The Chief blinked underneath his visor.
"The Rvarn'ii? Your not Covenant?" He muttered slowly. Commander Briyanku growled at him when the Chief said Covenant again, and he decided not to do that again. "Okay, you are not the Covenant. Who are you?"
"The Rvarn'ii, is your hearing defunct human?" The red Elite growled again, tapping the side of the Chief's helmet quite heavily with his well-armoured palm to conduct his statement. "We are the sworn enemies of the Covenant."
"Well, right now that's a good thing I suppose," replied the Chief, still trying to comprehend this new turn of events. His hands held his rifle loosely around his waist, as he thought of the best thing to say next, thinking what question would get the best response. "But…you are almost…identical to the…them, you know, the guys you hate?" Briyanku took a step closer so that he was almost chest-to-chest with the Chief, and he towered a good foot above the human. He looked down menacingly at the Chief, and grunted a sound of some dissatisfaction. But after a tense moment or two where no one on either spoke, the Elite backed down and turned towards the door.
"Follow me human." He growled without looking back. Cortana had left the holopanel and its usual door control display was back in place. The Chief gave a quick look at the eight or so blue Elites standing around him and followed Briyanku through the opened door. He had to almost run to keep up with the bigger Elite, but his travels through the ship weren't without their rewards; there were many opened hatchways that gave him an insight into his captor's daily lives.
One of the first open hatchways to his right showed what appeared to be a grunts' barracks. There were about five or six bright blue columns of light emanating up from the floor to the ceiling, and around the base of each 'pillar' there was about four or five sunken holes, each about half-a-foot deep and around two and a half feet wide, sided with a layer of blue padding. Inside a few of these holes were sleeping grunts; their bowed heads turned towards the light, which the Chief guessed, was a heat or energy source. The few grunts that were awake were chatting squeakily away around little tables, and they didn't give the Master Chief a second glance. The grunts themselves were different from those the chief had encountered before. Instead of a fin shaped backpack, they carried an almost cylindrical one, looking like a streamlined scuba diver's tank. And their colours were different too. Although there was one or two red grunts here and there who seemed to be in command, as far as the Chief could ascertain from the couple that were awake, most of them wore a blue, green, or white uniform, the colour varying from grunt to grunt for an unknown reason. Perhaps it denoted rank, as the colours did with the Elites, or perhaps their field of operation.
However, they moved swiftly passed the grunts barracks and climbed a staircase onto the next level. This appeared to be the quarters of the Elites. Many storage lockers were open, displaying their contents of spare armour components and plasma weapons out onto the corridor. Through a door on the left the Chief saw what looked like a small assembly area for the Elite's themselves, with sixteen beefy looking blue Elites standing to attention as a red Commander spoke to them on top of a slightly raised podium on the opposite side of the room. Up another staircase, and this time they appeared to be near the ship's main infirmary. Through the few open doors the chief could make out various bed-like standalone units that were located in small alcoves. Within one of these was a wounded blue Elite, its dark indigo blood dripping ominously onto the lilac floor below. Above the fallen Rvarn'ii was a strange alien that the Chief had never seen before. It was like a small, un-armoured Elite, standing about six feet tall and was clothed in a blue, bulky uniform that had a few traces of highly developed muscles underneath it. It held in its four-fingered hand a small oval-shaped device that he periodically looked down at every few moments. The Chief noticed that Briyanku had stopped and had taken a step inside the room. The human stayed a pace behind.
"How is Yrinken?" Said the red Elite, a hint of concern in his voice. The "doctor" alien gave the Covenant version of a sigh and looked directly at Briyanku.
"If he survives the night…then we will be lucky. I…there is not much more that I can do." The alien's face fell and Briyanku looked down at the ground for a second.
"He was a good warrior, brave but foolhardy. Y'vu, do what you can, we cannot afford to lose any more soldiers." He turned and looked at the Chief, his eyes staring deeply into the Chief's own even through the visor. "It hurts to lose your best men human, particularly when you can ill afford to." The big Elite brushed past the human warrior before the Chief turned and followed him. Another long corridor walk and one last staircase bought them up into the operations room.
The huge double doors guarding this nerve centre of the ship slowly but surely retracted into the wall, revealing the operations centre to the Chief. It was nothing like the bridge of the "Truth and Reconciliation". For one thing, like the ship itself, it was far bigger than its Covenant counterpart. Every wall of the rectangular room was lined with purple, blue and green holographic control panels delivering a wealth on information on the ships systems and sensors to the dozen or so green uniformed grunts manning about half of the available seats. At the centre of the room on a slightly raised platform was three standing Elites. Manning a circular control panel at the front of the platform was a blue uniformed Elite, who's eyes switched quite rapidly between its control panel and the large holographic viewscreen that was suspended high above the opposite wall above the grunt's consoles. The view was currently a strange red swirling pattern, almost as if the pilot (or whatever the blue Elite was) was flying the ship into a crimson stained whirlpool. Then next an extremely tough looking gold Elite who was standing in the exact middle of the platform was Briyanku. The two high ranking Rvarn'ii were exchanging quick but almost silent words as the gold Elite gave a curious glance in the Chief's direction. More words were spoken, and then Briyanku called the Chief over.
"Master Chief", growled Briyanku as he used his voice to imply that the human give this new Elite a lot of respect. "This is Captain Rniork, commanding Elite of the Rvarn'ii Cruiser "Proven Consequence", your host for the next few days." The red Elite took a step back, and his superior stepped up and looked down thoughtfully at the human.
"So, you are the famed "Master Chief"?" The human looked up emotionlessly at the Captain, his mind almost smirking however at the thought of his infamy.
"I am Master Chief Petty Officer John-117, of the UNSC Marine Corp, if that is who you are referring to." The Elite Captain frowned (so the Chief thought anyway) and took a step back, looking the human over from head to toe. Its eyes paused briefly on the rifle that was still in the Chief's arms. Then he smiled, a proper, human smile. He spoke again, in a far less harsh tone than the growl of Briyanku.
"The "Cutya Kuldis"!" He laughed. The Chief noticed that for the first time the rest of the bridge crew looked up from their console displays and had a good look at him. Some of the grunts exchanged a few excited whispers before the blue Elite gave a loud growl and the quiet muttering promptly ceased. The grunts turned back to their displays, as the Captain looked the Chief in the eyes again. "The Angel of Death", Master Chief," he paused. "Your 'nickname' in the Covenant reports we intercepted. You are a wanted creature, human, just be glad we found you when we did."
"The Angel of Death?" Repeated the Chief slowly, "well, it seems I have something to learn here…"
"Indeed you do," replied the Captain, "come with Briyanku and I, there is much to explain. Mristuwk, you have command of the bridge till I return." The blue Elite gave a grunt of acknowledgement as the Captain, the Master Chief and Briyanku turned and exited the operations centre.