Chapter 21
"Playing with Fire"

"Man is stark mad. He cannot make a flea, and yet he will be making gods by the dozens." – Michel de Montaigne

Serin's warning rung like an alarm, reminding Sam of the reality that she was a ticking time bomb. Nowhere was safe for her, and no one would be safe around her-not even a Spartan Master Chief. Gritting her teeth, she unlocked the phone she had stolen during her rush up to the rooftop. The fresh air fed the fire rising inside of her. She paced along the length of the roof, shielded her eyes from the afternoon sun bearing down overhead, and gazed out across the city. Where are you going to go, Sam? It didn't matter. The point was she had to leave.

At that moment, the door to the roof slammed shut, but Sam barely noticed the sound over her own internal dialogue, strategizing her escape. John was not as easily avoidable, though she turned away from him and let her hand fall from her forehead to cover her mouth. She felt the hot, sticky breath trail through her fingers and allowed her hand drop to her hip next. She rotated the phone in her other palm and began pacing once more.

John pried the phone out of her hand so swiftly and so easily she only noticed as an afterthought. Her empty hands reached for it, confused, stunned, and annoyed by his presence, but John calmly held it out of her reach. When her gaze found his, he said, "Don't run away."

"Serin's right. I'm too dangerous to be around," Sam growled with a sharpness that wasn't meant for him. "I can't take you down with me."

"Not everything is about you. We all have a stake in this."

Sam's face screwed in a dense frown, and she challenged, "You heard Serin…"

The Spartan was stone-faced as ever, though an aggravation simmered just beyond the surface. Their hideout had been discovered. John had been personally called out by ONI. The ZENITH Program was ducking any culpability, and the Spartans were becoming the UNSC's favorite scapegoats. And rather than guiding his team through this shit sandwich, John had run after Sam to make sure she didn't fall into a tailspin.

He clenched his jaw and told her, "There's a reason you didn't become a Spartan. You don't know what it means to be part of a team."

As he had anticipated, the words stilled Sam's nervous pacing, and she stood with her feet planted in front of him scouring his expression to unravel the meaning behind his words. Her eyes narrowed when John didn't rescind his sharp deduction.

He knew it was a blow to her ego, and he let the words land. "You're too worried about your own guilt and fear to think about the person next to you."

"John…"

He was a veritable mountain of a man, seething and directing all of that energy into a potent look down at her. His presence invited her to challenge him and see who landed on their ass.

In a brief, solitary moment of awareness, Sam took a step back, scowled, and looked away from him.

"You want to leave? Do it now," he said. "It'll be easier for you that way."

Her head darted back his direction, revealing the alarmed, hurt hue to her eyes.

"I need someone who will have my back when things get tough," he said next.

She toted herself to be a woman who could rise to any occasion, but faced with the possibility of John turning himself in and taking responsibility for all that had happened, she realized she was pulling out the white flag.

"I'm trying to protect you," she replied.

"How are you going to do that when you're tucking tail?"

Sam inexplicably felt like a child dwarfed in front of him. The gap in their ages breathed in the space between them. Until this point, she felt they were equally matched considering his inexperience with women. She'd even been charmed by his subtle social awkwardness and mistakenly thought herself the more worldly among them. But a lifetime of war had shaped him, shaving away the selfishness and pride to reveal a man bolstered by his loyalty, patience, and confidence. Forty years had hardened his personality, and he was a stubborn ass, unshaken from his beliefs. At the same time, he had a wisdom and a depth that was intimidating if only because so few could carry it without bending under its weight.

Sam couldn't grasp what he hoped to accomplish with this confrontation and couldn't deny the feeling that he was belittling her willingness to sacrifice herself in order to protect him, Sasha, Boone, everyone. The adrenaline was coursing through her veins, making it hard to stop and talk when every cell in her body told her to run. "You don't understand," she said and looked pained to admit this aloud. "Nothing scares you."

"There's one thing," he returned without hesitation. "I've been fighting to keep her safe."

Sam froze. She opened her mouth, but no sound came out. The words evaded her like something slipping through her fingertips.

John seemed to wait for a response standing impressive in front of her. Then he pushed the phone back into her hands and turned away.

The phone dropped to the ground with a dull clatter, and Sam's hand struck out like lightening grasping John's. Her fingers clamped down on his palm, as stubborn as the man she was holding onto. He paused but didn't turn to look at her. Sam was left to scan the sharp lines of his profile. It didn't have the answer either, but she tried, "I'm scared… I don't think I can do this again. Not when I know the cost. I thought I could do this, but I can't…" Her voice faltered, and she looked down to hide a rush of hot, stinging tears.

That rough, mean front John donned could snap any soldier to attention. It began to slip when he heard her voice crack. He still didn't face her, but his tone had softened enough to prompt, "What are you afraid of, Sam?"

She frowned with her gaze anchored on the ground beneath them trying to find a neutral point that would help steady her nerves. "I can't let someone else get hurt because of me. Not again. So I want to take the heat off of you. Make them follow me. Give you and Sasha and Boone a chance… It's all I can do."

He stared down at her, and his potent, serious expression faded away. The air settled heavy between them. Even the late afternoon wind had died out.

Feeling his gaze, at last Sam tilted her head back to look up at him. Thin, wet trails curled over her cheeks, though her eyes were clear for the moment. "I don't know what other choice I have."

"Are you done?"

She frowned subtly at his curt tone.

"It's too late to be a martyr." He turned to be on par with Sam, directing the weight of his full attention words onto her. "I searched for you. I followed you. I killed for you." He exhaled sharply and shook his head almost in disbelief of his own words. "You want to leave to protect me? It's too late, Sam. I jumped into the fire with you."

"Why?" she bit back. "Why would you do something so fucking stupid, John?"

"Because I thought you died at the Pit," he growled. "I saw you get hit. I saw the soldier over you. I thought I lost you." He paused breathing irregularly through his nostrils and set his jaw sternly. "And for seven months, all I could think about was how to get you back—how I could keep you safe."

Sam was silent, though her eyes began clouding up with fresh tears. The anger still simmered there, somewhere, but she was too exhausted to bother waging war against him. "If I go down, I'll take you down with me," she warned.

"I know," he said, "so I'm not letting you take the fall."

She swallowed thickly, and her gaze faltered. "I'm sorry."

No matter her apology, John's frustration remained palpable.

"I said we're a team. I haven't acted like it."

"No, you haven't," he agreed.

She exhaled shortly with a humorless, tight smile. "I guess I have to get used to that blunt honesty."

His responsibility to answer Serin's threat, lead his team, and develop a strategy on the fly sat in the peripheral of his vision. For that moment, Sam reached past his guard. She was the only person who thought the Spartan Master Chief needed saving, and the only person foolish enough to tackle that responsibility. He exhaled slowly and tangled one hand in her hair, the other circling around her until she was in his grip. Sam easily wrapped her arms around his waist to hold him close.

He bent over her, face in her hair, and said, "You can't run away when it gets tough. Show me you've got my six."

Breathing in his scent, she felt she could likewise inhale some of his strength and stand a little taller.

"Now brush yourself off, Innie," he said and released her. "We've got work to do."

Sam reluctantly unwound her arms from his waist, not sparing a petulant look up at him to reveal something significant had shifted inside of her. "Come at me with that mouth again, and I'll kick your ass."

John sustained her gaze, though his face shaded in a loaded look. "I'll let you wear yourself out and then finish you off."

Her lips parted in shock, though that promise blazed through her like a bolt of electricity.

He grinned wolfishly, but before she could react, he was already striding off toward the door and calling over his shoulder, "Let's go. Double time."

She hesitated, poorly fighting against the way her body responded at one comment. "Dammit," she bit through her teeth before she hurried after him and called out, "Hold the door!"

O O O

Hotel Happy Fun Love

In another quadrant of the universe, Hiro Takeda was preoccupied drowning out memories of a certain brunette with whiskey, scantily clad women, and more whiskey—or, at least, that had been his plan when Sam didn't return his phone calls. He had confessed via message that he missed her and wanted her back only to realize what a pathetic loser he was. A lovesick idiot standing there with his dick in his hand. Fortunately or unfortunately, he wasn't able to dive into a bottomless pool of strong alcohol or into bed with numerous women. Instead, one of his men got a hit on a drug dealer they had been tracking down for some time. The man had been on the lam for the better part of two weeks after having stole a large portion from the Takeda syndicate, but now finally he had stuck his head out. Hiro was quick to mete out punishment on his great-grandmother's behalf if it meant distracting him from her.

In fact, she was the furthest thing from Hiro's mind when he found himself in a narrow corridor of the love hotel facing four, bulky guards. Some big assholes who take a couple of judo classes, wear a suit, and call themselves bodyguards, the Takeda heir mused as he approached at the head of his men. The guards obediently maintained their posts in front of the door.

"Leave," Hiro commanded shortly before he drew his toothpick from between his teeth. His hand hung idly for a moment, and then he flicked two fingers toward the men with a bored expression.

The man in front drew his weapon from his back, and the other three followed suit. Hiro could feel his men tense behind him in anticipation.

The syndicate heir smirked with bluff humor. He tucked his toothpick above his ear and nodded agreeably at the four guards. In the next second, his expression shifted as quickly as he drew a small, curved knife from underneath his jacket. He sliced open the first man's throat before the others even fired a shot. Hiro's team had lunged forward at his heels, so that the scuffle ended as soon as it had begun.

"Door," Hiro said next while stepping over one man's corpse and adjusting his blade idly in his hand.

Shin kicked open the thin motel door and rushed inside; Hiro followed behind two more of his men to assess the cramped room. It was decorated in garish shades of yellow, red, and orange to mimic the rings of Saturn. His lips turned down subtly in a mixture of disdain and confusion. He couldn't quite grasp the sex appeal of Saturn. Shin had disappeared onto the balcony and returned only moments later with the drug dealer in tow, grasping him by the scruff of his shirt and dragging him kicking and shouting back into the room. Hiro approached at a casual stroll, having glanced over the dingy, musky space. Once he arrived in front of the man who was cowering on the floor, he paused to consider his captive. The dealer shook violently like an addict in need of a fix.

The heir sheathed his knife before he leaned forward, caught a whiff, and immediately recoiled in disgust. "He pissed his pants," he realized.

"Are you one of them?" the man stammered uneasily and flailed as if he were drowning to grasp onto Shin's pants leg. "Oh God…. Oh God, please don't let them get me!"

Without hesitation, Shin kicked him like a dog. The man fell with a short grunt before curling in on himself. Big, fat, ugly tears covered his cheeks.

Hiro frowned in confusion and took a step to open his body in the direction of his men. "What the fuck's he going on about?"

"He's high," Uuchi guessed.

Hiro grunted his frustration and nodded toward the dealer.

Uuchi stepped forward in a flash, landing a solid punch into the dealer's jaw that left the man sprawling awkwardly on the floor. His stained pants were revealed in full force, and Hiro curled his lips with disgust. Shin and Uuchi each grabbed a fistful of the man's shirt and forced him into his knees in front of Hiro.

Takeda slid his tongue across his teeth before reluctantly bending over to place his hands on his knees and look the dealer in the eye. "I don't know what you're crying about right now, Benny, but the only problem you've got to worry about is me."

"Ah shit, man," Benny whimpered pathetically. "They're coming for me! I have to get out of here!" His dark eyes scanned the room in a frantic, errant way.

"Look at me. Look at me!" Hiro snapped with his patience dwindling, and finally Benny's attention settled on him. "I'm already here, Benny. I found you. It's over."

Benny resumed crying and sniffling, eventually hanging his greasy head between his shoulders to sob. Many men dissolved into a piss-stained, blubbering mess when faced with the Takeda syndicate's particular flavor of justice. Hiro himself bore his artificial limb as a signal—even the heir wasn't exempt. What hope, then, did a measly drug dealer have? Still men bargained. They pleaded. They screamed. They sobbed. It was as predictable as it was gruesome. Hiro acknowledged a flitting piece of disappointment that Benny had broken so easily. This would be over too soon, and then he would have to go back to thinking about her.

"Where's my money, Benny?"

The man tilted his head back, seemingly distracted from his tearful performance, so that he screwed his face up in a confused look. "Mo-money… You got bigger problems, brother."

Hiro's mouth turned down while his eyes narrowed to potent, thin slits. "I'm going to ask one more time, Benny. Are you listening? Focus. Where's my money?"

Benny sniffed noisily and coughed on the mucus settling in his throat. He blinked his big, red-rimmed eyes. "I-uh-I… I don't have it."

"You don't have it," Hiro repeated, nodding.

Benny mirrored Hiro's nod until he was knocked off his knees by Hiro's fake hand. The faint snap signaled Benny's cheekbone was broken, and the dealer writhed uselessly on the dirty carpet. Uuchi offered a handkerchief with which Hiro wiped a drop of blood off his cheek. The heir eyed the blood on the material and grimaced. "That's not going to work, Benny."

"Boss, I found this," Ryo said as he emerged from searching the bathroom. He held out a bag of small, blue tubes for Hiro to consider.

Hiro took the bag to inspect the drugs more closely. They were injectable, made to slide into a slim, metal device outfitted with a disposable needle. Hiro didn't recognize either; he'd never seen any material like this on the streets. "What the fuck is this, Benny?"

Benny curled into a ball on the floor in a childish bout of avoidance that suited his piss-stained pants and wide-eyed looks. When he didn't answer, Shin kicked him in the ribs. Benny hissed in pain and rolled impotently but did not speak.

"Give him a shot," Hiro commanded and tossed the bottles back to Ryo who immediately loaded a tube into the injectable device.

Benny came to life in an instant, fighting wildly to flee when Uuchi and Shin grabbed him by the shoulders again. He cried out, writhed, twisted, and yelled, but Ryo approached calmly and pushed up Benny's left shirt sleeve.

Benny's bloodshot eyes found Hiro, and he threw his body toward the heir, begging, "Don't! Don't!"

Hiro clicked decisively against his front teeth, and Ryo immediately paused with the needle less than an inch from Benny's forearm. "You're going to tell me what this is," Takeda spelled out calmly.

Benny had ceased struggling so as not to accidentally be stabbed by the needle. He heaved out nervous breaths and stammered, "I-i-it's some military shit. Military grade A shit."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Performance enhancement. I don't know. I'm not a scientist!" Benny whined with his head rolling dramatically between his shoulders. "It's got a kick, and it lasts. It'll keep you flying for hours."

"What's the catch?" Hiro wondered considering Benny's less than subtle struggle to avoid being dosed.

"Coming down, that's the hard part," he explained, his voice quivering with inexplicable fear. "I let a couple of my guys do a test run. They ended up in an ambulance! Dead before they even got to the hospital!"

Even as Benny's voice became shriller and more desperate, Takeda remained visibly unmoved. Rather, his thin lips set in a line. "Where'd you get this?"

"I have a contact in this drug lab. They got contracted to whip up something special for the military. It was real hush-hush, so they knew that shit would be good. He couldn't even get me a sample. Security was too tight. So me and my boys intercepted a transport… We fucked up." Without warning, Benny began sobbing again. "They're coming for us!"

"You fucked up," Hiro agreed, observing Benny's emotional decline with a sort of mild negligence. "You moved without my permission. You stole from the UNSC… You've got to take the fall, Benny."

"No, no… Please. Please, Boss. You don't know what they're like! I saw them!"

Hiro nodded a silent command to Ryo and withdrew a pack of cigarettes from his jacket pocket.

Ryo resumed his position ready to inject the drug into Benny. An overdose could throw the UNSC dogs off the scent of the Takeda syndicate's inadvertent involvement. It was logical—if Benny's account about the lethality was to be believed.

Benny had begun bucking wildly in Shin and Uuchi's grips, and he managed to tear his shoulder out of Uuchi's hands. He flung himself forward, shouting after Hiro, "She took out half my guys! She moved like-like a fucking cyborg! She was one of those Spartans!"

Hiro cleared his throat; Ryo immediately stopped for the second time; Uuchi regained control of Benny's shoulder. Takeda balanced a cigarette between his lips, lit it, and inhaled deeply.

"Look at the footage! The security cameras caught it all! Watch it!"

Hiro removed the cigarette from his lips to idly scratch at his temple. His other hand rested casually in his slacks' pocket. By all outside accounts, he appeared perfectly at ease. Internally, Takeda's ears went up.

"He's just buying time, Boss," Uuchi commented.

He absently flicked the first few flecks of ash from his cigarette and sighed. "Where's the footage, Benny?"

Minutes later, Hiro was seated in a squat wooden chair in front of Benny who was still held captive in Shin and Uuchi's grips. He held a data pad in one hand while finishing his cigarette with the other. He tossed the butt onto the floor, squashing the last embers with his heel. He exhaled the smooth grey smoke through his nostrils and adjusted his stance in the chair to bend forward and rest his elbows on his knees. His dark eyes cut a warning at Benny.

"Ju-just watch it! It's one of those freak super soldiers—a Spartan!" Benny prompted, voice strained, so that Hiro could almost feel the pressure of his words.

The heir rolled his jaw and tapped the screen. The footage was captured by a camera in the corner of a hallway in what appeared to be a club. The low lighting and cheap quality of the camera meant that the footage was grainy and poorly contrasted. Hiro unconsciously furrowed his brow to hone in on the picture. All at once, a man was thrown in the frame. He slid across the short hallway and cowered with his arms over his face from his enemy. Another man was thrown against the wall just on the edge of the screen; he slid limply to the ground. A third man backed into the hallway, hands outstretched toward his attacker, and appeared to be pleading. At last, a woman stepped into frame. Nothing exceptional stood out about her from her ponytail to her average height and frame. The man on the floor managed to scramble to his feet, and he and his comrade gathered the courage to rush her. Despite her ordinary presentation, she moved fluidly. In five moves, she had incapacitated both men. The first was left writhing and gasping for air from a crushed trachea. The other was caught in her grip by the throat. The woman lifted him without visibly straining and threw him into the back wall.

All at once, Hiro sat up in the seat, and the heaviness of this encounter settled unmoving into his gut.

"I told you! I told you!" Benny exclaimed when he saw Hiro's dissatisfied expression.

"That's not a Spartan," Hiro corrected. He stood from his seat, withdrew a gun from his back, and shot Benny in the head. Shin and Uuchi released him to fall limply onto the floor, the blood pooling around his fixed features. Motioning with the pistol, Hiro instructed, "Call someone to clean this up."

With that, he tucked his pistol back into its holster and placed a call on his data pad. This was messy. It was complicated. It was bigger than him. Nothing about this experience sat well with the Takeda heir, but he was adept enough to recognize that it was likewise not something to be swept easily under the rug.

The screen opened on his pad, but rather than the brunette he expected, a different, albeit familiar face appeared. "Takeda," he greeted.

"Boone?"

Noah quirked his brows and replied, "Obviously."

Hiro almost couldn't believe his eyes that the ex-intelligence officer was onscreen. His hair was longer and face a little rounder, but otherwise Noah looked much the same. "Damn, they brought you into this, didn't they?"

Boone shrugged noncommittally. "It was mostly consensual."

"What—like you have a safe word?" Hiro quipped before he could catch his tongue. He closed his eyes briefly and shook his head. He didn't have time for shit talk with an old buddy. "Forget it. Get Quinn. I've got something she'll want to see."

"You're a little old for dick pics, don't you think?"

"Not too old for your mom," Hiro sneered humorlessly and caught himself yet again. "I don't have time for this," he snapped both to Boone and to himself. "Get Quinn. It's about the Zeniths."

"The Zeniths?" Noah glanced off-screen, narrowed his eyes suspiciously, and looked once more at Hiro. "I'll have to take a message."

Hiro imagined that Boone had looked off-camera to Sam herself and been told to initiate evasive maneuvers. "Seriously, Boone? Give Sam the damn data pad!"

"Tell me what you've got about the Zeniths, and I'll let Sam know when she gets back—"

"'When she gets back'?" he repeated. "Where is she?"

"Uh… Nowhere," Noah countered and snorted with derision. "Everything's great."

Hiro's tense features fell into an open look as it became apparent Boone wasn't running interference; he didn't know where Sam was. "You've always been a terrible liar, Boone. Stop trying. What the hell's going on over there?"

Boone grumbled something indeterminable under his breath, roughed up his hair, and snapped, "Listen, ONI may have just discovered our location, so unless you've got some good intel on the Zeniths, I have some malware to install in a UNSC satellite."

"ONI?"

Once again, Noah considered something or someone off-screen. He grimaced and mumbled, "Again, really not the time, Takeda."

"No, Boone! Don't hang up. Boone!" Hiro yelled at his data pad even as the connection was cut. All at once he growled out in frustration and threw the data pad across the room.

Shin narrowly dodged the device, following its trajectory with his comrades to see it crash into the far wall.

Hiro slumped down to squat on his heels and cradle his head in his hands. "How does this shit land in my lap?" he groaned through his fingers.

"Karma," Ryo suggested before Uuchi could elbow him sharply in the ribs. Shin likewise lifted his hand in a warning gesture.

Hiro glared lazily over his shoulder at the youngest member of his crew. "Little shit," he murmured before twisting away from his men to hide his pensive expression. He slowly eased his way up to stand on his two feet where he remained perfectly still. His head was an ant bed of questions and very few answers. How the hell am I supposed to handle this? What do we do with the drugs? Is Sam ok? How did ONI find them? Are they going to sick the Zeniths on them? Hiro grumbled and eased his hands onto his hips, cocking his head to the side. If he were superstitious, he might take it as a cosmic sign that he had to see this mission to the very end. Hiro, however, was not superstitious: he was a realist, and he knew realistically that he just wasn't ready to let go yet.

Grimacing, he called back to his men, "Wrap up. We're headed back to Murikami."

Uuchi approached to ask, "What about Masako-san?"

Hiro glanced over at Uuchi and then back at the other two, offering, "She hates loose ends. We'll tie it up in a pretty bow." Hiro was reaching for his pack of cigarettes when Uuchi pointed his pistol at him.

"Sorry, Boss," he apologized without a hint of remorse. Uuchi motioned to the other men, and Ryo approached to remove Hiro's pistol and his knife. The kid didn't even have the decency to apologize like his older comrade.

"My grandmother?" Hiro assumed, not sparing a hard, sharp look at Uuchi.

The man nodded. "We have orders not to let you near the terrorist."

No matter his stony expression, Hiro began laughing. "After all of this," he said through his laughter and swept his arm grandly toward Benny's corpse. "After months of this…" His words trailed off, caught up in a wheezing laugh. Steadily his posture straightened, and he huffed out that last few chuckles. A sharpness cut his expression as lethal as the knife Ryo had stolen from him. He turned his head to face Uuchi again and smirked. "I'm just a dog on a leash."

In the next second, three shots fired out. Ryo fell, and Uuchi stumbled back against the door frame; he lifted his pistol to retaliate, but two more shots riddled his chest leaving him to slump heavily into the corner.

Hiro squatted next to Ryo who was still gasping and clawing at life. He pried his knife from the kid's fingers, extended one bloody finger, and shook it from side to side in front of Ryo's wavering gaze. "Learn respect in the next life."

With that, he stood to find Shin had joined him at his side. He policed Uuchi's pistol and offered it to Hiro. The heir sighed his annoyance while replacing his knife and pistol in their respective places. His hands free, he placed one heavily on Shin's shoulder and patted. Frankly, Hiro preferred Uuchi's inappropriate humor and roaring laugh to Shin's moody silence. But Shin's loyalty couldn't be bought—even by Masako. That granted him permanent status as Hiro's right-hand man.

"Give me your gun," Hiro said. When Shin offered it, Hiro retrieved a handkerchief from inside his jacket pocket, wiped down the handle, and went to place it in Benny's right hand. "Grab the drugs," he instructed while carefully placing Benny's finger over the trigger.

"Murikami?" Shin guessed as he gathered the tubes and the metal syringe.

Hiro straightened and rested his hands on his hips only to drop his head between his shoulders. If he went to Sam after all of this, he doubted his grandmother would forgive him. In fact, knowing Masako's traditional perspective, he could be assured she would hunt him down and ensure he never disgraced the Takeda name with another traitorous breath. But these drugs… he mused. Somehow they mean enough to the UNSC to send a Zenith to recover them.

"You'll go," Hiro answered at length.

"Alone?" Shin clarified with surprise tainting his normally flat voice.

The heir lifted his head and looked back at Shin. "Show them the footage, and tell them what Benny told us."

"What about you, Boss?"

Hiro snorted lightly before checking his watch. "I've got dinner with Elena tonight. My grandmother won't be happy if she hears my fiancée ate alone." Returning his attention to Shin, he continued, "Find out what you can about their plans. I'll be in touch."

"Understood."

O O O

Murikami

The pair descended to the first level where the team was swept up preparations. Walking behind him, Sam was able to watch his transformation. Her brief glimpse at the man under the armor disappeared. The Master Chief resumed his impenetrable regard, stood tall with his shoulders broad, and looked ready to face any enemy. His determination was infectious and seen reflected in every Spartan's face, or it could be that each Spartan had learned that look just like they learned to walk. Everyone stopped amid their work to turn and await orders. No one commented on John and Sam's joint absence, and Sam felt that was a courtesy for the Master Chief, not her.

"Sam, you got a call," Sasha reported before anyone else could speak.

The brunette stepped around John to approach, ignoring the sterile, sharp eyes of Spartans on her. "Friendly?" she hoped. If any of her contacts had returned her call, they might be able to make it out of this by the skin of their teeth.

"Something like it," her sister responded evasively. Handing over Sam's data pad, she clarified, "Hiro said he's got intel on the Zeniths."

Sam instantly frowned in both confusion and distrust. Hiro's tried to contact you since you left. Would he lie about this to get your attention? she wondered and realized that no matter his litany of faults, Hiro wouldn't stoop so low. Her attention turned to Boone, so she could prompt, "What intel?"

The man in question was bent over his computer typing furiously without seeming to hear any of the conversation around him. His hair had been fussed into a disheveled halo like he had been raking it in thought. When he didn't respond, Sasha offered, "We don't know. Boone hung up before he could say."

Abruptly Noah shot up straight in his seat and snapped, "I can't hack the UNSC, throw ONI off the scent, and play referee to your love triangle. I'm one man!"

Sam's frown magnified even as Boone bent over his keyboard to continue his work.

"We need to move," Fred intervened to remind the team of the immediate task at hand.

"In what?" Kelly rejoined. She crossed her long, muscular arms over her chest and fixed Sam in a steely gaze. "We don't have a ship."

"We leave the way we came," Fred responded. They'd each taken alternate routes to reach Murikami. If they scattered, ONI would have a hard time tracking all of them. It was the best option Fred could surmise under the circumstances.

Kelly glanced at her comrade and pointed out, "ONI's got eyes on us. They're not going to let us hop on a space elevator and leave."

"We can't stay here," Linda spoke up to echo Fred's concerns.

"I have a way out," John suddenly revealed.

For one split second, there was a felt silence in the room-a joint sense of surprise that leveled the playing field.

"It was a last resort, but I thought we might need it, so I made arrangements," John continued, unfazed. "They'll be here by tonight."

"You didn't share this sooner?" Kelly wondered, voice somewhere between disbelief and anger.

"I just got word before Serin's call that they're en route." John caught Kelly's gaze and sustained it with a heavy look until the woman sighed and looked away. At that moment, John allowed his attention to oscillate around the room, taking each of the team in turn. When he seemed satisfied with what he saw, he commanded, "Get ready to move. It's going to be a long night."

Author's Note: I'm sure you're tired of reading my notes about "OMG I'm still alive!", so I'll spare you all the usual amazement at my own dogged determination to finish this fucking thing. Instead, I will offer you the promise of a three-way fight scene next chapter. Yep. Let that sink in. It's going to be epic (she tells herself, hoping not to disappoint).

Thank you lynda . key1 as always for the review! Thanks so much for the continued support. You can't imagine how much helps keep me motivated. Hopefully you enjoyed this chapter and will keep reading! xx