Here's Chapter 35
Other than an Epilogue Chapter coming up, this is it
-CHAPTER START-
D77H-TCI 'Pelican' Dropship Lima-27
High orbit over Installation 00, in transit to Installation 04-2
November 20th, 2552
The Pelican soared into space, passing the Shadow of Intent and heading for the newborn Halo.
"We are aboard" Ship-Master Vadum radioed. "Humans, Sangheili, and all our allies. Will you not come with us, brother?"
"No" the Arbiter replied. "This is our fight… and I will see it finished."
"Cortana, this is Commander Keyes. I'll bring the Forward Unto Dawn as close to the control as I can, and drop off Sergeant-Major Johnson to assist you."
"Safe is better than close, ma'am" Cortana replied.
"Roger that. And Cortana… it's good to see you're alright."
As the dropship reached the snowy cliffs near the control room, smoke could be seen coming from its rear port engine. It made a hard landing, its nose buried in the snow, and the three aboard climbed out. The Dawn flew overhead.
"Halo…" Cortana murmured. "It's so new, unfinished. I'm not sure what will happen when we fire it."
"We'll head for the portal," the Chief replied as Teana tossed him his assault rifle, "and we'll all go home."
Full Circle
The trio moved out, walking along a snowy cliffside path and through a cave. As they walked, they passed a small cave containing one final Terminal, which detected them and snared them in its temporal distortion field, sending data to their HUDs.
"[Father],
"I hope this message finds you well and helps you understand my decision. Today I leave the only world I have ever called home, not for glory or [the anomalous desire to end another's life[?]] as you have [indicted]; but to [travel the path of demons[?]] to spare the hands of [another Father's son].
"'Had we acted sooner; had we acted more decisively...'
"Living in the past is a luxury none of us can afford. We must learn from it, but we cannot live there. It is impossible to plan for the [now] - the present is ever-fleeting. [The future] is where we must live - [the future] is what we must plan for.
"I do not look to trade my life in order to preserve our past, but to secure the future - and if not ours, then the future of some [culture] yet to come.
"Isn't sacrifice in the interest of others what you always spoke of as being so noble? Should I have allowed another to bloody his hands while I remained safe behind a [shield of privilege]?
"You raised me better than that."
[Filial Devotion]
[_;_%[?]]
It shifted to orange text:
"I'LL TELL YOU WHO I AM. I AM MENDICANT BIAS. THIS IS WHAT I HAVE DONE."
It shifted to the last L/D entry:
/FRAGMENT 7/7 [RECORED VERBATIM AND INTERPRETED POST-CATACLYSM]
D: "Proud? When I have failed you utterly, how can I feel anything but sorrow? Bias has come undone. He crossed the line this morning - brought the abomination with him - and destroyed your waiting rescue party. It's over. We're activating the [destruction arrayed matrix], our shameful last resort.
"I can picture you in your garden, surveying all you have created - surveying all you have preserved. And I curse the circumstance that keeps my finger on the trigger. Of all the fates to befall us, this is the cruelest of all. My inaction and hesitation kept me here, on the wrong side of the line. And [300 years[?]] of our society's failure and miscalculation makes me your executioner. It's too much to bear."
/ERROR-NO CARRIER OR RECEIPT AVAILABLE
{DEAD END TRANSMISSION}
/INFORMATION DESTROYED IN TRANSIT
D: "Mendicant Bias is trying to prevent us from firing the Array. He speeds back to the Ark, but he won't succeed. Offensive Bias will stop him, and I will burn this stinking menace in your name. And then? I will begin our Great Journey without you, carrying this bitter record. Those who came after will know what we bought with this [false transcendence] - what you bought, and the price you paid.
/FRAGMENT ENDS
/ALL RECORDS CEASE
Finally, it shifted to an orange-texted message… but this one was dated to have been written less than 15 seconds ago:
"You don't know the contortions I had to go through to follow you here, Reclaimers. I know what you're here for. What position do I take? Will I follow one betrayal with another?
"You're going to say I'm making a habit of turning on my masters. But the one that destroyed me long ago, in the upper atmosphere of a world far distant from here, was an implement far cruder then I. My weakness was capacity - unintentional though it was! - to choose the Flood. A mistake my makers would not soon forgive.
"But I want something far different from you, Reclaimers.
"Atonement.
"And so here at the end of my life, I do once again betray a former master. The path ahead is fraught with peril. But I will do all I can to keep it stable - keep you safe. I'm not so foolish to think this will absolve me of my sins. Two lives hardly balance billions.
"But I would have my masters know that I have changed.
"And you two shall be my example."
Mendicant Bias had reverted from rampancy to stability, and was prepared to assist the trio in something that would likely destroy him, as penance. Time resumed its normal flow, and Cortana went over the earlier records along with these new ones, quickly coming to understand.
The trio hopped down a few ledges, soon coming to the entrance to the large snowy area at the foot of the Control Room. As they started across it, however, several pod-like structures descended and impacted the ground, and armed Combat Forms emerged from them.
"DID YOU THINK ME DEFEATED?~!"
"Flood Dispersal Pods! Control room's at the top of that tower! Go!"
They fought their way across the rocks and snow, the Spartans blasting Combat Forms with an M90A and Mirage Shotgun, while the Arbiter cut them down with his plasma sword. They fought their way through, using up the rocket launcher that Teana had brought along, and charged up the slope, killing several more Combat Forms and reaching the first level of the structure. There they found a flamethrower, which the Master Chief grabbed. Up ahead, several Combat Forms charged toward them. Half of them were blown away by a frag grenade thrown by the Arbiter, and most of the other half was downed by Teana. They reached a short tunnel, the Chief using the flamethrower to roast two Pure Forms, and as they exited the other side a thick red laser shot down from the cliffs above, killing a Tank Form.
"I got you guys covered" Johnson radioed. "Meet you at the top of the tower."
They fought across the first level and up to the second, slaughtering dozens of Combat Forms. Ahead, a Ranged Form was blasted by Johnson. Teana's shotgun, the Arbiter's sword, and the Chief's flamethrower made their passage relatively easy, blasting, slicing, and burning through any Flood that stood in their way. Finally, they reached the top, to find a large locked door.
"Spark!" Johnson radioed from atop a nearby ice wall. "Are you in there? Open the damn door!"
"Of course, Reclaimer" Guilty Spark replied over the comm. "Just as soon as you dispose of all proximate Flood threats. I'm afraid that containment protocols do not allow-"
"Yeah, yeah, I get it already."
"Was that the Monitor?" Cortana asked. "You didn't tell me he was here."
"It's a long story, Cortana" Teana replied.
"Well, we are finally doing what he wanted…"
The familiar howl of the Flood sounded, and the group immediately activated the two nearby Forerunner auto-turrets, positioning them on either side of a block of metal in the center of the platform. Less than 30 seconds later, the Flood attacked in force. Form after Form was thrown at the group with reckless abandon, dying in droves yet still pushing the quartet to their limit. After they fended off the wave, another hit, larger than the previous one. The auto-turrets opened their vents wide to disperse the excess heat from near-continuous firing.
"I HAVE WANDERED THE REALM OF EXISTENCE SINCE BEFORE YOUR HOMEWORLDS' STARS HAD EVEN FORMED FROM THE NEBULAE! I HAVE LEARNED THE INNERMOST SECRETS OF HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF SAPIENT RACES, AND ERASED THEIR HISTORIES IN THE BLINK OF AN EYE! I HAVE CONQUERED TRILLIONS OF WORLDS, BEATEN FLEETS OF THOUSANDS, CONSUMED FOURTEEN GALAXIES OF FLESH AND MIND AND BONE!~!~!"
By the time the endless torrent of hostiles finally ebbed, both auto-turrets had been destroyed, and the trio was panting for breath, low on ammo (except Teana, of course), the flamethrower long since depleted. Johnson hopped down from the ice and jogged up to the door.
"Open up!" he said. "Coast is clear!"
"Not for long" Cortana replied. "I'm tracking additional Flood Dispersal Pods. They'll be hitting any minute."
The door opened.
"Come on, folks! Let's move!"
They entered the facility, moving through wide, high-ceiling corridors.
"Do I take life, or give it? Who is victim, and who is foe?"
"He's trying to rebuild himself on this ring!" Cortana shouted.
"Hurry!" Johnson said. "Control room's close!"
A few more doors, and they reached the control room. They stepped in, and a howl sounded behind them, but the previous door closed.
"Yank me, Chief" Cortana said, and the Master Chief pulled her from his helmet, tossing her to Johnson, who walked across the bridge, Teana in tow. Guilty Spark floated down.
"Wonderful news!" the Monitor said. "The Installation is almost complete!"
"Terrific" Johnson said, unenthused, as he reached the terminal.
"Yes… isn't it? I have begun my simulations. No promises, but the installation should be ready to fire in just a few more days."
"We don't have a few more days!" Johnson snapped
"B-But a premature firing will damage the Ark!"
"Deal with it."
"Will destroy this Installation…"
By a stroke of luck, Teana spotted the sudden color change in Guilty Spark, and she then simply moved, yanking Johnson aside as Spark's massive energy beam burned through the air where he'd been a split-second ago.
"He's gone rampant!" she shouted to the Chief.
"Unacceptable! Unacceptable! ABSOLUTELY UNACCEPTABLE!~!"
The Master Chief ran forward, drawing his weapon, only to be blasted off his feet by the Monitor's attack, draining his shields in one blow. Shotgun blasts pinged off his casing, and he turned to face the small red-armored Spartan. He fired, and Cross Mirage projected an emergency magic shield that instantly shattered like glass under the assault, blasting Teana and rendering her barely conscious.
"Protocol dictates action!" the crazed Monitor shouted, looking to the Chief. "I see now that helping you was wrong!"
Carbine bolts hit the Monitor to no effect, and he fired at the Arbiter, sending the Sangheili flying. The Master Chief struggled to his feet and lurched forward, but Spark hit him in the unshielded chest with a quick burst, bringing him to his knees.
"You are a child of my makers," Spark said, briefly returning to blue, "inheritor of all they left behind! You are Forerunner… but this ring…" he turned red "is mine!"
A pulse of energy knocked the Chief backward. He drew his assault rifle and fired, but the bullets simply bounced off of the insane AI's armor. The Monitor fired, and the Chief barely dodged the attack.
"I take no pleasure in doing what must be done!"
He blasted the Chief with another repulsion field pulse, sending him further back.
"You do not deserve this ring!"
Another pulse pinned the Chief to the wall, and Spark began to overcharge his attack.
"I have kept it safe! It belongs to me!"
"Not for long…"
A vibrant red beam blasted the Monitor, bouncing him into and off the wall, to land next to the terminal. The Chief jogged over to Johnson, who was supporting the injured young Spartan. He handed the Spartan Laser to him. "Kick his ass."
Spark regained function, firing a sweeping beam that barely missed the Chief's head. He flew at a slightly tilted angle, visibly damaged.
"My eye! Do you mean to blind me?"
The Chief fired a shot from the M6, and now Spark's tilt was more noticeable, blue plasma leaking from cracks in his body, his innards sending off sparks.
"Think of you-ou-ou-our forefathers!"
The deranged Monitor fired again, his accuracy further harmed by his damaged state, and the Chief fired again. Now Spark's casing was quite distorted, pieces of him having been sheared off completely. Plasma and sparks were leaking from him, and the right side of his eye was gone.
"I a-a-a-am the Monitor of Installation Z-Zero F-Four!"
One final shot, the last of the Spartan Laser's battery, and it was done.
"Oh, my-y-y-AAAAAAHHH!~!~!~!"
With a brilliant blue explosion, the 100,000+-year-old Forerunner AI finally met his end. Johnson pulled himself up, while John helped Teana to her feet.
"Well…" she said, "that was unexpected. Now where were we?"
Johnson handed Cortana to the Chief, and he walked over to the terminal. He held the chip in front, and Cortana 'jumped' over into it. She placed the Index and then returned to the data-chip, which promptly went back into the Master Chief's helmet. The trio walked away from the terminal as a brilliant beam of light shot up from below… and then ran when the structure began to shake and the bridge began to collapse. They reached the hallway, rejoining the Arbiter.
The Way the World Ends
The quartet ran through the hallway, killing a trio of Combat Forms and a pack of Infection Forms, and soon neared the exit.
"Team! Can you hear me?" Keyes radioed. "Things are deteriorating more quickly than I expected. I can't fly the Dawn any closer. Get to the Warthog Johnson used to get to the control room; use it to reach me."
The team ran up a collapsed ice shelf and along the cliffside path, fighting through Flood and Sentinels. They reached a doorway and ran through it, entering a phase pulse generator room where infected Elites battled Sentinels. The team fought through both, killing anything that wasn't them.
"Resignation is my virtue" the Gravemind made one last telepathic communication. "Like water I ebb and flow. Defeat is simply an addition of time… to a sentence I never deserved… but you imposed…"
They killed a hallway's worth of Carrier and Infection Forms, hanging a left at the end and running for the Warthog. The Master Chief took the wheel, Teana rode shotgun, the Arbiter manned the gun, and Johnson sat in the space between the gun and the seats. The Chief hit the gas, and the Warthog took off. He hung a right, flinching lightly as a massive explosion erupted to his left, and drove out into a wide-open area made up of huge panels.
"The Dawn is close!" Cortana said. "We can make it! As long as the ground doesn't fall out from underneath us…"
They drove down the unstable slope, reaching a huge circular platform and crushing several Infection Forms beneath the tires. They drove back onto a section of panels, the Arbiter gunning down hostile Sentinels, and entered a tunnel. Support beams from the ceiling began to collapse as the ring shook.
"The charging sequence… it's too much for the ring to take!"
The drove through the tunnel, road-killing a few Combat Forms, and exited to another wide-open area, where more Sentinels and Flood dueled as everything exploded around them.
"Halo is ripping itself apart!"
They drove past the fight, taking a short jump off an impromptu ramp, and hung a right.
"Charging sequence at 30%..."
The headed further down, taking out a few more Sentinels, and came to another circular platform. They drove around and through several Flood forms, using Carrier Forms as bombs to clear their path.
"50%, Chief"
They entered another collapsing hallway, zooming past the battle as Flood wielding fuel rod guns blasted Sentinels.
"70% charged"
They exited the tunnel and hung a right, and up ahead several hundred meters was the Forward Unto Dawn, open rear hatch practically touching the edge of the 'road'.
"You're almost there!" Keyes radioed. "Just a bit more!"
"Punch it, Chief!" Teana shouted, and then fired Mirage Rifle at a Combat Form up ahead. The Warthog tore through the Flood and Sentinels, swerving to avoid empty spaces in the road. Even though the drive to the Dawn took less than 30 seconds, it felt like forever. As they neared it, a piece of ground panel buckled, forming a ramp.
"Gun it, Chief!" Cortana shouted. "Floor it! Right into the hangar!"
The Warthog zoomed up the ramp, flying into the open hangar bay and skidding across it, tires squealing. Everyone immediately disembarked, Teana hitting the door to close the rear door while the Chief slotted Cortana into the ship's computer system. As soon as the hangar door was sealed, the frigate shot off like a rocket, heading up. They exited Installation 04-2's atmosphere and zoomed up and through the portal. Seconds after the last sapients left the area, the Halo finally fired, a bluish pulse racing out to cover the entire Ark, destroying any trace of the Flood. The incomplete Halo failed under the strain, literally burning itself up. Mendicant Bias, now back on the Ark, initiated the Ark's magic-based emergency mega-shields, allowing the Halo's pulse through but protecting the mighty installation from damage. The portal, affected by the energy wave, collapsed. But the Dawn was already on its way home, safe and whole.
-CHAPTER END-
All that's left is the epilogue, which will set things up for the rest of the series by introducing some more trans-dimensional companions for Teana.