"If he wanted to go with you, he wouldn't have called for backup." As she speaks, Cortana's probing the defenses on the Meta's armor, nothing like the casual connection she'd used with Theta when they'd met earlier. This is methodical, thorough, and fast, and if there's a chink in the electronic defenses, she'll find it.

"You can stand down, or we can do this the hard way." Spoiling for a real fight after all this high road superhero nonsense, she wouldn't mind the hard way in the slightest, and she's not bothering to hide it.