Home and Family

{|style="width:100%; color:#FFF;" Their stares were as sharp and visceral as a knife's edge, and she could almost feel them boring into the back of her head as she continued walking. Her hands gripped the sides of her tray white-knuckled, as if the tray was something sacred. She kept a steady pace, boots thudding against the tiled floor in a timed rhythm, her eyes fixed forward in the thousand-mile stare they had all learned to adopt.
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Normally she sat with her team in the mess hall. But today was different. Her team was gone now; Ralph was in an ONI psych ward, Joseph was still locked up in the brig, and Brigid and Allen were dead. So she picked out a table on the far side of the room and sat down, with all the swift, automated movements of a machine.

No one else knew about their break for freedom. And no one would ever know. Dr. Halsey had initiated a cover-up story about Ralph, Brigid and Allen succumbing to internal defects brought on by the augmentations. It was a shady story, but it was enough for the other Spartan trainees, who were used to not questioning what their superiors told them. Joseph-122 and Daisy-023, on the other hand, were given punishment; the cover story for that was that they had "threatened" their trainers (which was thoroughly true, just not the whole truth).

It wasn't unusual for Spartan trainees to occupy the facility's brig. Last year Black Team had scuffled with Red Team over some issue or another, and for that Mendez had sentenced them to holding cells. ''Like we care about getting locked inside a small room. Tango Company's done worse to us.'' Daisy had been let out early for "good behavior"; Dr. Halsey had interviewed her several times, and Daisy had made it clear that she wasn't going to try and get out again. Apparently Joseph had been less agreeable. ''As if I have anything to go back to. My parents don't miss me. They never even knew I left.''

But everyone knew that something was up with Daisy, and for that they gave her a wide berth.

If they knew what I know they would be messed up too, she thought, taking a bite out of her apple. It was crisp and juicy and enhanced with vitamins and enzymes. Specifically prepared for the Spartans to consume, just like all the other food. It's all laced with vitamins and steroids and things that make us different from everyone else.

Her arms were sore from working out and from all the injections they'd been getting lately. Recovering from the augmentations took longer than she thought it would. Her hair had grown back, but her body was still getting used to itself. Her height kept steadily increasing and her slender figure had become lean and hard, defined muscles showing under the pale, scarred skin. She wondered if those long, surgical scars would ever really go away.

She moved on from her apple to the pasty, tasteless protein yogurt that was supposed to be vanilla but didn't quite make the cut. For a moment she just twirled her spoon in the white muck, lost in her thoughts. Every time her mind started wandering, she was back on Sargasso, watching as a frail reflection of herself lived the life that was supposed to be hers. It hurt when she thought of that. ''I wasn't "chosen" for this Spartan program. I was stolen. Me and every other kid unlucky enough to have good genes.''

She was so deep in thought that she gave a little jump as someone slid into the seat beside her. It was a boy whose face was as familiar as it was foreign, and it only served to remind her just how much the augmentations had changed them all. Once he had looked like he actually was fourteen; now he looked like a twenty-year-old bodybuilder. His dark eyes met hers and she swallowed her mouthful of yogurt. "John," she said quietly. "I thought you were sitting with your team."

"My team?" He frowned, then realized what she meant. "I'm squad leader, Daisy. Everyone's part of my team, including you."

Daisy glanced over and saw Sam, Fred, and Linda talking among themselves, then directed her gaze back at John. "So..."

"You've been acting strangely lately," John stated. He took a sip of his water and set it down. "I just want to make sure you're okay."

"Everything's fine." It was a lie, but a necessary one. He can't ever know what I know. "When we get hurt, we heal. We adapt. It's what we are."

"I know you miss them," John said, and he didn't have to specify exactly who he was talking about because everyone knew, and everyone had felt the loss equally. We all lost someone special to those awful surgeries... but I lost something else when I went back. "But you can't let it compromise your duty. Our numbers have been cut nearly by half, but that just means we have to be stronger. The UNSC is depending on us. Dr. Halsey says we'll be participating in actual missions soon."

I wonder if you'd be so trusting in Halsey if you knew she swapped you for a clone, Daisy thought, and it saddened her that John and the rest were so blindly devoted to a woman who duped them into becoming super-soldiers. "Dr. Halsey says a lot of things," she said, and she couldn't help the bitterness that leaked into the statement. "We're not robots, even if we do have machine parts inside of us. Don't you ever wonder if there's more to life than following orders and shooting things?"

John sighed, more of a huff than anything, and scratched at his short brown hair. "Sometimes," he admitted, then looked directly into her eyes, and she was surprised at how commanding he appeared. "But I care about everyone in my squad, all of my people, and if we're going to keep each other alive, we have to accept where we are now, and what we're going to do." There was pain beneath the forced neutrality of his tone, and it hit her that maybe he felt somehow responsible for all the trainees who had perished during augmentations.

"I'm sorry," Daisy muttered, pushing her tray away and folding her arms on the table. "You're right. If we're going to move on, we have to care about each other instead of ourselves." She looked up at him and mustered a small smile, the first she'd been able to do in weeks. "Thanks for reminding me."

"No problem." John glanced over at Blue Team's table. "If you want, you can come and sit with my team. Kelly's still recovering, so there's a free chair."

"I thought you said everyone is part of your team," Daisy shot back at him.

"So I did." John cracked a smile, shaking his head. "Well, you coming or not?"

Daisy almost declined, but then she thought about how nice it would be to not be left alone with her thoughts of clones and lost families and dead teammates, and nodded. She picked up her tray and followed John over to Blue's table, where Sam greeted her good-naturedly and Linda, ever silent, peeked out from under the crimson fringe of her bangs to welcome her with lucid green eyes. They teased Fred about his hair, which had grown back with silvery streaks, and goofed off until one of Mendez's cronies marched over and demanded that they shut up. It felt good to talk and laugh like a real person again, and after lunch was over, a thought crossed Daisy's mind as she walked from the mes hall to the med bay, where everyone got their post-meal shots. ''Even if there is a clone of me, that can't change the fact that I'm me. I have a family, and it's right here. I'm glad John showed me that, even if he didn't realize he did.''

That night she climbed into her cot and waited until everyone around her was asleep, then pulled a small trinket out of the left pocket of her shorts. She handled it delicately with her fingers, tracing the outlines of its funny little ears, remembering the brief moment in which her hand had been so close to that of her clone. She could have reached out and snapped her double's arm in two with one swift motion, but she no longer felt hostile toward the clone. Instead she felt... pity. The... other Daisy had been sick, confined to a wheelchair, and from what Ralph had told her, it seemed that the other clones were in similar straits, afflicted with serious diseases. It smelled of ONI, but thinking about all the things ONI had done made her head hurt, so she rolled over and tucked the toy bear back into her pocket. She wondered why Dr. Halsey had let her keep it, but trying to decode the enigmatic doctor's motives was pointless. I wonder if she ever feels guilty...

She blew a strand of blond hair out of her face and stared at the sleeping forms of her fellow Spartans, watching as their sides slowly went up and down. Kurt's arm was slung over his face, Joshua was snoring, and Keiichi was mumbling in his sleep. Arthur was flat on his back performing drill movements unconsciously, while in the bunk beside him, Grace was hugging her pillow, mouth wide open as she slumbered. John, as always, was as still as a stone, his snores barely audible. Daisy smiled, then closed her eyes and exhaled, hoping that her dreams would be more pleasant than they had been of late.

''Dr. Halsey was right, in a way. Sargasso isn't "home" to me, not anymore. This place is. And these Spartans are my family now. It may not be perfect, but it's a family all the same.''