Halo: Invisibles

"Insignificant short stories from the Halo universe."
==Halo: Invisibles==
__TOC__
===Ode to 117===
:• • •
===Rampancy===
:2553 - 2556
:UNSC Frigate Forward Unto Dawn
:Uncharted Space
===CORBULO's Kind===
:Planetfall, 26 April 2526
:Corbulo Academy of Military Science
:Circinius IV, UEG Outer Colonies
===Fear What You Know===
:UNSC Military Calendar: 2043 Hours, 21 January 2557
:Expedition Course: UNDERBRUSH PENETRATOR, Unknown Location
:Erebus VII – Remote Garden World, Human Space
Spartan von Essen trailed after his expeditionary group for the fourth time in two hundred meters. It wasn't like he tired or had reason to fall behind, something just kept putting him off.
Erebus VII was an interesting world, to say nothing more on its utterly alien nature. Humanity sailed the stars for a little over two centuries, and terraformed, colonized hundreds of worlds. It was so easy to take things for granted. Even after making proper first contact with the many Covenant races and fought a war against them, they ended up being deceptively human in their own rights.
So, it was flabbergasting to step foot on an untouched biosphere, unique supposedly and only to itself. A true standout. So why did he keep seeing something horrifyingly familiar at every turn?
Did his eyes fail him, or did he face a true ungodly force down here?
This was the sixth time he'd seen it. That brown, slick surface rippling like a surgery-freed lung or heart, pulsating in rhythm. Bulbous and rubbery like a wet, thick balloon. And it and the others were large, easily the size of an entire rose bush. And dozens more swells grew atop the big one, and around it in the muddy alien soil. They all squirmed as if more alive than in principle. Cancerous in appearance.
He didn't want to say it, for fear of realizing his rationale – his rationalized fear.
Von Essen knew what the others would say. They would call him crazy. Right? But this was a completely alien world, one only recently set foot upon by humans in the space of mere weeks to a few months.
Licking his lips behind the fog-trapped visor of his MJOLNIR helmet, he barked into the radio. "Team, hold. I got something of concern."
The blue waypoint markers of his team paused in movement, some taking a knee. The furthest marker was already making its way back down the satellite-designated trail as its speaker responded in a huff. "What is the hold up now? What could possibly be worth a break?"
Von Essen didn't bother responding, keeping his BR85 battle rifle pressed against his chest plate and his lone plasma weapon, a Covenant plasma pistol magnetized to his thigh. He recalled his post-War adversary identification training; plasma could temper most biological threats.
After many moments of waiting in tempered silence, the radioed voice entered into the open – coming to stand next to the Spartan. The perturbed woman, dressed in a procured and wrongly-fit Marine Corps jacket and environmental mask, stood barely up to von Essen's chest.
"So, Spartan. What's the holdup?"
Von Essen shrugged his shoulders and gestured to the swell-colony separated four feet from himself. "It's this thing—"
"It looks familiar Spartan but it's not what you think it is."
The Spartan paused, expecting an explanation but none came. He finally asked, "Then what is it?"
The science expedition leader grumbled and waved her hands around in mild frustration.
"Do I really have to babysit three Marines and a paranoid Spartan… It's like you not only can't think for yourselves; you soldiers can't even take care of your own jobs."
Von Essen made to interrupt, defending himself and the escort. "Doctor Stein, your comments are highly unprofessional and I don't—"
"What are my requirements of you and the Leathernecks on this trip?"
"Ma'am—"
The doctor interrupted once more, "Humor me, now."
Von Essen sighed, "Scan visible flora and fauna along the designated path. Avoid overexposure, collect samples where possible."
Doctor Stein glanced up at the Spartan. "Well, I guess you're at least good for that much. The Marines couldn't even remember that."
"To be fair, ma'am, we weren't given a crash course on what to investigate, and Command ruled that we keep a small team, so we couldn't fit your assistants this time around. The Marines are just trying their best."
The doctor sniffed at the rebuttal.
"Still, what is it if it's not—"
"Mummyvine."
The Spartan did a double-take, "What? I've—I'm sorry, can you repeat that?"
"Mummyvine. Arcadian climbers or creeper plant. They're a type of spore-vine flora that used to be native to Arcadia before it was glassed by the Covenant."
"I'm not familiar with the species."
Doctor Stein thrust her data pad at the unsettled Spartan. "Read it."
Von Essen gingerly took the data pad in one hand and swiped over its plexiglass screen. The on-board data jumped over a wireless connection to his suit computer, cataloging the information for his own data set. The Spartan handed the tablet back to the doctor and began to read for himself, the doctor huffed at the nonverbal interaction but already made to turn around.
Even so, the said unhelpful Marines began to arrive as well to assess the commotion between Spartan and doctor. No one spoke to them, thoroughly occupied. Still, von Essen couldn't help but feel sympathy for his subordinates.
They already verbalized their distaste for this assignment in private. They didn't want to be here. Doctor Stein didn't want to be here. Von Essen didn't want to be here. No one did, but here they all were regardless.
The said doctor's insults were certainly heard, unhelpful, unappreciated, and thoroughly ignored. The Marines made a flinching wide berth for Stein as she passed them by. Von Essen sighed but resolved himself to the alien flora documentation.
The data entry was thin but straightforward, short enough that von Essen could get a fair picture without holding up the expedition into the Erebus VII evening. How considerate of the good Doctor.
Mummyvine, a species of highly invasive Arcadian climber plants and once native to Arcadia was discovered in 2461 around the time of planetary colonization efforts. Hardy and spread through air-propelled spores, they sought out all potential spaces for water sources and then proceeded to absorb them like a vacuum. Other plants, animals, even humans were susceptible to it and lead to a health emergency in the same decade of discovery when Arcadian farming families, livestock, and crops failed on a grand scale near the planetary equator.
Turned out exposure to Mummyvine got into their bodies and food supply and once infected, sucked their bodies dry of water – leading to mummification on an epidemic scale. In the following decades, the invasive species managed to jump biospheres aboard Arcadian freighters but were quarantined quickly after several more notorious outbreaks on neighboring colonies. Since the glassing of Arcadia, the plant was on the endangered species list but not that anyone really cared beyond some prickly scientists.
Great. So, von Essen had the luck of being the first human to rediscover a very dangerous and nearing-extinct plant species. That wasn't going on his post-service resume.
Still, something about the encounter felt off to the Spartan. A little note at the bottom, attuned to his clearance level remarked: "shares visible identification qualities with Inferi redivivus."
"Doctor Stein, how are you certain this is Mummyvine? The vinery, spores, and these… blisters? They have a brown-and-orange coloration to them. Mummyvine is described as a green-and-grey coloration."
"It's Erebus, Spartan! Everything is fucking brown-and-orange on this stupid, humid rock. Let's go already."
So much for that… Von Essen's glance to the Marine escorts received casual shrugs.
One Marine, Corporal Tomas, made a passing remark as he turned away. "I mean… I do see it? It does look like the Flood from simulations. Not that I would know well, I wasn't at Voi."
Deciding maybe the doctor was right and he was just being paranoid, he took four steps – following along the designated trail once more. Falling into step with the shorter strides of the Marines. His careful eyes traced Doctor Stein's marker as it strolled ever ahead of and away from the security entourage. Von Essen didn't look back to his previous concern.
Well, that was before he heard a rustle. Then a bubbling, squelching 'pop'.
Turning around alone out of curiosity, von Essen detected a brief, low roar like a sickly horse.
His dew-covered visor made it difficult to make out clear details but he swore he saw something. It was kind of small, cat-sized. The shadow scuttled across the trampled ground and into the underbrush. A few thoughts crossed the Spartan's mind as it disappeared.
Squid-looking. Little tendrils. Did he see that right?
===The Eyes of Dolls===
:UNSC Military Calendar: 1800 Hours, 25 April 2558
:117 Institute, Boston Harbor
:United Republic of North America, Earth
While her friends were all back at that military academy, Andra mustered through the apparent permission work expected of regular midshipmen to justify a multi-day excursion off-campus. It was one thing to be on an Insurrectionist-hunting stakeout, but this requirement of not using her Spartan credentials to cut through red tape was an infuriating prospect.
Major Duceppe was a respectable man, a father figure even, and she understood what he meant by "no paper trail." However, she couldn't miss an opportunity to complain, even if it was to herself and the other pair of watching eyes.
The visitation was short notice and an invitation she didn't dare refuse. It was her… 'mother', sort of, after all. Saying that felt weird – Andra shivered as the words echoed in her cluttered mind while seated and waiting for a receptionist to let her move deeper into the facility.
She missed the outward efficiency portrayed by the Office of Naval Intelligence. AIs managed everything, calculating opportunity risk so no one wasted time unless a certain quality of emotional leverage needed to be exerted over a party.
The One-Seventeen Institute was established after the Human-Covenant War by ONI leadership but it was advertised and handled like a civilian operation; that meant resources went poof left and right. Andra wanted to pretend that ONI efficiency was an economical standard but the truth, apparently, was most people looked on their external orientation as clinically unnerving.
Spacious, unmarked hallways. Long empty spaces. Featureless fixtures. As if they wanted a squeaky-clean surface to cover their 'regular' business behind the scenes. Andra was a Spartan, she was familiar with the intelligence agency's closeted skeletons. Hell, her 'mother' was a skeleton-bearer and Andra one of the skeletons.
The One-Seventeen Institute shared ONI's love for clinical decorum but they mediated that, wrongly in Andra's opinion, with human clerks and attendants. Apparently, visitors and business partners didn't sit well with less-human experiences like cameras and unattended sliding doors. Even when contemporary society was full of less-human experiences, they were tweaked to fit a more empathetic appeal.
Andra ignored the well-dressed secretary when she arrived after twenty minutes through the sliding door and called for "Miss Andra Kearsarge" and "dear" to a receiving room of one. She whispered a quiet "thank you," leaving the attendant behind with short gratitude as she stepped into a cooled working chamber.
An artificial display covering the west and northern face of the office space that broadcasted real-time video of Boston Harbor and a submerged crater dated to the mid-twenty-second century. It was a beautiful distraction but it couldn't hide the narrowness of the ceiling or the lack of windows. Stale air whistled through ducts into the room.
Andra's old therapist and the recruitment head for SPARTAN-III Delta Company welcomed the young Spartan into the abode with outstretched arms. The words of Dr. Zhou-Romero were a distant whisper, something caught between a "hello" and "welcome." Andra didn't dwell on the older woman's slip-of-tongue and afforded herself the best of mental steel – she wanted to show this woman how far Andra-D054 had grown.
The conversation that followed slipped by as they discussed an assortment of tangentially related topics and on-the-spot questions. It was a cordial affair as they caught up as if no time passed; Zhou-Romero made intuitive remarks and Andra supplied the details. But at least something went her way and she managed a full-on conversation thanks to weeks of forceful exposure to normal human beings, even as the Spartan felt off-put by how little she got out of the therapist.
Andra talked about meeting her Gamma Company trainers. Her first-time seeing Earth in person. She discussed teaching refugee children how to swim in San Diego-Tijuana after a record year of avoidable drownings. She talked about living in the New Phoenix ghost town, picking fights with corporate supersoldiers in Seattle, hunting Sangheili extremists in Rio, and making fake friends at the academy along the Patuxent River estuary.
But the doctor didn't offer much back. Where did she go after Delta Company? What was she currently doing? How did she come into the employ of the One-Seventeen Institute? Was there to be another SPARTAN-III company? Had she heard from any other Gammas or Deltas?
Andra's unspoken questions were replaced by questions about "the weather" and "history of Boston" and "the requirements to become a therapist."
And then time ran out. Three hours felt like one. Andra quietly but respectfully and verbally thanked the doctor for her time, especially in view of the same secretary who stood in the ajar doorway at the other end of the room. The attendant never spoke to the doctor seemingly.
As Andra prepared to leave, the doctor pushed forward an elegant black box, like the efficient and well-dressed packaging she expected to encase a new smart device. The doctor called it "a late gift" and asked that Andra read the instructions and requirements carefully. That it was of classified value and to treat it with care. Andra nodded in understanding, adding some additional vigor to show she hung on every word.
The next words that followed as she made to step away from the desk gave Andra flinching, visible pause.
"I love you…"
Not an expected goodbye but one all the same. Andra froze on the spot for only a second before turning and rushing the woman who saved her from a crowded orphanage, dying to Covenant glassing, and giving her a new lease on life. Andra hugged her deeply and dared not let go.
The phrase haunted her nights after when Andra laid in silence, staring up at Merlin's bunk above her. But it wasn't the words that entirely drew her attention.
No, it was the following curse, she decided, that put her off in tandem. She now understood why people favored human experiences.
As a little girl at the Jasmine Hope Youth Treatment Center, she watched the other orphan girls play tea time with dolls they salvaged from their burnt homeworlds. The unblinking, jarring glass eyes that stared back as Andra crowd-watched. She hated those eyes.
When she finished reading the documentation tied to the little black box and examining the housing unit and data chip within, Andra synced the little device with her neural interface.
To say she suffered a panic attack after would be an understatement. But she didn't let anyone know. She decided it was her problem to bear – entirely. The doctor's directions encouraged her to share the duty with her teammates but Andra didn't dare follow through.
Not when everything she experienced was echoed in the back of her head. And not when the holographic phantasm dressed in a cloak stared back at her with eerily familiar, deep blue eyes.
It seemed Andra had a doll of her own now; whose eyes were her own. And she was afraid.
• • •
[SNI data entry cataloged to volatile memory.]
[User ID: ALT 5032-4 “Althea”]
===Roxanne: Hide and Seek===
:Daytime, 23 July 2552
:Sauvageau Homestead, Visegrád
:Viery Territory, Reach, UEG Inner Colonies
And so, played out the longest game of hide-and-seek ever by a little farmgirl on the Reavian highlands.
Little seven-year-old Roxanne Sauvageau could tell it was daytime, but not the hour or minute. Dim light poured into her hiding hole giving her the hint. She didn’t dare move from her cooled, dark spot behind a giant green fuel canister of six located deep within her family’s homestead. She clutched a small wireless handheld, a game player she refused to connect with the home network. It remained unused, a trick she learned the hard way against her elder brothers in hide-and-seek games like this one. If she hooked into the home network, someone would notice the signal activity eventually.
Her brothers were keenly aware of the trick because they too learned that mistake with the neighbors’ children and their parents over the years. Children got bored, even in exciting pursuits like this. Game players helped pass the time in the dark, but tracing signals back to users was easy.
The Sauvageau multi-ring kiva, a large complex formed by three permacrete housing facilities tucked between foothills and a ravine, was full of hiding places and obscure retreats perfect for children to disappear into. Over many years and games, Roxanne and her brothers mastered the layout of their homes and their neighbors’ homes in ways adults could not begin to comprehend. More than once, troubled children sent to their rooms disappeared for hours, only to mysteriously reappear in the kitchen in the dead of night looking for a snack.
Roxanne had on more than one occasion been that troubled child, just wanting to be ‘one of the boys’ after growing up under the competitive strongarming environment of Dicun, Lenard, and Radek Sauvageau. Being the youngest and the only girl had its ups and downs.
Like when the boys protected her from bullies at school, jesting about her out-of-place blonde hair among the family. Or when the boys stole her dolls, work gloves, and agreed time on the flight simulator they found in the basement from the farm family that moved out a generation ago.
Or maybe now, when Dicun made sure to put her in one of his undefeated hiding spots before running off to find Lenard after hearing their parents screaming from outside the homestead. And how Dicun, Lenard, or Radek never returned.
The homestead and its kiva rings were mostly silent now. Empty halls harmonically populated by the desolate sounds of air duct fans, drips of water, and the home’s settling foundation. As if nothing stalked the halls above.
Roxanne didn’t dare move. Noises were deceiving – she knew something was out there. A monster, or many monsters. She couldn’t let them find her.
Just like how they found Lenard two naps ago when Roxanne was summoned from comforting sleep by his animalistic screams of terror and the warbles of alien intruders upon the homestead. Roxanne’s brother screamed for what felt like hours, but she had the misfortune to try and count the seconds off in her head at that moment.
He screamed for three-hundred-and-seven seconds, split between earsplitting hollers for help, cries of agony, and desperate final croaks as he died by the insidious methods of the monsters. Not once did she call out to his aid or for her own reassurance. Not once did she seek to leave her coveted cover, assigned by Dicun. Not once did she try to save her dying brother as he screamed.
Dicun had been clear. Do not leave this spot no matter what. Do not call out, do not move. Do not make a peep. He was twelve and so much more worldly than Roxanne. Lenard was, had been ten. The missing Radek, thirteen.
She didn’t know what happened to Dicun, but she knew that somewhere upstairs, the body of Lenard waited, based on the echoing of his screams and the thumping of a struggle. He spoke terrible words, things that she couldn’t push from her mind, “giant birds—with many teeth” or “they’re cutting me Momma, they have long knives.”
Or “don’t eat me,” followed by alien squawks and even more violent gurgles. Roxanne couldn’t get the thoughts out of her head; she couldn’t stop her wild imagination from conceiving any number of terrible ways her sibling exited this world.
Roxanne did nothing. Her muffled gasps echoed just a little through her clasped hands-over-mouth as tears dripped down her cheeks. Her frustrated, angry, and horrified cries finally whisked her off to sleep, another barely blissful interrupt to the worst day of her life.
• • •
In her dreams, Roxanne imagined herself flying but not by way of fairy wings, nor Neverland imagination. She sat in a cushy flight chair with a four-piece harness restraining her in place just like the flight simulator in the other basement. A UNSC space fighter cockpit rested before her, the joystick and control panels just within reach. Outside the vehicle’s windows, she could see a massive sheet of cloud cover that extended to and beyond the Reavian horizon.
Gray clouds loomed as far as the eye could see; how very normal for the skies over Visegrád. Roxanne recognized these skies as she zipped over her hometown, watching tips of mountain peaks disappear and reappear beneath the cloud cover. She circled about in high-G elliptical turns that twisted into spectacles set off-angle with the horizon’s axis. She performed elaborated barrel rolls, dodging the plasma spray of fuzzy purple outlines that came in and out of her dreamy view. She threw herself into a vertical and a weightless drift, drawing a sky scissor on one of her imaginary pursuers and dropped on their tail. The alien fighter proved slow and cumbersome, never able to keep up because Roxanne was the best pilot the UNSC had ever seen.
As she flew by, she saw specs atop a cracked mountain top – split down the center as if by a lightning strike. Mount Törött. She drifted closer, the alien starfighters disappearing quickly from memory.
The specs grew into humanoid shapes as she neared, and then into humans. Five figures waved out to her, smiling, and cheering her on. Mom, Dad. Dicun, Lenard and Radek. Their faces were obscured but she knew it was them – the power of dreams.
She made to wave back; yell and holler their names in absolute bliss. They lived! Her family was there waiting for her!
The cloud cover shifted, a heavy gust of wind painting over the fluffy white sea and pressed into the broken mountain peak. Clouds shifted over Törött’s tops and the family became shadow, fading in the mountain mist.
Fading and gone. Roxanne’s hand slackened mid-rise, drooping back to her side. They were gone. Gone…forever, fading into the white without her.
• • •
Roxanne awoke screaming.
So did the rest of the homestead. Creaks, crows, and screeches joined the girl’s holler of desperation and terror.
Roxanne clamped a palm to her face, filling the fuel room with thunderous slap. Above her feet shuffled and scampered about, the monsters now alert to the other occupant of the house. How they didn’t find her yet was a miracle, but it didn’t matter anymore. The game was up, they would find and kill her now.
The little girl whimpered, staring into the darkness, and wished so desperately for the nightmare to end. End anyway possible, just get the monsters out and return her family. Anything but this. She didn’t want to die. She wanted her Momma.
The crones and step work of the monsters continued. Sounds of toppling furniture and shattering dishware hitting the kitchen floor. They were coming. Inhuman feet tapped against stairwell boards, one clawed foot at a time. They clicking grew louder by the second.
Desperation gripped Roxanne’s heart. She needed to run! It wasn’t safe! She needed to hide again!
But where else to run? This was the first time she was introduced to this hiding spot. The first time she lay eyes on this interior space beneath the laundry room in abundant detail. She didn’t know this small room like the rest of the house.
Roxanne was trapped, no place to retreat and no place to hide. The monsters were coming, having stormed past the keep. For a moment she thought of the homestead as her castle, and she, it’s princess... No, not a princess. A knight.
What would a knight do in a time like this?
A knight would fight the monsters. Draw a sword and bow against them. Roxanne had no sword, no bow. On ancient Earth, knights set fire to their castle moat to keep their enemies at bay in a siege. They used molten oil – she had no fire, but she had oil. Six giant bins of oil.
Roxanne rose, quick on her feet, and squeezed herself between the two canisters and under a fuel tube to break back into the open. The fuel room was still dark with exception to the dim glow above from a ground level window pressed between the wall and ceiling. Distant sunlight poured in but like before she couldn’t tell the time.
She rushed down the line of tubs, examining their green surfaces for valves and control interfaces to get a frantic plan in motion. If she did something, things would be okay. Do nothing and she would die, like a helpless princess. Roxanne had been her brothers’ princess, but she knew what she really was.
The very best fighter pilot. A dazzling female knight in shining armor. She would not fail now. She would defend what was hers, whatever she had left.
She spun faucet dials; nothing came out – safety systems. Roxanne tapped at the center console on the furthest tub in the room, away from the stairs leading to the foyer above.
The logo for Kawanishi Engineering flashed across the screen for a bare second than retreated into a user interface. Procedures – Functions – something. Her fingers danced across the settings menu looking for the pump control; she was seven, operating a gas tank was not the same as starting up a flight simulator, a game player, or a clothing washer. At least she thought this situation would run simpler than this.
The monster noises continued above – for what she thought were fast creatures, they seemed to be coming down slow. The pump release; found it!
Something hissed and bubbled within the tank, giving a hefty grunt from both Roxanne and the machine as she figured out how to get the fragments of an idea in her head together. A series of pops echoed within the tank, and then all the tanks.
Wait, was that supposed to happen?
Roxanne didn’t get a chance to find out – the squawks were right around the corner. She sprinted from the console towards her original hiding spot behind the fuel tanks. Her attempts crossed into brief view of the hallway; a grateful breath escaped the girl’s lips upon not seeing a raptor-like foot sticking out at the edge of the stairwell. But things grew complicated as she pressed back into the gap and felt two cold metal surfaces squeeze in on her.
She was stuck? No, please, not like this…
How did she get through here earlier? How did her brother do it? He said to squeeze herself through, make sure to… what did Dicun tell her to do? Her mind blanked, panicked.
The monsters were right behind her, she swore it.
The tanks sputtered further, their micro-pops rising in threat. They sounded like broken washing machines on the verge of self-dismantling. Roxanne was stuck between the containers but there was this dangling tube with jostling dark liquid passing between them…
A very bad idea assembled itself, becoming crystal clear to the girl. Oil was slick, she could slicken her clothes and slide through. Maybe she could be quick about it.
Reaching up to the darkened tube, she clamped down something fierce and twisted as her child arms only reached so far. The tube gave way with very little effort, twisting and twisting, until pop.
The tube came free and Roxanne was introduced to the worst smelling thing in the galaxy for the first time. Blackened sludge gushed free of the tube, finally giving way to the glories of gravity.
Roxanne’s head was in the way, as the first marks of fuel ink drenched her brilliant blond hair in black. She flinched, dodging away as more splashed across her skin, her clothes. The yellowish-black liquid kept pouring from the opening as slouching continued to fill the space. Not just from the tube, but from the giant fuel tanks took. Six pops echoed through the room and the slouching became awash – a full torrent. Her first reaction was to flinch, the liquid stung to the touch but there was nowhere to run.
Barely able to open her eyes, Roxanne could only squint through obscured, burning eyelids and made out a dark sea emerging in the fuel room. First an inch height in the putrid-smelling liquid, but then it kept going. It stunk, it stuck, and it rose. Like high tide, coming up to her toes and sneakers. Swallowing her ankles and quickly rising to her shins.
No, this was too much – the stuff was already pouring down on her head and back, now it was reaching up her legs too. Too much! The fuel ran free, smelling sweet with a terrifying, intoxicating aroma that made it very hard to think when mixed with panic. An aberrant thought summed it up for her, the scent of demonic honey…
Her moat wasn’t supposed to be this deep, but it did solve one issue. She squirmed harder and pressed forward between the bins – a blackened mass of a girl, drenched head to toe in oil. Roxanne cruised finally free, squeaking by as black splotches trailed over the surfaces of the fuel tanks.
She splashed forth into the oil puddle settling behind the canisters as well. Shirt, pants – all drenched. Getting a face full of the fuel’s smell, Roxanne cringed as the beginnings of a headache thundered in her skull. This smell, she could barely process through it.
Hide, she needed to hide. The thought consumed her through the pounding heartbeat pressing into her forehead. The headache would not stop her. She had her moat, now all she would need is a match. Something to set a fire between her and the monsters. The risks of lathering in the flammable liquid didn’t even cross her mind. She was simply set on staying alive.
And just in time. The monsters, the aliens, finally made their presence known in the deepest chamber of the Sauvageau homestead. Through the shadowed gap between the tanks, a blackened Roxanne watched as the beasts that haunted her deepest, darkest dreams for her entire life emerged before the makeshift moat under distant sunlight.
Living on the edge of civilization did not mean Roxanne was unaware of the demon creatures that sought to destroy all humanity. Her entire childhood was built around them – the alien Covenant. At school, they practiced Covenant raid drills. At home, her parents used to watch late into the night combat footage from the frontlines. In the fields, her brothers took turns pretending to be the Elite in ‘Kill the Split-Jaw’.
Now they wandered her home freely, invaders from beneath another star.
Roxanne didn’t dare move. Not for the putrid smell, not for her own fear, and not for the shriek demanding to be free of her lips. Two aliens sauntered down the stairwell and paused at the edge of the shallow, blackened sea that lay before them.
The aliens were reptilian – kind of like a raptor, or more like a feathery Moa. Their heads bobbed and shifted about, like those of chicken. Large feather crests extended from their heads; their bodies were adjourned in dark, ceramic armor. Their eyes seemed to glow in the low light, like embers or predator eyes, narrow and harsh yellow. Razor sharp teeth protruded from their tough, stone-like jaws.
She wondered if they could see or smell her while covered head to toe in the liquid fuel. They crooned at one another, the duo stepping cautiously into the flooded basement. While Roxanne couldn’t imagine understanding their foreign speak in the slightest, there were universal signals that any intelligent life could decipher.
One of the aliens screeched at the other as it tried to poke the black liquid with its blue-colored weapon, shaped like a large magnet. The yelling alien reached out and grasped its ally’s arm as if the other was making a terrible mistake. It made hand gestures toward the other’s weapon then its own and back at the black liquid. Danger, don’t do that?
Roxanne’s education was still simple but things like states of matter and basic chemical reactions were straight forward. Things that were hot, burned. Oil could start a fire. Aliens used fire weapons, right? As the reality settled for Roxanne, she allowed herself a moment of internal pride – had they stepped forward or done some other stupid thing, it could have burned it and its friend alive.
The victory was complete but short lived. After shuffling a bit at the black pool’s edge, the monsters seemed to lose interest – their wide eyes dimming in scale from dinner plates to tea cups.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity, they turned their feet and took leisure-like steps back up the path to the main floor. Roxanne watched and listened from the darkness while praying in silence to any creator above to prevent them from finding her. The desperate wishes seemed to come through as the alien raptors disappeared up the stairwell and out of sight – their footsteps echoed overhead but their voices, hisses in their own tongue, emptied off into nothing.
Roxanne did not celebrate. Her victory came somber, quickly sapping any pride she might have earned from the success. She was alone again. Alone in a house full of monsters and not a family member left in sound or sight.
She survived this round, but what next? Roxanne contemplated the situation as she mustered her remaining strength and pulled herself over the final ledge and back into her hiding spot behind the canisters. Sprawling herself out, she took note of her safe space. It was dry, but that didn’t say much regarding her drenched form, sticky with the scent and texture of putrid fuel of the underground. Her game player sat unattended, but safe and undisturbed. Uncorrupted by the fuel bath, unlike herself.
The young girl curled forward, her slick legs sliding into a securing hug of slick arms and the press of a drenched forehead and matte black hair. Tears once more threatened to fall but the burning held them back. Roxanne forced the urge down so, so easily – the first time since the worst day ever began. It became easy. Her cries, screams, and tears finally weakening what remained of her fighting will. Her throat grew parched and threatened to cough up the fuel that managed its way into her nostrils and throat. Dried ducts, sapped of their water, stuck fast with the fuel tart, holding Roxanne’s eyelids remained shut. Her world was obscured, blurry. Dark. Alone.
Her breathing grew haggard; finally driven to a point of incomprehensible thought. The fuel fumes took their toll – fuzzing her brain and making it difficult to breath. Roxanne’s head drooped as the horribly sweet smell of fuel warped into calming lilac and what might have been garlic…
Nothing made sense anymore. There was just the buzz. Then there was nothing at all.
• • •
The darkness became whispers and then the sensation of shuffling waves. But there was no ocean, no substance. Just the rhythmic sensation of a pulse, of patterned beats. There weren’t any words to say or describe. Just the endlessness and the waves.
It lasted for so long, but then it didn’t exist at all. A light flicked on in the darkness and Roxanne was awake.
Roxanne. That was her name.
Last name… Sauvageau? Thoughts of friends at school, her parents, her three loving brothers. The mountainous farms that defined home. Images became noise and color and sensation. The feeling of being alive.
She blinked, and Roxanne was back. Blankets shifted beneath and around her, soft but thin. The sheets were too paper-like to be her own; harvest season on Reach tended to be a very frosty time. The girl compensated often with layered blankets that doubled as a tent during late night reading sessions.
So, this wasn’t her bed. Everything was so bright but rubbing the tired from her eyes helped bring clarity to the space. The walls were decorated with tan wallpaper and water-color cartoon characters dancing around in their imaginary play world.
Machinery filled the room closest to her bedside and a glance to the right revealed a windowed balcony with an apparent ocean in full view from several stories up. Empty or nondescript shelves and a desk filled the rest of the room. A hospital room, was that right?
Looking down at herself, Roxanne noted a very apparent baby blue hospital gown. Other than undergarments, she was naked underneath the get up. Something obstructed her right arm, a black band with a wire connection up to… The girl glanced up to a monitor with a green line dancing like those rippling music displays, but to the sound of her own heartbeat in her ears.
Roxanne slid the band off her arm causing the heartbeat scanner to go inert. Her head felt heavy too, and… where was her hair? Her golden locks refused to descend, absent from view.
Reaching up, she felt a fuzzy cap, also hooked into a machine via a dark cable. Shifting around, she noted that something hard settled under the winter hat of sorts but she also felt the object contact with her skull, her bare skin. Not her hair. She made to reach up and pull—
“Oh, you’re awake! I was wondering when you’d come around. The nurses weren’t particularly certain when you’d be up but they took you off the medical coma about three hours ago. Glad to see you up and moving.”
The male, mouthful of a voice echoed from the open doorway where a man in doctor’s white trench coat and clinical blue coveralls leaned in with a grin that extended far into both cheeks. Roxanne blinked at the man’s appearance but upon collecting herself, she ignored his presence and went about taking off the hat.
“Hey, hey now. I’m not sure you’ll want to do that. Let’s take this slow.”
Roxanne had to cough twice before she felt some semblance of her wettened throat to speak up. Her voice came out hoarse but distinctly her own. “It’s itchy.”
The doctor-looking man nodded in understanding. “I’m sorry about that but I don’t want you freaking out so soon after your recovery. You’re a very brave girl, you know that?”
Roxanne blinked at the man’s remarks, not sure what he was alluding too. She thought to what she remembered – what had happened before she got in this bed?
Sleeping. The hiding spot. Her brothers, screaming. The oil. The monsters.
Her voice hitched as the blood drained from her face. Noting Roxanne’s change in demeanor from disinterest to morbid, the doctor slipped quickly to her bedside – kneeling so he was below eye level with Roxanne and well within her view.
“Hey now. Let’s breath. Are you alright – I can get something for you – water, milk, juice?”
Her breath hitching further until they took on an illusion of hiccups, Roxanne’s vision grew clouded and locking on the image of her brother Dicun as he waved for her to stay put in the shadows. To stay safe while he went to find the others.
Dicun called out to her, “It will be alright, sit tight. I’ll be back in a minute.”
Roxanne flinched, gritted, and squinted in terror as he disappeared up those stairs. He never came back – he never came—
“Roxanne, can I call you Roxanne? Hey, hey. It’s going to be alright. You’re safe now.”
It took her another minute or two to muster a manageable return to form but her daydream soon receded in favor of the doctor kneeling close and rubbing comforting circles into her back. Just like Roxanne’s mom.
Sucking in a deep breath, Roxanne mustered an explanation for her squelched outburst.
“My-my brother. He told me to hide… But he never came back.”
The doctor nodded in understanding, “I’m sorry to hear that. I’m here if you want to talk about it. Or maybe one of the female nurses if you prefer a woman’s presence?”
Roxanne shook her head in vigor.
“The last thing I remember… I fell asleep. The monsters left me…”
The doctor nodded again.
“The Jackals. It’s okay now – you’re safe. You’re on Earth now, not Reach.”
Roxanne’s grew wide like dinner plates. “I’m on Earth?”
“Hm. Have you ever been to Earth before?”
Roxanne shook her head.
“Off Reach?”
The girl shook her head again.
“Wow, this is a big change for you huh?”
Roxanne was slow to respond but eventually nodded in affirmation. “How did I get here?”
The doctor seemed to shift uncomfortably, trying to decide how to proceed. Still, he put on a weary smile for the little girl’s sake. “Are you sure you’re ready to hear that story?”
“Please… tell me…”
“Well,” The man seemed to straighten with some previously hidden confidence from somewhere as he tried to put together words. His posture turned rigid, uniform – almost undoctor-like if Roxanne had been more mature and observant at the time. She only noted on recollection years later.
The doctor treated her like an adult. “A UNSC Army search and rescue team found you during the evacuation of Visegrád. As we speak, I hear the fighting on Reach continues but you were too sickly to be moved to a Reach hospital and instead were put up in a Navy cargo ship headed here to Earth along with your neighbors.”
“I was sick?”
“Yes, you are both a very brave girl and a lucky one. The troopers found you after chasing out the aliens and noted an odd smell coming from the house basement. They found a puddle of fuel leaked out across the room and a little girl suffocated on fumes in the back.”
A silence carried through the unusually-warm hospital room.
“I should have died…” Roxanne surmised, catching up as her still-young mind raced to catch up.
The doctor nodded further, even with vigor to a point that it seemed like he was doing it more for himself than her. As if he was noting something.
“The soldiers pulled you from the fuel and saved your life. Speaking of which, this was left in my care.” The doctor presented a small yellow box, worn and just a bit browned by fuel staining. Roxanne’s game player.
“That’s mine…”
“Indeed. The soldiers grabbed it when they recovered you.”
“Thank you,” Roxanne managed as she powered it on just to see the start screen. For a second, memories raged by of her siblings and friends playing together. Farm children with not much else to invest in time but games and one another. Happy times. Simple times.
Crushing down the gnawing demand to weep, Roxanne instead brought the game player close – pressing it to her chest and hiding her face in her knees. She managed to mumble an appreciation before once more falling silent.
“You were in a coma for the entire duration of the flight to Earth. Your situation was very fragile that a medical team couldn’t put you in cryostasis in the meantime. They kept watch over you the entire time. After getting here, you were transferred to this facility – Puerto Rico’s Salinas Children’s Hospital. You’ve been here for about two weeks.”
“Two… two weeks?”
The doctor nodded.
“Did my friends make it out? My family?”
The doctor paused but shook his head soon enough. “I don’t really have an answer for that question. The reports I’ve gotten told me you were orphaned; each member of your family was accounted for… As for your friends, I don’t have any way of knowing. Most Visegrád residents are currently being housed up on Luna.”
“Luna?” Roxanne was confused. What was a ‘Luna’?
“You’ve never heard of the Moon?”
Roxanne glanced at the man weirdly but didn’t say anything, shrugging. She heard the Earth had a single moon; she never knew it was named Luna.
“Can I meet with them soon?”
“No, it’s a bit complicated right now with the refugee settlement issues ongoing right now. You’re currently an official ward of the UNSC military.”
Silence carried through the room as Roxanne lost any lasting questions or curiosity for her circumstances. She was truly alone now – there was no other way to describe it. Roxanne remained quiet for a long time, drawing out her thoughts to a slow droll and not wanting to address the implications. She stared out to the long beaches of rolling blue water along the Puerto Rican coast. The doctor said nothing, sitting with her and a presence she grew to welcome as the minutes passed by.
Finally, the little girl settled in her reality. She asked the question that the perceptive individual would, removed from her child façade by the realities of war.
“What’s next for me then?”
The doctor nodded in consideration, he still sat rigid and straight as if completely habitual.
“Well that’s up to you, isn’t it? Your home is gone – the future is yours to choose. How about this, what would you like to be?”
Roxanne toyed with the questions in her head. They were a blunt non-answer to her question, but it also revealed an offered opportunity. Something hidden. It wasn’t clear in the words but his tone of voice – the doctor wanted or was looking for something on her part. But what?
She answered honestly. “Well… My family owned one of the few airlifters in town, we handled all the material transportation for the other families in getting their bushels to market. Even then, we were all doing badly as demand shifted away from organic to synthetic foods due to the war effort. But my brothers and I were promised the family Albatross when we were old enough to fly it – so we instead spent hours on the flight simulator in the basement. I loved that thing…”
“You want to be a pilot then?”
Roxanne shook her head. “No… Well, sort of. I want to fly, but I also want to fight. I want to be a warrior at the front – not some princess or something.”
The doctor chuckled. “I don’t think the Longsword pilots I know would be happy to hear that.”
“I do want to be a fighter pilot. The very best.”
“But you also want to fight? What do you mean by that??”
Roxanne looked at the doctor for a moment before glancing back to the ocean. “I want to be able to face the monsters myself – I want to prove I’m no longer afraid.”
The doctor nodded and went quiet. Another silence permeated through the room.
“How about a Spartan then?” The doctor bluntly asked.
“My brothers were more into that than me. They had these action figures on their bookshelf too… but I guess I could be a Spartan…”
“They get to fly, and fight. They are the ultimate warrior – the greatest Humanity has ever made. It would fit you if you wanted it.”
Roxanne glanced at the doctor again, her eyes scrunched in confusion. “I could fly and fight?”
“And so much more.”
Roxanne shivered at the way the doctor didn’t blink and spoke in the most emotionless voice she ever heard, cold and straight – barely a whisper.
After a moment, Roxanne nodded. “Alright, a Spartan then.”
The doctor smiled and made to get up from the bed.
“Alright, a Spartan you’ll be then.”
Roxanne did a double take. “Wait, what?”
The doctor waved his had as he stood at the foot of the bed with a soft smile spread on his face. “You can become a Spartan. I’ll make sure of it; you’ll hear from me soon. When you do, take the hospital train north to Fajardo Post-Op Treatment Center. Ask for eighth floor, the Projects wing. We’ll be waiting for you.”
The doctor started shifting toward the door as Roxanne rose out of confusion, crawling over the bed but only stopped by the wire connecting to her brain scan beanie.
“Who’s we?”
The doctor paused as he made to step out into the hallway beyond. Pulling a pin from his coat lapel, he tossed the small piece of metal to Roxanne who just managed to catch it with her overstressed, underused muscles and motor control.
“Ask for me, Mr. Taylor, when you get there. The attendants there will know what to do.”
The man disappeared through the doorway and out of Roxanne’s sight, leaving her once more alone with the brief beeps of her brain scanner. He called himself Taylor, but his coat jacket had the name “Doctor Renaldo Cruz, M.D.” – what was up with that?
Roxanne glanced own at the pin she caught. It was simple looking, painted black-and-white and shaped like a triangle. No, wait, not a triangle but a pyramid. A circle sat at the center. What did it mean?
She sat there for a long while, staring at the pin. The realization that her entire body had been shaved clean in a nanite bath, hair and eyebrows too, now long forgotten. Minutes passed and nurses came by, doctors came by. The ‘Taylor-Guy’ as she came to call the first visitor, never came back.
Weeks passed. Roxanne went from intensive care to walking the premises of the Salinas Children’s Hospital with a small crop of yellow hair just beginning to return to her head. She went from a patient, to a ward and helper. She visited other orphans and children staying at the hospital, telling them how great the hospital care was. Shared and cried over her trauma with the other children who had similar tales of horror.
The loss of her family never went away, but the shock and pain did begin to slip away as she retold the story again and again. Adults in attendance would remark how brave she was, how smart or lucky she was. Roxanne knew her actions were dangerously stupid immediately after performing them that day in her basement, but she lived.
A small smile began to emerge from tight lips – color returned to her cheeks.
She heard that Reach fell in August – she wept that day of, hiding from anyone who looked for her.
The doctors watched a smiling Roxanne run around Salinas and take trips between other hospitals as she came to assist medical personnel with menial tasks, taking samples or paperwork between offices on occasion when digital distribution was not possible. She became a regular helping hand.
Then the day she managed a full smile, she disappeared on a visit to Fajardo. Someone said they saw her around the eighth floor, the one occupied by Naval Intelligence. Her costs were mysteriously settled by government accounts and sealed by medical AI. No one asked after her.
That brave little girl disappeared again, a final game of hide and seek. She was never seen there again. Not really, anyway.
===Regulation Four DQ===
:UNSC Military Calendar: 1538 Hours, 18 November 2524
:Special Warfare Center Seongnam
:United Korea, Earth
There is a clause amongst the pages-long conditions handbook regarding the prestigious UNICOM Special Task Sniper Invitational:
2524. A year before the augmentations. Linda-058 stood back on the firing line as shouts of “ceasefire” ran up and down the assembly of accomplished riflemen and women from all corners of the UNSC Armed Forces.
Airborne. Rangers. ODST. Marine Corps. Air Force. NAVSPECWAR. Naval Intelligence.
And a lone, up-and-coming SPARTAN-II – barely thirteen years of age.
The event proctors already took her rifle, her ammunition. She got pulled aside for a reason she couldn’t begin to know.
She felt more than two dozen, accusatory pairs of eyes locked on her scrunched back from the snipers, masters in their art of war with decades of training and battlefield experience to each their names. She read books by these operators, watched and practiced the regimens they recommended. Now as they reeled in her target plate for examination, she could only feel immense guilt for which she could give no name.
The dear Staff Sergeant who invited her to the event screamed and hollered up a one-man storm, arguing with the proctors before any judgment could be laid out.
Maybe she should have seen this coming – Spartans were supposed to expect things to not go in their favor, nothing ever went to plan. They were to make do anyway.
“She didn’t do anything wrong! Why did you pull her from the line? She’s just a kid – she couldn’t possibly have done anything wrong!”
“Regulation Four! Back off, Staff Sergeant. I am more than comfortable asking you to leave the premises if you won’t calm yourself.”
The Staff Sergeant and another proctor practically manhandled one another off to the side before letting go, straightening their jackets as they scanned one another with predatory grimaces. Another proctor was calling down to the line chief, “Can we get an ammo check?”
Linda looked up from her slouch, face aghast. She dared not speak up but stared as her magazines were run by a proctor to the control booth a few meters away. Her sim-target plate arrived, plastered with the typical paint-round powder used for sim-training and competitions such as these.
Marks were good – almost perfect. At least that’s what she told herself from a glance as the group of grumpy proctors went to work looking the plate up and down. Five shots, taken with a match, sandbag-stacked SRS99 rifle from the prone position at an open-air distance of two thousand meters.
The metallic-red paint stuck well to the titanium board, noticeable scratches from where the simulation rounds 'airburst' into fragments and paint. Impact points were evident from the center circle – a grouping of five shots within three inches of each other. She got through a single four-round magazine, began her second only to be pulled aside.
In a few seconds, the running proctor came back only for a Marine Force Recon shooter to demand an answer, “Well, are her rounds hacked?”
The proctor shook his head, eyeing Linda with doubt and a hint of suspicion. “No, it’s match-grade ammunition. Pulled from our armory – she’s using in-house ammo; the girl brought no home-grown kit.”
“What about the rifle?”
One of the proctor field stripping her rifle called from the strewn weapon and steel table. “No, it's our serial number too. All the parts are standard configuration, she got it straight from the Special Warfare Center. This is all ‘our’ equipment.”
Someone down the line from the Army Rangers growled out to a near shout, “What the hell then? How’s she getting near-perfect shots?”
“Maybe it’s her scope! A hack or some third-party app?”
“No, stock programs. Nothing looks odd… The site AI just got back to me on the debugging – nothing wrong with the scope or firing mechanism. The gun’s as it came from the armory.”
There was more shouting now as Linda looked away, refusing to speak up or make eye contact with the now utterly befuddled crowd of military sharpshooters. Some were even getting up now, coming to examine the rifle, the bullets, and the target plate themselves.
“Is she a freak-of-nature? An ONI science experiment?” Someone from the Navy Special Warfare team asked – potentially someone she might have met at another point, not realizing what she was.
The Staff Sergeant was now quietly approaching Linda, grabbing her by the shoulder with a gentle squeeze. He seemed to be eyeing the crowd with hesitant suspicion, his third sense for trouble was kicking in, setting the small Spartan girl’s nerves on edge.
Linda knew she was an odd-looker. Young, barely on the edge of puberty. She looked built, inhumanely so – as if she were genetically-altered or juiced-up. Younger shooters, even children sometimes made appearances at the competition, hosted by Korea’s Special Warfare Center. But no child ever beat experienced warfighters or conditioned for the simulated battlefield cacophony used to simulate warfighting conditions. There were prodigies, but not like this – they usually were a formality. Usually.
“I want her medical record,” a proctor began to demand to a nearby superior, having exited the control booth to witness the commotion.
“Forget it! We’re out of here, don’t bother,” the Staff Sergeant promptly butted in, drawing attention to him and Linda as he guided her away from the gathering, back towards the gymnasium – her weapon and ammunition, forgotten.
They would be looking for a ‘Linda Graves,’ daughter to a Misriah Armory colonial division head. If they searched, they’d come up with nothing. Linda Graves didn’t exist.
A voice of a proctor called to the control booth chief, “I need a marker – Regulation Four, DQ for Linda Graves, Lane Seven.”
The duo walked a couple of football fields until confidently out of earshot from others. The Staff Sergeant gave Linda a comforting shoulder squeezed but refused to make eye contact with the dreary-eyed, redhead child.
Linda spent three years, hours of every day breathing in gunpowder, shooting her rifle, and simulating every scenario she could conceptualize in the Reach Naval Officers’ Academy’s simulation bays.
“Did I do something wrong?” She finally asked.
“No, Trainee, you did nothing wrong.”
===Found Child's Case===
:UNSC Military Calendar: 0915 Hours, 14 December 2554
:Craterside Children's Hospital, Boston Harbor
:United Republic of North America, Earth
When the… those people came to get her, the girl clutched her Master Chief doll close. She felt no fear, not a hint of apprehension. She felt elated instead, brimming with joy. Today was the day!
She was going to make a difference, become a superhero, defeat the aliens, and save the galaxy!
Pride swelled through her form as she stood rigid and tall; the beginnings of an attentive military stance ready for molding from the rough outline of this war orphan. One with nothing left to lose and everything and more to give.
She smiled when a burly man offered a giant but inviting hand for her to grasp. Using her free arm, the girl took it and fell into step. Other men and women joined the child and welcoming man as they followed the hallways and staircase towards the orphanage exit.
Even as children peaked from doorways and watched with curiosity at the entourage, the process was quiet. No one spoke as nothing needed to be said. Her whole future was ahead of her – she could almost see it; she could feel it!
She saw the other children’s faces – her so-called friends, and enemies in this forgettable place. They were mere caricatures compared to her own grand fairytale, beginning from these humble origins. She couldn’t suppress her ecstasy and managed to stick her tongue out at some of the other children staring her down. She could see it in their eyes – the wild jealousy, and the silent rage.
The girl informed them what was to take place but they didn’t believe her. They teased her, called her a liar. Now she got the last laugh.
Someone called her name; she knew it was her name. At least that’s what felt right. But she didn’t hear it – like the voice was muffled by rain, material, or distance.
No, that’s not right. She looked up at the man clutching her hand. His palm was warm and comfortable – ever hyperreal but more impression than texture. Like a warm blanket.
No, that’s not right. That’s not right at all.
Why couldn’t she see his face? Why were the people’s faces missing? Why couldn’t she see what they were wearing?
She walked on clouds. No. She wasn’t walking at all. There was nothing, nothing at all.
The words sputtered to a stop as Nicoline’s recollection dragged to a screeching halt.
“Dear… Is everything alright?”
The group of assorted adults: a pediatric doctor, a police officer, a social worker, and the nurse technician watched the gown-wrapped girl on a hospital bed in apt interest and anticipation.
Too bad, the orphan girl named Nicoline couldn’t continue her story even if she was desperate to. And she was so desperate to recall as she clenched the blanket ends between her muscle-atrophied fingers from extended time in zero gravity and in cryostasis.
“Don’t worry, its safe here – you can tell us what happened. If you need it, you have all the time in the world. We can wait.”
Nicoline’s eyes grew wide like dinner plates as they darted to the eyes of each adult in the room. She felt trapped and confused. But how did she ask? Can they help her? What happened?
They wanted to know, and she wanted to know. But she couldn’t remember.
“I don’t know…”
The adults nodded in unison, supporting and well-meaning. They didn’t understand. The nurse technician extended a supporting squeeze to her shoulder. “You can do it.”
A pregnant but well-intended silence filled the space. Five seconds became twenty. Twenty seconds became a minute. A minute turned to three minutes.
Finally, Nicoline spoke with her fear and confusion on abrupt, full display in body, voice, and soul. “I can’t remember.”
The police officer spoke up then, just a hint of frustration slipping into his voice. His eyes matched her own, at least the beginnings of a desperation taking root.
“What do you mean?”
“I can’t remember anything. I just don’t know. Why can’t I remember anything?”
She yearned for their help, her verbal claws digging into the adults and pleading for a salvation that didn’t exist.
“Maybe we can give Mr. Korn a call. He might have some more information if he hasn’t left for orbit yet.”
Nicoline jumped at the name – not from recognition, but out of hope. Anything for an answer.
The police officer’s chatter ringed twice as the hospital room association waited with anticipation.
A rough face appeared on screen, a man in a gray trench coat and suit that screamed ‘government employee’ from a million light years away.
“This is Lieutenant Commander Korn speaking,” he greeted without looking to the camera while focusing oh his steering wheel and a rainy morning commute.
“Lieutenant Commander, is there any more you can say about Nicoline Folasade?” The police officer inquired.
It took a brief couple seconds as the military officer mumbled about needing to change lanes.
“No? I was just lucky, finding her out along the nature highway. It’s a damn crime – my hands are tied due to my work but I requested ONI Section One to open a criminal case file for Miss Nicoline. I can’t even begin to imagine how a brave little girl like her disappears and then reappears on Earth, fifteen light years from where she was last seen.”
The policeman agreed with a steady hum, “Absolutely lucky, and lucky that you found her. I want to thank you for your assistance in getting her to us. It’s a real nasty shame that so many missing children’s’ cases are open now that the Covenant penetrated the Inner Colonies. We’re already swamped in missing people cases. Any assistance from Naval Intelligence would be appreciated, if you could knock on any more doors? Whoever her kidnappers were, I hope they rot in prison.”
The military officer mumbled something out of earshot of the camera as he made to swap car lanes.
“Agreed, I’ll do what I can. Whoever is stealing children deserves to rot for eternity – my organization considers it a public security issue and we’ll be turning up the heat, whoever they are.”
The police officer thanked the government agent for his assistance one last time before closing the call.
Nicoline remained quiet even as the adults pitied her, and tried to ask further questions on what she could remember or how she felt. Instead, she wallowed in her silent frustration – she didn’t feel anything for the Naval Intelligence officer who rescued her.
She didn’t recognize his face, despite feeling that… she should.
Out of all of this, the only thing she could remember was ‘those people’ telling her that she would become a Spartan.
===The Burn===
:UNSC Military Calendar: 1149 Hours, 03 April 2558
:Jeremiah Mendez Stadium, Boston
:United Republic of North America, Earth
There wasn’t any reason for Lieutenant Commander Markko Kallas to catch a sense of melancholy while watching the Boston Astronomers dust up the New York Jumpers during the third home game of the North American gravball circuit in the spring season. But against his better reason and luck, he caught something tear-jerking.
First problem: he couldn’t cry.
Second problem: his face was beginning to itch, from the bottom of his hairless eye lids to the bridge of his nose.
Looking to his right, he noted with some relief that his teenage charges were too occupied to notice the obnoxious and increasingly twitchy muscle spasm erupting on his off-colored, gray complexion. A glance up the bleachers behind him revealed a couple removing their toddler and themselves from the stands in a hurry; another lone attendant in a particularly obnoxious Astronomers jersey was laser-eyed on Kallas’s hairless skull.
At least the Lieutenant Commander had the mind to bring his trademark dark panama hat with an extended brim. While he couldn’t dodge the invasive gazes, he could at least minimize his sun exposure.
As the itch turned into a scratching pain, he finally settled on dealing with it in a more private locale. Going to get up, his attempt to remain inconspicuous was met by the shouting voice of Petty Officer Third Class Merlin-D032 beneath a sound wash of sports fans cheering as the Bostonians made another goal run, bringing the scores to 110 and 40.
“Kallas! You alright?”
The male SPARTAN-III was a perceptive, borderline self-conscious type. Always kept a head on a swivel, of course he would notice something. Odd that he wasn’t the sharpshooter for his unit, but his role as spotter seemed to fit well enough. At least he was quick about not referencing his rank in a public venue. Most Spartans he worked with struggled with dropping the rank-and-file in a civilian setting.
“I’m fine. Just going to use the lavatory and grab a drink.”
The Spartan petty officer seemed to take the hint, though his eyes lingered on the superior officer for a second longer before returning to the main attraction. His female companion and said sharpshooter, Andra-D054, stayed firmly glued to the sporting match.
Leaving the duo behind, Kallas ascended the steps and passed into the stadium underdeck in the direction of the bathrooms. Wherever he went, he remembered the scrutinizing gazes on him and the blood-suspending spasms that tortured his face on random days like these.
Finally, alone and resting against a private stall, he found that his spike of melancholy twisted into blatant annoyance. Even as he applied an uncapped nanite-filled eyedropper to his twitching and swollen face, a burning memory rose to the surface.
The actual twitching stopped immediately but the burning did not. No, it grew and spread. Taking his face, his skull, his arms, his legs. It took his torso and back.
Everything burning.
He was back on Jericho VII again, among frontier marshlands with the Tenth Shock Trooper Battalion, Orbital Drop Shock Troopers. The scene reeled back quickly, passing excitement to just moments before things caught fire.
Lieutenant Commander Markko Kallas was First Lieutenant Markko Kallas then. A wet-behind-the-ears junior officer fresh out of the Martian Mattis Academy of Military Science.
He and his squad were escorting a convoy of Mastodon armor personnel carriers through muddy terrain. Due to an ongoing monsoon and despite being wheeled vehicles, the risk of getting stuck remained. In his own opinion, they were the wrong mounts for fighting the local insurrection.
Despite Kallas’s private misgivings, the battalion commander had a pension for making armor work in any scenario, at least by reputation, so maybe he saw something that the young lieutenant couldn’t. All those thoughts mattered little though as metallic thunder crackled overhead and smoke billowed under storm clouds from the eastern foothills visible over the jungle treetops.
The security-keeping staff sergeant was the first to sound warning as he and many other ODSTs in their Jogger Frame piston-suits dropped into the mud to the screams of artillery ambush. Kallas never registered the vocal shout, but he heard the shriek of explosions and smart-cluster munitions detonating over the convoy.
His relative-greenhorn luck and own miraculous stupidity had him spin and topple down into a ditch, avoiding the initial brush with death. Every APC spontaneously cooked off as their penetrated hulls absorbed shards of dense, molten metal.
He remembered seeing a lot of light as he tumbled into the mud, burning tanks and dancing figurines – Marines – set ablaze by metallic fire and dust. Even as it rained, the fires wouldn’t go out due to the weaponized chemical properties. Instead, things moved down hill to join his stranded broken body under the weight of a hundred-pound, mechanized suit of armor.
Fire, titanium alloy, toxic residue. It all caught fire.
Bodies, armor, weapons, clothing. It all burned.
First Lieutenant Markko Kallas burned, his facial and upper torso skin molting down to the muscle at a rapid rate. He didn’t remember when the Nightingale medical VTOL arrived. He didn’t remember when he made it to the hospital, or how he survived.
All that Markko Kallas remembered, was that everything was burning.
He jumped from the memory as if he had seen a ghost which was far more ironic as Kallas understood it. He quickly filed out of the bathroom but took a moment to freshen up; he never touched his face – that would be painful, and cliched.
Back in the relative cover of the fresh-air underdeck, he slipped into the booth of a World Cuisine. A buff and sleeveless bartender seemed to be waiting him as expected given his all-too-recognizable visage.
“What can I get for you?”
Deciding to forget the menu for now, Kallas responded. “How about a stim-cigar?”
“We got a few options.” The bartend reasoned.
“Martian Olympiad?”
The bartend passed it over without a word. A thumb print purchase later and Kallas felt he was a little more stable now. The bartend did a flourishing turn, to another customer who seemed quick on settling his lot and leaving.
“Sorry about spooking your customers,” Kallas mumbled off his stim.
It took a moment for the bartend to turn back and shrug but it seemed he could careless as the subtle theatric suggested something else with the UNSC Navy tattoo stressed on the man’s right arm.
“Don’t sweat it – veteran to veteran.”
Kallas chuckled. “That obvious?”
The bartend grinned. “With that whole burned zombie look? Nah, clearly it was the big neon sign saying ‘soldier’ over your head that gave you away.”
“Well firstly, it’s called a ‘Marine’. Second, ‘burned zombie’? That’s a new one.”
The two veterans chuckled at the quick-fire banter.
“What do your mates call you then?”
“The Boogeyman. Corpse Party is another one.”
The bartend nodded in understanding. “What unit were you with? Campaigns?”
“Jericho VII. Tenth ODSTs.”
“Oh, aliens got you pretty bad I’m guessing. Plasma pistol? Repeater?”
“Nah – human actually.”
“You’re kidding. Really?”
“Artillery ambush. Freedom League, 2524. I was the only survivor.”
“Fucking… Hell man, I feel for you. Get anything you like – it’s on the house.”
Well, that was an interesting surprise. Kallas took it in stride and examined the menu listings overhead.
“I’m not feeling too hungry. My blocked tear ducts started acting up so I’m coming off a pain high while my nanites clean up and numb me. How about something strong?”
“I can make a mean Needler.”
Kallas nodded at it, humoring the name of the alcoholic beverage.
“Make sure it burns to the touch.”
The bartender gave Kallas a weird look but he retreated into the shop to make the request.
Kallas meant it. Despite chasing off the pain with medicine and nanite treatments, and becoming not just numbed to the sensation of pain or the memories – there was one thing he still took from pain. A strange sense of melancholy, and an even stranger joy.
The feeling of being alive.
Lieutenant Commander Markko Kallas remembered the burn. 
==References==