James Cutter

"Cutter" redirects here. For other uses, see Cutter (disambiguation).

"Where you see half a crew, Isabel, I see family, courage. And a thousand heroes who swore to fight their way through hell before they'd ever... EVER turn their backs and run. And where you see one old ship, I see home. And that is always worth fighting for!"

- Captain Cutter to Isabel and the bridge crew of the Spirit of Fire.

Captain James "Jim" Gregory Cutter (service number 01730-58392-JC) is a senior officer in the UNSC Navy who served during the Insurrection and the early years of the Human-Covenant War. He captains the, a refitted Phoenix-class support vessel that was attached to Vice Admiral Preston Cole's Third Fleet in 2531. Cutter had a wife, Mary, with whom he had a daughter on Reach; he also had a mistress on Tribute, with whom he had a son, Daniel Clayton. Cutter and the Spirit of Fire went missing in 2531 due to circumstances that required the sacrifice of the ship's Shaw-Fujikawa translight engine in order to deny a fleet of Forerunner s to the Covenant. Cutter and the rest of the crew entered cryostasis and slept for years, awakening in 2559 only after being mysteriously pulled through a portal to the extragalactic Installation 00. There Cutter led the crew of the Spirit of Fire against the Banished, a power-hungry faction of ex-Covenant that were occupying it.

Early career
"I was Cutter's XO a couple years before Spirit of Fire went missing. To say I owe the man would be the grossest of understatements."

- Fleet Admiral Terrence Hood in 2558.

James Gregory Cutter was born on Reach on June 12, 2479. In the sixth grade, he had a teacher named Mrs. Ash. During one of her spelling tests James spelled the word "rendezvous" correctly, which led to him liking the word ever since. After Cutter finished school, his father pushed him to get a university degree and was furious when James became an ensign at the UN Colony Logistics Office and became even more angered when his son enrolled in flight school. He even went so far as to tell him he was "nothing more than a trucker". James enrolled in the UNSC School of the North Star on September 15, 2500, where he graduated magna cum laude with an emphasis in astronavigation and political science. He was admitted to Officer Candidate School on June 19, 2504, where he received additional training with emphases in command and astronavigation. On November 16, 2507 he entered naval service as a lieutenant and junior navigation officer aboard the Stick, a diplomatic attaché vessel assigned to the. He was transferred to the on January 9, 2514, whereupon he was appointed to the post of chief navigation officer. During Operation: TREBUCHET, a twelve-year offensive against the Insurrection in the Outer Colonies, Cutter earned a campaign ribbon during service with the Logistics Corps. Prior to this receipt, he also was awarded with two other ribbons for his service during the classified mission, Operation: WHISPER AMONG STARS, and Operation: BREADCRUMB. He piloted multiple colony vessels prior to 2519. Cutter achieved the rank of commander upon his transfer to the, a colony freighter vessel, on August 8, 2519. On May 22, 2524, he received a Bronze Star for his actions against insurgents in the Epsilon Indi system while serving aboard the Glasgow. These actions brought him to the attention of UNSC command. Cutter also served on two other vessels during his career before finally being given the captaincy and command of his own ship. Having married at some previous point in his career, Cutter had an extramarital affair with a woman on Tribute between 2524 and 2525. This liaison produced a son, Daniel Clayton. Cutter's mother also passed away at some point prior to August 8, 2525, the date on which James relinquished his former command to become the captain of another ship, the modified Phoenix-class colony ship,. Cutter had been the only person wanted for the job. Not long after he became the Spirit of Fire's captain, Cutter's father came aboard for a tour. He was impressed at what his son had accomplished and finally fully reconciled with him, telling him that he must have known what he was doing after all and that his mother would be proud. On January 30, 2528, Cutter was offered command of the, the , but turned it down because he was content with the Spirit of Fire and being stationed near his wife and young daughter on Reach, where its sphere of influence was then centered. By at least 2528, Terrence Hood had become Cutter's executive officer and by November of 2530, Cutter had seen that Hood was given command of his own ship, the,. During the early years of the Human-Covenant War, the Spirit of Fire served as a supply boat for the UNSC fleet to which it found itself attached. It primarily was responsible for ferrying supplies, water, fuel, and ground support to varying theaters. After his release from jail in 2530, Sergeant John Forge was reassigned to the Spirit of Fire by Vice Admiral Preston Cole, who told Cutter to expect him.

Aiding the Prophecy
"Serina"

- James Cutter

By January 3, 2531, the Spirit of Fire was part of the Third Fleet's Battlegroup D, which was massed at a staging area in interstellar space. The fleet had recently come into conflict with the Covenant's Fleet of Glorious Interdiction over the Outer Colony of Harvest. For the past five years, the Third Fleet had fighting to reclaim the colony from the Covenant. On January 3 Vice Admiral Cole chose Cutter and the Spirit of Fire to provide immediate assistance to the, which had successfully repelled Covenant ships near Harvest but had been critically damaged in the process. Cole did not believe that a combat vessel could be spared to rescue the Prophecy, but a support ship like the Spirit of Fire could be. In addition, the Spirit was to also use this opportunity to investigate ongoing Covenant activity in the system. After dealing with the, the plan was for the Spirit to rendezvous once more with the rest of the fleet for another strike at the Covenant remaining at Harvest. Prior to jumping to slipstream space, Cutter personally visited various locations on his ship, including the Shaw-Fujikawa drive room and Drop Bay Bravo, where he surveyed the slipspace drive and assorted ordnance, respectively. Before breaking from the battlegroup, he instructed the ship's relatively new "smart" A.I., Serina, to update their servers so he could read new a message from his family sent all the way from Reach. En route to the Epsilon Indi system, with a little over thirty-two hours before their arrival, Serina brought up the matter of Cutter's previous rejection of the offer to captain the Prophecy. Cutter stated that he was perfectly happy with the position he had, to which Serina jokingly replied that she was at least glad she didn't have to "break in" a new captain, seeing as it had already taken her long enough to get him where she wanted. Once Cutter requested an update on how the ship and crew were doing, he was informed that there had been a message from Doctor Ellen Anders, a professor from Rishard University assigned to the ship by the Office of Naval Intelligence to further study of the Covenant. Anders was not yet aboard the Spirit of Fire, but she was already asking for better quarters than those which had been set aside for her, as well as an audience with the captain upon her arrival. Not wishing to take even the slightest break from his activities on the bridge at that moment, Cutter assigned Lieutenant Blake to deal with her and explain that different arrangements just weren't a possibility at the moment. After over a month of time spent in transit, the Spirit of Fire arrived at Harvest on February 4, 2531. A looped message that had evidently been broadcast from the Prophecy since three days prior indicated that the cruiser's reactor had gone critical and begun leaking radiation, forcing its crew to evacuate to onboard solar bunkers. Cutter openly wondered how it was that ONI had known the Prophecy was in trouble so soon after it had been crippled. Serina wagered that ONI had been present when it happenned but had refused to lend any aid. Incensed at the thought, Cutter immediately ordered her to prepare for NAV database extraction and rescue operations. Just as she assented, however, four small Covenant ships exited slipspace on the other side of the cruiser, which was suddenly an impediment that blocked potential hits from the Spirit's Magnetic Accelerator Cannon from hitting any of the new arrivals. Cutter ordered that the Spirit move to flank the Covenant craft and that pelican EVA squads be scrambled. Serina subsequently relayed commands to fireteams Echo, India, Lima, and November. As soon they had a clean shot, the MAC was able to destroy one of the smaller Covenant ships with one slug. Cutter then gave authorization for HAVOK nuclear missiles to be used. The UNSC Marine Corps fireteams were successful in purging the databases of the Prophecy, rescuing some of the crew, and initiating a self-destruct sequence. The Covenant threat was also disposed of by the Spirit of Fire, but all survivors from the Prophecy were beyond truly saving, as they had all been exposed to far too much radiation. .

Investigation on Harvest
"Five years, five long years. That's how long it took us to get Harvest back. At first it was going well. Then setback after setback... Loss after loss... Made what was going to be a quick and decisive win... Into five years of Hell. Of course, that's all Harvest really is today... It's Hell down there, but now it's ours again."

- Captain Cutter's report.

Shortly after the destruction of the and four Covenant ships at the hands of the Spirit of Fire crew, the  arrived at Harvest, bearing professor Anders. Anders was presented to Captain Cutter on the Spirit's bridge by an ONI officer. Cutter wasted no time confronting the man with the fact that a stealth ship belonging to ONI must have been present when the Prophecy was first damaged, due to the time required to travel from Harvest. The officer defended the decision to leave the cruiser, seeing as those aboard were a lost cause. In addition, he reminded the captain that it would be in violation of protocol for any "hypothetical" prowler to reveal itself. Moving on from the matter, he introduced Cutter to his new guest and relayed that Fleet Command had given her the authority to make decisions related to scientific matters during the current deployment. Following that communiqué, Anders launched into a presentation for Cutter concerning what she had already gathered concerning the Covenant's preoccupation with Harvest and the Sangheili Arbiter leading its forces there: Ripa 'Moramee. Following the presentation Cutter made a log in his captain's report about the last five years of struggling for Harvest and what it felt like to be here now, being seemingly close to beating back the Covenant for good from the colony.

Once the Last Gleaming had departed, Cutter, Anders, and Serina conversed on the bridge. The professor, having been briefed on intercepted Covenant transmissions deciphered by artificial intelligences, let Cutter know that the aliens seemed to be particularly interested in an arctic region of the planet. Serina scanned the area and detected major gravimetric anomalies. Anders thought her readings might indicate a specific structure on the surface hereto unknown to them, and Cutter told Serina to have Sergeant John Forge investigate. Marines deployed as part of Alpha and Bravo Teams and soon came under fire from Jiralhanae led by the Brute known as Thrallslayer. The information coming from the surface threw the bridge into chaos and Cutter ordered Serina to get him a direct connection to Forge. The sergeant reported that unless Alpha and Bravo could link up at his position, his own marines would be done for. Cutter ordered him to secure his location and assured him that reinforcements were inbound. A short time later, as D77-TC Pelicans and D20 Herons were launched from the Spirit of Fire, Cutter reestablished contact with Forge once again. He confirmed the professor had been correct regarding the Covenant's interest in the northern pole of Harvest, and Anders once again shared her suspicion that there was some kind of structure down there. Determined to find out what this was all about, Cutter directed Forge to pull back to Alpha Base and to bring it back to operational status. To this end, he also directed more backup his way. After disconnecting from the sergeant, Cutter was sarcastically asked by Serina if he envisioned their current situation as "nothing too difficult". Cutter sighed and expressed a feeling that whatever was hidden in Harvest's arctic north might be the key to the entire war. Forge contacted the captain after arriving near to Alpha Base to let him know that it had been overrun. He also advised that Cutter refrain from deploying the "backup" until Alpha Base was theirs again. Cutter monitored the operation on the ground from the bridge high above the planet and provided Forge some assistance in the form of air support from B-65 Shortswords. After the base was recaptured, Cutter advised that Forge scout the immediate area surrounding it just to be sure they were in the clear for the time being.

After leaving the bridge and making his way down to the observation deck, Cutter was annoyed to find it full of professor Anders' and laboratory equipment. She casually asserted that she like the view it afforded her and the perspective it added to her work. Cutter reminded Anders that Forge felt it wasn't yet safe for her go down to the planet to investigate the mysterious structure just yet. Anders pushed back against his overprotectiveness and he reluctantly relented, saying that while he would approve her investigation of the site personally, at the slightest sign of danger he would pull her out. In order to make it safe for the professor's work, Cutter contacted Serina to coordinate the re-establishment of Alpha Base as a functioning forward operating base from which the Covenant at the structure could be assaulted. He encouraged the buildup of a larger military presence on the ground before making any moves against the Covenant occupiers. After the infantry eventually rolled out from Alpha Base and made their way toward the objective, they incidentally stumbled upon a base the Covenant had constructed. Cutter contacted his forces to let them know that destroying it would be nice, but their primary goal was still the strange structure in the ice. After they reached the approach to the interior of it, a detonator and explosives were sighted at the entrance. Cutter ordered that the detonator be destroyed right away so that it couldn't be used to seal the entrance to this wondrous and baffling find. Having done so, Cutter congratulated the marines on the ground and told them to await further instructions. A pelican, Bravo-029, brought Anders to the planet's surface so she could explore what seemed to be a non-Covenant alien relic. She, Forge, and others were ambushed by more Covenant not long after they began their exploration. Reinforcements from Alpha Base would take too long to respond to their cries for assistance, so Cutter dispatched M850 Grizzly tanks directly from the Spirit of Fire. Both Forge and Anders managed to survive and exit the structure safely, where they found a pelican waiting to return them to the ship. Cutter commended the professor for her work and stated that he wanted to be briefed on what she found as soon as possible.

Alone on the observation deck with Anders and Serina, Cutter tried to extract as much as he could about what the Covenant had been after that was apparently hidden under humans' noses on Harvest for millennia. Anders cautioned that she had only had around thirty seconds to examine the centerpiece of a giant room within the structure, but that interacting with it had triggered the display of a holographic star chart. a specific star system was signaled out by the artifact, which happenned to be the system known to humans as the Procyon system. In particular, the colony of Arcadia had been pointed to. Arcadia was Anders' homeworld, and she strongly felt that they should go there at once before the Covenant did. she figured that if they had accessed the same display she did, that it would only be natural that a Covenant fleet would be arriving there soon. The captain was hesitant, as their orders had been to investigate Harvest only. Anders was not going to give up that easy and continued to insist that everything indicated they should make for Arcadia. Cutter relented and told her he would clear their departure with Vice Admiral Cole. Sure that Cole would permit the journey, he instructed Serina to chart a course to their next destination. Before they could leave, Cutter took the time to compose a message to the father of Helena Roman, a marine who had given her life that day on Harvest under his command.

Battle for Arcadia
"We cannot lose our foothold on Arcadia, gentlemen. Secure a defensible position and hold it until we can reinforce you."

- James Cutter to Marines on the ground.

During the trip from Harvest to Arcadia, a memorial service was on February 7 for the crew of the in opposition to objections from ONI personnel. The Spirit of Fire arrived at the colony on February 9 to find it under attack by a single from the Fleet of Glorious Interdiction. Entering the bridge, Cutter asked Serina for a read of the situation. She informed him that there had been two battlecruisers, but one had recently been destroyed at the cost of the and, not to mention damage suffered by the and. The remaining Covenant ship was presently hovering over Pirth City, Arcadia's capital. Serina isolated a signal from the service sent by the Arcadian Patrol that contained a desperate plea for help with defending and evacuating civilians in the city. Upon obtaining visuals, Cutter was able to see footage of Spartan-IIs fighting in the city. He ordered Serina to launch D20 Herons to the surface and to bring the ship to alert. Marines from the Spirit of Fire were able to assist with the evacuation effort. As the last cargo transport bearing evacuees was away, Cutter told Forge to pull back from the city and to regroup before his next set of orders would be given.

The Marines excited the city but were pursued by Covenant ground forces. Not wishing to lose a foothold on Arcadia, Cutter ordered them to secure a defensible position and hold it until they could be reinforced with more bodies. Serina recommended an impact crater a few clicks south along a highway. Captain Cutter notified other UNSC troops retreating from Pirth City of their position and let Sergeant Forge know that he was directing them his way. The captain monitored the fighting and congratulated the marines on their ability to withstand the Covenant forces and even establish two bases in the area. With the assistance of Spartan Team Omega, the sector was cleared of Covenant. As soon as the hostilities ceased, Cutter contacted Forge and ordered him to report to the bridge on the Spirit of Fire to be briefed on a new problem. The Covenant had set up a massive domed energy shield next to an ONI base. The shield obscured all activity within it, which made both Cutter and Anders suspicious. Cutter suggested using the ship's magnetic accelerator against it, but the professor cautioned against potentially destroying what was beneath the shield without knowing what it was. Instead, she recommended a more precise approach. The nearby Pillar of Autumn's inventory showed that it was carrying some M145D Rhino prototypes, artillery tanks armed with Zeus 320mm plasma cannons reverse-engineered from Covenant plasma weaponry. Theoretically, using superheated plasma against the shield could disable it without doing damage to what lied beneath it. Cutter thought her idea a fine one. He put Anders and Forge in charge of getting the shield down and moved to make the arrangements necessary to acquire the Rhinos. The plan worked perfectly. Once the shield was no more, Cutter had the UNSC forces moved forward to investigate what it had been hiding. They were met by a partially-built Type-29 Scarab, which the captain ordered them to destroy. To this end, he identified power nodes in the vicinity that were supplying it with energy and advised that they become targets in order to reduce its efficiency in defending itself. Once the threat had been eliminated, Cutter praised the efforts of the men and women on the ground.

In the aftermath of the scarab's defeat, however, Sergeant Forge and Dr. Anders were ambushed by the Arbiter, Ripa 'Moramee during a moment they were alone. Anders was easily captured by the hulking Sangheili and taken aboard a Type-25 Spirit. Forge immediately contacted Cutter to let him know what had happenned. Serina was able to track her transponder moving away from the planet toward a waiting. Five of these ships had arrived at the planet to join the fray and were engaging the remaining UNSC Navy presence surrounding the planet. Cutter demanded to know how Anders had been taken but all Forge could say was that a massive Elite had come out of nowhere. Furious, Cutter ordered him to return to the ship on the double. Once he was returned to it, he went directly for the bridge. Seeing that Forge had clearly been wounded by the encounter, Cutter questioned why he had not made for the med bay instead. At that moment, Anders' signal showed that the ship she had been taken aboard was accelerating and was already outside their effective weapon range. At the urging of Forge and Jerome-092, a Spartan that was among three picked up by the Spirit from Arcadia, Cutter ordered that Anders' captors be pursued. As they prepared to jump to slipspace in the wake of the Covenant vessel's jump, a log buoy was released with data concerning their destination solution. The, captained by Cutter's old XO, Terrence Hood, was assigned to intercept the buoy. Hood failed to make it a priority in the midst of the ongoing battle and so the buoy was picked up by the Radiant Perception, a CPV-class heavy destroyer, instead. It was February 10 when they left and Serina projected that their destination in uncharted Covenant space would take them thirteen days to reach. The ship remained on high alert for the entire transit, though non-essential crew members were briefly place in cryostasis.

Ancient powers
"Sergeant Forge, rendezvous with Red Team and find Anders, but be careful. We don't know what these things are capable of."

- Captain Cutter to Sergeant Forge after encountering the Flood on the outer surface of the Etran Harborage.

On February 23, the Spirit of Fire emerged from slipspace hot on the trail of the Arbiter to the sight of a unknown planet. Cutter prompted Serina for any information about their location, but she was of little help. She did inform him, however, that the Covenant vessel they had followed had taken cover on the planet's surface. No other Covenant activity was detected, though Serina did not that the world below them was resulting in strange readings when scanned by their instruments. Not wanting to waste any more time, the captain told her to get Forge down to the surface as soon as possible, to which she replied that he was already aboard a pelican waiting for approval. Two reconnaissance teams, Echo and India, were deployed with M312 Elephants and instructed to set up bases at potential sites from which the Covenant could be attacked at a nearby fortified position. Cutter confirmed that both teams were free of hostiles before they moved to their designated locations. Sergeant Forge led his own team and another elephant. Cutter let Forge know that he would need to clear a fire line ahead and get to a beacon that was waiting for him to signal the all-clear for a firebase to be dropped off. Logstics prevented the captain from landing any more troops at that time, but he assured Forge that he should have enough squads of marines with him within the elephant for the task at hand. The marines soon came into conflict with Jiralhanae and Cutter kept a close eye on the skirmish, offering advice and encouragement all the while from his perch in orbit. After the Jiralhanae were defeated, Recon Team Echo signaled that it was fully operational and that the situation had returned to normalcy before the man reporting for the team suddenly shouted that there was movement all over the place and that they needed help. All of Echo's signals went offline and Cutter told Forge to take a team to find out what had happened. When the sergeant reach Echo's elephant, he reported that he believed both it and India, all members of which had vanished from observation as well, had been compromised. Cutter questioned what he thought might have happenned, as scans registered no Covenant in the immediate area. Forge assured him it hadn't been the Covenant, but in fact was something seemingly even worse. Echo's elephant had been completely engulfed by a strange biomass and the bodies of its members were being hijacked by hideous infectious lifeforms. Forge managed to get the transport free and at this, Cutter approved his request for a firebase. He had Serina make the arrangements for D20 Herons to deliver the components. After Forge freed India's elephant from a similar predicament, Cutter had him bring it back to the new base to hold and wait for new orders. The Spartan-IIs of Red Team contacted Captain Cutter to let him know that they were one-hundred meters from Anders' transponder signal but were meeting with heavy resistance from this new enemy. Cutter told them to hold their position and wait for reinforcements before proceeding further. He then contacted Forge to fill him in and have him make his way to Red Team with his remaining marines, but not without advising extreme caution. Once the Spartans and marines apparently "killed" a large monstrosity that had attached itself in place, Cutter asked Serina for an assessment of their situation. Anders' signal had been lost before the massive version of the alien lifeform had been encountered. However, The Serina let Cutter know that she had just discovered a new signal to the east of the UNSC's position.

Cutter had the Spirit of Fire piloted to within the planet's lower atmosphere over the source of Serina's discovery: the shoreline of a large ocean. Cutter asked her if she was sure this was the place where she had traced the signal to. The A.I. replied that she was fairly sure and indicated that she was initiating a deep scan. Immediately, she had results which confused and troubled her. She barely had enough time to tell the captain that he wasn't going to like what she had learned before the sea below them parted. The planet's very exterior crust was revealed to be artificial in nature as mechanisms beyond human or Covenant engineering divided the seafloor below to reveal a cavernous expanse beneath it. Cutter shouted at Serina in surprise as the ship began to tilt and be pulled into the gaping maw. Several flying robots emerged from the deep and began flitting about the vessel. Cutter ordered all hands aboard to engage the strange constructs and called for Serina to recall all troops back to the Spirit of Fire promptly. Serina had been able to halt the action of the force tugging on their ship, but stated that she believed it would be a matter of minutes before she could do so no longer. In order to evacuate the marines of Alpha, Bravo, and Charlie Platoons, in addition to the Spartans of Red Team, Cutter sent Sergeant Forge and more marines to break through the lines of the swarming alien creatures so it would be safe to land pelicans for pickup. Serina learned that the field that had gripped the Spirit of Fire was generated by nearby pylons. Cutter wondered if there was some way to shut them down, but Serina was already way ahead of him. At her urging, Forge directed XRP12 Gremlins to disable them with electromagnetic pulses. The move bought the marines and Spartans on the ground more time and In less than twenty minutes since the recall was ordered, all survivors were in the air and speeding toward the ship. Cutter commended Serina's actions and told her to prepare the airlocks to receive the incoming troops.

Unable to resist the field any longer, the crew of the Spirit of Fire could only watch as it was consumed by the artificial planet, which closed heavy gates behind it once it had passed through its outer shell. The captain, as usual, looked to Serina for an explaination of their predicament. She could only guess that they were being pulled along according to some sort of docking procedure and also let him know that the seemingly virulent lifeforms had followed them inside by attaching themselves to the ship's exterior hull. He ordered Forge outside with marines to deal with the infestation and reminded him to defend their airlocks, both so none of the creatures would breach the ship and so he and his troops wouldn't be cut off from receiving further help. In the midst of the EVA struggle on the hull, which pitched the UNSC forces against both the flood of aliens and AI constructs Cutter contacted Forge to let him know two AC-220 Vultures that had been undergoing repairs were ready for action and were his to command. Once the parasitic nightmare was cleared off the ship, Cutter directed Serina to give their engines maximum power to get them away from the swarming constructs, not knowing what waited for them the further inside the world they went.

The Etran Harborage
"If the Covenant get their hands on these ships it will mean the end of the war. We'll take our chances here, to give humanity some hope."

- Captain Cutter decides the fate of his crew. Spirit of Fire soon emerged within the shield world's interior and almost immediately collided with a CPV-class destroyer. Spirit ' s reactor was severely damaged and required repairs before the ship could escape. Cutter was thus forced to coordinate a delaying action at metaphorical point-blank range while Sergeant Forge's Marines conducted repairs. Anders escaped and was soon found by Sergeant Forge. She had gained knowledge of a fleet of Forerunner dreadnoughts that the Covenant planned to use against humanity. She quickly devised a plan to use the Spirit of Fire's FTL reactor to cause the artificial star inside the shield world to go supernova, thus destroying the ships before the Covenant could make use of them; Cutter understood that this would limit Spirit of Fire to sublight speed, though he considered the sacrifice necessary when weighed against the possible extinction of humanity. Forge and Spartan Red Team killed the Arbiter and his guards when delivering the FTL drive to its destination, although the reactor core was damaged. Forge stayed behind to manually overload the reactor. With the shield world's utter destruction eminent, the captain ordered Red Team and numerous Marines to deactivate the hard light barrier that enclosed the exit portal. Cutter ordered Serina to make a dangerous slingshot maneuver around the expanding star and the ship escaped the ensuing explosion, after which Spirit of Fire began a long journey home.

On March 11, 2531, Cutter forced Anders into cryostasis, reassuring her that her plan had gotten everyone out of the shield world alive. As the pod closed, Anders reminded the captain that not everyone had survived. Cutter then paid his respects at the late Sergeant Forge's cryotube before making a round of the ship. The following day, Cutter walked the ship to check on the crew still recovering. He assured Nurse Lulu Hershey that she would get to see her fiancé again, and then returned to his cabin to write five more commendations, fourteen family condolences letters and a note to his wife, as well as to finally sleep for the first time in two weeks.

Legacy
Spirit of Fire was declared "lost with all hands" on February 10, 2534, the ship having previously been classified as missing in action. The reason for this change was kept top secret. A memorial service was held for the vessel's crew, but many family members chose not to attend, holding out hope that their loved ones were still alive.

After the Human-Covenant War's conclusion, Spirit of Fire and her crew were honored at the dedication of the living monument, along with numerous other ships that had been lost with all hands during the war.

Daniel Clayton's revenge
On March 11, 2558, the UNSC flagship Infinity recovered the civilian freighter Pilgrims Pride after intercepting a distress call from the Artesia-702 system. Several AC-220 Vultures and AV-22 Sparrowhawks emerged from the freighter and launched a short-lived Trojan horse attack inside Infinity. It was soon discovered that these craft had been previously assigned to Spirit of Fire.

Despite the diplomatic risks, Lord Terrence Hood, who felt guilty over his role in the Spirit of Fire ' s disappearance and the loss of his former commanding officer, ordered Infinity to investigate. When they arrived at the specified coordinates near Oth Lodon, they found not the Spirit but a Covenant space station. Cutter's illegitimate son, Captain Daniel Clayton contacted Infinity, revealing himself to be aligned with the New Colonial Alliance, an Insurrectionist group. Believing Lord Hood to be responsible for his father's death, Clayton ordered his crew to attack Infinity with the station's energy projector. Although Infinity was disabled by the attack, the Spartans were able to board the station and stop Clayton, delivering him and his underlings to UNSC captivity.

Installation 00
"If we don't stop Atriox now, we leave the galaxy at the mercy of a monster. So no, Isabel. We won't be running anywhere today."

- Cpt. Cutter calling his crew to action.

In 2559, after 28 years of being in cryo sleep, James Cutter and the rest of the crew of the UNSC Spirit of Fire were awakened in orbit above the Forerunner Installation 00. There Cutter and the crew encountered the Banished, led by the Jiralhanae Atriox.

Personality and traits
As the captain of the UNSC Spirit of Fire, Cutter was confident with those around him and was met with strong loyalty from the crew. His stance and voice identified him as an intelligent, unambiguous, and thoughtful leader who carried the weight of the Covenant conflict on his shoulders. Though he looked old for his age, he put forth the energy and determination of men half his age. He was almost always at attention while listening to his advisors and crew. He was constantly on the move with no need for pomp and circumstance. This lack of flourish rallied many behind him and made him the perfect leader for the battles ahead.

Cutter was an officer from the start, but his demeanor was never one of a do-nothing officer like many of his class. He was fed up of watching his men die from the bridge, leading to him seeking for ways for humanity to gain an advantage in the war. Many officers of his class had political aspirations far beyond their potential, but Cutter found it more interesting to "talk shop" with the non-commissioned servicemen. He liked his fellow officers, but he believed in "get[ting] to know and respect your men, and they'll give you 200 percent when the time comes." This approach had good and bad sides. Though his record of service and bravery was well known within the fleet his lack of political ambition, his unwillingness to climb the ladder of the UNSC by stepping over others, kept him from far more. He could easily have been an admiral if he had ever cared to be.

The amount of assignments with missions the UNSC Spirit of Fire undertook was something that made Cutter smile behind his morning coffee. He sometimes refers to ships in archaic nautical terms, although he has never seen an actual waterborne military vessel.

As the commanding officer of the Spirit of Fire, he was known for walking the ship at night to check on his crew. He was so well respected and well-known that coffee houses in Inner Colonies gave him free coffee beans to take with him on long deployments.

decision to stay near Reach made it less likely to be given advancement.

By the time Professor Ellen Anders arrived, Cutter had developed a close working relationship with the ship's AI, Serina, and was initially suspicious of presence of Professor Ellen Anders, a civilian consultant forcibly recruited by the Office of Naval Intelligence; he suspected that there was more to her than met the eye. After making a log on the "five years of hell" that led to the reclamation of the planet, Spirit of Fire remained in the Epsilon Indi system. Cutter believed that although Harvest had been reclaimed by the UNSC, it was unlikely that the Covenant would simply back down.

His trust in Anders had been strengthened by the bravery she had displayed on Harvest,

Decorations

 * Bronze Star - Meritorious action aboard UNSC Glasgow (awarded May 22, 2524)
 * Campaign Ribbon - Operation: TREBUCHET (Logistics Corps)
 * Campaign Ribbon - Operation: BREADCRUMB
 * Campaign Ribbon - Operation: WHISPER AMONG STARS (classified)

Production notes

 * Cutter was voiced by Gregg Berger in Halo Wars. Coincidentally, Berger voiced G.I. Joe member Cutter in the G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero animated series. Gideon Emery provides Cutter's voice, likeness, and motion capture performance in Halo Wars 2, albeit digitally aged to match Cutter's biological age. The recasting was due to changes in Blur Studio's animation technology; whereas the cinematics in Halo Wars used hand-sculpted and animated models, Blur has since come to adopt full performance capture technology, for which an actor bearing a closer resemblance to the character was deemed necessary. Emery also portrays Cutter in the War of Wits live-action promotional shorts.
 * Early concept art for Captain Cutter bears an uncanny resemblance to Ian McDiarmid, the actor best known for portraying Emperor Palpatine in the Star Wars film series.

List of appearances

 * Halo Wars: Genesis
 * Halo Wars
 * Halo: Escalation
 * Halo: Fleet Battles
 * Know Your Enemy
 * Halo Mythos


 * Halo: Tales from Slipspace
 * Something Has Happened
 * War of Wits: The Armrest
 * War of Wits: The Sale
 * Halo Wars 2