"Take the day off, Sunny, You deserve it." Adam said snapping her a sharp salute before turning swiftly away to step through the automatic doors and into the official white room, and its official looking table and official looking chairs, matched only by its official looking people. An official crowd that he managed to, not only blend into, but look comfortable in standing at the head of the table in his sharp grey uniform and captain's cap.

He was a different man on days like this, polished to a shine like a newly sharpened blade, done up with buttons and ribbons, and fake appendages that didn't really belong to him. He traded in his smile too, replaced it with an official frown and brows furrowed in concentration. He looked like a commander on days like this, ten years older and ten years wiser.....

She much preferred her version of him. Not polished, not refined, but realistic, a crooked smile, an undying optimism, a trusting nature, and a single eye filled with the glee of their ever continuing mission.

The man in that room was a politician, the human she knew was soldier.

The automatic doors hissed closed with a metallic snick obstructing her vision and muffling the sound of human conversation coming from inside. Leaders of the UNSC and GA had come to be appraised of the current mission status. After the destabilization of the Tesraki tectonic structure, things across the universe seemed to have responded, like the snapping of a rubber band slowed down to a millionth of the time frame, slow, but violent none the less. She knew that the crack on the Tesraki homeward wasn't likely to have anything to do with the ever destabilizing nature of the rest of the galaxy, but she couldn't help but group it together. It had stared with the Drev, and her mother's strange device capable of pulling a ship out of warp, and then it had been the riots, the Tesraki disaster, and the strange cult. Now ships were going missing. Of course there were bound to be accidents, but Vrul scientists had detected a statistically relevant upsurge in the amount of disappearing ships, some, which had included civilian transports, in the center of habitable space..... Unlikely places to go missing.

She turned her back on the door and sighed leaning against the wall to her right and staring up at the florescent lights till her eyes grew soar.

"Missing your friend."

She jumped a bit against the sound of the voice and turned her head to look finding a familiar face towering above her, "Cannon" She said stepping forward to nudge him playfully with one of her armored shoulders. To anyone else the gesture may have looked aggressive, but that was a common way of showing affection with family members on her planet.

Cannon responded by nearly toppling her to the floor with the power of his push, and she had to leap away to regain her balance. As big as he was she didn't really have much against him in the strength department. She lifted her head to look up at him as he dropped a hand onto her shoulder and lead her away from the closed doors and the murmuring voices within. He was silent for a long moment leaving nothing but the whirring of the bionic skeleton that supported his crippled leg, "He would have made a good Drev I think."

Sunny tilted her head giving her brother a confused side-eye as they continued down the hall.

He turned to look back up the hall and shrugged, a very human gesture, "Fights as well as any Drev I know... yes.... I think he MAKES a pretty good Drev.... Without the extra limbs anyway."

"There supposed to be a point to this?" She wondered as they made their way out of the hallway and into the crew lounge. It was mostly deserted this time of day, even more so seeing as they were docked at one of the only human outposts this far into the system. She would be out there too, taking in the sights, experiencing the human things, but she felt bad doing it while Adam was locked up on the ship. Krill was gone, of course, dragged away by the new female doctor and a group of marines. She wondered what he was out doing.

Cannon gave a sigh and a grunt as he plopped himself down on one of the couches, taking up the entire thing with his massive body. She took a chair to the side small enough that it fit her comfortably as she waited for his response, "No point, I was just saying. I think our captain is a worthy holder of his position as Drev commander, that's all." She very much had a feeling that wasn't all, but decided not to push it. She tilted her head back to look up at the ceiling caressed by thin beams of light from the planets risen star. The crew decks didn't often see the light of a planet from inside the atmosphere.

"Can, I ask you a question?"

Cannon lifted his head to look at her, "Yeah shorty, what nugget of wisdom can I bestow on you."

She rolled her eyes forcing herself to ignore him, "How did you and Adam meet?"

He went quiet for a long moment, and she looked over to find that he had shifted from his lounging position to look over at her, "Did he not tell you the story?" He wondered in surprise

Sunny shook her head, "Well.... No, he hasn't mentioned it."

Cannon leaned back in his seat, "Well, that is an interesting story..... he.... Saved my life. Well maybe not my life but certainly my sanity..... I think we sort of did that for each other you know.... It started shortly after the war."

***

He watched from the window as the green purple surface..... Dotted with rivers or red.... Faded into the endless background of space as the shuttle shot away into darkness. He leaned his head against the window closing his eyes against the pain in his leg..... Pain so debilitating he could barely think. He hunched inwards on himself without even the comfort of his armor or a weapon to sustain him. He could feel the eyes on him as he sat hunched in the semi darkness of the shuttle clutching at his leg trying to rub away the pain, but having no luck.

He didn't look at them.

In front of his closed eyes, her face appeared before him, her beautiful white carapace gleaming in light of the fire as they circled each other on that first night. The night they had struggled for their lives in the ring. She had almost beaten him.... Nearly torn him in half. He had never loved someone so much than he did at that moment.... And now she was gone. The other half of his battle pair.

He didn't blame those that had sent her spirit to the halls of their ancestors. She had died in battle against a superior enemy, she would have wanted it that way, the thought made him smile a little. She had fought until she was overwhelmed by sheer numbers, and even to the last she had looked like a goddess, the spirit of battle come into form. He hadn't been so lucky.... He was a shame, wounded lying useless on the field stripped of his honor as the creatures obliterated his people one after the other.

His shame had been public for everyone to see, General Cosma had made sure of that. Faced with the glorious defeat of his father and his battle mate, he knew he was a disgrace wounded.... Too injured to walk by himself, battle useless. He would never see the halls of his ancestors.

The worst fate one could have asked for.

He had watched the slow change in his people as they realized what had happened, they had been beaten by a weaker opponent in their own game..... these strange off world creatures had beaten them in war half their size a fifth of their weight, and easily breakable.... It was a humbling experience.... For everyone accept his own kin.

He watched as his mother turned herself down the dark path of revenge..... Forbidden and unspeakable in all but the greatest tales of darkness. His own sister, who should have been praised for her feats in battle trodden under foot and blamed for their fall as if she had been personally responsible for their father's death, and their defeat. Now crippled, it had been his duty to rid the clan of himself. He could disgrace them no longer with his presence marred as it was by weakness.

The ritual of Apotheosis should have venerated his weakness, cleansed him by fire..... but standing atop the mountain under the heat..... he could not follow through...... he could not bring himself to the edge.

So the shuttle took him away into darkness, both literally and figuratively.

Never in the history of their planet had a Drev ever been forced to beg. They would rather have died first, and many did, but on the streets of distant outposts, GA planets, and rickety trade ships, he found himself relying on the kindness of strangers to eat, to sleep and for work.... What menial work he could do under the chronic pain of his own injuries. A chronic pain that only grew as he sunk towards despair reduced from a glorious god of battle to a pitiful waste of space and life.

He would contemplate finishing the job he should have the night he left on the shuttle. He stood atop cliffs over the fiery roaring of engines, and once against the barrel of a more human weapon...... but as low as he was, he didn't even deserve that anymore. How could he presume to ask the forgiveness of the spirits when his life wasn't worth anything anymore. He was a coward.

He was a shell of his former self, reduced to tasks to menial for the lowest of humans, for the lowest of any sentient creatures, tasks that had him on his knees wishing for death, but refusing to take it for he did not deserve it.

Every day was a torture.

And that is when he read about them, aboard a GA mining vessel in the middle of the night as he was mopping floors listening to the sound of his own despair. Holographic projections appeared on the walls in soft glowing greens and blues, illuminating his hatred for himself as his eyes drifted freely over the walls, and the words caught his eye. A research article on the effectiveness of a human hormone known as Oxytocin. He stopped to read without really realizing it under the burden of his own self-hatred.

It was a human-only chemical, but somehow managed to cause great effects in many other species in the GA. Statistically significant results had been shown for Tesraki, Rundi, and other species. Ironically the species it worked least on was the humans themselves. Though chemically stable substitutes for the hormone had been produced, the experience given by the humans was supposed to be cheaper, and more effective and safer.

***

So there he was again begging on the doorstep of another facility like a dog begging for scraps at the feat of its master.

He was used to the stairs by the time he was let in, those of fear, and hatred, and worst of all.... Pity. It had been a mistake to come there. He wasn't a member of the GA and so held no rights to be helped by the humans in the facility, and their overseers. But still, he was too pitiful even for them to kick out. He existed as a presence too dangerous to be approached to damage to be truly dealt with. He was constantly surrounded by the very creatures that had brought about his downfall. Outside of battle they seemed so weak. It would have been so easy to destroy them all.....

But they had been sure of the same thing once before, and look where that had gotten them.

His first encounter with the human had been a poor one. He had been living at the facility for a few months at that point, but even if he hadn't he would have recognized a member of the operational unit known as, "Steel Eye." Anywhere.

The human came aboard as a recovered officer of the war waiting as his paperwork for reconscription was examined by the UNSC. He was missing a leg, and was trailed by a fragile, false sense of optimism, and calm that could have been blown over by a strong breeze. He collapsed into strange and unknown fits at the slightest provocation helped only by the strange furry creature that stood at his side. The first time they had met, he had been wandering down the corridors of the facility trailing like a ghost barely able to function on his own..... wondering what it would feel like to disappear.

And there the human had been frozen at the end of the hallway eyes as big as dinner plates, Cannon had stopped taking in the missing leg, and the unusually athletic physique of a human, built more for war than anything else, and immediately knew who he was. They had stared at each other for a long moment before the human began to react strangely. Cannon didn't know human could change color, but this one did, turning white before his eyes, shaking uncontrollably, breathing erratically. A single step forward, and the human was reduced to screaming as its accompanying furry friend rushed to its side.

Cannon left soon after. They talked about getting rid of him, Cannon not the human, and he readied himself to return to his life of nothingness, but oddly enough, the human himself insisted that Cannon stay. He didn't find out for the longest time, as he was unable to ask the human himself without the situation quickly devolving. But slowly over time, they were able to stand at the opposite end of a hallway, then in a room together, then alone, soon the human spoke a few words to him, than entire sentences.

For the first time in almost a year, someone spoke to him with a measure of kindness. He wasn't a hired janitor, he wasn't an issue to be pawned off on someone else, he wasn't a problem that couldn't be fixed, he was a being with his own thoughts and intentions worthy of dignity he no longer thought he deserved. Perhaps the human's greatest motivation had been to fix itself, but what did it matter that first moment had been the greatest relief of his existence.

***

He didn't look up as the door opened, it wouldn't be worth moving. He would just let them come in and go as was their want and then hopefully to leave him to his misery.

"Cannon...."

It took him a moment to recognize the sound as speech, and even longer to recognize his own voice. "That's your name isn't it?" Slowly he lifted his head to find the human standing in the doorway, its luminous green eyes locked on him pupils wide with terror, hands clenched into white knuckled fists behind its back against the open door.

He hoped the human would just up and go away, but after a good five minutes of standing in silence he finally gave in, "Yes, human, that was once my name......." When no response came he continued grudgingly, "Why are you here?" He could see the human trembling from the corner of his eyes and turned to look back down.

The door closed.

"I'm here to help you." In surprise Cannon lifted his head watching as slowly, agonizingly, the human moved forward across the room unaccompanied. The eyes were wide with fear, the limbs locked against its terror, but still it came, and as it came it lifted a hand reaching upwards and outwards until...... until the fingertips brushed over the carapace of one of his arms. At first he assumed the human would draw back, could see that it wanted to, but then it proceeded onward. Fingertips splayed until the entire palm rested against his arm.

The human took a breath lifted its head to look up, "My Everest...... I conquered my Everest.... Now it's time for you to climb yours."

***

Oxy therapy is renowned and particularly known for its physical component. It may seem strange, petting stroking, holding a human can create feelings of bonding and good will, and reduce anxious, depressive, or even anger symptoms, but a more unknown part of the therapy involves talking. They don't respond as they are not trained doctors, but they do listen. And the creature listened a lot.

A human once unable to stand in the same room as him suddenly sitting on his shoulder, lounging in one of his arms as they walked about the facility sleeping curled against him in the darkness a strange gatekeeper against feelings of terror and inadequacy. And for the human, a sense of peace, sleeping in the same room as his greatest fear, as friends, nothing could scare him now.

Cannon became the first Drev to recover with the help of oxy treatment. The human conquered his greatest fear, and they parted ways at the end, one to travel the universe, and the other to become a newly winged captain in the UNSC.

***

"So what you're saying, is you were the little spoon with my friend before I was." Sunny teased

Cannon flipped her the bird, somewhat ineffectual seeing as he only had four fingers, "All I'm saying is that the best way to deal with stress is to hug a human...... but you already knew that."