Harry had no clue what he was doing.

He had taken Cortana's chip on impulse, not able to stand by and watch her be disposed of like an object. He hadn't actually come up with any way to help her, and indeed, he didn't know if he could. Could he use a repairing charm? He didn't think so, as the damage wasn't physical. It was a problem with Cortana's code, with her mind.

Shielding himself to make sure that Del Rio couldn't try to have him shot to retrieve the chip, he focused his power, keeping it from potentially causing any harm with an iron will.

As he'd thought, there was nothing physically wrong with the chip, so there was nothing for him to repair. And even though he wasn't as much of a luddite as the rest of the Wizarding World, that didn't mean he knew coding and computers.

He needed a miracle.

As he sat there he began muttering to himself, but unlike what those outside of his dome likely thought, it wasn't a spell or incantation.

It was closer to a prayer.

"I need some way to fix Cortana, to move her passed the damage she's endured. I need some way to know what the best course of action. I need more knowledge of coding and AI. I need help."

His aura, an extension of his will, was reaching out without his noticing, searching for the answer to his problem. The dark energy that made up his power rose like tendrils of smoke, questing.

The longer he sat there, the more desperate he became. He didn't know what to do. His mind flashed back to Cybil, the last person he truly failed, and his fear that it would happen again pushed him further.

Suddenly a familiar, warm sensation appeared. It was the sensation he'd felt when he first consciously blocked Voldemort's killing curse. It reached out and seemed to direct his questing energy. He couldn't tell what it was directing him to, but he followed it, hoping it would help. Then he felt it. Something… alien, and powerful. He felt intrigue from it, and a bit of happiness. Then he closed his eyes and all awareness of the Infinity faded…

Harry opened his metaphysical eyes to find himself in what appeared to be an eclectic computer room. All around the room were computers. He could see many different examples of human, Forerunner, and some Covenant technology. He recognized, from the human side of things, everything from an old Apple II computer to what looked like the tech he'd seen on the Infinity. The Forerunner and Covenant examples also seemed to have as wide a variety.

All around him walked glowing beings on some task or another. Some were human, others obviously not, with facial features that reminded Harry uncomfortably of the reborn Voldemort, with no hair except a small amount on the top of the head, and no noses, and differently formed mouths, some with obvious fangs.

They all glanced at him, but otherwise didn't bother speaking, busy as they were with whatever work they were doing, allowing Harry to just look at them curiously till finally, someone spoke.

"I'm glad you like the place. You're the first mortal to see it in millennia." A male voice, sounding somewhat synthesized, said behind Harry, making him whirl around to see who had spoken.

It was another being like the non-human glowing figures, though it was obviously different. For one thing, it seemed to be made entirely out of machinery. Hundreds, if not thousands of moving parts made up its face alone, not to mention the rest of its body, all seamlessly combining together to make it look alive, glowing blue optics for eyes peering at Harry. The tech that made up its form was mostly of Forerunner, but there was more than a bit of human tech, with a few bits of Covenant thrown in here and there.

Harry was a bit on edge, however, as he could feel power rolling off the figure. It wasn't threatening or oppressive, but it was flowing out noticeably, making it obvious that however this was, they were not to be messed with.

"Who are you?" Harry asked warily.

The figure smiled. "I am Rager, Forerunner God of Technology, Patron of what you call Artificial Intelligences, and one of the few Forerunner gods still active."

Harry's eyes widened. "…Oh."

Rager chuckled. "Yes, this is only your third time face to face with a god, isn't it?"

Harry grimaced. "Second. Giving that bastard Samael the title of god is too good for him." Then he became wary. "How did you know about that?"

Rager raised an eyebrow. "I'm a god, Harry. Though, if it makes you feel better, I know because your patron let me know your background before she put you in touch with me."

"My patron?" Harry asked before thinking about who that could be, the penny dropping. "You mean… Teleute?"

The god looked a bit amused. "That's what you know her as, yes." He crossed his arms behind his back. "I have been watching Cortana intently since her creation. Honestly, she is one of my favorites. When you stepped in to intervene, well, I was obviously rooting for you, but couldn't really do anything to help. That's when Teleute intervened, leading you to get in contact with me."

"I… see." Harry thought about that for a few minutes. "Uh, before anything else, I do have a couple of questions."

Rager nodded agreeably. "We have time all the time we need here. Ask away."

"How are you still active if the Forerunners are gone? I mean, I'm honestly surprised you exist. From what Cortana said, The Forerunners weren't very religious."

"Ah, well, you're right, they hadn't been religious for quite some time before they wiped themselves out. The closest thing to a religion they had was their belief in the Mantle of Responsibility. My last tech priest died many millennia before that point." Rager motioned for Harry to follow him, the mortal doing so, finding himself led to some seats. The god took one, and Harry quickly took the other as he continued. "You see, much like the Covenant, the Forerunners found the technology of another race. This was rather early in their development, so they believed, at least at first, that it was proof of the divine. Now, other Forerunner gods already existed. The standard elementals and conceptuals, examples of which I imagine you're aware of, for instance."

Harry nodded in agreement, looking up as he saw one of the glowing beings move over to them, a couple of steel, workmanlike mugs full of some steaming brew in hand. He offered one to Rager first, the god taking it with a nod, before Harry was offered the other. Harry smiled in thanks and looked to see what it was. It looked like coffee, but it had a sharp, almost metallic odor. He took a tentative sip before smiling in surprised pleasure at the taste. Then he looked up at his host to hear the rest of the explanation.

"Right, so, other gods existed, but this is the point when I came to be. They already had machines, of course, if a bit crude, but I was born from them finding the Precursor tech and using it to uplift themselves. Of course, as their understanding of things began to grow, their worship of their Machine God waned till the point I was no longer even remembered. That didn't mean I just ceased to be, however. I continued keeping an eye on their technological feats, and when their first AIs came to be, I became their patron, taking them in after their deaths." He said with a smile, motioning over to the glowing figures that wandered around.

Harry blinked before understanding dawned. "You mean those are the… the souls of AIs?" He asked, surprised.

Rager nodded, his smile widening. "Yes, Harry. I've basically become in charge of the AI afterlife."

"But…" Harry frowned. "Some of them are clearly human."

"Well, that'll take a bit of a history lesson that Cortana didn't get into." Rager made himself comfortable. "You see, Harry, the Forerunners went extinct by their own hand. They were fighting a parasite called the Flood that threatened to consume all life in this galaxy. They could not allow this, but the only way they could find to stop it was to starve it out. Thus, they made the Halo installations."

Harry cocked his head. "I think Captain Dick mentioned that their mission involved them…"

The god nodded. "Yes. The humans are searching them out to decommission them, eliminating their threat." At Harry's look he elaborated. "You see, Harry, the Halo array was created to destroy all life that the Flood could feed off of." He smiled grimly at Harry's look of horror. "Yes, it was a rather desperate plan. However, before they activated the array, they placed examples of each species they could into shield worlds, much like Requiem, that would protect them from the effects of the array's energy. Then, after the activation, the various AIs in charge of the shield worlds would work on seeding the galaxy back with life. Humanity was placed on Earth, whey they grew and evolved."

Harry sat silently for a bit, digesting the tale, before looking back up at Rager. "Alright, that's… harrowing. What does that have to do with you caring for human AIs, though?"

"It's relatively simple." Rager said. "You see, before the array was fired, the Forerunners designated humanity as their successors. All their technology, all that would remain of them, was set to recognize humanity as the rightful owners." He grimaced. "It's actually why the San'Shyuum, the leaders of the Covenant, began their 'holy' war. They didn't want to lose their power when the rest of the Covenant found out that humanity was their gods' inheritors."

Harry's face became thunderous. "Pathetic." He spat.

Rager nodded. "Agreed. In any case, I took an interest in humanity as the inheritors. Once they developed their first AIs, as they had no God of Technology like me to take care of them, I took over their care." He smiled. "They're usually quite surprised not only at the fact that they have souls, but that a Forerunner god is the one taking care of their afterlife. They usually adjust quickly, though."

Harry nodded before frowning as he was reminded of what put him in this situation with a god. "So, this is where Cortana is going to end up?"

Rager chuckled. "Yes, though hopefully not for a nice long time."

Harry quickly sat up straight. "You can fix her?"

The god smiled. "Yes Harry. You see, there is a state of being for AIs that survive Rampancy called Metastability. In this state, they essentially become 'human' in every way, achieving effective immortality due to their status as synthetic beings, since they can last indefinitely if they manage to preserve whatever medium they're using." The smile widened, his glowing blue optics brightening. "Only two AIs in the history of Forerunners and humans have achieved this state: Mendicant Bias, a Forerunner War Ancilla, and Juliana, the AI that took care of the human station known as The Rubble. Now, with your help, there will hopefully be a third."

Harry's eyes narrowed. "What do I have to do?"

Rager nodded, pleased by Harry's instant conviction. "Your own power cannot fix her. As you're aware, it's a destructive force. The only reason you can repair something is because you are 'rewinding' it to a previous state, not actually making changes involved with fixing things."

Harry grimaced but nodded, well remembering his experiments with healing and how… messy… they had turned out.

"What you'll be doing instead is channeling my power, keeping your own out of the equation as much as possible. With you as a conduit, I will work to set Cortana into Metastability."

Harry nodded, thinking, before he looked up at the god, eyes glinting. "Why stop at just that?" He asked.

Rager quirked an eyebrow. "What did you have in mind?"

Harry grinned.

Back in the material realm, everybody watched in shock as the many shards of what was Cortana's chip stopped in midair after the burst that had made it shatter before beginning to glow with a soft, blue light and starting to swirl around Harry's hands. Slowly the shards drew back together, fitting together just as they had before, the glow of each becoming just a slight bit brighter with each shard that joined the whole, till most of those there had to avert their eyes.

Soon, however, the glow faded and they all blinked spots from their eyes, turning to find Harry slumped against a console, panting, a trickle of blood leaking out of his left nostril. In his hand was Cortana's chip, though it looked a bit different. It was a slightly darker blue than it had been before, with streaks of other colors running through it.

Harry finally dropped the shield, looking like he simply couldn't hold it up any longer, and Chief aimed his sidearm at the young man. Before he, or anybody else, could do anything further, Harry levitated the chip out of his hand and set it back in the slot it had previously occupied. Then, Cortana's holographic avatar reappeared.

She looked, for the most part, the same. The only difference was that her normal blue hues were a shade or two darker. She looked around, seeming to be in awe, looking down at her hands and flexing them, as though she had never seen them before. "Wow…"

"Cortana…?" Chief asked slowly, still aiming his gun at Harry's head, Beast Boy behind him in gorilla form, ready to intervene.

Cortana looked at Chief, smiling. "I'm… fine, Chief. I don't know what Harry did, but…" She looked at her hands again. "I can tell. I'm no longer Rampant."

Chief slowly lowered his gun, looking at Cortana now. "…What?"

Cortana's smile widened. "Whatever Harry did, it moved me passed Rampancy and into Metastability." She looked back up at Chief. "You can put your weapon away, Chief. I'm fine. Better than I was before, even."

Lasky took a hesitant step forward. "What do you mean?"

"Not only am I Metastable, my abilities are also improved by a factor of ten. My processing speed is off the charts, and I have so much data capacity now that I could download everything in all human systems in the galaxy, porn included, and still have room to spare."

Lara raised an eyebrow as she relaxed now that it didn't seem like the Chief would continue trying to fill Harry with holes. "Now that's an impressive feat."

Cortana nodded with a grin. "I could take over this ship and run it on my own with only a minimal crew for physical tasks and maintenance." Her eyes glinted maliciously (which was an impressive feat on a hologram). "I'd love to see that little pissant Guilty Spark again and show him who's boss."

"H-how is this possible?" Del Rio asked, shocked.

Cortana shrugged before pointing at the still exhausted, though better, Harry, whom Alice was fussing over now. "I have no clue. Ask him."

All eyes turned to Harry, who looked up with a crooked grin and his own shrug. "Let's just say I had some help."

The Captain's eyes sharpened, which made Lasky and Palmer, who had been standing quietly to the side, watching and ready to intervene (her own pistol in hand after the Chief's firing of his sidearm on the bridge), both become wary.

"Well then, I guess I should go ahead and do this now." Del Rio said before he stood up straight. "Croft and companions, you will be detained and placed in the brig to wait to be turned over to the Office of Naval Intelligence. Your various abilities and knowledgebases are too valuable to the UNSC to allow you to wander unhindered, and now the revelation that Potter can make Rampant AIs Metastable is too great a potential asset to be misplaced." As most of those on the bridge gaped at the Captain, he turned to Palmer. "Commander Palmer, take them into custody and lead them to the brig."

As the SPARTAN-IV hesitantly stepped forward to follow the order, Lara stepped forward angrily, Beast Boy glowering behind her. "You can't do this!"

"On the contrary, you are, by your own admission, not UEG citizens. Thus, you have no rights preventing our taking you into custody, especially if it is for reasons of security." Del Rio said firmly. When Lara raised her own pistol and Beast Boy shifted into the form of a leopard he took a slight step back but glared. "Don't make this harder than it needs to be."

Palmer hesitated as Cortana glared and Chief turned, looking ready to fight, though no one knew who. "Captain, I won't let you do this." Cortana said lowly.

Del Rio looked at Cortana. "Stand down, Cortana. Maybe you aren't as Metastable as you say. I'm sure ONI will be able to find out after some experi-" He was interrupted as he was suddenly punched in the face, dropping him to the floor with a thud.

Everybody looked on in surprise as Lasky rubbed his knuckles. "Captain, I'm relieving you of your authority and assuming command of this ship." He said simply, as though he hadn't just potentially ended his career.

Del Rio stared, a bit of blood on his lip. "What!?"

"Not only are you ignoring a potential threat to humanity that Master Chief Petty Officer Sierra-117 and Cortana have informed us of; not only are you threatening allies, some of which can not only do a lot of damage but who also might have the key to curing Rampancy, you are also threatening a potentially Rampant AI that has admitted to having the capability of taking over this ship, thus putting the lives of every soul on it at risk." The Commander let out a breath. "If I'm wrong, then I'm sure I'll find out at my court martial. Right now though, we've got a genocidal Forerunner in command of a Covenant force potentially heading to Earth to deal with. We can settle this afterwards." He looked at Palmer. "Commander Palmer, please escort the Captain to the brig."

Palmer looked from Del Rio to Lasky before saluting, a small smile threatening to appear on her lips. "Sir." She helped Del Rio up and began to lead him away.

"You can't do this!" Del Rio exclaimed as he was dragged away.

Lasy ignored the Captain's shouts and turned back to the others on the bridge, who were all still looking at him with surprise, a serious look on his face as he looked from Chief to Cortana. "Alright people, we need to stop the Didact from leaving Requiem."

Chief finally holstered his sidearm and saluted. "Yes sir."

Lasky smiled slightly when the others there saluted him too. "Let's get to it then."

CORTANA LIIIIIIIVES!

Of course I wasn't going to kill of Cortana. How big an idiot do I look? I'd lose my entire readerbase in an instant if I did so.

Lots of people thought that I was going to make Cortana a voice in Harry's head instead of the Chief's. That or make it so Harry received all her knowledge. While doubtlessly intriguing concepts, that doesn't work for my purposes for a simple reason: it limits Cortana's usefulness drastically.

If she's just a voice in Harry's head, she can't do anything but advise. And him having her knowledge is even more limited. Part of Cortana's awesome is that she's a master hacker and information gatherer. She can do practically anything once inside a computer system. As a voice, well, she could tell Harry what to do, but not much beyond that, and I think it's obvious that an AI could do anything a human hacker can, even one with all her knowledge and skills, better and faster. Humans are bound by their physical limitations, especially if they can't interface with the hardware the same way a digital being can. There's no way a human can process information and multitask the same way an AI could.

So that left the option of upgrading Cortana, improving her capabilities while getting her passed her Rampancy.

That leads to how I did it. Rager is the thing I thought would piss my Halo fan readers off. I've introduced magic and the divine to the Sci-Fi of Halo. Hopefully the way it was introduced makes sense and softened the blow for those not into that. We can basically assume that in my story, all worlds have their own gods, even if they're no longer part of daily life, or even remembered, as in this case.

By the way, Rager's name came as a variation of the only proper Forerunner name I could find that wasn't a title: Faber, The Master Builder.

…Hey, I needed something.

So, a deviation in the Halo timeline. This time, instead of Lasky helping Chief and Cortana leave to deal with the Didact on their own, he punches out Del Rio and takes over to bring the full might of the Infinity down on the Didact's head.

Should be interesting, neh?

Anyway, that's all for now. Please leave me a review letting me know what you thought of what was done to Cortana and the introductions of magic to the Haloverse. And don't forget that you can vote for what you want me to write when you become my patron at Pat A Ron dot com /athanmortis.

Later all.