CHAPTER 14:
APRIL 30 2530, UNSC REACH MILITARY COMPLEX
Doctor Halsey had called Mendez to join her in the amphitheatre, the very same she had been in at the start of SPARTAN II, where she told the children they would all be warriors.
She felt the bitter pain being reminded she wasn't able to revive them all, and not all who would recover would ever function as Spartans, but would find other uses.
Halsey had worked on a daily to find ways to effectively counter the Covenant and ensure not just the UNSC's survival, but the entirety of human kind.
She was the one who the Admiralty had turned to in what was humanity's darkest hours, that had evolved to years, but she knew she was no hero, the children she had ripped from their parents loving arms and tendered into soldiers were now humanity's best and only hope of stopping the Covenant, and she had been hard at work to ensure more were available. Despite those who would remain in cryopreservation and those who would never be deployed as originally intended, or assigned to a desk job. She had a good measure of success with the above-dozen that she had.
"Is something wrong, Doctor?" Deja inquired. Her form materialised aside her on the display holotank.
"No, nothing" she said.
The new enemy had burned their way throughout the human colonies, Harvest, Second Base and Green hills at first contact in 2525, then dozens more through to the current year, 12 total planets had been glassed and millions were already lost. Only recently was Eridanus II, the very planet in which she had found John. He was now leading a Spartan team to shut down an insurgency brewing in the Eridanus system.
A man stepped from the rear of the theatre and stood onto the stage, he folded his hands behind his neatly pressed uniform and stood towards both Halsey and Mendez, the man had no insignia on the black naval attire he wore, no name either. His bone white hair was cut and trimmed and eerily represented an old war helmet. His eyes were dark blue and he was particularly tall, though Mendez stood a clear foot taller than him, he snapped and saluted to the smaller officer.
"Admiral Stanforth, Sir" Mendez spoke
"At ease, Chief" he nodded and returned the salute, he then nodded towards Doctor Halsey, "The Office of Naval Intelligence is appropriating SPARTAN TEAM Black for their interests, the description reads covert ops, recon, unconventional warfare, the like. BLACK Team excels in this category and wants to employ their skills behind enemy lines to gather intelligence.
Halsey never approved of her Spartans being appropriated. But she had no other choice, ONI had apparent interest in the "new enemy's" technology and wanted a field team to collect samples of this particular tech, in addition to any biological tissue of the species that make up their military.
"The briefing has been organised and I had Deja assembled the necessary report-"
"no need" Stanforth said, "Beowulf has it covered" he said. "Bring them in, Doctor.
Halsey nodded and turned to Mendez, "get them". He nodded and marched to their reserved quarters.