A/N: For those that missed the first one, this is my first ever public story.

Also; sorry for the info dump. The cliche upgrades thing won't be as OP as it sounds; I've plans to "nerf" them in ways. And the humor, well; I tried.

Reach

August 31, 2552

0106 Hours

Sierra Beta-312

My eyes shot open, as a silver metal ball hovered me and itself through a facility.

"Huh? Wha?" I mumbled, still somewhat sleepy and in pain.

"Oh, Reclaimer! I found you heavily injured and decided to bring you into my facility to heal you and repair your combat skin!" The ball greeted me cheerfully.

"Sierra B312, Noble Six, sit-rep?"

"I am Monitor 589 Ardent Reflection, Reclaimer; now just rest, medical care will be here shortly."

When I woke up again, my armor was on a stand by the medical bed I was on. I had on a UNSC T-shirt and fatigue pants.

"Ardent? Where are you?" I asked. I figured I should look for my only guide in this facility, and deal with figuring out what to do next later.

"Ah, Reclaimer; I have repaired and upgraded your armor, and I have recovered many things I believe you may like. I can inform you of your armor's additions." 589 Ardent Reflection said.

"I'd like to hear what you've added to the armor." I responded.

"Of course Reclaimer; the combat skin is now able to create hardlight shields, and there are 3 layers of them; with the interior hardlight and the other two your normal energy shields, and the suit is able to shape the hardlight shield via your upgraded neural implant. The combat skin is integrated with all of the 'armor enhancements' and all have been upgraded to be stronger, or more efficient. Each enhancement now lasts for 15 of your minutes, and recharge within seconds, although if your suit's capacitors are empty, they will take at least 24 of your hours.

Your enhancements have somewhat fragile upgrades as I was quite rushed; so they may fail on you. Your combat skin comes with capacitors; able to recharge through the ArmorLock enhancement, energy absorbed by your shields, or through the reactor in your combat skin. I have miniaturized the reactor and increased its efficiency by a factor of 10 to the exponent of 4. Your weapons have been upgraded to fire hardlight rounds, although you can switch between your old ammunition and the hardlight rounds if you find the hardlight to have too much stopping power." The monitor rambled, going a mile-a-minute; and I interrupted him.

"Whoa, hey; did you...fix some of the more...organized etchings on the weapons? Those are a little sentimental…"

"Of course not Reclaimer, the ones that resembled alphanumeric markings were left alone for further review, you can select the ones you wish to keep." Ardent Reflection stated, bringing up a holographic screen for me to select the markings I wanted to keep on the guns.

"Now, as to the other upgrades, your weapons are able to be stored in a pocket dimension of sorts, with a small stockpile of your old ammunition in there as well if you prefer those. However, it is recommended you not deploy more than two weapons at once, as the strain on summoning ammunition from the pocket dimension cannot handle more. Your combat skin has been altered in other ways such as weight and material, but those changes should be quite noticeable once you don the suit."

As I finished selecting the desired markings to keep on my weapons, I turned to the monitor and said "So what were those 'things I may like' you noted to have recovered?" while putting on the upgraded suit, noticing I could just 'materialize' it onto me on command.

"Using your TacPad; as you call it, I discovered your penchant for vehicles and the damaged aircraft near your position. I have also recovered and repaired several other vehicles and given them upgrades similar in line to your armor, with minimal hardlight shielding, conversion to hardlight rounds, reduced weight, and a few enhancements were integrated into them."

Intrigued, I asked "What sort of enhancements?"

"Your Active Camouflage, Drop Shield for ground vehicles, and all your aircraft are equipped with the 'Evade' enhancement. All the vehicles are able to fire their weapons independently of you, though it will relinquish control if you so request. They are also able to be stored in the same pocket dimension of your weapons and can be called upon, however only one can be deployed at once."

"Well, let's see what vehicles there are." I said, excited. After all, vehicles were my specialty.

As I was hyping myself up to see what kinds of toys I would have to play with, a yellow field engulfed me and the monitor, transporting us to a vehicle bay. As I panned my eyes past the Mongooses, Pelicans, Falcons, Scorpions, and even a few Sabres, I saw a whole swarm of Warthogs and their respective variants. I was pretty sure I squealed in delight a little at seeing at least 10 of them outfitted with the MLRS turret.

"How accurate is the automatic tracking?" I asked Ardent Reflection.

"In testing the constructs could hit their target at 64.41% accuracy." The monitor replied with a hint of shame. It should be much closer to 100%, but the facility here is not the best of facilities."

"Good enough for me. More than enough." I brush him off, trying to cheer the monitor up. "Say, any other curiosities you got your hands on?"

"Oh, yes! I found that you had experimented with a different look, and have a second combat skin that you can swap between! It is the EOD armor according to your TacPad, but with other 'Mjolnir' types of armor; which produce a much slimmer profile than your current combat skin. It can come with a different color scheme if you have any preferences…?" The monitor asked.

"Sage Green with brown highlights." I answered. "By the way, did you change anything about...me?"

"I simply amplified the effects of your augments by a factor of 1.5, Reclaimer. Any more and it would have caused severe issues to your body. Your arms have implants installed in them now that are able to project person-sized hardlight barriers, although it will consume your nutrients so do watch your vitals; I've placed a bar that roughly measures such a thing on your TacPad and have made the TacPad's information able to be recalled via your neural implant."

"Huh, neat."

"Now Reclaimer, this world is ruined and intruders are beginning to break into this facility. I have a portal system for you to use if you wish or if you desire, you could try to fight your way out."

"I'll take the portals; but can you…'store' all these items; and possibly destroy this facility?"

"Of course;" Ardent Reflection answered as bubbly as he had been for the last hour or two of the facility's semi-tour and equipment brief.

Still curious, I asked "Actually, I never asked; what is this place exactly, looks similar to that place under Sword Base."

"Indeed, both facilities were constructed by the Forerunners;" Ardent Reflection began, and he continued to give me an abridged version of the history of the galaxy as well as the Flood, sending the relevant information to my TacPad as we made our way down to the portal room.

"We have arrived, Reclaimer. There are more upgrades and additions I was not able to mention to you, but you should be able to discover them along the way." The monitor seemed sad to see me go, and it kind of made sense; I had basically ordered him to commit suicide and to destroy the only home he has ever really known after he waited for any human to show up for hundreds of thousands of years.

"If you wish, you could always hop along in the suit;" I offered, a small part of me secretly hoping he would say yes.

"I'm sorry Reclaimer, but as much as I would love to go with you, my duties rest with this station." Ardent Reflection said, very sad and contemplating if his facility would really have to be destroyed.

"Alright then, you don't have to detonate the station, just terminate the Flood forms and it should prevent Reach from turning into an even worse hell." I compromised; I was gonna miss the AI that had saved my life and gave me a second chance.

"Thank you Reclaimer, now just select a planet on the screen and the portal will take you there. I will destroy the portal device after you; it is only a prototype and the intruders will attempt to chase you." The monitor had a tone of finality, nothing could change his mind.

"Thank you Ardent Reflection. It's been a pleasure." I said, feeling a sense of loss as I selected Earth, knowing the technology I wore and carried with me could change the tide of the war.

The portal opened, and I walked through. As I entered, I could hear the portal violently collapse on itself; most likely destroying the equipment. Sighing, I walked towards the other end, but a strange fluctuation caused me to be sent hurling forwards, and as I emerged I could see a city, marked 'New Mombasa' on my map. A Covenant Assault Carrier hung barely above the city, starting to open a slipspace portal. I was right above the ship, and falling alongside several ODST drop pods.

"Shiiiit!" I yelled, as the portal engulfed me.

I was still yelling and cursing as I slammed into grassy soil.