Chapter 15

Blay'de Haulduur stood in the middle of a large room, filled to the brim with Forerunner technology. He was sure that the technology held the power to destroy the human race, and all others that stood in the path of the Covenant. He just had to figure out how to unlock it.

He had the best techies in the Covenant working on the Forerunner technology, and soon they would crack its code. They scrambled on and around the huge peices of machinery, trying to figure out what each thing did and how to replicate it. In the meantime, Blay'de had a personal vendetta to uphold.

The Spartan female had taken him apart incredibly easily. Blay'de didn't like that.

He marched out of the room and down a long purple hallway, turning several corners until he came to a large door. It hissed open and he stepped into a large room, filled with dummies and weapons. A training room.

Blay'de walked up to a rack of energy swords, and selected two. He walked up to one of the dummies, which was shaped crudely like a human and wore a partially shattered Spartan helmet. With practiced ease he activated one of the energy swords and sliced its head off in one quick motion.

Suddenly a bullet whizzed past his ear. He ducked behind the beheaded practice dummy and peeked around it. Protruding from another dummy's chest was the barrel of a human gun. Blay'de smiled. He had asked his technicians to upgrade the dummies, to give him more realistic practice sessions. This was just what he was looking for.

Several months later...

Jewel was recovering nicely, thanks to the sacrifice of Holmes. She was now able to make her way around the Pillar of Autumn on crutches, but she still wanted to be out and fighting. The Covenant attacked almost daily, now that the humans had shown up to take their territory back. The attacks so far had been repelled, but she knew that they would need all the Spartans possible in the field to have any chance at victory.

Now she hobbled to the bridge of the Pillar of Autumn, to talk with Colonel Holland about an idea she had. As she entered the large area, she searched for the Colonel among the dozens of computers, holographic screens, and technicians. He was standing by a huge floor to ceiling holographic topography map of Reach.

"Colonel," she called as she made her way over to him.

He turned, "Jewel!" he said, "I was just going to ask that you report to the bridge."

"What about?" Jewel asked.

"Given the success rate of the UNSC after the Noble team was rebuilt-"

"You want to make another one," said Jewel, cutting him off, "I had just the same idea."

Colonel Holland smiled. "I thought you might share my view. You are one of the best Spartan strategists, and Dark Wolf has been slightly... disagreeable." The Colonel traced his fingers along a fist shaped dent in the computers keyboard.

"Okay..." said Jewel. "So what about making a new team did you want my help for?"

The Colonel pressed a button on the damaged keyboard, and the topography map of Reach was replaced by a picture of a female Spartan in green and black armor.

"This is Angela. She's part of the Spartan II program, and an excellent Sniper. She and her brother Andrew were recruited from a small colony that was destroyed in an early Covenant attack. And this..." Holland pulled up a video and played it, "This is a video of her in action."

The video was from the point of view of an ODST trooper. A squad of Jackals charged towards him, activating their shields. Suddenly, one of the Jackals dropped. The others went into a panic, searching for the assassin who had killed their brother, but their search was futile. One by one, they dropped dead, until only the angry commander was left, backing away from the ODST trooper, holding his shield up defensively. Suddenly Angela appeared behind him, drew a knife, and stabbed him through the back. The video ended.

"Well?" said Colonel Holland, "What do you think?"

"I think she'll do fine." said Jewel.