Terribly sorry for the long wait for the next part, it'll be yet ANOTHER long wait until the part after THIS. I'd just like to thank Chunkyshark for what he said about my fanfic, and his little insight on the Reclaimers/Forerunners. Kelly awoke again, notices she had her whole suit on again, including the helmet. She looked around the room, no doubt they rigged the suit. She couldn’t use it anymore. One final check confirmed nothing else was in the room with her, besides needles, guns, and other medical equipment. She prayed for Fred’s welfare, and remember the Installation-02 incident. Even further back, she remember meeting CPO Mendez on Delta Halo. Mendez was an old man, and it seemed Dr. Halsey set him straight, he was doing something weird on Delta Halo. She wasn’t allowed into the human structure, but she remembered Dr. Halsey storm out mumbling to herself. It was an interesting series of occasions. CHAPTER 8======== 0600 HOURS, MILITARY CALENDAR/2548\ ON ARTIFICIAL RING-WORLD, KNOWN AS INSTALLTION-05 “Get up, it’s time for another exercise men!” Linda snorted. “And women!” Mendoza added on. He felt bad about doing this, but having a new SPARTAN-III project would really increase the probability of survival to the human race. They were clones. Mendoza couldn’t stop thinking about all of these contraptions that a team of under 250 men had assembled for the clones of the regular SPARTAN-II’s. John, Linda, Kelly, Will, Fred, Anton, Grace, Li, you name ‘em, they were here. Except Sam, who was easily Mendoza’s best team man. He let his life go on the Covenant ship in 2525 just for the welfare of Kelly and John, his two other ‘favourites’. Chiron TL 35-TL95 Training Complexes were assembled here on this ring-world, but Mendez couldn’t help thinking that ONI was keeping a dangerous secret about this place. Everything was fine, the Spartan’s clones were just as strong as the other Spartans, and would be stronger at this rate in about four years. That is, if the Covenant didn’t find this ring before then. Either way, if the clones turned out half as good as the Spartans, then it is likely they’d have success on the first Covenant assault on this ring-world. “Mendez!” A low ranking Marine has shouted, running down the hallway, kicking open the door that was mostly closed into the Spartans bunk. “Listen! Creatures! Everywhere!” The Marine screamed as if seeing hell itself. “Slow down there, take a deep breath, that’s it. Good.” Mendez replied. “Listen up, get all personnel the hell out of this ring! There is some creature, I don’t know how to explain it, little pod like creatures, they jump on you and suck the very life out of you!” “You’re sure this wasn’t a dream?” Mendez replied, astonished by the creatures described. “Ackerson is dead.” The Marine casually said. “Ackerson? How?” Mendez replied. At this point, Mendoza had turned completely around to face the door, and lifted a pistol out of his pocket. A Magnum, way more efficient than the other one with a scope which was used more, but then again this one was a brand new pistol. Some Spartans already began to rise from their beds, which were referred to as ‘mattresses’ because there was almost no sheets or blankets on it. They rubbed their eyes, but knew they shouldn’t ask what was going on when their CPO was in the middle of a seemingly important conversation. “The pods!” The Marine screamed. “We didn’t mark his as KIA, just MIA, we never saw his corpse.” “I guess that’s something to look forward to.” Mendez grunted. “Could you recount the events that lead to this… missing of Ackerson?” “Not now sir, they’ve followed me in.” “Now what are they called?” The entire wall collapsed, and Spartan-117, named John had to make a swift roll out of his bedding onto the hard concrete floor. Millions of parasite-like creatures crawled into the room, resembling humans. “The Flood!” Mendez cried. “Follow me!” Mendez shouted, smashing through the glass window with his shoulder. He fell off the 12th story onto the hard dirt and grass ground. Of course, just like Ackerson to play with fire and get us all burned. Mendez thought. The original plan was to modify the Spartan clones with Flood DNA to enhance their athletic abilities. After the discovering and studying the Flood since 2545, they decided the Flood had some advantages when taking over a human corpse, and turning it into a combat form, which was mainly the ability to jump great distances. And now, double energy shields were a necessity on the new Mark-VII Armour, which wasn’t exactly finished yet. He hoped the 24 kilometre long building which contained everything known about the Flood, the Covenant, the Halos, and the Spartans wasn’t destroyed. The plan was brilliant, sure-fire, perfect. Now Ackerson had to go and get himself killed. Mendez decided the next assignment was an antidote to turning flood combat forms, back into their original human forms, or Covenant forms for that matter, but not like they’d want to.