If it wasn't for the frankly unsustainable amount of slavery, Holly thought she might have liked Lys. It was an island paradise, the weather was always warm, with only light rain to mar the otherwise constant warmth and sun. The ocean lapped peacefully against the beaches and trees and plants offered good amounts of shade. If this were a survival exercise during their training, this place would have been considered an easy assignment. Unfortunately, this wasn't a training mission, or even a real mission.

Being stuck on this backwater planet, with no UNSC to fight for and no Covenant to fight against, Holly sometimes felt cheated. Gamma company had never had the chance to engage in real operations the way that Alpha and Beta had. Her company had only just graduated when Blue Flag had gone down and they had ended up stranded here. Her company didn't have the same service record of their predecessors, and if the latest reports, not to mention gossip, were to be believed, they wouldn't have any chance to achieve anything close to the previous companies.

She also knew that she wasn't alone in those feelings. Spartans were not typically prone to jealousy or resentment, and even now she had no ill feelings for the Alphas and Betas who had gotten the chances to face down the Covenant that her generation had been denied. But more than a few of her company had taken the time to complain about how little there was to really do now that they were here. It only slightly softened the blow that the captain seemed to assign away missions to Gamma Company more than any other and Holly much preferred being out and scouting foreign cities rather than being stuck at the Plataea or dealing with Westerosi politics.

"Holly, are you alright?"

Holly turned to her team leader. Ash stood with his pack slung over his back, their camp tidied up and the rest of their team watching her. Mark, Olivia and Dante were standing at attention, ready to move.

"Just thinking. Nothing to worry about."

"Well pack up, command wants us to meet up with Team Tango and receive new orders."

"Got it."

Silently, Holly finished packing her part of the camp. Team Saber had just been assigned two days ago to assist in the reconnaissance of the 'Free' city of Lys. Holly wondered briefly what moron had decided to name a group of city states, the majority of which had over seventy percent of their populations in some form of slavery, the free cities. Probably the people in charge, as far as she could guess, some stupid way of making themselves sound better.

The Gamma company team crossed the landscape, a leisurely stroll for Spartans bringing them to one of the city's gates within the hour. The guards were rude, and regarded them with a fair amount of condescension when they couldn't quite speak the native language. Holly rolled her eyes as they passed. If only those people knew that she and every member of her whole team spoke six languages. Well, Holly herself spoke eight, she liked Tamil and Urdu enough to put in the extra work with Deep Winter and Boundless Autumn. Still, the local Valyrian, that sounded a good amount like Latin, was something she wasn't fluent in quite yet.

Whatever the locals thought didn't really matter though, and Holly followed her team through the dusty streets of the city until their came to the rendezvous. It was a mid-range building that Holly knew was some kind of inn or tavern based on reports. Signalling Tango, they were quickly met and ushered up into the room that the other Gamma team was using as their base.

The walls were lined with maps, charts and routes. Satellite imagery had given them an accurate view of the city itself, but based on what she could see, there was still a good portion that would need to be surveyed from the ground.

"Any idea on the new orders?" She asked one of the Tango spartans

"No clue, but word has it the whole crew is getting updates." He responded, leaning on the wall as a holo-tank was set up and the room was sealed.

"Must be big then, haven't had a ship wide announcement since we got stuck here."

"Yep."

The two lapsed into silence, along with the rest of the mingled teams as the tank came online. The hologram solidified, showing Captain Ambrose standing alongside the entire command staff.

"Attention all UNSC personnel. As captain of the UNSC Plataea, and ranking officer of all UNSC assets on this planet, I am here to inform all of you of our recent discoveries. For the last four years, the UNSC has operated on this planet with the understanding of our imminent departure and return to the warfront. Nearly two years ago, this estimation of imminent departure was recalculated but not abandoned. Since then, we have spent every day looking for ways to return to our place amongst our brothers and sisters; protecting humanity, Earth and all her colonies."

Holly exchanged glances with Ash, who was leaning against the wall next to her.

"Unfortunately, our attempts at returning to the war effort have yielded no results. It is my solemn duty as your captain to inform all UNSC personnel that as of today, the return timeline has changed. With out current estimations, we as a crew will be stranded on this planet for at least the next century."

Holly could only imagine how what was happening at the Plataea with the bomb that the captain had just dropped. Even here, there was a ripple of shock. Her brothers and sisters were swapping glanced, looking for answers that none of them truly had.

"I understand that for most of us, this is distressing news. Please know that this is not news I relish delivering any more than any of you enjoy hearing it. With this change in our estimates and the implications that it brings with it, I, Captain Kurt Ambrose of the UNSC Plataea, am implementing colonisation protocols and informing all personnel to read up on your guides. We will be organising the transition from military to civilian colonial governments and ask that all personnel cooperate fully in this change. Within the next six months, future positions in our colonial government will be announced and democratic processes will be put in place to ensure that each and every UEG citizen may have their voice heard, either as a candidate, or as a voter.

In accordance with UNSC and UEG protocols regarding colonisation, we will begin discharging UNSC personnel from military service, while still maintain a colonial defence force. Please report to your respective superior officers if you are interested in either discharge or continued service.

This is your captain, signing off. Per Mare, Per Terras, Per Constellatum."

The holo-tank cut off, leaving the group fully in darkness for a few moments before it lit up again. This time, it wasn't a person. Instead, a large operations file appeared, ready to be read.

"Fuck." Dante might as well have detonated one of the C4 devices he always carried with him.

"Son of a bitch." It was an uncharacteristic outburst of rage from Arata, one of the Tango spartans, who punched the wall hard enough that his fist and most of his upper arm went right through the wood separating their room from another. There was a yelp that came through the hole, followed by cursing and swearing as a threat to get the innkeeper before he pulled out his arm.

"We've been fucking stuck in this backwater pigsty of a planet for nearly five years, and now they're telling up we're never getting back."

"Calm down Arata." One of his squad mates put a hand on his shoulder.

"No." He snarled. "The Covenant took everything from us, our homes, our families, and now not only did we fail during Blue Flag, but we can't even get back to the front and back up everyone we left behind."

"And getting angry won't solve anything." His team leader shot from across the room. She marched up to Arata, forcing the other spartan to meet her eyes.

"You think I don't hate this? You think any of us are happy we're effectively sidelined? We're not, but bitching about it and putting holes in walls isn't going to help anyone."

Tango's leader stepped back, pointing to the holo-tank which was still displaying their new orders.

"Now we have a mission, something the captain assigned us. I'm gonna find out what it is, and see to it that it's done and done well. That's what Captain Ambrose trained us for, and that's what I'm going to do. The only question is whether you're good to go, or if I need to sideline you from this fight too."

His team leader's words seemed to get through to him, and he nodded silently, dusting wood and debris from his arm before two of his squad mates came up and patched up the opening with a temporary seal. Given that they had it on standby, Holly guessed that this wasn't the first time he'd taken his frustration out on walls.

"Let's see what the captain has for us." He muttered, looking over the mission file.

Holly scanned the packet, using her own pad to download from the main holo-tank and skim through at her own pace. Reading her orders, Holly felt a grin form on her face. This wasn't a happy grin though. No, the smile on her face, one that she could see forming on many of her spartan brothers and sisters, was the smile of a predator, of a hunter given the signal that the hunt was on.

"It's about fucking time." Arata said, face taking on an almost feral look.

"Looks like we're gonna have some company pretty soon." Tango's leader said, her own smile wide.

"Let's get everything ready."

"Right." The combined teams said.


Donallo Varynaes felt a deep swell of satisfaction as his ship, the Weeping Crow, cut through the waves. The life of a trader and corsair was a dangerous one, but invigorating and thrilling in equal measure. Ever since he had been a boy, he had felt far more at home on the deck of a ship than he ever had on land. When he had come of age, he had decided to throw his lot in with the Tyroshi navy. His family had objected, especially when Donallo had told them of exactly what he would be doing for the navy, but his older brothers and sister were already due to inherit their family's modest caravan and marry off to secure their family a greater lot in this generation than the last. Donallo had been the third son and fourth born besides, and so his loss to his family in his effort to pursue his dreams was one they could bear, even profit from.

At first, Donallo had served as a deckhand on one of the many galleys that made up Tyrosh's navy. He had seen some combat deterring pirates in the stepstones and along the summer sea, and had loved every second of it. The roar of sea fighting was like music to him, and the spoils divided amongst the crew had secured him a good income, with enough to send home and reassure his family of his new fortunes.

It was during his second year aboard his new home that he had participated in his first raid. The taking of slaves from other peoples was common knowledge and common practice, and Donallo felt no guilt as he and his crew had first swept upon the shores of the summer isles to pillage and capture. Donallo soon found himself an even greater raider than he might have expected. On that first raid, he had managed to find and drag away three pretty girls and a boy, a mother and her children based on ages and looks. The boy had been more of an afterthought, but his captain at the time had heaped praises upon him for finding useful slaves both male and female. So impressed had he been, that he had even allowed Donallo to sample the mother before they brought the whole cargo back to Tyrosh.

With fire in his blood in the aftermath of the raid, Donallo had taken his reward as they sailed away from the burning village left to be discovered by whoever might care to find the burned-out wreckage. Arriving back in Tyrosh, the slaves taken in that raid were marched from the docks to the House of Flesh, where slaves were sold and bought by citizens of the island city and its mainland holdings. The woman he had taken in the hold of the ship had fetched a fine price, the captain had said when paying his deckhands, and the children had been bought for better coin still by one of the pleasure houses of Lys and a slave trainer from Yunkai.

That night, he had not paid for any of his drinks, for his fellows had groused and celebrated him in equal measure for his success. Since then, Donallo had felt a fire awaken in his blood, and swore he would see it quenched by no less than the gold of a magister. For the last decade he had worked himself ragged. He tended to his captain, made deals and struck bargains where he could, and when the old first mate had suffered a death wound during a skirmish with pirates close to the smoking sea, he had taken the man's place next to the man who had first offered him the chance to take charge of his fate. For a year and change he had served his captain loyally, seeing every command executed with perfect efficiency. Then came their time. Their captain had apparently had enough of raiding small settlements and escorting merchants, he had decided to undertake the dream of every sailor in the world. Their crew had roamed farther east than most men ever dared, into the lands beyond Qarth to Yi-Ti, where emperors lived in palaces of gold and their foods were dusted in precious gems. Whether or not all those rumours were true, Donallo would never find out, for they had not gotten near any of the palaces, let alone the emperor, but they had still succeeded. Hulls full to bursting with the wealth of that far of land and pirate blood coating the deck of their ship, The Weeping Crow had ventured across the waves with more wealth in her hold than most men had ever seen.

The gold had flowed like rain during a storm. Weeks at sea traveling the route home, dodging pirates, other merchants with aims for their cargo, and even some stone men when they had wandered too close to the Smoking Sea, had seen them home safe. The captain had near wept with joy when they had finally docked once more in Tyrosh, a sentiment the entire crew shared. One man had openly bawled when the customs officer had estimated the value of just the silks in their holds and not a man of their crew from the captain to the lowest deckhand had drunk anything but the finest of wines.

For Donallo however, the trip had not been the great ending that some might have expected it to be. With his fortunes secured and reputation buoyed by the successful voyage, his captain, who Donallo had served loyally for years at that point had offered him the one thing he could want, for some of his pay from their voyage to Yi-Ti, Donallo would be owner and captain of the Weeping Crow whole and properly. If the wealth of their voyage had not brought Donallo to tears, then that had. He had embraced his mentor, his second father on the seas, and accepted with tears running down his face.

Since that day, Donallo had spent every second he could upon his beloved Crow. He had wealth aplenty back in Tyrosh, but there was only so much he could take with him aboard his true home. More of what he made went back to his family, who had offered heartfelt congratulations on his good fortune. His sister had even written once, claiming her second son wished to serve with him, though she had told him to reject his nephew's service until such time as he was of proper age. He had seen no reason to risk his sister's rage, and so unfortunately his nephew waited impatiently amongst the rest of their family.

Donallo shook himself from his memories, looking over the water at his latest prey. It was a moderately large ship, slow for its size, but that just meant it was likely laden with cargo. The flags it flew identified it as being from Westeros, some noble house or other as far as Donallo could guess. Ships from Westeros were valuable. Not only were they loaded with good loot depending on which of their seven kingdoms they came from, captives from that land almost always fetched a good price.

Westeros had no institution of slavery as the Free Cities did, and so the buying of Westerosi slaves was a rarer occurrence than slaves of almost any other people. That rarity, combined with the exotic looks some Westerosi could possess, meant that the right slave, male or female, could fetch a grand price in any of the slave markets of Essos.

Barking orders to his sailors, all experienced in their art, Donallo waited as they closed quickly on the lumbering ship. Rounding to its side the Weeping Crow ploughed into the side of the ship, its metal ram splintering wood and snapping timber. A roar went up amongst his men and the same bloodlust that had filled him so long ago during his first raid flowed through his veins. Donallo joined his men, spilling onto the other deck where their ships were joined and onto the deck, ready to take captives and plunder.


Donallo felt water splash into his face, waking him from unconsciousness and bringing him back to the land of the waking. Gasping deeply, he tried to move, only to find that he was bound tight by thick, unyielding ropes.

"W-wha?" Was all he could get out before another bucket was thrown in his face, Donallo felt the salty taste and sting of sea water ridding him of the last vestiges of grogginess and forcing his full attention.

"Good, you're awake." The voice was cold and low and drew attention to the speaker. Looking up, he saw a man walking towards him. He was clad in strange clothes, and held no blade aside from a long knife as his thigh.

"Right, here's the way this works, I'll ask you a question, you give me an answer. One question, one answer. I don't get the answer I like, and we've got a problem, and if we've got a problem, you've got a problem."

The man spoke the common tongue, but with an accent that Donallo couldn't place. He racked his brains, trying to find remember where he had heard such a voice before. Was it the Reach? No, Reachmen had a different lint to their speech. Wherever the man came from, he had a certain threat about him, a way of carrying himself that Donallo was immediately warry of.

"Right then, first question. Where is this ship from?"

Donallo gritted his teeth. Raids were well known across the world, and the manner you dealt with them was knowledge that was equally common. You did not ask captains for their point of berth, better to avoid the necessary retaliations that such information required. Instead, such raiders, if ever caught, were imprisoned, ransomed quietly, or publicly executed.

"Your mother's cunt, it's certainly big enough."

"Oh man, hear that Roland, looks like we got ourselves a funny one."

Another man stepped up, looking over Donallo and his defeated crew.

"Just get on with it Jonah. The captain wants Free City up and running soon."

"Right right. I've got it. Don't want to disappoint the captain." He leaned forwards, getting close to Donallo's face. "You didn't answer my question mister. I told you that if I don't get the answer I want, we'd have a problem, didn't I? Roland, I said that right?"

"Right." Said the other man. "And as much as I don't like watching him play with his food. I think you'll like it even less when he plays with you, best thing for you is to answer him."

"We're from nowhere." This time Donallo gave the official answer. Denial by captain and crew, deniability by Tyrosh. "We sail the nine seas."

"Now you see, I'd be inclined to believe you." Said the first man. "But based on more than a few studies, we've found that quite a lot of the so called 'pirate' ships that operate in the Summer and Narrow Seas are in fact sailors from one Essosi nation or another, raiding villages and trade routes of other nations for bounty to steal and bodies for slave markets. Now, we don't care about you in particular, if you don't give us what we want, we'll just kill you and wait for the next ship that attacks us and try again."

The second man; Roland if Donallo remembered correctly, stepped up behind the first man.

"But if you help us, we might be able to let you go when we're done. We just want a name. Which of the free cities do you serve?"

Donallo's mind whirled, trying to come up with something or other that might save him, his crew, and his ship.

"Lys" Donallo lied. "We hail from Lys."

The man's face split into a smile, showing teeth too white to be a sailor, and barked out a laugh.

"Finally, someone gives the right answer. Right everyone. We've got our Lyseni. Lock 'em up, but keep 'em from the others."

Before Donallo could contemplate what the man meant by others, he was bashed in the head by a hard object, and for the second time that day, he was forced into unconsciousness.

Looking down at the man, and the other survivors of their latest trap, Roland signalled for some of the other spartans on the ship to help pick up their latest captives.

"Let's get them put away before they wake up."

"Yeah, yeah." Jonah groused, slinging two men over his shoulders. "I'm just glad we're finally finished. How many crews did we have to go through to finally get Lys? I swear, we've gone through five maybe six ships. Why couldn't we just say they were from Lys and just go through three crews?"

"Captain says they might need to testify in front of the local authority, we needed people who would actually say what we want and not fuck us over at the last minute."

"God, this whole justification shit is getting old. I almost miss the Covenant."

"No, you definitely miss the Covenant." Roland rolled his eyes. "Never seen you so fucking sad as when we got the news. Thought you might break into fucking tears."

"Whatever." Jonah dropped the two men in one of the briggs. Under the wooden exterior, the ship they were on was a more modern model, a ship specifically designed to hold prisoners without letting them interact. So far, this was the third crew that they had actually bothered to imprison rather than kill. Each had been given the same speech as the one they were now loading, and each of them had ended up selling out a different free city. None of them named their homelands, Jonah and Roland were good enough interrogators to tell when the captains or crew were lying, but it didn't matter. As long as they got a name they didn't already have, the mission was accomplished.


Damn, I can't keep a schedule to save my life anymore. I wanted to have this out last year in time for christmas, but then got absolutely stuck on the last like 200 words. I finally cranked them out and got it over with, and I'm generally happy with how it goes. We see some insight into future plans, some spartan pov and the announcement to the rest of the crew. I just have a question to ask everyone. Who would you guys like me to focus on once this next part is finished.

Rhaella/Kurt

Jane/Shane/Robert

Adam/Min/Tom/Lucy/wildlings

Ash/Holly/Dante/Mark/Olivia/Free cities

Jonah/Roland/Far East

OC spartan squads/Locals

Know I haven't actually been keeping up a ton with the books so some of the book characters like Team Saber or the Headhunters might be a bit ooc.