“Yes, sir. I’ll see to the initialization of our AI as soon as Cortana is through running her diagnostics.”

Captain Keyes had meet Cortana briefly in Dr. Halsey’s office. Although every AI he had met was brilliant, Cortana seemed exceptionally qualified. Captain Keyes had posed several navigation problems and she had figured out all the solutions... and had come up with a few options he had not considered. She was somewhat high-spirited, but that was not necessarily a bad thing.

Lieutenant Hikowa led him into the elevator and punched the button for D deck.

“At first,” Hikowa said, “I was concerned with all the ordnance on board. One penetrating shot and we could explode like a string of firecrackers. But this ship doesn’t have much empty space—it’s full of braces, honeycombed titanium-A, and hydraulic reinforcements that can be activated in an emergency. She can take a tremendous beating, sir.”

“Let’s hope we don’t have to test that,” Captain Keyes said. He checked that this pipe was in his pocket.

“Yes, sir.”

Their elevator passed through the rotating section of the ship and Captain Keyes felt his weight ease and a flutter of vertigo. He grabbed hold of the rails.

The doors opened and they entered the cavernous engine room. The ceiling was four stories high, making this the largest compartment in the ship. Catwalks and platforms ringed the hexagonal chamber.

“Here’s the new reactor, sir,” Hikowa said.

The device perched within a lattice of nonferric ceramic and leaded crystal. The main reactor ring was nestled in the center of what appeared to be two smaller reactor rings. Technicians floated nearby taking readings and monitoring the output displays on the walls.

“I’m not familiar with this design, Lieutenant.”

“The latest reactor technology. The Pillar of Autumn is the first ship to get it. The two smaller fusion reactors come online to supercharge the main reactor. Their overlapping magnetic fields can temporally boost power by three hundred percent.”

Captain Keyes whistled appreciatively as he scrutinized the room. “I don’t see any coolant pipes.”

“There are none, sir. This reactor uses a laser-induced optical slurry of ions chilled to near-absolute zero to neutralize the waste heat. The more we crank up the power, the more juice we have to cool the system. It is very efficient.”

The smaller reactors flickered to life and Captain Keyes felt the ambient heat in the room jump, then suddenly cool again. He removed his pipe and tapped it in the palm of his hand. He would have to rethink his old tactics. This new engine could give him new options in battle.

“There’s more, sir.”

Lieutenant Hikowa led him back into the lift. “We have forty fifty-millimeter cannons for point defense, with overlapping fields of fire covering all inbound vectors.”

“What is our least defended approach vector?”

“Bottom fore,” she said, “along the lay line of the MAC system. There are very few gunnery placements there. Transient magnetic bursts tend to magnetize the weapons.”

“Tell me about the MAC gun, Lieutenant. It looks under-powered.”

“It fires a special light round with a ferrous core, but an outer layer of tungsten carbide. The round splinters on impact—like an assault rifle’s shredder rounds.” She was talking so fast she had to pause and take a deep breath. “This gun has magnetic field recyclers along the length that recapture the field energy. Coupled with booster capacitors, we can fire three successive shots with one charge.”

That would be very effective against the Covenant energy shields. The first shot, maybe the first pair of shots, would take down their shields. The last round would deliver a knockout punch.

“I take it you approve, Lieutenant?”

“To quote Ensign Lovell, sir, ‘I think I’m in love.’ ”

Captain Keyes nodded. “I notice we have several single ships and some Pelican dropships in the bay.”

“Yes, sir. One of the Longswords is equipped with a Shiva nuclear warhead. It can be remote-piloted. We also have three HAVOK warheads onboard.”

“Of course,” Captain Keyes said. “And the Pelicans? One of them had extra armor.”

“The Spartans were working on it. Some sort of boarding craft.”

“The Spartans?” Captain Keyes asked. “They’re already onboard?”

“Yes, sir. They were here before we got on board.”

“Take me to them, Lieutenant.”

“Yes, sir.” Lieutenant Hikowa stopped the elevator and hit the button for C deck.

Twenty-five years ago Captain Keyes had helped procure the Spartan candidates for Dr. Halsey. She had said they might one day be the best hope the UNSC had for peace. At the time he’d assumed that the Doctor was prone to hyperbole—but it appeared that she’d been correct. That didn’t make what they had done right, though. His complicity in those kidnappings still haunted him.

The elevator doors opened. The primary storage bay had been converted into barracks for the thirty Spartans. Every one of them wore MJOLNIR battle armor. They looked alien to him. Part machine, part titan—but completely inhuman.

The room was filled with motion—Spartans unpacked crates, others cleaned and field-stripped their assault rifles, and a pair of them practiced hand-to-hand combat. Captain Keyes could barely follow their motions. They were so fast, no hesitation. Strike and block and counter-strike—their movements were a continuous stream of rapid-fire blurs.

Captain Keyes had seen the news feeds and heard the rumors, like everyone on in the fleet—the Spartans were near-mythological figures in the military. They were supposed to be super-human soldiers, invulnerable and indestructible—and it was almost the truth. Dr. Halsey had shown him their operational records.

Between the Spartans and the refitted Pillar of Autumn, Captain Keyes was beginning to believe Dr. Halsey’s long-shot mission might work after all.

“Captain on the deck!” one of the Spartans shouted.

Every Spartan stopped and snapped to attention.

“As you were,” he said.

The Spartans relaxed slightly. One turned and strode toward him.

“Master Chief SPARTAN 117 reporting as ordered, sir.” The armored giant paused, and for a moment, Keyes thought the Spartan looked uncomfortable. “Sir, I regret the unit was not able to ask your permission to come aboard. Admiral Stanforth insisted we keep our presence off the COM channels and computer networks.”

Captain Keyes found the reflective faceplates of the Spartans’ helmets disconcerting. It was impossible to read their features.

“Quite all right, Master Chief. I just wanted to extend my regards. If you or your men need anything, let me know.”

“Yes, sir,” the Master Chief said.

An awkward moment of silence passed. Captain Keyes felt like he didn’t belong here—an intruder in a very exclusive club. “Well, Master Chief, I’ll be on the bridge.”

“Sir!” The Master Chief saluted.

Captain Keyes returned the salute and left with Lieutenant Hikowa.

When the elevator doors closed, Lieutenant Hikowa said, “Do you think—I mean with all due respect to the Spartans, sir—don’t you think they’re... strange?”

“Strange? Yes, Lieutenant. You might act a little strange if you seen and been through as much as they had.”

“Some people say they’re not even humans in those suits—that they’re just machines.”

“They’re human,” Captain Keyes said.

The elevator doors parted and Captain Keyes stepped onto his bridge. It was much smaller than he was accustomed to; the command chair was only a meter from the other stations. View screens dominated the room, and a massive, curved window afforded a panoramic view of the stars.

“Status reports,” Captain Keyes ordered.

Lieutenant Dominique spoke first. “Communication systems are green, sir. Monitoring FLEETCOM Reach traffic. No new orders.” Dominique had gotten his hair shorn since he had been on the Iroquois. He also had a new tattoo around his left wrist: the wavy lines of a Besell function.