Isaac-039 (AAO)

SPARTAN-039, birthname Isaac Artur Clarke, was a assigned to during the Human-Covenant War. Identified as a candidate in 2517 by Dr. , he was brought to alongside seventy-four other children who had passed screening to begin training and augmentation. One of the less capable trainees, Isaac found his niche by learning the strengths of his teammates and anticipating their needs, facilitating better teamwork for his squad in team-based exercises. One of only thirty-three successful augmentees, he joined the other SPARTAN-IIs as a special operations unit undertaking missions against the , for most of the early war fighting on as part of the first .
Later in the war, Isaac became romantically linked with his longtime friend and teammate Vinh-030, leading to a son named Daniel whom had to be hidden from by their friend Erin Coney. With humanity's plight becoming more and more desperate, the playful and optimistic nature Isaac had once had deserted him, leaving behind a hardened and pragmatic soldier. Despite Vinh's stated concern for him, he casually dismissed her worries and insisted that he was perfectly alright. Isaac was again part of Red Team during the , and along with Vinh was captured by Covenant forces. When their leader stated that he would execute one of them, Isaac drew attention to himself by fighting back, satisfied with giving his life to prolong Vinh's. She would escape her imprisonment months later, making Isaac's sacrifice not in vain.
==Biography==
===Early Life===
Isaac would be born to Diane Clarke, an actress and third wife of retired Vice-Admiral , on Valentine's Day, 2511. Cole had married the much younger woman for superficial reasons, their marriage being heavily covered by tabloid media, and Diane announced her pregnancy within the year. By the time of his birth, however, his parents' relationship had already taken an unhappy turn. They fought regularly, and though Cole tried hard to have a good relationship with his son, Isaac began to sense the emotional turmoil and instinctively rejected it, retreating from them both to become a very solitary child. In 2514, Diane filed for divorce and custody of their child in a well-publicized court case, which she won, and took Isaac to live on the distant but wealthy colony of . 
There, Isaac and his mother lived a relatively quiet life, where Diane soon remarried and bore Isaac's half-brother (technically his fifth half-sibling, though the first on his mother's side). At this time, both children would be registered for a , and Isaac's DNA was indexed in a UNSC database where it would be identified by Dr. Catherine Halsey as one of 150 potential genetic matches for the SPARTAN-II Program three years later. As Arcadia was part of FLEETCOM Sector Five, Halsey would not interview Isaac in person, but recordings sent by the Office of Naval Intelligence agents who did were sent to her for final approval. She confirmed Isaac as a recruit, and the boy would be abducted and replaced by a by ONI within the week.
===Training and Augmentation (2517-2525)===
Delivered to a classified training facility on , Isaac and seventy-four other children like himself were assembled to listen to a speech from Doctor Halsey about the purpose of the program they'd just joined, and the next morning, training began. After a punishing day-long exercise routine, Isaac would be grouped with trainees Vinh-030 and for their first time on the obstacle course. Quickly finding himself ill-suited for the course after taking several spills into the mud below, he considered himself lucky not to finish last, pulled along by his teammates. Isaac continued to slip towards the back of the group in capability, and started to be seen as a liability to his teammates, a fault he was more critical of himself with than anyone. Few went out of their way to make friends with him, but of those few, Kurt-051 was the first, and when Kurt, Vinh, and Isaac were sorted into Green Team, their teammates and would soon follow.
Determined to stop holding his teammates back, Isaac gave himself over completely to his training, pushing himself to his limit, but still lacked the talent of other trainees and was woefully outmatched in practically every area. Once they began to divide up and scrimmage against one another in team-based exercises, however, Isaac found his niche by knowing and adapting to serve the needs of his teammates, allowing them to be far more efficient and effective at their specialties. His usefulness contributed directly to several surprise victories among teams up against more skilled groups like Red and Blue. At last feeling at home among his new brothers and sisters, Isaac began to be more widely accepted by the other trainees, partly because he allowed himself to feel accepted.
As the Spartans' training came closer to completion, they were matched up against the Marines of to experience fighting against trained soldiers, yet due to their superior training went undefeated against the Insurrection veterans. Humiliated by losing to a bunch of children, after the theft of Tango's fleet of the commanding officer began letting his men use live rounds and ordnance, willing to wound or even kill the trainees in retaliation. In , the members of Green Team were using a stolen Warthog in a maneuver and tripped one of Tango's landmines, and in covering the others' retreat Vinh and James were captured by the Marines. Regrouping, Isaac, Kurt, and Will, rather than retreat, mounted an impromptu assault on Tango Company's headquarters to rescue their comrades, and within found their captors had savagely beaten James to take out their frustration and intended to rape Vinh. Having Isaac to thank for saving her and impressed by his loyalty, Vinh's opinion of him changed for the better afterward.
Finally, in 2525, the seventy-five young men and women left Reach for the first time in seven years to undergo the program's most dangerous phase: augmentation. The processes of genetically and physically altering their bodies would prove lethal to almost half the total candidates, and would leave another dozen irrevocably disfigured, bringing the program's failure rate to 56%. Isaac was one of only thirty-three left standing, and even he required months of physical therapy to fully recover from the experience. The loss of thirty of his friends, however, he would never fully recover from, though he buried his survivor's guilt deeply enough that it went unnoticed even by regular psyche evaluations. After completing their therapy aboard the , the surviving Spartans were transferred back to Reach to grow accustomed to their new strength in several weeks of objective-based exercises against their hopelessly-outclassed trainers.
===Onset of the (2525)===
While the first of the SPARTAN-IIs' operations would be carried out by Blue and Gold Teams against the Insurrection, Isaac would be passed over by their respective team leaders in favor of more accomplished individuals. Though he knew it was nothing personal, and that many talented Spartans just as eager to take part had been left behind with him, it still reinforced to him the idea that he was not among the better Spartans. Sharing his concerns with Kurt, his friend promised to take Isaac with him when Green Team's turn came as a way to cheer him up. Their counter-insurgency operations would be put on hold, however, when their unit was approved to be briefed on the emerging threat of the .
Informed of the alien collective's attack on the defenseless agricultural colony of , the SPARTANs' schedule was moved up to outfit them with the products of Project: MJOLNIR as soon as possible. Isaac and the other Spartans boarded the UNSC frigate to be taken to , where MJOLNIR had been developed. But upon arrival out of slipspace, the Commonwealth detected a small Covenant vessel already in the system, and was suddenly engaged when the enemy ship made a precise intra-system jump to fire on them. The Spartans disembarked on a Pelican dropship, heading for the while the Commonwealth held off the Covenant ship. Reaching the facility, the Spartans were first integrated with their own suits of Powered Assault Armor. While the Mark IV did not yet incorporate , the high-tech battle armor increased their already-superhuman strength and speed to unprecedented levels.
As they made their return to the Commonwealth, the Spartans were informed that while the frigate had dealt their opponent heavy damage, they'd been hit by as much as they'd inflicted, and had lost the use of their slipspace drive, making escape from the battle impossible. However, saw an opportunity to exploit their new armor's vacuum-sealing, and with permission launched his contingent of Spartans from their Pelican in the hopes of boarding the Covenant ship. Isaac nearly made it to the target, but nearly strayed into the line of fire of one of the Covenant plasma batteries. He was saved by a kick from , who had launched near to him, sending them both out of harm's way, but off-course, drifting to be picked up later by the Commonwealth. Afterwards, Isaac learned that while some of Blue Team had managed to get onboard and destroy the ship, it had cost them the life of . While every Spartan mourned his loss and wished they could have taken his place, only Isaac genuinely believed he should have taken Sam's place.
=== (2526-2531)===
Though the front line of the Human-Covenant War was spread across the Outer Colonies from the beginning, as the first world to have been attacked Harvest formed a symbolic and strategic center of conflict which the UNSC was determined to reclaim. To this end, the SPARTAN-IIs' new superiors in ordered a dedicated team of the supersoldiers to be stationed on Harvest to see the conflict through: . This would require them to take part in large-scale direct combat as well as commando operations, and thus consisted mainly of heavy weapons, combat engineering, and demolitions experts. While none of these himself, Isaac's skill set would become invaluable in keeping his teammates alert and functioning through prolonged battles.
Although the SPARTANs were still a jealously-kept secret of the Office of Naval Intelligence, Red Team's participation in the campaign inevitably led to them working in the field with mainline military forces, and word of their successes against overwhelming odds soon spread. Breach of classifications aside, no one could begrudge them the morale boost as Harvest continued to crumble as it was ravaged by the ongoing war. Rumors painted the faceless supersoldiers as heroes, sometimes attributed with names and personas, but in truth their roster frequently changed to suit specific missions and reduce the risk of battle fatigue. While most often it was led by , nearly every Spartan was rotated in and out of Red during the five-year-long campaign, and leadership at times was given to , Joshua-029, and even John-117. But by the campaign's end, no Spartan had served in Red Team for as long as Isaac, whom had been removed for only one two-month period to recuperate from injuries sustained when a Wraith plasma mortar collapsed the building he had taken cover in.
=== (2531)===
After spending five years fighting on Harvest's scarred and dead surface, when the UNSC began to abandon the colony Red Team was recalled and taken by the to carry out refresher courses in the wilderness of the resort world . But as they were conducting exercises in the Neverland Mountain range north of the city of Pirth, a pair of Covenant CCS-class battlecruisers arrived in orbit and destroyed half of the battlegroup assigned to the planet's defense. With Covenant troops landing just outside Pirth, Jerome-092 immediately ordered Red Team to join local UNSC forces to repel the impending attack.
During the city's defense, Jerome ordered the Spartans to split into two teams: Red Alpha and Red Omega. While Red Alpha, consisting of Jerome, Alice, and Douglas, fell back to protect civilian transports evacuating the city, he charged Joshua-029 with leading Omega, a six-member team including Isaac and Vinh, to delay the main Covenant army before it reached the city. Acquiring heavy weapons and ordnance from a UNSC Army depot, Omega ambushed a legion-size convoy of Covenant Wraiths and Ghosts in the thick forests of the foothills surrounding Pirth, and destroyed a significant number of the mechanized forces. Afterwards, they were taken by Pelicans from the to reinforce Red Alpha at a rally point outside of the city, and helped to destroy the construction site where the Covenant had hoped to build a citadel. 
After assisting their comrades, Omega proceeded to root the remaining Covenant scavengers out of Pirth as most fell back to an excavation site at an on Beasley's Plateau. Now taking their time as they moved through the city, Isaac began to recognize landmarks from where he'd grown up. He became somewhat distracted by thoughts of whether or not he should have felt anything for his former home, but it went unnoticed by his team except for Vinh, who was able to help him square away his concerns and return his attention to the tasks at hand. While they continued to mop up the Covenant troops still on the planet, Jerome, Alice, and Douglas left aboard the Spirit of Fire to pursue the alien battlecruiser that had left them behind. Once the battle had finished, Isaac and the rest of Red Omega departed Arcadia aboard the damaged Pillar of Autumn to return to Reach and rejoin the rest of the SPARTAN-IIs.
=== (2539)===
Using information gleaned from former leaders of , the Office of Naval Intelligence was able to launch a string of insurgent-hunting missions, and requisitioned two SPARTAN-II operators: Isaac-039 and Vinh-030. They were transferred to the UNSC Nightshade, where they met their handler and mission advisor, Lieutenant Erin Coney. Beginning the first of their operations on Kholo, the Spartans were successful in locating and destroying a number of Insurrectionist bomb shops and safe houses. Unknown to them, a freighter captured by the Covenant millions of lightyears away had yielded the colony's location, and on their third day in the planetary capital, the slipped into the system and began an assault on the world.
Unable to escape the planet's surface, Isaac and Vinh resolved to fight in Kholo's defense, but upon the Covenant's discovery of them, were forced to retreat as a large number of ground troops attempted to slay the infamous demons. At last, a Covenant corvette was sent in overhead to ensure their destruction, but the Spartans managed to escape a pinpoint glassing beam by jumping down a mineshaft into the subterranean network of tunnels and fallout shelters beneath the city. Their survival didn't go undetected, however, and a Scarab under the direction of Field Master Vract 'Aeramee began digging them out with its excavation beam. Sure of their impending deaths, Isaac and Vinh admitted that their feelings for one another were more than that of teammates, and consummated their relationship to defy their feelings of despair. 
Waiting undetected in orbit, meanwhile, Lieutenant Coney hadn't abandoned them. With the prowler and a platoon of Orbital Drop Shock Troopers from the 7th Battalion, she launched a daring rescue under the airspace of an entire Covenant fleet to extract the two of them. Fighting off 'Aeramee's troops and commandeering his Scarab, the team finished digging the Spartans out and extracted them before making a slipspace jump to random coordinates outside the system. Though they'd survived, during their long slipspace journey home Vinh experienced pain in her midsection and it was revealed by an examination that she had become pregnant. Explaining themselves to Coney, Vinh declared that she wouldn't abort the child, and Erin had her discreetly transferred to the on Reach for her term. Isaac, in the meantime, would have to complete the remainder of the counter-insurgency stings to prevent ONI from discovering them.
For the next ten months, Isaac would constantly make voyages between Inner and Outer Colonies to return to Reach and spend as much time with Vinh as possible. After giving birth to a boy whom they named Daniel Clarke, using Isaac's last name, Vinh would spend two more months with the child before she and Isaac were convinced by Erin to leave him in an orphanage in New Alexandria under her watchful eye. Though both parents regretted it, they knew it would be best thing for the child, and themselves. Against the odds, Daniel would live through infancy without any complications as a 'Spartan 2.1,' though he would remain unaware of his own origins.
=== (2547)===
As the Covenant swept further into the more densely-populated regions of the Inner Colonies, the Spartans found themselves divided and deployed more frequently to worlds already under siege to enter losing battles, Isaac once describing them as "sucking chest wounds we can only put a band-aid on." One such conflict was Skopje, which despite being a prominent center of both manufacturing and agricultural production within the Inner Colonies, lasted only a few days. Green Team, composed of Linda-058, , , Vinh-030, and Isaac-039, arrived in the middle of the battle to find that the tide was already turning against them. Though most of the colony's population centers that hadn't immediately been destroyed had been evacuated thanks to the abundance of ships in Rhodes Collosi Shipwrights' extensive drydock complexes, they found the UNSC was no longer making any effort to reach the more remote cities in order to save RCS' shipbuilding machinery for relocation to Reach.
Understanding the need to prioritize war materiel over civilian lives made the decision no less difficult for the Spartans to accept, but they willingly complied with their orders to assist a unit of in holding the Covenant off while the machinery was collected. During the engagement that followed, Isaac saved the lives of a several scattered ODSTs including and escorted them to their rendezvous point with the rest of their unit before departing to rejoin his squad. The battle would end in the same way as more than a dozen battles that Isaac had taken part in prior: evacuating a large percentage of the planet's population to be crowded onto the already-overpopulated remaining worlds, while millions more were buried when the colony was glassed by the Covenant.
The loss of so many civilians without at least attempting to save them made Skopje a particularly bitter defeat, but knowing loss after loss was affecting his comrades just as strongly, Isaac forcibly suppressed his emotions to give his teammates one less thing to worry about. The only one to notice his behavior was Vinh, whom tried time and again to get Isaac to open up, only to have him to brush off her concerns. Over time, his unwillingness to talk to her caused them to drift apart from one another. By the time of Skopje's fall, Isaac and Vinh had ceased to be anything more than teammates again, though Isaac deeply regretted losing her. It would become just one more thing that he had to repress.
=== (2552)===
In August of 2552, most of the SPARTAN-IIs would reunite at Reach to receive an upgrade to the Armor, and be briefed on an impending top-secret mission. While the entire cadre of veteran Spartans were impressed by the new energy-shielded armor's capabilities, Isaac was more concerned by what possible mission could have demanded the presence of their entire unit, recalled from battlefields across the Inner Colonies. He would get his answers soon enough; the briefing for RED FLAG was given by Doctor Halsey herself, and explained that HIGHCOM was hoping the Spartans could secure one of the Covenant's highest echelon of leadership to negotiate with their empire and end the war. Isaac was intrigued by the idea that the operation could work, but before it could be commenced, word was sent to them that Reach had fallen under attack by Covenant fleet more massive than any seen before, and the SPARTAN-IIs were again being recalled to come to its defense.
Once again assigned to Red Team, now under command of , the Spartans were dispatched to hold the planet's ground-based generators from enemy ground troops. But while was reentering atmosphere, they were attacked by squadrons of fighters and their pilot was killed, forcing them to bail out thousands of feet in the air. The fall would kill four of his brethren on impact, and Isaac was lucky not to be a fifth. Losing control of his orientation, he had to put out both his arms to catch himself, and as a result dislocated both limbs and was rendered unconscious. He was found by Will-043, but both were attacked by Jackals while Isaac was still out. Fred and Kelly-087 arrived in time to rescue them, and they eventually regrouped with the other Spartans in addition to the handful of Marines that remained from .
Presented with multiple objectives, Fred divided Red Team into four groups, and assigned Isaac to William's group of wounded Spartans, Team Delta, as both his dislocated arms had been incorrectly reinserted in his haste to be ready to help. While disappointed, he complied and accompanied the five other Spartans and Marines of Charlie Company in falling back to , but he, Will, and Vinh were seperated from the rest of Delta en route. Though the three managed to reach CASTLE, the rest of Delta never caught up with them. Finding the entrance to the ONI facility locked down, they had to wait until Fred and Kelly regrouped with them and discovered that by using the "Oly Oly Oxen Free" code they used as children that the door would open for them. To their surprise, they were greeted inside by Doctor Halsey.
After a brief assessment of their injuries, Doctor Halsey sent Isaac and Vinh together to monitor the base's perimeter defenses, having guessed that they shared some relationship before, though unaware of its termination. While the pair had worked together since then repeatedly, Isaac was surprised for find Vinh rather brusque with him at being paired again, though before he could ask about it the Covenant caught up with them and began forcing their way inside. Retreating immediately, Doctor Halsey initiated a protocol codenamed WHITE GLOVE to prevent the base from falling into Covenant hands, and took the Spartans deeper underground as the facility was destroyed. Afterwards, however, the six of them would become trapped in the maze of tunnels below for several days. Making the most of this time, Halsey upgraded the team's MJOLNIR armor with spare parts salvaged from storage tunnels, including a new image-enhancing computer for Isaac. And reminded of the tunnels under Kholo, Isaac followed her example and did his best to try and reconcile with Vinh when they were able to find some privacy.
Eventually, however, the Covenant caught up with them, not giving up on finding and slaying the demons. As the ceiling of a cavern they had found fell in to allow thousands of alien troops to reach them by gravity lift, Isaac and Vinh were ordered to cover the group's retreat by setting explosives in a tunnel entrance. But as they were setting the charges, a stray bolt from a plasma pistol struck one of them, setting it off and caving in that section of the tunnel. Both Spartans survived the blast, pinned under tons of rubble, but were dug out of the debris by Covenant soldiers. Together, they were brought before Sangheili Ultra Veral T’ramee, who commanded that one would be imprisoned to be taken back to for celebrated execution, and the other he would claim the glory of slaying himself. He turned his blade on Vinh, but as he was about to strike, Isaac surged to his feet with a knife and drew T'ramee's blood, dishonoring him. Shaking with rage, T'ramee ran Isaac through, killing him almost instantly.
Isaac's body was left where it fell, and was lost when that sector of Reach was glassed, either buried or burned out of existence. His sacrifice would not be a meaningless one, however. Her execution delayed, Vinh was able to escape the Covenant months later and return to take part in the , where she aided in the defense of Japan alongside their son's own Spartan team, Team Machete.
==Personality and Traits==
Not as strong as Sam and Jorge, as good a shot as Linda or her rivals, and not as fast or smart as Kelly, Isaac at first had trouble finding his niche among Spartans. His lack of a great talent made him think less of himself than he thought of the other Spartans, and the idea of sacrificing himself for them became ingrained in his mind. In time, however, he learned to make up for his shortcomings by providing support to his siblings, maximizing their ability on the field through efficient teamwork. Known for his reliability in times of danger, many Spartans took Isaac's consistent willingness to fill the more routine roles for granted. Vinh, Joshua, and Kurt were perhaps the only ones who knew him well, and Doctor Halsey very likely the only one outside of the Spartans.
Though an average combatant for a Spartan, if one could ever be called average, the loyalty underlying Isaac's dependable nature could make him a stubbornly determined fighter when an objective or teammate was at stake, and was never one to give up on a mission easily. Still, he never questioned or disobeyed an order, and his mediocrity among Spartans made him easier to be forgotten after his presumed death. realized this while thinking about his fallen brothers and sisters aboard the , and angry with himself for the possibility of overlooking one of them, started to recall with all they could of Isaac and the others they believed had died on Reach.
==Weapons and Armor==
*Issued to all members of the SPARTAN-II Program in 2525 during the Battle of Chi Ceti, the first iteration of the armor to be used by SPARTANs in the field lacked energy shielding, instead offering protection against Covenant plasma weapons by a refractive coating over an armored alloy shell. Completely vacuum-sealed and nearly immune to EMP and radiation, the suit could allow its wearer to survive and function in extreme environments, including EVA. Isaac often supplemented his armor's carrying capacity for ammunition and equipment through bandoleers, belts, and backpacks, using the Mark IV through almost the entire Human-Covenant War until it was succeeded by the Mark V in 2551.
*Redesigned to incorporate reverse-engineered and improved , the Mark V also had improved integration with the SPARTAN Neural Interface to accomodate an Artificial Intelligence. Though Isaac never benefited from being paired with an AI, the interface allowed him to be more in-tune with his second skin, tremendously boosting his already prodigious reaction time. While in the mines under CASTLE Base, Isaac's suit was upgraded with an experimental image-enhancing computer which helped by actively seeking out and identifying points of interest.
*MA5B Assault RifleA versatile weapon with a high rate of fire, the MA5B was fairly standard in almost all branches of the UNSCDF. Produced by , it held as the military's most commonly-used firearm through the first half of the 26th century, replaced by the MA5C starting in 2552. Though he'd been trained in the use of most Covenant and virtually all UNSC-issue weapons, he rarely deviated from the assault rifle that allowed him to hold his own in all sorts of engagements.
*MiscellaneousIsaac literally shouldered much of the weight of any squad he was assigned to. Depending on his teammates, Isaac would carry anything from spotting lenses, GPS trackers, and scanning gear to spare rocket assemblies, energy weapon charge packs, and whole cases of ammunition.