章 648: Flooding in

John looks down at the assault rifle in complete confusion, even the usually talkative Cortana having nothing to say about the bazaar happenings...

"Chief, do you see what I'm seeing? Because I might be going rampant..."

"Affirmative..."

He turns his head as the woman blurs into movement and kills any Flood that enters within a few meter-circle around them. She had no visible armour, no filtration system, and was tearing apart the biologically advanced parasites with what seemed to be a mundane sword on her own...

"Chief, get away from these people, if they're this strong now think about the Infection Forms that will be born from them." Cortana cautions.

The man seems to realise his 'mistake' due to the extended silence and pulls back his offered items, "My bad, it's just really cool to meet you... I'm Michael, that's Saeko, I might be your biggest fan?"

Chief holds out his hand and allows a holographic Cortana to appear, "What is your designation?" she asks.

"I don't have one?"

"Then head back to a UNSC fortification, Civilian." she orders.

"I'll just stick with you two for now, I think." Michael states.

"No, you-"

"Cortana, we don't have time." Chief cuts them off and starts walking down the purple hallway, not wanting to get caught up in an argument between the annoying civilian and an annoying AI...

"Hey, what about my autograph!?" Michael complains as he follows after the Super-Soldier and doesn't get any response.

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The trio are stopped when they encounter a makeshift blockade created by some surviving Covenant soldiers to try and hold off the Flood. While Master Chief was thinking up a plan Michael steps forwards and pokes his head into a gap-

*PEWPEWPEWPEWPEWPEWPEW!*

A torrent of Plasma shots hit him in the face but do no perceivable damage aside from a slight sunburn that fades extremely quickly. "Ouch... Alright, have some back." he says as he thrusts his hand through the gap, fire exploding outwards and incinerating everything caught in it. The blockade melts into slag, revealing a scorched yet clear pathway.

"Chief-"

"Ignore them, Cortana..." he states, still unsure if he and Cortana were infected by some mental affliction. There was no way what they were seeing now was real... If it weren't for the incredibly dire situation he'd have checked them both in for numerous tests already...

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*RRRRROOAAAR!*

Chief rapidly turns and points his weapon at Saeko, who'd just turned into some kind of huge purple-furred wolf. Michael pushes his gun downwards, however, causing the shot to hit the floor.

In response to this, the Master Chief throws a skull-shattering haymaker at him, only to have Michael easily catch his fist... "Chill out, Saeko's just getting into it..."

"She's clearly infected by the Flood! What are you even talking about!?" Cortana's voice shouts from Chief's helmet loud enough for Michael to hear.

He shrugs, "Does she look like the Flood? Clearly, she's a Werewolf."

...

"Werewolves, also known as lycanthropes, mythological creatures dating back to the ancient greeks..." Cortana parrots as she erratically skims her database, "Werewolves don't exist!"

"Oh yeah? What's that then?" he points at Sakeo who was tearing apart the Flood with claws and teeth, any wounds she receives almost instantly healing.

"But... But..."

"Face it, I know a lot more about this shit than you do..."

"I'LL HAVE YOU KNOW THAT I HAVE THE ENTIRETY OF HUMANITIES COLLECTIVE KNOWLEDGE AT MY DISPOSAL!"

"And yet you don't know Werewolves exist... Funny that."

"YOU-"

"Cortana!" Chief growls.

"Right, right, ignore the possible hallucinations and get on with the mission... Keyes should be two floors above our current position. Find a way-"

*RRRRREEEEEEEEEE!*

Michael had just jumped up and torn open the metal separating the floors, all as the dumbfounded duo watched...

"Are you two coming?"

...

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What should have been a heroic battle of a lone Spartan fighting his way through hordes of horrific creatures turned into a cakewalk with the presence of the two 'civilians'. They reached Captain Keyes' location and the two natives were horrified at his state, his body was infected and melded into a mass of Flood material in preparation for the birth of a higher Flood-being.

"No human life-signs detected... He's one of them. You know what he'd expect... What he'd want us to do..." Cortana mournfully reports.

Chief nods before punching a hole through the infected Captain's face, destroying his brain and gripping the Neural Interface as he extracts his hand.

"So... About that autograph?" Michael interrupts the sombre moment by holding out his bloodied assault rifle once more.

"Look-, just..." Cortana sighs, "Just sign it for him, Chief..." she relents, having enough of this already.

"Fuck yeah... This is going on my wall. Hey, what would it take for you to give me your helmet?"

...

"Cortana, what's next." Chief asks, ignoring Michael entirely.

A now human-form Saeko walks over to Michael, clothes pristine after a few cleansing spells, "So, are we leaving yet or...?"

Michael shakes his head, "No, the Flood are worth almost nothing but there's no point wasting it. This place is gonna explode anyway..."

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Michael sends Saeko home as he prepares to extract any worthwhile value from the Ring. The plot goes mostly the same for Cortana and Chief, with the exception of his sabotaging the Pillar of Autumn's reactor, making it unable to self-destruct... They only realised this as they were fleeing the place in a Longsword however.

Fortunately for them and the rest of the galaxy, Michael wasn't planning on letting the Ring activate either. He flies up high, into the center of the huge planet-sized ring and activates an ability... [Supernova].

Needless to say, all Flood, unfortunate humans and Covenant were turned to ash, with only Chief, Cortana, and the few marines with Avery Johnson who'd fled in a Pelican managing to survive the cataclysmic explosion.

Michael was forced to lower the power of the nova due to Chief being too near to the Ring, but it didn't matter all that much...

*BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!!!*