Chapter 2 (The Party)
It has been officially twelve years since Master Chief became a guardian to the young princess of Denmark-2, as she was nothing more but a delight to the spartan. She always wanted to play UNSC vs Covenant or Flood, in which Chief played as the enemy while Melody was the spartan. Heck, even Cortana have it a little be fun by letting the girl play with Chief's hologram simulator, and give the best realistic experience of fighting against The Covenant or The Flood using dummy guns and grenades. Now, both Ariel and Eric did not mind letting Chief teach Melody all technique skills of the military, especially including teaching the girl how to both use and reload any type of guns they had at their disposal. Plus, importantly it was Melody's cute innocent looks and puppy dog eyes routine that convinced the three former UNSC soldiers to teach her everything they know.
Today is a special friday in Denmark-2 as all of its citizens were prepping their gifts and formal attire for the birthday party of their Princess Melody who is turning twelve years old. Everyone in the castle was slowly moving around since it was a peaceful friday morning, both decorating and living up the ballroom for the big teen party as Ariel and Eric wanted their daughter's special day to be memorable for all until her next years birthday. And speaking about Melody, she was currently still in her bed with her mouth a little bit wide open with saliva running down a bit with her hair all messy. She laid with her arms stretched up and snored peacefully without anyone messing with the young princess. The only person that knows that Melody was still asleep is Cortana who was on her nightstand looking at the beautiful girl. She smiled when seeing how adorable she was after deciding not to wake her up so soon, but instead, she transferred herself out of the girl's room and returned back to her and Chiefs room. Once arriving back on her small AI stand pole, Master Chief was already up bright and early after done taking a shower and had his armor on and helmet.
Chief looked at his AI and said plainly. "Melody is still in bed?."
"Yep, enjoying her nap if I might add," said Cortana, with one hand on her hip and smiled.
Chief reached his hand out for Cortana can transfer herself into his helmet before exiting out to do the same usual routine as always. In which was him going to the kitchen and pick his and Melody's breakfast from the royal chef, so they can eat together as a family. After this, they would head to the training area to do their weight lifting before starting their warm-up target shooting. They have to admit that the young teen has great potential when watching shoot the targets right in the head, despite the hologram target moving and acting like an actual enemy. Chief was highly impressed with Melody's performance since the day she was able to both walk and talk, while Cortana had no doubts about the girl since she is trained by the legendary Spartan-117. Upon arriving at the floors of where the kitchen is located the Chief was greeted by a few maids, butlers, and soldiers when passing through before waving and bid them good morning. Once entering the kitchen he could see the head chef already finished making breakfast for the Master Chief and Melody and put them in both a silver serving tray with the lid on top, and then place them on a clean gold cart. The head chef looked up and smiled when seeing the Chief in the middle of the doorway.
"Ah, yes, good morning Master Chief. I have finished making your breakfast. Just the way you like it." said Chef Louis, while pushing the cart towards the spartan.
"And what about the other thing I requested?." asked Chief, grabbing the cart.
Chef Louis slapped his forehead. "Oh, I almost forgot Chief!. I just took it out of the oven and finshed decorating it."
Chef Louis went over to the table a grabbed the small matching server tray and went back to hand it over the tall man, and said with a friendly attitude. "You two sure know how to spoil the girl don't ya?."
"Well, she is a princess. begin Cortana. "Plus, she grew on us like a little Flood Fungus."
"Yeah, except she doesn't try to either kill or eat me like The Flood." answered Chief, when remembering those old days on Halo.
"I see. Well, I'm glad that this planet does not have to deal with those monstrous things." said Chef Louis, before resuming back to working on making Melody's cake for tonight's party.
Chief pushed the cart out after saying thanks and headed to the elevator to bring the food there to Melody's room. He was surprised from the second day of him here to see that Ariel and Eric had installed some modern tech in the castle, and today made the place look very secure all thanks to Johnson of course. Johnson have made sure that the castle and Denmark-2 was up to par and ready for anything, even though Earth-2 had a reputation of being a peaceful planet with no Covenant insight. Of course the three missed the awesome action of the war as neither of them can not remember the good feeling of hitting The Covenant on where it hurts.
Cortana looked at Chief on his helmet screen and smiled. "Melody is going to love our birthday gift."
Chief smiled on remembering that they have a gift for the girl. "Indeed she will Cortana. Especially when she always wished the same wish on every giving birthday and Christmas. Two things that she wanted to happen but, I can not decide which one she wanted to come true the most."
"Is it obvious?. She clearly shows it every single day to you, me, and Johnson. Especially when she always wanted to hear our stories of the war instead of reading her Dr. Seuss books." said Cortana, smirking at her beloved spartan.
Chief chuckled at that reminder before hearing the elevator reach their selected floor. "Don't remind me. She sure loves to hear our stories including our own."
When the door opened up the two were confronted by the head maid of the castle who was carrying a few folded towels in her hands. She gave a slight bow to the spartan before speaking nicely.
"Good morning, John. I'll see you and Cortana at the ballroom. Hopefully." said Carlotta, after letting Master Chief exit out of the elevator before going inside.
"Of course we will. After a quick perimeter check around the castle both in and out of the wall. I picked out a good tuxedo." said Chief.
"Don't you mean I picked the tuxedo out for you?. Don't take all the credit before I instantly shutdown your armor." Cortana threatened with a pout.
Chief rolled his eyes before saying. "Alright. I'll take it back. Geez, you're so uptight sometimes."
Cortana broke a smile before puckering her blue lips and made a kiss noise in which Chief can not help but, to smile at his lovable AI of a woman."
"Well, anyways." Carlotta said getting the two's attention. "I just let you two do your job and see ya at the party."
Once seeing the clear door closed and see the elevator leaving the current floor, Chief resumed back to what he is doing and made it to Melody's bedroom in less than a minute. Chief opened the door all way in order for him to put the cart inside before closing the door back, just before removing Cortana out from his helmet to reach human size. A special upgrade that the AI contained a few years ago when thinking about it and decided to take the new installation upgrade, let alone install herself some speacial features. While letting Chief sat the trays down at the table in middle of the Melody's balcony, Cortana came over to a still sleeping Melody who had changed her sleep position and was wrapped around in her cover, with her head laying on her pillow with a plain look.
Cortana smiled sweetly before reaching over to move her shoulder. "Wake up sleepyhead. Wakey, Wakey with eggs and bacon."
With this it made the young princess begin to move and did a yawn while stretching her arms up. Melody begin opening her eyes to see the light blue AI smiling sweetly at her and could not help but smile. Cortana opened her arms wide to allow the young teen to embrace in a loving hug. The relationship between Cortana, Chief and Melody is like aunt, uncle and niece since they spent time together for every single second of the day over the years, and the three were like peas in a pod.
"Good Morning, Auntie Cortana." Melody said before breaking the hug with her smile in place.
"Good Morning to you too, Melody. Sleep well?." asked Cortana before helping the girl make her bed up.
Meldoy nodded happily. "Absolutely!. I had a wonderful dream that, I would love to share with you and Uncle John."
"Is that so?." Chief came while just about to remove his helmet. "Then that case my little spartan, why dont we discuss it over our breakfast?."
Melody turn her head to face her forever guardian and smiled brightly before running to hug the seven feet former activate UNSC soldier. This brung jubilant to the spartan as Melody was the soul reasons besides Cortana, that he gets up in the morning and a purpose to continue to fight. After they broke the hug, the three headed to the balcony for breakfast and sat down. Once sitting down in their proper seats in which is Cortana sitting in between while Chief sat at the end of the round brown wooden table in his custom made chair made to hold him while in his armor, as Meldoy sat facing her guardian with a still holding smile. Next, came Chief removing his helmet and placing it on the ground upside down, and revealed his pale face with a fresh shave and looked nicely in his forties. All thanks to sleeping in hyper chambers in many multiple occasions during the endless war.
Chief smiled when lifting his lid to show his breakfast meal in which was fresh chopped egg whites with the side of fat free two strips bacon, fruit cocktail and two daily vitamins. And with a glass of fresh cold milk.
"Just how I like it. Awesome." said Chief, before saying grace and begin eating.
Melody open hers and grinned big at her special birthday breakfast. On her plate she had a nice five stack of fresh cinnamon buttermilk pancakes with a side of sugar french toast, and chocolate pudding. Plus, having a cup of freshly squeezed orange juice. Melody would sometimes eat the same style breakfast as her guardian and Johnson down at the royal dining room but, today she is getting a special meal and was going to enjoy every last bite.
"So you two wanted to hear the best part or the beginning of my cool dream?." said Melody, before stuffing a slice of pancake in her mouth.
Chief swolled the food in his mouth before grabbing his milk to drink. "Tell us from the beginning Melody. And do not hold back the details please."
The young teen managed to eat half of her stacked pancakes and drank her juice to wash the food down. Then she took a few breaths to calm her super enthusiasm energy while both Chief and Cortana looked on in optimism, and can not wait to hear this interesting dream that Melody has dreamed up in her dreams. She looked at the two with a still holding smile on her face and begin her dream tell.
"Well, I dreamed of being on UNSC Infinity as a spartan and getting ready to head to my drop pod for a mission. I have dreamed my mission on going to the Halo ring and stop that." Melody paused and looked hard on trying to remember something before continuing. "Oh, yeah, I was supposed to stop Prophet of Truth from activating the ring. The same Prophet of Truth that your friend, Arbiter has killed with his energy sword. So anyways I had few marines behind me when entering the craziest battlefield ever."
"Huh, that sounds believable. All things considered," said Chief, finishing his breakfast.
Cortana grinned while getting comfortable in her chair. "Then what else happened?."
Melody grinned right back and burst her excitement. "Then I started shooting and grenade throwing every last Covenant scum until I have hijacked a banshee and begin flying to the cliffs. Which is where the hidden secret back door entrance is located. Once there I have to sprint and dodged bullets from both Covenant and Floods with the quickness. Next, I managed to hop on the elevator to the rings control room and fired it with enough time to find an escape pod, soon before I killed the Prophet of Truth with a bullet to the head!. Cool right?!."
Chief nodded while grabbing his vitamins to take, "In reality, it is not simple and easy to get to the Prophet of Truth. I have to go through a killing spree against every single race member of the Covenant, including the endless flood in which I hope to never see them again. And what shocks me is that Miranda Keyes survived her near-death experience, after Truth just shoot her multiple times in the back with a T-25 Spiker."
Cortana couldn't agree anymore as that was a rare chance that Miranda survived from death itself let alone be able to walk again since the spikes did fracture her spine and such. Even though she was not there at the time it took place since she was both shielding herself and being held captive by The Gravemind, who wanted to know anything that he needed to know, and eventually, he did but was stopped at the end. Once the AI's mind was done remember the nightmare past she then saw Melody finished her breakfast and was about to eat her fancy birthday cupcake, and said with happiness in her voice.
"Don't forget to make a wish before eating that cupcake, Melody."
Melody's mouth was inches away from eating her cupcake until hearing Cortana., "Oh, yeah, I almost forgot."
Closing her eyes and formed a small smile on her face, Melody reopened her eyes and saw what is in front of her was a delicious medium-sized loaded cupcake. Chief smiled at the sight of seeing the girl make such a mess with just one big bite while Cortana laughed a little, before getting up from her chair to go prepare for the day ahead. Melody finished her cupcake before getting up to go head on out while Cheif put his helmet back on, and then take the empty plates back onto the cart and then push it out to the side in the hallway. Melody waited outside with Cortana before the AI transfer herself back into the spartan's helmet, before the two-headed for the elevator and took the bottom level. The three stood silent in the elevator for a brief moment until Cortana broke it.
"What did you wish for Melody?.", Cortana asked eagerly.
"Cortana.", Chief begins., "You know that telling someone what you wish for on their birthday cake won't come true."
Melody crossed her arms with a smile and said, "I don't mind telling it, Uncle John. I wish for the same thing every year on my birthday."
"Which is?." begin a now excited Cortana.
Grinning like any typical girl on their birthday, Melody spoke and said, "I wished to be a spartan and be in the UNSC."
Chief immediately looked at the young twelve-year-old and had his brow raised, "Are you pulling our legs here, Melody?. If so, then that is not a good idea for a joke."
Melody rolled her eyes with a smirk still on her face, "I'm not making a joke. I truly wanted to be a spartan and serve the UNSC. I want to travel through space, be on another planet or a halo ring. I want to kick me some Covenant butt!."
"Your chances of being a spartan let alone serve the UNSC are zero. The reason why I said that is because you are a girl of royalty and such, you are the next ruler of Denmark-2.", said Cortana, once the elevator stopped at their destination.
Once getting off the elevator and headed their way to do their usual thing, Melody shook her head in refusal on accepting her fate as being a princess. In truth, she never wanted to be a snobby super girly princess who always complains about nothing and being a pure jerk to the servants. Melody would do anything to be a spartan and be an awesome legendary hero like her Uncle John and have endless adventures in space fighting the Covenant. As they reached the weight room, Chief helped Melody hold the weights in her hand so she can begin her daily weightlifting. For a girl her age, she can handle heavy things without any issues especially when doing it for years.
"Well, happy birthday my little warrior. Excited about your party?. You know I will."
Melody dropped her weights to the floor and looked to see none other than Sergeant Johnson who she calls her Uncle Johnson, who was in his army camouflage outfit and have a blue flat box behind his back. Melody ran over to Johnson to give him the biggest hug that she possibly can, while Chief was loading up his favorite gun who is getting ready to take the girl to target practice. He watched his best friend hand Melody her first twelve-year-old birthday present that turns out to be a brand new all silver 10mm pistol with a black branded symbol of the UNSC on both sides of the pistol. Melody grinned widely with her eyes popped open as she examines her new very own pistol.
"Oh, Uncle Johnson this is the best gift ever!. And it's the right weight and fit for my hands. Boy, I can not wait to use it in real combat.", said Melody, taking a pretend aim at something and made a few fake shooting noises.
Johnson smiled and said, "Hehehe, I knew you would love it, sweetheart. That pistol is custom-made just for you, Melody. And what did you two have given her?."
Chief placed his gun on his back and said, "We haven't given her gift yet, but trust me she will love it more than yours."
"I doubt that Chief. Anyways, Melody, I've got the hologram targeting simulator ready for you outside. So, go ahead and do your usual target practices.", said Johnson.
"Right!. See you guys outside!.", said Melody, instantly running to go play with her new gun.
As soon as Melody exit out of the place, Chief approached Johnson with Cortana appearing in the middle. Over the years the three have been keeping themselves updated on what is going on in UNSC, and gaining information through the radio to gain the feel of being back on the field. The news they were getting was interesting when discussing a few important missions, and some were tougher than the other. Currently, the three stood side by side listening to the radio on the big widescreen listen to a few new Spartans and their old friend Arbiter talk about the mission. A mission that consists of following two Covenant scout ships to an unknown location. They stayed to listen until decided to call it a break since it's Melody's birthday and such, as both Chief and Cortana who transfer herself into his helmet came out to see the preteens performance.
"Look at her go, Chief. I would not expect less from a student of yours.", said Johnson, before making his way down to have a good look.
Chief was always impressed by how great Melody is doing in practice combat. He watched how quick she was on her feet when dodging hologram bullets or blasters, and always shoot her targets straight into their heads. Then watching her take on a hologram Brute in hand combat by ducking down from the swing of its weapon and then jumped on it to run up to grab it by his neck, and then used her new pistol to shoot it in the back of the head. Melody then jumped off the dead hologram Brute as it faded away when the timer is over. And once again making another broken new record in practice for taking out every hologram foe that Johnson has set up for her.
"Piece of cake, Uncle Johnson.", said, Melody, smiling brightly before kissing her gun.
"Yelp, you have done it once again, Melody. Oh, you might want to wear this to both hold your pistol and keep you from getting sick when going to the sea.", said Johnson, throwing her an actual practice navy blue UNSC swim jumpsuit.
Melody quickly put it on with huge giggles before heading out to the locked sealed metal door with plastic glass on top. The only gateway to the beach that Chief use to go do his daily night scouting. Of course, Melody knows the code like always since Chief let her come with him every time and every day the two hang out. Once saying goodbye to Johnson, Melody rushed to the ocean with the collective bag that she always used to collect seashells and begin diving into the cold water. Chief smiled when using his built-in jet pack to fly over to his favorite flat rock and wait patiently for Melody to resurface to take a breather. As such, besides having Cortana to keep him company, Chief enjoys talking to his other friend that always shows every single day to keep Melody busy for a while until he finishes his late workouts.
"And speak of the devil.", Chief looked to find his friend who crawled out from the ocean and reached beside him, "Good Morning, Sebastian. How are you today?."
The old jamaican crab looked at the spartan and can not help but to smile at the former UNSC soldier. Ever since meeting Chief, Sebastian was thankful to Ariel and Eric to bring in the UNSC's best of the best spartan to Earth-2, and help protect Melody from the royal family's number one enemy. The enemy that they have not seen since her sick attempt at getting the trident.
"Good Morning to you too, Mon. I am assuming that the wanna-be spartan is down there somewhere, yes?.", asked Sebastian, looking tired of the same routine.
"As always. Have fun chasing her.", said Cortana.
"Yes, I know. You would think that she wouldn't be out here on her birthday. But what can I expect from the daughter of Ariel?.", Sebastian said jumping into the water, "The pain in my shell of course. A crab my age should be retired and playing sea-golf. Not babysitting another rebellious teenager."