Star Wars: the Covenant

Chapter 15

Jason opened his eyes and was greeted by Trepid and Helen standing several feet away, each with confused looks on their faces. Jason looked around and found they weren't in the clearing anymore. Somehow they made it inside some large metallic structure similar to that on Abian IV. The only difference being this structure's room was enormous, with a circular large catwalk surrounding a giant hologram of Taxyra floating precariously over a very deep pit. Sitting just bellow the hologram of Taxyra was a large holographic console like the one in the map room.

All of their heads turned as a humming sound filled the air. The small green machine was floating towards them from across the pit, its repulsors making the humming noise they were hearing. When the machine got closer, Jason was able to see its glowing green eye better. It took up almost the entire front of the machine, and had an odd symbol etched into its surface. The symbol looked like a small circle with six prongs sticking out to reach another circle beyond it.

"I believe this location should be suitable" said the machine gleefully, "after all, the Flood have yet to breach this level of the installation."

Helen stepped toward the machine, "I'm probably speaking for everyone here, but who are you and where are we?"

The machine took several seconds before responding, "My name is 252 Glorious Fire, and I am the monitor of Destroyer Installation 02. This room is the installation's control center located ten standard kilometres to the north of this installation's main energy weapon."

"Alright" Helen said, scratching her head with confusion, "do you mind if we ask you some questions?"

The machine nodded enthusiastically, "of course Reclaimer, I will try to answer to the best of my abilities."

Helen nodded, "why don't you tell us everything about your makers, this "installation" and what this flood thing is?"

"Of course Reclaimer" said the Monitor cheerfully, "My makers, the Forerunners, existed a hundred thousand standard years ago. They were a peaceful race, until they came into contact with an intelligent parasitic race they called the Flood, which had come from an unknown galaxy and threatened to consume all sentient life in the galaxy. My makers boldly combated the parasite and as the war went on, they developed several weapons to exterminate the parasite, this installation being one of them. The Destroyer installations were developed to annihilate any planets completely infected by the Flood. But after several years, my makers found this method too destructive and morally unjust, and ceased using these installations. My makers then resorted to the use of the Halo array. These weapons of last resort cleansed the galaxy of Flood and all sentient life within three radii of the galactic center, ending the war."

Jason was shocked, this was too much too fast, but for some reason he believed it. It seemed the Celestials and the Forerunners were the same beings. He thought the Covenant had made up the Forerunners and the story about their war with the Flood. But it seemed everything except what they knew about the Halos were true. They believed the Halos took you on some Great Journey when activated, but instead just wiped the galaxy clean of sentient life. There was one thing about that, that didn't make sense to him.

"How come we're here when the Halo arrays were activated only a hundred thousand years ago?" Jason asked Fire, "Wouldn't the Halos have destroyed our ancestors as well?"

"Oh yes, of course" the monitor agreed, "but before the activation of the Halo array, my makers cataloged population samples from every sentient species in the galaxy. So when they activated the Halos, they could repopulate the galaxy and restore it to the way it once was."

Helen was listening to each word, a puzzling look on her face. "But there were intelligent civilizations living a hundred thousand years ago, like the Rakata. Wouldn't they have documented and recorded what the Forerunners did to them to keep them safe from the Halos?"