DT 2021: Easy Smiles

Lieutenant Commander Jefferson Korn made more than a few house calls during the snatch jobs to get SPARTAN-III Delta Company off the ground. More than any executive officer during the project.
He met many bright and intriguing future Spartans in his time. Unfortunately, he wasn’t lucky enough to oversee the acquisition of one little blonde Reavian.
Roxanne-D107. Her easy smile glowed among the doom and gloom of her orphaned compatriots. Energetic. Talkative. Well-adjusted.
It was a farce. Everything about her was fake, however, the mask was the most real thing about her. To the other officers, trainers, and guards, she seemed like an anomalous oddball. A time bomb in the making by Spartan standards.
Korn knew better. He recognized that smile on an existential level, the same bared teeth he put on every day since he left that waterless rock called Aleria.
Little Roxanne was a tough girl. Someone who would go far. She pushed aside others’ reservations by never revealing her doubts and fears. She would smile in the face of danger and horror.
Korn did it upon his induction into Naval Intelligence as a groomed midshipman. Roxanne would do so as a grilled recruit on her path to becoming a defender of Humanity.
A wish sprung to life in his chest. “Whatever team SPARTAN-D107 ends up on, I want the responsibility of counseling it.”
Turning to Captain Johnson, Korn received a nod of acknowledgement and a confirmative wave from the program’s stuttering AI director, Delphi.
“I-I’ll make-make it hap-happen,” The AI answered with a glance to Johnson as the most senior officer in the room.
Roxanne would succeed. Korn would make sure of it. The little girl who lost her entire family to alien Jackals and willingly swam through gasoline to survive. He would make sure she never felt fear again. In that moment, he felt the missing and endless pride of a childless father.
Five years later, it broke his heart to see her smile vanish.
From the darkness of his starship atrium, she shifted her large duffel bag against her shoulder and walked into the harsh lighting of the docked space station. Into an unknown future.
Their paths disconnected a long time ago. He didn’t earn her easy smile. It wasn’t his to protect or receive.
She finally walked her own path alone. Their final smiles went unexchanged.