Halo: Rapture
Act Two: El Dorado is Burning
Chapter Four: The Moirae Are Laughing
___Flashback___
Beep….Beep….Beep….Was all John could hear as he lay on the surgical bed aboard The Hopeful. The augmentation was only halfway through and the young John was at the halfway point, he couldn't decide if he should feel proud at managing to survive this long or ask CPO Mendez to put his sidearm to his forehead and pull the trigger. His blood felt like it was on fire and his muscles tingled painfully as if he were being stuck with needles all over. Not only that but every noise that was made sounded horribly loud and aggravated his horrendous migraine even more.
Suddenly, John was alerted to another's presence, the noise of a small object being dropped to the floor (which sounded like a thunderclap to the SPARTAN recruit even though it should have been practically inaudible) followed by a soft curse of annoyance. Blurrily, he opened his dark green eyes to see if it was another nurse, or more hopefully, the doctor taking him off of the augmentation drugs. It took a moment to make out through the intense bright lights (that were probably brighter than they were to him) the shape of a man clad in a UNSC dress uniform. Not a doctor. Shit.
It took a little longer but John was able to determine that the man was not Chief Petty Officer Mendez but someone of higher rank...a colonel. He had only met one colonel in his life, and it was the only colonel who was 'in on' the SPARTAN program and that was Ackerson. What was Ackerson doing here, in his room?
Colonel Ackerson, for his part, didn't seem to be aware that John was awake and thus completely ignored SPARTAN candidate 117. With a quick glance over his shoulder, Ackerson removed a large unlabeled hypodermic needle from one pocket of his uniform. It was filled with a thick glowing blue substance that vaguely reminded the feverish John of half made Jell-O.
With a breath, Ackerson grabbed one of John's limp arms firmly and removed a cloth from his pocket and used it as a tourniquet before injecting the liquid in John's arm.
John, who could only remain still and watch in vague fascination in his crippled state couldn't help but wonder what was going on. Was it another part of augmentation? If so, then why was the Colonel administering it?
That was when the pain hit. It was even worse than before; his felt like someone had poured gasoline on him and lit him on fire. His vision went a bloody red and his body started to convulse. He opened his mouth to scream but no sound came out. It felt like a tarp was draped over his mind and memories, suffocating him and closing off a part of his mind.
Ackerson was suddenly very glad he had disconnected the heart monitor before beginning otherwise every medical personnel aboard the Hopeful would have been alerted to what was happening. He watched like one would watch a train wreck as John went into a seizure before collapsing and passing out.
When everything was said and done, he discreetly reconnected the heart monitor and removed all trace of his presence. He hoped the money would be in his account by now, though now he was just glad he didn't ask questions of what Dr. Fontaine was planning for 117.
___End of Flashback___
___Present___
___Zeus Distract, Olympus Heights___
After an hour of debate between Atlas and Harvey as to how Silhouette had managed to obtain Rapture's self destruct codes or enough access to Atlas's sub-systems to pull off something so bold, Harvey stalked off towards a corner of the lab and turned to a private channel, speaking discreetly with someone on the other end. Meanwhile, Zee' busied herself with asking about the Shogun's ancient armor, weapons, etcetera. To which he responded in a calm steady voice, patient with Zee's curious nature.
The Chief, however, was closely observing the 'Shogun' himself. For a Splicer, he seemed quite sane, despite his choice of attire. John listened closely as the gang leader relayed his tale. Once, he was a very prominent figure in Raptures' Historical Society and an acclaimed Professor of Ancient History, Hayato Takashim had quickly made a name for himself.
Unfortunately, like so many others of Rapture's citizens, he fell victim to the Plasmids alluring promises of bettering his life with just one injection. Of course it could never be 'just one' and after he first used it, he experienced an image of his samurai ancestors. After that he cut all ties with his friends, his job, his life entire and went into secluded mysticism.
That was until Ryan and Atlas started the civil war. Believing in Atlas' banner of 'fighting for the common man', he at once took to the streets to recruit an army of his own. He pledged his services and changed his name to the Shogun.
His loyalty later began to falter once he saw the methods both Ryan and Atlas employed. Snatching the poor off the ruined, war, torn streets and bribing them with food then conscripting them for cannon fodder. Killing all those little girls just for a few ADAM... he called it quits, believing it was a dishonor to his ancestors to have taken part in something so horrifically revolting. So once more he, along with his followers, retreated from both sides and lived in seclusion stealing ADAM from the other rival gangs that formed in the wake of the stalemate between Atlas and Ryan.
The Master Chief looked back over his shoulder toward Harvey once the Shogun was done and saw the Lieutenant nodding his head. The Chief then turned to the Major, who took over arguing with Atlas over their currant crisis.
"How could you be so careless as to let this happen?! Or is it that you are just incompetent?" Atlas, however, simple ignored him. He just kept staring at a set of codes and equations muttering to himself.
"This isn't right, this shouldn't be possible…it cannot be possible." The Major soon gave up on the rambling AI, making his way back towards Zee' and the Chief.
"This does not bode well Demon, something just doesn't feel right about this." Zee nodded her head in agreement while petting Hecate, deep in her own thoughts, which for the first time, seemed unwilling to share them with the group. The Chief didn't feel any better himself.
This whole situation didn't add up, why a timer? When Ryan activated Raptures self destruct program it barley gave him a minute to shut it off yet, now they had all the time left in the world. Eleven hours and seven seconds, to be more precise. Besides, why tell them? It didn't seem like who ever sent the message was taunting them. In point of fact, it seemed they wanted them to stop it… the Major was right, this didn't feel right at all. If SPARTAN-104, Fred, were here he'd probable say something along the lines of, 'This stinks to high Heaven, Chief.'
It was moments like this; he wished he could still use his Plasmids. He had tried many times, against his sisters wishes, to summon the Electro Bolt. Yet all he could feel was a slight tickle, similar to an electric shock. 'Don't force it Chief, I don't need you short-circuiting yourself. I live in here too now, remember?' Cortana cajoled.
John shook his head before looking back at the AI. With a frown, he suddenly was reminded of something he had wanted to ask Atlas. "How did you know I'd show up in Rapture?" He asked in a low voice to keep the others from hearing and vaguely wondered if Atlas heard him or even realized he was being addressed.
John was surprised when Atlas answered automatically in a distracted tone, "I paid the Colonel Ackerson under the table using my favorite alias Frank Fontaine to slip a Tonic into yours and Ms. Kelly Sullivan's augmentation procedure. Not that he knew what he was giving to you; he was intelligent enough not to ask questions. The Tonic was something of my own design that would ensure you would not only survive the augmentation but also added the mind controlling web to your brain." There was a pause when Atlas' code suddenly changed pace and his normally pure white color flashed gold before returning to normal.
"There was a sleeper command added in the Tonic that, if you were ever close enough to pick up the signal from the Lighthouse, you'd come down to Rapture in any way possible." John blinked and there was a brief flash of pain...
___Flashback___
"John, what are you doing?" The lights were flashing on and off in the darkness as he stumbled around. "How did you get out of cryostasis? John, are you alright? John?!" The female voice grated irritating his already pained head as he stumbled around, but he couldn't make out what the meaning of the words she was speaking, like a foreign language.
'Would you kindly...'
He had to get out of here, down to the planet. Only then would everything be alright again...
'...come home.'
___End of Flashback___
___Present___
___Zeus Distract, Olympus Heights___
"Are you saying that I-"
"Of course. The moment you saw the Ark's location on the Silent Cartographer the sleeper command was active. You and you alone ensured, by driving the Warthog at a certain pace, you'd not make it completely through the slip space corridor, trapping yourself in this part of space. Then it was only a matter of time before you arrived."
___Flashback___
His lungs burned as he came to and realized he had very little air left in his armor and the salt water had short circuited his shields. He twisted around in the water as best he could and grabbed onto the first piece of equipment he saw, the holo-display.
Without a thought, to the contrary, he grabbed the chip and put it back in his helmet. That's when the water reacted to the electric systems of the ship. Electricity shot through the water and John's vision went black.
_
He blinked blurrily when air no longer entered his lungs and his eyes took in the blurry sight of something that looked like a cross between a shark and person. He passed out again.
_
He groaned when something hit his chest and much needed air was pulled into his burning lungs. He saw the human/shark quickly disappear below the frigid ocean waves before something grabbed him under his arms and began to drag him up a small flight of stairs. His head turned to the side, and he caught sight of a lighthouse, illuminating the darkness in a more calming fashion than the horrendous fire blazing out of the quickly sinking wreckage...
_
Light were flickering on and off and the freezing air chilled the only occupant of the Bathysphere as he blurrily opened his eyes under his armor's helmet. His consciousness and thoughts slowly coming back together...
___End of Flashback___
___Present___
___Zeus Distract, Olympus Heights___
"You remember now, don't you?" Atlas asked with some amusement.
Before the Chief could make a retort, Harvey gave a sharp "NO" to whom ever he had been talking to and then called over to them. Harvey also made a small hand gesture to Bittermen, as he lumbered off with the Shogun followed closely behind. The cabal made their way over to the Lieutenant, who had taken out a small Tablet computer from his harness muttering, "There's always something." Once assembled the Lieutenant wasted little time.
"Alright, here's the plan. Bill is going to send us his council-member's genetic key. It should work just as well as Ryan's… in theory anyway." Harvey went on despite their less than confident looks. "That was the good news. The bad news is-" Atlas chose that moment to cut in, his wry, distorted voice filled the room.
"The bad news is that the disarming mechanism is in the Raptures City Hall, right in the middle of Moirae District of the Hemera Commons, which, by the by, is located outside Olympus Heights." Harvey gave a sideward's glance toward Atlas and looked like he was about to say something but, instead shrugged his shoulders then returned his full attrition towards the group in front of him.
"He's right, it right smack-dab in Splicer territory. All in all, I'd say our batting average is still the same though. The point is, We. Are. Going. If Shroud or any of her other flunkies want us, they'd have to go through the Shoguns men first-"
"Which is exactly what she is trying to do now." Atlas suddenly spoke replacing his Avatar with an image of dozens of Shroud's and Shogun's men fighting on the streets above. The party watched in awed fascination as the Shogun and his men fought with Shroud's who out numbered them five to one. The Shogun himself was in the middle of the fray, exchanging between throwing dozens of fireballs from his hands than to taking his Katana from its sheath and simply decapitating anyone that got in the way. His men were also quite the sight to behold as well. Dressed with anything from kimonos with kabuki and Noh theater masks all the way to full Samurai armor. They stood their ground beside their commander, which was getting smaller and smaller.
"We should help them, they could use some assistance and more Splicers are coming down the Street." Zee' pointed towards the furthermost end of the screen and saw, indeed, more of Shroud's thugs coming down the road, most carrying weapons this time. However, the Lieutenant simple shook his head and started making his way towards the back end of the room which was now illuminated, revealing a cargo lift.
"No, they're giving us a chance to slip away unnoticed Zee', and we don't have a lot of time. Besides he's gotten out of scrapes worse than this one. Come on, Bittermen's up top and has arranged for some transportation." The group all climbed aboard the lift, and it rose rather quickly to some sort of alleyway behind the mansion, as promised, there was Bittermen, with their transport. The Chief was not very enthused with it, but climbed in, nonetheless. The Elites simple stared at the large bulky vehicle not quite sure what to make of it…or the smell it reeked of.
"What, sort of vehicle is this?" Zee asked cautiously as she accepted the Chief's hand to help her inside. "Oh." was all she could think to say as she zipped up Hecate into her bag to keep the heaps of foul smelling garbage away from her beloved pet.
"I know, but once you learn to breathe through your mouth it's really not that bad Zee'." The Chief told her and even with the helmet obscuring his face, she could tell he was smirking which she returned. The Major came next; he took a long look inside the container then about-faced in the other direction. "Where are you going Ardy? There's plenty of room back here!" Zee' called after him her voice trilling with mirth.
"I am going to, how do you Humans say it? 'Ride Shotgun' with the lunatic, but thank you anyway, just try not to enjoy it too much." Despite the stoic way he replied, the Major's half-sister could see that smug smile on his face.
"I should have taken out his eye when I had the chance, I can see that clearly now." Zee' glared after the red armored one before jerking her head back to look at the Spartan.
The Chief didn't bother to reply as the only thing that was going through his mind at this point were the words, 'I wished I had thought of that.' Bittermen then slammed the container closed and hopped on the back like a true garbage man would as the truck lurched forward out of the alley.
_____
The mood inside the container was quiet, despite the roar of the engine as they simply had nothing to do. Well, that wasn't exactly true, the Chief and Zee' had a nice game of Twenty Questions going until Zee' had asked if he would join her in a study of Xeno-theropodian-Human interrelationships. An innocent sounding request on the surface. Yet, like all things the Chief had learned about Zee', she was a fully 'hands on approach' kind of scientist. So when she brought up the concept of a Human-Sangheili 'Mating' study, he quickly, but gently told her that he was not an authority on that particular field. She gave him coy smile, but said nothing more.
To get his mind off the awkward silence in the container and sniggering of his in-house companion, he began to go through his equipment. His suit was holding rather well after a full system check, all his weapons also checked out except for running low on ammo but, Cortana had assured him that there was a supply drop, complements of Charlemagne, along with McDonagh's key.
As he was putting his weapons away he saw something in the grime, so he switch on his VISR and saw it was an Audio Log. With nothing better to do at the moment, he reached out and cleaned it off before inserting it into his helmet and a refined southern accent, possibly Texan, started speaking.
_____Audio Recording___
"I hear often, 'Mister Sinclair, you just got a heart of stone, don't you wanna share with your fellow man?' And I tell 'em, 'Listen, I hail from sunny Panama, and my grand daddy - he got himself killed building one of those ridiculous space elevators, went on and on about 'doing it for the people, for the galaxy entire.' Well, not for me, thank you. I went out to various Earth's colonies to strike it rich, and Rapture all the more so, you won't catch me blowing my last bubble for any other personage - plural or singular."
_____
'Well, at least he tells you he's a self-serving jackass right up front.' Cortana quipped. He grunted in agreement as he saw something else of interest, a small News Tablet with the banner, 'Vox Populi'. He picked it up and the headline read, 'ATLAS LIVES!' The article went on to describe a mass protest in Apollo Square over the new curfew, the raised taxes on Plasmids, and the ridiculous need for a permit if more than just four persons are seen together. 'Atlas' was quoted to have said:
'You might hear things about me, see my name about. Think what you will. There was a time when I cared about politics, but it's just an excuse men use to kill one another. I'm done with all that. I just want
to see the sunlight again...'
The Chief closed his fist on the pad crushing it instantly. 'Do you want talk about it?' Cortana asked delicately, John shook his head, no.
Zee' flinched at the sudden, violent action from across the container, and before he knew it she was beside him removing the pieces of twisted material from his hand and placed hers on his shoulders in a supportive gesture. "Anger will not give you peace Spartan, so calm yourself." Zee said tenderly then pulled back and sat beside him. Had anyone told him he would be receiving a pep talk from someone, who months ago was his bitter enemy, in the back of a garbage truck, he probably wouldn't have believed them.
'Don't get too comfy John.' Cortana said teasingly, yet something told him it was more like a warning.
The garbage truck soon came to a slow halt and the container hatch opened. They all but flew out of the trash heap. "It will take me an eternity to get rid of this stench!" Zee grumbled while trying to remove some of the excess garbage from her armor. The Chief, meanwhile, had activated the CHIMERA's cloaking system to get a better look at their surroundings.
It was like stepping into a demilitarized zone. The paved stone streets were filled with debris, bodies littered around like common trash, upturned streetcars blocked most of the access ways, and scattered fires in various trash bins were the only sign that anyone alive was still here. The Chief turned back towards the group when he heard Zee' gasp, she was looking up in awe, and as he followed her gaze. He too had to admit it was rather odd, if not majestic, sight to behold.
Unlike most modern Earth style building designs, Ryan chose a more 'classical' design that now could only be found in a history vid. Tall, dark, stone buildings with filthy cracked windows lined the streets on either side of the streets as far as the Spartan could see. Along the walls were statues in their heyday, of beautifully crafted of animals. Glaring Gargoyles, lovely maidens, and Herculean men in a grand depiction of the people building Rapture, or as Ryan had said it, 'the impossible'.
Now all of them had fallen into disrepair, limbs gone, faces chipped, and in some extreme cases whole sides of the building collapsed in. A large water drop from above snapped the Chief out of his observations. Looking higher, he noticed the large dome ceiling had a few spider web cracks in numerous sections.
"Don't think about it so much, that's what I do. Come on, the place we are looking for should be just down the street." Harvey said staying behind Bittermen as he lumbered down the sidewalk in a hurried pace. The rest of the group quickly followed keeping to the shadows as much as possible.
The place was easy enough to find once Cortana placed a nav marker on the map as well as their HUD's. The destination turned out to be some sort of dinner or restaurant. As they made their way through the piles of debris, avoiding any contact with the few security cameras still functioning. However, something just didn't seem…right. The Major was the most on edge, the way he was moving his head back and forth reminded him of Isaac SPARTAN-039; he had the same habit yet, only when he was really anxious.
"What is it?" Harvey asked when he noticed the Major's hesitation.
"This is wrong, according to Atlas; we are within one of the most populated Splicer territories…" He gestured around the group and the area in general.
"Yes, and?" Zee' Prompted.
"So...where are they?" Every one at that point froze. He had a point. There wasn't a sign of life for blocks around. In fact, they haven't seen one Splicer, since they had arrived.
"Let's just keep going, just because we can't see them doesn't mean they aren't there." The Chief said evenly, climbing over the small hill of fallen concrete.
"The Chief's right, we need to keep going regardless. We only have…six hours left. So let's move it." They all soon followed over the concrete barrier. The In Vino Veritas Bar & Grill was strangely one of the few intact structures left on the block. It was a rather high-end looking place, mostly unbroken nice stained glass windows and the hardwood doors still on their hinges. Even now it still held an ambiance of friendly dinning, which was why everyone grabbed their respective weapons from their holsters and spilt up. Zee' and the Chief chose the side door that led to the kitchen, while the Major and the Lieutenant took the front entrance. Bittermen covered the street, looking for anything suspicious.
_____
The group was indeed being observed with shrewd unscrupulous eyes from a far-off lawyer's office, away from anyone's view. The shadowed figure reached into a pouch and retrieved a small communicator, answering a call from his owner.
"Mr. Trap? I assume you were successful in your task. The loss of more than your tongue would be most unfortunate for you." The voice on the other end of the line whispered thoughtfully, but Mr. Trap knew deep in his deranged mind that his owner was, in fact, actually going through with its scheme if he failed. He made a series of clicks with his teeth that only his owner could comprehend as actual speech.
"Excellent then. Move into position and remember, Hezekiah, if disobey me again it will be your head that adorns my wall. So don't keep me waiting. My patience, unlike the universe, is not entirely infinite."The call ended abruptly and Mr. Trap was already in place, waiting for his prey to wander into the snare.
_____
The innocuous exterior held little truth of the run-down interior. When the Major and Harvey made a sweep of the reception area, they found it blocked to the ceiling with tables, chairs, and a refrigerator.
"Damn." Harvey quickly switched on his radio. "Okay Chief, the entrance is blocked, and I don't want to bring attention to ourselves by breaking it down. Are you in?" There was a short pause of static before the Chief responded in hushed tone.
"Affirmative, the kitchen is clear…I got a few corpses in here and one of the ovens is on fire, Zee' is trying to put it out now."
"Alright, we're going round back. We'll meet you inside, continue the search." The Lieutenant waved to Bittermen to follow and watch their backs as they made their way inside.
____
"Copy that." The Chief cut the comm. looking over his shoulder to find that Zee' had put out the small blaze that previously had been blocking the way to the dinning area. Avoiding the various scattered pots and pans on the floor, Zee' got into a crouch taking cover on the other side of the waiters' door beside John.
Thumbing the safety off his pistol, the Chief activated his VISR and slowly pushed the door open to a horrible sight. Bones. Hundreds of human bones were piled high in the center of the room. The Chief made his way toward the pile with Zee' keeping him covered from the doorway. As John made a closer inspection of the remains, he saw teeth marks, Human teeth marks to be precise.
"Spartan, by the gods, what has happened here?" Zee' whispered as she viewed the carnage from the kitchen, holding back the need to regurgitate at the morbid sight.
The Chief had long desensitized to such horrific scenes but, he could tell Zee' was somewhat unnerved. So, he stepped over to her and placed one of his hands on her shoulder in the same fashion she had done not too long ago. Though Zee' was shocked by the action, no one was more surprised by the contact than the Chief himself. Few people ever wanted to touch a Spartan and Spartans in-kind also felt odd about physical contact with others. Yet, the part of him that was still Blue Team leader, told him to keep his teammate and… friend composed. He really wished he was better with words, but, that had always been more of Kelly's talent.
Zee', however, saw the intent behind the gesture and composed herself to a more tranquil state of mind. "Come on. Let's keep searching." The Chief's calm steady voice brought her back to the task at hand joined him in searching the dinner. As Zee' went about checking the tables, John searched behind the counters. The smell was awful, even his oxygen scrubbers had trouble filtering out the stench. Broken plates and fallen silverware were all over the floor along with a few pieces of rotting food.
The Chief bent down to examine a body of a male clutching something in his hand. Prying it open he saw it was a piece of jewelry, a butterfly pendant, to be exact. 'An odd thing to hold onto in death.' The Chief mused.
'It must have held great importance to him. Why, I can't say without more information.' Cortana said. As John stood up, he brushed against a credit register, knocking it to the floor with a clatter. Cortana was about to comment when she noticed something had popped out of the credit slide. It was another audio log.
'Even your dumb luck is remarkable, Chief.' Cortana laughed in reply as John inserted and played the diary marked, 'Sgt. Earl Manley'.
_____Audio Recording____
"I was on my way to a new badge. High-and-Mighty Lieutenant Asshole, in Ryan's Private Forces. But Doctor Lamb showed me that I got a duty to the common man... not Ryan. I feel like praying, and I haven't said two words to God since I was in short pants. And I'm not alone anymore - there's lots of us wearing her Butterfly Pins, now. So what if it looks a little bit- you know..."
_____
'Hmmm.' Was all Cortana said. John could tell she was deep in thought in his mind.
"Chief, what's that you got there?" Harvey asked from behind the counter, he and the Major had just wandered in from the fire exit in the back alley. John turned and handed over the pendant, who took it rather hesitantly. He stared down at the ornamentation for such a long time the Chief could no longer hold back his curiosity.
"Who's Doctor Lamb?"
"And why do all these bodies have those pendants? What do they mean?" Zee' questioned. Though still a bit shaken, she was still a scientist and wanted to know what happened to these unfortunate humans.
The Lieutenant, however, said nothing and pocketed the aforementioned item. Retuning his attention back towards the Master Chief he spoke as if nothing at all had happened.
"Chief, Zee', in here." He mentioned toward the kitchen and walked of with both John and Zee' in tow who were both more than beyond curious now. Even Cortana couldn't find much in the UNSC database. Only that Dr. Sofia Lamb was a noted psychiatrist and vehement altruist. Before Cortana could tell them more, Harvey had stopped in front of a large meat locker door.
"This used to be one of Atlas' safe havens when the civil war was still cloak-and-dagger stuff. I help set this particular one up, it was also one of the few Atlas didn't know about."
"The Pneumo is in there? That seems a little obvious a place to hide something." The Major quipped. Opening the door and found only a solid block of ice obscuring his way.
"Of coarse it's obvious, that's why I put the door behind the freezer. Okay Chief, Zee' you take the right side, and we'll take the left." Once in position, they took any sort of hand hold they could find and heaved. The grating sound of the freezer scraping across the tiled floor was worse than a thousand rusty nails running over a chalkboard, there were even small sparks coming off the bottom. As soon as there was enough room Harvey gave the signal to stop and slipped behind the deceptively heavy appliance.
"Why couldn't that lumbering load of yours move it out of the way?" The Major grunted. There was a loud irritated groan from the outside the doorway and Harvey just laughed before translating for Bittermen.
"Because he says he's got the bigger gun." His voice was muffled from behind the freezer before there was a brief silence in which Harvey opened the Pneumo. "Fuck." Each of their head shot up at the sound of the curse.
"What?" Harvey stuck his hand out from behind the freezer with a simple slip of white paper held in it. John grabbed the note and opened it with a frown. "Dear idiot-"
The Major turned to the Spartan in surprise, "Huh?" John handed him the note.
"It's for you."
___End of Chapter Four___
Afterwards:
Please read.
Hello everyone,
Once again, we apologize for the long wait, but we're having a terminal case of writer's block but we wanted something out before Bioshock 2's soon release. I wanted to let you guy's know that it'll be a while yet before we scrape together the money for the sequel so please be patient with us, but we are planning a sequel to Halo: Rapture. It'll be out once this is finished, and we have played Bioshock 2 at least, say, 50...million times.
Also, for those of you who voted, I'm sorry to say that all stories are on hold until we play the sequels; this includes the Halo/Dead Space crossover. The sequel to Dead Space (for those of you who don't know) was announced (with no release date, unfortunately), and we don't want to do anything with it until we play the far off sequel. We wish to be able to write a sequel to Halo/Dead Space eventually so we feel we'd better play the sequel before doing anything with it.
The Mass Effect crossovers are also on hold until we scrounge up the money for Mass Effect 2. So, sorry if this disappoints anyone, but we feel this is for the best.
Hopefully, we'll be finished with Halo: Rapture soon though so we can move on to other projects.
Sincerely,
KTHM and a Mortified Mind
P.S. The Flashbacks in this chapter are dedicated to reviewer: Alex Romanov. I had written the flashback at the beginning of this chapter long before we received your review but you encouraged us to elaborate with more flashbacks.
Thank you, to all our reviewers! You guys are the greatest! You encouraged us to keep writing even when we didn't feel like it. This chapter is dedicated to you.
-KTHM and a Mortified Mind