Halo_ The Fall of Reach - Eric Nylund [28]
The Spartan attached his rappelling line to the trainer. A moment later the writhing guard shot upward, into the darkness.
Two other guards turned to attack.
The Spartan dodged, rolled, and melted into the shadows.
Dr. Halsey realized the trainer’s exoskeleton wasn’t being pulled up—it was being used as a counterweight.
Two more Spartans, dangling from the other end of that rope, dropped unnoticed into the center of the bunker. Dr. Halsey immediately recognized one of them, although he was dressed entirely in black, save his open eye slits—Number 117. John.
John landed, braced, and kicked one guard. The man landed in a heap . . . eight meters away. The other Spartan jumped off the bunker; he flipped end over end, evading the stun rounds that filled the
air. He threw himself at the farthest guard and they skidded together into the shadows. The guard’s gun strobed once, and then it was dark again. On top of the bunker, John was a blur of slashing motions. A second guard’s exosuit erupted in a
fountain of hydraulic fluid and then collapsed under the armor’s weight.
The last guard on the bunker turned to fire at John. Halsey gripped the edge of her chair. “He’s at point blank range! Even stun rounds can kill at that distance!” As the guard’s gun fired, John sidestepped. The stun rounds slashed through the air, a clean miss. John
grabbed the weapon’s armature—twisted—and with a screech of stressed metal, wrenched it free of the exoskeleton. He fired directly into the man’s chest and sent him tumbling off the bunker. The remaining quartet of perimeter guards turned and sprayed the area with suppression fire. A heartbeat later, the lights went out. Mendez cursed and keyed the mike. “Backups. Hit the backup lights now!”
A dozen amber floods flickered to life. Not a Spartan was in sight, but the nine trainers were either unconscious or lay immobile in inert battle armor.
The red flag was gone. “Show me that again,” Dr. Halsey said unbelievingly. “You recorded all that, didn’t you?” “Of course.” Mendez tapped a button but the monitors played back—static. “Damn it. They got to the
cameras, too,” he muttered, impressed. “Every time we find a new place to hide them, they disable the
recording devices.” Dr. Halsey leaned against the glass wall staring at the carnage below. “Very well, Chief Mendez, what else do I need to know?”
“Your Spartans can run at bursts of up to fifty-five KPH,” he explained. “Kelly can run a little faster, I think. They will only get quicker as they adjust to the ‘alterations’ we’ve made to their bodies. They can lift three times their body weight—which, I might add, is almost double the norm due to their increased muscle density. And they can virtually see in the dark.”
Dr. Halsey pondered this new data. “They should not be performing so well. There must be unexplained synergistic effects brought on by the combined modifications. What are their reaction times?”
“Almost impossible to chart. We estimate it at twenty milliseconds,” Mendez replied. He shook his head, then added, “I believe it’s significantly faster in combat situations, when their adrenaline is pumping.”
“Any physiological or mental instabilities?”
“None. They work like no team I’ve ever seen before. Damn near telepathic, if you ask me. They were dropped in these caves yesterday, and I don’t know where they got black suits or the rope that for that maneuver, but I can guarantee they haven’t left this room. They improvise and improve and adapt.
“And,” he added, “theylike it. The tougher the challenge, the harder the fight . . . the better their morale becomes.”
Dr. Halsey watched as the first trainer stirred and struggled to get out of his inert armor. “They might as well have been killed,” she murmured. “But can the Spartans kill, Chief? Kill on purpose? Are they ready for real combat?”
Mendez looked away and