18+ only! DA: Lunataur - Twitter- lunataur -OC content and the odd fan content. I draw giant/tiny art as well as mature/niche themed g/t art. A good portion of my content involves vore, fair warning. This is a sideblog; my main is ricerex.
Croc anon again, I’m sorry I don’t mean to be annoying and in hindsight I probably should have asked this before assuming the worst, did my ask from last week about anuids selling humans and Gaspar vore not go through? I didn’t want to be a pest about it after you were kind enough to answer so many other questions so I waited and then assumed it just wouldn’t be answered because I was annoying, but it only just occurred to me that maybe the ask got eaten… also I’ve been chipping away to the tune of a 4000ish word story with Gaspar that I’ve been dying to finish 😅 I might as well ask again here on the chance they didn’t go through. I saw in an old post something about anuids selling humans, are they sold like as pets or more for labor or just as food? Is it a black market type situation or is it openly known? Can Gaspar control his stomachs while he’s sleeping? Is he okay with vorish affection? Would he be open to helping a tiny in exchange for tastes or internal rubs if the tiny offered it? Thanks again for all the asks, I know you’re probably really busy so I’ll try to be more patient. And a big Saskatchewan Sorry for asking so much 😅🙏
Oh yeah that ask definitely didn't make it through. Sorry!
So to answer a few things
Anuids do buy and sell humans, and vice versa. It's definitely a black market thing but it's also pretty normalized. Humans don't always see anuids as people and anuids often consider humans too small to be anything but a pet or food.
Gaspar cannot do that, however he's a crocodilian so he's never really fully asleep. That being said he would certainly not object to some belly rubs. Younger Gaspar was a menace and had a really bad reputation but nowadays he's a lot calmer and would really appreciate a little buddy to snuggle with.
I do appreciate the asks, so no worries! Helps me get motivated to draw my OCs again.
MONSTER CHIEF STORY OOUUUUGHH YES wait what was that last part
Following the official end of the Human-Covenant War in 2552, relations between the two factions had only just begun to stabilize, and both sides still held their prisoners of war. It wouldn’t be until 2560, eight years following the Onyx Conflict, that all prisoners would be returned to their home factions, thus finalizing the agreement to continue peacetalks at a later date.
Two years later, one John-117, colloquially referred to as Master Chief, was deployed to Epsilon Halo with a small squadron of scouts to locate the wreckage of a small runner ship supposedly containing humankind’s only Covenant-species ambassador. Well, they were called humankind’s only ambassador, John himself doubted that they were the only one.
It would be the first true assignment he would be sent on with his new… situation, and John couldn’t say he had the utmost confidence in himself to remain covert during such a high-profile mission—with a noncombatant of all things. He had not voiced these concerns, but Charlie—having been assigned to his personal detail as someone who already knew what happened on Zeta Halo—had slapped him hard on the shoulder anyway (something that had hurt him far more than John), and declared that he would “do fine.” John had his doubts.
In any case, he was not in the position to refuse, and even then he wasn’t sure if he had the will to. Whatever that structure had done to his brain made him… difficult. Something that he regularly failed to find the words to explain to his medical detail. It didn’t matter all that much anyway. He had an assignment to complete. Hopefully, a crew to save.
With that eerie, unsettling silence still stagnant in his head, he and four others found themselves planet-side, standing in a barren, frigid wasteland. Cold water lapped at John’s ankles, sucking the heat from him in great swathes. Beyond, mountains towered out of half-frozen ocean, reaching for the dark clouds above. It was a dull, lonesome visage unmarked by the smoke and fire of a crashed ship that would have made this assignment so much easier. John’s guts twisted with the thought that the ship could have speared through the thin ice that made the majority of Epsilon’s surface and sunken, inevitably killing all inside.
The marines at his feet broke him from that train of thought by grumbling amongst themselves, complaining of the cold and uncomfortable gravity, but they oriented themselves at the same time, so John didn’t bother to break it up. He scanned the horizon and mid-ground instead, idly prodding around the points of his teeth with a tongue that felt too big for his mouth.
John huffed, shaking his head. It still felt weird to not have any sound whatsoever in his mind. Disturbingly empty. Without Cortana, or even Joy, it was more difficult to recall the protocol drilled into him for the beginnings of a mission. Thankfully, his newly-repaired comms system fizzled to life with the voice of one of the marines at his feet, directing him to kneel and explaining their path. Cold metal creaked as John settled carefully onto one knee, ensuring he didn’t squish anyone while the marines clamoured for the miniscule ledges and handholds in his armor. It reminded John of a fire-truck, the way they hung off his thighs and back. He was sure it was all coincidence—this way, he could carry them without having to worry about squishing anyone or having his hands tied—but he definitely felt very much like an awkwardly-shaped Scorpion. He hadn't told the UNSC engineers that.
Two marines clambered up his back to steady their rifles on his shoulders while two more clipped their harnesses to his armor, preventing them from falling while they did one last check of their equipment. John did his best to hold still while they made themselves comfortable, but even his breathing jostled the lot of them, and their subsequent movements put him off-balance. It wasn’t the most convenient arrangement, he had to admit, but no vehicle was getting over the jagged terrain, and exposure suits or not, the marines would freeze if this theoretical vehicle broke through the ice. It was better for John to carry them all.
He crushed a terrible thought before it could form and swallowed the remains of it.
One of the marines patted his pauldron, a signal to stand, and more than a suitable distraction. A voice crackled in his ear soon after, directing him South. John turned to orient himself, pleasantly surprised when the sudden shifts in weight from his new passengers now moved with him, much as they had been trained to while riding outside of a moving vehicle. It helped him to not bellyache to himself as he walked. With no Cortana, no Joy with him, it would be a terribly lonesome experience.
“What are we looking for again?” Or, perhaps not. One of the marines perched atop his back briefly lowered their rifle to lean towards their neighbor at his thigh, though there was really no point as the comms carried their voices through far worse than a little distance and wind.
The one on his left hip sighed, helmet thunking audibly against his rifle’s scope. “Also Blue Moon, the diplomacy ship—do you EVER actually listen during debriefs, Hemmings?”
Hemmings, apparently, shifted his weight heavily to the left, like he was leaning. “I mean, not really… our assignments have been so low-stakes since the end of the war, y’know? It’s hard to listen when it’s like if we fail, fuck all happens.”
“Maybe they’re just putting YOU on the low-stakes missions.” A third. John huffed, fogging his visor. He could tell them to stop talking, but… well, it wasn’t as though he hadn’t heard worse. As long as they stayed focused, he didn’t have to care. A quieter part of him admitted that the company was nice. “This is a breath of fresh air from breakin’ up conflicts from the asscrack of the galaxy with a bunch of split-lips.”
“Is it? I heard you’re awful sweet on that real big one with the green eyes. Have somethin’ you wanna admit to us, Robinson?”
“Careful, Hemmings, he’s in perfect range to tear you a new asshole—not that you need three.” The marine on his right shoulder.
“Am I offending your sensibilities, Richards?” He could hear Hemmings’ smile through the comms. “We’re all thinkin’ it.”
“Naw, I think it’s jus’ you, Hemmin’s.” The fourth. “Pers’nally, I’m more concerned ‘bout whether or not this ambassador is still livin’. I’m ‘bout to freeze my tits off out here, and we’re all in exposure suits.”
A pause. The wind howled past John’s face. It was odd to feel it again, through what should have been solid metal and mesh undersuit. He thought about that instead of what could have happened to the diplomacy ship. There wasn’t anything he could do about it until he found it. He turned his attention back to the faceless ice.
“Hey, they got an ex-Covenant security detail,” Robinson said. “The aliens have better tech than we do. I’m sure they’re fine.”
Hemmings squawked, throwing his weight back from John’s shoulder presumably to look at Robinson. “Ex-Covenant? How’d we know this ain’t a setup?”
“You’d know if you’d read the debrief,” Richards muttered at the same time the fourth marine shook her head.
“Naw, they’d been off on some good-will vacation on the squid-head’s planet ‘fore they were comin’ back for peacetalks. ‘F they were gonna get backstabbed, it woulda’ happened there.”
John had remembered thinking that it was an odd concept, an ex-PoW willingly returning to enemy lines to foster diplomatic relations not a year after their rescue, but apparently it had been their suggestion. An effort to prevent further conflict. A conflict they were now trapped in. Truthfully, he didn’t believe the elites had betrayed them. To his knowledge, they had been under the Arbiter’s protection for the length of their stay, and as much as his battlefield instincts wanted to blame those he had fought against for years, the fact of the matter was that this war, in its dissolution, had only become ever-more complicated.
John, himself, with his new, strange body, was all the proof he needed of that.
“Awful hopeful there, Taylor.” Hemmings was still suspicious. “But I hope you’re right.”
“And I hope we’re not about to find a human-popsickle,” Richards said, and John started when a tiny finger attached to an equally tiny hand appeared in his field of view, pointing. John’s gaze skipped along the ice as he followed it up a glacier.
Smoke.
Just a wisp of it, escaping up into the dark clouds, silvery and oddly clean for a wreckage. John rumbled, uneasy. The ice was just about as tall as him, and a frigid blue, sturdy-looking, but John was also very heavy-looking, and he wasn’t confident in the ice’s ability to compete against him.
Hemmings patted his neck. “We’ll head up first. That ice might not hold you, Chief… no offense.”
And so it was.
John knelt again, letting his marines slide easily onto the ground. The banter fell silent as they coalesced into a neat wedge, passing climbing gear between each other which quickly proved pointless when John gently—always, always gently, if he was not he could crush them—plucked Taylor from the snow. She squealed, undignified, but quite charming, as he lifted her up to the precipice of the glacier, but the whole lot of them adjusted quickly, instead falling in single file for John to bring them all up. A completely trivial task that could have been half an hour of climbing.
Robinson huffed and used his fingers for stability as he settled on his feet again, sharing glances with the other marines as they all looked at the ship… well, not a ship, actually, an escape-pod. It was half-buried in snow, crumpled almost beyond recognition. Hemmings, the smallest of them, was probably the only one who could stand upright inside, it was so crushed. The assumption that anything inside was dead would have been natural if it weren’t for the quietly smouldering camp stove settled lopsidedly near a low spot in the snow.
John squinted. Reached—slowly—over his marines’ heads and carefully pressed into the powder.
It collapsed.
The entrance of the escape-pod yawned open, lit by strobing red lights.
It was Hemmings that took point, and everyone else fell into place behind him in a loose, narrow wedge. He called into the dark. Once. Twice. The lights continued strobing. John squinted, something taut in his chest. Another tense, hot breath edged white at the corners of his vision. Hemmings made it to the entrance of the pod.
Something flashed in the dark.
“Abort! Abort, NOW—” Hemmings yelled as a piece of the world peeled away from its place, blurring as specialized technology struggled to keep up with the movement. The bite of plasma catching sang through the air, pale blue light snaking into a forked blade that steamed visibly as snow fell heavier.
Before anyone could have stopped it, Hemmings’ neck found its way a hair’s length from that deadly light.
The squad froze, weapons up. John found them sheltered against one of his hands, the other reaching towards Hemmings. A growl rumbled through him like thunder.
Short puffs of white bloomed into the air from over Hemmings’ shoulder, coming in quick, feathery spurts. The energy sword quivered.
“Who… ” It was not any of his marines. It was not rough from years of yelling. It was not hoarse from tense silence. It was quiet. Soft. John almost couldn’t hear them. The tip of the energy sword was fully shaking now. Its blade sizzled almost louder than the voice against the snow. “UNSC. You’re UNSC.”
As quickly as it had been drawn, the sword fizzled out.
Hemmings gasped as he was pushed away from the camouflaged individual, and John took the opportunity to gather him, quickly, to his chest. Footprints appeared in the snow. Small. Human-shaped. “Oh my god, you’re marines, I’m—sorry, I—”
“You’re the ambassador.” Robinson tilted his head. The barrel of his rifle came down carefully. One of his hands rested on John’s finger as he stepped out from the wall John made of himself.
His heart hammered so hard he could hear it.
“I—yes—oh, uh—” With a flicker, the av-cam faded, fizzling out hexagon by hexagon. It peeled back to show the light, Covenant-style chestplate underneath, sleek but awkward-fitting and splattered with purple blood. They dropped their shoulders, and it slipped off, thumping into the snow. Obviously not theirs. Their hands came around to clutch at their arms. “Sorry, I thought you were—uh—pirates.”
Somehow, the metric of fifty-four kilograms had not prepared John for how incredibly small they were. They were taller than Hemmings, but tall in the manner that it looked like someone had stepped on their feet, grasped their head, and simply stretched them upwards. Even drowning in an emergency exposure suit far too large for them, he could tell they were skinny. He could see, easily, the tendons and muscles moving under what skin was still exposed, and as they rocked back and forth on their heels in the snow, they moved inside the suit more than the suit moved with them.
It was really a pathetic sight.
“Well, we’re not pirates.” Hemmings from against John’s chest. He released the poor man, letting him find his own feet again. He didn’t seem too shaken up. “Is that what took out your ship?”
The ambassador stuffed the hilt of their energy-sword into their sleeve (a terrible place to keep it) to reach up and tug on their own hair, dragging the silken black strands through their fingers. From the general mess it was in, John assumed it was a habit. “Yes! Well—probably, I don’t know, actually. Dir ‘Vogumm—he was my security for the journey—kind-of just shoved me in the pod and ejected me, and—well, the ship went down somewhere over thata-way—” they gestured toward East “—so I assume it was pirates. This is pirate territory.”
John had never met an Earth-rabbit, but he could only assume this is what they were like. The ambassador twitched this way and that every other second. Tangled their fingers together. Didn’t stop to breathe when they spoke, and it all came rushing out in a waterfall of words anyway. Cortana had used a certain combination of words once, to describe fleeing Jackals. What was it?
Prey-animal fear.
Yes, that described the person in front of him well.
“We gathered,” Hemmings said slowly, or perhaps it was only slow in comparison to them. “Well, lucky for you, we brought a Prowler, not some dinky little cargo-ship, so pirates won’t be a worry anymore.”
There was something eerie about the way they tilted their head, John decided. It was a little too far to be comfortable. “It’s planetside, I hope? Well, a transport is planetside, right?”
A look passed amongst the group. “No,” Robinson said after a moment too long. “Why?”
The ambassador bit their lip. Rocked back and forth more. “Well—I mean, it might not be a problem—I hope it won’t be a problem—”
“Today, please,” Hemmings stressed.
They said it all at once. “I haven’t been able to get any signals out from this halo at all.”
A tense, awkward silence.
Robinson was the first to reach his comm. “UNSC Spectral Vanguard, come in, this is Fireteam Spearhead requesting extract.”
The wind yowled distantly.
Taylor, then. “UNSC Spectral Vanguard, please come in, this is Fireteam Spearhead.”
Robinson. “Spectral Vanguard, do you read?”
Hemmings. “UNSC Spectral Vanguard, this is Fireteam Spearhead, package is secure, come in.”
The ambassador stole a glance at him when John didn’t follow in the footsteps of his marines, but quickly returned to rocking on their heels. “Sorry.” He wasn't sure what they were apologizing for.
Four heads turned to look at John. “Chief?” Taylor asked. He was their commanding officer.
This was his call.
John swung his head around, searching through the white for somewhere to shelter. The pod wouldn’t be big enough for them all, and considering the state of the armor the ambassador was wearing, he was reasonably sure there was a dead body in there somewhere. All there was, was ice, and frigid water, and mountains. Frozen, and barren. His gaze fixed on the grey peaks. “Every installation has a cartographer facility. We should find it and take shelter there. We might be able to make contact from the control room.” He ushered his marines closer. The ambassador seemed to waffle between following and staying in the snow, nervously twisting their fingers. “Those mountains will be a good place to start.” In the interest of time, John simply grabbed his marines from the glacier and placed them in their spots against his armor, letting them settle as he reached for the next.
The ambassador—Christ, they looked so young, standing there alone. They had no name on file, nor age, but they couldn’t have been older than twenty-five, surely—stared at him. He reached. They flinched before he’d even gotten close.
“You’re Master Chief?” They asked when he hesitated.
His nod was as slow as his hand when he looped his fingers around them. He’d have to carry them in his hands—he bit his tongue—even if his armor did have room for another to cling, he’d worry they’d get blown away.
Their heart raced against the pad of his index finger as he closed them in a loose fist. They looked anywhere but down. “You’re bigger than I thought you’d be.” They laughed. It was a strange, halfway-hysteric thing.
“What do they feed you guys up there?”
“People!” Hemmings shouted at the same time as Richards’ flat “steroids.”
The ambassador wrinkled their nose, not betraying the thundering of their tiny, tiny heart in John’s hand as he plucked them away from the still-burning campstove and their broken escape pod.
He settled them against his chest in a cupped hand, turned towards the mountains, and set off without a second thought.
The silence lasted approximately five seconds.
“Hey!” Hemmings was turning out to be much more of a people-person than anyone else John had met. He leaned over John’s shoulder to stare down at the ambassador. “What’s your name? It feels weird calling you ‘Ambassador’ in my head.”
They stared at him a moment longer than was polite. “Is that what they’ve been calling me?”
“Yeah, and it’s gettin’ real old. Name. Gimme.”
Another stretch of silence. They drummed a tune only they knew against John’s armor. “Uh—you can call me Bass, I guess.”
Hemmings seemed proud of himself about until Richards piped in with “is that short for ambassador?”
John spared a glance down and found their ears rapidly turning red. “A little,” they said. “It’s been… a minute since I’ve had a name.”
A beat of silence. Almost too quick to notice. The quiet understanding to not touch that topic unless it was brought up passed between them.
“And you picked Bass?” Hemmings asked, exasperated. “C'mon you can do better than that!”
“I don't see you providin’ any ideas, Hemmin's,” Taylor countered. “Don't listen to him, Pumpkin, he's more of a jarhead than anyone else in the corps.”
“Jar… head?” They were asking, but Robinson bowled over them easily. They were so quiet, it was hard not to.
“I agree with Hemmings. We need something to call you, and Bass is… a fish. Ambassador could be shortened to Ador—or Amber!” Robinson obviously thought his idea was marvelous. The ambassador themself—Bass—not so much. They were making an… interesting face.
“What's wrong with fish?” Entirely steamrolled by Taylor's “For God's sake have you ever met an Amber? That ain't an Amber, you're more like… a Paige. How about Paige?”
Richards, it seemed, couldn't resist. “We were supposed to be working off ‘Ambassador’, Taylor, how did you get Paige?”
“Y'know, like page! Like all’at administrative bull that diplomats do!”
Bass gave up speaking entirely to stare at their hands. They rolled the energy-sword's hilt around between them, expertly avoiding the triggers to unsheathe the blade.
“Do you know how to use that?”
They flinched. Looked up at him. They had to crane their neck to look into his visor. John's marines quieted.
“Yeah,” they mumbled. “Kind of. Roh ‘Xellos taught me enough to get by. He said I looked too pathetic to bear… kind of. It's hard to put that in English, I think.”
“You speak split-lip?” Taylor asked, and her weight shifted on John's hips as she leaned to look at them.
“Say something cool!” Hemmings demanded immediately. Richards walloped him upside the head.
Bass thought for a moment before clearing their throat. If John was being honest, he wasn’t expecting much out of them, enough to get by, perhaps, but the sound they ground out of their throat was raw, and guttural, and an utterly perfect imitation of what he'd heard his fair share of on the battlefield. They spoke slowly, stuttered some, and he figured that they could not growl as thunderously as the Arbiter could when he was undoubtedly cursing John under his breath, but truly that did not make the sound any less impressive. That they could reproduce a language meant for four mandibles at all was a feat in his mind.
His marines seemed to agree, and the icy air filled with delighted chatter as John walked.
“How'd you learn to do that?”
“There wasn't much else to do on a Covenant prisoner ship.”
“Did they make you fight?”
They shook their head. “No, I think they realized that would have killed me. I wasn't very old at that point.”
“Wait! Hey! Important question; have you ever tried popcorn?”
“No.”
Outrage. John huffed fondly as Hemmings and Taylor argued over popcorn versus candied apples as the first thing they needed to try, a conversation only tolerated by Robinson and Richards who continued asking quieter questions about their time as a prisoner.
“I had it pretty easy,” they pointed out several hours later. “I didn't really have important intel or anything—I think they were trying to make another Master Chief, but I'm not the best stock, y'know? I think they just kept me ‘cause I was the only one they'd managed to catch for a while. I'm sure the others have more interesting stories.”
John was sure “the others” would rather talk about anything other than being a prisoner of war.
“Chief.” He grunted, unable to turn his head without possibly squashing Taylor, but wanting Richards to know that he heard him. “We should stop and rest. We don't know what's out here, and… “ Quieter, then. “I don't know how well the ambassador's holding up.”
John looked down at his hand. At some point, they'd tucked their legs up under themself and abandoned the sleeves of their exposure suit in favor of hugging themself to presumably keep warm. It was too big on them, it must not be sealing in heat properly. Now that they weren’t talking, he realized they were shivering.
They weren’t exactly equipped for camping. His team had exposure suits, but nothing to keep them from the frigid ice. A little cold wouldn't do all that much to him—as of the moment there was little more than a chill nip in the air for John—but he was sure it was downright freezing for the small team. Well… if he kept them close, they could stay warm by his body-heat, perhaps.
John got halfway through a huff, thought better of it, and opened his nasal vents to breathe softly over the scruffy thing doing their damn best to merge with his hand. It didn’t stop them shaking, but they did offer him a thumbs-up. He needed something to keep them all out of the wind. Temperatures were already dropping in the simulated dusk, and John didn't have high hopes for what it'd feel like being out in the open.
The only upside to this world being covered in ice and snow was that it was an insulator.
It wasn't hard to find a thick, heavy pile of snow and ice big enough to fit him and the whole team. John knelt before a hard rock cliff shielding a high pile of compacted snow. The cliff would act as a good support. “We're stopping here for the night.”
His marines unclipped themselves with stiff fingers and landed in the snow with stiffer legs, complaints silenced by cold and weariness. They could go on, John knew, but there was no point in completely exhausting his team. He loosened his grip on Bass and let them slide off his hands before straightening and pulling away. Five small faces stared up at him.
John swallowed a bit of excess saliva, and very, very firmly thought to himself “no”.
Cooling night air only made the biting wind faster and sharper, and his companions were certainly feeling it. They huddled close amongst each other—save for Bass, who kept about four feet of space between them and the nearest person at all times—and to him as well, using his leg as a shield from the wind. Something in his chest went soft and watery, watching them crowd around him, and he sighed when he forced himself to step away. “Stay back. I don't need you underfoot.”
Hemmings grumbled something that sounded derogatory, but didn't say anything after John plunged his hand into the icy snow and started ripping Warthog-sized chunks out of it. John didn't hold it against him. The cold must have been getting uncomfortable, perhaps even painful. As good as exposure suits were, they were designed to keep people alive. Not comfortable. The faster he did this, the sooner they’d all be more comfortable.
“Do you hear that?”
John paused, turning to look to the side. He hadn't even realized Bass had moved, much less so far. They were a safe distance away, at least, but had crept right up to the ice wall. John tried very hard to not think of how easily he could have crushed them without realizing, but was still halfway to finding his voice and telling them to stay behind him when their words really registered. So, he shut his mouth and listened.
Nothing but a soft, faint ringing that he’d never noticed before his transformation.
“I think—”
Hell came calling.
The snowbank collapsed, falling in on itself, but not inwards, no, that would be far too convenient. Frigid water lunged out from the breaking snow—like shrapnel from an explosion—and for a heartbeat, it was all John could do to plant his feet and brace against a heavy torrent of frozen slush beating against his armor. His whole chest was soaked, sending a sensation like a shiver that just wouldn’t bite through his whole body. Even with his enhancements, the sudden shock had John gasping and still.
The world groaned as the last of the water drained away and the snow settled again. John fought control back from his protesting body, forcing muscles unwilling to cooperate to turn his head and search the white. “Report!” He managed to choke out as he spotted Robinson pulling Hemmings out of the snow and Richards still flush against Taylor’s side. She must have pulled him out of the way. “Everyone! Now!” He bit down hard on his tongue to keep his jaws closed.
“Jus’ a little shaken up over here, Chief,” Taylor called. “We’re okay, we’re all… “
But that wasn’t right. That wasn’t right, because John could only pick out four little figures slipping on the newly-forming ice. He scanned once. Twice. Thrice. Not even the flicker of av-cam. They were under the snow somewhere, but even then, the white powder was turning dark then clear.
Soaking through to unearth a great, dark sea.
“Stay here.” Chief’s voice was impassive, his heart thundering in his oversized body. His movements were slow, calculated, only bare conditioning keeping his hands from shaking as he dipped them in slowly—infuriatingly slowly, but rash movements could carry them helplessly into danger. He was large, Chief reminded himself, large enough, certainly, to chop up the water and make it only harder for them to escape.
One horrible fragment of ice at a time, he forced the gap wider, thinking about anything but the fact that their suit was ill-fitting and likely unsealed. That they could have drowned in the precious seconds he was forced to waste being delicate.
Five seconds turned to ten and he could plunge—no. Delicate. Careful. Slow, as much as he loathed to—his head under, crawling underneath the ice, prone, with his belly to the cliff’s foot. His visor started trying to frost immediately. Ten to fifteen, and he still didn’t see anything, even with his personal flood lights engaged. Fifteen to twenty—
An empty suit.
Stark white, it went floating, leisurely, past him. Like a ghost.
Chief—John—looked up, following the path of its drifting towards the underside of the ice. In the murk of the water, bright emergency orange shone like a beacon. John pushed himself up, crouching in the space between solid ground and dark ice. His floodlights landed solidly on a body, wire-thin and turning a terrible, pale shade, wrapped up in achingly human clothes—that bright orange long-sleeve tee and darkwash jeans, no socks, no shoes—and groping clumsily along the jagged underside of the surface-ice. They turned to look at him, something glassy in their gaze as he enclosed them carefully in his hands. He didn’t think. He didn’t let himself think. There was one correct answer. Otherwise, they would freeze to death.
Whatever lizard-brain had been transplanted into him was more than willing to oblige.
John swallowed awkwardly around the cold, twitching figure nestled neatly into the divot of his tongue, choking back a gag as disgusting, salty water raked against the back of his tongue and didn’t even bring with it the frigid body. No. Instead, they wheezed harshly between his jaws, still but tense. He could only be grateful they weren’t struggling. They could easily hurt themself on his teeth, or even him if they got themself lodged somewhere. They coughed. John’s tongue twitched. Their chill was seeping into him. They were still shivering.
There was a very easy solution to this problem. John rocked his jaw a little on its hinge. Tiny, feathery breaths panted against the sensitive inner membranes of his mouth.
They whined—a horrible, pained sound, strangled and halfway broken—when he shifted them, carefully, delicately, to the side, pressed gently—gently, gently, gently—against his gums. John tried not to notice the faint, sweet-savory flavor—like… hibachi, a thought which John immediately felt guilty for. But the more they warmed—whimpering; left helpless and paralyzed, stiff from cold, pained by heat—the more it invaded his senses. It’d been so long since he’d had real food, prepared with more seasoning than a packet of liquid cheese. The sheer depth of flavor all at once was almost overwhelming; sweet, meaty, salty, all quite literally at the tip of his tongue without even a word of protest—they couldn’t protest.
It was addicting.
John shook his head, trying to physically dispel the fog that had set upon his brain. Bass wailed, voice sharp as the blade they wielded. Guilt bubbled thickly in his chest, but that only helped, reminding him of who he was—what he was doing—easily. “I’ve got you, soldier,” he found himself saying, and he tried not to dwell on the strangeness of having two mouths. He hoped they couldn’t somehow end up in the other one… something about it made John’s insides clench. Not safe.
All things that were completely irrelevant to the civilian currently enclosed in the maw of something doubtlessly frightening. John worked his tongue around them a little, trying not to seem like he was… well, licking them, when that was exactly what he was doing. Their skin was still chilled to the touch, and he was trying to push more heat into them rather than letting them marinate in his breath.
They didn’t seem overly fond of the strategy. They found their voice with a hitched breath and tiny, cold hands pushing back against him. “Chief!” They whined it out, high-pitched and wobbly, like their voice was trying to give out. “I—I don’t think—”
“Easy, Bass, you’re alright,” he interrupted before they could work themself into a full breakdown. John could only hope it worked the same with small, panicked civilians as it did with soldiers. “I caught you before you could freeze or drown. We’re still under the ice right now. Once you’ve calmed down, we can find somewhere else to bed down.” They, at least, let him talk, though the odd fluttering, sometimes-touching sometimes-not didn’t stop. They shoved at his tongue suddenly and with no small amount of flailing limbs and squealing, seemingly at random, and by the time John got his next thought in order, he couldn’t tell them heads or tails. “Stop struggling before you hurt yourself.”
They laughed, strained and unsteady. He wondered what their normal laugh sounded like, when it seemed they only ever managed one when they were terrified. “Forgive me for—” they shuddered “—my skepticism, Master Chief, but—” He tried to nudge them away from his teeth, and they… hissed. Fully hissed, much like the Arbiter had during their time fighting, low, and guttural, and laced thickly with a snarl. “—I very much think I am, perhaps, significantly not alright!” They were talking to him. That was good. Talking, and responsive, and seemingly understanding the situation. Something metal clicked sharply against his teeth.
John huffed. Of course they still had their energy sword and hadn’t used it yet. He didn’t know if he should count himself lucky, or them a fool. “If you truly thought I was going to hurt you, you’d have cut me open by now.” Giving them the idea perhaps made him the fool. The vaguest notion of a soft, feminine voice calling him just that made his chest crumple. She sure did know how to pick them.
“No! No, I just—just think that we could come to a… an agreeable solution.” They weren’t slipping about so much anymore. He could feel each of their minuscule fingers against his gums, splayed and looped around his teeth. Trying to keep themself from the back of his throat, he figured.
John squished them against his teeth a little, trying to wring the rest of the chill from them when they very much did not want him to. Still, he wouldn’t have any of his team losing a finger to frostbite, panicked or not. They made it hard for him; it was like chasing a marble around his mouth. A very cold, very fragile—okay, maybe they weren’t like a marble at all, but they kept slipping and sliding over, under, around his tongue. “There is no agreeable solution. Your suit is soaked, and we have no supplies or shelter. If I let you out now, you’ll freeze. If I let you out once you’re warm, you won’t be warm for very long.” Their heart hummed more than beat against his tongue. He swallowed back pooling saliva, and they moaned a low, horrified noise.
“And if I stay? No—no offense, Mister Chief—” Mister? “—but your teeth are kind of, sort of, a little bit, no offense, GINORMOUS! And—and not to be uh—inflammatory, or—or like—racist? Giant-toothy-creature-ist? But I like all of my pieces attached, please, and thank you, and even just a little accident—” They scrambled around like a caught mouse when he shoveled his tongue back under them and away from the front of his mouth. Perhaps that would help. Cortana would know. Weapon would too. John cursed his blasted luck.
“You won’t be staying with my teeth.” And they were right. He was not afraid to admit that. Keeping anyone in his mouth during any kind of strenuous activity would be a risk.
There was a small beat of silence where everything, even Bass, was still.
“No. No, no, no, no, nononononono, Chief—Mister—Master Chief you don’t have to—I really don’t think—” They made a horrible hiccupy bird noise. John’s stomach grumbled, impatient. “That’s worse—you see—see how that’s worse, right? I’ll—I’ll take the teeth, actually, please, and thank you, and—” He lifted his tongue a little, pressing them gently—it was easier, he noticed, to be gentle and exact with them in his mouth—to his palette so he could turn his head and face where he’d come. He couldn’t get out of the water yet. He didn’t care in the slightest for the UNSC’s orders, but he couldn’t risk terrifying his fireteam too, lest they panic as well. “—oh no, no, no—”
“Chief?” A voice, crackling in his ear. Robinson. “Are you still alive down there?”
“I’m still alive. Package secured. We’ll be up shortly.” A pause as he waited to ensure Robinson was satisfied. “And once you’re secured—” Saying “swallow” just… felt wrong. So he didn’t. “—we’ll rejoin the rest of Fireteam Spearhead to extract.” How, exactly, they were going to extract was still up for debate. One problem at a time. “And I will turn you over to UNSC’s diplomacy division.”
“You—god, that guy was right, they really do feed you people—that could take DAYS!” The last was a yowl, loud enough to make even John’s head rattle. They squirmed a little in place, but he held them down easily. The hardest part was making sure he didn’t squish them.
“In which case, you would be warm for days.”
Another stretch of silence. They went still. “Are you kidding, stupid, or am I missing something?” Their voice was wet. Near tears, if John had to guess.
He tried to hum comfortingly and it ended up rolling into a growl. He grimaced. “I won’t hurt you,” he tried. Compared to them, his own vocal range felt very, very limited. Monotone. He couldn’t imagine what this sounded like, coming from him. “That would defeat the purpose of this whole assignment,” he added, just in case.
They laughed again. Salt bloomed against his tongue. They were crying. “So—so what, you have an ‘off’ switch in there?”
“In a sense.”
“And you—you expect me to believe all… this—well I suppose I don’t have a choice, now, do I?” They kicked his tongue. It didn’t hurt, only a light impact. They realized there was no point in struggling. Good.
“No.” Plain and simple. “But I would prefer your cooperation.”
“So I don’t kick around and scare everyone outside, too?”
John snorted. They were, at least, quick on the uptake. “Ideally, but ideally this will also not be… altogether terrifying.”
“We’re a stargate or two past terrifying, Master Chief.” They were warm, now, still taut and drawn up into—John prodded at them a little bit with the tip of his tongue—into a tiny ball, hugging their knees. They sniffled. Loudly. “If I die, ‘m haunting your intestines ‘n giving you indigestion.”
“You won’t die.” Something he could promise. He should take the opportunity when they weren’t fighting him. “Keep still.”
Another stretch of silence. They didn’t move.
Then, just as John thought they were waiting on him, they shifted. Untangling themself and stretching out. Even all straight, they didn’t take up his whole mouth. “Please don’t choke on me,” they whined, and he felt them cross their ankles against the back of his tongue. Like they expected to fall.
“I’ll do my best.”
They were about halfway through “that’s not funny” when he tossed his head back and swallowed all at once.
They stuck fast—not for any struggle, but their shirt, even soaked through, clung to his throat like spider’s web—at their ribs. Their breath puffed against his flesh. Their heart beat through his nerves. He could feel, acutely, every one of their tiny bones pressing into his throat, the tiny skeletal figure of the person with their life in his hands… so to speak. Something spasmed in his own chest, and John swallowed again.
Just like that, they went down easy. At least, far easier than any pill he’d ever taken. Impulsively, he brought a hand up to track them—and they made that really quite convenient, filling his throat just enough that his neck strained under it, enough that he could feel their rough shape on the pads of his fingers when he brushed one against his Adam’s apple. Still as they were, they slipped down smooth as whiskey, and their weight spilled into him just right. John shuddered. Maybe a little too right.
He sighed out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding, like he’d been carrying tension all this time that hadn’t dropped until they settled heavily into the pit of his stomach. “Make yourself comfortable.” They kicked him. Only a little, though.
John breached out of the water precisely four minutes and twenty-three seconds after he’d gone under. Distantly, he heard Hemmings make a “Godzilla” joke, and after he’d shaken his head to clear off the excess water, he found them all gathered as close as they could reasonably get while still leaving him space to haul himself out of the water.
“Where’s the ambassador?” Richards asked before he’d even gotten back on his feet. John found himself tensing his core—why eluded him, but what became increasingly obvious as he acclimated himself to the comparatively balmy air. Bass simply would not stop moving. Touching. They were touching everything that they could reach. They shifted their weight every few seconds. Kneed him sharply in the liver as they floundered around.
“Armor emergency storage,” he answered easily, and it wasn’t… a lie, per se. Intentionally misleading, yes, but his armor did happen to have emergency storage. Said emergency storage was also simply… him. “Lost their suit in the water, so they’ll stay with me.” He squashed them a little flatter when a peculiar, almost itchy sensation made itself known by hijacking his brain. John bit down on a growl. Stop that.
The excuse was accepted easily enough. It was designed to be.
“We’ll move to more stable ground then set up camp.” Such that any camp they could set up would be. “It’ll be a few hours more.”
No one complained.
John did find a good spot three hours after simulated dusk had fallen, and brought his marines close to his chestplate to sleep. He could keep watch—he barely needed to sleep at all anymore, after all. The only consequence was that it left him with only faint movement in the tangle of his guts and his thoughts.
Or not. “You called me Bass.” He could barely hear them himself, and their voice hummed up through his very bones. John tightened the perimeter of his arms around his fireteam. No one stirred save for them, wrapped deep in his core. Their movements fluttered under his skin, and John could feel every bit of it. Hands here, knees there, the scuff of their hair against his stomach, the points of their fingernails. He could humor them.
“I did.”
“Thought it was ‘sposed to be Paige.” They were feeling around, hands feather-light as they stroked along the walls closest to his spine. It almost itched.
“You called yourself Bass.”
“I did.” John huffed as they pressed their hand heavily in at him, and—oh. He tensed up, and they fumbled. “Sorry. Did that hurt?”
“No.” No. It was one of the most horrible, wonderful, intense sensations he’d felt in… a long time. Like someone had reached into his muscles and simply ripped the knots, and age, and wear out of them.
He breathed very, very shallowly as Bass hesitantly pressed at him again. “I don’t like it in here, by the way. You smell weird… no offense.” John was not under the impression he smelled at all, but then again it did make sense. They kept talking, and, more importantly, kept doing whatever it is they were doing that was making his muscles feel like water. “But ‘s kinda cool. Did you know gastro has the second highest density of neurons associated in the human body?” No, and that did not seem like information he could ever make use of. “Kinda cool to think about that.” They did not wait for him to respond. “Sangheili have three stomachs. They’re kind of like ruminants in that way, actually, ‘cause they’re cyclical. Go to stomach one, get all ground up, go to stomach two, get pickled, back to stomach one…”
John found himself somewhat tuning them out after the first five minutes, and simply letting them ramble the next hour. They were “a nervous yapper,” and apparently had a hard time stopping once they’d started. According to them, it was a fair trade for them sitting in his gut “turning into a giant sad prune”. John thought it was more than fair. They talked about anything and everything—how they thought they were the only one who had heard the ice break because John and also every single other marine had damaged eardrums, their favorite animals, the animals on Sangheilios, their sparse interactions with Arbiter Thel’ Vadamee, proper energy-sword stances, food, what they thought they tasted like (John decided not to add to that conversation in the slightest), everything was a topic. They talked at him for hours, and all the while they… squished him. Kneaded at the lining of his stomach like they were at a massage parlor, slowly working over every square inch of him within reaching distance, leaving John no more useful than a beached jellyfish. It was… familiar in a way he couldn’t place. Comfortable. Their voice completely drowned out that terrible soft ringing.
Forget paid leave or vacations where he wondered after the UNSC anyway, this was more than enough.
John came out of his stupor near dawn. He hadn’t slept, not in the slightest, but he had tuned most of the world out until it was time to get ready to move again. Though, eyeing the blisteringly bright white of the snow at sunrise, he thought he’d wait a while to wake his marines.
Bass had seemingly long-since fallen asleep, though faint, pleasant tingling remained in the wake of their ministrations. They were all balled up again, high up in his stomach, and—John flexed just a little and found he’d been tensed around them the whole time, leaving them little room to move. He hoped he hadn’t smothered them too badly.
Yet as he pulled away, they stayed right where they were—if anything, somehow they tucked themself in smaller. He clenched his abdomen again, shivering when they uncurled a little to meet him. They pushed against him. An odd feeling. A good feeling. Very good.
Before John could think too much on it, the crackle of their comms woke everyone up, a voice too loud for its proximity immediately filling the bare static.
“Come in, Fireteam Spearhead. Fireteam Spearhead come in. This is UNSC Spectral Vanguard. Repeat come in—”
John grumbled. He’d never been one for lazy mornings, but he’d be a liar if he hadn’t suddenly seen the appeal. “Copy, Spectral Vanguard, we read you.” Hemmings made a sound halfway between a groan and a whoop and achieved neither. “We tried to reach you yesterday, but it seemed the cloud cover was disrupting our access to the ship. We have the package and are prepared for extract.” Mostly. Taylor looked tempted to try going back to sleep. John pushed all four of them up off of his arm.
Very curious if Antares would really want to interact with the specks that are humans
He's so big that he interacts by visiting people's dreams! He'll appear in the background of their dream and if they notice him he can chat. It's how he gets to know what the planet is like (though he might have a slightly warped sense of what's real and what isn't lol)
How the actual hell does Ra not accidentally crush people??😭✌️
Like bro, I'd definitely not have the self control to be THAT gentle all the time. Like, imagine there's a living, breathing, thinking person who is not even half the size of your FINGERNAIL??
AH YEAH it's fine Ra and the other jotunn (extra biggg giants) are kinda like gods. They live forever, don't need to eat (there is no way in hell there would be enough food to sustain a 1000ft+ tall giant.) and if they do smush someone they will just reappear after. Painless death and they get to respawn like it's a video game. No harm done
With Massive Chief and Monster Chief both having healing stomachs and similar personalities, I wonder if they also feel the same about swallowing tinies/non-giants. I remember seeing in the Massive Chief sorry that he wasn't exactly enthusiastic about it. Does Monster Chief like it more, or does he also just want to protect them?
Oh yes. So they're both the same Chief, just different versions. Monster Chief is, well, a monster, meaning he can't always control his actions. Doesn't make him dangerous, just big and hungry and he needs something or someone in his belly or else. Plus his mouth is a lot bigger and he can swallow people very comfortably.
Whereas massive Chief is just giant Master Chief. He's just as mission-oriented and has hangups about putting his teammates in distress, such as his stomach. Though if I was to continue the Massive Chief story, it would turn out pretty similar to Monster Chief. People would be used to the big guy after a while and would expect to be eaten by him when injured. But there's a non-zero chance that a few cold, tired soldiers will bug him for a warm place to sleep. And Chief would oblige because why not? It's easy to get them out afterwards.
He'd still make em remove their packs and extra gear though. Anything that can get lost in his guts or present a choking hazard. He's very thorough. Whereas Monster Chief won't waste any time with it. Chomp.
Something that quite immediately gave me incredible "Chief finding a tiny" brainworms that I think you might like
Uhghhh this scene yeah. It's so good. The way he rests his chin on his arm to look at her is adorable
same with this earlier scene
and gosh Halo Infinite is FULL of handhelds with Weapon/Joyeuse. I swear more than half the time she's in his hand. And he holds her so gently aaUUHGHH I'M LOSING MY MINDDD
Took some scrolling but it was the one titled "Dat scube" (2013 was a hell of a time LMAO) but man has your style changed!! And i cant believe i forgot about Jager and Thane's little lady crush!!!! Im a fraud ;~;
I hope its not rude to say, your style really has grown with you, back when you did more of the Holo stuff, your characters looked so little, young, and mischievous, and now theyre HUGE, older, and confidently shitheads (affectionate)
Ohh yes that one! Man. Ephi definitely grew up the most. He was such an asshole for no reason back then. A lot of my characters were. I think as I got older I just stopped caring for the edgy jerk types and gravitated towards big chonky goobers.
Ive been following you since around 2012 (deviantart days) and remember seeing Gaspar around then – also fell in love with Ephi and Thane around then too
(that one piece of Ephi underwater with a diver itched my brain just right for a while)
RESPECT! Damn that's a long time and I think you're right. I made all those boys back then (tho Ephi was earlier, like 2010 or 2011)
I think playing hide and seek with a giant as a tiny at night would be the most scariest thint ever lmao. You can't see anything, you could only hear them. And you can' give yourself away by using your phone as a flashlight because if you do they will find you.
That would be terrifying. Better hope the giant is actively trying not to step on you too, cause they wouldn't see you either! It's less hide and seek and more hide and grab. Feeling around in the dark for a trembling, squirmy figure.
Stupid idea because Gaspar's a dad: he's with tiny whose got a baby who won't stop crying. Gasparhas them lay the babe in his giant palm. The moment they do? Bam. Baby's calmed down.
AUGH I always love the idea of a giant taking care of a tiny baby. Like yeah you know what let's let the super dangerous giant reptilian carnivore hold the baby. And baby goes right to sleep.
I really adore your attention to detail when it comes to scaling. The fact that I had to zoom in on the picture of Ra to learn that the blue thing was a person in a parachute was not only cool asf but also a really well done job at showcasing just how m a s s i v e he is, like holy crap
I love big big scale so much. The little details really do make it, I like to add birds and clouds to emphasize it. Can't forget that aerial perspective too, when things get hazy from the atmosphere at a certain distance.
With Ra though, sometimes you just gotta buckle up and add a closeup or else people end up looking like ants.
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