0942 Standard Colonial Time

Master Chief Petty Officer John-117, otherwise known as "Master Chief" awoke to find himself staring down the barrel of a gun. His eyes rapidly scanned his surroundings. A dozen soldiers in armor he had never encountered before surrounded him, hefting massive guns.

One of the soldier leaned in, his visor open. "Well, well. Sleeping beauty awakes. Mind tellin' us who you are?"

He was chomping on a large, brown cigar. He took it out of his mouth and held it to Master Chief's face. "I'm sure we'll find out who you are… eventually."

With no warning, Master Chief leaped into the air at such a velocity that the eardrums of the soldier who was leaning in burst. A split second later he pushed himself down from the ceiling and smashed the heel of his foot into the head of another soldier, smashing his visor and blinding him. He then sprang out of the way as dozens of bullets shot past him, hitting two more soldiers who both fell to the floor, dazed and with a few broken ribs. He grabbed another armored soldier and swung him around, catching another few dozen bullets. He threw the soldier on to another, and both fell with a grunt.

The remaining six soldiers surprisingly did not retreat, but rather held their ground and readied to fire. Master Chief shook his head. Who the hell were these guys?

He dived around a wall are even more bullets sped past him at Mach 10. There, he found his equipment, including his MA5C. He doubted it would be of much help, since their armor was extremely thick and blocked even their own bullets, but it would be useful as suppressive fire. They, after all, did not know how ineffective the gun would be.

He stuck his head around the corner and whipped it back as more bullets flew by. He saw that they were slowly advancing, more cautious after the death of their comrade.

Abruptly, a deep, gruff voice rang out. "This is Lieutenant Alex Kruchez of the Terran Dominion Marine Corps. Come out with your hands up and behind your head."

Master Chief did not reply; rather, he took out a flashbang grenade. He pulled the pin and counted to exactly 2.8 seconds and threw it. The grenade exploded a split second later in a flash of light and sound, blinding and deafening the remaining soldiers.

He jumped out during the chaos, having changed his visor to maximum polarity and blocking out the sound. The enemy were not so lucky. Many were covering their eyes, and some were on the floor. John spotted the one he suspected was the commanding officer; his rank were clearly visible on his shoulder pads. He leaped at him and punched him in the face. His hand crashed the visor and crunched into the man's face, literally causing his head to explode. Bits of flesh, blood, and brain matter came out, showering John in a torrent of gore.

Not the slightest bit unnerved, Master Chief calm ran up to a soldier and swept his legs from under him, letting him fall before smashing his elbow into his head. He then ran over to the remaining four, who were starting to get over the effects of the extremely potent flashbang. He smashed two of their heads together and faced the last two.

He kicked one of them, pushing him back into his friend. Both fell to the floor in a tumble.

Exactly 37.3 seconds had passed since he had woken up.

The Chief looked around. Where the hell am I? He was still in the Forward Unto Dawn, yes. But who were these people? And where was Cortana?

Suddenly worried, Master Chief quickly locked the surviving soldiers into a detention cell before moving around the ship, trying to contact Cortana. No response. After ten minutes of wandering around, John came back to the detention cell. He opened the door, not expecting any resistance. He was wrong. The soldier who's eardrums had been burst swung his fist at him while another swung his leg in hopes of tripping him.

Jesus, who the hell are these guys? John-117 easily blocked the clumsy blow, and stomped on the leg attempting to leg sweep him, crushing the man's lower calf. Both men moaned in agony, grabbing their respective broken body parts.

He spoke. "Now, would you gentlemen mind telling me who you are?"

Seven enemy soldiers had survived, and of them only five were able to speak. He quickly made up his mind, and grabbed the one who's leg he had crushed.

He held up his MA5C to the man's head and said, "'I'm going to count to three, and if nobody answers me, I will blow Mr. Armored Man's brains out. 1. 2."

He pulled the trigger on two. Gore showered the six others. He expected screaming. He expected cursing. But he did not expect this.

One of them spoke. "Bah, this the best you can do, boy? I faced ten times worse during boot camp in Alpha Squadron. Boy, I survived Mar Sara, New Gettysburg, and Char. You ain't breakin' me."

The other soldiers murmured their agreement.

He looked up and saw there would be no breaking them in time. They would surely have been sent from some kind of base or spacecraft and they would be getting suspicious.
He nodded. "Alright, then. Have it your way."

He walked out of the detention cell, not bothering to close the door behind him. He walked over to the CIC, where he made his way to the control console. To his surprise, the console already read: Self destruct command confirmation requred: Y/N

What the hell?

He pressed "Y".

"Warning: self destruct sequence initiated. Self destruct in 10 minutes."

He casually walked out into the hanger, where he spotted the craft that had brought them in. It was extremely large. He looked around the hanger bay, and realized that most of the aircraft in the hanger was in various states of disrepair; it would be impossible to fly them for long periods of time.

Suddenly, he realized that he had never seen a pilot. He darted into the ship, only to find himself staring down a barrel of a gun for the second time in an hour. A shaking hand held up a pistol. The man behind the gun was unarmored. He was rather short, about 5'5''. He had no muscle to make up for his lack of size, but he wasn't fat either. He had stark, bright green eyes, contrasted by jet black hair. He wore a uniform.

John-117 casually snatched the pistol out of his hand so fast nothing but a blur could be seen. The man jumped back with a loud yell, clutching his broken fingers.

The Chief gestured for him to go inside the cockpit. Shaking, he went inside. There was no copilot. The cockpit was well organized, with far fewer buttons than he had imagined. It was rather simple looking, actually. Master Chief sat down in the copilot's chair. He pointed and said, "Get in."

Still shaking, the pilot got in the seat and lifted the craft up.

"I suggest you drive faster. This place is set to blow in… oh six minutes."

"What?!" yelled the pilot.

"Just drive."


A/N: So, this is my rewrite. So, where should they go? I'm actually thinking they're not gonna join Raynor but hang by themselves for a few weeks. Thoughts? Please review. Laters.