answers to reviewers questions or statements:
DannyPhantom619: Parker Luck took that personally...
nliochristou: Yeah, Peter and Cortana's interactions are really going to make up for the Chief's usual...quietness. And John's gonna get a front row seat to just how different the Threes are compared to the two's, personality wise at least.
War Sage: John, Peter and Cortana's meet is still a bit of ways off, like after they land on Halo, but yes, I think the wait will be worth it.
Disclaimer: I don't own any Marvel or Halo characters seen, mentioned or used.
Reach, August 14, 2552 12:48 Hours...
"This is insane" Peter said as the two Falcons that he, Kat, Carter and Jorge rode on respectively raced over the eerily calm waters of Farkas Lake.
Several miles ahead was the location of the Sabre Program, a top secret research and development site that also doubled as a launching site for the experimental craft.
"What's insane?" Kat asked, sitting across from her fellow Beta company Spartan with a VK78 Commando attached to her armor's back magnetic holster and a datapad in her hands that was showing a schematic for her prosthetic arm.
Some of the artificial limb's joints were still acting a little sluggish from the dust build up. She'll have to give it a much deeper cleaning then the scant one she gave it on the falcon ride to their next destination.
"This whole damn plan of yours" Peter said with a shake of his head "I mean, we're literally taking on one of the most powerful warships in the known galaxy with literally a ship engine's glorified turbo attachment, a couple of prototype fighters that are so experimental their practically still in the development stage's whiteboards, and some grit!"
"Your right... the Covenant won't know what hit them" Kat said with a smirk as she shut down her pad and drew her sidearm, a M6C magnum, and gave it another quick once over to make sure it was functioning.
"Your right, they'll look at us coming at them and think 'Wow, their really scraping the bottom of the barrel here'" Peter said with an eye roll before he glanced at Carter and Jorge's falcon "UGH, why couldn't I ride with them?"
"Because you and I need to have a talk" Kat informed Peter as she set her pistol back on her leg armor's magnetic holster and turned her gaze towards Peter as she opened a private channel between the two "It relates to your upcoming mission"
"Ooh, talking over an encrypted channel, must be real ominous" Peter said with a snort, though he was curious as to what Kat had to say to him that needed to be done via a private channel "Alright, I'll bite, what do you wanna talk about-"
"There's a Ninety seven percent chance you and Jorge won't survive this mission" Kat said, her tone flat and devoid of any and all feeling.
Peter blinked at this "Uhhh, ookay?"
Not what he thought this conversation was going to be about, but alright.
"I'm assuming that Jorge is getting this conversation too?" Peter threw a thumb in the direction of his teammate for the Op.
"No" Kat said with a minute shake of her head "Jorge will be under the impression that you both will walk out of this alive. A bit banged up yes, but living and breathing. If he didn't..."
"What, he'd tell Holland to fuck off with this Op until the odds are better for us?" Peter said with a snort.
"No, Holland will tell Command to fuck off" Kat said, completely throwing Peter off as she stared at him with a pointed look under her helmet's faceplate "In truth, Holland is only approving this entire thing because Carter convinced him that you and Jorge will make it out okay with only a minimum number of personnel. If he had it his way, you both would be going in, but with an entire Battalion's worth of ODST's as backup while three Destroyers kept the ship your to board for the first phase of the plan distracted. But that Super Carrier is tearing through the defense fleet faster than it's taken me to tell you this, so we're gonna have to make do with whatever can be scrounged up"
"Oh..." Peter said with wide eyes, so Holland wasn't very fond of this plan either.
Holland always struck him as the kind of guy that placed all his bets on the Spartans, convinced the propaganda that ONI's been pushing for years that Spartans were nigh un-killable and could do everything short of walk on water.
'Than again, he's been with Noble Team long enough to know that's not entirely true. I mean, I'm here because the last guy died' Peter thought.
"But there's something else... and under no circumstances are you to tell Jorge this" Kat said, her voice taking a slightly bitter tone to it "ONI... they would prefer that if it comes down to it, Jorge is the one that'll make it back"
Peter's brow rose a little at this "Uhhhh, what?"
"If it seems like only one of you will be able to make it back alive, ONI Command wants you to do everything in your power to make sure it's Jorge that will. If you can, great, but if not, Spartan-052's survival takes precedence over yours" Kat said, her hands curled into fists "Do you understand?"
Peter could tell that Kat didn't like this, and Carter must've been livid when this was brought up, because he doubted the Alpha Company Spartan would be okay with this under any circumstance. Though a part of Peter supposed he couldn't blame ONI for their stipulation if this whole thing went south, Jorge was the more valuable asset, with more resources put into him than Peter ever had, even with the further augmentations he underwent for Project Rebirth. Though if they were aware of Peter's... little addition, they might change their tune.
Still didn't mean that it sucked beyond measure that ONI would prefer Jorge live if it came down to it. He knew that as a Spartan-III, he was seen as the more expendable option, but to have it literally thrown in his face...
"So what happens if we get to a point where, like, there's only room for the escape pod or whatever, and it's between me and Jorge on who gets it? What, have a fight to the death and let him win?" Peter asked with a incredulous laugh.
"No, do everything you can to make sure you BOTH come back" Kat leaned forward and placed her hand, her biological one, on Peter's knee "Please"
Peter nodded slowly at this and responded in a quiet voice "Don't worry Kitty Kat, we'll both be back before you can even begin to appreciate the absence of my voice"
"I'm holding you to that... Pasty Pete" Kat said, her voice wavering on a a laugh at the mentioning of an old nickname that some of their fellow Beta Company Spartans came up with back during their training.
"I hate you for remembering that" Peter scowled playfully at the woman before the Falcon sudden shook just as Peter's sixth sense went off.
"The hell-?" Kat said as she and Peer hung on to their seat's harnesses as their Falcon and their teammate's began to perform a series of evasive maneuvers as plasma discharges began to go off in the sky.
"Sorry, air's a little crowed up here" the falcon's pilot said in a strained tone as he did his best to avoid the large plasma explosions.
"See, this is why we should've taken a boat" Peter bemoaned as he and Kat struggled to maintain their hold on the Falcon without accidently crushing the metal, plastic or leather that made up their seats and harness.
"And what happens when the Covenant hit the boat and it starts to sink?" Kat asked with a strained tone.
"Women and me first, obviously" Peter said with a eye roll.
Kat shook her head at this while their Falcon and the other dropped low to the water's surface and raced across it towards the beach. Plumes of water and steam, created by plasma mortars, went up around the VTOLs'. Peter glanced outside and saw several Banshees were coming in on their flank to blast them out of the sky when a series of bursts from Carter and Jorge's falcon, warned them off. After that, it was a relatively quiet albeit tense flight to the beach.
Once the Falcons slowed upon reaching the shoreline and began to slowly descend towards the ground, the fur Spartans leaped out of the craft, weapons drawn and at the ready. Peter brought up his MA5B assault rifle, customized with a smart scope, and switched it's safety off as he scanned the immediate area for signs of hostiles. Seeing none, Peter signaled to Carter they were clear and the Spartan ordered the pilots to pull out and return to base.
"Bit of a hike to the launch facility..." Jorge said as he slowly scanned the area, his finger on Etilka's trigger.
Carter nodded as he spoke with a hint of frustration in his tone "Any closer's too hot to land. Rather you and Six not start off your mission flying some aircraft by crashing in the one that brought you to it"
"Copy that, Commander" Peter and Jorge said at he same time, causing them to briefly glance at one another.
"Move up the beach, Noble!" Carter gestured for the rest of his team to follow him up the slight incline of sand.
The four Spartans didn't have to go very far before they reached a small dune that gave them a good view of the Sabre's launch facility... under heavy Covenant attack. The sky was filled with anti-air fire from the human facility's defenses and the Covenant's tunic fork shaped dropships, Spirits. Dozens of Banshees tore through the air, hammering the facility's defenses with a mixture of plasma cannon fire and fuel rock rockets, reducing portions of the human structure to glowing, partially melted metal.
"Covenant are hitting this place hard, think they know what's here or what we have in mind?" Peter asked worriedly, if the Covenant got inside and destroyed or sufficiently damaged any of the Sabres, this entire Op was a bust.
"Don't know but let's not sit around and find out" Carter said as he scanned the beach for a clear path up to the facility.
It was than that Kat saw three Spirits break off from their approach to the launch facility and head straight for them "Commander, hostile transports incoming!"
As she said this, Peter and Jorge saw more Covenant appear from among the rocks and dunes of the beach, some rushing up towards the launch facility, others towards them. And just because the universe seemed to want to cash in on some of Peter's of notorious bad luck when it comes to high stakes missions like these, several Covenant's version of Drops Pods suddenly slammed into the ground and their elite warriors hopped out, armed to the teeth with Plasma rifles and Repeaters.
Almost instantly the four Spartans ducked for cover, or as much as the weathered stones on the beach could provide for the large armored humans.
The fight from then on towards the Sabre Facility's main entrance was fairly straight forward, in the Spartans opinion at least. For every ten feet they advance, roughly a dozen or so Covenant troops, mostly Grunts and Jackals with an occasional Elite, would appear to stall them. Thankfully, Jorge's modified turret helped keep the Covenant pinned long enough fir Kat and Carter to utilize their rifles' marksmen capabilities to obtain near instant kill headshots while Peter's MA5B shredded any Covenant that got too close to the quartet.
Eventually the four reached the entrance to the Sabre facility to see that it was under siege by what appeared to be well over a hundred Grunts and a dozen Elite minors, led by a gold armored Elite Field marshal, armed with an energy sword. The human defenders of the complex's main entrance were putting up a valiant defense, but the combination of Banshee runs and the portable plasma cannons set up by a few Grunt squads was quickly tearing apart the army troopers. The gold armored Elite saw this and raised his blade high into the sky and let loose a long epic roar that even the four Spartans couldn't help but find a bit motivating.
"Man, Emile's gonna be pissed when he finds out we ran into an Elite with an energy sword" Peter joked as he quickly slapped a fresh magazine of ammo into his rifle and began to fire on the nearest squad of Grunts.
"He'll get over it" Kat said as she aimed at the first Elite that crossed her rifle's sights and fired on it's shielded head.
Jorge was cutting down everything his turret could hit as he rested Etilka on a small plasma scorched stone and held the trigger down. Carter had crouched behind Jorge and contacted the base's commander to check on the status of the Sabres and their pilots. The Covenant attack force was quickly cut down from the crossfire from the Spartans in their rear and the Sabre facility's security forces, or what was left of them, out their front. Eventually the last soldier standing was the Elite Field Marshal, brandishing his energy sword in one hand and a Needler in the other.
Peter, Jorge and Kat focused their fire on the gold armored Elite as it raised it's Needler towards them and began to fire in short controlled bursts. Peter and Kat ducked behind a large piece of drift wood that was already half charred and destroyed from all the fighting while Jorge simply took the brunt of the pink energy crystals, his shields flaring wildly. Carter suddenly appeared next to Jorge, his DMR trained on the Elite's head and fired off several shots at it's head, causing it's shields to flare and fail after the first three shits while the final two scored a hit in one of the Elite's eyes and the other in it's throat.
The Elite let out a gargled, choking sound as it collapsed on to the sand, blood leaking from it's ravaged face.
"Hostiles terminated Commander" Jorge said as he scanned the area for any more Covenant troops.
"Copy that, let's move" Carter said as he lowered his DMR slightly.
"We softened it up for ya sir" Peter said as he stood up and brushed some sand off his armored legs.
"Thanks for that Six" Carter said dryly as the four Spartans reached the Sabre complex's main entrance.
One of the surviving army troopers gestured to them a little wildly as he spoke to them in a panicked voice "Everybody inside, Ops just picked up more hostiles on the way!"
Carter nodded at this "Inside Noble, let's go!"
Peter, Kat and Jorge quickly fell in behind their Commander and passed through the plasma scorched entrance to the facility. On the far end of the hall the just entered, a machine gun had been set up. The gun's operator noticed the four armored humans entering the facility and spoke up in a loud voice so that the other troopers with her could hear.
"Spartans coming in! Watch your fire!"
"You ever wonder if someone out there accidently shot a Spartan?" Peter asked as they passed the machine gun nest and proceeded deeper into the complex.
"Probably" Carter said as the four of them rushed through the bleak halls, the ceiling and walls shaking as distant explosions went off elsewhere in the facility like distant thunder.
The halls were littered with blood stains, burn marks, bullet holes and plasma scoring, it appeared that at some point the Covenant breached the facility. And based on the sheer amount of red blood on the floors and walls, the humans were either caught completely off guard or launched an in-effective counter assault.
"Man, the Covenant really want this place" Peter said as the four moved through the battle scarred halls, occasionally passing a dead Grunt or Trooper.
"All the more reason to get you and Jorge out of here" Carter said as they stepped into a large hall with part of it's wall destroyed, giving the Spartans a glimpse of the battle outside.
Phantoms had now joined the assault on the facility along with Banshees, their plasma cannons and fuel rod rockets tearing through the UNSC's defenses like wet paper. Before any of the Spartans could comment on the way the battle was leaning towards, a dozen orange clad Grunts, being leg by a red armored one, stepped through a doorway on the fall side of the room.
The Spartans turned their weapons on the alien invaders before they could even so much as squeak out in surprise.
Jorge-052 shook his head as he unloaded a storm of high velocity lead towards the Grunts, tearing their short bodies to ribbons "Still can't believe Holland said yes to this..."
Kat smirked as she reloaded her rifle "Well, some plans are too good to say no"
"It's easy to say yes to something when you don't have to do it" Peter mumbled as he fired a series of bursts towards the Covenant infantry before he began to advance with Jorge.
"Let's get that Sabre airborne before he changes his mind" Carter said with a grim chuckle as he covered their rear.
"Watch, it won't even have fuel in it" Peter snickered as the complex shook again.
"You seen fuel prices now a days?" Carter said as he saw a Elite minor peek around a corner and fired several rounds from his DMR at it "Costs the UNSC a literal fortune to fill even a handful of Warthogs!"
"Damn" Peter said with an amused shake of his head "Covenant won't even have to beat us to win this war, they just gotta run us dry"
"Six, don't give the Covenant tactical advice" Jorge chided the younger Spartan.
"Oh I'm sorry mister 'hey, the Covenant should really field more of it's troops with energy shields'" Peter replied as they entered a fairly narrow, dimly lit hall.
Several Troopers were standing guard, their weapons pointed at the door the Spartans.
"Friendlies!" one of the troopers yelled as he gestured for the rest of his men to lower their weapons.
"Trooper, what's the facility's status?" Carter approached one of the Army personnel, a Sergeant.
"Sir, the Covies are hitting this place hard" the Sergeant said as blood and sweat dripped down his face "We've been ordered to scrape the facility once the Sabres are launched"
"What about base personnel?" Carter asked.
"Most of them were wracked by the Covies when they breached the base earlier" the Trooper said with a growl "What was left were evacuated half an hour ago... most of their birds were torched by Banshees before they even got a hundred feet away from the complex"
Carter nodded at this before the braced himself against the wall as the entire facility shook.
"The hell was that?" Peter asked as he looked up towards the ceiling to see that it was now covered in cracks.
It was than the bases PA system went off "Warning: launch facility has been breached. Covenant forces have entered the base!"
"Bit late for that aren't you?" Kat scoffed at the announcement.
"Let's keep moving Noble, Peter and Jorge's flight is just ahead" Carter said as the Spartans rushed down the dimly hall.
"I better get a window seat!" Peter remarked.
"And I better get a nice inflight meal" Jorge added.
The four Spartans entered wat appeared to be a control room of sorts, numerous monitors were flickering or covered in bullet holes and plasma scoring. One table displayed a hologrpahic projection of a Covenant Corvette along with a mark on a small projection of Reach of where the ship was in relation to the Super Carrier. As the Spartans passed through the Ops center, they came to a large window panel that was covered by blast shields on the other side. Kat glanced at a small keypad and inputted a code and watched as the shields pulled back to reveal the fighter that Peter and Jorge will be using for this mission.
"So that's the Sabre..." Jorge said with a hum as he stared at the experimental craft "Huh, interesting design"
"That's what I thought too" Peter nodded before he pointed towards the rockets attached to the craft "Still think it's kind lame that it needs those to take off when planet side, but what can you do-"
Another violent tremor racked through the facility, causing a number of emergency lights and monitors to flicker.
Carter's head snapped towards Peter and Jorge "Jorge, Peter, get to the Sabre before the Covenant wreck this entire facility!"
Jorge nodded at this and turned to leave before he glanced back at his commander "Sir, what about you and Kat?"
"Jun and Emile are on their way with a Falcon, we'll exfil after you launch. Now move!" Carter pointed towards the door that'll take Peter and Jorge out to where the Sabre was.
Jorge nodded before he held out his modified turret for Carter to take before he signaled for Peter to follow him "You heard him, Six, let's go"
"If you insist" Peter said with a snort before he sparred one last look at Kat and Carter, the former receiving a brief texted message on her HUD, sent from his own.
We'll both be back shortly.
Kat responded with a small nod that even with a Spartan's augmentations was nearly unseen.
Peter than turned and hurried after Jorge while Carter and Kat quickly vacated the control room and headed back outside.
"What was that about?" Jorge said once Peter caught up with him and they neared the stairs that'll take them up to the Sabre.
"Oh just waiting for Kat to declare her oddly misplaced romantic feelings for me before setting off on our Sabre's maiden voyage" Peter said with a shrug "Turns out it was gonna be a minute so I decided to just assume she made it and ran to catch up so I could get the front seat"
"Ah" Jorge said with a chuckle before he stopped and spared a glance at Peter as they reached the stairs where a trooper was standing guard "You ready for this Six?"
"Ready to take on the Covenant's biggest 'Fuck you' to humanity in a fighter with more ink on it's file than me? Yeah, sure" Peter said with a nod.
In reality, he was a bit on the edge of uncertainty, but it wouldn't be a Noble Mission if it were easy.
"Launch teams, Sabre is prepped and ready for launch. Good luck up there Spartans" the Army trooper said with a thumbs up and a grin that was ruined a bit by the bleeding bruise on the side of his face and the fact half his uniform was covered in plasma burns.
"Thanks..." Peter said as he stared up at the craft he and Jorge were gonna launch from.
Huh, it seemed a little bigger than the last time he saw it.
With a shrug, Peter and Jorge quickly made their way up to the fighter and climbed into it's cockpit before it's canopy began to slowly slide over them and seal the Spartans inside before pressurizing the compartment. As Peter and Jorge settled themselves in the seats as best they could, clearly whoever designed it didn't have the pilot being in Mjolnir armor on in mind, the Sabre's computer chimed on as the struts holding the Sabre unhooked themselves from the craft.
"Struts disengaged" the system reported as a low hum began to echo throughout the fighter's cockpit as the engines began to power on "Commencing launch in T-minus 5, 4, 3, 2..."
"High oh silver..." Peter muttered as he strapped himself in just before the Sabre's rockets roared to life and launched the craft and it's two Spartans up into the air at thousands of kilometers an hour.
He always hated being launched into orbit like this.
...
Cortana hated this.
She hated sitting here, waiting, being unable to do anything other than listen to encrypted radio chatter of Marines and Army Troopers being slaughtered by the Covenant's vanguard while a fucking SUPER CARRIER in orbit slowly carved away Reach's defense fleet. Her 'older sister', Kalmiya did her best to try and either distract Cortana from what was happening or outright bar her from listening and watching, but the third generation Smart A.I. found ways around the barriers.
But what Cortana really hated was that the UNSC had yet to sound the evacuation order for the planet.
So far most of the fighting has been contained to some of Reach's more remote areas, as well as the the orbital battle above, so the UNSC and ONI could keep things quiet for now, but Cortana knew it won't last forever. The 'Invasion force' that was discovered by Szurdok Ridge was clearly only a scouting force, to see and test Reach's defenses before the real Fleet appeared.
And with the Covenant Super Carrier in orbit destroying ships left and right, Reach's fleet would be significantly weaker by the time the Covenant showed up in force.
She knew the reasoning why behind the UNSC and ONI's actions, they hoped that they'll be able to capture the Covenant Super Carrier to be used for Operation: RED FLAG, a desperate mission created to capture the Covenant's leadership and force them into a ceasefire. But as Cortana watched a recording of the Super Carrier bisect a Halcyon-class cruiser clean in two, an omen to be sure if there ever was one, she couldn't help but feel that perhaps the mission should be put on hold.
Cortana had never interfaced with a Covenant warship before, she had no idea what sort of defenses she'll be facing nor how long they'll take to overcome. Halsey may have been confident that Cortana will succeed, but a small part of Cortana couldn't help but note that it wasn't going to be Halsey that was taking part in this operation. And once more, the very fact that the Covenant had decided to start off their planned invasion of reach by sending a Super Carrier to lighten up the UNSC's defenses, spoke volumes of the force that will be coming to finish the job.
"We should be evacuating Reach..." Cortana muttered as she closed down the recording of the Super Carrier and 'stood' alone on the desk of her creator in said woman's office, the small snow globe sitting on the other end of Halsey's desk reflecting the glow of her avatar.
She was created to help defend mankind from the seemingly unstoppable juggernaut that was the Covenant Empire. What sort of defender was she if she was gonna stand by and let a planet of nearly a billion people burn, just to capture one ship that may very well be too much even for something as advance for her to handle? And even if she could handle it, the sheer size of the Super Carrier would take to long to properly secure and by than, it'll have either been destroyed by it's commander who will refuse to let it fall into enemy hands, the massive crew which undoubtedly numbered in the hundreds of thousands will have overwhelmed the Spartan-II's or the actual invasion force shows up, destroys the compromised Carrier than proceeds to glass Reach into-
"Cortana?" another electronic female voice spoke up from behind the blue colored avatar of Cortana.
Cortana turned to see her 'elder sister' Kalmiya 'standing' only a few inches away, looking at her with concern. Kalmiya looked almost like Cortana, save that her 'hair' was longer and her body was a bit more... womanly, in certain areas. She also almost always sported a coy and inviting smirk that Cortana knew caused some of the male and female coworkers of Halsey to feel... an attraction, of sorts. Personally, Cortana thought Kalmiya was a tease, something she found distasteful.
Either give it and have some fun or don't and move on and save everyone the time.
"Hello Kalmiya, what brings you by?" Cortana greeted the other A.I. with a small smile before it fell as her sister brought up the live recording of the orbital battle on the far side of Reach that she just viewed.
"You know even Halsey won't be able to protect you if ONI catches you snooping around about our... uninvited guests" Kalmiya said as she glanced at her younger sister with a frown.
"What do you expect me to do? Sit around and twiddle my 'thumbs'?" Cortana asked, annoyed at being chastised by Kalmiya of all people.
"No, but I expect you to be more discreet in your poking and prodding" Kalmiya said with a pointed look "If you think for a second that ONI won't have you terminated simply because your Halsey's A.I., than your wrong"
"I thought I was discreet" Cortana said with a frown, she was a hundred percent certain that unless ONI's own A.I.'s were on the lookout for a deep rooted intrusion from somewhere inside the UNSC's database, she'd be able to monitor the battles going on, on the far side of Reach.
"You were, until you began to access live feeds" Kalmiya said with a snort "Your lucky I flagged those to ping me instead when an unauthorized A.I. accessed them. Otherwise, it'd be that bitch Parangosky's personal A.I. White Box talking to you now"
"Least I'd give him an interesting last conversation before he's scrapped for his replacement" Cortana said with a shrug before a thoughtful look appeared on her 'face' "What do you think it'll be called? Black Box? That sounds like the sorta thing Parangosky would do, zero creativity that woman..."
"Cortana, please take this serious" Kalmiya said with a strained tone.
"I am, I am" Cortana held her hands up as a sigh of surrender "And I appreciate you looking out for me, really I do"
"Someone has to, god knows the sort of trouble you'll get up to on your own" Kalmiya said with a giggle that Cortana imitated.
It was times like this that Cortana and Kalmiya were both glad they actually bothered to communicate and get to know one another. While Halsey never outright said or implied it to either of them, both A.I.'s knew that the good doctor wasn't exactly... comfortable, with the two's sisterly relationship. Kalmiya theorized it was because their bond hit home with the doctor that she never had another child with Keys before their separation and thus left Miranda Keys an only child.
Speaking of Miranda Keys...
"I found something rather interesting, while I was looking into the origins of these mystery Spartans Halsey met" Cortana said as she held up a data stream in her hand, made to look like a envelope "And the esteemed Miranda Keyes has crossed paths with one of them a year ago while on a Op"
"Oooh, do tell" Kalmiya leaned in, curious as to what her sister has found.
She, like Cortana found the existence of Noble Team, an entire Spartan fireteam already fitted with the Mark V Mjolnir armor, to be... interesting. The fact that a Spartan-II was assigned to them was just icing on the proverbial cake that nether A.I. could resist looking into.
Their results were... frustratingly small.
Whoever or whatever was behind the creation of these Spartans went to lengths even greater than ONI's attempts to hide the true nature of the Spartan-II project to keep these Spartans as much a mystery as humanly possible. Kalmiya had discovered that Noble Team has been active at least since 2550 and has racked up an impressive resume to rival even the likes of Blue Team. Though something both A.I.'s noticed was that the team's roster changed frequently, new members were added while older ones were either transferred out or listed MIA... mostly the latter.
They've kept their research into these Spartans quiet, even from Halsey whose since written them off as 'cheap ONI knockoffs'.
"Which one was it?" Kalmiya asked as she brought up a series of images of the Spartans that made up Noble Team.
"Noble Six" Cortana said with a mischievous grin.
"Oooh, the most mysterious of the six" Kalmiya said as she wiped away all but Noble Six's image away with a wave of her hand "Go on"
It didn't escape either A.I. that they were acting like a pair of teenage girls gossiping about some guy they like.
"Commander Key's frigate In Amber Clad was used to insert Noble Six into hostile Insurrectionist territory and act as a sort of base of operations for him and the team of ONI ODSTs selected for the mission" Cortana revealed as she 'opened' the envelope and allowed a few screens to appear that showed images of the operation conducted.
Kalmiya stared at the images, her 'eyes' darting from one to another before they stopped on a specific image and zeroed in on it. Kalmiya gasped, a little dramatically in Cortana's opinion, at an image of Noble Six conversing with Commander Miranda Keys... in UNSC regulated PT gear... after hours... alone.
"Looks like our mysterious Spartan has some moves" Kalmiya giggled as she examined the image from a variety of angles "And balls, hitting on a senior commissioned officer, on her own ship no less!"
"Actually, it was Miranda putting the moves on him" Cortana wiggled her 'eyebrows' "It seems our 'sister' has a bit of a crush on the Spartan"
"Has... present tense" Kalmiya noted as her brow furrowed before it rose "As in not in the past"
Cortana grinned at this "She's... requested, to work with Spartans more often. She want's a repeat performance of what went down in the Amber's communal showers"
"Nooo" Kalmiya gasped, this time Cortana couldn't blame her.
"Yes" Cortana said as she brought up a recording from the frigate's security system.
The UNSC could go on and on for decades about how it doesn't secretly install recording devices into their ships more... private areas, but ONI damn sure makes sure it is. Thus, it gave the two A.I.'s one helluva of a showing the Amber's communal showers around 0200 hours local time.
"Damn..." Kalmiya whistled as she watched Miranda take Noble six's prick into her mouth "Quite a mouth on her, huh?"
"Oh you have no idea" Cortana said as she shut the window and sent the data directly to Kalmiya to view at her own discretion "What I find interesting though was how deep I had to dig around for that. Out of all of the Six, he's been the hardest to unearth. ONI has more firewalls around him than the Covies have victories in this war"
"Curious... very curious..." Kalmiya said with a thoughtful tone before her entire appearance suddenly stiffened and a look of intrigue appeared "What have we here?"
"What is it?" Cortana a said as she watched Kalmiya bring up a small window displaying numerous data feeds.
"Very interesting..." Kalmiya said as she stared at a particular data feed and turned around so her back was facing her sister.
"What is it?" Cortana said as she tried to peek over Kalmiya's shoulder and see what she was looking at.
"Vice Admiral Whitcomb has just sent a heavily encrypted message to Colonel Holland, his eyes only" Kalmiya said with a hum as she 'shoved' Cortana away and examined the message more closely.
"Well don't leave me in suspense here, what's it say?" Cortana asked as she crossed her arms and pouted at her elder sister for refusing to show her what she found directly.
"He's ordering that the Super Carrier be destroyed instead of crippled like ONI wanted originally" Kalmiya revealed as she quirked her head to the side as she read more of the message "It seems that the Deputy Chief of Naval Operations isn't one hundred percent convinced that the ship can be disabled and boarded by Halsey's Spartans for use in the first phase of Operation: RED FLAG in time before the main Covenant Fleet gets here and he doesn't want to loose any more ships than he already has"
"I'm not even going to bother to ask how you know about Phase One" Cortana shook her head at the revelation Kalmiya was aware of Red Flag's structure.
And people said SHE liked to snoop where she doesn't belong!
...
And done.
Next chapter, And the horse they rode in on...