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She followed the order pathway—crashed into layers of counter code. The code started a trace on hersignal.
She blocked it—and it restarted a trace of the origin of her block.
This was a very well-crafted piece of counterintrusion software, far superior to the normal ONIslugcode. If nothing else, Cortana liked a challenge. She withdrew from the database and looked for anunguarded way into ONI Section Three files.
Cortana listened to the hum of coded traffic along the surface of ONI’s secure network. There was anunusual amount of packets today: queries and encrypted messages from ONI operatives. She peered intothem and unraveled their secrets as they passed her. There were orders for ship movements andoperatives outbound from Reach. This must be the new directive to send scouts into the peripherysystems and find the Covenant. She saw several ships docked in Reach’s space docks—ONI stealth jobsmade to look like private yachts. They had cute, innocuous names: theApplebee ,Circumference , andtheLark .
She spotted something she could use: Dr. Halsey had just entered her laboratory. She was at checkpointthree. The doctor waited as her voice and retina patterns were being scanned.
Cortana intercepted and killed the signal. The verification system reset.
“Please rescan retina, Dr. Halsey,” the system requested, “and repeat today’s code phrase in a normalvoice.”
Before Dr. Halsey could do this, Cortana sent her own files of Dr. Halsey’s retina and voice scans. Shehad long ago copied them and occasionally they came in handy.
Section Three verification opened for Cortana. She had only a second before the doctor spoke andoverrode the previous entry access.
Cortana, however, was a lightning strike in the system. She entered, searched, and found what shewanted. Every piece of data on SPARTAN 117 was copied to her personal directory within seventymilliseconds.
She withdrew from the ONI database, routing all traces of her queries back to her Ackerson “ghost.”
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She closed all connections and returned to thePillar of Autumn . One quick check of the reactor—yes,operating within normal parameters—and she sent a complete report to Lieutenant Hall on the bridge.
Cortana examined the Master Chief’scomplete CSV. She scanned backward through time: hisperformance data on the obstacle course, and the debriefing he had given at ONI headquarters.
She paused and pondered the signal the Covenant had sent from Sigma Octanus IV. Intrigued, she triedto translate the sequence. The symbols looked tantalizingly familiar. Every algorithm and variation ofthe standard translation software she attempted, however, failed. Puzzled, she set it aside to examinelater.
She continued, absorbing the data from the Master Chief’s files. She learned of the augmentations heand the other Spartans were made to endure; the brutal indoctrination and training they had received;and how he had been abducted at the age of six, and a flash clone used to replace him in an ONI blackop.