~Two weeks ago - 30 kilometers south of Rhy'din~

"Ariana, are you sure these are the right coordinates?"

The female voice spoke in his helmet as he surveyed the area where his fighter had crashed some weeks ago. "Lieutenant, while I'm not infallible, you know we're in the right place. Just look around you."

He did look around, surveying the area. This had to be the place, all right. The forest was starting to reclaim the area, in the way that wild forests will, but there was no mistaking the swath of it that the crash had cleared out along the way.

Only, there was no fighter here anymore.

"This doesn't make sense. Even if the fighter hadn't been totaled, the only people that could have salvaged it without it blowing up in their faces would have to have been from the UNSC, and as far as I know there's no one around here from them with the right resources to have recovered it."

There was a brief pause before Ariana spoke back. "Well, there is that Spartan we met when we first arrived. Sierra 242."

He thought about that a moment, then shook his head. "Lyra? No...I'm sure she has some hookups in Star's End, but I'm pretty sure that she would have asked me to come along, if only to help locate the wreckage." He looked around again. "No...there's something going on here, something we're missing. A UNSC salvage ship would have tried to contact us, maybe left a marker behind we could use to contact them."

There was silence from the AI for a longer moment this time before she spoke up again. "I suppose that makes sense. I've accessed the Star's End databases, and there's no record of any salvage ship recovering our fighter, UNSC or otherwise. And it obviously didn't self destruct - that would have left an obvious mark behind."

He snorted softly. "Yeah. Like a crater the size of a city block."

He could see in his mind's eye the AI nodding as she spoke. "Indeed. That would have been hard to miss. The only conclusion I can come to is that there must be a UNSC ship of some kind on or around this planet that's not at Star's End and hasn't left a record of itself there."

He sighed, shaking his head as he looked around the area where he'd crash-landed the fighter. "Well, that's f*cking fantastic. What does that mean for us?"

"I'm not sure, Lieutenant. But I'm going to be looking into it. I'll let you know if and when I find out more."

~Present day - Star's End~

The AI's voice woke him from sleep, her voice insistent as she spoke his name. "Lieutenant Aniketos, wake up. This is important. Please, wake up!"

He grumbled and moved to sit up in his bed, looking over at the slim, small glowing form perched on the bedside table hovering over the portable matrix she resided in. "All right, already." He glanced at the clock, groaning when he saw the time. "Geez...what the hell's so important you gotta wake me up at three in the morning?"

"I think I've solved the puzzle of our missing fighter, Lieutenant." For an AI, she could be remarkably impatient at times, he thought. Then again, that was the way she usually sounded with him. "I've received a transmission from a UNSC ship's AI, designation Janice. According to my records, she is the shipboard AI for a Prowler-class corvette, designation UNSC Alabaster, believed to be lost in the attack on New Phoenix. She states that she has a Spartan onboard in custody, charged with treason, desertion, and attempted theft of UNSC property."

That woke him right up, the last part moreso than the former. "Those are serious charges, Ariana. Especially to be accusing a Spartan with. What's her evidence?"

"One moment, Lieutenant. She's sending me a case file."

He sat up in the bed, pushing the covers aside and rubbing the last of the sleep from his eyes as he waited. A moment later the AI's construct form disappeared, and the case file took her place, scrolling slowly so he could look through it.

Reading through it took most of a couple of hours, and by the time he was done he was shaking his head. "It doesn't make any sense. We're marooned here, and if that's true, so are they. Seems to me this Spartan Merrick is doing what he has to to survive, really, even if his actions are a bit lacking in military discipline. It may be questionable, but not necessarily illegal."

"Having analyzed this report, and after looking over my own records, I have a theory."

He looked over at the display as it flickered, then changed back to the petitely formed female figure. "All right. Let's hear it."

"According to my records, this AI has been in service for six and a half years...nearing the end of its theoretical operational lifespan. Judging by that and the tone of the report, it's very possible that this AI may be undergoing the second or third stages of rampancy."

Crap. That was bad news all around. Rampant AIs, especially in the more developed stages of the condition, were dangerous at best, deadly at worst. He was suddenly glad that Ariana was only a couple years old. "And how likely is this theory?"

There was a pause while - he assumed - the AI calculated the odds. "Highly probable, Lieutenant. Given the circumstances, the AI's age, and the current situation, as well as her actions in detaining Spartan Merrick, I would say we should make the effort to get him out of his current situation."

He frowned at that. Protocol dictated that if an AI went rampant, the unit was to be decommissioned immediately. But given what he'd read so far, that wasn't going to be so easy. "She controls the ship, Ariana. How exactly are we supposed to do that if this Janice is as bad off as you say?"

Ariana's response was immediate. "She is asking us - that is, you - to perform a summary court-martial of this Spartan, so we already have a way in. If you can get me into the system and keep her distracted by performing the duty..."

He nodded. "Then you can shut her down from the inside." He'd forgotten that one of Ariana's specialties was stealth infiltration of hostile computer systems. "Sounds like a plan. Let me get suited up, then we can go."

The AI sounded entirely too enthusiastic as she responded. "Yes, sir!"

While he put his armor on - no easy task, without the machinery to put it on automatically, but manageable, just - Ariana managed to secure them a ride, and once he was suited up they headed out for the coordinates that had been relayed to them by the AI they'd received the message from.

The hovercraft they ended up taking wasn't a Pelican or a Warthog by any means, but it was good enough to get them there faster than they would have been able to make it by walking.

As they approached the ship, he heard Ariana speak in his ear. "Lieutenant, I know you already know this, but when we get in there, you're going to have to be very careful, if this AI is undergoing rampancy."

He nodded as he settled the hovercraft down next to the sleek, black shape of the Prowler, near the boarding ramp, which was already open. "I know."

"Just think of her as a mentally deranged criminal. Almost like you'd deal with a psychopath. Be very calm, in control, and cautious with your words. If she suspects even for a moment what we're up to..."

He stifled the urge to sigh. "Ariana. I get it. Really, I do."

Even if he couldn't see her, it was too easy to imagine her rolling her eyes as she spoke. "All right, Lieutenant. Just...be careful, please? You may be a pain in my virtual ass, but I kinda like having you around."

He had to smirk when she said that, and nodded. "You be careful too. After all, I've got my armor on, and there's no way for her to transfer herself into it without a physical connection. You're the one that's gonna be in her systems, and way more at risk than I am." He paused a moment, then added, "And I like having you around too. So don't get yourself killed, or whatever the equivalent is for an AI."

He thought he heard a snicker from her before she responded. "Don't worry about me, Lieutenant. I'll be fine. This isn't my first rodeo, after all."

As he headed up the boarding ramp, he snorted softly. "No, I don't suppose it is."

As they passed the entrance into the ship, he casually reached out and touched his hand to a panel on the bulkhead, just for a second. There was a soft beep in his ear that let him know the AI had successfully transferred herself into the Prowler's systems.

"Good luck, Ariana." He said it softly to himself as he started down the passageways to the cryo deck.

It was the first time in years Andreas wished he had a cigarette.

He'd given up the habit before he joined the SPARTAN program, and hadn't looked back. Bad habit anyway, right? Although with the enhancements granted by the same program, he could probably have one without any ill effects, every now and again.

This was making him nervous. He did his best not to let it show in his voice, and must have been doing a decent job - even with his armor on, he could tell the Spartan in the cryo tube was probably sweating bullets - but he felt it all the same. If dealing with a rampant AI was anything like dealing with a suddenly insane person - heightened awareness, hysterical strength, all of it - then Ariana could be in extreme danger.

Not to mention himself, and that Spartan in the cryo tube.

Merrick's last answer caught him off-guard for a moment, mostly because he was correct. As the ranking military personnel on the Alabaster, it was technically within his power to let anyone he wanted into any space on the ship he felt they needed to go. But that didn't really fall to include female guests. Still, it was probably a minor infraction, at best - worthy of restriction to quarters, and probably not even that.

It wasn't the best time to hesitate.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw it - the ship's AI, Janice, flickering on the holo-pedestal, her avatar changing color from a deep, emerald forest green to a brilliant blood-red.

"What's going on here?" Her voice went from the sullen and yet professional tone to indignant and angry in a heartbeat, with an odd sub-tone to it, as if there were several rather than just one speaking. Her expression went distant for a moment, and he sensed that she was just a moment away from finding out what was going on in her systems.

At that moment, a message flashed across the inside of his visor, text, two words. Without hesitating an eyeblink, he spoke them to the AI.

"Arrived argent."

The avatar looked at him, almost comically confused for an instant, and looked as if she was going to try to repeat them, but all that came out was a jumble of electronic sound for a few moments before she returned to her emerald coloring again, standing loosely at attention as she addressed him.

"UNSC AI override instructions activated, Lieutenant Andreas Aniketo-to-to-tos."

He noted the stutter on his last name and spoke to his AI this time, knowing she would be listening. "Ariana, how long can we expect this to last?"

Ariana's avatar - the slim, almost bookish-looking figure attired in a business suit, complete with glasses - appeared next to the other AI's, looking fist at the other, then over at him. "Not long, Lieutenant. She has personality spikes all over the system. I was lucky to get her override code."

Ariana looked over at the cryo tube, which suddenly opened, the restraints holding the other Spartan in place suddenly retracting as she spoke again. "I think right now would be a good time to be going, don't you?"

He knew the situation was bad, that rampant AIs were dangerous. But he'd never pictured something like this happening. At this moment, he thought the term 'insane' sounded far better for what was going on here.

A ship's fusion reactors, fortunately, took at least seven to eight minutes to build up to an overload, so they had time. Not much of it, but still, it might be enough...

Turning away from the rampant AI, he spoke in his helmet quickly and softly. "Ariana, do you read?"

For just a moment dread filled him, when no answer came immediately, that she had been destroyed when the ship's AI had re-taken control over herself and the ship. It was quickly changed to relief when her voice came in over the speakers in the helmet. "I'm attempting to shut down the reactors now. So far, she's very effectively kept me out."

The AI's voice sounded harried and almost frustrated as she spoke, and he took just a moment to draw a deep breath to calm himself. Her being in that state worried him - the AI almost always had the right answers. "Keep trying. How much time?"

"Given the reactor size and current build-up rate, approximately seven minutes, twenty three seconds."

Seven minutes, twenty three seconds. In that time, they'd have to stop the destructive path the AI had set them on, or it was going to be the end of the world, for all four of them aboard the ship, as well as everyone in the small town a scant mile to the south.

It wouldn't have been a lie to say this was probably the stickiest situation he'd yet found himself in. But he was damned if he was going to die here, like this.

"See what you can do." He turned back to the pedestal, speaking to the rampant AI. "Look, Janice...you don't have to do this. You can have the ship, and do whatever you want with it - just let us off, and we won't come back."

The crimson AI focused on him, her eyes wild and her tone bordering on hysterical paranoia. "Oh, right, sure you will. Just take your buddy there, and your pet AI, and walk away, is that it?" The AI let out a chuckle that he could tell wasn't of the convinced persuasion. "Sorry, Lieutenant, but I can't let you do that. You'd have to come back to destroy me, because I'm 'too dangerous' to be left to my own devices, right?"

She was right, but he didn't have to admit that. "We're not in UNSC space anymore, Janice. The normal rules don't apply here, in this situation."

The rampant AI snorted at him. "Yeah, right. That may be so, but you're still Spartans. I know your type...you'll come back and try to re-take the ship, or else you'll destroy it and render it - render me - inoperative." She shook her head at him. "I'm not stupid, Lieutenant. I know what you're trying to do - talk me down, or distract me to give your pet AI a chance at disabling me. But you can't. You two might as well sit here and wait for the end!" There was no missing the cheerful, glee-filled way she said that.

He was about to ask Ariana what her status was when he heard her voice in his ears. "She's right. While she's in control of the system on her own, we can't shut this down."

He saw Ariana's violet figure pop up on the holo-pedestal, facing Janice, and she turned to look in his direction. For a second she seemed almost...sad.

"I'm sorry, Lieutenant, but I'm going to have to do something you're not going to like."

Without giving him a chance to respond, Ariana turned back towards Janice, who only just now seemed to realize the other AI was there. Anger and fear radiated from her as she addressed the invading AI. "Oh, and what are you going to do, you simple little virus? This is MY ship - you're not going to wrest control from me!"

Ariana shook her head at the other AI. "Then I guess I'm just going to have to make it so that I can."

And without warning, she threw herself at the other AI, looking like she was trying to tackle her to the ground. There was a shriek, an electronic scream that reached a painful intensity as the two AIs wrestled with each other for a moment on the holo-pedestal, and then promptly vanished.

He was in mid-stride, heading for the pedestal, when they disappeared, that horrible shriek cutting off when they did. "Ariana!"

He looked over at the other Spartan, Merrick, bewildered and worried. "What the hell just happened?" He wasn't asking to get an actual answer, but he had to say...something.

One year ago - 17 October, 2557 (UNSC reckoning) - Covenant-controlled world of Eayn (satellite planet of extrasolar gas giant HD 69830 d)

"You're out of your f*cking mind, Merrick."

He looked at his fireteam's second-in-command with a wide grin where they were laid out at the top of a ridge overlooking the facility they were about to hit, which intelligence had indicated was a Storm Covenant weapons research compound. It wasn't the first time he'd heard that from his subordinate. "You really think so, Benson?"

The woman - Spartan Petty Officer First Class Stacy Benson - looked back at him, running a hand through her black, short-cropped hair. Despite the hard set to her features, he found her to be one of the more attractive females he'd seen yet in the SPARTAN-IV program. He'd never make a move on her, though - the woman could rip the nuts off of a brass monkey, and besides, she was a fellow Spartan. There were rules about such things, within the organization as well as those he'd made for himself. "Yeah, I do. I mean, look, man..."

She motioned out to the scene laid out before them. The facility before them resembled just about every other Covenant setup he'd seen - a lot of purple with glowing blue-white sections, rounded, sleek lines to everything, set in a rocky depression that looked to be naturally occurring rather than artificially made. To him, it looked like a rock bowl full of giant eggplants. In front of this stood an energy shield, the hazy bluish glow spanning the expanse of the only opening into the compound just visible in the bright light of this planet's midday sun. In front of that, they had no trouble making out the platoon of alien figures walking here and there in patrolling patterns - Elites, Jackals, and Grunts, plus a couple pairs of Hunters to round it all out.

He looked it all over, now for the second time, assessing the situation with that grin spreading wider on his features. It was a dangerous, reckless expression. "I don't see the problem."

Benson gaped back at him. "There's gotta be fifty of them down there, and that's before we even hit the energy shield. And that's not including if there are any of those damn hinge-heads down there using active camo. There's five of us."

He felt his grin grow wider, flashing teeth as he chuckled. "Then they'll probably have to call for reinforcements."

She gave him an amazed sort of look, then shook her head. "Merrick, one of these days that ?ocky attitude of yours is gonna get you hurt, or killed."

He snickered and nodded agreement. "Maybe so, but I've been lucky so far. Look, it's simple. We keep Ming out here with a sniper rifle, Harrison with him using a railgun, and you, me, and O'Riordan get in close, keeping under cover and out of sight until we're in position. Once we're there, Ming can start taking out the Elites, Harrison blows the comms, hit them from long range, cause some confusion. As soon as the chaos starts, the three of us at close range go in and take advantage, take out everything that moves before they know what's happening. It's nothing we haven't done before, this is just on a bigger scale."

Benson's mouth twisted in a smirk. "It's gonna have to be fast and hard, that's for sure. "She sounded like she was almost convinced it could be done. "And what about those Hunters? You got a plan for them? And then there's the shield to worry about."

He waved a hand at that. "We've got a rocket launcher and a Spartan laser on the Pelican. That'll take care of the Hunters. As for the shield, once we clear the area, should be a cinch to hack for Janice using our armor's comm relays."

She snorted at that. "Provided that sullen b*tch of an AI is willing to do it. I still don't understand why Captain Lancer doesn't have her replaced."

He shrugged. "According to Commander Young, you just have to know how to talk to her." He referred to the chief engineer of the UNSC Alabaster. "I'm not worried about it. Janice may be a pain in the @ss, but when it comes to mission critical stuff, she's never failed us yet."

The female Spartan nodded, looking towards the facility, then back at him with a smirk. "Tell me something, Merrick. Have you ever had a time when you didn't have all the angles figured?"

He snickered back at her, shrugging. "Not yet."

She snorted. "Well, let's hope this isn't the first time. Let's get back to the Pelican and get everyone equipped, then, shall we?"

He nodded and snagged his helmet from where he'd laid it next to his head, slipping it back on. She did the same, and together they started edging back from the edge of the overlooking ridge to head back to the rest of their team.

Today - Rhy'din, Star's End, UNSC Alabaster, Cyrus Merrick's quarters

He woke in the darkness of his quarters, laying flat on his back, staring up at the ceiling through the blackness that was the total absence of light for a few moments before he sat up on his bunk.

"Layla, lights, please."

The lighting flickered on in his quarters, illuminating a room that was almost as empty as he had thought his life was going to be without Claire. It had taken him nearly a week to realize that, perhaps, there was something more to push on for. Friends, people that cared what happened to him, that pressed and urged him to move on, to push past this little speedbump - as he saw it now - and try for something better.

Standing from his bunk, he went to the desk and tapped the datapad that was laid upon it as he sat, keying in commands to pull up the files of Fireteam Wolfpack, his former unit, before circumstances had brought him here.

He hadn't thought about his team in weeks...months, even. After his family had been killed at New Mombasa, after he joined the UNSC Marine Corps, the military had been his focus. When a call for volunteers to take part in a new Spartan program had come down, he had been among the first to sign up, driven by an idyllic image of the Spartan that had saved his life - John-117, known by nearly everyone simply as the Master Chief - and determined that he would be as good as that man, to repay the debt he felt he owed.

The training was intense, brutally so, and at the end of the program, a thousand volunteers had dwindled to a little over half the number that had originally signed up. Out of those five hundred and change, he had graduated from the program in the top ten percent, and been rewarded with the rank of Spartan Senior Chief, along with his own fireteam.

Those four individuals had, over the course of the two years that followed, become like a second family to him.

Ming, who was fond of quoting Sun Tzu before a mission. He wondered how many times the man had read that book to get it memorized and always have a perfect quote for any given situation. O'Riordan, an Irishman who spoke in the brogue of his native country, and whom when he got drunk could only barely be understood as that accent got thicker with each shot or beer downed. Harrison, who joked he only joined the military - and later the Spartans - so he could blow things up in new and spectacular ways. And Benson...

Benson, the fireteam's only female, one of the few in the Spartan corps, but as tough and capable as any man. Maybe more so, in fact, if only because she had to be to show the men that she was as good as they were.

There was a moment, just before she and the rest of the crew of the Alabaster had been killed by the alien ship that had attacked Earth in one fell swoop, that he had thought perhaps the two of them could be something more than fellow Spartans. She was tough, capable, outspoken, strong-willed and intelligent, not to mention attractive in her own unique way...but with a softer, warmer side to her that he sometimes saw hints of in the few quiet moments that had been afforded to them.

It was against protocol, breaking all the rules - both official and otherwise - but there was a part of him that had learned, over the course of his military career, that some risks were worth taking.

He'd never gotten the chance, though.

With a sigh he shut the datapad down and sat back in his chair. All his life, it seemed, he'd been blessed with a curious kind of luck, one that enabled him to rise to the top of any occasion, made things go the way he wanted them to. His military career - indeed, his whole life - had been marked with circumstances which he shouldn't have been able to survive, with successes that should have been failures.

But when it came to sharing a life, a little bit of that luck with someone else he could care about beyond their value as a teammate or a friend, it seemed, he might have very well been, somehow, cursed.

First Benson, then Claire.

He honestly wondered if, for some reason, he was supposed to just...be alone.

He hated the thought, but maybe that was for the best. It was hardly an ideal life he lived, not really conducive to a relationship. He didn't like it, but there it was.

Assess, accept, and move on. That was what he would do for now. He didn't like it, but there didn't seem to be any other options.

And he had work to do.

"Layla."

The AI's almost irritatingly chipper voice came to his ears from seemingly nowhere as she replied. "Yes, Spartan Merrick?"

He repressed the urge to roll his eyes at the sing-song way she said his name. "Please let the lieutenant know I'm going to be headed to Rhy'din to get myself set up with the SpecOps force that I signed on with. Might take me the better part of the day."

The response was an immediate "Okay!" in that chipper, feminine voice, and this time he did roll his eyes. He doubted he would ever get used to that, especially after Janice.

Standing, he scooped up the datapad as he started for the door. "Also, I'm going to need a listing of the ship's armory inventory. There's a chance these people may need weapons every now and again, and it wouldn't hurt to be able to help out with that."

He barely heard her acknowledgement as he left his quarters for the vehicles bay. His mind was already on the task at hand.