Adriana stared straight ahead. She was surrounded on all sides, with ranks formed of rows and columns of uniformed soldiers.
Her instincts were itching at her. This was too many people. She’d stood in ranks before, of course. Her training had been good, and thorough. But she was used to smaller groups of people. She hadn’t been around crowds like this in years, not since before she was conscripted.Dozens of teenagers were visible to her eyes, and she knew that there were hundreds more on her flanks, and in her blindspot. A thousand cadets, all standing in silent ranks. Well, they were trying to be silent. They weren’t succeeding in that.The Spartan-II wanted to grimace as she spotted another cadet fidgeting in front of her, shifting ever so slightly despite standing at attention.
Come on, she thought to herself, keeping her gaze fixed forward. Just hold out a little longer, kid. We’re almost done.The droning speech was still booming over the speakers around them. Adriana wasn’t listening to it. It wasn’t anything new, really. Another motivational checklist, she figured.Officers were like that. They wanted to hear their own voice more than they wanted to get stuff done. Just another speech.Except… it wasn’t, was it? This wasn’t the Spartan-II Compound. Adriana wasn’t standing next to her friends. She was still on Reach, but she wasn’t in the Highland Mountains anymore. In front of her eyes, just beyond the podium where the Commandant was speaking, the skyline of New Alexandria stretched out like a forest of metal. On her ride in – on a civvie passenger flight, of all things – she’d seen the glimmering water of the sea as they raced inwards, towards the shimmering glass towers in the distance.A little over an hour ago, Adrianna had disembarked in uniform from at the city’s spaceport, located the waiting UNSC transport, and climbed on board the bus alongside two dozen other teenagers. Every single one of them was older than her, and every single one of them was less disciplined than her. They were all here for the same thing: to attend Officer Candidate School.Reach Naval Academy was one of the most respected academic institutions in the armed forces, and today was opening day; the first day of the Class of 2529. By almost anyone’s standard, earning your way here was an impressive achievement. She had to admit that she was a little moved, and not just because she was aware of how much political capital the Doctor had spent to guarantee that Adriana and her fellow Spartans could attend.
This was her first step into the real world, and a very important step on her road to leaving the UNSC behind, and returning to a normal life, away from the military.
Not that she wanted to abandon her friends. Over the years, she’d come to accept that she couldn’t just leave the Spartan program behind and pretend it had never happened. That was a childish belief, and at fourteen years old, she was no longer a child. Adriana had already made up her mind years ago, however. She would serve the duration of her service, and no longer. She’d fight for the UNSC until there was peace… and then she would retire, and she’d enjoy the life of a normal person.
The life she should have had, if they hadn’t kidnapped her eight years ago.
The speeches had been mostly boring, and Adriana was thankful that Sergeant Cavendish, an Army Pathfinder, had taught her the knack for telling when she should be paying attention, and when she could afford to let her mind wander.
But by now, twenty minutes into his speech, the Commandant was finally moving away from the virtues and disciplines they’d learn, and how prestigious the Reach Naval Academy was, and onto the elephant in the room. The reason for the long black banners that between the marble colonnades of the Reach Naval Academy’s classical Greek facades. “Humanity faces a new threat!” boomed the Commandant’s voice over the loudspeaker. “You have all seen the news. You all know what happened to the colony world of Harvest. We do not yet know enough about our enemy – the ‘Covenant’. But we know this: our survival rests upon the shoulders of soldiers like you!”The large crowd of cadets stirred around her. Adriana kept herself frozen, stock-still, while the others showed their lacking discipline by swaying slightly. Some even glanced, subtly, up at where the Commandant was speaking.
If this had been the Compound, then one of the trainers would have jumped down here and dropped them for a hundred pushups for that. Apparently, Reach Naval Academy had lower standards.
“This will not be an easy war,” the Commandant continued. “This will not be a short war. Our future as a civilization depends upon the men and women of tomorrow, not today. You are those officers! From this day forward, I want each and every one of you to carve this into your hearts: Remember Harvest!”A loud roar sprang up, angry and defiant. Many of the cadets, dozens, maybe hundreds, thrust their fists into the air and shouted. Technically, they had all just broken ranks to do that – but Adriana knew they wouldn’t be punished. Not for a clear morale-raising line like that.“Welcome to the Reach Naval Academy,” the Commandant announced, over the cheer. “Fall out!”The ranks shattered. All around her, young men and women stepped out of their stances. Some of them turned to their neighbors to talk. Some of them stood silently, staring up at the impressive front façade of the Naval Academy’s administration building. A few of them started walking back to the dormitories. Adrianna looked around. She didn’t really feel like socializing. She was younger than everyone here by at least four years, and only the growth spurt she’d gotten since the augmentations had kept that from being obvious.It should have been easy to talk with them. Every officer cadet at OCS had to go through Boot Camp before they could attend, and in theory she had a military common ground with them… except, she didn’t.
Because she hadn’t gone to Boot. She had been raised in a classified military base, and she couldn’t admit that.
There was almost no one in the crowd that she knew. The Spartans had been split up to different academies, and those still on Reach were the smallest in number. For the first time that she could remember, Adriana was surrounded by people… but she still felt lonely.Adriana walked through the crowd, leaving them behind on the open field of the Quad. She observed the others as she walked, more out of trained habit than out of any real curiosity. A couple dozen of the cadets were chatting eagerly, like they were excited for a new adventure in life. Most of them were quieter, and there were solemn expressions on the majority of faces. Black armbands were worn by almost everyone present, as the official allowance for the uniform exception had been granted just seven days ago.
This should have been a triumphant moment in all of their lives. The first day of their careers as UNSC officers. And instead, the mood was depressed, like a balloon deflated by a slow leak.All the faces made it clear, as Adriana walked through the crowd. Unease. Awkwardness. Fear. Plenty of her newfound fellow cadets had probably signed up to fight the Innies, or to police the space-lanes. They hadn’t expected to be fighting a war against an alien threat.
In some cases, there was motivation, and in some there was anger. Those kids, she thought, would probably do the best. Anger was a good fuel source. It could encourage you to get back on your feet and keep striving, even when all felt lost. She knew that from her own experience – from the burning, simmering anger in the core of her chest.Her dorm was filling up as Adriana entered. Some of the students were still unpacking their standard-issue kitbags into lockers, with their doors open to the hallway as she passed along. She was on the second floor, which was for girls only. Her roommate had not arrived yet, and she knew it wasn’t going to be a Spartan. There were only four Spartans still on Reach, and the other three were all boys. She’d already emptied her own kitbag, so she had nothing to do for the rest of the afternoonAdriana hesitated in the open door of her room. She’d claimed one of the two sets of racks, footlockers, and desks, so she didn’t really need to be here when her roommate inevitably arrived… and just sitting around on her bed, waiting, felt like it was too obviously weird, and it would get her in trouble.For lack of anything better to do, she picked up one of the keepsakes she was allowed under the Academy’s regulations – a framed picture of her home town, Elista. She went to set it down on her desk, but she paused, staring at it.She already had her cover story memorized, of course. She was from New Harmony. Her parents were divorced. She was independent minded, and didn’t like talking about home much. The cover story had the benefit of being true. Adriana had actually spent a month on New Harmony over the summer, and she’d touched base with her home planet. It was a gorgeous planet, and she wanted to retire there when this was all over. She could already imagine it – flying her own plane over the taiga, wintering near the tropics and summering up in the mountains. It was good to be around people that still talked like her, with that old Slavic accent that she’d tried so hard to preserve as an act of petty rebellion.
It was less good to discover that her parents had split apart. She had mixed feelings about that, now. Anger had been her first reaction. Why hadn’t they fought for her? Why had they just given up? Adriana hadn’t been told about the flash clones until after her summer vacation was over, and she’d returned to Reach. She’d been lucky, in that way – she hadn’t stumbled across her own grave, like many of her fellow Spartans had.“Hey, you in there?” called a voice. There was a young woman standing in the doorway, looking inside but not stepping into the room.Adriana looked up from her desk. She had noticed the newcomer at the door, but she hadn’t wanted to reveal that information. Hyper-awareness might give away her training, so she’d been trained to not ‘show off’ so much. “Yeah,” she said. “Are you my roommate?”“No, sorry,” the other girl replied, shaking her head. “A couple of us were heading up to the common room. You wanna come with?” “Sure,” Adriana said. She set down the picture frame, and she noticed that the other girl’s eyes flicked down to it.“Homesick?” the other girl asked.“Like you wouldn’t believe,” Adriana said, smiling weakly.They walked out of the room together, and headed down the hallway. There was already half a dozen other female cadets waiting for them at the end of the hall. To Adriana’s mild annoyance, she was clearly the shortest out of all of them. Well, that wouldn’t last. Not if that damn pellet in her neck had anything to say about it.“Mmm,” the other girl hummed. “It’s hard being away from your home planet for the first time. You went through Boot Camp there, I’m assuming?”Adriana nearly laughed, but held it back. It was a logical conclusion to make, especially after she’d admitted how homesick she was, but boy, was that wrong. This definitely wasn’t the first time that she’d been away from New Harmony. She had spent more of her life here on Reach than on her own homeworld.“No,” she replied. “Went through it here on Reach.”“Really?” the other girl said, with a little surprise.“Orders are orders,” Adriana shrugged, dismissing the topic.The other girl nodded, accepting the excuse. She introduced the other girls with a quick wave of her hand, and Adriana nodded politely, sharing her own name and shaking hands.
Adriana made a mental note to buy Sergeant Cavendish a drink when she finally met up with him again.
His tips on how to be a soldier were already paying off. When things got a little suspicious, it was better to admit that it was suspicious, grumble a little at how the military made no sense, and just like that, Adriana had successively put to rest the other girl’s suspicion.
…but on the flip side, Adriana only had so many of those tips. What would happen when she ran out?
She stayed silent as her new group of hallmates walked up the stairs and towards the common room on the third floor. The building had five stories in total, with the first two floors being for the women, the third floor being a mix of common utilities like the washing machines, kitchens, common rooms, and the like, and the fourth and fifth floors being men’s dorms. There was already a small group of cadets present. All of them, Adriana included, were wearing the same uniforms that they’d worn at the opening ceremony: the grey UNSC Navy Service Uniform, with full jacket and trousers. Some of the cadets had unbuttoned the top of their jackets for comfort. Almost everyone in the large common room was a stranger to her – but the one exception was Sam. Cadet Samuel-034, or Samuel Westergaard as she was supposed to call him now, was one of the best Spartans in the program. He was practically inseparable from John and Kelly, and it felt very strange for Adriana to see him here, without them by his side. But that was the way things were. John had been sent to Earth and Kelly to Luna, all to different academies. She was supposed to act like she didn’t recognize Sam. It was good operational security, or Op-Sec. It would be too weird if all the Spartans acted like they knew each other, and were already friends. Better to ‘become friends’ more naturally, in front of other cadets, so that nobody got suspicious and wondered about their prior association.Doctors Halsey and Meyer had been pretty direct about it: the best practice was to gain some normal, non-Spartan friends first, and then re-connect later on, to minimize risk. It was a good plan… which is why, in the best tradition of Chief Petty Officer Mendez’s training, it immediately went wrong.“Hey, what’s your name, man?” a male cadet was asking Sam, nudging him slightly with his shoulder from where they were sitting on a couch, chatting amongst the guys. Unlike Adriana, Sam was the same height as the eighteen year old, which boded well for his future height. It also meant that he blended in better than her.Adriana wanted to ask what was going on, but she didn’t know how. How much curiosity was acceptable in this situation? She didn’t know. Obviously, zero curiosity was strange, but so too was maximum curiosity, badgering Sam and the other cadet. Jumping in directly could be taken as rude or pushy, and she didn’t want to immediately blow either of their covers.She kept an eye on the conversation, but followed her hallmates over to a different couch, and settled in.
“I’m Emily,” the lead girl in the pack said, as soon as they sat down. “What your names?”“Sarah,” said the girl who had encouraged Adriana to come along.“Christine,” said the third girl.“Adriana,” the Spartan-II offered. “Nice to meet you all,” Emily said with a soft smile. “I know we all just met, but the first we’ve got leave, I can show you guys around. I’m from New Alexandria, so I can give you the tour.”“Thanks!” replied Christine. “I’m from Endymion myself. It’s a little, uh, surprising to see a city quite this big.”“You’ll get used to it,” Sarah said. “I’m from Manassas, myself.”“I haven’t heard of that world,” Christine admitted. “Inner or Outer Colony?”“It’s a city, not a planet,” Adriana corrected her. “Nice little place.”“Oh, are you from there?” Christine asked. Adriana kept her eyes locked in place, fighting the urge to glance at Sarah – who knew already that the Spartan-II was not a native of Reach. If she slipped up, this might ruin things. She had to play it carefully.“No, I’m from New Harmony,” she said, shaking her head. “But I went to Boot here on Reach, so I learned a little local geography.”“Ah,” a few of the girls chorused in sync. She smiled slightly, and her chest lifted up. Maybe this wasn’t going to be too bad. She’d almost stepped through the thin ice separating her real life from her official story, but these cadets clearly weren’t trained investigators. They’d failed to follow up on her slip-up. If they’d pressed her for more details, she’d either have said something too obvious “Come on, what’s the big deal?” came a guy’s voice, sounding irritated.Adriana turned her head, barely remembering to slow down her reaction.The male cadets were all looking at Sam. None of them looked hostile, so the situation wasn’t FUBAR, at least. At the same time, it clearly wasn’t going well. No Spartan should be the center of attention on their first day in the academy. It wasn’t right. Sam was tight-lipped, literally. He seemed to have gotten shy all of the sudden, and his mouth was clamped shut as if he was trying to keep a secret from spilling out. Her gut sank as she realized what the problem was: Sam hadn’t gone home over the summer, like every other Spartan from the first wave had. He’d stayed behind to held the second wave with their rehab. It had saved his life, since he would have gone to Harvest…
…but it also meant that he didn’t have even the meager amount of socialization experience that Adriana herself had from her own return home.
The biggest, strongest Spartan was trapped in a situation that he had no idea how to handle.
Adriana had to help him. Cover story be damned, there was a Spartan in trouble.
The question was how? Her own experience was barely enough confidence to help her out with this incredibly basic conversation. She didn’t know how to intervene in a completely separated discussion without drawing way too much attention on herself. Her hallmates would be curious, and wonder why she cared so much about a random other cadet. She didn’t have an answer for that.
But giving up on Sam wasn’t an option. It wasn’t just a matter of her fellow Spartan being awkward and uncomfortable – if he kept acting weird, the other cadets might suspect something was off, and start probing deeper, and start finding things that nobody was meant to know outside of HIGHCOM.She realized, abruptly, that this was an area that the Spartans had never been trained in. What the hell would you even call that kind of training? ‘How to Act Like a Normal Person 101’ didn’t exactly roll off the tongue. Plus, naming it that would require admitting to the bureaucracy that the Spartans were maladjusted, and that would just get Doctor Meyer’s Psych Team in major trouble. That was no good either.
Eight years of training, and they couldn’t teach us how to talk to people? Adriana thought to herself sourly. Jeez. What was the point of the blindfolded underwater demolitions training, if we all just lock up and stutter when someone talks to us without giving an order?
That was probably too harsh, she admitted to herself a millisecond later. They had been trained in this... they just hadn’t realized how important it was.
Doctor Meyer’s team had done the best they could to ensure that the Spartans had known what a ‘normal’ child’s life was like. The same efforts had been attempted by their trainers, and the other doctors in the science teams, and even the substitute teachers like Sergeant Cavendish’s Pathfinders, or Silva’s ODST’s. Heck, Sergeant Johnson had been nearly tearing his hair out, trying to teach all seventy-five of the cadets how to act normal!But there was a different between training and the real thing. The trainers had been firm on that point – the intangibles that popped up when you deployed on your first mission as a rookie. The nerves you experienced.
They’d been talking about combat operations, not social situations, but the analogy still fit.
Sam was talking to someone without authorization for the first time in nearly a decade, and he had frozen up.Think. What could she do that might help here? Even if she managed to help Sam out with whatever question he was refusing to answer, that wouldn’t actually solve the problem. The other male cadets would just ask him another question, and that would make his social awkwardness even more obvious.
He needed a tactical retreat, to escape from this unfavorable situation. After that, he could re-orient and fix his problem. He just needed some time for that.
The solution hit Adriana like the recoil of an Oracle anti-materiel rifle – strong, sudden, but good in a way that was hard to describe.
“Hey,” she called out, still looking over at where Sam was sitting by a half dozen male cadets, interrupting them. “Where are you from?”Sam stared at her. He looked confused for a moment, probably not from the question itself, but instead because he was wondering why she would ask that, when she already knew him.
Then he caught on, and Adriana watched as his expression shifted over milliseconds, growing cold and quiet and sullen in a way that was very natural… but which she knew was actually fake.
“I’m from Harvest,” Sam said loudly, speaking for the first time.
The words cut through all the conversation in the common room instantly. Everyone stopped talking all at once, and they all turned to look, wide-eyed, at Adriana’s friend.
“Oh,” Adriana said back, trying to put some emotion into it, and not knowing if it sounded fake or not, as she lied. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean…”
She didn’t really mean those words, of course. She was not sorry about asking, because this was to Sam’s benefit. Besides, most of the Spartans had already given Sam their condolences before they’d been shipped out to the Academies.
But the apology was expected of her, and it fit her cover.
“Thanks,” Sam said, looking her in the eyes and telling the truth.
He stood up, in what the other cadets probably thought was a sudden and fast movement, but was actually slow by their standards. He ignored the spluttering apologies from the other cadets behind him, and he left the common room.
“I’m sorry,” one of the male cadets said, looking over at her with a stressed, worried look. “We didn’t know.”
“It’s not your fault,” Adriana said, with a little bitterness. In truth, it wasn’t – it was the fault of the Program for not teaching them. “Maybe give him some space.”
The male cadets that had been talking to Sam nodded back to her as a group, with stricken expressions.
“Oh, that poor boy,” Sarah muttered softly. “How did you know?”
Adriana hesitated. She obviously couldn’t say that she knew in advance.
“I just had a feeling,” she lied. “He looked so uncomfortable.”
Sarah seemed to accept that. For a moment, the four of them were all quiet – and then Christine spoke.
“Do you guys think that’ll happen to our homeworlds?” the Endymion native asked, biting her lip.
Adriana flinched. She had seen the images of Harvest, back in the amphitheater underneath the Hive in the FLEETCOM Complex. The real images, not the sanitized, gently edited ones from the public press releases. Harvest was a burning cinder, with almost nothing left of its cities and fields. The image of that devastation coming to New Harmony flashed through her mind. She hadn’t spent long there, but there had been an almost irresistible feeling of nostalgia throughout her trip. It had overcome even the bitterness of learning that her parents had divorced, and she’d never be able to see them together again. Now, she could picture the huge expanses of taiga on fire. The trees burning. Pillars of blue-white plasma descending from orbit.She wanted to retire there after her time in the service was done… but would New Harmony still be there, when the war was over?