Eight: Midnight

An automated conveyor moved the Broadsword along under the watchful eyes of the station's surviving crew. It stopped over a hatch, which opened up, allowing an antigravity generator to lift the HAVOK nuke into place. The Broadsword latched it in, and then the conveyor released the fighter. The thrusters fired automatically, and John turned the ship to face the asteroid field beyond the station.

"Good luck, Spartan," said Tillson over the COM.

"You, too, Doctor," he answered, "The minute everything is settled with the Didact, we'll have HIGHCOM dispatch someone to help you."

The Broadsword blasted out of the hangar in pursuit of the Mantle's Approach, which was moving toward the edge of the system at a snail's pace, only slowly picking up speed as its automated systems enacted repairs. Despite the difference in power, they closed quickly with the Forerunner ship. 'Approaching the Didact's ship in 200 kilometers,' said Cortana, much improved from earlier, 'Once we get onboard, we'll find the bridge.'

A Slipspace portal irised open in front of the Approach.

[He's on the move again.]

'The fighter's shield's aren't rated for Slipspace!'

[No, but the Didact's are.] John flipped on the afterburners and closed the distance faster, cruising in below the ship's shield level right before they came online. The Approach moved into Slipspace, the world beyond its shields dissolving into streaks of light. The Broadsword shook violently, but stayed intact.

'Broadsword's hull integrity is stable,' Cortana informed him, monitoring its systems closely, 'We'll be safe as long as we stay below the Didact's shields.

John flew the fighter through a short stretch of trench before the Didact sensed him and spoke. 'Your antics matter not, Abomination. The Composer is mine one more, and once your Earth is, as well, that rabble you managed to save will follow.'

'Locking on to his transmission… He's at the Composer. We can take them both out at once.'

John accelerated, evading a series of thick panels trying to block their passage through a narrow tunnel, then pulled back, trying to conserve fuel. Ahead, there was an energy barrier blocking the trench; the Spartan launched a few of the fighter's missiles at it, and it broke apart in a shimmer of energy, the narrow gap opening up.

The Didact continued manipulating the terrain around them, forcing the hybrid to do a number of creative maneuvers, before Cortana said, 'Cherenkov Radiation fluctuating! We're coming out of Slipspace.'

The streaks of light faded out, revealing Earth beyond the ship. "At current velocity, hostile will achieve Earth orbit in approximately 4 minutes," FLEETCOM reported over an open channel.

"Roger," a female voice answered, "Battlegroup Dakota, close on the Forerunner vessel."

'Infinity must have warned them!'

John nodded. "Sierra-117 to UNSC Infinity," he said over the COM, continuing his maneuvers, "Captain Del Rio, do you read?"

"Chief, it's Lasky. Is that you?" The man sounded shocked.

[No, it's God.] "Affirmative, sir. Where's the captain?"

"FLEETCOM didn't take to kindly to his abandoning you on Requiem. I'm afraid I'll have to do."

'SUCK IT!' Cortana yelled mentally, making the Spartan grin as she danced around a little. He accelerated through a pair of closing blast doors.

"The Didact's got the Composer," said the Spartan, "We're in a Broadsword carrying a HAVOK-grade payload, on approach to deliver it." The fighter soared into a tight tunnel filled with spires. He flew them through, then boosted again to evade more closing doors.

"Let's see if we can grease the wheels for you. All ships, prepare to engage!"

John continued with his trench run, evading changing walls and vessels carrying supplies to other parts of the ship. Then they were in another tunnel, more open, but also with more anti-air turrets, whose fire he had been evading for the entire flight. The Spartan began evasive action.

"Chief, the Battlegroup's moving forward to engage, but at the rate the Didact's ship is advancing, he'll reach the wire in T-minus 2 minutes," Lasky informed them.

"Commander, direct all ships to the Composer."

"Copy that, Chief."

"Orbital Defense Command, this is FLEETCOM. Hostile inbound. Proceed to Condition Red."

"This is Earth Orbital Defense! MAC defense ineffective against enemy vessel. It's still approaching!"

There was a triple layer of laser gates ahead, used primarily in brigs as jail bars, but here they served to restrict flight. John's "anticipation" let him lead their movements and fly right through, unaffected.

"Infinity to FLEETCOM!" Lasky called, "Battlegroup has reached Didact's ship!"

"Captain Lasky, you are clear to engage!"

[Ooh, Captain now…]

The Chief cleared a chain of energy barriers, then accelerated through a tunnel that grew steadily smaller. The fighter escaped before it irised shut completely, emerging out into a bowl-shaped firing center. Massive panels were already closing off the way to the interior of the ship.

"Infinity, the Didact just closed off our entrance to the Composer," John called, pulling the Broadsword around to circle the interior of the firing center.

"We could try punching a hole in that hull plating," Lasky offered, "but Infinity won't be able to get a clear shot with all that flak."

"We'll take care of the guns." The Spartan fired on the beacon at the center of the arena, destroying the central pylon and removing the barriers protecting the AA cannons' power cores. He flew a wide circle to get a good angle, then blasted the first power core apart.

"Whatever you're doing's working!" Lasky said needlessly, "Clear up the approach, and Infinity can drop in and punch a hole for you!"

Two more guns went down. "Only one gun left," Cortana told the new captain.

"Copy that, Cortana," Lasky responded, "Weapons, prepare firing solution! We promised to get the Chief inside that ship, and I'm not about to let that man down!"

The last gun went the way of its predecessors, vanishing in a golden flare of dissolving hard light. "That's the last one," John said, piloting the Broadsword up and out of the firing center, "Infinity, you're clear."

"Roger that, Chief," said the captain. The ship moved into position. John could feel its systems, its :presence: inside his range, alien enough to be Forerunner yet familiar enough to be human. "You might want to back up a little. Main battery, fire!"

The ship's forward lasers blasted a hole in the plating protecting the Approach's core, debris being ejected into space in a plume of flame. "Clean hit," the Spartan reported, having a better angle on the fiery hole, "We're proceeding to insertion." He guided the Broadsword up in a smooth arc, and angle down into the gap.

"Acknowledged. We'll be on station if you need us. Make sure to give the Didact our regards."

It was a tight fit inside the passage the Infinity had opened up. The Approach was already reconfiguring to seal off the hole, forcing the Chief to execute a series of tight rolls to avoid slamming into the panels. Cortana clung tight to him as the passage continued to narrow further. He temporarily shifted his bones to mimic silicone to minimize damage as the Broadsword smashed through the smallest gap ever and slid to a stop in a solid hall. John popped the hatch and hopped out of the destroyed fighter.

'Now what do we do?'

John turned back, and pulled the warhead free of the missile before letting it attach to the magnetic panels on his back plates. [Plan B.] He moved forward into a series of halls that "T'd" with one another, with the crosspiece of one "T" forming the main branch of the next.

Distortion from Cortana filtered through to his HUD. Her fear was causing her to unravel even inside him. 'Chief, I know I'm supposed to know what to do, but…'

[We'll have to deploy the warhead manually,] John said firmly, lifting his gun to fire on the Prometheans crawling out of the figurative woodwork, [Scan for the Composer.]

'I always know what to do – I always know what to do…!'

[Cortana!] He mentally grabbed her shoulders. The moment all nearby Prometheans were dead, the Spartan put her in control. [Breathe in slowly and then hold.] She did so. [Now… breathe out.] She let the air out of their lungs in one long, slow exhale. [Again.] He continued having her breathe until he was sure that she was under control again. [Now, we need to get the warhead to the Composer. I need you to scan for it, so I can focus on getting us there.]

'Okay… okay.'

John kept moving through the halls and dropped down a small gravity lift. As he fell, a few rampant spikes pushed free, whispering, "I won't leave you, I promise! I'll always take care of you."

'Still good for something, I guess,' said the AI, 'I detected an energy signature up ahead – I think it's a transit system like on Requiem. Find a way to access it.'

The Spartan trusted her judgment. He moved up a short ramp, a set of doors opening before him, and out into a large chamber. Intraship supply vessels flew up and down and all around, moving parts and raw materials to places where hard light would not suffice.

There was a plinth on the platform. 'I'll try to route us to the Composer,' said Cortana, sounding almost resigned, 'Put me in the system.'

John approached the plinth and slotted her in. Her avatar appeared for an instant before compressing down into a sphere of fraying code that flickered red and blue. 'Is this the secret you kept from me?' the Didact projected, 'This… evolved ancilla? Your bride?'

"Didact knows I'm in the system – hurry, go!"

A portal opened up nearby, and he lunged through it. It dropped him at the bottom of a ramp, with a Crawler peering down at him. He shot it and moved up. Another portal formed at the other end of the short path, but there was a small army of Crawlers between him and it. As he slew them and picked up a binary rifle, the Didact said, 'I sense your malfunctioning spouse, Abomination. And yet… she eludes me.'

John entered the portal and arrived on a routing platform with a number of other portals, and also a lot of Prometheans. "Ca-aa-n't fight… Didact… and… myself… si-mul-ta-neously," Cortana managed, her voice staticky, "Opening another portal…"

The hybrid slipped into the system. [Here.] He generated a loose web of coding that would redirect any of the Didact's attempts to grab her directly. [Stay safe. It's almost over.]

'You, too.'

His body had been fighting on autopilot, mowing through the Knights and shooting down their Watchers. When he returned, all that there was left to do was pick up ammo and switch out weapons before entering the portal. It dropped in some kind of weapons chamber.

"I'm sorry," Cortana said over the COM, over whispers in the background, "I can't control what my processes are doing. The stronger threads keep reprioritizing themselves over me. I'll try to move you to the Composer again."

The Spartan stocked up on more ammunition, then moved through the vortex. It dropped him at another routing center, populated by more Prometheans. One was close by, with its back turned to him; he sprinted to it and killed it from behind with his knife, the golden flakes swirling around him as he turned to fire on the others. "Portal open, far side of the room!" Cortana called, audibly strained. He reached out to help her, but she pushed him away. "Didact comes first!"

He passed through the vortex and arrived in an L-shaped chamber. "Where are you?" the Chief demanded, lifting his suppressor to fire on the Knight and Crawlers blocking his path.

"Didact's cloaking the Composer from me!"

"Do you need me?"

"Yes! If you could just redirect him, even for a moment-"

"I'm on it." He left his body on autopilot and joined her in the Approach's systems. A number of security ancilla were harrying Cortana, despite the defense he'd given her. He could "see" them as Sentinel Majors zapping her with their beams. The Spartan moved to "shoot" them down, spinning up a few variations of his own to actively protect her as she raced through the system. He may have been a Gravemind, and technology may have seemed fast to outsiders, but within even Forerunner systems, he was bulky and slow, more so than even the worst of AI. John simply wasn't able to keep up with Cortana, so he returned to his flesh.

"I'm taking control of the local defense turrets," Cortana told him, spawning the devices. They began firing on the Crawlers that were coming in waves from both branches of the hall. The Spartan destroyed another score of them before he sensed Cortana moving back into the local systems. "I've got it! I've locked him out of the system, but I don't know for how long!"

The hybrid retrieved her and raced down the long branch to the portal at the end. Turrets lining the bridge distracted the Crawlers long enough for him to pass through the vortex. It dropped them in a short hall. The blast doors at the end slid open, revealing a gravity lift that carried them up several stories and let them out onto a ramp with a conveyor lift at the end. The "man cannon," as it was colloquially known, launched them through four ring-shaped momentum amplifiers and out toward the Composer.

His HUD began distorting. 'Chief, once that warhead is primed, the window for getting out of here is going to be pretty slim.' As she spoke, the massive panels overhead that protected the Composer began retracting, the centerpiece disappearing in the golden flare of hard light.

[I know.]

The amplifiers around the Composer began latching together. 'And so, you come at last…' the Didact rumbled.

'Significant Slipspace event building under the Composer!'

[He's powering it up.]

They landed on a ramp that took them through another small armory. John grabbed a binary rifle again, thinking that maybe he could use it to kill the Didact from afar, but once they moved through another set of doors, he saw that that wasn't an option. The Promethean was inside a barrier, along with the Composer. The shield generators were on either side of him, perpendicular to the Spartan.

'The nuke won't do us any good unless we can disable that barrier. Find me a terminal.'

As if summoned, a plinth emerged from the floor. The Chief slotted her in. "I have to do something you're not going to like," she said, right before she cried out in pain, her avatar distorting and splitting.

John yanked her as quick as he dared. [What did you just do?] he demanded, heading for one of the man cannons she marked with an objective point.

'I ejected my rampant personality spikes into the system,' she panted, 'If I do that at each of those beams, the copies – can overwhelm the Composer's shielding.'

The copies would keep replicating, John realized, and suck up so much memory that the generators wouldn't be able to process. Their systems would crash, and they would shut down.

There was a horde of Crawlers between him and the next console. It was times like these that he wished he could take control of the little buggers without needing contact with the Composer. It would be so much more efficient if he could get them to kill each other and let him pass.

John fought his way to the console. When the last Crawler broke apart, it rose up, and he slotted her in. Her cry of pain was agonizing for him to hear – it went against everything in him to let her hurt herself like that. As he returned her to his armor, the shield beam flickered blue and faded out. 'That's it! It's working!' John went across another gap in another man cannon, simply sprinted past all the Prometheans after setting up his autosentry, and crossed another drop.

'You humans sought the Didact,' the Promethean commander growled, 'You will have him.'

'Chief, his ship's in range! Once we get the barrier down, you need to get the nuke in there fast!'

The Spartan picked up his pace, focusing his fire on the Knights and leaving the Crawlers to the autosentry. One by one, the Knights fell, no matter how many portaled in, they were insufficient to the task of challenging the Spartan. He inserted her chip and watched, tense as a wire, as she split herself again, then turned to see the barrier vanish.

"And yet," said the Didact, "still you fail."

The Composer hummed, whined, and fired. The orange beam impacted somewhere in the North American southwest. John briefly touched the warhead to make sure it was still there, then reached for the AI.

Something hit the console, and it knocked him backwards, slamming him to the ground and draining his shields to nothing in an instant. But that was only a peripheral concern – what consumed his attention was the way the plinth dissolved in a swirl of hard light flakes. "Cortana!?"

There were so many copies in the system that he couldn't find the original, and with the Composer firing there wasn't time to. He jumped off a ledge and raced for the man cannon that would take him back to the first platform. The copies whispered to him as he ran – "Get to the core. Destroy it." – "I'll always take care of you." – "Place the bomb in the core."

As he blasted two Knights to oblivion, the original pushed through for just long enough to say, "Prime the nuke… sa-a-a-ave them! Destroy the Composer!" before she was gone again, too fast for him to grab hold of. His objective notice changed to a message from her: It's all right. But you must hurry…

A gravity lift activated, and carried him up to a light bridge leading to the Composer. The Didact was no longer in the energy stream, and the Spartan couldn't sense him because of the overwhelming radiation from the Composer and the continuing chatter from the Cortanas.

"You persist too long after your own defeat."

The sending didn't seem to come from any particular direction. Neither could the Chief sense movement anywhere nearby. Reluctant as he was to do it where the UNSC could find out, he didn't seem to have a choice. The hybrid triggered a tiny Change, fell it prickle outward from his core and crawl under his skin-

"Come then, Warrior. Have your resolution."

-behind –

John turned, managed to get off a shot before he was smacked away. His suppressor flew over the edge of the bridge, spinning down into the void below. The nuke stayed on the bridge, thank the goddesses, but as he lunged for it, the Didact bound him in the constraint field and lifted him away from the warhead.

The Promethean's helm plates retracted. "So misguided," he hummed, levitating the infected Spartan out over the void, "Humanity's imprisonment is a kindness." He clenched his fist, and the constraint field tightened. John writhed in his grip, lashed out with his mind. The Didact parried – barely. The Chief was about to strike again, but their attention was caught by the flickering of the light bridge.

Multiple copies of Cortana were emerging from the bridge, surrounding the Didact in a ring of furious, solid AIs. "In that case," they said, "you won't mind if we return the favor."

"Your compassion for mankind is misplaced-" the Forerunner began, but they cut him off.

"I'm not doing this for mankind!" And then they lunged, sinking into his armor and causing it to spark and malfunction, forming tendrils of hard light that shackled him to the bridge. John caught its edge as he fell after being released, panting from the strain. The Change was still active – it rapidly healed his injuries and brought strength back to his limbs. He heaved himself back up onto the bridge.

The Didact was still fighting with Cortana and her copies, trying to wrest himself free of their control. The Spartan couldn't give him time to do so. He got his feet under him, groped for a grenade-

-and came up empty.

He took a deep breath, then charged the Promethean, throwing all his weight behind tackling the much-larger Forerunner off the bridge. Their bodies collided, the Spartan's momentum great enough to send them both over the edge.

"JOHN!"

Lucky in the extreme, the hybrid managed to twist, push off the Didact, and grab the edge of the light bridge. Gravity pulled at them both, the Spartan safely latched onto the bridge-

Agony seared through his body, made him jerk and let out a cry reminiscent of a Flood roar. The Promethean had grabbed ahold of his ankle as he fell, using him as a living safety rope. John gathered himself, triggering a larger shift. Then he roared and swung his lower body up. The Didact slammed against the underside of the light bridge, the shock of the impact causing his grip to loosen enough for the Spartan to pull himself free.

The Chief held on despite his shaking arms, watching as the once-great Forerunner fell away, vanishing into the Slipspace event below the Composer. Then he pulled himself back onto the bridge once more. For a moment, he was too weak to do anything more than watch the Composer fire. At last, he rolled himself onto his stomach and crawled, inch by painful inch, to the HAVOK warhead.

He primed it, and then slammed his hand down on its casing to detonate it.

-------------------------------------------

Light. White light, like a star. Falling Lucifer, flaming Icarus, the dying small payment for the ecstasy of freedom.

But then all of his aches and pains began filtering back to him – cracked and broken bones that hadn't had time to fuse, torn muscles and tendons that were slowly wiggling their way back together. Brutal testament to the ferocity of the Didact and his Prometheans. The weight of his armor settled around him once more, heavier than his standard Forerunner kit but still an easy burden to bear.

'I'm still alive.'

It made his whole body fire with agony, but he forced himself to his feet. "Cortana." He couldn't detect her anywhere. "Cortana, do you read?" Her rampancy and countless copies made her slippery and hard to lock onto – he hadn't pulled her from the Approach's systems in time…! "Cortana, come in," he begged, praying that Epheria and Xo'ar would do something, anything-

Movement at his back. A sky blue glow. He turned.

It was her. It was her, his guardian and charge, his beloved brain buddy. Never before had he been so happy to see her. Never before had she looked more radiant. The blue beauty walked slowly toward him across a floor of hard light. "How…?" He let the question hang in the air, a precursor to a thousand endings. How was this possible? How had she survived? How had she generated a hard light barrier so close to a nuclear detonation and prevented him from being harmed? How were they getting home so he could keep his promise?

"Oh, I'm the strangest thing you've seen all day?" She was smiling, but there was sorrow in her eyes.

"But if we're here…"

"It worked," she said, "You did it. Just like you always do."

He accepted that, then looked up at the barrier. "So how do we get out of here?" There were no visible exits.

Cortana looked down at her feet, then met his gaze once more. "I'm not coming with you this time."

NO

Something of her remained, enough to flinch at the force of his projected denial. "What?" 'No, no, no, not her, anyone but her…'

She tilted her head toward the remains of the Approach. "Most of me is down there. I only held enough back to get you off the ship."

"No." This time he verbalized the thought. "That's not – we go together." It couldn't be true. It had to be a nightmare – was this Hell? Where monsters like him went?

"It's already done."

That didn't mean he had to accept it. She was speaking to him now – surely there was something – "I am not leaving you here."

"John…" Cortana crossed the distance between them in a single smooth stride. Her hand touched his chest plate, brought up a thousand memories of the Parallel and quiet moments stolen before the siege on the Tower. She led out a shuddering sigh. "I've waited so long to do that."

"It was my job to take care of you." 'I failed you,' went unspoken, but was heard anyway, 'I should have done more to stop your rampancy, shouldn't have let this be your only way to peace. I should have helped you directly, and damned the consequences.'

"We were supposed to take care of each other," she corrected gently, "And we did."

The Spartan looked back up at her. He could feel the stinging in his eyes. How long had it been since he had cried? He couldn't remember. "Cortana, please…"

The AI (and yet so much more than that) smiled sadly. She touched his chest plate one last time before beginning to back away.

'No, not without-' "/I love you,/" he said in Forerunner, knowing she would understand. She did, and smiled again, this time with joy mingling with sorrow.

"Welcome home, John."

-------------------------------------------

John wasn't sure how long he drifted, mind blank, in the remains of the Mantle's Approach. He only became aware of his surroundings when a spotlight shone down on him, drawing him out of his near-catatonic state. He slowly turned his head to look up into the light.

"Infinity actual? Pelican Nine-Sixer. We found him."

The troop carrier's hold opened up, the ship slowly moving close enough for him to grab onto it and pull himself inside. The artificial gravity took hold, and he got to his feet without a word. One of the Marines on board to the rest of his remaining gear from him while two more supported him to one of the side seats. He strapped himself in, but barely felt the Pelican's acceleration as it turned toward the Infinity.

There were Spartan-IVs and Marines waiting in formation in the bay where the Pelican docked with the ship. They saluted him as he descended the ramp – a hero's welcome he hardly thought he deserved.

HIGHCOM was still in disarray because of the assault on Earth, so he had no orders to report anywhere. He used the opportunity to slip away, and hid on the observation deck, looking out over the green and blue planet. The Infinity's AI, Roland, had to know where he was. As for the rest of the crew, he wasn't sure if they were just giving him space or if they genuinely had somewhere else to be. Either way, he was grateful for the moment of quiet, the time to grieve.

But of course, it was too good to last. There were footsteps behind him, followed by a voice. "Mind if I join you?"

Lasky. John straightened respectfully and turned slightly to look at the officer. "Of course not, sir."

One corner of the other man's lips quirked up in sardonic amusement. "At ease, Chief," he said, walking closer, "Feels kinda odd for you to call me 'sir.'" Both of them gazed out at Earth.

John had had people close to him sacrifice themselves to defend Earth and humanity before, but never to defend him. He returned his attention to Lasky when he realized the man was speaking. Cortana had always been able to grab his attention right away.

"Chief," said the officer, "I won't pretend to know how you feel. I've lost people before, but…" He seemed unsure how to put it. "…never anything like what you're going through."

"Our duty," he said quietly, "as soldiers is to protect humanity, whatever the cost." It was more of an automatic response than an actual thought.

"You say that, like soldiers and humanity are two different things. Soldiers aren't machines. We're just people." John glanced at him but did not otherwise respond. "I'll let you have the deck to yourself."

As he walked away, the Spartan murmured to himself, "She said that to me once. About being a machine."