A Beginning

The trek was a grueling slog, almost worse than he had had originally anticipated and the overall length of the journey had been drawn-out in order to evade the bulk of the Covenant occupation. Several days were spent traversing hostile terrain and evading even more hostile patrols. Sometimes he was able to pass through unnoticed… others reduced his ever dwindling source of ammunition. Nevertheless, eventually, and near at the limit of his supplies, he arrived at his destination.

From the vantage point afforded to him by a sheer rock face overlooking the remains of the base, the enemy contingent guarding the blasted skeleton of the once clandestine SPLRR compound, did not appear all that intimidating. Reality, however, was a far more serious affair. A pair of wraith siege tanks, a platoon of varied Covenant infantry, and the presence of a sangheili commander, rather complicated the threadbare plan he had spent the past several days concocting during his march to the remains of the sabre launch facility. He had initially expected minimal, if any kind of enemy force disposition. The severity of this Covenant presence was a surprise, and reaffirmed the spartan's deduction that there was a reason Reach had not yet been fully glassed.

Nevertheless B312 was undeterred from his current course of action. No matter the threat, whatever the means, he would accomplish his objective.

This was, by a fair margin, the worst day of her life. In moments like these, Lumi Sudomi wondered why she had ever left her homeworld. In moments like this, she was also reminded that such a decision was by the will of the prophets.

However, it was difficult to take comfort in the sacredness of her duties when arms deep in the bowels of heretical machinery. The sharp jolt of pain, and the golden flash of sparks, was suitable castigation for her distraction.

"By the ancestors, confound this blasphemous technology!" She hissed, yanking her numbed hand away from the sparking panel buried in the heart of this unholy contraption. Human technology was fundamentally crude and boorish, and interfacing with their primitive machines was viewed as heretical, especially so as it had been decreed by the hierarchs.

Lumi, her mandibles twitching into a saurian smirk, found an endless source of amusement in the whole affair. As the war against the humans continued, and their crude, primitive technology proved to be nonetheless effective in stalling the mighty and oh so very sanctified Covenant military, such sanctions had been… carefully revised.

And she would admit, after having witnessed the tenacity of the humans in the defense of this world, she was starting to see why. Despite its rudimentary nature, when wielded in the hands of their creators, human technology could be used to devastating effect. As such she often wondered why it was the prophets were so single-minded in their desire to destroy the humans. Would it not be better for them to join in the great journey, would not their relentless tenacity be a great boon to the gods and their plans? Had they not earned the honor in the ways of the magelekgolo? Such questions were not unfamiliar in the average rank and file of the sangheili serving in the military. From the many she had spoken with, there was a popular opinion in regards to the humans and their persistence, especially amongst the younger warriors. Most saw it as a sign of great courage and resolve, despite their horrible inadequacies.

Where the kig-yar folded, they proved unrelenting, where the unggoy broke and routed, they fought to the bitter end, and where the yanme'e fell in masses, the humans sold each life dearly.

Unlike any of the Covenant member races, the humans and their spirit could not be broken. Each defeat, instead of shattering their morale, only made their determination that much greater, and their resistance that much fiercer. And Lumi Sudomi was certain that this war would not end with an overwhelming Covenant victory. She was, in fact, uncertain as to when it would end. The swift and decisive victory the prophets had promised had, as of yet, not been delivered.

More importantly, a war initially projected to last months had been drawn out for twenty-seven long and painful years, and there was still no end in sight. Many were still waiting for the prophets to fulfill their promise.

But such opinions were dangerous to bear openly.

Lumi turned her gaze away from the mechanical intestines of the human aircraft, searching for any sign of the commander overseeing her project, as if he might be able to smell her sacrilegious thoughts. Yet the towering presence of the gold clad warrior was absent, and she remained alone in the hanger. Most likely the pompous male was off throwing his superiority around the repurposed human launch facility, though the thought was unfortunate.

She had noticed that Jur Moramee possessed a cruel disposition, and more worryingly, seemed to hold a definite… fondness for her. She desired greatly to finish her efforts here so that she might be assigned to a less uneasy tasking.

Breathing softly in relief at her solitude, she returned her attention towards the gutted human craft with renewed vitality, recording her findings with some personal interest. Regardless of her thoughts on the morale and governmental ambiguity of this war, she still had a task assigned to her, and great repercussions if she were discovered performing inadequately. And as luck would have it, she had vested curiosity in her work.

These humans were such fascinating creatures. Their machinery, while simple in comparison, was actually quite robust, and had a certain utilitarian design and function that bellied the true distinctiveness of their craft. There was something to be… admired, about the artless, yet undeniably functional and quite effective machines of theirs.

Lumi could think on the subject for hours, and indeed she might have if not for the earth shaking explosion that rocked the facility. The female sangheili stumbled from the human craft, thrown from her thoughts by the tremor, and watched the cloud of dust that fell from above. "What…?" She muttered to herself in a confused daze.

She took a step further away from the strange human contraption, thoughts flying in search of an answer for what was occurring. The humans had been pushed back from this world, their armies defeated and their ships left as lifeless wreckage up above. By definition they had lost occupation, and she had been promised that it would be safe to depart her ship and come down to investigate their technology, a promise ensured once again by the hierarchs themselves.

Yet… as she stood in silence now broken up by the occasional thump of explosions, and the brief startlingly interjection of weapons fire, the interpolation of the rapid snap-pop rattle of human weaponry, she felt the icy jolt of uncertainty and disbelief strike her core.

Regardless of her incredulity, or in perhaps in spite of it, the sounds of war did not dissipate, but instead grew louder, and more frequent. The young sangheili female glanced about her makeshift workspace littered with scattered tools and un-attended rations, till her eyes landed upon the cast away outline of her issued service weapon, wondering only briefly as to the merit of arming herself.

The decision was discarded after only a brief internal debate. She had little experience in combat, other than her training on sanghelios. And unlike the vast majority of her kind, she did not take particular relish of violence. In this instance she was certain all that would occur if she tried to fight, would ensure an even more ignoble death.

Her choice made, and afraid to depart the perceived safety of her workstation, she waited for the future to come to her. The following passing of time was tense, and she could feel her muscles flex and strain futilely, her instincts still pushing her to fight or to flee, and yet higher reasoning prevailed, and she remained motionless, all the way until the far door to the room hissed open.

The figured seen inside caused a great sigh of relief to pass through her as she recognized the bright golden armor. And for once, she did not impulsively abhor his very presence. The towering warrior stepped inside, and she prepared to speak with him, to inquire as to what might have happened, when her eyes widened and she took a step back in shock.

Jur Moramee fell to his knees, his mandibles grasping and straining as he vomited dark blood upon the silvered steel of the human facility floor. In his place was an even larger shadow, a figure of splattered fluorescent blue and smeared purple. Lumi recognized the thick, functional bastion of overlapping metal, memorable as the artless but evocative combat harness of the humans' greatest warriors, and the one true legitimate threat to Covenant preeminence. The only ones of their kind that could match the strength of her people, and accomplish feats that would have been legendary had they been of the same species. Here, in person, for the first time in Lumi Sudomi's life, she stood before a demon.

She felt her knees threaten to buckle as the giant armored form of the human warrior strode into the antechamber, its armor drenched in the blood of her kin and the gentle glow of an appropriated and repurposed plasma rifle clutched in a massive gauntlet, the heated barrel of the weapon sweeping from side to side trailing wisps of venting plasma. The motion was replicated in tandem by the demon's great helmet as it scanned the room for further threats.

Yet it saw no more of the Covenant's numberless legions, finding little else but a comparatively diminutive sangheili female bedecked in simple clothing stained by oils and lubricant. No fierce weapon wielded, unless one found alarm in the unassuming computing device she grasped tightly in a shaking, four-fingered hand.

Lumi was no great warrior. She did not join the Covenant's military arm to spread their faith through fire and sword. She was first and foremost a scientist, one of the few and far between of the sangheili to ever dain to touch a profession they considered beneath them. She had been ridiculed and mocked her entire life for persisting in her belief, and she had lost the support of her clan to be where she was today.

There existed no home for her on sanghelios, but so it seemed in this moment as the graceful form of the human warrior approached, so very large and imposing and driven, that such a thing would not remain long as a point of consideration.

It studied her with its impassive faceplate, and she expected to join the many others that had given their lives for the Great Journey. Instead she was treated to a heavy boot to the back of her knee, and a gauntlet to roughly catch the collar of her bodysuit as she fell. The barrel of the plasma rifle pressed tight against the back of her skull, the warmth emanating from its maw, was a stringent reminder of her tenuous grasp of life.

Its actions were so swift and coordinated, that she did not recognize what had occurred until after it was done, and she looked up towards the demon in shock. Her surprise was ignored as the human warrior seemed more interested in her work than herself. She watched as it stared at the partially disassembled fighter craft still secured into its launch cradle.

There was a full cycle of silence as it studied the culmination of several days of effort, before it ponderously shifted its helmet down to Lumi, her mandibled visage blurrily reflected in its golden, mirrored visor.

Then her skull cracked against the floor.

Noble Six was… bemused. And while that was not an unfamiliar state of mind, in context with what he had walked in upon after clearing out the complex, blood still rushing with unspent adrenaline, this was perhaps the most illustrative of such a thought process.

He had expected numerous outcomes to his half-baked, ill-considered plan, most ending with his hard-fought demise and many dead aliens. However none of them had accoutered for… this.

The spartan, plasma rifle clutched uncertainly in a steady hand, stared down at the unconscious sangheili sprawled across the floor, rendered thusly by a stern fist to the back of the head, therefor alive and very much not dead. Hesitancy in the face of the enemy was not something usually associated with him, nor a spartan of any generation. Nevertheless, he found himself of… divided thought.

He was certainly no expert on the morphology of Covenant member species. He did not care for what form the enemy took, so long as their ultimate destiny was to lie bloodied and broken at his feet. And the sangheili were the highest upon that scale of cold calculation.

And yet, this was the first time he had ever encountered was what was in all appearance a Covenant non-combatant, who also happened to be a sangheili… and apparently a female.

Spartan B312 sighed, holstering his drawn weapon as he turned to address the more worrying and far direr complication that threatened his threadbare plans. The sabre, the vehicle that was supposed to at least guarantee his chance at getting off this doomed planet, sat half-disassembled in its berth, its guts spread out in neatly categorized piles across the breadth of the launch bay, and was certainly in no condition to do anything it had been designed for.

Noble Six looked to the sabre, and then back to the unconscious alien, before grunting tiredly.

When it rains it pours.

Ju'das departed the council chamber in a thunderous huff, the doors slamming shut behind him as he ventured into the depths of the carrier overcome by anger and disbelief that swelled and surged inside him like the tumultuous sea of his coastal home. Such was his fury, that by presence alone he parted the busied crowds of the ship's hall, unggoy and sangheili alike staggering and stepping aside respectively to make way for the silent anger of the imposing and venerable field marshal.

How could the hierarchs be so blind? How could they be so uncaring? Did they not see the danger this abomination posed? Their skepticism had been apparent, crossing the vastness of space and imparted fully by the indifference upon their digitized features, and all the more wounding for it.

A trivial concern, they had called it. The deaths of more than a hundred warriors to the demon were trivial, the deaths of good friends and fine sangheili, staunch believers and pious souls, trivial.

He scoffed at the sightless imprudence of his leaders. So caught up in the grand arc of their vision that they did not recognize that the most crucial moments were born of the smallest details, they believed the demon would die on that world, assured him most adamantly that there was no possible way it would survive, not against the full might of the Covenant. Yet, despite their placations, in his hearts, Ju'das knew they were wrong to be so confident. He had made that same mistake, suffered that same blind arrogance when he had confronted the demon, standing amidst the bloodied wreckage of his brothers.

And he had been defeated, cast off and left for dead, his honor worth less than the blood that spurted from his throat.

Ju'das had slain demons before, all of varied, but undeniable skill. He was well known and respected for his deeds against the humans and their greatest warriors, at least he had once been. This demon was different… a creature that truly deserved its title. It was no more a warrior than a shackled beast that had stolen its title from its betters.

No.

The abomination would not die on that world.

He had crossed blades with it, and in so had learned the make and measure of its resolve, knew that it could not be stopped by anything less than an opponent of equal or greater will. The prophets did not understand matters of honor. And he would go so far as to claim that they suffered deficiencies in matters of warfare and grand strategy. But his concerns were of no import. Their commandments were absolute. And as of late many soldiers had grown too zealous in assuming their divinity.

They had forgotten that the hierarchs were not themselves gods, but simply their voice.

And of those he could count the Ministry as their most ardent supporters. As such he knew that any action he might take to thusly seek and defeat the abomination would be in direct opposition to his superiors.

This understanding placed Ju'das in an unexpected crisis of faith. For the first time in his many decades of service, he felt himself questioning the will of the prophets, and their collusion with the gods. Would not the gods wish a swift and righteous end to such an abomination as he had faced on the human world? Was not its very existence and affront to the Great Journey? He himself did not have the answers, nor it seemed, did the hierarchs.

"G-Great Marshal…"

Ju'das, though withdrawn in his thoughts as he waked the halls, had presence of mind enough to notice the stunted creature that shuffled up towards him, the diminutive unggoy tottering at a run to match the long legged stride of the much taller sangheili. In recognition he slowed his pace, both as a result of his curiosity and as a courtesy to the stumpy little being that visibly struggled to maintain its closeness.

Most of his people did not hold the unggoy in high regard, they were as a species, inherently fainthearted, and made less than adequate soldiers, treated instead as fodder for the frontlines. Nor did their stature and their strained grasp of the common tongue garner them much respect amongst their peers. Nevertheless, through experience Judas had come to consider them as some of the most devout followers, and could, as certain individuals, possess considerable heart and courage in some of the direst of circumstances.

Further more than that, Judas recognized this particular individual.

Mandibles curling in the slightest imitation of a smile, the large figure of the sangheili turned towards his stout follower. "Minor Nipnup." He greeted the little creature as it slowed to a more manageable walk, looking up to the towering field marshal gratefully.

"Thank much, Great Marshal. Nipnup not good at running fast." The squat unggoy, upon seeing the sangheili's courteous nod, eagerly held a dataslate up for Ju'das to take. "I bring message, Great Marshall. Special Operations Officer Chadamee requests your presence in Hanger C. He say, it very important Nipnup, must hurry-bring Great Marshal, quick-fast!"

Taking the device from the unggoy's thickset digits, the sangheili examined the information compiled for him, and felt his hearts quicken. "When came you by this?"

"Nipnup only just received orders, found you quick-fast yes?" The unggoy asked enthusiastically.

"You did well to find me so quickly." Ju'das praised the little creature, clapping a hand against its shoulder. "I am most grateful."

Nipnup's grin, while obstructed by his clunky breathing apparatus, was heard enough in his jubilant exclamation as he turned and beckoned excitedly. "Thank much, Great Marshal. Nipnup glad to be of service! Now come quick, Nipnup will show you the way!"

Ju'das nodded once more, amused at the young unggoy's eagerness, and followed after the little creature that seemed to have picked up a second wind and impressive stamina, his little legs thumping rapidly on the deck as he led the sangheili to his destination. Some in the hall seemed disgruntled at the small intruder that upset their schedule as he charged recklessly through the crowd, but upon noticing the imposing figure of the sangheili Field Marshal behind him, they were wise to keep their irritation to themselves.

Ju'das Rasumai was not one to be trifled with.

Spartan B312 was… irritated.

Of all the complications he had expected and prepared for, of all the possibilities of outside interference he had predicted, having to reassemble the partly disassembled components of his escape craft was, in point of fact, not amongst his plans.

It did not help either that he was racing against time. He had done his best to eliminate the Covenant occupation force guarding the facility before they could report his attack, but he had assaulted the entire complex without support. After all he was probably the last human left alive on Reach. Spartan or not, it was inconceivable to assume he could have been fast enough to prevent a call for reinforcements.

They would be coming. And Noble Six would not be here to greet them.

Or so at least that was as far as his plan went.

Reality was proving to be far more bothersome.

The spartan, reconstructing and reinserting the stripped components of the sabre's main fuselage, glanced back to his unexpected captive as his gauntlets flew in a frenzy of deft activity. The saurian alien sat propped against the far wall, bound by a length of discarded piping he had bent into a set of makeshift manacles, still unconscious from the blow it received to the back of the head. As before, his thoughts darkened upon laying eyes at the alien that still breathed as a direct result of his restraint.

Since the moment he had spared its life, Noble Six had been trying to understand the motive that had stayed his hand. Something could be said in favor of the Rules of Engagement and its policy in regards to noncombatants, but it was also clear that the Covenant didn't give two shits about ROEs. There was no reason he should have bothered either. Fair was fair, after all.

Yet there the thrice damned alien sat, very much still alive.

The spartan grunted dismissively, discarding the alien from his thoughts as he returned to the work at hand. Currently he didn't have the luxury to second guess his in-the-moment decision making skills. The sangheili female was alive, and for the interim, she would remain so. Right now, he needed to focus on getting off this planet before it went to hell in a handbasket.

His own situation was less than ideal. He needed thirty to forty minutes to put the sabre back together, and a further ten to fifteen to run a diagnostic to make sure he hadn't screwed up somewhere along the way.

Fully expecting a Covenant incursion somewhere between then and now, he had made his preparations. The doors to the launch pad had been sealed, and all facility systems had been rerouted to the technician terminal hooked up to the cradle. The base itself had been put into lockdown, which should buy him at least twenty minutes when Covenant forces arrived.

However, the upper control room offered any opposition an advantageous overwatch that gave them nearly perfect vision over the hanger. If any enemy forces were able to secure it before he departed, his chances of escape were pretty much null and void. Since he had no intention of being bombarded by fuel rod cannons from a superior position, he had left a suitable surprise in store.

Despite the delay it had caused, Noble Six had spent a brief interlude divesting the facility's armory, and had compiled a formidable assortment of weapons and supplies, condensing them into a pair of storage crates he planned to take with him. Should the second stage of his incredibly stupid and unrealistic plan actually work, he figured he'd have need of the equipment to buy him the time necessary to reach the third phase.

Everything, absolutely everything hinged on his ability to get the sabre working, if for whatever reason it would not fly, then his preparations here would be his last. In that case, he would have no cause for worry, and as such did not put too much thought into that eventuality.

All he needed was a little bit of time.

And yet the deep, thunderous reverberations that shook the very foundations of the sabre launch facility and interrupted his efforts, were inclination enough that time would soon become a precious commodity.

"The abomination… it is here?" Ju'das turned to the warrior standing beside him, his voice hushed by the din of weapons preparation and the murmured benedictions voiced by the small team of sangheili Special Forces operators and their unggoy companions. Their goal was simple, and yet their target was anything other than that. They were here to hunt a demon, perhaps the most dangerous yet.

Ju'das, having a personal vestment in this hunt, cared little to disguise his interest, which was transposed well enough for his companion to hear. The commander of the lance chuckled softly as he replied. "Worry not, Marshal Rasumai." Officer Chadamee, mandibles flexing amusedly, eyed Ju'das patiently. "You will have the demon you seek, and with it, your honor restored."

Ju'das huffed and snapped his jaws dismissively at the indirect slight. "You need not remind me of the merits of honor, Chadamee."

"Of course, my Marshal." The special operations officer inclined his head deeply. "T'was merely an observation, no affront was intended. I have naught but respect for your contributions to the Great Journey. Your accounts are legendary, even in my keep."

Ju'das dained not to reply, and instead walked to the edge of the phantom's troop compartment. The sangheili turned his thoughts to the horizon, looking thoughtfully upon yet another world turned to glass.

The humans had fought admirably, they always did. But, as always, they failed. Reach they had called this place, and they had battled fiercely in its defense. Many ships in the Fleet of Particular Justice had been destroyed in the war for orbital supremacy, and many warriors had given their lives to secure victory on the surface. The unexpected difficulty of this campaign was a stringent reminder of yet another unfulfilled promise from the hierarchs.

It felt as if they were no closer to winning this war then they had been thirteen years ago, and Ju'das spared little thought to the less than zealous nature of his musings, looking instead to the surface of another world that had been disfigured by the fury of their faith. Was their hate for the humans so fierce, so unrelenting, as to merit the destruction of desirable worlds? This would have made for a beautiful colony, the seas had once been bright blue, the air had been crisp and unsoiled by harsh pollutants, and the grasslands had possessed a beauty all their own.

Now, the oceans boiled, and the plains were little more than glass. The air was hot and heavy, the bitter tang of ash a constant companion of every breath. This planet had been ruined, lost like so many others on their path of conquest. And Ju'das took umbrage with yet another decisions of the prophets.

He had been inducted into the studies of war at a young stage in his life, like all sangheili. He had learned of tactics and stratagems at an age where other races focused more on childish games. And his skills with a blade had been honed through his adolescent years under punitive tutors.

It was not unreasonable to conclude that he had been born for war. And yet this was no like no war he had ever participated in.

More accurately, this was nothing but an extermination. They did not spare the human young, nor the elderly and infirm. They did not keep prisoners. Any human unfortunate enough to be captured, found their last moments to be used as little more than sport, or perhaps even as a meal for a pack of hungry jiralhanae or a coven of backbiting kig-yar.

The lauded tenets of the Covenant, the principles that defined their religion and unified the diverse species of their empire, had been discarded in favor of this policy of unremitting genocide. And they were so surprised, that the humans fought so tenaciously?

The line between right and wrong had ever grown blurred in the years of this war, and Ju'das did not feel the same staunchness of faith as he had at the onset of this crusade. He had watched far too many good warriors die, and the screams of the defenseless often became a familiar companion in the dead of night. He had witnessed more horrors propagated upon the humans in the past twenty-seven years, then had ever been done between all the species of the Covenant in the entirety of its existence.

He had seen good friends turn cruel and vindictive, and had heard the delight some of his peers took in crushing a technologically inferior foe and the pleasure they took in their physical superiority over the average human. More than once he had watched one of his collogues toy with a human warrior, offering the illusion of hope to a broken and battered creature, moments before snuffing it out.

Ju'das could only turn his thoughts to such memories, and wonder if it was really so surprising that the abomination was so full of hate and malice. The demons had been the humans' answer to the wrongs forced upon their people.

As a collective, humans were small and weak, placed on a scale somewhere between an unggoy and a kig-yar. They were brave and coordinated fighters possessing an impressive understanding of strategy that few of the citizens of the Covenant could match, but in physical combat with most member species, they were inherently disadvantaged.

Yet the demons were the manifestation of their resolve. He had seen a demon, alone and unaided, make a mockery of the best the Covenant had to offer. Their exploits were infamous amongst the ranks and accounts of their activities were as consummate as they were omitted by the ministry, able to turn great hordes of unggoy on appearance alone, and give pause to the greatest of jiralhanae.

The phantom soared over the last mountain between them and their target, leaning into a steep dive that crested the jutting rock formations and skimmed just above the open field that spanned for several kilometers outside the human compound.

Ju'das looked on to their destination, studying the destruction that had been revisited upon the human dwelling. He could see already, proof that the abomination had indeed been here as Chadamee had promised, an unfortunate truth for the warriors sent here on their mission.

The gates of the military installation, blasted open in the initial assault, had proved no deterrent to the demon, nor had the pair of wraith tanks in their place. Both vehicles burned with blue flames, belching black smoke into the sky, and even as the dropship neared he could smell the occupants cooking within their hulls.

Several bodies lay sprawled nearby, mostly kig-yar, riddled with the crude ballistics of human weaponry, and stripped of their own, no doubt to supplement the demon's arsenal as it furthered its unknown ambitions. The sangheili field marshal sighed heavily as the phantom sped forwards at the sight, the pilot eager to unload his cargo so that they might enact retribution.

Seeing all that he needed, Ju'das made his preparations for what was to come, and followed the special operations team as they disembarked the transport. Moral was high despite the scene they had arrived to, and he could tell that the sangheili amongst them were fervent for the task, each no doubt wondering if they would be the one to claim the honor that awaited them.

Ju'das could only sigh and offer a humble prayer. These warriors were strong and experienced, veterans of many operations and campaigns, but he could see in their actions, in the way they showed little hesitancy, that they had not yet faced a demon in combat.

They were unprepared and the field marshal wondered if he himself was ready to face his foe again. He worried that more than his honor had been lost in his defeat at the abominations behest.

The dual, heavy impacts that slammed into the dirt behind him however, were enough to encourage Ju'das, reminding him that unlike before, he would not be on his own. He glanced over his shoulder to the pair of towering magelekgolo that marched in step, their bond synchronizing their movements to a near ethereal perfection. Each was armored in the equivalent of starship grade hull plating festooned in spines, and wielded immense cannons that fired beams of emerald energy.

The magelekgolo, Ju'das predicted, would be the deciding factor if they were to emerge victorious. For demons were cunning, and this abomination was no different, numbers alone did not guarantee victory. Both human and sangheili scholars had made note of this fact, and there was precedence for such knowledge.

"Come, Marshal, we have prey to hunt!" Chadamee called to him eagerly, the stalwart sangheili leading his lance past the gates and into the facility proper, stepping over the corpses of their brethren who had tried, and failed, to accomplish what so many had attempted before.

Ju'das, sparing one last cursory glance to the pair of behemoths that strode behind him and conversed with one another in the deep rumble of their speech, followed in the footsteps of the eager officer, though he did not share such a fervent disposition.

The truth was, as he came to realize, that reality had no place with zealousy.

He was out of time.

They had come for him, and sooner than he had been prepared for. B312 took a reprieve from his efforts to prepare, rearranging supply crates into an improvised barricade around the launch pad. It would not ward off heavy weapons, but it would hopefully keep the sabre from any significant damage that might prevent his launch.

The spartan, in the midst of stacking his defenses, refrained from dwelling on the very real possibility that he would not survive overlong afterwards. His end had already been decided, and all his current efforts were really just to see how far he could push the envelope.

As ready as he would ever be, Noble Six, after a period of hard thinking, pulled the female sangheili to the side of the launch bay, away from the worst of the firefight to come. Having decided that he would at least not be directly responsible for her death, and unwilling to think on his leniency any further, stashed the alien out of sight, and therefor out of mind.

His affairs settled, the spartan returned to his more important dealings in greater haste. With the enemy closing in, he'd have to cut a few steps from his plan, namely the maintenance diagnostic on the sabre's core systems. That bought him ten minutes, though he would need at least twice that much to get the ship operational.

B312 grimaced as he reaffixed the outer paneling on the hull. This was not as glorious of an end as he had been hoping it would be. So far he felt more like a mechanic than a spartan. In truth, he was almost glad for the arrival of the enemy as they fit more in line with his expectations, although he was soon to regret the thought when his motion tracker triggered

Noble Six counted the red dots that closed in on his position, noticing that their number was smaller than anticipated. However their grouping and pace was recognizable, and he readjusted his plans to account for the appearance of a special ops unit. They would be more difficult than the usual massed infantry waves the Covenant employed. But he had dealt with his fair share of Special Forces before.

The spartan pulled aside from the sabre, stacking up against the closest container and retrieving the long bodied, distinctly alien frame of the focus rifle he had stashed earlier. It was not as directly potent as the particle rifle, but he was not exactly flush with options at the moment.

Reaching an arm back to the slot in his armor at the base of his spine, he extracted the armor mod and slotted in a piece of Covenant tech. His HUD flashed as it downloaded and unencrypted the foreign software, integrating the alien system into his Mjolnir. He wasted no time, and as soon as the patch was installed, he keyed its function, disappearing in a shimmer of reflected light.

He waited to spring his trap, watching the command center as the aliens entered the room above the launch pad. They used standard tactics, nothing special or particularly noteworthy, grunts above with heavy explosives, assisted by a pair of jackals with support weapons. As the radar contacts had split earlier, he knew that the core sangheili lance was making their way down to him.

B312 was somewhat impressed that they had cleared the rest of the facility so quickly, and he knew that would mean he had even less time to work with then he had first thought. He just might have to launch without a few sheets of the external hull, unfortunate, but survivable.

Noble Six decided to skip any formalities in favor of triggering the detonator.

His visor polarized, and the spartan hunkered down as the windows blew out of the command and control center, gutters of flame shooting from the frames, scattering warped chunks of metal and charred body parts. Stepping from cover, he tossed a frag up and into the devastation, preparing a second just as the doors to the launch room were blasted open.

Pulling the pin, he chucked it through the smoke and repositioned behind a maintenance console at the bottom of the ramp. Three seconds and the ground shook as the grenade burst in the hallway, and the spartan shouldered the fusion lance in preparation.

The first sangheili to stumble out of the smoke fell to the floor soon after, bisected by the beam of directed energy that separated its legs from its torso, and the second followed swiftly in the footsteps of its predecessor. The corpses fell, and for a moment there was no one else to follow.

Then three blue spheres hurtled inside, and the spartan crouched low as the explosions tore through the room, taking fire to the tarps that had been lain out by men long since dead. Following in the wake of the flames was the enemy, his motion tracker flashing with activity as several contacts stormed inside, laying a thick torrent of plasma bolts into anything and everything they could see.

As the spartan was invisible, he was not amongst their targets. Instead he lunged forwards and caught the first alien in the gut with his shoulder. The giant saurian, draped in ornamented regalia, did not have the chance to contemplate its failures, as the spartan locked his elbow around its throat and wrenched its head backwards past biological limitations.

Snatching the plasma repeater from its limp grip, he tucked an arm under its pits and held the corpse out in front of him to absorb the worst of the returning fire and allow the spartan the flexibility to pick and choose his own targets.

Obscured by the growing haze of smoke from the flames and his partially effective active camo, most of the shots taken on him were near misses, and those that did make it through were dulled by the barrier of metal and flesh he had imposed between himself and his adversaries.

And then there was a flash of green, and an overwhelming surge of heat.

The spartan blacked out, only to regain his senses and notice that he was now draped haplessly over a smoldering crate halfway across the hanger. His shields crackled and sparked, indicating that the generator had overloaded, and that he was dangerously vulnerable. He could taste copper, and his nose was filled with the smell of burning ozone.

Noble Six tumbled back over the crate and rolled to the side, narrowly avoiding the second beam of viridian light he had been expecting. The plasmatic lance punched through the steel box and slammed into the far wall, boring a hole into a foot of titanium sheet metal.

He grimaced.

Hunters…

They would be a problem.

While he had anticipated that the Covenant would bring out their walking artillery, the limited arsenal he had on hand was not appropriate compensation. With that he had now his odds of success were… less than optimal. His suicide mission, as it seemed, had just become even more suicidal.

So be it.

B312 primed his muscles and launched forward. Diving hard, he cut under another burst from a hunter's assault cannon and came out of his maneuver at full speed, clenching hard on the fire assembly of a plasma rifle wielded in either gauntlet. The fusilladed of shaped energy splashed harmlessly against the massive shields that blockaded the entry doors.

Then the shields parted like a gate comprised of starship grade hull plating. Two gaping barrels jutted forth from behind the makeshift barricade, crackling with building energy.

In answer, Noble Six lobbed a frag right between them. The pair of shields slammed shut like a coffin lid, but they were too slow to stop a spartan. There was a muted thump, and a flash, as the grenade detonated and showered the outer corridor and its occupants in shrapnel.

The shield bearer on the left sagged and thrummed in pain, providing the slightest of openings for B312 to ply his only advantage. The spartan threw himself forwards, breaching the gap with a millimeter to spare. He landed hard on his spine, guns up and firing into the unprotected backs of the two hunters.

With the understanding that momentum was the only thing preventing him from being killed, Noble Six flipped into a backwards somersault and slammed his elbow into the throat of the closest sangheili warrior. The blow was solid, the impact traveling through even though its shields endured, it was strong enough to send the beast gasping. Retracting his arm, he prepared a supercharged haymaker and plunged it into the second.

All of this occurred in the span of five seconds.

And then the world went still.

It was not long before the demon fell amongst their dwindling number to thwart everything they had prepared to accomplish. Their plan had been executed perfectly, simple but effective. Heavy weapons from above to cover their steady approach upon the abomination's position, and a vanguard of the best close quarters fighters supported by the hunter pair. By all rights it should have been more than sufficient, even for one such as the prey they hunted.

And yet, from the reach echelon Ju'das was able to watch as all of their efforts were undone.

The fire support, so carefully positioned and prepared, had been incinerated, along with the entire room they had set-up in. No doubt their killer had been a charge placed prior to their arrival. The first warriors to charge into the room were scythed down as they entered into a prepared kill zone, and Chadamee himself had been killed and hoisted like a puppet to turn away their fire as it advanced upon them. His death was unfortunate and yet ultimately expected. Chadamee had been brave, but foolish, a trait that seemed to dominate sangheili culture throughout this war.

It was, Ju'das feared, a characteristic that the demons and this abomination frequently exploited.

And as the magelekgolo were wounded, giving their adversary the opening it needed to slip amongst them, he could see firsthand what their sense of entitlement had done to them as the creature made a mockery of their martial mastery. There was nothing to blame but their own complacency.

Minors Raso and Kyaza were felled quickly, perhaps even mercifully, so they did not have to face the shame of their failure. Ju'das stepped away from the armored monster, wary of its physical ability and unwilling to take a risk he did not need. He took the opportunity to plan his reprisal, and hope the magelekgolo could accomplish what he had been unable to.

The eldest of the pair, as told by its greater height and lengthened spines, was the first to turn and face the threat among them. Wielding its shield like a ram it sent the partition of metal rocketing out towards the abomination with the full intent of splattering it against the facility wall.

Such, however, was not to be.

It contorted like water around a stone, the hilted device in the human's left hand stuttering to life. And it was by Ju'das' ancestral blade that one of the mightiest Covenant soldiers was slain. The plasma sword, one that had been in his lineage for generations, hacked through the massive magelekgolo's unarmored midriff with traitorous ease.

The sangheili could feel his ancestors cry out at the indignity, and so with a hateful roar he charged forward, all plans forgotten, plasma repeater thundering at his despicable foe. His enraged shout was amplified a thousand times by the deep reverberation of the magelekgolo bond brother as it threw itself upon the abomination in a fit mindless insanity.

The human warrior discarded all weapons but that which it had stolen and raised an arm to ward off Ju'das' attack, the familiar form of a kig-yar point defense gauntlet activating in an amber haze. The barrier turned away his shots, and the relentless demon moved too quickly to be brought down by the sluggishness of the magelekgolo's lumbering swipes. The abomination weaved in close under its guard and struck thrice with the thieved blade in rapid succession, cutting deep into the unarmored gaps and divesting the hulking beast of both its arms and its right leg.

Boiling blood and charred worms spewed from the severed limbs, and Ju'das felt sorrow as the once proud creature collapsed with a pitiful rumble by the corpse of its fallen brother, defeated and denied its vengeance. The sangheili field marshal realized in that moment as the blood soaked demon, painted in the fluids of his comrades in arms, turned its visored gaze upon him… that they were not enough to stop it.

He had thought his will… his faith, to be stronger than that of honorless abomination. But as he matched its stare and watched as it readied itself to face him, wielding the honored weapon of his forefathers, he knew that after decades of battle he had finally met his match.

Nevertheless he drew Kyaza's blade from its owner's corpse and readied to greet the gods. If he had lost his honor in life, he would at least find it again in death.

"Your blasphemy ends here, abomination. I swear it."

B312 was… less than enthusiastic at the prospect of facing the same foe twice. If he were to consider as well, the state he had left this particular alien in, he would also admit that to see it again was a surprise, an exasperating one at that. He might have been impressed with its persistence if not for its bastardized heritage.

In view of that, he was instead rather infuriated. Noble Six was not in the mood for games, and had since lost his taste for the dramatic. His limited operational window had not included the possibility of an alien hell-bent on revenge.

And his timetable had shrunk as much as he would allow.

"Fuck off." The spartan snarled wearily, and turned his back on the slavering sangheili warrior.

Though it was not a native of the dominant human language, it was prescient enough to understand an insult when it heard one. Many human warriors had no doubt uttered similar declarations before meeting their end at its hand.

The sangheili field marshal gargled, its hoarse vocalization lost somewhere between an enraged growl and a disbelieving scoff as it wondered at the demon's boundless temerity. It raised its taken blade, ready to sink it into the unguarded back of his adversary, when it heard the rattle of several metallic objects on the floor.

The alien glanced down and watched a trio of grenades bounce off the ground and roll towards him.

Noble Six left the marshal to the tender mercies of his farewell gift, and dusted the ensuing shrapnel flakes off his armor. He would have preferred to confirm the kill, or at least have the satisfaction of watching the damn thing bleed out, but he could not suffer any more delays. The op was already a stretch on realistic expectations, and he was adverse to the idea of wasting what little luck he had left.

Luck as he had come to understand it, belonged to other people.

Amidst the carnage and wreckage of the recent firefight the object of all his preparations rested in its cradle, remarkably intact and as ready to fly as it would ever be. B312 worked quickly, loading the trunks and running a very brief pre-flight checklist, enough to ensure that it would not explode upon ignition. If the sabre was to go up in flames, he'd prefer to burn up in atmosphere.

With the fuel in the tank he had the means to accomplish his objective. And with the cannons loaded and the missile racks full, he'd be able to stop anything that tried to stop him, at least anything within the confines of reason. He held no illusions that a sabre might outgun a Covenant cruiser of any class or nomination.

Noble Six climbed up the gantry and opened the canopy with the keypad recessed into the hull paneling beside, scaling up the vertical incline and into the pilot's seat with a slow, welcomed familiarity. Before Reach, before ONI had tasked him with running anti-Covenant operations, he had been one of few test pilots for the new flight system, and was unusually versed in avionics for a spartan. He wasn't much of a scientist, but military technology was somewhat of a personal passion of his.

He knew the ins and outs of the YSS-1000 almost as naturally as his Mjolnir, and his flight record and the operation over Mamore indicated as much.

B312 patted the flight stick, running his other gauntlet over the onboard system display with the lingering trace of genuine affection, although his fondness was tainted by memories of his last trip. He hoped that his sacrifice would be something 052 could be proud of, and something the enemy would never forget.

The spartan skipped most of the actual checklist as he started ignition, the shudder that surged through the sabre's hull knocking loose a memory he had turned aside for lack of interest. He glanced out the canopy, wondering for whatever reason, if the sangheili female had survived the engagement. He had never been directly responsible for the death of a noncombatant, at least insofar as ONI recognized. The idea of it left an… unpleasant taste in his mouth.

Regardless, the memory was a fleeting one that the spartan ultimately disregarded as he turned to more important matters at hand.

After all, he had a ship to hijack.

For the second time that day, Ju'das Rasumai regained consciousness in a way that was disagreeable. The smell of smoke and human explosives wafted into his nostrils, and the sangheili field marshal groaned as he climbed to his hooved feet amidst the thick blanket of smoke.

He recalled, to his dissatisfaction, the insult he was rendered, and felt his bile rise with his anger. Had he not thought the abomination despicable enough, it now did not even dain him a worthy opponent. It had nearly done him away in the most contemptible of fashions, and that was a slight that could not stand.

Ju'das climbed over the bodies of the fallen magelekgolo and through the flames, into the debris strewn chamber of the human hanger. There he saw the bodies of his fellow warriors, more proud sangheili dead at the hands of the beast. He doubted that he might even find anything left of the warriors stationed up above. And in that moment, he could taste the bitterness of defeat in the acrid pollution that rose from the flames.

They had stood no chance against its cunning, and its resourcefulness was at a hitherto untold aptitude. It had seen through their plans before they had even made them, and turned the best the Covenant had to offer into bumbling children tripping over their own feet.

He saw no sign of it, and had at first no inclination as to where it might have gone, at least until he noticed the empty, primitive launch cradle. The abomination had absconded with its victory and taken to flight, its plans as of yet unknown, but intent clear to read. Wherever it had departed, death was soon to follow.

Sighing heavily at the fullness of his shame, Ju'das activated his communications device and hailed his pilot. The conduct of their conversation had been brief and pointed. The male had seemed ecstatic at first, but his mood had darkened as the information was given. The call completed shortly, and Ju'das was left to wait for his arrival.

The aged sangheili swordmaster took in again, the sight of their efforts, and sat upon the sagging weight of a human container, content to stew in his bitterness till his transport returned. There were many dead in this operation, and they had nothing to show for it.

Should the hierarchs learn of this, they would be most displeased, The Ministry, perhaps even more so. If the gods were on his side, he might at least be granted a swift death.

If not… as it so happened to be, there has not yet been another arbiter in many years.

The faint rustle of movement drew him from his bleak musing, and the field marshal rose from his seat slowly, his actions calm and collected. He knew the abomination was gone, but perhaps there was someone else that might have survived its tending.

If there was at least one other, he would thank the gods for their kind benefaction.

AN: Here's the next part fresh of the press. I hope it is a good one for you readers. I wanted to make the events preceding Lylat to have a more comfortable pacing then the original work had indicated, while not stretching it to a point of irritation. Or so at least that's how it should be in theory. It was also my hope to add a little more depth to the Covenant, after all the war has been going on for 27 odd years, and I felt there had to be at least a few amongst them that were becoming disillusioned with it all, as I hoped to portray properly with Ju'das and Lumi.

On a different tangent, I am pleased as pie to see the responses thus far for the remake. And it is with this writers most humble gratitude that I thank you for your words and inspiration. I'd write this story even without your kindness, though it does me some good to read your thoughts. So as always, feel free to leave reviews and suggestions, your words are always a pleasure.

Keep the faith!

Drake