DT 2021: Freedom In The Moment

The ONI operative Markko Kallas stared across the corner table from his compatriot for this moment in the night. Their cold drinks collected droplets, precipitating with the passage of time. Few words sailed across the tabletop.
It was summer in Earth’s northern hemisphere, meaning the evenings in Rio de Janeiro stretched and the temperatures dropped into the cold-biting without a long sleeve shirt.
A winter in the tropics.
The woman across from him was more than equipped for the frigid air outside with a trench coat conforming tightly to her thin body frame. A skull cap wrapped her strawberry blonde hair and variable shades masked her already dark eyes created by the shallow lighting of the Irk Pub five minutes walking north from Low Benefaction. Despite that, the coziness inside provided warmth through assorted beers, proximity, and sweat built by activities of an early night.
The woman stuck out compared to the frolicking teenagers and young adults on the dance floor, more than a few in holographic personas. A couple imitations of towering Sangheili made Markko frown, their fake reptilian visages reminding him of the Covenant War still fresh on the mind.
Most establishment customers wore skintight and skinless attires, his compatriot who refused to make small talk really did seem like an alien compared to the people that called this town home. She didn’t reply to his conversation starters but didn’t comment about his presence or persistence.
The communications brick wall left him wondering more than a few questions. Did she suffer from a language barrier? A communications disability? Was she from on-world or off? Did she arrive from an Outer or Inner colony? What was she here for? Was she prepared for something? What did she fear? What kept her planted in that seat for who-knows-how-long?
Despite those many questions, Markko did have some answers as their quiet share of the booth left plenty of room for analysis and a wild imagination. The ONI agent shot down most of his wilder and more initial presumptions but he did have some definitive items.
She wasn’t local, as she did speak to order her drinks and the accent: it was too indistinct to be a standard UEG English tongue but derivative enough not to be a multilingual second or more language.
No, English was her native language. The bartender, so-called Server-Chan after a Japanese motif, attempted to greet the woman in local Brazilian Portuguese – the lady responded in her accented English that “she didn’t understand.”
Her lack of reaction to him entering her booth with the greeting of a "nice night" established the woman as someone who passed judgment on first impressions. Most saw Markko's ugly mug and responded with a flight-or-fight response. Of course, she could of froze but her shades and established grimace gave nothing away. It definitely wasn't him, she spent the long minutes of Markko's distant observations with the same expression on her face.
She parked herself in a strategic place, eyes zoned in on the entrance way and arced enough to keep most of the room under surveillance. These were far from sophisticated spy tactics but they identified the woman as someone well-read and self-aware.
The woman at the center of Markko's interest took a sip of her drink, something golden-colored but seemed to be of a cheap and reliable make. Taking her lips off the clear glass, her shadowed eyes focused on the man across from here. "You've been watching me for twenty minutes, sir. Even before you sat in my booth. Most men would have walked away after the first two icebreakers."
Markko leaned back, making an attempt to ease his body into an actual conversation. "That's funny. Most women walk away as soon as I enter a room."
"So that's why you wear the oddly fashionable suit to a less-than-appropriate establishment like this. You're compensating for something," the woman remarked, giving her glass an uninteresting inspection as if it had more worth than the ONI agent sitting in front of her.
To be quite honest, Markko didn't doubt she actually felt that way. The woman was fast on the verbal wrestling which confirmed the well-read presumption he made earlier. Her comments weren't inherently complex or impressive, but they were quick and said which little effort as if practiced and mastered. She was an experienced conversationalist, that much was certain.
So why the sudden interest in Markko Kallas?
"Something like that. It's certainly a confidence booster."
"I don't blame you, seems like it...
----
Andra stood amongst the wilderness set before her and wondered what to make of it all. A two-hour march from the edge of town, there was not a single person or road in sight.
She left civilization behind, immersing herself in the first true sense of wildlands she had in almost three years. Her conditioned instincts twitched at her hands, legs, mind, and eyes. Thoughts raced, demanding to check the surroundings for hostile threats that weren’t there. Her mind ordered her close to the ground, scratch at the dirt and form a combat indention, and prepare her rifle for combat.
She did not budge.
There was no combat here. No rifle, no gear webbing. No fire control software, no power armor. Andra was alone and without purpose; just her and the spring hissing of wild bugs and the twittering of songbirds.
Mountainous foothills arched out at her left and right. Listening close, she could hear the distant roar of the ocean even from half a kilometer away. A deep blue sky dressed in small clouds marked a pleasant day of…
Well, Andra didn’t really know.
The locals of Aishō-chō, the first planned landing site for human colonization on the frontier world of Furthest Point, warned her there was nothing out beyond the Goldcrest Valley farming district. The people were right of course, a road that ran to the edge of mountain forests and then promptly stopped at a line of woods.
Ragged Ass Road, the townsfolk referred to the town of Aishō more so by that vulgar nickname, than the formal Japanese designation that adorned town shops and the local spaceport. It was an apt description, the young woman’s hips despite her supersoldier augmentations felt sore after even marching towards her destination.
The locals really knew what they were talking about and yet talk about crisis of identity. The only history of this world’s Japanese origins was the company that terraformed it – Naoto Technologies.
Most of the residents now were a mix of peoples and cultures unified as friends and family of former Naoto terraform engineers. All they had in common was their destination and a common tongue of standard UEG English. A brief reign by Russo-colonials from the secessionist Wealthian Coalition brought Russian and pro-Insurrectionist culture to the world but even then, it didn’t seem to change the people or the world.
They were a screenshot stuck in time. A world with no past or future. Come sunset or sundown, the same life continued without interruption. Andra was getting used to this routine every extra day she stayed here.
But a question had been nagging her since setting foot in town to stay for the first time.
It nagged at her as she took her first steps from the Ragged Ass Road’s end and into the open wilderness passed the tree line that met her there.
----
If Merlin said he expected some final meetup or congratulatory debrief after the mess on Iradu, his team would laugh him into the ground. But he would also be lying to himself if he said he didn’t want one.
Recognition. A pat on the back. A return from war as conquering heroes.
Foolish dreams imagined by a fool named Merlin-D032. A child-soldier absorbed into fictional offerings of a society that worshipped the mythos of Spartans. It was ironic, for a Spartan-in-the-know to fall for his own unit’s propaganda.
The sweet lie helped keep him motivated, outside of finding comfort in some new knowledge about the universe settling into his brain every day. Really all he wanted was for someone to see the fruits of his labor and tell him “Good job.”
Such parties and pleasantries were far and few between. And probably not real to begin with.
There wasn’t one after Delta Company other than night party with the tiki torches – that one was nice. His sendoff at the Infinity began with a broken ribcage and weeks unable to contribute to his team.
And mission after failed mission back… wherever “home” was. New Phoenix wasn’t really his home anymore. After Daniele and Roxanne pulled their stunt in breaking out a war criminal, Earth wasn’t exactly inviting Merlin back for Round Two.
Merlin got wrapped up in a new war he didn’t understand, only recognizing for himself that it was what he was born to do. He spent four years wanting a piece of the Covenant and he finally got to put them down his own way.
He watched soldiers and Marines burn and fall in the face of plasma fire. He killed on their behalf, removing a few more aliens from the galaxy on behalf of humanity’s safety. Then he and his team discovered Simon-G294’s presence on the battlefield and he kept popping up, drawing their attention and leading to conflict repeatedly.
He nearly killed Merlin had Andra not come to his rescue. It was an infuriating realization that for all his training and technology, he couldn’t best the worst Spartan of Gamma Company. Sure, he had a suspicion that he would find difficulty fighting Simon, five years his senior as a Spartan, after reading all the combat and intelligence briefings he could on the rogue’s killing of fellow S-IIIs and the new SPARTAN-IVs.
He got chewed out multiple times by Lieutenant Commander Frendsen on more than one occasion over his sloppiness during this campaign. Sure, the VIOLET-III commanding officer chewed out the group but Merlin always felt the words targeted him most.
It was Merlin that got the team’s AI stolen and compromised UNSC network security over a grudge match. Althea’s debrief report was damning at least on Merlin’s part. No one berated him on that one, but he could see the fault line clear as day. It pointed back at him.
This wasn’t his idea of an adventure. It seemed with each passing day; the well-crafted fiction that kept him motivated slipped little by little. The Headhunters of VIOLET-III disliked his guts. Joshua-G024 hated him outright. Amy-G094 always pitied him.
Andra always picked up after him, fixing and dealing with his mistakes. Shizuko bounced between cold and silent around him during the entire deployment, treating him like a waste of space. While Team Boson was off failing missions, where was she? Off on Headhunter training to become one of the UNSC’s true best of the best. Andra once made that shortlist too, and now he held both girls back from completing the one mission that mattered: winning and surviving this war with the Imperium of Clarity.
That mixed unit, Team STALLION, ended up pitying Merlin too. They barely knew him but that Callum-B042 saw right through him, knowing the kind of individual Merlin was. It was all so tiring. Callum tried to give Merlin support but Merlin couldn’t rise to the challenge, if there ever was one. The Beta Company Spartan disappeared from his side as soon as they were paired together because Frendsen couldn’t be bothered to watch over Boson after Merlin’s screw up with the Althea AI.
It was all so tiring, so clouded.
After the mission with the nuke of that Grunt colony, his days just seemed to bleed together and left him unsure what he was doing.
Simon-G294’s battlecruiser kept popping up on the battlefield and in his dreams, an omen reminding him of his many screw ups during this war.
He spent the last day of the conflict hidden behind a wall, waiting for Imperium reinforcements to assault his position at the edge of the Iradu palace. They never came, or rather they seemed to hit anywhere he wasn’t. He got some easy pickings here and there when stragglers tried to engage but it just seemed like one long hazy day and memory.
What did you call this feeling? He wasn’t sure.
He just felt so tired after all this.