Vesper woke with a start to a knock on the door. Wait, door? Just where exactly had she fallen asleep? Her eyes shot around her environment, cataloging dried blood from where her wounds had reopened, Mjolnir's scattered shell, and the dog tags still clenched in her fist. A deep burning ache made itself known in her chest, like she'd been stabbed. Energy sword? She hadn't seen one in what felt like an eternity, but really it might have been two days since she watched Emile die. Her internal clock, hell, a lot of things hadn't been running right since then. Her muscles burned like she'd just run a marathon—
"Lieutenant?" A voice asked from behind the door. "I brought some hot chow! Nobody's seen you eat anything since coming aboard, and it's been more than twelve hours. The guys are getting worried."
Had it really been so long? She knew she had to eat something, but her body was still catching up to the fact that she was still alive, safe again. As she reached for the door's latch, her sore body protested. It had done far too much with far too little and the exertion with little fuel had made her stiff, sore. Functional, but not effective.
Unacceptable.
A heady cocktail of scents wafted through the crack in the locker door. Most apparent was the harsh laundry detergent the UNSC issued, likely from the marine on the other side of the door. Cooked pork, garlic, and green onions reminded her of happier times before the war; before the insurrection.
Things were more hopeful, back then. Humanity was still trying to expand, though the insurrection was starting to ramp up. Vesper herself was the culmination of a project meant to develop a hardier form of life that could be sent to austere planets for future colonization, though she hadn't known that back then. All she knew was that there were a lot of people in white coats that taught her, fed her, kept her safe. They ordered what they called Chinese food back then when they hadn't wanted to cook, or for special occasions. While this dish wasn't quite the same as it was from a restaurant sixty years ago, it brought her back to better memories.
Memories she could use.
These fragments in her head, better times, let her push the trauma, the pain and suffering she'd been through far down, far enough that she could forget for a while. She'd wonder for a while just what happened on Reach, but she'd be happy.
Yeah right.
She'd been doing it so long there wasn't any room left for repressed horror. It worked long enough for her to get out of the locker and stand in front of the marine that brought the food. Then, Vesper's body locked up as she relived the month she spent on Reach. Her eyes leveled at the far wall of the loading bay, hackles raised, tail bushed out. Barely breathing, she stood stock still.
Tragedy occurred to her, as it occasionally did. How many people had she watched die? How many had she indirectly killed because she wasn't fast enough, strong enough, hadn't paid enough attention? Had she saved as many people as she indirectly killed? Her mind cycled through every face she'd seen on Reach and wondered if any at all were still drawing breath. The loss of human life was staggering, and she was left wondering how the war could ever be won—
"Sorry for the wait on a fork, LT, I was trying to find my fork. Here you go."
"Thank you. I need to see the captain. Is the mess hall on the way?" Vesper took a bite out of the fried rice with the offered fork. It made her feel a little less terrible.
"Sure, but what do you need the mess for?"
"Might want more. Besides, I don't have anything to wash this down with."
"Right! Follow me."
The still unnamed trooper led her back into the ship proper. The deep pain in her chest started to fade with every step she took away from her ruined armor, and her calmed breaths took the burning away from her muscles. Fading pain left behind hunger, though that too was fading away with each bite of fried rice.
Noble team's dog tags clinked against her fork. She'd forgotten they were in her hand. Odd, considering that she couldn't stop remembering every aspect of her time on Reach. She grounded herself again by rubbing the tags into the fork with a thumb, and taking another bite.
"They must've been close to you, for you to still have them."
"Hm?" Her confusion was evident on her face to most, but she mumbled through a mouthful of rice for good measure.
"Those tags. I've got my own collection. People I knew, people I liked. Hell, even some I didn't like but respected nonetheless. Keep them all right here," The marine patted his thigh pocket, metal jingling, "never let them get too far. Sometimes it's almost like they're right here with me. Helping me chamber the next round, clear the jam, what have you. You probably think it sounds stupid, but it makes me feel better."
Others could say what they wanted about superstitious soldiers, but Vesper appreciated his mindset with a silent nod.
"I don't think it's stupid. You're right though, we were closer than you'd think."
"You guys know each other as kids? Grow up on the same planet?" He asked.
"Classified." At least, she was pretty sure the details of the Spartan program were still classified. How much longer they would be now that Reach had fallen? The truth had a habit of coming out in hard times. "But yes, something like that. I like the way you see things. We could use more marines like you."
"Marines like me? I'm not tracking LT." He said, clearly confused.
"You've still got hope."
Her solemn reply left them walking in silence.
There weren't many marines on the way up to the mess hall. Most were probably still in the bunks, in the gym, or in the showers. If it really had been more than 12 hours, most of them were likely just waking up. The mess itself was almost completely empty. The only person there was the ship's chef. He didn't say anything, his eyes were sunken and vacant. Hopefully he was only tired from serving more people he was used to. Hopefully, he hadn't been traumatized by all the war stories he'd no doubt heard. He was an ONI chef, he probably hadn't seen what it had been like on Reach. Time to stir him out of his stupor.
"Sir."
"Hm? Oh sorry LT, I guess there's a lot on my mind. What can I do for you?"
"Something to drink?"
"We got water, milk, a coupla' different sodas—"
"What kind of sodas?" Vesper asked directly. Milk was fine, and water was standard, it had been so long since she'd had a simple soda. Supply lines had all but disappeared in the last couple of weeks.
"Well, we've got Grn, Blu, and Oranj. We had cola, but we've run out."
"Oranj, please."
The ship chef rolled the spherical can towards her over the galley counter. She shoved her fork into the rice and stopped the citrus soda. She'd always wondered about the logistics and manufacturing process of a spherical can, or the reason. It must've been expensive and difficult to make. At any rate, it held soda just as well as any other can, in what was technically a smaller package. It would go well with the rice, at any rate. She turned to walk away, only to be interrupted by the chef.
"Say, Spartan, would you do me a favor?"
"What do you need?"
"Could you, I dunno say something to the guys? They're…" He paused for a second, deep in thought. "They're not hanging in too well, ma'am."
"...I'll see what I can do." She'd never been good at speeches. It's why she'd let Noble team do the talking for her. Still, she'd be able to manage.
She'd had some good examples, after all.
"Attention on deck!"
Vesper's escort called the bunk room to attention. She hadn't asked him to, but he had anyway. Marines and the ship's crew were scrambling to stand, make themselves decent and stand at attention because she held a higher rank. There was a casual, twitching hatred on their faces; they'd all suffered under an officer's boot for too long..
"As you were!" One simple command set the bunks back to the same, depressed energy they'd had before. Her glare sent her escort retreating with hands up.
"I have a few words to say, if you'd hear them." Murmurs and whispers rang across the room and her enhanced hearing heard, stored, and analyzed them all. Things like "So that's a Spartan," "Are they all so fuzzy?" and "She thinks we need to be asked to listen to a Spartan?" She refocused on what she wanted to say, keeping it in her mind. It would slip away like sand if she didn't. Never was good at words.
"We were massacred at our strongest hold. Hunted down. Glassed." Her thoughts were interrupted by more murmurs: "Is she trying to help?" "This is the most I've ever heard a Spartan talk."
"But we're all still alive—"
"Oh, and that's such a fucking blessing, is it now?!" One woman flew into a rage, jumping up from where she'd been crouched before. The marine's shoulders squared, looked like she was spoiling for a fight. "Because I would've much rather died," there were tears in the woman's eyes, voice wavering where it had been full of fire moments later, "than leave my fucking family behind. They were my everything. They're gone and it's MY FAULT!" The trooper's fist impacted Vesper's stomach. The Spartan let the woman crumple against her chest, letting her sob and cry. "I should have died down there. Should have fought and died."
"I thought so too."
"What?"
"I was going to do just that. Was going to make my stand near Asźod."
"What stopped you?"
"It would have been easy to just fight and die. I'd lost everything I thought I'd never have. I had watched my team, my brothers and sisters, die in front of me," Vesper refilled her lungs with a shuddering gasp, "and I remembered. Remembered that they died for Reach. Nobody would remember them if I died. Not really. It's much harder to keep living, keep the memories alive."
The marine had long since stood back up, was looking up attentively even through the tears and shudders. The silence of the room was deafening, like time was standing still. Even the ship's air circulation had been dampened. Having said her piece, Vesper turned and left the bunks silent. Even her escort was shocked and silently followed close behind, careful not to step on her tail.
Just one stop left.
"Why do you have a desk in front of the Commander's office?" Vesper asked doggedly.
"I'm his secretary," the woman said angrily. She looked tired.
"In what world would an ONI commander waste the manpower for a secretary in this stage of the war?"
Ensign Grazzete, as her name tape revealed, leaned forwards and looked around to make sure the ship's crew wasn't around.
"Look Spartan, between you and me? This guy's an asshole. He keeps me as his secretary where I'm a fucking maintenance tech, put the other two ships in danger getting to you with some of the worst piloting I've ever seen because he wanted to 'bring it in' himself. Catch my drift? His early career looked good, he had a long lineage of officers in his past, but he's not fit for the position he's in. He's not fit for a higher one either. He just reached too damn far."
"He put the other two Prowlers in danger?"
"Yes ma'am." Grazzete leaned back, seemingly satisfied that her point was made. She fished a cigarette out of a white and red package, striking the chemical laden end on the table and igniting the vice. Sticking it between her lips, she took a drag and puffed a small cloud of smoke, only for it to be sucked away by the ship's ventilation systems. "Want one?"
"No thanks. I need to give him a piece of my mind."
"Good luck, ma'am."
Ensign Grazzete keyed an intercom, "Commander Beltrano, Siera Bee Three One Two is here."
"Send her in, ensign."
"She's on the way."
Vesper walked past the desk that shouldn't have been and into the commander's threshold. The room smelled of cigars and pointless aspirations. Who would waste their limited manpower on something so pointless this late in the war? He wouldn't go anywhere like this. Her hand snapped into a salute, which he sloppily returned and cut. Alcohol wafted into her nose despite the 10 foot gap between them.
"Sssiera B-312." Beltrano's glass of cheap scotch came dangerously close to his burnt out cigar, golden liquid threatening to spill, "Good to have you onboard."
"Good to be off Reach, sir. What's our—"
"What's our sstatus, you ask?" Beltrano cut her off immediately, "Well, we're okay all thingss considered. Little burnt up from a rough entrance into atmosz. Not my fault, heh"
"Not what I—"
"Anyways, we're gonna meet up with Valiant somewhere off in the outer rim. If it's still around. Was gettin pretty beat up—"
His excuses drove her into a hot-red madness. Vesper's fist slammed the table. Dark oak splintered under bare hand. He was visibly shaken by the otherwise blank faced Spartan.
"Where do we begin, sir? You have a secretary. On a spy ship. You took the helm from your pilot, a pilot specifically qualified and selected to fly this ship because you wanted to 'bring it in'? I'm disgusted. After all the life lost on Reach, every other planet we've lost in this war, you risk your entire ship? All your crew? Where you sit, all I see is one more threat."
"Now h-hold on, I had a good—"
"You're relieved of duty effective immediately, Commander. You'll spend the rest of the trip in the brig. Far better than you deserve."
Vesper's arm smacked away his sidearm, pulled from under the oaken desk, far out of his hand. She heard something in his wrist snap, and he started screaming until she hoisted him kicking in the air. She threw him towards the door. He slid across the ground, coming to a sudden stop against the wall.
"G-Guards! Security!"
Vesper keyed the ship's PA system.
"Commander Beltrano is in violation of the WINTER CONTINGENCY: His misconduct has resulted in the endangerment of a Tier One Asset, and several survivors of the Fall of Reach. He is to be detained in the brig immediately pending a trial for treason. XO, report to the former commander's quarters."
She walked over to him as he lay broken on the floor. It would have been so easy to kill him, so easy to just snuff this filth out like she'd done to so many insurrectionists that were accused of the same thing. She stood over him, a looming pillar of cruel strength towering over shattered ambitions. He cowered under rank, under the fact that he was supposed to be her superior, that the ship's crew would listen to him. He was wrong. Her fist came crashing down, primed to knock him out cold—
He'd already fainted.
It would keep him safe from her, but he wouldn't be safe from their boss. ONI was always watching, after all, and it never forgot, either. It would've been bad for morale to kill him after her announcement. She'd gone through Scaled Morality Training, just like any other field officer. He'd live out the rest of the war far away from whatever his misguided ambitions could get him into. Her handler probably wouldn't even mention it.
It was a better fate than either of them deserved.