Paul Wu leaned back in his familiar chair in the conference room.
He waited a moment for the speaker to look the other way, and then glanced over at Steve and David with an unimpressed expression. Both of the men looked back with similar emotions on their faces. David even rolled his eyes, though it was a little good-natured.
This was not the first time they’d been in this situation, and it was a little hard for any of them to take it too seriously.
“…cannot allow this to stand!” Catherine Halsey barked, as she slapped a hand onto the table and continued ranting. “Twenty-one failures! Twenty-eight percent of the Spartans! Yes, none of them died, and I’m as overjoyed about that as it is humanly possible to be, but we must remedy this!”
Across the table from Paul, the new addition to the room opened his mouth to speak. Unfortunately for Gunnery Sergeant Johnson, it didn’t look like Catherine was willing to let a single person get a word in edgewise.
“What will this look like when they consult the historical records? That we scraped by with a C-minus average?! No! I refuse!”
Johnson closed his mouth, and his shoulders slumped slightly as Catherine turned on her heel and started her tenth circuit of the conference room table.
Honestly, it’s kind of reassuring that she can still get this excited, Paul thought to himself idly. Although… the last time, she was drunk.
He blinked at that thought, and squinted at Catherine as she walked around the table. He didn’t think she was drunk. After all, he hadn’t seen her take so much as a single sip of alcohol since the Spartan Program had started… but he also hadn’t been her chaperone, so for all he knew, she could have been drinking up at her compound, and he never would have noticed.
“It doesn’t matter that the project is ‘officially’ over,” the brunette doctor snarled, smacking a clenched fist into her other hand. “All we need to do is come up with some excuse to keep the money flowing, until we can get all those children out of the cryopods!”
Paul winced. He was in total agreement with Catherine on that, but so was everyone else in the room, so she didn’t need to keep going on about it for so long. “What matters here is not ONI,” the woman said. “But the children, themselves! Nothing else!”She was far more confident than Paul felt, since they were sitting in the same conference room in the Hive that they had always used. There had been no official meeting scheduled, but today, just one day after they’d all returned from the UNSC Hopeful, Catherine had dragged them all to the FLEETCOM Complex and occupied their usual meeting room without any word to anyone else. It felt a little sacrilegious in a way. Like that time in University when he’d gotten kicked out of the library for closing hours, so he’d decided to study in his lecture halls instead. Or maybe like some of those stories that you heard about software engineers ghosting an entire life inside one of the megacorps on Earth, eating in the cafeterias, sleeping under desks, all without actually being employed by the corp itself.
The security blackout was enabled, but Paul didn’t really know if it was actually working or not. He barely understood anything about electronics, much less surveillance devices. Was a Faraday cage really all that was needed? He didn’t know.The experts in that case were the other three men, the military ones. Captain Stanforth, Chief Petty Officer Mendez, and Gunnery Sergeant Johnson. None of them were speaking up to stop Catherine. They were all on the same page, all a part of the same conspiracy to ensure that the program worked, no matter what. Paul didn’t really know what reasons Stanforth or Johnson had, but he thought that Mendez, at least, was devoted to the children above all else. You couldn’t work with the kids for that long without getting affected, he figured.
“…Kirk, Douglas, Cassandra, Fhajad, and René!” Catherine listed. Paul jerked slightly. He’d zoned out, and come back to hear Catherine listing off names – the names of the failures. “Jerome, Alice, Edgar, Victor, Otto, Douglas, Margaret, Ralph, and Visha!”
Her voice cracked on that final one. Everyone in the room, save for Mendez, winced in sympathy. They all knew that Visha’s situation was the most worrying. Most of the other Spartan-II’s that had failed their augmentations could recover, and live a relatively normal life… but not Visha. She was doomed to live the rest of her life in a cryopod, forever frozen at fourteen. They couldn’t defrost her without fixing the cascading reaction happening inside her bones.
The only possibility that might save Visha’s life was exactly what Catherine Halsey was arguing for right now: telling the Office of Naval Intelligence to screw the original plan, and to extend the program for as long as it took to augment every single remaining Spartan.Was it wrong to put those children through the wringer one more time, just to give Visha her life back? A life of violence as an ONI supercommando? Paul didn’t know. It seemed wrong, when those kids had finally escaped the program with their lives… but on the other hand, the price for that was condemning a life to either death, or eternal purgatory.
That was the unstated, but widely known reason why Catherine had grown so close to that particular cadet in the first place. To motivate herself, Paul assumed. The list of names was also why Paul wasn’t so worried.
Sure, last time he’d seen her this exuberant, it had ended up with all four of them getting shanghaied by ONI to work on a horribly immoral science project… but last time, Catherine Halsey had been ranting about how they’d improve things for the whole world. She’d talked about improving society, civilization, humanity, all very general and broad terms.Here and now, Catherine was laser focused on the individual. On those children. She wasn’t talking thinking about hypotheticals, but about the very real lives that she needed to save.
“Seventy-five out of seventy-five,” Catherine hissed, her voice finally running out of steam. “That’s what I promised Admiral Keeler. I told him I would deliver seventy-five Spartans, and thus far, I have delivered only fifty-four. Not acceptable! I don’t care if I have to take another seven years, but every single one of these Spartans must succeed!”Her hand smacked the table again, but this time, it was much softer than before. Paul waited a moment, to see if Catherine was going to continue. She didn’t.“It won’t take seven years,” he said, breaking the temporary silence. “One, at the absolute most.”There was a sharp hiss of inhales from the rest of the room, and Catherine stared at him, her eyes wide and her face frozen.He cleared his throat, and then when that didn’t work, he elbowed David Meyer in the side, as hard as he could.“Right!” David said, agreeing quickly. “We just finished a preliminary analysis this morning. If we break the twenty-one failed augmentations into three categories, we can do it in three waves. The first wave can start in a month.”“So soon?” Catherine whispered. She’d grabbed onto the top of her empty chair, and was gripping it so tightly that her hands were shaking.“For this group, yes,” Paul said cautiously, trying to keep her expectations down. “Frankly, some of these cadets might have succeeded in their operations anyway. We pulled the plug for safety reasons when we ran into the first complications, but they might have ridden them out and survived. All we need to do is tailor the procedures for each of them. That’s simple enough.”“Customized surgeries,” Stanforth commented, frowning. “I thought we discarded that possibility years ago.”“We discarded it for the group as a whole,” Paul pointed out. “If every augmentation was customized, then we were shooting blind, just like what happened with the Orions. No offense, Sergeant.”“None taken,” Sergeant Johnson replied with a sad frown. “But the Captain’s got a point. Why do it now?”“They wouldn’t be truly custom surgeries,” David said, stepping in before Paul could speak. “Just small tweaks. Even for the second group, we estimate that we could get each of their surgeries figured out with no more than six months of additional research. For the final group… about a year.”“For the worst off, we’d basically add a single surgery,” Paul continued. “Designed to address whatever specific problem they had. After that, we can bring them up to the full standard.”“If ONI will let us,” Steve countered, looking gloomy. “The red tape’s starting to pile up.”“I don’t give a damn about the red tape,” Catherine said, with a desperate sharpness to her voice. “If it can save their lives – I mean, if it can augment them… then that’s all that matters.”“And the cost?” Steve asked. He didn’t look happy to be arguing with Catherine, but the man had a point. “Catherine, we all respect the hell out of you for convincing them to give us this much money, but if the program is officially over, then where’s the funding going to come from? They’ll say we’re wasting it.”The words hung in the air for a moment. Then, as if drawn by a magnet, every head slowly turned towards Stanforth.The official ONI supervisor of the project pursed his lips, and he didn’t turn to look at Catherine’s crestfallen expression.
“The per-unit cost,” the Navy officer said, almost absentmindedly. “We wouldn’t be wasting money. We’d be reducing the price-per-unit of each of the Spartans. It’s simply… efficient.” No one spoke for a moment. Paul gawked openly at the man. He hadn’t expected this.
“We’ve already invested heavily in all the research,” Stanforth continued slowly, still talking as if this was all hypothetical, and not a very real question of ONI politics. “Money and time. If we invested fourteen percent more into the project, and got every single Spartan out, then that’s twenty-eight percent of the total, if I have my math right. The cost-benefit analysis is the most important part of military research.”Catherine was staring at Stanforth like she’d never met the man before. Her eyes were wide, and her mouth was moving faintly, as if whispering something to herself – though Paul couldn’t hear anything.The words themselves were ringing a bell in Paul’s head. He’d heard them before, six years ago. But that time, Catherine had said them to Stanforth, when he’d been unwilling to spend more money. She’d argued that exact concept. Stanforth looked over to Catherine finally, and he smiled slightly.
Catherine rocked backwards as if she’d been struck by a blow, but then, a moment later, a smile started to grow on her face. A wide, toothy, energetic smile.“Michael… now you’re speaking my language,” she said softly, eyes shining. “It only took you seven years.”“Did it?” Stanforth asked, with humor in his voice. “Maybe you only just noticed it recently.”Catherine tilted her head as if thinking about it, and her smile softened into something gentler. “I appreciate it,” she said, staring directly at the ONI officer. “And how do the rest of you feel?”“Oh, I’m just so relieved,” Steve said, letting out a sigh as the sarcasm spilled out of him. “Here I was, thinking you’d all abandon me, while I slave away as the last real member of the Spartan-II Project. Running off to those fancier jobs, with all kinds of luxuries and benefits, and all that stuff, leaving me behind in that damn titanium mine.”Paul scoffed and David rolled his eyes at the man’s melodramatic act.“Chief?” Catherine asked, glancing at the head trainer.“We’re on-schedule, Doctor,” Mendez replied, his face still utterly emotionless. “We always knew there would be an adjustment period. Nothing has changed.”“Sergeant?” Catherine turned to Johnson, the seventh member of Spartan-II leadership.Johnson, unlike the rest of them, rolled his jaw as if he was dissatisfied. “If we can kick those damn bureaucrats back into line, then sure,” the Marine NCO said. “Because when I’m on walkabout to all your little science teams, I keep seeing their fingers everywhere I go. Same pattern, every time. Of course, none of you eggheads spotted it, so I guess I’ve gotta do that for you.”The man chuckled, shaking his head.“Nah, Doc,” he drawled, looking back at Catherine. “You’re stuck with me.”
“Bureaucrats?” Catherine asked, frowning slightly.“They’re trying to poach your boys and girls,” Johnson informed her. “Steve’s getting it worst of all, since he ain’t some hyper-specialized scrub-wearing doctor, but they’re trying on David and Paul’s teams, too.”“My team was… getting bored,” Paul said quickly. “They were helping Steve’s team out, since their work on the augmentations was finished weeks ago.”It wasn’t true, but where the Marine Sergeant had the courage to say those things openly, Paul still had his doubts about how secure the ‘black room’ truly was. It was better to pretend that his team of biologists were assisting the power armor engineers, rather than admit that they were hiding out with them, in an attempt to avoid answering their emails.“Simple enough to solve,” Stanforth spoke up, before Catherine could reply. “I’ll have a word with Admiral Keeler. Once he’s informed of the project’s extension, we can shut that down very quickly. I’m sure those requests were just… preliminary.”He wasn’t an expert in office politics, but even Paul could tell the way that Stanforth had leaned on those words. As if stressing that they had better be ‘preliminary’. That if they weren’t, that was going to be rectified very quickly.
“Paul? David?” Catherine asked, turning to them.
She was biting her lip now, and Paul wondered if she’d waited to ask them until last. After all, it was their teams that would be doing the real work.“The whole team’s onboard,” David told her. “Everyone will prefer this approach.”“Everyone?” Catherine asked, raising an eyebrow. “Even the Smart A.I.’s? They’re coming up on the end of their lifespan. They must have only months before their decommissioning. This kind of research… it could shorten what little time they have left. I don’t want to force them – what to do with their last months should be their choice, not ours.”“Demetrian and Isolde would like nothing better,” Paul told her firmly.“They’re risking their deaths,” Catherine said, an edge to her voice. “You haven’t asked their opinions on this, have you?“They’re going to die anyway,” Paul answered. “And I don’t need to ask them. I’ve worked with them for six years now. Both of them would like nothing better than to spend their last days keeping those kids alive.”Catherine sucked in a breath through clenched teeth. She held it for a moment, and then she nodded sharply, holding in the pain that Paul knew she was feeling.“Well, then,” she murmured, exhaling. “How shall we go about this? ONI’s wheels are already in motion. We’ll need to act fast, if we want to pre-empt our reassignments to other projects.”“Keeler’s back in town,” Stanforth said, leaning back in his chair. “I’ll call him, and we’ll get it done right now.”Everyone paused at that. Paul flinched. He’d never actually met Vice Admiral Keeler, the head of Section Three, the man that – as far as he knew – was behind the Spartan-II program. He wasn’t sure he wanted that fact to change.
“Right… now?” Catherine asked, her voice a little strangled. Stanforth nodded. The brunette glanced around at the rest of them, naked uncertainty on her face. It was a remarkably open expression, given how closed off and stonefaced she usually was…
…but perhaps this was the new normal. Catherine had been more open with Paul and the other members of the Party House in that brief window after the investigation had ended two years ago, but the closer they’d gotten to the augmentation, the more she’d returned to her previous cold appearance. She had never been that open for Stanforth in any of their monthly meetings.Now, with the augmentations over, and no deaths from the children… maybe this is just what Catherine would be like, in the future.“I see,” Catherine muttered. She waited a moment for everyone else to nod back to her, and then she reached down and turned off the security lockdown.As usual, the only visible sign of the black room becoming ‘visible’ again was from the windows. The enormous shutters had clamped down and cut off the outside world, but now they were opening, pulling back, and exposing the beautiful views of the FLEETCOM Complex.The ONI officer got up and left the room so that he could summon his boss.
Paul killed time by staring out at the gorgeous scenery around the mountains. The sun, in particular, shining down on the forested mountains with snow-caps gently melting as spring approached, easing away the deep winter of the Highland Mountains.
It took about five minutes for Vice Admiral Keeler to arrive.The Head of Section Three walked into the room without knocking, and Paul swallowed a little at the sight of him. He was a pale man, and tall, and he looked like a vampire, wearing that space-black ONI uniform without any rank insignia whatsoever. Paul wondered if he should stand up, but nobody else was.Admiral Keeler stepped up to the end of the table, and tapped it gently, re-engaging the security blackout. Nobody spoke a word as the shutters descended again.
“What do you need, Doctor Halsey?” Admiral Keeler asked, his voice smooth and cultured, despite his haunting appearance.“I want to give you twenty-one more Spartans,” Catherine said, meeting Admiral Keeler’s steely-eyed stare with her own blue orbs. “I can give you a third in the next few months, another third in half a year, and the final third in one year. But to do that, I will need more resources. We will be creating customized surgeries for the candidates that were not successfully augmented. I can’t predict how much it’ll cost.”Paul held his breath. He didn’t know much about Keeler, but the Admiral had been a looming figure above him for so long that he didn’t really know how this might shake out. Keeler might deny this for the most arbitrary reason imaginable… or he might agree, but only conditionally, with some favor owed, or some deal for yet another sliver of the souls.“Done,” Admiral Keeler said.
Catherine blinked, and she didn’t say anything back. “Is there anything else?” Admiral Keeler asked, after a moment.Paul felt like the man should have had a humorous note in his voice, but it was still smooth, unhurried… and without any emotion.“The science teams are having some issues with transfer requests,” Stanforth said, when Catherine failed to reply. “We’ll need to keep those teams together for that timespan. All of them. Including the trainers, to help the Spartans adjust to their new capabilities.”Admiral Keeler frowned, and fear spiked in Paul’s heart.“Those morons,” the Admiral said, with a trace of irritation. “Thank you for informing me, Michael. I’ll ensure they don’t bother any of you again. Anything else?”“No,” Catherine said, with some hesitation. “Thank you, Vice Admiral Keeler. We greatly appreciate it.”The man’s lips twitched, and a very slight smile came across his features.“Thank you, Doctor Halsey,” the Head of Section Three said, before his eyes flicked to the others in the table – including Paul. “And you as well, Doctor Meyer, Doctor Wu, Doctor Sullivan.”“Of c-course,” Paul answered, stuttering slightly.Admiral Keeler looked around the room at them, and then nodded slightly.
He tapped the surface of the table again, disengaging the security lockdown, and retracting the shutters, allowing daylight to flood into the room again. It looked odd, against his space-black uniform, but also, strangely, right in some ways.
Then he walked out of the conference room, as if this had been nothing special, just another daily occurrence to him – which it might very well have been, Paul realized.Catherine Halsey stood up at her end of the table, and clapped her hands once. Everyone turned to look at her, and Johnson barked out a short laugh at the sight. The light from the windows was silhouetting her, the sun’s rays glimmering around her head like a halo.“Gentlemen,” she said, addressing them all and ignoring Johnson’s good humor. “Let’s get to work.”