She could feel the wind lick her face. The bitter coolness of it all made her want to stand there even longer. Moments passed but she couldn’t say a word. She closed her eyes, and a flashback took her by surprise.

It had only been a few days ago, when she was approached by a small gathering of random peoples. She couldn’t even place names, but those would come in time. She remembered sitting on a rock, a rather large one staring off into the distance. She tended to do this quite often. It wasn’t rare that she’d find herself out here, alone with her gun. She had set up a prop, another rock, laid out so that she could easily lean over onto it to stare out among the scenery through the scope of her rifle.

The first voice came, as any other would. And she knew that it was immanent. “Mistress Vel? Are you feeling alright?”

She wasn’t one to really talk. Not really much to anyone anymore, unless it was on business. Her work had enveloped much of her time, and that was fine with her. She was still heavily covered in bandages, sort of an outcast despite her position within the fleet, and civilization alike. She didn’t mind it. She was a loner, after all. Vel nodded. “Have you come to sort out your thoughts as well?” She asked, in her dream world.

The people, she was not aware what their answer had been, sat around her. She watched the sky, her gun resting in it’s position staring into the forest. “You know,” She started. “I come out here every night. Sometimes in the day, and sometimes when the weather is at it’s worst. I come out here to think-- and I tend to think a lot.”

“Think of what..?” Asked a voice, one of which she was unsure whom it came from.

“I think of many things. Me, you, the universe. I think of war, and peace, and burdens. I think of loneliness.” Vel said. “I think of my brother, and all friends lost to the war we so triumphantly discarded. I think of what has yet to come, and what is already happening. There’s always much to think about, if you let your mind do so.”

She got no answer from the elites at her sides, not that she expected them to have an answer for her. “It’s odd, I think I’m learning the ways of being a hunter. As if I had not known them already before the war, I’m used to being alone, I’m used to thinking. I’m used to problems, and watching things through what will always seem like my scope. I watch people, and trees, and animals. Sometimes I swear I can see things unexplainable to the naked eye while watching here, alone.”

“But how are you alone, if you’re second in command of an entire planet..?”

“I just.. Am.” Vel sighed, “It’s sorta hard to get. Yah see, everyone has this perk. This objective, and this burden. That’s the layout of a singular being.” She paused. “Everyone hurts, and everyone bleeds. Everyone has a flaw. Something that makes them hate themselves, everyone has a perk. Something they exceed at among all else. Be it making friends, or battling it out for the blood of their fathers and sons. Lastly, everyone has an objective. Most objectives end with an honorable death, or a family among loved ones. I don’t have an objective. I suppose that is my burden. But because of my burden, I have taught myself something.”

Her pause irked another question to arise, though one unspoken. She could merely feel it pressing urgently into the air. “I have learned, that even though I am lonely, I am not alone. I have myself, and that is all I need. I am strong. We are all strong. We control our fates, we might have a track set in stone, but tracks have splits. Every single one of you have purpose. Reason. A reason to keep fighting. A reason to love who you are. Don’t let your burdens get the best of you. They are there for that very reason, and allowing them to take heed over your life, allows them to become you. Close your eyes, my friends.”

When her voice ended, she felt the silence around her take hold. It took control, and only the warm breeze allowed her to breathe. When she opened her eyes, before her stood the civilization of the planet. Every living being. Every single child, man and woman. Her friends, and her allies. She did not feel fear. Her words, though in a vision had been spilled now, to the very people that urged her so willingly to become a leader.

She held her head up high-- gazed out among them, and took another breath. "We may thrive here, on a heretic planet. But what is a heretic? We are no longer Covenant! We are our own! We do not abide by their rules, thus does this make us covenant?!” She snarled, “We are our own, a mass be known only by our victories and our stories. The history that has brought us all together may be grim, our lives may hold darkness. We may not be perfect, but together we will rebuild this world. We will thrive as a community, and split, eventually into our rightful keeps. This is our fate. Hail our mistress! Hail our world! Hail our victory!” she snarled, never feeling so terribly bold in her entire life.

It was worth it. The response made her feel like the leader she was.