Six climbed out of a large spike pit and covered it with a several twigs and then placed branches full of leaves on it before covering it with a light amount of dirt. He walked towards the north a bit and dug a small hole, about the size of his fist and placed an explosive loaded with poisonous shrapnel. Just in case they got away, they'd perish shortly after. None of them were going to leave here alive.
The trees that surrounded him swayed in the wind and the breeze blew his cloak a bit. It was almost peaceful with how the afternoon sun peeked through the leaves and the birds chirped above, flying branch to branch. Some looked at him briefly before flying off shortly after while others went into their nests. His weight left footprints in the soft soil below and he hummed lowly as he strolled through the wild.
Auspicious floated next to him, scanning a few plants and he stopped momentarily when she did. After a few seconds, she would return next to his shoulder and would gaze around the area, simply enjoying the peace and quiet the wilderness offered. Through careful planning and gathering the necessary information, he had come up with a plan to get rid of the heat off his back.
"There's a chance that this could go wrong." She said and glanced at him.
"Not all of my plans are ever foolproof, but this should get rid of any opposition trailing us or would target the settlement." He answered and stepped up to another trap. It was a simple snare trap, but the angle he had set a spider hole would allow him to kill the victim with a simple shot to the head.
After staying with Maaya and the children for a while, he felt a bit calmer and noticeably less bloodthirsty. He came to the realization that he was indulging in his more violent tendencies. Every brutal kill he made made him feel a small sense of sick satisfaction he had been repressing since his childhood. The urge to maim or mutilate just like the Covenant had done to his parents.
It was like a sick drug that wriggled in his veins. To hear every snapping of bone, tearing of flesh, and terrified scream of his victims made him feel a rush of adrenaline. Killing Ozpin made him realize how far down the rabbit hole he had actually gone, and he needed to get his act together. He needed to go back to his roots and be efficient as possible.
He was trained to be aggressive, not reckless. The latter always ended up creating more problems for him down the road.
"Thinking as usual?" She asked.
"I am." He nodded and continued to walk down a small dirt path. Killing the bounty hunters was his main objective right now, killing Hazel Rainart was the next, and obtaining the item was the final one. It would be a difficult task, but he was used to these kinds of things. Doing difficult tasks was always rewarding when he completed them.
"After we acquire the relic, it's in our best interests to keep our presence on the low for a while." She advised.
"I've been doing that for the past few months." He replied.
"There's going to be a lot of attention towards us." She said.
"I know, but the sooner Salem and her allies are dealt with, the sooner the world will be free of an annoying parasite." He responded and checked another trap. Enough heat had died down in order for him to finish getting rid of whoever wanted to claim the bounty. Once they were dead and he had the Monitor get into the systems to forward the lien to a secure and secret account.
He'd withdraw the money and start distributing it to various settlements to increase their chances of survival. It was the least he could do with the amount of destruction he's been causing since he's arrived on this Installation. A chance for them to rebuild from the ashes and live to the best of their abilities.
"What do you intend to do after dealing with Salem?" She asked.
"Leave this place. That's if it's possible." He answered without missing a beat.
"The people will miss you." She said.
"They'll miss the illusion that I'll be there to save them. I'm not their savior though. When it comes down to it, it's them who usually save themselves. I merely get rid of the problems that everybody has been ignoring." He explained and knelt down to another trap. He carefully put the pressure plate on it and backed up, observing the area around before departing.
It was a simple grenade trap that would kill its victim quickly, possibly ending their suffering before it even began. His mind went back to the previous victims; their screams and pleas as he ruthlessly cut them down. He didn't feel any remorse for ending their lives, but he did seem to allow himself to bask in the fact that he prolonged their suffering.
"Like it or not, you are their savior. You're the one who inspires them to do better and step up when they realize you're not coming this time." She said.
"..." He just let the comment wash over his shoulders like water and ignored it. The last thing he needed was for him to consider himself anything else besides what he was. A majority of the time, he was an individual that completed the mission no matter the cost. Nothing more than a weapon and a killer.
The tens of thousands of lives he's taken, both human and Covenant combined, it was enough to fill a lake of blood. He could almost picture the stench of it all wiggling into his nostrils. Now, he was about to cause a dozen or so more individuals to be sent to an early grave. All because of human greed, something that's been in humanity's genes since the dawn of it all.
He stopped when he got to a small clearing and sat down at the campfire after making sure all the traps were set. The smoke rose in the air and could be seen from miles away. A slab of meat was cooked in the flames for a while. The butcher had seasoned the meat well and had given Six the first cut of it. He had a hard time deciding what he enjoyed eating more, elk or boar.
His thoughts went back to the children, having a hard time what he should be calling them. They looked up to him like a father figure, even though he wasn't their biological father. It made him feel strange to be honest and now that he was sitting down and thinking about it, he didn't know how to feel. Should he feel joy or indifference? He didn't know anymore, things were changing now and never in his life did he think he'd be in this position.
"Hmm." He rumbled lowly as he continued to think. One day he'd figure it all out, maybe it was the day he was able to contact the UNSC or the day when he imprisoned Salem, or even the day he was finally able to pass away.
The day started to slip by and before he knew it, it was evening and the sun started to set a bit. Shadows started to cover certain spots in the wilderness and he could faintly hear the sound of a few Bullheads approaching in the distance. He quietly sighed and stood up before stretching a bit and extinguishing the fire, pouring some water on it and putting his canteen in the bag.
"There's two dozen heavily armed individuals coming from the South." She informed him.
"..." He nodded and started to walk away from the campsite, purposefully leaving footprints in the ground towards one of the traps. His large body disappeared into the brush and he found the spot he had scouted earlier. It was a little lip in the side of a cliff near a waterfall and he carefully climbed up to it, doing his best not to lose his footing and plummet to the bottom.
Once he was on it, he slowly slid back towards the waterfall and disappeared into a small cave behind it. His cloak got soaked almost immediately but he didn't pay it any attention. All he did was simply set his bag and cloak down before waiting patiently until he heard the first explosion or trap set off. By now, the sky darkened considerably and the inky black clouded the area.
It was another reason he always requested his armor to be painted black. Half the time he operated at night and anything that made him stick out like a sore thumb was unnecessary. He didn't care if it was considered dishonorable to strike at night and stab the enemy in the back, fights were rarely ever fair.
Whatever got the job done was alright in his book.
He watched a small group split off from the others, carefully looking around and aiming at the smallest sound. They were trained, experienced, and well armed. Each one wore heavy armor and he could hear their breathing through their masks. Not a single one of them felt fear and he could tell they were different from the rest of the hunters in the past.
A frog croaked next to him in the water as he slowly slid up from the waves, up until his head was barely out of the water. One of them started to approach his first trap and they stepped on the pressure plate. The snare wrapped around their leg and they were suddenly hoisted upside down and suspended into the air. They barely had time to react before he raised his DMR and fired once.
The suppressor still could be heard, but canceled out a majority of the noise. He watched their head jerk back as they swayed back and forth from the rope before being cut down. It was caught before it made a sound and he lowered it slowly, having the Monitor disintegrate it before he quietly crept through the brush. The leaves barely made a noise as he crawled through them, he only stopped when one of them approached him.
His suit made an almost silent warbled noise as the active camo turned on. He stood up and made a small noise, but it was enough for the hunter to hear and they quickly turned around, firing into him a few times. A small grunt escaped his lips as his suit flared up and he gripped their weapon, directing it upwards as they kept their finger on the trigger.
Several rounds echoed across the night sky and he wretched the rifle from their hands before swinging it at the side of their head. A sickening crack was heard from their helmet and their head jerked to the side. Their body collapsed onto the ground and he quickly looked behind him to see flashlights further down from his current position. His form was concealed once again and he disappeared from the spot.
He hid in one of the spider holes he made and watched as one of them started to walk into another trap. They stepped on a small flat and he waited to faintly hear the sound of the round being forced down onto the nail. Once the primer was ignited, the round was fired and went through the bounty hunter's foot. Blood and splinters of bone shot up and the man screamed loudly.
The others looked back at him and quickly went up to him, tending to his foot. Six sprang up from his position and fired three times, killing the two that were tending to the injured hunter and the injured hunter himself. Their bodies collapsed onto the ground and he walked by their corpses, pulling out the Boltshot and disintegrating them on his way to the next location.
Twenty more remained, and he eventually found them after stalking the forest for several minutes. He climbed up into one of the trees and waited patiently on a large limb, watching as two of the hunters carefully looked around. They managed to avoid one of his traps that he set up, diving back as the spiked log swung towards them. It was fortunate for them that they avoided the trap, but all it did was put them closer to the tree he was currently perched up in.
The ground behind them shook as he landed and quickly slashed the throat to the one on his left. Blood leaked and they held their throat and he blocked the second one's attack. He raised their right arm and stabbed in between their ribs twice with his combat knife, slamming his forearm against their throat and pinning them to a tree until they bled out. Once they were dead, he let them slide down and disintegrated their bodies.
Eighteen remained and he grunted a bit when a shotgun blast hit his chest before diving behind a fallen tree. Chunks of the tree were torn off as the automatic shotgun kept ripping them apart and he merely waited until he heard the sound of something snapping on the ground.
The hunter looked down when the snare wrapped around his ankle and he jerked his foot forward. A flexible branch swung out in front of him and the wooden spears on it slammed into his chest. The chemicals on it had eaten through his aura and managed to do their job. A scream tore from the hunter's throat and he desperately tried to free himself from the trap, only going silent when Six shot him in the skull with his shotgun.
It's loud discharge echoed across the night sky and Six was already gone from the position, going off to deal with the remaining seventeen. Diving into a nearby river and staying submerged as a group approached the riverbank. They carefully looked at the area before firing into the water near him, making him move to the side to avoid the shots.
Fish darted by him at the sudden commotion and he simply waited for them to stop firing. Once they did, several of them left shortly after and only five remained near the river. He slowly emerged with his weapon raised and fired five times, the recoil was the only thing he felt as he killed the ones near the edge. Their bodies either fell backward onto the ground of fell in the water and he climbed out. He shook the excess water off of him and his weapon before slowly continuing forward.
Crickets chirped and bats squeaked in the night sky, filling him with a small sense of ease as he stalked the bounty hunters. For the next half an hour, he looked for the remaining and spotted two of them in a spike pit, struggling to live and he fired the suppressed DMR twice, putting them out of their misery. He left the bodies shortly after that and found the ten surrounding his campsite.
"I can't reach them." One of them said.
"Try again." Another one urged.
"You think I haven't? I've been trying to contact them for the last fifteen minutes." The first one said.
"Why the hell did we even-" Another one started to say but stopped when their head jerked to the side. Blood splattered on another one and they quickly tried to wipe it off, but their head jerked back as well. The remaining eight fired into the spot Six was at and he quickly left the area, diving behind a tree as the fired and winced a bit when they immediately spotted him and fired into the tree.
He peeked around the tree and fired the Boltshot, hitting one of them in the neck and they dropped with a smoking hole in their corpse. A grenade was thrown at him and he dove out the way before it exploded shortly after. It took his shields down and the alarm blared loudly, before he felt a bit of the force when a round skimmed the top of his helmet.
The one who managed to skim him had a knife thrown into their eye socket and they fell backwards. A splinter grenade was thrown and managed to kill two of them, leaving the last four looked at one another before nodding to one another and grabbing a vial of glowing blue liquid. They injected it into themselves and they started to groan in pain before charging at him suddenly.
One of their legs were blown off, but they continued to crawl towards him quickly and grab his foot. He just raised his other foot and stomped on their skull before raising his shotgun and firing into the other ones. Large holes were blown into their chests and they stayed on the ground before suddenly getting back up and charging at him again. He just raised his shotgun at their skulls and fired.
Their heads were ripped in half and they fell back onto the ground. As a way to prevent any of them from coming back, he disintegrated their bodies and looked around the area. It was silent and Auspicious ascended into the sky before scanning the area then descended back to him. She floated in front of him and bobbed a bit in place.
"There aren't any more hostiles in the area." She informed.
"..." He nodded and spotted a tablet on the ground, picking it up and having her unlock it. He went through the files and read each one carefully, narrowing his eyes when he saw that there were going to be at least three dozen more on the way in the morning. The bounty on his head had increased to seventy million at this point and he knew that the desperate scum of Mistral were going to go at war with one another over it.
"What are you thinking?" She asked.
"The ones pursuing me are part of a private military company as well as other groups." He said.
"I'm aware of that." She said.
"I don't have enough supplies to tackle every single one of them at the moment so I'm going to turn them against one another. Greed will forever be in humanity's foundation and I'm merely taking advantage of that." He said.
"There's an abandoned mineshaft nearby as well." She informed.
"It's where I'm going to have them kill each other in there. There's still traces of Dust in some spots and a chain reaction should cause it to all trap them inside." He said.
"There's a chance they can escape." She said.
"It's why I'm setting traps on both entrances to ensure none of them leave alive." He responded.
"You're really keen on eliminating any threats." She commented.
"Some of them are more nuisances than anything. It's getting old having this bounty on my head." He said and started to walk towards his bag.
"Most normal people would feel fear having a price that large on their head." She said as she floated next to him.
"I'm not normal and I never was, nor will I ever be normal." He said calmly and the rest of the trek was thrown into silence. No matter how much he looked at it, he would never be a normal man and it was something he had come to accept when he first agreed to on his path of becoming a Spartan.
It was a path he chose to walk and he'd do so until the day he finally completed his mission in serving humanity.
Another day passed by and Six waited on the edge of a cliff staring at the abandoned mine entrance in the distance. He hummed lowly when he saw different groups made up of bounty hunters, surviving gang members, and even assassins kill one another over the bounty on his head. Not once did he decide to interfere with their little war. Gunfire, explosions, and the faint sound of blades slicing through flesh were heard.
He wondered if this was what humanity was like centuries ago, it was like watching a reenactment of the past and he wouldn't dare to admit that he found it interesting. By the time the fighting was over and the weaker groups killed one another off, it was late afternoon and he felt a bit of the weight off his shoulders. He watched as the last remaining groups cautiously entered the mineshaft tiredly.
"They're started to approach the trap you set up." Auspicious informed.
"Good." He said and pulled out the detonator. He had set up a mock copy of him, sitting at a little control room and facing the cameras inside. Once they figured out that it was a fake, he'd detonate the charges and seal them to their doom. They'd be too tired to run towards the exit, not to mention too far in, to survive this encounter. If they somehow did, then they'd just die to the traps he set outside.
Some would call it dirty or lazy, but he simply would just brush these comments off. There was no right or wrong way when taking a life, especially if the ones who could survive potentially posed a threat to the ones he cared about. He was never one of the most sane Spartans and never claimed he would ever be. With the amount of blood he spilled unnecessarily, he would even dare call himself a disgrace.
He was supposed to be clean, quick, detached, and efficient above all else. Now, he was messy and had formed a certain attachment towards some people. A part of him didn't know how he was going to explain to his superiors about his current situation. Knowing them, they'd probably use the children and Maaya to keep him in line. He's seen it happen before towards non-Spartans.
That's if he started to get out of line though, so all he had to do was keep himself in check and they'd be safe. He was brought out of his thoughts when Auspicious nudge the side of his helmet with her chassis and gestured towards the mineshaft.
Nothing was said nor felt as he brought up the detonator and pushed it. A series of explosions were heard and felt; he watched as flamed shot out of the entrances of the location and the wind blew against his body violently. His hood was blown down and he could see the place start to cave in on itself, sealing whoever was inside to their graves before going still.
The money was put in a secret, secure account and was traced back to the one who set the price on his head. Salem had been the one to give the order, but one of her little followers, Arthur Watts, was the one who actually set it all up. At first, he was somewhat alarmed anyone managed to put a price on his head, but now he just brushed it off like anything else thrown his way.
They'd all be sent to their graves one day, maybe not today or tomorrow, but certainly in the future. Now that the bounty hunters were all dead, he could finally get back on track and acquire the relic and put it in the facility. Neither Ozpin, whenever he reincarnated, nor Salem had access to it. It was best to keep these items out of their hands since it was obvious neither of them were going to put them to good use.
"Off to secure the Relic then." Auspicious chirped.
"..." He just stared at the collapsed and destroyed area before nodding and turning away. Nothing was left but rubble and it was best to keep it that way. He still had to drop the bomb on the place just in case; call it overkill, but he wasn't taking any chances.
"You remind me of a rather stoic Forerunner." She started a conversation.
"Is that so?" He asked as he walked towards the ship, pressing a few icons on his TACPAD and summoning the ship. It slowly started to descend from the sky and the grass blew in several directions before it landed roughly on the ground.
"Quite so. He was quiet, valued efficiency above all else, and even looked out for others below him." She said.
"Sounds like a respectable individual." He commented evenly.
"He was." She said quietly.
"What happened to him?" He asked.
"He perished in the war with those two buffoons. Saving others from a particularly cruel fate. I think you two would have found some common interests within the Installation and about several other topics." She said.
"I'm sure we would have." He nodded and climbed into the ship. He took the controls and the ship started to ascend into the sky before hovering high above the location of the destroyed mine. The bottom of the ship opened up and revealed a rather large explosive before it was released from its clamps and dropped. It spun through the air quickly before impacting the ground, causing a larger explosion to destroy anything that would have survived.
"Was this really necessary?" She looked at him.
"Yes." He nodded and she shook her chassis before fitting herself into the slot, finding an odd sense of comfort in it.
"Would you like to hear more about the Forerunners?" She asked.
"I would." He said and listened to her start to tell some more tales about the advanced race. Thousands of years of being by herself had done wonders, thousands of years of loneliness was too long to go without another soul to talk to. So the first chance she got at finally being able to talk to someone was considered a blessing in its own right and she was happy to indulge in it.
It was interesting for him, because he got to learn more about the Forerunners. For her, it was a nice change of pace and somebody to share her stories with.
Short chapter, but at least it's better than me being dead. I'm just going to cut to the chase since I don't like bullshitting. No, the story is not up for adoption or anything like that, stop asking. Yes, I'm aware people continue to talk shit about me, there's nothing I can do at this point. I was angry at first but now I'm just disappointed for the most part.
I'm not doing story requests at the moment so stop asking for that as well. Also apparently me responding to people who go out of their way to be an asshole labels me as one as well. So be it, I'm an asshole then.
To the people who go out of their way to bitch and moan about the story not being how they wanted or how they interpret it... cry me a river. No one's forcing you to read it, if you want to cry about it then be my guest.
Like I said, if I seem like an asshole then deal with it. I stopped being a nice guy the moment this story got too famous for my taste. I won't go out of my way to cause shit, but I'm not taking unnecessary shit either.
Also to the RavenKing guy, I realize what you were stating your opinion and I humbly apologize for my childish response. As I said above though, I don't take shit from no one.
Well, I won't bore you guys anymore. I'm fine and I'll see you later.