Chief Petty Officer Mendez

Summary
The cigar smoking, black and silver haired Chief Petty Officer Mendez was almost a father to the Spartan children during their first years in training.

The Chief's citations included Silver and Bronze stars, three purple hearts, and a rainbow of campaign ribbons.

Chief Petty Officer Mendez was the Spartan's training leader during their first years on Reach. He trained them as hard as any Marine when they were only at the ages of 6-7 years old. After their training was completed, he was reassigned to go train the next generation of Spartans, though he has not been heard of for some time. It may be assumed he was killed, along with any young Spartans he may have been training, when Reach fell during the invasion. He is currently listed as MIA.

However, some fans think that Mendez and Dr. Halsey decided to train the new SPARTANS on another world, possibly to stay concealed from the Covenant. They think that this is hinted at in the book Halo: The Fall of Reach when the Master Chief wonders why he hasn't seen the new Spartans or the Chief himself for a long time. Also, Dr. Halsey found a fragment of a file in the CASTLE Base server which read "CPOMZ" followed by a star chart reference.

It is only known that the Master Chief will probably never see Mendez again.

Note: The appearance of Spartan-458 raises the possibility significantly that Mendez is alive and that he has trained more Spartans.