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The Pelican settled over it and clamped tight.
Blue Team came back all green status lights, and John relaxed; he had been holding his breath.
The Pelican lifted the Warthog, laden with Spartans and warheads, into the air.
"Make secure," the pilot said. "Bogies inbound on vector zero seven two."
Acceleration tugged at John, but he stood fast, one hand bracing the nukes, the other against the punctured side of the Warthog.
The clear blue light outside darkened to black and filled with the twinkle of stars.
"Rendezvous with the Bunker Hill in fifteen seconds," the Pelican pilot announced. "Prepare for immediate out-system Slipspace jump."
Kurt carefully eased out of the driver's seat and into the midsection to join them.
"Nice work," Fred told him. "How did you know it was a trap?"
"It was the guards loading ammunition off the Warthog," Kurt explained. "I saw it at the time, but it didn't register until it was almost too late. Those ammo canisters were marked as armor-piercing rounds. All of them. You wouldn't need that much AP unless you were taking on a few light tanks…"
"Or a squad of Spartans," Linda said, catching on.
"Us," Fred remarked.
Kurt doggedly shook his head. "I should have figured it out sooner. I almost got everyone killed."
"You mean you saved everyone," Kelly said and she butted her shoulder into his.
"If you ever have another funny 'feeling,'" John told him, "tell me, and make me understand."
Kurt nodded.
John wondered about this man's "feelings," his instinctive subconscious awareness of the danger. CPO Mendez had made then all train so hard, lessons in fire-team integration, target prioritization, hand-to-hand combat, and battlefield tactics were part of their hardwired instincts now. But that didn't mean the underlying biological impulses were worthless. Quite the opposite.
John set a hand on Kurt's shoulder, searching for the right words.
Kelly, as usual, articulated the sentiments that John never could. She said, "Welcome to Blue, Spartan. We're going to make a great team."
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← ^ → CHAPTER
TWO
0500 HOURS, OCTOBER 24, 2531 (MILITARY CALENDAR) \ ABOARD UNSC POINT OF NO RETURN, INTERSTELLAR SPACE, SECTOR B-042
Colonel Ackerson ran both hands through his thinning hair, and poured himself a glass of water from the carafe on the table. His hand shook. Ironic that his career in the military had come to this: a secret meeting on a ship that technically didn't exist, about to discuss a project that, if successful, would never surface from the shadows.
Eyes-only classification. Code words. Double deals and back-stabbing.
He longed for earlier days when he held a rifle in his hands, the enemy was easily recognized and dispatched, and Earth was the most powerful, secure center of the universe.
Those times only existed in memory now, and Ackerson had to live in the dark to save what little light remained.
He pushed back from the ebony conference table, and his gaze swept over the room, a five-meter-diameter bubble, bisected by a metal grate floor, with stainless-steel walls brushed to a white reflective sheen. Once sealed, it became a Faraday cage, and no electronic signals could escape.