Sangheili Youth Academy 7, Ministry of Education Learning District, Covenant Holy City: High Charity, 07/11/2519

Age 13

Ketan 'Rottinee watches the student in front of him who seems so enraptured in his mid-test nap that he doesn't notice the teacher walk up next to him. He is no stranger to disrespect, having worked to train younglings ever since he left the Covenant, but the callous disrespect shown by this said student is something he rarely ever experiences. Not that he will let it slide.

The so called 'Respect Stick', as humorously named by the students who don't see it often, slams down on the offending student's hand. Before the student really has time to process what's going on, he's pulling his hand back to his chest as he nurses the growing welt with his other, eyeing the teacher warily as he realizes he's been caught.

Ketan growled, "you were sleeping."

The student glanced at the terminal on the desk which he had used to take the test. The screen was empty besides the words, 'Test Completed'.

"I finished the test," the student groaned, a mix of sleepiness and boredom.

Ketan whacks the student again on the same spot, the student lacking the reflexes to avoid it. The now frightful student recoils and pulls the hand back, "That doesn't give you permission to doze off. Laziness breeds complacency," Ketan lectures, "You would do yourself a favor to remember that. There are many who are less accepting than me."

The student bends back as far away from the teacher as he can, glancing between the mark on his hand and the teacher who threatens to hit him again. Slowly the youngling lowers his head, "My apologies, sir. It won't happen again."

Ketan holds the stick in his hand preparing to strike the student again... but. Staring down at the cowering child before him Ketan finds himself being torn between discipline and lenience. Ketan menacingly brandishes the stick and orders, "Make sure that it doesn't."

There was a moment of silence in the classroom. Even the constant pattering of screens was absent as everyone stared at the confrontation. It is quiet enough to hear the rustling of clothes and bated breaths as students watched the scene in front of them. Ketan looked up at the rest of the students, who stared at him as if they were the ones just scolded, "Get back to work," he demands walking back to the podium where he lectures, "Any lost time won't be returned."

Ketan reaches the podium and checks the holographic screen; the class slowly regained life as the rain-like tapping of screens continues. The teacher looks once again at the previously-sleeping student. With not much left to do all he does is slowly meld into his seat as he waits for everyone else to finish his test, "Oh, and Vol," the class silences once again, "Meet me after class."

Vol sinks even deeper into his desk as if the terminal would somehow conceal him. Ketan scans the classroom, examining his students. They were unruly and young, he would shape them into model Sangheili in time.


Vol sat in his desk, watching Ketan apprehensively as Ketan typed away on his terminal. Vol snuck a glance at the corner of his desk where a clock laid. It is nearing an hour-cycle after class had ended. Vol glanced back up at Ketan who seemed to ignore the monstrous amount of boredom that Vol was feeling.

Vol rested his head on his desk, telling himself that he wasn't going to fall asleep, he was just going to rest for a bit. At least while his teacher did whatever he was doing.

There is a sublime nothingness to sleeping, at least to Vol. Ever since his days on Earth it's always been a means to avoid problems. You don't need to worry about things when you sleep, because you can't really worry.

Vol glanced up from his hiding spot. Through tired eyes he saw Ketan standing next to the desk whacking stick in hand. Vol nearly jumped out of his seat and sputtered, "I-I wasn't asleep," as he tried to push himself as far away from Ketan as much as the desk allowed.

Ketan looked down at Vol, who dwarfs the aged Sangheili. Vol's youth was painfully obvious to Ketan, as he lacked many of the customs expected of an adult. While Ketan was frustrated he let it pass, and simply stated, "you aced the test."

Vol glances at the stick again as if the stick would come to life when he wasn't looking and hit him again, "I, uh… thanks?"

Ketan continues, "one-third of the students didn't even complete the exam in the given time. Yet you finished with enough time to fall asleep."

Vol lowered his head, he was unsure if it was a compliment or a reprimand so he simply replied, "I'm sorry. It won't happen again."

"Good," Ketan readjusts his grip on the stick and watches as Vol winces in response. Ketan sighs at the student's response, as he lays down the stick on a nearby table; proceeding to sit down on top of the desk, slightly equalizing the height difference, "You're Taso's brother right?"

Vol blinked and shifted in his seat as if it was suddenly uncomfortable, "yeah. He's three years my senior."

"I taught him as well," Ketan stares at Vol seeing the faint familial resemblance to the student he taught three years ago, "He was like you at the time. Defiant yet gifted. His potential was hampered by his inability to accustom to formalities."

Ketan examines the slightly confused student's face, "You show the same potential he does, and I want the best for the both of you. For you to realize this potential you need to understand that you need to afford the proper respect to your superiors who will guide you in turn."

Ketan continues, "Do you understand what I'm saying?"

There was a moment of hesitation from Vol, but he nodded and said, "yes sir."

Ketan could easily see the conflict within the student. He knew that Vol wouldn't change in a single day, and simply said, "good. You are free to go."

And as suddenly as the conversation had started it was over as Ketan grabbed the stick off the desk and made his way back to the podium. Vol grabbed his stuff and checked the terminal on his desk, it was way past class ended, he needed to get home.


The door in front of me flashes for a second as it turns white and retreats into itself. I walk into my home and touch a keypad to my side, closing and locking the door. I twist my head around to check that the door turned red, verifying that the door locked. Father wouldn't be terribly happy to return only to see me leave the front door unlocked.

I hold my breath for a second. Standing in place and listening to see if anyone else was home. Deeper into the house I can hear a faint clicking. It's Taso, my older brother, he has been spending a lot of the time recently in the study disassembling and reassembling our father's energy sword.

I take off my shoes and lay them next to the front door. Slowly, as not to make any sudden sounds I make my way through the house to where my room lay. If I were practicing sparring my father would possibly even congratulate me for my effort, but as it stands the deceit is to avoid my brother.

As I pass the doorway I glance in and see him twisting around to face me. I duck around the corner hoping that he isn't paying attention and missed me walk right past him..

"Vol where were you?" he demanded from around the corner, "your class ended an hour ago."

I round the corner again and stand in the doorway as he crosses his arms at me. I give him a brief nod of respect and reply, "Sorry it went on a bit longer than I thought it would."

Taso looks at me obviously unhappy with my answer, "Then why did you try to avoid me?" I open my mouth to reply but he stops me with a wave of his hand, "I'm not in the mood for excuses Vol. Why are you late?"

I sigh, look down at the ground to avoid his gaze, and give him the answer he wants, "I was disrespectful to the teacher. It was my fault and he reprimanded me, I learned my lesson."

Taso clacked his mandibles. I racked my mind of sangheili facial expressions trying to pinpoint it down. It's the equivalent of a sigh, possibly of frustration, maybe of disappointment. Either way he isn't happy. Not that I really expected him to be happy after the answer I just gave him.

"You never learn, you make the same mistakes, you don't think before you act," Taso clacked his mandibles again, "One day you are going to dishonor our family."

"My apologies brother," I simply responded, avoiding his gaze by looking at the ground.

He sighs in front of me, "You always say you're sorry, but you never change," he twists the chair he was sitting in around and sits down facing me, "what did you do this time?"

"I, uh," I suddenly realize how bad this sounds especially to an honor loving sangheili like my brother, "I fell asleep during class."

He pauses. In that moment do I realize just how bad falling asleep sounds. "When would that be appropriate?" he demands, "didn't you also have a test today. Did you even finish the test or did you waste the time sleeping? By the gods Vol, couldn't you have done something else?"

"I finished the test, I was tired and I didn't think they would mind," I admitted, "I'm sorry, it was stupid and disrespectul of me."

He seems to like my answer if only a bit and shifts into a more relaxed position. Taso continues, "These tests are as much about knowledge as they are about customs. You need to demonstrate equal proficiency in manners are you do knowledge. I understand that you are young, but... are you even listening to me?"

I blink, "Yes."

He looks at me again, he wants to play the part of the older brother and lecture on me how to be better. I'm just not in the mood. Luckily he picks up on my hesitation, saying, "Fine. I won't give the same lecture you already received, but I ask that you act better."

I nod again, "Thank you brother," I glance past him and see the hilt of father's energy sword poking out from behind him, it wouldn't hurt to make some small talk, "Does father think you're ready to train with his sword yet?"

He turns around and glances at the sword, "Maybe. He said he would test me when he returns later tonight," as much as he tries to hide it I know him well enough to hear the anticipation building at the back of his throat, "Speaking of which I'm going to study a bit more in anticipation of his return."

"I wish you well Vol," he says. twisting the chair back around and getting back to disassembling the energy sword one last time before our father returns. It's my queue to leave and I take it, heading back to my room until father returns.

Maybe I should take a nap.


The door whirs open. I stare up from the terminal in my room as my father, Atan 'Zotanee, walks in. I stand up from my chair and give him a bow, he gestures for me to sit on my bed, "I heard you got in trouble during school today."

I sit on the bed and wince, "Yeah I, uh..." I trail off not wanting to explain to the third person today on what I did wrong.

He lets out a sigh but says, "Taso already told me what happened. While I'm not happy he also said that you've been lectured enough, so I will say, 'don't do it again' and leave it at that."

My father looks at me for a second before letting out a small smile and sitting next to me on the bed, "I also got a message from your teacher saying you got a perfect score on your test."

I let out a shrug and reply, "It was just a test over the core subjects," it's a simple answer that he likes without having to go into why I know all of these subjects so well.

"It's designed to be a comprehensive and difficult test, it's meant to find the weaknesses of each student and exploit them," he rests a hand on my shoulder, "If the price for an intelligent son is the occasional hiccup then I can accept that."

"I, uh, thanks," I rub the back of my neck awkwardly, "I'll do my best to remove my 'hiccups'."

"Provided you do so," he starts, "I think you've demonstrated competence in your studies."

My father stands up, says, "Follow me," and walks off even stopping to check if I was following him. I jumped out of the bed and followed behind him, having to keep a slow jog just to keep up. He led me to the corner of the house I went to the least, my father's position allowed him to own a small sparring room complete with short target range. It was more of a formality than anything else as I never saw my father use it, and rarely ever saw my brother use the sparring room.

He led me up to the range, he lowered down a blue crescent looking gun. I immediately recognized it, a Plasma Rifle, and specifically the plasma rifle my father got from his father. Sangheili are weird with heirlooms. It's not the first time I have fired a gun before but it was the first time I got the chance to fire a plasma rifle.

I go to grab it and he pulls it away just out of my reach, he looks at me and says, "This rifle has been in our family for 3 generations. I expect you to treat it with respect."

He lowers it down again and this time wraps my hand around the grip, showing me how to hold it. My first thought, it's surprisingly heavy. Maybe I'm holding an older variant or maybe I'm just a wuss but the way Master Chief and everyone held these in the games made it look like it was just a toy. With one hand I might be able to hit a target properly if I can touch it, beyond 3 feet, I can close my eyes and not lose any accuracy.

My father watched me fumble with the gun and lets out a bark of laughter, "At this age you should hold it with two hands. The rifle isn't on, try giving a couple practice shots when ready."

I try to grip the handle with my other hand and realize that while lighter it is far more awkward to hold it like that, and left me with the impression that I'm waving around some sort of two handed boxing glove.

My father, obviously amused by my confusion, he lets out another laugh and continues, "try aiming down at that target."

About 10 feet away down range stands a roughly Sangheili shaped block of metal, there are a couple of burn marks on it contrasting the immaculate walls. My father probably used it once when he first moved in, realized it wasn't much of a challenge for him to hit the target and never used it again.

I try aiming it down range only for my hands to wobble like I'm holding a shake weight. He stands behind me, grabbing my shoulders and pulling them back, adjusting my stance. He steps back for a second examining my stance before coming back in to adjust my grip to a slightly more steady yet uncomfortable grip.

He steps back yet again and lets me hold that stance for a bit. I give a couple experimental presses of the trigger, the gun doesn't react.

My father notices me pressing the trigger and says, "Here." He grabs the gun out of my hands, he presses a switch under one of the prongs and the gun whirs to life, the central gap on the tips arcing with blue lightning. My father, now more careful, hands me the gun. I gingerly take it in both hands and wave it around a bit more as if it being on would have changed the weight. He adjusts my stance yet again and says, "Fire when ready. Single shots only."

I nod, breath in, breath out and pull the trigger. The gun flashes and an annoyingly bright bolt of plasma. It streaks out and down the rather short gun range sending a small wave of light around it. The bolt of plasma shears against the side of the dummy leaving a short scorch mark before impacting the back wall and fizzling out.

I pull the trigger again. The next shot completely misses.

I frown adjust my finger on the trigger to be more centered, breath in, breath out and fire. The shot hits the lower torso.

"Good," my father says from next to me, "hand me the rifle." I hand it to him and he continues, "you will practice your marksmanship after your sparring practice. I expect you to put the same effort into practicing marksmanship as you do your studies."

He turns off the rifle and sets it down on a nearby table, "Dinner will be soon, and then bedtime after that."


As I lie on the bed, refusing to fall asleep, I watch the window in front of me. My mind knows that it is nothing more than a projection of what I would see if my room was at the edge of High Charity, and not in the middle of a residential district, yet my brain can't help but stare out and wonder if any of the holographic stars are supposed to represent Earth.

I check the terminal. Nearing the end of the day-cycle, the equivalent of midnight. My father would probably be upset if he still found me awake. Even if he did, I probably wouldn't stop.

Watching the stars I can almost feel like this is some sort of an odd dream. And that I'm back at my home on Earth. At this moment in my room I really have no obligations and I can finally feel relaxed. I can almost mentally squint and imagine that this never happened.

There's a faint rumbling in the distance. Maybe a ship docking nearby. And suddenly I'm back in reality and on High Charity.

For a second I feel myself drifting away as I stare into the stars. I sit back up trying to wake myself up. It's been a while since I could get a good night's sleep anyways. And anyways, I'll head to sleep in a bit, I just want to enjoy the moment a bit longer.

I really don't get why Sangheili are so strict. Well, I get why but I don't like it. They love given the same lectures over and over again: Don't speak unless spoken to. Always address your superiors by their title, not their name. Go to sleep at this time because I say so. Blah blah blah.

It's gotten to the point where I realized arguing is useless and the best thing I can do half of the time is keep my head down and apologize where needed.

Maybe I just got unlucky and got a really strict father, but from what I heard of the outright draconian methods back on Sanghelios I don't think that I got it that bad.

I'm lucky to really even have a family. Most Sangheili are separated from their parents at birth, something about not having your parents influence your skill. I never got a full answer why, but my parents didn't go down that route. Again, I should call myself lucky, but it's hard to do so given the circumstance.

My brother rapidly flips between being antagonistic to outright dismissal. Every conversation with him feels like it is forced. My father disappears every day and returns later each day and generally says nothing. Even the smallest bits of affection tend to be confused and lazily done.

My mother… well I've seen her twice in my entire life. See divorce doesn't exist in Sangheili customs, but that doesn't mean there aren't loopholes. From what I heard she is a skilled soldier, even more skilled than my father in most regards, so right after I was born, when their marriage reached what I guess was the breaking point, she 'devoted' her life to the Covenant and disappeared. They were still technically married but she had a perfectly legitimate reason why she couldn't be home. If this were any other family we would be regaled in tales of how she was fighting for her children, but not this time.

She has only ever returned once when her Shipmaster got severely injured and was put on leave for a bit. She barely acknowledged my presence and disappeared a couple days later. Part of me wants to blame it on her, but I don't even know her. I barely even have a face to attribute to my anger.

Well now that I talk about it, Sangheili families still seem remarkably Human in the worst possible ways.

Speaking of, I still don't know what to do when humanity is discovered. Or should I say I don't know when humans are going to discover the Covenant? Which side am I even supposed to be on? Is my best course of action to join the Covenant to help humanity? Does that even make sense?

Philosophers would have a field day with my situation.

Another rumble in the distance, maybe that imaginary ship is undocking now.

I stand up and walk over to an unused corner of the room. I grab one of the panels on the wall, feel around the edge, find a little groove and pull the panel off. I hold a simple, cheap datapad, completely disconnected from any network.

I turn it on and go to the notes, for a second the characters on the screen seem alien. Another glance and I recognize the English letters. Thank god even future space alien tech still ran on the same basic 1's and 0's of coding, with enough finicking and a couple weeks of headaches I was able to create a custom keyset for this datapad.

I went to the directory labeled "My Weird as Hell Autobiography" and open up a new page. I recollect my memories of the day, and think of what I want to start today's entry with. I eventually type,

It's interesting, in my opinion, how Sangheili and Humans so be so very different similar at the same time.


Did you know that Sangheili hands don't callous? I didn't, and it's not really something you would think about. It seems like one of those trivial things that doesn't really matter, hell I didn't even think about it for the first couple years of my life.

See, but Sangheili are clever and when it comes to running you to your limits. They know exactly what to do in training to put you through the most discomfort possible. See Sangheili skin is tougher than human skin, but it isn't as malleable. If you get cut on your hands as a Sangheili you are feeling that for the next week.

Well imagine if you get a cut on your hands after hours of sparring, where you did the same technique over and over and over again for hundreds of times because your teacher wanted you to get it just perfect. Imagine after that, you just want to go home and rest while you nurse your cut and bruised hands. You'll probably get the chance to let those heal overnight, but the next day you are coming back and doing another new technique hundreds of times until you have entirely new welts.

See I'm all for getting as physically capable as I can. If I'm going to make a difference in a world as brutal as Halo I'm going to need to be fit as possible considering the fact that there is so much stuff in this universe that could sneeze on me and I'd probably die.

But when I'm worked till the point of breaking, as I feel my skin burn from sparring impacts over already healing bruises, while my hands feel like they are about to detach, that's when I get annoyed.

So as I stare down my opponent, holding a stick out in front of me trying to keep the distance, I can't help but think about how much I want this session to end.

I try to keep my steps at a discordant rhythm as we both size each other up. I pause for a second feigning hesitation and he takes the opportunity to rush at me. He raises his stick for an overhead swing, so I sidestep it and sweep his leg trying to knock him off balance.

He tries to swing at his side going for my head, so I deflect the attack and give him a firm smack on his head in return with the opening I created.

The teacher walks in and says, "Good job Vol, you are free to take a break," I bow in thanks and walk to the side to grab some water.

See there's one thing I realized that gives me an advantage in fighting despite the fact that I never even did martial arts previously as a human.

Sangheili, especially in training environments, inherently think that fights are solely based on physical capabilities, to most of them a fight is about winning with honor. Combine that with the fact that many Sangheili at my age haven't reached the age where strategy is largely a thing, so their style mostly comes down to hitting harder and faster than your opponent.

It would be an insult to my intelligence if I didn't find ways to exploit my opponent's mistakes. It's one of the few things that keeps me sane here.

I glance back at the opponent I defeated, he is getting a stern lecture from the sparring teacher over what he did wrong. He is most likely going to have to practice even more as punishment, part of me feels bad, a different part remembers when I was in that situation and doesn't care anymore. At most I'm barely on talking terms with my classmates, and the same with them. I would hesitate to really call them classmates... coworkers would be a better word.

I sit down on a nearby bench, grab a drink of water from a nearby bottle and flex my hands gently as if that would wear out the soreness. There are a couple other Sangheili sitting next to me, some I recognize. We're all keeping to ourselves, each one of us either doing something to distract themselves until the next sparring session or avoid obvious discomfort.

I glance up, a fight is about to start, two sangheili stand at opposite ends of the sparring ring, one with his back to me and the other facing me. The one facing me I recognize, I've seen him before, at first he beat me but as I started actually learning how to fight I eventually started beating him in spars. He's one of the few students here who can think ahead in fights. I mentally hedge my bets on him, don't let me down buddy.

The fight is short and clumsy. The sangheili who I put my bet on taking a couple hits but ending it with a clever move that allowed him to disarm his opponent, ending the fight.

The teacher claps getting everyone's attention, "Lessons are done for today, I am impressed with most of you all. I expect you all to practice at home and reflect upon your mistakes. Good day and you are all dismissed."

The gym springs to life for a second as all the students get up and do their own thing, some heading to grab some belongings and others taking the second to stretch in the crowd.

I run over to my stuff and check a separate tablet I left there. 2 hours until my brother and father return from training. Gives me 2 hours to do whatever I want.

I already know where I'm going to head. I keep my head down as I jog through the hallways of High Charity, passing by the odd San'Shyuum, Sangheili and even Kig-Yar. At this time most people in this section of High Charity tend to be busy. I eventually reach my destination deep in the bowels of the Second Cloister.

I walk into what appears to be an empty room with a single chair and a desk. There's a terminal on the desk and a middle aged San'Shyuum sitting behind the desk tapping on the terminal. As the door opens he looks up, sees me enter and beckons me in, "Ah Vol good to see you today," he sniffs the air and I mentally facepalm for forgetting to take a shower before I decided to come, "Did you just come from sparring?"

"Ah yeah," I pause, "Sorry Kurc, I should have showered."

He waves his hand in dismissal, "Just remember next time, no use in sending you all the way back. How was it today, same story of you getting beat up all the time?"

"Believe it or not," I drawl, "I don't always lose. Just... sometimes."

"Yeah I've heard it all before kid," he scoots to the side, motioning to the door towards the workshop, "When you're done coming up with excuses we have a new deal and some junk for you to play around with."

Kurc is sort of an odd San'Shyuum in my books. He works for the Covenant with one of his best friends, a Huragok named Keeps Drifting. It's weird, but basically they take jobs from the Covenant occasionally where they will repair broken equipment that the Covenant don't want to get rid of. Most of the time during orders, however, they get some stuff that is completely irreparable, and they used to just get rid of that, but now they let me tinker around with them in exchange for me occasionally helping.

I step through a smaller door and end up in a smaller room in the back. Floating to my left is Keeps Drifting repairing what looks to be a ghost engine. He acknowledges my presence with a wave of a single tentacle and goes back to his work ignoring me.

"Good to see you too," I respond and head to the back corner where a container set aside lies.

I set my bag down next to an old looking desk and grab the thing on top of the junk in the box. It's a damaged plasma pistol. There's a bit of speckled light blue blood on the handle and the front looks like it was rammed into a wall multiple times flattening out the gun. The focusing crystals which normally control the plasma as it is fired is completely destroyed. Due to the damage it is probably easier to build a new gun, hence why this was in the garbage container.

There's a couple of tools lying at the edge of the desk, which I use to pry the plate off of the top of the plasma pistol. There's a bunch of wiring leading to a large slightly glowing green cylinder near the back of the gun.

I stare at it for a second unsure if what I am seeing is correct. Normally Kurc would take out any part of the scrap that could potentially harm me. This normally includes charged plasma batteries. Curiosity taking me over, I grab some wire cutters and remove the wires from the cartridge, and hold it in my hand. It's definitely emitting a heat, albeit very gently.

I put it down on the desk and grab another tool on the side of the desk. In my couple months of tinkering around I've come to realize this is basically the equivalent of a Voltmeter for plasma charge. The results aren't all that surprising to be honest.

The cartridge is almost out of charge. It probably had enough power to kill a fully grown Sangheili if set to detonate. To me, a completely untrained kid, it was nothing more than a warm paperweight. Not that the Covenant have any paperweights in the first place, or even use paper.

I look back at Keeps Floating. He hasn't moved an inch. Maybe they just don't care if I get something like this. I can't see any damage to the cartridge so it just might be that they think that I won't injure myself with this.

Either way I'm taking it. I drop it into my bag and go back to examining the plasma pistol.

With the main energy source out of the gun most of the systems no longer respond. I flick a switch under the gun and the holographic display flickers on the back of the gun, albeit a lot more faint than it should be. I thumb the safety and the screen flickers brighter indicating that it is ready to fire, not that it is going to be shooting any time soon. I give it an experimental aim at the wall in front of me. I pull the trigger and nothing happens. Don't know what I expected.

I turn off the plasma pistol and toss it into another box at the end of the desk labeled 'Garbage'. The door behind me whines and opens up, I twist around to see Kurc walk in, he tells me, "Vol I just got a delivery. Do me a favor and carry it back."

I nod and get up as he holds the door open for me. On the same desk with the terminal now sits a large purple box, poking out of the top I can see some bits of machinery that I don't recognize. I grab it by the corners and pick it up. It's heavy enough to the point that I have to lean back and absorb some of the weight in my back.

I crane my head around the box so I don't crash into anything as I move it to the next room over. I set it down next to Keeps Floating who waves a tentacle both as a sign of thanks and dismissal, I nod in response back.

I turn back to Kurc, "Hey, by the way," I start, pausing at how I want to phrase this, "You left me a plasma pistol with an intact battery with a small bit of charge."

"I know," he nods, "Keeps Floating and I thought you would be smart enough not to injure yourself. Consider it as payment for your help, just don't do anything stupid with it and come to me if you have any ideas."

"Well, uh, thanks," I respond, rubbing the back of my neck, "Doubt I'll do much with it, but I'll let you know if I have any plans."

"Ah it's no problem," he says heading back to the front desk, "Just do me a favor and carry the refuse to the recycling plant when you're done."

The door closes with a whir and I head back to my little desk in the back. I fish the top device out of the box and examine it. I think a cloaking generator, a third of it is blackened from plasma damage and has wires jutting out at angles it shouldn't be. I toss it in the garbage bin.

I reach for the next thing in the box.


I close the front door and make my way to the back of the house and into my room. I sling my backpack next to my bed, reach into it and grab the plasma battery out. I lie on the bed and hold the battery over my eyes.

Truth be told I'm not really working towards anything by taking apart and dicking around with destroyed equipment. Part of me is still an excited young child, having reached the chance to travel in space as an astronaut, and meet aliens. Naturally as a child the pirate/corsair life wasn't exactly an option so the next best solution is playing around with technology I would have never gotten the chance.

A couple of years ago the Ministry of Education had what was the equivalent of a job fair. They had this big spiel about how it was our duty to join the Covenant and this would give us a window into what life within the Covenant was like for different jobs. It was all the fun of the job fairs with double the indoctrination and half the interest.

Naturally I tried to find the darkest corner and wait the job fair out as I didn't really have any intention to get converted, and that's how I met Kurc. He was required by the Covenant to attend in case any of the students want to become a Weapons Master. Naturally all the 9 year old Sangheili kids went to talk to the swordsmen who attended.

So through mutual disinterest I met Kurc and we started talking, and once I mentioned my interest in technology we made the deal where he would give me unwanted equipment in exchange for my occasional help. Which ultimately ends up here with a plasma battery with no idea of what to do with it.

I hold the battery up next to the 'window', the artificial light washes over the holographic screen which then flickers in response. I hold the battery closer and the screen flickers more, until the point where it is right next to the projector and all that is coming out is a bit of static.

So plasma pistol cartridges can emp even outside its charged shot. Not sure what I can do with this info.

I hear the front door open from across the house and I lazily toss the battery back into my backpack and close it. I hear my father and brother enter, their voices barely audible from my room. By the sounds of the jovial talking sounds like swordsmanship training went well.

Provided I don't get disowned by my father in about 3 years I'll be in my brother's position learning how to use an energy sword as well. Part of me is excited, part of me dreadful.

Back as a human I never even had the thought about joining the military, it simply wasn't for me, and now I am being forced to go into a military lifestyle without any choice in the matter. But, there's a naive... yet excited part of me that relishes the chance to become a swordsman.

I kind of want to just say fuck it all, go and do my own thing. Wrestle back control of my life, but I can't do that and sit by idly and accept that I didn't make an attempt to change things when I could.

It would be an insult to the chance I am given. Being a Sangheili on High Charity gives me opportunities within the Covenant most would never have. Maybe I am being given a chance to make a difference and here I am sulking and debating just giving up.

I idly clenched my hand. The cuts and bruises from sparring were healing already, as slowly as it is. Tomorrow, however, I would go and reopen those wounds and get new ones, and I already know I am going to dislike every second of it.

But at the very least, I can choose to push through, holding on to the distant hope that I can prevent billions of human deaths as their sworn enemy.


So quarantine and classes have me bored.

That combined with the fact that I read PyreElegy's amazing SI-OC story The Songbird (Check it out if you haven't) has inspired me to write again. It's been a couple months since I have written stories so it might take me a bit to get back into the groove.

I also want to lay out the groundwork I have in place for this story, for those who are interested. I prefer transparency of information so I'm generally going to have a section in my AN listing my ideas forward.

So without further ado:

1 - I'm going to try to keep Vol balanced powerwise. He's going to be a skilled fighter, but I'm going to try to keep it realistic of what would happen in fights.

2 - I'm going to try to keep the intro part of this story relatively brief. I've had experiences with previous stories where I drag the first part on too long. I'm going to establish what I think is necessary and move on to more interesting parts. Hopefully the story should pick up soon.

3 - As of 2/24/2021 I edited this chapter.

Anyways I hope you liked what is here. See y'all next time.