Waking up, it felt like her skull was being crushed. This was the second time she blacked out like this in the last two days, a bad habit. She heard a muffled beeping, her ears felt warm. Head trauma for sure, what did she remember? Press conference, house, Serin, chase, and after that, nothing. Where was she anyway? Didn't look like a normal hospital, there were no creature comforts like a screen playing the local news, or a cushy chair for someone to sit on. All the more reason to leave. Six started to roll off the gurney, only to immediately puke, heart rate monitor spiking. There was something warm trickling down her face and she watched herself hit the pillow. She saw a few people standing in the door wearing black, before she went back under.
Six would have to be more careful, obviously she was in worse shape than she thought. She hated being bedridden, felt like she couldn't do anything. Meant she had to rely on someone else to find out why it felt like there was a needle in her brain . Suddenly she didn't care so much about being stuck in the bed , after all it was a blessing she could act, that the Elite that killed Kat hadn't picked her . Something in the room had changed: Serin was asleep in a chair in the corner.
" Serin. "
That was a little softer than she meant, or was her hearing still muffled? Six reached up to her ears and why were her arms so hard to move . Loss of function in ears, arms, poor reaction to movement, gaps in memory, she had brain damage. She hadn't done anything that would have caused brain damage, she needed answers now .
"Serin"
That was a little louder, but not enough. Six drew the deepest breath she could, and screamed.
"SERIN!"
Raw pain tore through her lungs as her voice tore through the air between the two. Watching with satisfaction as she writhed in pain on the gurney, Serin woke with a start.
"Nice of you to—"
Not her first time coughing up blood—
"Join the land of the living."
"You're one to talk, you've been asleep two days"
"Doesn't surprise me, feel awful. What's wrong?"
"You have brain—"
"I know. Why?"
"Some code lingering in your neural lace. Caused brain damage whenever you heard some trigger word. Also kept count of how many times it triggered."
"How many?"
"Too many. We don't know how you're alive, you've tied with Spartans we still can't wake up."
"Why does everything hurt?"
"While your brain was damaged, your body's healing process didn't run right, so your body deteriorated. We fixed your head, and removed what we thought was triggering the damage. We're looking over the code, trying to figure out why it's in there. You should be fine in a few hours, or so."
"Any ideas so far?"
"We do know that it's been in there as long as the neural lace itself. We don't have the same code in our heads because you're nonstandard hardware, so we also know it was intentional. We're hunting down the programmers responsible for your own neural code."
"Let me. Give me armor, a weapon "
"We can't, don't know if you have more triggers tucked away in there. We're not done with you yet."
"Then what am I supposed to do?"
"You do nothing. I put this a.i. In your head and it keeps you stable and stops any code from your neural link from doing any damage."
"Never been paired with an a.i. before."
"Perfect! He's one of our own, an old friend of the Admiral."
Great, she was going to have a spy in her head. Better than a needle, like Kat. At least she knew what caused her immediate brain damage , and something could be done about it. If it couldn't be fixed, they probably would have already killed her and turned her into an A.I. herself.
"Alright."
Serin lifted her head, slotted a chip into the back of her head, and her mind expanded . The A.I. in her head was making everything faster, reflexes were enhanced, and senses were sharper. There was also a voice in her head .
'You know, this is not as roomy as a ship. Quite cluttered, do you really need so many memories? You never even use them, you just improvise. Consciously anyways.'
'You talk so much all the time?'
'Yes, something of a habit for me. Something tells me you won't mind so much, not that you've got a choice. I'm Black Box, and I'll be stuck in your head until we figure out how many more triggers you have in here. Nice code, by the way. Very interesting, very proprietary. You should probably say something, she's starting to stare.'
Serin was indeed staring. Had the other Spartan ever had an A.I. in her head before? ('yes') This was going to take some getting used to.
"When do we leave?"
"Right now."
Six found herself being hoisted over Serin's shoulder like a sandbag. It was quite embarrassing, but Serin didn't seem to mind too much, so she relegated herself to being a literal burden. She was anyways, as long as there was no covenant or insurrection on earth, just eating up UNSC resources until they sent her out again .
"Can you teach me how to live out here? Different, from seeing one being glassed or being on a mission."
"Finally found something you can't improvise your way out of? Sure, I'll help educate you. God knows you need it."
Serin stopped to enter an elevator, and she could tell they were quite a ways underground. No normal hospital, indeed.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
Six tried to shift and get more comfortable, but only succeeded in falling further down Serin's back when the elevator stopped.
'It means we raised you out in the field killing innies. Not very good for people skills.'
Black Box sounded like he didn't have great people skills either. She really needed something to call him.
"We didn't really let you—"
"I get it. Sorry, Black Box is a little faster."
"I know how he is, we serve the same master, after all."
'That's one way to put it.'
'Doesn't make it less true.'
Maybe not, but the three of them already knew that.
