A Return

[prettycoolguy]

The man sat at one of the mess hall tables, eating with one hand and tapping on the omnicomm on the table with the other. He wasn't just tall, he was big, broad across the shoulders and built like a tank underneath the plant suit. The pale skin of his neck and face was laced with scarring. He was entirely focused on what he was reading, brow furrowed slightly.

There were only a few people on the ship that might have recognized the Master Chief without his armor.

He had been asleep for a long time, that much was clear.

It was making things difficult.

Comments

[prettycoolguy]

Evidently, the Daligig were just as good guests as they were providers of helpful information.

Evidently.

It took him a second to compose a sentence that couldn't immediately be construed as a threat to their benevolent saviors.

"Have they given any indication of leaving?"

[zouichi]

Oh, Chief. Zouichi knew how you felt. Silent mental brofist

"Nope. They've just been pretty much holed up on restricted areas."

[prettycoolguy]

"I wonder what they could be doing in there."

They were pretty much on the same page with the anti-Daligig sentiment. It felt good. The Chief hadn't entirely trusted them to begin with, and this bullshit was not helping at all.

"Hopefully we'll find out something about it. Save them the trouble of having to come out here every time we need a fuse changed."

[zouichi]

"I don't know. And that worries me." Zouichi frowned.

"This is the first time they've come aboard the ship, isn't it? Or were they here before I woke up?"

[prettycoolguy]

"This is the first time. They told us it would take two or three years for them to reach us and that we were on our own."

[zouichi]

Zouichi nodded. "Another untruth. Or perhaps half-truth. Wonder how many more they've got up their sleeves."

"By the way, the pirates that took over the ship -- did they hijack it, or salvage it?"

[prettycoolguy]

"I'd thought she was going somewhere. A crew's a formality for Stacy; she can go under her own power."

He shrugged a shoulder. "There was no crew awake when the pirates came into the picture, according to her."

[zouichi]

"Yeah, I can tell. Public relations doesn't seem to be the ship's strong point." In any case, Master Chief had confirmed the story Leon had been telling -- although Zouichi still wondered how the story had gone from 'pirates salvaging the ship' to 'pirates hijacking the ship'. There was a fairly large conceptual difference between the two of them.

"So by some means this ship, with all the people asleep on it, was left derelict for whoever to find. And our allies, who were significantly closer to us than they let on, finally pay us a visit..."

[prettycoolguy]

"...And lock themselves up in the restricted areas and don't tell us things," he finished.

He was sure it was a reason. There was always a reason. In this case it was probably one that the Daligig were not eager to share and the crew would not like if they heard it.

[zouichi]

"I don't like it," said Zouichi, frowning, "But I guess we'll find out more later."

He'd mistrusted the Daligig from day one, more or less, and he wouldn't be surprised if Sakura's demonstration gave him one more reason to do so. "Anyway, I should get going. But welcome back."