It was a rainy April afternoon when Admiral Delving stepped off his personal transportation Pelican. Joe stood and breathed in deeply; it felt good to be away from recycled air for a change. He could see nothing of the Chicago skyline through this clouded haze; but, then again, he really didn't need to.

He knew that somewhere, off to the east of this building, was the Office of Naval Intelligence. A looming 200 stories of black glass and metal. No one saw in, but it seemed as if that building saw everything. You were hard-pressed to find a place in Chicago proper that you couldn't see the ONI building.

The Admiral shuddered in the chill of the rooftop. If they knew why he was on Earth, more specifically, if the NavSpecWep division knew why he was on Earth, he would disappear.

Joe smoothed over his dress-uniform and quickly crossed the concrete landing platform. A waiting Navy Liaison Officer saluted crisply as Joe approached the waiting elevator. Joseph returned the salute and stepped inside.

"What floor, Sir?" The officer spoke in a voice that was pure military, devoid of feeling.

"Eighty-two." Joe ran a hand through the wet hair. "What's the local time, son?" The Admiral pulled a data-pad from his uniform jacked and thumbed it to life.

"Fifteen-forty-one hours, Central Standard Time." Delving was impressed as the young-man spoke; he had made no discernable move to check any type of chronometer that Delving could see.

"Good, I'm on time." Joe remarked.

"Yes, Sir." The man offered. Joe liked him. He made a quick mental note to see if the kid wanted a transfer to a more exciting post.

The elevator slowed to a stop and the doors hissed open revealing a lavish white-carpeted hallway. It was almost harsh on the eyes the way this hall was bright. The Liaison saluted as Joe left the elevator to silently make his way down the hall.

A number of high-ranking Naval Officials made their groundside home in this gigantic condominium tower. So many, in fact, that the Navy housed a permanent staff here to attend to their personnel if need be. Joe shook his head; no doubt the ONI had the entire building riddled with the most advanced listening devices. They never missed a chance to spy, especially on someone so close.

The Admiral crossed the hall to his condo and pressed his thumb against a square touch-pad. The locking mechanism scanned his thumbprint and the lock snapped open. Joe quickly slipped into his home and shut the door behind him. If the entrance hallway was lavishly bright, Joe's Earth-side home was the polar opposite. It was a myriad of darkness: black sim-leather couches and chairs, mahogany appointments, thick burgundy carpet, dark-stained wood paneling. The whole apartment swallowed light, like the void of space where Joe often found himself.

As Joe started to cross the room, a sharp knock at the door stopped him dead in his tracks. Panic instantly exploded in his brain and a thousand questions needed answers. Joe's hands started to shake ever so slightly as he turned towards the massive oaken door.

Joe warily crossed to the door, the whole while trying vainly to calm his fears. His hand hovered about the knob for a couple of seconds as he debated whether to open it or let whoever was on the other side go wanting. Steeling his reserve, Joe twisted the knob and opened the door.

Another Liaison Officer stood on the other side in an immaculately pressed uniform. His face also betrayed no secretes as it wore an equally immaculate smile. Joe narrowed his eyes and formed an immaculate dislike of him.

"Yes?" Joe tried to look as annoyed as was possible when scared out of reason.

"Admiral, Sir." The Officer offered up a haphazard salute. "We're pleased to receive you, this evening. Is there anything I could do for you? Dinner? A holo-vid perhaps?" The man looked the Admiral over as he talked, slowly, as if assessing him.

Joe sighed explosively. "Petty Officer, if I had any need of you I would have sought your services the instant I landed. Since I did not, it stands to reason that I do not wish to be disturbed. If there is another knock on this door I will see to it you, your commanding officer, and whoever thought it would be a good idea to staff you here, are sent to the furthest posting I can find." Joe didn't wait for the man to respond, the heavy oak door slammed closed.

The Admiral sagged to the floor as silently as he could. He was so terrified by the intrusion that his stomach roiled and the Admiral covered his mouth with his hand. After about a minute, Joe breathed in a deep breath. He rose and keyed in a combination on the mechanism panel. There was an audible click as the three deadbolts slid into place. As Joe turned, he whispered a curse: "Damn spook."

It had begun subtly enough, a wary attitude, double checking all of his communications for listening protocols. A cautious step here and there; watching his back when he was groundside. Soon however, it had blossomed into full-blown paranoia. Now, there were spooks in every shadow, spies at every turn. He was convinced that the ONI haunted his every step. Everyone he had come to depend on had been transferred, or worse. Joe swallowed hard as he remembered his former assistant. Now the only person he trusted was his first officer, Commander Kimball. Well, not the only, but the other was hardly a person.

The Admiral crossed the condo on silent feet until he reached a large, dark stained oak desk. Joe sat his data-pad on the bare top of the desk, instantly the interface changed to a number pad. The Admiral tapped in the combination and a series of soft clicks issued from the drawers.

This whole condo was a technological miracle. Wireless interfaces on basically every electronic device, all synced to his data-pad; multiple high-speed optic channels, each one triple fire walled and secured by a multi-variable encryption system. He even had a passive sensor suite to monitor local airspace; this apartment rivaled a deep-space listening post.

Joe opened the top drawer and retrieved a small glass and a large bottle of amber liquor. The bottle's label was so faded its writing was now a faint ghost of what it once was. Nothing but a lasting memory, doomed to obscurity.

Shutting this drawer, he opened the next one down and pulled out a thirty-centimeter long cone, setting it gingerly on the desk he pressed a small button on the side. After a few moments, the top blossomed open and spiraled into a dish. Joe smiled to himself.

He poured a glass of the liquor, bourbon, and began to sip. The biting liquor felt good as it went down his throat, warming his chest and reminding him he wasn't crazy. Joe was half done with the liquor when a soft tone issued from the cone object. Joe's smile grew wider and he stood and stretched. It was time to go to work.

Joe reached down and tapped a few buttons on his data-pad and an armoire hissed open across the room; revealing the largest super-processor this side of a starship. In fact, he had appropriated it from a cruiser that had suffered massive damage. As Joe looked at the super-processor he offered up a thankful prayer to the crew of the Lancer.

A row of emitters flickered to life along the side of the apparatus and a ghostly image fluttered into the room. The hologram stood as tall as a man with a belled hat upon his painted head. In his hand was a mummer's scepter capped with the same tri-balled hat. The Jester smiled languidly at Admiral Delving and waved his hand at him, scrolling lines of code fluttered in the wake the scepter left.

"I have been busy while you were away." The Jester spoke.

Admiral Delving had become accustomed to the AI's mocking voice. "Excellent, the names, please."

"They're already on your data-pad." As the Admiral looked bewildered for a small moment, the Jester's bells tinkled softly like staccato laughter.

"Show off." Joe grumbled as he picked up the pad and settled into the overstuffed burgundy sofa. He quickly scanned through the names and frowned. "Most of these doctors were off planet. What good was that?"

The AI shrugged and balanced on his toe for a moment. "Most, Admiral, but not all. By my calculations we will need only two doctors and a handful of Med-Techs. We have the doctors, as you can see from number forty-seven and eight. The Med-Techs will be easy to obtain."

It made Joe cringe the way the Jester referred to flesh and blood humans like they were objects to be obtained and discarded. They were his fellows, humans, Joe had to remember that. That is what set him apart from the ONI; or so he hoped.

"These men and women, the people on this list." Joe drew in a breath. "They worked on the Spartan II program?"

That was it, all of the secrecy, the years and years of planning, the theft of a Military Grade "Smart AI", all of it was a prelude to this moment. The culmination of all of Joseph Delving's hard work hinged on the answer the AI would give. It was hard to devote your life to something so secret. No one had shared Joe's pain, he wouldn't let them. He couldn't risk others lives for the sake of his secrets. But he had, Joe suddenly realized, he had risked lives; even lost some. But that didn't matter.

The bells on the end of the Jester's hat were jingling furiously. His smile stretched wider into a hideous grin. "No, Admiral," Joe could barely hear over the din of the bells, "these people worked on the Spartan III project."


Joe leaned back in the crowded coffee shop, his coffee with a shot of amaretto was rapidly cooling but he didn't care. The drink was the least of his concerns. He was late, the doctor. Joe had busted his ass and wallet to get to Songnem, South Korea, traveling as a civilian the entire way. He couldn't risk being found out. He couldn't afford one slip-up.

The Jester had performed better than the Admiral could have expected. In little under an hour the AI had created an alias for him and, using Joe's issued ID Card, altered all the necessary data to make sure he wasn't questioned as he traveled. It was more than he could have asked for, more than he even expected.

The Jester had been reluctant at first. Of course, being ripped out of a housing during an engineered power glitch would be trouble enough for an intelligence that was housed completely by electrons. The Jester was, naturally, very angry. But, as Joe had banked on, very intrigued on how the Admiral had accomplished this feat. So Joe had explained what he wanted, how he proposed to go about it, and why the Jester would be a great boon to said plan; like clockwork, the AI agreed and thus began their partnership.

After last night's display of data transmission, a technological miracle to say the least, Joe had been feeling uneasy. If the Jester could leap a string of electrons across ports in the house and finally end up on Joe's data-pad, he could just as easily have alerted his creators to his whereabouts in any of the past 13 months the Admiral had been on active duty.

Joe wondered who was controlling whom at this point.

The door to the coffee shop opened and drew Joe from his musings. A frail man with gold-rimmed glasses sauntered in. His grey hair was combed flat against his scalp and he wore an austere expression. Joe gave a nod to the doctor's searching glance and the man sidled up to the table.

"Isn't this rather public?" The doctor looked around nervously. "I would have expected the UNSC Navy to contact me directly. Not all of this cloak and dagger nonsense. It's ridiculous."

Joe held up a hand to silence the man's annoyed grumblings. Just in time too, a waitress approached the table and asked for an order.

"Coffee, black." The Doctor pushed his glasses up further on his nose. "What is it you want, Admiral?"

How much had the Jester told this man? Joe wondered to himself.

The waitress quickly returned with the coffee and left the two gentlemen to their discussion. The Admiral smiled politely at the aging doctor, hoping desperately that the Jester was right about him.

Joe reached into his breast pocket and pulled out his data-pad. He thumbed it to life and scrolled through to Andrew's medical profile. He flagged the genetic markers and slid it over to the Doctor. "You can call me Joe." He remarked as he took a sip from the tepid drink.

"Doctor Choi will do." The Doctor picked up the pad and looked at the page. His eyebrows raised ever so slightly. "What is this?"

"My son." Joe said dryly, suddenly he didn't want any more to drink.

"You should be proud, he has an excellent medical history." Doctor Choi began to set the pad down when Joe reached across the small table and stopped him.

"Look at the next page please."

Choi pressed the page-turn button and, once again, his eyebrows raised; this time they were more pronounced. "Oh my," He sighed, "how horrid."

"Indeed."

Choi continued. "His lower body has been pulverized, his arms too, the chest cavity has a burn. Bigger than I have ever seen."

Each symptom Choi listed stabbed at Joe's heart. He gripped the edge of the table and willed himself to stay strong.

"Joe, it's a miracle your son is even living."

"But he isn't living, Doctor." Joe fought hard to keep his voice down. They had been telling him that for the past ten years. Some miracle. "He will never live again without your help. Don't you understand?"

Joe snatched the pad back and went to the previous page, this time he isolated the genetic markers and made sure they were visible. He handed the pad back and drained the rest of his cup.

Doctor Choi spent a long moment looking at the pad. Slowly he set it down. "I don't see what this has to do with me."

"Of course you do." Joe was in no mood. "Project: Chrysanthemum. NavSpecWep Section Three's pet project. All the markers are right there; better than those kids."

Choi's heart froze. That was the code-word. No one outside of the project was supposed to know about it. No one. Punishable by death, he remembered the solemn words spoken to him. He tried to push back from the table and leave, flee from this place and save his life, but Joe's strong hand came across and held him in place.

"Continue, page three, Doctor."

Choi looked down and flipped to page three. He recognized all of the drugs, their purpose, their applications, but how could any of this relate to the Admiral's crippled son. When Choi read past the list and came to the drugs that weren't used on the kids, on the threes, realization dawned.

"It's impossible." Choi shook his head vehemently. "It cannot be done. Your son is too old and there is no way to know if the augmentations will take effect."

"That's why I added the immune-boosters and the knitting agents." Joe's grip on the man tightened, he had to force this point home or else all hope was lost. "Ten years in a Neural Buoyancy Gel-Tank have done nothing for him. His bones haven't healed fully and his mind is trapped; kept alive by solution 87556-UD61." Joe released the man. "You have to help him."

Choi didn't look up from the pad. It was possible, by such a long shot he couldn't even begin to calculate the odds. There were a thousand things that could go wrong, if those happened, any one of those, Andrew wouldn't want to wake up. To do so would be more horrid than any hell he could imagine.

There was the possibility that if it did work, he would make history. Choi would be the first person to successfully augment someone that age and have the augmentations stick. Andrew needed to learn how to use his body again anyhow, after so long in the tank there was bound to be some neural degradation.

"If I refuse?" Choi looked up into Joe's welling eyes.

"Please don't." Joe averted his gaze. "Please."

Choi gazed at the data-pad once more. He couldn't shake the feeling that he was making a mistake.

"I will need a state of the art facility, and a military grade AI to help with the procedure."

Joe could hardly believe what he heard. "You'll have it all, anything you need."

"And because you are taking me from my duties here in Songnem-"

"You will be generously compensated of course." What Joe didn't add was: "As long as my stolen AI has managed to reallocate the necessary funds."

Choi looked at the data-pad once more. "When do we begin?"

Joe's heart soared.