“Oh no..”

“You again?”

“What now?”

“Oh, dear.”

“God yes.”

“Hell no.”

“Would you?”

“So what?”

“Make me.”

“Kill me.”

“Die already!”

“Stop it.”

“Enough, you!”

“Good grief.”

“Good riddance.”

“Love you..”

“You good?”

“Get away..”

“Easy, peasy.”

“Too much..”

“Hey there.”

“Come on.”

“Come here.”

“Kiss me.”

“Hold me.”

“You suck.”

“Be still.”

“Calm down.”

“I’m here.”

“So long.”

“I’m awake.”

“I’m hungry.”

“Life’s tough.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

‘ do you miss anyone? ’

‘ how are you doing? ’

‘ do you believe in ghosts? ’

‘ what makes you laugh? ’ 

‘ list your top three bands or singers. ’ 

‘ how many blankets do you sleep with? ’

‘ does your name hold any special meaning to you? ’

‘ gum, cake, pie or ice cream? ’

‘ favorite book? ’

‘ are you a good person? ’

‘ describe love. ’

‘ have you ever taken part in an uprising? ‘

‘ favorite song? ’

‘ name a guilty pleasure. ’

‘ the most embarrassing thing that’s happened to you today? ’

‘ tell me one truth and one lie. ’

‘ do you like people? ’

‘ what motivates you? ’

‘ describe the perfect weekend. ’

‘ any pet peeves? ’

‘ do you need a hug? ’

‘ would you like to have kids? ’

‘ do you have any tattoos? ’

‘ classical, oldies, punk, hip hop or country? ’

‘ when was the last time you cried? ’

Lucy’s heart pounded in her ears with her growing adrenaline. She had bared her teeth at the bewildered group. Her eyes not leaving them for a single moment. That was until a large hand decided to rest on her shoulder. “!”She instinctively took a firm, vice grip of the other’s hand. She pulled it off before spinning around. Her right hand balled into a tight fist. Her eyes widened as she forced herself to stop her fist. She breathed softly as it was mere inches away from his stomach. Her eyes drifted up before meeting Emrys’s. She let out a shaky sigh before forcing her hand to uncurl from a fist before holding up her hands in return. :I: She blinks a couple of times before forcing herself to take a deeper breath calming her unsteady hands.

:I APOLOGIZE FOR MY OUTBURST: She looked however back over her shoulder. Her eyebrows knit together, having not forgotten about them. She held up her hands before her fingers flew together with her anger. :MOTHERFUCKERS WOULDN’T LEAVE ME ALONE. I WAS TRYING TO DISTANCE MYSELF:

Lucy’s heart pounded in her ears with her growing adrenaline. She had bared her teeth at the bewildered group. Her eyes not leaving them for a single moment. That was until a large hand decided to rest on her shoulder. “!”She instinctively took a firm, vice grip of the other’s hand. She pulled it off before spinning around. Her right hand balled into a tight fist. Her eyes widened as she forced herself to stop her fist. She breathed softly as it was mere inches away from his stomach. Her eyes drifted up before meeting Emrys’s. She let out a shaky sigh before forcing her hand to uncurl from a fist before holding up her hands in return. :I: She blinks a couple of times before forcing herself to take a deeper breath calming her unsteady hands.

:I APOLOGIZE FOR MY OUTBURST: She looked however back over her shoulder. Her eyebrows knit together, having not forgotten about them. She held up her hands before her fingers flew together with her anger. :MOTHERFUCKERS WOULDN’T LEAVE ME ALONE. I WAS TRYING TO DISTANCE MYSELF:

Emrys gives a little shake of his head, visor polarizing once again. “Negative, Spartan. I was just in there. And only typically is it squad versus squad. I was just in there solo against Fireteam Forest. We’ve a rule for fairness sake that no Spartan can be in a match so soon after just finishing one; unless a tournament is ongoing.”

He did feel a little guilty; after all this Spartan was still struggling with loss. 

“I’m sure you could handle yourself solo too. It’ll earn their respect and stop the little shits from hassling you so much.”

Safe to say he was a little disappointed at that, but credit to him for not letting it show. He supposed then that he’d have to learn said rules, because they were important and he didn’t want to fuck anything up. Not more than he’d already fucked things up on Reach, at any rate …. well… that wasn’t the truth but more often than not he believed it to be true.

“Stop the little shits from harassing me, huh? Well, when you put it that way…” A twisted sort of smirk formed on the Spartan’s features, and he gave a little shrug. “Tell you what… maybe you watch me go up against IVs and tell me what rules I’ve breached at any time? You don’t have to, it’s just a suggestion, but… I don’t want to mess anything up, you know?”

“Custom set training exercises, typically two squads against each other for an objective. Or whoever can get the most,” Emrys does little air quotes with his hands before continuing, “kills. I was just in a match of the latter and wiped the floor with the IV squad I was up against. It’s cathartic in some way.”

Now that was a tempting idea. Wiping the floors with some Spartan-IVs was good fun. Plus he could put them in their place a little, too. Carter tapped a finger on his chin, mulling it over. If it was two squads against one another… he didn’t exactly know anyone aboard this ship aside from Emrys… well.

He did feel a little guilty; after all this Spartan was still struggling with loss. 

Emrys had his own struggles. Quite a number of them. But something had always just prompted him to carry on. Even now after having never properly figured out her fate, he kept on. It was all he knew after all. “You must not be keeping busy. If you’re only keeping to your thoughts, that is not the right way to do it.” A pause, his hands remain in the air but unmoving as he thinks. “Have you tried War Games yet?” A sort of nod behind him, to where he’d just exited from. “Even if you think the IVs aren’t up to our speed, it’s still a chance to have some normalcy again.”

A thoughtful look flitted over the younger Spartan’s face at the suggestion of Wargames, and going up against the Spartan-IVs. Now there was an idea. Maybe he could get even with the idiot that had knocked him into the wall, that way. Nevermind about the fact that normally, the S-IVs couldn’t keep up with him. They at least had two normal legs to stand on. And sure, he could still run, could still fight, but he was quite certain that he wasn’t as fast or as nimble as he used to be.

“You act like they’re going to come back as ghosts to haunt you. If anything, I guarantee your team will be angry at you for your current behavior.”

Finally, Emrys shifts his stance, crossing his arms. “If you were CO for Jorge, I know for certain he wouldn’t accept this attitude.”

“Maybe I do feel that way.” Carter admitted quietly, rubbing the back of his neck, both out of a nervous habit, and out of the fact that he’d been sleeping in awkward positions because he tossed and turned a lot. “The amount of times I think that one of them will rise up and chew me out for the fact that I’m not still fighting… not fighting what’s taken me over inside…”

He lifted his shoulders in the barest hint of a shrug.

“Spartan, all of us have survived something we shouldn’t have.”

He says simply, perhaps signing a little too quickly on that notion. He could recall the almost panicked entry topside to Reach, where most of their Pelicans had been shot out of the air by Anti-Aircraft turrets, and the drop without any sort of parachutes. A fair few died just from that, unable to properly try and fight for their home. Emrys had to keep his helmet on for translation, but at the very least he depolarized his helmet, staring firmly at Carter through forest green eyes. “There’s a culture between soldiers of ‘see you in Hell’, and dying with your team is the only path to glory, but that’s a load of shit. If you survive, you need to carry your team with you. Not as a weight, but as strength.”

More rocking back and forth on the soles of his feet. Emrys did have a point. He recalled vividly B312- Artemis’ - guilt over the fact that she had survived after Jorge shoved her out of the Corvette, stating how she should have died and not him. But then, too, he recalled how after Kat had died, the fiery redhead broke in spirit… then after that, she was nothing but angry, annihilating the Covenant on the way to SWORD Base and then afterwards.

He glanced away, furrowing his brow and licking his lips in thought. “I just… I’ve been with a team for over half my career, building it up from scratch myself time and again…. and I don’t know what to do without them.” He rubbed the back of his neck and glanced back - and up - at the other Spartan.

A nod. “Yes. One of few left.” A rueful, bitter smile quirked his lips up of their own accord; though Emrys couldn’t see it, he would have heard it bleeding into Carter’s tone. “Kind of ironic when you think about it. The War cleaned up the galaxy, including soldiers who are now nothing more than relics of a time long past.”

Yeah, he sure was a ball of sunshine and joy, wasn’t he?

But then, the loss of his team, and the injuries to his self…. they had changed him. He wasn’t the same laser-focused, charismatic soldier he’d once been. He was just a broken man, fighting in scraps here and there whenever he felt the urge to spill the blood of enemies onto the dirt of some planet unknown to him.

He shook his head when Emrys apologized. “We’ve all got our scars. I’m sure you’ve noticed mine.” he answered somewhat dryly. “Scars take different shapes and forms; whether we’re born with them or we earned them through battle.”

He didn’t see disabilities as just disabilities - he saw them as battlescars, war wounds that one carried until the day they died. Whether those that held them thought the same as him, well…that was up to them.

“Glad to know though there’s more of Jorge’s kind left than just Blue Team.”

He’s caught a bit off guard when the stranger in royal blue cut their way through to stop right before his path. There’s a tick of silence immediately following his words as they scrawled onto Emrys’ HUD in translation.  The Spartan-II brings his hands up to sign back at him, a loose closed fist ‘nodded’ a yes in response, followed by a finger spelling of his name and number. E-M-R-Y-S 100. Another tick, and a voice kicked in from the elder Spartan’s helmet. “Greetings, I am Thais, Emrys-100′s personal AI. I serve to translate for him, it may be a little jarring if you do not know sign language, and I apologize but I assure you you’ll get used to it! From now on unless you address myself personally, I will be speaking for him directly. He does confirm that he is a II, and gave you his name.” Another sign. “Did you need anything?”

For a moment, the CENTURION-clad Spartan was caught off-guard. Sign language. The II only spoke sign language. Perhaps he was deaf, or mute? Maybe even both. For a moment, the thrill of hope shot through him - he wasn’t the only Spartan who wasn’t 100% able - but what was only a spark flickered and died as quickly as it had come. Why did it matter if there was another disabled Spartan? It wasn’t like they had anything aside from that in common?

And he didn’t want to get close anyone ever again.

“…No, not particularly. I do know basic sign language but it’s been a long time.”

Again, he rocked back and forth on the soles of his feet, a slight swaying motion that barely translated through his armour, though Emrys would surely catch it regardless.