Summary continued: She met their charge with knives, and bullets, and the deadly blade of the Energy Sword she'd taken from the Sangheili that had taken Emile's life.
She was still standing, and she was determined to take as many of these bastards out before succumbing to the same fate as her brethren.
...But it seems that Fate has other plans in store for her...
A/N: Sooo, AU oneshot, because I can, and because I wanted to write something angsty, with a bittersweet ending, and some light shippy-ness to it! ...I was kinda planning for this to be about 3.5K words, but then it just escalated into... this. Still, hope you enjoy!
Also, the song lyrics (bolded and italicized) and fic title were taken from Flames by Sia & David Guetta; singular flashback was written in italics.
In case you were wondering, the language Artemis speaks is Hungarian, her native language and the most commonly-spoken language other than English on her home planet of Reach, and Carter speaks Xhosa, which is his secondary native tongue, and also a common language spoken on his home planet of Biko
It was not the end.
Not yet.
One foot in front of another, babe. One breath leads to another, yeah.
Alone, fighting through a miasma of impending death, the planet a hellscape around her, the skies themselves on fire.
And yet she, the lone wolf, Noble Six, Artemis-B312... she, the demon, fought the Covenant forces continually hurling themselves at her. She met their charge with knives, and bullets, and the deadly blade of the Energy Sword she'd taken from the Sangheili that had taken Emile's life.
Just keep moving. Look within for the strength today; listen for the voice to say: just keep moving.
An overcharged bolt from a plasma pistol hit her, her shields breaking in a heartbeat, and whirled around, howling out her rage. She bore down on the Unggoy that raised its gun to fire again, building up another charge, and punched it in the face so hard that its head caved in.
She heard the roar of a four-jawed Sangheili, before she saw the saurian creature leaping at her, mandibles split wide and Energy Sword raised high above its head, ready to cleave her in two. The Spartan uttered a roar of her own, and drew her own Energy Sword; the blades met crackling and hissing as they collided. Her energy shields might have been drained, and slowly recharging, but she wasn't going to let this deter her. One way or another, the squid-head was going down; it and the rest of its kind – and the other Covies alike – were going to pay for the fallen Spartans.
It was not just Noble Team who had been wiped out.
Exploring the shipyards had told the Lieutenant that she was not the only one who'd attempted to make a final stand, but the unmoving bodies of her comrades showed where they'd failed.
She was still standing, and she was determined to take as many of these bastards out before succumbing to the same fate as her brethren.
Go go go, figure it out, figure it out but don't stop moving. Go go go, figure it out, figure it out: you can do this.
Snarling, the Spartan dug her boots into the dirt, dust swirling around both warriors as they pushed against one another, fighting for ground. The moment one of them gave, it would be over for the other, and their corpse would join those already spilling ichor onto the ground. One thing Artemis had that the alien didn't? Anger, and a burning desire for revenge. To make sure that her siblings' deaths were not in vain. To honour Noble Team. To uphold her duty to defend Reach.
Eventually, it was the hinge-head that slipped.
The Spartan darted forwards, and plunged her Energy Sword straight into the bastard's chest, watching as the light that burned in its eyes was snuffed out. She kicked the corpse aside, drawing her blade out with the movement, and rose, whirling to see a quartet of Unggoy waddling their way towards her, weapons going up and ready to fire.
Mentally, she took stock of their ranks. One Major, two Minors, and a Heavy carrying a Fuel Rod Gun.
The Heavy would have to go first – its gun was the most problematic for her, given that her shields were only halfway recharged, and the blasts would also knock her back, leaving her much more open for the other Grunts to take her down.
With an ease that belied her years of practice, she yanked her combat knife free of the sheath that rested on her chestplate, and hurled it at the vaguely crustacean alien, nailing it in the eye and causing it to topple over. It wasn't dead – not yet – but it was out of the way for now, and that allowed her to deal with the other three Grunts. The two Minors were anxious, but with a few rasping squeals from the Major, they were soon back in line, their plasma pistols aimed at the Spartan once more.
Not today.
So my love, keep on running; you gotta get through today.
Artemis unslung her MA37 from where it had been clipped to her backplate, and with a burst of fire one Grunt was down, a gout of fire spewing from where its methane tank had been disconnected from its back. The two Minors panicked now that their leader was downed, throwing up their stubby arms and running around in circles, which gave the Spartan the perfect opening to pick them off with her assault rifle.
There was still that Heavy, though, its Fuel Rod Gun discarded on the ground a few feet away. It was quickly dispatched with a 7.62mm round slamming home into its skull. She retrieved her knife, wiping the blood off onto the creature's almost iridescent green armour, and rose, surveying the environment around her.
Corpses of alien bodies littered the area, and the ground was painted with the colourful ichor. There were a couple of bodies of her fallen kin, downed where they'd made their last stands, and their weapons salvageable nearby. The lone wolf moved towards these weapons, policing the spare rounds for her MA37 and two M6G Magnum pistols; she also scooped up the lone SRS99, and locked it in place on her back.
That would have to do.
Now was the time for her to choose a better area to make her own last stand, because there was more Covenant coming in, and this was not the place she wanted to die. It was too boxed in, and not in a good way; the shelters were crumbling, and feeble at best. It was open ground, or not at all.
The Spartan's fingers flexed on the trigger of her assault rifle, and she performed another cursory scan of the area, pleased to find no fresh life swooping towards her.
She kicked off into the hard-packed dirt, and began running, heading for the best spot to begin her last stand. Somewhere high, she decided, and as sheltered as possible. A good place to snipe the Elites from, before she would charge into their midst and go down fighting. There would be no better death for her, and at least she would die in peace.
There my love, keep on running. Gotta keep those tears at bay.
As she moved, she thought of her fellows in Noble Team.
Gentle, kind-hearted Jorge. His anger at the Covenant being on Reach matched her own, as it had been his home planet too, and together it would be the two of them flinging curses at the bastards in Hungarian, while their weapons mowed them down. The big man had sacrificed himself so that she might live to fight another day, and that was something that she had not forgotten.
Fierce, curious, intelligent Kat. Her sister-in-arms; cut down when the team were fleeing to a fallout bunker below ONI's headquarters at Olympic Tower. Artemis had been blinded with rage and anguish that day; she had been hysterical when a unit of UNSC Troopers came to take her sister away, but it had been to no avail. Still there was guilt held close to her heart; she felt like she should have noticed that Phantom, only to watch in horror as her fellow Beta was shot in the back of the skull by a Field Marshal.
The Lieutenant wasn't the only one who had mourned the loss of their best friend that day.
The hard-to-read, cool-headed, focused and determined Carter. Leader of the team; Commander of numerous incarnations of NOBLE. Artemis recalled so strongly the day after they'd gotten out of the bunker, how he'd never slept and she'd woken to find him in tears. He'd been grieving for his XO – and best friend. The only thing she could do to offer comfort was to hold him; a silent pillar of support as they both mourned their slain comrade. He'd died when he'd rammed a burning Pelican into a Covenant Scarab – a last-ditch effort to make sure that Emile and Artemis completed the mission in safety.
And then there had been Emile. Ruthless, temperamental, snarky and sarcastic. She hadn't gotten off on the best foot with him at first, but somehow, somewhere along the lines, the Warrant Officer had begun to think of her as a younger sister of sorts. Probably when she'd displayed impressive skills with a combat knife; he'd been pretty impressed. He, too, had been willing to make the sacrifice for her, and in the end... she supposed that he had. Aiming to stay behind in the Onager, to cover her escape on the Pelican – and eventually, the Pillar – he'd been impaled by another blasted Field Marshal, but he had only died after ensuring that the alien had gone down with him.
The fallen. Her siblings-in-arms – though, she was beginning to consider that she might have had feelings for Carter – and honourable fighters.
They had given their all against the Covenant, and it had not been enough. No, that was not right – and, she decided, as she clambered up a rocky promontory, foolish thinking. The truth of it was, they had given their all, but the Covenant had the numbers, and the superior technology. It was hardly a fair fight, despite the Spartans giving the UNSC an additional edge.
That edge was enough to drive the bastards back, and that edge had been enough, today, to escort the fragment of a Smart AI to a Halcyon-class cruiser in safety.
Oh my love, don't stop burning. Gotta send them up in flames; in flames.
Artemis pushed her thoughts to the back of her mind as a hinge-head wandered into the view of her SRS99's scope, and she grunted in satisfaction when a crack echoed out across the field, before the alien dropped, indigo blood pooling out of a neat hole in its skull.
The two Grunts that had been nearby chattered in alarm, their Needlers waving wildly, though for the most part, they themselves remained stationary.
Easy pickings.
The Spartan took a frag grenade from one of the pouches on her armour, pulled the pin, and lobbed it over the edge, where it detonated a few seconds later in a fiery explosion. The smaller creatures were directly caught in the blast, and they were killed outright; a trio of Elites staggered back, their energy shields flashing as they struggled to recover.
Breath in, shot lined up, breath out, crack. Repeat.
The remaining hinge-head, clad in the white armour of an Ultra, roared its frustration and shook a fist skyward. It hefted its plasma repeater in a better grip, and began to march towards where it thought the Spartan's hiding place was. It didn't get far – with barely a second's glance to check that she had one bullet left in her current magazine, said Spartan squeezed the trigger, and with a spray of brilliantly-coloured violet ichor, the beast toppled to the ground, its life cut short.
A low rumble from behind and above the Spartan signified the presence of Mgalekgolo – a Hunter. A lumbering, armoured gestalt of wriggling worms. Where there was one Hunter, a second, its bond brother, was not very far away. One alone was trouble to deal with, but two? That was worse. And all she had were three frag grenades – not enough to crack the armour of both of them without winding up with irreparable damage herself.
She knew she was going to die, but she wanted it to be after she found and took down the Field Marshal that had taken her sister-in-arms from her. That bastard was going to pay, and she would cut through as many Covenant as it could throw at her.
Accompanying the sound of the approaching Hunters was the low growl of another hinge-head; this one sounded anticipatory. It was on the hunt – likely seeking to flush her out of hiding.
Below, there was another cluster of Grunts, as well as a grouping of Jackals, most of them wearing their typical arm shields, save for two, which carried a beam rifle and a carbine, respectively. Pains in the ass, in her opinion, and they'd have to go – quick.
Before that split-lip and its wormy escorts found her sniper's nest.
Sooner or later, she knew they would chance across her – this would occur faster if she began sniping the lesser Covenant on the ground below. It looked like she'd have to move.
Locking the SRS99 into place once more on her back, barrel poking high into the air behind her head, and clutching her AR with one hand, Artemis skidded and jumped her way down the path she'd climbed barely half an hour before. Once her boots hit the even terrain below, she opened fire, gunning down the Grunts with ease. The Kig-Yar were more difficult – the vaguely avian creatures gathered close together, their shields overlapping and protecting them from fire.
Still, there were gaps in their disclike shields she could exploit, and those two Jackal snipers to deal with. She was glad there were no Skirmishers – those were problematic on a different level to their mainline Jackal cousins.
Drawing her Magnum, the Spartan began hitting the aliens with precise shots – a head that poked above a shield here, a foot unprotected below there, a clawed hand holding a plasma pistol. Within moments, the shield-carrying Jackals were downed, and the two snipers were easily dispatched with a couple of headshots.
The lone wolf glanced around, checking for signs that the hinge-head up above had not found her, and if it were not yet at the ground, if she could find a place to hide.
But time had run out.
There was another eerie, subsonic rumble from the two blue-grey, fan spined Hunters as they approached, a noise that vibrated through the Spartan's boots. And their Sangheili leader's mandible seemed almost to quiver with unbridled, early triumph. Gleaming gold armour gave it away to being a General – one more difficult to dispatch, though certainly no trickier than a purple-armoured Field Marshal.
She would have to face her enemy head-on. And while close-quarters combat was her strong suit, fighting against Hunters in anything other than long range was perilous.
Again, she swapped her MA37 for the sniper rifle, and even at such close range, the Spartan was able to fire the weapon accurately, hitting one gestalt in its exposed midsection, causing bright orange blood – as well as a few wriggling worms – to explode out of the wound. It growled in pain, and its bond mate growled with it – growled in anger.
Their leader, for the meantime, seemed content to stand back and watch its guards perform its bidding. It would jump in when the time was right, and finish the demon off, claiming the kill as its own, though really it would be the Hunters that had done all the work.
Not today.
Artemis swapped in her last mag, which contained only three bullets instead of the usual four, and fired more shots at the wounded beast. It stumbled a step backwards, but still remained standing, and the Spartan tossed the spent weapon aside, knowing it was futile to carry such a thing around. Momentarily forgetting about the bond brother, she sprinted towards her foe – only to get whammed backwards by a seemingly impenetrable wall of metal, and she went sailing, cartwheeling through the air.
The Spartan slammed into the ground, hard, all the breath knocked from her lungs. She tasted copper, and realized she must've bitten her tongue during her unceremonious landing.
Huffing in frustration, she rolled onto her hands and knees, coughing, before slowly rising to her feet to stare down her enemy. The two Hunters shuffled towards her, the angered bond brother raising its assault cannon, a sickly green glow forming at the end of the weapon as it prepared to fire.
Not gonna die here... not like this she thought determinedly, and fired a few rounds into the wounded Hunter, which was closer than its companion. The shots didn't do much in the way of deterring it, but at least it bellowed in pain. That was all she'd wanted.
Don't stop, tomorrow's another day. Don't stop; tomorrow you'll feel no pain; just keep moving.
The Spartan blurred forwards, and at the last second leapt, propelling herself onto the great beast's shoulders – or what passed as shoulders, considering it was just a colony of metre-long worms encased in armour – and smashed her fists into the gap between its helmet and backplate. She pulled out a handful of wriggling worms, tossed it aside, and continued, again and again, ignoring the rumblings of pain – and the rage from its bond brother, who had turned to see its mate being attacked, and realized it could do nothing without hurting the already wounded Mgalekgolo.
Eventually, the gestalt lost enough of its worms to lose coordination, and it toppled to the ground.
Artemis whipped out her Energy Sword, and the blades hissed as she stabbed the creature in the back a number of times, before declaring it dead. She stepped backwards, crunching some of the worms she'd pulled out of the colony underfoot, and looked up at the bond mate.
It rumbled out its rage, and she, in turn, gave a growl that rumbled from deep within her chest as a response, lowering her chin in determination.
She would see to it that this beast suffered the same fate as the first: death, at her hands.
Her legs pumped, propelling her forwards, and just as she prepared to make the leap, a bolt of green energy smacked into her back, and caused her to smash straight into the Hunter's shield instead, crumpling to the ground in a heap at its feet.
Mistake.
She'd forgotten to check what sort of weapon the split-lip was carrying, and of course, it was a Fuel Rod Gun. The shield meter on her HUD told her that her shields were drained to halfway, which was just her luck.
The Mgalekgolo took a couple of paces backwards, and she was aware that the General now stood over her, laughing in that strange, grating language that was by now familiar to the Spartan.
Also appearing in her line of sight was a Field Marshal, wielding a Needle Rifle. It clacked its mandibles at its subordinate, and the two of them began growling to one another; one sounded frustrated, the other, bored.
Artemis could have gotten up and run away, but there was that gestalt nearby, and her shields were only just recharging now. It didn't help that her mind had immediately jumped to that fateful day. There had been so much anxiety the air all but reeked of it, and it had come from the Spartans. She recalled, so vividly, the blur of blue armour barely ahead of her, and further than that were the boys, calling them over, waiting for them to get to safety...
And yet, she had missed that Phantom.
She had missed that Phantom, and Kat had paid the price.
Don't stop – the past will trip you up. You know right now's gotta be enough; just keep moving.
This would not do. This was the very squid-head that had taken Kat from her, and here she was, lying crumpled on the ground, not doing a damn thing. Gritting her teeth, the Spartan rose, whirling about and ramming her shoulder straight into the General. That Field Marshal would pay for her sister's death with its own blood, but first, she had these two mooks to take care of.
"Demon!" the purple-armoured alien rasped in frustration; "Nishum!" the gold-armoured beast growled in her face. The words were harsh and unnatural to her ears; a butchering of English, spoken by an alien tongue. If they even had tongues.
She reared her head back, and smashed her helmet into the General's face, stunning it, before ramming her combat knife home into its throat. She pulled it free, watching with satisfaction as blood spurted out of the wound, and the creature collapsed to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut. She then turned to face the Field Marshal, only to find herself almost face-to-face with the Mgalekgolo instead, its spines fanning in anger.
With one whack of its shield, once again, the Spartan was sent tumbling end-over-end, and this time, she smashed into a rock, causing her to cry out in pain. Her shields were drained to nothing, her vision was going blurry, and there was now a crack in her visor.
There was the clomping of heavy feet behind her, and the Hunter growled, spines on its back rattling as it shook itself, almost as though it were preparing itself to end her life.
Artemis braced herself, waiting for the blow that would send her to wherever it was her fellows had wound up when they had died hours before.
But it never came.
Instead, there was the familiar, echoing report of what could only be an M392, and the gestalt bellowed in pain. The Spartan rolled onto her back, and though the crack distorted her view somewhat, she could see the alien wheeling about to face its hidden assailant, only for another shot from the hidden soldier to go through its neck, followed by a third, a fourth, a fifth. That was enough to kill it; the Hunter dropped to the ground, dead.
A roar from somewhere to her right reminded her there was still that squid-head after her.
She wanted to rise to her feet, but found she had not the strength to. A weak, low groan reached her ears, and she dimly realized it had come from her. It felt like she was bruised all over; her body throbbed and ached, and her head in particular felt rather tender, from where she'd crunched face-first into the rock she now lay in front of.
Another set of footsteps approached rapidly, but they were lighter, and there was no mistaking the shadow of a figure clad in MJOLNIR armour that dimmed her view of the sky above.
Armour so charred it was now more black than the beautiful blue it had once been, and still perhaps smoking in some places, her rescuer stopped in her line of sight, and crouched down, offering a hand to help her to her feet. Despite the film of grime marring the golden visor, there was no mistaking the somewhat pointed design of the Commando helmet – that belonged to none other than Carter. A Spartan she'd thought dead, who was now appearing very much alive before her, and she knew that she wasn't hallucinating, simply due to how damaged and battleworn his gear was.
Artemis took his hand and got to her feet, swaying unsteadily for a few beats, one arm snaking around her ribs, of which she was sure that three were cracked. Her gaze was on the Field Marshal walking towards them, and she drew her Energy Sword, saying to Carter, "It's the one that killed Kat." She hoped he wouldn't argue.
He did.
"You're in bad shape – you need a few minutes' recovery. I can give that to you while I dispatch him." The Commander's tone brooked no arguments, but of course, the Lieutenant was going to do exactly that.
"Carter, you might've known Kat for longer than I had, but she and I had a promise to one another and I broke it. I let her down because I missed that Phantom; this is my chance to allow vengeance for that to ring true. Please." The lone wolf spared a glance at her leader. She didn't want to have to physically fight him on this, but if it came down to that, she would.
Carter's nod told her all she needed to know: go kick its ass.
Go go go, figure it out, figure it out but don't stop moving. Go go go, figure it out, figure it out: you can do this.
Artemis gritted her teeth against a wave of pain, charging towards the split-lip and uttering a primal, bestial howl of rage. This was the alien that had taken her sister from her; this was her time to spill its blood into the dirt.
The purple-armoured saurian gave a yell of its own as it rushed to meet her, and their Energy Swords hissed when they finally clashed.
It was a deadly dance; a whirling, dangerous maelstrom of anger and fury and swords and skill. A fight to the death, and the drumbeat was the sound of their feet pounding into the hard dirt, and the steady, ever-present background noise of Carter's DMR dishing out punishment to Covie mooks; one-one, one-one, one-one.
She knew the oddly lizard-like creature would give her no ground; she would not play fair, either.
She rammed her shoulder into it, hard, and elbowed it with a stunning whack across the face, momentarily stunning it. She took the split-second pause as an opportunity to draw her favoured combat knife, and stab it in a gap between the shoulder plates of its armour, driving it beneath the undersuit until blood streamed out of the wound.
The Sangheili howled in pain, and gave her a stunning blow of its own, causing the crack in her visor to increase in size, and thusly making it more difficult for her to see it. Her own pause gave the alien the opening to drive a fist into her solar plexus, and while her armour protected her from the blow, it did exactly as the creature wanted – it smashed into her shields, and they drained to three-quarters.
Something borne purely of wrath curled in the Lieutenant's gut, and she fought back with renewed vigour. A one-two punch to its face sent it reeling a step or two back, and she slashed it with her Energy Sword, cutting into its own shields, and breaking them completely. But the Spartan didn't stop there. She repeatedly smashed her fists into the alien's face, grunting in satisfaction when it dropped to its knees, and with a rapid motion, thrust her Energy Sword into its abdomen.
There was a gleeful madness to that – overtaking her, and she chuckled darkly, pressing all of her weight into the hilt of the blade, so that the tips of the weapon poked out the split-lip's back, just as one of its lackeys had done to Emile.
With that move, his life had been taken from him – and so, too, would this hinge-head die in that manner.
A darting movement garnered her attention, and she glanced down to see the alien trying to strike out at her with its Energy Dagger. That was quickly solved by her snapping its wrist, causing it to howl again, and she yanked the weapon free, choosing to stab the Elite in the side. She wanted it to feel as much pain as possible before it died – all the pain it had caused her, and more. She twisted the Energy Sword to one side, before pulling it out, widening the cut, and then, holding the creature still, drew Kat's Magnum and shot it in the face, point-blank.
Only then did she allow the corpse to drop to the ground.
Artemis yanked her combat knife out of its shoulder, wiping the blood on its armour before sheathing the blade once more, and glancing towards her teammate.
There was a crowd of Sangheili – high-ranking, fast and deadly – closing in on him, and he was in the process of dancing around a Ghost, piloted by an Unggoy that was hellbent on killing its first demon. Not enough time; too many enemies. She would not let him succumb to the same fate as their fellows. Not after he'd come and saved her ass.
She ran to him, clearing a path as she went, leaving nothing but the broken corpses of hinge-heads in her wake. None would stop her from aiding the Commander.
It was the two of them, now, back-to-back, their weapons running low on ammo, but the fires inside of them lit, and raging. Raging against the Covenant; this wrath was their weapon as much as their guns and knives and grenades were, and they wielded it with skill.
From their throats rose a song; a Spartan battle anthem. Low and haunting at first, it grew in intensity, and increased with their rage. It was a song to their brethren, one they had sung so long ago now. And it was the song of their last stand; together, here, on this burning planet, side-by-side, they would give their all, until they gave their last breath.
"Here we are; don't turn away, now. We are the warriors that built this town. Here we are; don't turn away, now. We are the warriors that built this town, from dust."
They were yelling from wounds as much as wrath, now; there were so many Sangheili, and their shields had been able to hold out only so long. Under the steady barrage of plasma fire and needler shards, they had given out before the Spartans could create many more corpses.
Artemis glanced to her teammate; she fought alongside him now; they moved as one, and they would die as one. "A csomag ereje a farkas, és a farkas ereje a csomag," she murmured, and there was nothing but respect in her voice. For the strength of the pack is the wolf, and the strength of the wolf is the pack. What had once been solely the Lieutenant's motto; eventually being adopted by the entirety of Noble Team.
Carter inclined his head in a nod, understanding and accepting. Even if he didn't know Hungarian, his armour would have translated it for him. The same was done when he spoke quietly to her, "Kuba amandla epakethi yimvu, kwaye amandla empisi yipakethi." For the strength of the pack is the wolf, and the strength of the wolf is the pack.
And so it was they had spoken their final words in their respective native tongues.
They had made their peace, and their kin had been avenged.
Together, they rushed into the fray; together it would be they would fall, and join their fellow Spartans, their armoured bodies turning to glass when the Covenant finally overran the planet.
There were so many Sangheili, swarming them, getting ready for the kill, and–
The Elites were falling.
One by one, they were falling to the ground, torn to pieces by 70mm depleted uranium slugs.
The roar of a Pelican's engines filled the Spartans' ears, and they glanced up to see the grey-green, blocky dropship swooping in an arc close by overhead, gunning down the Covenant. It was giving them an opening – a chance to survive.
"An opportunity?" Artemis inquired, gesturing to the Pelican, flinging one of her smaller combat knives at a Grunt and pinning it in the eye.
"I'm not questioning it." Carter shook his head, and together they jogged towards salvation.
"Where do we go now?" The Lieutenant gritted her teeth as the Commander peeled back her techsuit, and attempted to bind her wound to the best of his ability. Her abdomen was a mess of burns and open wounds – those Sangheili had been particularly determined to take her down, rather than the both of them.
Wonder what I did to piss them off she silently remarked.
"We'll figure it out together." The older Spartan leaned back on his haunches, silently appraising his handiwork, before giving a shrug, and helping ease the lone wolf into a sitting position.
Indeed, the UNSC had thrown them together – and now, Fate was keeping them that way. Perhaps the universe had plans in store for the likes of them? Artemis didn't know; there were other questions on her mind. Here were two Spartans of Noble Team; three others had been accounted for. But where was their chatty sniper, Jun?
An ache grew beneath her breastbone, and it was not pain caused by her physical wounds. She drew in a quick breath. "We are the last?" Jun is no longer with us? she asked, without asking.
The Commander shook his head. "He went down fighting. The way he'd always wanted. I found him, and he was already gone. Nothing I could've done – didn't even know until I began to wonder what had happened to you three," meaning her, Emile, and Jun, "It was so quiet, on TEAMCOM."
Here they were, the last members of what had once been a proud and formidable team of Spartans.
Those fallen would be honoured; they would do all they could to make sure that the Covenant were destroyed for good, so that all humanity's sacrifices – all the countless civilian deaths – had not been in vain.
Her head drooped wearily, and she closed her eyes. Just for a few moments, she told herself silently, just get some shut-eye, until we can get to somewhere safer than being out in space.
A palm pressed into her outstretched hand, fingers curling around the back.
Artemis glanced up and saw the Commander – no, he's Carter her mind silently corrected, you can call him that – looking down at her, a weary smile on his face.
She wanted to pull her hand away, but strangely, she just couldn't bring herself to. She chalked it up to her tiredness, and brushed that thought aside. "You need something, Boss?" she addressed, using Emile's favoured nickname for the team leader.
"I was going to say penny for your thoughts, but I guess you're not lost in them, are you?" he said wryly, and seated himself beside her. "Nice view, isn't it?"
Her gaze followed his, and the two of them stared at Reach's stars, high above them.
She'd always found them to be beautiful, and tonight, there was an aurora borealis, which made it all the more breath-taking. Sure, it wasn't like she hadn't seen one before, but that had been fifteen years ago, now, and her memories were more than a little faded. But now, though, seeing one again... it brought back a faint memory from a time when she had seen her first aurora borealis when she was only three years old.
"Yeah," Artemis exhaled softly, a warm feeling in her chest, "It's home, to me. Familiar and inviting."
"That's right – you grew up on Reach, didn't you?" She glanced at him when he spoke, seeing the starlight reflecting in his eyes, and for a moment, there, she thought that he himself was ethereal; made of stardust and moonlight instead of flesh and blood.
The Lieutenant nodded, and a smile flickered across her features like lightning flashing in a stormy sky when she felt him squeeze her hand. "I've missed this place."
"I don't remember Durban – my home town on the planet Biko – much... but... it was home. Now my home is wherever my team are." Carter shifted to lie down on his back, for a better view of the stars.
"It's a good policy," Artemis mused, and she heard her teammate hum in agreement.
Carter's voice roused her from her nap. "Come on, lone wolf, we'd better get off this bird and get some proper medical attention." There was a trace of fondness when he spoke her nickname. Once, it had been somewhat of an insult; now, it was a moniker she bore proudly.
It was apparent they'd touched down – in the hangar of a spaceborne vessel, apparently – and that their pilot was already gone.
Artemis heaved herself to her feet, and glanced towards the pile that was both of their armour, before shrugging a shoulder. They'd come back and pick it up later, once they were better-suited to walking around and lugging their gear. Not that they weren't strong, but they were exhausted, and injured to boot. No sense in making anything worse.
She stepped towards the Pelican's ramp, and then stopped. Hesitant. Anxious.
"I-..."
It felt like betrayal, leaving her teammates' bodies behind. It felt like betrayal, fleeing the planet as the Covenant reduced it to a flaming ball of ash and glass.
"I'm not sure if I can do this," she admitted, and swallowed, glancing at her companion as he stood abreast of her.
He glanced down at her, worry creasing his forehead. "Can't do what?"
"This is... stepping off this dropship feels like stepping onto a new path. And I don't... I don't know where to go, or what to do, and I know you said we'll figure it out, but... I'm scared. I feel lost; alone; cast adrift. Seems funny, since you're standing here next to me, but...that's what it feels like." The lone wolf stared at her feet, and her shoulders drooped in weariness.
"Hey." The softness in his voice surprised her, and she glanced up at him. Doubly surprising was when he moved half a pace closer to her, and lightly, tenderly pressed his mouth to hers, before moving away again. "You won't be walking this path alone," he said gently, and even his tired eyes smiled when his mouth did. He reached for her hand, clasping it in his – just as had occurred so long ago now – and together they stepped down and off the ramp of the Pelican – and onto the threshold of their new path.
One breath leads to another; just keep moving.