SIX; COME TO BLOWS

Hayd was going easy on her again.

And worse was the fact that he was beating her. Addison pushed an irritated hiss through her teeth, then drank another few mouthfuls of the water and electrolyte powder mix she'd made up. After the first round, Hayd was ahead. That was normal. He tended to restrain himself more with each round. But he had won that round by five points, and Addie could feel the bruises blossoming across her face. There were more on her shoulders and arms, but Haydn had mercifully avoided her chest. There wasn't a lot that hurt more than copping a fist to the tit.

The differences didn't stop there. Addie was blowing hard, despite the fact that she was a professional cage fighter now. Hayd was on a chair, taking up as much room as he physically could, and breathing so deeply and slowly that he could have been asleep. She knew he was a Spartan now, but Addie hadn't thought the physical enhancements would have been quite that extensive.

"He's good," the other Spartan said – the one who refused, or wasn't allowed, to tell her his name.

"He's holding back," Addie puffed, draining the last of the bottle of sports drink.

"If he wasn't, you'd be dead by now." The Master Chief's face held a bland expression, but Addie thought she saw something in his eyes. Concern, perhaps. Whether it was for his comrade or for her, she couldn't tell.

"Probably. I didn't realize you guys were so heavily augmented."

"The Fours are. Like Vance. I'm a Two. Outmoded. But I won't be outdone."

Addie let out a delighted giggle. "Does that mean you'll go a few rounds with Hayd when I'm done with him?"

"If you promise not to act like a five-year-old." The next well-controlled expression that crossed the Chief's face was a tiny frown of disapproval. "No screams. No squeals. If you so much as swear under your breath, I'll hear it."

"Got it." It was no fun acting like an adult, but Addie knew she had to grow up one of these days. She was twenty-four. "Eh, Hayd, break time's over!"

Addison got to her feet and stepped back into the ring, taking her place in her corner in time to watch Haydn vault over the ropes. Suddenly she wasn't so sure of herself.

John didn't like standing by and watching a civilian get pounded. He squashed a strong desire to intervene, knowing Vance wouldn't leave Addison with any injury that she wouldn't sustain fighting a normal human being. That was a small comfort, given that this was mixed martial arts, and people died in the ring all too often. There was a certain move, knee to the chest while pushing the person down from above, that could be quite lethal with a frighteningly small amount of force. John didn't know what that move was called, just that it was deadly.

This fight was unusual in that it was being fought in a boxing ring. Usually MMA was fought out in a cage. But this was clearly Addison's training room, and from the blood on the floor, it appeared fights were held here. Either that or training was more serious for this particular fighter than it was for most.

There was no doubt Addison was a professional. She hadn't told him as much, but John was good at picking them. That level of skill, strength and athleticism would carry someone out of the amateur ring and into the professional cage in very short order.

He watched as young Spartan and equally young civilian traded blows. Addison managed a lucky hit and bloodied Vance's nose, but he didn't seem to notice, responding with a swift jab to her kidney which made her double over for a moment. John quickly realized how much restraint his comrade was showing, and it was only a couple more moments before he noticed that as the fight continued, Vance held back more and more.

"This is an interesting fight," Halsey commented.

John just grunted, still fighting the urge to intervene.

"Vance really isn't comfortable hitting her, but despite that, he's one round up, and leading in this one. And it's not like Addison's a beginner. She's good."

"A beginner wouldn't have been able to bloody a Spartan's nose. No matter how much that Spartan was holding back." John stopped watching the fight, instead choosing the more comfortable sight of Halsey's face.

"Exactly. Relax, this round will be over shortl-" Halsey broke off, wincing, and an instant later the sound of two people hitting the floor hard had John's expression mirroring the Doctor's. That wouldn't hurt much for a Spartan, but Addison was going to feel it in the morning. If she wasn't feeling it already.

"They're both fine," Halsey said. "Vance has just taken the fight to the floor. He was a third dan black belt at judo before he enlisted. Now he's seventh dan. He's equally competent in four different upright martial arts, he's just more comfortable with the grappling side of things."

"I won't tap out," Addison grunted. John turned his attention back to the fight. Vance had Addison in an impossible position. John doubted even he, in all his years of experience, would be able to get out of a bind like that.

Addie got an arm free and elbowed Haydn in the solar plexus with all her strength. Hayd grunted and his grip loosened, and Addie wriggled free, scrambled to her feet, and danced away across the ring. On the floor, Haydn had the advantage. He was a lot taller than her, which gave him leverage, and easily three times her weight. It was her agility that Addie found to be her greatest advantage, and upright, she could use that to its fullest.

But Hayd had gotten faster. Addie swore and tried to dodge but he was up in a heartbeat and crossed the ring in less time than it took her to see that he was moving.

"Well damn," the Master Chief muttered. Addison couldn't pay him enough attention to figure out who had surprised him, because she was too busy trying to keep Hayd from getting the leverage to force her to the ground again.

She'd lost this fight. Hayd was up too many points now for her to ever come back. But damn it, she wasn't going to let him make her tap out. But before she could think, he got one hand on her elbow and the other in her armpit, and the world tipped on its axis. Hayd slammed her to the floor and then came down next to her, trapping her legs with one of his. Before she could get free he put her in a headlock with one arm and trapped both her elbows with the other.

"Tap out," he whispered in her ear.

"Never," Addie growled. She only had to survive another thirty seconds.

Thirty seconds? In this position? Who was she kidding? She'd seen people killed because they were too damned stubborn to tap out. Hayd's arm cut off her airway with a very specific amount of force that she suspected was the least he was capable of applying. He wasn't going to push the point any farther. Addie knew he wasn't going to risk breaking her neck.

But thirty seconds was an awfully long time when you were being slowly, carefully strangled.

She tapped out, and Haydn instantly released her and got to his feet. Then, typical Hayd, he offered her his hand to help her up.

"Fuck you," she said jokingly, getting up on her own steam. Ouch. Had he left any of her muscles be? She was sore all over, and it was going to be so much worse in the morning.

"Well, if you insist," Hayd said, grinning like an idiot because he was trying so hard not to laugh.

"You are so immature."

"Look who's talking!"

Addie shook her head and laughed. "Well, Master Chief, if you go a few rounds with Hayd, I'mma stick around and watch. Otherwise, I'll take my parts shipment and see what I can get done without the actuators I need to finish that tunnel crawler."

"Best of five," John growled, looking forward to the challenge despite himself. "No rules."

"You're on!" Vance vaulted out of the ring, still barely blowing, and threw his untouched bottle of sports drink to Addie. Then he jumped back over the ropes and took his place in his corner.

-LATER-

John finally felt himself relax as he watched Vance's subtle post-fight celebration. The young Spartan was flat on his back, blowing hard, face wearing an exultant but exhausted smile. It had taken all five rounds to determine a winner and it was more than fair, John thought, that Vance be proud of himself for that win.

Periodically, clanging and swearing drifted up through the floor – beneath which Addison was in the garage working on the tunnel crawler – and Halsey was in the living room watching, and making the occasional grumpy comment on, the local news bulletin. John and Vance were still in the training room. John was there more because he had nowhere better to be than for any sentimentality.

Cortana, he thought, turning his attention inwards, I know you're in here somewhere.

There was no response. John hadn't expected one. Halsey had said he needed to awaken the part of Cortana that was in his neural lace before she could be rebuilt, but had neglected to tell him how to do that. He assumed he had to find the AI first, but that was easier said than done. He didn't know what to look for. He knew Cortana as the cool, liquid presence in his mind, and the voice in his ear. He knew her as a thinker – an over-thinker at times – and he knew her as his friend.

No, friend is the wrong word, he told himself. But if not my friend, then… what?

The answer didn't come to him immediately, and he didn't agonize over it. Instead, he went searching through his brain for anything that might give him the answer as to how to awaken Cortana. That was the most important question on his mind.

Cortana? Wake up. I miss you.

It was the first time he'd let himself think the words since she'd sacrificed herself to save his life. But there was still no response. No liquid presence in his mind, nothing.

John sighed and left the training room, making his way back to the living room. He needed to talk to Halsey.

"You said I had to awaken her," he said, offering no other explanation when the Doctor stood and faced him with a confused expression on her face.

"Hmm?"

"Cortana. You said I had to awaken the part of her in my neural lace before you could rebuild her. But you didn't tell me how to do it."

Halsey blinked a few times, and then her expression resolved into one of understanding. "Right. That. Obviously you have to find her first. I can help with that part. But I'm afraid I can't help you wake her. Think I haven't tried already, as many ways as I can think of? Now… last time you lost her. Remember that?"

"I had to leave her with the Gravemind… but I had her chip."

"Which was destroyed this time. Yes. But you have your neural lace. Nobody can take that from you. I have a spare memory crystal large enough to hold Cortana and all her knowledge… and give her room to expand. That will become yours when you awaken her."

"Finding her is the first step," John said, more to remind himself than to remind Halsey.

"And that's what I'm trying to help you do. When you left her with the Gravemind, part of her stayed with you. I've seen the footage your helmet recorded. The times she spoke to you, the times she interrupted your HUD. I take it she's been more passive this time, but you'll find her. Remember how it felt when she spoke to you. Separate what is Cortana from what was the Gravemind, and search yourself for the sensation that is Cortana."

John sat down on the floor and cast his mind inwards, remembering what he had thought were hallucinations at the time. He remembered the fear that he was slowly going crazy, and wondered if that was how Cortana had felt when she had realized what was going on…

"Focus, John!"

"Sorry," he grunted, pulling his mind back to the events of New Mombasa and later, the Ark. When High Charity had arrived, and infected Earth with the Flood… when Cortana's almost-presence in his mind had been at its strongest, right before he'd rescued her. It was incredibly difficult to identify where Cortana ended and the Gravemind began but he examined the feeling closely and finally he found the line.

Latching onto the memory to give him a compass, John found a dim presence in the back of his mind that felt similar. It wasn't the same, but it was… it was her. He found himself caught off-guard by a kind of fierce joy that reminded him just how human he really was.

"I found her," he said, not caring that he wasn't at all in control of his voice, his face, or his body language.

"I haven't seen you smile like that since you were six," Halsey told him. "You should smile more often."

John chuckled, and was amazed at how natural it sounded. "Maybe I will. I still have to wake her, though."

As suddenly as it had surfaced, his joy faded, and was replaced with grim determination. And, inexplicably, a sense of loss. John didn't understand the feeling, so he ignored it, instead concentrating on the task at hand.

"Let yourself be human, John. Stop making a distinction between yourself and a Marine, or a civilian. Human is human, no matter the differences in your body, training and upbringing… you were born human. Nobody can take that from you but you." Cortana had said something along those lines to him once, but she had worded it differently. Even so, the words he heard in his mind were 'spoken' with her voice.

Her presence was still dim. She felt like she was asleep. Suddenly he knew why. She couldn't properly wake up, because he was still shying away from his grief. And there was a lot of it. Kelly, Linda and Fred were the only other Spartans of his generation left. The rest were missing, or dead. And Halsey wasn't even sure where Fred was… the Doctor was going on John's conviction that his 'brother' was alive somewhere. The same conviction that told him that Grey Team was out there somewhere, frozen but alive.

Inexplicable, sure, but when was his gut feeling ever wrong?

Let yourself be human. But that was much easier said than done.

AN: finally! A long way behind schedule but we have a new chapter up. A lot happens and not much happens, if that makes any sense at all.

As always please review, let me know what you think, how it's going, etc.

Love you guys!

Halo and canon characters aren't mine. OC's, original concepts, story and plotline are.