Chapter 13: Like a Virus

The four Pelicans ponderously skimmed the LZ once before touching down in harmony, their ramps thumping into the dirt and spitting out personnel as quickly as possible. The humans cleared the engines and the pilots lifted off again, elegantly passing the next set coming in to do the same. The group began setting up a more permanent base of operations.

The first order of business was setting up a safe zone. With flame throwers and machetes, soldiers cleared back the jungle until the clearing was nearly five times its original size. They cut down every big tree for another twenty meters into the jungle, dragging them into crude walls in case of an overland invasion. Patrols began working around the encampment, mapping the terrain more closely than the initial probes had to find potential ambush sites.

Another team fixed a seal over the tunnel, in case the Flood escaped the Forerunner complex and began heading towards the surface. They wired it with explosives that would bury the tunnel, effectively sealing this exit of the complex if necessary.

When things in the complex went to shit, John sent in two more teams to provide back up for Hotel and wished he could be there to assess the situation first-hand. He knew, however, that he belonged on the ship. So he paid attention to a thousand details at once with Maximus and Kent providing support and information in a never-ending stream.

The two extra teams plowed through the Flood and met with Hotel; they made it to the room where Linda had been infected and Urbano, despite her non-functioning legs, gathered samples from the creature that still lay half-demolished against the wall.

Their fight back to the surface was just as exhausting. "Where the fuck are they all coming from?" Kelly heard one soldier grumble as they reloaded in tandem. She only shrugged in response; without a better map of the place, for all they knew, the Flood could number in the thousands.

Finally, though, they made it back through the cafeteria and sealed the door during a lull in the battle, allowing everyone some much-needed breathing room. Kelly reloaded her rifle with a spare magazine, slid extra clips into her empty magazines, and wiped her faceplate of human blood and other unappetizing fluids.

"Mission successful," Fred reported tiredly to the captain as he scrubbed his helmet with moss to clean it off a little. "We have the samples."

"I've sent retrieval," John replied immediately. He already knew their casualties and wounds and ordered the entire group back to the ship to be checked out in medical. "You'll be quarantined for 48 hours," he added.

Kelly growled in her throat. "Why?" she asked on a private channel to her friend and commander.

"Dr. Patch is concerned that these Flood may be infectious in different ways than previous Flood we have encountered," John replied stoically. "Linda is already in isolation, as is anyone who had contact with her."

"Anything weird yet?" Kelly asked curiously.

"Not yet." There was a pause and John spoke in his captain voice again, addressing the entire crew. "Should you feel unwell, you are to report it immediately to Dr. Patch."

"Define 'unwell,'" Urbano chuckled darkly, the precious samples balanced on her chest as Stratts and Chesters picked her up on a quickly-assembled stretcher made from their packs. Her legs were still refusing to respond and she had no feeling below the waist.

"You'll be fine, quit bitching," Chesters groaned. "I'm the one having to drag your fat ass up this tunnel."

Urbano grinned up at her teammate's annoyed face. "You could be carrying Kelly instead," she teased good-naturedly, the drugs in her system making it hard to focus and stay alert.

"I heard that," the Spartan II said dryly over the radio. The exhausted group chuckled and began their slog upwards.

On the surface, the group was unceremoniously doused with antifungal and antibacterial foam in a sealed tent, one at a time, before being allowed to step out of the tunnel. They avoided contact with any of their comrades, who stayed well back, as they loaded into the Pelicans meant to carry them back to the ship.

Once ship-side, Urbano gratefully relinquished the samples to a scientist in a sealed hazmat suit and let her teammates leave her in the capable hands of the medical staff to fix her bruised spine. The rest were given quick exams and shown to the isolation rooms in the medical bay; their stuff had already been moved in.

With a groan of fatigue and relief, Kelly sat down on the floor and began taking off her armor. Her fellow soldiers copied her, though they had barely half the gear she carried. Fred, in a second room with members of another fireteam, first checked on Linda's condition using the comm system.

"And here I was thinking that would be a milk run," Stratts grumbled to himself, stripping off his sweat-soaked clothing. They had no real showers here, but the chemical shower in the room would have to do; he doused his head in the lukewarm tap water and scrubbed his face of blood, sweat, and tears. Then he released the handle and let another soldier take his place, slicking off the worst of the water as best he could without access to towels.

Kelly grunted in agreement. Free of her armor, she simple spread out on the cool floor, closing her eyes. Her fireteam casually stepped over her when they needed to, used to the big woman catching a nap anywhere, anytime. The members of other fireteams, however, were a little perturbed at the casual way she wore her bloodied body suit and seemed completely relaxed within seconds.

After a quick power-nap of fifteen minutes, Kelly roused herself and sat up again. She looked around the room and took a count. Of the original Fireteam Hotel, less than half remained; she retrieved the fallen soldiers' dogtags from her thigh pocket and solemnly handed them to Tuckkit. He accepted them without comment, adding them to his collection.

It took her nearly two hours to thoroughly clean and repair her armor where she could. Without the proper tools, however, she knew it wouldn't hold up in another combat. Thankfully, the next forty-six hours were going to be boring. She sighed and sat against the wall, since there weren't enough bunks to go around and she wouldn't have fit comfortably in one anyway.

"Lunch time," one of the nurses announced cheerfully, pushing a cart loaded with MREs into the chamber that cycled it through. Kelly helped herself to a packet without checking which one it was; she opened it to find one of her favorites and quickly ate the edible portions. Tuckkit sat next to her and silently took her dessert, handing her a packet of the crackers she preferred anyway.

"Any word on Linda yet?" she asked quietly, leaning her head against the wall and staring sightlessly across the small room. It felt cramped and crowded, in an unpleasant way totally unlike when she was packed into a garage with her fellow Spartan IIs.

"Not yet," Tuckkit muttered around a mouthful of chalky brownie.

Kelly let her eyes slip closed and napped again, regaining energy by the minute. She would enjoy the exhaustion while it lasted; when she was alert again, the enforced boredom would grind on her. Tuckkit gathered up the remains of her meal and returned it to the cart before rejoining her on the floor, finding that her well-muscled arm was at just the right height to lean against comfortably.

In Linda's isolation room, the Spartan woman reclined on the warm, rock-hard hospital bed with a scowl, eyeing the scans of her chest. The thousands of tiny rice grains growing in her lungs seemed a personal affront; the doctors were at a loss and quietly conferred on the other side of the clear plastic wall.

"The good news is that you're responding to the steroids," Dr. Patch reminded her when Linda waved away the ugly pictures. "Quite remarkably, in fact. You should be up in a few days."

Linda nodded in agreement, idly readjusting the oxygen mask over her nose and mouth. "How long to wean off the steroids after that?"

"Three months."

"Ugh." Linda let her head thump back onto the pillow and stared at the ceiling. "Any chance of escalating that?

"That is the escalated schedule. It would take a normal human nine or so months to come down from these doses," another doctor chimed in, smiling kindly. Linda shot him a glance. "Er, I mean-"

"I know what you mean," Linda said without letting the stammering man recover. "How is everyone else?"

"No one in isolation has yet showed any symptoms of your reaction, nor of any others," Dr. Patch replied confidently. "Though it may be too early to tell, of course."

"The pains began suddenly, within hours of contact," Linda mused. "I was down within forty-eight hours."

"Indeed, which is why we have quarantined all of those who were exposed to you and to the Forerunner complex for two days, and will continue to check blood levels for anomalies regularly." Dr. Patch smiled at the Spartan and gestured towards her crossword puzzle book. "You, however, will be here for a while. Do you need anything at the moment?"

Linda shook her head and the doctors quietly left her to her own devices. She picked up the book and flipped it open with a silent grimace.

John ordered the tunnel sealed to avoid having to put any more of his crew in quarantine. The ground-side crews were doing an excellent job of holding the landing zone, though there were no signs of Sentinels reactivating. A couple of scientists had transferred to the planet and were beginning to classify the life forms they found.

The enforced quarantine made John itch to see his brother and sisters again, face-to-face. He visited them all, of course, but speaking through a plastic wall with no privacy was not his idea of a good time. Kelly had been glad to see him but restrained, even when the rest of the room surreptitiously moved away from the comm units that allowed the pair to talk and looked away to give them some semblance of privacy. Fred gave his report on the mission, being harsh on himself for not having realized their danger earlier and having lost so many of his team. Linda, drugged up and on mood-swinging steroids, had spoken quietly and shortly, reporting what the doctors had told her.

"Sir…"

The worry and confusion in Maximus' voice made John look up from his desk sharply. The AI appeared on his pedestal, frowning as he looked over John's shoulder. "There's an unidentified ship heading for us."

"Origin?" John asked, looking at the report the AI pulled up on his desk.

"From the planet," Maximus replied carefully. John read the schematics and tilted his head in confusion unconsciously.

"Is this accurate?" he asked unnecessarily, trying to process what the picture was saying to him.

"Yes, sir. The ship appears to be modeled after a Pelican. But… made out of Flood… tissues." Maximus eyed the "ship" with distaste.

John shook his head at the absurdity and flicked the report onto a tablet, picking it up as he stood. "Crew to weapons stations. Have you tried hailing it?" he asked as he strode to his door.

"Yes, sir," Maximus replied from the tablet. The klaxon began whining through the halls, calling soldiers to their ready positions. "No reply."

John entered the bridge to controlled chaos. He joined Kent at the main view panel and saw that three more of the Flood ships had appeared on the short-range scanners.

"They appear to be originating from this mountain range," Maximus reported, highlighting a north-easterly section of the main continent. "Another should appear within two minutes, if they are following a standard ground-to-air attack conventions."

The bridge held its breath as the seconds ticked by. The ships already free of the planet's atmosphere formed an ugly "v" shape on the other side of the planet, putting its bulk between the human ship and themselves.

John frowned as another ship appeared just when Maximus had predicted. It joined its fellows. "I've never heard of Flood assembling ships," Kent muttered worriedly.

"Reports confirm that it's not known to have happened since the original invasion of Flood which destroyed the Forerunners," Maximus chimed in. "And in those days, they would simply take over human or Forerunner ships, much like what happened with the Pillar of Autumn on the original Halo."

John nodded slowly, remembering the organic matter that had been spreading outwards from the "seed" of the Autumn's captain, Jacobs. It had been like the ship was being consumed by the Flood in the same way it consumed living matter.

"Still no radio response?" John asked to confirm.

"Affirmative, sir. Also, all fire teams are in position and Longswords are prepared to engage on your word."

John nodded thoughtfully. "Send in a probe first; let's get a better idea of what we're up against."

"Aye, sir." The probe launched quickly and skimmed around the planet. It came right up to the flank of the silent Flood ships and scanned them thoroughly, apparently without rousing the creature(s) inside.

"Scans indicate that there is metal inside," Maximus reported, calling up the report. Five more ships had joined the small fleet amassing in the time it had taken the probe to finish its search. "They may be using Sentinels as the main framework and engines."

"Hopefully not as weapons," Kent muttered unhappily.

"Ensign Clark, fire two missiles into the lead ship," John ordered after a second of hurried thought. He had to know what the Flood was planning, and the number of ships gathering was starting to worry him. His ship had firepower on their side, even without the MAC, which was still down for repairs. But these Flood ships, for all he knew, could have him beat in speed and maneuverability.

The missiles streaked away and impacted on the lead ship; John and the crew braced for retaliation but the rest of the fleet simply reformed into a more loosely-packed defensive position, placing the smaller and more vulnerable ships in the middle of the fleet. The pieces of the decimated Flood ship, caught by the planet's gravity, slowly tumbled into the atmosphere and started to burn up.

John grit his teeth and forced his jaw to relax as he realized he was telegraphing his disquiet to his crew, who looked at him with confusion and hope for clarity.

"Clark, continue firing – take out any new ships that come up from the mountain range. Kent, tell our crew ground-side to get firing solutions on those mountains and see if they can't take out the hangar these things are coming from." Both men nodded and turned to their tasks. "Maitri, plot an emergency burn in case they attack. Shepherd, send a report to Earth about these things."

"Aye, Captain," the ensigns replied easily, turning to their duties with relief. With something to do, the threat wasn't quite as scary.

As soon as Clark took out the first ship rising from the mountain range, though, the rest of the Flood ships – nearly a dozen in all – moved into action, firing up their engines and heading quickly towards the human ship.

"Sir, those engine signals are definitely Sentinel-like," Mahoney reported worriedly. "And there are power fluctuations that I really don't like."

"Shields up," John ordered tersely. "Clark, do we have plasma bolts?"

"Aye, sir, but not the MAC." John nodded in understanding.

"Send the Longswords to intercept and keep targeting the mountain range, ensign," John ordered. The bay doors opened and Longswords swept away from the ship with resounding thumps that shook the deck.

The Flood ships remained in a loose attack formation as they sped closer; against the backdrop of space, they seemed to drift serenely. The Longswords plowed over them, short-range missiles making easy work of the apparently defenseless ships. Bits and pieces of Flood ships soon littered the battlefield.

John could not shake the feeling that something was off as he watched the Longswords easily sweep aside their prey. The ships offered no defense and did nothing to return fire; Mahoney reported that the power pulsing in the ships continued even after it had been blown apart. Clark continued to target ships rising from the mountain range, letting none get into the upper atmosphere before removing them efficiently.

Propelled by their inertia, the pieces of the Flood ships hurtled towards the Odysseus II and bounced harmlessly off its shields, careering out into space or into the planet's atmosphere to burn up.

"Shields down," John ordered, seeing that the threat was well in hand and not wishing to drain the ship's reserves too far in case some other new threat popped up. The distant pinging of Flood ship pieces banging into the metal of the ship was disquieting; everyone seemed to be holding their breath.

"Uh…" John looked at Ensign Mahoney, who was peering at his station with concern and mounting panic. "Uh, sir! Those ships aren't dead! They're on attack vectors!"

"Shields-" John barked, only to be interrupted.

"Shields not responding!" Birchwood growled, smacking his display. "Something's in the-"

Maximus turned red and then green, a frown on his face. "There is a virus in the system, sir," he reported to John calmly. "It is fighting me for control of the ship."

"Burn it out," John ordered unnecessarily. "Weapons?"

"Still responsive, captain," Clark replied.

"Keep firing on that mountain range. Kent, order the Longswords to continue destroying the Flood ship remains."

"Longswords are picking off the pieces they can, but they're… Sir, they're boarding us."

"Boarding us with what?" John asked, flicking through the camera feeds on the ship. He spotted soldiers in the bays, patiently waiting for orders to load into Pelicans. The hallways were mostly clear, but then he found one of the "boarders." It wasn't a Flood form as he knew it; it looked more like a carpet of Flood tissue, growing out of a hull breach.

"Ew," Kent commented quietly, looking at the same screen. The living carpet's rate of growth was impressive, John had to admit; it was growing in all directions and would soon fill the hallway.

"Order everyone to switch to incendiaries and burn that out," John said.

"Aye."

Soldiers blasted the carpet back on the screen and the bridge waited for the result. Another invasion was found and another team sent to deal with it. Maximus located the hull breaches and sent teams to each one even while he fought to contain and destroy the Flood computer virus.

"Sir, they're in the engines!" a panicked crew member cried through the comm system, breathing hard.

"They've got Far Too Heavy trapped in the maintenance room," a calmer soldier reported from another section of Engineering.

It quickly became apparent that the Flood was doing what it did best – attacking, engulfing, swallowing everything in its path. It also became clear that the ship was ill equipped to deal with it; the hull breaches continued to multiply. Once the living carpet had a foothold, it was nearly impossible to burn out completely. Several teams, upon roasting everything on the surface, had been surprised by the carpet suddenly appearing again right under their feet.

"It's using the maintenance hatches," John realized with a sinking feeling.

"The ship is infected, sir," Kent agreed angrily, fist clenched.

"It appears to survive in vacuum and thrive in oxygen-containing environments," Maximus opined. His outline flickered, a sign that he was seriously overtaxed with containing the Flood virus and everything else the AI was juggling. "We may wish to consider scuttling the ship, sir."

John glanced around the bridge at the stone-cold silence that met Maximus' announcement. A crew got attached to their ship; it would not be lightly abandoned.

"Seal all hatches and order everyone to put on environmental suits," John ordered. "Then open the bay doors and all hatches and let's see if we can't starve it."

"Captain, I am having difficulty containing this virus," Maximus warned. "Should it shut down any further systems, we could well end up stranded – and potentially find ourselves delivering a Flood ship to Earth."

John nodded slowly. He knew he had to make the decision – stay and risk losing the ship to the Flood, potentially giving it a Slipspace-capable vessel with which to find Earth? Or destroy the ship and its new parasite, stranding his crew on an unexplored planet with potentially no rescue?

"Initiate the Cole Protocol," John ordered resolutely.

The crew exchanged worried glances. Technically, the Cole Protocol was still on the books – but no one had used it in years. Maximus winced but nodded affirmation, beginning the necessary data bank wipes.

"All crew, this is your captain speaking," John said into the ship-wide comms. "Evacuate the ship. I am initiating Cole Protocol." Kent began organizing the evacuation, starting with the medical personnel and crew closest to the hangars.

"Once I power down, that virus will have everything," Maximus warned, outline jagged. "And we won't be able to shoot down those Flood ships coming out of the mountains."

"Clark, cease fire," John ordered absently, skimming across the report with unfocused eyes as he tried to figure out the best way to take the ship out of commission without endangering his people, including Maximus. "Begin safety protocols for all weapons."

"You want to lock up the weapons already?" Kent asked worriedly. John nodded firmly and Clark did so without protest once the XO conveyed the necessary orders.

"Maximus, how long will it take to evacuate everyone?" Kent asked the AI as John ran through scenarios in his head.

"Nearly an hour," the AI replied. "Emergency pods are in use but a lucky hit means most are already compromised. Pelicans are our best way off."

"Recall the ones on the planet, have them start shuttling," John interjected. "Is Engineering clear of personnel?"

"Almost, sir," Ainley replied confidently.

"Once it's clear, have the Longswords begin firing into the engine bay," John ordered. Maximus nodded; it was imperative that they completely cripple the ship before anything else. The Longsword pilots hated to fire on their own ship, but they quickly moved into formation and filled the Odysseus II's belly with small plasma bolts and more conventional missiles as soon as Kent gave them the all-clear.

"We're scuttling the ship?" Stratts asked incredulously when Kelly shook him out of his nap and relayed their orders to evacuate.

"Flood's inside," Tuckkit grunted, checking his weapon quickly. "It's infected the entire ship, including the computers. We can't risk letting her get back to Earth."

Kelly nodded in agreement as Urbano, newly released from the medical bay and on wobbly legs as her spine healed, joked, "At least we'll get some real R&R on the surface this time."

"If we make it down," Stratts muttered rebelliously. "This seriously blows."

"Stow your bitching and get a move one it," Tuckkit growled in reply.

"What about the captain?" Kelly asked her CO under her breath. "Any word on when he's getting out of here?"

Tuckkit shook his head sharply. "He's got a responsibility to see that this ship doesn't give the Flood anything, so he'll be last off," he reminded the Spartan woman.

"Permission to make sure he remembers to leave?" Kelly asked neutrally. Tuckkit hesitated for a moment and then nodded, knowing that the big Spartan woman could, if nothing else, maybe man-handle the stubborn captain into an emergency pod and see him safely to the ground.

Kelly jogged through the silent halls to the bridge. She came across several growing carpets of Flood tissues, which stank to high heaven. To control the smell, which reminded her of the tunnel leading into the Forerunner complex, she sealed her helmet completely.

On the bridge, half of the crew had already evacuated, leaving only Maximus, Kent, John, Clark, and Mahoney at their stations. "Sir, weapons are scuttled," Clark reported as Kelly stepped through the hatch. John glanced at her and his eyes tightened, but he made no move to order her back to her fireteam. Kent welcomed her appearance with a wan smile and nod; she held her rifle at the ready and waited by the door.

"Mahoney, Clark, get to your pods," John ordered. "Maximus, how long?" The last two crew evacuation pods thumped as they spat from the hull of the quickly-turning ship.

"Ten minutes, sir."

"Kent, you, too."

"Respectfully, sir, you should be leaving now, too," the XO said with an air that said he knew the captain wouldn't hear of it.

"Go."

"Aye, sir." Kent headed for his emergency pod in the wall of the bridge and glanced at Kelly, firmly pointing to John. Kelly nodded once to show that she had no intention of letting John go down with his ship.

"Sir, plasma is primed to overload on your command," Maximus told the captain as the XO's pod disengaged and fell towards the planet below them. "I am ready, too."

"Have I missed anything?" John asked the AI stoically as they waited for the last of the ship's crew to evacuate.

"No, sir." The AI looked fuzzy and was clearly distracted. "Auto-pilot is set to take the ship into the sun as soon as we are away."

John nodded and watched as the newest wave of Flood ships attached like suckers to the hull of the Odysseus, spreading the living carpets further. One bay was overwhelmed already, the pale flesh having grown over the outer door, sealing a Pelican inside momentarily. The pilot had simply fired a hole into the organic tissue and flown out with her cargo, but it had taken precious moments.

The last Pelican finally took off and the last of the Longswords guarded it as they headed for the planet. Maximus relinquished control of the ship to the virus, though the Flood would be hard-put to remove any of the blocks they had placed on the computer controls, particularly before it melted in the heat of the sun.

John removed the AI core that held Maximus and slipped it into a portable computer. Then he solemnly tapped the final command into the computer manually, sending the ship on its new course.

"Last transporter is ours, Captain," Kelly said as John looked around the bridge for anything else he had forgotten to do. With the time they had taken for evacuations, there had been plenty of time to rescue all of the cargo they needed and put them in the Pelicans with the soldiers. The last transporter had been left specifically for the Captain, loaded with his armor and enough supplies to last him a while in case he was unable to make it safely to the LZ. So far, the Flood ships had ignored the evacuating Pelicans and Longswords, but they were taking no chances; two Longswords were in position to guard the last Pelican off the ship.

John and Kelly jogged to the bay and climbed into the transporter quickly. The carpet was growing fast and starting to clog the bay's opening, so John wasted no time making a clean exit; he simply pointed the nose at the exit and burned the engines. The carpet crisped and flash-ignited in the ship's wake as they shot out towards the blue-green planet below.

Despite seeing several of the small Flood ships blast by, the Pelican and its escort were unmolested. They made it to the cleared LZ above the Forerunner compound without incident. John landed the ship expertly at the edge of the clearing. Kelly punched the command to lower the door and stomped out, putting her rifle away in favor of picking up a crate of supplies.

Kelly stepped out of the Pelican and was immediately pointed off to the right by a harried supply officer. She carried the supply crate to a stack of boxes and put it in place before looking around and orienting herself.

The LZ was filled with Pelicans, cramped together and occasionally scraping wing tips as they were unloaded by soldiers, some of whom struggled in pairs to carry what she had easily humped across the clearing. Without the usual unloading gear, everything was taking much longer than it should have.

"Kelly, Fred, give the supply officers a hand," John suggested over the radio. Kelly spotted him moving easily through the crowd. Kent jogged to keep up; the giant Spartan dwarfed the short XO.

"We're going to be the closest thing you have to heavy machinery," Fred joked lightly. Kelly snorted in agreement.

Kelly reported to the closest supply officer, who beamed over his clipboard at her offer to help. He set her moving the heaviest crates – armor, replacement parts, and machinery to make more – to the eastern corner of the severely crowded clearing. Already, she noticed, crews were working to expand the borders, hacking and slicing through the vegetation while others ruthlessly felled trees.

As soon as a Pelican had emptied, it lifted off and was replaced by another. Kelly learned that the Pelicans had only dropped off soldiers and urgent supplies in the evacuation by landing. For everything else, they had found nearby pastures and literally just opened their hatches, letting everything tumble into the grass haphazardly.

Once the Pelicans were empty of their primary cargoes, those abandoned supplies were brought in by overland Warthog teams, which took up to three hours to cut a path, and additional Pelicans. Kelly found herself losing track of time with the repetitive unloading, following a pointed finger and stacking crates to ensure the supplies could be re-loaded quickly if evacuation was necessary.

In the command tent, John easily squashed a desire to rub a palm over his face as Maximus scrutinized the map with him. There were two likely Alpha Base locations, both of which had advantages. Both were on high ground, one a plateau roughly three hundred clicks to the north and another the edge of a mountain range five hundred clicks to the east.

The northern site boasted clear sight lines in all directions, but there was hardly enough space on top for three Pelicans perched side by side. Part of the camp would have to be dug into the rock, which would take precious time, or cut out of the jungle at the base of the six-hundred-meter cliffs.

The eastern site had mountains to its back and grasslands around it, giving them plenty of room. In fact, the Pelicans not engaged in defense or shuttling were already parked there to conserve fuel. A large river running out of the mountains would provide plenty of fresh water, a concern with the northern base. However, those mountains would make it easy for an enemy to get quite close to the base without warning.

"The eastern one," John finally decided, tapping the icon on the map. "Set up Alpha Base there, Kent. But have a secondary base ready at the northern plateau."

"Aye, sir." Kent saluted and quickly walked from the tent.

"Where are we here, Maximus?" John asked the AI as he signed the orders and sent them to fireteams Alpha and Bravo to accompany Kent as security for the base-building crew.

"Supplies are fully organized, Captain," the AI replied easily, standing calmly on the desk's holographic pad. "Medical is up and running, though no one is seriously injured other than Linda. All Pelicans are parked outside or at our temporary holding pastures. Longswords have been holding in a geosynchronous orbit above us, but they cannot operate within the atmosphere without severe fuel depletion."

"Understood. Have them hold position for now. We will have to rotate pilots somehow." John would hate to give up the tactical advantage of having some sort of orbital weapon, be it small ships rated for inter-ship battles and not equipped with the firepower to nuke anything on the ground.

"Yes, sir." Maximus frowned as he watched the taxed captain shake his head jerkily, almost as if the Spartan did not make the gesture consciously. "Sir, are you well?"

"A headache, that's all," the stubborn captain replied stoically. Maximus immediately sent a silent note to the infirmary, requesting ibuprofen capsules and, if possible, a quick examination of the captain to ensure his health.

It was moments before a cheery nurse appeared at the tent's locked door. Maximus let her in without asking the captain's permission; John looked up and then glanced at the AI with a neutral expression, though Maximus fancied that the small twist to the man's upper lip was amusement.

"Maximus says you've got a headache, sir," the nurse said breezily, holding out a small paper cup with a couple of large capsules filled with white powder. "Can't be having that." She offered a bottle of water, though John dry-swallowed the pills easily.

"Thank you for your time, nurse," John said gravely. He placed the water on his desk, which made both the AI and the nurse frown at him, one fondly and one with exasperation.

"Sir, you need to drink something – and I would like to make sure your headache is minor." The nurse rolled up her sleeves confidently, uncapped the bottle, and presented it to the captain again. "Please have a seat." She patted John's shoulder by reaching up.

John sat down slowly in his captain's seat and smiled a little at the bossy nurse's clicked tongue as she shook the full water bottle at him enticingly. He took it and drank a good portion before setting it aside.

"Well, that will do for now, but please do finish it within the hour." The nurse pulled a pen light from her pocket and leaned forward, shining the bright little light into John's left eye. He blinked quickly and she flicked it back and forth expertly, watching both of his pupils for their reactions. She held a finger up and John focused on it patiently as she moved it towards his nose and then away again. "Excellent, pupil response is still good. Let's see that pulse."

John sat still as the nurse pressed two fingers to the hollow of his throat and looked at her old-fashioned wrist watch silently. Maximus grinned at the long-suffering look the captain shot him as the nurse hummed. "A little faster than I like, but we did just have some excitement, didn't we, Cap'n?" The nurse grinned widely, inviting the Spartan to share the joke. "Any other symptoms I should know about?"

"None," John replied.

"Then just rest for a spell and let the meds kick in." The nurse pointed to the water. "And drink that!"

"I'll be sure he does," Maximus chuckled.

"Good, thank you." The nurse left quickly.

"Sir, there's nothing you need to attend to until Kent is finished with Alpha Base. I suggest a meal and then sleep." Maximus shut down the desk's display, except for himself, for emphasis.

John closed his eyes, allowing himself to enjoy the fresh air, quiet jungle sounds, and lack of grey walls, at least for a moment. The chirping of insects, quiet rumblings of soldiers, and steady whispering breeze were welcome to his ship-tuned ears. The pounding in his head was already receding, though he felt vaguely anxious and could not pinpoint why.

Conscious of the AI's glowing hologram, John opened his eyes again and finished the water bottle before speaking. "I have a mission before we leave for Alpha Base." Maximus frowned at the captain's determination to run himself into the ground trying to be both soldier and leader.

"The complex is overrun with Flood," the AI protested.

John shook his head. "Not the main complex. The control room." The Spartan stood and picked up his tablet.

"I'll organize an escort," the AI said grumpily, hologram disappearing and leaving John in the pitch-black tent. John navigated easily around his desk and let himself out of the tent, startling the two guards posted outside his door. He found it unnecessary but Maximus – and Kent – had insisted. He returned their salutes and went to find his armor.