blank features betrayed nothing, despite the girl’s waving of her magic stick.
“Human.”
Arianne nearly jumped out of her skin. If she had known how to operate the sceptre, she would have no doubt have blasted the statue out of reflex.
“Arianne. You have come further than I would have thought possible.”
The voice was deep and guttural, and it seemed to come not from the statue’s perpetual frown, but from all around her. Every syllable bouncing and booming off of the ornate walls of the grand hall. The speaker did not sound human, but neither did its tone betray a hint of hostility. More like… regretful?
Arianne cursed under her breath.
“That you, ‘Ontom?” She called out to the empty air, her eyes scanning the hall for any sign of her former Sangheili teammate. Nothing. Not even a flicker. “Just how long have you been stalking me?”
There was no response for a few seconds, long enough for Arianne to question if she had somehow merely hallucinated the Sangheili’s voice. Maybe, after everything that had happened, she should have been a little crazy. But Arianne did not have long to entertain the thought, for soon enough, the Sangheili’s booming voice returned:
“Since your duel with the Spartan.” He answered. Arianne felt a tinge of anger rise up within her.
“And, what, you didn’t think to help?” She said, her words dripping with venom. And hurt. To think that the Sangheili she had once trusted to have her back had been in that room, had watched what Delvin and her had done to each other– and had not lifted so much as a finger to stop it.
“There was no such obligation. Our alliance was at an end. You know this as well as I.”
Arianne could not dispute the truth of ‘Ontom’s words. But that did not stop each one from feeling like a cruel knife to the gut.
“And, perhaps… I had hoped to face the Spartan instead. It would have been better that way. Easier.”
The young girl did not hear those mournful words whispered by the cloaked Sangheili. Nor should she, Is ‘Ontom decided. For who in Arianne’s position would possibly care about his self-pity?
‘Ontom had bore the title of “coward” for his defection to the humans’ Office of Naval Intelligence for years. Long enough for him to learn how to stand tall despite whatever deluge of insults his own kind may hurl at him. But to look Arianne in the eye and beg for her forgiveness before he did the deed, to make this about him…
That would have made him something worse. Scum of the absolute lowest order.
“Should've figured loyalty meant squat to someone like you…” Arianne spat, voice cracking. She hefted the shaft of her strange sceptre, and fumbled at the smooth, glossy material until a bolt of raw power shot out, crackling like lightning. But it struck nothing but the far wall of the grand hall, which left a meter wide segment of the metal warped and red-hot.
“Show yourself, you coward!” Arianne shouted, planting her feet. “See what happens!”
‘Ontom had no need to rise to Arianne’s provocations. Although the young girl’s weapon was considerably more dangerous than his own modified magnum, all that firepower meant nothing if the girl could not find her target. And yet, even so, ‘Ontom spoke again:
“Throw down your weapon, Ms. Doppler,” His voice seemed to emanate from the walls of the very hall the two former comrades found themselves in. “I promise you– there will be no more suffering.”
“Screw. You.” Arianne growled, loosing another bolt in ‘Ontom’s general direction. But the girl was slowed by her injuries, and the glow that coursed through her sceptre before it fired made any attack far too telegraphed to catch the former spec ops Sangheili before he spun away. But Arianne must have known that, for as she unleashed bolt after bolt of pulsating energy, she inched closer and closer to the entrance of the hall.
This made ‘Ontom tilt his head, perplexed.
She had no hope of outrunning ‘Ontom, even if she had not been injured. Was her aim simply to reach one end of the room, where she could at least be assured that ‘Ontom had no choice to approach her head-on? Certainly, she would have a far greater chance of spotting the irregularities in the air caused by ‘Ontom’s light-bending camouflage if she only had one direction to worry about.
But it mattered little. The imperfect refraction of ‘Ontom’s camouflage would only be discernible to Arianne’s human eyes if the Sangheili were to move at a great enough speed. And ‘Ontom had no need to reposition again.
Arianne was already within his range.
His finger hovered over the trigger, the magnum’s aiming reticule settling on the girl’s head. It was a harder target than center mass, but ‘Ontom, perhaps rather foolishly, desired the highest possibility of eliminating the human in one shot.
The girl was still scanning frantically for any sign of the Sangheili. Her gaze drifted across where the invisible ‘Ontom stood, and even though she didn’t know it, for a single moment, their eyes met. He could tell even with a glance that for as frightened and hurt as the girl was, there was not even the slightest hint of surrender in those eyes. Eyes as deep and green as the waters that surrounded this grand hall.
She did not plan to die. Who did?
He would remember the girl for the rest of his days, he knew then. As well as the shame that would come after he pulled the trigger. The reticule settled between the girl’s eyes. A clean kill. A mercy that ‘Ontom did not deserve himself.
But before he could complete the wretched act, the ground beneath his feet rumbled, throwing his aim into disarray. Arianne stumbled, and nearly fell flat on her face. Dregs of energy faded from the tip of the sceptre, and ‘Ontom had no idea what had happened– until one of the pillars supporting the grand hall buckled under its own monumental weight, and collapsed in two separate chunks, between the two former teammates. The quaking that followed threatened to topple even ‘Ontom himself.
“What madness is this?!” ‘Ontom exclaimed, steadying himself. With the cloud of debris between himself and Arianne, a clean shot was no longer possible. Had this been part of the girl’s intentions?
Arianne chuckled weakly. Something splashed against ‘Ontom’s helmet, and he looked up to find that the ocean was slipping through the small cracks in the high ceiling above. One droplet at a time.
“If I’m gonna die anyway,” She rasped, fighting through the pain of her fractured ribs with nothing but pure spite. “Then I’m taking you with me, asshole!”
‘Ontom pupils widened. She was going to bring this entire grand hall down on their heads.
The Sangheili’s powerful legs propelled ‘Ontom forward into a sprint, all concern for stealth fading from his mind at the reveal of Arianne’s true intentions. The camouflage failed to compensate, and peeled away entirely. No matter. He had to stop her quickly, or the two combatants and the grand hall both would be sentenced to watery grave. And ‘Ontom had no plans of dying here.
He crossed the distance from where he had stood to where the largest fragment of debris lay after only a few strides. The stone chunk was about as large as a Wraith tank, forcing ‘Ontom to leap up and over the obstacle.
An energy bolt, courtesy of Arianne, was waiting for him.
Had ‘Ontom not tucked and rolled away to the side at the last moment, he would have been vaporized like the stone chunk behind him, which blew apart and pelted his armor and shielding with superheated fragments of rock. Arianne was charging another shot by the time the Sangheili scrambled to his feet, and might have ended him then and there if ‘Ontom had not been quicker on the draw.
The high caliber round buried itself in the girl’s shoulder, and she cried out in pain. Yet she did not drop the sceptre. Energy continued to coalesce at the tip, but the light paled in comparison to the fury in Arianne’s eyes.
Before she could find the strength to adjust her aim back on the Sangheili, ‘Ontom was upon her. His free hand clasped around her small neck, and he hefted her up into the air as if she weighed nothing at all, his pistol forgotten.
“Enough!” ‘Ontom roared in her face.
Arianne clawed uselessly at his iron grip with her free hand. The jade fire in her eyes was still there
“You have fought hard, Arianne.” He said, his voice wavering. “But enough. This ends. Now.”
It wasn’t supposed to be like this. He didn’t want to hurt her. Not anymore than he had to. He didn’t want to see the hatred and the anger and the betrayal in those eyes.
But this wasn’t about him.
Arianne began to chuckle again, so pained and struggled that ‘Ontom thought the girl was just gasping for air. Until he saw a shaft of light peek out from below.
The sceptre. It was still charging. ‘Ontom did not know what Arianne had done, but light was seeping out of newly formed cracks that ran along the sceptre’s length. Even through his armor and shielding, he felt the heat rising from within the strange weapon and could only imagine how scorching it must have felt in the girl’s hand. How could Arianne, through everything, still bear that agony?
“Fuck. You.” She eked out, before the light of the sceptre became too much for the ancient metal casing to hold back.
What engulfed Is ‘Ontom was the true extent of Arianne’s resolve. And it burned.
31: Beginning of the End[]
A cloud of thick debris burst through the doorway as the metal segments of the entrance slid aside. In an instant, Ragna Aasen’s eyes were caked with dust, and she felt an overwhelming tickle in the back of her throat as the particles forced their way down into her lungs. Overcome by the need to cough, she doubled over, hacking away as the cloud finally cleared.
This could be a trap, she realized, and rolled over to the right, out of the doorway. Despite her suspicions of the dust cloud being some sort of cover for an ambush, no gunfire rang out, and no clangs on the metal floor signaled impending footsteps. As the dust settled to the floor she tentatively rose, beating her chest to belch out the last of it from her lungs.
While it didn’t seem to be a trap now in hindsight, Ragna doubted that the debris was simply a gimmick of the Spire. It had to be the aftermath of a fight, and for all she knew one or more of the combatants could still live. Cautiously, she peeked around the door, instinctively reaching down for a weapon, only to remember she had none. That Orion hag had cost her every damn gun she stockpiled over the course of the season, and she wasn’t even back to square one - she was in the negatives at this point!
The door Ragna peered through gave way to a massive chamber, even larger than the Sanctum with the Guardian Sentinel. This one stretched on for hundreds of meters, with vast pillars and Forerunner statues dotting the floor like the headstones of a mass graveyard. Closer to the center of the vast area were collections of floating platforms, centripetally rotating in circular layers, with every other one moving clockwise while the layers in between moved opposite of them.
Their center? A massive blue energy beam, likely a gravity lift if Ragna’s time aboard the Soul Ascension had taught her anything. But that could be investigated later; the real point of interest was right in front of the Cyclops jockey. A massive pile of debris, composed of chunks of Forerunner obelisks and statues, lay in front of her, smoke and steam still rising from the smoldering remains.
Ragna scanned the perimeter once more to check if the perpetrator was still around, and satisfied that she was alone, passed through the doorway, approaching the wreckage. If the Announcer decides to cut me some more slack, there might even be some salvageable gear in there…
Ragna had no idea why the Announcer had given her mercy with the portal, and as much as she despised him, she was at least a little grateful that he hadn’t been bloodthirsty enough to simply let her plummet to her demise. No, don’t be grateful to that bastard for anything. He’s the reason you’re here in the first place. He’s the one who’s been putting you through all this!
Pushing the thoughts of the enigmatic game master out of her mind, she knelt down upon reaching the debris, examining the burnt alloy of destroyed Forerunner metal. It didn’t take an Unggoy to know that it would still be hot to the touch, so Ragna settled for prodding aside the wreckage with her combat boots. No sooner had she started digging through the massive heap than something distinctly organic was uncovered from the metal scraps.
It was a hand, burnt and scarred from whatever had created this mess. Ragna counted to the five fingers and immediately knew it was another human. Working faster, she vigorously kicked away clumps of metal until she had excavated the entire body from the debris. It was a human alright, but the features had been mangled and desecrated beyond recognition. Judging from the smaller size and lack of Mjolnir, she predicted that whoever this person was wasn’t a Spartan.
The entirety of the human’s skin was inflicted with burns of all degrees, and where there might once have been hair was only skin, implying that the force unleashed in this Grand Hall of sorts had burnt it all away. Hell, the jockey couldn’t even tell if the corpse belonged to a man or a woman. It was a gruesome sight, but Ragna had seen just as bad, if not worse in her time with the Kru’desh, and even before, under Redmond Venter.
On the cadaver’s waist was a holster with something in it, and Ragna’s hopes spiked, if only a little. She bent down, grabbing a hold of a promising metal grip in the holster that was still warm to the touch.
“Sorry, whoever you were,” she said to the body as she wriggled the sidearm out of its pouch. “This’ll do me a lot more good than it will you.”
Alas, her prays for more favor from the Announcer fell on deaf ears. Not visible from inside the holster, it was now clear to see that the machine pistol the corpse held had been bent and warped by the explosion. Not even the corpse would give her anything of use.
“Well fuck me, you can keep it,” Ragna scoffed, tossing the mangled firearm back onto the corpse.
She resumed kicking metal away from the pile, grumbling at her rotten luck. After a few more minutes of searching, she saw another trigger guard gleaming beneath the burnt metal chunks.
“Let’s try this again.”
Ragna used her boot to sift away at the area until her prize was fully unearthed, revealing a Gunfighter Magnum, dented in a few places but seemingly undamaged for the most part. She would’ve said bingo if it weren’t for the fact that there was another hand in the guard, fingered clenched in a death grip around the pistol.
One, two, three, four - that’s a Sangheili hand.
At least Ragna knew who the other combatant was. A human and a Sangheili duked it out here shortly before she arrived, and some sort of explosion caused by one of them - advertently or inadvertently - killed them both. And now I’m here to loot the scraps, like a vulture.
Not that being a vulture bothered Ragna much - she had filled the role many times, and knew that it was better more often than not to be the one who lived to fight another day than the one who went out in a purported blaze of glory. She grabbed the Magnum and pulled with some effort, eventually wrenching it free from the hand of the Sangheili. It had some heft - that was good, it meant the magazine still had most of its ammo left.
“Well, you’re much more helpful than the other one back there,” Ragna thanked the corpse, dusting off her new sidearm. “Now let’s see where the rest of your mags are-”
Ragna could’ve sworn she’d seen the hand twitch. Impossible, this Sangheili’s been hit by an explosion and buried under several hundred pounds of rubble. There’s no way he could’ve-
Another twitch. Ragna stepped back, checking the Magnum she had just looted off the supposed corpse to make sure it was ready to fire. The hand clenched into a fist, and she heard a muffled groan from beneath the debris. Damn it.
Ragna couldn’t stay close - the rubble inadvertently acted as a shield against any shots from her pistol, and even then she didn’t know where the Sangheili’s head was, and had nowhere near enough ammunition to spray and pray. Melee wasn’t an option either - Unlike her encounters against the spook and the Orion, where she could still hold her own, she knew a punch wouldn’t even make a Sangheili flinch. Her best shot was to find cover, wait for the Sangheili to emerge, and mow him down with sustained fire.
Ragna slipped behind the nearest undamaged monolith, sliding the magazine out of her Magnum to check the number of bullets left. The top of the cartridge had some space, so one bullet and one bullet only had been fired. That left her with eleven shots left. Let’s hope that Sangheili has some weak shields.
“Ragh!” a deep voice boomed from the other side of the monolith. Ragna heard rubble being pushed aside, followed by labored breathing and footsteps, followed by a snort of disgust.
“I am truly sorry, Arianne. I had only tried to end it quickly, but your stubborn demeanor made your death all the more painful.”
More huffing as Ragna slid the magazine back into her firearm, then: “Wait… You should’ve been buried, as I was-”
Ragna didn’t risk waiting any longer. She rounded the corner of the monolith, coming face to face with a Sangheili wearing a black-burnt infiltration harness. While useful for stealth, Ragna knew from conversations with Kru’deshi Sangheili that its shields were light.
Eleven shots rang out through the Grand Hall. Ragna stood there, panting. The Elite stood across from her, looking down at the slight shimmer in his stronger-than-purported shields.
“I thought you were weaker…” Ragna whispered, realizing that she had spent the gun’s entire magazine for nothing.
The Sangheili sighed, jumping off of the mound of metal to land on the hard floor. “You know how this ends, human.”
Ragna chucked the pistol at him and turned tail, sprinting away as fast as she could. Her target: the gravity lift at the center of the room. It was her only escape now. Regardless, the attempt was futile. In mere moments, she felt a massive, meaty hand wrap around the back of her neck, lifting her from the ground as her legs still kicked back and forth.
In an instant, she was slammed to the ground, and her lungs flattened tightly as the air escaped from her lips. The hand forcefully rolled her over onto her back before grabbing her throat, raising her again. The emotionless helm of the Sangheili leered at her while holding her above the ground, but his voice betrayed weariness.
“You damned fool, you had to fire the whole magazine, didn’t you?” he berated her like a father would berate their child for breaking a vase. “I could have made it quick and painless, like I hoped to do with Arianne back there, but you decided to waste the rest of my ammunition on me. Now the quickest way to go will be far more painful, thanks to you.”
“I suppose the Announcer would want my final kill to be as brutal as possible to give his game a most bombastic end…” The Elite mused, not even reacting to Ragna’s fists beating on his arm in an attempt to make him drop her.
“But I would never wish to satisfy him,” the Sangheili continued, “no, I will make your death as painless as I can. Perhaps a bit for your sake, but also to spit at the feet of this bloodthirsty being… So then, human. How do you wish to die? I will grant you that request before cementing my victory.”
Ragna’s eyes widened. “H-”
“What?” The Elite asked, loosening his grip on her throat just enough for her to speak clearly.
“Hun-”
“Speak up!” The burly alien roared, his placable tone giving way to frustration as Ragna attempted to spit the word out.
“Hunter!”
“Hunter?” Ragna’s captor asked incredulously. “I do not understand-”
Boom!
Ragna’s ears started ringing, and her vision went white. She felt the fingers around her throat release her, then felt the hard thud of the alloy floor as she landed on it. She scrambled around blindly, rapidly blinking in an attempt to get her vision back. As things cleared up, she looked up to see a towering form standing perhaps ten meters away from her and the Sangheili. It was just as she said; a Mgalekgolo; a Hunter.
“Final targets acquired,” it declared in a monotone voice, slowly stomping forward with an arm cannon of human origin raised. “New directive from Bulwark-Memento; no more running; no more hiding.”
Ragna fell back onto her elbows and crawled back as the Mgalekgolo swiveled its turret around to point at her. She hastily got to her feet and dove behind the nearest pillar as a torrent of bullets bounced off the Forerunner alloy where she had been standing a mere moment prior. A loud shuffle alerted her to a sound from her left, and she turned to see the Sangheili shimmying close to her behind the barrier, his shields still depleted from the Hunter’s blast.
“Take comfort in the fact that I did not wish to kill you in earnest,” the Elite said quickly. “Keeping you alive is a far better gamble for us both with this behemoth terrorizing us.”
If she still had a weapon, Ragna would’ve shot the hingehead on the spot. “You nearly strangled me fifteen seconds ago!”
“Times change, do they not?” The Sangheili clicked his mandibles beneath his intrusion helmet. “The gravity lift in the center of the chamber is our best hope for survival. I will not impede your attempts to reach it this time, so long as you do not impede mine.”
Ragna didn’t need to hear anymore. The Elite’s promise to leave her alone was all she needed - even if he was likely to break that promise. The Cyclops jockey dashed out from cover, running between pillars as gunfire erupted behind her from Bulwark.
“Directive reiterated; no more running. Refusal to comply will see lethal force elevated to hyper-lethal force.”
Ragna didn’t have the time nor breath to shoot back an insult. As she weaved through the pillars, attempting to throw the Mgalekgolo off of her, she heard the heavy bounds of her would-be Sangheili killer. She chanced a look back and saw him further back on her right, making a diagonal beeline towards her. At this rate, in several seconds he would catch up.
He won’t kill me, but if he gets ahead he’s sure as hell leaving me for dead. I gotta make sure that doesn’t happen.
Getting closer to the rings of floating platforms around the gravity lift, Ragna realized that the Elite’s trajectory would intersect with her own soon enough. It was here that she made her move. As the musclebound alien warrior approached her line, she dipped down into a slide, keeping her boots pushed forward as she slid across the pristine metal floor. Her timing was impeccable, and the Sangheili arrived just in time to plant his foot down next to her boots, scraping his toes along their lining as he raised his foot. The sheer weight of a several-hundred-pound alien’s foot kicking into her own elicited a sickening snap from somewhere inside Ragna’s foot, but her gambit worked.
The Sangheili lurched forward, caught off balance by the sudden act, and with too much momentum to regain his composure, barreled over her, crashing in a heap next to a statue. Ragna pressed on, bounding to her feet even as a sharp pressure poked through her right foot. Had it not been for the rush of adrenaline coursing through her, the effects of such an injury would have impeded her far more. I’ve survived worse before, even in these past twenty four hours.
Pushing forward, fueled by a desire not to win, but merely to survive, Ragna hobbled along on her injured foot, still maintaining a relatively fast pace as she heard the guttural cries of the Sangheili grow more distant behind her. She passed beneath the floating platforms, arriving at the gravity lift. She didn’t risk looking back this time, and immediately stumbled into the weightless embrace of the device.
As she floated upwards, Ragna’s stomach churned just a bit, but her service aboard the Soul Ascension had tempered her to this experience. Ragna rose, ascending out of the desecrated Grand Hall, ascending out of the monolithic Spire, ascending out of the wartorn Cosmopolis, ascending out of the sea that had sunk Mors Insula. She continued to rise for minutes, speeding past ocean fauna around the gravity lift as she neared the top.
At long last Ragna emerged, not only from the lift, but the subaqueous death city she had been trapped in for hours. Her ascension slowed to a halt, and she was gently set down in the middle of a new structure, one with no roof of metal or hardlight, but simply thick congregations of storm clouds. Ragna hobbled off the lift platform, taking in her new surroundings. This foreign location was yet again Forerunner in nature, but looked nothing like any she had seen before. If anything, this new area she found herself in resembled a coliseum more than anything.
A vast circle stretched outwards, encased by a towering wall with rows and rows of empty seats atop it. Ragna suppressed the urge to scream. She had traded one cage for another - a walled city for a literal arena. She nearly let the urge to end it all take her.
But she wouldn’t. Ragna Aasen had been through too much to simply give up. No, she had made it to the final ten - three, if the two aliens were her last opponents - and had been the first to step into this final arena. This stupid game was nothing compared to the hardships she had endured. Talitsa, Archangel’s Rest, those had been true wars. This was nothing but a victory lap compared to them. Regardless of whether her last two foes outclassed and outsized her, she would go out with a bang.
“I’m not going down without a fight, dammit.”
Ragna turned to survey the arena before her. While it was relatively open, there were scant amounts of cover, as well as numerous weapon pods holding firearms of Forerunner design. Ragna almost decided that they would do fine, before noticing something far more appealing, far more shocking next to the far wall.
“Well, if it isn’t the old boy back from the grave…”
* * *
“Conniving human!” Is ‘Ontom shouted to no one in particular as he ran. He had killed one human girl only to be saddled with another. After tripping him, the human had left him behind at Bulwark’s mercy. He couldn’t even blame her, considering how he had been on the cusp of snapping her neck mere minutes beforehand.
If it weren’t for the General-grade strength of his shields, the sustained gunfire from the behemoth chasing him would have razed him by now. It was through these same shields that he first survived Arianne’s suicidal attempt to crush him, then resisted the gunfire this new human had sprayed him with. He would have used active camouflage to outwit his foe, but his generator had been damaged in the blast, leaving him with a limited battery capacity remaining.
“Continued evasion will be met with increased hostility until your armor is but glass,” the Bulwark rumbled in the human tongue. ‘Ontom snarled, grabbing onto a pillar before bounding up onto the lowest and furthest of the platforms circling the gravity lift. With his elevated position, the Mgalekgolo would have to arc its grenades, and its kinetic fire would never penetrate the underside of the solid alloy blocks.
‘Ontom leaped from platform to platform, gradually ascending as he neared the gravity lift. As quickly as he rose, he soon fell, as an explosion rocked the platform beneath him, causing the Sangheili to plummet to the floor of the Grand Hall. His damaged shields took the brunt of the impact, bursting on collision, but his momentum caused him to messily bounce forward, sliding to a halt in the gravity lift.
That bond-brother is quite accurate with its arcs… ‘Ontom conceded as his body rose upward. To his chagrin, he could see the Mgalekgolo closing the distance before it went out of sight, and the Sangheili rapidly zoomed upwards, escaping the wretched Spire for good.
As his shields recharged, ‘Ontom gathered his thoughts. He was unarmed against a warrior several times his size outfitted with heavy weaponry. If wherever he was heading held weapons, it would likely be the Announcer’s doing. After all, it was perfectly in character for the ostentatious entity to “spice up” fights, as the human term went. In this time, he ironically had to rely on the Announcer’s whims to fight rather than fight in spite of them.
‘Ontom finally reached the top, being deposited onto a floor not unlike that of the Grand Hall below. Before he could gather his bearings though, a massive clang signaled his demise behind him. The Sangheili turned around to find himself face-to-barrel with the human-designed hybrid cannon of the Mgalekgolo who had pursued him.
“Target locked; victory certain,” Bulwark uttered coldly.
“Lock this, you can of worms!” a voice cried out over a speaker.
In an instant, a titanic green form, larger than even that of the Mgalekgolo, barreled into Is ‘Ontom’s line of sight. Shoulder raised in a charge, the massive figure slammed into the bond-brother, causing the once-stoic gestalt to squeal in surprise as it was knocked off its feet.
‘Ontom cautiously stepped back, engaging what little remained of his active camouflage charge to slink into the shadows as the Mgalekgolo slid across the floor, eventually grinding to a halt. Its assailant, a massive Cyclops mech, stood tall and defiant, chassis gleaming as rain droplets began to pound on it from the storm clouds above. Ragna Aasen stood defiant, her second skin reclaimed for one more fight.
Bulwark-Memento rose to its feet, arching into a combat stance as its impenetrable shield raised into a defensive position. As it looked back and forth across the arena and Ragna’s Cyclops, it analyzed the situation, and for the first time, hesitation creeped into its otherwise emotionless voice.
“Target updated; victory… Uncertain.”
The rain began to pour down harder. As the storm intensified, the final three survivors of the deathmatch closed in on their final moments. The finale had approached.
32: Clash of Titans[]
Rain droplets fell from the dark skies above, hurtling towards the alloyed arena floor of the Coliseum. In an instant, hundreds of those water drops were swept away from their current trajectory as a massive, large-caliber shell intercepted them. No sooner had it cut a swath through the rainfall than the round slam into the titanium shield of an alien behemoth, only to bounce off, making the most unremarkable of dents as its mark on the world.
Ragna fired three more times. While each autocannon round did little to damage Bulwark-Memento, she could see the Hunter visibly flinching from the force. Ragna continued firing, but her foe squatted down to lower its center of gravity, compressing the distribution of its mass and allowing it to better endure her onslaught. Lightning struck, and Ragna spotted a glint of black peeking out around the shield.
A massive whirlwind of bullets slapped against the chassis of her Cyclops, but Ragna’s old boy held firm. The projectiles weren’t anywhere near large enough to do any meaningful damage to her mech, but Ragna still remembered the flash of white from down below. She couldn’t risk taking a hit from one of Bulwark’s grenades.
Sure enough, a puff of smoke from above the shield confirmed her suspicion, and Ragna spun to the left, narrowly avoiding the scathing explosion that followed.
“Plug your grenade launcher and fire again!” Ragna shouted through her speakers, pushing the throttle. The old boy sprinted on a beeline for Bulwark, autocannon raised and firing more rounds. The Mgalekgolo growled, forced to lower its cannon as it readjusted to the proper angle. As the Cyclops neared, Ragna stopped firing, instead choosing to raise the walker’s arms high. As she reached her opponent, she swung the mech’s mechanical arms down on the Hunter.
Metal squealed and splintered as Bulwark maneuvered its shield upward to block the blow. The gestalt slid back on the wet floor, but it refused to let Ragna gain any more ground. With a mighty heave, the Hunter surged forward, throwing the Cyclops off of it. Ragna righted her mech as naturally as she would right her own body, regaining balance immediately.
“Aggression will be met with increased force; escalation required,” Bulwark clicked.
Ragna gritted her teeth. While her old boy was by far the taller of the two behemoths, giving it longer reach, she knew that Mgalekgolo were incredibly dense, even without the armor. Bulwark didn’t have the same reach as her, but it made up for it with heavyweight punches and a sturdier guard.
The Cyclops took a tentative step back. It was all Bulwark needed to push the attack. It threw a sideswipe with lightning speed, hitting the mech in an instant. Ragna bit her tongue as her chassis stumbled backwards, but she ignored the pain, bringing up a metal hand to grab Bulwark’s shield as it attempted to strike her again.
The Mgalekgolo didn’t play around this time, raising its machinegun-grenade launcher hybrid in the perfect firing position at her cockpit. Ragna’s response was just as swift. Her mech twirled around to the right, putting Bulwark’s own shield between her and its gun. Refusing to let the Mgalekgolo respond, she quickly slapped her left hand down on its shield as well, pushing back as the colony creature shook its arm in an attempt to wrestle free from her grip. The Cyclops released the shield with its right hand, keeping the left firmly in place, and aimed her wrist-mounted autocannon straight at the Hunter’s head.
No dry response came from Bulwark this time. It squealed in surprise before ducking down behind its shield, making it impossible for Ragna to fire. However, her arm still had the reach to do something else…
“Oh no you don’t,” Ragna hissed, reaching over Bulwark’s shield and grabbing its titanium head. She pulled upwards, bringing the faceless mask of the Hunter back into view. She continued to tug, taking satisfaction as several worms popped free of the gestalt’s neck. She kept pulling, and Bulwark vocalized its displeasure.
“Cease.”
Ragna kept pulling.
“Order repeated; cease.”
Despite the plea… Ragna kept pulling.
“Excessive… Force… Authorized…”
Victory was snatched away from her clutches as she noticed a slight shift in Bulwark’s right arm. A moment later, an explosion at their feet forced Ragna back, and she released her hold on the Hunter. Bulwark growled as smoldering worms were forced out of its legs by those still intact, but the Hunter had saved itself just in time.
Ragna looked at the burnt toes of her Cyclops's feet and grimaced. “Alright, I’ll give you that one.”
* * *
Is ‘Ontom slinked in the shadows of the coliseum, unnoticed by the two titans as they clashed. His active camouflage served him well; the rain was heavy enough that the shimmers from the droplets landing on his shields were easily masked by the sheer downpour. He had spent his time prowling the arena, inspecting Forerunner weapon pods while his two opponents fought tooth and nail, oblivious to his intrepidations.
The Sangheili had collected a sizable assortment of gear at this point. A grenade, a pulse rifle, and a heavy sniper weapon. He cradled the latter in his arms, noting its extreme length, even for his large grip. A scope floated above the weapon; its orange glow would doubtlessly make him conspicuous if he hadn’t covered it with his hand.
‘Ontom looked back to his foes, Ragna Aasen and Bulwark-Memento. He had half a mind to let them tear each other to shreds and swoop in to pick off the remains. In fact, he had a full mind to do so. There was no point risking his life against opponents that outclassed him so severely!
Crack!
A lightning bolt pierced the sky, striking the ground only a meter away from ‘Ontom’s position. Sparks of electricity scattered through the water droplets on the alloy before fizzling out, and ‘Ontom glanced up at the sky. It was a clear sign.
“Fine then, Announcer. I suppose your finale would be robbed of its climax if I were to do the sensible thing, hm?”
The only response was a roar from Bulwark as Ragna’s Cyclops landed a well-placed uppercut to its helmet. ‘Ontom sighed. The next bolt would surely strike him if he did not intervene.
“Let us see what developments these two have made.”
‘Ontom cautiously approached the fighters, his pace slow, but not so slow that it would seem like he was dawdling. The Mgalekgolo threw its shield forward to bash the Cyclops, but the mech wrapped its arms around the shield to soften the blow. Taking one hand off, the walker grabbed the gestalt by its “throat,” stepping forward to shove the Mgalekgolo onto its back.
Bulwark’s worms screamed in unison as the spikes on its back were crushed beneath its weight, and its attempts at retaliation were thwarted as Ragna planted her Cyclops’s steel foot on its right arm, pinning its cannon to the ground.
‘Ontom knew that Ragna’s Cyclops was in good enough condition to eviscerate him if she killed Bulwark here and now. Intervention was required, and he would deliver it.
Not knowing how strong his sniper rifle was, ‘Ontom hefted it regardless, deactivating his camouflage to quickly fire off a bolt of hardlight. It pierced straight through the titanium thigh of the Cyclops, pushing Ragna back off of Bulwark. ‘Ontom paused, taken aback by the sheer impact of the weapon, then shrugged it off. Forerunner weapons were always immensely powerful. He took more careful aim this time, illuminating his target with a red laser. He landed it straight on Ragna’s torso through the cockpit windshield, but she evidently saw it too.
He fired the other shot in the cartridge, but Ragna pivoted at the last moment, causing it to shred through the side of the Cyclops’s chassis. ‘Ontom wrenched the scope forward, fiddling with a new magazine as he reengaged his camouflage.
“You split-lipped cowardly son-of-a-bitch!” Ragna roared through her speakers, aiming her auto cannon straight at ‘Ontom.
The Sangheili threw his rifle to the ground, sprinting away as the first round fired. It split his firearm in half, and the impact threw him off balance, causing his shields to shimmer for a mere fraction of a second. But that was all it took for Ragna to relocate him.
“Not so big anymore, huh?” The girl said as she stomped towards him, continuing to fire.
‘Ontom realized that she was cornering him and went into fight mode. He took hold of the mysterious grenade he had scavenged, turning to sprint towards her. If he could close the distance, he would be able to throw it-
Another round hit him dead-on, shattering his shields. ‘Ontom wheezed from the impact, losing all momentum. He desperately fought to stay on his feet, trying not to fall over. The dazed Sangheili heard heavy footsteps and turned to see the Cyclops looming over him, a look of grim determination plastered on the face of its jockey. ‘Ontom raised his grenade.
A giant, green hand came from his right, palm open and fingers outstretched. It slammed into ‘Ontom with unspeakable force, and a hundred bones broke simultaneously. His spine snapped, as did his neck, and he went flying several meters to the left. His death was instantaneous. But the time his corpse spent in the air seemed like an eternity to Ragna Aasen.
She watched from her cockpit as the Sangheili corpse finally hit the ground, sliding for several more meters across the wet arena floor. But the job wasn’t finished yet. Ragna had one more opponent, who was all too eager to remind her of that fact.
Another explosion rocked the Cyclops, causing the old boy to collapse on its back. Analyzing the feed on her cockpit’s HUD, she deduced that her mech’s entire left leg had been blown clean off by none other than one of Bulwark’s grenades. Ragna cursed herself for letting vengeance get the better of her. She had neglected to finish off the Hunter before moving on to the Elite, and now she might pay with her life for it.
Ragna raised her autocannon, only for Bulwark to grab it, wrenching the turret off in a single motion. It immediately fired its machinegun, not at her windshield, but at the joints in her Cyclops. Diagnostics read all limbs as dysfunctional, and the Hunter grabbed on her remaining leg, tearing it off.
“Combat problem detected, solution: dismemberment.”
Ragna cursed under her breath, undoing the straps on her belt as the Hunter proceeded to her right arm, methodically grabbing it before pulling. It was playing with its goddamn food. But Ragna refused to be the metaphorical meal of a Hunter. Not while she could still stand on her own two feet.
The jockey slammed the release button on her controls, causing the cockpit shield to burst open. She scrambled out of the husk of her old boy, sliding down the wet chassis to the ground. She heard a crash from behind, followed by near-silence. Only the heavy rain made any noise as the Hunter had gone quiet.
Ragna peaked around the corner of the dead walker, recoiling as a massive boot planted itself in view. She quickly edged in the opposite direction, hearing a low rumble emit from Bulwark as it searched for her.
“Give yourself up. Resistance is futile.”
Ragna pursed her lips, silently slipping behind the Cyclops’s sole remaining arm as another boot came down. She gradually went around the torn-off legs, finding herself on the side of the Cyclops facing Is ‘Ontom’s corpse. She suddenly remembered the grenade he held when she had killed him.
The grenade didn’t go off… It’s still inert. If I can make it to him, I can use it.
Ragna heard the footsteps stop and took a quiet, shallow breath. She planted her hands and feet on the ground in a running position, waiting for the inevitable Hunter to come around the corner. But what happened instead was not what she expected.
She heard metal grind against metal and turned to look back over her shoulder. The Cyclops had moved a tiny bit. Then, another shift. Ragna fought to keep her breathing steady. She had fought plenty of enemies before this, but those larger than her had always been engaged from behind the safety of her cockpit. This Hunter was something else entirely.
The grinding stopped too.
Ragna didn’t know what to expect now.
Another low rumble. A clap of thunder. Then…
The entire Cyclops was pulled aside at once. Ragna gasped as Bulwark hurled it to the side with its shield hand, its dark, imposing form illuminated by a flash of lightning.
“Die.”
Ragna sprang forward, making a dead sprint over to ‘Ontom’s body. She broke into a slide, snatching the grenade from the dead Sangheili’s open hand as the rainwater carried her past. She dug her elbows down, forcing herself to stop. From the quick glimpse she had gotten, she knew that ‘Ontom possessed a Pulse Grenade. That was good, since she didn’t need to place it well to kill a creature of Bulwark’s size.
The Mgalekgolo roared triumphantly charging towards Ragna. It made no move to shoot her, rather charging at her with its shield at the ready to squash her body like a bug. But she wouldn’t let it do that, not without a whole lot of pain.
Ragna yelled in defiance, hurling the Pulse Grenade at her final opponent. It made contact with Bulwark’s shield, then, as expected, rapidly expanded, creating a massive ball of orange energy that began to encapsulate the Hunter’s body.
“Inconcievable-” the gestalt let out before its translator was disintegrated by the surge of energy. The worms within the titanic body shrieked as they burned away, and the Hunter stumbled back, trying to escape the deadly fate Ragna had thrusted upon it, only to be consumed by the orb of light. The energy evaporated, and the steaming remains of Bulwark’s impenetrable armor clattered to the ground, now void of any invertebrates to animate them.
Ragna stood there. The rain began to subside, but she paid it no heed. She turned to Is ‘Ontom’s mangled corpse and silently thanked the bastard for his final favor. The Cyclops jockey then trudged over to the charred armor segments of Bulwark ‘Memento. She kicked the still steaming shield with her combat boot, then spit on it.
“I won.”
It felt impossible to hear those words. But she had done it. Ragna Aasen had entered a deathmatch against ninety-one other competitors against her will and somehow came out on top. There really was a light at the end of the tunnel. And speaking of the light, Ragna had to raise a hand to shield her eyes as god rays split the clouds. The storm parted unnaturally fast, replaced by the clear sky that she was first greeted with when she arrived on Mors Insula.
Her thoughts shifted to her teammates - not of regret for them - they had been murdered early on, forcing her to face impossible odds and outwit the most dangerous of foes as a lone wolf. Hell, the only one she might’ve had any sympathy for was Caroline Danton. Leon Sikowsky and Kaurava were better off dead.
A number came to her head. Nine. Nine kills. A whole ten percent of the competition had been brought down by her alone. The man who had chased her into the Innie base, followed by the Spartan-III. Then the oonskie squad that had destroyed her old boy the first time with their Scorpion. Then the old lady - a damned good fighter, Ragna would give her that. And finally the two here. A Sangheili and a Mgalekgolo, dead by her hands. Not that she hadn’t killed them before, but the weight of accomplishment felt far more… significant.
Ragna looked up to the sky, her eyes narrowing. “Well, Announcer? I fucking did it. I played your little game and I won. What more would you have your grand champion do?”
A flicker of movement in the corner of her vision caught Ragna’s attention. She turned around, but saw nothing. Another movement, lower down. She glanced at Bulwark’s remains, still churning out steam. Just paranoia. Just an illusion on the eyes-
Something shot out from one of the dead gestalt’s empty boots. A singular worm ensnared Ragna, latching onto her with a vice grip. She grabbed it immediately, pulling with all her might to wrench it off. Despite its diminutive size, the worm stayed on. Wrapping around her throat, it tightened its grip, squeezing her esophagus.
Ragna coughed, punching the worm to no avail. She tried to dig her fingers under it, but it only coiled further in response. It began to constrict in time with her blood flow, and in time Ragna soon fell to her knees. The worm continued to hold firm, refusing to budge. The blonde woman put her hands on the ground to prevent herself from falling forward, gurgling in desperation as it became harder and harder to breathe.
Inevitably, she collapsed. Not long after, her diminutive struggles ceased, and Ragna Aasen’s body went still. Only then did the worm uncoil itself, slithering back to the burnt armor that had served as the shell for the rest of its colony-mates.
While Bulwark-Memento had indeed ceased to exist as a colony, a single worm in its boot had been spared the fate of disintegration. And it still knew its objective well. Bulwark had been ordered to win. To emerge victorious.
And victorious the worm was.
Epilogue[]
The lone worm slithered across the wet floor of the Coliseum. Robbed of its colony-mates, the serpentine creature wandered aimlessly. It had only left a few meters away from its victim when a golden beam shot down from the sky, enveloping the Lekgolo in radiant energy. A moment later, the energy dissipated, and left standing in the worm’s place was a massive gestalt being adorned in honeycombed black armor.
“Colony restored,” Bulwark-Memento articulated through a fresh new translator. “Method; unknown.”
“Some things are best left obscure,” a familiar voice boomed from the sky, “in the meantime, let us read off the list of finalists!”
“Objection-” Bulwark began, only for its translator to go silent against its will.
“My oh my, what a finale that was! Everything was present, folks, from climactic confrontations on a personal level to epic battles between literal colossi! Pardon me if you disagree, but that may have been our biggest set of final matchups to date! And for sure our largest completed season! But before I get ahead of myself, it’s finalist time!”
“Just barely making it into the top ten, we have Bailey-132! This Spartan became an unstoppable force after learning of his late wife’s murder by Delvin-A125, but despite his success against man and statue in the Hall of the Unfit, he just wasn’t cut out to avenge his lady. He did know how to put up a show, though! I’ve never been so happy to answer a competitor’s request to make things ‘mano a mano!’”
“Next up, we have Alexander Redford. This sly ONI agent managed to slink his way into the top ten without even getting a kill. The man’s track record remained the same when our grand champion used its signature move of turning its victims into red paint.”
“Erin-G174 died a second time shortly after. For all the knowledge and skills she had over her younger self, it seems she didn’t gain a healthy dose of paranoia. You walked right into that one, hun.”
“While that Spartan was easily victimized by the veteran variant of Erin Coney, her next kill had to be worked for. Rtanis ‘Daelahm proved to be a much more difficult foe, and if he hadn’t let Sangheili honor drag him down, Miss Coney would be a bisected mess in the water right now! Alas, we’re in the realm of reality, not theoreticals - actually, belay that, this is a very theoretical realm - but Rtanis was the one whose blood was in the water this time.”
“Delvin-A125 really struck out as a controversial figure in this game. Many in the audience wanted him to pay for his murder of Addison Solaski, while the zealous warhawks cheered for more. While he successfully murdered a husband and wife, Delvin met an ironic end, being executed by a teenage girl in the exact fashion he executed another teenage girl. Thank you, Miss Doppler.”
“Following that, we reach the end of the Erin dynasty. The last woman to hold that godforsaken name, the elder Erin Coney, finally met her match against the craftiness of our runner-up, Ragna Aasen. If anything, this just proved that Ragna didn’t need a mech to take out the competition.”
“Arianne came back, if only briefly, only to find herself in combat with her former teammate, Is ‘Ontom. The Sangheili tried to put her down peacefully, but the girl insisted on going out with a bang, even if it made her final moments far more painful.”
“Speaking of Is ‘Ontom, the sneaky Sangheili made his way to third, winning the metaphorical bronze before getting bitchslapped into the pavement by Ragna’s old boy. Didn’t help that I had to send a few bolts of lightning his way to get him out of his comfort zone.”
“And finally, stupendous silver! Ragna Aasen proved to be a fan-favorite throughout the season, from her brutal beatdowns with her Cyclops, singlehandedly wiping an entire enemy fireteam, and making it all the way to the grand finale. While not the winner, I would feel guilty not to mention the sheer number of kills she scored along the way. Better luck next time, young lady!”
The disembodied voice paused, and a lightning bolt crashed into the surface of the arena. Standing before Bulwark-Memento was a man in a black suit and tie, its condition pristine in spite of the steam wafting off of it. Behind him were nine pedestals. The first held a golden statue of a Spartan, the fourth a similarly-colored Sangheili, the sixth a police officer, and the eighth a diminutive silver insect.
“That brings us to you,” the man grinned, “congratulations-”
A hundred bullets spun up and fired from Bulwark’s machinegun immediately. They slammed into the Announcer, only to ping and ricochet off his body. The man made no reaction, not even a slight flinch, keeping his cool demeanor.
"You know what, I’ll give you props for that, Bulwark-Memento,” the man chuckled. “This right here is why you won. Past contestants always waited to hear the plan behind the game from their hosts before trying to kill us, but you’re punctual. Straight to the point.”
A grenade impacted his tie, exploding. As the smoke cleared, the Announcer sniggered. “Good thing I brought the indestructible suit. Otherwise I’d be standing here naked.”
“Mastermind identified,” Bulwark clicked, finally able to vocalize again. “Announcer marked for elimination.”
“Hoho, you wish,” the Announcer smirked. “That’s not how this game goes, big guy. I get to have fun watching you all and making slick jokes, while you also get to have fun - just a more violent kind.”
Bulwark lowered its cannon arm, rumbling thoughtfully. “Rules outlined; role understood. One question remains; commander’s intent unclear.”
“You’re asking why we did this?” The Announcer said. “We did this because a lot of people from upstairs wanted entertainment. And that’s my job, so entertain them I did. You were entered alongside your brother Mori because your creator wanted you here. Same as every other competitor.”
“The Office of Naval Intelligence authorized this training exercise?”
“No, no, your real creator. It’s a bit much to get into, so let’s wrap this spiel up. I got a meeting to go to real soon.”
“Logic does not compute…” Bulwark murmured, “new course of action required.”
“Ah, don’t worry about that. You just need to stay still, maybe make a cool pose, and then we’ll turn you into a statue like these other winners, right on that ninth pedestal.”
Bulwark cocked its head to the side. “Confirm; is the statue containment until the next deployment?”
“It may be a very long while until that next deployment, but yeah, sure, why not? It’s definitely containment.”
“Terms deemed… Acceptable. Awaiting return of Bulwark-Mori for containment.”
“Ooh,” the Announcer winced. “Did you not get the memo? Only the winner gets to be put into ‘containment,’ no one else.”
“Mori is a bond-brother. We are one and the same.”
“Not according to the paperwork, it’s not,” the Announcer retorted, manifesting a paper document in his hand and thumbing the fine print. “Your creator submitted you both as separate competitors. That’s just the rules, my big wormy friend.”
Bulwark growled, hunching over with its shield and cannon raised. “Terms no longer deemed acceptable. Prepare for eradication-”
Snap!
The Hunter flickered out of existence. The Announcer turned around to admire his handiwork, stepping over to inspect the hulking gold statue of a Mgalekgolo in a combat stance atop the ninth pedestal. The plaque on the podium read BULWARK-MEMENTO, VICTOR OF SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST, SEASON EIGHT.
“Beautiful, captured the pose just right!”
The Announcer exhaled deeply, satisfied with the final result. After so many years, a season of Survival of the Fittest had finally been finished again. The tables were even, and the biggest season in the history of the deathmatch had finally concluded. The man turned to a seemingly imaginary camera, exposing his pearly whites with a gleeful smile.
“Thank you, adoring fans, for your love and support on another season of Survival of the Fittest. It’s been quite a journey, with some massive changes and colossal bloodflow. I hope you all liked - no, loved the season, and until next time, this is your friendly Announcer! Au revoir!”
Final Stats[]
Kills[]
- Actene (10)
- Ahalosniper & S-D379 & UnggoyZealot (6)
- HyperZergling & Lieutenant Davis & Navisiul97 (5)
Character Kills[]
- Ragna Aasen (8)
- Bulwark-Memento (5)
- Erin Coney (2559) (4)
Kill/Death Ratio[]
- Navisiul97 (5.0)
- Bardo XCIX (3.0)
- Actene (2.5)
Final Statistic[]
Epilogue_Addendum.doc
After a few moments, the Announcer eased his smile and turned back around. The statues were gone, and in their place stood seven hooded figures, their faces concealed by green robes that bore the letters “HF” in gold on the chest.
“You’re here? I thought we were going to meet back in your boardroom.”
“Plans change,” one of the two figures at the front spoke, a golden crown stylized after the Prophet of Truth atop his hood. “Besides, where better to have our meeting than at the place where it all ended? Fucking poetic, if you ask me.”
“I don’t deny that,” the Announcer agreed, “and you’re the boss. At least, one of the bosses. I guess that dual sponsorship plan worked out in the end, didn’t it?”
“Quite well, in fact,” another hooded figure confirmed, an SRS99 sniper rifle cradled in his arms.
“I have to give you all props for making this thing work. From what my statisticians say, this season was by far the longest, and got the biggest number of investors yet! Ninety-two competitors being submitted was no easy feat, let me tell you.”
“We made do,” the crowned figure said, “simply needed drive. Thugged it the hell out.”
“That’s one way to put it,” a third cloaked figure scoffed, his voice interlaced with the faint sound of distant waves crashing against each other.
The Announcer narrowed his eyes. He recognized that voice. Lifting a hand, he made a dramatic gesture towards the new speaker. “I know that voice. You were last season’s sponsor, correct?”
“So the Announcer remembers little old me?” the man questioned sarcastically. “Or did UZ write you to do so?”
“No, I left his memory of previous seasons intact,” the crowned man interjected. “Makes him more dynamic that way.”
“Maybe we don’t discuss the Announcer’s… Health right in front of him?” A fourth figure suggested, the letters “SOTF” emblazoned in silver on his hood.
“I’m the fictional one here,” the Announcer smirked, “like I give a damn about anything other than my job and a good laugh. Say, you’re my predecessor, aren’t you?”
“Say again?”
“I see those letters on your hood. I’ve done my reading, it means you were a host from back when the sponsors ran things more personally.”
“Ah, you’ve done your research,” the cloaked individual nodded. “Yeah, it was a fun gig while it lasted. No energy for it these days, I’m afraid, but that’s why you’re here.”
“Ahem,” the crowned figure cleared his throat. “Back to the topic at hand. Our meeting isn't just to exchange pleasantries and make cool throwback references, as fun as that would be to write. First off, congratulations on a successful job commentating on our glorious deathmatch here. Second, we have something to present to you, and eventually the audience beyond the fourth wall over there.”
“And what would that something be?”
The man with the crown atop his hood snapped his fingers, materializing a gargantuan holostill into existence above the arena. The Announcer craned his neck upwards to get a good look, and nodded in approval.
“Now that is a good cover. Should I get back on air to show it to the audience?”
“Nah,” the hooded sniper said, “It ain’t done yet. The audience will see when it’s finished on the main page. Your part is done for now, but don’t worry. We’ll be seeing you - and everyone else - again in the no-so-distant future. UZ would like to say summer of 2026, but that’s very much subject to change.”
“With that, it’s time for us to dip,” the crowned man concluded. He snapped his fingers again, and the Announcer winked out of existence. One by one, each robed person began to follow suit, until the ringleader was all who remained.
“See ya in Season Nine, Halo Fanon.”