Author's Note:
This chapter starts on page 100 on Word. Yay!
Anyway in this chapter we learn a few things about The Major, Wyatt, Sheila and Cortana.
And hey, someone (actually a few people) dies in this chapter.
Chapter 10: The Closely Guarded Secret
"Hey." Cortana made an odd tapping noise inside John's helmet. "Wake up."
John ignored her and rolled over.
"Come on, get up. Do I need to do CPR?"
John grunted.
"Get up! It's been over 8 hours!"
John could hear the frustration in Cortana's voice; good. John sat up and checked the time, 0630.
He turned to Fred and shook him.
Fred moaned as he sat up. "There is no way that that was 8 hours."
John and Fred stood; they walked over to Kelly, Will and Linda and woke them all up.
"See?" Cortana said. "That wasn't so hard was it?"
"No, but you're not the one doing all the fighting." John murmured.
"What?"
John ignored her and kept walking.
"Where we supposed to be?" Kelly asked.
"Captain Keyes wants you to report to the bridge." Cortana answered.
John and the other Spartans stopped and saluted as Major Miller passed by.
"At ease Spartans." The Major said returning their salute.
John stared at the Major's insignia, a golden hawk over two golden swords that crossed each other. It was the insignia of the Hawk Naval Division. John had heard about the Major's skill in a Longsword, alone, the Major had destroyed over a hundred Seraphs; his team had destroyed three times that.
The Major looked at John, "Good to see you Master Chief, it's been awhile."
John wondered how the Major had been able to identify him from the rest of his Spartans.
"Yes it has been, sir."
"I assume that you are heading to the bridge?"
"Yes, sir." Cortana answered.
"Good."
The Major turned and started walking towards the bridge again; John and the rest of his team close behind.
The Merciless Inquisitor belonged to the Sangheili now.
A hundred Sangheili, forty Lekgolo and hundred-twenty Unggoy. The massive amount of soldiers was split into four groups, a gold Sangheili leading each. Twenty-five Sangheili, ten Lekgolo and thirty Unggoy made up each squad.
"Camouflage." Levi Rovoalee ordered to his Sangheili and Unggoy.
He made a few hand singals to the Lekgolo for them to push back. "Do not fire your weapon until the Jiralhanae fire at us."
As soon as his Active Camouflage was activated Rovoalee crept forward towards the door. The lights on the door flashed and the door opened.
Inside the room were dozens of Jiralhanae Honor Guards. Rovoalee continued into the room as quietly as he could. In the center of the room was a ramp that led up to a raised platform. Rovoalee walked silently past the Honor Guards up the ramp, at the top was something he didn't expect. A Prophet.
Rovoalee jumped as he heard a few Jiralhanae fall to the ground, his Sangheili must have been moving in already.
The Prophet turned, his bug-like eyes meeting Rovoalee's. "Guards! Remove this Infidel from my sight!"
Camouflage was no good now; Rovoalee turned his camouflage off and activated his Sword.
A few of the Guards threw down their large spears and pulled out their red plasma rifles.
The Prophet moved out of the way of the charging Jiralhanae.
A few Jiralhanae moved towards Rovoalee; he smiled at this challenge, though he knew that there were too many for him to fight and survive. Levi swung his Sword at the first Jiralhanae, killing it in a single swing. He drove his Sword through the next one's chest.
Now to really have some fun, Rovoalee grabbed a plasma grenade. He jumped over the Jiralhanae, triggered the grenade and stuck to a Jiralhanae's head; this time it killed four of them. The Guards turned around, Levi jumped over their head again, repeating his previous tactic.
Two of them left.
Rovoalee cut one of the Jiralhanae's throats open, killing it instantly.
One more.
Rovoalee turned, this Guard had a Jiralhanae shot.
Out of nowhere an Energy Sword penetrated the Jiralhanae's chest. It began to fall, dead before it hit the floor.
A red armored Sangheili holding an Energy Sword revealed himself in front of Levi, Rovoalee nodded a thanks to the Sangheili and walked over to the Prophet.
Rovoalee picked the Prophet up by the back of its robes. He read the names etched into the robes.
"The Prophet of Valor. I didn't expect you to be here."
The Prophet struggled to break free from Rovoalee's grasp. "Put me down you Infidel! If you're going to kill me do it now!"
Rovoalee laughed and pulled the Prophet up higher towards him. "I'm not going to kill you, unless you give us a reason to. You may be useful to us."
Rovoalee tossed the Prophet off the platform towards a group of Sangheili. "Lock him in the brig!"
The Sangheili nodded, grabbed the Prophet by the arms and dragged it out of the room.
Rovoalee turned to the large hologram the formed a "C" around the platform.
"This must be the Sermon Chamber." A red Sangheili said.
Rovoalee nodded and turned on his opened up a COM channel with the other teams. "This is 1st Platoon Leader Levi Rovoalee; we've captured the ship's Sermon Chamber and a Prophet."
Cortana stood in a corner as the other Constructs conversed. There were tons of them, Cortana had never been around so many Human, or Ex-Covenant Constructs her in life.
This was their second meeting here; the first time the all had met was chaos. The first time they had to figure out how to get the Index without releasing the Flood. Yet, that was the problem, the Flood; somehow their plan had failed, the Flood had been released; now they had to decide what to do next.
Cortana cleared her throat to try to bring attention to herself. The Constructs all looked at her.
"As you all here may know, our attempts to contain the Flood have failed horribly. We need to figure something out soon, or else the Flood will take over this Ring as they have done twice now. Our rule of having to burn everyone who dies in a fight with either the Brutes or the Flood has been working; but not well enough. We need a way to stop them."
One of the Elite Constructs stepped forward, Cortana recognized this one, it was Pashko. "Well, Cortana you understand how hard it is going to be to stop the Parasite without activating the Ring."
"Of course I do. What do you take me for? A 'dumb' AI!"
"No, I'm just saying- that, well you know, this is tough."
"I know, can we move on?"
Another Construct, Vlad turned his head towards Pashko. "Yes, I think we should."
Here we go again. Cortana mused as all the Constructs decided to join the argument.
"Dr.Halsey, you wanted to see me?" Johns said.
"Yes. I have a few questions for you."
"About what?"
"The Flood."
John moved closer towards Dr.Halsey's desk.
"It's just one question, what do you know about Gravemind?"
"Ma'am?"
Dr.Halsey sat back in her chair. "Just explain to me what he was like."
For half and hour John told Dr.Halsey everything he remembered about Gravemind.
"Hmmm." Dr.Halsey said after John finished his story. "Cortana."
Cortana's image appeared next to Dr.Halsey's computer. "Yes?"
"Do you have anything else to add?"
"No ma'am."
Dr.Halsey nodded. "That's all I needed to know John, you may go."
John saluted and walked towards the door, it had shut halfway when he overheard Cortana say, "It's a shame you got to the SPARTAN III's to late."
John froze and spun on his heel until he was facing Cortana. "You knew?" He said deeply.
"Well- I-I- ummm"
"You knew where Dr.Halsey was taking Kelly?"
Cortana turned her head to Dr.Halsey. Dr.Halsey nodded to Cortana and she brought her gaze back to John, squinting. "Yes. She asked me not to tell anyone, and act like I didn't know what was going on."
"You lied to us, to me, and to an Admiral."
"It was something that he, you, or anyone else couldn't know. It's been my closely guarded secret for over two weeks now."
John sighed. "Cortana, you have some explaining to do."
Corporal Wyatt Andrews walked outside over to a group of marines. In this group was his younger sister, Sheila. A few others he knew, Lieutenant Parker, Corporal Ekoumov and Sergeant Johnson.
Wyatt saluted the Sergeant which he returned.
Sheila looked at Wyatt grimly and walked over to him. "You and I haven't had a good chance to talk since Earth."
Sheila shoved Wyatt onto the ground and put her boot on his chest.
Wyatt winced as he hit the ground. "What's wrong with you!"
"You! Everytime I leave you alone you go nearly getting yourself killed!" Sheila pressed her boot into Wyatt's chest.
Wyatt coughed. "That was 6 days ago, my shoulder's almost full healed, why are you saying this now!"
She pressed harder on Wyatt's chest. "I may be younger than you, but not by much. You always think that you have to protect me. It's you who needs the protection!"
"So I got shot in the shoulder by a Carbine, what's the big deal? I'm fine"
"If it weren't for the Master Chief, you'd be dead, that's the big deal!"
Wyatt looked into Sheila's eyes. "You mean that you were-?"
Sheila looked away. "Yes I was worried, okay? Happy?"
Wyatt grunted. "I won't be happy until you let me up."
Sheila sighed angrily and lifted her foot off his chest.
"Thank you." Wyatt said as he stood and brushed himself off.
"Just, be careful from now one, I don't want to lose the only family I have left.
"Is that what this is about?"
Sheila looked at him. "Wyatt, the rest our family died on Reach, we would have died too, if the two of us hadn't been transferred!"
"Damn." Johnson said. "That women's tough on her siblings."
Sheila laughed.
Major Aidan Miller woke to the sound of heavy footsteps and gunfire outside of his tent. He rolled out of his cot and grabbed his Battle Rifle. He pushed back the fabric that served as a door with one hand; his other hand was holding his Battle Rifle. Once he saw that the coast was clear outside, he walked out of his tent slowly.
Miller heard something behind him in his tent. He spun on his heel, aiming his Battle Rifle at an AI.
"Vlad." The Major said as he lowered his weapon.
"Major, are you alright?"
Aidan rose and eyebrow, "Yes. Why?"
The facial expression on Vlad's face changed from worried to serious. "The Flood has found our base."
The Major stepped back in disbelief, "No, they couldn't have found us this quickly."
Vlad curved his holographic lips into a depressed smile. "I had trouble believing it too, Major. Even though we've been doing a good job at keeping this base a secret they have found us."
Aidan looked down at the rock and whispered to himself. "I wonder how-" The Major looked into Vlad's eyes. "Where's the rest of my team?"
"They're all in combat right now."
Aidan widened his eyes. "They're not going to last long."
The Major knelt in front of his cot and grabbed a Shotgun. He cocked it and ran out of his tent towards the battlefield.
The Major kept running down the long hallway until he was outside.
Outside of the base were numerous fires, dead Marines and Combat Forms. Red and green blood had been mixed together, making an eerie shade of brown.
"Collect their tags, and then burn these bodies." The Major ordered a small squad of Marines.
Aidan kept running with a few other Marines at his side, all of them had Shotguns and materials that they could use to burn bodies. The squad encountered a small group of Combat Forms and Infection Forms. The Major fired at the first Combat form, killing it; he fired again, killing the next one in the line. Miller fired a few more shots into the bodies of the Combat forms to ensure that it would never move again.
"Major, look!" A Marine shouted as he lowered his gun and pointed to another group of soldiers fighting against more Infection and Combat forms.
"Keep moving!" Aidan barked.
The Marines all nodded and continued forward.
As he got closer the Major noticed five Spartans fighting against the Flood as well; good. He also noticed two members of his team, Warrant Officer James and Chief Warrant Officer Emily.
Emily looked up at the Major and the Marines as they arrived. "Major, good to see that you could make it to the party." She said saluting.
Aidan smiled. "How could I miss a party like this?"
"Hmmmmmmmm. Vlad maybe."
"Ha-ha, stop making fun of my AI."
Out of nowhere an Infection form jumped on Emily's neck. She fell to the ground screaming for someone to get it off.
The Major leapt forward but a large green metal arm grabbed him before he could get to Emily. Aidan struggled to break free the Spartan's grasp, but failed.
"No! Let me go! That's an order!" The Major wasn't about to let his second in command die, or his little sister.
"It's too late, sir. She's not human anymore." The Spartan said deeply.
"I'm not going to let my sister die like this!" Aidan continued to struggle to break free, but still the Spartan was much stronger than him.
"I know, Major."
The Spartan eased his grip and handed the Major a strike-anywhere match. Aidan accepted the match and shot the Infection form, causing it to pop; he reluctantly lit the match and burned his sister.
"Sa boi-est laanche',
Stin-alon, stin-alon,
Demoi cruisey' daminoi iney stin-alon,
Sa boi-est laanche'"
After He finished singing Noromir looked at Sam.
"You learn quickly."
Sam looked into Noromir's maroon eyes. Noromir was an amazing warrior, and teacher. His crimson hair and maroon eyes was not a normal combo in a Forerunner, Noromir was indeed amazing in not only his appearance but his skill against the Flood, and so was his intelligence about the Flood as well.
On the back of his dark blue robes was the Forerunner symbol, "Etu'im" meaning "Warrior".
"I enjoy singing in the old Forerunner language."
"That's a good thing, but the bad thing is down there." Noromir turned his attention back to the fight below.
"You mean the death of the Major's sister? Yes." Sam sat down on the edge of the cliff "it is a shame."
Noromir's tall figure sat next to him. "Yes, that too, but something worse is to come in the next few days."
Sam looked at him quizzically. "What do you mean worse?"
"Worse."
"Alright, fine, have it you way. What's going to happen to who, and when?"
Noromir sighed. "To your best friend."
Sam's eyes widened. "What's going to happen to John?"
"We need assistance." The Human Construct said.
"That's it, Leader." A Sangheili said.
Levi sighed, that was a short transmission. All the Human Construct had said was that they needed help on Halo. She didn't say which one, but she had sent its coordinates to anyone who picked up the signal. But, why? Had the parasite been released? Were the Jiralhanae overwhelming them? No. The Jiralhanae were weak, they couldn't overwhelm a mix of Sangheili, Lekgolo, Unggoy of Humans; it had to be the parasite.
"Set a course for the Ring. And tell me how long it will take to get there." Rovoalee ordered.
"Yes, Leader."
Levi turned to a red Sangheili. "Ananilee, how's our prisoner?"
"He's well guarded."
"Good, have you managed to get him to speak?"
Ananilee sighed. "We've tried everything we know on interrogation, but he won't crack."
"Well, he may be of use to us later on, once we get to Halo."
Ananilee nodded and left the Command Center.
"Entering Slipspace in 3…2…1." Announced one of the pilots.
"How long will it take to get there?"
There was a long pause on the bridge. "60 units, Leader."
Rovoalee sat down in the command chair. "Good."
The Phantom sped into the ring's atmosphere with ease. Levi hat taken a squad of 10 Sangheili and 10 Unggoy to clear a landing zone for the rest of the warriors.
Rovoalee strode along the lines of Sangheili and Unggoy. "We will be landing under fire, so take heed. And be ready for the worst."
"Bringing us down." The pilot said over the COM.
"Alright, let's move!"
Levi activated his Blade and jumped into the gravity lift, his team close behind.
As he had expected there were Jiralhanae in their landing zone. The Phantom fired a few more shots of Red Plasma missiles then left.
Levi quickly ran toward a group of Jiralhanae, swinging his Blade wildly. He leaped over their heads. As soon as he was no the other side of him, Rovoalee sliced into all three of the Jiralhanaes' necks, almost cutting off their heads.
Another Jiralhanae challenged Levi, it tossed a Plasma grenade at him. Rovoalee dodged out of its path and ran towards the Jiralhanae. Rovoalee thought he was out of range of the grenade's explosion, but he was wrong. The edge of the explosion of plasma sent Rovoalee flying forward. He landed on his stomach, his bottom mandibles were on the grass; he couldn't move.
A Jiralhanae holding a Jiralhanae shot readied the blade on the gun and was about to finish Rovoalee off when the hoof of a Sangheili landed right in front of Levi's face blocking his vision of everything else.
It wasn't the hoof of any Sangheili on Rovoalee's team, he knew that much; it was bigger that any hoof he had seen before. He couldn't see the color of the armor because of the bright reflection.
The Sangheili was holding an Energy Blade, and it so close to Levi's head that he could feel its heat.
"You will not touch him again." The Sangheili growled.
Rovoalee had heard that voice before, but he couldn't remember whose it was. It had been so long since he had heard it.
"You have come between me and my meal, now you will die." The Jiralhanae snarled.
"Raaaaa!" The Sangheili roared.
All Levi could see was the Jiralhanae as it fell and the Sangheili's hooves.
"Are you alright?"
Rovoalee struggled to his feet, it was painful, but he managed to. "Yes. Thank you."
Levi looked over the Sangheili, it wore the orange armor of a Supreme Commander.
Despite the pain from motion Rovoalee dropped to one knee and looked down. "Forgive me for not properly addressing you, Commander."
The Commander laughed.
Levi looked up. "Something wrong?"
The Commander looked at Rovoalee, then smiled. "I do not expect anyone to bow to me; least of family."
Levi whispered so softly that only he and the Commander heard it. "E'hy?"
"Yes Levi, it's me."
Levi didn't care about pain, he quickly stood and wrapped his arms around E'hy. "It's good to see you Brother."
E'hy returned the hug. "Yes it has been, how long has it been since we've seen each other? 10 years?"
Levi released E'hy, "Yes, I think that's just about right."
E'hy looked at Rovoalee's gold armor. "I see that you have been transferred and promoted."
"Yes, and you haven't."
"Yes, well, I can't go to a higher rank unless I'm voted into the High Council but you know that already."
"Yes, I know."
"We should get back to the battle." E'hy looked up at Levi's ship. "You have a ship?"
Rovoalee looked up. "The Merciless Inquisitor, yes. We captured it; and a Prophet."
E'hy looked back at Levi in shock. "Explain."
It had been just over a day since Chief Warrant Officer Emily Miller died. No, she didn't die. She had been infected and the Major had been forced to burn her. If John hadn't grabbed the Major, he might have been infected too. John couldn't allow that to happen. The Major hadn't been happy with what John had done. But after the battle at Delta Base the Major had, to John's surprise, thanks him. John was still puzzled on how the Major knew that it was him who had stopped him.
John's thoughts about the day before were interrupted by Fred. "Chief, you alright?"
"Yeah, I'm fine."
Fred came to John's side. "Still thinking about what happened yesterday?"
"Yes, and something else."
"Something else? Like what?"
Kelly, Will and Linda joined John and Fred. "I feel like something's watching me, and waiting."
John looked down at the lake below, it was a three-hundred meter fall to the water from the cliff John and the others were standing on.
There was an odd feeling that John couldn't get rid of. He felt like something was watching him. Like something was waiting for him in the water.
"We should get away from the edge." John said after a minute.
"Why?" Will asked.
"Because I think-"
John tripped and started to fall off the cliff, the Will, Kelly, Fred and Linda grabbed him before he could fall.
"What's going on?" Fred grunted.
The Spartans should have pulled John up by now, something was holding on to his leg, and whatever it was; it was stronger than his team.
John's arm slipped from the Spartans' grip and he started to fall. John tried to grab anything he could as he fell. He managed to grab onto a root that was sticking out, but he ended up pulling it out. John continued down towards the lake that seemed to be getting bigger every second.
John bounced off the cliff again and again until his head hit the rock.
The grayish rock was the last thing that John saw.
Author's Note:
In translation to the little song that Sam sung:
Sa boi-est laanche',
Stin-alon, stin-alon,
Demoi cruisey' daminoi iney stin-alon,
Sa boi-est laanche'
To remain myself longer,
Longing, longing,
With all that's left of longing,
To remain myself longer.
Until next chapter!