Halo: Ghost of the Spartans

I woke up to nothing but darkness, it was a welcome change from the constant bright lights, beeps, and nurses bustling in and out of my room. My life was a continuous hospital stay from Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), so I took solace in reading the HALO series books and Naruto manga. Due to continuous vacations in the hospital I grew up as a silent person, unless it was someone that I had a friendly relationship with to be comfortable enough to joke around. I just feel bad that I was not able to say goodbye to my Mother, as she has sacrificed a lot for me and has taken an endless amount of extra shifts or jobs to be able to afford treatment.

As I was reminiscing about my Mother and family, I found the darkness had started to fade away with a light encroaching with a calming aura that felt soothing to my soul. I then see an older man who smiles and says "I can see your thoughts of your mother and family. Would you like to know what will happen with them as you will no longer be able to see them again?" 

"Since you can see my thoughts and know what I will ask then would you tell me about them please?" 

"Yes, your mother will be devastated as she was on her way to visit you. But I will assist her and give her some boons as luck to assist in the grief process. She will move on in a few years and finally move on when your nephew, Garrett, and will spend her time spoiling him. Your sisters will both find good men who take care of them and love their families very much."

"Thank you very much! That is everything that I could ever ask for them. Now I would like to ask, where exactly am I and how may I help you?"

"What a nice young man. You are currently in my domain and due to some certain circumstances, I am going to give you an opportunity to be reborn in either Halo or Naruto worlds." 

"Umm... I would like to know if I was able to have a little time to myself to choose?"

"That is perfectly fine. But just try to make it within the next 20 minutes as I have some other things I need to do."

"Oh shit... well with that I would like to choose Halo."

"Because you were a polite young man and had such a difficult life I will give you 3 wishes."

"Alright sir for my first wish I would like to have the appearance and Taijutsu experience of Sasuke Uchiha."

"That can be done. Are you going to want his duck butt haircut also?" 

"Uh I forgot about that. Would it be possible to have the haircut from adult Sasuke?"

"Yes lol. Don't worry you still have two more wishes."

"For my second wish I would like to have the body of Hagoromo Otsutsuki with his healing ability."

"That is within the realm of possibility for the universe you will go to. I will help you out and make it to where your cells will not make others be overrun from the major difference in the life force of your DNA."

"For my final wish I would like to have the Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan, with the design of Indra Otsutsuki's Mangekyou Sharingan." 

"Now that is going to be too much power for that universe. I will give you an EMS with that design but the ability will be just be an increase in perception and for your other eye I will give you a Byakugan."

"Alright, thank you very much for this opportunity sir. Will I still have the full 360 degree vision?"

"Yes you will. Now as you have chosen your wishes, I wish you good luck in life young one."

On November 11th, 2511 at 11:11 a.m., the young man entered the the world of Halo. However, his birth was not without difficulty as even with the advances in technology, his mother, Mikoto Uchiha, died just after childbirth but not before giving him the name Indra Uchiha. Since there was no father in the picture and after an extensive search to locate any living relatives, Indra was sent to an orphanage on Harvest. As a result, Indra spent the first 5 years of his life in peace until he was visited one day by a very interesting man and woman.

(Third Person POV)

August 28, 2517,

On Harvest, also known as Epsilon Indi IV, a human Outer Colony world that is one of the farthest colonies from Earth and a major agricultural center, two young people that could be mistaken as a couple but would vehemently deny said relationship and instead claim they were professional colleagues. 

The couple strolled alongside the streets of Utgard, the city was located on the continent of Edda, at Harvest's equator. There were several small settlements that were scattered around the city. The city was surrounded by Harvest's seven space elevators. The buildings in Utgard were relatively small, with only several dozen skyscrapers that were no taller than twenty stories. Regardless, the buildings were still of modern designs, with most of them being glass-shrouded. A floodlit, well-landscaped trail was found alongside the Mimir River, along with numerous scattered bars. The Harvest Parliament Building was found near the river as well, with a large wall separating the Parliament Building from the river.

However, the couple was not focused on the geography or any of the other possible attention grabbing features that most tourists visiting the planet would be excited to see. Instead, the male companion dressed in a formal suit, that has not seen much wear, as he appears to be very uncomfortable as he was following his female partner. She, who wore a stylish sundress paired with a straw hat to protect from the sun's UV rays was leading them through the cityscape at a moderate walking pace all while occasionally glancing back to keep a track on her companion.

It had been a week since the couple had begun the observations of the Office of Naval Intelligence's scientific advisor, Doctor Catherine Halsey's new Spartan-II initiative. They were already at the end of the observation and were on their way to hopefully "acquire" said candidate. This was not knowledge know to Halsey's escort Jacob Keyes, a young Lieutenant in the UNSC, who was mostly just along for the ride.

"Doctor, I thought we were done playing dress up? May I know what the objective of today's observation is?" asked the young black-haired man, while pulling down on his tie and undoing the top button of his shirt.

"I thought you enjoyed my company Jacob? Besides the fact that I have told you to call me Catherine, I figured you had begun to enjoy dressing up with me?" a light brown-haired young woman responded with an amused smile on her lips. "Seeing as our time together is coming to a close I believed that you would be savoring this opportunity, alas" she shook her head in fake lamentation.

Jacob decided to not feed into the Doctor's delusions, "Hardly," he replied quickly with a wry look on his face, "You didn't answer my question, Catherine. When we returned to Reach I thought our mission was concluded, that was until you brought us back out to the outer edges of colonies." Jacob spoke out to the woman while looking at the towering structures surrounding the sidewalk as they were walking along.

The doctor released a sigh at her coworker's comments before a glint filled her eye and a teasing grin graced her face, "Well Jacob, if you absolutely must know what we are doing back here... we are going to have a child."

*trips* *coughs* *drops drink*

The sounds coming from the Lieutenant as he processed what he just heard, had caused the doctor to break out into a giggle that threatened to evolve into full blown laughter had she not raised her hand to cover her mouth. Meanwhile, Jacob had to take a breath to clear his foggy brain, and contemplate the true meaning of her words and his course of action if there was no "true" meaning behind her words.

In the meantime, Halsey continued walking further down the street as Jacob stood still for a moment, articulating the greatest escape plan of mankind since Houdini himself. However, before he could enact said plan the doctor called out to him expressing that it was just a joke. The Lieutenant sighed in relief, as he thought he was too young to have a child. He then moved to catch up with the woman he had been escorting for the past few months.

They then began to continue their walk into the downtown portion of the city. The downtown like all other city's downtowns was an area infested with crime and unsavory characters. The sidewalk had become noticeably dirtier with all sorts of trash piled up from feces to packages of leftover drugs, all kinds of things littered downtown Utgard. And the entirety of the city's unspoken rough area was nearly completely hidden from the average citizen. 

Due to the advancements of structural engineering in the late 23rd and early 24th centuries, cityscapes continuously expanded upward. With building and roads being stacked on top of each other. Leading to the "downtowns" of the past centuries becoming more like the "underbelly" of the cities. The underbelly's colloquial name given by its inhabitants was "The Demon Pit," due to the tendency of the gangs and loan sharks giving money to those desperate for money and had no other choice or just an idiot thinking that they could hit it big if he kept gambling. 

The payments for these debts were rarely paid in full, but the gangs never planned to get their money but instead wanted another slave to be a constant source of income. Men were usually kept for manual labor in manufacturing drugs, whereas the women were employed in "entertainment" and rented out like vehicles. All in all the men and women would be working for the rest of their lives to pay back their debt which only seemed to grow due to the high-interest rates.

"Catherine you didn't tell me we were going to be visiting this part of the city." Jacob said as he scanned for threats in his surroundings. He tried to maintain his visage to be calm and unassuming in his posture while he thought about how much he would really love to have had his M6A service pistol.

"I didn't know you were afraid of some thug Jacob," replied Catherine teasing the man without looking back.

"I am not afraid of some two-bit thug. What I am worried about is there could be some Insurrectionist activity. While I am glad our trip to Epsilon Eridani IV went off without any sightings of them I would still rather not push my luck." spoke the Lieutenant.

The doctor knew that the Lieutenant had a point which was why she had ordered the shipboard AI Toran to skim through any and all reports of possible Insurrectionist activity on Harvest. The AI had found none, and while that was usually not enough of a reason to allow her to relax, the combination of factors surrounding the current situation did.

First, the mission of her and her escort were highly classified and no one knew of their immediate whereabouts as of now. Secondly, they had already been to Harvest to inspect another candidate of the Spartan-II project and had run in to no problems. Thirdly, she had used Toran to hack and borrow the help of the superintendent class AI in control of the city, which would act as support and a failsafe should they run into trouble. Lastly, they were able to blend in with the general populace, while Jacob did show some traits of a trained soldier, most would simply write him off as a husband on leave from the military and not the escort of one of ONI's head of research. Thus, as long as the two of them stayed relaxed and calm they would be able to walk in and out safely with the package she was hoping to acquire. 

"Not to worry Jacob, we are merely a block away from our destination, and I do have confidence in your ability to protect me should the situation arise," said Catherine.

"Yeah I know, but a heads up would have been nice," mumbled Jacob to himself, "I would have then brought my pistol," he silently thought to himself.

"An orphanage? I don't recall any of the candidates we discussed being orphans," Jacob said aloud with a raised eyebrow while looking to the side at his companion.

In front of Jacob stood an unsound, two-story building that looked like it has seen better days, but not many. The outer walls had numerous marks and even some holes scattered around the front-facing wall. A fluorescent sign with "Saint Christopher's Orphanage" was lit up giving light to the dark entrance though numerous letters had long blown out their bulbs and had gone dark. 

Ignoring the words of her companion the doctor nodded at the fact she had successfully found their destination before walking towards the front entrance. Jacob shook his head at his partner and followed her inside. 

Once inside they were greeted with a scene of complete chaos. Children screaming and running wild, some eating things they weren't supposed to, and others causing property damage were the actions most of the youngsters were engaging in. All the while a middle-aged matron and her husband were attempting to wrangle and constrain some of the cracked-out kids.

"We will be with you in just one moment!" yelled out the female caretaker as she chased a rather rambunctious girl that was running with a butter knife in hand.

"This is where our candidate lives?" asked Jacob in disbelief. Though he and Catherine were unable to observe the candidates located in the outer colonies, so far all the ones he had gotten eyes on had showed a somewhat structured home environment with a few outliers.

After a few minutes, the caretaker duo were able to subdue and put down the rebellion from the terrorists disguised as children and gave them the harshest sentencing, a nap. After such an unsuccessful rebellion, the children were tuckered out so with no choice they accepted the sentencing with no complaints. Eventually, the pair came back to the entrance where Jacob and Catherine had been standing while watching the entire scene unfold with matching amused smiles.

"Hi! I am Amy Faris and this is my husband Jeff Faris. We are the caretakers of this orphanage. How may we assist you?" she asked with a tired smile.

"Hello, I am Catherine and this is my husband Jacob, and we heard from one of my relatives that lives down here about a boy we might be willing to adopt," Catherine decided to get straight to the point. 

"Oh really? That is a wonderful thing to hear! If you don't mind me asking what is the name of you relative?" asked Amy excitedly.

"You might know him, his name is Imran Zakhaev." said Catherine with an innocent expression. 

Once hearing the name spoken by the doctor the matron's expression turned complex. She showed a range of expressions from disgust to fear. She stood there and thought for a moment before speaking again, "Yes we know Mr. Zakhaev, but out here we tend to call him Big Z," she took a deep breath and let out a long sigh, "If you have heard of a child from him then I can only guess that he was talking about a young five-year-old boy with longer black spiky hair?" she asked while rubbing the back of her head.

"Why yes! That is exactly how he described him. Though he did mention that the boy has two different colored eyes," Catherine spoke with a mock expression pondering what her "relative" had told her. While Jacob stood there twiddling his thumbs, and occasionally nodding his head and saying "Yes dear," even though he had little to no idea of what was currently happening.

The caretaker sighed once again while her husband massaged his temples at the topic of the boy, "His name is Indra Uchiha. He has only spoken when inside the orphanage or when the kids have a question about school or if they have a problem with another kid picking on them." She then motioned toward a table in the dining room, "He's not here as of now. He goes out early in the morning and returns late in the day. I am sure you both must have many questions about the boy. Why don't we have a seat and discuss him?"

Catherine, maintaining her role, smiled and thanked the kind woman before sitting at the table and had Jacob take the seat next to her. Jeff sat across from the two while his wife went to bring refreshments. A couple of minutes went by before Amy walked back in and sat the tray of drinks and cookies down on the table.

"Now, where should we begin?" asked Amy to Catherine.

*15 minutes later*

As they were walking out the door, "Well that was.... informative," spoke Jacob as he inspected the surrounding areas around the orphanage's front door. They had finished their conversation with the caretakers and were proceeding to a common location the candidate frequented after being informed by one of the children who had seen him entering alleyways while she was out playing with the others.

"Yes, it was indeed. Wasn't it?" spoke Catherine with a knowing smile on her face as she glanced over at her companion.

"Yet I feel as though what she spoke was only half the truth of the situation, and you know the other half I take it?" questioned Jacob with a pointed look at Halsey.

"Well you would be correct in that assessment," she confirmed his belief, "Since you have been accompanying me so far I will fill you in on the specifics later. But for now, our destination is just around this corner," Jacob nodded and was thankful for her trust, but little did he know this was just another of one of her little tests that Halsey had decided to give him to decide whether he would continue to work on the program or be reassigned. 

As the pair began to make their way towards the designated alleyway they began to take notice of details out of place. Specifically, this alley had less light shining upon it than all the others on the street. It also had many dark stains that were unable to be identified due to the low light level. The detail that stood out the most was the striking sound of flesh and low cries of what sounded like a wounded animal.

Jacob decided that situation might go sideways and made his way in front of Catherine motioning for her to get behind him while he withdrew a knife. Catherine was still relaxed as she already had an idea of what was going on in the alley based on superintendent surveillance that had been occurring for the past month on the candidate. 

They slowly approached the edge of the alley with their bodies hugging the wall and in close proximity to each other yet neither noticed or at least they didn't say anything. They peeked around the corner at the same time and caught sight of the scene unfolding.

In the alley lit up by just one barely lit pole was dumpster with trash bags thrown about throughout the area. Amongst the trash and near the dumpster were two teenage boys lying down with one on his face and the other on his back. Both looked like they had been beaten, if the small stream of blood flowing from their noses and mouths were any indicator. They were also covered in bruises and small cuts, in which Jacob was positive was caused by a brawl of sorts with a strong opponent.

Besides the right wall of the dumpster, however, was the goal of this entire recon mission. A third teenager was still putting up a fight but was looking more and more like they would keel over at any second against a short, long spiky black-haired child with his back towards the beginning of the alley where Jacob and Catherine were located. The boy was currently moving with a grace and speed that looked unnatural to a child of his size, eventually knocked the boy out with a running jump off of the dumpster into a round-housed kick to the head. The boy himself was wearing a pair of athletic shorts with a long sleeved, high collar shirt on top. The sleeves of said shirt were now dyed red up to mid-forearm with splattered blood found on the rest of the shirt. The kid had a small bruise that looked like it was changing color at a visible speed on his cheekbone. He seemed awfully calm as he pondered on what he was going to do as all three teenagers were out of commission when he suddenly spoke aloud to no one in particular, "Is there anything I can help you with sir and ma'am?" 

While he was turning around, Jacob and Catherine stood still in shock as they had made no noise and the boy hadn't turned his head even once to see behind him. Indra noticed that the two people at the end of the alley looked clean and wore decent clothes, he also noticed that the man's hand was attempting to conceal a knife. Growing up in "The Demon Pit" you don't see many people looking like that found around here. He stood on guard in case their apparel was simply a way to get him to let down his guard and then catch him off balance. As he took a closer look at the pair, he had a vague feeling that he knew who these people were but was not able to place where he would know why he would know them. Little did he know 

"Well... who are you and what do you need?" Indra asked getting a little impatient but felt a small shred of amusement after seeing their dumbstruck faces.

(Dr. Catherine Halsey POV)

After shaking herself out of it Catherine replied, "I am Catherine Keyes and this is my husband Jacob Keyes," as she gestured to the Lieutenant who upon seeing my wink played along. "And we would like to adopt you." Her straight forward answer wasn't the full truth but that really didn't matter all that much. 

The boy's eyes widened a bit before hearing the boy he had knocked out with a round-housed kick was starting to come to and calmed down and refocused on the teenage boy. As he was turning around to focus on the teenager, Catherine and Jacob both turned towards each other with a widening of their own eyes as they had never seen eyes like Indra's. Jacob had also pointed out to her that the bruise on his cheekbone is basically gone. Her brain went into overdrive as she mentally noted to dig deep into Candidate 001's DNA. 

(Back to MC)

Indra crouched down in front of the now groggy teenager and decided to give him two quick slaps to his face to wake him up. While gripping the collar of the delinquent's shirt, "Why do you guys keep picking on the orphan kids and trying to rob them of the money that I give them from my hard work?" he asked with a sliver of rage. While his face had the visage of calmness, his eyes were displaying just how angry he really was. The other boys were also coming around after hearing the voices so he grabbed all three of them and while in his hands he expressed that this would be the lightest beating they would get and if this behavior happened again he would break their spines. He then proceeded to throw all three of them in to the dumpster and started walking away.

(Dr. Catherine Halsey POV)

The teenage boys had seemingly been beaten up and reprimanded by a mere five-year-old. Something that would often be referred to as a joke and something that was impossible to happen. But the glimmer in her eyes showed that this was not some fictional reality. This was something her candidate was capable of. It wasn't something that completely blew the other candidate's actions out of the water but it did show that this one was showing extreme promise. 

As Indra was walking away he remembered that he was not alone and turned towards us and scratched the back of his head smiling and said "oops, kinda forgot you guys were there. What did you guys want again?" 

Jacob looked at me and chuckled, "My wife and I are looking to adopt you. Now would you like to go somewhere to talk?"