.......en
...ven
Steven!
He started to open his eyes slowly.
Steven immediately felt groggy, like he'd stayed up all night playing his golf game.
He struggled, but managed to open his eyes fully. But he was surprised when he saw his surroundings.
Walls of flat gray metal surrounded him on three sides. With a set of heavy bars that were obviously bent in front of him.
His shoulders were shaken lightly. He finally noticed the person that had shaken him awake. Rather roughly if he would add.
A good visor stared at him. With blue armor layered all over the figure.
While he'd only met her for a few minutes there was no mistaking who was in front of him.
Naomi was crouched by his side, rifle in her off hand.
"Good, you're finally awake, kid. Now if we could please get going, there are about to be several dozen insurrectionists coming through the doors any minute." She said with a bit of annoyance in her voice as she stood to her full height of 6 feet 9 inches.
She scanned the hallway connecting his cell to the few others he could see. Finger only slightly off the trigger.
Steven slowly stood up. His joints audibly cracking as his sore and tired body moved. But as soon as he did he noticed several key differences.
He was taller for one, nearly at neck height with the Spartan in front of him. Which would put him just under the six foot mark.
His clothes were dirty and torn. Probably from the forest he realized.
His appearance was slightly more....monstrous than he remembered. His nails were pointier, his skin had a slight pink hue to it. And worst of all, he put his hands up to his head and felt the small nubs where horns had grown out of his head. The same went for his spine.
That was when everything came rushing back to him. His monstrous transformation, what he did to that rogue gem when it attacked lapis, and the strange dream of.... Pink Diamond.
He felt overwhelmed. There was just so much happening all at once. He just wanted some time to process everything that was happening. Maybe talk about this with Garnet.
He didn't exactly trust Pearl or Quasar at the moment. They had both lied about mom or Rose Quartz.....Pink Diamond? Did he really care about the distinction right now?
Sleeping again sounded really good right now.
Hey! Steven! I know shits gotten real over the last couple of days but I need you to get it together for a few hours so we can get out of this pile of junk!" Yelled an annoyed Naomi.
It was then that a small explosion happened to his head right down the hall. Small bits of debris simply bounced off the thin gold barrier surrounding Naomi.
She swore before putting several short bursts down toward figures he couldn't see.
She ducked into the cell as a powerful boom sounded out and what he guessed was a sniper rifle round ricocheting off her shields. They shine bright for a moment before going invisible once more.
"Alright, times up! Sorry in advance kid!" She yelled at him before switching her rifle for a pistol. She then grabbed him and rushed out of the cell. Firing .50 cal rounds from her Socom magnum as she did.
He heard several yells and a loud thud when she stopped.
He wisely hugged the wall and tried to avoid any gunfire. Although he only had to worry about ricochets from here.
Naomi reloaded her magnum and handed it to him as well as several magazines.
"Here, you're gonna need this. Can't have you not be able to fight back can we now?" She said.
Steven grabbed the large handgun carefully. He'd shot a different version before, but he'd been told the principle was the same. But the thought of having to actually shoot and possibly kill another human being? That scared him immensely.
But it may be unavoidable.
But that didn't mean he wouldn't try to go on the defense for as long as possible.
He put the items in a still intact pocket. He then clenched his fist and breathed deep. A slight hum sounded out as his shield materialized on his arm.
Even his own shield was different now. Made up of crystalline styled hexagons. With the same rose in the center, but now with a diamond at the center of it.
Yet another reminder of his cracked reality.
"Naomi, we need to find Lapis! I can't leave here without her. I'd never forgive myself if I did." He said with a rare grit on his tongue.
Naomi turned her helmeted head to look at him. She racked the bolt on her MA5K, slotting a new round in the chamber.
"You think I came all the way down here just to pull you alone out of the fire? Missions clear, rescue both of you, get any data I can from this damn place and get out before the compound is leveled." She told him with a practiced ease.
She grabbed a grenade off her harness.
"As soon as this blows we go. Stay behind me and use that jackal shield of yours to stay safe. Fire on anyone that's not a gem or wearing UNSC standard. Can I trust you with that?" She asked in a deathly serious tone.
He clenched his fist and nodded. He'd save Lapis, hell or high water.
She nodded and pressed a button on the top of the frag grenade. She then peeked over the wall and chucked it. A few seconds and several panicked screams were heard before a loud boom and the sound of metal fragments hitting filled the air.
She was gone in an instant and Steven followed up right behind the Spartan. His shield raised in front of his body.
They both rushed through the doorway the enemies were behind. He heard several short bursts from Naomi's rifle put down any survivors of the explosion.
She motioned with her hand toward an airlock on the far side of the wall. Steven nodded and grabbed the pistol from his pocket with his right hand. Anxiety filled him as he followed Naomi.
They stopped directly in front of the airlock. He watched as Naomi pulled a chip out of the back of his helmet that he'd recognized as the same one that carried AI.
It went into a small port below the control panel. A few moments passed before the airlock slid open into an elevator.
They entered and the door slid behind them. He guessed the AI Naomi had inserted stayed inside whatever computer this place had, because the elevator started moving on its own.
His heartbeat was like a machine gun in his chest. Just, why couldn't he just have a single minute to just think some things over. But everything had just kept hitting him.
He turned his head to look at the Spartan that rescued him. After everything that went down, he never got a good look at her.
Covered in a car different style of armor then he'd seen the other Spartans use. Was it something new? Or was it just a different version of the same suit?
She stood like a statue, staring at the door with an intensity that could bore through it. Golden visor standing out against her dirtied armor.
She was also far taller than him even now. He'd say she was just shorter than Garnet and an inch or two shorter than Will.
But he didn't get much of a chance to see anything else before the elevator stopped. Naomi raised her rifle in a ready move. He raised his shield in front of him and readied his pistol. Still not sure he could pull the trigger on a regular person.
These were just people. Not gems that could mostly regenerate from damage when they reformed. Or the corrupt version he fought with his family. This wasn't even like fighting the robots he went up against in training. These were real, flesh and blood people.
But did they want him dead? He woke up in a cell after all. So they must need something from him. So, what did they want exactly? To experiment on him. That seems likely given all the strange things he'd seen so far.
The doors opened up into a large....chasm might be the best word.
A long metal walkway that hung from an unseen ceiling extended out in front of them.
The whole area was rather dark, but it oddly felt like he shouldn't have been able to see much at all. Was this something weird about his new Diamond powers?
The dull mist of frost wafted up toward them. Shrouding the pale blue lights that lie below to be obscured from them. The whole place sent shivers down his spine. Both from the sheer cold that this entire place had, and from an indescribable feeling of dread that filled him.
Naomi gestured with her right hand to move forward. He slowly followed behind her. Her footsteps were far quieter than he would've guessed from a soldier in a thousand pounds of armor.
As he walked, the faint sounds wafted down from above them. Sending small chunks of ice raining down on them, before crashing to the floor so far below.
"Ummm, Naomi, what's that sound? Because it definitely doesn't sound good." He said with far more nervousness than he wanted.
She never paused in her practiced and smooth stride.
"Ship grade munitions that missed their mark crashing into the ice. As well as a healthy amount of debris making a bunch of craters. That is what's probably falling down onto the surface from the battle above." She said coolly and calmly. Like this was a casual occurrence for her.
Steven paused in his stride, after a few moments of not hearing the kids footsteps Naomi turned around.
"Keep moving, one of those rounds might get all the way down here." She said with a mocking tone. And unknown to Steven, a shit eating grin on her face.
Steven just sighed, letting it fall past him. He had enough to deal with, and that was without the constant threat of death raining from above.
But they didn't get much farther before he noticed Naomi stiffen like a board. The movement was so small it was nearly unnoticed by him.
She traced her gaze all around the chamber they were in. Letting her golden gaze pear through the thick fog from the ice. He noticed now that the fog seemed to be much thicker than before.
A small hiss made its way into his ears. He almost didn't hear it over the continuous shudders of the ceiling. But now that he knew it was there. Well....he just couldn't shake it.
He traced the sound to the side of the walkway.
Being made up of two main metal girders, with several smaller supports layered throughout the walkway. All topped off with sturdy grates for walking on.
The hissing came from a small nook where the supports met the main girder. Tucked in the nook was a small cylinder that spewed white smoke.
He stood up, an uneasy feeling starting to read it's head.
Naomi was now scanning the surroundings. Rifle out and going over every little place one could be hiding.
A dull this echoed out in front of them.
Both immediately looked forward to see what it was that made the noise. But all that was on the walkway was an innocuous chunk of ice.
Steven trailer his gaze up where it might've fallen off.
Well over a thousand feet away was the only place it could've come from. What with the slope of the ice on this side of the walkway.
A dark blue shifted slightly on the wall.
Steven only had time to widen his eyes as a bullet that traveled far faster than he could see rung out.
But the target wasn't him.
Naomi barely had time to angle her head as the round struck her head. Breaking through her powerful shields and carving a groove through the thick titanium. The round then deflected and slammed into the opposite side of the chamber.
"Sniper!" She yelled out as she shakily started to run his way. Naomi barreled into him as her large arms wrapped around him. The cold metal stung against his skin. But it was far less than the concussion the Spartan probably had.
Another hypersonic round slammed just inches away from where they were just a second ago.
Naomi began to run even faster with him cradled in her arms. Her muscles and suit working in symbiotic harmony to propel them at speeds far beyond that of a normal person.
If he had to say, they were probably going at well over 45 MPH.
Steven felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. A sense of imminent danger filled his mind once more.
Unnoticed to him, his eyes narrowed to diamond shaped slits and his eyes shine a bright pink.
He pushed his arms out behind them. And with a yell a wall of pink hard light appeared. Just in time to stop a third round that sent cracks along the wall in a spider web pattern.
But not even a second later, another round rang out. Less powerful, considering the sound it made. But it shattered the wall and was sent straight into Naomi's right thigh. Blowing a quarter sized hole through the plate and burying itself in her leg.
She only let out a grunt of pain that mixed in with her heavy breathing.
A loud whine echoed from the Spartans back. Naomi immediately flipped him around so that she cradled him like a bride. It was then that her jetpack thundered and they took off into the air at a far faster speed.
Steven let a breath he didn't know he held out. But like everything else, the universe just had to Fuck with things.
Steven heard an electric like static sound out before a wave of warmth surrounded him and Naomi. A golden barrier of plasma washed over them in a protective embrace.
Yet another round rang out and slammed into one of the turbines on the jetpack. It was uncovered by her shields so it would work properly. But that meant it was vulnerable.
The two spun out of control. But Naomi spun around and protected him with her body right as they slammed into the side of the chamber.
The sound of a broken energy shield and shattered ice rang out as they hit.
Steven, in another instinctual move, created a pink bubble around them. Just in time for another round to impact the bubble. The sheer kinetic force slamming them back into the wall of ice.
They quickly sunk deep into the fog, and like that, the shooting stopped.
But the ground quickly came up from under them. Dull steel slammed into the bottom of the bubble. Chasing the headlight construction to shatter and send the super soldier and hybrid to the ground. They laid there, still.
_____________
A large figure dropped from the wall into the walkway. Making the metal shudder and groan as the immense weight of the figure settled on top of it.
Heavy footsteps made the grates shudder as they walked. The faint whine of electric motors sounded as their legs moved.
A mechanical left hand grabbed the barrel of the M99 Stanchion. The hand being of a ceramic bined and dense muscle, all wrapped in graphene nano weave gripped the magazine.
They simply left what was left of the tungsten projectiles fall to the grate as they reloaded. They rifle then went to their back. The massive gray coilgun blending in high the onyx plates of Titanium A. They then hefted an LMG from their back. Racking the bolt to chamber a 30-06 round.
A dull good visor stared down into the fog below. A subtle flick of the arm and a glowing blue barrier of plasma shot out in a ring shaped shield.
The figure then jumped down into the cold depths.
______________
Naomi opened her eyes slowly, blinking to get the blurry spots out of her vision.
Her whole body felt like she'd been run over by a Pelican. Then used as a brute punching bag.
'Thank God Halsey thought to reinforce the spine's of our armor. Might've snapped my neck from the force on that gauss round without it.'
She lifted her gauntlet to the side of her head that got hit. As she thought, there was a large dent that had been shaved off metal where the round tore through and deflected.
She felt several of her ceramic bones pop as she sat upright. Her next concern was her leg. She bent it to inspect the damage.
Guess she could thank that hunter partly for crushing most of her right leg. It was replaced after a lengthy surgery with a sturdy Titanium alloy version. Made it the same alloy as her current armor.
It grinded slightly as she bent it. Most likely some of the frame had bent or broken. And from the slight sting of pain that she ignored, had hit one of the artificial nerves.
She promptly pulled herself up before shaking her leg. Freeing it up.
She waited only a few seconds before her shields recharged to full. She wasn't gonna let that bastard get the drop on her again.
A quick mental command and her jetpack let itself go from her armor. A slight hum filled the air as the shields strengthened themselves along her back.
She then noticed Steven standing a few dozen feet in front of her. Gazing down from the platform they landed on to the source of the lights below.
He didn't even acknowledge her presence. His face was contorted into a look of horror and disbelief at....something.
She turned her gaze to the lights. And she knew immediately why he was shocked.
Rows of hundreds upon hundreds and Gems.
She hit the zoom function on her visor, magnifying her view of the situation. A small glass container with cases of black plastic held the gemstones. Contained inside, they couldn't reform.
So, this is where the Innies we're keeping the captured gems huh? Well, the massive chunks of ice would prevent deep scanning of the place, so it would be as good as fort Knox to keep them down here.
She made a mental command to unzoom and her view went back to normal. She turned her head to see Steven just as he'd jumped off the ledge. Pink energy trailing behind him and Magnum in hand.
Naomi sighed.
She crouched low, when with a great leap she went over the ice ledge to chase after the teenager.
God she hated teenagers.
__________
Her heavy footsteps echoed throughout the icy cavern as she cracked ice beneath her. Shards of it so behind her as she went.
She'd searched half a dozen lanes of gem storage and still hasn't found Steven. Maybe he'd already found Lapis.
She rounded another corner only to come face to face with a ghost.
Standing at well over seven feet and clad in less advanced but sturdy looking armor was a Spartan. One of her own.
The only thing she needed to see was the small but simple number on his chestplate.
066
Soren
He....he died years ago! How the fuck is he here of all places!
What was worse was the fact that he held a far more monstrous Steven in his grasp. Despite how powerful the kid may be with his Godzilla like spikes and black and pink eyes. He still needed oxygen, which he was being deprived of by Soren. His thick arm wrapped tightly around Stevens neck.
But his other arm held an LMG that was pointed directly at the gem of Lapis Lazuli. Struggling under his massive mechanical foot. The armor's weight alone weighing down the alien and the threat of his gun stopped both from doing much.
"Figured you survived that. Takes a lot more to kill you eh?" He said in a slight chuckle. What the FUCK happened the last fifteen years! First Will running off and starting a brand new civilization. Now Soren has turned into an Innie! What the fuck was going on!
Naomi reached her M7 SMGs, but Soren simply pushed the barrel of his gun harder into Lapis.
She slowly brought her hands away from the dual guns. Holding them up in the air so Soren wouldn't kill either of them.
"Let the kid go Soren!" Her tone was filled with venom and her gray eyes narrowed at the rogue Spartan. This mission just got a whole lot trickier. Especially with those two in harm's way. She needed to think of a plan, and fast.
She made a quick mental command and her neural pace connected to her armor's comm unit. After a moment the Dumb AI she'd connected to the system of this base gave an acknowledgment. She needed it to give her an edge.
She smirked beneath her visor. Bingo
Now it was time to stall.
It was at that moment that Steven passed out once again from lack of oxygen. Soren immediately let his unconscious body fall forward. A quick scan confirmed he was still alive.
Lapis screamed In rage as he fell, causing a thin waft of snow to blanket the area around him.
Soren simply brought his foot up and slammed down onto her back. A cracking sound echoed around the area as Lapis cried out in pain. Tears fell down her cheeks as her eyes turned glassy instantly. Soren slid his foot lower and Naomi was able to see the newly formed set of hairline cracks in the gemstone.
"I'm giving you one chance Naomi, surrender now, or they both did right here. I don't really care if they live or die, but I'm pretty sure the UNSC would be angry to have some of their Spartan candidates go up in smoke." He said with a snarky and cold tone in his voice.
His helmet cocked to the side before it leaned toward her. His voice changed to a deep and bitter tone.
"So, what's it gonna be?"
Naomi narrowed her eyes, a Spartan being able to detect faint body language of one another would be able to tell. No doubt Soren knew how she was feeling, and she could tell what he was feeling. A deeply repressed rage was starting to show.
Maybe they were a little more alike than she gave credit for.
"We trusted you Soren, all of us trusted you. And you're gonna turn your backs on not only the UNSC. Which might I add is doing more to prevent us from just Keeling over and dying in the face of the Covenant and now these Gems. But you also turned your back on us, your Spartan brothers and sisters." She let out with more poison in her breath than she would like. But the message stayed the same.
Soren scoffed, actually fucking scoffed!
"You're gonna talk to me about betrayal? Who was it that turned their backs on all us rejects huh? We didn't fit in with their little Spartan mold. Surgery didn't quite do a good enough job on us and what? We turned out like freaks! For fucks same Naomi, you saw how I turned out with your own fucking eyes! So tell me, who really turned their backs on us, on me. It was you and the UNSC."
The worst part was, he was right. She saw what augmentations did to him and the other 'washouts'. Those who didn't just outright die had received horrible side effects. From shattered and mutated ceramic bones, to grossly large masses of muscle, to permanent blindness. There was a host of friends she'd known for a long time who ended up in a poor state.
Hell, some of them had to be switched wheelchair bound or even kept in cryo for a majority of their lives. Which was something she could never bring herself to look at.
Soren himself had come out better than some of the other washouts, but the bones in his left hand had reacted wrongly with the ceramic plating, turning them into an unusable ghost of its former self. And while his upper half had turned out even stronger and larger than most of their peers, his legs were massively deformed when she last saw them. Which left him no chance of walking on them ever again.
It was how she knew that he'd have prosthetics he was standing on right now.
And that was what she was counting on.
"You're right, we did abandon you in your hour of need. But you have to look at the facts, Soren, there was no way you could fight on the front lines with even as much effectiveness as a marine trainee with your state back then. It was the reason Halsey would never let you go."
"And then what did she do? She tried to stick me behind some desk deep down in an ONI black site for the rest of my life? No, you wonder who I sided with the Insurrection Naomi? It's because they gave me a chance to be what Halsey wanted us all to be."
Naomi sighed, lowering her head to the ground. She could definitely see why he did what he did. ONI pretty much turned their backs on the washouts. With only Halsey herself trying to help them. She'd heard that some of them even were nursed back into fighting shape. But she guessed she was too late to save Soren before he put
t in his lot with the enemy.
"Seems fate just dealt us the cards we had. And we just had to figure out a way to play them didn't we?" Naomi said as she tilted her helmet to the side.
"Seems that way doesn't it." Said Soren as he seemed to go on edge. Preparing for something.
Well, it wouldn't help with her plan.
Connection established
Taking manual control
It was then that Soren had his prosthetics momentarily hijacked. Making him fall to the ground and his left hand to seize up. The one holding the LMG.
Noami took her momentary chance. It wouldn't last more than a second, And she couldn't chance him shooting Steven or Lapis, enough damage had been done already.
She sprinted toward the rogue Spartan. Her shields are reinforced on her front.
She then held her arm back before rocketing forward in the blink of an eye. Her fist collided in a flash of titanium and contained plasma against the underside of Soren's helmet. She followed it up with another uppercut to his chin, dizzying him further as her shields took minor damage from the sheer power of her punches.
But she could already see Soren's limbs come back under his own control as her AIs hacking program was booted from his armor's systems.
She then brought back her biological leg and lept with her robotic one. She jumped forward and kicked him straight in the chestplate. Sending him flying back several f etc from the sheer force of a Spartan kick.
She spared a glance toward Lapis, that whole attack was less than 4 seconds, meaning she'd barely any time to react.
"Grab Steven and get out of here! I already sent out a distress signal. Hell bumpers should pick you up and wipe up any resistance you might find!"
To the aliens' credit, she didn't argue, instead just looking back toward Soren with a look that could kill, her white glossy eyes making the look all the more creepy.
She then ran toward Steven and picked him up with a grunt as she heaved him over her shoulders. The effort nearly made her legs buckle, it seems a cracked gemstone significantly weakened a gem. Noted.
She grabbed her SMGs off her thighs and brought them up. She immediately unleashed a horse of 5mm careless rounds at Soren. But it seems he'd fully recovered and leapt to the side. Bullets ricocheting off his armor plates and failing to penetrate the thick undersuit beneath.
Naomi continued to spray bullets at him though, because if there was enough ammo flying downrange at something, it'd die eventually.
But as iron slammed into glass, plastic, stone and eventually Titanium. They just sparked off his plates, barely scratching the black paint, or failing to penetrate the suit and Soren just took the kinetic transfer.
She dropped the magazines out of her guns as they ran empty. Swapping in new ones in a flash and chambering new rounds.
It was then, that through the shattered glass and gem containers that she saw Soren shoulder the machine gun and aim at her.
Shit.
She fired at him with her SMGs as she ran, her shields glowing a bright gold as the heavy UNSC grade rounds slammed into her shields. While they could stand up to a good amount of fire, even tanking rounds consecutively from a 30mm cannon. Prolonged bullets or a plasma weapon would quickly drain them.
Naomi leapt forward into a roll, trying to make herself a smaller target as her shield bar went low from the couple dozen rounds that hit her shields.
She crouched behind a particularly cloudy container and grabbed her MA5K from her back, the heavier and faster round of the rifle would do a far better job at penetrating that thick plate then the pistol calibers bullet hoses.
She activated VISR as she shouldered the rifle and slowly moved forward, her shields started to recharge and she took a quick glance at her motion tracker, but she didn't see anything.
It was then that she heard the familiar whine of magnetic could once more. Instinctively she dodged to the side and angled her body. Causing the tungsten slug to ricochet off her shields. It still took out a good chunk of them and the round went through a couple dozen containers, but she'd survived the hit.
She then fired her rifle on full auto in the direction of the shot, tungsten and iron passing through shattered glass effortlessly. But Soren was moving, and his next shot was lined up.
Spartan time kicked in as her world slowed, she ducked down just before the round flew above her head at hypersonic speed. The sheer air damaged her shields as it passed by.
But now she had a bead on Soren, and she wasn't gonna waste it.
She fired more rounds at the exposed Spartan, 7.62 rounds made divets in his chestplate a half inch deep, if that was an ODST with older armor, it would've gone through their chest cavity and flattened on the armor across their back.
But his Spartan grade armor was tough, and all her shots in the rest of her magazine simply ricocheted off his angled chestplate.
But he'd aimed at her yet again with the Stanchion. Not a good shot, but he would get it off before she could move far enough. And to be fair, you didn't escape a Spartans gaze long.
She moved her body in the moments she had before the magnetic coils discharged their deadly payload.
The whine of electricity thundered far after the round had left the barrel and made contact. A tungsten slug that could one shot Banshees into a cloud of shrapnel wasn't fun.
Her shields shone a bright gold for a moment before they shattered from the kinetic energy. But the round also ricocheted off to the side and slammed through several containers.
She threw her rifle onto her back and twirled around, dodging where Soren was aiming by inches as he adjusted his aim. But she grabbed her Magnum and took aim at a very specific target.
Just as the whine started to pick up, the plasma discharged sparking the gunpowder. Then a cast iron round with an explosive core goes out of the barrel.
Her aim wasn't near as good as Linda, but no one's was. Her bullet still flew down the barrel of Soren's Stanchion , scraping barrel components and shredding coils. Before the round finally hit the tungsten rod in the chamber of his gun, igniting the explosive core in her bullet and wrecking his weapon for good.
What Soren did next confused her though.
He threw his rifle toward her direction before hunching over and ran in her direction. A slight hydraulic whine came from his back as two hidden rockets popped out.
The acceleration was something to be admired. He slammed into her. She was stunned.
He slammed the thousand pound women into the icy ground. Scraping armor and sending chunks of ice flying as he dragged her through the base.
The storage containers felt like slamming into bricks as she was used as a ram.
"You mother fucker!" She yelled as her arm swung toward his face. Titanium bodysuit met transparent aluminum in a heavy blow.
His head rocked back as his visor visibly cracked. She forced her synthetic leg and armor to max power with a mental command. Slamming into Soren's lower abdomen and sending them flying apart.
Naomi tumbled over the ice and crashed through the glass of a container, shards of glass scraping her bodysuit and the paint of her armor plating. She rolled several times with loud clangs of metal on metal as reinforcement plates from the wall she found herself rolling on hit her.
She then finally ended her momentum against a hard steel wall.
She let out a gasp of pain as her back hit the steel and heavily dented it, and probably her own armor as well.
Damn, she really hated melee battles, they always sucked when she was fighting Elites or Brutes. Humans and lesser Covenant were easy. Turns out an actual death match with another Spartan sucked even more.
Noted.
She let out a Shaky breath as she slammed a gauntlet hand into the ice around her. Cracking it and sending snow onto her scratched visor. She lifted her head to look in the direction her armor's systems said Soren was. Kinda hard to was a seven and a half foot man in bulky black power armor and rockets.
She shakily got to her feet and looked at him doing the same.
"Alright, this ends now Soren. I don't give a shit what you think anymore. Nobody throws me through a fucking wall!" She said through gritted teeth, her helmet speakers amplifying the last words.
She glanced up to the top right of her visor and noticed that all her guns had sadly fallen off in the rocket chase. Damn, that sucked. Seems Halsey didn't make the damn mag mounts strong enough.
But it seemed Soren had the same issue as well, because he simply grabbed a combat knife from a food in his armor.
She reached up to the left side of her chestplate and undid the strap on her knife's holster with a flick. Then, her own blade came free.
She clicked it up in the air as it spun, before easily catching it in a reverse grip.
She stared at Soren's majorly cracked visor, an indent of her fist in it. She wouldn't admit how much that made her smile.
He brought a hand up to the side of his helmet and threw it off to the side. Showing her the face of a man she hadn't seen for damn near thirty years.
His dark skin had cold sweat sticking to it, a sign his environmental systems were faulty. His eyes were the same shade of vibrant blue as she remembered. So full of optimism and hope when they were just kids. Now they were filled with a fiery blue anger.
His black hair was absent completely, guess he went bald in that time. Not like it would matter when she shoved a knife through his skull.
Her visor then completely cut to black as the broken connection in the prototype armor came undone. Emergency wires were rerouted, but the incoming quality through her visor was almost useless. She simply grabbed the underside of it and chucked it to the side.
She glanced toward the broken hunk of titanium and saw the indents from Soren's gunfire, as she suspected, several wires were sparking atop her helmet and she could see broken computers falling out.
She simply scoffed before returning her gaze to Soren.
Then they went at it in a blur of motion. To an un augmented eye, they were nearly indistinguishable shapes of blue and black.
Naomi went high with a stab from her knife, attempting to slam it down through Soren's neck. But he slipped to the side, causing her to miss narrowly.
Naomi recovered quickly as Soren tried to run her through with his blade through the abdomen. She brought her own knife and parried the blade to the side, scraping along his edge and slamming into his mechanical finger, cutting a small indent into the metal.
Soren then swung his left fist toward the side of her face. Knocking her to the side before Naomi recovered and swung her knife in a forward grip across his nose, slamming off his ceramic skull.
He then swung downward toward her head, but Naomi twisted so it slammed into her chestplate, scraping a line across the blue and exposing the gray metal.
She retaliated with an upwards punch to his stomach with enough force to crack an elites bone. But he just muscles through it and slammed her in the shoulder with an elbow strike, making her grit her teeth in pain.
She made a shallow slash across his leg, making more score on the plates. Narrowly missing the undersuit that would've been cut.
Soren then slammed his leg upward into the bottom of Naomi's chin. Making her teeth slam together with enough force to crack a few.
She growled in anger as she felt a small amount of blood in her mouth now. She responded to his oh so kind hit with a bit to his cheek bone with the pommel of her knife before she made an attempted slash. But Soren fucked the hit, shoulder checking her in the chest. He then followed it up with a heavy punch to her side. Making an audible cracking sound as his prosthetic fist met ceramic bone.
Naomi powered through the pain and slammed her leg into Soren's chest, denting the chestplate slightly from the force of her kick. She then swung around and roundhouse kicked him in the shoulder. Knocking it out of the socket.
Naomi then brought her knife down once again and slammed it into the front of Soren's chestplate. The heavy duty, self sharpening alloy slammed through the alloy. She felt the blade move off to the side as it slammed off his ribs. From where she hit, she'd probably hit his left lung.
Soren coughed blood in her face, causing her to let go of her knife and wipe the blood off.
But Soren rushed at her with a quick series of jabs to her weak points. Her shoulder joint that was hit, her cracked rib, her most likely concussed head.
He then followed it up with a jab to her forehead, cutting the skin and cracking her skull slightly if the searing pain was anything to go by.
She roared in life rage as she slammed her left arm into his abdomen, knocking the air and blood out of his lungs as he coughed out the scarlet liquid. She then kneed him in the groin, her knee armor slamming into his cod plate.
In all Spartan armor, the groin was armored and heavily padded. Because a Spartan couldn't go down from a kick to the groin.
Didn't mean a kick to the groin from a Spartan to a Spartan, even in knock off armor. Didn't hurt like a fucking bitch.
He wheezed, before powering through the very large amount of pain and slammed his mechanical fist into Naomi's prosthetic leg. Shattering the armor in an adrenaline and anger induced punch. Titanium alloy gave way underneath it. Making her leg near useless.
Naomi gained a near psychotic look in her eyes as she cut fully loose. Both Spartans now being fueled by almost primal rage and adrenaline as their pain and wounds were forgotten.
Naomi had long since dropped her knife, she used her flesh leg and jumped forward. She then slammed a heavy fist upward as Mjolnir unleashed all it's force. Safety systems being bypassed completely.
Soren went to counter by slamming into the Spartan. Her prosthetic leg only being controlled from the hip like a stiff peg leg. But she brought her arms up and golden plasma shot out of her shield's emitters. Burning both of them as the magnetic containment field was almost non-existent.
But his undersuit on his fist had completely boiled away and charred his biological hand to the bone with third degree burns. Naomi's own forearms were charred around the emitters as they burnt out forever.
She then slammed her fist repeatedly into his face. Blow after blow after blow slamming into his skull.
She yelled a blood rage as her arm slammed into him. Blood flew as his skin cut open and bruised.
His nose broke on the third hit, his jaw on the eighth, and she felt his skull finally start to crack on the 14th hit.
She barely even registered a large set of arms hooked themselves under her shoulders and dragged her off of Soren's bloody and unconscious body. Anger still fueling her. Visions of the past swarming her vision.
For a brief moment, she saw his own face mirrored as an Elite. Her eyes bloodshot as morbid images danced in her mind. Fields of bodies stacked up in front of her. Warcrikes commuted by the Insurrection at the front of her mind.
She was completely consumed with the desire to kill.
"Douglas! Get me a tranq syringe! I can't hold her much longer!" The young, but familiar voice rang out in Naomi's mind. It was soon drowned out with screams as she ripped free from the vise-like grip and moved toward Soren. Her Gray eyes manic as her mind screamed for the kill.
A gold visor entered her vision before a Mjolnir clad fist slammed into the bottom of her chin. Knocking her to the ground.
She gazed up toward the ceiling of ice as she struggled to get up. Another visor of gold entered her vision. A green helmet with a simple red stripe looked down toward her as he used his ironclad strength and weight to keep her down. But he was still straining against the near feral Spartan.
"Alice, I need you over here to help hold her down! She's in a damn mania!" Came the same voice once again.
The sound of heavy machine gun fire stopped as a third figure rushed to hold her down. Another Mjolnir clad individual that was just so perceptibly more lithe.
"What the fuck happened to Naomi? Spartans don't do this kind of shit." A gruff female voice came from the helmet.
It was then that she felt something stab itself into the side of her neck. Her pupils widened as her world started to go black.
The last thing Naomi knew was she was being hefted over the Spartan's shoulder and the sound of gunfire started again.
Her mind cleared as her consciousness slipped. Enough tranquilizer agent to knock out a rhino flooded through her bloodstream.
She was, in that moment of clarity before consciousness slipped away she was able to realize who that voice belonged to.
'so, little Jerome has come home at last.' she thought before her eyes closed.