Kurt woke up in bed, an osmotic IV in his arm, and nearby monitors displaying his vital signs, blood composition, and brain-oxygen saturation levels.
He surmised he was in a hospital, although there was no call button, and no obvious door. There was also a camera mounted in the corner of the ceiling. Kurt felt the familiar subsonic thrum around him, and he relaxed. He was on a spaceship. Although he preferred boot-on-dirt, anywhere was better than hard vacuum.
He lowered the bed's railing, and swung his legs over the edge. Pain lanced up his side.
Cracked ribs—he'd had them many times. Bruises covered his pale skin; they were especially livid on his shoulders, stomach, and waist. He checked in the mirror for injuries, and then ran his hand over the long black stubble on his head and face. He was intact… but how long had he been unconscious?
The wall slid apart and a balding man entered. Curiously he wore an Army uniform, pinned with the eagle insigne of a colonel. His dark eyes fixed upon Kurt.
"Sir!" Kurt started to stand and salute.
"At ease, soldier," the Colonel said.
Kurt checked his motion. He opened his mouth to correct the Colonel's error, but fell silent. Naval NCOs were never called "soldiers," but in Kurt's experience, officers. Army or otherwise, never appreciated correction unless lives were at stake.
The Colonel's continued stare made Kurt uneasy. In fact, several things contributed to his unease. He was on a UNSC ship, receiving medical care, but how had he gotten here, and why was an Army colonel interested in him?
"I am James Ackerson," the Colonel said. He then did a curious thing: he held out his hand to shake.
This was a rare occurrence. Usually no one wanted to touch a Spartan, let alone shake their hand.
Kurt took Ackerson's hand and gingerly squeezed it.
Ackerson. Kurt knew that name. There had been conversations between Dr. Halsey and Chief Mendez. Ackerson had come up a dozen times, and from their inflection and body language Kurt had surmised he was not their friend.
Kurt was aware that everyone in the UNSC had the same basic goal: protecting humanity from all threats. Not everyone, however, agreed on how that mandate should be executed… which led to internal conflict. Kurt understood this the way he understood basic precepts of a Shaw-Fujikawa translight engine. He grasped the underlying theoretical principles, but the nuances and the actual application of that knowledge remained a mystery to him.
Most likely this colonel was on permanent loan to ONI as a liaison officer. They often recruited civilians, officers from other branches of the military, or anyone they needed to get their job done.
An Army colonel was approximately the same rank as a Navy captain, so while Kurt was wary, he had to be polite, and even take orders from Ackerson as long as they did not conflict with previous orders.
"If you are well enough, get dressed." Colonel Ackerson nodded to the night table on which was a neatly folded uniform.
Kurt stood, removed the osmotic IV patch, and dressed.
"SPARTAN-051, what is your name?" Ackerson asked.
"Kurt, sir."
"Yes, but Kurt what? What is your family name?"
Kurt knew he had had another name, before his training. That, however, was part of a life that seemed more dream than real now. And that other name was just a shadow in his mind, as was the family that had gone along with it. Still, he struggled to remember.
"It doesn't matter," Ackerson said. "For the time being if asked, use the last name…" He considered for a moment. "Ambrose."
"Yes, sir."
Kurt buttoned his shirt. The uniform was missing the Spartan patch of an eagle holding a lighting bolt and arrows. It instead had the clasping-hand patch of the UNSC Logistical core.
It bore the single pip of a private first class and two combat ribbons for Harvest and Operation TREBUCHET.
"Follow me." Ackerson moved out the open doors into a narrow corridor. He led Kurt through three intersections.
Many Naval officers passed them, but none saluted. They kept to themselves for the most part, eyes down. And while a few nodded to Kurt, no one so much as even glanced at Ackerson.
Kurt's unease at this odd situation grew palpable.
They halted at a pressure door guarded by two marines who saluted. Kurt crisply returned their salute. Ackerson gave them a causal half-salute gesture.
The Colonel set his hand on a biometric reader and face, retina, and palm were simultaneously scanned.
With a hiss, the door opened.
Kurt and Ackerson stepped into a dimly lit twenty-meter-wide room filled wall to wall with monitors. Spectroscopic signatures, star charts, and Slipstream space pulses strobed across the screens. There were several officers and two holographic Als consulting with them in whispered tones.
One AI was a gray-robbed figure without a body. A wraith.
The other was a collection of disembodied eyes, mouths, and gesturing hands—what Kurt vaguely recalled from one of Deja's art lessons as an example of cubist art.
Ackerson whisked him across the room and to another door. A second biometric scan and they entered an elevator.
There was downward motion, then a moment of zero-gee free fall, and the sensation of gravity then returned. The doors opened to a catwalk that extended over inky darkness to a blank wall.
The Colonel approached the blank wall, a seam appeared, and then the two sections pulled apart.
"This room is called 'Odin's Eye' by the junior staff," Ackerson said. "You have been temporarily granted a code-word top-secret clearance to enter. Whatever is said inside is similarly classified and you will reveal none of our conversation unless the proper code words are provided. Do you understand?"
"Yes, sir," Kurt replied.
Kurt's instinct, however, was to not enter this room. He, in fact, wanted to be anyplace but in that room. But he couldn't refuse.
They entered.
The doors closed behind them; Kurt didn't see the seam.
The room had white concave walls, and Kurt's eyes had a hard time focusing.
"Your classification code word is Talcon Forty,'" Ackerson said. "Now, speak freely in here. I certainly will." He gestured to a black circular table in the center of the room and they both sat.
"Sir, where am I? Why am I here?"
His words seemed to evaporate as he spoke them, deadened by the too-still air in this strange room.
"Of course," Ackerson murmured. "Your recovery is not complete. I had been warned of that." He sighed. "We have gone to considerable trouble to extricate you from normal NavSpecWep operations… from your recon mission to Station Delphi."
Kurt remembered the explosion on his T-PACK; he blinked and saw for a split second the dizzying blur of stars in his faceplate.
"My team," Kurt said, "are they—"
"Fine," Ackerson replied. "No injuries."
Kurt inhaled, feeling his cracked rib. Not quite no injuries.
Something changed in the Colonel's expression. The dark stare and hardness softened almost an imperceptible fraction.
In a lowered voice, Ackerson said, "Section Three has issued you new orders." He pushed a reader across the table to Kurt.
Kurt thumbed the biometric and the screen warmed. There were code-word classified warnings and then he saw his transfer orders under Colonel Ackerson. The usual fields for assignment location, routing protocols, and record verification were redacted.
"You are now a part of a subsection of Beta-5 Division," Ackerson said, "a top-secret cell within Section Three. All the events at Station Delphi were staged to bring you here in the utmost secrecy for a new mission."
Staging the events at Delphi? Arranged by a subcell of Section Three? Something seemed wrong in a way Kurt couldn't quite put his finger on.
But part of it made sense now. The partially decommissioned Shaw-Fujikawa drive at Delphi Station was the perfect lure and the ideal excuse for a malfunctioning T-PACK. The sensor echo the Circumference had picked up on the in-system jump was another prowler, the ship that had picked up Kurt's exhausted body—after he had been propelled on a not-so-random explosive trajectory. Though he resented the manner in which they obtained him, he had to admire the sheer elegance of the extraction plan.
"You have been classified as missing in action," Ackerson said. "Presumed dead."
Something cold contracted in Kurt's stomach. He checked his emotions, though, sensing that in this instance, they might not have been able to help him.
"What is this new mission, sir?"
Ackerson stared at him a moment, then seemed to look through Kurt, past him. "I want you to train the next generation of Spartans."
Kurt blinked, taking in what Ackerson had just said, not quite understanding. "Sir, I was under the impression that Chief Petty Officer Mendez had been reassigned years ago to carry out that mission."
"The effort to train additional SPARTAN-IIs was postponed indefinitely by Dr. Catherine Halsey," Ackerson said. "There were other candidates within the gene pool, but they were out of synch with her age restriction protocols. And with the continuing war, her program funds were… diverted."
Kurt had always presumed other Spartans were being trained.
that he and his fellows were the first in what would be a long line of Spartans. He'd never considered they might be the first, and the last, of their kind.
Ackerson said, "Mendez will, of course, join you."
"It would be an honor to serve under Chief Mendez," Kurt replied.
One of Ackerson's brows quirked up. "Indeed."
He motioned at Kurt's secure tablet. "Read. New training protocols have been outlined as well as an improved augmentation regime. We've learned much from the unfortunate medical processes Dr Halsey had at her disposal."
Kurt balled his hands into fists, remembering the pain of the bone grafts—like glass breaking inside his marrow, and the fire that had burned along every nerve as they had been reengi-neered for enhanced speed.
As he read he started to grasp the opportunities and challenges of this new program.
The new bioaugmentations were a quantum leap ahead of those he had received. There were lower projected wash-out rates. There was, however, only a fraction of the original SPARTAN program training time and budget. MJOLNIR armor was to be replaced with something called Semi-Powered Infiltration (SPI) armor systems.
"With these new candidates," Kurt said, "you're trying to do more with less."
Ackerson nodded. "They'll be sent on missions with higher strategic values but correspondingly lower survival probabilities. That's where you come in, Kurt. We need your training as a Spartan, and all your field experience passed along to these candidates. You need to make these Spartans better and train them faster. This program may be the key to our survival in this war."
Kurt scanned the reader again. The new genetic selection protocol expanded the pool of candidates, but there were disturbing references to behavior problems in these less-than- ideal potential Spartans.
But this mission was vital to the war, Kurt sensed that. And there would be CPO Mendez.
It would be good to be working under his old teacher again. Could the two of them really train a new generation of Spartans?
"In ten years," Ackerson said, "with your guidance and a little luck, there will be a hundred new Spartans in the war. Employing several of these new Spartans to help train the next classes, there will be thousands within twenty years. With projected improvements in technology, perhaps a hundred thousand new Spartans will be created in thirty years."
A hundred thousand Spartans fighting for humanity? The image swam in Kurt's mind.
Was that possible?
While Kurt didn't understand all the ramifications, he now understood the importance of the end result. His initial feeling of unease, however, remained. How many of these new Spartans were going to die? He steeled himself. He'd do everything he could to see they had the best training, the best equipment, be the best soldiers humanity had ever produced.
Even then, though, would it be enough?
He took a deep breath. "Where do we begin, sir?"
Ackerson said, "New training facilities are being constructed. You will oversee the operation, and simultaneously begin the screening of candidates. I have an ample supply of willing recruits for you." He reached into his pocket and withdrew a tiny box, pushed it across the table to Kurt. "One last thing."
Kurt opened the box. Inside were the single silver bar insignia of a lieutenant junior grade.
"Those are yours now." A faint crease of a smile appeared on Ackerson's face. "I'm not going to have my right-hand man taking orders from NCO drill instructors. You're going to be in charge of the entire show."
SECTION II
SPARTAN-III
CHAPTER SIX
1950 HOURS, DECEMBER 27, 2531 (MILITARY CALENDAR) \ ZETA DORADUS
SYSTEM, PLANET ONYX, CAMP CURRAHEE
Kurt watched the incoming Pelicans. The blocky jet-powered craft were so distant they were only specks against the setting sun. He hit the magnification on his faceplate and saw lines of fire tracing their reentry vectors. They would touch down in three minutes.
In the last six months he had developed a training regime tougher than the original SPARTAN program. He had created obstacle courses, firing ranges, classrooms, mess halls, and dormitories from what had been jungle and scrub plain.
He had received every piece of equipment he had requested from NavSpecWep Section Three. Guns, ammunition, dropships, tanks—even samples of Covenant technology and weaponry had appeared as if by sleight of hand.
All personnel were accounted for: six dozen handpicked drill instructors, physical therapists, doctors, nurses, psychologists, and the all-important cooks… all here except the most critical person, who was now on the incoming transports: Senior Chief Petty Officer Franklin Mendez, Mendez had, a dozen years ago, trained Kurt and every other Spartan. He would be invaluable in preparing the new breed of SPARTAN-III, but he wasn't going to be the solution to all Kurt's problems.
After poring over every detail of the new recruits' files, Kurt discovered they didn't match the perfect psychological and genetic markers set in Dr. Halsey's original selection protocols. Colonel Ackerson had warned him they had to draw from a "less statistically robust" group. These recruits wouldn't be anything like himself, John, Kelly, or any of the original SPARTAN-II candidates.