Rabbit Zero-Eight-Seven

by Rob Sears

Pulled from her assignment to eliminate pockets of the Covenant remnant, Kelly-087 is given a new mission after she stumbles upon an atrocity: to hunt down and kill one of her own. A Spartan. On Kelly's mission to destroy her target, she will come face to face with not only the terrible will of her quarry, but of her own harbored doubts. Extreme prejudice authorized.

17. Chapter 17: Frozen Blood

XVII: Frozen Blood
"It Always Ends This Way"

---

The homestead, ordinarily stately and deprived of any ostentation, appeared as many vibrant hues through the false-color macros the Marine squad leader peered through. He swept his gaze as much as the forest allowed him to as he glassed the buildings and the smoothed fields which acted as a barrier from the trees that otherwise threatened to swallow up the dwelling. He took note that the exterior of the abode seemed lifeless, though the presence of a multitude of footprints in the snow that ringed around the buildings was evidence enough that the place was populated.

The wind blew through the evergreen trees, sending up a thin skein of flurries over the icy ground. The snow cover seemed to shimmer, becoming almost liquid. The dry air furrowed and expanded, appearing saturated with thick, white dust.

A few more minutes in silence passed, with no movement occurring through his ten power macros. Behind the squad leader, the raw and crumbling mountains remained dotted with cloudwisps some several miles back.

Then, he raised a fist, slowly unfurled his fingers, and angled his hand ever so slightly forward. Behind the trees and bushes they had been occupying, the ten-man squad slowly rose from their positions, their weapons all angled down the hill, toward the home, as they moved in that direction. Snow crumpled behind them in their wake, leaving deep canyons that had been chiseled into the powder.

All of the Marines were bundled tightly, without any skin showing. Their eyes were hidden behind dark green tactical goggles. Black balaclavas muffled their mouths. They wore heavy armor, colored the hues of carbon gray, riflestock brown, and acrylic forest green. They held Misriah M20s and MA40s, the magazines at their hip color-coded for hollow-point and armor-piercing rounds. Two Marines even carried large M739 LMGs, having to utilize both hands equally to heft the weight of the drum-mag weapon. Every weapon was modified to some extent, whether the sight system had been replaced entirely for a magma-glinting holographic sight, or if the internal mechanisms had been tinkered or replaced outright with lighter materials for better performance.

The forest thinned. The squad leader gave the signal to halt just before the break in the trees. He looked up at the glazed blue sky. Clouds were rolling in. It was midday, but it seemed to be getting colder.

From their position, they had a much better line of sight to the homestead, what with less trees blocking their way. If anyone had been looking outside a window, they would be able to see the Marines hunkered upon the hillside. If they were paying attention, that is.

The squad leader tapped the transmit button at his temple. All of the soldiers out here were tuned into the same frequency.

"Recon?"

"Heat sigs confirmed—two contacts min," his sharpshooter reported. He was sighting down his sniper rifle, a bulky scope system affixed atop the weapon. "Place is poorly insulated. Distortion is appearing through the walls."

"Confirmation on TOI?"

There was a deliberate pause before the sharpshooter responded. "No confirmation. Can't get firm definition. TOI had to have come by, though. Only standing structure within immediate walking distance of their crash site."

The squad leader agreed on that. Just this morning, while scanning one of the untouched sectors on their grid, they had managed to finally locate the long-cold ruin that had been the Pelican stolen from the base on Arbogast. It had looked like it had exploded upon impact, but perhaps that had been a ruse to cover their tracks. If their target was smart, they would have looked to have gotten to lower ground to stay warm and stay alive. That would have led them away from the mountains. It would have led them straight to this place.

Did he question his orders? No, of course not. Though it was not like he had been provided much in the way of details. His squad had been provided the basics: the identity of the TOI and the order to terminate the TOI. As simple of a mission as they come.

In any case, all ROE had been suspended for this mission, he had been assured. It seemed like collateral damage was being encouraged, in this case. Fine by him—his men had been getting rather complacent as of late.

He keyed the comm again. "Let's flush them out. Gas rounds first."

One of his men lifted a 40mm launcher, one that had been modified to fire riot control cartridges. He crouch-walked forward a couple of feet and let off two rounds in quick succession.

The cartridges left silver spirals through the air as they arced, momentarily catching the light of the sun, before perfectly hitting their targets. There was the crashing of glass and the rounds sailed straight through the two front windows of the house. The Marines could see clouds the color of talc began to expand past the broken rims of glass in the dwelling. If they concentrated enough, they could almost imagine hearing someone coughing.

"Give it a few seconds for the gas to set," the squad leader told the group.

They waited until the first ragged streams of the CS gas began spilling past the jagged openings that were the remains of the windows. The soldiers watched the house—no one exited.

Standing from his position, the squad leader fished a portable loudspeaker from his pocket, which was a ringed device no bigger than a mug coaster. "The hard way, then. Be ready to open fire." He connected the loudspeaker to his radio and raised it to his masked face. "Spartan-087! We have the house monitored! You have nowhere to run! Come out with your hands up, and we can at least—"

A ferocious snap shook the tree just to the left of the squad leader's head and he realized half a second later that he had just been fired upon. A flash had emitted from one of the shattered windows—someone was inside, shooting at them.

He dropped back down to a crouch, releasing his hold onto the loudspeaker, which sank into the snow half an inch next to his knee. His squad was already firing—he did not need to give the order.

The Marines with their scope-fixed MA40s were slamming the house with short and controlled bursts. The snow flurries shockwaved and rippled as the pressure rudely pushed them aside to make way for the bullets. Cordite tangy on the palate. The air pulsed orange.

The squad leader could see the roof rattle and shake, snow exploding off of the corrugated metal, as the bullets slammed into it. Holes quickly punched their way through the front door—whether it had been from his team or the other side, it was hard to be sure. Raising his own weapon, the squad leader sighted in on the right window and let off a few multishot bursts of his own. It was dark inside the house and he had no way to confirm if he was hitting anything.

With a quick hand gesture, the squad leader ordered two men to peel off and to cover the rear of the house, to make sure that no one would attempt to escape that way. It would take them three, maybe four, minutes to get into position.

The rest of the squad continued to open up onto the house. The two M739s were howling away, distorting the foundations of the structure. Sparks hurried along the walls of the house like the brief and vacant ripplefire from firecrackers. Rounds poured down the hill, a tide of lead.

And yet, past the empty expanses where the windows used to be, the momentary flare from return fire continued to pronounce itself.

---

The kitchen was in absolute shambles. The two gas rounds had come through the windows and one had lodged itself in the sink after vacating the counter of all of the dishes that had been piled there. The other had skipped off the floor and had rolled underneath the couch.

Shattered remains of cups and plates littered the floor. A cookbook, its pages all torn, joined the fray down there too.

The CS gas swirled, the light streaming in from the open windows catching it and revealing a sinister yellow tinge.

Dariush had leaped into action almost immediately and headed toward the sink, where a few rags had been sitting next to it. The CS cartridge was still puffing away in the stainless-steel basin—he reached in, and yelled as the hot canister burned his hand. He hurled it towards the front door, his eyes already watering and his lungs stinging.

The faucet to the sink had been ripped out when the fired canister had smashed into it—it was now geysering water in a continuous stream. Dariush grabbed the rags, ran them through the spouting water, and quickly tied one over his face. He then took the other two to Elnaz and Soraya, who had been crouching in the corner, breathing into their shirts. He put the rag over his daughter's face first before he attended to his wife.

"Papa," the girl coughed, trembling from head to toe. "What… what's…?"

"Stay down!" Dariush screamed, just as the first of the bullets smashed into the wall above his head. He had to push down the heads of his girls as dust and debris exploded all around them. He guided the two over to a corner, away from all the firing, then ran back to the kitchen.

Two rifles had been partially disassembled on the kitchen table—they had been in the middle of being cleaned. Dariush took the one that was the most intact, quickly slammed the bolt back into place, loaded several bullets into the tube, and crouch-walked over to the first window. At a break in the firing, he quickly rose and let off a couple rounds. He had no time to look through his simple scope to see if his .308 bullets had hit anything. The fact that he was firing back seemed to make his aggressors angrier and the continued gunfire from the forest erupted anew.

Dariush dropped back into cover and slotted in some more bullets until the rifle's limiter refused to accept any more.

So many questions rushed through his head that he could not hope to answer them all. What had he done to deserve all this? Was this all because of that woman they had let inside? Was she being hunted? Did these people think that he was her accomplice just because he had helped her?

A bullet spat its way through one of the floorboards just inches from Dariush's foot, soberly keeping him in the here and now. He looked up, watching the crossbeams of the ceiling eject sawdust every time they were struck by the hurtling projectiles. He was concentrating so hard on picking the best time to fire back that he did not notice that Elnaz had taken up a position at the other window, having assembled the second rifle when he was not looking.

"What are you doing?!" he had to bellow over the din when he spotted his wife. "You need to get our daughter out!"

"You'll never take them by yourself!" Elnaz roared before she rose and fired her rifle out of her own broken window. More bursts smacked the wood and stone next to her head, but she had leaned back into cover before they could hit flesh.

Dariush caught his wife's face. Darkened. Determined. It seems like she would do tear apart anyone who dared to come through that door if they intended to hurt her family. Their daughter.

The thought filled him with fire. He leaned out again and pumped two more rounds outside. The snow blinded him and reduced everything past the threshold to a bright blur. He could see the crackling of muzzle flashes out amongst the treeline. But not enough definition. He could not see any faces.

He reloaded again, but this time, he raised his head to spot Soraya. The girl was cowering underneath the kitchen table on all fours, hands over her head while it seemed like it was the end of the world and that everything was coming apart all around her. His heart wrenched to see his child so afraid.

In that moment, the thought of his own life did not matter at all. Everything he did now, he would all do for her. That was his burden. His privilege. He would not fall apart. Not at this moment. If someone wanted him dead, then they would not catch him lying down.

But first, he needed to make sure his daughter was safe. This house was the furthest thing from it, so there was only one thing he could shout to her.

"Soraya!" The child lifted her head up. Saw her father. Saw the bleak devastation in his eyes like suns collapsing on themselves.

Saw her father take a breath.

"Run!"

Her hands fell away from her head. Her mouth parted, not understanding.

Dariush flinched as another hail of bullets smacked the countertop, some of them pinging upon the hanging pots and pans and producing terrible ringing noises like the galaxy's most hellish percussion ensemble.

"Papa—" she cried out, but her voice was lost amidst the chaos.

Dariush pointed towards the back door, knowing he was letting his world slip through his fingers.

"RUN!"

Soraya obeyed this time. Keeping low, she crawled from the table until she was finally clear of it. She then stood and frantically began running towards the back door. She was running so fast she did not even think to grab a coat. More rounds impacted after her, but she was already in the hallway, past the bedrooms. The door was in sight.

Her vision darkening, her little hands reached up and grasped the door handle. With all her might, she yanked on it. She would have to make a run across the field. Go to the woods. Hide in a gully somewhere. Wait until her father called her and said that it was safe to return.

She had her whole plan in mind so well that the second the door opened wide enough to let her through, she was already moving—

—only to rebound against something solid.

The child fell to the floor, her nose sore and bleeding. She had run headlong into an immovable object, draped from head to toe in a metal alloy. Her eyes focused and caught a set of dark armored boots. A full wave of fear engulfed her body. Her neck feeling like it was encased in diamond, she managed, with some effort, to peer upward, finding more and more heavy armor surrounding an impossibly tall soldier, their hands devoid of weapons. This soldier's visor was a matte imitation of a scowling boneplate… and it was looking right at Soraya.

The trembling child began to scoot backwards, slowly. Eyes never leaving the armored warrior.

At the same pace, the demonic being followed her inside and slowly closed the door behind him.

---

Kelly and Furan heard the shooting ten minutes before they made it onto the farm property. They had already been running at a blistering pace through the forest. Hearing it all kicking off in the distance caused them to go even faster.

The soldiers leaped over gouges in the earth and vaulted across ancient boulders as they skirted through the trees. They were predators in pursuit of the deadliest prey in these woods—a layered Spartan clutching a rifle like a staff, the silver-armored Elite just behind while tightly gripping the deactivated hilt of an energy sword.

Thee two of them skidded through a thin cut in the trees. The snow blistered and seemed to boil as the faint rays of the sun fractalized and condensed upon the particles in the wake of their purposeful strides. A slick smear of gold glared upon the snow and ice in front of them, extinguished once they were back under the cover of the trees again.

They had left the road a long while back. They only had the sound of the rifleshots to follow. Keeping to the higher sections of the hillcrests, they skirted the lines of the property, enabling them to see downslope.

A tall collection of rocks, the largest of them greater than two stories high, provided ample cover. Kelly and Furan used the terrain to their advantage so they could regroup and check their bearings. The gunshots were dangerously close, now. Perhaps if they peered around the boulders, they would be able to see the shooters, for it sounded like they were just right there.

Kelly checked the clip of the rifle that had been given to her. The .22 had a twelve-round clip—the only magazine she had was currently loaded into the weapon. Twelve rounds for such a small caliber. Not exactly the type of armament preferable for an assault.

"I'm practically ineffective at long range," she told Furan after she completed her mag check. "The rounds in this rifle won't penetrate body armor. I'll need to aim for the face or the joints." Not impossible shots, but it was just another wrinkle to overcome in a day that was rapidly filling with wrinkles.

The Elite considered her own weapons. Besides her sword, all that she had was a plasma rifle, and that was also not very good for anything greater than medium range. Plus, spewing plasma bolts tended to give away a shooter's position far more easily than firing a projectile weapon.

"Procure-on-sight, I take it?" the Elite rumbled.

"Something like that," Kelly said. She shrugged off her coat and felt the familiar bite of the cold nip at her skin. The coat was colored bright yellow. Wearing it would be just as useful as having a target painted on her back. "We need to take them out without alerting the others. Lure some of them away from the homestead. We'll need to create a distraction. A grenade explosion, perhaps…"

"Or…" Furan suddenly offered as she raised an arm. Kelly saw, on a beaded chain, the FOF tag that the Elite had been carting halfway across the galaxy dangling from it. Light glazed off its waxed surface and the Elite handed the card to the Spartan. "We become the distraction. For that, we'll need a rabbit."

Kelly took the card. She squeezed it in her hand for a moment before she slipped it over her neck. It seemed like she could read everything that the Elite reflected back in her alien eyes. Eyes that were full of understanding. Of solidarity. Of kinship.

"Yes," she said lowly. "We will certainly need one. I'll be—"

"—Staying where you are. I feel up for a sprint, anyway."

"You're putting your life in my hands," Kelly said, holding the FOF tag close to her body. "If you want me to be the rabbit—"

"And trust that you won't get shot?" Furan snorted. "Far easier to trust that you won't miss." She gave the rifle in Kelly's hands a determined nod.

Despite all that, Kelly seeped a tired smile towards the Elite. "Then I wish you good hunting, Shipmaster."

"And you, Spartan."

With nothing else that needed to be said, Furan abruptly swiveled and broke from her crouch in a purposeful run. There was a static pulse that manifested as an audible bubble in Kelly's ears, and she watched as the active camouflage draped over the Elite in sheets, creating a silvery film that made her all but disappear from sight as the forest seemed to swallow the alien up.

Kelly was also advancing along the hillside, having already scoped out a spot where she could lie in wait. She could not stop thinking about the family down below in the house. About Soraya. Were they still alive? They did not deserve this kind of retribution. This should have only been focused on her. But Logan, or whoever was truly pulling the strings, seemed to think that any association with her, no matter how fleeting, deserved a punishment as permanent as one could imagine.

She slid down a steep embankment for a couple of yards, her body hugging the ground. Snow clumped at her feet, producing an almost longing ache in her toes. Frostbite scars. Her body was remembering the pain.

High above, the pine branches became outlined in a magma hue from the sun. The sky was turning bloody. Kelly's breath shone in the air. She clutched her rifle indelicately, her knuckles white and clenched so hard even the plastic of the stock was creaking in protest.

She leaped behind the trunk of a nearby tree. And waited.

---

The two UNSC Marines bringing up the rear of the crackdown squad had stationed themselves further up the treeline. From here, they had a good view on the house as the rest of their team poured lead upon it. The air was crackling with the reports from high-carbine rifles—the return fire had dwindled down to a simmer. The danger, such as it was, seemed to have passed and soon adrenaline gave way to boredom. This would all be wrapped up in short order, from the looks of things.

Soon, their squad leader would give the order for everyone to move in and congregate on the dwelling. Then, they could get off of this frozen hellhole. Or at least someplace slightly warmer.

Then, a twitch flickered in the corner of their motion trackers. A gray-blue dot skirted the little circle upon their HUD. But only for a moment. A digital ghost.

One of the Marines turned around. The other quickly repeated the same action.

"Did you catch that?" the first one asked.

"Yeah," the second affirmed. "Wasn't a malfunction if you saw it, too."

"I was afraid of that. We'd better check it out, just to be safe."

The Marine's cohort groaned. As if he needed yet another reason to delay their inevitable flight from this place.

He keyed the radio. "Squad, Lancer-7 and -8 moving to reconnoiter western perimeter. May have spotted additional hostiles. Stand by."

"Roger that, Lancer-7," the squad leader chimed back. "Maintain regular contact."

The two soldiers then worked their way up the hillside, in the direction where they had thought the contact on their trackers had appeared. They hunted for a path—found none—and were forced to make their own as they trudged through the brush and the snow in their hateful march.

In no time, the house below had been sucked away by the snow-draped vegetation. Even the sounds of gunfire had retreated to a dull pop. If they didn't have their VISR system active, they would have lost their sense of direction in this maze a while back.

They kept their weapons parallel to the ground—silenced MA40 assault rifles that could put down a Brute in a single clip, provided one's aim was straight. The number "60" blazed electric blue upon the LED display in addition to the compass arrow that ticked this way and that in half-second intervals.

After five minutes of trudging miserably through the snow, the Marines stopped in place.

"Man, screw this," the first soldier said. "There's nothing here. An animal probably tripped the sensor."

"This was a waste of time—I agree," the second one nodded. He then keyed the comm again. "Squad, Lancer-7 and -8 maneuvering back. Will form up in seven mikes. Out."

Their footprints had left a clear path back to the dwelling. An easy breadcrumb trail back to their support. The two soldiers started back down the hill, the steady and yet comforting crunch of riflefire in the distance acting as an additional guide.

Until—

Another blue blip skirted across their sensors. Behind them again.

The Marines whirled, bringing up their weapons. "The hell?!" one of them gritted. "Contact! We have contact!" They were only talking amongst themselves, both of them having forgotten that they were no longer transmitting.

Before their eyes, the blip on their motion trackers then snaked to the left. Several seconds later, it was at their right.

The soldiers were spinning in place, aiming their rifles at any gently swaying branch. "Shit, they're on all sides!"

The forest seemed to snarl around them. Everything turned into a blur of white and brown so dark it appeared almost black.

The two men did not know whether they should head into cover or not. They still had not zeroed in on where all of this digital chatter was coming from. Every so often, there would be a new blip on their tracker, but it would not even last three seconds before it would disappear again. And it would never show up in the same spot twice. Always a new location.

Like they were being circled.

Lancer-8 furiously tapped the shoulder of his cohort. He pointed at something through the trees. "There!"

Just beyond, it seemed like a gaseous cloud was wisping through the timberzone, but it continuously traveled in a circle around them, keeping the same radius. The distortion seemed to glide its way between the massive trunks, like a cloud of steam slowly dissipating into the morning air once the sun had risen.

Both soldiers gave a start. That wisp… that couldn't be an active camouflage device, could it? They had not been informed their target had that kind of tech—it had been reported that she had not been able to escape with even a set of MJOLNIR.

So, what was this? Was it… Covenant?

The Marines slowly lowered themselves into a crouch. "You see it?" Lancer-8 whispered.

"I see it," -7 said. "Out of range, but it's closing."

"Can't tell if it's human or not. It's blending in with the trees—we can't get line of sight. We make for the homestead. Regroup and—"

On their motion trackers, a new contact brimmed to life. Yellow, this time. Not blue. Less than ten meters away, if the gauge was right.

The Marines froze. Then they looked at each other. They seemed like they were about to start pointing at each other, now hopelessly confused.

"If you're seeing what I'm seeing, you'd better speak up right—"

The snow exploded just up the hill. Kelly rose from where she had been laying prone, the FOF tag bobbing around her neck from its chain. She had on a baleful glare and her fury was enough to melt the snow in a cauldron of steam as she leaped out from where she had been hiding, rifle in hand and a large rock in the other.

The Marines spun to face the leaping Spartan, but Kelly was already attacking.

She threw the rock first. A powerful sidearm that whistled through the air in a flat spin. It hit Lancer-7 on his temple, indented his helmet several inches, and fractured his skull. Blood immediately gushed from the wound and the Marine lost all tension in his limbs. He crumpled where he stood.

Kelly gave a mental blink. She remembered when she had tried that very trick back on Reach. But she had been a little girl back then, her strength not yet enhanced. She only been able to knock out her enemies with such similar blows. But now, she had the capability to kill.

Lancer-8 was bringing his weapon around, the death of his squadmate not yet registering, but Kelly already had her own rifle locked in. She raised the long gun, one-handed, did not bother sighting down the cheap optic, and fired.

She had always been trained to aim for the center of mass all throughout boot camp. She did not do that this time. A .22 round would not penetrate the chest armor of a UNSC Marine, so she had adjusted her aim for the most opportune target: the neck.

The bullet zipped through a pocket of flesh and darted out the other side. A miniscule tear had opened up in the Marine's carotid, emitting a brief red spurt behind it. But even miniscule was enough.

There was a long, gurgling sound.

In the next instant, the wound opened up and a long gout of pressurized blood spat from Lancer-8's neck. The snow turned red before Kelly's eyes. The Marine's hands grasped at his neck as he gagged, doing anything to stem the flow, but it was already too late. As the spurts continued to jettison, the blood pressure in the man's head continued to fall. Unconsciousness came in the next minute and he quickly bled out before the Spartan's eyes after he finally collapsed into the crimson-stained snow.

Kelly wiped the gruesome sight from her brain. This was combat. Soldiers were expected to die in combat. Even if her enemies were, in fact, human.

She exchanged the .22 rifle for one of the MA40s and rifled through the belts of the men she had killed for a few extra magazines. She even managed to acquire two frag grenades, which she clasped to her bodysuit.

The assault rifle would work well, she determined, especially with its silencer. That would stave off detection for a few more minutes. This next part, she needed to act quickly.

She did not have a radio link with Furan. She instead made a long sweep of her arm in the direction of the farm, in case the Elite was watching. The signal to start moving up and to kill anyone whose paths they crossed.

A cataract of obscurity throbbed upon one of the nearby boulders—Furan had perched there for a second, Kelly saw. The Elite dropped her camo a shade, making her briefly appear like an apparition, before she switched the equipment back on again. An acknowledgement of the directive, one accepted with glee.

Together, they hurried down the slope. Kelly did not have a helmet, so she did not have a motion tracker handy. She hoped that the FOF tag she was wearing would give the Marines enough pause to disregard her approach, as she would show up as a yellow dot on their sensors instead of a red "enemy."

She wondered how many soldiers Logan had sent their way. A squad? A platoon? An army? There was no time to perform additional recon—not when the shooting had already started. To delay now would just risk the deaths of the family in that house.

Not going to happen.

Of course, there was still the possibility that Logan was on the field, looking to direct this raid personally. Well, she would just have to cross that bridge when she got to it. The only person who could stand up to a Spartan was a Spartan, after all.

The two of them moved in sequence, hopping down the frost-sluiced embankment. The sharp crackle of high-powered carbines were closest—they moved to those first.

A pair of snipers had taken cover behind a screen of young conifers. From their position, they had a clear view of the house and barn some fifty feet below. They were fully concentrated on looking through their scopes, not even aware they had visitors sneaking up behind them.

Kelly slid down the last few feet of the slope, sprang forward in two powerful strides, and snaked her arm around the first sniper's neck. She bodily lifted the sniper up off his feet and tightened her arm. Cartilage crunched and the sniper's hands, which were scrambling and tearing to get the Spartan's arm off, already began to slacken.

She placed the muzzle of the silenced assault rifle in the small of the sniper's back with her free hand. "Surprise."

The rifle fired and the man's abdomen exploded in a grisly gout of flesh and blood. The sound of the burst had been muffled against the man's body—the snowdraped landscape absorbed the rest. Kelly released her hold on the man and he collapsed, dead at her feet.

To the side, she saw an energy sword flare to life, which swiftly embedded itself into the back of the second sniper just feet away, severing his spine. Snow steamed and blood bubbled—the sniper jerked once and died.

The camouflage condensed itself around Furan again, but the Elite managed to provide the Spartan with a quick nod of the head. So far, so good.

Kelly took one of the sniper rifles that was lying in the snow. She slung her repatriated assault rifle over her back. She checked the clip of the sniper—two bullets left. She tried looking for spare magazines, but found none. They must have been with the other sniper, but Kelly was already moving into a better position while Furan scurried off into the other direction. She hefted the weight of her latest acquisition in her hands. Long range was not exactly her specialty, but beggars couldn't be choosers in the context of warfare. Besides, a guerilla used any tool to their advantage, no matter their skill.

Rapidly, she unfolded the stock and took up a position upon an overhanging boulder. She brushed aside the dirt-streaked snow and dropped prone.

The scope of the rifle was a precision model that went up to ten power. Kelly quickly clicked the scope to the second zoom level and glassed the field below. She had a visual on two more Marines taking up stationary positions out in the open. Sloppy. They had not yet realized that their squad was already four men down.

Well, she only had two shots. Might as well make them count. A sniper rifle was not exactly the weapon of choice for stealth—this one did not have a silencer installed—but she did have the advantage in that the sound of occasional gunfire kept caroming around the woods from the rest of the members of the intruding force. Perhaps her shots could blend in.

Kelly considered the two Marines and quickly began making practice movements, aiming the reticle of the rifle from one soldier to another. Superfine movements. Hair's breadth. She was not worried about the range—the rifle had a two-kilometer limit and the house was only about two hundred meters away. She had to compensate for wind resistance and bullet drop—she did the math in her head and lifted her rifle up a tick.

She laid her finger on the curve of the trigger. Furan was probably lying in wait among the trees and bushes, having seen Kelly take the rifle. The Elite would only move once the Spartan had made her shot.

There was the tenderest of clicking noises and the rifle furiously bucked back into Kelly's shoulder as she merely brushed the trigger. She held control of the weapon steadily enough to see the path of the bullet through the scope.

She had aimed center of mass on the soldier closest to the homestead, but a brief burst of wind had knocked the bullet to the right at the last second. It still hit, regardless, and the Marine spun completely around as if punched. But, as Kelly looked through the scope, she could see part of the man continue to arc away in a grisly fountain. The bullet had impacted his shoulder and had torn his arm clean off. A dark and dripping mass where his arm used to be gushed thickly. Blood splattered the far wall in a macabre tableau.

The second Marine had seen his fellow soldier fly apart before his eyes and his first reaction was to embark into a partial crouch. He stared dumbfounded at what remained of his dead squadmate, mouth partially open as if he was about to call out to him to inanely ask if he was okay.

Then, instinct took over and the Marine turned to face the woods. Tracking the trajectory of the bullet. That urge of self-preservation had only seconds to set in. Right now, incredulity was reigning supreme.

The Marine's face filled Kelly's scope. Confusion visible in his eyes, even through his goggles. But something caught his eye. His eyes widened as he made contact with the glint of a scope.

Kelly touched the trigger again.

There was a crack and the man's head lurched back, the snow combusting into a fizzle of white powder behind him where the bullet had kept traveling. A great spray of gore flattened against the ground and the Marine fell, half his head missing like someone had taken a giant scoop out of his skull. A dark matter began leaking from his opened dome. He twitched once, his remaining eye searching for meaning through his halved and shattered goggles. Then, without ceremony, he died underneath that veil of falling snow.

The Spartan was already moving and she left the rifle behind. She unslung her MA40 and dropped down the ridge. Someone might have heard the shots and gotten suspicious. She could not assume that her gunshots had gotten passed for background noise.

She made it to the final tree that constituted as part of the woods. Whereas the heavy leaves had dappled the sunlight prior, a thick fog was starting to move in. She pressed her back to the tree, breathing swiftly from her nose. Bare and flat snow lay before her. No one around except the two bodies she had felled earlier.

Move, move, move.

It was about seventy meters from the treeline to the house. Kelly covered the distance in less than five seconds. She left a whitish outline as she moved, as though the air itself was having trouble rendering her very form. She managed to skid to a stop to avoid slipping and running headlong into the side of the house. Now, she paused for a second to catch her breath.

Where are you, Logan? I don't have all day.

The snow began to fall harder. An eerie calm passed over the homestead. The silence felt wrong. There should be noise, Kelly figured. There were not even the sounds of gunshots anymore.

Kelly hugged the wall and slowly moved around the side of the house. It was tempting to try the front door, but did not want to risk being perforated by Dariush if he was laying in wait inside—he would have no idea she was coming. She aimed her assault rifle at the nearest corner, fully prepared in case someone decided to jump out around it and attempt to surprise her. All she could hear was her own breathing and the steady pump of her heartbeat in her ears. She treaded through the deepening snow, frost collecting in her hair, her cheeks ruddy.

She reached the next corner and paused for another few seconds. Soon enough, there was the slow crunch, crunch of approaching footsteps. One person.

Just inches in front of her, she could see the muzzle of a shotgun slowly appear from around the corner. There was no time—she had to act. She didn't have a shot, though, so she did the only thing she could think of in that moment.

She swung her assault rifle down and connected the forend of her weapon with the barrel of the Marine's shotgun.

There was a tremendous clang and both weapons dropped to the ground, ripped from their owners' hands. Kelly stepped out from behind cover and bare-knuckle punched the man's chest, caving in the body armor three inches. Blood spurted from the cracks in the scratched plating. She also grabbed the Marine's arm and broke it in three places by abruptly wrenching it to the side. And, for good measure, she grabbed the back of the man's helmet and plowed his head straight into the wooden wall of the house. There was a crunch and the man went limp as his face went through the structure, leaving his body hanging out in the open.

Her vision cleared—another Marine was standing out by the barn, having witnessed the whole exchange. He started to bring up his weapon.

Kelly's hands scrambled for the .45 pistol in the holster of the Marine she had just killed with her hands, the one who was hanging in place with his head through the wall like an elaborate decoration. She whipped it up, chrome barrel scorching white, and shot the soldier that had tried to draw on her in the chest twice and then in the head once.

The pistol's reports had been deafeningly loud. Loud enough to draw the attention of the last few remaining Marines. Just what she had been afraid of.

A forest-patterned Marine quickly leaned out of cover behind the barn door in front of her, silenced assault rifle blasting away. The snow puckered at Kelly's feet and she dove in a sideways roll. Just as she was about to get up and bear down on the man with her pistol sights, there was an electric fizzle and she watched as, before her eyes, the Marine came apart into two pieces, sliced in half at the waist.

The swerve of the energy sword sparked plasma and snow fizzled as it impacted against Furan's active camo. Kelly could spot the slight shake of the Elite's wrist. Got your back. She made a brief salute of the pistol and took the side of the barn while Furan headed into it.

She was now in the brief alley that separated the barn from the house. Only a breezeway connected the two structures. A side door underneath the breezeway led inside the house—she headed for that. Otherwise, she could hear nothing, see nothing. It appeared there was no one else around.

Perhaps that was not true, for not two seconds later, Kelly spun her head towards the barn as automatic fire ripped from inside the structure. Savage clangs—someone was firing wildly inside there. Not at her, though—bullet holes were not ripping through the walls. At something they could not see, perhaps?

"No!" someone yelled from inside the barn. "No!"

The person who was shouting then made a strangled noise and the twin spears of Furan's energy sword slammed through the wall of the barn and extended into the alley, just feet from Kelly's face. The wood of the barn walls hissed where they were scorched by the plasma. The sword was held in place for a few seconds before it abruptly wrenched to the side, carving a black and sooty line through the wall. The sounds of slipping and gurgling carnage of a body falling apart inside emitted half a second later.

"Damn," Kelly murmured under her breath in a combination of both surprise and admiration. Hopefully that was the last of these assassins.

She hurried to the side door and opened it. It was quiet inside, with only of the creaking of floorboards acting as the audible accompaniment. The Spartan clutched her pistol, two-handed, and quickly checked every single corner she came across as she moved down the hall, toward the kitchen.

"Dariush!" she whispered, a flowing word. There was no answer.

Whenever the hallway intersected with a room, Kelly quickly scanned it and whispered for the occupants with the same results. She lifted the heavybarreled pistol and now made the final push towards the front of the house.

"Dariush! Soraya!" she hissed again. "It's me! We need to g—"

As soon as she entered the kitchen, the words died in her throat.

She stopped.

Outside the windows, a white hell raged. Inside the house, a different kind of hell had come to roost.

Kelly could only stare up at where three familiar forms dangled from the rafters. Their feet hung at eye level, the bare skin of each rooted with veiny red and dripping tendrils. The warrior's mouth parted in astonishment. She could not take her eyes off of them. Their glassy eyes—or what remained—refused to stare back, already marbling and turning salt-white as the world fragmented and greyed inside their still-glistening shapes. She absorbed the pain on their faces, their bodies. The room contained evidence of the sheer brutality that had been inflicted in her absence. Because of her presence.

The Spartan felt like she had swallowed a heavy stone. There was a roaring not unlike waves that began to intrude into the lower registers of her ears. Her hands began to tremble and her jaw tightened to the strength of titanium. Her eyes narrowed more and more and she bared her fangs as she looked up at the terrible sight, everything else melting away to reveal one clear goal, as crystalline and obvious as she could ever make it.

There was something that she had been keeping locked away all this time. Something that she had not yet realized had been lurking within her. A long-distant part, buried years past.

But now… the vein of glass that had encased the mantle of hatred had finally melted away. The prize within free to explode forth. Desperate. Vengeful. It was a feeling that had never been becoming of her station.

Yet she was in no position to resist. She welcomed the sensation with open arms.

Finally, she dropped her head down, breath coming so loud it was almost a continuous growl. Still so absorbed in the dark cloud of her infuriated thoughts that she almost missed the door bursting open behind her.

Adrenaline spiked into her brain. An electric bolt of sensation.

Kelly whirled and her eyes drank in the sight of three more Marines—a patrol returning?—all barging into the house, each one carrying a heavy machinegun.

Lifting her pistol felt second-nature. The pump of the recoil against her wrist felt almost tender. Calmly, she watched as her shots pulped heads, shredded skin, and ripped open bodies in hissing ventilated geysers of chugging blood.

She stepped over the bodies of the men she had just killed, everything feeling numb, and headed for the barn.

Pausing in the middle of the breezeway, Kelly saw four more Marines that were skirting down the hillside, leaving behind deep channels as they pedaled through the snow. Kelly unclipped the grenades she had liberated and threw them, one after the other. Deep concussions reverberated and plumes of white and black dust coughed. The remains of the humans hurtled out in all directions—the Spartan kept moving.

Furan had left the barn by the time the Spartan had entered. However, the Elite had left behind the mutilated body of the Marine squad leader, whose exposed and blackened ribcage had been cut open so much that nearly all of his organs had spilled and cooled upon the rough concrete.

The squad leader's helmet had rolled free of his head. Kelly unclipped one of the earpieces and placed it upon her head, so she could listen in on enemy comms.

She headed over to the workbench, Elnaz's movements replayed clearly in her head. Kelly moved aside a stack of boxes, edged the bench out a few inches, and dropped her hand down in the gap. Her fingers clenched upon a smooth wooden stock. She lifted the shotgun up, blued steel practically dripping in the soft smelterlight. The slide racked empty, but Kelly found a couple of boxes of double-ought shot close at hand. She slotted a shell into the port, slammed the slide back out, and rapidly clacked shells into the feed tube until it would no longer accept any more. A bandolier was quickly found and she slotted it full and tied it around her waist.

I know you're out there, Logan. But you're wrong if you think I'm going to run.

But as if on cue, when Kelly was headed to the barn door to step outside, there was a click over her comm, followed by an industrial burst of static.

"I hope you can understand," Logan's voice whispered on the other end, making Kelly crouch and turn in all directions, "Hostages… nothing but a distraction. Why would I have used them as bargaining chips? They served their purpose by drawing you here. Because I figured that you would feel… compelled, somehow. Sentiment—a weakness. Their usage was at an end the moment they laid eyes on me."

Kelly did not want to hear it. She did not know if it is even possible for her to be more furious.

She silently grabbed for the FOF tag that still hung around her waist. Her fingers found the notched switch and quickly flipped it off. She had the feeling that Logan would not fall for that trick right now.

"They weren't a part of any of this," she spoke lowly as she gently creaked open the barn door, ushing in a gust of blustery air. He could not hear her, but it felt good to give her rage a voice. "I'm going to enjoy gutting you, for what you did."

The wind blew in from across the field, swirling in miniature maelstroms. She could not get Soraya's final expression out of her head. That girl. What had she done to deserve such a thing?

Kelly slowly stepped out and tenderly scanned the broken horizon when, in the next second, there was a sharp whine and the boards that made up part of the barn door suddenly shattered into a million splinters. She ducked. Someone was zeroing in on her. Where did it come from? No time to look—not when she was exposed like this. It was time to move.

Immediately, headed forward in a crouch and began to run back toward the treeline where there was cover. The faster she went, the more upright she straightened. She was soon travelling too fast for the shots, for the snow crackled and puffed as sniper rounds skirted at Kelly's feet. The gunfire boomed throughout the field. He still had eyes on her. If she were Logan, she'd hide out in a position with a good vantage point, up the half-caldera that overlooked the cabin. If Logan was anywhere, he'd be in there. Somewhere.

Kelly pounded across the snow, tightly clutching her shotgun as she ran.

When she made it to the woods, she leaped atop a lightly dusted series of boulders and began to climb up the tallest ones. Pinnacles—they would have been totems for the ancients on Earth to carve their mysteries and tales into. Her hands scrambled for purchase on the sandy surface. Digging into dirt and rock.

And… something metal.

Her fingers traced the etchings of a wire, but she mistook it for a branch until the last second, but by then it was too late. She heard the sharp ping. A pin being knocked out. Realizing what she had done, she dropped and heavily landed on her back on the next rock ridge down, just as the upper ledge exploded in a black and red fireball. Shards of rock speared past her face and her body was battered by the concussive wave. She rolled and hit the ground, the snow cushioning her fall this time.

Groaning, she lifted herself up, feeling several cuts burn at her face. She was still holding onto the shotgun. Traps. Logan must have laced the woods with them. His dossier had read that he was an expert in guerilla warfare and improvised explosive devices.

Great. This was about as much of his home turf as it was likely to get. She was just going to have to watch her step.

"You didn't think I would make it that easy for you, 087?" Logan taunted over the comm. "Let's just say that I had plenty of time on my hands before you showed up."

"Too much, you defective washout," Kelly grimaced as she stood, blood dripping down her cheeks.

Still, she could not afford to get cocky. She scanned creases of snow that frothed at the floor of the forest. A new deadly layer had unfolded—who knows how many other traps Logan had laid underneath it? Too much risk to assume he was bluffing. She had stepped into a literal minefield.

Briefly, Kelly considered running back out into the field. Bad idea. Even if Logan had not mined that area, she would be an even better target out in the open. No. She had to stick to her current plan. It was the only way she was going to stay alive a little bit longer.

For Soraya. For that little girl.

She hurried around the base of the pinnacles, moving further and further back uphill. She was constantly scanning the ground for more tripwires. Sure enough, there were little segments of brief clingwire that had been tightened across narrow passageways through the trees. Those, she stepped over easily.

Not once, though, did Kelly let her guard down. She did not know if Logan had intended for some of his traps to be visible. That was what she would do—make the enemy get complacent by getting them to think that they could get eyes on all the booby traps… only to be killed by the one that had been deliberately hidden.

Sure enough, when Kelly put her foot through a section of snow, she felt her foot step on something that made a slight clicking sound. Two feet from her right, the ground plumed and Kelly's ears rang as a shotgun shell, buried in the snow and deliberately positioned upward, went off. The buckshot barely missed the Spartan's face, but she felt pinpricks at her side, followed by a slow roll of heat. She clutched at her thigh and her fingertips came away bloody. Hit, but it only seemed to be surface-level. She needed to be more careful. Cartridge traps had been a favored device of the Insurrection—only natural that Logan would pick up a few things here and there.

Logan broke through on the comms again. "Haven't blown your foot off, have I? They're nice, huh? Those things held off an entire Covenant battalion while I was bunkered in an apartment complex over in Melbourne during the invasion. It took them half a day just to make it to the second floor because I had wired the place so tight. How quick will you be?"

"Quicker than you," Kelly spat. She kept moving through the foliage.

She gripped her shotgun and brushed aside a curtain of dead vines. The soldier hunkered in the shadow of a fallen tree and listened for a little while. Logan would be foolish to stay in one spot. He'd be trying to hunt her, considering he had the tactical advantage.

All she could do now was remain mobile. They would find each other sooner or later.

With a constant grimace on her face, two hands marbled upon her weapon, the Spartan rose, flakes of snow dusting around her head. Eyes the color of frozen metal. A sharp luster trapped within them.

Eventually, she came to the next section, which was a shallow gulley just a little taller than she was. The muddy ridges on both sides were impassable. The only way across was down in the crevasse. Forlornly, she spotted where the end of the cut stretched across the way, about twenty meters from the opposite end.

Logan would have known she'd try to come through here. He would have been a fool to not trap this avenue.

There was no time. Kelly had to get to him and fast.

Taking a breath, she slid down into the snowpocketed gulley. As soon as she felt the ground level out through her heels, she took off running in gazelle-like leaps.

Immediately, she felt little twings of resistance as her feet tightened and then snapped the taut wires that had been invisible in the snow beneath her. There were a series of incredible and heavy creaking noises as spike-studded boards, also buried in the mud and snow, suddenly sprang up from their hiding places and folded forward. Kelly could see the traps in the corners of her eyes, but she knew, in the adrenaline-fueled speed of the moment, she could not afford to slow her velocity by any amount. Just keep running. The metal barbs whooshed just centimeters from her body behind her and buried themselves in the ground as they missed. Snow splashed out around the boards—the throes of frustration.

Her arms pumped as she ran. Kelly felt something pull at her bodysuit—a hook. There was another snapping noise and an enormous wooden ball with embedded spikes sticking out of it tumbled from the branches of the tree ahead of her. Kelly had to hurl herself to the side to avoid being impaled. The ball, despite its weight, silently swung by her and began to come back around, tied to the canopy by a thick rope. But the Spartan had already clambered out of the ditch by then and kept on in her semicircle upon the caldera.

Logan certainly was not lying about having too much time on his hands. Give him a couple of hours and he would have dug and camouflaged pits filled with spears, Kelly figured.

There was a small clearing ahead of her now. Kelly was about to carelessly trek across it when she heard a light beeping sound, so soft that most humans would not have been able to hear it. But she did.

She recognized the telltale sound of an activated TR/9 landmine. As she could discern a chorus of similar noises, Kelly figured that there were no less than seven of the things scattered within this part of the woods. Those things had the power to blow apart a fully armored Spartan in a flash. No sense in risking her neck there. She just had to go around.

That also turned out to be quite the detour, because the route that Kelly had selected led her into a skeleton yard of dead trees that had died from some plague or other. Plastered on the lower parts were bouquets of Type 18 claymores. All of them active, ringed with sinister red halo LEDs. Wander in range and a quarter of the forest would be turned into a field of volcanic glass in an instant.

However, Kelly had an idea, which she waited until she had skirted around the boundary of the claymore field before she put it into action.

One of the claymores at the far end was out of range of the larger groupings of explosives. These were most likely thermal-activated, so Kelly heaved a chunk of snow at the claymore until it was sufficiently buried. She then ran up, buried her hands in the snow and grasped the cylindrical object underneath. The Type 18 had been designed as a purely anti-Covenant device; it was impossible for the aliens to disarm as the fingers of Elites, Brutes, and Grunts were too large to make the fine motor adjustments needed to make the claymore inert. Kelly performed the sequence from memory—a twist near the top, fingers held down on the contacts, wait two seconds, and…

There was an electronic bleep. Proximity sensors deactivated.

"Okay," Kelly panted. That was one victory today.

She shuffled the snow off the claymore and disengaged the locking points that bolted it down to the forest floor. She then tucked the claymore into her bandolier and resumed heading in the direction she had been going.

The cold air had been scything through her the whole time. She had kept from shivering up until now.

She really wished she had been able to bring her coat.

---

The rest of her journey saw Kelly's pace slow to a crawl as she made a concerted effort to avoid the traps that Logan had set for her. She had also slowed partially due to her sixth sense telling her that she was getting close to where her target had perched, or was lurking about.

As she had traveled, the thought had occurred to Kelly that Logan could very well have known where she was this whole time if he had a thermal scope installed on his rifle. With one of those, she would be lit up like a bonfire in the desert at night. Was it too much to hope that Logan was the sporting type and wanted to give himself a fair hunt through the limitation of devices at his disposal? The claymore that pressed against Kelly's back said otherwise, but the fleeting possibility was all she had right now to reassure herself.

The fog had consumed the forest by now. It was hard to tell where it or the snow began, for everything was soon filtered in varying shades of gray. Soon, Kelly could not see to more than a few meters in front of her.

But that meant that Logan might not be able to see her, either.

Willing to stake your life on that?

She checked her weapons one last time, out of habit. Her shotgun was still fully loaded, with a shell pumped and primed. Her pistol only had the one clip—that was her last resort. And she had the claymore. It was not the sort of arsenal she would have hoped for, but there were worse pickings to be had.

The cold throbbed at her body. Fortunately, her cuts had clotted and had stopped dripping. She scrambled further and further into the trees until she came upon a sloping plain of ferns tufted so thick that she could not see the ground. Instinctively, she dropped nearly prone. For some reason, she just has the intuition that if Logan were to park himself someplace, it would be here. She could not say why. Just a funny feeling.

Damn, now she was thinking of Kurt again. Him and his acute sense for danger.

Gently shifting the barrel of the shotgun across the leafed horizon, Kelly held her breath in the roaring silence as she opened herself to the world, taking in every possible sense she could fathom. Trying to filter out the noise to unearth what she was looking for. Sounds of a foreign nature. Glints of metal amongst the snow. At the edge of the wild tract, Kelly made herself part of the herbage. A ghost among the roots. As if she had always meant to be here. That she would be a guardian against the strangers that dared to trespass upon the very boundaries of this forest.

"Come find me, 087," Logan hissed through the radio, almost making her jump. "I'm waiting."

Could he see her? Or was he just trying to flush her out, force her to make a mistake?

She tried to peer through the ferns, ice and snow biting at her cheeks, but she had neither the ability nor the equipment to locate where Logan was hiding amidst the shrubbery. She would not venture into that shrouded field of raw verdant.

No. He would need to be the one to move first.

Kelly's hand closed upon a nearby rock. She scanned the field until she found a suitable candidate for a target: a strong-branched cypress near the middle of the pasture with branches evenly spaced out like an explosion frozen in timber form. She did her best to keep herself as low as possible, then she hurled the rock with all her strength.

To the naked eye, the missile would have been invisible. When it hit the tree trunk, it made a noise not unlike a gunshot, only hollower.

Kelly's eyes had not been on what the rock had hit, but upon the field itself. She was looking for a shift in movement. Something. Anything. The tiniest fluctuation in the carefully constructed portrait of the taiga.

And… when she heard the sound, just up the hill, there was a glint. A shimmer. An incongruency amidst the setting.

Looking hard, Kelly could see the framework of some of the ferns in that specific patch did not appear to line up correctly. As if their forms had been skewed completely out of shape, like peering through a pane of wavy glass.

Once Kelly had realized that she was looking straight at Logan, she took action right away. She brought out the claymore she had appropriated, inputted the correct sequence for the timed detnation, analyzed the field once again, and chucked the device in a high arc. The cylindrical explosive tumbled end over end, the energetic ring blinking its crimson death knell as it grew closer and closer to the ground.

Logan must have seen the claymore coming because there was a scurry of movement, blurred against the backdrop, as he tried to scramble from cover, but it was too late. A shockwave of red flame pulsed through the field, setting the ferns ablaze, and jostling Kelly's unprotected organs. Light flashed, nearly blinding her, but she had already stood and was running towards Logan, every muscle wired taut and feeling like they were fused with steel.

From the cloud of pale smoke, Logan stumbled out, standing with red-rimmed and burning ferns up to his thighs. He was visible again, and from the looks of how white electric bolts were arcing from his back, that blast had destroyed his active camouflage generator. Static sparked around his armor—his shields had also been drained. He shook his head, seeming dazed.

"Well played," he grunted. "I was wondering if—"

He had not noticed that Kelly had closed the gap since the claymore's explosion. The barrel of her shotgun chugged and Logan staggered back as the buckshot caught his oversized shoulder pauldron. The reactive armor flared, a brief burst of flame, and he staggered back.

Kelly pumped the slide of the shotgun so fast it seemed like one continuous sound. She fired again and more sparks erupted upon Logan's chestplate. She shot him twice more, hoping that her shots could penetrate.

But Logan was not so easily felled. He had recovered by now and he lifted his own shotgun, which was a massive and custom design. The rotating barrels clanked into place and he took a shot at Kelly's head. She swore she could feel the ripple of the slug as it passed by her head—she had to dive out of the way so that she would not find herself suddenly decapitated.

From where she was lying on the ground, partially shrouded by the burnt ferns, she pumped the shotgun again and fired once more, hitting Logan in the leg. He jerked and dropped to a knee, but not for long.

"Bold of you to go this far without your armor," Logan coldly stated as he rose back up. "But you're outmatched at close range this time." He lifted his enormous weapon and fired again.

Kelly rolled, and the ground where she had been laying had disintegrated into a cloud of broken earth. She scrambled to her feet, reloading as she went, and levelled another blast at Logan's head, which he ducked.

This is what she had been afraid about. Logan, with his armor, was a literal tank. Even without shields he was the most dangerous creature on this planet. That could've been her if she had her armor on, but she was paper-mâché against his titanium alloy. She could not even go toe-to-toe against him; he'd rip her apart.

Images of Soraya's face haunted her brain. It was like the girl was crying out for revenge through some oft-forgotten spectral plane. Something in her chest gave a wrench. An uncomfortable sensation.

As Logan fired, Kelly rolled once more, her breath frozen amidst the cloying fog. She stood back up, loaded another shell, and fired three times in quick succession. Constellation bursts from the buckshot hitting their mark pinged off of Logan's MJOLNIR armor, emitting nothing but scratches. Kelly wanly realized that her 12-gauge shots were not going to do anything against this monster. Her weapon was just not up to spec in terms of shot velocity, in addition to the gauge being too small.

There was only one option, though Kelly was loath to even consider it.

Retreat.

She waited until Logan levelled his heavy barrel in her direction. Quickly, she bent down and gripped a fistful of snow and hurled it at him. The Spartan flinched away, expecting Kelly to juke right, but she stayed right where she was. The concussive shockwave pulverized her body as the ground next to her plumed and erupted in an icy spray. She had already aimed her own weapon by then—straight at Logan's head—and fired.

The flash of a hundred pieces of iron striking their target made it look like Logan's face had suddenly erupted. The 12-gauge had not broken through the helmet's visor, but the force was enough to snap Logan's head back. By the time he had recovered, Kelly was nearly all the way back up the slope, parting with a lingering look back, an equal mixture of worry and fury.

"Running won't do you any good, you're dead either way!" Logan shouted and raised his shotgun. The tree behind Kelly exploded into a shard of woodchips, but less than two seconds later she had disappeared into the forest, invisible once more.

In the sudden quietus, the snow trickled down, unperturbed to the chaos that had ripped the land apart.

---

Logan watched where the tricky Spartan had disappeared up the rise. Slowly, methodically, he began slotting shells into the rotating barrel that fed into his shotgun. Hi-power shot this time. No half-measures. 087 had been unusually on the offensive this time around. She would be more careful next time. He would need to adjust his tactics in response.

He did not pursue. No need. His mistake was allowing 087 to gain an equal advantage with the environment. She would not leave this place—the both of them were indoctrinated to never fully disengage from a fight. He would soon bring this farce to a close. He could take a few shots. She could not. Only a matter of time until he was standing over her cooling corpse.

Calmly, instead of walking up the slope, Logan headed down, toward the homestead. He had remembered where he had placed the rest of his traps and carefully maneuvered around them all. He reached the bottom of the hill, which was getting rather deep now that the snow was falling harder than before. All the while, he kept trying to kickstart his active camouflage back online, but it was no use—his visor was reading a triangular error warning symbol. The sort of warning that indicated that the technology was not building a charge. Lucky bitch. She may have tipped the odds closer to her favor, but the scales were still nowhere near equalized.

He knew 087 did not have a long-range weapon. Why bother delaying the inevitable? If they were to meet in battle, might as well do it in a venue that was convenient. Out in the open. Free from this game of cat and mouse they had both embarked in.

Logan walked past the barn, doing a shell count as he went. As he walked just by the doors to the barn, he stopped. A static charge had eerily rippled across him. A familiar sensation.

He was not alone.

Almost casually, the rogue Spartan turned around. Coming from inside the barn, a figure of liquid light slid into view and stepped outside—snowflakes puffed and sizzled as they landed upon the camouflaged warrior's barrier. The contours were alien. How very interesting. 087 had brought backup, but not the sort he had expected.

He looked at the flicker, the adumbration. An unspoken statement that he knew this creature was there. That using the active camouflage was useless against his own keen senses.

There was a pause and then the camouflage parted, much like a curtain separating to reveal the sun behind thick panes, and Furan stepped forward, energy sword already brimming to life in her hand with an electric hum.

Logan looked at the blade and tilted his head slightly. Almost in mockery. Yet, he found his curiosity strangely piqued by the silver-clad Elite. There was something about her that was familiar, but he could not place what it was.

The Spartan then lifted his shotgun, but not by the grip and instead by the forend. He tossed it to the side, where it scattered tufts of snow where it landed.

"I know that armor," Logan murmured, having finally realized where the source of his familiarity had come from. "Ah, yes. Look at you. So… that's the connection. The Elite from Sonus V. You would have not been so mercenary otherwise. You came here to settle a score."

"I came for revenge," Furan spat as she straightened. Her heavy-lidded eyes seemed to snarl of their own accord. "To remind you that you should have killed me when you had the chance."

"While you were lying on the ground half-dead? No sport in that." Logan then reached down to his side and took out what looked like a silver handle. He flicked a button upon it and a long and thin metal blade the color of mercury extended from the hilt. He gave the weapon a quick spin with his hand, able to seemingly carve the air with the sword, before he then extended his arm out in expectation. As if he was offering an invitation. "I'd say the circumstances have changed, this time."

The Elite slowly got into a warrior's crouch, her energy sword angled behind her body.

"Indeed. But this time, I will be the one having your armor mounted for all to see."

"So confident. I'm going to enjoy this."

They gazed at one another across the plain, the cool and calm eyes of Furan's matching the constant glare of Logan's furrowed visor. Everything else might as well have not existed. That the only place that mattered was the arena they had constructed for themselves, an audience disregarded for the only valor that could be bestowed would be the one to walk away to share their stories.

It all came down to this.

Cold fog rippled at their feet. Snow smashed at their bodies as it blew in from the side.

Then, without any signal or announcement, the two charged the other.

The first slash was a collision of strength and technique. There was a crackling noise as plasma met treated steel. Both blades rebounded off the other in a flurry of sparks. The tips of the swords briefly arced back before they raced forward again, cutting against one another in a savage exchange. They met and sliced and met again as their blades sizzled and flashed. Snow melted in the wake of their vicious blows, turning to a warm rain.

Furan was eerily silent as she swung her sword down with a terrifying ferocity. Logan, on the other hand, opted for a two-handed grip to further control the weight of the Elite's blows. It was just as well; Furan was stronger, but Logan was quicker. The Elite had to rapidly backpedal on occasion to avoid some of the swift stabs that the Spartan made in her direction. All she could think about was separating Logan's head from her body, but she had to resist the urge to lunge out and overextend, potentially leaving her open for an immediate counterattack.

This was not going to end quickly. It would be a long, bloody duel to the death.

After their swords hit and fused for two seconds, the combatants disengaged with quick leaps away from the other. A chance to regroup. To re-strategize. They were far from being tired, but neither of them could afford to whale on the other with their sword until one of them finally broke.

They stilled in the aching cold. Twin warlike statues. Always thinking many moves ahead, the battle in the mind just as important as the one their bodies would wage.

Reacting to the same unsaid cue, Furan and Logan ran at one another. Their blades swirled and crossed in energetic stabs, but met only their equal, which caused a stream of molten metal to splatter the ground between them. The warriors skidded to a halt, having replaced positions on opposite ends of the field. They turned together, as if they were embarking upon a dramatic duet in a magnificent ballet instead of a deadly duel.

Furan gave a small huff and scraped a foot upon the ground. She gently dipped her blade into the snow and made a soft arc, emitting a brief spray of steam that hissed and boiled, adding to the fog.

In response, Logan made a show of tightening his grip on his sword before he slowly swung it around so that the blade was pointing directly behind him, levelled at his waist. He still maintained his grip and kept on staring at Furan all the while, providing the Elite with his full attention.

They waited. Waited for a tell. A weakness.

Again, as if they shared a neural link, they sped forward at the same time, their blades whispering and crackling in unison. Once more, they sliced, each one aiming their blades at exposed joints. The swords met, sparked, and created a thundering noise as the two combatants scraped by one another.

Only Logan dug his heel into the ground half a second after he passed Furan by so that he could make a flat spin all the way back around. His sword became a gray blur and a line of purple sprayed across the snow as the razor's edge made contact with the back of Furan's thigh.

The Elite staggered to safety, more incensed than injured. She stared at Logan, who was slowly returning to his full height, the Spartan not at all bothered about pressing the advantage. Bastard. His intentional deliberateness was nothing but him gloating at how he had landed a hit. A lucky hit. Furan tested her leg. There was some stiffness, but nothing felt permanently damaged. It looked much worse than it felt, for although her leg was freshly dripping blood, she found she could compartmentalize the discomfort to a dull simmer.

Logan shook the blood from his sword. "The first of many."

Furan gave a grunt as she brought her blade up. "The only blow that matters is the last one."

They would not speak any more. Words were not the weapons that would win this battle today. The duelists had a vested interest in having their blades taste flesh and spill blood. Anything less was a delay of the inevitable.

Marching toward each other, they struck with the force of a thousand suns. They blocked, spun, parried, and riposted, each blow tasked with altering the other's balance and throwing off their tempo. However, they were so entrenched in their own movesets that they had accounted for each and every possibility; every angle of the blade that hurtled their way all fell into the same equation.

Furan thrust towards Logan's gut, but he leaned into it and deflected with a rising parry before locking together. The two were now practically chest-to-chest, close enough for the sparks from their grinding weapons to splash upon their armor and for Furan's breath to fog at Logan's visor.

They stared at each other for a time, their corded arms refusing to budge. They could feel everything through the contact that just their swords made. Their natural hatred of the other. The veiled reserves of energy they harbored.

Logan seemed eager to bring this to a close and he silently disengaged with a whirl so that he could deliver a fearsome thrust upon the Elite.

But Furan had seen this coming and had embarked in a spin of her own and he blade whipped out and scorched a line across Logan's massive shoulder pauldron. Logan just looked at the smoking cut that had scarred across his armor. Touché.

The two of them did not remain apart for long. With their composure recovered, they both executed a velocity of attacks so strong that each had to constantly switch between offensive and defensive postures. Logan tried a feint, then tried to sweep Furan off her feet, but the Elite easily leaped over the attack and followed up with an overhead strike so fearsome that the Spartan's reinforced muscles nearly let go then and there.

This was going too far, Logan had decided. He made a forward diagonal slash and nicked the collar of Furan's armor. She answered with a chop that bent his arm back, allowing the energy sword to scrape along his right inner arm. A wire of fire lanced Logan where plasma met skin. In response, he twisted his guard and carved through the Elite's side—deep enough to draw blood but not nearly enough to kill.

Furan did not so much as make a sound as the blade entered and exited her body. She used the opening that Logan had given her to make a stab downward. Armor and tissue sizzled as her energy sword flickered in and out through Logan's thigh. Beads of crimson dribbled upon the snow and the Spartan now limped away, giving ground.

The Spartan was on the ropes—Furan moved in, looking to secure the kill.

But Logan's limp had been another feint. He easily slapped away Furan's wide strike and sliced his sword, almost delicately, into the section where Furan's shoulder met her collar. He withdrew the freezing blade before the Elite had a chance to level an answering blow back, and he darted out of reach, but not before his blade flashed and opened a deep cut into his opponent's neck. Instinctively, Furan clasped a hand to her wound—the sword had missed all of the arteries, but it was still profusely bleeding to the point where half of her armor was painted a sickly lilac. Pools of multicolored blood littered the snow in front of the house, like buckets of dye had been dropped upon the ground.

Quickly, Logan skirted around, ducking underneath a frantic swipe from the Elite, and sliced again. More blood exploded from Furan's back and she staggered forward, almost like she was trying to retreat back into the woods.

Blade held high, Logan followed the stricken Elite, eyes looking over his opponent to determine where the final blow should be placed. Well, this had been amusing, all in all. But now, this farce was to come to a close. He had to admit, this alien had given him more of a run for his money than he had anticipated. He should have switched on his helmet camera—he would have loved to have recorded this for—

His train of thought was momentarily derailed as he spied a yellow contact coming up from behind him in his motion tracker. He allowed himself to relax. How about that, some of his backup had survived 087's onslaught. The assistance was unnecessary, but it would allow him to leverage some force upon the Elite. Maybe use her as bait to draw 087 out. He could afford to play. Just a little bit longer.

Logan partially turned to address the new arrival, but as he came to provide his attention upon this person, he found his vision partially obstructed by a large rock clenched in the hand of a massive fist, the face of 087 bitterly emblazoned in a wild, yet silent snarl behind it.

The impact of the rock resulted in a blaze of white fire and a crystalline shattering noise. Kelly grunted as she swung her arm with all of her might—her blow hit Logan's visor perfectly and kept going until half of his faceplate had caved in.

Shards of the thick, hexagonal visor careened and spun into the air. The armored denizen screamed and whirled away from Kelly. Logan scrambled a hand to his ruined helmet and slowly pried it away. Most of his visor was still intact, but where Kelly could see past the broken visage, she could see nothing but bloody hamburger where she should have been able to see a hint of skin. Half of Logan's face was just meat, his left eye completely destroyed and weeping a dark fluid.

Adrenaline and indignation consumed Logan in an instant. He recovered faster than Kelly had expected—marching forward, he twirled his sword in his hand once, a practiced maneuver, and reached out and speared Kelly through the side in a blindingly-quick lunge.

Kelly felt the cold of the blade before the throbbing heat of pain wracked her insides. She grunted and dropped the rock in her hands, a strange tugging sensation at her muscles forcing her to be bent in directions against her will.

Logan tugged the blade forward—Kelly had no choice but to follow. He then headbutted her so hard that Kelly was dislodged from being impaled and flopped down upon the stained snow, dazed.

When Logan had rammed his helmet against her skull, it had felt like a sledgehammer had been hurled against her forehead. The world had flashed once, went triple, followed by several shades of gray. Right away, she felt like she was going to throw up. Her knees refused to support her weight any longer and she lay there, with everything refusing to come into focus.

Get up, she told herself. Get up. Get up. Get up get up get up getupgetupgetup—

His throat now producing rabid growls, Logan stalked forward, preparing to strike down and finish Kelly off. He flipped the blade in his right hand so that he was now holding it in a backhand.

He raised the sword with both hands.

An arc of cascading energy suddenly whipped out at Logan's and disintegrated flesh and bone, parting the rogue Spartan's left arm from his body. Tendrils of smoke wisped from the stumps and the dismembered limb fell away. A charred smell filled the air. The smell of burning tissue and melted metal. The hand dropped and sank into the snow, palm open, leaving Logan holding his sword with only one appendage.

Upon the ground, Kelly rolled over and looked up. A panting Furan had just finished her swing next to Logan, mandibles all extended like she was about to recite the vilest curse she could imagine.

Kill him, she tried to shout, but she was too exhausted to even make a single noise.

Logan just looked at his still-smoking stump, seemingly beyond pain. Then, laboriously, he began stalking his way over toward Furan, nothing but murder in his mind. Even though he now only had one arm, Logan was far from being beaten. Kelly had been forgotten quite eagerly—he now had to settle this spat with this infuriating Elite.

The Elite's wounds had taken their toll on her and she was slow to bring her energy sword back up to guard. Logan slashed and the sharpened steel raked along Furan's wrist and caught the hilt of the energy sword—the Elite let go and the sword automatically darkened once it left her hand.

Logan's blade swung back up, ripping through the air itself, and he lunged forward. There was a sickening and wet noise as the sword plunged through Furan's chest and exited from her back.

The hollow sound reverberated once across the field before it died.

Furan glanced down, surprised, and looked upon where Logan had buried his weapon into her body. Thick blood dribbled down her front and back, creating a tar-like smell. She could feel the chill of the metal in her chest, feel the last lingering beats of her impaled heart—the very contractions destroying it as it remained speared by the sword. Her other heart fluttered, beginning to slow. Numbness had already found her extremities. A distant tiredness threatened to overwhelm, to roll over her like she was flotsam upon the shores of the great sea.

The terrifying Spartan lifted his head to look at the Elite one last time. The ruined pit of Logan's eye gazed balefully at the dying alien.

"Your vengeance remains misplaced," Logan hissed.

There was a shuffling sound behind him. Kelly. He glanced over—087 was starting to stumble to her feet. Those would be the last steps she would ever take.

Logan appraised Furan once more. A shame this moment could not have lasted longer, but a mission was a mission, and no one but him would be leaving this place today.

With his remaining hand, he regained his grip on his sword. He made to pull his arm back, to wrench the sword out from Furan—

—only for the Elite to reach out and wrap her hands around the very blade of the instrument that had pierced her, stopping it in place within herself.

"I… beg… to… differ," Furan uttered, her voice quiet, but each word spoken with the intensity of a roar.

The Elite then kicked out, connecting the toe of her boot with the deactivated energy sword hilt lying just nearby. The weapon skirted across the ground, gliding over the snow and ice, bouncing and spinning as it moved upon its set path, a discus maintained between two white backdrops.

Logan watched as the hilt skated away from him and headed on course for the rising Kelly. Panic rose in his throat and he tried wrenching his sword out from Furan's chest, but the Elite was holding on too tightly. The alien's palms latched onto the metal, bleeding profusely as the serrated edge tore into her skin, but she registered none of the pain. She was just looking at him eerily, a calm anger. Almost as if she had been expecting this final act to play out as she imagined it.

Behind Logan, Kelly reached out and snagged the Elite's deactivated blade just as it was about to slide past her. A column of snow lifted from the ground as she brought the weapon up. She wrapped her fingers around the massive hilt and clenched upon the failsafes. Twin crescents of blinding plasma speared to life.

The armored Spartan heard the sound and grew more frantic. He was snarling and grunting, trying to extricate his sword, to get this stupid Elite to let go, but Furan was steadfast. She would not move. Her grip would not slacken. He could not let go of the sword either to punch Furan—that would leave him weaponless, open to attack from the Spartan coming up just behind him.

There was nowhere to go.

Kelly kept on staggering towards Logan's back. Blood dripped down her face, into her eyes, and her breath seared past her clenched teeth. She levelled the rippling sword that she clutched.

Logan did not turn around. He just stared up into Furan's judging eyes. They were full of flames.

"Very well," he said, his voice sounding light and detached.

With a bellow, Kelly lumbered forward and made a massive swing. There was a rumble of thunder overhead, a quick scintillation of light and magma, and Logan's head flew from his shoulders. The helmet bounced once in the snow and rolled upright, forever appraising the clouds, never to see the stars again.

At the same time, Furan sunk to her knees with a gasp. The headless body of Logan collapsed before her—the once-iron grip they had upon their blade now completely slack. The two seemed to move in slow-motion until they both found the ground at the same time, but Kelly was there to catch Furan before she too fell motionless and limp.

The snow continued to trickle upon the scene, heedless to the violence that had permeated the clearing.

The two survivors just sat there in that cold, focusing on their breathing.

---

Furan finally spoke after taking several wheezing coughs. "Not quite… how I imagined."

She touched her fingers to the gash in her chest, which was still steadily pumping blood. Her clawed fingers came away stained, the color fresh.

Kelly helped the Elite sit up, propped by a nearby stump. She then knelt in front of the alien, examining the wound. "I'll take the truck to the ship. They'll have some bio-foam on board. I can stem the—"

"No," Furan interrupted with a shake of her head. "No. It is a fatal blow. You wouldn't have time."

The Spartan watched the Elite struggle to take breaths. She had watched teammates die before in combat. If the end had not come instantaneously, they seemed to realize, after a certain point, when they could no longer fight. But this felt different. Furan had been a teammate of circumstance—sharing the bare threads of a common goal and even less when it came to their ideologies. Yet they had fought and bled together all the same. It made them more than just soldiers, in some regards. It felt strange to be in this position, though, knowing that she could do nothing to stop the inevitable.

Slowly, Kelly placed her hand on Furan's shoulder. The Elite regarded the contact, but looked up at the Spartan with gratitude.

"You don't want me to try?" Kelly asked, one final plea.

Now, Furan chuckled. "It would be useless. Besides, I've had enough of your species' bloodletting. I've spilled too much today, as it is."

The Elite gave a wracking cough. Blood misted from her throat and she erupted into wet spasms. She was deteriorating. Fast.

"Ah," she sighed, noting Kelly's concern. "This is a good thing. A death worthy of envy. Would you have it any other way, Spartan?"

"I wouldn't," Kelly replied immediately.

"Then no explanation is required. You understand, probably better than anyone else. However—" she coughed again, "—there is something you can do for me."

"Tell me."

Furan pointed to the deactivated hilt that Kelly was still gripping in her other hand. "Let me finish it. On my terms."

Kelly glanced down at the inert weapon she held. Implicitly, she understood what Furan wanted to accomplish. If an Elite—no, a Sangheili—was critically wounded in battle, then the only option for them to keep their honor intact, if they still had the capacity, was to commit ritualistic suicide. A slow expiration, though not necessarily considered dishonorable, was not upheld with such emphasis as being able to exert control on the course of one's own life. Any other death would not be proper for Furan and she could not be convinced otherwise.

The Spartan smiled, but it was a smile borne of finality and acceptance. She looked upon her fellow warrior and, for the first time, dreaded their impending last actions together.

"I'll help you up," Kelly whispered.

She got behind the Sangheili and gently wrapped her hands underneath Furan's arms. Trying not to aggrieve her any more, Kelly slowly lifted Furan up until the warrior was now on her knees instead of sitting down.

Kelly walked around, facing Furan again, and got onto a knee in front of her. She offered the hilt of the energy to the Sangheili, who slowly took it from Kelly's hands.

Furan turned the weapon over and over, as if she wanted to memorize every imperfection in the metal, to have the knowledge of the blade etched perfectly in her mind before she would turn it on for the last time.

Then, she stared at Kelly. To the human's surprise, the Sangheili extended a hand. An open hand. It was clear what Furan was intending, but the gesture nonetheless shook Kelly.

She reached out and clasped the offered hand. The grip was light, but pronounced. The two held themselves there in that position, as if they were afraid that, if they broke the connection, the universe would come undone in that moment.

Furan's mandibles rippled. A smile of her own.

"Spartan," she nodded.

Kelly repeated the gesture.

"Shipmaster."

Furan was still staring at Kelly when there was a burst of light that lit the underside of her face. Miniature tendrils of smoke rose into the air and there was a caustic noise of sizzling plasma.

The Sangheili held there for a while, before her grip on the energy sword became too much for her to bear. The weapon slipped from her grasp, exposing the two burning holes in her stomach, and immediately deactivated. It fell into the snow between the two soldiers, forever dark.

With a withering sigh, Furan bent forward and Kelly was there to catch her in her arms one last time. Even though her vision was beginning to fracture and darken, as she stared over Kelly's shoulder, Furan was able to spot, just past the trees, a small and curious little furred creature hop amidst the foliage. Short, blinding leaps. Scurrying from place to place. Never once content to stay still for long, always moving.

A tired breath flowed from Furan's lungs in a laugh. Wistful and longing.

"It is… an apt name," she whispered loud enough for Kelly to hear.

Seconds later, she was gone.

---

The flames roared from the two pyres, colored as red as blood, seeping a thick cauldron of ash into the air. The ground around the fires had melted, exposing the frozen top layer below as though the snow was afraid to venture closer.

Kelly wiped her face as she watched the burning conflagrations. She had donned herself with bits and pieces of UNSC armor she had taken off of the men she had killed around the site. This had been after she had patched herself up using the rudimentary supplies she had lifted from the household. Many of the armor pieces did not fit, so she had to make do with what she had. She had also liberated the corpses of their weapons, which included a silenced SMG and Logan's custom shotgun.

She stood there for a time, a lone watcher amidst the empty field. The flames were the only thing moving out here. She had built two separate fires—one for the family, another for Furan. They had been covered before the fires had been lit, for Kelly could not bear to look upon their faces again. The shapes of the bodies had long passed out of view, shielded from her eyes by the very wrath of the flames.

There was nothing to say to the people before her. Nothing except a mute apology. An unsaid promise to take up their vengeance and place it unto herself. To do anything less would be an insult and a violation of the generosity and loyalty that had been bestowed upon her.

The flames continued to saw back and forth in the stale wind. The great crackling of sparks thudded deeply into the failing day. Glowing embers pulsed out from the base of the pyres, some of them spitting out onto the snow and delving tiny holes like trace meteorites had impacted there.

Kelly watched the beat of the fires, their redness reflected in her eyes. With a tremendous effort, she finally turned away and headed in the direction the soldiers had come, their footprints still visible upon the ground. She had seen them arrive in a Pelican—no doubt it would be a short hike away. Her business on this world had finally concluded and the path of her vengeance was as clear and raw in her mind as the scars that had been left upon her body and in her heart.

It was time to make a return.

---

Playlist:

Homestead Under Fire
"Farm Aid"
Marco Beltrami
Logan (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)

Be the Rabbit
"No Longer the Hunted"
James Horner
Apocalypto (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)

The Horror in the Cabin
"A Fatal Tragedy"
James Horner
Southpaw (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)

Immediate Anger / Kelly Retaliates
"The Prowler"
Daniel Pemberton
Spider-Man: Enter the Spider-Verse (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)

Trap-Laden Forest
"The WLF"
Mac Quayle
The Last of Us: Part II (Original Video Game Soundtrack)

The Duelists / Final Blows
"Home"
Jed Kurzel
A Writer's Odyssey (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)

Seppuku / Vengeance
"I Put All That Away"
Max Richter
Ad Astra (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)