Sean walked through the automatic doors that led to Captain Benjamin's office. As he walked through the doors he stood in front of the desk and presented a crisp salute.
"Sir, Terra squad leader reporting for duty sir"
Captain Benjamin looked up from his desk, "at ease, take a seat".
Sean sat down and waited for the Captain to speak. The Captain put down his pen and stared at Sean with his arms folded.
"So, what am I supposed to do with you and your squad?" he said wearily
"With regard to what sir?"
"You know dam well what, Mark has six broken ribs seven fractures and is now paralysed from the waist down", the Captain leaned back in his chair and sighed "I suppose by all means you should easily be getting through to the augmentation, taking on Delta was either stupid or brave, they were the best, if I was to wager money I would have bet against your squad"
"The warthog helped sir"
"Of course it helped with Mark, but the rest of the squad as well, that must've been a hell of a fire fight"
"Well it became more of a hand to hand fight, David took one out"
"Yes, Avery will hold that against him for a while"
Sean nodded "Yes sir, then I shot the one that David and Diarmuid were fighting, then David and I fought Mark, and Diarmuid and Chris fought the other, we wouldn't have been able to beat Mark were it not for Niall"
"Yes that was nice, driving while partially stunned, actually where did he get the warthog from?"
Sean shrugged "not sure sir he said their was a patrol passing by and he borrowed it"
Captain Benjamin stared hard at Sean; Sean could feel that gaze stare right through him. "I've decided" the Captain said, "I have decided to let you and your squad go through to the next stage of the project"
Sean saluted "thank you sir"
The Captain returned the gesture "dismissed, I shall see you at thirteen hundred tomorrow for the procedure"
Sean turned and left.
Once the boy had left Captain Benjamin swung round in his chair and sighed, "God's speed boy" he whispered. He wondered how many good soldiers in a battle that couldn't be won, even though the destroyer "Pegasus" had just gained seventy kick ass marines he wondered how many Spartans they would lose in the procedure.
Sean sat on his bunk dressed in the white paper medical gown; all of his squad had gone before him so he was left in his bunk sitting alone.
The two medical officers appeared at the door, Sean nodded stood up and left the barracks. Sean walked down the metal corridor. The metal floor felt cold against his bare feet, they slapped across the floor loudly. He walked into the medical bay; the automatic doors slid open with a hiss. In the room there was a large metal table, around the table were six sets of needles filled with a strange blue liquid. Sean lay down on that cold metal table. The medical officers strapped him in and left. The procedure started the needles began to spin then, they hit, the pain was intense, he closed his eyes so hard he felt they might not open, he clenched his fists tightly, all his muscles tensed up then all was black.
Sean woke up suddenly, sweat covered his brow, his clothes were drenched in sweat. He felt cold and restless, he looked around, there was no one else in the room it was only him. He was brought three meals a day, but he had a high fever and everything seemed to only be moving at half speed. Finally after two weeks, he was let out of that room. All of his squad had survived the operation, except for Diarmuid who had died during the procedure. Sean and his squad went into the gym area, it took some time to learn how to walk but eventually it came back, then he moved on to running, he crashed into three walls not judging his speed right, also he was able to lift much heavier weights as well. David could lift half a ton. Sean stared at his newly super-engineered squad of Spartans.
Then he was called to Captain Benjamin's office. He entered saluted and was told to sit down. Captain Benjamin stared at him with a stare that the Captain was infamous for. Sean held his face straight and didn't allow his face to betray any emotion.
"Has your squad recovered from the procedure?" the Captain asked
"Yes sir and we're performing better than ever" Sean replied, they performing far better than before, they were all faster and stronger than they ever could have been before.
"Good then it's time to move on to the next step"
"Next step sir?"
"Yes, follow me, and call your squad to meet us in the engineering lab."
Sean opened a private COM channel, "Terra meet the Captain and I in the engineering bay"
When the two arrived the other Spartans were already there.
"The next step of this program is to get you your armour"
When the squad walked to the centre of the room they saw that there were four sets of armour, one for each Spartan. Then the Captain took them in a line past the armour, speaking as he went. "Niall this is your armour" he said gesturing to his left, "it's scout armour, light enough that you can move around, yet still heavy enough to take a beating, these technicians will fit you in", Niall stopped there to get fitted into his armour.
"Chris this is your armour" he said pointing to the suit "it's CQB or close quarters battle armour", Chris also stopped there.
"David, we needed to reinforce your armour so we gave you EOD, or explosive ordnance disposal, you can take the most beating out of them all", David stopped to get fitted.
"Finally we have you, the squad leader Sean, we gave you the best all rounded armour we could find, it's mark six armour, enjoy". Sean stopped to get fitted. It took fifteen minutes for eight technicians to fit his armour.
"Try to start slowly, this suit speeds up all your reactions, so start with a slow walk" the technician said when the armour was fitted. Sean raised his right leg, it came up much faster than he had intended and slowly he started to walk.
Within half an hour he was running around an obstacle course at a nearly impossible speed for a human. He stopped in front of a technician "excuse me," he said, "can I ask you something?" the technician nodded "what's the blue bar at the top of the HUD?"
"It's your shield bar" the man said "when you run out of shields, take cover for a while and they will start to recharge"
"O.k. thanks" Sean said and he sprinted off, then the Captain called them in. The Spartans all looked at each other. Niall's armour had a cap-like protrusion along its rim, a beak- like extension under the chin, and a thin, slit-shaped visor. He had two rectangular shoulder pads and a large plate on his chest in the shape of a H.
Chris' armour had a "T" shaped visor with two large cheek guards. On the top of the helmet there was block alloy that forces a protective brace on the top of the helmet.
His shoulder pads were made of a rough rectangular plate going across the upper arm and the body consisted of a chest plat that is made of a silvery alloy with an additional 4 set of plates that were fused together.
David's armour had a mostly square helmet with two separate eyepieces. His shoulder pads blocked off any joints on the shoulder. The body was similar to Sean's but a bit bigger and more reinforced.
Chris let out a long whistle.
"You like em" the Captain said, "well I got just the mission you can test them in".