User blog comment:Ahalosniper/The Expandables/@comment-26685181-20110226021322

Don't forget, led by Red Fifteen (name unknown), a total of eleven Spartans. We hear their exploits through the radios in Reach multiplayer, and we hear of their spectacular last stand against an entire Wraith column while Army troopers and Marines evacuate. We hear a dropship called Iron Fist moving in to pick them up, presumably to evacuate the valuable warfighters off Reach before it goes up, and we hear of the descent of several cruisers to hammer the battlefield in a desperate attempt to kill the "demons". We hear Iron Fist drop down low and fast to try and complete it's mission.

And that's the last we hear of them.

The story is meant to be ambiguous - did Iron Fist reach them in time? Did the Spartans make it aboard? Did they escape two cruisers and hundreds of tanks? Even after all that, could they make it offworld? There's no concrete answer, and I like it that way. I choose to believe that they did, and went the same way as Grey Team - presumed MIA/KIA by their fellow Spartans, using that as a cover for their activities. It gives anyone who wants to pick up the hanging thread a lot of room to expand these characters and their fate, and I'd just love to see 343i release a graphic novel about it, in the vein of Helljumpers or Blood Line (the scheduling nightmare of Uprising still fresh in my mind). How can you just leave this alone?