I do not own Fate or Halo; they belong to their respective owners.

Artoria reluctantly jogged alongside the rest of the children; what CPO Mendez had claimed to be a "short run" had turned out to be three kilometers. She felt that Shirou's aching muscles were being healed by Avalon, something she was grateful for. She wondered if the medical products of today could be able to rival Avalon, humanity had advanced so much, but it made sense that none could genuinely replicate Avalon.

Eventually, they arrived at the "playground" that Mendez had spoken of. She felt Shirou's anger show through the mental link: "This isn't a playground; it's a cruel test!" Artoria sent a feeling of concurrence over the mental connection, similarly angered by subjecting six-year-olds to such without their permission.

Squinting at her surroundings, she realized that they were in a place that resembled something that had been crafted for rather practical use. Stacked-up cargo containers seemed to be something the trainees were meant to scale.

After giving Artoria barely enough time to analyze the obstacle course, Mendez orders the trainees to form three lines. Artoria privately wanted to resist, and she could see a similar expression on Illya's face. Artoria probably needed to make a trilateral mental connection between the three. Though she was going to make sure that she couldn't spy on their more private thoughts, especially toward one another.

The lines that Mendez ordered to be formed eventually coalesced, "The first person in every row will be team number one; the second person in each will be team number two, and so on. If you do not understand this, speak up now."

Artoria bit her tongue; she glanced at her left and right. Illyasviel stood to her right while Shirou was to her left. Perhaps luck had smiled upon her today and decided to make this exercise slightly more tolerable, emphasizing the slightly, of course. Artoria could feel that Illya was warming up her body to use Emiya Crest when prepared; it would undoubtedly help her get there speedily. As for moving faster than the human eye could register, she figured that Illya would likely underpower the crest to prevent suspicion.

Mendez continued his instruction, "Today's game is called Ring the Bell." pointing to a platform connected to the obstacle course by a singular pole. If Artoria's eyes weren't deceiving her, she could swear she could see a small bell at the top of the pole.

He began elaborating on the nature of the game, "There are many paths to get to the bell." Artoria could feel her blood boil with how he was subjecting children to such exercises without a second thought. "I leave it up to each team to find their own way. When every team member has tolled the bell, you are to get ground side double time and run back across this finish line." To further highlight his point, he used his baton to carve out a line in the nippy and parched sand.

Then, someone raised his hand; Artoria looked over to the boy; it was the very same boy who had taken some of her crackers. Now that she had a better angle to get a better read of him. His name was John, and the angle she was standing at concealed the rest of his serial number, but that was all she needed to know. After all, no one addressed one another with just numbers; they weren't machines.

CPO Mendez appeared not particularly pleased with John since he growled out: "A question, Trainee?" Artoria had seen those eyes in the most stringent of commanders, ones who were dead set on an objective and saw anything ancillary as a significant inconvenience.

Artoria could tell that the boy wanted to flinch but chose to stand his ground to Mendez, providing his question to the officer, "What do we win?" Artoria wasn't surprised by this question; they were children. After all, they needed motivators.

CPO Mendez answered this question by articulating what was at stake: "You win dinner, Number 117." Artoria already felt Shirou's complaints about being treated similarly to tagged cattle rather than human beings. "Tonight, dinner is roast turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes, corn on the cob, brownies, and ice cream." There it was, the motivator, she called it.

Artoria listened as the other children dropped what was left of their modicum of critical thinking and seemed to silently agree that such an exercise was agreeable now. She didn't judge them; it was their nature, after all. Admittedly, she probably would have done the same if she were mentally the same age.

"There's a catch here, isn't there?" Shirou whispered in her mind.

"Of course, Shirou. That man doesn't seem like he'd give us such kindness after so much work." There was always a catch; they needed to have a punishment, or else the children would take the easiest way possible with the least effort. Her suspicions were again proven correct when he introduced the zero-sum game concept to the children: "But, for there to be winners, there must be a loser. The last team to finish goes without food." Artoria spotted Illya narrowing her eyes and grumbling something about cruelty but kept it silent enough not to get noticed by the instructors or CPO Mendez.

The trainees grew suspicious and mutually hostile, knowing what was at stake. Artoria gritted her teeth; it was just a method of dividing each other against one another. She admitted that the competition was good in training, but there were two problems. First, she didn't train children. Second, food was seldom a motivator; glory and pride served that purpose much more adequately.

Regardless of her feelings regarding this particularly terrible exercise, she eyed Shirou and Illya. The former seemed to have used minor reinforcement on his body, hoping to keep it together. His eyes showed a fiery resolve to ensure that Artoria and Illya pushed through the course intact. He was always caring in that respect, but Artoria was confident they'd make it through alright.

While the others were quickly going through quick introductions, the trio decided to plan and coordinate a rough plan regarding how they would proceed through the obstacle course; it seemed that the crates would be the first issue and that Illya would have to get lifted up last.

Time slowed as the race began, and Artoria was sure that wasn't solely due to Illya's time manipulation. She watched as the children determinedly attempted to scale the crates as fast as possible, with John seeming to leave his teammates behind and hurrying along. That boy was not a team player, but that did not concern her. The trio began thinking out the next obstacle when they saw the bridge flipped, sending five children careening down to the water below.

As they moved toward the bridge, it was there that they saw a girl wailing, as she was holding on to her teammates for dear life. Artoria's eyes dilated immeasurably. She could also feel the surprise Shirou was experiencing, a feeling of recognition. The girl seemed to also recognize the trio.

"Shirou, Saber-san, Illya! Help me up this instant." It seemed that the Tiger of Fuyuki had also been dragged into this. At this point, Artoria wasn't even surprised. But Shirou dove into action, helping Taiga's teammates pull her back to the platform. Then, her Scabbard was enraptured in a hug with Shirou's de facto step sister. After a few seconds of intense embracing, the two eventually separated as Taiga calmed down. It was strange that her tank top simply said Taiga-012.

They still had an objective to complete, and Shirou seemed more determined to ensure that Taiga's team didn't arrive last. She didn't know whether it was because he genuinely cared about her eating or if he didn't want her bothering him about food after this exercise. After managing to hammer out an agreement, they began the tedious task of crossing the bridge. Clearly, it was a game of balance, with the group in front of them having the bridge capsize, propelling them into the water below.

Artoria took a tentative step on the bridge. They ran down in pairs of two, which made it particularly suitable that they had now created a group of six. After all, Mendez said nothing about collaboration with other teams. She looked down, seeing some of the more unfortunate children having to swim back to the start. After pacing with great precision with Shirou, they could arrive at the other side without peril.

This left Illya and Taiga traversing the bridge. Looking ahead, it seemed that the rest of the course was relatively straightforward; all they had to do was climb the pole and ring the bell. Artoria and Shirou lingered, waiting for Illya and Taiga to cross the village. Taiga's balance slipped; they were halfway across the bridge. With her magical crest, she figured that Illya would be able to speedily dash toward the platform they were standing on.

Instead, Illya had a particular fire in her eyes, and Artoria felt the mana surge from Illya's body, signifying the activation of her magical crest. Illya uttered, "Time alter, quarter accel," and she began moving at breakneck speeds. She had made the distance between herself and Taiga in only a few seconds, managing to catch her before she fell off the bridge.

Now was rushing over to Artoria and Shirou's position before the bridge capsized. Shirou wanted to intervene, but Artoria put her arm in front of him and shook her head. "Have faith, Shirou."

Shirou let his displeasure known through the mental link, but it seemed he acquiesced to Artoria's judgment.

Twelve meters was the distance Illya needed to close in only a few seconds, with Taiga in tow. She did the right thing in the end, though. Artoria looked across to the other platform, seeing John's teammates struggling to scale the metal blocks, falling behind the rest of the groups. Clearly, there was a difference in the character between Illya and John. Even though it was an unethical game they were forced into, he had still abandoned those he was supposed to collaborate with.

Artoria watched as the bridge began to tip beyond the point of no return, and Illya had limited time. She witnessed as Illya maneuvered herself toward her own lefthand side in an attempt to delay the overset of the bridge. Artoria could see the panic emerge on Illya's face and realized that she had increased her own velocity, managing to run on top of the side of the bridge at the point of no return.

Illya leaped with Taiga in tow. Shirou managed to realize too late that Illya's trajectory aligned directly with Shirou's body. Artoria's eyes widened, and she attempted to move her scabbard out of the way, but it seemed that it was too little, too late.

The two girls streaked through the air before them, directly colliding with Shirou.

Taiga was the first to get back up, tearfully thanking Illya for preventing her from falling off the bridge, before looking down and realizing whom they had landed. The Tiger of Fuyuki jumped up at lightning-fast speeds, but the expression on her face seemed marred in a mixture of wanting to apologize and playfully mock Shirou. Illya had also jumped up after realizing that Shirou had served as her air cushion. She began to apologize to her brother at a rapid-fire pace. Shirou gripped his forehead before reassuring Illya and Taiga that he was fine. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see John running over to a tube that eventually led back to the finish line in the sand.

The group of six then refocused themselves on the pole that lay ahead. Taiga was the foremost to the steel bar and began to ascend rapidly without many tribulations. Taiga's partners had no problem joining her at the top and ringing the bell.

Artoria motioned to Shirou that she would ascend last. She looked behind herself; a decent proportion of the trainees were behind them. They were in no hurry. She watched as Taiga and her partners hurriedly brushed past her and began to follow John's path into the tube; they were in the home stretched now, so Artoria wasn't particularly concerned about Taiga now.

She turned back to the pole and watched as Illya rang the bell at the top, and Shirou began following her up to the platform. Once Shirou had ascended to the forum and Illya had simply slid back down the pole, Artoria paced over to the bar. Her left hand began to grip the lukewarm steel bar, her hands guiding her as she ascended the bar, rung it, and slid down. To her own bemusement, Shirou decided to leap off the platform, with Artoria witnessing as he reinforced his legs for the impact.

Artoria witnessed as he landed feet first, perfectly fine. Before turning to her, smiling with the classic smile of his, and running toward the tube. Artoria looked over to the bridge again; the other teams had begun the catch-up.

The crawl through the tube was essentially an uneventful affair and simply served to be a test of their own endurance. Artoria could feel the pain in her knees, but she labored on. It seemed this particular body of hers was starting to match the mind in how much pain it could endure.

Here it was, quite literally, the light at the end of the tunnel. Crawling out, Artoria made it to the finish line, just behind Shirou and Illya. She craned her head upward, observing CPO Mendez check off her team's completion of the challenge on his digital tablet.

After several minutes, the rest of the trainees streamed in after her, notably Kelly and Sam, John's teammates, finishing last in the race. She knew exactly what this meant, but she kept silent here. Subjecting these children to such punishments in the twenty-sixth century was cruel; she was powerless to stop it. Just as she was powerless to stop herself from destroying the Holy Grail at the end of the Fourth Grail War.

Mendez seemed to put on a face of genuine pride, which was surprising for Artoria before she realized that Mendez truly believed that they were just soldiers in training rather than just children, "Good work, Trainees. Let's get back to the barracks and chow down."

While the rest of the children cheered, Artoria and Shirou put on a pained expression about what was to come.

"- all except team three." Mendez eyed each member of the team in question.

John seemed to dispute this, pointing out that as an individual, he had won. He was right, to a certain extent. Artoria looked pitifully at Sam and Kelly, who seemed resigned to their fate.

"Yes, you were first, but your team came in last. Remember this: you don't win unless your team wins. One person winning at the group's expense means you lose." If Artoria had no context, she would have said that she agreed with such sentiments, but since Artoria had the context, she still felt this was a cruel way of teaching them such a lesson.

As the night retreated from their portion of the planet, a boy sat alone at his bunk. He was defeated because he never understood the value of the group. Ordinarily, Artoria would have left such a person to continue sulking and reflect on their own problems.

He was just a boy, though.

Artoria walked into the still empty hall of beds; he could hear her alright. That did not dissuade her from continuing to approach him. She saw an arrogant boy in John, but that obstacle course did not lie about his individual ability. In all respects, John possessed the raw physical skills to become a capable leader.

But so too was the case with Mordred. Artoria could never right her own wrongs when it came to her son, reflecting on how much potential had been perverted into the same weapon that had brought down Camelot. In her mind, this was her chance to catch a Mordred in the making.

She carried a sealed platter with her; courtesy of Shirou's projection, it's not like it needed to last very long anyways.

John remained silent as she approached him and sat next to him on his bunk, so Artoria decided to take the initiative in this conversation, something she should have done with Mordred all those years ago, "John."

"Alis." The boy acknowledged her presence. It was still strange to be addressed in such a way instead of "Saber" or Artoria. She was getting used to it, but she always reflexively used Shirou and Illya's actual names.

Artoria was not the kind of person to entertain pleasantries, especially regarding conversations such as these, "Charging ahead without regard for your teammates, leaving them at a disadvantage, why did you do it?" She already knew the answer but wanted to hear it from John's mouth.

John lowered his own head in defeat, perhaps due to his exhaustion. The confidence he had shown back at the obstacle course melted away under the weight of his hunger and Artoria's questions, "B-Because I thought that I could win on my own."

Artoria nodded; it wasn't a mindset she blamed him for, especially at this age. He had to learn this lesson before returning to the course tomorrow, or team three would be consigned to his fate again. Life wasn't fair, and this training was certainly more unfair, but they had to make do with what they had, and Artoria would do her best to bend the rules too.

"I think the punishments given to your team weren't right," Artoria admitted to the boy but quickly elaborated, "But, as much as I hate this, Mendez was right."

John nodded, understanding what she meant, but he did not verbally respond to her. Artoria continued her monologue. "Have you ever heard of the story of King Arthur, John?"

She heard that he uttered something around the lines: "Of course." Artoria was privately happy that the story of Camelot still lived in the hearts of men nearly two millennia later.

Artoria's eyes glazed over as she tried to go over the final moments that led to the death of "King Arthur" and the fall of Camelot. It was difficult to convey such complicated events to a child while balancing conciseness and the story's meaning. She talked about the fates of the Knights of the Round Table, with "King Arthur" being killed by the blade of his son, Mordred. "Arthur" died alone, surrounded only by Bedivere. Ultimately because others viewed it impossible to connect with him. The truth still stung her, but she kept it concealed from John.

John had been paying attention to her recollection, so she concluded her story with a question, "What did Arthur regret as he lay dying, attended to by Bedivere?" He seemed stumped by this question. No one honestly could know the answer. Well, she did, but she needn't tell him that.

"I think he regretted making enemies and not saving his friendships." He was right. It struck a chord within Artoria. She did a double-take but was able to hide it behind a cough.

"It's as good a guess as any," Artoria paused for a moment, allowing for herself to transition the conversation to something more relevant, "When I look at you, John. I see a leader who doesn't realize he needs to lead."

John's eyes visibly widened as Artoria continued, "Kelly and Sam, they are your Knights of the Round. Being a leader means more than just ordering people around or being respected… It means being there for each and every one of them, no matter what." Something she had failed to do when it came to Mordred and Lancelot.

In his eyes, one could see that he had reached a great epiphany. They then tightened in spirited resolution, with only one question on his mind: "How do I start?"

Artoria motioned to the sealed platter on her lap, "Rikuto and I managed to get a fair amount of scraps from dinner; you don't know how hard it was to get this here." It was a challenge, as Artoria was tempted to inhale all the food, even if it wasn't Shirou's cooking.

To give him an extra push in the right direction, "It's only enough servings to barely feed a few people."

John appeared to be embarrassed that they were doing so much for him, but the red in his cheeks quickly faded as the determination returned. He stood up as Artoria handed him the sealed platter of food, seemingly deciding how he would proceed. As he ran out of the bunk area searching for Kelly and Sam, Shirou emerged from the shadows, having watched the exchange with a grin on his face.

"I think you did the right thing here, Artoria-san."

Artoria matched his smile with her own, pecking his cheek, before asking him a question it seemed he was dreading: "So… any methods of escape that you've found?"

Shirou scratched the back of his head, "Well, I almost got into the kitchen…."

Unknown Date

Carter Morgan felt powerless. Carter had reached the peak of his career as a researcher in the field of cryogenics. He had a loving wife and daughter. But, nothing could have prepared him for the revelation that his daughter was born with organs doomed to fail. He didn't know how it got past genetic screening. Still, the doctors assured him that they were confident that it was a de novo mutation that caused such a disease and that there was an astronomically small risk that any of his future children would also have this disease. Carter grew bitter; it was a small consolation given that he would be doomed to lose his daughter in a few years. That was with the most optimistic reports of her condition.

Lisa burst into tears when she heard the news; any mother would. Any mother would react in such a way if they knew their child only had years at best, that their child may not see the sun tomorrow. It was an incredibly humbling thought for Carter that nature triumphed over science again.

As a scientist, he thought the diseases of yesterday could not touch him or his family. He dismissed any reports or journals about families with a child born with abnormal conditions as rare and unlikely to occur to his loved ones. He believed science could solve the world's issues.

A stray tear ran down his cheek; he would reveal nothing to Alis. She deserved a happy life, however limited it was. If death robbed decades of her life, he would make those few years left the best one could ever hope to have. To this, he swore upon the stars that Alis gazed upon these days. He reiterated his desires to himself; he had enough money from his family to afford to live without working, which he intended to do.

He strode to his mahogany desk, which had his computer situated. He looked around and pulled something out of the drawer of his desk. It was a simple ebony box, but inside was something far more. It was something that had held great significance to his family. He never knew what sort of superstition they had concerning charm; when he tried to ask his grandmother about it, she simply answered that it was an invaluable heirloom passed through generations.

He pulled off the top of the box, revealing the heart-shaped pendant for all the world. After getting a fraction of the information from his great-grandfather, Calvin informed him that the jeweled necklace purportedly came from the late 20th century, a four-hundred-year-old artifact kept in the most satisfactory condition the family could afford.

He had once considered selling the necklace, but something in his mind told him it would be best if he did not. As he gripped the Jewel in his hand, it almost felt warm, but he figured it was just his hand that had warmed up the Jewel. There was nothing extraordinary about it, just a jewel that had helped his family tie themselves back in time when humanity was a society that had barely conquered the solar system. Even if it wasn't special, he knew the power of the placebo effect; if there were a belief that it could help, it would.

It was strange that he had fallen back on the dogmatic faith. He never hated religion; he didn't understand it. He considered it a way for people to delude themselves from the truth, but here he was. Crossing his fingers and praying, hoping that his daughter would live one more day, that she would live, that she would defeat the expectations.

Once he had finished praying, Carter quickly skimmed over what he had written out, but Carter didn't check the content; this was a final decision that absolutely no one would be able to pull him off. He finally sent his resignation letter to his supervisor, and he would understand. Carter was sure of it.

Carter could feel the warmth of the necklace and gently settled it back into the box, placing the container's cover over the chain and Jewel. This necklace was going to be a lovely gift for his little princess. He grinned at the container; perhaps this contained more than just history.