Daily war with monster girls

by Masterdude21

With the help of the highly-motivated extra-species in the military, mankind holds their own against the brutal onslaught of the Covenant. In their haste to close the gap in space warfare, ONI stumbles upon Relay 314. Even as new enemies arise, the galaxy constantly thwarts Cortana's schemes to build the Master Chief the ultimate harem. Halo/Mass Effect/Monster Musume crossover.

26. 3,3: Daily life on shore leave pt III

AN: Tune in for chapter 26, the last shore-leave chapter (kinda) before we kick things up a notch in chapter 27.

Special thanks to my new Beta Reader, ManwithaPlan113!

~0~

"Spartans have the uncanny ability to fold clothes and armour while people are still in them. A krogan Battlemaster would look at that and reach for the chill-pills."

Anonymous UNSC Marine

~0~

---

Miia resurfaced and gasped, sucking in a deep breath of air. The sunlight beaming down on the surface of the sea was a delight on her bare skin.

Next to her, the Chief surfaced as well, holding a sputtering Draco against him. His pale, confident visage was a stark contrast to the Dragon Girl's flustered, puzzled face, but it was a beautiful image nonetheless.

If she absolutely had to share the Chief with someone else – and that thought was regrettably starting to look more and more likely with each passing day – maybe sharing with Dracosa wouldn't be so bad? She was a fellow warrior, a fellow marine no less. She honestly cared about the Chief.

Plus, she had an adorable vulnerable side to her that just screamed 'tease me'. That Rachnera didn't bother Draco more was a miracle in and of itself.

"You alright?" Her darling asked.

Draco coughed, then took a couple of deep breaths. "Y-Yeah."

"Having trouble swimming?"

Draco's face grew a little redder. "O-Of course not. It's just…just cold, is all."

Miia chuckled, but kept her remarks to herself. For such a self-proclaimed superior species, Dragons seemed to really struggle in the water. "Come on, let's go back to shore."

Back on the beach, it didn't look like Kyuri even noticed something had happened. Wearing those large sunglasses, she might as well have been asleep and nobody would be any…the…wiser.

Hmmm…

Miia shot a look at Rachnera, lounging in her self-made hammock, then back at the motionless Vampire. She poked Kyuri once with the end of her tail.

No response.

Grinning, Miia tenderly lifted the girl's sunglasses from her head.

Kyuri was fast asleep.

"What did the two of you do yesterday, darling?" Miia asked. She was really sure that they hadn't…well…done that, but something must have happened after all.

"She needed sustenance," the Chief simply replied. "I offered her my blood. She took it."

It wasn't that simple. It couldn't have been! "Oh darling, Vampires feeding on men is just like a – "

Draco plopped down next to Kyuri on the towel and closed her eyes as well. "It's not a romance novel."

" -a romance novel!" Miia narrowed her eyes at the Dragon, then slapped a tailful of sand her way, causing her to sputter and cough for a couple of precious moments. "Isn't that how it works? The victim struggles at first, but then the resistance slowly drains out of them, anger mixing with desire and need? That's how Dracula describes – eeeep!"

Snarling, Draco chose that moment to get revenge by grabbing a hold of Miia's waist and dragging her down and through the sand. For a moment, all of Miia's senses turned into hot, chafing sand. She hissed in protest and wrapped her tail around the cocky Dragon's shoulders, pinning her arms against her waist and dragging her down with her.

In return, Draco wrapped her own tail around Miia's neck, keeping her from gaining any leverage. Miia half expected her to start throttling her, but by some miracle, Draco decided that she wouldn't be taking it that far.

But since the end result was still just the two of them rolling around in the sand, struggling and growling, it didn't really matter.

"Leave it to the two reptiles to start a catfight," said Rachnera. "Could you two NOT get sand all over us!?"

"Bite me," snapped Draco.

"That kind of talk started this whole mess," sighed Rachnera. "Say, being squad leader and all, shouldn't you intervene?"

"We're on shore leave," Miia heard the Chief reply. "They're not hurting anyone."

"Aside from each other?"

"Exactly."

At that point, Miia felt her top snag on something and disappear. She shrieked, struck a blind blow at Draco and felt her fingers hook behind something soft, which came free when she pulled her hand back.

"Ah, oh, I'm awake! I'm awake! Wait, why are Miia and Draco topless?"

Somewhere along the way, Miia managed to release Draco, Draco stopped trying to drag her through the sand and the Chief appeared in-between the two of them.

Miia raised her head from the sand, looking up to see the Spartan towering above her, the smallest quirk pulling at his lips in the closest thing of a smile she'd seen all morning. His eyes didn't wander down for a second as he knelt down, fished around the sand and then found the missing pieces of clothing.

"Maybe you should both cool down a bit," he said with that deep, gravelly voice of his.

Normally, having the Chief see her topless wouldn't have bothered her in the slightest. But since there were other people watching them, she couldn't be that frivolous yet. "Ah, thank you, darling," she muttered, swiftly snatching her top from the Chief's scarred hand. "I got a little carried away…"

She fixed her clothes, then turned her gaze back towards the two girls sitting underneath the parasol.

Two girls and one young man, sitting on a towel and drinking a soda. He had thin, grey-blonde hair framing his adorably handsome face. Going by that alone, he couldn't have been much older than his late teens, but his body had the sort of wiry muscle tone to it that came from prolonged, tiring work – and he had a lot of scars to boot.

The thing was, he sat underneath their parasol and Miia didn't know the guy, like at all. "Hey!" She shouted, quickly making sure that her clothes were really fixed. "Who the hell are you? What are you doing here?"

Kyuri looked up from her book and looked at Miia with a puzzled expression. "What are you talking about?"

Rachnera smirked. "No, I get the confusion. Who could have guessed that underneath that rugged beard was an adorable pretty-boy?"

"Oh. My god," muttered Miia. Now she recognized the scarring on his face! It looked way different without an angry beard encroaching on it! "Will?"

"You should ask for your money back," Draco said with a snicker. "The barber turned you back into a kid."

"Or a girl."

"Ha ha," the de-bearded sniper replied with a gruff tone. "Very funny. This is why I stopped shaving in the first place."

"I think he looks adorable," said Kyuri.

Rachnera waved with her hand. "Yeah, so adorable that he nearly got kidnapped by a pair of Mermaids just walking over here."

Draco laughed. "Without the bushes, he's just as powerless as the other humans."

"It's not the beard on the outside that counts, but the beard on the inside," Derek replied in what he must have thought sounded pretty mysterious.

"Why'd you even shave it off?" The Chief asked.

Will shrugged. "I didn't want to be recognized."

"As a state-sponsored bushman?" Miia said. "Well, you succeeded in that."

She appraised the cute little sniper again. He wasn't nearly as big or muscled as the Chief was, but he definitely worked out in his spare time. Those scars though…she spotted at least three bullet holes and lots of lacerations that looked like they were caused by fangs and claws, but surprisingly little plasma scarring.

Bullet holes…maybe mass accelerator fire from batarians?

Draco and her went to wash the sand from their scales while the Chief sat down with Kyuri and Rachnera. But when Miia returned – all clean and just as beautiful as before – something was wrong. She spotted strange movement in the sand a few meters behind the Chief.

Miia scowled and focused on her pit vison. A heat signature erupted into existence, shaped like a turian.

Turian…

"Damnit Saren," Miia hissed, recognizing the figure that steadily stomped towards the rest of her team.

She couldn't see if the Chief noticed his turian teammate. He probably did, but decided in his Spartan wisdom not to do anything about it. However, when Saren was only within a few feet away, Derek suddenly spun around and literally pulled a gun from his crotch. Saren didn't even have the time to respond before Derek dropped to one knee and pulled the trigger –

- spraying the cloaked turian with squirts of water.

"What the fuck?" Draco said.

"Are you kidding me?" Miia groaned.

What was worse, it actually worked! The sudden squirts of water overloaded Saren's cloaking device and with a shimmering ripple in the air, the brooding turian suddenly appeared.

"Insolent bushman!" Saren growled. "Put that toy away!"

"Saren," the Chief replied in an equally charitable tone. "Come to join the squad?"

"As much as I would love to join your scantily-clad companions, I have more grave matters to attend to. I have discovered rumours of a great disturbance in the nearby forest. It would be prudent for us to investigate."

Na-uh. No way. That sounded just like the sort of thing the Master Chief would do – risking his time during his rare, precious shore leave for no discernible reason. Miia wouldn't allow Saren to pull her darling away from a rare moment of relaxation like this. "I don't think so. Last Op could have gotten seriously bad. The team needs their time off, Saren," she bit at him.

"Do they now?" The grumpy turian said. "I doubt a ragtag formation of beasts and bushmen can understand, but the Spartan and I are of one mind here. Galactic stability supersedes personal comfort."

Miia bristled at his choice of words. She was about to give the Spectre a piece of her mind when the Chief spoke up.

"No."

His voice was calm and quiet, but impossible to mistake.

"Excuse me?" Saren replied, his eyes narrowing.

"I said no. I won't push my team beyond their limits without need. Unless everyone wants to go, we're staying here."

"Yeah, and you should stay, grab some electrostimulation while you're here."

Saren's left eye twitched.

"Actually, trouble in the forest sounds kind of fun," said Rachnera. "I heard there's a lake somewhere that is supposed to be breath-taking."

The Chief looked at her, his expression perfectly neutral, then looked at Kyuri and Draco. "What about you?"

Draco shrugged. "Some food first?"

Kyuri enthusiastically nodded. "And drinks too! Something cold!"

"Well, there you have it," continued Rachnera. "Problem solved, right?"

Saren scoffed. "Agreed. I will contact Stacker and Dubbo. I will find you when you are ready."

And with that, the angry turian skulked away, leaving behind four confused Liminals and one bushman.

"What was that about?" Will asked.

"Saren is probably going stir-crazy," Miia said with a sigh. "Turians are like that and he's bad even for a turian."

"How unlike someone I know," said Rachnera.

Chief raised an eyebrow, but didn't respond.

"So I guess we're going for drinks first then?" Miia said. "Seriously Rachnera, why'd you say that?"

The Arachne smiled, completely unconcerned. "I'm not much of a swimmer and trouble in the forest sounds like it's just up our alley, right?"

"It's alright," said the Chief. "It can't be too bad."

"Aah! No, darling, you jinxed it!" Miia cried out. "Now it's going to be bad!"

"…I can't believe you look like a pretty boy underneath the beard!" Draco laughed.

Derek rolled with his eyes and kicked sand into her face.

~0~

---

Once everybody got that part out of their system, the group went back into town for late breakfast and drinks. Since there were a dozen such places scattered all across the district, Miia picked one at random and they all sat down there. They ordered drinks and some food.

"You know, we've fought things and geths together, but I still don't know a lot of things about you," said Kyuri.

"Fair enough. Best way of getting to know each other is in the middle of a firefight," replied Miia. "What do you want to know?"

"I'd like to know why you do what you do," Kyuri answered immediately. "Why did you sign up?"

The Vampire glanced at the other members of the team expectantly. Even Rachnera and the Chief. The wonders of a thorough feeding, the Chief supposed. Something about self-confidence.

"Well, it's really simple for me," Miia replied, smiling. "I like staying fit and I like challenges. When the Covenant attacked, I knew that there was only one thing I could do with my life."

Kyuri gave her a weird look and tilted her head a few degrees to the left. "In service with the Marines?"

Miia nodded, then took a sip of her coffee. "The recruiter thought I could be put to better use as an infantry officer, since I studied and all. It's been touch and go, but I don't regret joining."

"Not even after Elysium?" Draco asked quietly.

Miia's smile faded. "Elysium was…hard. I don't like to dwell on it."

"Even though the UNSC branded you a hero?" Rachnera dryly commented. "Single-handedly fighting off an invasion force and all that? It was a total victory all around."

John looked at the Arachne. Her expression was calm and her voice sounded detached enough, but this was the third time she raised the subject of heroes. Why the fixation?

"It doesn't work like that," snapped Miia. "Yeah, sure, we won in the end and I got the spotlight, but a lot of people died that day. Just ordinary men, women and children enjoying their vacation. I did what I had to do and it paid off. There's nothing more to it!"

She never raised her voice, but it was obvious that Rachnera hit a sore spot., judging by the way Miia coiled up and clenched her fists.

Rachnera, however, didn't seem to care. "It just seems funny to me. The UNSC idolizes her heroes, prides herself on the "good men and women" giving everything they have, but they never seem to be around when they're truly needed."

"What are you getting at, Rachnera?" Asked John.

The Arachne levelled a glare at him that could have pierced through a Jackal's shield. After a couple of seconds, her red eyes seemed to soften and she sighed, crossing her arms under her breasts. "Since we're sharing anyway…I didn't join a terrorist organization. Not the way you all seem to think. After the Templars burned down my home, my village and the entire forest around it with copious amounts of napalm, the UNSC and her heroes were nowhere to be seen. The only hero I saw was a human boy barely in his teens, who risked his life to get both of us out of that hell, but he didn't get a happy ending. He didn't get to walk away. So I joined the only organization willing to fight for our rights."

Rachnera's scathing response gave Miia pause. It was silent at the table, and John didn't know the words to break that silence. There was a tangible air of discomfort at hearing her story, which wasn't anything new to the Spartan. Still, he wasn't sure how he would have acted had it been him.

Derek, as always, stayed out of the conversation, hiding himself behind his own glass.

That was when Kyuri leant in slightly, peering at the Arachne with worried eyes. "That must have been rough. I'm sorry to hear that."

Rachnera scowled, slumping in her seat a little bit. She stared at the Vampire for a long moment, contemplating her answer. "Don't be. That's the way life is."

Her voice lacked her previous conviction. John didn't think she believed that half as much as she wanted to.

"But it shouldn't be," Draco spoke up. "You got dealt a bad hand. I get it. You wanna take it out on the entire galaxy. Everybody's to blame. I get it. But…do you feel like a hero?"

Rachnera narrowed her many eyes. "What does that mean?"

Completely unconcerned by the pissed-off Arachne sitting next to her, Draco took a moment to stir the ice cubes in her juice, then took a long sip. "Terrorists hurt civilians. Military goes ape-shit. Terrorists die. Their next of kin goes ape-shit. This kind of crap never ends well. Didn't work out for the Innies. Won't work for the Fang."

"As long as people stand by and look at the injustice and inequality and think to themselves that it's not their problem, there is no other way, no other solution," hissed Rachnera.

Again, Draco didn't seem at all bothered by the effect her words had. She closed her eyes and downed her juice in one go. "Then what's the solution? It's simple for me. Monsters killed my mother. My father. Everyone I know. So I have to kill them all. Can't stop until it is done. That's the way it has to be." She put down her glass and glared at Rachnera, her eyes bright and piercing. "Are you willing to take it that far too?"

"Enough," interrupted John. "It's not that simple. Everybody wants to do what they think is right. Only a few get that chance. It's not a perfect galaxy and people fight to make it better every day. Some of them get lucky. Some of them survive."

"But – "

"Some of those who do, are branded heroes," Derek suddenly said. "Thing is, no' one who serves, thinks of themselves as a hero. Nobody thinks of themselves as a terrorist either. We just want to make things work."

"What about you then, Master Chief?" Rachnera asked, her voice dripping with venom. "Why did you join with the Spartans? Looking to make things better too?"

John couldn't meet her eyes. "I didn't join. I was selected."

"Same difference."

Was it? "I just want to do my duty and end the war. So…in a way…I suppose."

"Yeah…" Rachnera muttered. "You would, wouldn't you?"

"Nobody thinks of themselves as a hero…" Kyuri softly repeated. "Do you believe it's the same for the enemy too? That nobody thinks of themselves as a monster either?"

Derek shrugged. "Don't know. There are exceptions everywhere. I try not to pay them any mind."

"That right?" Draco said. "Why'd you join up then? You're a guy – I think. Didn't you want to be a hero?"

There was plenty of anger and bitterness there, too. But just like with everything else. Derek didn't seem to register it. Tension and high emotions just seemed to ground themselves in his vicinity.

"I joined up with the Marine Corps because I was good at killing people," Derek simply said, pausing to blow at his own coffee. "Are you using that sugar…?"

His statement left a moment of confused silence in its wake. The girls looked at him in surprise, but it didn't look like Will realized he said anything wrong.

"What?" He asked upon seeing their confused faces.

"Most people don't figure that out until after their first deployment," said Miia. She blinked a couple of times, staring at the sniper as if she never saw him before. "Should we be concerned here, Will?"

Derek cocked an eyebrow. "Oh. Ah. Context. Asari home invasion. Our parents had a big house. When I was…uhm…sixteen…these two asari Maidens decided to break in and…well, I guess rob the place or something. They were armed, mom and dad were out, so it was just me and my little sis. I uh…"

"Wait…hold on," interrupted Rachnera. "Are you telling me you killed two armed asari gangsters? By yourself? When you were sixteen?"

John understood why she sounded so sceptical. All asari were natural Biotics. A human teen fighting and killing two of them was…improbable at best.

"Not exactly," said Derek. "When they broke in, I cut the power and caused a blackout. I tracked the first one through the living room. She was distracted with…I dunno. The TV or something. Didn't hear me until I stuck a kitchen knife into her throat."

Kyuri flinched, while Rachnera pulled a face like she just swallowed a bug, "You - ?"

"Even if they had them, Barriers don't protect against that kind of thing, you see?" Derek simply said. "So I cut her throat apart. Uhm. She couldn't scream very loud, but she did make noise, so I…" he gestured with his hands. "Left her there. It took a minute for the other one to show up."

Miia stared at him with wide eyes. "What happened next?" She quietly asked.

Derek shrugged. "She only had eyes for the other asari. She didn't hear me."

"And?" Rachnera urged him.

He shrugged again. "I cracked her face open with an iron candlestick. She went down and I…you know, didn't stop hitting her. Eventually, she died. And it felt…right, you know? Somewhere along the way, she stopped being a person. So I kept whacking."

Kyuri stared at him, her eyes huge and disturbed. "And that didn't bother you?"

"They were armed and they broke in at the dead of night and we were both kids. Police called it self-defence - "

"No, no, I mean, doesn't it bother you?" Kyuri repeated.

Derek took a swig of coffee. "No."

Wow. No hesitation there.

What followed was a moment of disturbed silence. The Master Chief realized that what he just heard wasn't exactly healthy. It made sense on a logical level, considering the nature of the threat and the success of the actions taken, but from a sixteen-year-old? Without a lifetime of training and conditioning? That was not necessarily a good thing.

"Holy shit," Miia weakly said.

"That's… " Rachnera shook her head in disbelief. "That sounds like a psychopath talking."

Draco cocked a slender eyebrow and then took another sip from her juice. "What? It worked out in the end, didn't it?"

"Draco…it's not…that's not how normal people approach things," protested Miia. "Don't get me wrong, I'm really glad it worked out the way it did, but…"

"I know the concerns," said Derek, raising his hands in protest. "I'm not a psychopath. Some people can simply shut down their emotions for a while. Many snipers and marksmen do just that."

It was an explanation that made a lot more sense than Derek being a psychopath, in all honesty. The Chief knew psychopaths. He'd dealt with them several times in the past. The Prophet of Truth had been a big one. Psychopaths didn't just have a lack of remorse, but they had a lack of empathy. Derek's actions on this team spoke for themselves.

That, and psychopaths tended to function a lot better than he did.

His response seemed to alleviate some of the concerns the girls had. At least, until Draco put down her glass and said, "That's just what a psychopath would say."

"Shut up."

Somehow, that brief exchange immediately shattered the tension that had been building up throughout their conversation. Miia had to stifle a laugh, Rachnera sighed and shook her head and Draco couldn't quite hide a grin.

The waitress came by and they ordered food. Plenty of it. Miia called it tapas, which was Spanish for snacks. Things like chicken wings and roasted shrimps and roasted vegetables with spicy sauces, all served in tiny brown pots.

Most UNSC vessels had Navy cooks. They were renowned for their incredible cooking skills. On the ground however, the UNSC had rations. These were…less renowned.

After all the frantic fighting, from Sigma Octanus all the way to Earth, John hadn't had a good meal in months. Even before that year, Spartans rarely partook in Navy dinners. So being served all these colourful dishes caused something akin to a sensory overload.

And yet, John hesitated. The only thing he knew about table manners was that they existed. He wasn't as bad as some ODST's he'd seen – he was also aware of the existence of cutlery - but the food wasn't exactly practical and…well, he didn't want to make a bad impression.

Surprisingly, the others didn't seem to have that problem. Miia, Rachnera and Draco all had a set of teeth that would make a Brute proud and Derek…well, marines never gave a damn.

After the first round of the tapas disappeared in under a minute, they quickly ordered another two. Kyuri picked soup. Apparently, there were a lot of different types of soup.

John took the moment to observe his teammates. Draco didn't seem to realize that she wasn't meant to eat bones and shells; she happily crunched and mauled away.

For a moment, he wondered how many people she had killed that way. Her reputation suggested she was a psychopath at best…and an absolute monster at worst. The Butcher of Torfan, they called her.

Yet looking at her, John didn't see any of that. He saw a young woman enjoying a little moment of peace and tranquillity in what was otherwise a vicious, bloody life.

Come to think of it, he had rarely seen Draco look happy. As far as he knew, the first time she truly looked genuinely happy was just this morning, when they went diving for the coral reef. And, though Draco was already easy on the eyes, a glimpse of her heartfelt happiness amplified that beauty many times over. Devoid of pain, or hate, or anguish.

Beautiful.

They made small talk, sort of informing Kyuri and Rachnera about the history that went by between the UNSC and the rogue General Desolas. How he was Saren's brother and how he was responsible in part for the armed hostilities during the First Contact at Shanxi.

John kept his comments to himself. Miia left out the more classified details. She didn't say anything that the UNSC didn't want the general population to know.

Looking at Kyuri, John wanted nothing more than for those secrets to stay buried. Forever.

That thought put somewhat of a damper on his mood, but thankfully it went unnoticed.

When they were done, John paid and the team formed up, ready for a challenge. The road leading from the city towards the forest was crowded, but it was also the most direct route where time might be an important factor. It was only to be expected that Saren eventually stepped out of the crowd a couple of meters to the Chief's left, wearing his signature scowl.

"Spartan," he growled. "Come now. The forest is this way."

"You mentioned trouble?" The Chief replied. "What kind?"

"Suspicious figures moving an unknown cargo around. Whispers and rumours of a shady corporation running backlog activities."

"Do you think it is related to Desolas?"

Saren took a moment to eye the rest of the team as they came within hearing distance. "The…enemy is insidious. Funded by dozens of corporations, banks and other investments. Everything could be related to them."

John nodded. He could see how, following that line of thinking, any corporate activity would be suspicious. "The name of this organization?"

"The Noveria Black Lily Innovations."

"Noveria…?"

"A UEG colony in the Horse Head Nebula, Citadel Theatre. Your government is said to use it to host dangerous research and strange experiments," explained the turian. "And Black Lily Innovation owns Noveria, free from Council law or the restraints of morality."

"You know an awful lot about human colonies," Miia said, her expression thunderous. "Even more about our secret research, if that's even accurate."

If the angry Lamia bearing down on him intimidated him, Saren didn't let it show. "I am a Spectre, woman. A dull mind is a dead mind, where we work."

"And random trivia about other species helps you…how?" Miia pressed.

"The right information can make or break a mission. I could tell you things about your own government that would give you nightmares."

"Let's not start revealing state secrets," said John. "Cortana might think you're issuing a challenge."

There was a moment of contemplative silence. "Agreed," Saren was quick to reply. Apparently, playing a game of 'who knows the most state secrets' with Cortana was something even he didn't want to try his luck at. "I have tasked the Stacker and Dubbo pair to recon ahead. We should make haste."

As the group continued on their way towards the forest, John considered what he actually knew about the enemy. A turian equivalent of ONI, funded by corporations, investments and proxies, intent on bringing back an ancient race of sentient machines in order to bring life to an actual goddess. Normally, he would have simply dismissed them as yet another alien organization obsessed with religion. His meeting with the Goddess of the Underworld, however, had…broadened his views.

The route to the forest was calm. No sign of trouble. There were plenty of tourists around having fun, and John couldn't blame them for that. The city outskirts were beautiful; blooming flowers, lazily flowing creeks and large, sprawling trees. But the deeper they headed into the forest, the quieter it seemed to get.

John noticed that, past a certain point, there weren't any civilians around at all and the ambient noises faded away into the background.

"It is close," said Saren. "Stay alert; Black Lily Innovations will be present."

Saren wasn't lying; John spotted the tire tracks of a large, armoured vehicle that had pushed through the forest. Boot prints of humanoid individuals followed after it. At first, it looked like a single vehicle, but closer observation revealed that there were several tire marks. A convoy had passed through here in a classic formation to decrease their tracks.

Whoever these guys were, they knew what they were doing.

"Are you sure we should be here like this?" Miia asked. "I mean, there's nobody else around. What if we're trespassing?"

"Relax," said Draco. "There would have been signs, right?"

"I guess?"

"If Black Lily Innovations is as shady as you make them out to be, this might be dangerous!" Stacker then called to Saren. "Shouldn't we have – oh, I don't know – GUNS?"

"And give their guards an excuse to engage us?" Saren snapped. "No, on a civilian world, they can't follow their usual policies."

"Which are?" Miia asked.

"Shoot first, ask never."

"Did you learn about these corporations while hunting Desolas?" John asked.

Saren made a clicking noise with his mandibles. "Partially. I worked extensively with such organizations in the past to fund my own operations. But, as you humans say, that was but the tip of the iceberg. Delve too deeply, and corporate corruption is the least of your problems."

John didn't know anything about that. During the War, every part of human civilization was geared towards fighting and surviving the Covenant. Were there corporations that managed to earn money off the misery and death of others? Reason told him that couldn't be true.

Then again, reality didn't conform to reason very often.

Following the tracks, it didn't take the team very long to find evidence of the Black Lily Innovations' presence. The Chief saw a couple of very large, armoured trucks parked in the distance, to the left side of a lake. The trees there were spread apart wide enough for them to manoeuvre with little difficulty,

John counted no less than nine armed guards walking around the area. As he took his team closer, he counted another five setting up electronic devices around the perimeter. What were they doing?

"So what's the plan?" Miia asked.

"Violence?"

"Damnit Draco, no violence!"

"We're going to walk in," John calmly responded.

The two young women exchanged a look. Draco looked a bit too smug for the Chief's liking, so he quickly added, "And ask nicely."

Now Miia was the smug one.

"I doubt they are willing to give us anything," said Saren. "We should wait until nightfall and infiltrate their camp."

"I am not waiting until nightfall on shore leave!" Dubbo snapped. "No way. You'll have to kill me, mate!"

"I will accept those terms," growled Saren.

Stacker cleared his throat and quickly said, "Unless that's your order of course, Chief!"

John was utterly, utterly relieved that neither Stacker nor Dubbo had any affectionate nicknames for him. "Cortana will do the asking."

"Walking into a camp of paranoid armed guards employed by a corrupt NGO mega-corporation to steal their secrets," Rachnera sighed. "Is this your idea of having fun?"

Draco overtook her. "Wimp."

He didn't know Black Lily Innovations, but Saren was convinced that there was some sort of trouble brewing here. If these guys were in any way connected to Desolas, Cortana would know. All he needed to do was give her access to their systems. A manual override was all that would take.

So, unarmed and without his suit, John began taking his team towards a site with probably hostile guards. Soon enough, one of them spotted their approach and quickly rushed to intercept them. He was clad in a hardsuit and wielded what looked like a mass accelerator assault rifle.

"Halt! Don't move!" The guard yelled, holding out his hand to accentuate his words. "This area is off-limits!"

"Uh, uhm, sorry about that, we didn't notice!" Miia replied, offering the Black Lily guard a smile that was much too wide to be innocent.

"You didn't notice the signs?" The guard exclaimed.

"Ehm…about that," went Derek. He sheepishly held out a large, wooden sign that said 'PRIVATE PROPERTY, KEEP OUT!' "You mean this?"

Everybody turned to stare at the sniper.

"Really?" Draco hissed.

"What's wrong with you!" Miia yelled.

"You have got to be fucking kidding me…" Rachnera swore.

The Black Lily guard raised his hand to his ear. "Alright, this is getting suspicious, I'm calling this in!"

That was when Saren shoved his way past the sign-holding Will and thrust out his omni-tool. "Don't bother human. I am a Council Spectre on official business. You will take me into your camp and tell me what is going on here."

The guard stared at Saren for a moment. "This isn't Council space."

"Very astute."

"I don't have to do shit."

"And I don't have to kill you and feed your carcass to the Dragon, but I will if you don't do what I say."

John glanced at Draco to see if she took offense to that. Strangely enough, she didn't. It was probably part of the bluff…probably.

"Uhm…that…uhm…" the guard sputtered. "Alright, let me…call it in."

"Yes, do that."

As the Black Lily guard turned away to call in his boss, Miia whirled upon Derek, her tail was rigid and stiff. If John knew his Liminal body language, that meant she was ready to throttle him. "What the hell! It didn't occur to you to warn us, or just leave the damn sign there!"

Will shrugged. "No?"

"…I will feed you to the next Liminal girl we find," hissed Miia.

Will's shoulders slumped and he cast his gaze to the ground like a chastised child. "Okay…"

The guard, meanwhile, finished his own business and gestured for them to follow him. Only two or three of his colleagues were armed with rifles – the others all wielded strange tubular weapons with thick nozzles and large, armoured backpacks. They looked somewhat like flamethrowers, but no mercenary worth their salt would carry around flamethrowers in a resort area this close to a major population centre.

Which begged the question, what were they carrying? And why?

A group of unarmed men were busy with the devices they had placed around the area. They didn't wear armour, either. Civilian contractors or scientists? And what were they researching?"

Another mercenary met them in the middle of their camp, which turned out to be a clearing in the middle of the three armoured vehicles. The man carried one of those nozzled devices as well. "A Spectre, out here? Hah! Not fucking likely!" He yelled. "Who are you? What do you want?"

"Saren Arterius," said Saren. He held out his omni-tool for the mercenary, displaying his credentials. "We are never likely, but here I am nonetheless."

The mercenary's helmet covered the upper half of his face, but the lower part still scowled upon seeing that Saren was legit. "Goddamn. And I thought you bunch worked alone."

"Most of the time. This activity has come under Council scrutiny. Time to come clean."

John spotted motion from the corner of his eye. He turned, seeing a tall man with a pristine business suit approaching them. His eyes were hidden behind a pair of sun-reflecting glasses, but his relaxed composure and broad smile suggested a measure of confidence not seen in the other mercenaries. Was this their contractor?

"Well well well, that's no way to greet a guest!" The man said jovially. "Welcome, mister Arterius. You've arrived at a critical time!"

Saren didn't share the man's enthusiasm. "So it seems."

The man offered him a hand. Saren, in a gesture that surprised absolutely nobody, didn't take it.

But the man didn't seem offended, or even taken aback. He simply stuck his hand in his pocket and said, "I'm the President of this operation, and all of the Noveria Black Lily Innovations field operations. It's good to see the Council finally taking notice! Please, you and your team can follow me."

John lingered for a moment, until he and Kyuri took up the rear of their formation. He didn't like this President guy, and being around these mercenaries without any way to defend himself made him feel somewhat unnerved.

"We at the Noveria Black Lily Innovations never fear creating breaking strides in the Unified Earth Government's technological advancements!" The President said as he led the group past their formation and operations and towards the lake. "We have been aiding in technological breakthroughs for centuries, always pushing to blur the lines between the mystical and the scientific!"

"Yes, I am aware of your corporation's research," replied Saren. "You started out researching Liminal properties and using them to advance science all the way back in the twenty-first century. I don't care about that."

"Ah,, but our past is vital to determine our future!" The President shot back without missing a beat, never losing his confident, cheerful attitude. "What we are doing here ties perfectly into our motto! But you'll see what I mean soon enough."

The President took them to the edge of the lake, where two more of those large, armoured vehicles had been parked, each one guarded by three Back Lily mercenaries.

As far as John was concerned, the lake didn't look like anything special. Clear water that reflected the glistering sun overhead and a calm blue sky. Strangely enough, he didn't hear any ambient noise .No forest animals like he would have expected this deep in the forest.

"Since you are here on this world, I gather you know about Slimes?" The President then asked.

"Of course. Semi-liquid monsters that mimic the appearance of females," answered Saren. "They are gelatinous in nature, but are actually sentient. They possess a central 'core' that acts as a data storage unit."

John glanced at the lake and narrowed his eyes. He couldn't quite see it, but he got the sense that there was something out there. Something big.

"Correct! A brain and a heart at the same time. It acts like an AI's datachip, capable of containing massive amounts of data."

"But how does that bring us here?" Miia then asked. "You're going through all this trouble, setting all of this up, just to capture a Slime?"

A ripple ran through the surface of the lake, as if something just skimmed the surface. It didn't fade away. It came closer, as if making its way towards the shore.

The President laughed. "Not just any Slime, but…well, you'll see. We – "

One of the soldiers came rushing towards them, yelling, "Sir, it's coming! Get clear!"

"Ah, just in time! I'd advise you to get some distance and enjoy the show!" The President yelled out before the mercenary grabbed him by his shoulder and guided him away.

As he said that, the surface of the lake exploded as something huge erupted from its surface. It looked like an enormous, elongated neck with dozens of glowing eyes growing over its surface, like the upper body of an enormous, prehistoric water monster.

"Holy crap!" Rachnera yelled.

"It's gonna eat us!" Miia joined.

It wasn't a lake monster. As more and more of the creature rose from the water, John realized he wasn't looking at a neck, but at a proboscis of some sort. Its real body emerged seconds later. It was an enormous, black mass underneath, propelled by half a dozen enormous tentacles. The thing was huge; easily the size of a Scarab, and it came right for them.

"Places people!" The President yelled. "It's not getting away this time!"

John backed away, not eager to get in-between the giant Slime and the people intent on capturing it. The rest of his team fell back as well, as far as the terrain permitted them at least.

Kyuri landed next to him. "How is it doing that? I thought Slimes couldn't handle water?"

As far as he was aware, they couldn't. "Cortana will know," he replied. He shot a quick look at Saren, who seemed to have disappeared completely. Good. That part was underway.

The men and the armoured vehicles pulled back deeper into the forest as well, luring the enormous creature after them. It dragged itself onto the shore, at which point the vehicles began opening fire.

John couldn't recognize their munition. It wasn't anything kinetic, but instead it looked like they sprayed the Slime with some sort of reactive liquid. Whatever it was, the stuff reacted almost immediately with its intended target, forming thick layers of bubbly foam. Soon, the combined barrage had covered up the entire creature.

They weren't trying to kill it, so it couldn't be anything that damaged the Slime. It didn't result in any temperature changes nor did it cause any reactions in the foliage around them, so it wasn't a chemical weapon either.

That left some sort of hyper absorbent compound. The UNSC had employed such weapons in the past to stop the rampages of particularly prolific Slime Girls.

Behind the mercenaries' lines, he heard the President say, "All right, it's shrunken down quite a bit. Teams One, Two and Three will suck up its core. Men! Vacuums at the ready!"

So that explained their tactics. The alien structure and layering of a Slime's core allowed it to survive a lot of punishment. As long as it was intact, the creature could restore itself from any sort of damage.

But something wasn't right. The foam-covered creature trembled and lurched, before an enormous, claw-tipped hand erupted from the cloud and slammed into the shore, causing the ground to tremble and shake.

An enormous, humanoid shape emerged from the cloud of foam. It had the body of a curvaceous woman, with a mass of "hair"; black tendrils that ended in yellow antenna-like tips. Its joints, knees and shoulders were covered with tough-looking ridges that almost looked reptilian and nature.

"Alright, I did not see that coming," commented Draco.

"How can you sound so calm over this!" Rachnera snapped.

The Dragon shrugged. "What? We routinely fight big things."

The enormous Slime took several lumbering steps forwards, levelling trees and crushing everything in her path. She even had a humanoid face, which was set in an angry scowl.

"Oh my god it's Godzilla," Miia said weakly.

"Isn't that copyrighted?" Will replied.

The giant Slime spat a globule of black ooze their way, causing everybody to scatter. The black ooze exploded on impact, sending viscous liquid everywhere.

A Black Slime. Whatever it was that now composed her body couldn't be good for the environment – or for any people standing in her way, incidentally. They had to fall back, regroup and think of a way to beat this thing.

One of her tendrils shot down and coiled around an armoured vehicle that hadn't managed to get out of the way fast enough. Its driver bailed as the Slime lifted the multi-ton vehicle into the air, before flinging it at the other retreating vehicles. The superabsorbent went everywhere, caking the ground in slippery foam, making it all but impossible to manoeuvre.

"Saren, contact Cortana, call in support," ordered the Master Chief. "Cryo munitions, danger close."

He trusted that the turian would be close enough to hear him, and capable enough to fulfil that order. It was the only tactic left to him; an extreme change in temperature would certainly affect the slime, Scarab-sized or not.

The trick was staying alive until Cortana could get that sorted out.

"This is your fault, Saren!" Miia cried out as the giant Slime slammed one of her tendrils into the ground ,missing her by mere inches. "You had to drag us here!"

The Slime uttered a monstrous roar that cut deep to the bone, then lashed out at John with another tendril. He saw it coming through and threw himself to the side, narrowly avoiding the pillar of black slime. He rolled over his shoulders and came to a rough landing in-between two slippery trees. It felt like the Slime had nicked him; his left shoulder felt soggy and wet.

Knowing Cortana, a Shortsword bomber would be underway to turn the entire AO into ice. They had to get clear from this area and fast.

Rachnera appeared within his field of view, circling around the taller tree with a fistful of threads.

John knew he had to find a way to distract the giant Slime, keep her pinned until Cortana could freeze her in place with the Cryo bomb. It was time to get creative.

"Rachnera, can you create a dummy, something to keep the Slime distracted?" He asked.

The Arachne looked down at him and winked, then swiftly leapt away before the giant Slime could nail her.

He'd take that as a yes.

The Spartan rolled back to his feet and swiftly relocated, his thoughts racing for a way out of this situation. Black Slimes were often associated with pollution and acidic environments. They had been extensively used in the past to clean up hazardous environments or other toxic wastes. But there weren't any sites of pollution or waste around here. How did this Slime end up here? Why take refuge in the lake, and what was Black Lily's role in this all?

He heard the rhythmic pulses of mass accelerator fire and realized that Saren had opened fire. That would be no use; any offensive actions that weren't concentrated on extracting the Slime's core were useless.

Saren did succeed in pissing the giant Slime off though, as she immediately tried to flatten the turian with an angry swat.

The Black Slime reared back, then proceeded to breathe a giant, white laser down on the forest, cutting through everything in its path .

There was no time to process the sheer improbability of that happening. John burst into movement, sprinting for cover as the thin beam carved a deep trail through the ground, slicing through trees as if they were made from tissue paper.

Highly-pressured water, the Spartan dimly realized. Slimes were known for their water manipulation. This was getting worse by the minute.

"Ordnance incoming, get clear of the enemy!" John ordered. "Rachnera, now!"

The Slime launched another attack with her tendrils. Everybody scattered except for one of the marines – John didn't see who it was – who remained rooted in place. There was no time to react; the Slime mercilessly snatched the man off his feet and pulled him into her acidic body.

Content with her prey, the enormous Slime hung back for the moment, as if assessing who would be her next victim.

"We've got to get him out!" Miia yelled. "If we don't save him, he'll drown, or worse!"

John narrowed his eyes. Was this…did she - ?

"Not bad eh?" A voice rang out from above. Rachnera hopped down on a thick branch, looking down at Miia and John. "That's a dummy made out of silk. How's that for a distraction?"

A Shortsword soared overhead and delivered its deadly payload. A single Cryo bomb slammed into the ground underneath the Slime and exploded into a massive cloud of supercooled gasses and fluids. Even standing a hundred meters away, John felt the sudden drop in temperature. With the Slime at ground zero, there was no way she would walk away from this one.

Sure enough, when the gasses dissipated, they revealed a glacial landscape covered with spikes of ice, flash-frozen in an instant. The giant Slime was stuck in the centre; most of her tendrils having been shattered to pieces by the force of the detonation and the sheer coldness of the gasses involved.

"Well done," John told Rachnera, and he meant it. "It won't be a threat to anyone now."

A shadow seemed to flit across her face, but she didn't respond.

Draco approached them, warily eyeing the frozen Slime. "Is it dead now?"

"Don't think so," replied Miia. "Not while its core is still in there. We'll have to retrieve it before those shady guys come back."

"Alright. How?"

John spotted one of those nozzle-like weapons lying on the ground, along with its backpack. Considering the Black Lily mercenaries hadn't fired the things once, they might have been designed to contain rather than combat.

He approached the fallen weapon and carefully opened its backpack. No munitions to be seen; it was completely empty.

Containment, then.

"Radio for Cortana, call for something to contain this thing on our ship," John then said.

The present girls turned to look at him.

"Uhm…boss, that thing is big," said Draco.

"Yeah, and…darling? How exactly are we going to contain that thing on our ship?" Miia asked.

"Scratch how, why are we containing the giant corrosive Slime on our ship?" Rachnera added.

John picked up the Black Lily containment device, then turned back towards the frozen Slime. "Simple. They want it. So we take it."

Shrugging, Draco replied, "Okay."

The Arachne sighed explosively. "That's completely insane!"

"No, it makes perfect sense," Saren said, stepping out from behind a nearby tree. "Then, we can – "

Saren didn't get to finish his sentence, because a loud rumble ran through the frozen Slime as she suddenly jerked free of her glacial prison, leaving half her body behind in the process. Chunks of frozen slime fell to the ground as she drew herself up and glared at the small team that had hurt her.

"…uh-oh," muttered Draco.

"That is not good!" Miia gasped.

"Right, I'm going to be not here right now," decided Rachnera.

But John had other plans. "We'll have to stop her ourselves."

Rachnera looked at him like he had lost his mind. "Honey, she's twelve stories tall and made from toxic liquid. Even you can't stop her."

To John's mind, that almost sounded like a challenge. "Nothing is truly untouchable."

"Sure, I'll bite. How exactly are you going to beat her?"

"Her core. I'm going to separate it."

With that, John hefted the vacuum device and assessed the tactical situation. Within seconds, he had formulated a plan of action and moved to initiate it.

He sent Miia and Draco through the left flank to harass the giant Slime. Stacker, Dubbo and Derek went through the right to buy him more time. Saren would be on his own, since he was the only one fully kitted out. He would attack the Slime head on with a combination of tech attacks to draw out the worst of its attacks.

"I don't know how long my webbing will hold," said Rachnera.

The Master Chief took a moment to memorize the exact location of the Slime's core. "It'll be long enough."

Rachnera brushed a strand of pink hair out of her eyes. "If not, I hope you're really good at holding your breath."

He didn't respond. The team managed to catch the Slime's attention and keep her occupied. She obviously didn't know where to hit them; he kept whirled back and forth, angrily lashing out at everything she saw.

It would have to do.

As the Black Slime roared again, struggling to keep her humanoid form together amidst the ice, the Master Chief broke into a flat sprint. Time seemed to simultaneously speed up and slow to a crawl as his training kicked in.

The Slime saw him coming, but with such a large and damaged body, there was no way she could react fast enough. She lashed out with her remaining hand, tearing a large, sweeping gash through the earth, but the Chief easily ducked underneath the blow and jumped. The large and jagged pieces of ice formed icy stepping stones for him to reach the center of the creature's body.

She spun around to face him, but she was too slow, and the Master Chief, nozzle extended, straight into her body.

Her dark, liquid body reminded him of the coolant fluid of warships. Thick, viscous liquid pressed down on him from all sides. The acidic properties of her body were far stronger than those of regular Slimes and already he could feel his clothes starting to dissolve, his skin starting to itch.

But her core was right in front of him. His accuracy had been impeccable.

Undaunted by the hostile environment, John activated the device and began his work. The Black Lily weapon immediately began sucking in an enormous amount of the black gelatinous substance, swiftly followed by the core itself.

With the core removed, the Slime girl theoretically wouldn't be able to sustain her body anymore. It would collapse and fall apart. Problem was, that might take time. Time he probably didn't have; the goo surrounding him was thicker than water and hard to move around in. His body felt hot. He could hold his breath, but there was no guarantee that the creature's body would fall apart before the acid did its damage…

…or before he drowned.

John reached around to his waist and grabbed a hold of the webbing Rachnera had bound around him. He gave it three sharp tugs and felt the wires suddenly pull taut.

Moments later, he got pulled out of the Slime's collapsing body with great force. The air and the ground tumbled several times in rapid succession before he felt a pair of claws dig into his shoulders and his body suddenly jerked to a sudden halt.

John looked up. Kyuri had managed to catch him in mid-air, preventing a nasty landing amidst a mass of black slime and ice.

Mission completed, he thought, wiping the black goo from his face.

Kyuri dropped him a safe distance away from the collapsed Slime. There, a concerned-looking Miia and Draco were waiting for him already.

"Darling! Are you okay!" The Lamia yelled. She saw him approach and grinned, but when she saw him, her eyes went wide and her ears grew red.. "You – good god!"

Kyuri swept down from above. "You're alright, you're alright! You're – oh. "

John frowned. His Augmentations would promote tissue regeneration and stave off any diseases he might have gotten from the incursion. He didn't feel any large injuries either. So what was - ?

Frowning, John looked down at himself. Ah. So that is what she means.

Aside from a few blotches and burn marks on his limbs, the Slime hadn't managed to dissolve more than just his clothing. He'd need a new set of those.

Draco, Kyuri and Miia all stared at him like something was terribly wrong for a couple of long, bushing moments, before Miia and Kyuri both looked away.

One elbow jab from Miia later, Draco also turned away.

John had no idea what that was about. The mission was a success and the Slime survived, didn't she? Or was this…was this about the scars?

"That's a nice ass you've got there, honey," Rachnera's voice sounded from above. "You look like you need some sunlight though…"

Crossing his arms, the Spartan looked up at Rachnera. She didn't seem at all bothered by his sudden lack of clothes, which was very strange, considering she wasn't military and Draco and Miia both were.

That was when Will emerged from the nearby bushes. "Black Lily's coming back. Guess they'll want their big slime, sir." He paused, then did a double-take. "Chief, don't tell the girls, but I think you might be naked."

"We're not giving the Slime up," replied John. "Tell Saren to call for a dropship. With spare clothes."

"Roger."

With that, the sniper disappeared into the bushes again, leaving a naked John alone with four baffled young women.

Who spoke up before he could even address the situation.

"Darling, put on some clothes!" Miia yelled, her entire face now a luminescent shade of red.
"You're making me feel…unseasonably warm!"

"I – "

"Hey, if I can't stare, you can't either!" Draco snapped at Kyuri, who seemed transfixed by the Chief's lack of clothing.

"…I'm not staring…" she mumbled in response.

"God, you're completely shameless," grumbled Rachnera. She scowled and looked away, but John couldn't help but feel like her smaller eyes were still directed at him.

John wasn't sure how to respond. Kyuri hadn't been bothered by his scars before, but Marines were used to seeing each other naked. This reaction wasn't normal.

The Master Chief turned away. Some things, he guessed he wouldn't understand on his own.

It didn't take Cortana long to bring down a Pelican dropship. Foehammer was off doing…whatever it was pilots did when they got shore leave, which meant the dropship was completely unmanned when it arrived.

John wasted no time grabbing a set of spare clothing and getting redressed, although he'd definitely need a shower after this.

While he got dressed, Miia got the team together and gave them a quick debriefing. Apparently, Saren was stone-walling Black Lily, keeping them from laying claim on the Slime core.

John glanced down at the little sphere, wondering just what made a creature born from pollution appear in a place as peaceful as New Barbados.

Humanity was growing at an incredible pace. With all the support the other species had given them, the UEG had once again spread out among the stars. It only made sense for an enormous NGO like Black Lily to extend its influence across the populated galaxy.

But that didn't mean he had to like it. He made a mental note to visit Noveria if they didn't find any other leads, then –

A shadow moved across the interior of the Pelican. John turned his head, hoping he wasn't about to have another awkward moment with Saren.

It was Rachnera.

"Just looking to see if you're not keening over from toxicity," she said matter-of-factly. "That would surely put a damper on things, wouldn't it?"

John didn't respond. He still didn't know how to feel about her. On one hand, he could understand the desperation of an activist group like hers, forced to keep escalating in order to be even heard. On the other hand…the Black Fang had been branded a terrorist organization for a reason. He didn't care about threats to him as a person, but using violence against the civilian population to get what you wanted? For him, that was where reason ended.

Rachnera's slender eyebrows furrowed, and she said, "You always look so serious. It's like you don't get it."

"Don't get what?" The Chief asked.

Rachnera crossed her arms underneath her chest. "The simple things. The normal things. The joy of going out with people you like, or the appreciation for a stroll in a sunlit forest. Or, you know, standing completely naked in front of three beautiful women who fancy you. You always have that same look about you, like…"

"Like what?"

The Arachne sighed and gestured vaguely with one claw-tipped hand. "Like you're somewhere else with your head. It's like you don't seem to get that there's more to life than the military."

His first impulse was to argue – to bluntly point out that, as civilian-turned-extremist, Rachnera had no clue what the reality was about. But as that thought entered his head, it was quickly followed by the realization that she wasn't wrong. His entire life revolved around fighting for humanity's survival. Like Draco had said, it wasn't something you just turned off. How could he?

"Maybe," admitted John. "But it's irrelevant. Our duty is to protect humanity, no matter the cost."

Rachnera stared at him with apparent disbelief. "But this is your…what do you call it? Shore leave?

"Our enemies won't wait for us to prepare," he pointed out.

She didn't immediately respond, eyeing him with an expression he couldn't exactly. Then, she made a noise in her throat. "You and that girl are more alike than I thought…fine, I'll say the same thing to you as I said to her. What's the point of living, if you don't enjoy life?"

With that, Rachnera walked away, leaving John alone to process her words. But he'd get to that later; right now, he had other matters to take care of.

The President of the Black Lily came back to verify the Slime's defeat. Miia handled that one while John filled Cortana in on the whole situation from within the Pelican, though he did listen in on their conversation. It was strange, but…the President didn't seem at all upset that he wouldn't get the core. He did offer Miia a very large sum of money to get it, but she wouldn't budge. In the end, the man gave her his card and then left without a fuss.

"…I still can't believe you just jumped into a Black Slime like that," Cortana said, shaking her head in disbelief. "You couldn't have asked Miia to pull it out with her tail or something?"

John shrugged. "It was the fastest way to get it done."

"And the most dangerous. You were supposed to take it easy here."

"And I will." He turned around again, looking on as the rest of his team regrouped in Miia. Stacker and Dubbo were unhurt as well, though it had been close. The Slime had thoroughly smashed the area around her in her rampage. They had been lucky to walk away unscathed. "I have everything under control."

Cortana placed her hands on her hips. "Oh really?"

"Really."

Cortana snorted. "Okay."

"Just like that?"

"Yes, just like that. I'm going to take care of the fallout of this encounter, so you just take it easy. Got a few days left, don't you? Here, grab a phone, we can stay in touch."

The Master Chief nodded in confirmation and took the little device from one of the storage compartments. "Any word on Desolas?"

There was a moment of silence as Cortana stared at him. "Why, thinking of inviting him along?"

Wordlessly, John raised his eyebrow at that comment.

Cortana rolled her eyes. "You know, this is exactly what Rachnera just told you. What everyone keeps trying to tell you."

"To let the mission go?" He dryly replied. "Pretend nothing is at stake?"

"No, John, to be happy," Cortana said, clearly and sternly. "Just to be happy. You cannot honestly tell me that you or any of the other Spartans had a normal life, can you?...exactly. You don't need to let go of anything, John. You just need to open up to new ideas, new possibilities."

New possibilities…ever since the Human-Covenant War ended, the Master Chief felt like he had been thrust into a new kind of war. One he just couldn't seem to adapt to. What Cortana said resonated with Miia's words. That, to adapt to this new method of warfare, this…this new life, he didn't have to do anything impossible, or even drastic.

Small victories. Little steps, Miia had called it.

Maybe.

Black Lily Foundations let them leave without protest, much to the confusion of the present mercenaries. John made a mental note to have Cortana look into their unit, but later. He didn't want to concern anyone with those details yet.

John rinsed himself off in the lake. The day was young and the weather nice, though it looked like that might not last very long. He saw clouds gathering in the distance.

After that, there were a dozen other places in the city they could visit. Among the suggestions were a tropical swimming pool, a museum, an art gallery and, strangely enough, a fortune teller who seemed really popular with the locals.

Upon reading about the fortune teller in her brochure, Miia's mind was set. Before the others even had a chance to make up their minds, the Lamia decided that was where she wanted to be. Not everybody was as eager to join her, but she was…persuasive.

"Come on, we can at least take a look!" Miia said a few minutes later, eagerly pointing at the little stall.

Looking up at the sky, the Master Chief saw that the good weather wouldn't last long. He saw dark clouds gathering in the distance. The air smelt wet, which was an early warning sign of imminent rain.

This was the moment Miia wanted to muck around with a Dullahan? "You can't predict the future."

"Of course I can't, but she can!"

"Wow, that went straight over your head…" Draco muttered.

Miia shot the Dragon an irritated look. "There's more to life than just mundane things and science; I've literally seen Dullahans bring the dead back to life!"

"Can't science bring the dead back to life too? Barely?" Kyuri asked.

Miia sighed explosively. "That's not my point! Science has limits, but magic doesn't!"

"It does," John chimed in. "A minority of races can use it, and only the really old, powerful or gifted can use it to a functional degree."

"Ah, come on darling! You've got to broaden your horizon!" Miia exclaimed. She took John's hand and began tugging him towards the future teller. "It's not going to cost you anything – "

"Except for credits."

"- and you might learn something useful – "

"I doubt that."

" – and I'm curious about the rest of us too!"

The Chief sighed. There was no way he was going to get out of this one, so he might as well just play along.

No Spartan had ever seen the inside of a fortune-teller's lair before. It didn't look like anything special though; just a small, wooden structure furnished with disturbing paintings and questionable rugs. A glass closet on the left side of the room was filled to the brim with morbid items, like skulls, talismans and organs floating in formaldehyde. To the right stood an enormous mirror painted with odd lines.

The Dullahan sat at the far back of the room, leaning back in her chair and resting her purple boots on her desk. Her skin was eerily pale and her eyes yellow and slitted like those of a cat. Her sclera were black, giving her eyes something predatory.

"Halt," she commanded and the group stopped. "Thou standest before mine threshold. But one soul may cross it."

There was a moment of silence as the squad stared at the foreboding lair of one of the most supernatural, least-understood species in the galaxy.

"Not it," Derek quietly said.

Draco snorted and then shoved Miia, sending her stumbling over the threshold with a loud "eep!" noise.

The Dullahan smirked and tilted her chair forwards, looming over the desk like a shark. "I see. Wouldst thou care for mine services, Lamia?"

Miia regained her balance, cast Draco a downright murderous glare, then glanced back at the Dullahan. "Y-Yeah. You are a fortune-teller, right?"

The Dullahan's smirk grew larger. "Fortune-tellers tell thee what thee wishes to happen. I am a witch. Witches tell thee what shallst happen, whether thee wishes it or not."

That didn't sound fun at all.

"Then…then you can tell me my future?" Miia continued.

"Mayhaps."

Mayhaps. Was that even a real word?

"The others shallst wait beyond mine threshold. Come hither and find out."

Somewhat uneasily, Miia entered the Dullahan's room. She shivered visibly when she stepped over the threshold and sat down in the chair opposite the self-proclaimed witch.

The Dullahan stepped out of the chair. She reached up and, with a simple tug at her hair, lifted her own head. No metaphor there; she literally detached her head with a little yank and gently laid it down upon the table, where it could stare at Miia in an unnerving manner.

John knew about the Dullahans. He even got to see one or two before, but never up close and never when they displayed their more bizarre biology. They were among the more mystical of the Liminal species, being closely connected to death and the afterlife. He never cared much for those rumours before. Death was an inescapable reality of the battlefield.

But his meeting with Ereshkigal had…broadened his views on death. There was certainly no denying the magic inherent to the Dullahan witch here.

Miia's reaction was peculiar. She gasped, sank in on herself and then shrieked – a surprisingly quiet little noise – before bringing her hands to her mouth and sucking in a breath of new air.

"Huh," Rachnera said with all the air of someone commenting on the weather. "That's new."

"Indeed," spoke the witch's head. "Tremble before the undeniable. Placeth thy hands upon mine table, soldier, and lay bare thy soul."

The Dullahan's body soundlessly stepped around the table to stand behind Miia. John felt his hackles rise when he saw that; he hated it when people stood behind him, headless or not. He wrestled down the urge to intervene, however. She didn't look like a threat, and he didn't want to cause Miia any trouble.

"Uhm…guys, anyone wanna switch?" Miia whimpered. "K-Kyuri?"

"…no, I'm good," the Vampire timidly replied.

The Dullahan's body reached into a strangely stitched-together sack and retrieved a handful of bones. She trailed a scar on Miia's left arm all the way to the palm of her hand.

"Yes, the battlefield left its marks upon thy soul," her head spoke as her body moved. "In the distance, thou has seen death. Thou visited it upon thy enemies without losing sight of who thee are. "

Cortana would have a dozen ways to debunk this. AI's tended to react negatively to the concept of magic. But thus far, the Dullahan's claims were on point.

"Ah…this is weird…" Miia muttered.

The witch cast a handful of sturdy bleached bones on the table. They were finger bones of some sort, since they ended in thick, tipped ends. Draco frowned when she saw the pale bones clatter against the heavy wooden desk and asked, "What are those?"

"Brute phalanx bones," replied Derek.

"Huh?"

"Finger bones. She's got Brute finger bones."

Which was a red flag all on its own.

"Classy."

John really doubted that.

The Dullahan turned her gaze towards the collection of alien bones. Her eyebrows furrowed and she said, "I see hardship in the path ahead. Thou shallst experience…pain. Joy. Sorrow." Her eyes narrowed. "Thy reality will crumble around thee, thy beliefs dashed to the winds. How thou shallst handle it, mine eyes cannot see."

"Ehm…'kay…" Miia replied, obviously ill at ease. "Do…do you see anything…you know…fun? Like…about…uhm, romance?"

The Dullahan's head blinked. "Romance?"

"Yeah! Romance, love, happiness, like that?"

Her gaze returned to the bones. "Nay. Reading thy future entails what shallst happen, not what might happen. This hardship of thine is guaranteed. A…romance…could occur. I cannot see it."

Miia abruptly stood from the table. "No thank you. I mean, thanks, but I've…there's been enough hardship already, you know? Don't feel like more."

"I am a witch, Lamia," the Dullahan merely said. "The future be set in stone. Thy cannot change it. Payeth thee in credits, or…?"

Draco scoffed. "Sure, why not? I wanna go next."

Miia leapt up from her seat and scampered out of the witch's shack. John couldn't blame her; his gut told him that this Dullahan wasn't bluffing. Some Liminals used physical items as extensions of their power, to project their abilities into the physical world. Humans had no talent for magic, but they could still sense it being worked. This place, it felt off. Wrong.

Suddenly, he wasn't sure if he wanted to be there anymore.

Miia latched onto him, coiling her tail around his left leg and wrapping her arms around his shoulders. At first he thought she was being overly affectionate again, but when her grip grew strong enough to make it hard to breathe, he started to think something else was going on.

John looked at the Dullahan's detached head again and then it hit him. Miia was afraid.

Draco didn't seem bothered. She sat down in the chair and the Dullahan's body marched around the table, gathering the thick phalanx bones in a single gesture.

"I have limited mine powers to this room," said the witch's head. "The threshold keeps the outside from interfering with the inside. I needs must not know the past, present and future of all who wander past."

Perhaps that was why the Dullahan hadn't said anything else yet. If anyone would have sensed his descent to the underworld, it would be her. There'd be some really awkward questions.

That only reaffirmed it for him. He was not going to cross that threshold.

Draco craned her head around and looked at the Chief. Sitting in that chair, the Dragon looked small and vulnerable. The things she'd lost – what she'd been through – what if the Dullahan told her that she had to go through it again? What if she saw more loss and grief in her future, like she did with Miia?

"You don't have to do this," John told her. "The future doesn't have to be set in stone."

Draco frowned at that, if only for a moment. "Maybe. But I want to be sure."

"Very well," spoke the Dullahan witch. "Let us see."

She cast the bones to the table once more. They clattered around for a while. For a couple of seconds, it looked like a handful of the bones would bounce right off the end of the table, but they came to a stop at the last second.

"Hmmm…intriguing…" muttered the Dullahan. "There has been much death in thy life, young one. Thine is a dark path through a blackened night. Take great care that thou dost not envelop thyself in this darkness. Thy resolved thyself to vengeance, yet thy heart remains. Keep a hold of it. Thy shall have need for it in the days to come."

"Wait, what do you mean?" Draco asked.

"It means thou must be careful come moons. Thou shallst need thy heart, Dragon. Guard it closely."

John guessed it made sense for Draco. He wasn't entirely sure what the Dullahan meant, but Draco looked like she did. That was the important thing, wasn't it?

Draco didn't respond. She slowly stood up from the chair, rubbed her shoulder, then turned and walked back out again, her expression grim, but determined.

Miia reached out and ruffled her hair.

"I don't know about you two, but I'm fine on this side of the witch's threshold," commented Rachnera. "I like to figure my future out myself, if you get what I'm saying."

"Uhm…yeah, this thing works, I get it. Let's go now," Derek said, a hard edge to his voice.

The Spartan couldn't agree more. After what he just heard, he really didn't feel like sitting in that chair and having a supernatural entity write his future into stone. This place being a scam would have been infinitely easier.

"What's one more?" Kyuri said. "Two girls, none of the guys? That's so unfair."

"Oh, I completely agree," Miia was quick to say "How about it Will?"

"I don't – "

The sniper was in the middle of protesting when Kyuri and Miia grabbed a hold of his shoulders and pushed him over the threshold, before quickly withdrawing again.

Derek stumbled into the witch's room -

- and the Dullahan's body leapt away from as if jolted by electricity. Her head, still on the table, narrowed her eyes into an icy cold glare. "I see thee, murderer," she hissed. "I know what thou hast wrought." Her voice grew louder and more venomous, to the point where she all but spat her last words. "Thou art a monster – and thou shallst receive what is coming for thee, real soon now."

Will went pale. His breath hitched and he slowly backed away from the witch's chamber, without ever breaking eye contact with the Dullahan. The moment he was free of the threshold, he turned his back on the structure and bolted.

"Wait, what just happened?" Kyuri said. "What was that about?"

"Oh crap," said Miia. "Shit. I didn't see that coming."

John watched Derek leave. He didn't know what the Dullahan had learned, but it had to be bad.

Miia stayed behind to pay the witch while John followed Derek. For the normally-reserved sniper to react like this was…completely out of the left field. It lent an unfortunate amount of credence to the Dullahan's words.

And just when the team was finally starting to trust each other, too.

William stopped at a wooden fence overlooking the sea, He slowly placed his arms on the wooden railing, then bowed his head.

Wordlessly, John approached the man until he stood side-by-side. The view wasn't bad. Watching the sea stretch out into the far distance like that, pleasantly reflecting the light of the suns? It had been far too long since he saw something so soothing. Some people took those sights for granted, but he had watched too many worlds burn to think that beauty could last forever.

John allowed the silence to stretch on for half a minute before he spoke up. "What was she talking about?"

Will looked at him from the corner of his eye, then sighed. "Can't talk about it. Not supposed to."

John knew exactly what that meant. "ONI."

Wordlessly, the sniper nodded.

John considered that. If Derek's activities were classified by the Office of Naval Intelligence, he couldn't afford to ever talk about it. It didn't matter how much time passed, or how much people had gotten hurt. That was the unfortunate truth behind humanity's intelligence agencies. Classified meant classified and to hell with the soldiers who lived through it.

"Psychiatric evaluations?" The Chief asked.

"Four months ago? Maybe more? I don't know, can't remember." Derek shrugged. "Couldn't talk about what happened, so it doesn't help."

John nodded. He knew what William meant. "So how does she know?"

"Dunno…I've done things, Chief. I've done things and…and she could sense it on me. Maybe they all can."

He could hear a hint of hysteria in the sniper's voice. He had to steer him away from that. "Did you do what you had to do?"

Derek gritted his teeth, then slowly shook his head. "I don't know. I could…I - I had to…" He stifled himself. "It shouldn't…" he took a deep breath, and his voice grew steady again. "It won't affect my performance."

That sounded far too familiar for comfort. Once, that would have been John's primary concern too. Ensure his team operated at full capacity for the mission. Nothing else would matter. Even the way Derek just wiped all the emotional hurt and distress from his mind was all too familiar to him. He'd shove all the baggage into a little box, to be locked away in the deepest recesses of his mind, never to be looked at again.

It never worked. Sooner or later, a trigger factor would raise its ugly head and that box would burst. The consequences were…well, they were bad. John hadseen it happen before. "Keeping all that to yourself won't help anyone, Will. If you need to talk, there's always someone willing to listen."

Will nodded absentmindedly. John didn't think he got through, though. He'd need to keep an eye out. The man's service record had a lot of classified sections – a lot of the ONI-relevant black ink. He didn't want to pry, especially considering the Sergeant's uncertain mental health, but…if his past activities ended up affecting the team's integrity, he might have to.

An ugly situation without a clear solution. He wasn't sure what to do here.

Miia came up to him, looking at him questioningly. John slowly shook his head. When Derek was out of earshot, Miia softly said, "A claim like that, coming from a Dullahan…that's a problem."

"You believe her?"

Her face worked through a variety of expressions. "I think she's credible. I mean…his service record is mostly censored. She wouldn't explode like that for nothing."

The Master Chief suppressed a wince. "Miia…some of us had to do questionable things." He hesitated for a moment, then took a gamble. "If she's an Insurrectionist sympathiser, she'd think me a monster too."

Miia looked at him, surprised…and a little bit pained. "I…but that's different. They're terrorists."

John thought back to the Spartans' abduction of Colonel Watts. Of the dozens of bodies they left in their wake. "They are," he conceded. "As are the Black Fang. To some people, the Templars too. What's the worst thing Rachnera did?"

"Attempting to kidnap the leader of the Spartans. That'd be chronical stupidity," growled the Lamia. "But…I suppose people have tried dumber things."

"Which didn't get them branded as terrorists. It's what Will said; people are people. "

Miia looked past him, stealing another glance at Derek, standing in the distance. She didn't look reassured. "I get what you mean, but…was that really the reaction of someone innocent?"

No, it wasn't. And that bothered the Chief. But a leader couldn't afford to sow distrust in his own unit. He had to be above that. "To me, it looks like guilt. And I think that's more concerning."

Miia's expression slowly shifted into one of resignation. "Moral injury…" she muttered. "Alright, if you're sure about this, I won't complain."

"Thank you."

Though the others were wise enough not to bring the issue up either, the Dullahan's sudden outburst had still put a serious damper on the day. It didn't help that the weather proceeded to do a full one-eighty and dark and gloomy. The clouds had bundled up into an imminent storm front, already gathering power. The wind was howling, blowing something fierce.

"That isn't ominous at all," Rachnera muttered a few minutes later, looking up at the sky. "I think it's raining."

As if on cue, it started pouring. Draco glared at the Arachne, who sighed and shrugged.

After that, everybody just…split up again. Will muttered something about hitting a gym and vanished. Miia wanted to go visit a bar and take everybody with her, but Rachnera wasn't eager, and neither was John for that matter. His head was starting to hurt and he felt strangely tired for some reason.

Kyuri and Draco were up for it though, so. The three of them were very eager to drag the Chief along, but he really didn't feel like it. In fact, he felt like he needed to take a moment for himself. He had a lot to think about, and he needed a moment of rest.

Maybe the girls understood. Maybe they didn't. But they accepted it nonetheless, for which he was very grateful.

"We won't be long," promised Miia. "If you change your mind, just give us a call!"

He would.

Back at the apartment, John sat down on the bed and uttered a quiet sigh. A pressure had built up between his temples, throbbing with painful regularity and his throat ached. He wasn't sure whether to chalk that up to exposure to the Black Slime, or simply being too social.

Now that he had the time – and privacy – he took the opportunity to grab a shower. As he relished in the warm water, his mind couldn't help but drift back to events earlier in the day. Going to the beach with the others had been surprisingly fun. It was…different from the time he spent with his brothers and sisters. It took him a while to figure out why.

He was fond of Miia and Draco and Kyuri in ways that that he wasn't fond of anyone else. Sure, they had their faults, but he recognized that he was willing to overlook them. It was a strange thing, but this shore leave was the best he had ever had. He knew that it had to end, but at the same time, he didn't want it to end yet.

Maybe they could go to the beach again? They could make it a night time visit, so that Kyuri's circadian rhythm wouldn't get thrown out of whack.

He turned the shower off and redressed.

The view outside of their room wasn't well lit. The single source of light was mostly blocked by trees. With weather this poor, it almost felt like evening already.

John walked into the room, then realized the door was ajar. Strange. He could have sworn that he had locked it.

With experienced eyes, he glanced around the room, quickly counting their possessions and scanning possible hiding spots for an intruder. Nothing missing, nobody inside.

Scowling, the Spartan walked towards the door. He reached out to pull it close again –

- and someone on the other side roughly jerked the door back into its frame, closing it with a loud bang.

Alarmed, John immediately pulled the door open again and quickly stepped into the hallway, ready to defend himself.

But there was nobody there. The hallway was completely empty on both sides and he hadn't heard any other doors shut.

…Rachnera, then, he thought, taking a deep breath to calm himself down. Some sort of joke involving string, that was just like her. It was a much better outlet for her frustrations than Draco's.

Shaking his head, John stepped back inside and closed the door again. He had difficulty gauging the Arachne. She was, technically, an avowed enemy of the UEG. But…so was Thel. So many people had died because of him…was he to blame? Maybe. The Sangheili had been the victim of decades of lies and manipulation. Had it not been for the Prophets and their Covenant, the war would never had happened.

But Thel had done everything in his power to make things right, the moment he learned about this. He had stood by John's side every step of the way, even risking a fate worse than death to personally pull him out of the Flood-infested High Charity.

Watching the Arbiter stand there, surrounded by Flood, risking even the future of his own people just to give the Spartan a better chance to escape High Charity…that was the moment Thel' Vadam became his friend.

Was such a redemption possible for everyone?

John glanced out of the window again – and froze

Someone stared at him from the bottom left corner of the window. A mop of shaggy black hair framing a ghastly pale visage. Hollowed out, black eyes peeked out just above the edge of the window, black as coal and completely lifeless.

Instinctively, John backed away from the sight. It remained there, unmoving, its dead eyes staring straight into his. Then, with a jerky motion, it withdrew again.

The room suddenly felt a lot darker.

Something about this whole situation felt terribly, terribly off. Whatever that thing was, it was bad news. He wasn't going to deal with that on his own. He reached for his phone and sent Cortana a quick message: danger at the home base.

Behind him, the door rattled in its frame. Someone was trying to open it.

John quickly sprang to the door and locked it, his instinct screaming at him the entire time – avoid contact.

This wasn't a threat he could place. Not an alien species, Citadel or Covenant. A Liminal? Maybe. But his gut told him this was something else, something much more sinister.

His phone vibrated. Cortana had gotten his message

'I've got nothing on the cameras. Stay put! We're coming!'

Help was on the way.

Carefully controlling his breathing, the Spartan scanned the room again. It wasn't just him; his surroundings actually had gotten darker.

Not good.

Someone knocked on the door. It started out soft, like someone gently tapping their knuckles against the wood. John was in no hurry to open it though; he didn't know anyone team would respond that calmly to an situation like this.

And sure enough, when he didn't immediately respond, the knocking grew louder, more aggressive. Whatever stood on the other side of that door was just wailing away on its wooden frame, furiously, as if eager to rip through

John wasn't entirely sure what was going on, but he wasn't about to make things easy for his enemy. Trying to intercept an opponent he knew nothing about was a bad call.

When he didn't rise to the challenge, the entity assaulting him slowed down again. It ceased its onslaught on the door and the room became silent again.

John scowled. This was the first time he had ever encountered something he could not defeat in a physical fight. It made him feel helpless. Useless. He couldn't bear the thought.

Another bang on the door, this one much louder and harder than the others. Involuntarily, he backed away from the noise, wishing he had something to defend himself with.

Something solid impacted on the window behind him. The Spartan whirled around to face the new avenue of attack, but just like before, there was nothing there.

Terror tactics. Whatever this thing was, did it want him scared before attacking? Was that what drove its behaviour?

John turned away from the window again –

- and the pale, shaggy-haired woman reached for his face, black, ragged nails coming within an inch of his eyes before he managed to snatch her wrists.

What happened next, transpired in a haze. The window behind him shattered into a thousand pieces as he fell through it. He hit the ground amidst a shower of falling glass and rolled back to his feet, immediately pivoting to face his attacker again.

There was nobody there.

John shifted his stance, making sure his flanks were secure. He felt warm blood dripping down from several open wounds, but he banished the pain from his mind, concentrated on the fight and allowed his training to take over.

His flanks were secure. Grass rustled underneath his bare feet as he spun around again and again, his eyes jerking from one shadow to the next. There was nothing there. Nothing at all. Where did - ?

There was a blur of movement, a gust of wind. All of a sudden Kyuri was there, hovering in the air a few meters up and to the left. The moment John noticed her, something heavy slammed into his door, busting it off his inches. Miia and Draco rushed into his room, followed closely by Derek.

"Are you okay? What happened?" Kyuri exclaimed.

"Darling!" Miia yelled. "Are you hurt?"

"Hey, what the fuck!" Draco shouted.

Breathing heavily, John took another look around. The thing that just attacked him was gone. "I… there was a…"

Rachnera appeared in his door opening, too. "What's that ruckus? Was someone breaking in?"

"Breaking out is more like it," muttered Miia.

"There was something here," John immediately said. "Something not human."

Miia stared at him for a moment, her eyes large with concern…and doubt. "Sergeant, secure the perimeter. If you find anything, hunt it down."

"Got it," Will replied, before disappearing into a nearby bush.

Meanwhile, Kyuri had circled around the garden and landed soundlessly. She folded her wings against her torso again, looking at the Chief with concern as well. "You're bleeding."

The Master Chief brushed a few shards of glass away, feeling increasingly unsettled. Where did that thing go? Did it cloak and break contact? Teleport away somehow?

…it had been right there. The door was locked. Where could it possibly have gone?

The others were staring at him, their gazes filled with concern and uncertainty.

"Come on, let's get inside," Miia quietly said. "Get those cuts patched up."

Draco wandered around the room, sniffing the air and searching the same possible hiding spots John had searched. She didn't say anything.

Miia had him sit down, then began contacting Cortana. In the meantime, Kyuri began fumbling with a first-aid kit, pressing herself close against him as she did. Her body felt pleasantly warm.

"What happened out here?" Rachnera asked. "What did you see?"

John told them. He wasn't sure they believed him. That stung. Then again, he supposed it would be difficult to believe.

Will came back half an hour later. He hadn't found anything. No trails, no signs of intrusion, not a single trace of evidence that something had broken into their room. Cortana supported that, stating that she'd taken control of every single camera in a radius of two kilometres and found nothing.

Not a trace.

It definitely put a damper on the day.

~0~

---

"Aliens want to make my tiny sibling cry? Over my empty vodka bottle!"

Anonymous UNSC Marine