Chapter 5 - Halo Crossover (Patreon)

Chapter 5

“The attempted escape by Adriana-111 was easily stopped, but it does worry me what she’ll be able to do as she progresses, Doctor Halsey.”

Catherine looked at Mendez, who stood at nearly rigid attention, which she knew was his version of ‘at ease.’ The man’s military bearing was quite perfect for the role with the trainees, but she found it a bit tiresome.

“It looks like she was inspired by John-117 and his hijacking of a dropship. She’s refusing to tell us how she bypassed the security codes.”

Catherine wasn’t truly worried. There were all sorts of contingencies in place, including subdermal ONI-level tracking implants in all the trainees. Reach also had tremendous resources and was, other than Earth, one of the planets with the highest concentrations of vessels. While it would be highly embarrassing for any of her trainees to even temporarily escape the program, it would showcase just how effectively they were training them.

It had been almost three years and Catherine continued to be amazed by the progress of all of them. They were still children but their competency was already terrifying.

And they hadn’t even gone through the enhancements we have planned for them.

That part filled her with the most guilt. The survival rate for the various enhancements was well below fifty percent. Her team was working on the bleeding edge of progress on that front, desperate to find ways to make it safer without losing efficacy. Given the medical technology they had now, it was likely only a score, maybe even less, of her children would survive. The thought of putting them through all of this only to see most die hurt her.

Examining her feelings on this was always difficult. Billions would die if she didn’t do this, but as she looked at particular individuals like John and Tanya, she felt an almost overwhelming crippling guilt. Tanya in particular worried her, as her raw genetic potential was lower than that of the others. Among the general population, nurture played a huge role in the skillset someone was capable of. A lack of proper nutrients in early childhood could eliminate any baseline hereditary advantage. An improper learning curriculum could make someone squander their mental capacity. A bad diet leading to counterproductive systemic inflammation would lower peak height and bone density. Conversely, a curriculum that forced the mind to expand and create more neurological connections would elevate even average hereditary intelligence into unexpected competencies.

But here – in this program, where conditioning, education, and diet were fully optimized, the variation of baseline potential, the nature aspect, was beginning to make itself known. In that regard Tanya had continued to slowly lose out. And yet… she had the best record in advanced combat simulations and tactics. By an incredible margin.

Kurt was far stronger. Kelly was faster. John had more stamina. But when it came to practical application of violence and strategy, Tanya shone like a beacon. When they simulated different eras of military conflict, from ancient Rome to the European Middle Ages, and into the Industrial Revolution, she excelled. She didn’t always win, but the data was clear. Despite her physical limitations, she was far and away the most dangerous combatant in anything other than a direct duel.

“Doctor Halsey?”

She shook herself. Her mind had wandered.

“Thank you Mendez, but I don’t think we need to worry. Her psych evaluations show she’s growing more used to being here. I believe these attempts will eventually peter off. Adriana-111 may even just be looking at this as a challenge or for the thrill. Her sleep and neurological measurements indicate far less stress and emotional concern than the baseline she had in year one. The social conditioning and strict regimen has frayed her initial bonds of her childhood. The program is working.”

Some, like John, had been easy fits. Others had struggled in their first year. Yet the constant use of their numbers, the forced socialization in small groups, and the relentless cramming of knowledge and skills into their neurally plastic minds had done exactly what the sociologist had predicted. Almost all the children had adapted, and she had the empirical data to prove it.

There were outliers, there always were, but she had run simulations and could easily tell which ones would be likely to make further escape attempts. The human mind was complicated, but with enough data she could predict almost everyone. Individuals could always surprise, the random firing of neurons triggered by something as simple as a scent, could alter someone’s planned behavior or emotional state enough to trigger a resolution to do something.

And then there are the ones who violate all baseline assumptions.

Tanya was an anomaly. An anomaly that defied explanation. The physiological data didn’t make sense. She didn’t feel ‘homesick’ like the others in the first year. She didn’t wake up from nightmares. And yet even after three years, her demands remained the same. Proof of life of her parents, and now her sibling. Not even a hint of that desire growing lax or waning over time.

Then there were the flash-clones. None survived. Sixty-seven experiments, and sixty-seven failures. Upon regaining consciousness most just screamed and then died. Flash-clones occasionally did that, but it was rare. Usually the breakdown took longer, on a scale of weeks, not hours, let alone seconds. Brain scans while they screamed and died showed some sort of massive neurological surge that spoke of impossibilities.

What killed her was that nothing about her brain seemed to indicate that would happen. Her mind held a significant amount of raw intellectual capacity, but it was within the upper-band of gifted children. It was one of those mysteries that continued to gnaw at her and distracted her from the other seventy-four candidates.

She turned away from the enigma that was Tanya and looked at what the next tactical exercise would be. Hmm, a survival game that mimicked jungle combat in the 20th century. Catherine made some adjustments to the suggested plan. She wanted to make it a little more difficult and then also bribe Tanya with extra footage of her parents beyond just proof of life.

Let’s see if her already stellar tactical prowess can be improved with incentives.

***

Incentives worked. It underpinned the entire study of economics. Why did we do anything? Because we wanted some joy, or an avoidance of some discomfort. This was a bit reductive, but even moral satiety came down to the two-sided coin of pain or pleasure. Moral hedonism was just another flavor. The absence of self-loathing or guilt of ‘sins’ could motivate just as much as seeking a wage at a job you disliked in order to preserve the security of your shelter and sustenance. Ultimately, it ended up being deeply personal to each person. For me, who had quite appreciated the childhood family I had in this third life, Halsey had found the right button to push.

This was all management ended up being. How do you motivate people in a sustained way? What carrot did you dangle? What fear do you club people with? The mistake of many business leaders was assuming the one-size fits all approach. For some, the new corner office and title was more important than the increased salary. For others, to be overtly lauded was embarrassing, as they preferred to remain introverted. Even as I was filled with loathing at the dangling of precious recorded moments of the Fischer family, I heartily approved at the sensible approach Doctor Halsey was taking in motivating to new heights. After all, she was treating me as a rational person with a clear incentive for performance.

The current exercise was a three-day game of deadly hide-and-seek. We had traveled through history at a fast pace. Gone were the days of armor, spears, and bows. We were now in the more modern era and the lessons of Vietnam were being taught. My streak of near-perfect answers to all tests had finally been broken when I confidently, and wrongly gave the wrong information about artillery during World War One. In fairness, it was the right answer in another reality.

After World War One, we went into the second World War and spent a long time on major battles that shaped the course of the war and the world after. Stalingrad, Kursk, Normandy and several others. Even though the Americans had waged war against my first life’s homeland, their ‘D-Day’ invasion was something that had saved millions from tyranny. Had the Western Allies not been so daring, it was likely the Iron Curtain would have contained far more of Europe and the tyranny of communism would have been an even larger blight on history.

It was actually quite a fun debate to talk about how various generals who used tanks the way horses had been used in bygone eras. Captain Ahrens would have loved it. I felt a momentary pang at the memory of my Salamander Kampfgruppe. As it had expanded I had been able to make full use of more combined-arm tactics.

War was a tremendous and horrible waste, but there was something that sang to the soul about an effective charge and encirclement done with armored cavalry. Who was the best? The self-proclaimed father of the Blitzkrieg, Heinz Guderian? Or was it Patton, the iconic American general who had raced across France with breakneck speed? No conversation could be complete without the ‘Desert Fox’ Erwin Rommel. Sticking with the desert we also had the Israeli general, Ariel Sharon, who completed the daring 1973 Suez Canal crossing under enemy fire.

After the thoroughly enjoyable debates on those subjects, we began learning more about guerrilla tactics. The joys of asymmetrical warfare. And that led nicely to this exercise. We were going to be dropped into a large forest with a tracking beacon on myself and two other individuals. The area was decently large, a bit over two thousand acres.

The rules had been explained and they added some luck and randomness to it. I and two candidates I would select would have a beacon attached to us. Every three hours, one of our beacons would show up on their HUD for thirty seconds. It was random which would trigger. For seventy-two hours we had to avoid getting shot with their paintball guns. And yes, paintball, because that was the name of the game. As the ones trying to escape, we were not even given guns of our own, but we were given the tools needed to make paint explosions that simulated booby traps of the Vietnam era.

Actual pit traps used to cripple our fellow trainees were not allowed, but we were given quite a bit of material so that if they stepped wrong on our traps, then a paint ‘explosion’ which would remove the searcher from the fight. We were allowed to pick up weaponry our opponents had. Along with their rifles with paint cartridges they had simulated grenades that would blast out paint.

Winning would entail any of us surviving for the full seventy-two hours. Looking at the roster, I ended up selecting Adriana and Kelly. We were given water, a few ration bars, and the tools needed to construct traps. We had exactly a one hour headstart, and the way the traps had to be constructed took a bit of time. The intent here was that we couldn’t use all of the supplies in the first hour, but instead had to construct them sometime during the engagement.

“Ugh, why did you pick me, Tanya. Mendez has it out for you,” Kelly griped, “There are seventy-two of them and we don’t even have guns!”

“Because no one can outrun you, eighty-seven,” Adriana pointed out. “You’re the perfect rabbit to lead them into the traps.”

“Great, I get to be bait while you just find somewhere to hide.”

I shook my head. “That’s the trick, the beacon goes off too frequently for us to sit and hide. We have to be moving when beacon triggers, but more importantly, we were told we can use their weapons against them. The only real way to win this is to even the odds and strike unexpectedly. So here’s the plan…”

***

Kurt had been given command, but he wanted to hedge their strategies.  

“We are going to split up into two teams John, you take half, and I take the other. We’ll work independently, so if Tanya somehow has a trick up her sleeve, we have less chances of both of us falling for it.”

Musa objected. “You should coordinate and use two separate ideas for finding and tagging them. That way we don’t overlap, you could both independently fall into the same trap.”

Good point.

The odds were heavily stacked in their favor, even if they didn’t have communicators or radios. But they had all learned not to underestimate Tanya. Kurt saw John nodding, and the other trainee went first.

“I’ll take my team and slowly move toward the center. Priority is to slowly and carefully clear a path there while taking the fewest casualties possible. We have seventy-two hours and by holding the center we guarantee that we are no further from a beacon alert than the radius of this battlefield. Tanya doesn’t want to be cornered so she won’t stick to the edges, meaning we’ll probably only be a klick or two away when the beacon triggers.”

Kurt thought John’s plan was a decent one, but he also thought he had a better one.

“The beacons from what we’ve been told, tell us how they work and that they can’t be removed. The whole exercise surrounds them, but my plan is to be more aggressive. We don’t wait for the beacon, and instead we go on the hunt and grid pattern our way through the area without worrying about how Tanya will use the beacons to set us up. I’ll keep my teams to the east of your location for the first day, and plan to use three squads. That should be more than enough eyes to spot any traps or hiding spots as we sweep the area.”  

Naomi agreed. “I like Kurt’s idea better. This is probably going to only be the first of many times we do this. Chief Petty Officer Mendez is probably going to have some of you be in Tanya’s shoes later, and I bet they will assess things like casualties taken and time until completion. Playing too safe will count against us.”

“Thanks, ten,” Kurt said with a smile. He looked over to John, “Don’t change your plan now, Musa is right, we should try this two different ways. Whatever tactic she ends up going for, it can’t work optimally against both of our strategies.”

Linda snorted. Kurt looked at her.

“Sorry, just that you are starting to sound like Tanya when you take the lead. It’s funny.”

Kurt didn’t mind. Why shouldn’t he model himself after the smartest trainee? Over the last couple of years it had become painfully apparent that she had a natural ability to just figure out loopholes and tactics that the trainers had not envisioned. The rules for each exercise had started getting longer and longer just to eliminate clever interactions that normally people wouldn’t have expected. This one for example had specific limitations on the sorts of traps Tanya and her team could use.

“Since no one has any real objections, let’s move out.”

***

Adriana thought Tanya’s plan was needlessly risky, but she was the CO for the mission, so that was that. They had spent time perfecting her hiding spot so that it was literally impossible to be physically seen until they crested the shallow elevation. At that point, it would be possible to spot her, if they were very thorough and looked behind themselves. Something that was unlikely to be done in the first minutes of the exercise.

Tanya had explained that early on, the hunters would not be looking for them, but for the traps. The traps were pressure-based. You stepped on the ground with the trap and it acted as a ‘mine’ even though it more accurately represented a punji stake trap. The explosion of paint was narrow and not nearly as big as a proper landmine.

However…

The rules indicated that getting hit with paint took you out of the game. Since that was the case, and most traps would be thought to be on the ground where the focused attention would be, Tanya had a few set slightly above eye level in trees that could not support their weight. As a group of trainees passed and reached the right spot, Adriana moved out of her hiding spot and threw her rock with precise accuracy.

They weren’t allowed to throw rocks at other trainees, not after what John and the others did when hijacking a dropship, but throwing them at the traps themselves wasn’t mentioned. Her aim was good and the paint splattered like rain and managed to hit two. Adriana then booked it along a pre-planned path that included the regular ground-based paint traps.

A few paintballs splattered against the tree behind her, but there was no clean shot. She knew where the traps were, they didn’t. The sharp eyes of her fellow trainees would likely prevent additional casualties, but they would be slowed.

I stirred the hornet’s nest, two down, and now it’s Kelly’s turn.

***

Kurt sure hoped John’s group was doing better than his. Having come under surprise attack within the first hour was ridiculous. They had been told that those they were hunting wouldn’t have weapons!

Perhaps this is a test on what to do when the intel turns out to be wrong?

Paint exploded around him, and he didn’t get the electronic indicator that he was hit, so he was still in the fight. Taking cover behind the tree to avoid a simulated grenade probably wouldn’t work once they were on a true field of battle, but for the approximation they had here, it did the job.

Kurt signaled the remaining members of his squad, then flung one of his own paint grenades as a distraction while dashing out of cover. He wasn’t going to let someone else take point after leading his squad into an ambush. As expected the paintball round still struck him and he was out. But, it did let the rest of his squad know where the fire was coming from and they unleashed a storm of paint. He was forbidden from speaking and knew that once the immediate vicinity was clear, the trainers would come fetch him and escort him and any others who were ‘out’ away from the field.

When he arrived, there were monitors set up to watch the action. Several hidden cameras were deployed, but also drones in the sky gave a great aerial view with thermal imaging.

“Chief Petty Officer Mendez, permission to ask questions?”

“Permission granted, Kurt-051.” 

“We were told that they wouldn’t have weapons, was that false?”

“It wasn’t false, they didn’t start with weapons. Adriana-111 used a booby trap in a creative way to score two ‘kills’ and then made off. The squad gave chase, leaving their comrades who were ‘out’ behind, including their grenades and guns. Kelly-087 then swooped in and quickly grabbed the supplies and hustled back to Tanya. From there, your split-up squads are now getting picked apart.”

Kurt shook his head ruefully. Seventy-two hours, he had thought a big portion of this would be an endurance check. His idea was to keep constant pressure, not letting the enemy get any rest, and avoiding a predictable three-hour cycle. He had not predicted this turn of events and without radios to warn others… they were falling to ambushes they were unprepared for.

“We got complacent, we let our guard down.”

“You did,” the big military man’s blunt assessment did not have much sympathy in it.

Kurt was surprised to see Doctor Halsey approach. She interacted and spoke semi-frequently with the trainees, but was typically hands-off with the training.

“Kurt-051, you are correct, but also should remember that is why you are being trained. Tanya-118 chose an abnormally aggressive strategy, but the lesson does remain. Always be on your guard, and never assume intel was perfect.” 

“Yes ma’am.”

The doctor watched the images as the trio of ‘prey’ moved in for another ambush on Kurt’s remaining squad.

***

John felt that things were a bit too quiet. They had run across a couple of traps, but that was it. The area was large, and perhaps they didn’t have time to set many, or they only had a few supplies. Either way, they made it to the center without taking any casualties. When the beacon pinged, it showed a signal half a klick away, so relatively close.

That’s Kurt’s territory, should we go?

While eager to go out and secure the victory, he was cautious. They had to secure all three of their targets, and his team had just completed a swift march. While all of them had the stamina to keep going, they likely wouldn’t be able to locate them this early. The parameters of the game didn’t give them extra points for winning sooner than later. The winning was what mattered. If they wanted to assess them on how quickly they did so, then they could have included that in the rules.

“We stay here for now, get some rest. Stay hydrated and eat your rations. We will move out on the next beacon in three hours.”

Only an hour or so passed when two members of Kurt’s team arrived. John approached along with the others in the makeshift camp they had made. He had heard Naomi’s voice, but something was off, the way she was tilting her head downward, the helmet covering part of her features…

John grabbed his paintball rifle immediately, only to get shot in the chest by someone else. At the same time ‘Naomi’ and her companion revealed themselves to be Adriana and Tanya. They immediately shot the surprised group that had gathered with brutal efficacy and John silently cursed. After killing half the camp, they retreated as the rest of John’s team got their weapons and kills didn’t come so easily. Adriana got tagged and was out, and the two ran off into the setting sun.

I messed up. There should have been a security perimeter. Passcodes could have been given out. I should have seen the way they walked, how they obscured their features. Stupid, stupid, stupid!

John wasn’t sure if he had lost. Maybe Kurt’s group or the remainder of John’s group could get it done. That would make him happy, but he had a sinking feeling it wasn’t going to go that way. He sighed. Losing always stung, but it also taught him a lesson. He would not make this same mistake again!

Author's Note: Path for this story, probably one more chapter and then augmentation event. I've gone back and forth on how I want to handle it, solicited some feedback in the spoiler channel, and I've decided... to make a poll. :0 Obviously the poll results will have spoilers, but since the poll result --> then reveal in one chapter I think its an ok solution and I can stop hmming and hawing about it. Before that, one last training exercise next chapter - put some ideas down for near-sci-fi conflicts. Its one thing to go back and have exercises in historical situations, but Halo is set in the future, but what training exercises might be fun for the wars of the 22nd and 23rd century for the trainees to do?