Review Responses and IMPORTANT A/N at the bottom.

He saw it too late. Streaks of orange raced across the sandy red field, effortlessly dodging a surprise strike of lightning from the armored alien that had been his impromptu guide. John's instincts screamed at him, warning him of an approaching threat.

The Chef listened to those instincts and began bringing up his rifle, but the thing that appeared in front of him outpaced him.

It was small and lanky, with long arms covered in a dark suit. Red, glowing orbs were one of the few details John saw before the alien crashed into him with impossible force. He only barely managed to keep a grip on his MA5D when the new enemy collided with him. Even so, the two crashed to the ground, John grunting when his back collided with the course sandy surface.

Distorted, howling laughter filled his ears as the alien pinned him to the ground. His shields vanished in the blink of an eye and he only faintly caught Cortana's surprised outburst before something struck his helmet – hard. John's head snapped to the side when the alien atop him hit him. Alarms blasted across his HUD. The Master Chief moved, his finger pressing down on the trigger of his rifle. The weapon fired.

The Spartan was certain that he had hit the alien – he had fired right at the mass pinning him down – but it showed no signs of stopping. A second strike, faster than he could block, hit the other side of his helmet. His head snapped to the other direction, and a crack sounded off as his visor began to fail under the strain. Part of his HUD fizzled as a thin break spiderwebbed in the corner of his visor.

His finger slipped from the trigger during the brutal attack, and the moment he tried to jam the gun into his opponent's side, something forced the MA5D down. John jerked, failed to dislodge the weapon, and made the split-second decision to discard it. His hand shot up, narrowly avoiding a weight that attempted to press down on it. He brought up both arms to try and guard his head as the alien moved for another strike.

Its hand collided with his elbow, and John tried to force it aside. He used his other arm to block the creature's left-handed strike. He was rewarded with an eyeful of the alien's otherworldly helmet and the merciless, artificial orbs that gazed back.

The creature screamed down at him and snapped its head back. John's eyes widened when it brought its armored forehead down in one swift motion, bashing his own helmet.

The crack widened.

John heaved, adrenaline pumping through his veins as he tried to roll over. The aline vigorously resisted the motion, and he only managed to roll halfway, but it was enough for him. He forced the thing's foot off his weapon and grabbed it with a free hand. The moment he relinquished his grip on the alien's arm, it drove its clawed fingers down onto his shoulder plating. It tore hungrily at the armor, stopping only when John jammed the barrel of the UNSC service rifle into its side and pressed the trigger for all he was worth.

A stream of bullets tore into the creature's side, burrowing into the armor it wore. John found himself almost unsurprised when the thing didn't die. These aliens had proven monstrously resilient to conventional weapons.

Still, the beast sprang off him and flipped away, vanishing into the air. John caught sight of the black and gold alien he had been following in the split second of respite, noting with a pang of panic when he saw that it was grappling with a second creature, identical to the thing that had attacked him.

Said thing reappeared several meters above him, let out a whooping laugh, and lunged down. The speed and reflexes of the Spartan combined with the augmentations of his armor saved him as he dove away. The alien crashed into the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust that washed over the rocks surrounding them. John's dive brought him into a kneeling position and he rapidly raised his weapon to try and fire burst, only to blink when his target vanished again.

"To your left!" Cortana hurriedly warned.

The Master Chief's keen eyes had already caught orange streaks racing across the sand as his enemy rapidly closed the distance between them. John braced himself to meet the approaching threat, his muscles tensing when his opponent materialized and attempted to tackle him.

Now!

John ducked as the creature's lanky arms wrapped around the air where his head had been a moment earlier. Immediately, he drove his own body upwards, slamming into the extraterrestrial's stomach. He managed to get a grip on its sides, digging his fingers into armor that refused to bend beneath his strength.

The alien let out a shout when John threw it down. His intent had been to try and kill – or at least cripple – it once he had it pinned down, and rather than take risks with such a fast alien, he slammed it into the ground with his grip maintained throughout the whole motion. The Spartan used his impressive weight to force the thing down, violently pushing it into the sand.

The enemy soldier thrashed furiously beneath John's grip for a moment before it cloaked. Then, suddenly, it wasn't beneath him. The Spartan's body abruptly sank to the ground when the soldier he had been pinning down simply wasn't there anymore. Almost immediately, the alien reappeared in front of John, swinging a leg at his unprotected head.

John backpedaled frantically to avoid the incoming attack, managing to put himself out of harms way. Then the alien vanished again.

Right!

He whirled around when a dark shape reappeared to his side.

Gone.

Something crashed into his back. The Master Chief grunted in frustration and pain when the alien knocked him forward. He landed on his stomach but rapidly rolled away to avoid an armored boot that had been aimed at his head.

John ended up on his feet, swinging his rifle up to face the enemy. He paused for only a fraction of a second when the thing suddenly convulsed while familiar lightning danced around its shivering body. His opponent momentarily stunned, John did what his instincts screamed at him to do.

He pointed the barrel of his gun at the alien and pulled the trigger. He put several rounds into the creature's center of mass, the force of which knocked it flat on its back. Behind it, John saw his own companion kneeling next to another convulsing body. The black and gold alien had one hand planted firmly on its victim's head while the other was pointed at the hostile John had been shooting. Both limbs sparked with ferocious electricity.

Spartan and armored alien exchanged looks before both their heads snapped up in unity at the roar of an incoming aircraft. The squadrons of bulbous dropships had closed the distance between them in the time that they had spent fighting off the twin aliens.

John's ally reacted fast. In a blaze of ethereal red, it launched itself forward, closing the distance between itself and the Spartan near instantly. It tapped him on the shoulder, and a surge of energy coursed through the Master Chief.

The sensation felt otherworldly to an indescribable extent, and yet...it felt empowering. The Spartan's body moved on its own, training and a seasoned soldier's intuition kicking in as he raced after the electric alien. The dropships' roar, however, didn't let up. They were still close, and John could even catch the occasional shout or order hollered over the growl of industrial machinery.

The alien ahead of him threw hurried glances over its shoulder, sometimes at John, sometimes as the sky. The Master Chief couldn't see the alien's face, but from its jerky movements, he caught the telltale signs of a cornered soldier. Their situation had long since gone critically fubar. The enemy had air superiority, the numbers advantage, and nightmarish units to deploy.

And John was running out of ammo.

A familiar sound – the groan of a mechanical weapon – thundered somewhere behind him. Abruptly, a storm of glowing hot projectiles rained down around the Spartan and his companion. Both warriors dodged vigorously as the enemy carpeted the ground with holes. A wave of sand and dust rose from the planet's tormented surface to meet John in the wake of the bullets.

The pattern of the shots brought a new realization to mind, however.

They're trying to split us up, the soldier realized as he dodged more bullets. The deadly gunfire was spaced between him and the alien, and the enemy was doing a dangerously effective job of herding him away from his guide. The Spartan grunted and zigzagged to try and keep up with his quarry. The boost from the alien's lightning was gone, and the drop in speed was noticeable, but the Master Chief pressed on.

His view became rapidly obscured by the growing clouds of dust and pebbles kicked up by the aerial fire. The clouds eventually cleared for a minute when the gunner of the ship paused – either to reload or because the gun jammed, John didn't know.

And it was in that moment that the alien abruptly whirled around. Its speed tripled in a split second in a burst of electrical energy.

The black and gold lifeform closed the distance between them instantly, tapping John on the shoulder as it passed and hurriedly ushering him to follow. When John saw the enemy ship attempt to halt itself, he understood what the alien was doing.

Perfect. The ship can't turn as fast as we can. We've got a breather, but for what?

The ship that had been on their tail was arcing across the sky in a return run. Meanwhile, to their left, the other dropships were closing in. The Spartan and the alien were moving perpendicularly to the ships' paths, and it would take the craft a second to adjust.

And it was at those moments that a spade-shaped ship appeared in the air, practically right on top of them. The Master Chief's gaze snapped to the aircraft, eyes widening when he recognized the alien ship from earlier.

Interesting stealth mechanic. Could have been useful on Halo...and on a lot of other places.

The ship pulled ahead of them and slowed down, lowering itself closer to the cracked, rocky ground. The deceleration of the ship, coupled with its lowered altitude clued the seasoned veteran on what the plan must have been.

"No way we're getting of here without being seen," John observed. The problem lied partially in the fact that while the ship could go invisible, he couldn't. He'd be seen boarding, and extracting danger-close without actually seeing your extraction point would have been near suicide.

No, the ship would have to uncloak, they'd have to board, and then re-cloak and retreat.

"One chance," Cortana vocalized. "Enemy vessels will be on top of us in less than thirty seconds."

"Noted."

The ship lowered in an elegant descent. Whoever the pilot was, he was doing a good job of keeping the craft steady. The acrobatic alien jumped, latching onto a bar located in an open compartment on the underside of the ship, towards the nose. The techno-organic warrior looked back at him and reached out a boney hand, palm open and fingers outstretched.

The Spartan didn't know if it would be able to hold his considerable weight, but he didn't have much time to ponder. There would be just enough space for him to grab onto the bar itself, if he jumped high enough.

John wasted no time in pumping every ounce of power he had into his legs to close the distance as fast as possible. He was almost at the jumping point, his mind preparing his body to make the leap.

And then things went wrong. Again.

The alien's head abruptly snapped up to look over John's shoulder. In that moment, a shrill howl of laughter echoed in his ears. John didn't need to turn around to figure out what was behind him. A red blip appeared on his motion tracker, and it was gaining on him with terrifying speed.

The alien on the ship retracted its arm and produced a pistol. With on arm locked firmly onto the handlebar of its vessel, it used the other to fire a rapid succession of shots. Sharp cracks, accompanied by the flare of the gun's nozzle, signified the attempted counterattack.

There was a loud, warped grunt. The red blip momentarily faltered, but kept pressing on. The fact that only one of the two horrors was chasing him wasn't lost on the Spartan.

Where's the other one?

The alien friendly kept shooting, the hostile kept dodging, and the Spartan kept sprinting. The only thing that was stopping the maniacal alien from tackling him was the sharpshooting of the other extraterrestrial.

"Enemy aircraft closing in!" Cortana warned hurriedly.

He needed to get on that ship, now.

The jumping point was almost upon him. He just had to get himself a little closer! The black and gold soldier had to pause when his magazine finally ran empty. It didn't bother to holster its pistol when it swapped to its electrical attacks, carpeting the area behind John with bolts of crackling lightning to try and halt the enemy's attempts at grabbing John.

Almost there!

The alien fired lightning in rapid succession before swinging its legs up and digging its feet into the compartment. Whether magnetically or otherwise, its legs stuck to the ship, and it freed both arms. A bony, armored hand reached out to grab John while the other expended more lightning.

Now!

The Master Chief planted his foot on a rock higher than its surroundings and jumped. Lightning arced past him to cut off their pursuer. John's armored fingers closed instantly when his palm made contact with the alien's techno-organic gauntlet. The concern of whether or not his companion could hold him up flew out the window: they had run out of time. The two soldiers' grips tightened, and John found his feet slowly lifting from the ground as the ship began to ascend.

His weight was being handled. A lucky break.

His grip on the alien remained strong, even when it lurched slightly due to the sudden addition of half a ton of Spartan. The ship began to climb upwards while John looked back down at the teleporting abomination chasing them. Crimson energy rushed to meet it whenever it uncloaked. The thing was quick, but the lightning was fast enough to keep up.

His motion sensor beeped.

John glanced up just in time to see a flash of orange fly from the face of a high rock when the beast materialized.

"Contact!" the Spartan roared. Both he and the golden alien tried to react, but it was too late. The creature crashed into him, violently ripping apart both his shields and his grip on his key out of this nightmarish place.

Time slowed to a tormenting crawl as John watched the ship ascend into the sky without him. There had been one chance for him to get off this world, and it was now flying away. No way would the ship be able to extract him now.

Reality zoomed back into full speed when John and the enemy that had tackled him crashed through a rock. It shattered under their combined weight. The impact, even after softened by his armor, jarred the Master Chief as the vibration ran through his entire body.

They bounced off a second rock, the MJOLNIR armor taking the brunt of the impact again. His shields had long since failed under the strain and would refuse to recharge until he could give the battered generators a chance to recuperate.

The enemy, however, gave him no such chance.

They twirled through the air, the Spartan attempting to grapple with his assailant, only for his arms to close around thin air when the body he was fighting vanished. A moment later, he landed painfully on unforgiving ground.

John scrambled to his feet, the first thing greeting him being the twin speedsters. One crouched atop a rock while the other twitched uncontrollably beside it, both glaring at him. The Master Chief's instincts told him to attack, but when the two didn't attack him, he understood what was happening.

The one crouched on the rock let out a low, daunting chuckle and straightened out. The increasingly loud whirr of mechanical engines filled John's ears, and he risked a look behind him.

The enemy dropships had caught up. They had been gaining ground the whole time the friendly ship had been decelerating to allow him to try and get on.

"End of the line," Cortana whispered.

John turned back to the twins. One chuckled, and then they both vanished, reappearing some distance away as the ships slowed down to circle John. Within moments, he was surrounded, a chorus of chugging engine and foreign voices greeting his ears.

Dozens of soldiers jumped from the ships, some gliding down on jet packs, others rappelling down sturdy ropes. John's grip on his weapon tightened. He wouldn't be able to fight his way through this. He could make a final stand and try to take down as many as he could, but would good would that do?

Ground troops of various sizes and forms approached him, weapons drawn and aimed at him. Many thundered something in their unearthly voices.

The Master Chief wondered what protocol would dictate. UNSC vessels had their instructions regarding capture at Covenant hands, but what should a Spartan-II do in the face of these things? Captured or killed: either way, John's armor and weapons would likely be confiscated. The former scenario at least left him alive to try and reclaim those weapons.

The super soldier's mind then screeched to a complete halt at the sight of one of the troops that was walking towards him. The other units moved to give the armored figure space as he walked over. His stature and form were no different from many of his comrades, but that wasn't what held John's gaze. No, what caught his attention was the lack of a mask to cover the approaching stranger's face. The Spartan's breath caught in his throat, and he could hear Cortana's horrified gasp at the sight.

What approached John was no alien. There were no mandibles, no fangs, no scales, no inhuman features. What looked back at the Spartan was a pale, wrinkled face, with patches of dead skin and subliminal wiring running under the surface of the cheeks. A pair of intense red eyes stared at the MJOLNIR helmet's cracked, orange visor.

What looked back at John was no alien, but a man.

~X~

The cover to Aras' transference pod bloomed like a flower, releasing the occupant from his ancient seat. The child-like figure inside leaned forward, head planted in his arms, white hair brushing against pale fingertips. The Volt Prime Warframe, recently pulled from combat, stood dead still not far from him, the animated movements drained from its being the moment Aras terminated the link between himself and the armor.

"Manics," the Tenno sighed, a hint of frustration creeping into his voice as he rubbed his temples. "Since when did the Grineer station so many well-trained troops on Mars?"

Mars had been, historically, a place of easy pickings. It was entirely uncommon for the upper echelons of Grineer soldiers to be there, but today? Aras hadn't run across such tough clones in a long time. Had he known their resistance would be so fierce, he would have brought a stronger Warframe and stronger weapons. The soldiers present were powerful – far more powerful than either the Tenno or the Lotus had initially anticipated. Preliminary scans revealed nothing too far beyond the ordinary. More troops were present, of course, but they had been indicated as a low threat, likely not much stronger than the usual Mars detachment.

What the Tenno actually found, however, was light years ahead of the typical red planet patrols. Manics, Commanders, Elite Lancers, all thoroughly trained and outperforming their typical counterparts by exponential measurements. These kinds of troops were rare amongst the typical Grineer armed forces. They were prominent in their high value operations only.

But what had struck Aras as the most profound detail was just how much of those troops had been mobilized to stop the Tenno from escaping with the armored man. Grineer were excellent at moving many troops in record times, but dispatching air squadrons, manics, kill squads, and who knew what else like they had today? Something deeper was at play.

"Curious," mumbled the mechanical voice of the ship's AI. "Ordis hasn't seen this kind of mobilization of Grineer units in some time. Is the – hunk of junk – artifact that they located truly so valuable?"

"Apparently," Aras mused, his ancient mind running over the details of the mission and its failure. "What did the Grineer use to interfere with the comms, though? Did the signal match anything we know?"

Off the top of his head, Aras could remember one particular group of Grinner that could wipe Tenno communications with relative ease.

"None that I can see," Ordis admitted. "The most logical conclusion would be the Grustrag Three, but this signal is...different. Ordis will work on fixing our connections and perhaps looking for future countermeasures against – those stupid bags of – the Grineer."

The Tenno nodded and turned to look at Volt Prime. The frame wouldn't be enough to extract the armored man from the Grineer prison. He'd need something along the lines of a Limbo to keep the stranger safe. But then, the Grineer wanted this character badly. The Tenno wondered what other surprises might await them inside the Grineer stronghold.

"Operator, Ordis has managed to intercept encrypted Grineer messages amongst the radio chatter while studying the signals. I haven't been able to catch all the data packets, but one of them explicitly addresses Sargas Ruk."

Aras paused and glanced up. "I guess we shouldn't be surprised. He probably made the discovery."

"It...seems he's done more than that," Ordis said uneasily. "He has special interest in this project. These transmissions...Operator, Sargas Ruk is on Mars."

Important A/N: Hey lads! Long time no see, huh? I'll keep this brief: in response to people mentioning my error on the Orbiter and landing craft differentiation, I read your comments and saw the issue. That was my bad. The previous chapter has received very minor edits to clarify the difference. Re-reading it isn't necessary, but know that Aras' Orbiter and Liset are now two different entities, and the Tenno's physical body with the Orbiter, not the Liset.

The second point I'd like to make is the reason for this hiatus. Since I've been enjoying the crap out of both RWBY and the crossover I'm writing for it, Oversleep has been on the back burner for me. I'm not blind to the fact that there are quite a few of you who have followed this story (hence why I haven't forgotten it), but if you've ever tried writing one story while your mind keeps going to another, you might know how unsatisfying it feels at times. This story's not dead, but it will have slower updates compared to the other one. That said, thank you, everyone reading this, for your patience and understanding.

Review Responses – I read all reviews, but I respond to those that seem like they are asking a legitimate question or bring up something that I'd like to address. If you stopped by and said something like 'good work' or 'good story', then know that, even if I don't directly respond to you below, you have my thanks! Also, sorry that this section is so long: quite a few reviews have accumulated during the hiatus.

Me: The reason for the hiatus is in the author's note.

joshingblock: I hear ya, but I do want to reply to people, and sending out mass PMs isn't very efficient. FF also tends to miscount the words on my documents. Not sure why. Glad to hear your thoughts about action; this chapter is just that, but the point is to lead up to the slower-paced future chapters on the Grineer holding site.

Anzer'ke: While I don't want to bloat Aras' importance as a Tenno too much, I do want to use Ordis because he is one of my favorite characters in the Warframe universe, and because I don't want to pump too many OC elements into the story. The error regarding dropships and the Orbiter has been explained in the A/N, and the reason for delayed Tenno help has been shortened to simple distance (very short edit in the previous chapter). Regarding Tenno bodies, that excerpt was removed due to the Liset/Orbiter correction. And yes, I have been using 'radio' rather loosely to refer to comms, and I took your suggestion into account and tried to make minor grammar edits to those terms. Same response on the adjective critique. You were certainly right about that (a re-read of the last chapter taught me so). As always, thank you for your continued feedback on not only the content, but on the presentation. Really does drive me to try and improve as a writer!

Guest: Your point on the Orbiter/landing craft issue was addressed in the A/N. And yes, John's reaction to the Operators should be interesting.

Umaru the Unfeathered: You're welcome! 1) I addressed this in the A/N. Sorry for the confusion. 2) That is true, but the Liset does uncloak to allow passengers to board or to deploy Archwings. They also leave behind traceable residue (either physical or energy-based), as indicated by radio chatter on the landing craft's Scanner. 3) Awesome! 4) Perhaps 'radio' wasn't the most spectacular word for me to use. It's more accurate to say (at least for this story), that the Grineer are using comms that Cortana doesn't recognize. It's a completely different technology used by a radically different faction.

Schwarz: I will keep that in mind, thanks :)

Thermonuclear: I see what you're saying. I'll definitely try to incorporate as much of Warframe as possible without crossing into its game designs portions.

Astrefernal: Thank you for the offer! Funny you should mention John using a sidearm, because in this chapter, he was originally supposed to borrow a Tenno weapon, but the outcome ended up the same, so I cut it out and decided he'd use it on another occasion (especially since he's been captured now).

thor8797: But would it work on Chief is the question. It works on Tenno and other agents, but I'm wondering if it will help a Spartan.

Prometheus-G747: Your evil laugh is quite formidable! The landing craft/Orbiter thing was actually a mistake, and has been explained in the A/N. That was my bad *Minecraft death sound*. Also, are you quite alright, dear reader? The amount of brackets you used may have exceeded typical human capacity. The only cure is a new chapter, you say? Hmm, I think I have provided (even if it is short…)! Also, changing Aras' gender might give poor Master Chief a heart attack if he sees people transforming like that! The man already has so many problems to deal with, don't you think? Especially after being captured...Also, I don't actually own the Liset Prime skin (I've got the plebeian Prisma skin instead!), but do I at least get points for trying to be fashionable? I think Prime versions are awesome, but I don't want to make Aras seem too decked out. He's an above-average Tenno experience-wise, that's for sure (he's based off my account level), but he's not like the god-king of Tenno kind (basically, anyone who owned Excalibur Prime before Umbra came out). Ah, so many story questions, but answering them would be spoiling it, wouldn't it? Think of the story as a nice meal, and the details as dessert. Having the latter before the former spoils your appetite! But I will give you some imaginary cookie points, since you asked so politely :P

Eltyr: Not dead, but it is on a slow update schedule. Hope that makes up for it a bit.

razer666L: Spot on with both observations! And yeah, John's taking a bit of a beating, but all in the name of plot progression.

AgentMaryland93: Glad to hear you're enjoying the ride. Sorry about misspellings; I proofread as much as I can, but they're bound to slip through every once in a while.

A Fan Me: Thank you for the kind wishes. I assure you, I'm in great health, and finally managed to put out a new chapter.

Gabe. d. clark. 1997: That's actually a pretty interesting idea. We'll see where that might take us.

Jack the Sparrow: And here it is!