"But the hero...never gets to see that ending. They'll never know if their sacrifice actually made a difference."
Epsilon really regretted saying those words. But there was no other option left. He wished their were, but in the end, all of the evidence added up: there was no way he could run enough systems on the Meta's armor to save his friends. Only a new A.I. could do that.
And there was only one way to get a new A.I. here.
"They'll never know if the day was really saved."
[Temporal Distortion Unit Activated]
[Reformatting Protocols Selected]
[Warning: Reformatting now will erase all prior data in this A.I. unit. Continue [Y/N] ?]
"In the end... they just have to have faith."
Church looked around at all of the people in the room, which, even with his mass perception difference from a normal human, was only possible because of the distortion unit. Here were people that he could call quite a few different things: stupid, gung-ho, perverted, paranoid, psychotic...
But most importantly of all, he could call them...
His friends.
"Ain't that a bitch."
[Y]
*thud*
"OW! What the-come on, ya stupid Charon dogs! Bring it on!"
"WHAT THE FUCK!?"
"Huh?" responded Sarge.
"Sir, with all do respect, CALM THE FUCK DOWN!" shouted a rather surprised sounding man.
After shaking his head for a moment to fight off a raging headache, Sarge took in his surroundings. It looked like he was on a ship of some kind, and it wasn't the staff of Charon.
"Ugh, um, where am I?" he asked.
"Seriously? You're on the fucking Konkers, man!"
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGHHHHHH-OOF. Ugh, what happened."
"You fell off your bunk. Again," responded a female voice. "That's the third time this month, Caboose."
"I know... wait, Lisa?! Is that you?" asked Caboose.
"...I think someone hit their head a lot harder then normal," responded another female voice.
"...Patty?"
The first thing Doc did when he could stand up was go and puke in the nearest trashcan he could find.
"Ugh, what happened?"
"How should I know, we're the same person!"
"Hey, Frank, how're you doing?"
"Ugh, um, not well... wait, Melvin?"
"Yeah?"
"..."
'What's going on?'
'What do you mean' replied O'Malley. 'And who is Melvin.'
'One of my...um...colleagues from Med School. But we stopped seeing each other after I graduated.'
"Wait," went Sarge, "I'm on da Konkers?"
"Yes, you bloody idiot," replied the other soldier. Now that Sarge had a better look at him, he noticed he was wearing recon armor."
"But I haven't been on the Konkers for... wait, what's they date?
"...June 7, 2551."
"Today's the day you're supposed to ship out, Caboose," remarked Patty.
'Oh man, that was so much fun! We got to play games, and have the super friendly instructor give us encouragement really loudly... wait, I went to training camp more than two years ago.'
'Wait, you guys stopped meeting after medical school. Why? And were you, um, interested in him?'
'...One: we met because we studied together; and 2: I think Melvin is asexual. But that's not what worries me.'
'And what would that be?'
'I graduated from Med-School about three years ago, and according to my armor clock, today's my graduation day, down to the year.'
'...wait, so you mean'
'Yes. Somehow.'
Across the UNSC, roughly 2o minds shared the same thought:
'I've/We've gone back in time.'
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AN: Happy Roosterteeth Day!
Read and Review! This is Flameal15k, signing off.