Halo: Fireteam Phoenix

Chapter 12: Wonderful Chain of Events

"I know, I know. Are you ready for tomorrow?" It was an odd question. Of course he was ready. Aaron dreamt about killing, he could do it in his sleep. "Now who talks about war too much?"

"Answer the question, 2," Sarah insisted. Ah, she wasn't talking about the killing.

"Yes. I am." He straightened up.

"How?"

"Everyone that really mattered to me died pre-program." He ignored the look of feigned indignance on Sarah's face. "Me and you? We're disposable. Bred to be disposable. Derek? He was disposable. He did his job."

"So that's how you prepare," Sarah scoffed. "You dehumanise everyone around you?"

"No, I don't. They do. The UNSC, ONI, they took me, you, Derek, all of us. They took us, kids, they turned us into killers. Taught us we weren't worth nothing to them. Spartan 2s? Those guys, they're valuable. Precious media fodder. Us? We don't matter."

"So I did what they taught us. Started seeing us, people, as less than that. Pawns in a game." He picked up some scattered bullets of various sizes. "Grunts? They're pawns." He put down a .22 "ODSTs? Rooks. 2s are Knights. We're Bishops." He put down three more rounds, of increasing calibre. "Reach is the Queen. And Earth? Earth is the King." Aaron put down two grenades. "More than anything, keep Earth safe. So they do. They took us, armed us, then threw us into suicide missions. 'We're trading lives for time,' they said. Lives for time, to stop the covenant finding Earth. Because if they take Earth?" He knocked them all aside. "Checkmate."

"Lovely metaphor," Sarah said, picking up the munitions. 

"They did this to me. To all of us. Made us see everything as the war. We never had real childhoods. Teen years. Never found love, never will." He saw her face had fallen, shadowy in the dusk. "Commander, get some sleep and let it rest. There's billions died fighting this war and before its done, billions more will join them. Spartans, 2 or 3, we're no different. Derek died. All Alpha company died. We don't go missing in action. We're not special. We're just like everyone else." He sat back, satisfied. "I just seem to be the only one who realised." 

 Marie sprinted down the long, bland corridor to the logistics centre. A siren had alerted them to a covenant invasion of multiple cities around the planet. As she burst into the room, Richard and Aaron were already assembled. "3, good to see you," Sarah said, hobbling past the view screen. "What's the situation commander?" It was the early hours of the morning. Not what they had planned. "The cruisers failed. The covenant figured out we were drawing them away and started bombarding the cities to draw them back. The plan has changed.

"The short briefing established their severe lack of resources. Between them, they had an entire planet to save. They assigned Richard to ferrying troops, equipment and people across the city. He was also set to be Aaron's extraction. A pair of ODST squads would join the latter. Marie, on the other hand, would be deployed to New Belgrade alone, alongside an entire division of ODST's. Marie caught Sarah gnawing her nails as Ball informed her she was going alone, but said nothing. It would only fall on deaf ears and, besides-they didn't need to hear it.

The three spartans headed back down the hallway Marie had travelled up ten minutes prior. Aaron soon left them in his dust, and he was gone. Sarah and Richard lagged behind, speaking softly to one another. "So, this is probably it?" Richard mumbled. Marie nodded, and stopped. He looked back to her, then she leapt up to him and planted a passionate kiss on his lips. "There, now it won't be so bad. Now go, before we lose our nerve." Marie ordered, pointing him after Aaron. He nodded and waved, putting his helmet on as he went. Her heart began doing somersaults and she had to breathe hard to slow her racing pulse. She did all this even as she embarked the entry ramp to the frigate set to deploy them to New Belgrade- whatever it held.