John stood at attention as the commanding officer made their rounds through the UNSC encampment. Besides them, a growing field of white tents made their new home across the untouched planet that was now a refugee safe-haven for all those fleeing the Covenant.
It was a normal occurrence now, and with the Covenant beginning to crawl deeper inside Human-occupied colonies, space had, ironically, become a commodity to both UNSC and fleeing colonists. So much to the point that John stood at practically arm’s length from civilians that have never seen death. Separated only by an electrical chain link fence.
They gawked and stared, of course. Something he had become so used to by Marines and Navy alike. But these civilians looked up to him more like their savior.
And John ill liked that feeling.
His eyes still traced the tents and the crowds of people that stared at him. Threat assessment. As was typical of his kind. But in the crowds, he spotted something almost felt strange.
Sat almost hidden away by the crowds sat a woman surrounded by children. She wore a modest dress as if she were plucked from a summer vacation and placed in the grime of the refugee camp. She was calm, and spoke words that John could not hear, but he surmised she was reading from the book settled on her lap.
It was almost out of a museum that the scene was set. And it was amidst this chaos that there was a moment of peace.
It was this moment that John wondered, albeit for a moment, if he was once a child like those staring up at the woman with dream like wonder.
He glanced to his fellow Spartans at his side, their faces hidden behind the veil.
No. Never.
This was what he was born to become.