Den Mother

“So, should we get the obvious joke out of the way first?” Laurette Agryna had an easy smile, contrary to what some of the Spartan Trainees under her command might’ve expected. But Callum wasn’t her underling in the same way many of the others were. He answered to her, sure, but strangely the field promotion to Lieutenant had stuck and put him and the good commander a deal closer in terms of authority.
“That HIGHCOM clearly has a thing for Spartans missing legs and officer positions here at AJJ?” Callum answered, a small grin meeting hers as the two sat in the otherwise lonely officers' mess, sans armor for once. It’d been a long day, and Callum had lost more bouts than he’d won, but such was the pain of reintegration into Spartan Operations proper.
The new Spartans, and those who generally hadn’t spent the last two years cut-off from the UNSC proper, were far more familiar with all the new toys than he was. Grappling hooks, repulsor devices, and things as small as the operation of the thruster systems had changed drastically, it seemed sometimes like the world he’d known had all but vanished. In a way, it had.
The Commander chuckled and nodded in agreement, lightly knocking the prosthetic beginning at her left knee. Sometimes he wondered if their injuries meant command was benching them, keeping them out of a fight they were so desperately needed in, or if his superiors, like Mendez before them, thought Callum might’ve been better as an instructor. It was neither of those things, he knew, while Agryna was no doubt a superb trainer, Callum’s placement here was for something different entirely.
“So, with the last group, how many do you have now Callum?” She stuck to his first name, as she had since they’d met. She must’ve had experience with threes, knowing better than to call them by names they did not recognize, and thinking far too much of them to reduce them to only a number. He didn’t ask how she knew, nor who the ‘327’ on her armor was for, he just appreciated the mutual respect.
“Thirty-seven now, out of three hundred.” Either the rest of his brethren had horrible track records with the Spartans of Delta Company, which given his own brother, Jacob-G043 had countless heated exchanges with Andra-D054 to his name, that wasn’t impossible. Or Callum was simply the only person they had on hand that could feasibly wrangle Delta. He didn’t pretend hundreds of empty bunks in the Delta Company wing of the Avery J Johnson Academy would ever be filled. Some had died even before the Created, and only God knew how many died after. Some had defected even, gullible children believing they were doing the right thing. He should’ve felt something cruel towards them, but all Callum had was pity, and the memory of how dirty it had made him feel to wear the pieced together remains of their armor.
“How many full teams?” Laurette continued, her lips pressed, mourning written across her face. She saw them as children, even if she didn’t say so. In War Games she didn’t, but in non-sim training he watched her pull her punches, and when she reviewed their dossiers he saw the horror in her eyes when she saw all they had done and had done unto them. Callum knew better, partially, at least enough to know better than to hold back. That was why he’d been placed over them instead of some four, he knew what they were, just as he knew himself.
“Still just the one that was stuck on that General’s security detail. The last five to roll in came from three different teams. A lot of MIAs, at least four KIA that they’re sure of.” It was an ugly thing, the war they were fighting, but at least the Created had the decency to take prisoners, though he couldn’t say the same for the Banished. Still, for once in the existence of the SPARTAN-III program, missing did not have to mean dead. That was a bright spot.
Laurette gave a nod and a sigh, taking a drink from the glass of water resting on the table before them. While she contemplated the report, Callum worried after one of his charges, wondering if Merlin was off doing the exact thing he’d told him not to. He should’ve just taken Alt, he was perfectly capable of doing so, but she’d kept him and Merlin alive. Something close to sentimentality stayed his hand.
“Damn shame. How’re they settling in then?” She did love to pry, that much he’d noticed. But it was born of genuine concern and interest, not some ulterior motive as far as he could tell. Plus she had rank on him, so lying wasn’t necessarily advisable.
“Poorly, same as the last few. They’ll adjust the same too. They don’t understand why they’re off the line, they got a million questions about who’s commanding what, what systems are lost and which aren’t, who’s missing and who’s dead, the usual.” Callum had never in his life imagined he’d be playing den mother to a pack of younger Spartans, helping them adjust as they came from places and battles even further removed from the UNSC than his own misadventures to being embedded on a dozen different migrant fleets. The world had changed, and he was there to guide them.
Putting them in new armor was usually the first step, and one many were all too happy to take. Some had come to AJJ clad in half-destroyed suits of GEN2, others in tattered SPI, and some had entirely lost the armor so crucial to the Spartan identity. Putting them in Mark Seven helped them readjust, gave them something familiar. He understood, he'd felt the same way.
Laurette nodded and chuckled as Callum pushed images of the traitor Delta’s ruin of a head, one he’d had to bury in pieces, out of his mind. Poor, stupid kid.
“They were glad to see the others though, plenty of smiles.” She probably imagined he meant the usual two-fingered gesture deeply ingrained in Spartan culture, but in truth, it’d been a decidedly more human response. The kids smiled sure, some eagerly clasped hands, laughing that the others had made it. The week prior one of the boys, supposedly the last survivor of his team, had been reunited with not one but two of his own. There had been tears, and he didn’t fault them. He understood, for all the joy it’d brought him to see Tom and Lucy again in ‘46, he’d have lost his composure if one day Dieter-B204, Marcella-B029, or Abdul-B213 rounded a corner to meet him.
They wouldn’t of course, they were dead, gone before the reactors at Pegasi ever blew.
But his kids, the Deltas, that didn’t have to be their story. They wouldn’t have to limp from one loss to the next, not if he prepared them. He had a bias of course, he knew Andra and Merlin far better than any of the others, but that didn’t always have to be the case. He’d come to know them all, as their instructor, and allegedly as their temporary leader if what little he’d gleaned of their deployment procedures had been true. Apparently ordering around Free Domain mercenaries to their deaths gave him some kind of qualification for all of that.
“Good, they deserve it.” Laurette agreed, rolling her shoulders, the questions finally seeming to have come to an end. They’d ended the exchange on a high note, and he’d chalk that up as a win.
“Now, I’ve got a question for you Commander,” Callum began, still wearing a grin, though slyer now than before. She looked to him and arched her brow, not accustomed to Callum doing anything beyond giving answers, but seemed eager to hear the inquiry.
“Spartan D032,” He caught himself, raising a hand to beg for pardon. “Merlin,” He corrected. 
“He wants to know if you’ve been avoiding him in the exercises ever since he stripped that rifle from you and whacked you.”
The Commander raised her brows then laughed, genuinely. “Tell him he’ll eat those words Lieutenant, that’s a promise.”
They both laughed, and Callum enjoyed another quiet moment, never sure how many he had left to come.