The Director looked around, surveying the room. Despite the quiet, it buzzed with activity with various techs running around, securing last minute connections, checking and rechecking every system. There would not be room for error. Mistakes would not be tolerated.
"Director?" A petite woman in a rumpled lab coat inquired from his side. She looked nervous, with obvious hesitation written on her face. "Oh, uh, excuse me, but, sir, the, err, subject is ready. Shall we, shall we bring him in?"
He said nothing, merely nodding, consulting the tablet in his hands. Reviewing the scenario they were about to run. After the failures of the last several tests to... achieve positive results, he could only hope that this test, this scenario, would finally bear fruit. He needed results.
"Subject incoming!" Three medical assistants rolled him in, with the supervisor doctor following behind. Only then did the Director look up. This was when he finally looked. When he always did. The subject was pale – after all, he'd never seen sunlight. Not really, anyway. He was gaunt, not undernourished, just restricted to intravenous nourishment. One could not feed oneself when they were only ever awake in their mind. Or rather, the tests. The tests the Director himself designed, the tests that would have driven him mad a dozen times over. And yet, out of ten tests, only four had achieved fruition. That was truly maddening. Again, he hoped that this test would work. After all, he'd finally accepted help.
Help from himself was still help, he reasoned.
The subject was lifted into the VR tube, and the medical assistants feverishly began attaching various cables and electrodes to the subject's body. They would be able to monitor every facet of the subject's physiology.
"Director," it was the petite woman again, "we're ready to being testing?" She made it question, as if perhaps he would call it all off. But that could never happen. He had no choice. This was for humanity. In the end, they would call him a hero.
But first he needed results.
He ascended to the observation deck. From here, he would monitor every facet of the test and the subject. He could even make minor changes to the test scenario if he saw fit.
Now he nodded:
"Initiate scenario eleven."
The marine squadron was pinned down, on the wrong end of the valley for evac. The fight was lost, the planet was about to be glassed, and the LZ was a Covie-filled valley away. Perfect.
The sergeant was yelling into his radio, trying to get orders, backup, guns, anything. He had to get his people out safe. That was his job, his duty to them as their leader. And the situation was looking bleaker by the minute.
"Copy, Sergeant. Proceed through the valley to extraction point Zulu."
The sergeant turned ashen, shock the only thing left to colour his face. "Repeat directive, Command. I swear I just heard you order us through a Covenant infested death trap."
"There was no mistake, Sergeant. Proceed through the valley. Those are your orders. Command out."
The sergeant let the radio fall down. How could he take his men through there? That would be slaughtered. He couldn't let that happen. He owed them more than that.
"Sarge. We can't do that. We'll die. And you know it, Sarge, I see it on your face." A corporal looked up at him from where she was kneeling. Good god, she was young. Too young. She could've lived. Her death would forever be on him. He gulped.
"We have orders, Corporal. Command must know what they're doing. They have a plan." His confidence was forced at best, and as transparent as glass. He wasn't fooling anyone.
"But, Sarge..." The corporal trailed off, fear in her eyes. He didn't blame her. In fact, he ws sure that fear was mirrored in his own eyes.
"Command wouldn't let us die for nothing, Corporal. We're going to be fine. We are going to get off this planet." He said it as much for her and the squad as he did himself. Hopefully at least once person was convinced. But he doubted it. "Let's move out."
"What? Sarge, this is insanity! We could go up the cliffside, and possibly never even be noticed by the Covies! Going through the valley guarantees us a firefight!"
"I'm sorry, Corporal. We have orders. And Marines follow orders."
The corporal gulped, and nodded tersely. God, but she was afraid. And so was he.
"Don't worry, we're going to get home. I promise you that."
"This is my home, Sarge." She mumbled it, looking down. Poor kid. She was losing everything. He squeezed her shoulder slightly.
"We are going to get to safety. I promise you, Corporal...?"
"Strun. Zara Strun."
"Well, Corporal Zara Strun, we'd better get moving if we don't want to miss our flight." He attempted a half-smile but it came out as a grimace instead. He wished he could do more for the kid, but there was nothing to be done. Nothing but move out.
"We're moving out! Let's go!"
The squadron double-timed it to the entrance of the valley, spurred onwards by desparation and fear. That fear was only compounded by what they saw. Hundreds of Grunts, Jackals, and Elites moved through the valley, blocking the way to safety. The sergeant looked up at the cliffs. Not a bastard in sight. He should've listened to the corporal. He should've disobeyed this mad order.
"Well, standing here doesn't make it any better. Let's move out, but keep it quiet. We'll not attract any attention if we don't have to."
The squad moved into a line, hugging the cliff face, hiding under the shade of the trees. With luck (and a miracle from God himself), they could make it out.
They were halfway through the valley when he heard the scream. A human scream. A woman, no, a girl's scream. A scream of utter terror.
He whipped around, pulling his rifle out and pointing in the direction of the scream, and froze.
An Elite held Corporal Strun aloft while she vainly emptied a clip into its arm, screaming in terror. It didn't even flinch.
The sergeant opened fire, spraying bullets erratically, trying to save her. He emptied an entire clip to no avail.
Oh god.
No.
The Elite held the corporal's arm and leg, pulling them in separate directions.
The corporal's head turned to the sergeant, covered in tears, eyes alight with fear and pain. She was screaming at him, trying to tell him something.
"Shoot me. Kill me. Please."
"Please."
He froze, staring into the face of an already dead girl. All she wanted was to die quickly, to not be torn apart. But he couldn't move. He couldn't do it.
"Please!"
And then. Nothing.
"Copy, Sergeant. Proceed through the valley to extraction point Zulu."
"Wh...What?"
"Sergeant, proceed directly through the valley. Confirm directive."
The sergeant looked around in confusion. How...? The faces of six marines, whose lives were in his hands, looked back. It was impossible.
"Sergeant, confirm directive!"
"Con- Confirmed." He stuttered the word out, barely able to function. This couldn't be real.
"Sarge?" The corporal! She was alive! "Sarge, we can't go through the valley. It's a death sentence! We won't make it halfway through, much less to evac!"
He stared at her face. Exactly the same face as before. This was it. A second chance. He could save them.
"Sarge, we could go -"
"Up the cliffs, exactly right, Corporal. We'll take the high ground and avoid the Covie bastards altogether. Let's move out."
He was confident, he was assured. These men and women would not die. He could save them. He would save them.
The cliffs were narrower than they looked from below. They had to proceed in a single line, clambering up and over the rocks. But there was no Covenant. There were safe.
This time, they got within sight of Zulu. He could see the Pelican. They were so close! Just a little bit farther! He'd done it. Relief broke across his face.
"Just a little bit farther now!" He called back. A cheer rose up from the squad. They were going home.
But that was when the needles started raining down.
"Cover! Cover!" He could still save them. He could still save them. It was going to be alright.
"Corporal! Cover! Now!" He shouted at her, caught in the open as everyone else jumped behind a outcropping of boulders. She took a running leap for him, and landed beside him, in a heap.
"Corporal?" He rolled her over, face up to the sky. A purple needle stuck straight out of the middle of her chest.
"Oh, Sarge, I wasn't fast enough." She grimaced in pain, coughing up a handful of blood. The needle had pierced a lung. She was as good as gone.
"Corporal, no, you just keep fighting! We are going home!" He yelled, tears streaming down his face. Why couldn't he save this one young corporal? She was just a girl.
"Didn't I ever tell you, Sarge? This is my home." She smiled one last time, and turned her head up to the fading sky one last time.
"Copy, Sergeant. Proceed through the valley to extraction point Zulu."
How many times now had this repeated? How many times had he seen his men die? Why couldn't it just end, once and for all?
"Sergeant, please confirm directive."
This was too much. He couldn't. Not again. There was no way out. No way home. He failed. He'd always fail.
"Sergeant, confirm directive!"
"Confirmed." It was a whisper, a ghost of a word. Not that it would make any difference. They were all doomed.
"Sarge? Sarge, that's a death sentence." The corporal. The girl. How many times had he seen her die? How many times had he been powerless to do anything about it?
And that's when it struck him. All but once. All but one time had he been powerless to do anything about her death. All but once had the power to help been take from him.
He knew what he had to do.
They went through the valley again, something he hadn't done since that first awful time. And once again, they made it halfway through before the scream. Before the Elite.
But this time, when Corporal Zara Strun begged him to kill her with tears in her eyes and fear on her face, he took the shot.
"Director, we have a positive result! A sector has been fragmented from the main mind!"
He smiled. Scenario eleven, it seemed, was a success.
"Extract the fragment, and move it to a storage device, at once." What would it be like? What would it be? Who would it be?
Greedily, he took the storage device in hand, looking it over. An entirely new entity lived inside it, waiting to take form. The test, his test, had worked.
Quickly, he inserted the unit into the on-hand holo-chamber, here for precisely such an event. He could not wait to meet his newest creation.
The chamber turned on, flooding with white light. It began to flicker, first red, then orange, yellow, green, blue, violet, moving through the entire spectrum of color. It quickly discarded all the warm tones, flicking through various shades of green, blue, and violet. Finally it narrowed down to blue. The original had also chosen blue.
But this one instead, finally settled on a darker shade. Somewhere between the turquoise of the ocean and the deep blue of a spring tulip.
It didn't take long to settle on a female shape. Interesting. It – She - was the first to do so.
It took even less time for her to discard the various armor models. She then combed through various uniforms, often flickering back and forth among a few.
Finally, she settled on the dress blacks of a marine. Interesting. There had been marines in the scenario. Perhaps, she was reflecting her genesis? The Director made a mental note to research how the constructs chose their appearances.
Ah, she wasn't quite done yet. The jacket was unbuttoned, the shirt untucked, the skirt ruffled, and the hat completely done away with. Her hair, came loose, spreading out along her back and shoulders.
A messy marine? Well, who was he to deny these unique programs their quirks?
"Program, instruction: identify yourself."
She looked up at him, blue eyes buzzing with numbers and letters. She was thinking.
"Executing. I am the intelligence program Zeta, as created for the special operative program Freelancer."
"Wonderful."