CHAPTER 1 - LOST MEMORY

I had just woken up on the strange, ring world. And I had very little knowledge of my past. There were strange plug-like things on the back of my neck, on my arms and legs, and down my back, but I didn't know what they were for. The strange wolf's tail that swayed behind me as a got up and walked across the rock terrain didn't have much meaning to me, either. I kept walking for hours without seeing any form of intelligent life, so I decided to lie down on a flat boulder. The stone was warm from the sun and I fell asleep within a few minutes.

I woke up to the sound of an aircraft over head and sat up. I sat up and stared at it blankly as it landed about ten feet away and unloaded a dozen Marines. One saw me and shouted, "Hey kid! What are you doing here? It's dangerous. Who are you?" I just stood up, looked at him, and creased my eyebrows in confusion. "Hey...that kid has a tail. Weird, huh?" one of the Marines whispered to his comrade. I looked towards the opening of the drop-ship just as a man in green armor came out and walked up to me.

"Can you tell me who you are and what you're doing here, kid?" he said as he tilted his head slightly to one side.

I shook my head and said, "I have no idea. I don't know what I'm doing here or how I got here. I don't even know who I am." I swayed my tail from side to side, and pointed to where I came from. "I just woke up over there a few hours ago..."

"Hmm..." He then looked over to the drop-ship and shouted to the pilot, "Foehammer, can you take this kid back to the butte?"

Before the pilot could answer, I said, "No. It seems like you guys are about to go into a fight." I looked around and found a discarded plasma pistol. "I need to remember who I am and what I'm doing here... I feel this might help."

The man in the green armor motioned to the plasma pistol and asked, "You sure you know how to work that thing?" I just grinned, turned around, spotted a bird flying about twelve meters away, charged, and fired. The plasma bolt hit dead-on and the bird fell to the ground. I turned around as one of the Marines said, "Holy shit!" The armored man looked at the toasted bird on the ground then looked back at me. "You don't know who you are, but you know how to wield Covenant weapons?"

I raised an eyebrow when he said Covenant, but just said, "I don't have any memory of myself, but I have memories of how to do things. This is one of them."

"Ok then." He put out his hand and I shook it. "I'm the Master Chief. Since you don't know who you are, we'll just call you Kid till you do."

One of the Marines in the front of the group that I guessed was the Sergeant motioned forward and shouted, "C'mon, Marines! We've got Covenant to fry and information to obtain!" A few of the Marines shouted "Yes sir!" and we were off. I stayed close to the rear and looked around at my new surroundings. I noticed the Chief staring at me from time to time, but didn't really care. We turned a corner and a Marine shouted, "Enemy contact!" as he fired his assault weapon.

I dashed through the group of short, squealing creatures that I remembered calling Grunts and got up onto a boulder, letting the Marines handle the small fries. I looked down the hill at the tall, metallic structure that the Covenant seemed to be guarding. Seeing a black-clad Elite standing by himself on a platform with large stairs leading up to it, I ran down the hill at a startling speed and as I got close, jumped. But I didn't go to the second step as I thought I would. I jumped high. Even a few feet above the Elite. He looked up and roared in surprise as I landed on his shoulders and snapped his neck with my feet. I landed on both feet as the Elite fell to the ground with a slight thump and a few Jackals and Elites came to investigate, but stopped when they saw me. They didn't fire. They didn't even attack as I stood there, staring down at the fallen Elite They just stood there and stared as if shocked by something until the Marines came rushing down, firing their assault riffles and M6D pistols.

It took about fifteen minutes for the Marines to clear the area of Covenant forces, and I was still sitting down, staring the dead Covenant. The Marines and the Master Chief came over and looked down at the Elite. Some of the Marines were whispering among themselves and each other. I heard things like; "Did you see that kid?" "Yeah. He just flew through the air and then cracked the Elite's neck!" I didn't even look up when the Chief said, "I saw what you did. Do you know how you did that? You jumped as far as any Spartan could, maybe even farther, and you cracked that Elite's neck without any effort. There's no way any human could do that."

"I don't know, ok? I don't know!" That's when Sergeant Johnson came over and said, "C'mon, Chief. Leave the poor kid alone." Then he added, "The database is over there. We should extract what we need and get the hell outta here and back to Alpha Base." I got up and followed the rest of the group to where Johnson was talking about. I looked around and found a large monitor that had data streaming across it. But when I touched it, the data stopped and something appeared in a different language. A coil came out of the dashboard and went around, behind me. I cried out in pain as it found its way into the back of my neck.

POV Change - Master Chief

The Master Chief spun around at the sound of the cry. There were images streaming across the screen of the monitor and the kid's eyes were glowing a bright green. One of the Marines shouted, "What the hell? What is that?" Sergeant Johnson stepped up and shouted, "What are you waiting for? Let's get that thing out of him!" He was about to reach for the wire when John put his hand up.

"Cortana?" the Chief asked expectantly.

The AI's voice came on his HUD. "I'm not quite sure. It seems to be...some kind of memory transfusion... But I don't know why that kid's memory would be stored on HALO..."

The Chief watched as the memories flickered across the screen and frowned. Some of the images were quite disturbing. That's when the John saw something he really didn't like, and debated on weather he should pull the plug or not. He chose yes when the loading got to 7, and yanked the coil out of the kid's neck.

POV Change - Zak

I fell to the ground and tried to catch my breath. What the hell was that? I looked up as the Master Chief said, "Kid, what do you remember." Then it hit me. I knew things... I stood up and said, "My name Zakery Alexander Kumashiro. I live in West Shinjuku, Japan. I'm a 9th grader at Oshiwa High School. I remember some stuff about my family and friends as well... But nothing else."

The Chief sighed and turned away as a female voice came on his HUD. "Well at leased he knows who he is."

I looked up again. "Huh? Who said that?" The Chief turned to mean and asked, "You heard that?" I looked around and answered. "Yeah, I heard that. Who was it?"

The female voice came again as the AI spoke to me now. "I am Cortana. Once the AI of the ship, Pillar of Autumn, and now I travel with the Chief, here. It's very strange that you can hear my speaking without an HUD..." Her voice trailed off as she tried to figure this out.

I was trying to figure out how I lost my memory and why I would find it stored here. Wherever here was... It didn't make much sense. I sighed as I noticed the Marines staring at me again. They would always look away when I took notice, and I think some of them were afraid of me. Sergeant Johnson had had enough and said, "Alright, people. We got what we came for." Then he switched to the comchanel, "Foehammer, we need immediate pick up."

"Affirmative, Sergeant." The pilot of the drop-ship paused to look at her map and then said, "There's a clearing north of your position. I'll pick you boys up there."

"Roger that, Foehammer." The Chief answered. Then he turned to the rest of the group. "Let's move, Marines. We don't want any of our alien friends to decide and drop by while we're still here." He turned and stared walking in the direction that I guessed was north. I sighed and looked back at where the dead Elite lay before following the rest of the group.

POV Change - Covenant

"What!" Field Master, Tuno Tonkomee roared in anger. "Are you saying that a single human took down one of our best soldiers with his bare hands!" An extremely brave Grunt stepped up and correcting the golden-armored Elite by telling him that the human had used his feet. It shrunk back and lowered its gaze as the Field Master roared again and shouted, "Do not correct me! Next time, I'll that methane mask from your face and laugh as you die!" Tonkomee turned to a Jackal sitting at the controls of the view screen and ordered, "Show me the footage of the attack in sector 57! I want to take a look at this human boy..."

The screen switched the battle in sector 57 and the Jackal rewound it to before the humans came. The picture zoomed in on the commando Elite on the platform, showed him being killed, and froze on the image of the boy. Tonkomee's eyes widened. "This is impossible..." he whispered to himself. He turned to his troops and gave another order. "Find that boy. Bring him here, but do not harm him. Kill any other human there. Now go..."

The troops hesitated, then started out, leaving Tonkomee alone in front of the screen.

POV Change - Zak

The pelican dropped us off at a pyramid-looking, metallic structure with military personnel guarding post. This must me Alpha Base... I sighed and one of the men saluted, "Welcome back, Chief. Who's the kid?"

The Master Chief returned the salute and replied, "We found him near the structure that we got information from. His name's Zak Kumashiro, but he can't remember much else."

"Huh... Poor kid." The Marine looked at me and I raised an eyebrow. "Does he even know how he got here?" The Master Chief shook his head, the Marine saluted again, and walked away. I had just sat down when another Marine came running down a ramp leading into a room. The man saluted and said, "Sir! We've captured a man in strange, golden armor that claims to be from the future. He says he's a Spartan..."

"What?" The Chief followed the Marine up the ramp and I decided to tag along.

POV Change - Master Chief

John ran up the ramp, behind the Marine, and was lead into a jail room with energy cells. The Chief told the Marine at the controls to turn the energy off, and when it was he walked up to the man in the gold armor. "Who are you?"

The man looked up but did not take off his helmet. His armor, the Chief noticed, looked like that of a golden Elite's. When the man spoke, the Master Chief could tell that he was most-likely human. "I cannot tell you my name, but I assure you, I am on your side." His voice was low and husky. "I have come from the year 2612 and am part of the SPARTAN IV project. There is a terrible danger that I need to tell you about." He then took off his helmet. His hair was dark gray, his eyes were a piercing blue, and there was a long scar down the right side of his face. "You may not believe me," he continued, "but the darkness lies within a boy..."

The Chief turned away from the other "Spartan" when someone said, "Hey, look. The kid's tail changed. It's not a wolf's tail like the last time I saw him." He looked over at the kid, who was looking down at his tail in confusion, and raised an eyebrow. Zak's tail now looked like it belonged to a large snake instead of a wolf. The Master Chief spun around as the man in the golden armor came rushing out of the cell, eyes wide.

The man pointed at Zak and shouted, "You! You are the great evil! You are the darkness that killed my family and so many others!"

Zak stared at the man a bit blankly, but startled, and asked, "Do I know you? And I didn't kill anyone! Besides, didn't you say you came from the future? I can't even remember my past!"

"Heh... No memory, huh?" The man stepped closer and a small spike came out of his wrist plate. "You want to know what you did! Then here!" The man stepped forward and jammed the spike into the back of Zak's neck.

POV Change - Zak

I felt the stab of pain in the back of my neck, but didn't have time to react. Streams of images started flooding my mind. Destruction everywhere, corpses sprawled all over the place and twisted in ways not thought possible, fire, black rain, blood... There was something else, too. Something I couldn't quite make out... The Covenant? The spike was yanked from me and I fell to the ground. I heard the man's voice, and some angry shouts, but it all seemed so far away...

"You now know what happens in the future. What chaos you create. I must destroy that evil before it becomes full!" A blade came out of the man's right arm plate and he lunged at me. I thought I was going to die, but the Master Chief came and tackled the other "Spartan", making him miss. "Stay out of this, you fool! This is for the good of the future!" He lunged again, but this time I had time to react. I put my hands out in front of me and shouted, "Go away!" Two sickle-like blades came out of my forearms, and the gold-armored man stopped in his tracks and then flew into a wall.

He got up out of the dent I had created and growled, "Damn you...demon!" He was about to lunge again when another Marine came in and reported, "Sir! Enemy sighted. But...it's strange. There are only four of them. A Hunter, an Elite, a Jackal, and a Grunt. They don't seem to be attacking, Sir. Silva's not here, so I'm asking you. Should we fire?" The Chief was about to reply when I asked, "Wait! What color armor are each of them wearing?" The Marine looked puzzled but then said, "The Elite and the Hunter are wearing black. The Grunt is wearing blue and doesn't seem to have a methane mask on him. All the Jackal is wearing is pants. Very strange... Why do you ask?"

I stood up and mumbled to myself, "Could it really be them?" Turning around, I ran out the door and looked down the hill, forgetting the armored man for the moment. It was true, there were Covenant like the Marine described. When one of them saw me and called out my name, I made it official. I waved and said, "Hey, guys! How did you get here?"

A Marine came up to me and said, "Wait a second! You know theses Covenant!" I turned to face him and said, "Yup. They've actually been living with me for about three years. Don't be alarmed. When I found them, they were almost dead and they had absolutely no memory. Kinda like when you found me. You'd probably wonder how four Covenant could be on Earth, undetected by the authorities for three years. That's because I created a disguise mechanism that gave them each a human form."

The Marine looked extremely confused, so I just grinned and left it at that. I looked down and saw that they were half way up when I felt a sharp pain in my back. I winced and turned around, seeing that the armored man had stabbed me with his arm-blade. I brought my arm up and tried to return the attack, but the man quickly took his blade and slashed a long cut across my chest. I feel to the ground and put my hands over the wound, trying to slow the blood. The man was about to cut me again when a blob of yellow-green plasma crashed into the wall right next to the man's head. I heard someone say, "You need to work on your aiming! Hit him this time!"

The armored man cursed and said, "Looks like your friends have come to help you." I looked up and he glared at me. "Do not think that this is the last time you'll see me. I'll be back to finish the job." With that, the man disappeared. The Master Chief ran over to me and said, "Zak, are you alright?" I just looked up at him, unable to think of words. The four Covenant reached the top of the hill and the Marines moved out of their way. The Elite came up to me and I managed to say, "H-Hey, Franky..." He crouched down and said, "Zak! C'mon! Stay focused!" He turned around and said, "Will someone help him!" The Marines hesitated, but one finally said, "Let's get him to the med. room!" The last thing I remember is someone picking me up and carrying me somewhere...

POV Change - Master Chief

The kid was taken to the med room and had been out cold for several hours. He had lost a lot of blood what that other so-called "Spartan" came and tried to kill him. The four Covenant who had come to Zak's aid had explained how they had been living in Zak's home for over four years. They had been using some sort of camouflage that gave them human appearances so they could go out on public. The Master Chief was told that they had no memory of the Covenant Homeworld or ever being in their forces. All they could remember was the time they spent on Earth since they crashed somewhere in the desert. They said Zak had destroyed the ship just in case there were any tacking devices.

The Elite called "Franky" had been pacing for an hour now while the other three sat against a wall. John walked into the room that lead into the med space and looked through the window. The bandages around Zak's chest were drenched in blood and the medic went to try and wake him so they could be changes, but he wouldn't open his eyes. The Chief noticed that there were tears streaming down the kid's face. He was told that about an hour ago, Zak had opened his eyes, sat up with a start, started gibbering in a strange language, and nearly slashed the medic's throat open with the blades o n his arms before becoming unconscious once more. The Master Chief had arrived just before Zak became unconscious and saw that his eyes did not seem to be his own. They were a dark-dull green that seemed to hold no life. The Chief looked back at where the kid was resting and noticed that he was mouthing something. Whatever he had seen when his attacker "showed him the future" must have been terrible.

John sighed and finally spoke, "Cortana, how is he? Will he be alright?"

"Well..." the AI replied hesitantly as her holographic, female form appeared on a near-by table, "He'll be fine. No vital organs were punctured... But it's very strange. I checked his blood, scanned his body, and found something. His blood is most definitely not normal. Not even a mixture of several human blood types could match his. The way his body is structured also puzzles me. There are wires running through his entire nervous system, connecting to the ports on his neck, legs, and arms. His body seems human, but slightly altered. Not counting his blades, tail, and those wires."

"Meaning?" The Chief asked with a ring of impatience in his voice.

"Meaning, he's not human. There isn't one bit of human DNA in him."

"Kinda figured that. But what I want to know, it what is he?"

Cortana crossed her arms over her chest and shook her head. The Master Chief was about to ask another question when a Marine came rushing in. He saluted, "Sir, Covenant! A lot of Covenant. And they're attacking. Awaiting orders, Sir."

"What else?" John answered. "Return fire."