There was a mix of different emotions on Kitty's face; anger, disappointment, betrayal, sadness, and confusion. Why was he doing this? Why were his morals so skewed? "What the hell are you doing?" There wasn't as much force in Kitty's tone as she would have liked, but there was enough force there for her to be heard. She withdrew her sword slowly, but didn't yet move to attack. A naive and hopeful part of her was hoping that he could just explain it all away. "Is it true? Did you slaughter them? Send us to that planet to die?" Her eyes flicked to the screen, her shoulders sagging slightly at the target. "Dan please, don't."

Elias simply sat in silence as Seh'makou talked. Something about how Sam'anar had betrayed the celestials and slaughtered their so called council in order to use a superweapon in order to destroy one of the major powers in the galaxy as well as those heroes who had enough might to fight back. Seh'makou showed the group a bunch of videos of Sam'anar sitting silently at a chair in the middle of a circular command center of some sort, likely that of the superweapon he used.

"I don't care about your celestial politics," Elias growled, "But that fucker lied, and that's something I can't stand behind." Elias stood, his knuckles were white as he gripped his staff and stepped through the portal into Sam'anar's command center. He glanced at the screens. Earth appeared to be Sam'anar's next target. Elias frowned and his brow furrowed as he drew his purple necromancy wand from a pocket in his robes. The Spartan appeared to have a similar reaction, a twinge of anger could be heard in the superhuman warrior's voice. Kitty, on the other hand, had a far more emotional reaction. As if she had known Sam'anar from long before. Even in a personal relationship. Elias fought to keep his expression from changing as he realized the nature of the two's relationship from who knows how long ago.

Sam'anar betrayed no emotion as he questioned how the group had arrived.

"Your friend Seh'makou sent us," Elias said. He lifted his necromancy wand and flicked his wrist. With a flash of deep, sickly purple light, six smoky apparitions of ODSTs in black armor coalesced in a loose circle around Sam'anar. Each armed with a fully loaded standard assault rifle. An invisible and unfeelable whirlwind of magic began forming around Elias as he waited for Sam'anar to hopefully defend himself. If the stories of celestials were true, the group had nowhere near enough firepower to take Sam'anar on.

"Them?" Sam'anar turned away from the group to view the scenery. It was now littered with debris of rock and minerals, still expanding outwards from the force of the blast. "I killed a lot of people, but it is for the greater good. Don't you see it?" Now he looked to the group, tilting his head in question. "Anyone who has died up to this point was worth what we have achieved. The Crusade is scattered, leaderless. They've already lost their ground on Zaegrim's Spirit." Slowly he took steps towards them, fists clearly clenching.

"Yet you conspire with Seh'makou? I was willing to do what you were not. Sacrifice your lives to save the galaxy. You should be grateful there is a galaxy left for you to be alive in!" He stopped a few meters away from them, looking primarily at Kitty. "You don't see it. You only hear his lies! Enough of this!" Suddenly Sam'anar slammed his fist into the ground, causing a wave-like effect to radiate from the impact. As if the metal floor were made of water it rippled outwards and flipped, transforming the scenery around them to an empty field of grass.

"If you are here to kill me you will not succeed. This is my realm. My reality." Both hands moved in unison, crafting matter from the cosmos itself to populate the world around them. Thick jungle trees, shubbery and fog suddenly appeared, limiting everyone's standard visibility. Then footsteps came rapidly, before a group of four creatures shot out from the treeline. They were raptors, just like from the period of Dinosaurs on Earth. Two lunged for Kitty, whilst the others took a man each. Their jaws snapped unrelenting at their prey, whilst Sam'anar continued to craft...

The raptor that lunged at Sebastian was the same size as him - two meters tall. It was also incredibly fast, lunging at him at such a speed that he did not have time to fire upon it. Its jaws were open wide, its teeth ready to bite down on his armour if he didn't react soon. Fortunately, he did.

The Spartan put one foot back before slamming the butt of his rifle into the raptor's jaw, the rifle hitting it in the side. The reptilian creature went flying sideways and hit the ground. The creature writhed and struggled to get up from the pain of its now dislocated jaw, some of its lower teeth lying in a pull of blood under it. Sebastian aimed his Assault Rifle at its head and fired off a four-round burst into its head, the armour piercing rounds penetrating the reptile's skull and killing it instantly.
"Welcome to the 26th century, dino."

He looked up to check on Elias, who had been attacked by the other raptor. Switching to his pistol sidearm for more precise shots, Sebastian carefully fired off a few shots at the raptor, aimed at its body region and legs to avoid hitting his ally.

Kitty turned tail and ran from the raptor, splitting up from her allies as she tried to evade the raptors. Truthfully she was sniffing the air, trying to see if she could sniff Dan out. "Do you honestly think I could ever kill you?" She shouted out at empty air, before she let out a scream as one of the raptors got a hold of her leg with it's teeth. 

As she fell she dropped her sword just out of her reach, ignoring the pain of the teeth digging into her calf she threw a fireball from her palm straight at the raptors head. It was enough to throw it off of her and stun it, giving her time to grab her sword and throw it in perfect aim at it's heart. Then she started to hobble run in a different direction, she could already hear the other raptor approaching. She knew she should remain quiet, she wasn't healing and attracting more attention from the raptor would be deadly. But she needed to see if she could get through to Dan. She had to try.

"I'm not conspiring with anyone! If I were conspiring I would have attacked you out right! But I didn't! Maybe I'm not seeing or understanding, so help me to see and understand. For once Dan just let me in so I can understand. I'm sorry okay? I just-" Kitty's shouting was abruptly cut off as the raptor leapt onto her back, biting into the lower portion of her neck and her shoulder. It's claws raked down her back, the scent of blood was heavy in the air now. To save herself Kitty's skin morphed into lava, reducing the raptor to nothing as she got up and morphed back to bleeding torn up flesh.

She was unsteady on her feet, her head spun and blood was streaming out of her wounds along with traces of black ooze. That little fraction of corsetta that was still left was screaming inside her head, screaming at her to let her out, to let her destroy him, but she'd rather die than hurt him. "I know I hurt you and I'm sorry. But I was scared. I was scared that I was going to be waiting for a man who was never going to come back home. Waiting for a man that would always choose power over me." Het voice was barely above a whisper now, she was coughing up blood and expending herself further by trying to heal her wounds with magic. Although she was only succeeding in stopping the bleeding. "I have always been on your side Dan, haven't I? So please just tell me what's going on. Please, because I'd rather die than hurt you again. So for the love of god just explain to me what's going on. Before it's too late."

The temperature of the room command noticeably rose as Elias fought to keep his emotions in check. Any hasty actions could cost even more lives than the billions of demons on Hades. The significance of it felt disjointed and distant, as if he could only grab a pinch of the feeling any normal human should have had to see such a cradle of life so easily destroyed. Even if it was the home of the enemy, no race deserved a fate so grotesque. Aboleth was the problem, the whole of the Demonic Crusade wasn't nearly so much. The events of that day would change the face of the galaxy forever. On the plus side, the day still wasn't over.

"I don't 'them'," Elias replied as Sam'anar began shifting the world, "I care that you lied." The wizard refrained from action until Sam'anar's scenery reached a foggy swamp. Elias lost sight of kitty through the fog as she darted after Sam'anar, sputtering some kind of words. Elias couldn't pinpoint what they were, but he could feel the hurt in them.

That didn't stop a raptor from darting out of the dull white mist. It clattered off a semisphere of cobalt white light as a handful of bullets thumped into the beast's side. The Raptor writhed and screamed in pain as Elias snapped his fingers and set the raptor on fire with a flash from his staff. The wizard calmly walked towards the spartan as the Raptor died in blue-hot flames fueled by quiet, controlled rage.

"So what should we do now," Elias asked the spartan. He stood uncomfortably for a moment before continuing, "Oh yeah, I'm Elias, I never got your name before Sam'anar tried to kill us."

"You will lie to me no longer!" His voice boomed from all around, as if he were in the air itself. Another ripple shot out from the left, flipping the whole landscape over again to a rocky composure. Now they were on a large asteroid in orbit of a sun, but normal oxygen and gravity still applied. From nowhere a giant metallic hand grabbed hold of the edge, pulling up the rest of Sam'anar's chrome body. He stood immensely tall and large, seeming to grow each second until he rivaled even that of The Starforger.

"You think you understand the worth of a life. But you are foolish. There are billions of alternate versions of each of you, why should this one matter?" He shouted own at them, before bringing his hand down to smash the asteroid. With scattered remains of rock the three of them would end up losing sight of each other again, instead entering seperate realities.

For Sebastian there was a UNSC armory of sorts, with a view outside the window of a familiar sight; Haven. Covenant forces were storming the building whilst Spartans died all around him. Most prominent of all was a scarred Elite entering the room, pistol in one hand and energy sword in the other, charging to take on the Spartan.

Kitty would find herself in the mountain where Lana had captured Jaya, this time with Jaya laid dead on the ground horrifically. Lana turned to grin at the vampire, summoning her black tendrils in an attempt to grab and tear apart Kitty limb by limb. All the while her manic laughter filled the room from over Jaya's dead corpse.

Elias would be alone in a stone hall with Kitty, her eyes locked on his in anger.
"I hate you," She said, taking steps forward with her claws bared. "I only used you! How could you compare to a Celestial?" Her claws were now upon him, aiming to slash across his chest and face with her signature coloured fire.

"Spartan Duarte... just call me Sebastian though." Sebastian replied in response to Elias's question. As he reloaded both his sidearm and Assault Rifle, he looked over to the direction in which Kitty ran, and then back at Elias.
"We need to regroup and find a way out of here." Sebastian said, his tone suddenly serious and militant. "With Earth in danger, I need to get a message out to FLEETCOM, alert Earth's defenses that they're bout'a have company. My radio can't get the job done from here, but if we somehow get back to that control room, we may have a shot at it."

Sebastian eyed his motion tracker. Two green dots, one right next to him and the other right on the edge, northwest side. This was in concurrence to a female voice that seemed to echo from that exact direction.
"Let's get moving." He said, before sprinting into the thickness of the jungle. He arrived just in time to see Kitty a mess; not just physically but emotionally too.
"Kitty-" he began but it was already too late.

Before they knew it, the Celestial's voice was heard from all around them and reality itself seemed to ripple as they were subsequently dropped onto an asteroid. The giant figure of Sam'anar appeared, promptly reminding the Spartan of the Starforger.
"Like father, like son eh?" Sebastian joked dryly, his voice suddenly bitter and with a hint of anger.

However this confrontation was short-lived. The Celestial's fist came down and the ground fractured. The new environment in which he found himself suddenly didn't feel so new. He sensed some level of familiarity with it. Quickly, he got to his feet and surveyed the area. A UNSC armoury, that explained it. Wait, no. That wasn't it. He walked over to one of the windows and gazed outside, before reeling back in shock, his eyes widening behind his visor.
"No.." Flashback after flashback hit him again. Covenant forces slicing through UNSC defences, bombarding entire bases. Hundreds upon hundreds of marines falling in battle. And now it was happening again.

He looked around the base.. Kitty and Elias were nowhere to be seen and Spartans laid dead everywhere, some of which he even recognised from the other Fireteams that he had worked with. Spartan Greene, Nicholson. Another flashback went through his head and he saw those events again: the moment when Spartan Marshall was sliced in half by a Hunter's shield, the moment when Spartan Bob was impaled through the chest by an energy sword...the moment when...

Suddenly, Sebastian felt a sharp pain across his back and he dropped to the floor, on all fours. The sound of his Heads-Up-Display beeping rang in his ears as he realised that his energy shielding had dropped entirely. Worse still, his armour was compromised from the back. Fighting through the intense burning sensation in his back, the Spartan rolled over, balancing himself on both forearms as he spotted the threat: a sword wielding Elite, noticeably injured.

The Elite lunged for him again but despite the injury, the Spartan managed to roll away from the strike and stood himself up, facing the Elite. The Elite wasted no time in pulling the sword out of the ground and lunging at the Spartan again.

Kitty let out a curse as she was flung off to somewhere else, and had failed in getting through to Dan as of yet. "When have I ever lied to you?" She cried out, but the  she cried out for real when she saw her daughter's horrific corpse with Lana standing over her. Lana's tentacles shot out before Kitty could move, wrapping around her limbs and starting to pull which made her yell out in pain. "Well the vampire in this reality still loves you, and is probably the one person here right now that doesn't want to kill you!" She forced out the words through hissed breaths of pain, she could feel Lana wrenching her arm out of her socket. Corsetta was screaming so loudly inside her head that she couldn't help but give in for just a moment, but that moment was everything.

Kitty's hands curled around the tentacles that were holding her arms, but they didn't look like her hands. No these had inch long claws and skin that looked like that of a black snake while her veins had turned to glowing lava. One of Kitty's eyes changed as well, the white of her eye turning pitch black while the actual iris turned a dark red with slitted pupils. The fire that curled around Kitty's hands wasn't natural, instead it glowed red and black and burned cold, freezing everything in it's path. With a flick of her wrist she shattered the tentacles, doing the same to her legs before leaping at Lana with the speed that was fast even for her. Her claws savagely ripped at Lana's face and chest until the freezing fire had spread through her. Then she got up and kicked her, aiming to make her shatter too. Then she turned to the body of her daughter, the fire fading away as she fell to her knees and cradled Jaya as if she were still a baby. "I'm sorry that this version didn't come in time." 

Her clawed hands brushed the hair away from her daughter's face as Kitty leaned down to kiss her forehead, her hands closing her eyes so she looked a bit more peaceful. "Find peace my little angel." Then she stood and looked outward, speaking directly to Dan again. "Please talk to me, if not for my or your sake, for our daughter's sake. Right now she's out there fighting, fighting for you, because she believes in you and believes that you can do better. Don't you want to make her proud to have a father like you?"

Elias followed Sebestian through the fog until they finally stumbled upon Kitty and Sam'anar screaming something about how no one will lie again. Elias stood confused for a moment. Every single word he had spoken contained nothing but the truth, yet this crazed celestial couldn't get over his own ego and good guy complex to listen to the words anyone else had to say. All the guy seemed to care about was how insignificant they were. How infinite parallel universes existed with themselves, only different. Elias had no time to get a word in before the celestial brought a fist crashing down onto the ground. Appearing to shatter his imaginary world into some kind of personal illusion for Elias.

Kitty stood at the opposite end of an uncannily wide stone hall. Torches cast a faint orange glow accross the well worn stone bricks at their feet. Above, the light was swallowed by an immeasurably high ceiling A golden throne inlaid with hundreds of magical stones and runes sat on top of what appeared to be a stone altar lacking a table at Elias' back. Behind kitty, there was a gate, an entrance to the exit of whatever illusion this was.

"It's almost as if I'm the boss mob," Elias muttered to himself as Kitty screamed something about how he's nothing compared to a celestial. The wizard sighed as a whirlwind of invisible and unfeelable magical energy began swirling around Elias' staff. Kitty leaped towards Elias with vampiric claws extended and blood in her eyes. Blood licked the ends of her hair and claws as she went for a slash across Elias chest. Elias drew conjured a barrier energy from the stones in the walls and sent a ball of Kinetic energy hurling at Kitty's side, aiming to launch her back down the hall to the point where she'd began.

As Sebastian struggled in his fight against the Elite, Elias' move had worked well for him. The alternate Kitty slammed sideways into the wall, shattering it into pieces of what seemed like holographic triangles. As if it were a video game level the wall gave way to the view of Sebastian's alternate reality. Elias could see and walk straight into the Haven reality as if it were one and the same with his own. More Covenant forces were beginning to flood the armoury, and soon they noticed this strange room now adjoined to it with a wizard inside.

Meanwhile Kitty's surroundings simply fell away shard by shard, leaving an empty blackness with Jaya's body being the last thing to leave. Now there stood only her and Sam'anar in this vast empty space. His hands clenched slightly, but he relaxed his composure for the moment. White lines crawled up him before his human form was visible, back when he had short black hair and looked somewhat young.

"Kitty..."

The Elite fell dead but soon, dozens more Covenant soldiers followed. The Grunts came first, their plasma pistols blazing with heat as they fired off a volley of superhot plasma shots at the Spartan. Sebastian ducked and rolled to the side unholstering his sidearm and dropping three grunts within a second - a headshot each.

Dozens more Grunts pushed forward with their attack, a few plasma bolts slamming into Sebastian's recharged energy shield. Sebastian grunted as he forced himself up. He returned fire on a few more of them before using his thruster pack to evade the rest of the bolts. He landed behind a pillar, using the cover to switch to his Assault Rifle. He peered around the pillar which was now getting bombarded with shots and slowly deteriorating from the hot plasma. A group of the Grunts stood together firing from the same position, strengthening the volley of plasma coming towards him. He quickly emerged, aimed and shot a grenade into the group, killing them in one explosion.

A needler round hit his side and Sebastian quickly used his thruster pack to evade whatever else may be thrown at him almost instinctively. As he landed, he looked to the other side to see a group of Jackals entering the armoury with the familiar silhouette of an Elite at the back.
The Jackals attempted to spread out into the small room in an attempt to overwhelm him. While they ran they fired a few shots at the Spartan, which he swiftly evaded. Unfortunately for the Jackals, moving had exposed more of their bodies and Sebastian quickly made use of this advantage, putting three of them down with precise automatic bursts. However another two needles landed in his side along with a few more plasma bolts. The plasma bolts downed his shields entirely and the needlers successfully managed to embed themselves in his armour. Three needles exploded inside the titanium plating, ripping through it and sending smaller shards into his undersuit.

Sebastian returned fire on the Jackals but to no avail, as they had managed to surround him from two sides of the room and were firing on him relentlessly with their shields raised in front of them. To make matters worse, an Elite had entered the room and also began firing on him with an automatic plasma rifle. Sebastian dodged and ran behind lockers, pillars and overturned tables as he prepared a fragmentation grenade in one hand. By now, Elias's reality had joined with his which briefly distracted the Jackals. Making the most out of this advantage, Sebastian threw the grenade into the group and it exploded. Unfortunately, there happened to be a locker full of more grenades right next to the explosion which amplified the blast and took out all of the Jackals.

As the smoke cleared, only the Elite stood, its shields depleted and heavily injured. Sebastian finished it off with a burst to the head. He looked up just in time to see more Elites flood the armoury. Having depleted his Assault Rifle's ammunition and with no time to reload, Sebastian dove straight for the pile of shotguns, picking one up and instantly putting a charging Elite down with the weapon's tremendous stopping power. However the Elite was followed by a barrage of plasma bolts from two other Elites, forcing Sebastian down onto one knee as the plasma melted through the armour on his torso and inflicted lethal burns on his actual chest. Sebastian forced himself through the pain however, bringing his shotgun back up and dropping another Elite with it.

A few more Grunts entered the armoury and chose to go for Elias instead. The remaining Elite roared a battlecry and unleashed its Energy Sword with which he blocked another shot from the Spartan and charged forth.
Sebastian forced himself up and quickly brought his shotgun up to defend himself as the Elite sliced the weapon in half. Sebastian dropped the remains and quickly lunged forward and grabbed the Elite's sword arm, subsequently entering into a physical power struggle with the alien.

Kitty's body seemed to sag with relief when she saw him, especially since it was him. She looked a little worse for wear, her clothes were ripped up and stained with her blood and some mystery black sludge. The bite mark on her shoulder and lower neck was starting to bleed again, but the mark on her chest and stomach had closed along with the scratches on her back but the bite on her calf was open but not bleeding. The eye that had changed to something resembling a demonic snakes eye did not change back, and her hands stayed the same snake skin with lava veins and claws. 

Kitty hobbled closer to him, a relieved smile on her face. "Dan..." She looked so happy to see him as him, it had been so long since she had actually seen his face. It made the pain in her chest so much worse, and she waned to spout off apologies again, but this wasn't the time. "Can you tell me what happened now?" Her voice was soft and gentle, so unlike her. She was usually brash, sarcastic and angry, but right now she just wanted to understand what the hell was going on. Dan had been doing so well as a Celestial. She thought he had finally freed himself from whatever darkness he had left.

It seemed Elias' prediction was right; Sam'anar's unusual fist crushing spell had been an illusion. The phantasmal kitty slammed into the wall with an immense amount of kinetic force, shattering a depressingly weak barrier between Elias' illusion and Sebestian's. Elias could only watch dumbly as the spartan almost majestically tore through a horde of covenant forces. His trance was only snapped when a translucent cobalt-white shield flashed into existence, just barely blocking a volley of Grunt plasma bolts. The Grunts panicked, giving Elias enough time to swing his staff in an arc at his waist. The amber tip glowed with a bright green light as nearly visible blades of air erupted from the space in front of Elias. They flew and sliced clean through a few of the grunts ahead of him. Those five who still stood quickly regained their composure and began firing wildly in Elias' direction. Multiple bolts collided with his body, the burning hot plasma burned through his wizarding robes, revealing the high-tech nypherian body armor underneath. Elais quickly raised his arms to protect his face from more rounds as he channelled another spell. This one was an ancient spell so widely used it had even permeated its way into old earth game textbooks. A pool of bluish white light pooled in the tip of Elias staff as he thrust it forward. Five spiraling bolts of penetrating light streamed from the tip of Elias' staff, each pierced clean through the grunts ahead. Blood splattered from the grunts' wounds as they collapsed.

Elias looked over to the other side of the room, where Sebestian was surrounded with Covenant corpses of all kinds. He'd taken far more damage than Elias had, and appeared like he would soon be overwhelmed. Even an Elite had already snuck behind the spartan. Elias took no time to think as he charged forward. Bursts of kinetic energy flinging his footsteps farther than normally possible as Elias wound up his fist for a punch. Potential energy pooling into the air in front of it as Elias. His boots grinded to a stop just as Elias approached the Elite's side. Elias' punch fell just short of the Elite's armor, but the potential energy that had been pooling from before instantly transformed into Kinetic. The Elite's armor buckled under the immense force of the impact and sent the alien crashing into the bulkhead. His whole body crushed under the force of the impact. Elias doubled over to catch his breath after the extreme exertion of magical energy.

"I..." Dan looked into her eyes, scanning them whilst a thousand thoughts ran through his mind. Eventually he decided how to finish his sentence. "I break the deal!" He shouted out into the darkness, extending his hand outwards to create a large distance between himself and Kitty by materializing a corridor of sorts between them. Any attempts for her to close the distance would make the stretch longer.

From behind the familiar purple orb appeared, floating silently at first before it took the form of a man. This man was dark skinned and looked very much like the form Seh'makou had taken earlier, except now he was dressed in a much more fancy manner even with a top hat. Within the cloth binding of the hat was stuck a small flat idol of a skull.
"You know what that means, Sammy boy." Makou grinned, letting out a low and periodic chuckle.
In response Sam'anar swung his fist around aiming for the other man's face, however it was caught with in his bare hand. "The deal makes me stronger than you. And you know what the price is for breaking the deal."

Makou's spare hand reached down with curled fingers towards Dan's chest, before shooting backwards in a sharp pulling motion. In unison with his movement a green energy was ripped from his body, in turn damaging the now-chrome celestial seriously. As his metal form returned it began to crumple and shriek, whilst what could only be thought of as whispers of breath escaped the cracks and tears. Once Dan's metallic body lay lifeless and shrivelled on the floor under it's suit, Seh'makou let out another laugh.

By this time Sam'anar's magic had gone with him, dropping Sebastian and Elias right next to Kitty in the empty darkness. Now there stood only the four of them, with Seh'makou now wielding a cane with a crystal-like ball encrusted on the top. Resting both his hands on the top and using it to lean on the ground before him, his grin never faded whilst he looked at Kitty and the others.

"You must have many questions, but for now I can just say what needs to be said." Makou pointed his cane at the body of Sam'anar. "You completed your end of the deal, weakening him, and I completed my end," He now raised one of his hands, green energy like that he had stole from Dan glowing visibly for a moment. "Imprisoning him."

"Your precious Sammy is not dead, but his soul is where it belongs. With me." A sudden burst of laughter came from the man, along with a dramatic twirl of his cane. "I'm a man of my word. Sure, I may have exaggerated the whole 'killing his mother and friends' part, but he still deserved what he got." A roll of his eyes signified how lightly he took the subject. "Besides, thanks to his own deal, he's now with his father." Raising his cane slightly, a twirling blue dragon very much like the Starforger was visible within. 

"Anywho, you'll be pleased to know I sabotaged his big machine. In fact I believe it's already imploded in on itself..." A rather exaggerated pondering expression came over his face, before being replaced with an odd smirk. 

"I can feel this is only the start of a beautiful friendship. But for now, your journey home!" That low rumbling laughter ensued, before a thick mist suddenly shot throughout the nothingness, encompassing everyone before it slowly yet surely cleared away. 

The man was now nowhere to be seen, as they now stood upon a plain of grass on what they may or may not recognize as Reach.

As Sebastian struggled with the Elite, the pain of his injuries - along with their effects, began to take their tole. His strength weakened as the energy sword was held between his and the Elite's faces, but with all of his might he fought on, struggling to push the sword into the Elite's face. However with his balance failing as well now, the Elite sent a powerful knee into the Spartan's abdomen, cracking one of his left ribs and sending a burst of pain throughout his front body.

The Spartan's strength weakened and the Elite pushed the sword further, the very edge of which burnt into the Spartan's visor. The plasma blade easily burnt a small slice through it and Sebastian felt the heat of the sword on his right eye. The Elite pushed further and the sword neared his eye - and so did the heat. The extreme temperature seared his right eye completely, causing him to grunt out loud in pain.

And then... he was in free-fall. Before he could figure out what happened, he landed on something, his legs buckling under him and causing his entire body to sprawl out across the dark surface. He grunted again as he struggled to pick himself up, managing to sit up with one hand behind his body, supporting his weight as he looked at the Celestial that was talking to them. As he struggled to comprehend the being's words, they were dropped once again, but this time on a field. The Spartan groaned as more pain shot through his body. On his damaged visor's HUD, his shield bar finally began to fill up again.

Forcing himself to his feet, he looked around through his one remaining eye and examined the environment.
"Reach..."

"Dan no!" Kitty cried out as she watched the events unfold with horror, a part of her knew what would happen if she tried to close the distance, but she ran anyway. Her heart was pounding so hard in her chest that it hurt, and she had never run so fast in her long vampiric life. But it didn't matter, no matter how fast and far she ran the distance between her and Dan only grew. "You idiot!" She screamed, and then she screamed again when she watched Makou rip Dan's soul out of his body. 

As the magic faded away she was finally able to reach Dan, running over to the crumpled metallic body and falling to her knees beside it. Makou's words twisted in Kitty's gut like a knife, she had been so easily tricked. Just before the mist started to billow out, Kitty looked up at Makou with a face that looked nothing like her own. Her face was covered in black snake skin, the white of her other eye turned black and her iris turned blood red with a slitted pupil, the veins in her face turned into lava and her hair hung down in lava-like strands. Instead of just two teeth sliding down over her lips, every single tooth turned sharp and deadly as she looked up at Makou. "If you ever try and trick me again, I'll rip you apart and shove that cane up your ass." A forked tongue flicked out from behind her teeth, "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned." 

When the mist billowed out and left them on Reach Kitty was back to normal physically, her wounds had healed and the monstrous features had vanished but there was an emptiness in Kitty's eyes that was unnerving. She pushed herself up off her knees, starting to brush herself off. She was still covered in her own blood in some places. But she didn't seem to care. "Are you two okay?"

Elias found himself unable to catch his breath and began to collapse. He closed his eyes, expecting his cheek to slam into cold metal. Instead, the wizard stumbled on the familiar darkness from before boarding Sam'anar's superweapon. The voice of Seh'Makou greeted Elias as he fought off his fatigue and looked up to face the celestial. Seh'Makou's appearance had changed somewhat since their last encounter who knows how long ago and now. The Celestial had added a top hat paired with a skull mask, a crystal cane, and a few other doodads that pointed towards voodoo. Everything about the guy had been off-putting the first time, but now Elias certainly didn't trust him, especially with the voodoo bits. The wizard made sure he didn't drop any blood or hair as Seh'Makou spoke about his imprisoning of Sam'anar. A crystal filled with immense magical power floated behind him. Elias frowned, it had all the makings of a soul, yet a single soul wasn't meant to possess so much power. He noted the crumpled celestial body on the ground and immediately connected the dots: Celestial souls. Something no one should ever be in possession of. Everything about Seh'Makou's demeanor suggested he was not going to sit around with such power and not do anything with it, especially if he had the power to manipulate a soul so perfectly. That kind of power was disgusting.

Then thick fog flowed in and reduced Elias' vision to zero before dispersing to reveal a vaguely familiar landscape: reach. Elias' staff every so slightly vibrated in his hands with recognition of the place. Even after months of absence, the burned grass and overturned earth from the ritual creating his newer, more refined tools of magic. He then noticed Kitty, all torn up and covered in what was likely her own vampiric blood. She asked if everyone was alright.

"You don't look too good yourself," Elias replied, "though Sebestian here has it the worst off." He motioned towards the spartan laying on the ground. "He had to fight a horde of covenant over some kinda metal planet." The wizard sat down and laid back in the tall grass. "Considering that," He commented casually, "What did you see in Sam'anar's illusions?"

Sebastian turned to look at Kitty, his armour noticeably damaged and charred from the heavy plasma burns inflicted on him. On his back was a large gash where the energy sword had been used to slash him, and his frontal torso armour had melted and a section of it gave way to a bloodied view of his flesh underneath. The blood was dried up due to the cauterizing effect of the plasma. The right side of his helmet now had a noticeable slit through which what used to be his eye could be seen.

"I'm good, just a few scratches" Sebastian replied through a slightly strained voice. "What happened up there?"

She sat down beside Elias, a frown on her face as she pulled her knees to her chest. "I'm fine, physically at least. All the wounds healed. Other than that yeah not too good." She looked up at the sky, but then held out her hand to Elias. "You can take some of my energy if you need it, I have a lot to spare." She neglected to answer Elias's question of what she saw, she didn't want to talk about it. 

Looking up at Sebastian she sighed once more, "We were deceived double time. Makou used us to get to Dan so he would break his deal, thus surrendering his soul. He's such an idiot."

Fortunately, it seemed that everyone was still alive. Elias' head and body ached horribly, even his chi had been flung way out of whack with the immense amounts of crazy over the last few hours. After celestials, demonlords, and superweapons, Elias' body had finally given out. The wizard wished he could say the same about his fellow defenders of the universe. Sam'anar seemed to have had a more personal relationship with Sebestian and Kitty, allowing him to basically nuke their emotions into oblivion with whatever illusions he could conjure on a whim.

"Celestials aside, I'm glad we're done with this," Elias replied, still laying back in the grass. His gear and staff lay by his side. "Now we've got to figure out what we're doing next." Elias began standing up, groaning slightly as his muscles screamed in protest. After slinging his satchel over his shoulder and with staff in hand, Elias started walking towards New Alexandria. "Now that the GSU is a thing, I'll go hitch a ride back to Mytheria and head back to Nypherian space." He stopped and tossed two pale blue gemstones. One for each of his allies. "Use those Apatite gems to call me if you want. In the meantime, see ya." With a slight wave of his free hand, Elias continued walking off towards the city. Hopefully the authorities wouldn't label wizard with burned robes and battle armor as a terrorist.