Mendez’s expression didn’t change at all.
Standing at the entrance of the gymnasium, his grey eyes swept over the scene: Executioner kneeling on the floor, the three ODSTs sprawled on the ground, and Ethan standing in their midst.
There was no surprise on his face.
No anger.
No emotion whatsoever.
He simply watched.
Then he spoke.
“Medical team,” he said, his voice echoing through the silent gym.
“Gymnasium, Sector C. We need medical assistance.”
His comm chime chirped.
Soon, rapid footsteps echoed down the corridor.
Mendez walked into the gymnasium.
His gait was steady, each step measured to a precise rhythm.
He stepped over Broken Finger, who lay collapsed on the floor, stepped over the unconscious Butcher, and passed the still-struggling Spike before stopping directly in front of Ethan.
The two looked each other in the eye.
Mendez stood half a head taller than Ethan, but Ethan didn’t back down.
He looked straight into those grey eyes, seeing his own reflection within them.
“You were drawn into an unexpected incident,” Mendez said, “and ultimately neutralized a threat to your life.”
Ethan said nothing.
He waited.
Mendez stared at him for a long moment.
Those grey eyes were like scalpels, attempting to dissect every layer of Ethan’s disguise.
Then he uttered a sentence that caught Ethan completely off guard:
“But you pulled your punches.”
Ethan’s heart skipped a beat.
“You controlled your strength,” Mendez continued.
“Broken Finger’s wrist is only dislocated, not snapped off. Butcher has broken ribs, but none pierced his lungs. Spike’s leg is broken, but it’s not a compound fracture.” He paused.
“You held back.”
Ethan didn’t deny it.
He knew denial was pointless.
Mendez was a twenty-year veteran who had seen countless battles; his eyes wouldn’t be fooled by any front.
“Why?” Mendez asked.
The question hung heavy in the air.
Ethan knew what the textbook answer should be.
It should be because they were friendlies.
Because Spartans don’t kill their own.
Because of any reason that would put him on the moral high ground.
But those were all excuses.
There was only one real reason.
“They aren’t my enemies,” Ethan said.
Mendez fell silent.
Something flickered in those grey eyes.
Not anger, nor suspicion.
Something else—a far more complex emotion.
“Not your enemies,” Mendez repeated.
“Then who is?”
Ethan didn’t answer.
He couldn’t.
If he did—if he spoke those names aloud: Covenant, Forerunner, Flood—what would Mendez think?
A fourteen-year-old child claiming to know who humanity’s true enemies were?
Mendez didn’t press the matter.
He simply looked at Ethan for a long moment, then turned and walked toward Executioner.
“Get up,” he said.
“Can you walk?”
Executioner pushed off the floor and dragged himself up with difficulty.
His knees trembled, but he didn’t collapse.
He looked at Mendez with something strange in his eyes—not fear, not resentment, but something bordering on respect.
“Master Sergeant,” he said, “these kids…”
“I know,” Mendez cut him off.
He said nothing more, merely clapping Executioner on the shoulder before turning toward the gymnasium exit.
Executioner gave Ethan one last look.
That glance held many things—reluctance, shame, and a sense of calm that bordered on relief.
Then he turned and followed Mendez out of the gym.
The medical team arrived.
They rushed into the room, pushing hover gurneys, and immediately began emergency trauma care.
Broken Finger’s face had turned pale blue as his blood oxygen plummeted.
Butcher’s chest was filling with fluid, each breath a struggle against suffocating pressure.
Spike was screaming—the agony of a shattered bone stripped away any veteran’s composure.
Ethan stood where he was, watching it all unfold.
He should have left.
There was nothing more for him to do here.
Mendez had made his call, and the corpsmen had taken over the casualties.
He ought to go back and rest, awaiting his next orders.
But he couldn’t move.
His feet felt nailed to the deck as he watched the ODSTs loaded onto gurneys, listened to the harsh chimes of the medical telemetry, and saw the tense expressions on the young corpsmen’s faces.
He knew these men would live.
Broken Finger’s lung had been punctured, but prompt emergency care would prevent permanent damage.
Butcher had broken four ribs, but his chest wall hadn’t collapsed.
Spike’s leg was fractured, but he was young and would eventually recover.
But they would never be ODSTs again.
“You can go now.”
A voice spoke beside Ethan’s ear.
He turned to find a corpsman standing next to him.
“You’re not needed here anymore,” the corpsman said.
His tone held no blame, only a weary calm.
“You did well.”
Ethan froze for a moment.
“I did well?” he repeated.
“You controlled your strength,” the corpsman said.
“Anyone else, and they’d all be dead.”
Ethan stood rooted to the spot, feeling something shatter inside him.
*You did well.*
Those three words were like a dull blade, slowly carving into his heart.
He had done it.
Controlled his power.
Kept from killing.
Done well.
But those men’s hands would never hold a rifle steady again.
That man’s leg would never run across a battlefield again.
That man’s chest would never withstand the shock of intense physical strain again.
That was what “doing well” truly meant.
Ethan walked into the shower room.
Water poured from the showerhead overhead, washing over his body.
Blood—Broken Finger’s, Butcher’s, Spike’s—slid off his skin with the stream, swirling down the drain.
The red liquid spun across the tiles and disappeared, as though nothing had ever happened.
He closed his eyes.
Darkness.
The rushing water.
And those sounds.
The dull thud of Broken Finger collapsing.
The sound of Butcher’s chest caving in.
The snap of Spike’s tibia tearing through his trousers.
The crack of Executioner’s knees hitting the deck.
The noises echoed in his mind like a flock of crows refusing to disperse.
He had known this would happen.
He had known from the very first day he transmigrated.
Or rather, from the moment he joined the Spartan program.
He had had six months to prepare.
Six months to think.
Six months to try and find a better way.
But there wasn’t one.
There was no better way.
Either he fought, or he didn’t.
Either he pulled his punches, or he went all out.
No matter what he chose, someone was going to get hurt.
John had chosen to go all out.
And so two men had died.
Ethan had chosen to hold back.
And so no one died.
But was this really any better?
Ethan remembered the canonical details from his memories.
John had killed two ODSTs and wounded two others during their altercation.
Afterwards, Mendez had told him: *Obeying orders comes first; only then do you consider protecting yourself and your teammates.*
Yet now, what Mendez said to Ethan was: “You held back.”
He knew.
Mendez knew Ethan had controlled his strength.
Mendez had seen right through him.
What did that mean?
It meant another layer of suspicion in Mendez’s eyes.
A fourteen-year-old child who, when provoked by four hardened veterans, could control his physical strength with such pinpoint precision—that wasn’t normal behavior.
A normal kid would either lash out with everything he had or panic completely.
No one precisely calculated the force of every strike in the heat of combat.
Unless he knew what was coming beforehand.
Unless he had prepared for it in advance.
Unless he knew from the very beginning that this was a test.
Standing beneath the stream of water, Ethan felt a chill creep up his spine.
He knew too much.
Now Mendez knew he had held back.
What about next time?
Would he be able to hide it next time?
The water kept running.
Ethan reached out and shut off the valve.
The rushing water ceased, plunging the shower room into silence.
He stood on the damp tiled floor, droplets still clinging to his body.
Cold air blew in from the vent, causing him to shiver.
He raised his head and looked at himself in the mirror.
A fourteen-year-old body.
A youthful face.
Yet there was something in his eyes—a weariness that didn’t belong to his age, a heaviness borne only by those who had lived through too much.
He knew the future.
He knew Reach would fall.
He knew the Covenant fleet would appear beneath those blue skies.
He knew countless people would die—civilians, soldiers, his squadmates, his friends.
He was trying to change it all.
But every change brought new complications.
He had saved those ODSTs’ lives, only to deepen Mendez’s suspicions.
He had avoided deaths, yet permanent disability remained.
He had thought he could do better, but “better” still meant people suffered.
This was the price of being a transmigrator.
Knowing the future, yet powerless to alter it completely.
Trying to change things, only to discover that every change demanded a new price.
Standing at a crossroads where every path led to pain, where the only choice was deciding which brand of agony to endure.
Ethan dried off and pulled on his clothes.
He left the shower room and walked out into the corridor.
The hallway was deserted, save for the overhead fluorescent lights humming softly.
His footsteps echoed off the metal deck like an ancient metronome.
He knew Mendez was somewhere nearby—perhaps in the security observation deck, perhaps in his office, or perhaps watching from some shadow.
He knew Halsey was somewhere out there too; she always saw what others missed.
But right now, all he wanted was to return to his berth, lie down, and close his eyes.
Tomorrow brought more training.
Countless tasks awaiting his attention.
As for those ODSTs—Broken Finger, Butcher, Spike, Executioner—they would be lying in medical bays, classified as permanently disabled, and discharged to military rehabilitation facilities.
The rest of their lives had been altered forever because of today.
And there was nothing he could do about it.
He could only keep moving forward.
Meanwhile.
Dr. Halsey sat in her office before a floating holographic display.
On screen was the gym’s surveillance footage—recorded simultaneously from multiple angles, faithfully capturing every single move made by Ethan and the ODSTs.
Her fingers slid across the interface, zooming in on every detail.
The angle of Ethan’s punches.
The movement of his footwork.
The degree of muscle contraction when he grabbed Broken Finger’s wrist.
The force released when he kicked Butcher in the chest.
Data flickered before her eyes:
[Muscle Activation: 63%] [Skeletal Stress: 58% of designed maximum] [Neural Reaction Speed: One-third of peak Spartan average]
He was suppressing himself.
Halsey leaned back in her chair, staring at the display.
This wasn’t the first time 007 had exhibited such tendencies.
During the coin-flip tests, he had deliberately guessed wrong.
In hand-to-hand combat drills, he had engineered draws.
In tactical simulations, he had deliberately kept his performance unremarkable.
Every single time, she had noticed the anomalies.
Every single time, she had chosen to remain silent.
But this time was different.
This time, Ethan had faced a real threat.
Four hardened combat veterans, carrying genuine hostility and intent to kill.
Yet 007—a child remade by augmentation procedures—had meticulously metered every fraction of his power during the fight.
Sixty-three percent.
Not full effort.
Not half effort.
Just enough to neutralize the threat, and just enough to avoid inflicting fatal injury.
That was not something a fourteen-year-old child should be capable of doing.
Unless—
Unless he knew what would happen ahead of time.
Halsey closed her eyes.
If he truly knew the future—
If he truly came from somewhere unknown to them—
Did he know if humanity would win?
Did he know if she would die?
Halsey opened her eyes.
The surveillance footage continued to play on the display.
Ethan stood in the center of the gymnasium, surrounded by the fallen ODSTs.
His expression was serene—a stillness that reminded her of the deep ocean.
Beneath that quiet surface lay endless darkness and crushing pressure.
What should she do?
Turn 007 over to ONI?
Let him become a test subject—dissected, studied, broken down into pieces, and placed in culture dishes?
Or remain silent, keep observing, and pretend nothing had happened?
Halsey looked at Ethan’s face on the screen.
That child—no, he wasn’t a child.
Regardless of what soul inhabited that body, regardless of where he came from—he bore more weight than anyone else.
She remembered the children who had died.
The day thirty urns were launched into deep space.
She had stood in the launch bay, watching those smooth stainless-steel cylinders disappear one after another into the endless void.
She was a scientist.
She ought to pursue the truth.
But she was also human.
She shut off the display.
The secrets surrounding 007—she decided to keep protecting them.
Not because she didn’t want to know the truth.
But because she knew that once certain truths were uncovered, they could never be closed again.
Night fell deep.
The *Hercules* sailed through the Lambda Serpentis star system, the low thrum of its engines like a tireless lullaby.
The soldiers aboard had fallen asleep; only the officers on night watch remained dutifully at their posts.
In one of the berths, Ethan lay in bed, staring up at the ceiling.
He couldn’t sleep.
Whenever he closed his eyes, he saw Broken Finger’s deathly pale face, the sunken curve of Butcher’s crushed chest, Spike’s snapped tibia, and the trembling shoulders of Executioner as he fell to his knees.
He had thought he was prepared.
He had thought he could handle it all.
But he was wrong.
Some things, no matter how many times you prepare for them, leave you entirely unprepared.
He rolled over, burying his face in the pillow.
Tomorrow there would be more training.
More missions.
Countless people who needed his protection.
And those injured because of him—they would wake up in medical bays to face a completely altered future.
This was war.
It wasn’t a game.
It wasn’t a novel.
It was real flesh and blood, real agony, real sacrifice.
Ethan-007 closed his eyes.
He didn’t know when sleep finally took him.
But he knew that when he opened his eyes tomorrow, nothing would have changed.
The battle would go on.
The toll would continue to be paid.
And he—a transmigrator who knew the future—could only keep pressing forward.
Until the day he could truly change something.
Or until he was crushed under its weight.
Whichever came first, he didn’t know.
He only knew that he had to keep moving forward.