A/N: OK, well, sorry about not updating until now, had homework and school and- "yadda yadda yadda WHO GIVES A F—K!! JUST MOVE ONTO THE DAMN STORY!!!!" OK, OK.... calm down, jeeze.

I DO NOT OWN ANY OF THE TITLES LISTED HERE. I just enjoy them.

Chapter 13: Intel

"Hey! Get up!" Anthony was awoken by Leon, who kicked the soles of his feet to get his attention.

"What time is it?"

"0500, we gotta get to the rendezvous point by 1030." Leon said impatiently. Anthony looked over to where he last saw Chief. Chief was up, and staring at him very uncomfortably.

"Alright, alright, I'm up." Anthony shook Makie next to him.

"Uuh, wha? Hmm...." She sat up, rubbing her eyes. "My god, what time is it."

"You don't wanna know." Anthony remarked.

"Cmon, we don't want to be late." Leon said. Anthony got up, and offered his hand to Makie. She took it, and he pulled her up. She stood, and gathered herself. Then nodded, and the team was ready to go. They started walking through the dense forestland, it would definitely give them cover against the covenant ships that were on the hunt for them. The covenant foot soldiers were another story. They would have to move fast and consistent to avoid them.

"How far is the rendezvous point?" Anthony asked.

"It's about 60 miles due southeast." Anthony's jaw dropped.

"How are we gonna make it there in 5 and a half hours? We'd have to be going 10 miles per hour at the least!" Anthony protested. Leon turned around and looked at Anthony. Anthony was right, and he knew it.

"Well, what do you think we should do?" Leon asked. Anthony looked down, trying to come up with an idea. Anthony looked up at Leon with a flash of inspiration.

"Ghosts!" He yelled.

"SSSSH!!!! Keep you voice down...." Leon looked up and around, checking to see if anyone was near.

"No! Dude, make as much noise as possible!" Anthony said. Everyone looked at Anthony as if he was crazy. He sighed as he began to explain. "Ghosts! We need a vehicle. Obviously, human vehicles aren't available. So, let's use theirs.

"You expect us to go back to the base, to get some ghosts?" Chief said, once again thinking he was insane.

"No, that's why you yell. Get them to come here." Chief walked up to Anthony, getting close to his face.

"You actually expect us to give our position away for the slight chance that we might get a ride? You are an ass, endangering your comrades like that." Chief said. Anthony backed up.

"Think about it, Chief. The ships wouldn't be able to get here without knocking into the trees and sending them crashing down. That's a risk they can't take. And their not gonna send a bunch of people on foot to get us, otherwise we'd be long gone by the time they got here." Anthony explained. Leon looked, confused.

"That might actually work." Leon said. Chief turned towards him swiftly, then back at Anthony.

"Well then, Mr. Big shot, how do you expect us to bring them here?"

"Noise. And, if necessary, I'll use my powers." Anthony said.

"Just use them now, nothing we have here could make enough noise to give us away." Leon said. Anthony looked at him, and nodded. He turned to Makie.

"Go behind the Chief." Anthony said. Makie nodded, and walked over next to the Chief. Anthony turned to the side, and started to put his hands together in front of him, but stopped about 4 inches before they clutched together. He then brought both of his hands, in the same position, to his side, and a red, glowing ball started to form in between his hands. He charged his power in the ball, and just as it was about to push his hands further apart, he threw both hands forward, aimed up at the sky, and opened them up as a streamline of concentrated fire energy flew out into the sky, and dissipated 1/3 of a mile away. Anthony turned back to the team after regaining his strength. "We should hide, it won't take them long to get here."

"I have a better idea." Chief said.

The elite and his team was ready to face them. The enemy, that is. The idiots had fired off some sort of cannon, and it gave away their positions clear as day. Humans were so stupid. HQ had sent out 5 men with ghosts to make sure they didn't get away from them. The team was getting close, they saw a small pile of ashes not too far ahead. All of a sudden, one of the elites fell off of their ghost, and it was cut in half. The others turned to see what happened, and as one of the driver's was distracted, it hit a tree, and blew up. The other elites looked at each other, confused, just before one elite was hit with the side of a giant metal foot, and someone landed on the other and shot it point blank on the top of the head. While the last elite struggled to get back it's sanity and figure out shat to do, Leon leaped forward and grabbed it's open mouth as the elite sat there, and pulled it so the elite had to turn it's head. Leon pulled up his hand, and hit the elite in the side of the throat, knocking it out. Leon looked at Makie, still on the dead elite's shoulders.

"What? It's better to discharge him than kill him." Makie looked at Leon a little longer, and she started to sway without her realizing. The elite's body fell over on the ground, and drug Makie down with her.

"Whoa!" She cried as she fell. Leon walked over to a tree and started to take the thin carbon fiber wire that was wrapped around it, and tie the elite up. He got back up, and mounted the ghost just as everyone else had.

"I'll admit it, Anthony. This wasn't such a bad idea." Chief said quietly.

"I'm sorry, did you say something?" Anthony asked sarcastically.

"Not a thing." Chief started up his ghost, and lead the way. Makie followed, and Anthony after with a small grin. Leon started up after him.

The ride seemed pretty calm after the team got out of the forest. That was hard, needless to say. Avoiding trees was no laughing matter. The beaches and fields that followed were smooth sailing. This brought Leon back to the days when he was a kid. That was a while ago. Almost 700 years. His time as a youth was well enjoyed, but short lived. He enrolled in the police academy, and the day after graduation, everything went downhill. The Raccoon City incident, his training with the secret service, then the whole thing with Ashley. Then he had to protect her like his normal duty required afterwords. And of course the thing with the G- Virus at the Kennedy Airport. He rarely had a time to take to himself during those days. "My life is going waay too slow" He thought. "Makes me wonder how long it will continue...." Leon was brought back to reality by the colorful rise of the giant star nearby that heated the planet. Leon had always enjoyed watching the sun rise, it had given him a sense of calmness he knew he could never have for long. He smiled as he admired the beauty and tranquility of the sky "Can't say it doesn't have it's moments."

The trip to the rendezvous point took a while, but was pretty easy due to the ghosts. Foot travel that far meant they would have had to continue on through the night before. They arrived at 0700, 2 hours before the scheduled meeting. That gave the team enough time to get a little rest, grab a bite, and whatever else that was needed. Anthony walked over to Makie, and pulled out a ration.

"You got any left?" Anthony asked.

"One or two." She said. She pulled out one of hers, and sat down. Anthony sat next to her and opened his own, and the two began eating. In between bites, one would chime in with something to say.

"Where are you from?" Anthony asked. "What made you decide to join the military?"

"I was born on Earth, in a fairly rural area. My childhood was nice, but short lived. My parents were doctors, and were called away for the war. They died in some huge battle, I didn't get very much information from the military aside from 'Their dead'. After that, it went downhill."

"How so?"

"Well, I was sent to live with my uncle, and as with all sad cases he was an alcoholic bumcase with no job and could barely support himself let alone a kid."

"What happened to the rest of your family?" Anthony asked.

"They were either dead, sick, or didn't care. Needless to say, neither did my uncle. I didn't really care though. It wasn't so bad. He wasn't abusive, just either drunk, passed out, gone, or too lazy to do anything. Even when he had a hangover he would drink."

"What happened to him? Did he always drink like that?"

"No, actually. Surprising enough he worked for the UNSC designing ships. He was doing pretty well."

"What happened?"

"His wife died. Heart attack at 28. He knew it was something more, but the police didn't bother to investigate anything further. So after about 2 years of trying to get them to look into it, and him trying to run his own investigation with nothing to show for it, he just quit. By then, the UNSC had grown tired of him being late, missing deadlines, or just not showing up at all for a long period of time that they fired him. The only reason they had let everything slide until then was because he hadn't even taken one day off of work before the incident, and he was really good at what he did."

"Harsh."

"Pretty much."

"So, what did you do?"

"I lived with him for about 5 years. From the time I was 14 to when I turned 19. Like I said, it wasn't all bad being there. He didn't talk to me that often, but he wasn't abusive when he did. His tone actually sounded more.... remorseful than angry." Anthony looked down at the grass, continuing to eat a bite of his pound cake. Makie took a bite of her turkey sandwich, chewed it, then continued after she finished. "I went to school close by. I didn't have that many friends, maybe one or two, but it was nice. We were close friends, and did a lot together. I had to get a job, otherwise I wouldn't have been able to eat. My uncle was living on some government program that gave him money, but only enough to heat his trailer and buy his whiskey. Yea, it wasn't the best life, but it satisfied me."

"How did it get worse?" Anthony asked.

"Huh?" She looked at him, confused.

"You said it went downhill, I'm assuming you had some worse things to add to it."

"Oh, right, yea, well when I was 19, I said goodbye to my uncle and entered a boarding school. It required tuition, and I didn't really have much to pay for it. I had my job, but even after only 2/3 of my tuition was paid for the month, I only had enough to buy food that lasted me a week." Anthony looked down, sad.

"Why'd you stay?" Makie looked out at the sky.

"I wanted to take a class there. That school was said to have the best creative photography class in the world. I was taking it, and only focused on that class. So much that I never did any of my work from my other classes. I passed school with every class except photography with nothing higher than a C. Needless to say, no college was going to accept me with those grades. So, all my talents were going to go to waste. I tried to do some newspaper photos, but it never worked. I guess that I'm only good at taking pictures that intrigue me. The ones I presented to the editor were thrown back at me. He said 'You'd have to pay me to use those, and even then I wouldn't use them!' I left the building, crying. It was pretty embarrassing for me. So, there I was, no home, job, money, family, friends, anything. So, nothing was left but for me to join the military." She took the last bite of her sandwich, and picked up her granola bar.

"That sounds horrible." Anthony said. Makie finished her bite before responding.

"Eeh, I guess. I prefer not to dawn on bad things. If my uncle taught me how to do something well, it would have to be that. How about you, why did you join the military?" She asked.

"Well, my childhood wasn't very lively. I don't have parents for all I know. I grew up in an orphanage. I never knew anything else about my childhood. Not where I was born, who were my parents, or even what my name was. I was dubbed "no face" there." Makie looked at him, mortified.

"Why weren't you adopted?" She asked.

"Some people came, and some of them looked at me, as in sat down and talked with me. But it never happened. Ironically, they would always adopt my roomate. Every person that looked at me always ended up adopting my roomate. It was like god was torturing me or something. Not only am I not going to leave and lead a happy life, but the closest asshole to me is going to instead, and you bet every bastard rubbed it in my face by saying 'better luck next time' when the smirk on their face said 'you'll never be as good as me'." Makie finished her granola bar, and crumpled her lunch together. "I wasn't told anything about myself until I turned 18. The exact day that I turned 18, they called me in and told me I had to leave, plain and simple. No warning, or even a small amount of money to get jump started on my life. I just left with nothing in hand. Only the clothes on my back. I wasn't educated past 11th grade, so I was considered a dropout and couldn't even get my GED because I wasn't taught at a 'real school'. So I was left with nothing. I joined the UNSC when I looked at a billboard that said 'Join us, stop them!' I saw it and was like 'stop who? Well, what do I care, I'm getting' some food.'"

"If you knew what you were getting into, would you have joined?" Makie asked.

"I dunno, probably. I had been living on the streets for about a year before I realized I could do something with my life aside from watch high class people walk by while I was in a dark alley just hoping one of them would throw away some food or drop some spare change. It wasn't very fun, needless to say, so yea, I would have. What about you?"

"I knew, sort of. I didn't know much aside from we were fighting some alien race. Nothing else. I don't think I would have honestly. I probably would have found something else to do. But if someone told me I would meet someone like you, then yea, I definitely would have joined." She smiled as she looked his way, and into his eyes, and him at her. They pulled each other closer, and laid back as they drift into a light sleep.

Anthony and Makie were awoken by the hum and roars of a Pelican. Anthony got up, and pulled up Makie as she held out her hand. The ship landed, and a soldier walked out. He was an african american man, with a slightly larger than medium build, and slight fuzz for facial hair. His nameplate read 'JOHNSON'.

"Alright boys, and girl." He looked around. "You the only guys that made it?"

"Unfortunately, yes." Leon spoke.

"Where the hell's the general?" Johnson asked.

"He was a double agent." Chief said.

"A human, working for the covenant? Will this war stoop any lower...." He said sadly.

"What do you have for us Sargent?" Chief asked.

"Well, if I knew you were the only one's left I would have brought more. Currently, I got 4 extra guys. They are good though, if that makes you feel any better. I also got 2 mongooses, and a warthog. You want 'em?" Johnson asked.

"I thought we were coming here for extraction." Chief asked.

"They didn't tell you, did they?" Johnson asked.

"Tell us what?" Leon asked.

"You have a new mission. The data recovered by the late Captain Nathan had information that the very base the general was located at was a base specifically made to locate Halo's throughout the universe." As Johnson spoke, the eyes of the team widened in horror and astonishment as they realized what they had just got themselves into.

A/N: PLOOOOT TWIIIIIST!!!!! Review if enjoyed, or surprised at what I have brought forth. MWAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAA!!!!