"Tell them to make it count…."

Ghosts and Glass

Halo: Reach

The Master Chief and Count Dooku stood inside a Separatist Shuttle. Two B1 Battle droids wielding their standard rifles stood at the entrance of the shuttle at guard. Two blue pilots were in the cockpit, and out the window was the black void of space. The shimmering silver metal reflected off the light from the top, showing metallic cabinets along the top sides of the wall. The pilot's cabinet was separated by a metal sliding wall.

"Chief?" asked Cortana. But of course, the Spartan did not respond, but she could understand from the outside visual cues he was listening, which she continued, "Do you think we made the right choice? We had no say in this conflict."

He responded with a deep raspy tone, "They are getting us in contact with the UNSC… That's enough."

"But still, if we do get in contact, we just may have started an intergalactic-"

"Tell me my friend," Count Dooku abruptly interrupted (obviously not hearing Cortana through the private channel inside the Spartans helmet), "you still have yet to tell me your name."

Turning to the Count, he nodded, "Spartan One One Seven."

"It is a pleasure to officially meet your acquaintance," sticking out his hand for a shake, the Chief responded. His palm was easily twice the size of Dooku (who has large hands even for a normal human), which made this shake a bit more interesting.

The Count adjusted his metal clip around his neck before sitting back down slowly.

The Spartan, still standing gestured, "Those warriors back there with the energy swords, who are they?"

"Well," the nobleman sighed as if he needed to collect his thoughts from griefed lament, "those are Jedi. They claim they are for peace and order. But their corrupt government and clone army destroy everything in their wake."

"Their weapons are original."

"The lightsabers?" he brushed his own curved metallic hilt before chuckling under his breath, "yes, works of a true artist aren't they?"

"Sir!" the droid pilot interrupted, with the sliding metal door opening down the middle, "coming out of Hyperspace now!"

The Spartan was in awe. A blue wind tunnel of space encapsulated the ship. Funneling around in so many different directions, this was nothing like Slipspace. The glowing blue came off his faded sage armor, and Cortana herself was dazed.

"What is that…?" she murmured.

"Hyperspace?" said Dooku seeing the Spartans long face, "it's our way of travel, our navigation of the galaxy in a… reasonable modicum of time."

As the ship pulled back from this 'Hyperspace' it shocked the whole vessel back slightly like a rollercoaster at a theme park. As it did, stars streamed back as if time itself would come back to reality. Hundreds of them stretched like rubber bands in space. In the center of our observation window was this huge planet (at least from their perspective). Tanish in color with clouds around the surface, it was striking to look at.

Off in the distance, there were many semicircle-shaped battle stations with a circular center. Dozens of Separatist and Trade Federation warships guarded the area. As their small land shuttle came closer, the sensor above the pilot beeped yellow. Pressing it with its three-fingered robotic hand, it rang for a small moment before another similar synthetic B1 Battle Droid tone came over the channel,

"We received your identification. Welcome back, sir."

Dooku grinned at the Spartan who was looming over behind him listening, "There is someone I want you to meet."

A chamber opened for this ballroom. The long table with dozens of tan empty chairs sat perfectly still. The designs around were very elegant, light dazzling in from the ceiling window gently glistening the dust particles in the air. Chandeliers hung shining from the sun's reflection. This beautifully decorated room lay elegantly and peacefully.

Unique and alien designs from the galaxy far far away coated the entire area with sparkling indents. A long table like that of the rich eloquence with just two chairs on each of the short ends, and about twenty on each side of the long end. With a stretched blue carpet over the top of the table that came over the whole thing.

A woman sat at the end of the table in one of the paired chairs, and she sat with her hand to her chin in deep thought. Short brown hair faded with hints of gray, piped up on expensive makeup and facial edits trying to hide her age, even though it still showed and proved its relevance. Droopy and expensive earrings that sparkled in the sunlight behind her, dazzled and danced from her expensive head.

From the void of thought, she was removed as two B1 battle droids marched side by side down a side ramp. As they approached her, one of them held a holo-clipboard. And the other nothing, neither of these were equipped for warmth, but more of for a laid back and luxurious lifestyle.

"Senator Bonteri," said one, "Count Dooku has arrived, and has brought a visitor."

"Alright," she sighed somewhat faded, "bring them in."

As she stood up it revealed the further of her costly elegance. A white dress draped to her ankles made of a unique silk exotic and unrecognizable to most eyes. Designs and patterns of her world and culture, it was beyond obviously what any citizen should have.

The main doors open, a foot thick in metal with carved indents and ancient architecture. Two huge chains on each side from a massive shaft lifted the mechanism above the door creating the loud cranking sound of gears. They opened up and peered inwards, and walking in was Dooku of course with the blinding white light from outside behind him… but also someone else.

The woman was stunned by the Master Chief. She had never seen anything like him before, and it almost startled her. As the two approached, Dooku nodded politely,

"Senator, this is the Spartan I have told you so much about, he helped us in defending our capital ship…. And wishes to communicate with his government."

"Ah, I see," her tone was similar to the Count's possibly of a familiar dialect. She reached out and elegantly shook the Spartan's hand, "We should work on that immediately… follow me."

The three walked down the end of the ballroom, to the side door entry where the two B1 droids came from. There was an adjacent passageway similar to the main room. It was only about a hundred yards long and thirty wide but massive for this structure. Windows along the left side about thirty feet up with the beaming light of heaven embracing its way in. It collected and bounced off the three as they slowly walked down the arcade.

"Now tell me, my Lord," she smiled gently, "how did you come across our friend here?"

"It was an astounding tale, one that should be recorded in the galactic archives."

"Again on behalf of the Separatist Alliance, I would like to thank you Spartan."

"Your welcome ma'am," the senator was quite surprised hearing the feminine voice responding, but Cortana continued, "Would you have the ability to reach deep space with transmissions?"

"Yes we do," she responded.

As they continued the end of the hallway was a massive almost medieval-style door. Thick and cased in a special type of metal one could hear heavy entryways open. It rumbled slightly and came through as the orifice grew.

Inside was a dim circular chamber with a massive holo-table in the center. A small set of stairs were at the front that led down. Gray walls and less decorated room, there were a few B1 droids at the entrances (four on each exit). As the three came down the steps, the senator waved to one of the droids. It marched to the table in the center and pressed a few buttons. Beeping sounds followed as a massive light blue coloration appeared out of nowhere above. As the hologram formed, Cortana recognized it immediately,

"That's the Andromeda galaxy."

"Oh?" Dooku raised his eyebrow, "is that what you call our galaxy?"

"Yeah, I would not expect human life to form this far away… how did you guys get here?"

"The history of man is rumored of myth and legend, the best archeologists in the history of the galaxy have all theorized that we are from Coruscant."

"And where is that?" said the Chief.

He nodded to the B1 droid who expanded the image of the flat circular galaxy, blanketed in stars. As it zoomed into the inner side closer to the core of the center, a plant system came to the eye. A massive city planet with a few moons orbiting the outer areas. It rotated slowly upon its axis, and for what it was worth, was beautiful. As the Spartans and the AI stared at it for a moment, they noticed just how advanced this galaxy was compared to theirs back home.

"I would love to visit that planet. To figure out how human life evolved separately across two separate galaxies," she Cortana.

"Indeed, that is a question we all would like answered, but I am afraid you are a few years too late. The galaxy as you can see is engaged in a great civil war," Dooku sighed.

"Which is why," Bonteri interrupted, "we want to contact your government. We can tell they are fairly expansive and advanced based upon yourself here."

The Spartan's blank reaction despite the thin air still provoked the senator to continue, "and many of us within the senate think that your government would be an excellent broker between—"

The Count immediately raised his hand in defiance, "Let's not get our friend here into politics."

Stuttering, she collected thoughts before nodding slowly. Head low for a moment she concluded, "My apologizes magistrate."

"Can your radio signal reach deep space?" asserted the Chief.

"If I could be uploaded I could find potential UNSC activity in the area," Cortana said out loud through the helmet comms.

The Sith Lord gestured to the droids. They pressed a few more buttons causing the galaxy map to vanish. Appearing in its place was a small blue line above the table. After a few more moments the droid looked to Dooku, "Transmission is ready and secured sir, it's protected for deep space."

He turned to the Chief, "It's ready my friend."

The Chief took a deep breath and nodded as the recording took place, "This Spartan One-One-Seven breaching hail code is Delta, Echo, Zarga, Reach, Three, Six, Zero. I am under friendly non-UNSC custody. If received, send coordinates for extraction, over."

A phasing static from the communicator ended as the transmission finalized. The B1 droid turned to the Spartan, "Where should I send it?"

The Spartan took two steps forward and bent over slightly above the table. The droid backed away seeing him coming, and 117's hand slightly hovered above the controls. Yellow light phased in circles around his wrist and forearm. As small electric fizzes were heard. Another moment passed, and out of the speakers was Cortana's voice,

"Wow, this system is very different from what I am used to, you will have to give me a second," Dooku and Bonteri both were shocked,

"Your Intelligence is in our systems?" asked Dooku.

"Don't worry, I can only access what's in the kiosk as this is a locked system," she said.

"Hm," his glare seemed of doubt and distrust. Before seemingly he could follow, Cortana cut him off,

"Huh… that's strange… I scanned all known UNSC frequencies on all registered locations on this database… and you won't believe this."

The holo-map appeared and so did the galaxy. Zooming into a faraway area was a planet system. A dust bowl, covered in sand for the entire circumference. A scared surface from war and conquest, it seemed beyond empty. As it continued getting closer, it showed the moons around floating in near orbit along with the stars pixelating in the background.

Dooku instinctually pointed to it, recognizing it immediately, "Ryloth?"

"What is that," said the Chief.

"It's a planet infested with rebellion and turmoil. We have been laying siege to it for weeks."

"My Lord," budded the Senator, "I have received word that our forces have captured the capital city of Lessu. I was going to tell you but our friend here obviously measured more importance."

"Good," he turned back to the holographic display (Cortana), "What business do your people have there?"

"There is a distress call hailing on all of the open UNSC channels… I noticed almost immediately."

"And would the Republic find this?" said Bonteri.

"Possibly, but unlikely. The UNSC uses a unique type of gamma wave broadcasting which makes it very difficult to detect."

Dooku raised his eyebrow, "What does the message say?"

A beep was heard from the hologram, with a short pause of silence. Static followed with a few background sounds and sounds most of which were unclear. Then a distinct voice came through, one that sent a few strange vibes that created a bewildering aura. As it came, gave a faint smile to the Spartan underneath his helmet.

"Anyone out there? I need—" static broke up the transmission for a moment, "send immediate help, any UNS—" more cut out back feed, "Noble Five requesting—"

As the message ended, even Cortana herself faded for a moment… just one. It was strange, none of them were expecting this. The aura changed from confusion to a righteous certainty. It was almost heroic how it made everyone feel, and it sparked from the following words from the Master Chief,

"It's Jorge, I know that voice."

17th of June 2557

34 days before The Release

Let's go to chapter 5. Thank you guys for waiting. I had to go on a two-week hiatus due to irl stuff which put me away from my computer, to which I apologize especially since this is a smaller chapter. Anywho, nothing really new but I hope you guys like this one, I had fun with this one! Anywho, I do have like the next four or five chapters laid out and I'm super excited! I think it's time for comments!

To addressing an elephant in the room, I believe the master chief's armor would not be able to survive a hit is because of two reasons. One, in the halo games players ALWAYS die to one hit from an energy sword, unless there is over shields involved and parrying (which doesn't count as they removed it from the game, and then they didn't do it properly, and it came back as a glitch) and it wasn't seen at least to my knowledge and gameplay remembrance of halo, four and five. Ironically, I have not played infinite very much so I couldn't say anything in that regard. And finally two, in lore, there has been very few instances where a spartan has been hit with an energy sword, and their shields deflect the hit. I think Buck as a spartan IV in the Halo five prequel is one of the few instances I can think of.

SupremeSongLeader - Yea I do plan to use the forerunners in a way that's much more interesting, taking a similar approach to the forerunner saga (which is amazing btw). All those old games are AWESOME!!!!! Lol literally EA could have made so much money if they just revamped Galactic Conquest for their battlefront lmao. Anywho, yea I don't know how many legends I am gonna touch on as I haven't read much, but that's just me. I love that you liked it as that's what I am here for. Thanks my guy!

pau456 - thanks! ;)

ikusatsunagi - as always my friend.

Guest - your welcome.

naotw - thanks for the grammar notes as I will take them into consideration! Although a lot of the story-driven elements I will keep as they are my own artistic liberty of the situation. Thank you for the feedback though! But to Grievous, he mastered ALL saber forms. Both in legends and canon. I do though appreciate all your feedback as it tells me what I might need to change or need to reconsider.

gpno14 - here it is!!!

Anyway! Your guys' feedback means so much to me and thank you for all of it! I will try to get the next one out sooner but we shall see! As always, be safe out there. Stay squatchy! And of course, stay groovy!

DEUS VULT!

~1DL1NG KN1GHT