SPARTAN-II training

The Spartan-II's secret to being seemingly invincible and matchless in combat has always been their training, which was what made them worthy to wear the MJOLNIR armor.

The Beginning
Between 2511 and 2517, 150 six year old children were selected from near perfect psychological and genetic markers that were set in Dr. Halsey's selection protocols. The children were screened for certain genetic markers: strength, agility, even predispositions for aggression and intellect. But due to lack of facilities and funding, only 75 children were chosen for the program. Half of the 150 original candidates were not chosen due to environmental factors, mutations, learned ethics, and hundreds of other factors that made some of them unacceptable.

Between August 17 and September 23, 2517, the accepted candidates were taken from their homes in the middle of the night, injected with a chemical that rendered them unconscious, and rushed through Slipspace to Reach, where they were going to be trained. They were only recently brought out of cryosleep when Dr. Halsey told them that they would be indoctrinated into the UNSCDF to defend Earth and all her colonies, and that they could not return to their parents, that there would be a great deal of hardship on the road ahead, encouragement, and various other things. The children were then escorted to barracks were they had a meal, and went to bed at around 11:30 PM.

September 24, 2517
The Spartans were rudely awakened early in the morning by CPO Franklin Mendez and his instructors at 5:30 AM. Mendez ordered them to go to the showers and those who hesitated were hit with an Electric Baton. After that they went outside and Mendez ran them through 100 jumping jacks, 100 sit ups, and 100 crouches.

After that, Mendez and the instructors jogged them about a mile to Déjà, a "dumb" AI that taught them a wide variety of lessons, including math and history. They also got to eat crackers and milk. Their first lesson was a video of the original, Greek Spartans fighting against Persian soldiers at Thermopylae. Then they jogged two miles to the playground, a maze in mid-air with a bell at the top, the instructors put them into 15 groups of 3, and told them the last group to finish didn't get to eat supper.

September 25, 2517
The Spartans were woken, took their showers and did their morning calisthenics and ran a mile to Déjà. Their lesson was about a pack of wolves hunting moose. After the lesson they ran the two miles to the playground, which had been changed and was much more complicated.

September 26, 2517 - July 11, 2519
In this time Mendez taught them to strip a trip line, fire a rifle, and treat a chest wound. Mendez's exercises often had a twist to them such as stun mines on the obstacle course, snipers with paint guns during parade drills, and others. They were taught to be strong in body and mind.

July 12, 2519
Around two years later, Mendez took them on a Pelican to the Military Wilderness Training Preserve.

One child handed out pieces of paper, the papers were portions of maps of the local region. Mendez told them, you will be set down by yourselves, you will navigate to a marked extraction point and we will pick you up there, the last trainee to make it to the extraction point will have to walk all the way back.

The Spartans silently made a plan to meet up at a lake near the LZ. Once they were all at the lake they regrouped, scouted the area, and put their map pieces together. When they got to the extraction point, the men around the Pelican weren't in uniform and the Spartans devised a plan to take back the Pelican. The Spartans lured them out and they beat them all with rocks and stolen stun batons. With Déjà's help they all got home, some with minor injuries. A Spartan, named John-117, was responsible after the mission and was promoted to squad leader.

-July 14, 2523
For even more serious training, the Spartan IIs were matched against Tango Company in multiple games. The Spartans were only 12 years old at the time and still they beat the marines. Eventually, Tango Company started using live ammo as opposed to their stun rounds to get back at their juvenile opponents.

Related Articles

 * UNSC
 * Reach
 * Military Wilderness Training Preserve
 * Franklin Mendez
 * Déjà
 * John-117
 * Tango Company