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Intro

      The Master Chief has escaped safely from Halo, but has yet to reach Earth. Approximately a quarter of the way to Earth, he and Cortana have encountered a Covenant Cruiser. In hopes of finding the Covenant homeworld's coordinates, the Master Chief follows the Cruiser in his acquired Longsword Fighter. Not knowing what lies in store for the duo, they follow cautiously in hopes of a chance of defeating the Covenant...

Part I

      The Chief looked up. There he was, on the bridge of a Covenant Cruiser, shotgun in hand; green blood coating his MJOLNIR suit, but something was different... He took a quick glance around and remembered. The yellow decaying body of a human warrior flood lay before him, blown to pieces by his shotgun. The walls were covered all over with a sort of green ooze. They seemed to look as if they were melting, but stayed completely still. There were stalactites and stalagmites everywhere. It seemed like thousands of years of decay had happened since someone was in the bridge, but everything seemed so familiar...

      "Cortana? What's going on!?" The Chief demanded, beginning to become dizzy. What followed was a long murmur that the Chief couldn't understand. Maybe the bridge would tell him something, he thought. But something told him not to go. Still, he pressed on. Slowly, he walked up the ramp towards the bridge, pushing both Flood warriors and Covenant corpses (or what remained of them) out of the way. He reached the top to see what he had come for.

      The Captain. There he was. Mutated into one of the Flood, into a large blob of ooze, no life left in him. But as the Chief began to walk towards it, the Captain's face seemed to be moving. The Chief moved closer, to hear the words he thought of as true...

      "Chief.... You.... You did this...Now.... Do it.... Finish me...Before it's too late.... That's...That's an order!" The Chief knew he couldn't do it. Not the man that had brought him all the way to Halo in an attempt to save earth. Just as the Chief turned to leave, he knew he should have done what he was told to. The blob turned towards him and seemed to mutate before his eyes. Before he could understand what was happening, the blob had taken the Chief, lifted him, and pressed him against the giant creature's centre. The ooze began to surround him, drown him...

      A red light awoke him, and he sat up, still holding his shotgun, looking in every direction.

      "Chief, are you ok?" Cortana asked him, her hologram flickering to life before him.

      He shook his head and eventually said, "Fine, just a bad dream."

      "Good, I couldn't wake you so I switched the ship to combat mode. I guess that worked." Soon after they left Halo, the Chief had placed Cortana into the ship in order to get some rest. He had been awake for what seemed like a year, but in actuality were only a few days while on Halo. He had also taken his suit off for the first time since he was on Reach.

      "So what's going on Cortana?"

      "A Covenant Cruiser approaching. For some reason it hasn't noticed us, but I felt you should know anyway."

      "Yes I do. From which direction is it coming, and in which direction is it going?" Cortana fed him the coordinate data, and other logistical data about the ship.

      "The Advocate. Never heard of her. How could she have gotten this far into space with the amount of damage she's taken?" The Chief asked, puzzled by the ship's status.

      "Well, I can only assume it was near Reach, and was damaged severely in the battle. A strong gust of wind could finish it off...."

      "And since the Covenant has no known shipyards, then it must be heading close to, or directly to...." The Chief trailed off, knowing that Cortana had already figured it out.

      "The Covenant Homeworld...This could be what we've been waiting for! What the Covenant has been trying to hide from us, and what could very well be the data that could save the human race! Master Chief, this is the opportunity of all of mankind!!" The Chief sat there in awe. This was what he had been fighting for, a chance to find the Homeworld. "Or even if it didn't lead us to the Homeworld, it could lead us close to it, and maybe to one of their main shipyards."

      "You know what we have to do, Cortana."

      "Yes Master Chief, following their course. I can't imagine why they haven't moved to attack us...Perhaps they know if they do we have to ability to destroy them in their weakened condition...."

      "Perhaps, but lets not over analyze this. We have a chance to find the Homeworld, and if not, a major port. Meaning we will have a chance to finally launch an attack, instead of defending against horrible odds."

      "I will try and stay the same distance away, so that we won't attract that much attention."

      "Okay. And Cortana, you don't have to call me the Master Chief anymore. I'm off duty."

      "Yes Chi.... John." With that the red sirens switched off and John was left to ponder the recent events. It wasn't very often that Cortana stopped her badgering, so he took up the opportunity.

      "Thank you." As the Longsword's engines fired up, John couldn't help but have a sense of foreboding. As good as it all sounded, something was not right. All the same, the ordeal of Halo did not seem to be over. Not at all...

Part II

      "Chief.... You.... You did this...Now.... Do it.... Finish me...Before it's too late.... That's...That's an order!"

      Once again Chief awoke with a start. The hologram of Cortana flickered before him, a concerned look on her artificial face.

      "John-" she began.

      "Cortana, I don't want to hear it. You're going to say something that I won't want to hear, and you don't want to say, so lets just forget it."

      "You think it's your fault, don't you?"

      "I knew you were going to ask that."

      "John. I may be artificial, but I have feelings too. I have been blaming myself. The fact that I warped you to one part of the ship when, if I had taken a few more seconds before the warp, I could have sent you right to him. He could have had a chance if it wasn't for me."

      "If I had been quicker..."

      "No. It's...them. They would have gotten him anyway. It is not my fault, nor yours. We did what he would have expected us to do. We could not have saved him, but at least we know that with the destruction of Halo, his soul can be is at rest. Because of us, he was set free of the...the Flood and the horrible dreams that come with it." With the words 'Flood' and 'horrible dreams', John visibly shuddered. "The dreams I know you've been having..." With what seemed like an impossible gesture for a construct, let alone a hologram, she leaned over and placed her small hand atop John's. With what seemed even more impossible, John thought that he felt warmth both through his armor and from a hologram. John, for the first time in a few weeks, smiled genuinely toward the construct. Cortana smiled back, in a manner that also seemed genuine.

      A loud bleeping quickly broke the silence. John quickly looked away from Cortana, looking around the viewport in hopes of seeing what caused the commotion. Cortana, also flustered, quickly informed the Master Chief.

      "Two Covenant recon fighters incoming," Cortana explained calmly. The bleeping was to alert the pilot that they were being targeted by an enemy craft. The bleeping turned to a long wail. "Target lock!"

      As the recon craft came closer, they began to take shape. The Chief had seen them before in combat videos, but never up close. The recon crafts looked quite a bit like Banshees, except their wings are directly horizontal to the cockpit, as well as the cockpit being closed and straight back. It's weapons were the standard plasma cannons, with four plasma warheads used usually against opposing Cruisers, but were known to be used to take out lone fighters at times. For some reason, one of the recon craft was a fair distance ahead of the other, but all the same they continued towards the Chief, who now had the greatest advantage a person could have while fighting two opponents. The Chief had never piloted a Longsword except during exercises, but knew the weaponry quite well. Two side by side adjustable lasers and four plasma warheads, more technology that had been taken from the Covenants, along with the all-encompassing shield that the Chief's armor sported. The Spartan-IIs were created to pilot any craft and utilize any weaponry. With his current advantage, the Chief wouldn't have any trouble.

      The Chief swung into action. He hit a series of buttons to accelerate the fighter to a faster maneuvering speed. He then armed the lasers, and grasped the flight stick, prepared to shoot down any incoming plasma warheads. He waited. Soon the first of the two recon fighters would be in range of the Longsword's lasers.

      "A Covenant Reconnaissance Craft is no match for a Longsword Fighter at close range. Why won't they fire their warheads?" Cortana exclaimed.

      "Maybe they're bluffing. They may have used all their warheads in the firefight that the Cruiser was damaged in," the Chief tried to explain while preparing his targeting system to lock onto the recon crafts, since they were obviously not firing their warheads.

      "Maybe...But I still got a bad feeling about this..." Cortana murmured.

      "I wish you hadn't said that," John growled, as the recon crafts came into range. He noticed that the further back of the two craft had caught up with the first, and seemed to be firing upon it.

      "Chief, this isn't making any sense! Why are the Covenant firing on their on ships?" Cortana asked

      "Maybe they aren't..."

      "What are you talking about?"

      "Just hold on." With that the Chief set up his shot on the second of the two recon craft. He knew that the lead ship wouldn't fire on him. The lead craft's shields had failed and it was beginning to take serious damage from the seemingly friendly fire.

      "Chief, the lead ship is trying to communicate with us," Cortana informed him.

      "Don't bother, record the message and I'll listen later," the Chief said, as the second recon craft came into range of his lasers. He pulled the trigger and let loose a volley of laser fire that would destroy the ship easily, with its weaker shields and hull. The craft pulled away, but not without it's shields absorbing some of the lasers. The ship carried out a few basic maneuvers, and turned itself back toward the other recon craft. After a few seconds, a flash of blue light emitted from the craft's bow.

      "Two plasma charges-"

      "Don't worry, they aren't aimed at us Cortana," The Chief spoke calmly. He lined up another shot and fired within a second. This time the recon craft had no chance to dodge. The shields failed and it took a series of lethal blows around the cockpit. It was enough to cause the hatch to burst, carrying the pilot into space. After a few more laser blasts, the recon craft exploded into a wondrous fireball. The Chief quickly turned the ship toward the plasma charges. "ETA?"

      "12 seconds," Cortana informed him. The Chief knew he could hit one, but the other was too far out of range. At least he could try. He set the throttle to full and easily hit the first with one blast. It exploded a bright blue, illuminating the Longsword for a moment. At his current speed he would reach the other warhead in 6 seconds - With only 8 before it would hit the recon craft. It seemed that the Covenant craft had been damaged so far as to hinder its maneuverability - all it could do is try and outrun it.

      "4 seconds until you're in range..." Cortana explained. The Chief knew, but he needed to reminder to keep his mind on the task. The cockpit of the recon craft burst with 2 seconds until the Chief gained range.

      "At least the pilot will survive," The Chief blurted out quickly.

      "In range!" With the words of Cortana, the Chief hit the trigger and destroyed the second of the plasma charges, but the recon craft was destroyed all the same. The radius of the explosion with the damage already taken by it was more then enough to finish it off.

      "Now, if the pilot was wearing life supporting gear, he should be alive," The Chief spoke out loud to no one in particular. "Providing he wasn't killed by the blast..."

      "No he wasn't, he is still trying to contact us through what seems like a Comm device. He must have had an extra one on him. Fly us in Chief." John flew the Longsword in slowly, seeing exactly what he had expected to see. A Covenant Elite, floating in the debris of his destroyed recon craft. John powered up the lasers for a blast that would vaporize the helpless soldier. He hit the trigger, but noticed that the power had been taken out of the weapons.

      "Cortana-"

      "No Chief, I know you hate them with every fiber of your being, as do I, but this Elite could prove invaluable."

      "Providing he forgets completely about every religious thing he's ever believed in, and the fact that they have now sworn me as their devil, I agree with you completely."

      "He was trying to contact us. He wanted help. From anyone, any race. He was trying to save his own life, and threw away all his beliefs because he wanted to survive. Maybe the Covenant aren't all that different from humans..."

      "This is not the time to discuss human nature, but if it makes you feel better, we'll take him on board. But there is no way I am releasing my shotgun from my hands."

      "But what is the only thing that could scare a Covenant Elite that much?" John knew the answer. He knew who the other pilot was.

      "The Flood survived," John told Cortana. With that he flew the Longsword fighter up to the Elite, and prepared to take it on board. With the Chief's suit having life support systems, the task was quite easy. From what he could tell, the Elite was unconscious, but continued transmitting a recorded message from when it ejected.

      "Well, at least we know one thing for sure," Cortana began, staring down at the face of the near dead Elite. "He's going to have a big surprise when he wakes up..."

Part III

      Dazed and confused, the monstrous Covenant lifted his head and began to take in his surroundings. His shimmering gold armor had been tarnished, most likely from the plasma charge going off so near to him. He looked around and realized his assumption was correct when he took off; it was indeed a human Longsword Fighter. He was in such a panic he didn't care what it was, but if it had a human crew, there would still be some trick to escaping to somewhere safe. He made an effort to stand up, but hit his head on something, falling back to the ground. With a soft growl he looked toward what he had hit his head on - and was face to face with what he believed the humans called, "the barrel of a shotgun." He indeed was in trouble.

      "Don't bother trying to move," he heard a metallic sounding voice say. But why could he understand it? Usually the human's language came out as gibberish, unless going through Comm channels - which was rare. Another voice spoke, this time from him.

      "We have supplied you with some software that will allow us to understand you, and so you can understand us." It was a human female's voice, but he saw no one. With that, the armored sage human reached down and plucked something from the side of the Elite's head, keeping his shotgun trained on him all the while. Whatever the human had taken, he had placed it into one of the ship's control panels. The image of a human female appeared, translucent and purple.

      "A human AI construct! Inside of me!?" the Elite bellowed. The large gold figure quickly stood up, evading a blast from the Chief's shotgun, which left a large dent in the metal floor. With such agility that seemed impossible for such a large Covenant, he had grabbed the shotgun from the Chief, spun behind him, gave him a quick thrust with it to the back of his head, put his arm around his neck, and held the human weapon to his head. The Chief knew it would have happened, but Cortana didn't want him to fight back.

      "We know how your religious society works. You have been soiled by the devil, and you will no longer be accepted back into your society," Cortana explained. With those words, the Elite loosened his grip. The Chief sensed the opportunity, broke free from the grip, and delivered a quick hard punch to the Elite's face. Being stunned, the alien lowered the weapon, leaving himself wide open. A hard kick to the chest knocked the alien to the floor, and the gun from his hand. The Chief quickly grabbed it and once again trained it on the Elite.

      "Shoot me," the Elite said in its characteristic low voice.

      "Gladly."

      "Chief, no!" Cortana yelled. The Chief pumped the shotgun and was about to pull the trigger when the fighter gave a hard shudder, knocking him to the floor.

      "John...." Cortana said in a worried voice. The Chief stood and looked toward the cockpit. There, splattered on the cockpit were the remains of a Covenant Flood Warrior.

      "The other pilot," the Chief said, ignoring the Elite lying on the floor. When it had impacted on the cockpit, the green blood from its missing limbs had also splattered on it. The visibility had through the front windows was gone, leaving the side windows the only way to see out. The Chief then turned back to the Covenant Elite. It seemed to be looking for something on the floor. The Chief placed the shotgun to the temple of the beast.

      "Stop moving now," he said in an intimidating voice.

      "Or what? You will shoot me? I would accept it. My life is over. If I return to the Homeworld, they would kill me on sight. You have destroyed me," he pointed to the purple hologram of Cortana. "So do it, destroy me now." Despite his intense hatred for their kind, the Chief felt a pang of sympathy inside him. He was made to be a killer, but not a cold blooded one. He slung the gun over his shoulder and helped the battered Elite up.

      "What's your name? If you have one," John asked. The Elite gave him a puzzled look, not understanding what he was doing.

      "Why do you not kill me? I am your enemy."

      "Does your race have emotions?" Once again the Elite gave him a puzzled look. "Never mind. What's your name?"

      "I am Icarath. In my language it means, 'Leader of many, destroyer of all.'" He said, standing with a sort of pride that gave an aura of truth to his statement.

      "Well then, Icarath, just because you would not be accepted into your own society doesn't mean you would not be accept into ours," Cortana explained. The look of pride changed to anger.

      "I would never join the humans! You, who have brought us so much pain, so much anguish! No matter how hard we have tried, you continue to live! I would never join something that my forefathers gave their lives to destroy!" Cortana and the Chief were both completely perplexed.

      "Uh...what...I mean, what are you talking about?" Cortana said, struggling for words. Icarath looked at her with a glare that could kill a normal person. "I mean... one day your race showed up, and basically told us that your gods said we should be destroyed. How is that causing you pain and anguish? We did nothing to you or your kind!"

      "Nothing? NOTHING!?" The walls shook with his bellows. "You attempted to destroy all life on the universe, just to get to us, and you nearly succeeded! If not for my forefathers, you would have destroyed our planet, our way of life!"

      "Wait wait wait," the Chief stood between the two arguing parties. "Our life began on Earth, and we have never seen your Homeworld."

      "No, you have never seen our Homeworld, that is why you created the Halos! You could destroy us without so much as lifting a finger, and the monstrosities you contained within Halo could do your dirty work for you! You may attempt to disguise yourself as human, but we know your true origin! You are all that survived when we finally fought back! We have fought for a millennia to try and wipe you out!" Icarath stopped his rant and looked at the two confused listeners. "You really do not understand, do you?"

      "No, I can honestly say we don't," Cortana said right away.

      "Then you do not know?"

      "Know what?" The Chief asked. He wanted some answers. This was beginning to get out of hand; he was getting more aggressive.

      "You think you are only human?" He let out a low resounding noise that the duo later realized was laughter. "You are the ones who created the Halos! You are the forerunners! You tried to destroy our race for no more then to control the entire universe, with the Halos doing your work for you! After you realized that the forerunners would be susceptible to the dangers of the Halo, you created a parasitic race called the Flood. You were destroying our forces, but never came anywhere close to the HomeWorld. If you had known, you would have gotten your race out of the firing range of one of the Halos, fire it and wipe out our planet. But you never found it. This is when you released the Flood. The Flood nearly destroyed us when they made it to our world. Unfortunately it was out of range of your precious Halo weapons. You thought the Flood would be loyal to you, but when you landed on our planet to finish us off, they turned on you. Very few of your kind escaped, I believe three dropships it was each with forty people. Men, women, and even some that had not come of age." By this Icarath meant teenagers. "We destroyed one dropship soon after it left the planet. We destroyed the second when it reached one of your planets, and the third was never found. With all of your military in the hands of the Flood, we quickly destroyed and overtook all of your controlled planets. Using two of your own Halos against you, tricking the monitors of the installations into leading us to the index we managed to wipe the forerunner clean of their area of the galaxy, and we thought forever. We were able to do this because there were a great many defectors from your kind, as you were fighting a losing war, and treachery seems to flow genetically from you. After a few years on our planet though, we were nearly wiped out by the Flood. We soon realized that we needed to relocate and did. Many of the Covenant do not know this, but my ancestors were the ones who led the evacuation from the planets and also who destroyed the two of the three dropships. The stories have been passed down through my blood with pride. When the war began, we realized that the third dropship had survived and reproduced. Vastly. You were becoming as powerful as you once were. But your ancestors must not have passed down the stories, since you do not know of your own heritage. The elders, one of which is a brother of mine, declared war on you once more because of your attempted genocide."

      Cortana and the Chief stood in awe. It all made sense. The holy war, the Halos, the mysterious disappearance of the Forerunners, the Flood. It all made sense.

      "But... then why are we an affront to your Gods?" Cortana asked.

      "You attempted to kill them, and us, is that not enough of a reason?"

      "Oh, yes, I suppose so," Cortana said.

      "Now I know what the others do not. That you in fact are not Forerunner. You are only human."

Part IV

      The three had been standing for what seemed like eons when John broke the silence.

      "What exactly is happening over on that ship?" He had just realized this hadn't been explained. Icarath looked at Cortana and the Chief.

      "I'm not at liberty to say." He stood and held his hands behind his back. Cortana looked at the Chief and raised an eyebrow.

      "Well, Icarath, we cannot help you until you tell us what is going on," she said sternly.

      "I do not wish for your help," he said, keeping his hands behind his back and raising his head.

      "Wow, your testosterone is almost as high as our sage-suited buddy over here," Cortana said jokingly.

      "Hey-" John said.

      "I'm only joking, jeez, I see you weren't genetically modified to have a sense of humor?" she chuckled a bit, but after a look from the Chief she quickly stopped and turned back toward Icarath. "We know that ship has the Flood on it, we just aren't sure of the severity of the infestation." The Elite lowered his head.

      "It comes to this," he spoke. "To have the fore- humans - aid us. Perhaps we are not as powerful as we believe." He sat down on the floor. "My beliefs are shattered, as is my life, and now I am forced to ask these -" he pointed towards the duo in disgust, "- to help me. I am Icarath; I have never needed help. While commanding the great armies that have the power to destroy the universe, I have encountered many things. But not this." He pointed towards the Flood warrior plastered across the windows. "This is horrific. This is godless. This is something that has killed so many of my brothers, I do not know who I am anymore."

      "Then you were on Halo?" Cortana asked

      "Yes, yes yes. Where do you think the Flood could have boarded a vessel? They disabled and captured one of our cruisers. We were sent to destroy the ship, the Flood, and to recapture one of the human commanding officers." A cold chill ran down the Chief's back, but he kept his cool, staying completely still. Had Cortana not convinced him to take off his armor, they would have heard the slight stutter in his movements. "But the Flood somehow repaired it and made into space. My Special Forces team, as with a few others, were trapped inside when it took off, moments before the ring was shattered. I was glad I was alive. But not now. Not after seeing all of my comrades turned against me, having to kill each one over and over..."

      "So there are more Covenant on the ship?" the Chief asked. Icarath, seeming so proud before, now seemed so frail and weak. He had lost his composure, something that a soldier never does in front of an enemy. Only in front of those he trusts. Perhaps this Elite would be of use after all.

      "Not anymore. They are destroyed, every single one of them, another monstrosity. Or worse..." Icarath stood and returned to his proud state. "Now you, who are you two?"

      "I am-" Cortana began.

      "No, we shouldn't tell him, he isn't trustworthy," the Chief quickly interceded.

      "Yes he is. I am Cortana, AI construct aboard the Pillar of Autumn." Icarath seemed to shake a little at the name. He knew everything about the PoA. It was the ship he shot down, the ship containing the remaining cyborg that he was sent to destroy, but instead lost many men to it. At least the devil went down with the Halo. The construct was not to be blamed though; he was convinced it was the only reason that he remained alive. "Well? John?"

      "Fine. I am Master Chief John 117-" That was all he managed to get out. Icarath instantly went for his throat, prepared to kill him with one swift blow. John's reflexes allowed him to duck under the beastly arms and deliver a hard knee to his stomach. He then rolled out of the way, grabbing the shotgun on his way down. He brought it up and fired, but the Elite was also well trained in combat. He dove under the shot and hit the Chief in the legs. They both fell to the ground, but landed outside the cockpit. The Chief delivered a quick blow with the shotgun to the face of Icarath, and dove out from underneath of him. He then took another quick shot at it, dissipating its shield entirely, as well as hitting him in the upper arm. He quickly closed the door to the cockpit and blew off the control panel, cutting through the opposite control panel, leaving the door completely in place. He quickly began to put his armor on. He had gotten about half way, when the door began to shake. The beast had stopped licking it's wounds and was trying to get in.

      "Chief, quick!" Cortana yelled.

      "Hey, this was your idea!" He yelled back.

      "Well after your business with the Monitor and practically wiping out the human race, you aren't one to talk."

      "Yeah yeah yeah, we'll argue later." He had finished putting his armor on and was preparing to put his suit into action. He clipped on the helmet and the vacuum in his suit was created. His shields charged up, and he once again picked up his shotgun. His assault rifle he strapped over his shoulder, and he deftly slid his pistol into a holster mounted in the leg of his suit. He was ready for Icarath when he broke through, but he was not expecting to find what he found. It broke through, but it wasn't Icarath that came first. It was the glowing green of a fuel rod gun. He quickly dove from one side of the cockpit to the other in time to see it flash light green and explode. Luckily it hadn't breached the hull, but another shot and there would be no doubt. The Chief acted quickly. He took a frag grenade from his belt and threw it until the hall, without pulling the pin. He heard Icarath yell, thinking he and the plasma charges directly beneath him were about to make a very large hole in the ship. Instead the Chief ran out and shot at the large gold armor. He hit dead on, making Icarath take a step back, but without permanently injuring him. The fuel rod gun fell to the floor, and the Elite prepared to counter-attack. Before the Chief had enough time to pump his shotgun again and fire, Icarath was on him. In manners of combat style and accuracy, the Chief far exceeded an Elite's skill; even an exceptionally intelligent one as was the case with Icarath, but in the field of brute strength the Elite's reigned supreme. The blow that Icarath delivered knocked the Chief from his feet, and put another dent in the wall of the internally bruised fighter. The blow had taken out his shields entirely, but he was no where near beaten. The blow had also knocked the shotgun from his hand, but he quickly reached down and brought up his pistol. He fired quickly, glancing the first shot off the shoulder of the approaching Elite. He fired again and hit it square in the middle of his chest. The armor the Elite was wearing kept him from becoming more then bruised. Before the Chief got off another shot, Icarath was on him once more. But this time, John delivered the first blow. He landed the butt of his pistol in the forehead of Icarath, forcing him to take a step back. He then raised the pistol for another shot, but Icarath managed to duck the shot once again, glancing another bullet off his already tarnished amour. The Elite dove once more at John, but this time he managed to leap over the hulking body. He thrust both feet into its head, then rolled to where his shotgun lay. He picked up the weapon quickly and trained it on the downed Elite. The Elite turned to see that he was beaten. He raised his hands in a sign of defeat, letting something drop to the ground. The Chief kept a close eye on his attacker, and reached down to pick up the dropped item. He lifted it up and began to inspect it. He had no clue what it was.

      "What is this?!" He yelled at his defeated foe.

      "It's a surprise," he said, then began to chuckle.

      "Chief, I got a bad feeling about this," he heard Cortana say from the decimated cockpit. Icarath's laughter had risen to a deafening pinnacle.

      "Cortana, can you analyze this somehow?" John yelled.

      "Bring it in here if you can," he brought it through slowly, staying aimed at Icarath. He held it close to the hologram.

      "Oh shit..." Cortana said. It was the first time John had ever heard Cortana swear, so this had to be bad. "It's a detonator and timer for a bomb."

      "So how much time do we have?!"

      "49 seconds and counting."

      "How damaged is the ship!?"

      "Well, the weapons systems are -"

      "Can it fly?"

      "Well.... Yes."

      "Put all energy into the engines, I don't care if they overheat, and fly us in to land on the Covenant cruiser as fast as you can!!"

      "The Covenant cruiser? Are you crazy? It's swimming with Flood!"

      "Yeah, but if that bomb goes off, it will take out the plasma charges, then we'll be swimming around the cruiser! Which would you prefer?!"

      "Taking us in, ETA 24 seconds, explosion in 34." Through all the panic the Chief had forgotten about Icarath. When he saw a plasma grenade land on the front window, he knew he this was going to be a lot harder then it seemed.

Part V

      "Cortana, keep the ship on course," John quickly spat out, as he yanked the construct from the central control panel, placed it in the side of his helmet, and dove out of the cockpit. The plasma grenade exploded, breaching the hull easily. The entire front viewport, as well as most of the controls, were blown away completely, if not permanently destroyed. Icarath began to laugh maniacally once more. He was holding onto the edge of the doorway, and the Chief had grabbed onto the side of an alcove leading to the lower level of the fighter. Thankfully, the Chief had put his suit on again, which contained life support systems. The Elite's armor also had them built in. Despite the explosion, it seemed that the fighter was still moving toward the Covenant cruiser. The inside of the fighter had become mostly depressurized, so neither the Chief nor Icarath had to hold on for dear life. The gravity was gone, but they needn't worry about falling out of the cockpit.

      "20 seconds to detonation!" Cortana yelled.

      "Why are you doing this, don't you realize you won't be able to survive!?" the Chief yelled at Icarath.

      "You forget!" he yelled back. "I'm already dead!! And now I will go down in history as the one who killed the Devil!!" his laughing didn't cease, but continued to grow. The Chief thought that after all that had happened since he encountered the Flood, Icarath must have lost his mind somewhere along the path.

      "10 seconds... We should have hit the-" the entire ship shook, with gravity kicking in a little. Icarath was instantly tossed out of the fighter, and through the hole that was just made in the Covenant cruiser's hull. John on the other hand hit the wall beside the door leading to the cockpit. Fortunately, the crash also caused all the weapons that were stacked restrained on the wall towards him. With 8 seconds left, the Chief grabbed a pistol, shotgun, and assault rifle, leaping through the hole in the hull. He landed in the cruiser to discover that the hole created spanned a great deal, causing the atmosphere to be vacuumed out as well. Despite this, the Chief continued away from the fighter. He was a good hundred feet away when the fighter exploded, but not far enough away to get out of the blast radius. He was tossed another 50 feet, but was relatively unharmed.

      He looked back on the wreckage. The vacuum had stopped, but like in the fighter before there was no gravity. He was in what used to be the brig, with the fighter crashing through the roof. Icarath was no where in sight, most likely killed by the explosion or sucked out into space. The Chief began to float toward the exit. Covenant blood was everywhere, but no bodies were in sight. There was also the green blood of the Flood all over the walls and the floor. When the explosion went off, the Chief had lost his assault rifle, but he was sure one of the Flood could provide him with one later on. He reached the exit, which didn't seem to open. The automatic doors didn't seem to operate without gravity.

      "Insert me into that control panel on the left," Cortana spoke. The Chief had nearly forgotten about her, but didn't let on. He placed the construct into the panel. Within seconds he heard a thump, and the power to the door seemed to die, as the lights surrounding it slowly turned off. He took Cortana out and placed her back in his helmet.

      "You should be able to pull the door open easily now," she told him.

      "I just hope no one's waiting for us on the other side..." the Chief trailed off. He pulled the door open to be greeted by yet another vacuum. The atmosphere was still contained in this part of the ship. He quickly slid through the small opening he made, and slammed it closed behind him. His feet were now planted on the ground.

      "Thank God we're through that," Cortana said, relieved.

      "We're not through anything yet," the Chief told her. "We still need to find a way out of here. Preferably not as one of the Flood."

      "We need to reach the bridge. If we get there, then we can either signal for help, or see if there are anymore Covenant fighters or dropships intact."

      "Which way?" the Chief asked.

      "You're going to love this," Cortana said with a hint of scarcest. "We are in the centre of the ship, we need to get to the head of the beast."

      "Great. Just great," the Chief said, beginning to wander away from the destroyed brig.

      After a few minutes of walking, Cortana told him to stop.

      "I'm detecting motion all around us," she informed him. He switched on his motion tracker to see that she was right. Around the outside of the tracker was a large red ring.

      "The Flood must have found out how to travel between the ship's corridors."

      "They would have to very careful not to hit the wrong wire, that could cause serious damage. The might accidentally short out the lights, or life support systems."

      "I doubt it would be by accident. They don't seem to need oxygen to survive, or light." The ring of enemies began to close in, but not on the Chief. Another signal, around the corner. Knowing that stealth would be the key to this, the Chief cautiously poked his head around the corner. He heard something yelling.

      "I guess Icarath was wrong about all the Covenant being wiped out..." Cortana said. It was indeed Covenant. There were two Elites, one red, one gold. Along with them were four grunts. All seemed to be participating in the argument.

      "The Master Chief is here?!" the red one bellowed. "We are having enough trouble surviving with the Flood breathing down our necks all the time!"

      "Not so loud...They'll hear you," one of the grunts said cautiously, obviously the commander sporting red armor, while the other three were wearing orange.

      "We must get to the shuttle bay, and retrieve the dropship the Flood are holding," the gold elite said. "It is our only chance to make it out alive." The ring of enemies began to move faster, closing in on the Covenant.

      "We couldn't possibly -" the red elite began. The gold elite delivered a blow to the side of the red one's head, knocking him hard to the floor.

      "How dare you defy me! I am Icarath, the greatest military leader the Covenant has ever seen!" So he had survived, the Chief thought, but seemed to be hallucinating. Cabin fever most likely, being separated for so long, he must not trust anyone. After his short rant, Icarath ran off, most likely toward the shuttle bay. The ring of enemies had clustered around the Covenant, but had stopped moving. The Chief was outside their ring, obviously they had not seen or heard him yet. There was a low rumble, which caused the red elite to stand and begin looking about furiously, pointing his plasma rifle at anything that could be considered opposition. There was another rumble, this time louder, and much more threatening. One of the orange grunts began to panic.

      "We have to get out of here!!" he yelled. "They'll kill us all!! Then we'll become one of them!! Or take us to be eaten by the Great Flood!!"

      "Don't say such things!!" the red one yelled back at him.

      "I can't stand this anymore!!!" the orange grunt yelled, fleeing down the hall towards the Chief's position. The Chief turned back around the corner and cocked his shotgun, expecting the crazed grunt to stumble on his position. As soon as his gun was cocked, the Chief heard another thud, then the sound of metal being torn open. What followed was a barrage of gunfire towards where the grunt was. Thee Chief looked back down the hall. The Covenant were frantically firing in every direction, and the roof over where the grunt was running was torn away, with a large blue puddle on the ground. What followed was a series of sickening sounds, with more blood falling from the hole in the roof. There were more and more thuds, crashes and screams. The Flood broke through the walls, and took each of the grunts, without so much as running into the corridor. This was different then the Flood usually fought. There were no parasitic forms of the Flood, or squids as the Chief had called them. All that was left was the Elite. He stood there, frozen with terror. He began to run down the hall away from the Chief. The Flood began pouring out of the wall, in an attempt to grab the running elite. Something else had changed in some of the Warriors as well. A few of them had smaller limbs, most likely from grunts or jackals, and seemed to be able to crawl across the walls and ceiling with them. The crawlers were the first to be on the elite. They jumped onto his back, and began whipping him with their tentacles that they had on their left arms. This slowed the elite down, allowing the rest to swarm the beast. Within half of a second of the first Flood leaping on him, the elite was taken down and killed. There was a loud cracking sound, and all movement stopped. They lifted the Covenant over their heads and began to march off from the direction they came.

      "That's different. Usually the Flood would plant a parasite in the Covenant for a host..." Cortana said.

      "Something has changed in them since they were on Halo," the Chief whispered, hoping the Flood wouldn't hear him. "They're more intelligent, more efficient for some reason."

      "I don't see where the parasites having planted themselves. There were tendrils coming from them when we were on Halo, but now they have nothing. It's almost as if the squids have been replaced by something." Cortana said. She was right. Something had replaced the parasite Flood, something obviously much worse.

Part VI

      Cortana and the Chief made surprising progress. They encountered minimal Flood, as well as no Covenant. When they had found a small group of crawler Flood, the Chief eliminated them quickly, but a few escaped through what seemed to be some sort of air duct. The Chief's knowledge of the structure of a Covenant ship was limited, but he kept his guesses from Cortana. He didn't want any unnecessary speech. One thing the Chief had noticed though, is that the crawlers, being weaker physically, seemed to be used as scouts for the Flood, otherwise they would have had some sort of Flood warriors for assistance. He also thought that the Flood seemed to be learning. They knew the weaknesses of the grunts, to make them run from the main part of the group separating the powerful elites from them. With the grunts out of the way, the large Flood overwhelmed the elites.

      As Cortana put it, "they seem to be acting like some sort of community, such as an ant hill, or a bee hive. They know how to work together now, instead of running aimlessly in hopes of destruction. Something has to have changed it, a leader must have emerged. They most likely mutated a very intelligent elite, who managed to teach them. That's the best explanation I can come up with anyway." After about ten minutes since the first run-in with the Flood and Covenant, they had reached the shuttle bay. They were about half way to the bridge, without facing many hostile forces, but the door had been locked. The Covenant most likely held this part of the cruiser, and locked this door hoping the Flood couldn't make it through. Obviously they did, learning to travel beside the walls and over the ceiling. This meant they could expect a lot of hostility on the other side of this door, if it was the front that the two adversaries fought on. He uploaded Cortana into the control panel for the door.

      "This should only take a second..." The Chief looked around. Must have been a big firefight, there were giant holes torn through the walls, and plasma burns everywhere. There was also damage from explosives and human small arms fire. "Wait...Wait, I've found something. This must not be the control for the door, for some reason it has part of the ship's log in it..."

      "Sorry, I'm not the one with the vast knowledge on the cruiser, you could have told me it was the wrong panel," the Chief responded lewdly. His patience was running thin. Something was not right. The Chief reached for the construct.

      "No, wait. This may provide some insight as to what happened here..." she paused for a moment. "There isn't much. From what I can tell, the Covenant fought their way to this point. Then something else happened. The Flood was being killed off faster then they could mutate their new hosts. I estimate it takes a period of at least twelve hours to mutate a being. Then, when they reached this, something happened. The Flood began mutating much faster, but without the parasitic kind of Flood. There were no squids in sight, but the Flood kept coming in higher and higher numbers, becoming more coordinated. They were still unintelligent, but a slightly coordinated group of fifty Flood could easily wipe out one hundred Covenant. It must have been about then they attained their leader, whoever he may be, but it doesn't explain their accelerated mutation. After that the log is cut off. That must have been when the Flood overwhelmed them, but it has some statistics here... There were much more Covenant then I thought... Not only did they send their best to wipe out the Flood, they sent thirty full special operations forces. Each contained three elites, four jackals, and four grunts. They also sent fifteen hunter battalions, which as you know contain only two hunters. That makes for a total of ninety elite, one hundred and twenty jackals, one hundred and twenty grunts, and thirty hunters. As you know, that is an extremely large amount of Covenant. When the last piece of log was posted, they were down to ten elites, twenty grunts, no jackals, and three hunters. That was one day ago, the day we spotted the ship. The first set of statistics was... the day we destroyed Halo, five days ago. If Icarath was right about this ship coming from Halo, I don't know how we couldn't detect it."

      "Perhaps the ship floated in space a few days. We only scanned once we left the ring, and the Longsword's ability to detect ships using practically no power is very small. The Monitor said the Flood alters the atmosphere, so maybe the Covenant turned on the life support before the PoA detonated. That could have allowed them to survive. As for catching up with us, the Covenant ships have always been faster, they could have caught up with us. But your the construct, you tell me if it makes sense," John said.

      "It is probable, but perhaps we should leave this to talk about later. We still have to find a way off of this ship," Cortana said. "Put me in the door control, it should be on the other side of the door." The Chief took Cortana from the control on the right, and placed her in the control on the left. "Wow, they locked it up tight. Get ready.... There, got it." As the door opened, the Chief cocked his shotgun and placed Cortana back into his helmet.

      There, curled up in huddles all over the floor for as far as he could see were Covenant Warrior Flood. Interspersed were a few human warriors, but the majority was Covenant. All across the ceiling were crawlers. They seemed to have mutated to the point where they needed not to think about clinging to surfaces. They slept hanging. It was clear now that the crawlers were jackals, with their light weight and large claws, it made perfect sense. The grunts didn't seem to serve a purpose for the Flood yet, or the hunters, but if the jackals had found a proper mutation in which they could survive, then soon enough they would begin mutating. Looking on through the shuttle bay, he knew if he woke any of them up he would be in serious trouble. The Chief slowly began to wander through the hunched Flood. They seemed to be dead, but that was the case with any Flood that was not charging him and attacking. They were on the second floor of the vast shuttle bay. They needed to reach the top floor, but there was no way the Chief was willing to head through a maze of corridors so close to a large threat, especially since they would have the advantage. He looked for anything that might be able to bring him up the third floor. The large purple rectangles that the Covenant used for barricades at times were strewn across the large bay. Those wouldn't be of any help, there wouldn't be enough room to make a stack high enough. There was also a dropship, but it had been completely destroyed. The front of the ship was rammed into the ground, with the cockpit and gun jutting through the top floor of the shuttle bay. If he could get on without falling, the dropship would allow him to crawl up to the third floor.

      The Chief spoke to Cortana as quietly as he could, "Lock this door again, then we're going to climb the dropship to the third floor and try to find the bridge, if it's still accessible."

      "Yes, Master Chief." He placed Cortana in the panel, and waited for her to relock the door. He didn't want any Flood to be able to get out. After placing Cortana back into his helmet, he began to move cautiously toward the dropship. Although it would provide him with the best way up, the dropship was a fair distance from any part of the second floor. This was going to be noisy, but the Flood weren't too intelligent, so they might not be disturbed by it. The Chief had reached the centre part of the second floor successfully, without disturbing any Flood. If he did this right, he would leap from the centre to the closest infantry tube. He could grasp where the hinge is and pull himself up. The rest would be just like climbing a tree.

      He moved back a few feet, until he was on the far side of the centre piece, while slinging his shotgun over his shoulder. He ran until he got to the edge of the other side, and leaped through the air. His right he lodged instantly into the hole where the hinge was - at least he wouldn't overshoot it. His body and legs hit the empty tube with a loud thump. His left hand grabbed the inner edge of the tube, and he held on for a moment, to give a hint if anything heard him. This was going to be more difficult then he thought. The tube was completely smooth, no edges. After waiting for a few moments, he began to scale the dropship. He had made it to the top of the tube, where the inner edge stopped. This was the hard part. He would have to swing himself up the right side without making a sound. He was prepared to do this when Cortana yelled in his ear.

      "Movement! Above us!" This startled the Chief, making him lose his grip with his left hand, and slide down the shaft. It made a loud scraping sound that was sure to wake someone up. He quickly grabbed the inner side once more, and began climbing as quickly as he could. If that last noise didn't wake them up, nothing would. He swung himself over the top with a loud scrap and a thump.

      "Where is it?" the Chief asked.

      "Right above us, it's stopped moving." The Chief unslung his shotgun and scaled the rest of the ship with ease. There was Icarath, standing looking down directly on him.

      "Devil!!" He yelled. That woke up the Flood. Within seconds hundreds of them were standing moving towards Icarath and the Chief. Icarath had somehow acquired a plasma sword, and began hacking through them easily, heading toward the exit to the bridge. The Chief got up onto the third floor, and began chasing after Icarath. He was trying to do something, but he wasn't sure what. The Chief was leveling Flood as he went. Each shell he delivered knocked another one down for the count. The third floor was relatively unmanned, most likely because there would be very little resistance on it. But Flood could jump, and climb. The crawlers began leaping at him from the ceiling. He evaded them for a time, but once he was in sight of the exit, one landed on him. It landed with such force to make the Chief stumble. For something so small, it could hit pretty hard. He knocked the crawler off with the butt of his shotgun and threw it toward the bottom floor. He looked toward the exit to see Icarath laughing. He closed and locked the door, and there would be no time to let Cortana unlock it. The Chief quickly disposed of all the Flood in his immediate area, but there would be much more to come. There had only been about ten or so on the top floor, with well over fifty coming from below him.

      "Is there a quick way out of here!?" the Chief yelled, over the sound of his shotgun. The Flood from the second level had begun leaping to the third. Fairly soon they would be on him.

      "There should be an air duct on the bottom floor! But I'm not sure where it leads!" she yelled back.             "We can find out later!" He yelled back. Within a second there was a nav point on his HUD. It was then that the Flood came charging toward him. He threw a frag grenade, and began firing his shotgun at the mass headed toward him. He guessed thirty, maybe forty of them, with more coming from the bottom level. He had to get back to the centre so he could jump down to the bottom level. The nav point marked the duct directly below the dropship.

      "A light explosive should break through the ground when we make it there!" Cortana yelled, sensing what the Chief was going to ask. The frag detonated, sending ten densely packed Flood in every direction. The Chief charged at the group of now no more then twenty, firing his shotgun in wide bursts, damaging or killing many at a time. He reached the pack, knowing the melee that would come of it. Just as they lifted their tentacles, the Chief jumped over the group of them. He placed a plasma grenade on the head of one of them in the centre, and landed on the opposite side, rolling as to not injure himself. He delivered a blow to the head of the Flood standing near him, knocking it to the ground. He continued firing at the group - his last two shells. He didn't have time to reload, so he slung the shotgun over his shoulder and took his pistol from his leg mounted holster. He cocked it and shot the few remaining Flood on his level. He had reached the centre to see about two hundred Flood waiting for him.

      "Not getting down that way," he muttered under his breath. He ran to the dropship and leaped down to the tube. He threw a plasma grenade into the highly packed group of Flood that was now leaping at him. It exploded sending dozens flying. The Chief jumped down onto the tube, sliding down while firing wildly at the hoards leaping to meet him. When he reached the bottom floor, he rolled off of the tube and toward the nav point, still firing. He had already used two magazines, and the Flood showed no signs of stopping. One landed right in front of him, and gave him a hard whip across his entire body. So much for his shields. One shot with the high caliber round and the Flood collapsed. He threw a plasma grenade toward the nav point, landing only 0.03 metres away. The Flood was closing in fast when the grenade went off. They may have learned something since he last fought them, but they were still horrible shots. The crawlers had stopped trying to sneak up on him, and began launching themselves from the ceiling. The Chief was walking backward toward the hole he had created, but his shields still hadn't had a chance to recharge. He took a glimpse back. The hole was right behind him, but unless he could find a way to get rid of all these Flood he would be trapped in there. His thought process was interrupted when a volley of plasma grenades began heading toward him. Twelve Flood had each thrown five or six each. They landed in a wide array around the Chief and the dropship. Without any other option, the Chief leaped into the vent. The plasma grenades exploded in unison, damaging the passenger tubes severely. A few Flood went charging in after the Chief, when the damaged tubes collapsed, crushing the vent underneath. A few of the Flood were caught under the dropship, killed instantly. The noise was deafening, sending Flood confused and frightened in every direction. After the dust settled, nothing was moving, as it was before the Chief entered the shuttle bay.

Part VII

      There was a faint click and a hum when the Chief turned on his flashlight. He looked around the vent. It was surprisingly large, he could nearly stand without much trouble. He only had to bend his head down a little bit. When the explosives went off, his shield was down. The leap was also a high one. The Chief guessed he went down about twenty feet, and landed on his shoulder. The dropship collapsing also shook him up a bit. Despite his shield being down though, he was fine. His training, strength, and armor left him with only a sore shoulder, where a normal man would have been killed quite easily. The Chief began to walk away, but he was caught on something. He looked back to see a Human Flood Warrior clinging to his leg, but obviously dead. He thrust the butt of his shotgun through its wrist, breaking it off, sending dust in all directions.

      "It won't take them that long to break through, we had better keep moving," Cortana said.

      "They aren't terribly bright. They most likely think we were crushed, but your right, we should keep moving." The Chief shuffled down the vent - it was smaller then he thought. He had to bend at the waist in order to fit. It was uncomfortable, but quicker than crawling. The vent seemed to go on forever, and the power to his flashlight had to be recharged twice already.

      "Cortana?"

      "Don't worry, John, we're almost to the exit," Cortana said, sensing his impatience.

      "Hey, you remembered my name," the Chief said, as his flashlight died once more. They had been making conversation since the Chief entered the vent, with Cortana calling him Chief all the time. He had to keep correcting her.

      "I have to get used to calling you by two names," she replied curtly.

      "Don't you have some sort of memory thing? You're a construct, you should be able to remember these things."            "I work just like a human, lacking the body, except when linked directly to a machine. Such as your suit."            "Ah, well, I learn something new everyday."

      "Wait, movement." She was right. The Chief had to stop socializing, he never had a problem with it before. He was always professional, serious, and precise. Having another person constantly around was having a bad influence on him. He turned his attention toward his motion tracker, and saw a large red ring around him.

      "Oh great, my light is out and I don't have any room for cover or to maneuver," the Chief muttered aloud. He began running toward the where the exit presumably was. He rounded a corner to see a dead end.

      "Cortana! Where is the exit!"

      ".....Up..." The Chief looked up to see a long shaft heading up. At the end was some red light. The opposite side of another locked door. The ring of enemies was getting closer, and the Chief was trapped. He could hear the light tapping of footsteps coming from all around him. There must have been hundreds of intertwining vents and pipes, none of them connected though. The Covenant probably thought that if something got in one, it only had two places to go. But they weren't expecting the Flood. Another group had approached and gotten through the outer ring, coming from the direction of the shuttle bay.

      "I got a bad feeling about this..." the Chief said. He turned the corner to see crawlers, and that was all. Nothing else, not even the vent. They were packed wall to wall. Unfortunately, the Chief was out of grenades. He began firing his shotgun. The wide spray allowed him to take out five or six with one shell, but the group didn't stop coming. They had most likely found a way under the dropship from the shuttle bay, and since they were scouts, they were sent in first. The Chief only had one option left. He began climbing in a feeble attempt to escape. For each step, the Chief broke in part of the vent, then placed his hand in it, then his foot, climbing slowly but steadily. The ring had nearly closed in, and the crawlers from the shuttle bay were about to round the corner. He had made it about half way up the pipe at an alarming fast rate. The crawlers rounded the corner, and the ring around the Chief had stopped. The Chief was firing his shotgun and pumping it as fast as he could, taking out any of the crawlers that came around the corner. The shotgun echoed wildly in the narrow passage. He would probably have more company fairly soon. There was a loud thumping from the upper part of the vent. A few feet before the opening in the top of the vent, dents were being made from the outside. The Chief began to start climbing again, while still firing at the crawlers that were coming from the bottom. Soon the corpses of the fallen crawlers would clog the vent, and he wouldn't have to worry about them for a while. After slowly firing and crawling up the vent, the Chief had blocked the crawlers from advancing any further. They would have to dig for a while to get through the sea of corpses. From above, the area of the pipe with the dents in it burst. Warrior Flood started leaping down toward the Chief. They were trying to pull him down to the crawlers, or kill him. A few stayed at the top, firing with Covenant plasma pistols. The Chief was only a few feet from the opening, but needed to get past it to get out of the vents. It seemed like the warrior Flood were as numerous as the crawlers. They continued jumping down on top of him, overwhelming him. He could only keep this up for a little longer, he needed to find a way out. Just as the Chief was thinking that, the lid on the top of the vent opened. Down peered a gold elite, obviously curious as to what was going on. The Chief recognized him as Icarath instantly, even though the Flood was literally crawling all over him. The Flood that were firing on him began firing on Icarath instead. Icarath threw a plasma grenade in, landing inside the vent that the Flood had come from, behind one of the plasma pistol toting Flood. The grenade exploded, making a crater in the immediate area. The blast also knocked the Chief off of his perch, and all the Flood with him. With his shotgun still in his right hand, with three shells remaining, he reached up with his left and snagged one of the dents he had made earlier, stopping him from falling to the sea of Flood corpses. Icarath still stood at the top of the vent looking in. He was laughing hysterically once more, taking pleasure in the destruction of the mutants. The Chief started to climb once more, hoping to catch Icarath before he ran again. But this time, Icarath didn't go running away. He stood there, waiting. He seemed to be looking around for something as well. When the Chief had gotten to where he was last time, slightly below the newly formed crater, Icarath found what he was looking for. He looked down the pipe laughing once more. He dropped something, most likely nothing pleasant. As it whizzed past the Chief's head, he caught a quick glance at it and knew exactly what it was. It hit the corpses sitting on the bottom of the vent, just as the crawlers began breaking through. The Chief reached up into the new crater and pulled himself up. The Chief's legs were still out in the main vent when it went off. It was an Anti-Matter charge, a smaller one then that was used in Covenant cruisers. The Covenant infantry was said to have been carrying them. A small highly concentrated explosive used mostly against vehicles, never once used against infantry. The Chief was tossed down the vent, and he heard Icarath laugh maniacally once more. He heard footsteps patter away, and knew it was time to move. When the Chief reached the vent he was formerly in, he saw that the corpses had been vaporized, and a few stunned crawlers had miraculously survived the blast. The Chief knew he had to leave them instead of risking of attracting more, so he pulled himself quietly out of the vent, without engaging them. He knew where he was now. Just outside the shuttle bay, in the Covenant armory. That was where Icarath got the Anti-Matter charge.

      "I'm really tired of getting blown up by him," the Chief said.

      "You and me both," Cortana replied. "And I seemed to have found us the armory."

      "If we could be one-on-one, instead of with this Flood, he wouldn't be any trouble."

      "You know as well as I do that he is much smarter and stronger then any other elite we've encountered., otherwise you would have finished him off easily while we were still in the Longsword. But enough about him, grab as many weapons as you can carry and lets get out of here."

      With that, the Chief began to take anything he thought of as necessary. The Covenant had many items he had never seen them carry here. There were a few circular objects which had a cylinder attached to it - the bomb that Icarath had used in the Longsword. A remote bomb would mostly likely come in handy, the Chief thought, so he clipped three of them onto his belt. The other object he took he had never seen before. It looked like a handle, that was all. The Chief had a vague idea, but didn't want to test it yet, in case he was wrong.

      "We're almost to the bridge," Cortana said. "We need only follow a series of passageways past the brig, and we'll be there in no time. The Chief had also found some shotgun rounds, most likely left by a Flood. Those would definitely come in handy, since he had lost the majority of them. With the new found rounds, he now had thirty, plus the eight he had reloaded into the shotgun.

      "Good, I can't wait to get off of this ship and leave that bomb-happy elite behind," the Chief said. He seemed to be developing a sense of humor. "I like it." He said, cocking his shotgun, leaving Cortana bewildered as to what he was talking about.

Part VIII

      The Chief began walking, slowly once more in hopes of not attracting any attention. The Flood had become coordinated, that was for sure. They no longer just ran wildly at something. They would wait for others to run wildly with them, as seen in the crawlers. They must have figured out that there's strength in numbers. While they were walking, Cortana was feeding Chief the information she didn't have time to tell him while she was in the ship's log.

      "Apparently the Covenant held the bridge once they got off Halo. They went into slipspace in the opposite direction we're heading now. They most likely wanted to take the Covenant to a secluded area, and hopefully finish them off. I guess the Flood got control of the bridge after that, they came out of slipspace and began heading in generally the same direction we did. Just before they showed up on our sensors, something happened. Maybe the engines got damaged in a fight or something, it didn't say, but they came out of slipspace. That was when we found them."

      "It would be dangerous for a ship this damaged to be going through slipspace. Travelling that fast for too long with hull this damaged could tear the ship apart. There was probably a decision by one of the Flood, providing they can remember such things if they took over a pilot," the Chief whispered, still cautious.

      "It's good they came out of slipspace, we should be approaching on some small human settlements soon. That means when we get to the bridge we can call for assistance. There was a small planet where a military base was being constructed, that was where the Longsword was headed first. We could have gotten a faster ride home, as well as more comfortable." The Chief reached a corner turning to the left, and stopped. He thought he heard something moving around. It must be too small to show up on the motion tracker, but something was there. He poked his head around the corner to see a small black armored grunt on his knees.

      "It looks like he's praying..." Cortana said. It was likely, considering the religious nature of the Covenant and the predicament the grunt found himself in. At the same time it sounded as if he was crying. The grunt seemed to be unarmed as well. The Chief tried to stand up straight, from leaning against the wall but something caught him. The green oozing blood of the Flood seemed to be quite sticky as well. He had to pull hard to get off of the wall, but the grunt still didn't notice him. The Chief took a few steps out. Perhaps this grunt could provide some insight as to where to ship was going, as well as how he was still alive. John had gotten to no more then within five feet of him, but the grunt still didn't notice. Its eyes were closed, and grunts don't have the best sense of hearing.

      "Are you sure you want to wake him up Chief? He may go hysterical, providing the Flood with a noise loud enough to pinpoint where we are," Cortana said.

      "Well, I'll just have to keep him quiet," the Chief whispered. With that the grunt opened his eyes. Surprisingly, it just sat there and stared up at the Chief, as if he expected this to happen.

      ".....Master Chief?" the grunt said quietly, also cautious of creating too much noise. "My prayers have been answered..." it whispered. These words confused the Chief quite a bit. He began to try to form words to ask how he had answered the small grunt's prayers, but the grunt spoke first. "I knew you would be the only one to save us, the only one. Our own soldiers are too frightened, with the exception of our leader, Icarath, who has gone rampant."

      "That's one way to describe it..." the Chief muttered.

      "We need you. We are trapped in this corridor. The Flood know it but do not come, they are too afraid of the Great Flood, as are we," the grunt's voice was a bit louder now.

      "I heard some others talking about the Great Flood, what is it?" the Chief asked, with his voice also louder.

      "It is their leader. Only Icarath and few others have seen it and survived. If not antagonized, the Great Flood will most likely not notice you, it has no eyes for seeing, but sees well without them."

      "Like a bat," Cortana said. The grunt turned his head sideways. Even though the environment suit covered the grunt's face, it was obvious it didn't understand. "A bat is an animal that used to live on Earth, before it became instinct, as with many other species. It used sonar to bounce sounds off of its surroundings, bringing it back to the bat. This way they didn't have to see, and could tell exactly where their prey was at any time."

      "Yes, yes, the Great Flood does that. It will scream before it strikes. Icarath has gone to the bridge with our only remaining soldiers in an attempt to kill the Great Flood, I managed to sneak away from the group to pray for you to come, now you must help them!" the grunt's voice was escalating.

      "Not so loud," Cortana told the grunt. Cortana spoke to the Chief, only inside his suit not to the grunt. "We have to reach the bridge anyway, we have to help this grunt. It would be the first documented case of Covenant working with humans to achieve a greater goal. We are making history, Chi- John." John knew she was right, he had to help the small Covenant fight this thing. The only thing he was worried about was Icarath, but he hated the Flood more then the Chief for killing all of his men, as he had told the Chief back on the Longsword.

      "I'll help, but you have to come with me," the Chief said, placing his right hand on the grunt's head and lifting him up with almost no effort at all.

      "This way," the grunt said, pointing to the right, the direction that the Chief was headed in. He dropped the grunt and they were on their way once more. The grunt explained some of the things he knew about the Great Flood that he was told.

      "Icarath told us that it emitted some kind of pheromone, he said. A gas that caused the prey to become disoriented," the grunt seemed to be well spoken, unlike many that had fallen before the Chief. That was most likely why he was a special operations grunt, which was shown by his black armor. "And also, it can hide quite well. After seeing it, one wouldn't think it could because of its great size, but Icarath said he thought it could kind of camouflage and allow itself to blend in with it's background. It's weakness is it is slow, and if you don't move, it has trouble seeing you, especially at a distance and near some kind of structure, like a wall." The grunt was very informative.

      "So from what being did this Flood mutate?" Cortana asked.

      "Most do not know. It does not seem to look like anything we know about. You perhaps may know, but Icarath guessed that it was comprised of many different hosts, not just one." One thing was for sure, this grunt held Icarath in very high regard. "We are almost to the bridge. We locked the door so the Great Flood couldn't escape from it, but as you will see it has become quite at home. I can unlock the door for you, but there is one other question I needed to ask you about..."

      "What's that?"

      "Do I have to go in with you?" the grunt asked sheepishly. It was obviously very scared, which made the Chief anticipate what he would soon encounter

      "No, I would prefer if you didn't. It would take out the risk of friendly fire." Even though he still couldn't see the grunts face, he could tell it was smiling. They were obviously following the trail that Icarath and his men had set, fallen Flood warriors all over the floor, some plastered to the wall. The grunt was walking on the right of the Chief when he made a small squeak. The Chief looked over to see one of the Flood stand up. Quickly the Chief knocked the grunt aside, pressed his shotgun right up to the Flood's chest and fired. The chest and the torso separated from each other, the torso collapsing in front of the Chief, and the chest and head flying backward and hitting the wall.

      "Perhaps you should arm yourself before you get hurt," the Chief said to the grunt. The grunt stood back up, taking a plasma pistol with him. They reached the bridge without having another encounter from the Flood, sending the grunt into a slight panic. The grunt cautiously began fingering the panel to the locked door, but for some reason wouldn't allow the Chief to see. There was something odd about this grunt. He was too smart, as well as not knowing a thing about weapons. On the way up to the bridge he had accidentally discharged the pistol twice, startling him both times he did so. The Chief also couldn't shake the feeling that when he knocked the grunt out of the way, that he heard the sound of his suit hitting metal. The red lines outlining the door turned white, signaling the door had been opened. The door slid open, and the grunt watched eagerly as the Chief walked slowly in. When the Chief had entered the room, the grunt's voice changed to that of a humans.

      "Well done, Reclaimer," the grunt said, in a British sounding voice that sent chills up the Chief's spine. As the door began to close, the image of the black armored grunt faded away, leaving only the image of 343 Guilty Spark floating over the ground. The door closed and locked before the Chief could get another word out.

      "He....survived...." the Chief said, anger beginning to flow through him. "That bastard! I'll kill him!! He sent me to my death, for no reason then to please himself!" The Chief kicked wildly at the door, feebly attempting to knock it in.

      "Calm down!" Cortana yelled. "You can just put me in the panel for the door, and we can get out. But first we need to access the bridge." As she said that, the door behind them opened to reveal a single Flood warrior standing and looking at the Chief. It emitted a high wail, like some kind of air raid siren. The Chief took one shot, hitting the Flood in the middle of his stomach, impairing it to the point where it collapsed. The wail was most likely some kind of wake up call for the Great Flood. His sentry warned him of an attacker, and now it would wake up to neutralize the attacker. Something incredibly strong suddenly hit him from the back. The Chief fell unconscious on the ground, with Cortana screaming in his ear.

Part IX

      The Chief woke up dazed. He was exactly where he had been knocked down, surprised to find himself still alive. The Chief looked around. 343 GS was right, the Great Flood had made himself at home. The walls were dripping with the green ooze that the Chief knew as Flood blood, which had also coated his suit. There were stalagmites and stalactites made of the green ooze everywhere. The ground was covered with the ooze in some parts, with other parts just bare floor. Something was different from when he had been knocked unconscious. He looked around the room, and realized what it was. There were Covenant bodies mutilated lying all over the floor, as well as few Flood bodies. The sentry that appeared before the Chief still lay before him, with a large gaping hole in its stomach. The Covenant that were coming to kill the Great Flood must have been in here before the Chief had arrived, and sneaked up behind him while he took care of the sentry. The wail most likely woke up the Great Flood, and this was his handy work. There was one question that remained - why was the Chief still alive?

      "Cortana? What's going on?" the Chief spoke calmly as he attempted to stand. The knock to his head must have done a lot of damage, he noticed he felt a little disoriented, even a little nauseous. What followed from Cortana was a long murmur that the Chief could barely understand. All he understood was "bridge" and "upload." She would need to get into the bridge in order to contact anyone, as well as to find the coordinates for the Covenant Homeworld, so the Chief assumed she needed to be placed into the bridge. His disorientation would most likely pass in a few moments, as he had only been conscious for a minute or so. The Chief began to walk toward the bridge, his disorientation growing. Cortana was yelling something that he couldn't understand, but the Chief pressed on. The Chief no longer felt conscious, his disorientation grew to the point where he felt like he was in a dream, but continued on anyway. He reached the ramp up to the bridge, and began walking up it. The corpses were heavier here, and with the Chief's disorientation, he tripped twice before he was half way up. He began knocking Flood and Covenant corpses out of the way, feeling a strong sense of foreboding. Everything seemed so familiar... When he reached the top of the ramp, his vision started to become blurred. He noticed there were several large red stalactites hanging from the ceiling. Something had been torn from them. The Chief's vision began to go dark. He could barely see in front of him, but he continued moving toward the bridge. Something was in front of him, something large. It was a large hulking mass, throbbing as if breathing. It had four legs, and two large tremendous arms. The Chief had seen it before, and he wretched in horror knowing what it was. The Chief, knowing what was about to happen tried to regain his composure, instead of slipping further away. He glared at the large beast, and saw what he knew was there. The Captain's face, staring in horror, trying to scream. The hole, which the Chief put in his head, was still there, leaving his face cracked and twisted. As it had when he had seen the Monitor, the Chief felt a great surge of anger. His adrenaline began pumping, canceling out the effect of the pheromones that the Chief now realized the Great Flood was using on him. When he had seen the blob on Halo, it had only two legs and could not hold itself up by itself. That was why it most likely grew the other two legs. The arms were also a new addition, making it more of a foe in combat. The arms were directly on top of the legs, with the large throbbing mass on top. The mass was translucent, and the Chief could see elites, jackals, grunts, and hunters all within it. There were also some partially mutated elites within. So this was how the mutation sped up, without the squid. The Chief assumed he was standing behind the beast, with the tail of it protruding in the direction of the Chief, where the Captain's mangled face was. Since the Chief had concentrated, hoping to get the pheromone to wear off, Cortana's screams became understandable.

      "It...Icarath! ....Tampered...suit, vaccuu....the pheromone....Icarath...here, Flood...Captain Keyes!" Some of what she said the Chief still couldn't hear, but it was more then enough. No wonder the pheromones were affecting him, he was breathing the outside air. The Great Flood would pay for Captain Keyes' death and mutilation, and he would pay dearly. The Chief armed three plasma grenades, and threw them at the throbbing torso. They landed, but something odd happened. The ooze wrapped around the grenades, and they were pulled inside. The Chief waited for the explosion, but nothing happened.

      Cortana began yelling once more," Weapons...useless, it absorbs...everything, no impact!" Her voice was coming through clearer, and the information she provided was substantial. The Great Flood emitted a high wail, much like that of its sentry. It turned around slowly looking directly down at the Chief. He saw the faces of horrified Covenant pressed up against the outer layer of the ooze. As the Great Flood turned, a Covenant warrior Flood emerged from the front of the blob. It slowly sifted through the layers of the ooze, and landed on the ground. It leaped at the Chief, tentacles flailing wildly. Cortana was right when she said they were like ants; the Great Flood was like the Queen, and the drones would give their lives to protect her. The Chief fired a shot hitting the Flood in its midsection, sending it lifeless to the ground just short of the Chief. Another long wail came from the Great Flood as it began to walk toward the Chief. He heard thumping from all around. The Flood was trying to come and help their Queen, but all the doors were locked. The Great Flood moved surprisingly fast. It charged at the Chief who was standing at the edge of the ramp from the holopanels at the other end. It's arms reached down slowly for the Chief. He leaped off the side of the ramp, diving across the sunken-in floor beside the ramp. The Great Flood obviously couldn't reach him that way, so it began to walk down the ramp and around the pillar. As soon it was around, it charged again. The Chief hadn't moved, trying to formulate a plan to defeat the seemingly invincible mass. The giant arms of the Flood reached the Chief much quicker this time, giving him no time to jump. Its forearm hit the Chief in his back, sending him hurtling through the air. His chest hit the edge of the bridge, but the Chief grabbed, hoping not to fall off. He pulled himself up, the Flood reaching out with its huge arms, coming just short. The Chief threw a frag grenade at the ground in front of the Flood. It exploded, the fragmentation being absorbed by the beast, but the explosion itself knocking it backward. It hit the wall and slid down. It was trying to get up, but was having no luck. Cortana's voice sounded again, this time completely clear. His vision had also returned and the slight disorientation had also passed.

      "I resealed your suit with fresh air, the pheromones aren't having anymore effect on you at all." The Flood had gotten its feet underneath it, and began lifting itself off the ground. "Put me into the bridge, I'll do more good in there then in your head."

      "Good idea," the Chief said, seeing the Flood had managed to stand and was once more coming towards the bridge. The Chief took the construct out of his helmet quickly, and plugged her into the holopanel. He hoped it was the right place. The Flood had reached the top of the ramp, and began charging once more at the Chief. The Chief, still looking at the Flood, stepped backward off of the bridge through the holopanel, disappearing from view. The Flood wandered down to the ground floor again, wailing in an attempt to find the Chief. Before long, the Flood gave up. It paced, waiting for the intruder to reappear, while the gripped the edge of the bridge as well as using a stalactite to keep himself suspended under the bridge. The Flood couldn't see him. Now he could try and figure out how to beat this thing, while Cortana tried to find them an exit.

      Cortana began with trying to contact some human UNSC forces, or anything that could possibly help her. She knew there was a large scale military project happening in the area, so it was quite likely she would be able to find the Chief and her a ride out. She only hoped they could get here in time, before either the Great Flood or Icarath finished the Chief. She couldn't possibly think of the Chief being defeated, but Icarath was something special, not just an elite. And the Great Flood didn't seem to have any type of weakness.

      Chief Petty Officer Second Class Matthew Teff had been sitting in his quarters for a few hours. It was still early, no need to start the exercises for today yet, he felt his men needed some rest. He was relaxing, smoking a cigar when a notice came over the PA.

      "CPO Teff, please report to the command centre, urgent."

      "Great, somebody probably lost a contact." Teff was tired of being on a planet training endlessly while the Covenant wiped out the human race. But if the project went off without a hitch, then the Covenant would have a lot more to worry about. Nothing ever happened on Thermopylae, but that was why it made a perfect place for the project, just like the last one, but this one was much more secluded. No colonized systems were around it, but that didn't mean they weren't cautious. Since Teff was promoted to CPO, he hadn't been in the field much, but that was to be expected. What he wouldn't give to go back to how he was before, before this project. The pay was great, but he wanted to be in the action. Teff reached the command centre quickly, the Colonel waiting for him at the door.

      "Ready your men, Petty Officer, we have a situation."

      "You have no idea how long I've waited for you to say that," Teff replied. He quickly walked away from the Colonel with a smile on his face. At last his soldiers would be able to do what they do best. Fight.

      The Chief didn't know how much longer he could hold himself up. He had been there for at least fifteen minutes, without a single idea. The constant wailing of the Great Flood had also become quite an annoyance. The Chief had gone over and over in his mind any weapon he could use against the beast. The grenades on the Chief's belt had been dangling dangerously. He couldn't reach out to restrain them, but they were close to falling off. And if that happened, the Great Flood would be on him faster then he could imagine. While he had been hanging, the Flood banging trying to get in had stopped. Evidently they thought that the Chief had left. The stalactite was also beginning to give. It was straining, close to snapping. He had to think of something quick. Something slipped off of the Chief's belt, falling toward the ground. The Chief managed to reach down and grab the item, barely supporting himself. He had to push harder on the stalactite, making it strain even more. The Chief looked at what he had nearly dropped. The Covenant remote bombs. He had three, and had forgotten about each of them, since he normally didn't care anything more then eight grenades on his belt. He knew how he could stop the Great Flood. And without the Great Flood, the Flood wouldn't be able to reproduce until some Flood mutated into carriers to reproduce the squids. If they could be stopped before that, then there would be no danger of them finding the Covenant Homeworld. If they found the Homeworld, they might find Earth. The Chief dropped from the bridge landing on his feet. The Great Flood heard the commotion and began to run toward it. The Chief ran to the sunken-in area of the bridge and hid once more. The Chief placed one of the remote bombs a few feet up the pillar that stood right above him. The Great Flood had a general idea of where the Chief was, and began heading toward him, wailing and searching. It was getting dangerously close, so the Chief grabbed a plasma grenade and threw it to the opposite side of the room, through the opposite two pillars. The Flood began moving in the direction of the grenade instead. It exploded while the Flood stood right between the pillars opposite of the Chief's position. This merely enraged the Flood more. The Chief crawled up and hid behind the pillar. He walked out between the pillars, the Flood sensing his presence turned towards him and began charging. He threw the second bomb at the Flood, landing square in the middle of the blob. It was absorbed as the Flood passed the ramp leading to the control centre. The Chief moved away from the pillar just as the Flood reached it. The Chief detonated the bomb inside the Flood, causing it to stop in its tracks, confused and injured. The ooze inside began seeping out, and the inside looked hollow. The Chief detonated the second bomb, breaking the pillar loose of its hold on the ground and sending it toppling on top of the Flood. It struck the Flood, carrying it to the ground with it. As soon as the Flood hit the ground, the pillar fell on top. The large mass of ooze exploded all over the bridge. The Chief was knocked backward, but not over, with the force of the ooze. The Flood was motionless as the Chief began walking toward it. The lower body of the Great Flood was still in one piece, including the tail. John knelt down, looking at Captain Keyes' crushed face. Nothing of his body was left, but the portrait of him remained.

      The words of John's dream passed through his mind, "Chief....You....You did this...Now....Do it....Finish me...Before it's too late....That's...That's an order!" He never thought he could do it, but he knew he had to. He lowered the barrel of his shotgun to what used to be the Captain's face and fired. It was torn apart instantly, leaving nothing of the Captain. John knelt back down, looking on what had become of the man he held in such high regard.

      "Now your free."

Part X

      After long, Cortana had explained everything that had happened that the Chief had missed out on. Icarath had knocked out the Chief, not realizing who he was. When Icarath did this, it broke the seal of his suit. Cortana altered the suit's layers, making another seal and filling his suit with fresh air. After Icarath had knocked him out, the Great Flood had attacked the Covenant force that Icarath had brought with him. The Covenant forces fought the Great Flood with no luck, as the Chief lay unconscious on the ground. Since he was covered in the blood of Flood warriors, the Great Flood assumed it was one of it's fallen warriors, up until the Chief awoke and began attacking it. While the Covenant forces were fighting the Flood, Icarath had input various coordinates into the bridge's controls. He then fled while his men were killed off. Icarath had set the ship to enter slipspace and fly directly into a star, destroying the ship and everything within it. He was willing to give his life to kill off the Flood and the Chief. They had about one hour until the ship reached the correct coordinates to enter slipspace. It had to reach the opposite side of the human planet, Thermopylae, first. Cortana had also called for reinforcements from the human planet. With luck they would arrive within a half-hour, a little more, at the docking bay that the Chief had left no more then an hour ago. There was one disappointing thing though. For all their efforts, the coordinates to the Covenant Homeworld were not in the computer. Cortana concluded they must have done it for a failsafe, in case a ship was captured; only the leader of the group would be given the coordinates. All that remained would be for the Chief to chase down the Monitor to find out what he was scheming, and Icarath, to make sure he didn't make it off the ship.

      "I have also contacted the local officials on Thermopylae, they will send a task force of forty-five soldiers, as well as five boarding craft. All we will have to do then is hop inside, and they'll take us away," Cortana said.

      "That's good news, what shuttle bay are they coming to?" The second shuttle bay was the one that the Chief and Cortana had passed through, the first was near the back of the ship, the third opposite the second and the fourth opposite the first.

      "The third one, opposite the one we were in before. There's one Covenant dropship left there, most likely swimming in warrior Flood, but it's the only one that is accessible from space."

      "Well, that will make things interesting when they land. Can you change the ship's course so it won't collide with the star?"

      "Do you not wish to destroy the Flood?" spoke a monotonous voice with a slight British sounding accent. The Chief raised his pistol, turning in the direction of the noise. While the Great Flood was looking for him, it had stepped on his shotgun breaking it permanently. The Monitor was flying down from the ceiling, and the Chief fired one shot at what he hoped was what kept the robot floating. The shot hit, and GS dropped to the ground with a thud. "There is no point in using violence, Reclaimer!"

      "Just like back on Halo?" the Chief asked him.

      "It was in the best interest of all. The Flood has escaped and they will not be stopped, thanks to you, Reclaimer! I was doing as I was programmed to do, and what should have been done!"

      "What are you doing here, Guilty Spark?"

      "I could ask you the same!"

      "You aren't in a position to threaten, Spark, you have no sentinels, you have no protection, but most of all, you have no mobility." The robot was at the edge of the ramp heading down from the bridge, unable to move. The Chief was still pointing his pistol at him, but lowered it just so GS wouldn't feel as threatened and would speak more freely.

      "Well, to begin with, I had not the power to travel any far distances after Halo was destroyed, so I boarded the closest ship. I have been trying to find the bridge, with no success. When you came, I produced a hologram of one of their species, in hopes you could find the bridge for me. You knew, so you came. But I had analyzed one of the larger of their species. Quite like your armor, they contain video units. I looked over most of it, and realized that what they call the 'Great Flood' had mutated. It is a great reproducer, but lasts for only a few months, maybe a year, until it cannot hold itself together. When it was made the parasitic form of the Flood was useless, so the weaker form of the species that were used for carriers," by weaker the Monitor meant the jackals," mutated into what you have called a 'crawler.' I was also perturbed to find the dialogue the two of you had. I only found that after I trapped you in here. For that I am most sorry, and hope you will spare me. That was your fault, you interrupted me! Had you waited a few more minutes, I would not have led you in here to face the Great Flood." In his mind the Chief was glad the Monitor led him inside, but he was still angry at the defenseless robot.

      "And why should I spare you?" the Chief asked, raising his pistol once more.

      "Because the information within my databanks could very well save the human race. If you kill me, you will lose the war," GS said, chuckling to himself. The Chief was still mad at the little robot for attempting to kill him so many times.

      "But then why did you want to kill me so badly back on Halo?" the Chief asked.

"Let me guess, on Halo you knew to follow your programming, but when John and I arrived, you realized the Forerunner were still alive, the people who had trapped you in the installation never to leave, never to see the outside world. You knew what you were made to do, but you wanted to carry through with it so much you tried to kill the Chief and I. It was because you wanted revenge on them, not to prevent the spreading of the Flood," Cortana said.

      "Well, basically, yes. But now that I know they do not know what they have done, I cannot blame them for leaving me there for thousands of years. Now I only wish to help. It was I that told Icarath the only way to defeat the Flood would be to launch the ship into the nearby star, but that wasn't enough. He wanted to know if it would destroy you," 343 Guilty Spark had suddenly changed. Perhaps it was because he was not human, he could not hold a grudge, but it was true. Cortana knew it as well, she could understand machines. Normally the Chief would destroy him right there, but if something had use it should not be terminated. After this was over, he would have the little robot properly deactivated, personally, if possible.

      "So you know what he's planning then?" the Chief asked him.

      "Yes, you must follow me, quickly," the Monitor said, trying to lift itself up. It sat there and rolled about, falling down the ramp and smashing into the wall behind it.

      "Here, let me help," the Chief said, pulling Cortana from the bridge and walking over to the small robot. He picked up the robot, pistol still in hand. "Now which way?"

      "The opposite direction from which you came, the third shuttle bay," it said. "Quickly, we haven't much time!"

      Fifteen minutes after CPO Teff was told to ready his men, they had taken off in their boarding craft. The boarding craft were basically Pelican dropships, except the back end was closed off to prevent the occupants from floating out into space. The human boarding craft each contained nine soldiers, each one having two squads, a commander for each, and a commander for every two squads. After making a special request at the briefing, CPO Teff was in command of the lead task force, as well as the entire operation. Each dropship contained ten MA5B Assault Rifles, six M6D Pistols, two M 19 SSM JackHammer Rocket Launchers, as well as M41 LAAG Minigun, and by special request, fourteen M90 Shotguns. It was needless to say that they were fully loaded. Each soldier carried an assault rifle, a pistol, a shotgun, and four M9 HE-DP fragmentation grenades. One member of each squad had a minigun and a jackhammer, designated the heavy weapon carriers. Teff carried only a pistol, being his weapon of choice for his twenty-year military career. Within ten minutes, his men would reach the Covenant cruiser, and Master Chief. None of them had seen the Flood that Cortana had described in her transmission, but knew that shotguns did a good job of dispatching them. The high-caliber pistol was also said to work well against them, and the assault rifles each of them held were standard issue. When the boarding crafts landed, all the soldiers would be under direct control by their squad leaders, each of those under control by the dual squad leaders, given their orders by the CPO, and if they could tell him, the Chief.

      "Alright soldiers, ETA ten minutes," Teff said through the Comm link built into his helmet so all his men could hear him. "Shields up in five." At least the Chief would be able to see some friendly faces when they arrived.

Part XII

The three Spartans made for the exit, the remaining forty-three ready to suppress the Flood threat. The main opposition was on the centre floor, with about half of that amount on the bottom floor, and a third of that on the top floor. Teff was in command of the forces in the centre, with Master Sergeant Powell in control on the top, and Second Lieutenant Boarders commanding the lower level. They were armed mostly with the Covenant's plasma weapons. The Covenant plasma weaponry excelled at knocking out shields, but the MJOLNIR armor they had, had many improvements, one of which being a stronger resistance to plasma weaponry. Teff quickly called his men back. From the small amount of data Teff had on the Flood, one of which was that they were not particularly bright. They moved as one, a sea of yellow decaying bodies moving towards their position on the centre island between the two landing bays. The Flood was numerous, Teff guessed approximately five hundred of them, and they were still coming. They were advancing quickly, faster then Teff could issue his orders.

      "Heavy weapons, jackhammer the threat, then LAAG. Shotguns and frags for first line, AR for everyone else!" Teff yelled through his Comm unit. There were four of the heavy weapons soldiers, and two squads of four in the front line, not including Teff. There was one line behind that, from which the Assault rifles fire would come. The Flood was pouring into the island, with the Spartans standing near the back. When the Flood had made it approximately half way down the island, the heavy weapons soldiers fired two rounds each at the advancing Flood, with nearly every other Spartan throwing a single frag grenade. The mighty explosion lit up the room, decimating the Flood, sending bodies in every direction. Many of them impacted off of the Spartans, but they were taught not to let anything distract them. The Flood's general strategy was to use their weapons only after they realized they would not be able to get close enough. This was that warning. About two to three hundred of them were completely destroyed, few others surviving barely able to stand. Every soldier then unslung their shotguns in unison, as they had been trained, and opened fire, with frag grenades interspersed. The heavy weapons threw down their jackhammers and readied their LAAGs. They stood near the front of the group, the others with shotguns firing. The LAAGs opened fire, keeping the Flood well back of the Spartans. With all of this, the Flood force had only been cut down by half, with some still flowing into the shuttle bay. The Flood that had plasma weapons began firing. There was easily one hundred armed, two hundred unarmed. This meant the Spartans would have to find cover, with nothing more then the purple Covenant barricades. Teff ran to the stack of eight to his left and began kicking the bottom one. Within two kicks and a mere second, it was knocked out and the others began falling forward. They landed, providing sufficient cover for his soldiers, but the Flood continued to advance. He was hit by three plasma bolts, most likely a plasma rifle, and turned to see two unarmed Flood flailing their tentacles toward him. He fired three shots with his pistol, all to what seemed to be the brain of the grotesque monsters. The first warrior fell, the tendrils from where it's parasite had been inserted cut off leaving the beast lifeless. The second reached him, but Teff punched it in the stomach with his pistol, stunning it, then blasted it in its tendrils. Teff then dove behind the barricades, and noticed four Flood warriors fall from the third floor as he turned. The second line behind him followed in suit, but instead had to place their barricades down, as there was not a stack to knock into place. Within the thirty seconds the Flood had entered the room on the second floor, the Flood's numbers had been cut in half and sufficient cover had been found by all of the soldiers. There was an explosion on the top level, and the furthest left support pillar collapsed into the middle of landing bay one. The Covenant dropship nearly stopped it, but it broke over top of it and continued to fall, crushing the Flood, and hopefully not any Spartans, below. An inaudible voice came from the behind the battle, that of 343 Guilty Spark's.

      "Oh my, the Flood have realized their Queen has died and have begun producing parasites. This will make them easier to dispatch and far less intelligent, but that may mean one may still survive. This is not good news, not good news at all...."

On the bottom floor the Flood presence was about half of that of the second floor, but they were much more spread out, making them harder to wipe out. The soldiers on that level were commanded by Second Lieutenant Boarders, a veteran soldier who had seen many Covenant before, but nothing like this. The group he commanded were mostly greenhorns, but they were still a skillful and powerful bunch. He commanded all of his men to get near the one door that the Flood were not flowing from, behind the first landing bay, and begin creating something that they could use as cover. Three squads had arrived, but the other was separated in a pile of the purple barricades. The Flood had surrounded them, and it looked like there was no way they would be getting out soon, with the two hundred Flood surrounding them. Boarders looked on his HUD, no casualties as of yet, but with the amount of opposition down here, they wouldn't last long, even with their extensive training. The Flood's plasma weapons were firing all around them, but they were horrible shots.

      "We need some cover!" Boarders yelled. One of the heavy weapons Spartans fired his jackhammer at the supporting pillar beside them. It landed on the opposite side as they were, sending it down right in front of him. The ability to improvise under pressure made the Spartans a deadly foe. Just as Boarders was thinking this, there was a tremendous explosion from the centre island. CPO Teff has done it again, he thought, quickly returning his attention to his squads. The Spartans knelt down and began firing their shotguns at the Flood surrounding second squad. Boarders took a closer look at his HUD. Their shields were beginning to fall. The Flood may be horrible shots, but there were a hell of a lot of them. Their close combat also made them quite deadly, but the Spartans were also trained well in close combat, able to evade attacks and counterattack, be it with a weapon or their own melee attack.

      "Heavy weapons, move to the centre island and toward second squad. We need to flank the Flood so they can get out, now move!" Boarders yelled. Three lights on his HUD winked, signaling the soldier's acknowledgement of the orders. They moved out instantly, as there was no real threat to the squad under the cover of the pillar. They reached their destination in a matter of seconds, opening fire on the Flood. Four dead Flood warriors dropped directly in front of their group from the upper levels, but the Spartans barely noticed it. The flanking procedure did exactly what Boarders thought it would, and that was to break the forces attacking the second squad. He switched his Comm device to the second squad's channel.

"Suppressing fire down, move to our position," Boarders said calmly. The four soldiers came out of the pile, firing their shotguns at the confused Flood. At that point, the support pillar that the HW man had blasted before came crashing down on top of the pile of barricades as the Spartans had just escaped. One Spartan was directly underneath the pillar, and dove to the ground, barely fitting under the pillar as it was supported by the pile of barricades, but was back up quickly after blasting a Flood warrior with his shotgun. The pillar crushed many of the Flood, decimating their forces more so. Boarders switched the channel on his Comm unit back to his squad.

      "Move up to support Spartans and flank the enemy, move toward HW," he said. He stood from behind the pillar and began moving toward the soldiers that he had saved. The three squads of Spartans understood, as it was a normal battleground strategy they had been taught, and began working their way toward the heavy weapons soldiers. The heavy weapons soldiers had managed to fend off the Flood, but they were getting closer. The now four squads moved towards them, decimating the Flood who was separated in an attempt to stop the Spartans. Within a few more seconds, they Flood were completely eradicated on the first floor.

"Now, we need to help the CPO with his predicament. HW, how many rockets do we have?" Boarders asked.

      "We have fourteen left between the four of us," one of them spoke up. One of the Flood stood up beside the Lieutenant as he was informed. He quickly spun and shoved the butt of his shotgun into its chest as hard as he could, shattering the chest completely. It slumped and collapsed again.

      "Good, I want a side by side deployment, one for each corner of the walkway above..." the Lieutenant went on to issue orders to the heavy weapons and the other soldiers.

      Master Sergeant Powell hadn't expected what he saw. What he saw were corpses come to life, attacking him relentlessly. His single squad was trapped in between the two groups of Flood of about fifty each. This wouldn't be a problem if there was anything to use for cover, but nothing remained. All the same, their nine Spartans were having trouble with the two groups of Flood that seemed to be made up of about fifty of them. They were also spread out, making frag grenades or jackhammers ineffective. Three of the Spartans shields were down, the other five's beginning to fail. Something was needed to help them, but if they had to go down, they would take some of these bastards with them.

      "Squad, engage in close combat, repeat again, close combat. Hopefully we can get some friendly fire as support, otherwise we won't last much longer," Powell said. The Spartans followed their orders and ran into the group above the first landing bay. As they did this, there was a tremendous explosion underneath them that made the floor shake. Teff certainly got the job done, Powell thought as he engaged the enemy. The shotguns and the two LAAG they had with them were devastating at close range. Powell delivered a single blast to a group near the edge, sending four Flood off the side of the third floor. Powell leveled another group of Flood warriors, three this time, and turned to see a human Flood warrior holding a jackhammer up, about to fire it at point blank range at the Sergeant. There was a blast from behind it, and the warrior was cut in two. The LAAG from their HW man had sawed through him, as he was within five feet of the monster. The Jackhammer accidentally discharged, hitting the support pillar behind Powell and eliminating quite a few more Flood. The pillar collapsed and fell on top of where the Flood on the bottom level was.

The voice of Boarders spoke on the open channel that all the Spartan groups used, "Powell squad, move to centre portion of top floor and brace for impact. Boarding craft, move outside the ship, Teff squads, move as far back as you can get, jackhammer in five!"

      "You heard the man, soldiers, assholes and elbows, prepare for impact!" Powell shouted. They ran toward the centre portion as there were four explosions, followed by four more. There was a creaking, followed by four more explosions. The side of the third floor that Powell's squad was formerly on began to collapse. There were two more explosions. Everything began to shake as the centre island seemed to get closer and closer.

      After Boarders had spoken through the open channel, he saw Powell's squad move into the centre portion, and Teff's squads move back to the edge of the centre island. The boarding crafts moved just outside of the docking bay doors. Boarders knew the Covenant ship had been extremely damaged, and hoped to God this would work. The Flood didn't seem to stop coming, so maybe they could cut them off. He signaled for the HW men to fire their jackhammers while the other soldiers got behind the safety of the centre island facing space. The first two rockets severed the remaining support pillar in the first landing bay; the other two took out one pillar on the second landing bay. The next two destroyed the remaining support pillar, the next hitting either under where the support pillars once were against the wall, severing the connection of the path and the wall, as well as separating the path from where the corner of it where the outside support pillars were. This continued until the top floor was completely severed from the wall. The last rockets were used to shoot directly under where each of the pillars supported on the second level. The path that extended to the centre portion from the walls of the shuttle bay collapsed, taking most of the remaining Flood with them. The HW men ran and hid behind the centre island to avoid being crushed from the top level collapsing. When the top level hit the centre, the nine Spartans rolled, receiving minimal damage from the fall. With that, hundreds of the Flood were killed. Very few remained, and the Spartans took the next five minutes to clean up the rest of them. When the top floor had collapsed, the controls to the docking bay were smashed, closing off the boarding craft from the soldiers inside.

      "Ah, shit!" Boarders yelled. After the Flood threat had been neutralized, Teff had lowered the purple barricades down so that Boarders and his men could stack them and climb up. Boarders saw what his stunt had caused, and he was angry with himself.

      "Boarders, this is no time to be critical. Your quick thinking could have potentially saved some lives," Teff said. "And because of that, the Spartan-IIIs first operation has been flawless, not one casualty." Teff's words brought some comfort, but not enough.

      "You heard what Cortana said in her transmission! We have only fifteen minutes until this thing becomes part of the light over Thermopylae, and we'll be with it! That doesn't sound that flawless! And what about the Chief? We still need to get him off of this ships!"

      "I know you are upset because you think you made a mistake," Teff said, his tone becoming more menacing. "But I will not stand insubordination! Stow it, now!"

      Boarders realized that there was no point in fighting his superior, especially since it could get him kicked off this project, as had been threatened many times before. There was a faint hum from behind them, and they turned to see the small robot that the Chief had left behind.

      "Perhaps I can be of service, for I know the systems of this ship quite well," the Monitor said.

      "And who might you be?" Teff asked, realizing he had never once spoken to the robot.

      "I am 343 Guilty Spark, Monitor of Installation 04... well, not anymore I'm not," GS replied.

      "We are supposed to keep you protected, like the Chief said, why are you floating around out here?" Boarders asked.

      "Well, I figured you could use my help," GS said, chuckling to himself.

Part XIII

      The Chief, Huds, and Dawson quickly ran out of the shuttle bay after Icarath. This was a portion of the ship that the Chief had never seen, the corridors were wider, and there were more paths branching off. Luckily, Icarath hadn't gotten very far and was still appearing on the Chief's motion tracker. They reached a locked door, the Chief taking Cortana out of his helmet to unlock the door.

      "Sir, that may take too long," Huds said, holding and patting his jackhammer. The Chief inserted Cortana back into his helmet, and made a gesture towards the door.

      "Be my guest, Private," the Chief said. Luckily, these doors were fairly thin, and the explosion from the rocket blew the left part of the sliding door clean off, the other being knocked backward, but not off of the wall completely. The three soldiers went through, with the Chief at the point, Dawson covering their backs and Huds in the middle. It was another corridor, still very large. The Chief guessed that this was where they transported the vehicles from their holding bays to the shuttle bays for transport. At least two tanks could fit side by side travelling down the hallway, as well as the height of two of them. They reached large blast doors, which were held wide open. There was a small alcove into the room, but it was obviously vehicle storage. The Chief made a motion signaling for Dawson to go left, Huds to go right, and the Chief would go through the centre. The Chief made it through the door with the other Spartans about to pass through as well when the headlights of a ghost shone towards their direction. It began hovering quickly toward them, and opened fire. A rocket passed over the Chief's head, hitting the ghost dead on. It exploded, but continued the hurtle toward them.

      "Get back!" the Chief yelled. He dove to the right side of the alcove, as the ghost went ramming into the panel for the door. The panel was trashed, and as a result of Covenant failsafe, the doors slid closed. There was no way in or out, with the Chief on the inside and the other Spartans on the outside. The Chief knew Icarath wasn't killed when the ghost exploded. In fact he would be surprised if Icarath was even in the ghost. The Chief still stood by the right side of the alcove, not quite prepared to enter the room knowing Icarath had most likely rigged something else. After waiting a few seconds, the Chief cocked his assault rifle and began walking into the middle of the room. As soon as he left the alcove, he saw Icarath. About two feet from him on his right, the elite held a plasma sword, beginning to laugh once more. The Chief aimed his rifle at him and fired. Icarath lowered his plasma sword and swung it upwards, in an attempt to cut the Chief into two halves. The Chief leaped back, putting his rifle out as defense. The assault rifle was cut in two clean halves, and dropped to the ground. The Chief pulled his pistol before Icarath could get off another shot and prepared to fire. Icarath swept his sword from the left to the right trying to behead the sage-armored warrior. The Chief's reflexes were once again too good for the elite, and he jumped back. The plasma sword cut through the barrel of the pistol, hindering the Chief from firing it again. He dropped the broken pistol and tried to punch the elite in the face. The elite sidestepped, nearly putting his sword through the Chief's stomach. Icarath then kicked the Chief hard in the stomach, knocking him to the ground. Before the Chief could stand once more, the plasma sword was directed right at the Chief's throat. Icarath put his foot on the Chief's chest. Icarath raised the plasma sword, and prepared to stab it into the heart of the Chief.

      "Now, Devil, you will die!" Icarath screamed, continuing to laugh maniacally.

      Huds and Dawson were cut off from the Chief, but they could hear something was going on in there. There was no way a jackhammer was going to cut through that, they would have to get through manually.

      "You think you can hotwire this?" Huds asked Dawson. Dawson shrugged.

      "I suppose so...." Dawson said, beginning to pry open the panel. "But it won't be too easy..." as he said that, there was a loud gurgle, and the sound a yelling elite.

      "No it won't, sir," Huds said, quickly changing his voice from carefree to that of one with a purpose. "We have movement approaching from the end of the hallway, not enough to be a challenging Flood threat, but enough Covenant to give us a run for our money."

      Dawson stood back up, raising his shotgun. "It's Covenant, I can see them." Dawson slung his shotgun and raised his pistol, activating the scope. He began picking off the jackals, as they would be lots of trouble at close range. He had a tally of three within five seconds. Huds fired a rocket into the centre of the group, sending elite and jackal bodies everywhere. The Covenant had gotten closer, and had begun firing. From what Dawson could tell, there were only about twenty or so left, five elites, ten grunts or so, and four jackals. Dawson holstered his pistol and brought out his shotgun, Huds bringing out his LAAG. They were within forty feet now, the effective range of the LAAG. Huds began firing, cutting through the front line of grunts easily. The five elites knew what would happen if they tried to run through, instead they leaped, trying to get closer. Huds picked off one in the air, the rest were going after Dawson. The first elite landed directly I front of him, about to punch him with all it's strength and momentum. Before the elite could move his hand forward, Dawson shot the elite in the legs, sending him to the ground. He then kicked him in the face, knocking it unconscious. Another elite nearly landed on top of Dawson's face, but he quickly thrust the butt of his shotgun into the groin of the elite. It wailed in pain, evidently male elites had the same problem as male humans. Dawson fired, shooting the elite in the head. It's wailing ceased and it dropped to the ground. The other two were further back from the group and had just leaped over the fire of the LAAG, which seemed to be concentrated on the jackals. Dawson quickly grabbed a plasma grenade from one of the fallen elites, and threw it towards the two that were about thirty feet away. It landed square on the nose of the lead elite, but seeing as the elite was in the air, it had no time to maneuver. It exploded a mere fifteen feet from the two Spartans, killing the remaining elites without bringing any injury to the black suited soldiers. While Dawson had been dealing with the elites, Huds had thrown a frag grenade into the group of four jackals and remaining two grunts, who were using the jackals as shields. It exploded killing all but one grunt. The grunt stood up, dropping his gun. He looked back and forth between the two Spartans.

      "Yikes!" it finally yelled, running away from the two. Dawson raised his pistol, and fired one more shot. It hit the grunt in the back of it's head, sending blue blood all over the floor in front of it.

      "That was easy enough," Huds said.

      "Enough with the chatter, Private," Dawson said. "We have to get in there and get the Chief out." With that there was a crackle over their Comm units.

      The Chief was on the ground, Icarath's plasma sword rushing down quickly to meet him. The Chief grabbed the only thing that still remained on his belt, squeezed it, and lifted it to block Icarath's sword. The handle he had grabbed in the armory earlier flashed blue as a charge of plasma ran through it. In a fraction of a second it looked like a refined plasma sword, just like Icarath's. The Chief's sword collided with Icarath's, stopping it suddenly with a blue flash. Icarath was stunned, not moving, not comprehending that the MC wasn't dead. The Chief kicked Icarath hard in the gut, and swung his plasma sword at Icarath's heels. He barely reached the ankle of his left foot, making a small cut. Icarath was still stunned, not moving. The Chief seized this opportunity, leaping to his feet. Icarath finally realized what had happened, and swung back at the Chief. He was not accustomed to using this weapon, and tried to block the incoming swing. When he did, there was another blue flash, his own sword ricocheting off of Icarath's. The Chief went for the offensive, trying to jab Icarath in the stomach. Icarath lowered his own sword, knocking the Chief's out of the way. MC was now wide open to any attack of Icarath's. Icarath went right for the head, trying to lob it off. The Chief ducked it, and stood back up. He was now behind Icarath, but the elite spun quickly, punching at MC. The Chief pulled back from his arm, and raised his own plasma sword. It cut right through Icarath's arm, just above the elbow. The elite's forearm dropped to the ground, separated from his body, along with a horrible scream of pain from Icarath. With the MC's plasma sword now pointed high in the air, he spun around and delivered an elbow to the face of the wailing elite. He stumbled back even more, still screaming in pain. With a loud bass scream, the elite took one last stab at the Chief. It scraped against the Chief's armor, scraping some off and exposing the softer layer underneath. The vacuum in his suit was still intact, but the armor all the way up his right arm was shaved to the lower layer. With that, the Chief stabbed at the extended arm of Icarath, as hard as he could. This knocked the plasma sword down and out of the way. The Chief's sword was now pointed into the ground on his right side. He raised it as fast and as hard as he could, to the upper left, cutting across where the elite's gargantuan neck was. The armor around his neck exploded in a rain of white sparks, the Chief blinded for a moment. The next thing the MC saw was Icarath's head landing on the ground behind him. Icarath's plasma sword dissipated, disappearing completely. The body of the elite, still pouring its purple blood, collapsed in front of the Chief, spraying his MJOLNIR armor. His armor now had the original sage color, along with greens from Flood, and the purple of the elite. After a few seconds, the Chief caught his breath, and released the handle of the sword. With that the Chief's sword dissipated, and he was once more disarmed. The Chief set his channel to that of Dawson and Huds'.

      "Dawson, Huds, you two still there?" the Chief asked.

      "Yes, sir, small Covenant force, but no casualties," it was Dawson who responded.

      "Get away from the door, I'm going to blast it," the Chief said.

      "With what, sir? That stuff's way too powerful for a jackhammer," Huds replied.

      "Stow it, soldier," Dawson's voice again.      "Not strong enough for a Covenant plasma tank, I hope," the Chief said.

      "We are in position one hundred feet from the door, sir," Dawson said. The Chief smiled. They were quite fast, even for a Spartan soldier. The Chief hopped into the closest plasma tank and powered it up. He found the weapons control, and fired a plasma mortar at the door. It still stood, but was dented at a very odd angle. He fired again, creating a large hole in the door. The middle of the blast doors had collapsed onto Huds and Dawson's side, and the Chief hopped out of the tank.

Running toward the other Spartans, he asked Cortana, "How much longer till this thing sets off to become part of the sun?"

"Fifteen minutes, Master Chief," Cortana replied.

"John, remember. It's John," the Chief said, smiling.

Part XIV

      The Chief, Huds, and Dawson all made it back to the shuttle bay in ten minutes, and saw the destruction the other Spartans had been up to. The only problem was that the three Spartans had no access to the other groups. They saw the barricades stacked up, so they dropped down onto barricades that were on the bottom floor as to not injure themselves. They then climbed up the stack of barricades to find the Monitor playing with the door controls for the shuttle bay. There was not enough room in the shuttle bay for five boarding craft again, so only one sat at the island.

      "Ah, Master Chief," Teff said, turning his attention toward him. "Is everything wrapped up on your end?"

      "Yes, Petty Officer," the Chief replied, speaking once again professionally with his hands behind his back, chin up, and feet forward. "The Covenant Elite will have no chance to impede our progress anymore, and will have no way to exit this ship."

      "Good. But you don't have to talk to my like I'm you superior, we are in co-command of this operation," Teff said. The Chief slowly returned to a casual stance, but still spoke professionally.

      "We have to get out of here, soon," the Chief said. "In about five minutes this ship will be in slipspace on it's way to a brighter future."

      "We can only transport one ship in at a time, so we may need it," Teff said. "First craft, ready?" Teff yelled out. The first boarding craft seemed full, with its nine soldiers.

      "Yes sir!" they all yelled back. The first ship left and another craft flew inside. This continued until there was two minutes left, and time for the Chief, Teff, and Guilty Spark to leave.

      "Come on, GS," the Chief said, walking into the boarding craft.

      "Well, Reclaimer, I can't do that," the robot responded. "If I do, there is no way for the shuttle bay door to remain open. Since they were damaged in the fight, they need some other mechanical object to get them to open."

      "There has to be a way to get you out," the Chief said, looking around.

      "No, there isn't. I would prefer it this way. I started this all because of vengeance of the bad memories I've had, of the ForeRunner locking me within Halo for thousands of years. But I have realized my memories are not worth having. This is what I deserve, and I shall take it all in nobly," the Monitor said, seeming as noble as he claimed. A small disk rose out of the top of GS. "Here, take this. It is all of the information that I carry, and you do deserve it, Reclaimer. Your race has shown to me that you deserve to live, unlike what I last thought. You are fighting a losing war for a reason you don't know, but this perhaps will explain some of it." The Chief stepped out of the ship and plucked the disk from the floating orb.

      "Goodbye, 343 Guilty Spark, and thank you," the Chief said, turning and running into the boarding craft.

"Less then one minute...." Cortana said within.

"Goodbye, Reclaimer, Master Chief John 117," the little robot said, looking down at the panel and opening the doors. The last boarding craft left, with the blue light of the Monitor slowly fading away. When the small blue light had completely disappeared, the CPO hit a button on his TransComm unit.

"Flight Officer, give me an ID on that ship," Teff said.

"Sir, your going to love the irony in this one," the Flight Officer replied, chuckling. "The Advocate." The Chief already knew it, but chuckled hearing it this time, along with Teff.

"Don't laugh!" the Chief yelled. The entire ship went silent. "We have done the Covenant a momentous service! We have destroyed their biggest, most important lawyer!" Everyone starting laughing again, more then before, as the Covenant ship disappeared into slipspace, carrying 343 Guilty Spark with it.

When the Chief had reached the planet, had been debriefed, and had a nice long shower and nap; Teff began explaining to him the Spartan-III project.

"Well, the Spartan-IIIs were started about a month after the Spartan-IIs. The higher-ups saw that the Spartan-IIs were going to be everything they hoped, so they made a backup in case. As you know the Spartan-IIs were all killed, except for yourself, on Reach. Since then there have been numerous advances in the armor, with added resistance to plasma, better deflection rating of projectiles, and one especially fun feature that you know nothing about," Teff explained. A group of the Spartans was passing by the two veterans who were walking down the hallway. "Private!" Teff spoke loudly.

"Sir!" he responded.

"Camo change, winter!" Teff said. The Private pressed two buttons on his suit, and the color instantaneously changed from black to white. "Pretty neat, eh?"

"Yes, I'll have to pick up one of those suits before I leave, sir," the Chief said.

"Stay a few days at least. You've had a long straining ordeal, and you need a rest," Teff said.

"Sorry, can't do that," the Chief said. "I should have returned to earth quite a while ago, and now that I've gotten enough sleep to last me a few more days, I'm ready to go."

"Well, I can see there's no chance of making you change your mind, is there?" Teff asked.

"Nope, not even with your persuasion techniques," the Chief said, giving Teff a light punch in the arm. "I'm supposed to leave in an hour, I need to find Cortana, get one of your new suits, and get on that Longsword." The Chief saluted Teff, something he felt he hadn't done since his days on Reach. Teff saluted back.

"Come this way and I'll get you the first two," Teff said, walking into the command centre that they had been walking toward the entire time. They walked into the command centre and saw a hundred or so people crowded around one terminal.

"What's going on, Teff?" the Chief asked.

"Beats me, lets take a look," Teff said, walking toward the terminal. When they got close enough, they could hear Cortana speaking through the terminal.

"...Now I can't be sure if it is, but it's a planet we've never been to before, and it was titled as it. Now, don't get your hopes up; it could always be something else. Oh, Chief, Petty Officer Teff, welcome," Cortana said, her image flickering in front of them. The Chief smiled. He hadn't seen her in a day, and after being with her for a period of about two weeks, he kind of missed her. Cortana saw his smile and returned it.

"What have you found, Cortana?" the Chief asked.

"Well, in case no one told you, I was going to look through the disk the Monitor gave you and see if there was anything of vast importance. And, there was. There are thousands of pieces of information in here, including cultural, technological, and mechanical. There were a few blueprints for some types of weapons and armor, but the most interesting is this," Cortana said, motioning toward the screen. There was the title of "Alien Homeworld" at the top, with a series of numbers beneath it.

"Those are coordinates!" Teff said.

"To the Covenant Homeworld..." the Chief said. "So the trip to the Advocate wasn't all in vain."

"Chief, you have to take these coordinates to earth for us. They are of monumental importance," Teff said. "Once that is done, we will have enough time to have looked through all of the Monitors data. Or at least most of it..." Teff had just looked at the list of never ending information on the terminal next to it.

"Cortana, T-30 minutes until we board," John told her, beginning to walk away.

"Yes, John," Cortana said, still smiling. John smiled as well, but didn't let her see.

The Chief sat in the seat of the Longsword fighter; Cortana in the computer as well since the Chief wasn't wearing his new MJOLNIR armor. Set course for earth, Cortana, he said as they left the planet's atmosphere. After a long goodbye from Teff, they were finally on their way. Before they had left, Teff told him what happened to his old trainer and mentor, CPO Mendez. Since the Spartan IIIs were finished their training, he had left them once again as he had the Chief's group of Spartans, to train even more of the impressive super soldiers. Since the Spartan IIIs were for the most part successful, Teff said it was going to most likely be the larger then the numbers of the two other Spartan groups put together, even though none other then the Chief remained from the IIs. Nothing else that would be of use right away was found in the Monitor's disk, except the blueprints for a newer MJOLNIR armor. When the Monitor told the Chief to upgrade from a Class 2 armor to Class 12, he wasn't kidding. This armor seemed to be just like their current armor, except there was no visible power source, as well as more layers with a seemingly lighter alloy. If the tech boys on Thermopylae could figure out how to create and use it, the Covenant was in for a lot more trouble on the ground. The trip to earth was a short one, with only about two days left until they reached the large blue planet.

The Chief looked up. There he was, on the bridge of a Covenant Cruiser, shotgun in hand; green blood coating his MJOLNIR suit, but something was different... He took a quick glance around and remembered. The yellow decaying body of a human warrior flood lay before him, blown to pieces by his shotgun. The walls were covered all over with green ooze. They seemed to look as if they were melting, but stayed completely still. There were stalactites and stalagmites everywhere. It seemed like thousands of years of decay had happened since someone was in the bridge, but everything seemed so familiar... Maybe the bridge would tell him something, he thought. But something told him not to go. Still, he pressed on. Slowly, he walked up the ramp towards the bridge, pushing both Flood warriors and Covenant corpses (or what remained of them) out of the way. He reached the top to see what he had come for. The Captain stood there; looking as good as he ever had since the Chief had known him.

"Sir!" the Chief said, running forward.

"Chief, thank you," the Captain said. "You saved me from the Flood. For that I thank you. You are one hell of a soldier, and I feel proud to have commanded you, even for a very short time. You and Cortana need not worry about me now, you've done more then I could ever ask for."

"Twelve hours until arrival," Cortana said, waking the Chief. Her hologram flickered and came up before him. "Sorry, did I wake you?"

"Yes," was all the Chief said.

"Is something wrong?"

"No... No, not anymore," the Chief said, leaning back into his chair, and closing his eyes trying to get back to sleep.

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