I do not own Halo, Bungie, 343, and Microsoft do. All original characters belong to me. All other characters mentioned, such as those in Halo: Ghosts of Onyx, do not belong to me.
The Jump
2400 Hours, September 29, 2543
Onyx, Unknown Location
I watched the trees fly by as the drop ship soared through the sky. I could almost imagine that they were the forests from my home planet, with my house just over the next hill… but I knew that was impossible. Aquilium was gone.
I'd been forced to watch as the Covenant had burned the planet to ash, along with my family. The planet had slowly turned a deep red as the monsters burned the surface until it was covered in plasma. Our transport, covered by a single UNSC frigate, had narrowly escaped. We jumped into slipspace and forced ourselves away from the small windows on-board. Slowly, we tapered out into our own groups… all but me, that is. I had been staring out the window still, remembering the dull red glow of my home, the only place I had known.
When we arrived at a dock on Reach, a man dressed in a dark, jet black uniform had asked me if I wanted some revenge. When I looked into the man's dark eyes, I was reminded a little of the monsters back on Aquilium. But when I remembered my family, I clenched my hand into a fist and slowly nodded. Within a couple of days, I was placed on a new ship with hundreds of other kids, like me. One by one, they placed us into metal and glass tubes and put us to sleep. When we woke up, we were ordered onto nearby Pelican drop ships and were promptly delivered to the surface of a new planet. The adults in my Pelican called it Onyx.
When we had landed, a tall man had introduced himself- I still couldn't remember his name- and then another, shorter, and much angrier looking man ordered us back onto the Pelicans. This led me to where I was now- riding a Pelican at supersonic speeds easily a thousand meters from the ground.
A man dressed in a dark green outfit grabbed a megaphone that was hanging from his belt and started to yell into it to be heard over the wind blowing by the open back hatch.
"Alright maggots! You see those packs over there on that rack? Grab 'em!"
All of the children aboard, including me, shuffled and bumped their way over to the rack and grabbed the packs. We all turned to face him again.
"Boys and girls, we're going for a little jump!" The man yelled as he grabbed hold of the edge of the ship. "Strap on your packs like so!"
He demonstrated how to put the packs on properly and then returned to his yelled instructions as everyone fumbled with their straps and clips on the backpacks. I struggled at mine; still not quite believing that it was harder to put on than my school backpack. I finally got it set the right way and quickly turned my attention to the instructor again.
"When you jump, count to three and then pull the handle on your left by pulling it across your chest!"
He showed the action, pretending to pull down on the red handle on the left side of his chest.
"Just remember, if you can't do this, then you can't be a Spartan!"
I clenched my hand into a fist again in determination. Then I looked down. My insides turned to ice. We were hundreds of meters in the air, just at the point where trees looked like toothpicks and fields looked like blocks of bright green. I backed away from the edge quickly, heart thumping a mile a minute. I hadn't told anybody except for my now dead sister that I was afraid of heights.
"Alright, form a line!" The drill sergeant barked. We all obeyed immediately- except for me. I slowly dragged my feet into the line and stood very still; trying not to move, or else I would be blown out the back of the Pelican by the howling wind.
Despite my attempt to stay in the back of the line, I actually found myself near the front of the line, just behind the fourth person. I could almost imagine that my knees were knocking together in fear. There was a pause, and then the first kid looked up at the man and took a deep breath, as though he was going to jump into the deep end of a pool.
"Go!" The man yelled. The boy simply stepped off the ramp with no sound and disappeared into the night sky. "Next!"
A small, scrawny little kid crawled on his hands and knees to the edge, looked down, squeaked loud enough for me to hear over the howling wind. "Go!" The boy jumped and did a sort of somersault off the edge and he too disappeared.
Another boy, much taller than any of the rest of us, stood at the edge now. "Go!" He looked down, nodded, and promptly jumped with a slight smile on his face. I shuddered. How could he be so calm?
The girl ahead of me stepped forward and stopped. She glanced back at me and caught my eye. Her fearless blue eyes caught my terrified green glanced back at the drill sergeant. "Go!" She smiled, took a running start, and she was gone. "Next!"
My turn…
I shuffled to the edge nervously and glanced down. The trees looked less like toothpicks now, and more like tall spikes that I would fall on if I jumped. "Go!" At that instant, a million horrible ways of dying flashed before my eyes: falling into the engine somehow, getting impaled on a tree, tripping on the deck as I jumped and landing on my head, the parachute not working…. The list was endless. I shut my eyes. There was no way I could do this. I wasn't going to become a Spartan.
I jumped back into the Pelican, covering my eyes and screaming in fear, yelling "No way! You're crazy!"
No one made a sound. Then the instructor barked out "Next!"
I shuddered. I had failed the test! I would never be a Spartan. There was no way I could ever be able to fight the monsters who had killed my family. I felt tears sting in my eyes briefly before blinking them away.
Once again, the instructor shouted over the still wailing winds: "Next!
Then, almost barely above the howl of the wind, I heard one kid's voice whisper in my ear. "You can do it. C'mon. Jump!"
I clenched my teeth. Before I could even think, I leaped from the ground, past the line of other recruits, past the instructor, and launched myself into the inky darkness of the sky and the howling maw of the icy winds.
Update: I have updated this chapter significantly. For those who know how the first version was, please tell me what you think. As always, R&R.