Cassandra and Fred had stepped aside once introductions were over. Herissmon stayed with the main group of Spartans in order to bring Sam up to speed on the current situation.

The two were on the other side of the maintenance bay, far away enough from the rest of the group to freely talk about the secret Fred and the others had kept from her after he informed her of her adoptive father's death and handed her the broken Digivice that had hung on the man's dog tag chain. At least he had cared about her enough to keep the broken toy she called a good luck charm.

"So, you found out from Cortana about your adoption?" Fred asked, almost for clarification while kneeling to look her in the eye. "Your adopted parents never told you?"

"Yeah, and I guess that's why 'mom' ditched me back on Reach," she said with a frown and noticed anger flash in his eyes. "Were they supposed to tell me?"

"Yes, they were supposed to tell you," he sounded angry, but then he quickly got ahold of himself. "They had signed a contract to tell you early on in your life, but they clearly didn't do that. I gave them one too many chances to make it right and was about to take custody of you when the Covenant invaded Reach."

That got her attention and then another thought popped up into her brain. Fred had visited her every chance he got. If anything, he'd been more of a parent to her than her adoptive parents and had done more for her in terms of support. Then the pieces began to fall into place.

"You're my dad." She stated, not asking.

Fred's eyes widened, and then he smiled. It wasn't entirely a happy smile, but she could see he was glad she finally knew the truth. Without warning, he pulled her into a bone crushing hug. She wrapped her arms around him and squeezed back.

"We're going to have a long talk when we get the chance, Cassy," he said. "There's so much I need to tell you."

She didn't say anything and just buried her face in his chest.

Captain Keyes, Admiral Whitcomb, and Major Silva were debating on the best course of action in the Gettysburg's war room when the Master Chief stepped in. Keyes knew the Spartan was still on the mend, but he learned early on that getting any Spartan to rest and recover was like lecturing a brick wall.

"Come on over, Chief," said the Admiral, beckoning the armored man over with a wave. "I assume Cortana or one of the Digimon's gotten you up to speed?"

"Affirmative," came the all too familiar response. "Permission to speak, sir?"

"Speak as freely as you want, son," Whitcomb turned to fully give the Master Chief his attention. "No point in keeping the status quo considering our current options."

"Sir, is it true that we have another Spartan onboard?" Keyes expected this question, especially after the identity of said Spartan had been confirmed beyond a shadow of a doubt.

"Yes, and he's currently with the rest of the Spartans, and I'm sure the good doctor is going to want to confirm his identity herself as soon as she's done with surgery. Magnamon has informed me he's being brought up to date on the war and our current predicament.

"On another note, Datamon has secured all of our sensitive data from the alien Engineers, including yours and the other Spartans' armor systems, so they can help repair your equipment. The little buggers have been a big help in making repairs to both ships."

"However, they're limited to interior repairs," Major Silva pipped up. "Exterior repair work is being done by us wherever we can, but without additional help we're stuck in doing patchwork."

"So long as both ships hold air and don't rip apart in slip space, we should be okay until we come up with a solution," Keyes spoke up. "Wellesley, could you bring up a chart of our current location?"

"Gladly," said the male AI as a hologram chart of the star system they were in.

"This is our situation, Chief," Keyes began and indicated their location between star systems. "We're drifting between two systems; one is uninhabitable and the other glassed years ago. Neither area would have anything for us to salvage and use in repairs, nor anything to help us contact High COMM."

"That's not entirely true, sir." The Master Chief pointed to an asteroid belt near Eridanus III, the planet that had been glassed by the Covenant and- Jacob remembered this correctly- John's home world. "Years ago, I and a team of Spartans infiltrated an Insurrectionist's base in this asteroid belt."

"The extraction of that Bastard," Whitcomb mumbled and Keyes saw what the Chief was suggesting.

"Do you think they escaped notice from the Covenant?" he asked, remembering his time on the Midsummer Night and their encounter with Innies hiding similarly in an asteroid belt years ago. Though both scenarios were vastly different, he had a feeling this would turn sour quickly no matter what they did.

"As soon as we jump into slip space, we're gonna turn into a giant flare for the Covenant to track," Silva pointed out. "That crystal Dr. Halsey brought on board is a huge liability and I don't believe it's worth keeping around at this point regardless of the scientific discoveries it could lead to."

"I agree, Major," Keyes surprised everyone with his sentiment. "There's also the fact of the crystal forces us into a different version of slip space that brings us close to something we can't see. Did Cortana mention this bit to you, Master Chief?" Once he got a negative response, he continued. "Omegamon reported that the portal that appeared earlier during our jump was connected to a network that resides in that dimension of slip space. He didn't get to analyze the incoming data as much as he'd like, but he is certain this network is far older than the Halo construct and has it's own Digital World."

"Digital World?" the Admiral asked, clearly trying to remember his debriefing on their digital allies. "As in where these Digimon critters come from?"

"Yes, but it's extremely isolated. Omegamon wouldn't have noticed it had Cassandra not been nearly torn out of the ship. It's also where the Spartan had been before he was dumped into the Truth and Reconciliation, or at least in some in-between state."

"It would explain why it appears that Samuel-034 had not aged a day since his 'death'," Datamon's hologram avatar appeared on the table, startling them all. "It also appears that the crystal artifact may have properties that distort both space and time when activated or exposed to slip space. By all means, with how much time the Pillar of Autumn's crew spent in slip space and fighting on Halo, we should have arrived back to Reach in mid October not late September.

"However, that is not important right now. Long range sensors are picking up a faint signal from the direction of the asteroid belt the Master Chief indicated where the Insurrection base is located."

"It'll take us several hours to get there by traveling the old fashioned way, but it's marginally safer than jumping into slip space again, sirs," Wellesley added in as though the decision was made. Granted, no one else had any better ideas and this was a desperate situation.

"Captain, do you think this is as good idea?" Whitcomb asked.

"It's far from a good idea, but it's the only real option we have, sir."

"Alright, Wellesley, set course to that location. Chief, we'll call you when we're close and need you on the bridge. Everyone that's not dead, dying or too badly injured is to assist in repairs, except the kid. For the love of God, keep her out of trouble!"

Keyes, Silva and the Chief snorted at the last bit.

"Good luck with that, sir. She's a bigger danger magnet than the artifact."