There will be a surprise appearance. I know he's dead but his personality was just so compatible with Tiffany's. What I'm saying is, kind of an AU. Sort of.

Thanks to Valerianus for going over my Beta chapter.

Chapter 3

John shivered away the cold as he woke up. He looked about his spacious tent, and found the light lacking. He checked his analogue watch, it was too early. He let his head fall back into his pillow and sighed. He didn't want to get up, so he used to the cold as an excuse to stay in bed. If you don't go now, you'll have to deal with more hell jumpers than necessary. He sighed again and stretched, his joints popping.

Tiffany yawned like a cat as she looked over the desert, the sky was still dark, her shift was almost over. She gazed around and turned pacing her route on the perimeter. The group of four ODST's was about to show-up. Instead, she saw the master chief come around the corner of an "avenue" of tents, in grey fatigues. She stopped surprised, and then grinned. Not that he saw it, since she being fully armed with a full face silver visor and all.

She figured he came this way to deal with less people. Well, less hell jumpers. She tapped the side of her helmet and her silver visor went up. "Good morning, Master Chief." The chief stopped and looked at her, as if it were the first time he even noticed she was there.

"Good morning." Replied the master chief quietly. She could tell he was still groggy from sleep; his head snapped up and looked past her immediately alert. She turned to see what he was looking at. The patrol of ODST's finally arrived around the corner about ten meters away.

Wary, she tried to distract him, "You heading to the showers; or the gym?"

It took him a moment before he replied, "It would probably be smarter to head to the gym first, don't you think?" she could tell his attention wasn't completely trained on her, because the comment was rude, as if she too stupid to remember it was smarter to go to the gym first than shower, rather the other way around, but his tone was more he was speaking to himself. She turned so she was side by side with him and started to walk, to her surprise he actually started to follow. "Maybe I will go to the gym." He decided.

"Get a jump before everyone else? Not have to deal with the crowd, wait in line, and beat up people who try to take machine from you even though you got there first?" she inquired

That confused the master chief, he squinted down at the girl who was looking straight ahead at nothing, as if her comments came from actual events, "What?"

She looked up at him with a fake look of surprise, "What, you've never beat someone up to use the weight lift?"

"No. I can't say that I have." He was quiet a moment, "Have you?"

Her mouth tightened, "I'm not at liberty to say?"

He raised an eyebrow and nodded once slowly; she was so weird. The ODST's stopped and gazed at the master chief with a look of annoyance. Tiffany grinned at them but continued walking around them as she didn't stop her conversation.

"Corporal, what are you doing?" asked one of the patrolmen.

She cocked her head, "Escorting the master chief."

"I didn't know you were an escort." said one of the troopers in the back with a malicious, lustful grin.

She smiled back just as vicious, she placed a gauntleted hand on the chief's chest, "Sorry, limited clientele slots." She guided the chief away past them.

"You shouldn't have done that." Master Chief scolded her.

She stopped and looked up at the chief once they were far enough away from the patrolling group, "Why not, they all know it's untrue."

"That's not what I meant." He said, seemingly void of any emotion, "They are your teammates; you shouldn't be causing tension amongst yourselves."

"That sounds so wise but there's a flaw to your thought process there. They are my teammates and I expect more from them than such childish behavior as dominate games, if they were smart, they would be using you to their advantage, not trying to beat you down to seem bigger and better. If it's less work for me, then go right ahead and do whatever it is you need to do. You don't have to worry about me stopping you. Ok, my point, I am willing to be the better person. Me, completely minusing the fact you saved my life, have no problem with you, honestly you seem like a decent man, and are as far from unattractive as we are from earth." The comment made John do a double take towards the girl who was viewing the grey desert as her post required.

"What?" he asked now confused, what did his looks have to do with anything? He blinked and shook his head, "I must to go."

She grinned, flashing her teeth prettily, "ok, have fun showering."

His eyes widened in surprise at the odd commendation, "Right."

"Bye" she said as he walked away.

He turned back, incredibly unsure of this girl; "Bye."

She sighed and looked behind her to see the patrol gone but one, who was staring after her, continued on, when he saw that she saw him. She turned back to watch the Chief walk away. He looked behind him to see her watching. She waved excitedly, and he raised a hand to her. She flashed a large smile when she got a wave and giggled. Quickly, she let her visor fall back into place and she turned around to continue her patrol. Her heart was racing and she couldn't stop grinning. She turned to see if the master chief was gone before she started dancing with giddiness. She giggled and punched the air and jumped around to double check that the master chief was gone. It wasn't until he was gone that she realized that she probably should have saluted him. Unconcerned, she grinned at nothing bounced back around and yelped to see her replacement staring at her with concern.

"Love struck for the master chief?" She asked.

"What?" Tiffany snorted, "No, of course not."

Her replacement nodded slowly with a small grin, "right, go get breakfast."

"Okay." Quickly she gathered herself and strode away, leaving her replacement to shake her head.

John relaxed on the flat bench press, arms resting on his chest. He couldn't help but let his mind turn to the eccentric girl that seemed to keep popping up around him. She was…different, hardly more than a civilian with battle armor and a gun. She was free spoken, unafraid of her comrades or what they may think or feel about her. As if she truly didn't care. He had to admit that she was absolutely right about how she needed to treat her allies, partners. Wouldn't he have done the same with his Spartans? They weren't just his soldiers. They were his best friends, his brothers and sisters. He expected only greatness from them just as she expected greatness from her hell jumpers. She didn't fear them because they were her family. They may be a pain, but they wouldn't hurt her, right? He was very aware of their notoriety with women, especiallyif they'd been out in the field too long. But was this the same?

"Your tent isn't that far away if you want to sleep Chief." came the voice of Lieutenant Kurt Ambrose who was leaning against the bench press beside him. John sat up and shared a smile with his friend who had been lost for so long and snatched the bottle from his hand, giving himself permission to drain half of its contents. "Help yourself." Kurt added sarcastically.

"Thank you." He said nodding, handing back the bottle, "Did you need something?"

"No," he said with a weird smile, "You looked to be pretty deep in thought. I was curious."

John nodded, "Ok, curious about what?"

"Oh nothing!" he said shaking his head, "just I—, what's her name?" He asked quickly, trying to catch him off guard.

"What?" John asked exasperated.

"Oh please! What's her name Chief? You can't be that engrossed in your thoughts and have them not be about a girl."

John stood, shaking his head at his friend, "Whatever, I was always worried about you when we were younger, you know that? Always talking non-stop be it other soldiers or civilians. It's had a bad effect on you. "

"I'm crazy, is that what you're saying?" he asked smiling. He loved to be weird around his brothers and sisters, just to relax and be himself, but he didn't get to often because of his Spartans III's. He more often than not had to be their leader and roll model.

"Yes, putting it simply." John replied standing, "I'm going to take a shower, were you on your way there or were you staying?"

"I was on my way." He said, grabbing his brothers discarded fatigues. John took his offered fatigues but didn't bother to put them on over his shorts. Silently they strode out, side by side making their way to the showers.

As they rounded the last corner to the showers, John froze and swung back around, grabbing Kurt by the collar, dragging him back. "What are we doing?"

John peeked around the corner, "her, who I was thinking about, it's her." John backed up and Kurt took his place and gazed around the corner to see a young woman, tall and slender with—

"Her hairs too long, she's bad for you. She's too much of a civilian."

John was taken aback. "I wasn't thinking about her that way, gracious Kurt." But he had to admit to himself she was very much the civilian.

Kurt's expression was thoughtful, "Then what about?" He peeked around the corner again but the girl had disappeared into the showers.

"She's different, that's all."

"Everyone's different, Chief"

John just gave him a look.

"Hmm, well, let's go shower." Said Kurt, vanishing around the corner. John looked to the heavens.

Why do I bother? He said shaking his head. He followed his friend around the corner into the showers.

"The last base was a little lacking." John replied quietly, remembering the base on installation 04, and all the personnel that had been lost.

Kurt quieted, observant of the melancholy. "They say you were the only survivor." John shook his head.

"I was one of a few; Sergeant Avery Johnson, for example, also survived." Kurt nodded. "I think they took a good look at my debriefing transcript before we came." He said quietly, not wanting to disturb the other occupant at the far end of the showers.

They were finishing up, going back to their lockers when they saw Tiffany looking at herself in the mirror as if she were trying to make up her mind about something important about herself. She sighed and picked up a strand of her too long hair and observed it with a sad expression. With another sigh she gathered the rest up and pulled it tight and pulled a combat knife from her side.

"WAIT!" All three jumped and looked to the door way to see Petty Officer Second Class Kelly standing in the doorway, "You shouldn't cut hair like that."

Tiffany watched the Spartan walk up to her. She had been one of the MIA's that returned; she was one of the master chief's "sisters".

"Let me help you." She took the knife and set it on the counter and divided some of her hair, "Where's your hair tie?" Tiffany raised her hand to reveal a green hair band; one of the few standard colors, along with white, beige, black, brown and dark green that protocol allowed. That lovely protocol. "I'm sorry, I like hair, and I don't have much of my own to actually play with." Tiffany gazed into the mirror to look at Kelly, who's hair was shortly cut and brown.

"Are you boys just gonna watch us all day?" Kelly asked without turning around.