Sorry for this being so long in coming, my muse up and left me for some time. Anyway this is one of my longest chapters yet and has lots of stuff going on. Hope you enjoy.
DISCLAIMER: I do not own the rights to Ranma 1/2 or The Halo enterprise as a whole. I write this purely as a dedication to them both. There is no point trying to sue me anyway because I'm nothing more than a poor Otaku.
Chapter 3: The Game.
0630 Hours, July 12, 2519 (Military Calendar) / Epsilon Eridani System, Reach Military Wilderness Training Preserve, planet Reach
Ranma clutched the overhead grip tightly as the drop-ship roared over a snowy peak. The sun, just visible on the horizon, washed the snow that covered the jagged mountain tops with pinks and oranges. The other members of his team watched out of the other windows in the ship.
John jostled his way through the crowd to him. "Reckon we can even the score out here?" He asked with a quick smile.
"You'll never even the score, after all I don't loose." Ranma retorted.
"Didn't look like you won last week. What was it that you did in the end of the exercise? Came out with a white flag?" John teased.
"Yeah and handed your butt to you before your team dog-piled me." Ranma shot back with a smug smile.
"My team still won in the end and thats what counts." John said calmly.
"Is it?" Ranma asked suddenly. "I'm not so sure sometimes, is it ok to win at the cost of someone when that cost could have been avoided?"
John was silent for some time following that question, it wasn't one he could answer despite it not being the first time that Ranma had asked it of him. Was it ok to loose a team member to complete the mission when there could have been a way to avoid the loss and still win? John was sure the answer was 'no' but what if there was no other option that could be seen. Hindsight being 20-20 and all that.
He was snapped out of his musings when CPO Mendez stepped from the cockpit to the hold area. All trainee's snapped to attention. "At ease, and sit down."
"Today's game will be simple for a change." Mendez's voice easily cut through the background noise of the drop-ships roaring engines. He passed a stack of papers to Kelly. "Pass these out, Recruit."
Kelly snapped a quick salute. "Yes sir!" She quickly went about handing the papers out to the rest of the seventy-five child squad.
"These are all portions of a map of the local region. You will be put down and then navigate to the designated extraction point. You will be picked up there," Mendez explained. "First drop in 3 minutes."
Ranma looked at his map quickly and couldn't readily find anything useful on it. He received a nudge in the side from john who pointed out the window at a river that made its way to a lake. Ranma nodded and passed it on the to trainee next to him, a kid that he didn't know as well as the others called Frederic. All the children knew about the plan in short order.
The drop-ship slowly descended over a river bank and Mendez made his way to stand in front of John. "Your first boot, oh and one last thing to warm your boots trainee, last one to the EP gets to walk home."
Ranma couldn't make out John's expression as he made his way down the ramp but he could tell that the other kid's brain was ticking at a million miles a second to try and figure out how to get them all back. He wasn't given much time to ponder the situation as the drop-ship ascended once again to go to the next dispatch point. Looking out his window Ranma noticed that John had already taken to the shelter of the tree's. Mendez's games always held an extra twist.
Ranma was the fifth child to disembark from the drop-ship. It took a few moments for him to orient himself to the terrain before he started the trek towards the river and finally the lake. Keeping a sharp ear out for any hints of possible threats Ranma's mind was running through two problems at once. First being how to get all of them on the drop-ship and not have to have anyone walk back to camp. The other being some martial arts theory he had been inspired about only a few days before, but was still yet to have the chance to try it out.
Ranma came out of his musings when two sounds met his ears in rapid succession the first being the sound of running water, the second being a singsong tune whistled from above. He whistled back the reply 'Olly-olly Oxen Free' and waited for someone to collect him.
Within only a few minutes a small figure ghosted out of the thick underbrush, only the faintest noise of disturbed foliage gave the child away to the senses but Ranma had senses that others didn't and could instantly tell who the figure was before they even emerged into visual range.
"I could hear you a mile off Linda, you need more work." Ranma said without turning around to face her. He could hear her footfalls stop and practically feel the indignation come off her in waves.
"The lake is another half mile west of here. How do you keep doing that? It's creepy." Linda complained softly, she did everything softly, everything but hit that was. Despite her slender frame Linda packed a mean jab. In an all out brawl she would be next to useless but for quick and painful distraction hits, she was the one you chose.
"It's an art," Ranma said with a smirk as he finally turned to face her. "come on lets start moving, how many last count?" Ranma asked as he started to walk towards the lake.
"Half at last count, not all were put down as close to the river as others and some were put even further out than you. We might be hiking at night if we are unlucky." Linda informed him, Ranma had become a quick leader amongst the kids from an early stage, earning their trust and friendship in equal measure.
As the pair slowly came to their destination Ranma started to reach out with his senses, he had been able to feel when people came near him for a little over a year now, he felt the presence of most of the other children not to far ahead of him plus the ones that were in the tree's above them keeping watch for any of the children and potential threats.
In the clearing John had taken charge in Ranma's absence, he had gathered together most of the map pieces and a plan was already beginning to form in his mind. He only needed to see if there was any more to the map and discuss the plan he had in mind with Ranma. Internally he laughed at the idea, two years ago he would have attacked Ranma for even planting the idea of getting approval on a plan, but a lot had happened in the last two years.
A badly whistled birdcall caught his attention, only several members of the team warranted that call, seeing as Kelly, Sam and himself were already next to the lake that meant Linda was coming back, hopefully with Ranma. He looked over towards the tree-line a good fifty meters distant and could easily make out Ranma taking one of the other kids to task for their bad whistling. It caused a rare smile to grace his lips.
Rising slowly from his position near the bank of the lake John made his way towards Ranma and Linda to discuss their next options. Ranma was just winding down from his latest rant with Linda standing beside him ever silent but there was a slight tilt to her lips and eyes that indicated to a smile. The crunch of his boots on the gravel beach bought Ranma's attention from the unfortunate child onto himself.
"Come on Ranma you know Kurt can't whistle to save his life, thats why we never put him on far watch." John said once he was sure that Ranma wasn't going to have a go at him.
"Then keep him on open watch instead John, he's part of your team, either fix the problem or use his strengths." Ranma said calmly, the beginnings of a debate often taken up obvious in his tone.
"Now isn't the time, boys." Linda interjected softly before John could start up. Ranma shot her an odd glance before deciding to heed her advice.
"Ok then, we are almost all here, what do we have so far?" He asked in what the other cadets had come to know as his 'leader tone'.
"Going from the map pieces we have so far and best guessing some of the distances, since we don't really have to tools to make an accurate translation, we have about another six hours hiking ahead of us to reach the EP." John explained to him as they walked back to where Kelly and Sam were resting with the map.
"Ok so who is missing?" Ranma asked the silent pair. "I wanna start moving before dark."
Kelly stood up and snapped a quick salute to Ranma. "All accounted for except Fhajad, he was last off, should be here within the hour, unless he got lost. Part of your team after all Ranma, don't know how they function without the mighty leader." She said with a smirk.
"Not all of us can run like rabbits Kelly, least he's got a better head on his shoulders than yours, he'll be here." A quick trill came from the tree-line followed by a dozen shapes emerging from the shadows. "Ah and here he is now, took a side trip to pick up our watchers too, almost as quick at thinking as you are running away there, Rabbit." Ranma smirked back.
Once again Linda came to the rescue by pointing silently towards the group of children again, more specifically the child being carried on one of the others back. Both children had some blood covering them though it seemed to be mainly from the child being carried. John frowned at the sight and saw Ranma start to move towards them at a speed that rivaled Kelly.
The group came to a stop and let Ranma and the others join them. Ranma was first on the scene, Kelly a close second. By the time the other children were on site Ranma had the injured child on the ground and stripped to the waist to expose the wound. With only a cursory glance the wound would seem to be superficial but if one were to look closer it was evident that some bones had broken to compliment the gash.
"It was a boar sir," One of the children was explaining, a dainty little girl called Elisabeth, or Liz "It attacked Todd here no reason I can think of, a couple of us managed to kill it before it could skewer him properly." Ranma nodded then turned to Sam.
"I want its body here in fifteen, find out what you can as to why this happened, but that comes second to bringing its body to me." Ranma ordered.
Sam nodded then gathered a couple of cadets and moved back into the forest to follow out the order. John watched them walk briskly back in the direction they had emerged from. Turning his attention back to Todd and Ranma, he needed to blink a few times just to affirm what it was that he was watching.
While John was giving orders to the other children, Ranma was focusing his attention on Todd. Thinking back on a previous lesson with Deja, in which she had discussed with them some contemporary old forms of healing, he considered Reiki healing and an idea of how to implement it to save Todd's life.
Closing his eyes, Ranma focused his own aura towards the palms of his hands. A glow started to envelope them as the spiritual energies began to gather. Keeping his eyes closed and mind focused on the task at hand Ranma failed to notice both the light show and also the drain on his own body that quickly started to sap his energy.
John watched in shock as the light that covered Ranma's hands extended out and over the wound in Todd's side. The bleeding slowed and eventually came to a halt as the glow started to get weaker and John finally took notice of Ranma's state. Where only moments before he had looked vibrant and full of life, now he was pallid and sickly.
Ranma seemed on the verge of collapse and was beginning to wobble where he knelt until John put a steadying hand onto his shoulder. Ranma looked up at him with a weak smile, his eyes communicating what needed to be done. John searched Ranma's face for an idea on what he had just done, finding nothing but promising himself to find out later he set about making litters for the pair.
It was only a short while later when the children were all making their slow way through the forest towards the extraction point that was marked on the map. John hovered around the middle of the group, keen to keep a close eye on the condition of both Ranma and Todd. While their complexions both got a little healthier and the certainly didn't get worse, the pair still looked frighteningly unwell and John was afraid for his friends lives.
After several hours of solid marching and the imminent onset of night word finally come from the scouts of a clearing several kilometers ahead with a pelican drop-ship. All was not as it should have been though, according to the scouts the men around the Pelican were not in standard issue UNSC combat fatigues that all the ground troops wore. The pelican was unmarked and the one scout with an IFF tracker pad couldn't pick up anything from the implanted IFF chips that all UNSC troops have in their neural implants.
John decided to take a probing action to find out if the men were friendly or not. It would mean using Ranma and Todd as bait but they would understand. His plan was simple, first a rabbit would draw the attention of the men with either Ranma or todd on their back and then pull them deeper into the woods to be ambushed by a group of children. Shortly after another group would pull another away, hopefully dropping the numbers a bit.
After quickly outlining his plan to the group they split into two units to carry out the distraction. John stayed in the same unit as Ranma and Kelly, placing Sam and Fhajad into the leadership roles of the second unit.
Kelly had the job of being the Rabbit for their unit and Linda would play spotter to see how the men reacted to the presence of not only a child but a pair of wounded ones also. John bent down and picked up a rock the size of his fist from the forest floor. Hefting its weight he looked around at the near 30 other children still with him. Several others had followed his example and picked up sticks and other various blunt objects. Another group and scaled up several feet into surrounding tree's to get a jump onto the target.
It was only a short time later that the sound of breaking bush announced Kelly's return.
She came out of the brush at a speed that defied logic, especially with another person on their back. Shortly followed by a panting man dressed in a pair of faded jeans and a thick jacket. He stopped and looked around the small group of children, not seeing the hidden recruits, and smiled.
"Well, well I expect two and I get four times that, come on kids I have hot cocoa back at the ship." While the man talked his hand moved slowly towards a stun baton resting at his waist.
When the mans hand started to close around the batons handle, John struck. With a lightning quick throw the stone left his hand and impacted the man on the elbow of the arm reaching for his baton, disabling it with a sharp crack of bone. The man let out a cry of pain and spun towards John but managed no more than a step before the hidden recruits dropped him in a flurry of small bodies and limbs.
John smiled at the sight then smiled further as Linda ghosted into sight long enough to give a thumbs up and a quick signal for five men approaching their position. Quickly regaining order over the children he passed on the situation and got them back into position, this time taking a hidden spot also.
The men walked into the clearing to find their comrade in arms unconscious on the forest floor. The men were instantly put onto alert by the sight but like the man before them were unable to get their stun batons clear before rocks flew and disabled their arms. They went down shortly after. Thirty to five are not odds stacked in the marines favor.
The marines went down quickly and soon all that could be heard was the excited breathing of the children. Slowly the rush of taking down their opponents wore off and the children went about securing the marines and getting everything ready to take back to the drop-ship. It wasn't long before everything was ready and the cadets were again on the move, this time feeling less cautious about their situation but still maintaining the calm discipline they knew they would need to see this game through to the end.
"Come on lets go see how the team did." Kelly whispered to John as they walked.
"Not us Kelly, we have to stay with the team," John whistled sharply and Linda ghosted out of the bushes a few paces away, "go see what's waiting for us at the clearing, try to find out what Sam and Fhajad have done." Linda nodded and disappeared into the bush again.
"It's still freaky how she does that." Kelly commented under her breath.
"But useful." John shot back in defense.
Kelly could do nothing but nod her head at that, they had been saved more than once by Linda forewarning them of a danger ahead that only she could get close enough to in order to recognize. She may not talk much but she was one of the biggest assets the squad possessed. John bought the team to a halt in order to wait for news from Linda before moving on. The didn't have to wait long.
"All the men have been taken care of, it seems there were only a dozen in total, some cadets in the other team were tagged by stun rounds before they could neutralize the threat." Linda reported after giving John a crisp salute.
John nodded at the information, his jaw tightening slightly at the news of losses. He took stock of what their team had done different to the other in order to have sustained no loss and figured it to be a matter of a rabbit. He would have to speak with Fhajad and Sam later.
"Come on lets move, keep you guard up until we hit the ground at base, this isn't a holiday, its one of the CPO's games and nothing is ever quite what it seems in a game." John spoke loudly but only loud enough for his voice to carry over the whole group. He was answered by a chorus of 'Yes sir!' from the others before they began to march out of the forest and into the clearing beyond.
Waiting for them at the ship was the other team of cadets, Sam waved him over from the top of the loading ramp on the Pelican. John tapped Kelly on the arm and tilted his head in Sam's direction. She nodded in response, understanding that he wanted her to handle the team without him, leaving him free to jog over and speak with his friend.
"So we have this bird but none of us can fly, any ideas?" Sam asked as soon as John took a step onto the ramp.
"I have one." He replied with a grin to match Ranma's.
Making his way up to the cockpit of the aircraft he quickly found the COM unit amongst all the other instruments and patched himself through to Deja. Her face appeared as a scratchy hologram above the unit.
"Good evening, Trainee 117, do you have a homework question?" She asked.
"Kind of Deja, we are playing one CPO Mendez's Games." He replied.
"Ah." she paused for a moment. "Very well."
"Im in a Pelican drop-ship and we have no pilot, but we need to get home. Can you teach me how to fly please?"
Deja's head shook in the negative "You are not rated to fly that craft Trainee. But I can help you. Do you see the winged icon in the corner of the flight screen? Tap it three times."
John tapped the button. The screen promptly filled with a myriad of icons and displays.
"Touch the green arrows at nine o'clock twice," she told him.
He did so and the words 'autopilot activated' flashed on the screen.
"I have control now," Deja told him "I will get you home."
"Hold on a second." John dashed outside quickly. "Everyone onboard – double time!"
The children started streaming onto the ship.
Kelly stopped next to him at the foot of the ramp, "Who's getting lefts behind?"
"No one," John replied tersely "just get on board." Making sure he was the last one on John made his was back up the the cockpit. "Ok Deja get us home, I should advise that we have one wounded by boar tusk, one fatigued and several WIA in our number, if we can have the appropriate response teams ready for our return that would be good."
"Thank you for the advisory Trainee 117, I will have medics standing by ready to receive the other trainee's."
"Thanks Deja." John muttered, the last thing he heard before drifting to sleep in the pilots chair was the roar of the Pelicans jets lifting them into the air.
John and Ranma both stood to attention in Chief Petty Officer Mendez's office. Neither had been there before, none of the cadets had. They both radiated an aura of unease about them but Ranma hid it the best out of the pair, the only give away to his nerves being a slight tremble in his eye. Where John had sweat trickling down the side of his head.
The CPO glowered at them both over the top of the report on his clipboard.
The door opened and without announcement or permission Dr. Halsey walked into the room.
"Hello Ranma, hello John." She greeted them each in turn with a small smile, she sat gracefully in one of the chairs to the side of the room so she could see them but Mendez also.
"Dr. Halsey." they both replied without hesitation and with a crisp salute. Neither questioned why she called them by their first names when no other grown ups did.
"Trainee 012, I would like to know why you almost killed yourself using a technique you had never used before and had no idea what its effects may have been." Mendez stated without preamble once the Dr was seated.
"Sir, I either used the technique with the hope that it would work and trust in my skills or watch a comrade in arms bleed to death, sir." Ranma replied.
John saw the Dr making some notes on a portable terminal out of the corner of his eye but his attention was soon held entirely by Mendez when he received the next question.
"Trainee 117, I would like to know why you stole UNSC property and incapacitated the team I had assigned to guard it."
Under Mendez's stare John wanted to crumble and start apologizing for his actions. Promise to do anything to make it up to them. But John and Ranma both knew the Chief hated whiners, almost as much as he hated excuses.
"Sir, the guards were out of uniform, had no IFF tag we could pick up. They failed to identify themselves, sir!"
"Hmmm, so it would seem," Mendez said slowly, "and the ship?"
"I took the squad home, sir. I was last on board if anyone should have been left -"
"I didn't ask for the passenger list, Crewman." His voice softened to a growl as he addressed Dr. Halsey. "What are we going to do with this pair?"
"Do?" She resettled her glasses further up her nose and set the portable terminal on her knee. Her Gaze pierced them both. "I think thats obvious, Chief. Make them both squad leaders."
Love it? Hate it? Found something wrong with it? Please let me know so I can fix it.
A/N: Not much to be said in the author notes this time around. This chapter is a turning point for John in the original story line, I just couldnt kick John out of squad leader totally so instead im going to split it in two. John is basically going to be Ranma's 2IC in the field but until they hit proper military ranking then they are on an even playing ground. If anyone has any ideas on how this could make things play out further in the future let me know as im writing as I post so your comments could change the flow.
Ja Ne
