@nekoprankster218 this is a rough idea I had of a Charbiter story with fem!Chief. Definitely not fleshed out yet.
Her first dream, she remembered feeling furious at her Soulmate. The Alien, already much taller than her, with her barely reaching his waist even if she stood on her tiptoes, just looked down. Both of them suspended in the usual void of a First Souldream wearing their pajamas, her in a nightgown with teddy bears in it, her long, curly, brown hair pulled back in a ribbon, and he in a dark purple top and shorts with some type of predatory fish on them. He had spoken first, his words fanning the hot temper she was born with.
Stomping her foot down, despite having nothing beneath her, she had snarled at him with all the righteous rage of a five year old, her curls bouncing from the force of it.
“I am not! I'm growing fast for my age! Everyone says so!”
He had looked unconvinced. Leaning back and crossing his arms like he had seen the Elders do right before a lecture.
“Oh? How old are you then?”
Still fueled with her anger, she had spat out.
“I'm five years old! And one day I'm gonna be the same size as you!”
“Well I am six and I am still a lot bigger than you. You will have to do a lot of growing to catch up to me.”
He remembered thinking how adorable she was, stomping her foot against the shared dreamspace.
“I am going to have to be the greatest warrior of all so I can protect you. Since you are so small.”
“Well I'll be the even greater warrior and I'll protect YOU!”
Taking his Soulmate's hand, he laughed.
“We will both be great Warriors and protect each other then.”
That seemed to mollify his hot tempered, little Soulmate.
“Mama's going to wake me up soon. See you tonight!”
“I will see you as well.”
And both woke up, separated by billions of miles.
“I forgot to tell you my name. That was rude of me.”
This time the two children were gently kicking their feet in a stream that the girl had played in that day. The sand mixed with the water as they moved their feet, her hand laying on top of his. His feet actually touched the water and hers were suspended above it, not quite big enough to make contact with it yet.
“That is okay. I forgot as well. My name is Thel Vadam. When I am older I will be Thel Vadam’ee to show people I am a Warrior.”
“Mine's Jonna Smith! Mama told me I can't go train with the soldiers yet, so I've been trying to get the other kids to fight me but they WON'T and then I'm in trouble for fighting!”
Thel was incensed on her behalf.
“How are you supposed to learn to be a Warrior if you do not get to train!? And then get in trouble for trying to train yourself!?”
Jonna exclaimed flopping backwards on the bridge.
“If you were on Sangheilos, I would demand they let you train, even if you are smaller and much younger than the average beginner, and even bring my father into it if I have to!”
“Is your father important?”
“Yes! He is a Kaidon. When I am grown up I will take over as Kaidon like he did with my grandfather and his father before him.”
Sitting back up, Jonna frowned.
“I'm gonna have to train really hard then. Daddy says important people have assassins go after them. I'm gonna have to kill the ones you don't see because you're too tall.”
“And I will kill the ones YOU do not see because you are too small.”
They both lapsed into silence, watching the tiny bugs that were lured by their splashing.
“So what's Sangheilos like?”
Pausing, Thel thought, and then answered.
“It is mostly desert. The twin suns are sometimes so hot hatchlings can not be outside or else they will be cooked alive. But it has very big oceans. My cousin, R'tas, lives near one. Supposedly, the Kaidon's Tower can see it. But I do not know because I am not allowed up there yet. It is the homeworld of my race, the Sangheili. What about your world?”
“It's a colony world called Eridanus II. Earth is the homeworld of humans. But there's lots of grassy fields here, big enough to get lost in, and lakes, but no big oceans. We have only one sun. We don't have a Kaidon's Tower, but we do have a monument to the Firefighters that died during the Great Grass Fire saving people. Daddy says if not for them, Mama would've died and they wouldn't have had me.”
“When I come find you, I will stop and pay my respects to them. It is only proper, since without them, you would not have been born.”
The sun in the dream began to set, painting the sky in pale colors. Thel sighed sadly.
“My steward will be waking me up soon. I can not wait to see you again Jonna.”
“I met a strange lady today.”
Thel paused midswing with his practice sword, he hadn't realized Jonna was here. She sat down on the stairs to the Keep's training ring, she had encouraged his relentless pleading, wearing down his father until he granted his request to begin training early, despite the usual minimum age requirement being ten. That first dream where he could show her the simple ring had been wonderful, she had looked at him with awe in her eyes that were as blue as the Mid Ocean.
“She said she can help me train to be a Warrior.”
“Do your parents know? How do they feel about it?”
His voice tinged with curiosity, her parents had resisted even signing her up for, what Jonna had called, Karate classes, so how could some lady help her convince her parents to let her become a warrior?
“They don't yet. She had to leave before I could ask her to come with me to talk to them.”
“I hope you see her again soon. What's that in your hand?”
Jonna paused flipping the shining, silver object. Holding it out to him, she let him see it, one side had the side profile of some unknown human, the other a type of predatory bird with arrows in its claws.
“It's called a quarter. I won it in a game the lady had me play with her.”
A sudden whim seized her, and she put it in his hand.
“Here! You should keep it so on days I am late to the dream, you can remember our promise to be the best Warriors together!”
He took it and tucked it into a pocket on his training uniform.
“Thank you. Want to practice swords with me?”
“Didn't you tell me only those that the Elders approve of can learn swords?”
“Yes. And you are my Soulmate, there is no way they will refuse to let you learn when I find you.”
He helped her to her feet, leading her by the hand over to a wall with practice swords.
“We just have to figure out the right size for you.”
Carefully selecting the closest match they had to her smaller size, they both took their places in the ring. Thel helped her take the first stance, and both of them spent the rest of the dream practicing.
Thel decided he did not like this new dreamscape. It was cold, impersonal, it fit with what he imagined a maximum security prison would be like. Jonna sat with her arms wrapped around her legs looking confused. She was dressed in a dull grey bodysuit, her curly hair gone, leaving her head bald. he sat down beside her.
“What happened, Jonna? Where are we? What is wrong?”
Her voice was flat, like it had been when her parents refused again and again to let her take any type of combat training.
“I'm going to be a Warrior.”
“Well, that is good, how did the lady convince your parents?”
The next words had Thel decide he was going to hate that lady forever.
“She didn't. She kidnapped me in my sleep. She said I'm not Jonna anymore. I'm Spartan-117.”
“She did WHAT!? Where are you!? I will… I… I will steal a ship! I will come find you!”
Her head snapped up and she reached out with one arm to grab his shoulder as if to stop him from physically leaving.
“No! They'll kill you! She has fully trained Warriors! I don't want to lose you! If they find out I'm having Soul Dreams they'll cut them off like they are going to do with Sam and Kelly!”
“But I promised to protect you!”
“Please… I don't want to lose you.”
He hated how she sounded so desperate. Reluctantly, he agreed.
“Fine. I will not come find you. Yet. I will come when I graduate and can fight them.”
“That's the best I'm going to get out of you, isn't it?”
She sighed, letting her head fall back against the wall, she let go of his arm and wrapped hers back around her legs.
“Okay then. I guess that's good enough.”
“So what kind of training is it?”
A frown wrinkled her face.
“It's not as fun as yours. Lots of running and lifting weights. Said they're making us strong. But I didn't understand the training today. They said it was a race, with teams. So I thought it was like your team training where at least one of you had to make to the goal. So I won, I got there first. But since my team didn't make it too, they said we lost and we didn't get to eat tonight, and we won't until the next night.”
Shock dropped Thel's mandibles.
“How are you supposed to get strong if they will not let you eat???”
“I don't know. But I'm going to have to help the other two run faster, and try to stay with them. So we don't lose again.”
He was silent for a moment.
“Can I still call you Jonna?”
“Yeah. I'm scared I'll forget it if someone doesn't use it.”
Taking her hand in his, Thel held it until she was woken up far too early.
“We had a training exercise this week. They dropped us out in the wild and were told to find our way to a drop ship. They dropped us off in this clearing actually.”
The clearing was in the middle of a deciduous forest, the shadows deep under the branches.
“What was the reason for such an exercise?”
Her eyes flickered slightly.
“Survival, we had to forage for food and make a shelter. But there was a twist. The last one to make it to the drop ship was to be left behind. I was the last one.”
His hearts felt as if they stopped.
“No. I wasn't left. But they didn't lie. I rallied the other Spartans and we took the drop ship from the Marines guarding it. I think we killed a couple of them. I didn't want to make it to the base just for them to take the last one back, so I made sure I was the last one on board.”
“Oh. I am glad you were not left there. Probably would have actually stolen a ship to go find you.”
Reaching over, she squeezed his hand, his fingers moving to capture her own.
“At least the other Spartans will trust your judgment now.”
The room was like a surgical area, brightly lit, sterile white, and unknown equipment with screens he didn't know how to read. Jonna lay on the bed, stitches traced her body. She was taller and more muscular than she was last night, but paradoxically, she never before looked more smaller and fragile than she did at that moment. Her eyes were closed tightly.
“Please turn off the light, it hurts.”
Immediately, Thel obeyed, switching off the light, plunging the room into near darkness, the only illumination being from the equipment screens.
“They made us stronger. Only half of us survived, from what I've heard.”
“Well, at least my bones won't break when we finally spar face to face. And I might be able to keep up with you during sword practice.”
“We will have to see when you are well, Jonna.”
In a movement that had long become familiar, he took her hand, and waited for whichever of them to wake up first.
Smoke curled around ruined buildings. Thel found Jonna sitting in her green armor, golden visored helmet in her hands. He sat down next to her, their hands instinctively reaching for the other’s, fingers twining together.
“This was where they sent us on our first urban deployment. We executed the operation perfectly, just like they taught us too.”
Thel gave a short bark of laughter.
“Heh, I am going to have to work very hard indeed. You already are a Warrior on the field with several victories to your name and I am barely out of training, not even assigned a squad to lead yet.”
Her smile was wicked with challenge. And a touch of something neither could name that wasn't there before.
After the glassing of Harvest
Falling into the dreamscape, Thel saw Jonna poised with her helmet off, aiming it. He dodged as she hurled, but still, the helmet almost hit him. Jonna's eyes were furious.
“What the FUCK Thel!? Why is the Covenant attacking!? You KNOW we're not Soulless like those Prophets of yours are saying!”
He picked up her helmet, his low rank armor gleamed under the suns, they were in Vadam Keep again. He reached over and handed it back to her.
“Halsey most certainly is. She severed the connection between the Spartans and their Soulmates. The only reason we still share dreams is because you did not tell her you were having them yet.”
“Oh and that makes what happened to Harvest so much better!?”
“What happened to Harvest was wrong, but this is normal. Every time we encounter a new race, we battle, and then they are extended an invite to join the Covenant. I imagine it will not be long now. Maybe a few months. A year at most.”
Her voice sounded like a hammer striking an anvil.
“UNSC is going to deploy us against your forces. Against the Covenant. I might be deployed against YOU.”
“Then I shall look for you on the battlefield. It will be glorious to see you fight.”
Both stood on either end of a bridge half remembered from a distance childhood, the space between felt as far apart as the physical space that separated them as children. Thel could feel her eyes even hidden behind her visor.
“I… I redirected the fleet from Eridanus II. I could not imagine them burning the fields, or the bridge.”
“I supposed I should thank you for that.”
Jonna's voice was cold as ice, he just knew the blue of her eyes would be as cold as the winters of Varun Keep on the shores of the distant Northern Ocean. It sent a chill down his spine. He knew the reason why too.
“I am sorry, about your brother, Sam. If it helps, his sacrifice has parts of our command structure still in chaos.”
Neither of them had shared a dream in years. The war naturally altering sleep schedules into near insanity. But this time, after Reach was burned, they shared it.
Both of them stood tall, the yawning chasm between them filled with burning glass, his cape denoting his rank fluttering on the hot wind, her visor gleaming in the light of the flames, and they glared with hatred for each other in their eyes.
“Fleetmaster Vadam’ee, when I see you. I will kill you for this.”
No others were on board his ship in this dream. He stood alone, his cape draped about his shoulders. His eyes were narrow, glaring at the human vessel, a mere pinprick in his eyes, he spoke, her new name amongst the Covenant slipping from his mandibles.
“You will not set a singles cursed foot on that Sacred Ring, DEMON!”
And her voiced answered in a defiant hiss as clear as if she stood next to him.
Refusing to look at her, the view from his ship's screen showing the destruction of the Sacred Ring. She was on a tiny ship, and he just knew she was looking at him.
“Halo was a weapon. It was going to kill us all.”
“I'm not lying, Halo was a weapon! Thel! Listen! It was a weapon!”
With strength he didn't know he had, Fleetmaster Thel Vadam'ee forced himself to wake up to free himself from his demonic Soulmate's lies.
The burning of his brand followed him into his dreamscape. And he wasn't alone. He could sense The Demon he was bound to from where she stood, across the great chamber from him where he had been punished, the jeering crowds still filling it with their bodies and the air with their chants. And yet her voice sounded as if she was standing next to him.
“I was disgraced. For failing to protect the Sacred Ring.”
“If I knew they were going to torture you, I would have found you and killed you.”
The silence dragged on uncomfortably before Thel whispered two words.
And he found that he meant it.
Standing outside Vadum Keep in the dreamscape, the ocean lapping at the sand, the Arbiter stood. The suns settled on his shoulders. The antique armor had a dull gleam to it. Weighted with the multitudes of Arbiters before him who had worn it and died in it seeking to reclaim their honor. Suddenly a whisper entered his ears, he just knew The Demon was watching him through the scope of a sniper rifle. Fortunately, one can not die in a Souldream.
“That armor doesn't seem to fit your rank, Fleetmaster.”
“Take your mockery away Demon. I have lost that title.”
“Well I'm not calling you Thel either. You lost that right.”
“I have. I am only the Arbiter now. Until my death.”
“Good. And I'll be the one to put you in the ground.”
He didn't have to actually see her to know she was fully armored like she always was now. Her ocean blue eyes hidden from him forever.
Chief jerked her head up to face the Arbiter. The dreamscape around them the Gravemind's lair. He stood on the far side of the room.
“He haunts me. I've never been afraid of anything or anyone until the Flood. And that thing scares me the most.”
With a heavy air, almost as if all of the universe was holding it's breath at that moment, Arbiter crossed the massive room, each step taking him close to his Soulmate. Finally, he stood next to her, and in a move he hadn't done in over a decade, he sat down beside her, his hand almost reached out to take her's like they used to do so long ago. In a quiet voice, Arbiter admitted something.
“It frightens me as well.”
Determination suddenly filled him, and he concentrated as hard as he could. Finally, the scene shifted around them, blurring and finally settling on his room at the top of the Kaidon's Tower.
Chief noticed, she could see the Ocean from there. Taking a breath, she spoke of her first encounter with the Flood.
“One of them breached my suit. One of the infection forms. I could feel it trying to drill into my skin. If Cortana hadn't triggered the armor to unleash a shock that exploded it, I would have been one of them.”
Neither of them spoke after that. Just sitting side by side, the small gap between them felt like an uncrossable barrier.
Walking into the vaguely familiar dreamscape of Arbiter's room in the Kaidon's Tower, Chief stood over him, arms crossed.
“So you're still asleep.”
He didn't answer her. Head bowed low, holding something in his hands. A small flicker of that rage she had had in her childhood suddenly, and unexpectedly, reared it's head. And she snapped.
“Oh boo hoo! Your religion was actually a death cult and your special ring was a weapon like I told you! Knock off your fucking pity party and SAY SOMETHING!!!”
His answer was as broken as his voice.
“I… I promised you. I promised I would… I would protect you. I would… seek you out. Find you. Bring you home. Protect you. That we would both stand beside each other as the greatest of Warriors. Instead… I am one of your enemies. I burned the worlds under your protection. I ordered your brothers and sisters killed. And for that, I deserved to be stripped of my title and name. I am unworthy to be your Soulmate.”
“You protected Sergeant Johnson and Commander Keys from Tartarus. And Eridanus II managed to escape glassing thanks to your meddling at the start. You know the truth now. And since we still can share dreams I guess whatever picks out Soulmates thinks you're still worthy. But…”
She reached down and grabbed his shoulder, his head tilting up to look her. Her eyes gleaming behind her visor.
“If you want to start to make up for what you've done. Then you get up. And you FINISH this fight side by side with me.”
Grabbing his hand, she pulled him to his feet, jostling what he had been holding from his hand. And a human quarter hit the ground unnoticed.
“I think, that was the first time I've been unlucky.”
The back half of In Amber Clad hung in space, wreckage floated around them. Thel studied it with a critical eye.
“I shudder at the near deaths you must have had to call this the first time you were unlucky.”
For the first time in years, Jonna took off her helmet. Despite the void of space around them, this was the dreamscape, helmets were not needed here. Her eyes told endless stories of her life. But they still were as blue as they were when they were children.
“I was always lucky. It's the reason Halsey chose me.”
A smirk crossed her face.
“Still am. Because you know I'm alive. Don't forget your promise. Remember? You said you would come find me one day. So come find me, Thel.”
Taking her hand in his, he swore to her like he had when they were children and promises were meant to be kept.
“I will Jonna. I swear it.”
No dreamscape allowed their meeting this time. Reality embraced them as Jonna walked out of the wreck of the In Amber Clad, freed from her Cryotube, it was sitting were it had been pulled into the hanger bay of the massive Supercarrier, Feverant Seeker. Cortana had been given back to her, the AI's chip placed in her hands like a delicate piece of glass art. She slide it into the slot of her armor, one of her few friends still alive reunited with her.
Waiting for her, almost impatiently, was her Soulmate. Thel's voice was apologetic, as he spoke.
“I apologize for my lateness, it took me awhile to find this place.”
“But you found it. You found me.”
Reaching out, he offered her his hand, she took it.
Jonna could feel Cortana's excited smile, although she was suspiciously silent as if she didn't want to miss a word of what she would call, an enemies-to-lovers drama. The AI had often proclaimed as one of the most fascinating tropes.
“I am hoping we can go see the Keep in the waking world, and Eridanus II. I have a monument to Firefighters to thank, Jonna.”
Reaching up, with her free hand, she pulled off her helmet. Allowing him to see her eyes outside of the dreams. Clipping the helmet to her hip, she reached up and tried to run her fingers through her short hair, which she found to be near impossible as it was a tangled mess of curls.
He began, his eyes meeting hers without a barrier for the first time.
“My cousin is furious I did not tell him I have been having Souldreams this whole time. I suspect he will be sulking around the Keep, hoping to glimpse you.”
“How shocked will he be when he realizes who I am?”
“Not as shocked as you might have believed. He found his Soulmate while you were gone.”
Curiosity piqued, she asked.
In a far too casual voice, he replied.
“Just a Spartan named Fred.”
Stopping to stare at him, Jonna couldn't help herself.
“FRED? He's alive!? But he said… oh that clever little… He said he never got his Souldreams. Just like I did.”
They shared a wry laugh, the first laugh either of them had had in years. A Sangheili approached them both.
“Which course shall we take Arbiter?”
“The Human world, Eridanus II. I will have to keep my father and cousin waiting to meet my Soulmate a little while longer. I have something I must do there.”
The Sangheili left after touching his hand to his chest briefly. Jonna paused for a moment.
“Think your Elders will still let me learn to sword fight?”
“Let you? They will beg you to learn.”
Holding hands, they continued walking down the Feverant Seeker's hall, hand in hand, finally together.
