Chapter 2

Nick had been assigned to Team Omega, his fellows were Frank-B341, Penny-B542 and Charles-B401, their leader. Charles did not like him, and hoped to get rid of him if he could. He was gonna be a spartan, that's what he kept saying, but he hoped Nick would never make it. Nick tried to tolerate him, andd he tried to cooperate with him but Charles never listened. For some reason, Nick was faring worse in a team, no one was listening to him, and Omega had one of the worse record. "They're sure to be washouts" Kurt once said. Today, one of the exercise was capture the flag, teams were put against eachother, and they had to capture the other team's flag. The teams that won would get 8 hours of sleep tonight, and be able to eat before the losers, who'd only get 4 hours of sleep, and the rests of the winners. The only resources they had was their radar, which functioned with their heartbeats which looked like watches and stunt pistols, which would only paralyze the target until given an antidote. Team Omega was sure to lose this one. So far, Nick's training involved a year of training where he fared badly with his team. Today he had enough of Charles, Frank and even Penny. Charles was a poor leader, his strategies always involved Nick getting left out. In their match of Capture the Flag, they were fighting Team Aleph, who were composed of 4 members as well. The exercise would take place in a forest. The exercise had barely started, and Charles told his plan :

"Alright, Nick, you go in front, with Frank, while Penny and I flank them on the right."

That was the problem with Charles's plans he would always underestimate others, while overestimating himself. Nick knew this would not work, but went with the plan anyways, for now.

Stunt pistol in hand with radar on wrist, Nick moved forward slowly, and then noticed movements in the woods, his opponents. He then took a look at his radar, and observed the friends and foe dots. He then made sign to Frank to move up as he would follow, but instead removed his watch and went to the left and moved forward, he detected the foe tags closing around Penny's and Charles' position and moved towards the other team's flag, he still had the watch in his hand. He looked at the radar and saw that Charles and Penny had been taken out as the members of Aleph would continue towards Frank's position, he continued moving and at about 20 meters stopped. And then he saw the other team's dots closing around him ; they had taken out Frank. But then, he threw his watch to the flag, and the enemy team rushed towards the flag, and when they were all there, tack, tack, tack, tack.

Nick had taken them all out, he walked towards the flag, picked it up and returned to the base. He then heard over the megaphones across the forest :

"Team Omega are the first winners of today."

That evening, Team Omega were part of the winners and would eat at the cafeteria before the losers. Nick was first at their assigned places, as the others were still recovering from the stunt guns effects. He wasn't eating yet but he craved the odor of baked bread and chili. Nick was smiling, and was expecting a good reaction from his teammates, or at least something else than what he'd actually get.

"You didn't obey my orders." Was the first thing Charles said to him.

"You told me you'd stay behind me!" Frank said, with fear in his voice.

Penny simply didn't say anything, and walked with no emotion on her face and sat at the table.

Nick was in awe, with what had just happened, he won the game for them and was presented with ungrateful teammates.

"I won the game for you!" He replied standing up. The other winning teams turned their heads to what was happening.

"You just want the glory for yourself! If we had gone with my plan we'd still be sitting here right now!" Charles said.

"Your plan? You and Penny didn't even got any of th-" Nick's reply had been stopped by Charles, who gave him a jab to the face.

That's it, Nick thought. He jumped across the table and on Charles, who fell on his back. He then started punching him and quickly overwhelmed any option Charles had of getting up and had successfuly incapacitated him. The next thing Nick knew, Penny and Frank were trying to incapacitate him, whether it was to stop the violence or to allow Charles to take adavantage of him and beat him, Nick did not care. He quickly took Penny and whiped her on the ground as well and while doing so used his left leg to stabilize him on the ground and the other flew up and then released it with all his force on Frank's head which was sent flying to the table's side. Then, he saw SCPO Mendez who shouted :

"ENOUGH! YOU FOUR, YOU'RE COMING WITH ME! NOW!"

Mendez's voice changed Nick's fury into fear almost immediately. But rather than show it he simply stood up with an angry look on his face and followed Mendez, before the other three got up and followed too.

They had been brought to Kurt's office, with the former sitting at his desk, Mendez then closed the door behind them and stood guard. Kurt wasn't in his armor, strangely, but was rather dressed in a military uniform, like an officer. Nick knew that in this office his life was going take a new path, for better or worse. Kurt was walking around them slowly. The room was silent, and Kurt looked like he was waiting for someone to speak until he suddenly started speaking after no one else spoke up :

"Senior Chief Petty Officer Mendez noticed me of your incident. And assures me-

- I swear it was Nick's fault he started it all, he didn't respect my orders, he-

- "Charles-B401, you expect your subordinates to listen to you and yet you do not respect the authority of your CO, remind me how you are fit to be able to lead a team, especially one consisting of exclusively spartans. Not only that but your last year consisted of failures from jeopardizing your team in your battle plans and this is not the first time it is discussed." Kurt then took a long pause, and the room was silent."As of today, Team Omega is disbanded. Charles-B401, Frank-B341 and Penny-B542 you are to be reassigned to each a separate team.

- What about him? asked Charles, with a smug look, pointing in Nick's direction

- Chief, I'm placing you in charge of them, you may re-assign them to a team of your choosing. I will personally take care of Nick-B312's case.

- Yes, sir. Now move it soldiers!" Said Mendez opening and holding the door for the three and exiting last while carefully closing the door.

No matter what was coming next, Nick was ready for it.

Kurt had a feeling about this one, a good one. He remembered discussing a theory they had come up with. The theory of "cat-2"s, that some people in the Spartan-III program would be on par with Spartan-IIs. There were some cat-2s in Alpha company, but they weren't shown that early. Of course, the decision of whether or not Nick-B312 would be a cat-2 was still many years from now, Kurt had a strong feeling about him, and thus would give him an exception. "You will not be reassigned to another team.

- With all due respect sir, why?

- Do you dislike this decision? You can speak freely, I'll go with your choice. If you would like to be reassigned to a team I'll assign you to team foxtro-

- No, sir, I would quite frankly prefer that than to be with a team.

- Are you comfortable with facing the other challenges alone?

- Yes, sir.

- Good, by the way, can you tell me how you won today?

- I threw my radar away

- Why? It detected your enemy's movement.

- True, but it also detected my movement.

- How did you figure it out?

- Heartbeats don't give friend-or-foe signals sir.

- Smart man. We might just make a spartan out of you just yet. Dismissed."

Kurt watched as the boy left the room. He took out 3 of his fellow trainees with ease, and managed to win a game of capture the flag by himself. One thing's for sure, if he's right about him, he'll make a hell of a Spartan.