Preview For Path of Demons

Good morning, Doctor. Coffee?"

A cup of vanilla hazelnut - some milk and a few pinches of sugar, just the way she liked it - materialized beneath her nose, and she accepted it gratefully with a murmured "Good morning" to her mysterious benefactor as she changed course from the mess to her office on base. The human took a sip - delicious, and not too cold, nor too hot. She inhaled deeply, and the calming smell of the coffee loosened the tension in her shoulders - right before she realized who had spoken and dropped the cup, the china shattering on the icy concrete beneath her feet.

"I brought a spare." Another cup of coffee materialized beneath her nose, and now she could see that it was being held up over the palm of a strong hand by equally strong fingers. Halsey followed the hand to a wrist, where it joined with a forearm that had an immediately recognizable titanium-ceramic alloy plate wrapped around it. It was connected to an elbow that looked like it could be used to break her in two if it hit the right spot, which was attached to a rather powerful-looking upper arm, despite the plate that covered most of it. Now that she was really looking, she could see subtle differences between this man's armor and the other Spartans', namely the color. Her gaze slid up the shoulder and over one of the main joints on the chest plate and the part of his jet-black cloak covering it, running over the Spartan's trapezius muscles, before slipping up a strong neck to a pair of intense eyes - brown, not red like she'd expected, though they flashed a deep crimson for just an instant as she watched.

He smirked at her and proffered the cup again, which she accepted. "You're back," she observed as she took a sip, keeping her gaze locked with his as if she was afraid he would disappear.

"What, worried that I wouldn't, and then you'd never be able to study me?" he asked, clear amusement coloring his tone and dancing in his eyes as he quirked an eyebrow at her.

"Maybe." She snickered softly. "Any chance I could convince you to let me dissect you?"

"Oh God, I thought you were going to try there in Crow's Nest."

"I won't deny that I was tempted," she said loftily right before an alarm rang in the building next to them, followed by the sound of the clock producing the noise being slammed into submission with a single hit.

He glanced at her, a kind of "Really? You thought that would work?" expression on his face before he entered the barracks where the Spartans had simply rolled over and went back to sleep. John walked right up to Kelly's bed and goosed her side, making her jerk awake instantly, giving an undignified feminine squeal before she fell off her bed in an attempt to escape the tickling.

John just chuckled quietly as he watched her struggle to collect herself, the other Spartans sleepily sitting up in their beds to see what all of the commotion was about. "Oh," the fastest Spartan said, noticing him at last, "It's you. John, right?"

"Quite. John-117."

Halsey poked her head around the armored Spartan. "Good morning, Kelly. It's nice to see that you're up." She pointedly glared at Fred, who was responsible for the alarm clock's untimely demise.

"It was annoying," he grunted by way of a response, climbing out of bed and reaching for his fatigues, the others doing the same now that they were awake, though there was a brief moment where Jose-010 was forced to do a comical one-legged flamingo dance in order to get one of his legs into his pants. In groups of two and three, they all trickled out, John patiently waiting for them to go through their morning workout routine (having done the same thing himself two hours prior), and then they showered and met up at the mess hall, where he appeared to be discussing Forerunner physics with Doctor Halsey.

"... but teleportation of individual cells is so much easier than moving the whole organism at once. If you break the bonds of the cells, that provides the initial energy boost required to start the process, to begin the transportation, and then it's a simple matter of reassembling the cells in the proper order and streaming some extra energy to reattach them."

"Haven't you ever switched cells or something?"

"Me personally? No. We worked out that bug a long time ago because you see, cells have a property similar to inertia in that once they are attached, they want to stay attached. Even after they split, they want to get back together, so we simply increase the attractive force between them with the help of a special frequency, and viola! The organism virtually rebuilds itself."

"...that's amazing."

"Not really," John said, turning an apple over in his hands as he spoke, "There are other, more impressive things throughout the Empire, and not necessarily artificial, too. The Element Cascades of Corasetii Nine, for example. Falls of not just water or ice, but lightning, fire and earth, too." His eyes became distant as he remembered one of the few times that he had been permitted to walk the surface of the volatile planet.

"How is that possible?" Halsey asked.

"Well, the liquid fire is like very runny lava, about the consistency of oil, and the lighting isn't so much lightning as it is nanoparticles bursting with static electricity so that it looks like lightning. The earth is just mud that is about as thick as maple syrup."

"Ice?"

"Glaciers."

"Ah. Is this planet safe?"

"Not by any means. Because of their rather... shall we say, unique states, the elements are prone to combining in numerous and unexpected ways. The only continuous outposts on the planet are a the poles, everything else - all of the research facilities, resorts, etcetera - are on its moon, Hr'Graan."

The Spartans sat down around the scientist-types, listening eagerly to the conversation.

"Living species?"

"Lava crabs. A kind of mud snake that's a cousin to the water moccasin. Something like an arctic rabbit. Basic stuff." He shrugged. "If you're looking for exotic, Corasetii Three is the place to go; it's got something like a monkey that breathes fire and has pincers for hands and a mane like a lion, and no, I'm not making this up," he said, looking over at Valerie-142, who had a disbelieving look on her face, "Strangely enough, it's called a jackalarf, and no, I don't know why." This last bit was directed at Wolfgang, who was about to ask.

Robyn-009 chewed thoughtfully for a moment, swallowed, then asked, "How did you come to this universe? You obviously aren't... native."

"Ah. So you want to hear my story, do you?"

The Spartans skillfully hid their anticipation and eagerness, but he sensed it anyway, a smirk tugging at his lips as he laced his fingers together and rested his chin on them, elbows supported by the table.

"Long ago, in a galaxy far, far away..."

"Be serious, John."

"I am being serious! A hundred thousand years ago and about forty thousand light years in..." He looked around before pointing out through one of the west windows and up about thirty degrees, "that direction..."