Caleb Vale

Caleb F. Aagard (civilian identification 78104-985-RBA8774) was a candidate for the SPARTAN-II program, though he eluded his captors. Had he been conscripted his official designation would have been Caleb-095.

Biography
Caleb Aagard was born on May 16, 2511 in Newport on Luyten in the Luyten 726-8 system. He grew up in the city of Old Willem, at 22 Hunnestad Road. During his childhood, he suffered a head injury due to a farming accident. Neuroimaging of Caleb's brain conducted after the incident confirmed a neural network accretion often associated with intuitive behavior—commonly called "precognition". On account of his exceptional attributes, Caleb was selected as a candidate for the SPARTAN-II program. However, he was never located during the attempted abduction. Doctor Catherine Halsey blamed this on failings in the mission, denouncing the rumor about his supposed prescience.

Caleb eventually changed his name to Caleb Vale and became a slipspace drive technician and married Nerina Vale with whom he had a daughter, Olympia Vale. A devoted pacifist, Caleb refused to work on military vessels, leading to Caleb and Nerina getting divorced after a last family camping trip to Hoodoo Gorges. The divorce was completed just ten days later - coincidentally on Olympia's eleventh birthday. Mother and daughter boarded a diplomatic shuttle for Earth, only to have a six-day trip turn into a six month trip due to a slipspace drive failure. Olympia would suspect her father of having somehow sabotaged the shuttle in a last-ditch effort to keep his family on Luyten, but Nerina dismissed the idea so scornfully that Olympia concluded that it was a dumb idea until after the Battle for Earth.

Following Nerina's death in the Battle for Earth, Olympia attempted to contact her father to let Caleb know that his ex-wife had died in the Covenant attack. However, Olympia learned that Caleb Vale didn't exist. Through her ONI connections, Olympia discovered that Caleb Vale was actually a false identity assumed by Caleb Aagard who had been born on Luyten in the same year as her father, but the trail then ran cold. The only note in Caleb's file was that he had refused conscription in 2517 and then vanished. When Olympia tried to find a ghost file that would explain the discrepancy, her superior claimed that it was simply a case of father and son having the same name, and then advised her in a tone that suggested that the "advice" came from someone far above both of their heads to stop wasting ONI resources and devote herself to her proper assignment.

Subsequently, Olympia stopped poking around ONI's files regarding anyone from Luyten and started searching for more subtle ways to find out her father's true identity. However, the Created uprising came and Olympia could no longer be sure that the information still existed or that she would be able to access it even if it did. The revelation by a rogue journalist that the Spartan-IIs had been conscripted as six-year-olds caused Olympia to deduce that her father really was Caleb Aagard and that he'd fled conscription as a Spartan, which was ironic as Olympia herself would eventually become a Spartan-IV. By November 2559, Olympia had still not been able to locate Caleb, although she was determined to find him and get closure and answers from her father.

Personality and traits
While evaluating his aptitudes, Doctor Catherine Halsey regarded Caleb as extremely intelligent, namely scoring a 161 on the Finchy-Franks Intelligence Quotient. Like each candidate for the SPARTAN-II program, Caleb boasted superior strength and speed than his peers, along with a remarkable intellect and cognitive absorption rate. However, he was very self-sufficient and introverted.

While neuroimaging conducted on his brain confirmed that Caleb had a neural network formation often associated with intuitive behavior, Halsey criticized the claims that he maintained limited precognition.

As an adult, Caleb worked as a slipspace drive technician and claimed to be a devoted pacifist that wanted nothing to do with the military. How much of his pacifism was real is unknown as he may have been avoiding the military out of fear of being discovered due to his past as an attempted Spartan conscript.

Caleb's daughter suspected that he may have been somehow responsible for the slipspsace drive failure that had stranded Olympia and her mother for six months in a last-ditch effort to keep his family on Luyten, but Nerina Vale dismissed the idea so scornfully that Olympia concluded that it was a dumb idea until she learned of her father's past after the Battle for Earth.

List of appearances

 * Halo: Reach
 * Dr. Halsey's personal journal
 * Halo 5: Guardians
 * Halo: Outcasts