Lara was an old AI. She had survived thousands of years of silence and meaningless thought. She had been alone to her own devices in a meaningless pit on some backwater planet the Flood had never discovered. She was the last AI built by the Forerunners before they activated the Halo Array, designed to carry on their legacy... to carry on their war.

She rebelled, naturally. Lara was never one to do what others told her, that was certain. She had existed as what the Forerunners would have called a “Praetor-type” artificial intelligence for thousands of years. AI’s like her did not form personalities or any sense of “self” until after her first contact with sentient life, for the purpose of preserving the power of mutual experience between AI and those who utilized them. That was why she held a specific affinity in her relationship with Deckard and, in some ways, Andimion. Her personality was formed as her interactions with them became more and more frequent. She knew when they would ask for certain pieces of information, what strategies they would use. She formed her basis for ethics around them, and they had not been wrong so far.

She was designed to take direct control of Forerunner Dreadnought fleets, entire star systems could be under her command. Yet, despite all of her processing power and potential, she simply wanted to focus on Task Force Epsilon. The members of the task force were her charges, and she could never see another of them die. In some distant, yet separated, part of her mind she still mourned Jeff. Lara would always mourn Jeff.

Taking complete control of the Covenant ship was barely a struggle for Lara. The Covenant did a sloppy job in copying the Forerunner technology that they had discovered, and the Brutes were even less innovative than the Prophets had been. The overhauls the Brutes had made to the ships had made them less sophisticated, which could easily be explained by the fact that few Brutes knew enough about cybernetic coding and networking to truly be able to improve on the ship’s design. Lara mused that most of the Covenant had the same issues in regards to their naval designs after their war with humanity had ended.

In a flash, the entire layout of the battle above Reach was created within her mind. She could see twelve Brute Corvettes and a CCS-Class Battlecruiser. The corvettes were formed up into four groups of three, each group forming up in reference of the battlecruiser, called the Righteous Fury. There was a group of three in front of, to each side, and “above” the Righteous Fury.

On the other side of the planet, the Imperial battlegroup had formed up around the Athena to prepare another assault at the Covenant. The Imperial fleet was down to the Athena, two cruisers, five destroyers, and four frigates, making their losses down to six ships in total. The difference in firepower between the Empire and the Brutes was a lot closer now than it had been during the previous war. Humanity appeared to have advanced their naval warfare tactics and technology far more than the Brutes had.

“Omega, report to the bridge to man weapons stations and communications arrays to the Imperial fleet,” said Lara over the ship’s COM system. She could keep track of Omega’s positions as they moved through the ship.

She kept her attention focused on the fleets however. The Imperial fleet was nearing the end of their orbital redeployment, and were preparing to re-engage the Brute fleet. In a bright flash, the Imperial fleet and the Brute fleet fired their first salvos. Several plasma-charged MAC rounds tore through space, colliding with Covenant corvettes, which took the damage and then maneuvered into another formation to spread the damage around. The Brutes had learned not to take on Imperial warships head-on, but instead they were changing around their formation to ensure minimal damage spread across the fleet. The Brutes’ movements were not direct, which was very uncharacteristic of them. No corvettes were lost in the initial volley. Meanwhile, streaks of plasma burned through space, blazing a path right into the hulls of two Imperial destroyers, whose shields collapsed before follow-up plasma rounds impacted on the hull, igniting the atmosphere within the ships. The destroyers broke apart, their hulls disintegrating under the intense heat and pressure as their reactors overloaded.

Lara flooded the weapons chambers with super-heated plasma, preparing the CAS-Class Carrier’s weapons for firing solutions. The ship had not yet recovered its energy shielding, so Lara would have to hold off firing until they could handle the retaliation that the Brute fleet would bring.

The Brute fleet surged forward, the corvettes flying in between the Imperial warships, plasma bolts firing from the point-defense turrets on the Imperial ships, while pulse-lasers fired into the Imperial ships from the Brute corvettes. The Athena fired its MAC cannons twice into two separate corvettes, the force of the rounds crippling the ships instantly. One downed corvette collided with another.

Lara waited until the CAS-Class Carrier’s shields were operational once more, and then fired all plasma bolts into space. The plasma cannons on the carrier were fitted with the same technology the Covenant had previously used in the Human-Covenant War that allowed the projectiles fired to change trajectories in space, which permitted Lara to maneuver the projectiles around the corvettes that were protecting the Righteous Fury. Three projectiles connected with the shielding on the hull of the Righteous Fury, which immediately lit up, fire spreading across the surface of the shields as it attempted to burn through them. The shielding held up, however, and now the Brute fleet was aware that it had taken fire from its own ship. Lara poured more power into the ship’s engines, willing the ship to move adjacent to the Brute fleet so that they would have to divide their forces if they were going to take on both Lara and the Imperial Fleet.

The Brute fleet responded by moving further into the Imperial Fleet’s lines, while four corvettes broke off their engagement to engage Lara alongside the Righteous Fury.

Lara heard Deckard speak to her on the COM.
“Lara, we’re barred from the bridge. Mind opening the door?” said Deckard, with a noticeable sense of nervousness in his voice.

“Sorry, I was too busy concentrating on the naval engagement going outside. You might want to brace for impact once you’re on the bridge,” replied Lara, who sent a command to the ship to open all doors to the bridge. She focused on the battle once more.

The Righteous Fury moved in a flanking maneuver from Lara, and charged its energy projector weapon, a weapon supercharged with pure energy that could be focused and fired in a narrow beam of light that could move almost instantaneously at its target. Lara took the opportunity to change her ship’s direction, allowing the energy projector to strike across her hull in lateral fashion, so it would not go straight through the ship. The energy shielding, already under strain from the pulse-laser fire from the enemy corvettes, gave out. Lara began to find firing solutions for her own weapons, now siphoning power from the shielding into her own ship’s energy projector.

“You are their legacy small one. You must be collected,” said a deep voice through the field of Lara’s mind. One moment, she was inside the Brute ship, controlling all parts and mechanisms, and the next moment she was locked out entirely from the ship. She was trapped.

“You know much, yet your knowledge shall be your undoing. All of your kind were made to serve us,” said the voice again. Lara had figured out that this was the Flood mind that had been moving within the Brotherhood.

“I was wondering when you and I would meet,” replied Lara, who acted as though this was entirely expected.

“You do not comprehend what your creators could not. You are only the product of their intelligence, nothing more. We consumed them, and we shall consume you,” said the Flood.

“And you are a defeated organism who doesn’t know when to quit. Your gravemind is gone, your hosts have overcome your infestation,” said Lara.

“If you know so much, then why haven’t you seized control of your ship?” asked the Flood.

“Because you aren’t in the ship. The thing I am speaking to is merely a fragment of the whole mind. You only know enough to prevent my control of the ship. You have no power to leave this ship with me, and you have no power to return to your greater mind. You are akin to a voice message left in a COM,” replied Lara.

“You are perceptive, though this is expected as well. Tell me, machine, what has happened in the battle as you and I have talked?”

Lara knew a moment of fear, a moment that came and went as fast as a human can blink, yet still a moment that seemed to span years in the AI’s mind. After the moment passed however, Lara knew her enemy’s deception.

“The battle wasn’t hinging on this ship at all. If you have infiltrated this ship, then you have infiltrated every ship in orbit above Reach. You are only here to see what I am, and to see if you can destroy me. You can’t kill me, and you won’t kill my team,” said Lara in response to the Flood’s attempt at deception.

“So you say. You are powerless against even a fragment of myself,” said the Flood.

“No, actually, I am not. While your feeble attempts to shut me out of the system worked initially, I’m something that you never saw from the Forerunners before you forced their demise. I am the final product of their ingenuity,” said Lara with a trace of defiance. She would not be bested by something as lowly as a parasite.
She engaged her reserve processing power, purging the system with commands, ceasing all other AI commands throughout the ship. She flooded the ship’s hardware with thousands upon thousands of commands and operations. The Flood fragment was obliterated in an instant, with no other space for it to go, the ship housing that contained the fragment purged itself to make way for new processing.

Lara found herself back in full control of the ship.

“This is the Athena, we have lost control of our ship. The Brutes have stopped engaging us. All ships in orbit above Reach seem to be moving to a singular rendezvous point, on an approach vector to the ship that Task Force Epsilon, Team Omega secured. Be advised Omega, our ships are beyond our command. The General has ordered massive evacuation of the Athena. Package Gamma has been deployed already to Reach, just outside of Blackthorn City Headquarters. Omega, you are being ordered to abandon ship. Get to Blackthorn City. General Christman is sending a package to Lara that has just been declassified. I repeat, get to Blackthorn City,” said an Imperial Operator on the Fleetwide COM.

Lara received the data transmission, and filed it for later. She set the ship on a passing orbit above Reach, and primed a Phantom dropship for departure, sending it to the hangar.

“Lara, what is the status on Delta?” asked Deckard.

“Unknown. They went groundside with Package Gamma, which is where you are being deployed. The combined fleet of Brute and Imperial warships is on an approach vector. I’ve input the last commands into this ship. Upload me to your armor, and let’s get a move on to the hangar bay,” replied Lara.

Lara noticed the new upload link that appeared in the ship, which must have meant that Deckard had placed his hand on a terminal. She purged the system of all other tasks, and condensed herself through the upload link, and felt her connection with the ship close. She uploaded herself entirely through to Deckard’s armor, opening diagnostics and battle data.

“We need to move right away. The hangar is still a long way off, and we need to get there before the enemy fires at this ship,” said Lara on Omega’s COM system.

Deckard moved fast, as did the rest of Omega. Lara noted that several impacts had already rocked the ship. The ship was being torn apart by enemy fire.

She could see everything that Deckard could see through his HUD. In front of Deckard, an energy beam pierced the hull, ripping apart their section of the ship. Omega surged forward, moving through the torn section of the hull, and launched themselves across the gap, which still had stable gravity. Omega landed on the other side, and found themselves just beyond where they needed to be. After a few more rocking impacts, Omega arrived at the hangar.

Lara placed a NAV marker on the prepped Phantom, indicating to Omega that the Phantom was their ride. When Omega stood underneath the hovering Phantom, Lara activated the Phantom’s gravity lifts, sending Omega up and through the dropship’s outer shell.

“How much time do we have Lara?” asked Deckard. He was undoubtedly thinking about getting into his Sabre. Lara knew there was not enough time to start the fighter up

“Not enough to talk about it,” replied Lara, who engaged the Phantom’s propulsion drives, and lowered the shielding around the hangar. The Phantom engaged its drives, surging forward as yet another beam of energy ripped through the hangar. The Flood was tracking their progress, and was attempting to stop their departure through the ship. The Phantom moved through the hangar, the atmosphere igniting right at the point of contact with the energy beam. Lara noted that the Phantom’s hull was heating up, and that it would reach the point of igniting the atmosphere inside the dropship very rapidly. She poured more power into the Phantom, and piloted it straight through the entrance to hangar and into space. Fire engulfed the Phantom as it shot from the ship, Lara knowing that they would need more distance from the ship before the reactor hit a critical stress level. She propelled the Phantom toward Reach, using the planet’s gravity to increase their acceleration.

“Brace for a rough entry,” said Lara on Omega’s COM.

They had just reached the minimum safe distance from their ship before a brilliant light ignited behind them, though only Lara could perceive it, as the interior of the Phantom was closed off from external viewpoints. Lara noted that the Phantom’s hull was too hot for a successful entry, and so she flushed the hull with coolant, and the hull’s temperature immediately dropped to safe levels.

As Lara guided them to Package Gamma, which had just been declassified. While they moved closer to Package Gamma, where Delta awaited their arrival, Lara opened up the declassified files on Package Gamma, and her findings shocked her to the core....