Chapter 1: Abduction
"How long before we're ready?"
"Two weeks at minimum sir. We were, unprepared for such a large number of them. Hell, there are less Spartan IVs than these classes!"
"You didn't bother to even read the whole thing, did you? Only about fifty are cleared for being Rogues. The rest will become Spartan IVs."
"Won't that cause them to resent the other fifty?"
"Perhaps in the beginning, but they won't care after that, they'll be trained not to."
"Why are we still making Spartans at all though? The Spartan IVs are surely numerous enough already to provide security as we set up our colonies once more."
"That information is, by necessity, classified. To an extent that even I don't know what these Spartans will be doing."
"One last thing, didn't that briefing also say that all these children are coming from a planet that resembles what Earth was like a couple of centuries ago? That somehow, just shows up after the Master Chief wiped out the flood?"
"Yes, it did. ONI speculates that the rings destruction caused reality to morph around it. That once deserted area of space now has a star, eight planets, and a couple billion people within it. All of whom are known in the databases as having lived around five hundred years ago. Now I would suggest you leave before security gets worried, Captain."
Five weeks later: Hamilton High School, Football Training Field, Freshman class
Another long, tiring day of practice before school which would probably force me to write a couple more stupid reports and the like. That is the problem with honors courses, especially when your taking a junior level math class during your freshman year. Granted, I'm not the most advanced student at this school but still within that top ten category. Besides, I'm always tired during those classes due to the drills our D-Line coaches put us through. "Hey Ingram, we should probably head out." Grayson said. He is one of the few friends I've made since moving to Arizona about a month and a half ago. I responded, " All right, but I call one of the lighter orange bags." Once on the field, we have about fifteen minutes before practice starts. Fifteen minutes to just relax and... what the hell is that?! Out of no where pods cylindrical objects start falling from the sky, landing on both ends of the field. Almost like their herding us into the center, seeing that we could only exit the field at the ends due to the walls. "Run!" I shout out before running straight towards our locker room. However, I wasn't fast enough.
Out of One of the pods rose a human figure, a giant one. Clad in, what the fuck? Is that Halo armor? No way, no! If these people are Spartans we are all fucked! The figure fully stepped out into the light, black armor glinting in the sunlight. Oh yeah, these are definitely spartans alright. A voice, surprisingly female, boomed out at me, "I would suggest that you stay back or I will be forced to knock you out." Ah shit. Well, time to see if I can last more than a second against a spartan. Throwing a punch at the spartan, I pull back just as I see her arm coming up. Which is practically half a second. Fortunately I took a minor interest in body language. This chick is about to go to the gut with her legs. As such I step back, barely enough to get out of the way. Catch the punch, roll with it to deliver a quick elbow to the face (Her face mask was like a freakin stone!), duck underneath her punch to the face, and... Get thrown off my feet by someone behind me.
Oh yeah, she has back up too! "Alright buddy, just stay down now!" a male voice says from behind me. I don't think so. I roll in the direction of the voice, kicking his legs out from under him. I scramble up, only to roll to my right side as that damn woman tries tackling me. I dodge left as the guy throws a punch at my midsection I kick back immediately after, but he blocks it. I keep fighting them for a while, barely deflecting and countering their blows. Then I hear a another voice, this one more mechanical then the other two say, "Stop or I will shoot." This green spartan has a battle rifle aimed right at my head. Knowing the legendary skills of spartans, I put my hands behind my head and get on the ground. "Finally! I was beginning to think we would lose that fight. I don't know how he managed to move like that, he hasn't been enhanced yet!" the male said. The robotic one chuckled, then started talking into his headset. Looking around, I noticed that all or at least most of the football team is capturing. As expected, looks of fear and shock are on most of their faces, while the rest are gaping at me. Rightfully so too. I have no idea how I had just lasted against not just one but two spartans in a fight for more than a minute.
After a minute or two of waiting, five pelicans drop down from the sky. The brown one turns faces me. "You're going on first kiddo. I don't want another scene like the one down here to happen on a pelican." he says. Great, now I'm public enemy number one to this guy. Slowly I make my way towards the hold of the pelican he was directing me towards. Inside I see another spartan, this one in grey and red. As I enter I see that he is holding a data pad of some kind. "So your the one that just beat the crap out of Monte and Viva? Bets on you being the class commander are starting to go up. Hell, after that little showing I'd say we could put you in armor right now!" he says excitedly. Me, I'm just taken aback at this guy. How the hell can he be a spartan yet be this laid back at the same time? His shoulders are slumped, his hands are slowly texting with somebody in orbit for most likely a roster sheet, and he has his back to most of me. I could probably hit him before he can react in his current state. Then again he is escorting teens though which could explain that. I finally notice that he is now staring at me. He motions to my seat before asking, "You going to sit down or what?" "Uh, yes of course." I reply. Then I hear a voice that couldn't possibly belong to the person I think it does. Oh shit.
"I can walk on my own you know you jackals!" the closest thing to my best friend said to two ODST troopers who were carrying him one arm apiece. 'Secrets' as he labelled himself finally got shoved into the pelican. "You, new boy, sit near this guy!" the spartan onboard said. When he got close enough to see me, his eyes shot up in surprise. "Well I'll be damned if it ain't that jackal Collin Ingram." he said, pausing slightly before continuing, "Any chance that you know what the hell is going on?" I sighed lightly before telling him what I believed to be going on, "If I'm not mistaken, we are being abducted by spartans. We are most likely going to be inducted into the spartan program as fourth generation spartans, seeing as how these spartans are wearing strange looking armor parts, though some still have familiar parts. I can also say that logic dictates that we are about to enter space in order to dock with a UNSC cruiser. And before you ask, no I do not know the designations for what was supposedly a fictional entity in a video game series for the xbox and xbox 360." I pause for a couple seconds in order to catch my breath and think things through a little bit, "Seeing as this a recruitment operation and that most of us football players are being funneled into pelicans right now, this will be a multi-class project. Also based on the fact that I saw a map of our planet with blinking red dots on it, this isn't the only sight getting raided. That enough of an explanation for you John?"
"You know I don't like my real name so please stop using it. I also agree with most of what you are saying." he says, "Ya know, we are the only two kids on this damn thing. Wonder if we are getting separated from the rest on purpose." Then I hear someone else walk into the bird. "Out of all the people I could get stuck with in an abduction, I get stuck with you two!" the asian chick I sit next to in chinese says. I chuckle before talking to her, "You know, I'm not that bad. I think you are referring to Secrets." "Hey!" "Now onto the important question that I have to ask both you and Secrets," I pause for dramatic effect, "What in bloody hell did you two do to end up in here with me?"
John started scratching the back of his head before replying, "I kinda shot one of those armored up guys in the back with a gun one of the normal looking guys left on a sink in the bathroom. Didn't do a damn thing, the bullet just bounced off like it had hit a barrier." "You mean their shields?" I asked. He shrugged, "I guess. Anyways, that person just got right back up and moved faster than I thought a human could move. He knocked the gun away and held me on the ground with his foot before two of em carried me here."
My eyes moved to Cassandra, she finally took the hint and said, "I tried leaving the school. I snuck out the gym door after warding the guard off with an empty gatorade bottle. There was a guard on the other side of the door. After silently opening it, I inspected him, seeing that he wasn't facing me. His helmet had a cord running to a transmitter on his back. Simple flick of a switch and his signal died. He tried moving away from the building, which let me get out of there. Then I ran into your friends out on the field." "Damn!" was all that John could say. My thoughts exactly buddy. The spartan with us burst out laughing. "I'll be damned if I didn't get the top three recruits for this group." he said. I noticed that the pelican's doors are closing. A voice came up over the intercom, "Hey Rogue, we'll be up in space in a minute. Make sure your charges are strapped in!"
I wasn't expecting our takeoff to be as smooth as it was. No turbulence at all as we climb up above Earth. However I can tell that both Cassandra and John were having a hard time keeping their stomachs in. Can't say that I blame them. Right as I counted to sixty we broke through the atmosphere. Now my wonder is going sky high. Out in front of us, just as I had predicted, is a cruiser. Shade of Glory, is her name. However, what catches my attention is the veritable swarm of pelicans, all of whom were heading towards the cruiser as well. My guess as to the size of this recruitment session was off by at least 5,000, and that is at the very least as well. Eventually we reached a docking bay, gliding right in among the other ones.
To my surprise though, our pelican is moving upwards now. What is going on? Finally the pelican stops moving. The doors open, right out to a dressed up man in a white suit with a black stripe on each side of his torso and probably back as well. The spartan in our pelican ushers us off and we stand in a line in front of this guy. "Welcome to your new lives as Rogues! You three have the designated genetics to safely commence the augmentation process for yourselves. You are not, unlike your other colleagues going to become spartans at least in , you are going to be enhanced much further than that. Individual modifiers will be added to you based on what my data says. Now enough talk, why don't you meet your new classmates." he smiled cheerily after he said that, eager to get all fifty of his personal specimens together. After a quick trip down a couple hallways, we finally entered a large circular room that was two stories tall. In the center of its first floor were strange cubical machines. Each floor had five passageways branching off of it. Probably where our rooms are. As we walk into the room, I notice the array of other kids around me.
The racial mix seems like it is pretty much equal, though at least from what I can tell there are more boys. That is to be expected though. Then I noticed the fact that we were being split up into teams. Most likely to develop a good squad between us. I'm thinking either five groups of ten or ten groups of five. The five groups of ten is more sensible as it allow enough people to take on two objectives at the same time. Unfortunately that is not the case as I see that there are ten colors up on a big screen with names beside each color. Looking for my name, I see that I'm on black team. As is John and Cassandra.
Great, I also got Victoria, a quirky talkative asian from Cali. Not sure what to do with her. Who is the last person on black team? Damn, how did I get stuck with people I know? "Yo Collin!" Grayson's voice boomed from behind me. A smile inserted itself on my face. Yeah, this team is shaping up real well for me. Grayson is a bit slow with anything that doesn't requires only simple thoughts (algebra, history, and lock picking to name a few) but his strength and rather canny ability to see the big picture in chaotic scenarios is an incredible asset in most situations.
I turned to talk to him, but never got a chance to say anything. Someone's voice, louder than a clap of thunder began speaking. "Attention cadets, this is your Commander speaking. Please assemble with your teams at your designated tables. Thank You." Slowly the mass of people around me disintegrated into nothing. Taking in the situation I final found black table.
After catching up with everybody and wondering what the heck we were doing here for about five minutes, someone finally appeared. A rather tall asian man, with stubble on his chin and a prominent scar on the right side of his face. He walked right through us onto the central platform. From there he turned around and somewhat rudely said, "On your feet cadets!" We all immediately got up. He continued, "Incase you haven't realized this yet, you are now part of a UNSC program, Project Rogue. This ship, Shade of Glory, will be your temporary home until we arrive at our official ship. As you can see, you have been separated into ten teams of five. While this is rather inefficient," I could have sworn he was looking right at me when he said that, "it is to help us filter our top recruits out." A large screen appeared behind him with our same teams on it, numbered one through ten. I was a bit startled to find that black team was at the top of the list. "Your team's rank is displayed here. The top two teams upon our docking at our ship will receive most of our attention. The other forty will be given as much training as the regular Spartan IVs with additional focus on stealth, reconnaissance, and assassination." At this people began panicking. "We have a week until docking, I suggest you find out where you are on that ranking board. Now you will be transported to your halls. Goodnight."
Uneasily I walked with the rest of my new squad to our new bunks. None of us were in a talking mood after what had just been revealed to us. Finally we made it to our rooms on the second floor. Each one had a number on it with a title next to it. Two assault spots, one grenadier, one sniper, and one medic. Guess this is the Spartan way of choosing their positions. "Hey guys, think we should probably choose who is doing what right now." I say, thinking through who would be best in which role. John immediately spoke up, "I want my rocket launcher!" "Oh no, that rocket launcher is mine!" Grayson replied. Yes, it is yours Grayson. "Secrets, how about you take assault instead? Grayson is better suited to the task." I say. Fortunately my words do not fall upon deaf ears and Secrets backs off. Well that is two down, now we just gotta get the other three down. I turn towards the two girls, "Decided what you want yet?" "I'll take sniper, she has medic." Cassandra replies, jerking her thumb at Victoria. Which means I'm paired with Secrets. I was kind of hoping for that sniper spot, but I won' deny someone a spot until they severely screw up or someone else is better trained at the position.
Well with that settled, we all hit the sack. Upon entering my room, I find that there is a rather grandiose bed in the room, with a symbol on it that I cannot recognize. Which means this ship is either part of an experimental program or it belongs to ONI. Probably both. There is also a toilet, shower, desk, and a dresser. All my clothes are black. I have nothing to bring in but the clothes I had on when I was taken. With an inventory of all my possessions, I hit the sack knowing that tomorrow will be a true test of my abilities.
I woke not to the sound of an alarm or person, but of myself. I just couldn't sleep. As such I decided to search the ship a bit. Turning down yet another corner, I finally came to what looks to be our training area. The space is massive, but what impresses me is the fact that the entire floor can morph into different environments. I also found, shall we say a key to what exercises we would be doing today. A minor hand to hand combat training exercise. Black team versus the team right below us, red team. Smiling, I walk back to my room.
"Black team and red team will be the first to compete against each other. Remember, last person not lying on the ground sobbing wins." Both teams nodded in recognition. "Good, now fight!" With that the battle started. Let's see, they got three girls and two guys. "I got the big blonde guy." I said motioning to a huge brute on the red team. Guy had to be at least 6'6. John took on a tall blonde chick who looked like the guy I was fighting. Must be related. Grayson took the other guy, a short black guy who looked like he was fast. Victoria and Cassandra got the other two girls. They and their dance partners looked a bit squeamish at the prospect of fighting.
As suspected, the guy I'm fighting is way too slow to hit me. His fists go to where I was five seconds ago. After dodging his fifth punch, I knock him in the ribs with a short kick. Knowing that I shouldn't let my momentum go, I jab at his nose, then as his head starts going back, grab his shoulder and pull it down with his face. He topples over. Jumping on top of him, I pin his arms down with my knees and punch point blank right on his face. He tries to stop me for awhile, but then he goes limp. As his eyes start rolling up, I know he is done. Getting off of him I face the rest of my team. Seeing that Grayson is managing to hold his own and that John is winning, I help out the two girls on our team. Whom haven't thrown a single punch this whole time.
I went easy on the two girls I had to fight. Once they were on the ground I only punched them once in the rib cage. Neither got up. John had also finished his adversary. I still had to help Grayson however. He was having trouble tracking his small target. So I told John to step in and help him. Soon after that guy went down the announcer declared black team the victors before moving on to the other teams. I also noticed that red had dropped to fourth place. Poor fools. Don't mess with me next time. When we reached the observation area where I had been earlier, the other team members either stared at the ground or looked at us with disbelief. "Black team, you are wanted in the main room ASAP." the announcer, well, announced. I began thinking about what we could possibly wanted for. Our last showing wasn't all that impressive to be honest. Cassandra and Victoria had cowered in the corner the whole time.
We walked into the main room to find that asian guy who had talked to us last night waiting for us. "Well, why are we up here sir?" I asked, crossing my arms and staring right at him. He didn't even back down much to my detriment. One would think that after my friends and I's showing that he would be slightly afraid. He simply cocked a smile at my outburst. Then he started talking, "Nice performance on the training floor blacks. Your making my choice to put you at the top seem like a wise one. Now for why your here, there are two things. One, I wanted to introduce myself to you, I am going to simply be called the Conductor. All you really need to know about me is that I'm going to be assigning every mission you receive while being trained." he pauses and stares at the leader board, "Secondly, you will all be receiving your enhancements much earlier than normal. As in Friday morning." Shit, that's only two days from now! A question bubbles to the surface that I find extremely interesting, "What types of enhancements sir?" He is still staring at the leader board when he says, " All of you will be getting the basic spartan treatments which increase speed, strength, and durability. However your individual enhancements are being custom fitted to your psyche. Collin, since you asked, your going to be getting reflex boosters in order to make time around you seem to move slower, much slower while you move at your normal pace. The other major one is the addition of a web interface directly linked to your brain. Anything connected to charged negative ions can be accessed, including neural pathways in humans. In effect mind reading/control." Not the answer I was expecting to be sure.
