Twin Blades

Twin Blades



Chapter the Sixth: Comrades



Time Setting: during the first level of Halo 3, “Sierra 117”





The Arbiter took a deep breath of jungle air, thick with moisture and the heavy scent of growing things, and tried not to think too uncharitably about Humans.



An individual Human was no match for a Sangheili warrior in hand-to-hand combat. It was the root of the reason why Sangheili looked down on Kig-yar, Unggoy, and Yanme’e—the lesser species. But unlike the lesser species of the Covenant, Humans did not know their place in the natural order of things, and they didn’t seem inclined to learn. Instead, they grouped together in packs like Brutes, succeeding through numbers and cooperation rather than individual prowess. In its own way, it was almost admirable. They were still alive, after all, despite years of the Covenant’s best attempts to wipe them out.



But they were still savages, with their primitive weapons and gibbering language and absolutely alien beliefs and practices.



And then there was the Demon.



The Arbiter had already developed a grudging respect for the Demon’s battle skills, but by the Rings, it was as though he was being handed a punishment from Beyond, to have to work alongside the Demon.



The Human herd took a break for lunch. The Marines threw themselves down on rotting logs and patches of earth, getting rest while they had the chance and pulling pouches of food out of their rucksacks and pants pockets. The Arbiter noticed that none of the Marines were sitting too close to where he stood, though the dark-skinned leader approached him and offered him some sort of grain bar to eat.



The stuff smelled like prey-animal fodder, but the Arbiter chose to interpret the offer as a gesture of politeness, because all the humans were eating those bars. “Thank you, Sergeant Johnson, but meat would be a more suitable meal.”



Sergeant Johnson eyed the Arbiter’s razor fangs and nodded. “If you don’t want to catch your own, go talk to the Chief. I think he’s got some bags of chili.”



Catching his own did sound good, but the Arbiter had no idea what Earth animals might be edible and which might make him ill, nor did he have any way of finding out in time to have some lunch before they were on the move again. Deciding it was better to be safe than sorry, the Arbiter made his way to where the Demon sat.



The Sangheili noticed that none of the Marines were sitting too close to the Demon, either.



And the Demon wasn’t eating. Instead, he was staring down at a small square device in his hand.



The Arbiter cleared his throat, but the Demon—usually hyper-vigilant—did not seem to register his presence.



“De...Chief,” the Arbiter began.



The featureless helmet turned towards him. “What?”



The Spartan’s voice did not sound particularly friendly. The Arbiter noted that his first encounter with the Demon here on Earth had resulted in the muzzle of the Chief’s gun being shoved up through his chin.



Then again, the Arbiter had not exactly tried to stop himself from threatening the Demon, even when both of them had been in the clutches of the Gravemind.



So, willing to call it even between them, the Arbiter sat down near the Master Chief. “Sergeant Johnson says you have meat. Something called...chili.”



The Chief slid the little square device back into a slot at the rear of his helmet; then he opened a Marine rucksack he’d been carrying. He withdrew a foil package and threw it at the Arbiter, who caught it, reflexively, before realizing that it wasn’t a frag grenade or some such.



“How do I eat this?” the Arbiter asked, sniffing at it. He smelled metal and chemicals, not meat.



The Master Chief looked in both directions, then raised his hands to his helmet seal. “Just a minute.” The Arbiter heard the hiss of air as the seal broke, and then the Demon lifted the helmet off of his head.



The Arbiter wasn’t exactly sure what he had been expecting. Part of him had imagined the Demon with fangs and leathery skin and earbuds, like a Sangheili, because it was hard to believe that a mere human was capable of the damage the Demon had inflicted. Another part of him expected the Demon to look like the Covenant idea of a devil—a being accursed, sporting stubby horns and cracked, bleeding hide and a hairy face and Marks of Punishment branded everywhere.



The sight that met his eyes was a Human being, just another Human, and were it not for the fact that his skin was much paler and smoother than that of the other Humans—the result of being hidden behind the helmet most of the time instead of exposed to the light—and the MJOLNIR armour he wore, the Arbiter would not have been able to pick the Demon out of a crowd of other Humans.



“Here,” the Master Chief said, ripping open a foil pouch and dropping a long spoon into it. “It’s cold, but if we start a fire, the Brutes might see the smoke.”



The Arbiter accepted the open pouch. He withdrew the spoon and sniffed at it. He could smell some kind of plant in the “chili”, but he could also smell meat and some kind of spice that made him drool.



He wasn’t at all sure how to use the spoon.



The Arbiter watched as the Master Chief opened his own pouch, added something called “hot sauce,” and dipped the spoon into the mixture. Apparently the utinsel was designed to deposit food in the bottom jaw. The Arbiter shrugged, tilted the chili pouch on its side, tipped back his head, flared his mandibles and poured a bit of the stuff down his throat.



To his surprise, it wasn’t all that terribly disgusting. He wriggled his mandibles experimentally.



“This really helps.”



The Arbiter lowered his head to see the Master Chief offering the package of hot sauce.



“We put this on all the food,” the Chief explained. “So it at least has some flavour.”



“Thank you, De…ah, Spartan.”



The Chief raised an eyebrow. “You’re welcome, and is “Arbiter” a name or a rank?”



“It’s a title.” He drank more chili out of the pouch, and it really was better with the hot sauce. “I do not have a name.”



“I thought you guys did. Elites, I mean.”



“We do. I…lost mine.”



The Master Chief blinked. “Really.” A pause. “Me too.”



Now it was the Arbiter’s turn to look at him quizzically. “How?”



He shrugged. “I was taken for Spartan training at a very young age. I don’t even remember my parents’ last name.”



The Arbiter felt a strange feeling of empathy, and he could not quite keep the growl from his voice as he said, “They took your family name away.”



“Yeah.” The Chief looked surprised that the Arbiter understood. “All I have left is my given name. My parents…they named me “John.”



“I have lost my entire name.”



“To be the Arbiter?”



“In a way.”



The Chief was still looking at him, so he decided to give it to him with both barrels.



“Historically, the title “Arbiter” surpasses all other ranks and names. But prior to that, I lost my name as a punishment—for not stopping you from destroying the first Halo.”



“So that’s why you hate my guts so much.”



The Arbiter sighed. “It’s worse that I can no longer blame you for destroying that Halo.”



“Still sucks.” John stirred the last of his chili. “I bitch about photo ops and the rest of that “hero” crap, but at the end of the day I know they appreciate what I’ve done.” His eyes darted towards the Sangheili. “Sorry, buddy. You’ve got the worse deal.”



The Arbiter shrugged. “You can consider yourself fortunate that for the time being, the Prophet of Truth, his Brutes, and the Flood are all greater dangers to my people than you are.”



“Well, that cuts me down to size.” He finished the chili and began to dig a hole. “Eat your lunch and give me the wrapper. We have to bury them so the Brutes and their buddies will have a harder time tracking us.”



The Arbiter guzzled the last of his chili and handed the pouch and the unused spoon to John. The Spartan placed them in the hole, filled it with earth, and scattered leaves over the top to hide the newly disturbed ground. Then he picked up his helmet and placed it back on his head. Suddenly he was the Demon again, his expression obscured by the gold-tinted visor.



The other Humans were still eating. John sat down with his back against a tree, pulled the little square-shaped device out of his helmet and began to toy with it once more. The Arbiter squinted at it. To him, it looked like the Sangheili Intelligence images of a Human AI cartridge, save for the fact that there was no holographic avatar atop it.



“Is it broken?” the Arbiter asked abruptly.



The Spartan tilted his head. “It’s…unoccupied.”



The Arbiter frowned, puzzled. It seemed like an odd time and place to be worried about a mechanical device. “Why are you so concerned about a computer program?” He gestured to the disk.



John scowled at him. “Cortana’s a lot more than just a computer program. And you should be able to guess that I’m not supposed to be talking about AIs with you.”



“You mean the fact that it’s absolutely forbidden for you to let an AI fall into enemy hands? The fact that Spartans can join with AIs, creating two intelligences in one body, a body which is partly artificial itself? Or the fact that you build them by copying the brain patterns of real human beings, which gives them a unique personality of their own?”



John stared at him.



He smirked. “Sangheili intelligence is good.”



The Spartan continued to eye him warily. “It’s the last of those items that’s the concern.”



The Arbiter could not see John’s expression, but the faintest of odours began to filter from the Spartan. He smelled agitated. “So you consider her to be a person.”



“She’s not, I know that. Or rather, she’s not just a person. She’s a weapon and a knowledge source and a powerful technological tool.”



“But when she’s in your head, she’s a person.”



John hesistated. “Yeah.”



“And where is she now?”



The Spartan let out a long, slow exhalation that whistled through the voice transmitter on his helmet. “On High Charity. She stayed behind so that she could make sure that the ring didn’t fire, and that the Flood didn’t escape.”



“And you left her there.”



“She told me to!” he snapped. “She said she didn’t want to chance a remote detonation—do you think I wanted to leave her there?” He looked as though he might reach out and try to grab the Arbiter’s throat, or throw a punch or otherwise forget what “truce” meant.



The Arbiter raised his hands in a mimicry of the Human gesture for “surrender.” “Speaking between two soldiers such as ourselves, I did not intend to insinuate that you desired to leave her behind.”



The Spartan lowered his arms, and his agitated scent began to fade.



“War often causes us to do things we wished we did not need to do,” the Arbiter continued.



“Yeah? What have you done lately that you didn’t want to do? Otherwise than get chewed out for letting me kick your troops’ collective asses?” The Arbiter swore he could hear the Chief’s raised eyebrow.



The Arbiter really didn’t want to talk about it, but having accidentally insulted and upset the Human, he felt that he was obliged to be honest. “There are places I would much rather be at the moment than here on your planet, chasing Brutes through the trees.”



“Like where?” John asked.



“My concern is not so much a place, as a person.”



There was a knowing pause. “You’ve got someone back on your homeworld, don’t you.”



The Arbiter folded his arms, “I might have someone in the Sangheili Fleet of Retribution—and if it weren’t for this war, I would be back there right now making sure of it.”



John whistled. “Sounds serious.” And that quickly, they were back to being comrades in arms again.



The Arbiter winced. He really didn’t like the sound of that word, serious. Fil Storamee had lectured him about that, too; well, to hell with it. How was he supposed to know if he was “serious” about Rtas ‘Vadumee when he had no idea what the other Elite was even like in bed?



On the other hand, he knew damn well that not a single one of his previous flings was thinking about him right now, wondering if he was all right. Rtas, on the other hand, would be climbing the walls in his stateroom with worry—the SpecOps commander was all cool control in front of his men, but privately...privately, he was just so intense.



The Arbiter supposed that as long as he translated “serious” into “target of ongoing sexual encounters” instead of “bondmate” or “consort” or even “boyfriend,” as the Humans put it, then “serious” might be all right. He had to admit that it was nice to be able to sit here and think about someone, and look forward to seeing that person again.



“So spill,” John said, his eyes shining. “Who is she?”



“He,” the Arbiter corrected.



John’s expression was unreadable as he tilted his head, but the Arbiter could tell that the Spartan was staring at him through his visor.



“What?” came a loud voice from behind him.



The Arbiter turned his head to see Sergeant Johnson standing there, mouth open, eyes huge, hand raised to hold his cigar—except that the cigar was not in his hand. It was smoldering on the forest floor.



“Tell me I did NOT just hear that our alien buddy here is a faggot,” said Johnson.



The Arbiter tilted his head. “What’s a…”



But the Master Chief interrupted. “Look, what do you care? If he’s got someone at home, he’s not going to be asking you out on a date.”



The Arbiter’s mandibles quivered. He’d never had anyone make an automatic presumption that he was the faithful type.



But somehow the expression on Sergeant Johnson’s face convinced the Arbiter that now was not a good time to point out that he’d had experience juggling four or five consorts at a time. The sergeant’s look was a bizarre mixture of fear, disgust and relief.



Besides…if it meant more time with Rtas…maybe being faithful for a little while wouldn’t be so bad.



The Arbiter realized, suddenly, that he had nothing to prove that he and ‘Vadumee were a couple. Nothing like that little holo of ‘Vadumee and Kusovai that hung in the SpecOps lounge under the portrait of old Commander ‘Coradee. All the Arbiter had on his comm unit was the same profile image of Rtas that anyone could download off the Sangheili personnel roster files; he’d put it there during the flight to Earth, just so he could look at ‘Vadumee’s face before going to sleep.



It was a far cry from the sort of tokens that lovers gave each other. ‘Vadumee’s sword had been a loan, not a gift. The Arbiter still remembered how the hilt had felt in his hands; how he had felt to have been given ‘Vadumee’s faith that he would succeed in his crazy mission and return the blade. The Arbiter wished he still had it. He hoped that ‘Vadumee still had faith in him.



He wished he had ‘Vadumee’s sword now. It would be the next best thing to having ‘Vadumee himself.



Sergeant Johnson was trying to get his composure back. The Arbiter decided that the wisest thing to do right now was to agree with the Master Chief. Whatever a “faggot” was, it didn’t seem like a good thing to be around Sergeant Johnson. He nodded and said, “I hope you’re not offended, Sergeant, if I say you’re not my type.”



Sergeant Johnson swallowed. “Good…good then. I guess as long as you keep shooting Brutes off my back the way you’ve been doing, I don’t care who you sleep with…but I do NOT want to have to hear about it.”



“Then don’t sneak up on him and listen in,” the Chief said, folding his arms.



Johnson gave the Chief a strange look. “If your tastes run like his, I REALLY don’t want to hear about it,” he said, and turned away. “Let’s go, people, there are Brutes out there all ready and waiting for us to come kick their asses!”



The Arbiter turned to the Spartan. “Thank you.”



The Master Chief shrugged. “I’m in love with a computer program. You think people wouldn’t call me sick, if they knew?”



The Arbiter nodded. “If you need help teaching those people to hold their tongues, just ask.”



The Chief began to explain what a “faggot” was and the Arbiter listened in disbelief. To a Sangheili, bisexuality was just plain normal, and though there were some Elites who only sought intimate company outside their own gender in breeding season, nobody cared as long as the fertile ones met their legal obligation to reproduce every other year. What was wrong with humans, to condemn private relations between consenting adults?



Then his comm link crackled.



“Arbiter?” came a familiar voice over the line.



It was ‘Vadumee. The Arbiter’s heart leapt as he raised the comm link to his mandibles. “Receiving.”



John nodded a farewell and turned away, heading to the forefront of the group of Marines to take point as they moved out, leaving the Arbiter to cover the rear. Suddenly the Arbiter felt lucky. John had no idea how his loved one was faring. The Arbiter was no longer convinced that of the two of them, he had a worse deal than the Chief.



Then ‘Vadumee asked a question that knocked all other thoughts out of his head. “You haven’t mated with any Humans, have you?”



The Arbiter choked. Just how bad had his reputation become? “No,” he retorted. Thank the Forerunners Johnson hadn’t overheard that!



“Are you sure? Because from what I’ve heard, Humans carry all sorts of nasty sexually transmitted diseases, and if you’ve mated with one, I’m not getting within ten yards of you until you’ve had a thorough medical examination, just in case any of those things can cross species lines.”



The Arbiter scowled. “No. I can assure you I’ve not mated with any Humans whatsoever. Would you believe that Humans have a derogatory slur word to describe a male who mates with other males? As if it was unusual…no, make that deviant. The species must be either boring in bed or else terrible liars, and I’m not sure which…”



There was a pause on the other end of the line. “What about those two Sangheili you took to Earth with you? N’tho and Usze?”



“No!” the Arbiter snapped. “If you must know, I’m hoping that we can…”



Suddenly the comm crackled with a noise that sounded like a loud, rude imitation of a Grunt in heat, followed by howling laughter and ‘Vadumee shouting at someone to shut up already.



The Arbiter was glad that ‘Vadumee could not see his smirk. “Associating with Fil Storamee, are you?” That laugh was unmistakeable. The Arbiter felt a sudden thankfulness that Fil had survived the purge.



‘Vadumee’s scowl came across the comm with crystal clarity. “She has been doing that for the past two hours, so I want you to be very grateful for what I’ve had to put up with to come see you.”



The Arbiter had just started to chuckle when the laugh died between his mandibles. “Coming to see..?” His heart stopped leaping and started hammering wildly.



“You said you’d forged an alliance with the Humans. If that’s true, we need to combine our military strategy, to make sure we’re not working at cross purposes to one another. I need to meet with the Humans’ Lord Hood right away…I’m sure you can arrange that for me? Because Fil and I are in a Watchtower shuttlecraft and we are inbound for Earth.”



Humans were so strange. A Sangheili general belonged on the front line with his troops, while Human generals seemed to be so busy with administrative challenges—not to mention so frail with old age—that they could not fight with their soldiers. But Sergeant Johnson had assured him that he would be meeting with Hood shortly. He figured he’d better ask again, because now there was a time limit.



His pulse sparked. And he’d be seeing ‘Vadumee.



“I’ll call you back shortly,” the Arbiter replied, and jogged to catch up to the rear of the platoon.



No, he was definitely better off than the Master Chief.