Chapter Thirty-Four: Sharing Spaces

1412 Hours, March 5, 2558. UNSC Staging Camp, Near the City of Redwood Falls, Planet Khan. "The Hard Line," Outer Colonies. Day Fifteen of the Dawn of the Prometheans

I thought it'd be the smell that did me in first. In the thick, humid swamp that reeked of stale water and moldy plant parts, I was sure on the first day I'd laid my feet on the mucky, uneven soil that I was going to christen my new black combat boots with puke. I'd never been pregnant before but I figured that this was what it must feel like, to have your insides constantly swirling and your olfactory senses hideously assaulted, with every breath I took in and out. It was only when the Covenant force hit us without warning that I realized there were things much worse I could smell.

Like cauterized flesh when the Marine beside me, Corporal Ziad Hernandez, was struck with an overcharged plasma shot from somewhere between the vines. The large, glowing green orb got him right at the hip between armor plates, his clothing and belt offering little protection against something as hard-hitting as that. He let out a piercing scream in what felt like was the inside of my eardrums, and I whipped around fast, panic written all over my face and thrumming through me as a jolt of emotion, too. It was the stench that hit me before I got a good look at what had happened. Then I wanted to cry out myself.

But I couldn't. Green or no, regardless of whether I was mostly younger or the same age as the Marines in the platoon I led, I was in charge of these men and women. Any reaction I wanted to have I couldn't, at least not on the outside, so I just kept the fear and the revulsion and the queasiness to myself and said nothing.

That's when our company's captain, Josia Kefentse, ran up beside me. He was a burly South African from Earth with dark hair and dark eyes who'd been a famed rugby player before the War. He had his submachine gun in one hand and easily grabbed my uniform collar with the other, half-yanking me back.

"Lieutenant, what are you doing?"

"Sir, I - "

"You need to get these men moving! Now, Cooper! Unless you want to join the corporal on the ground!"

I glanced to my left and the nausea increased. Lying there in the brown-gray muck was Hernandez, already dead from his wounds. I swallowed and tried not to inhale. "Yes, sir!"

I rushed to get to my duties as platoon leader, even though by now I could hardly stand since my legs were shaking so bad. This was my first real-life encounter with anything ever - I'd trained, I'd watched the vids, I'd been in the simulators, but this was the big time. And so far, my batting average wasn't that great.

Gradually, though, I got a hold of my nerves gone wild and started to make a little sense out of the chaos around us. I focused on the lack of rhythm to the events, and I finally raised my rifle and fired off my first shot.

A high-pitched squeal came from the twisted flora in front of us. Not bad.

Growing confident from the kill and settling into a state of deep concentration, I turned back to the rest of my platoon and shouted, "Fire back, Marines! Fire back! Watch for movement between the vines! Watch for ripples in the water! You'll see those alien bastards coming and you nail 'em!"

Slowly we put up a blanket of lead between us and the enemy - just the Covenant, as I knew them back then. I was hardly even aware of their names as each separate species. All I knew was that they were aliens who wanted to kill us, who'd killed my dad and Willis's baby brother, and so I wanted them dead, too.

Things didn't end up working out that way, though. The more we pushed forward, the more the Covies pushed back. It didn't take longer than five minutes for our lines to finally mix, and that's when things really got crazy.

On my right, as I was still firing my rifle at the Covenant up ahead, one of the Marines in my platoon jumped up and tackled a tall and fully armored Elite. I never found out why he'd done it - likely he'd run out of ammo at an inopportune moment - but either way the force of the hit sent them both tumbling into the nearest patch of shallow, vegetation-filled water. The still body of liquid was a muddy, sickly green, but the Marine dove in like it was nothing and took the alien son of a bitch with him. As soon as I realized one of my men was in trouble, I stopped shooting and ran over to help.

By then the pair was struggling in the water, the Elite roaring in surprise and the Marine sergeant trying to get his head above the surface since the bottom gave way so easily under his boots, making it hard to stand. While he fought to keep control, I leveled my weapon at the Elite, wanting more than anything to rattle off a quick burst and save my subordinate, but the bastard was too close. With the amount of adrenaline pumping through me, I was afraid if I let off a bullet that it might hit the sergeant rather than the intended target.

So I froze and watched, feeling utterly helpless. I watched as the Elite gripped the Marine by the throat and submerged his head under the six feet of water, crushing his trachea at the same time as it drowned him. I could feel tears pricking at the corners of my eyes but I couldn't seem to do anything, be it move, yell, or cry at what I was seeing. I just stood there, transfixed, knowing that the moment the Elite was done with him, he'd come gunning for me. That I was already dead.

Then a crack rang out through the swamp, and the Elite very suddenly fell face-first into the water with a loud, hard smack. My anxiously overloaded mind took a while to recognize it as a sniper shot - one of ours. I realized I was saved for now.

But one of my men wasn't. The thought barged into my head in the same instant, and I shouldered my gun, quickly stepping closer to the edge of the water and thrusting my hands inside to try to grab his body before it was too late.

Miraculously, I felt something brush against my fingers right away, and I pulled him up bodily from there, grunting and sweating and running off the energy I'd gotten from shear terror alone to get his upper body onto dry land. Or drier, anyway. Once I saw him, however, I sucked in a harsh breath.

The Marine who'd had his neck flattened had watery blood still pouring out of his nose and mouth. His throat looked so mangled it was hard to remember what it might've looked like before - how a normal person's neck would be - and worse than the smell that came from the swamp and his body and the dead Elite was the fact that his eyes were still open. They stared up at me, vacantly, silently shouting at me that I hadn't saved him. That I'd done nothing to save him.

And in the next moment, I found myself screaming back.

I awoke from the terrifying dream with all my senses on high alert. I inhaled sharply, nearly jumping in my seat, and felt my heart pounding hard inside my chest. And I could feel cold steel in the fingers of my right hand. It was resting on my hip holster.

A full state of consciousness came on abruptly, and I was left sitting at my husband's bedside, ten years later, on mainland Khan in the Outer Colonies - not in the dingy swampland of Coristal. My pulse still thundered through my veins. I eased off the grip on my sidearm then, willing my body to relax, but it wasn't enough to keep from waking Willis, too.

He yawned from his bed and glanced over at me sleepily, taking in the disquietude in my expression. "Cooper? You okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine," I replied, doing my best to cover up what I'd just experienced. Or rather remembered. I gently pulled my hand from his grip and smoothed it over my face. "Must've just drifted off after you did. By the way, you didn't...hear anything just now, did you?"

"No. Why?"

I waved the same hand at him. "No reason. Thought I heard something."

So I wasn't at the point where I was doing the screaming out loud yet. That was good. I checked my cheeks, too. They felt dry. So far, it seemed it was just the nightmare part that was active - along with waking up to feeling like I was about to have a second heart attack. It was bad, but it could've been a lot worse.

True to his nature, Willis gave me a more probing look as he grew more alert and raised an eyebrow at me. "Natalie? You're sure you feel okay?"

"I said yes, honey. Please don't worry about me." I sat up a little straighter in the chair, for good measure. At least my heart rate was finally returning to normal now. "How about you? How goes it with the pain?"

My husband winced and responded, "It's bearable. But I don't think I'll be...standing on my own two feet anytime soon." He glanced up at the ceiling, letting out a frustrated sigh. "It's been almost a week, Coop. I still haven't improved that much."

I leaned over to place my hand on his cheek and gave him a soft kiss, smiling a bit at his impatience. "More like it's been four days, Will. I know it seems like longer when you don't have much going on, but it really hasn't been a lot of time yet."

"But I...should be out of this damn bed by now."

I patted his arm in reassurance. "You know the doctor said it would be a while before you were mobile again. Hell, you're awake and talking without a great big effort anymore. That's more than I could've hoped for a few days back."

"Cooper - "

Whatever Willis was about to say was interrupted when he made a heaving motion, and I knew he was about to throw up. I quickly reached over beside me to grab the clean bucket the orderlies had left behind, shoved it under his chin, and let him spew. He'd done that for me a couple of times when I'd been pregnant with the baby we'd lost, so it was only fair I returned the favor now.

When he was done, I got up to go set the bucket in the far corner and squeezed the buzzer on the bed for a hospital tech. I sat back down on the chair and reached over to rub his back. His head hung low over the side of the bar on his bed, his golden brown hair a little matted with sweat from the injuries.

"I'm sorry you feel so bad, honey," I said to him. "But you know what Kiev said about the concussion - "

Willis gave a snort. "Fuck the concussion. And Doctor Kiev. And this damn bed, this hospital, my bird, all of it. I just want to get back to flying, Natalie. I hate this."

"Well, we all do, but sometimes a little rest can - "

"Can what? Fix everything? Fix this?" With effort he raised his head then to look at me. "Is that what you were about to say to me? Because I bet if the roles were reversed, and it was you lying here unable to do anything and with your career on the line, you'd bite my head off too if I said it."

I paused, taken aback at his outburst. It wasn't like him, although I knew that news of his small likelihood of ever flying again had hit him pretty hard. This time I released a sigh. "Will, I know this isn't what you want. It's not what I would, either. But I hope you already knew that you and I, us, we're defined by other things besides the job we do."

"Yeah? Like what?"

"How about the fact that I love you and I'm grateful that you're still fucking alive, for starters," I retorted, getting angry at his attitude now. "And the fact that even if their dad never gets the chance to fly again, our kids will actually have their father present in their life?"

"I...I know that. But Natalie, without flying - "

"Without flying? What about without a pulse? Because that's what I thought you'd be just four short days ago before they told me you'd woken up." I stopped again for a moment to rein in my emotions; my throat was closing up and I had to swallow before going on. "You just haven't given it enough time, Will. You're getting better, even if your stubborn ass can't see it. I know it's hard, but don't let it all go."

Willis didn't get a chance to reply then since the orderly came in to take away the puke bucket and replace it with a new one. After that I didn't have much time to reflect on my dream, or my husband's battle with himself. My datapad rang and it all got put on the backburner.

"Hello? This is Lieutenant Colonel Cooper," I answered.

"Colonel, this is Doctor Leedom on Qamar. We've...had a situation develop. We'd like to get you back to the island as soon as possible."

I glanced over at Willis suffering in his bed and my heart ached. "What's going on?"

"Do you remember me mentioning to you when you came down to survey the chamber that we'd found an additional passage? That we wanted to look into where it led, but didn't have the time because of the portals?"

"Yes."

There was a pause. "Well, we finally got the chance to follow it along its length today, Cooper. It leads to another portal - a third active one we didn't know about before now."

"And?"

"It goes to Earth."

I tried not to let what I'd learned in the conversation show on my face. Willis didn't need anything else to worry about right now, and even if he knew, there was nothing he could do at the moment to help. "I understand, ma'am. I'll be there shortly."

I cut the connection then and turned back to my husband to find him having a hell of a time trying to drink out of the cup of water the orderly had brought by. I took the cup from his hand and held the straw steady for him so he could drink. "Hey, how about asking for help sometimes?"

A corner of his lips twitched. "I could say the same to you. Who was that?"

"One of the scientists we've got down in the ruins. They found something. I'm going to have to leave once you're done."

"Guess I better keep drinking then."

That made a smile break out on my face despite how irritated I'd been with him earlier. I took his hand and squeezed. "Just stop being so down on yourself and think of everything you've overcome already. You're doing good, Will. Time will do the rest."

Willis's best friend was once again the pilot who shuttled me back to the island. I was sitting in the troop bay in full gear with my helmet on, DMR in my lap with my head in my hands as I thought about what Leedom had just told me. Captain Heat's voice cut into my thoughts.

"Natalie? How's he doing?"

I glanced up toward the intercom and sat up straighter, though I knew he could see me from the monitors in the cockpit. "Physically he's improving. He's in pain and having a rough time with the bad concussion, but he's getting better. Mentally though, all this talk of never flying again is taking its toll. He's mostly just very grouchy lately."

I heard him heave a sigh. "I'm sorry," he said quietly.

"Yeah. Me too. But I see him growing stronger every day, so that gives me hope that he'll come out of his funk soon, too." Then I shook my head. "You know what I think would really help him out?"

"What?"

"A visit from his buddy sometimes, instead of just his wife."

"I know, Cooper. I want to see him, but I guess I've just...been waiting for a good time. And to be honest, I don't really know what to say." He swallowed. "How do I tell him that I'm the one who put him into this mess?"

"Same way you told me, Heat." I planted my hands on my rifle then, gripping the cool metal at the barrel and stock. "Don't expect him to take it well at first, especially with the mood he's been in. But he needs his friend, Brandon. I think even if he doesn't show it right away, he'll appreciate you going to see him."

"I uh, I suppose I could do that."

"Good. Then I'll expect you to go visit the next time we're out there."

When we finally landed on Qamar, I was surprised to hear that the sounds of the fighting were fiercer and louder than when I'd left. I worried that something had happened since my departure for the mainland, but when I radioed my battalion commanders, all I heard back was that the Storm were being more aggressive than usual. Other than that, there was still no sign of more Prometheans yet, and the Remnant ship in orbit hadn't made any moves. I found it all curious, but for now, I decided to let my Marines handle it while I went back down to the ruins with my security detail to see what it was that Doctor Leedom wanted to show me.

"So I hear we've got another portal in this place," I said to her once we met up. "And it leads right where we don't want it to go. Where is it?"

The lead scientist pointed to my six. "Behind the stairs, Colonel. I'll take you to it. The entrance is a little hard to find, but I'm sure we can - "

The earth suddenly quaking beneath our feet stopped whatever she'd been about to say mid-sentence. I tensed up immediately, shooting a look at the rest of the Marines down here, and held my DMR tight in my hands. "Status!" I yelled.

"We're all green across the board, ma'am!" one of the men shouted back. "Must be something up top!"

I exchanged a glance with Staff Sergeant Porter, who'd led my team down here. "Wonderful. Josh, let's get topside. Now."