Sorry for the delay, school has been hectic so far. Work on LiH has been slow, but I'm getting there. Comments! Reviews! Suggestions! All are welcome as long as you're nice about it!
As Hal and Orion entered the darkened room, Hal picked up on a few things right away. One, It was way too quite. There should have been machinery running, or the hum of electrical wires running through the walls. Two, because of the complete silence, he could here hushed breathing and barely audible giggles coming from a few sections of the room. He couldn't make out any details of the room yet for the complete blackness engulfing the spaces.
Orion closed the door behind them, his green eye ports giving of a soft emerald glow which illuminated his mask. Hal fell into a crouch, hearing unnatural swishes of air float through the room.
Something's not right here… Hal thought to himself. He felt something deep inside shifting, and his vision sharpened and the darkness cleared as if a light had been switched on. Something else shifted as well, some hunting fight or flight instinct going into overdrive, simultaneously adapting Hal's body for optimum combat and evasion situations. Hal viewed this by not viewing it, as his hands, legs and body disappeared. This could be useful. Hal thought to himself, grinning slightly under his helmet.
"Hey, Emma!? Jana said you wanted to talk to me?" Orion called out, the emerald glow of his eye ports swinging back and forth as he walked forward into the room. Hal grabbed Orion's shoulder.
"Hold up. There's something here." Hal whispered, stalking forward silently around Orion, who was now looking around in confusion.
"What? Where?" He asked, flicking out his needle and a crouching. A small movement caught Hal's eye and he whipped his head towards it. Two yellow eyes gleamed in the light from Orion's helm, which flickered and jumped and Orion looked around. Hal strode slowly over to the Little Sister, keeping alert to other movement around him. As he got closer, he saw the Little Sister was playing with wooden blocks, with letters adorning the sides. They clacked and clicked as she placed them on top of each other and side by side.
"Hal, where are you?" Orion asked, lightly stepping forward. Hal ignored Orion and kneeled down in front of the Little Sister, who placed a final block and turned to look straight at the hidden Hal. His blood froze, staring into the blazing yellow eyes of the Little Sister. The Sister pointed slowly at the blocks, drawing Hal's gaze with her diminutive hand.
HELLO HALCYON MY NAME IS LYRII
Hal looked slowly back to Lyrii, the Little Sister, in disbelief. She reached over and grabbed her extraction needle, which compacted down into the handle, with the extraction bottle sliding into the handle and the needle sliding into that. She slung it over her shoulder using a dirty piece of knotted, blood stained cloth. It was presumably taken from the corpse of a Splicer, killed by her Big Daddy or Sister protector. Lyrii stood up, stumbling a bit. Hal instinctively reached a hand out to steady the little girl, softly putting a heavily armored hand on her tiny shoulder to stop her swaying.
"Thanks Big Brother!" She exclaimed, clasping Hal's hand. It looked massive in comparison to her own hand. Hal grabbed a hold and helped her climb onto his shoulder, letting the Natural Camouflage drop. Suddenly the lights flicked on, illuminating the room with harsh white light. Hal spun around suddenly, causing Lyrii to slip off his shoulder with a squeak. He caught her with his right and flicked out the blade on his left, slashing at the person behind him while pulling Lyrii in close to his body.
The blade sparked and skidded along an incoming three foot long needle, deflecting it wide to the side and throwing its wielder off balance. The second slash from Hal's blade sliced through the metal brace on one leg of his assailant. A third cut through the brace on the other leg. The fourth and fifth destroyed the needle apparatus on the right arm and a sixth traced a line through the circular port on the spherical helm facing him. This all took place within a few seconds. Shards of needle and glass clinked and clicked as they hit the floor. Lyrii tapped on Hal's breastplate.
"Why are you and Sister fighting? Did I do something wrong?" Lyrii asked, worry crossing her face. Hal inspected the enemy in front of him. It was a Big Sister, complete with harpoon and the distinctive sphere-shaped helmet, which now had a diagonal line through the view port, cracking the glass. There was also a bright silver line above the port. As Hal watched, the glass cracked a bit more and started to fall out, revealing a set of glinting eyes, the color of a certain stone he had remembered seeing in posters of the rich and wealthy wearing, before the Big Sister jumped away and leaped into a vent in the ceiling.
More Big Sisters dropped out of the ceiling from varying vents, completely surrounding Hal and Orion. Hal's eyes blazed red as he reached up and slid Lyrii into the cage on his back, securing the latches tightly. About forty or so needles slid out and various plasmids flickered and sparked to life. Hal unsheathed his twin needles and electricity arced between them as a crackling sheath of lightning covered the blade on his other arm. He roared shook the room, causing the Big Sisters to winch slightly.
"I'll take you all on if I have to!" He roared at the crowd, crouching low and preparing to attack.
"Hal! Stop!" Orion yelled across the room, struggling to look through the crowd. He gave up and started to push his way through the crowd towards Hal, but the Big Sisters held him back. One Sister stepped forward. She looked a bit different than the others, in that her suit was much more worn out and older than the others. Her needle didn't retract and the design of her helmet and suit were a bit different than the others around her.
"Orion, you and I will talk later about Adonis." The Big Sister, presumably Emma, called back to him. She turned back to Hal. "As to you, Brother, I must request you put Lyrii down." Hal stared straight at her.
"No." He responded shortly, already examining Emma for weaknesses, flaws, weak points in armor and for openings to attack. Emma readied a ball of flame and her needle.
"Stop fighting!"Lyrii exclaimed, undoing the latches on the cage and crawling onto Hal's shoulder. She jumped to the ground, stumbling again. The blade slid back as fast as the lighting covering it and Hal placed a steadying hand on her shoulder. Lyrii looked back and smiled, then strode forward and looked up at Emma. "Please?" She asked, yellow eyes wide. Emma looked down at her, then her shoulders slumped and the fire dissipated.
"Fine, but you and I," Emma said, pointing at Hal, "are going to have a long chat, understand? And that isn't a suggestion either."