Cassandra-G006

Childhood
Cassandra was born on Sigma Octanus IV on the outskirts of the metropolis Cote de Azure. Her genes were found to be compatible with the requirements for SPARTAN III augmentation, and she was taken from her home by ONI agents. This sudden removal from her family traumatized her, making Cassandra quiet and shy. Making few friends in the program, she was one of the lowest rated candidates in most exercises, although her academical assignments were above average. Cassandra narrowly avoided being washed out of the program through her interest in becoming a medic, something few SPARTAN IIIs trained for.

Team Kopis
Cassandra was assigned to Team Kopis when Gamma Company was separated according to squads. Lacking strength, she instead worked to become faster, impressing many of her instructors and teammates through her tenacity and refusal to give up. Although Kopis was never one of the higher ranking teams, they managed to replace the void left in Cassandra by the loss of her family. When Gamma Company graduated, she and the rest of her team were sent on several low-profile missions as the company was scattered throughout UNSC space. During one mission to recover a UNSC database that had been lost on an uncharted world, Team Kopis was inserted into the wrong place and was quickly surrounded by Covenant forces. Despite Cassandra's medical expertise, her four teammates were killed before aid could arrive. This loss further traumatized Cassandra, making it almost impossible for her to form any lasting friendships. In the aftermath of her team's destruction, Cassandra was reassigned to Team Jian, a squad with zero percent casualties. One of five other additions to the squad, Cassandra disliked the crowded environment and resisted attempts by her team leader, Jake-G293, to bring her into the fold. Ironically enough, it was the antisocial Simon-G294 who broke down her barriers when the two of them were paired together during a field assignment against the Covenant. His unintentional humor forced her to laugh and made her decide to give friendships one more try.

New Africa
Unlike many of her teammates, Cassandra was glad for the slew of unimportant missions given to the SPARTAN IIIs due to the decreased likelihood of her losing any more friends to the Covenant. When Gamma Company was reassembled and prepped for the assault on New Africa, she was worried that the huge battle to retake the planet would result in casualties for Team Jian. Her fears were realized when, soon after "helljumping" near a Covenant fortification, Jian suffered its first losses in its entire operational history. Horrified, Cassandra suffered a near-nervous breakdown before Simon managed to yell her out of it. His berations managed to get her through the continuing fighting, and when Simon himself went missing in action, Cassandra joined Jake in agreeing that he was still alive before continuing the battle. Although Simon did survive, he deemed that with the dispatch of ONI death squads to execute the SPARTAN IIIs, his squad's survival seemed unlikely and fled the planet with a group of ONI renegades.

Wounded
Team Jian did, in fact, survive the assassination attempt. After losing a single member to the death squads they fled into New Africa's wilderness and managed to avoid any more deaths. Unfortunately, Cassandra was severely wounded during a firefight with the pursuing agents and passed into a coma. Some time later, they were discovered by an ONI search team who were under orders to bring the SPARTANs back to the UNSC. The order to kill them had been rescinded after a meeting of ONI's leaders had deemed it a "foolish overreaction". The SPARTANs were told that they had been the victims of a friendly fire accident sparked by an orders-mixup. Team Jian accepted the explanation and returned to an ONI hospital, where Cassandra was treated for her wounds, which proved too extensive for the UNSC to heal. Feeling that a protracted medical incident might lead to a security risk (this was the same reason that the SPARTAN-IIIs had been wanted dead in the first place), her superiors planned to take her off of life support. However, Simon intercepted the order from where he was hiding. Still wracked with guilt over his murder of an ONI officer, he infiltrated the hospital and kidnapped Cassandra, taking her back to his stolen stealth ship, the Simbiote. Knowing that he did not have the medical equipment to save her, he prepared to return to the hospital to steal it. A half-conscious Cassandra asked him why he had turned against the UNSC. Simon then told her the real story about the execution of the SPARTAN-IIIs. Unsure of what to believe, Cassandra begged him not to kill any of their friends as he placed her in cryo-storage.

The Sanghelli
Cassandra was still in cryo storage when Simon was presumed killed by Jake during a brawl on an orbiting station. Blown out into space, he was saved when his AI, Diana called the Simbiote to collect his unconscious body. The ship was then picked up by a Sanghelli scavenger ship that was passing through the system with its mother ship. The curious Sanghelli tended to Simon's wounds, and then, at his request, saved Cassandra as well. They, unlike the UNSC, did have the medical knowledge and equipment to grant her a full recovery. Meanwhile, Simon made a deal with them: if they would grant the two of them political asylum and place them both in cryostorage indefinitely, then they would fight for them when the galaxy "really needed" them. When approached with this deal, Cassandra reluctantly agreed to believe Simon's story, and then was placed into cryo sleep for an indefinite amount of time.

Personality and Traits
Prior to being placed in the SPARTAN III program, Cassandra was shy around strangers but outgoing enough with her family. Once she was separated from them, she barely talked at all with her fellow SPARTANs. After being placed in Team Kopis, she once more began to be social with the members of her team, treating them like the family she had lost. When the other four members of Kopis were killed in action, Cassandra refused to talk to anyone in her replacement squad until Simon unwittingly brought her out of her shell. Even then she remained quiet, making her an excellent person for her teammates to go to to vent their frustrations. Although a capable soldier, she was privately horrified by the realities of war, something that influenced her decision to train as a medic.

In training, Cassandra found herself to be physically frail, a trait that would continue in her even after her augmentation. Determined not to wash out, she worked hard to become faster instead, showing a seemingly limitless amount of motivation. During exercises (and later, missions) she was often chosen to run messages or supplies to other teams when alternate means of doing so were unsuccessful. Despite her attempts to prove otherwise, however, Cassandra's kill count remains the lowest on Team Jian.

Equipment
Cassandra wears the standard SPI suit of combat armor into combat. She uses an MA5K Carbine like most other SPARTAN IIIs, and follows Team Jian's tradition of strapping an extra combat knife to her weapon. Along with her sidearm, Cassandra carries a UNSC medic's field kit with her during missions.