Grace-093

Grace-093 was a SPARTAN-II supersoldier. She was the SPARTAN-IIs' principal explosives expert. During Operation: SILENT STORM in early 2526, she served as part of Gold Team, led by Joshua-029.

Conscription and training
Grace-093 was a genetically, intellectually, and physically gifted child chosen for the SPARTAN-II project. She was abducted by the Office of Naval Intelligence and replaced with a flash clone when she was around six years old. She and seventy-four other children were taken to Reach in the Epsilon Eridani system. There, she was trained by the "dumb"AI,Déjà and Chief Petty Officer Franklin Mendez, with the two serving as the Spartans' teacher and drill instructor, respectively. In 2519, she was taken alongside her fellow trainees to a Military Wilderness Training Preserve for a mission that required each trainee to be left alone in the woods with a only a single piece of a map. It was up to them to find one another so that they could piece the map together and locate the designated extraction point. The mission was ultimately a success. At another point during training, Grace and the others traveled to Emerald Cove for an underwater mission. There, they abandoned Mendez and lived on their own on an island for a few days. By July 14, 2523, Grace and her fellow Spartan-IIs had begun facing the formidable and ruthless UNSC Marine Corps' Tango Company in simulated war games. On March 9, 2525, Grace and the rest of the Spartan-II candidates underwent their augmentation procedures at Medical Facility Endurance orbiting Reach. After successfully enduring the procedures, Grace later attended a military funeral aboard the carrier, the UNSC Atlas, in the Lambda Serpentis system for the Spartans who died during the process. Afterwards, they all returned to Reach for their final training phase in the Highland Mountains.

War with the Covenant
After the Covenant attack on Harvest and the beginning of the Human-Covenant War, Grace and the rest of the Spartan-IIs were brought to the Reach FLEETCOM Military Complex, where Rear Admiral Michael Stanforth and the AI, Beowulf, briefed them on the Covenant. In response, the training of Grace and the rest of the Spartan-IIs was accelerated, and the Spartans were sent to Chi Ceti IV in the Chi Ceti system to receive their new MJOLNIR Powered Assault Armor from the Damascus Materials Testing Facility in order to combat the alien threat. While en route to Chi Ceti IV aboard the Paris-class heavy frigate, the, they were attacked by the Covenant warship, Unrelenting. The Commonwealth was able to ward off the Unrelenting and the Spartans were deployed to Chi Ceti IV with Halsey, where they each received a set of armor. While the Spartans were returning to the Commonwealth, the Unrelenting returned and engaged the frigate. To provide aid to the Commonwealth, John-117 had Grace and the other Spartan-IIs use thruster packs to embark towards the Unrelenting so that they could destroy the warship with Anvil-II AS missiles, though only John, Kelly-087, and Samuel-034 made it aboard. Grace and the others missed the Unrelenting, but were picked up after the battle.

Netherop
By early 2526, Grace had been assigned to Gold Team, led by Joshua-029. On March 5, Grace, her teammates, and eight other Spartans were organized into an assault squad led by John-117 with orders to board and capture a Covenant frigate, Radiant Arrow, orbiting the planet Netherop. To accomplish this, they were all deployed from the prowler for an EVA boarding action. Using a flight of Type-27 Banshees for cover, the Spartans stealthily approached the alien vessel. They boarded the frigate via its underslung hangar and eliminated the Covenant forces stationed there without the rest of crew realizing they had been boarded. As Blue and Green Teams pushed further into the alien vessel, John instructed Gold Team to collect weapons and corpses to be piled into the Banshees, which would then be pushed out into space for ONI to recover later on for study. Once that task was completed, Grace and her team acted as support for Blue and Green, watching their backs. As the two forward teams continued on, a sensor operator aboard one of the prowlers "accidentally" broadcast a transmission on the Spartans' SQUADCOM, revealing their presence to the frigate's crew. Unbeknownst to them, the crewman's apparent mistake was part of an insurrectionist plot designed by Hector Nyeto, who intended to get the Spartans killed. With their presence known, Blue and Green Teams split up, with John leading his team to the bridge. John was unable to prevent the frigate's shipmaster from activating a self-destruct sequence, forcing him to order all of his teammates to abandon ship immediately. All of the Spartans—including Grace—made it to safety before the Radiant Arrow detonated.

SILENT STORM
On March 8, 2526, Grace, Gold Team, and the other Spartans that had participated in the pervious mission were given a new assignment as part of Operation: SILENT STORM. They and the UNSC Marine Corps' 21st Space Assault Battalion would board and destroy Covenant vessels and stations in an attempt to slow their destructive advance through humanity's Outer Colonies. For the duration of this mission, the Spartans would be assigned to Task Force Yama, a small fleet of prowlers that would serve as both transport and support. As a Covenant fleet was currently glassing the colony of Etalan, the nearby world of Biko was chosen as the theater for the task force to launch its first attack. Specifically, an abandoned ice quarry on its third moon of Seoba was selected to house the prowlers until the moment presented itself.

During the voyage through slipspace, Grace and the others trained with the ODSTs in the 's mission preparation hold. The Spartans made short work of the veteran marines in each exercise until Staff Sergeant Avery Johnson taught them some unorthodox strategies that proved to be much more effective against the supersoldiers. After four days of training, Colonel Marmon Crowther had them all gather in the ship's drop hangar to be briefed on the specifics of the operation. Despite their exemplary performance against his ODSTs, Crowther was still skeptical about deploying the Spartans to the front lines due to their inexperience on the battlefield, as well as their apparent young age, much to their frustration. Grace's squadmate, Daisy-023, was particularly vocal in her dissatisfaction.

Seoba
Upon the task force's arrival at Seoba on March 18, 2526, Colonel Crowther planned to practice the mass deployment of the Spartans and ODSTs into the ice quarry, in an exercise dubbed Operation: ICE DANCE. However, entrenched insurrectionist forces were detected in the quarry, and they were preparing to stage a coup against Biko's chancellor. Crowther decided that ICE DANCE would proceed as planned, but now with the objective of taking the quarry from the rebels. An intense battle ensued, with the Spartans leading the way. Blue Team focused on destroying a convoy of Civets moving to repair the rebels' damaged communications relay as the other Spartans—including Grace and Gold Team—were engaged elsewhere. Ultimately, the insurgents were soon defeated and the quarry fell under UNSC control.

The next day, Captain Halima Ascot, commander of Task Force Yama and captain of the Starry Night, held a meeting to discuss the events of the previous day's battle. John was reprimanded for his maverick actions at the start of the battle, and his Spartans' experience was called into question once more. Due to some of Nyeto's sly comments, the truth about their young ages was revealed to the few personnel present at the meeting. Learning this disturbing fact, Colonel Crowther refused to send the Spartans into battle again, instead ordering them to guard the insurrectionists captured during the fighting and prepare them to be sent to Biko to be processed. While this meeting was being held, a Covenant flotilla was detected as it arrived in-system and began heading for Seoba. As the rest of Task Force Yama mobilized to meet the alien vessels, Grace and the other Spartans were sent to Subsurface Maintenance Grotto 6M430 where they would direct the captured insurgents onto a transport. While the line of roughly 300 prisoners marched onto the vessel, John noticed that a group of them were hiding the presence of an officer, General Harper Garvin of the United Rebel Front. He ordered the officer to step forward, but another rebel presented herself instead, clearly trying to stall for Garvin. To show that he meant business, John grabbed the woman by her tunic lapels and threatened her with summary execution for interfering with a guard while on the field of combat, as per the UNSC Military Code of Conduct. John's plan worked and General Garvin presented himself. He began trying to pry information out of John, but this effort was interrupted when a situation with Captain Ascot's flagship was relayed over the task force's command channel. The Starry Night had been shot down on takeoff, crash-landing back into the quarry. Crowther was unable to send a unit of his Black Daggers to search for survivors without putting more prowlers at risk. Since they were the only unit available to assist, John decided that he and his Spartans would go for the Starry Night once the transport was loaded. After sending Garvin back to his people and ordering the transport pilot to launch, John had his Spartans move out, much to the concern of Joshua-029 and Kurt-051. Not only would they be disobeying a direct order from Crowther, operating without the support of the task force in such a situation would be very risky.

Grace and the others proceeded to the grotto's access vestibule and entered its airlock, sealing the inner hatch. With that, they stepped out into the dense sublimation fog enshrouding the quarry floor. Visibility was so poor that each of the Spartans could barely even see the ends of their rifles, but the flashes of plasma bolts could be seen dancing through the clouds above. John accessed the command channel and requested a waypoint leading to the downed prowler. Crowther quickly responded by asking what he thought he was doing. John stated that they were checking on the status of the Starry Night as they were the only unit that could do so at the moment, carefully choosing his words so that Crowther could deflect blame onto the Spartan if need be. This would make it more likely for Crowther to not stand in the way of their self-assigned mission. While John waited for a response, he signaled Joshua and Kurt to spread out their teams in a hundred-meter-wide search line. Grace and Gold Team spaced out on the right of the more tightly-gathered Blue Team, as Green Team spaced out on the left. In doing this, the Spartans would be more likely to find any debris from the Starry Night that might have otherwise been missed in the fog. John also ordered them to advance at a trotting speed, leading them away from the dockyards where Blue Team had engaged insurgents the day before. When Crowther still had not responded, John added over the command channel that they would simply take a look at the crash site and report what they found.

Finally, Crowther replied and acknowledged John's plan, but ordered him to not take action unless immediately warranted. He also informed the Spartans of Biko's naval response to the alien bombardment of Seoba and that Nyeto believed that the small Covenant flotilla would either be in full retreat or destroyed within the hour by the approaching overwhelming force. An inexact waypoint was placed on each of the Spartans' HUDs and John had them adjust course to match the new trajectory. With the fog still as dense as ever, John ordered them all to advance at a full run while keeping their eyes on their feet, since that was all they could see anyway. As they ran, the Emmeline departed the grotto and flew over the Spartans, churning up the fog and allowing a brief moment of visibility. Through the haze, they could see five Covenant vessels fire towards the transport as it crested the horizon.

As the Spartans neared the provided waypoint, the fog had lowered to shoulder-height, allowing the Spartans to discover that the Starry Night was indeed seemingly intact, but sat atop a large avalanche about seven hundred meters up the quarry wall. Frederic-104 spotted a Covenant intrusion corvette sliding over the rim of the quarry and descending over the prowler. Kelly-087 theorized that they may be trying to recover the Starry Night themselves. Realizing the danger, John declared to his teammates that the mission was no longer a rescue mission. Their primary objective was now to deny the Covenant from recovering the prowler and the data stored within. Opening the command channel again, he relayed this information to Crowther, who echoed John's concerns and insisted that they could not let the Covenant take possession of the Starry Night. The vessel's navigation computer and other onboard data devices could reveal the locations of UNSC outposts, entire force deployments, or worse. Crowther asked Nyeto if there was any way that the prowler's nuclear self-destruct system could be remotely activated, to which the lieutenant commander responded in the affirmative. However, there were only three positions that had access to that ability. The first two were the flight commander and wing commander, both of which were roles held by Captain Ascot, who was either dead or unable to be reached aboard the Starry Night. The final person with the ability to remotely detonate the prowler was the captain of the Vanishing Point, which was holding station two planetary orbits out from Seoba. At that distance, it would take nearly an hour for the request to be sent to the cruiser and for the return signal to arrive. By then, the Covenant might already have retrieved sensitive data from the wrecked prowler. Crowther began to reluctantly order the Spartans to prevent the Starry Night ' s capture, but John cut him off, assuring him that they would not fail. The Spartan requested that Task Force Yama assist them by keeping the assaulting corvettes off their backs. Nyeto began to say that their prowlers were not designed for ship-to-ship combat when Crowther interrupted him, promising that they would find a way. Crowther started to tell John to standby for instructions on how to manually activate the prowler's self-destruct, but he reassured the colonel that his Spartans already knew how to activate a Fury nuke.

Just then, a Ghost appeared out of the fog, firing at John, who killed its Jiralhanae driver with his MA5B's underbarrel grenade launcher. Shortly after that was handled, more Ghosts entered the quarry, so John ordered Green and Gold Teams to deal with them as Blue Team went with him to the prowler. At this point, the looming intrusion corvette had begun deploying EVA-equipped Sangheili, Jiralhanae, and Kig-Yar warriors via gravity lift, with the first already looking for a way inside the ship. Another corvette crested the edge of the quarry, firing its main cannon on the Spartans. A plasma bolt narrowly missed John, and crashed into the fog-filled quarry floor. Grace was caught in the blast radius and cried out over SQUADCOM, prompting Joshua to order Daisy-023 to tend to her injured teammate. With the situation quickly deteriorating and Nyeto's support still setting up, John realized that immediate action was necessary. He ordered Blue Team to simultaneously fire on the avalanche just below the Starry Night with their grenade launchers to cause the vessel to fall to quarry floor and prevent the Covenant from gaining entrance. Despite Fred and Kelly's warnings that such an action could bring the whole slope down on top of them, each member of the team acknowledged and followed his order. As they has feared, the volley of grenades worked a bit too well, bringing the avalanche down on top of all twelve Spartans, but successfully delaying the Covenant in their boarding attempt.

Six of the Spartans were buried under the ice flow, with Grace's teammate, Naomi-010, becoming completely incapacitated. John-117 was also buried, but not totally immobilized. While he worked on freeing himself, John gave Fred command of the mission to board and destroy the Starry Night. Fred and two other Spartans boarded the prowler as the available members of Gold and Green Teams coordinated attacks on the seemingly endless stream of enemy ground vehicles, supported by at least three Covenant corvettes. John freed himself from the ice flow and began helping repel would-be boarders while Fred's team prepared the vessel's Fury tactical nuclear weapon. Meanwhile, Nyeto's support finally arrived the form of strafing runs that destroyed two of the intrusion corvettes assaulting Gold and Green Teams. Just as the nuke was finished arming, the looming Covenant corvette finally made its move and began slowly levitating the Starry Night up and into its hold using a gravity lift. John ordered Fred's team to activate the nuke and flee from the prowler with the surviving crew, which they did via escape pod. He also warned the others that the nuke would detonate in thirty seconds, urging them to escape the blast radius immediately. Each of the Spartans made it to safety, including Grace. Colonel Crowther extracted them after the resulting electromagnetic pulse had dissipated. The blast also destroyed the intrusion corvette, and some of the Spartans assisted in the recovery of a starholo from its wreckage. They and the starholo were transported back to the Vanishing Point.

On March 20, the six Spartans that had not been confined to the infirmary attended a funeral service for the two-hundred-and-three men and women who lost their lives at Seoba. Held in the command hangar of the Vanishing Point as it sat in a high parabolic orbit around Biko, the ceremony included an honor company of a hundred-and-one enlisted personnel in their dress blues, including the six Spartans and Avery Johnson. After the service, Lieutenant Commander Nyeto—now the de facto commander of Task Force Yama after Ascot's death—approached John-117, who asked if he'd reconsider sidelining them. Nyeto promised that the Spartans would be seeing all the action they could handle for the rest of the operation. However, Crowther again contested this on the basis of them being too young, forcing the lieutenant commander to back down by threatening him with a report to a UNSC board of inquiry. The Black Daggers would board the incoming fleet alone. As everyone left the hangar, Crowther revealed to Johnson that he did not trust Nyeto. He believed that the Spartans were combat-ready, and he was instead sending them on a mission to disrupt Covenant supply lines at Etalan.

The Fall of Reach
During the Covenant's invasion of Reach, she was designated Red-Twenty Three and assigned to Fred-104's Red Team under by John-117. Their mission was to defend the generators for the orbital MAC guns around Reach. As their Pelican, Bravo 001 was descending to the surface, it was shot down by Covenant AA plasma fire, and their pilot was killed. The Spartans were forced to jump to the surface of the planet, gaining many injuries and a few deaths.

Grace was then assigned to "Gamma" team, along with Anton-044 and Li-008. They were sent to evacuate Vice Admiral Whitcomb. They found him but were unable to rally with the rest of the Spartans due to Covenant activity. They then retreated to Camp Independence, where they broadcast Oly Oly Oxen Free and went on hit and run missions for three weeks until they were found by John who recognized the Oly Oly Oxen Free tune. They then proceeded to rescue "Alpha" and "Delta" teams from the Forerunner caves beneath CASTLE Base. Grace then boarded a captured Spirit and went to the captured Ascendant Justice, under control of the AI Cortana.

The vessel then became trapped and ensnared when it tried to jump into Slipspace. The Forerunner crystal Dr. Halsey found warped slipspace into an anomalous slipspace bubble, and several Sangheili survivors of the ship sabotaged its main drive conduit. Grace was designated Blue-Six during this operation. Despite the rogue plasma and an ambush by the Elites, Grace managed to survive, as did John-117, Frederic-104, and William-043. However, Anton-044, Li-008, and Petty Officer Second Class Polaski did not survive.

Operation: FIRST STRIKE
Grace then participated in Operation: FIRST STRIKE, boarding the Covenant space station Unyielding Hierophant with the other Spartans. However, as they entered a temple, they were ambushed by Jiralhanae. Three rounds from a Brute Shot hit Grace in the stomach, and blew her midsection apart, killing her. John was forced to activate the fail-safe detonation system on her MJOLNIR armor, and it self-destructed the armor's fusion pack. She took out four Elites and a dozen Unggoy in her "funeral pyre". John thought Grace would have liked that.

Personality and description
Grace was the Spartan-IIs' explosives expert. She could shape a charge to cut into a single steel bolt with only a whisper of sound, or rig a hundred thousand litres of kerosene to blow into a "firestorm from hell". Ironically, her temper was nonexistent. It seems that she liked calamari, a type of seafood, which she fondly remembered eating during one the Spartans' training missions on Emerald Cove.

List of appearances

 * Halo: First Strike
 * Halo: Silent Storm