December 18, 2553

1312 Hours

UNSC Onondaga DD-153

"You called for me, boss?" A woman spoke as she entered the destroyer's flight control center. Down on the flight deck two of the vessel's dart-like F-29 Nandao fighters had been converted for simulation use.

"I did. I want you to see this. Our newbie has finally been cleared for duty and I wanted to see how well he could fly." Her commanding officer stood before a set of consoles. One showed a more technical readout of the pilot's performance, while the other displayed what he saw within the virtual reality of the combat simulator.

To her the live report was somewhat boring; sure it gave an idea of how easily the pilot cut through the computer controlled bots, but the pilot's view was so much better. From his heads-up display she could tell that he had the sleek fighter's engines almost redlined. Suddenly he reduced speed, flared his nose mounted reaction control thrusters and flipped one hundred and eighty degrees. His ship's thirty millimeter autocannons fired silently in the simulated void and dusted an F-41 Broadsword. "Wait, how the hell did he do that? Our Nandao fighters are pretty much obsolete. How is he able to pull a maneuver like that on a Broadsword?"

"I'm not entirely sure either. I was told that he's a shit pilot, but these readouts pretty much state the opposite. However, he isn't showing me anything too special, even on the hardest difficulty. I think it's time to shake things up a bit." Before he could do anything a transmission came from the pilot.

"Command, this is Viper. All hostile fighters are down. Are we done here?" The man's voice was deep, but young, nothing like most of the Onondaga's outfit.

"Negative Viper, remain on standby." Quickly the Lieutenant Commander swapped comm frequencies to the other simulator. "Badger One you are cleared for insertion. Flagging callsign Viper as hostile, shoot to kill."

"Copy Command, Badger One is entering the AO. Ready to roll Harlow?"

"Born ready Regent." The radar operator replied with confidence. Regent and Harlow were veterans of the War, having served alongside one another for the better part of a decade. Originally they had joined the Onondaga's fighter escort fresh from flight school, however the two had worked their way up as the destroyer's top aces, earning themselves the role of flight leader for Badger squadron.

The woman in the FCC looked back at Viper's readout. "Hold on, Viper doesn't have a radar operator. This doesn't seem fair. Why does Badger One get a full crew while Viper goes alone?"

"Just keep watching."

Within the simulation Viper continued to patrol the debris field. His fighter's IFF system flagged an unknown vessel entering on his port side at approximately thirty degrees above his horizon. Whoever it was, they were moving fast. "Unidentified craft, this is UNSC fighter callsign Viper. Reduce speed and alter vector immediately, failure to do so will be taken as hostile action. I repeat, reduce speed and alter vector immediately. Failure to comply will be treated as hostile action."

An automated scan of the new vessel informed Viper of its squadron and the status of its weapon systems. Viper immediately increased velocity and steeled himself for the dogfight to come. Regent gave chase, attempting to get within gun range of his adversary while Harlow attempted to maintain a radar lock. "Something isn't right about this Regent."

"You're telling me. Our friend here just went from two hundred kliks an hour to mach three. I've never seen a pilot do that." Regent had a feeling that Jacobson hadn't been entirely truthful when he said that Viper was a poor pilot.

Meanwhile in the flight control center the woman watched Viper's helmet feed intently. The pilot turned to look over his shoulder and for the briefest moment she could see his HUD create a wireframe of what was outside the ship. "Wait, what was that? What kind of helmet can do that? Is that why he doesn't need a radar operator?"

Jacobson didn't initially respond, instead choosing to watch as Viper carefully wove through the debris field. Absentmindedly he picked up a data pad and synced the stream. He passed it to the woman before speaking. "Let's go, Hamada. This is going to be over quickly and I want to be down there when they both pop their canopies."

Back in the simulator Viper had managed to lead Badger One into a relatively open area. There was little debris and he could easily maneuver to avoid being locked on to. A turning battle would be the most common way of hashing this out and was something he'd grown accustomed to during his training. That would be boring however, so for now he decided to play with his target. He slowed his vessel down considerably, allowing Badger One to catch up before matching their speed and rolling his craft "upside down" and "above" them. Looking up he could see their canopy and they could see his.

Harlow looked up in confusion as their adversary matched every minute course correction and shift in velocity that Regent made. In all their years as escort fighters, they'd never seen a pilot do something so absurd. "How is he mirroring us so precisely?"

"I don't know Harlow. You have a weapon lock on him right?" Regent had the fighter exceeding Mach six.

"Yeah, but the Medusa's won't arm at this distance and even if they did we'd get caught up in the blast."

"I've never seen anybody pull something so stupid."

Viper keyed his comm, speaking directly to his adversary, "This has been fun, but I think it's about time we end this."

With that said Viper punched his throttle forward, accelerating to mach nine. After securing a three hundred kilometer gap he deployed countermeasures to deter missiles, throttled down and pulled back on the stick. The ship looped out in front of Badger One and then passed under their horizon. Just before the veterans passed Viper, he opened up with his autocannons. The thirty millimeter coil guns shredded the underbelly of Badger One and left the ship screaming through the void without engine control until it slammed into the debris of a much larger vessel.

Regent was the first to exit the simulator. "What the fuck was that, Jacobson? You told me that your boy couldn't fly. That pilot not only was able to mirror me, he pulled stunts I wouldn't dream of trying in a real fight. What kinda pilot can handle jumping from subsonic to mach three like that?"

"I'm just as confused as you are, Flight Leader. I certainly didn't mean to cause you and your radar operator this much trouble," Jacobson said as Harlow's boots hit the deck.

All eyes were on Viper as his armored form climbed out of the cockpit and on to his fighter's fuselage. "Permission to doff my cover, Lieutenant Commander?"

"Permission granted. As for you three, I want you to meet the latest member of Special Operations Group X-Ray. This is Spartan Andrew Gamma One Niner Niner." The deck shook as Andrew hopped down from the ship. After dismounting he reached up and pressed the release for his helmet. There was a sharp hiss as his black undersuit broke the airtight seal. After a moment he removed the Gungnir helmet and slicked back his undercut brown hair. His piercing green eyes almost seemed to glow from under his heavy brow.

Harlow was the first to break the silence. "Where's your RadOp?"

"RadOp?"

"You know, a Radar Operator?" She really couldn't believe he asked her that.

"Oh. I don't need one. My armor can act as an auxiliary processor for my neural interlace." She looked at him with a face of bewilderment. "I plug into the ship and my suit translates data for me. Anything I need to know it projects onto my HUD."

"So you can fly without needing a RadOp. Neat."

"Andrew, explain what just happened here. I was told that you can't fly. What's up with that?" Jacobson cut off their conversation before he could respond.

"With all due respect sir, you're mistaken. My file recommends against using me as a pilot. While I can fly well enough, I struggle with landing. Aside from that, my talents in the field are best suited for ground pounding." Andrew stood at ease with his helmet clipped to the rig at his waist.

"Thank you for clarifying that, Spartan. It would seem that I may need to re-read your files. Ensign Hamada, please show Andrew to X-Ray's ready room and quarters." Jacobson waited for Andrew and the Ensign to leave.

"I was beaten by a ground pounder?" Regent was stunned by the revelation.

"Again, I'm terribly sorry for all this. Had I double checked what I read all of this could've been avoided. Though I will say, Spartans are known for finding a creative solution. Chances are he knew you would've tried to make it a turning battle. There's an even better chance that he checked your craft's records and knew you wouldn't push your RadOp beyond their limits."

"Whatever he knew, he seemed to enjoy playing with us before finishing the job. Watch out for that one Lieutenant Commander, he seems like a bit of a sadist." Harlow warned before walking off.

"Duly noted. Thank you two for assisting with this training exercise." Jacobson climbed up into Andrew's ship and looked over the controls. Despite his near insane maneuvering neither the throttle nor the stick were damaged. He made a mental note of it. His Spartan could be a cudgel or a scalpel, as reserved as needed and as cruel as could be. He could use this to his advantage.

December 20th, 2553

1200 Hours

DD-153 Mess Hall

Andrew sat at a table alone, mindlessly eating the slop that Navy cooks called smothered burritos. Truth be told, he'd eaten better while operating undercover within an insurgent cell. His mind was brought back to the here and now when two figures sat across from him and started to eat.

"Y'know, in nearly ten years of flying I've never seen someone fly like you." Regent said before taking a bite of his burrito.

"I don't recall asking for company at lunch. We had one training exercise together, you had bad intel. That doesn't make us friends, find someone else to bother." Andrew set his fork down and glared at the pilot in front of him.

"Well aren't you chipper today? You didn't need to ask and I don't need your permission, Petty Officer." Regent took another bite of food, not bothering to meet Andrew's glare. "I've read over what I could from your files. I'm surprised that I outrank you. I'm more surprised by how much of your record is black bars. So tell me, how is it that Spartans are able to pull Gs like you did the other day."

Andrew swallowed his food, looked at Regent and spoke. "Lieutenant Jack Salvan, Flight Leader of Badger Squadron, you're from Mars. Chief Warrant Officer Harley Loville, Radar Operator for Badger One, you're from Earth. You two have a history going all the way back to flight school. Harlow is just an abbreviation of your name, Jack got his callsign because he graduated top of his class and acted like hot shit after getting transferred here to the Onondaga. You two have more confirmed fighter kills than any other flight pair on this ship. I can read people's files too. If you don't know how I can pull about fourteen Gs in seven seconds, then I can't tell you. The specifics of my augmentation and armor are clearly above your pay rate. Now if you don't mind, I'd like to eat in peace and go about my day."

"You're starting to test my patience, Petty Officer."

"Jack, it ain't worth it. All you're going to do is bring trouble down on us. Let's just go eat with the rest of the unit." Harley pleaded with Jack before picking up her tray. Jack huffed, grabbed his food and followed his flight partner to where their unit ate.

"What was all that about?" Ensign Hamada sat down with her tray next to Andrew.

"Eh, Lieutenant Salvan wanted to know how I was able to do what I did." Andrew took another bite of food, chewed and swallowed. "Damnit. It's fuckin' cold. I just wanted to eat in peace."

"What'd you tell him?"

"That if he couldn't find out from reading my records it's above his rate." Andrew pushed his tray forward and rested his chin on his fist.

"You not gonna finish that?" Hamada asked, pointing at the half eaten burrito.

"No, Ensign, it's cold and I'm starting to get ticked off. I just wanted to be left alone to eat."

"Look, I'm just trying to be friendly. If we're gonna be pulling ground ops together, we need to have some sort of report. Like I've been saying for the last two days, call me Aiko." With that she cut her burrito in half, put the part she'd eaten from on his tray and swapped trays. "There, all better. Coop wants us in the ready room at fourteen hundred. I won't bother you anymore, so hurry up, eat and get ready to go."

"Thanks, Aiko. Sorry for gettin' snippy."

"Don't sweat it. Now hurry up and eat."