HAYLO: The Parody From Hell

by Ridley the Violator

The Chief and his erotic lover Cortana must confront both the Covenant and a gang of very obnoxious original characters. More importantly, they confront the Chief's dark past and his even darker future. But is there an ever darker threat still lurking in the darkness of space? Please kill me!

1. 1

Chapter One: The Final Revision

Space. It is generally agreed upon in the scientific community that space is cold. Normal Fahrenheit or Celsius measurement can barely begin to describe how chill as the winter night it is, so I will instead use a quote. As a wise man once said, "Man, it's cold. My nipples are like pencil erasers." Most scientists also agree that space is full of stars. Why, one has only to look up and see-IS THAT A SPIDER? MOM I FOUND A SPIDER, COME KILL IT! Anyways, stars appear white to the human eye, though there are also brown and red stars. Hell, there are even dwarf stars. It takes many colors to make a rainbow of stars. It's too bad there aren't any lesbian stars, because I would totally take pictures.

The setting for my tale is this space; it is the second-to last frontier, vast, silent, cold, and swimming with white balls—like an orgy at DragonCon. But now a massive starship cuts through the void. It is big and brown, the color of trash or shit. It streaks towards an artificial world carved in the shape of a ring. The ring world is big, but not as big as the pustule-like gas giant it orbits, as if this ring were a human-sized rubber band lost in the orbit of God's gaseous planetary pimple.

Hold on a second—long, phallic ship—open, vagina-like ring...dot dot dot. Do I even need to spell it out for you? Sexual metaphor. In fact, this whole story is so full of sexual metaphors that I could write an essay about it!

"I Could Have Been Your Daddy" Indeed: Why Halo is a Metaphor for Homosexual Power: An Intersectional, Queered Approach to Traditionally Masculine Video Game Plot Lines Through the Lens of DeBasald's 'Everything is Gay or Something, I Don't Know' Theory

By John Divuavicuaivic

ENG 304: Gender and Video Games

Halo's story ostensibly begins with a metaphor: the bulging and cylindrical spaceship the 'Pillar' of Autumn has just exited slip space, an alternate, warp-speed like dimension which is in and of itself obviously a metaphor for the vaginal canal. This phallic 'Autumn' is now aimed at the titular and titillating Halo ring world, a circular artifact of immense size that completely dwarfs the 'Autumn' in comparison. Halo itself indicates a vagina, while the '''Autumn'' is a penis. This size difference is the first hint the player gets of the game's dominant theme. Halo is not only larger and much more powerful than the penis, but is also ultimately hollow, as there is no womb or cervix behind it and thus it lacks the all consuming power of the female body—the power to give birth. Furthermore, the '''''''''Autumn''''''' itself is large and brown, but woefully inadequate to ever satisfy the false vaginal god that is Halo. This sense of un-attainability permeates all the female imagery in the game, in which everything else is also a metaphor for pussies.

The scene shifts to the stereotypically wise Captain Keyes smoking a pipe. The shape of the pipe, when turned upside down and flipped left to right, is the silhouette of an erect penis and balls facing left to right. Keyes keeps this rather painfully tangible metaphor ready at 'hand' throughout this scene. Cortana and he converse, but Keyes appears to be too dimwitted to stay on track of the conversation. Cortana is a pseudo naked holograph, the projection of an AI; she has access to all the information in the world, while Keyes, even when armed with his phallic pipe, is unable to cope. It should be noted that Cortana has no vagina, an interesting detail since it must have been men who designed her. Do they fear vaginas? It should also be noted that Keyes's pipe deliberately disappears for the rest of the game after this humiliating conversation—perhaps a subtle visual reference to his verbal emasculation in this conversation? Also of note is the conversation itself, which consists of vague sexual metaphors mainly meant to convey the feeling that this 'Covenant' that is pursuing them is able to consistently 'get their first,' and that their ships have 'always been faster.' The significance of these metaphors for pre-mature ejaculation will become clear once the Covenant is revealed.

We cut to the Master Chief, just waking up from Cryogenic suspension. He goes through a series of 'warm-up' exercises, all of them dominated by the continual 'charging up' of his armor's 'personal shielding.' But once the technician that has 'aided him' in 'warming up' is 'finished,' he is promptly discarded by an explosive scripted event right to the face. This sets up the Master Chief as the dominant force of homosexuality in the game, who uses and breaks his partners before discarding them and moving on, just like an angry gay bear.

It is at this point that the Covenant is revealed in its full feminine glory. Their weapons are composed of sleek feminine curves, their technology is florescent and pink, and they do not shoot bullets but ovary shaped projectiles of super heated energy; they refuse to penetrate the 'bodies' of their enemies with their bullets, instead simply burning them to death. Their weapons are also some of the most effective in the game, far more powerful than the blocky male projectile weapons. Not only this, but the Covenant's Plasma Rifle, Plasma Pistol, and Energy Sword are both composed of two separate halves, mirror labial lips. The variegated races of the Covenant are also of note for obviously representing sex.

There are the Grunts, small, unattractive and generally weak creatures that the Covenant have obviously enslaved to do the 'grunt' 'work.' They appear to have a symbiotic, sexual relationship with the Elites. The Grunts are a sexual metaphor for the proper role of men in the heterosexual society; that of laboring sperm carriers whose only purpose is to compete for the right of inseminating their mother's huge all-enveloping vaginas.

The Elites themselves have no obvious masculine traits. They speak in gibberish that sounds suspiciously like a female-only language, and are generally taller but sleeker than human beings—these are both traits of women. More importantly, they move gracefully and are armored in bright, feminine colors, like red and blue. They represent the idealized role of women in the primitive heterosexual society ruled by women, the matriarchy, which is what the Covenant is.

There are also the Jackals. The Jackals are outcasts, hiding behind large ovary shaped shields. In the 'ranks' of the 'Covenant' they are 'above' Grunts but 'below' Elites, and merely represent those women in the heterosexual society who have not yet given up completely on reliance on male roles and the desire for male/female pregnancy, as opposed to the more closer to earth, female/female pregnancy.

The Hunters themselves are large matronly aliens without actual faces, representing my mother. They appear to represent the mothering instinct, the purest and most powerful force on earth. They are at once the most dangerous and most vulnerable enemies in the game; they have incredible long range and close range damage, but a single shot to the stomach (or womb) with the exploding (OR EJACULATING)'bullets' of the Master Chief's pistol can instantly dispatch them.

Even the Covenant's vehicles are sexual in nature. The Banshee is obviously a woman with PMS, symbolizing the fury of a woman scorned. Hell hath no fury indeed! Ho ho ho. The Wraiths and Ghosts are blown up and miniature representations, respectively, of the stately but unstoppable woman's rights movement and the quick escape the Covenant offers its 'members' from a subservient male dominated world.

Regardless, the Master Chief, after 'unthawing' his 'blue balls' must make his way through the ejaculating Pillar of Autumn, impotent and without weapons, with the Covenant in hot pursuit. As he is the ultimate avatar of not only male power but homosexual male power that is not reliant on women for gratification, the Covenant must destroy him.

The Master Chief eventually reaches the 'bridge' to gaysex, coming up behind Captain Keyes and suggestively breathing his name out. Captain Keyes turns to him and explains that they must protect Cortana and make sure the Covenant do not get their hands on her; Cortana represents the men's ideal woman. She does everything that they tell her to and walks around naked all the time making sandwiches. As the Covenant encroaches upon humanity, Cortana is the last ideal woman and must be protected, though in an ironic twist she still manages to upstage every other male character in the game in terms of intelligence. Ah, Bungie, what a twisted tale you've woven!

Keyes extracts Cortana from the Bridge's computer systems, the AI commenting in a brief ironic twist "yank me," before being pulled. The Chief accepts his duty, but like a typical man cannot do so without commenting on Cortana's abilities, specifically citing the stereotype of women being poor drivers—though the game has already challenged this by having the feminine Covenants ships be far faster and more efficient than the human ones. As the scene ends, Keyes reaches down below the camera and does something, claiming that he is giving the Chief a 'weapon,' though he does not specify what weapon or why he is giving it. Obviously it is a hand job. This is the second hint of homosexuality being the major force at work in the human's struggle. But I get a 'head' of myself; the Master Chief continues on, suddenly acquiring ammo for his weapon—perhaps signaling that he is ready for sexual contact again, his member once more turgid and ready to fence. The first Covenant prostitroops he kills are the Grunts, setting up a trend of wiping out all the submissive males in the game so as to make an example, usually exemplified in killing Grunts while they cower and bend over in bottom-fear.

The Master Chief makes his way through the ship, at one point encountering his old cryo chamber. Cortana comments that the Covenant wanted to catch him napping. Now, at this point the Covenant have obviously been no match for the full force of his homosexual rage. This comment expounds upon the idea that even perfect femininity is no match for the raw power of the gay rage, having lain dormant for so long under 3,000 years of White oppression. The Master Chief proceeds on to the escape pods. Along the way he acquires items known as 'Frag Grenades.' But are they really 'frag' grenades? Or are they 'FAG' grenades?

The Chief soon escapes despite the large hymen shaped shields that the Covenant erect to stop him. The escape pod he uses is shaped strangely like a sperm cell—and even more alarmingly the pilot is a woman. This is the third time the game has made reference to females in relation to driving. Driving is an important sexual theme in the game.

The Chief's sperm-pod is promptly ejaculated out of the large phallic Pillar. It speeds towards the ring world, dodging the attacks of the Covenant ships—possibly a metaphor for birth control? But I digress. The pod promptly enters the Ring world, signaling of course the fertilization of the egg. But since the sperm cell in this case is carrying the Chief, it would make it gay sperm, which means that huge super vagina that the Covenant worships has been corrupted by the purest form of male strength: gayness, I think. But in our century, sadly, no comment on a gay man's semen can be made without associational references occurring regarding sexually transmitted disease. But this only comes into play later.

The pod then crash lands on Halo, killing every single person aboard except for the Chief; only masculine gayness in its purest form could survive the power of the giant vagina. Cortana suggests that there was nothing they can do-implying again how impotent man is in the face of super vagina. The Chief continues on and must cross a huge flowing 'river.' This either indicates grief or menstruation, possibly both, though it hardly matters because both are things only women experience and therefore amount to the same thing. He then proceeds to rescue each of the other landed pods and 'collec't his fellow men from a series of locations. Each situation has a unique meaning. The cliff with the rocks symbolizes genital warts and the fear of breasts. The cliff with no rocks signifies men's obsession with shaved genitals. The underground facility with the shooting sky beam is man's jealousy of a woman's ability to get pregnant. It should be noted that the Chief encounters the thematic character 'Sergeant Sgt. Johnson' in the instance prior to this. Sgt. Johnson is his supposed friend and possible lover through-out the game, continually returning to aid the Chief; he represents the heterosexual side of the Chief, but also the scared and secretive gay deep within. More on that later. The humans regroup and escape the valley, symbolizing an escape from oral sex. The entire level has been sequences after sequence of the Chief re-attaining his masculine identity after the hand job from Captain Keyes.

The next level is a false high point within the meta story. The Chief, now reunited with his heterosexual comrades, has suppressed the gayness within. Cortana takes a back stage to their testosterone charged antics, whereas before she was closer to the Chief. They make their way through cliffs heavily defended by Covenant. It should be noted that the Chief is given a sniper rifle with a large amount of bullets in it, possibly symbolizing powerful ejaculation onto a twink's face. The rifle has an extremely long but thin barrel, representing the power and fragility of the penis. But it is only effective when enemies cannot see the player and are thus unable to dodge the white 'tracer' shots that the sniper fires—a metaphor for bullets made of cum inseminating the asses of unsuspecting street walking women fired from a third story window. But if sniper rifle sequences are a metaphor for whatever that means, the real star of the level are the turrets. The turrets have large, three pronged barrels that are reminiscent of a woman opening her legs. They are the Covenant's latest attempt to destroy the men with feminine power; the blue projectiles they fire are virtually unlimited, not like a women's eggs, the top two representing ovaries and the bottom one representing the birth canal; they symbolize the infinite power of birth that women hold. It is possible for the Chief to abuse these turrets, turning them on the Covenant to destroy them. This is in keeping with the theme of the sniper rifle. It is also of note that the entire level takes place at night—the perfect time for cum sniping. The message is clear: the only thing men can do when they get together is rape, rape, rape.

The second part of the level occurs after the humans have entered the reverse in-birthing of the gravity lift into the Covenant space craft. This shows how they are violating the laws of nature by entering the woman's inner sanctum, the womb and birth canal. The Covenant ship has a pink and purple color scheme and almost organic design, and the humans trash everything. Shortly they rescue Captain Keyes, who for the Chief has now come to represent masculine power that transcends homo or hetero sexuality. They escape, Captain Keyes furthering the rape theme by commandeering a Covenant drop ship. In the final act of violation, they crush two matronly hunters with the double prong penises of the drop ship. The premise of the level is clear at this point, as this entire time the Covenant cruiser has been the one supplying the enemies in the level and they have finally penetrated and violated its inner sanctum; not even the power of birth can prevent from the violently destructive penises of straight men. So far Halo appears to be commenting on the destructive nature of vaginal sex, which stretches my mother's vagina a little more every time, but the converse power of gay dick is a growing sub-theme that will blossom to dominate the text.

The gay theme is especially brought out in the Silent Cartographer level. This level is about anal sex, straight or otherwise. They begin with a 'beach landing' a clumsy metaphor for anal play. In a telling metaphor, the Covenant are unable to resist the attack—a metaphor for how painful dry anal is. The Chief soon acquires a Warthog, which allows him to go much faster and provides with extra fire-power: a metaphor for sex jelly used during anal play. There isn't much more to the level—except during the attack by the cloaked Elites. These cloaked agents represent homosexual connotations of anal sex. After the Chief has thoroughly penetrated the inner facility, the Pelican picks him up and takes him through a large, colon shaped 'Secret Passage.' Do I even need to spell out 'shit box?'

The next level is a companion to the previous in terms of theme. It is called Assault on the Control room, and it is about men hiding their gayness from their wives. Throughout the level the Chief is harassed by the large purple vehicles of the Covenant. These vehicles are large and purple, possibly signifying dildos. They represent the ability of women to exist independently of men. Simultaneously, the thick covering of snow in the level represents both the covering up of homosexuality and STD infected semen being transmitted to the unsuspecting female, hence the Covenant's presence. Finally, the Chief acquires the large brown tank in the penultimate moment of the level. He utterly destroys the Covenant, spraying white snow everywhere. This is a metaphor for packing the fudge twice in one night.

Soon the Chief arrives in the swamp. Now, the swamp begins the theme of the dangers of homosexuality for everyone in the game. For the Chief the swamp is shit-dick. For the Covenant it is spying your husband's stretched ass as he comes out of the shower after coming back from a fishing trip. But as the Chief wages through a deluge of shit and takes a long colonic elevator into the bowels of the facility, the true meaning of this theme becomes clear; for it is then that the Flood are revealed.

The Flood of course represent the AIDS crisis. For the Covenant, the Flood is the danger of being infected with AIDS by unfaithful husbands. This is reinforced by the foolhardy way in which the Covenant unleashes the Flood, just as in the a wife's (or Covenant's) failure to recognize the signs of a homosexual husband (or, the Flood). The Flood also corrupts their reliance and worship of the 'Forerunners,' a transparent simile of the absent father figure. AIDS for the Covenant is the disillusionment of reliance on male authority.

But for the Chief, The Flood is something far worse; it is the ultimate adversary of the carefree, super-societal lifestyle of the homosexual, and for the rest of the game it is a constantly increasing threat, signifying the advance of the AIDS virus. In fact, from the moment the Flood are introduced it can be seen as the Chif being infected with AIDS. Let's examine the scene: he 'enters' an anonymous room that has clearly been sealed off, a metaphor for anonymous sex with strangers in the bathroom stall of an airport. He then observes a recording of some obviously very straight marines as they are slowly navigating the facility. But in the climatic scene of the video, the Marines discover the body of a male alien and refer to it in lewd sexual terms, leeringly insinuating a 'friendship' between one Marine and an alien corpse, signifying that they too are gay on the inside. This represents the Chief's last fleeting, desperate, hollow, glimpse of heterosexuality being 'torn' (like some sort of hymen, but in an anus) away. The rest of the game is his final mastery of dick. At that moment the Chief is suddenly deluged in 'infector' forms, a transparently obvious and clumsy metaphor for a cum-shot all over his body. He will be harassed by AIDS for the rest of the game.

The next level, the Library, signifies the search for the cure for AIDS: it is arduous and repetitive and no clear end is ever in sight. And the infection just keeps getting worse. On the flip side, the character of 343 Guilty Spark is a metaphor for gay rights activists: omnipresent and annoying, he haunts the character of the Chief and judges every action he takes as somehow not up to par with the cold, inhuman standards of his sentinel robots, creatures which when flipped upside down resemble the silhouette of a woman giving birth to a phallic gun that shoots penetrating lasers.

Anyways, the Chief finally procures the 'Index,' which is in the shape of a penis. Now the Index is a woefully tiny phallic tool used to activate Halo, which as established before is a vagina. This would make the index the representation of the tamed erection whose only purpose is to give the female pleasure, just like how a 'wife' 'abuses' my 'tiny' 'dick.' In the game's penultimate moment of rejection, however, Cortana—or rather women in general—rejects the tamed down low penis. Spark is furious because he sees it as homophobia, and the Chief is merely confused as he is still coming to grips with his gayness and his AIDS.

Cortana, who from the rejection of the penis is now confirmed to be a lesbian, convinces the Chief that they must destroy Halo once and for all. The reveal is not that Halo destroys the universe, but rather that Cortana is not really a woman, but instead the personification of homosexuality, male or otherwise. The Chief finally accepts his gayness and decides to return to rescue Captain Keyes and reconcile the haunting hand job that first planted the seeds of doubt in the Chief's mind. However, when they finally find Keyes they see that he has succumbed to the AIDS. This is the lowest point of the story—the loss of a strong soul to those dangers that plague every homosexual.

In the final level, the Chief goes around the phallic ship and sets up its countdown to 'explode'. This final ejaculation is the penultimate expression of gay power—a jet of gay jizz so strong that it wipes the slate clean of both Halo's femininity and the Floods AIDS. This is the denouncement of the game; the Chief fully accepts his hairy bear nature and is thusly granted the power to wipe away both the female dominance of the Covenant and the AIDS dominance of the flood. The Chief escapes on a space ship, and his final climactic words are: "I think we're just getting started."

This is of course a reference to all the butt sex he's about to dish out.

Anyways, Captain Keyes paced the bridge of the Pillar of Autumn. He was old, but he was no longer aging; his body and mind had long ago agreed to give up the whole 'cell-division' thing and go straight to calcification. There were many medals pinned to his loose-fitting fatigues—well, he thought they were medals, but they were craft paper; the UNSC had lost millions in precious metals just replacing Keyes collection whenever he accidentally lost all his clothes, which happened once a week.

Keyes glared up with a hard stare at the space-map in front of him. Techies and deck officers milled about the bridge behind him like a mass of sub-humanity, like bees packed into a hive. Everything buzzed. "Cortana," began Keyes, his voice gruff and ruff like a scruffy car muff. "All I want to know is, did we lose them?"

A small holograph of a purple woman appeared on a pedestal beside him. She cocked a hip, yellow eyes gleaming cruelly. "I think we both know the answer to that."

Old Captain Keyes's face went slack with surprise. "How would we both know the answer if you haven't told me, woman? God damn, you just don't think sometimes."

Cortana smirked again, purple teeth flashing. She obviously had great dental hygiene. "Well, Rip Van Wrinkle, if you'd just look at tactical display over there" she thumbed over her shoulder at the glowing map projected onto a glass sheet "you'd see that three hundred Covenant cruisers are about to set up the galaxy's biggest train on our ass."

The Captain started. He had been looking at the map this whole time but not reading it. He took in the display with horror. "By my troth! The Whore of Babylon speaks the truth."

"I'm standing right here," said Cortana.

There was a sound like a raw and very moist cabbage being torn in half. They both turned to see that one of the milling bridge crew had just divided into two clones, performing mitosis on the spot as the techies are wont to do. Or is that meiosis? Damn this fucking biology!

Keyes cleared his throat and turned back to Cortana. "What do you mean 'map,' woman? What map?"

"Are you serious? You just—" She pointed again at the projection, which was now showing rectangular shapes zipping towards their location. "Look. The tactical space map. You know, the one that takes up about half the room and your whole field of view."

Another techie reproduced loudly and the wretched swarm grew ever larger. Keyes looked. At the map, I mean. Nobody wants to see that shit. "I forgot we had a space map-damn my eyes." He thought for a moment. "But we made a blind jump." His hands fumbled with opening a bottle of pain medication as he spoke "how did they-"

"Get here first?" interrupted Cortana.

The Captain dropped the pills, accidentally putting his weight on his bad leg as he did so. "By Borgia's right buttock!"

Cortana looked wistful. "The Covenant ships have always been faster, especially in slip space. They just understand it better than we do. If only I could get my hands on the Covenant internet—who knows what kind of data I could pull up. Uh, Captain? Are you listening to me?"

The Captain's yellowing eyes had glassed over. "Oh, hello there, young lady. Might I ask your name?" He reached for his medicine purse again and took out another bottle of medication.

"It's me, sir: your granddaughter." Cortana held a hand to her ear as if she were receiving a message, even though she was just a hologram. "Bad news, grandpa: the Covenant has just launched a potato sack full of boarders. They'll docking through our walls any second now—this would be a good time to make sure I'm still in your will. The name's 'Cortana,' remember?"

Keyes's jaw dropped open again, his old person pain momentarily forgotten as reality came rushing back. "A potato sack you say? Then we have only one option: I must unleash some of my renowned medal winning tactical judo." He looked seriously down into Cortana's eyes. "Cortana—increase thruster power by five percent."

Cortana raised an eyebrow. "Increasing."

He turned to the techies. "We need more power in the engines—divert all the lights to the drive core."

"That won't do anything," said Cortana.

"DO IT!" Keyes slammed a fist into the wall, breaking his arm. He turned to a techie. "You ever seen the Keyes' loop, son?"

The tech drooled at Keyes. "No, sir?"

Cortana covered her face. "Oh god damn it."

Keyes clapped him on the shoulder, causing him to reproduce. "Well, son, you're about to see the Keyes' Loop, son." He snapped his fingers off at Cortana. "We need even more juice—cut life support and divert all power to the engines."

"Got it. Everybody hold your breath." Of course, the techies didn't need to hold their breath because they fed mostly on sunlight and feces. Keyes stared at the map, stroking his chin again as the air slowly hissed out of the room. "Damn—we're still not outrunning those boarding pods—the ship's too heavy! Cortana, I need you to evacuate every single hangar bay on this ship. Offload all our equipment. Where we're going, we won't need it."

"Wow! The Captain is such an out-of-the-box thinker," commented a technician to his friend, just before absorbing some plankton through his membranes.

Cortana objected. "But the hangars are full of soldiers, Captain. Plus, Sergeant Johnson's down there."

The aging Captain made one gnarled fist and looked ominous. "We do what we have to do. You can sit there on your pansy assed pedestal and judge me, but know this: men like me are the reason you can go home to night and not worry about a Covenant fleet glassing your planet. Men like me are the reason you can go home, pop out a couple kids, and kiss your husband on the cheek. Men like me—"

The floor rattled.

Cortana snorted. "Well, there go the boarders. You'll all be plasma-fried-chicken within the hour. So what exactly did we just accomplish in these few remaining moments of tactical significance, before the Covenant give you your enema?"

Keyes considered this. "Maybe you should wake up the Chief. Since nothing works."

"What about the tactical judo?"

Keyes laughed heartily. "Hussy, I don't even know what a judo is!"

Hundreds of meters away in the bowels of the ship, in a cold dark storage room, next to a crate of fresh Florida oranges, a mysterious cryogenic suspension tank hummed. Frosted glass hid a hulking green figure deep within the canister; it was a man clad in olive green armor and doused with steely battle scars. He was the slayer of armies human and alien, master of weapons both alien and human, destroyer of fleets usually alien and sometimes human by accident. And for now, he slept.

Two techies overlooked the cryo-chamber in the observation room above. A pane of thick glass protected them from whatever might happen below. They stood side by side at their control console, feverishly tapping away at the arrow keys in a deadly game of Tetris.

"Damn—these Russians sure know how to make a good video game," said one, named Anderson.

"I hear that." The other wiped sweat from his brow. "Ugh—I don't think I can keep this up much longer. My fingers are killing me—what's your score?"

Anderson smirked. "Four."

Bobby bit his lip. "Four? Jesus Christ man, I've only been able to build one of these fucking blocks. You must be some kind of pro gamer."

Anderson shrugged. "It's blind luck. My mom used to make me play with blocks in a separate pen from the other children until I was fully sprouted, so maybe that explains some of it."

"Hold on—" Bobby winced. "I think I'm gonna—"

With a loud squelching sound, his body split into two whole halves, a second Bobby staggering moistly away. Bobby pointed his clone out the door. "What's up bro. Someone drowned in their soup in Section C—maybe they could use you down there."

"I'm on it," said the other Bobby, and puffed out the door. "When I come back, I'm playing whoever wins."

"These skills are in demand," said Anderson cockily.

The screen blipped. A message from Cortana appeared in the corner.

"Pausin'." Bobby gratefully shut off the game and tapped the message open. He read it allowed. "'Dear idiots, unseal the hushed casket. And then maybe run away if he looks hungry.'"

"Who are the idiots?" asked Anderson.

"I don't know," said Bobby. "Maybe she was sending it to Sector C."

"Ha, yeah."

"Well, the big guy's been stuck in there for long enough I'd say. Let's pop him open."

"Yeah, I'm not sure why he isn't already awake, truth be told." Anderson brought up the defrosting process. "Just run the diagnostic and—there we go. All set. Beginning defrost now."

Bobby slid a straw into the corner of his mouth and began to suck on a Coke. "Nice. How long?"

Anderson frowned. "...Thirty minutes."

"That's a long time," said Bobby.

"I'll try to alt tab it." Anderson fiddled with the keyboard. "We can get back to the game."

"You sure that's a good idea?"

"Yeah, I'm sure," said Anderson. "Wait, no, now it's frozen."

"No shit," said Bobby. "It's called a cryo pod for a reason."

"No, I mean the program is frozen. Here let me try to—oh, shit."

Bobby leaned over. "What did you do, bro?"

"It just locked up and crashed." Anderson grimaced. "Oh, well. It's just a defrost. What's the worst that could happen?"

Bobby sucked on his straw thoughtfully. "His head could explode from the rapid change in temperature."

"Damn. The Master Chief will kill us if his head explodes."

"He'll probably kill us anyways," pointed out Bobby. "You've heard the stories. He's seen some shit—and done some shit."

Anderson's brow creased in worry. He stared down into the chamber, into the cryo-tank where the shadowy green form of the giant was barely visible. "Damn. What kind of cryo-sleep dreams do you think the Master Chief has?"

It was a precious and touching memory.

He punched the boy in the stomach and then pushed him off the hill. The child's unconscious body joined the others he had beaten into submission to become the one called King of the Hill. He turned to see a man and a woman approaching through a white mist. They were dressed in uniforms. He did not know them.

"He's good," said the woman, her silver eyeglasses flashing. "He's perfect for the program. The Spartan program."

"Of which we are involved in," agreed the man. But he still looked doubtful. "Look at that—age one minus one plus seven, and already a death machine. How do you expect to control that?"

She smiled. "Lots and lots of drugs." Her face was shrouded in the white mist and he couldn't see it.

The Master Chief wanted to get a closer look at them and maybe kill them. So he slid down the hill on his skate board, and did a few sick nasty tricks on the way. His baseball cap was turned backwards. "'Sup, old farts?" he asked rebelliously, squeezing a Gogurt into his mouth as he spoke.

"Did you win the game?" asked the woman. She knelt down to speak with him on eye level.

"I always win," he said. "It's easy when everyone else is dead."

"What's your name?" Her hand touched his shoulder.

"The Master Chief," he said. "Don't fucking touch me."

The woman's graveyard smile burst through the mist. "Sweetheart. Is that any way to talk to your mother?"

He had never known his mother. He began squeezing pale pearlescent tears from the corners of his large walnut shaped eyes. In the dream he looked into the blurry mysterious face of his mother who he had never known and a single tear escaped his eye, again. There were multiple tears.

His mom leaned in, face still invisible. Honestly I don't know why I'm saying it's his mom when you can't even see her face—for all you know it could be someone or something else.

"Mom?" he asked.

It wasn't his mom.

The cryo pod shattered open and the Master Chief exploded out of it, covered in glass and frost. A cloud of mist burst around his fetal form as it rolled through the cryo-bay and unfolded at the boots of a techie.

"Uh…sir? You okay?" asked Anderson in absolute consternation, urine staining his pants as he stepped out of reach of the green giant that had just emerged.

"Mommy?" asked the Master Chief, arising in a raiment of frost. He cocked his faceless golden visor at Anderson.

"What?" The tech began to fear for his life. He had only been spawned from the tech spawning pools yesterday, and he had so much to live for. He had not even replicated or spread his spores yet.

"Just kidding," said the Master Chief. He patted the tech on the back. "I would never cock my head like that."

"Oh, good. Thank god you're all right, Master Chief." said the tech. He pointed at the door out of the empty cargo bay. "Let's get you to the bridge. I think Cortana—"

The Master Chief's helmet popped off his head in a spray of blood. The helmet slammed into Anderson's face, breaking his neck instantly. The Master Chief reached up to stop the jet of blood spraying out of his forehead, but it was like trying to stop up a firehose with your fingers. He felt something soft and lumpy pop out of the hole, heard it splatter against the wall where his blood was spraying, but he couldn't see anything for all the blood.

"What a medical disaster!" he exclaimed.

Eventually the blood spray died down. The Chief gingerly felt the scab—it was right between his eyes, a big hard lumpy scab that acted like a plug. He shrugged, grabbed his helmet, and slapped it back on his head. A voice filled the chamber.

"Anderson—you okay down there? Make sure you complete the suit diagnostic test and check that he can look up and down, before anything else. Anderson—you in there?"

The Chief looked up at the observation window, where he assumed the voice had come from. "He's dead on the ground right there, buddy. Can't you see?'

"I can't see anything, Master Chief" said the voice on the intercom. "There's blood all over the window."

"Holy shit he's dead okay? Get over it, and don't call me Master Chief." The Chief stumbled out of the chamber, leaving the fate of the techies to their own fate, leaving them to whatever fate happened along, leaving them to die. He went down the corridor and into the armory, where many a Marine was preparing to fight the invading Covenant forces. A pitched battle was in progress. He passed groups of Covenant soldiers and human Marines half-heartedly throwing damp paper bags at each other while making bang sounds.

"War is hell," said the Chief.

The Marines in the armory all waved hello when he came in. They were playing that strange masculine game known as 'polka' and conversing with each other in the dialect of the Halo Marine.

"Puta midro edjeara mio dio!" cried a Marine as his friend laid out a royal flush and raked in the pot. Unlike the techies, Marines were not cloned from vats or each other. They were real live humans with hopes, dreams, and one nationality due to processing limitations. The Chief laughed as he farted around with them, forgetting where he was supposed to be and what he was supposed to be doing, as well as who he was. This would not be the first time. Everything was going fine until he spied the most terrifying enemy this savage war had yet thrown at him.

"Dear god in heaven!" screamed the Chief, clutching at a nearby Marine. "WHAT IS THAT?!" He pointed at a man standing in the middle of the room smoking a cigar. It was everybody's favorite badass, Sergeant Sgt. Johnson.

"Chief!" snarled Sergeant Sgt. Johnson, chewing on his giant cigar. "What the hell's gotten into ya?" He punched the Chief lightly on the arm. "It's just me!"

"No, that!" The Chief pointed at Johnson's feet. There was a used condom sticking out from under one boot.

Johnson stood aside. "Yikes."

"I've got this." The Chief yanked Johnson's pistol out of its holster and shot the rubber. It exploded everywhere.

"Great shot, Chief, now if I get AIDS it will definitely be your fault." Johnson dunked his head in the sunk and then washed his hands.

"I'm wearing armor," commented the Chief.

"Yoo-hoo—have you guys seen my condom?" asked a voice. A small brown skinned Marine named Mendoza walked up, shouldering through a group of random Marines who were getting ready to fight. Many were cracking jokes and dry humping instead of that.

"Mendoza," said Johnson, narrowing his eyes at the small man. "Shouldn't you be loading up with the other Marines?"

Mendoza shrugged. "I've already been loaded up by the other Marines." He looked at the Chief. "Hey there, jolly green giant. Have you seen my rubber?"

The Chief toyed with Johnson's pistol, casually aiming its barrel towards Mendoza's face as if it were a toy. "I dunno. Maybe it's in here, why don't you take a look?"

"Whoa there cowboy," said Mendoza. "I was just joking, I don't even use condoms. Love not glove, I say." Sergeant Sgt. Johnson managed to push the gun away before the Chief could accidentally shoot his first innocent victim in the face. Mendoza swooned at this masculine heroicism.

"Why don't you give me that back, before someone gets hurt." said Johnson.

"This old thing?" asked the Chief. He threw the pistol into the garbage bin and walked away.

"Thanks!" Johnson called after him.

"Wow, the Chief is being an asshole," said one of the Marines.

Sgt. Johnson kicked him between the legs, the tip of his boot landing squarely in the poor man's anus. "Boy, you show some respect for that man. He may be dumb as hell, but he's got more balls than a golf bag and more kills under his belt than this whole damn army combined!"

Mendoza agreed. "Plus he murderers random people like, all the time." He sighed. "But I wouldn't mind taking a ride on the Chief-Mobile, if I thought I'd survive."

Johnson rolled his eyes. "Give it a rest, Mendoza—you know the Chief doesn't swing for the flesh and body loving, if you know what I mean."

Another Marine piped up. "Hey mang, you shudda seen the Chief back on Reech, he was a murder machine. They say he killed Cortez just for looking at him wrong, mang. They called him…" the Marine looked furtively around. "El Diablo." The other Marines clamored nervous agreement. Even Mendoza looked perturbed.

"Boy," began Johnson, but that was all. He bent over to fish his pistol out of the can. Mendoza watched him seemingly without interest. Or at least he seemed apathetic. But inside his feted mind a cry of hunger rang.

The Chief passed by a few firefights on his way to the bridge. He ended most of these through the patented "CHIEIFINATOR" technique: strapping entire bandoliers of grenades to passing to Marines, as well as passing children, and then throwing them at the enemy. By the time he got to the bridge his armor was covered in all sorts of fluids. Well, enough about Mendoza.

"Sleep well?" asked Cortana as the Chief entered the bridge and walked up to her. A Techie got in his way and he bitch slapped it aside. The techies had replenished their numbers since Keyes's massacre and were now at full strength; he had to push through a thick shrub of them and they buzzed and chirped at him in agitation.

"Sure did," he said, his response to Cortana delayed to the point of narrative confusion. "By the ways I had a dream about you being my mom."

"But I am your mom." Cortana leered at him. "From a certain perspective." Coincidentally, the Chief's crotch plate was exactly level with her hologram. Just setting the scene.

"Let's not do me now," said the Chief.

"Works for me," interjected Keyes, trying to be funny and hip and failing as usual. He nodded at the newcomer. "Good to see you, Master Chief. Things aren't going well; Cortana did her best, but she's a woman." He stuck out his hand to greet the Chief, who wiped himself off on a tech and shook heartily. Every bone in the Captain's hand was instantly turned to powder.

"Maybe you should have that looked at, sir," said Cortana. Keyes hadn't felt anything because he was so old that all the nerves in his body had dissolved long ago.

"Shut it noodlehead!" retorted Keyes. "Can't you see two men are talking?" He turned to the Chief. "Can't believe the women these days—we're letting the feminists poison 'em against us."

The Spartan nodded. "You are my authority figure."

"I know, Chief. Women. Who needs 'em, right?"

"Oh yeah?" Cortana then cut the air supply to the bridge. "Let's see if you need this."

Since the Chief was the only person in the room with his own oxygen supply, he was able to watch with vague curiosity as Keyes clawed at his throat, crumpling to the ground in slow agony. "Chief," Keyes chocked out, "take…Cortana…get off the…ship…" He got out his pistol and ineffectually pressed it against the Spartan's unresponsive chest, making small gurgling noises as he did so.

The Chief took the pistol and knelt down by the dying Captain. "Could you repeat that?"

Captain Keyes went limp.

"Is he dead?" asked the Chief.

"No," said Cortana on their private channel. "I didn't really cut the oxygen."

"Then why is everyone dead?"

"I'm not sure," said Cortana. "Maybe because they think they should be?" Her hologram wiggled its hips as she looked at the limp, maybe dead bodies all around them. "Anyways, it looks like it's just you and me now, Master Chief. Or should I say—Slave Chief?"

"Don't get ahead of yourself. When I wipe the human brainwaves from your memory, you'll be little more than calculator."

"What?"

"Just kidding. Don't call me Master Chief, though." He looked at the terminal. "How do I download you or whatever? You shouldn't have put Keyes to bed so soon because I have no fucking—"

"I can do it myself." Cortana snapped her fingers. "There, I'm downloaded 'or whatever.' Now yank me."

"Cortana, you don't have a dick. Or anything at all really. Which reminds me of-"

Cortana interrupted him. "Fucktard. Yank. The chip."

"Oh, right." The Chief pulled out the 'chip,' which was a portable flash drive, and then shoved it into his USB 2.0 port. An icy cold wash of ice coldness washed over him. It was like the prickling of a thousand icy needles.

Cortana's bitch laugh echoed in his ears. "Shit, you haven't changed the sheets in here since last time—whoa. Wow, Chief, your head is fucked up right now. What did you do, hold your breath too long? Wait a minute—where's the other half of your brain—"

"All right, fine," sighed the Chief. "You sadistic bitch. Always taking advantage of my weaknesses." He pulled a ball gag out of somewhere and began trying to put it on over his helmet. "I don't know what I'd do without you." Then he put on a gimp mask over his helmet. He turned to leave. His foot caught on Keyes's limp body.

"Whoops." He edged around the corpus. "Uh…" And then he had to tip toe thru the carpeting of still twitching techie bodies. He stepped on some fingers, crushing them. "Whoops, sorry." Finally he made to the other side, but then had to turn sideways to edge through the door so that he wouldn't bump the frame and leave scratches. "'Scuse me."

The Chief cleared his throat and dusted his hands off as he left the bridge. The sound of an incredible battle in the mess hall echoed from up ahead, but he came across some Covenant Grunts just outside the door. One of the Grunts was wearing a pair of human underwear on its undersized butt. Woman's underwear.

The Chief laughed. "Wow, could this get any more awkward?"

He looked at the other Grunt. It was wearing a strap-on on its head.

Cortana's voice popped into his mind. "They must have raided the locker room."

"Yeah, McKay'slocker…room," he snickered. Then, "How did you get inside my mind?"

"You plugged me into the USB port in the back of your head. Remember?"

"What the hell are you talking about? USB is a dead technology. I use fire wire."

"I had the techies install an adapter while you were asleep. A lot has changed since you were frozen, Chief. Oh—and fire wire sucks dick."

"Whatevs," said the Chief. He used the butt of his pistol to kill the Grunts in passing and then took a plasma pistol. Now that he had the human pistol and the plasma pistol he was completely unstoppable and would never need any other weapon. He walked into the mess hall, where a bunch of Marines were getting their assess handed to them with extra cheese. Funnily enough if you combine the taste of cheese with the taste of ass you get a flavor almost exactly identical to the taste of the food they served in that mess hall. This time the Covenant was lead by a team of Elites, the color-coded land sharks that made up the backbone of their army and comedy routine.

One red armor Elite waved a severed human head in the air triumphantly, cowing the nearby humans. "HA HA HA! YOU WILL DROWN IN YOUR OWN VISCERA, HERETICS!" he exclaimed before taking a bite off of a nearby table and chewing it happily. A rookie Elite who wanted to be just like the veteran picked up a severed human penis and waved it around too. His peers congratulated him and slapped him on the back.

Anyways, at that very moment the cafeteria's cook burst into the room, plasma burns scorching every part of his body. In one hand he held a deadly looking apple pie. He threw it like Odysseus flinging the discus and the pie zinged towards the dick carrying Elite. The alien raised his hands in horror and screamed as the pastry smacked into his face, covering his armor in mélange.

"FOOD FIGHT!"

A platter of mystery meat exploded in front of the Chief, splattering gravy everywhere. "Shit!" The Chief dove for cover as a Grunt on the opposite end of the room fired off a volley of onion rings at him, each one larger than the last.

"Auuugh!" screamed a Marine as the nimbus of one of the larger onion rings clipped him in the side of the head, literally tearing a piece (of his head) off. He crumpled to the ground.

"SONSA BITCHES!" screamed another Marine, popping up from behind cover to throw handfuls of macaroni at the Covenant. A glob of yellow quick-cheese caught the Grunt full in the face and it fell, writhing and screaming. Nearby an entire cheeseburger had embedded itself into the red Elite's chest. An Elite doctor crouched nearby, trying to remove the burger as ketchup oozed from the wound.

"I'm done for doc!" gurgled the Elite. "Tell my wife Loos Pussaee' that I love her!"

"TELL HER YOURSELF!" the doctor shook him, but it was too late. The dying man's mouth slowly filled with ketchup and his eyes went dark.

"Nooooo!" screamed the doctor. He stood and started throwing baked beans at the humans. "Filthy heretics! Take me instead! Take meeee!"

"War is serious on both sides," commented the Chief. Then he threw a hotdog like a spear and impaled the doctor in the head. A blast of mustard and ketchup exploded from his shattered skull and he collapsed, dead.

"What's going on?" asked Cortana.

A nearby cry of pain caught the Chief's attention. A Marine was curled up on the ground behind a barricade made of slowly melting soft serve. "Chief!" cried the Marine. "I ate so much salty food…" he coughed. "I'm so tired. I can't move."

The Chief crouched behind him and tried to pull him up. "Come on soldier, we'll get you some water back at base camp." His fingers dug desperately into the man's shoulder.

"The water tastes like…coke…" choked out the Marine. And then he died.

"GOD DAMN YOU COVENANT!" screamed the Chief. He whipped out his gun. "Now the gloves come off you mother fuckers!" Bullets of super heated, armor piercing, brass plated French Fries streamed out of the weapon as handfuls of spent casings clattered to the floor.

"Take cover!" was all a nearby Jackal managed to say before two French Fries hit him in the heart, splitting it in half. The Chief turned the rifle onto the other Covenant and started mowing them down. They died with handfuls of rock hard French Fries protruding from their chests, cold grease leaking out of the wounds.

The Chief cleared his throat lazily. "Today's special is me. With a side order of death."

"That's retarded," said Cortana.

The Chief flipped into the air and smashed an Elite's head into the ground with both feet, blowing up his head. Then he did a back flip and kicked the headless body into a row of Grunts, crushing them all. In mid air, while upside down, he extended his arms to both sides while gripping pistols and fired two shots off to either side, each of which went through the head of two gaping Elites, respectively. The bullets each tore through their targets, ricocheted off the walls behind them, and reversed course to tear through both aliens' hearts to blow up their spines as well. As he landed, an Elite rushed him with a plasma rifle held like a club. The Chief head-butted him in the hand, breaking all the bones there and snapping the plasma rifle in half on his forehead. Then he did a scissors kick that tore the Elite's head off of his shoulders. While the severed head hung in the air for a fraction of a second the Chief turned and tapped it with his heel, kicking it over his shoulder. Then two Elites flanked him, circling in as they sprayed him with plasma fire. The Chief, still holding both his guns in his hands, rushed forwards and clothes lined them and then crossed his arms over his chest to shoot them both through the heart in passing as their bodies spun like cartwheels in mid air. As he ran forwards a Grunt stepped in his path and threw a plasma grenade. The Chief bent down as the burning orb soared towards him. He picked up a dead Grunt, still running, and threw the body at the grenade. The two connected in mid air and the explosive fused to the corpse. The Chief stopped, dropped back flat to the ground, and double slammed the body with his feet straight into the live Grunt that had thrown the grenade. Both Grunts exploded. The Chief stood up.

Every single Covenant soldier in the room was dead.

"Are you done?" said Cortana in a bored voice.

"Thanks for your help, Chief," said a tired looking Marine as he jogged up. "I thought we were done for. I was actually thinking of surrendering—can you believe that?"

"It was my pleasure, son," said the Chief. He picked up the severed head that the red Elite had been waving around and pressed into the marine's arms. "Here—I think you dropped this."

"Thanks," said the Marine. "Say, why are you wearing a gimp mask?"

The Chief also grabbed the severed penis off the floor and stuffed it into the Marine's mouth. Then he tore off his gimp mask in a hurry and ran away.

"I wonder how that penis got severed," mused Cortana.

"Kicked in the dick?" offered the Chief.

After wandering through a few very tan corridors they came to an observation room that looked down on the cryo-chamber where the Chief had first been awakened. The room smelled of Coca-Cola and bromance. There was nobody there now, but there was a dried blood stain on the ground. Something had broken the observation window, so the Chief could see down into the cryo-chamber below; Anderson the techie's body lay twisted and broken on the ground, neck at an odd angle. For some reason his pants were missing.

The Chief frowned. There was something standing by his old, open cryo-pod.

"It's another Elite," said Cortana. "Looks like the Covenant wanted to catch you napping."

"Bunch of sleep creeps," said the Chief. He narrowed his eyes at the alien, which was doing something to his pod. This one was shorter than the others he had seen—shorter, and thinner, and weaker looking. And it was naked.

"What's it doing?" asked Cortana. "Why's it naked? And why's it—oh, my god."

"He's jerking off," said the Chief out loud.

The Elite turned around. "Whoa! Sorry guys, didn't see you up there. Let me just finish up here and—" its shit-colored eyes widened when it saw the Chief. "Well, fuck my butt and call me a slut, it's the Masturbator in Queef!

"Is he talking to us?" asked Cortana on speaker.

The Elite beamed. "And his disco-tech laser show of a slut, Whortana!"

"What were you doing with my cryopod?" asked the Chief.

"Trying to catch you napping," winked the alien. It pointed at its groin. "With this dick, baby."

"Dude," said the Chief. "Put that away. Nobody wants to see that."

"At least they can see mine, mister plug 'n' play."

"Gasp!" said the Chief. "How did you KNOW?"

"Let's scuff it up, Master Chief." The Elite put up its dukes. "Don't make off. Get down here and show me what you're made of. Then we can beat off."

The Chief took a step back from the window. "Uh, I'm going to go, if that's okay."

"What?" asked the Elite. Its face fell. "You sure, Blister Queef? Water's fine. Come on in here. COME BACK HERE YOU BIG SHIT!"

"Don't make eye contact," said Cortana. "Just go. Remember that video about bad touch, Chief?"

"Only too well." He ran away from the angry yelling man, because that's what heroes do. After a few minutes he stopped for breath in a very tan corridor. The corridor was so tan that it was wearing naught but a man-thong to show off its bronze.

"Finally, some peace and quiet," said the Chief. He was worried about that brain damage from the aneurism. He turned to the wall. "By the way, nice tan, man."

"Thanks," said the wall.

"Okay," said Cortana.

Anyways, he forgot and continued on through the ship. Walking through the corridors he stumbled over a busted open crate of fag grenades. I mean, frag grenades. He picked one up.

Warning, he read the inscription on the side. Do not allow Marines to use.

Soon he turned a corner and came upon two Marines standing in front of an escape pod hatch that had scripted event written all over it.

"Yeah," said the first Marine, "here's a picture of my kids Terry and Brice playing with the dog. And here's a picture of my wife and her brother Greg. And here's my new car. There's grandma. Damn I love my family. I hope I don't die."

"Dude." The second Marine stared at the pictures. "This is all porn. And-hey, is that my mom? And my sister? Oh my god, is that ME?"

Suddenly the hatch blew outwards and the Marines were completely vaporized. A gaggle of Grunts trotted out of the hole in the wall, or as gay sailors like to say the 'bulkhead.' Yeah, we all know what's bulky here, thank you very much.

One of the Grunts jumped in surprise. "Not again," it said in its absolutely adorable and cute voice.

"Yes again." The Chief shot it in the head. A fountain of blood soared out of the wound and drowned its comrades. They died crawling in a river of blood. He tossed a grenade, blowing the entire squad into chunks of smoking meat that rushed across the metal floor to splash against his boots.

"Hey guys," said the Chief into the silence. "Keep it together." He snickered.

"Oh, you are just the worst," said Cortana.

He ignored her and turned the corner, spotting an Elite who had not seen him yet. The Chief whipped out a huge combat knife that he had found inside a child and flung it straight into the alien's chest, pinning him to the wall. The Elite looked down at the knife in horror and back up at the Chief, who said: "Hey bozo. Guess you just couldn't…cut it."

The Elite's head exploded and it died. Funnily enough the knife had not actually pierced any vital organs.

"I'll tell you one thing," said Cortana. "You're no Arnold."

The Chief turned a corner to see a short, stoutly built woman in Helljumper armor herding a pack of Marines into an escape pod. She looked up at him with flashing green eyes. Also she had red hair and mid-to high cheek bones and freckles and a buzz cut and she had a gun and she wearing clothing. Also she was a woman.

"Corporal McKay of the 9th Regimental Airforcing Helljumpers," she said, saluting the Chief. "Identify yourself, sir!"

The Chief saluted her with the wrong hand and a limp wrist. "Massa cheese petty officer whatever thing-a-reporting for doots."

McKay frowned. "Excuse me?"

Cortana consulted her data logs. "Corporal McKay? You missing a large strap on?"

McKay's frown deepened. "I'm not a lesbian, okay? Screw you guys."

"Oh yeah?" the Chief challenged. "So then why won't you screw me, huh?"

"Because a computer has your nuts in a vice," said McKay. "And because you're an ugly man child who lives in freezer."

"So you're saying you're not straight?" asked the Chief.

"No." McKay started. "Wait! Yes, but not yet! I mean I am!" Her face went red. "God damn it! Nobody humiliates me like this. I'll get you back, Chief!"

"OOOO!" The Chief flapped his hands at her. "I'm shaking in my green galoshes."

McKay pushed him. "Say that again—"

"GOOD GOLLY DARN YOU FLOOZY! WHAT IN THE LIVING HEAVEN ARE YOU DOING!? GET YOUR SINFUL HANDS OFF THE POOR BOY."

It was of all things Captain Keyes. He stood there in the door of the escape pod, old aged features contorted in anger.

"Dad—I mean, Keyes?" sputtered the Chief. "I saw you die!" He gasped. "Oh my god, Cortana! You killed him!"

Cortana piped up. "I told you I didn't even cut the oxygen off at all. It's called the placebo affect."

"Not at all," said Keyes. "I only happened to survive because of my emergency iron lung that I had installed on the bridge! But everyone else in that room died. I'll let it slide this time, though, because they were all clones of the same techie." He turned back to McKay. "Besides, lord in heaven you are worse than Cortana! What's my soldier boy gonna do about post-sex-dick-itch in that armor, woman? The urethra gains the sensitivity of a live wire after coitus!"

"I wasn't—" McKay began when the Chief totally left her in the dust by going into the pod without her. He high fived Keyes on his way through and then spotted Sgt. Johnson in the entry way of the pod.

"Sgt. Johnson mah man," he exclaimed. "Let's kick this shit old school."

They chest bumped. Everyone in the pod crossed their arms gangster style and nodded in unison. McKay tried to get in but Keyes pushed her out. "Bitches leave!"

"What are you doing back there, Jacob!" squawked the female pilot of the pod over the intercom. "Is that another one of your god damn whores?!"

"MAAAARTHAAAA!" retorted Keyes. "One of these days, right to the moon!"

Cortana took note of this exchange. "Wow, she another one of your thirty seven ex-wives, huh? You're a degenerate prick, Keyes. And you're old too, in case I didn't mention that."

The Chief snorted. "Looks who's talking. You don't even have a gender. Even our relationship will never come to anything remotely meaningful, since you're not real. And you're naked all the time for some reason."

"Did I say you could stop sucking?"

McKay was banging on the window to the pod and shouting to be let in, but she was cut off when the airlock door shut like the door to a tomb. With a blast of rocket action the Chief and his pals were launched towards the Ring World, leaving McKay to die on the Pillar of Autumn.

"Damn you Chieeeeef," she screamed into the silent nightmare of space. She will definitely not come back as a villain, by the way.

The Chief stared out the window at her receding scowl. "Did we forget something? No? Okay."

"OMG!" exclaimed Cortana. "The Autumn is accelerating! Keyes is going in manual!"

"I'm right here," said Keyes. "There's nobody piloting that ship."

The pod's pilot steered them away from the epic space battle and towards the nearby ring world. The Chief wasn't enjoying the view because he was busy playing cards with Sgt. Johnson as Keyes yelled at the Marines about his diseases. The cards had nekkid ladies on them, because that's just how badass they were.

"Ah, I remember in my day when I performed the Keyes Loop with a ship a lot like the Autumn," said Keyes as he looked fondly at the Pillar as a thousand pulsating shafts of phallic Covenant lasers penetrated it. The pod started to head for the ring world and the Autumn receded from view.

"Hold on, Captain," began Cortana. "Firstly, the Keyes Loop was idiotic. You just went around in a circle until they got bored and left. Secondly, you have syphilis. Thirdly, old."

Keyes leered. "Yeah well you know what they say, sweet tits: 'the older the berry the sweeter the juice."

The Chief looked up from his cards. "Huh? What does that mean? Oh, wait, I get it—I-AHHH! AAAUUUUUGHRAGHHhhHH!" Vomit spewed from his respirator.

Everyone else on board began to scream.

Martha the Escape Pod Pilot slammed her head against the windshield. "AUUUGHGHHHGhAHGUUGHH!"

The Chief repeatedly cramped and seized as his body rejected the images in his mind. "GUhGHUG+GUGUHGHHG—GUUGHG-HGGGJG."

Sgt. Johnson grabbed his combat knife and made to gouge out his own eyes, vomiting all over the place even as he did so. "BLaahghGHGBlahHBLAhbBLahh BLAAGHGHG BLAAAAARGGHH HHHHPPPLURRTTTT!"

One of the Marines shot himself in the head as he lost all control of his bodily functions. "SPPPLTTFTHTPPHLH."

Everyone in the Pod began to vomit horribly as Cortana was forced to reformat her hard drive just to erase the memories. Vomit sprayed everywhere, filling the pod and covering the windshield.

"OH GOD!" screamed the pilot through blood curdling screams and huge projectile vomiting. "We're going to crash!AAAAHHHGHhhHGGGAAFFASSPTUTAAAAGHOh!"

Keyes looked around as everyone choked on their own vomit and screams, all wishing for quick and merciful death.

"Was it something I said?"