Title: Bitter Family

Genre: General/Angst

Rating: PG-13

Timeline: Post Halo 2

Summery: A battle, between Father & Son.

The Elite awoke, yet didn't open his eyes. The ground was vibrating, meaning he was laying on the floor of a moving vehicle. He could vaguely hear muttering, from a crowd by the sounds of it. He tried to remember what had happened. The last thing he could remember was confrontling Truth, when the Prophet smirked at him, before being thrown off the building, by someone, or something. He was starting to think that every time things looked to be going his way, he should brace himself for a sudden drop.

The Arbiter opened his eyes. Ah, that explained the where, he had smashed through the roof of a passing train. Surprisingly, full of civillians, all of whom were glaring at him with raw hatred. The Sangheili sighed, before examining his situation. His armour had been smashed to the point of no repair, leaving him in his torn undersuit. No shields, no stealth, not even any standard armour, just a tattered layer of fabric. He wouldn't stand a chance against against even a lowly Drone. And he was unarmed. Slowly, the Arbiter pulled himself to his feet, ignoring the aches and bruises that covered his body. He pondered, for a moment, as to why he was still alive, whatever had thrown him of the building had been strong enough to snap his spine with ease, yet it had decided to take a risk. Why? He looked at the crowd, doing his species equivilant of a frown. No point asking them for assistance.

The Arbiter started limping down the carrage, eager to get away from the humans who, rightfully so, hated him. He wasn't halfway to the door when the sound of glass smashing reached him. He spun around, hands up, ready for a fight if it came to it. The civillians screamed and tried to press themselves against the walls. The Arbiter looked at the new arrival in shock, another Elite, yet he was two feet taller that him, (and he was considered tall, even amongst his own species) and had a look of utmost loathing. But when the Arbiter took a good look at this new Sangheili, he gasped and started to back away. It was impossible, he had died! A sniper had shot him, a lung shot, something that garunteed a painful death! How could he be here!

"Father?" The Arbiter asked, voice shaking.

The new Elite smirked at the disgraced one.

"Son. You've been a bad boy, working with these heathen." The Elite dressed in gold said, in a mocking tone of voice. "Looks like I'm going to have to punish you!"

The Zealot ran at the Arbiter, faster than the son could track, and planted a fist in his stomach. The Arbiter doubled over, coughing up blood. Without giving his son a chance to recover, the zealot kicked the younger Elite, sending him staggering backwards, his ribs, barely healed from his fights against Tartarus, broken again. That punch and kick, the power behind them surpassed anything the Demon could have done, any of them. And he had pulled his punch, and put no effort into the kick. He was being toyed with, by his father, the one who had taught him everything he knew about fighting, and honour. Honour is a privilige had been the most important lesson, yet here he was, attacking his son, where was the honour in that? And how did someone who had been killed return, acting like they were pumped up with what the humans called steroids?

His father charged again, but this time the son was ready. The Arbiter shot his fist out, to meet with his father's face, but the experianced Elite grabbed his arm and twisted, snapping his arm, before executing a vicious upper-cut, sending his son flying back. The Arbiter landed on his back, groaning. If this was his father's definition of toying with someone, then he wasn't sure he wanted to see him actually trying. Slowly getting his feet, the disgraced Elite looked around, looking for an advantage. Not finding any, he tried to form a plan, something that could, if anything, help him escape. But he wasn't going to last much longer at this rate.

"How is this possible?" He asked, hoping to stall his father.

The veteran's smirk grew wider.

"I was given the same treatment that was given to the Demon." The Zealot gloated. "If he, a pathetic human, became as strong as the average Sangheili from the augmentation, just picture, if you will, what would happen to an Elite under the exact same conditions."

Only to easily, could he imagine the result, but the Prophets must have done something extra to the treatment, something to change him into a pawn of the Prophets, his father had never been sadistic, or cruel, not even to his enemies. When he had been sent of to fight the heretics, he hadn't formed any kind of pleasure from killing them, he was just following orders. Now that the Arbiter thought about it, his attitude was similar to that of The Demon, if what the other 3 had said was true. Impassive, he just put his mind on his job. Something had obviously changed that. Mind control chip? He'd never heard of something like that, but he wouldn't put it past the Prophets to use one if they had it. He was torn from his musings by his father charging towards him.

'Fool. never stray your thoughs in the middle of a battle.' The Arbiter silently scolded himself.

The youthful Sangheili ducked under the punch and rolled, stopping behing his elder and attempted a spinning kick, ignoring the pain from his broken ribs and arm. The Zealot spun around and grabbed his leg, and threw his son into the wall, denting the metal. Before the Arbiter could think to get up, the older Sangheili grabbed him by the neck and lifted him up, pinned against the wall. The Elite weakly struggled, but all he his was the shield surrounding his father. Only once had he felt this helpless, when Tartarus had tortured him, before he became the Arbiter. This wasn't as bad as that, though, nothing could ever compare to what Tartarus had done, that had been the only time he'd ever lost his will to live. His father sneered at him.

"Is it true?"

What was he talking about?

"Is it true that you bare the mark?"

The Mark of Shame. Permenently scarred on the Arbiter's chest. A constant reminder of the Covenant's betrayal. He renewed his struggle. His father moved his hand over one off the larger gashes in his clothing and pulled, tearing the fabric, and revealing the mark that had been burnt onto his son.

"I'm disappointed son. Very disappointed in you. Not only did you betray your Covenant, but you have dishonoured your family name."

"...And what... would... you know... about... Honour?" The Arbiter asked, putting a lot of effort into speaking. "Attacking... your own... son... like a... a... a Brute!"

His father's eyes widened in shock. He had hit a nerve. The Zealot hit his son in the face, his smirk now replaced with pure hatred.

"Dishonourable welp!" He shouted, making the humans yell out in shock.

The veteran started to hit his son, not bothering to pull his punches now, hiting and kicking the younger Elite. The Arbiter sruggled to stay concious during the assult. He looked pleadingly at the humans, but didn't expect them to be any help. He was surprised, therefore, when a human male picked up a shard of glass and stabbed at the attacking father. The attack never penatrated the shields. The Zealot struck the human, who fell to the ground, eyes glassy, but unseeing. As his father was distracted, glaring at the human who dared to strike him, the Arbiter, in a rush of adrenaline, climbed to his feet and leapt through a window, in a bid to escape his father. The glass of the mono-rail train smashed as he slammed into it, failing to stop him from making a jump that could well kill him.

Sargent Avery Johnson and a team of helljumpers tried, with difficulty, to move down the street. For some reason, this city seemed to ignore the Covenant threat, so long as the aliens weren't actually walking down the streets killing everyone in sight. This made it extremely difficult for the marines, because at the moment, it was rush hour. They had been assgned patrol duty, and even the cocky helljumpers knew that it was best to travel in numbers, especially after Brutes became the most common threat on the streets. But at the moment, the rush hour was forcing them to stop moving, or become lost in the swarm of civillians. Johnson cursed softly at being put into a patrol detail, he'd much rather be out on the frontlines than stuck in the middle of rush hour. They couldn't even call themselves soldiers at the moment, their job made them look more like fancy poilcemen, who were looking into a rumour that the Prophet of Truth had been sighted. If it was true, it would explain the Arbiter's lack of communication, he had been in the general area at the time. One of the helljumpers sighed and looked up.

"Sarge, why couldn't we just commandeer a mono-rail..."

Johnson glared at the soldier before following his gaze, and spotted one of the blasted things, headed from the direction they were heading in. He watched it, thinking mournfuly about the ease and confort that they could have had if they had thought to use one earlier. Just as he was about to order all of the soldiers, who were all staring at the mono-rail, one of the windows shattered, and an Elite more or less flew out of the space that the window once was and fell.

"Shit!" One of the helljumpers cursed.

Johnson ran to where the Elite had landed, pushing through the crowd that had formed around him. He pushed his way through the human barrier and stopped short. There, lying on the verge of death, was the Arbiter. After shouting out for the medic of the group, he crouched beside his friend, trying to assess his injuries. No plasma burns or gunshot wounds. In fact, it looked like he had been physically assulted. Which was hard to believe, because few could even lay a hit on him, with his speed and agilty. The medic pushed through and started to take his own assessment of the Sangheili's injuries.

"It looks like he has a couple of broken ribs. And his arm is snapped... Legs are broken in various places... multiple gashes and bruising all over. Sir... Looks like he was tortured, sir."

Johnson eyes the countless bruises on his friend, eyebrow raised.

"But why risk letting him live? If it was torture, he'd be dead by now. And why torture him in a mono-rail system?"

The medic shrugged, starting to treat the injuries, that did look suspiciously alike torture injuries. Johnson cursed and called a medivac. The Arbiter needed urgent medical attention. He jumped slightly when the Arbiter shot up and grabbed on to him, in a manner that reminded Johnson of his kid nephew, when he wanted tobe protected from his father for whatever reason, usually because he'd done something and was scared of his fathers wraith. The human frowned slightly. The Arbiter was scared of something? That was hard to believe, considering that it was this Elite that had killed the biggest, baddest Brute there was. He didn't try to pry the Elite from the embrace he had on him, he new from experiance that if it was fear, then forcing the scared one to let go increased that fear, because they felt vulnerable. Or something like that. He could never tell with his nephew.

The Arbiter awoke with a start. Where was he? It took him a minute to realive that he was in the med bay of the Cario.Softly, the Elite sighed to himself. Safe, he was safe. For how long, he didn't know, but for now, he was going to enjoy the moments of safety he had. Sighing again, the Sangheili pushed all thoughts of his father from his mind and tried to return to a dreamless slumber. He was safe.

-End

AN

Yes, I know the ending wasn't super, but towards the end I was running out of ideas. No worries, this may be continued some time. In fact, you can count on it. Just, don't expect it to be the next chapter I post up, it may take some time to think up a conclusion.