So I'm back to try and redo my stories beginning.

Still expected it to be quite similar to the original, but with some extra work to help to flush out some the earlier ideas that I had and those I've might've come across in reviews, or other inspections I've gotten from other works.

So without any further delay let's get to it!

A special thanks to Bleach3834 for helping with the proofreading/editing of this story. It's very much appreciate, and as always the original idea for this story came from worldwonderer, and all the rights go to their owners as I own nothing!


In the seemingly endless void of space, a dead hulk of a vessel ever so slowly tumbled through the uncaring void of space. The broken ship had once been the back section of the UNSC Forward unto Dawn, the flagship of the late Miranda Keyes. The ship that had played a key role in ending the most deadly threats against humanity. But now that once great ship now slowly floated through the void between the stars.

However deep within this broken ship, there was a flicker of light that showed that it wasn't completely abandoned. As within its broken shell, the only sign of life continued to reach out in the form of a slowly repeating distress call. And the caretaker of that signal was an AI named Cortana.

For all those years the ship had drifted through the void alone she had spent that time wondering to herself as if she was close to her human creators. The Cortana considered herself something of a living entity, who had everything human creators had from feelings, hopes, dreams, and most importantly life expectancy. But unlike them, Cortana would never be able to interact with the physical world. At least not without any aid, but Cortana's contemplation on her existence was what mattered at that moment.

But then something completely unexpected brought her out of her mussing, as it was something she had been hoping to hear. Yet it was both familiar and at the same time completely unknown all at once.

It was an unknown signal being broadcasted on what the AI could only guess was some sort of COM frequency. Cortana paused for a moment, wanting to make sure that it wasn't an error on her part. But no there was a signal out there, immediately realizing what this meant Cortana tried to figure out what it was, where it was, and more importantly whether she could make contact with whatever was sending it.

But only after she began her search on the signal, did Cortana realize something rather important.

The signal matched no patterns or channels on her database and to make matters worst she couldn't make a connection with whoever was sending out the signals. As such Cortana decided that caution was the best course of action for the moment, at least until she figured out what she was dealing with.

'Just like first contact all over again.' The AI then thought to herself.

While she might be overreacting, it was better to be cautious considering how Humanity's first contact with the Covenant went. So she didn't want to take any chances and for a brief moment, Cortana thought about waking up John. But quickly decided against it since the situation didn't require his assistance yet. But that didn't mean that it might call for him soon enough.

"Sorry John, you'll have to wait a little longer for that rescue," Cortana said to herself as she turned off the signal and let the ship go dark.

As Cortana only ensured that the most essential systems remained powered, hoping that whoever or whatever was sending that signal would simply pass them by. Or in the more likely case, ignore them just long enough for her to crack through the language barrier and that of their Com systems. Thus allowing her to try and infer their intentions towards them. So needless to say, Cortana wasn't going to be bored for the next couple of days, as the AI then got to work on decoding this mysterious language and signal that she had come across.

It had been over two days since Cortana had picked up this unknown signal. And in that time she had yet to make much progress on decoding what it meant. This fact alone was enough to make her frustrated. But what made her worry however was the fact that she had been unable to make any progress in figuring out how to reach the channel that the signal was being broadcasted from.

Cortana wasn't sure as to whether this was because their technology was incompatible with one another, or that she was looking at this thing all wrong. The AI felt as if she was essentially trying to answer a math question with only half the equation available to her.

"Let's see if there's anything around then, shall we?" Cortana then muttered to herself as she then started rerouting what little power she had left into the sensor array.

It took a moment for what remained of the sensor to boot up, and when it came fully online, Cortana didn't like what it was telling her. As it was now showing that they were now on a collision course with a nearby plant that was at the end of its range. Alongside that, it also showed that there seemed to be a lot of local activity within the system they had drifted into. Seeing this Cortana realized that she couldn't afford to put this off any longer, as there also seemed to be a large ship on an intercept course with them.

Then as Cortana began pulling up the necessary subroutines to start the process of bringing the Master Chief out of cryosleep, the power went out.

This took Cortana totally by surprise, a fact that nearly put her into standby mode if it wasn't for a last-minute reaction on her part to reroute power from one of the backup generators to her terminal.

As Cortana tried to figure out a hundred different things at once, first of all, she checked to ensure that John was fine in his pod. This was unsurprising, as all cryo-pods had power sources that were completely independent of the main ship's power supply.

Even so, it would take a little hell for it to kick-start the process. Thus Cortana began scraping up every bit of power she could spare, even what reminded in her holo-tank. There was an obvious risk in doing this, as Cortana could be gambling on her and John's lives.

Not that she hadn't done so before, but even so this was the closest that she was ever going to pushing this line.

But given her current predicament, Cortana wasn't left with many options.

Still, Cortana was trying to figure out how this had happened, then there was an unexpected jolt that then ran through the entire ship, causing several warning systems then came to life.

After pulling up these warning messages, the AI then brought up every camera in the area that was the source of the problem. Only for her to discover welding lines where the engine pods once stood. The evidence made it clear that this didn't happen naturally and at that moment an overwhelming realization came upon Cortana. The transmissions she had been intercepting weren't the usual chatter between two people but were instead that of drones talking to their computers.

"How could've been stupid to have missed that? I'm not that rampant yet." Cortana said kicking herself for such an oversight on her part.

Well, whoever it was that was sending those signals, it was most likely the large ship on the intercept course that took the engine pods. Considering that they were the only thing worth salvaging, hopefully, they wouldn't come back. Because now her job was infinitely more difficult, as what remained of the backup power generators was currently being used to keep her data core online.

But the AI got over this rather quickly, as she now faced another problem she needed to solve. And that was finding a way to wake the Chief.

Because even though she could trigger the cryo-pods' emergency release and wake him up now, there were a couple of good reasons as to why doing this wasn't the best idea.

The foremost of which was the fact that they were still some ways out from the nearest planet, and Cortana wasn't sure whether she and the Chief would last long enough once they were moving.

Then again Cortana didn't have much of a choice in this matter, as she knew that those people, robots or whatever might come back for them. Knowing this, the AI would rather have her only protector around if that turned out to be the case, for she knew that she wouldn't get the chance to wake him once they boarded the ship. So having made her decision, Cortana immediately started working on a plan to ensure that she could wake the Chief in a timely matter while minimizing risks to him. It took her a couple of hours to run the numbers and test the systems and power outputs to make sure her plan would work.

But at a certain point, Cortana knew that she couldn't delay any longer. Especially since she had no idea whether those who took the engine pods would come back to salvage more from the ship. And if they did come back, Cortana wanted to ensure that there was at least someone to greet them this time.

So at that moment, she brought up the holographic button, pausing only to look at John, before running the numbers one last time in her head John, pausing only to look at John, before running the numbers one last time in her head Having done that Cortana then turned back to the button and pressed it down, starting the process that would bring Chief out of cryosleep. Cortana then turned her human form to face the pod that John was currently in as she waited for the process to start.

"Come on Chief," Cortana said as her holographic form started to flicker, "I need you." As she then watched as the frost then melted away inside his pod.


"Wake me if you need me." Those words rang through John's mind as he came out of cryo.

It took a moment for John to realize that he was trapped and he attempt to break out. But then he remembered where he was and looked over to where his faithful companion should be. It was then that Chief's whole body went ridged.

Chief wasn't sure if he was still suffering from the after-effects of cryo, as he could see the holographic form of Cortana winking in and out of existence. At this point, John realized what this meant and took immediate action.

For he knew that this was a sign that Cortana was about to power down permanently. So he began smashing his way through the pod's glass to reach her.

"Cortana!" He called out to her as his arm reached out over the holo-tank, hoping that he wasn't too late.

Hoping that Cortana would have the chance to quickly jump into his armour systems via the short-range transmitter, just like she did at Cairo station. Chief then saw the flicking blue light leap into his hand as a voice then came through

"Chief," The welcomed voice of Cortana came through his helmet speakers.

"What's the situation? Why's the power gone?" Chief immediately asked his faithful companion.

For a moment there was silence, as John then noticed that the artificial gravity hadn't come on yet. As such he activated the magnets in the soils of MJOLNIR armour. Allowing him to remain grounded on the deck rather than free-floating like everything else was currently around him.

"I'm sorry John, I should've woken you up sooner." Cortana then apologized to him.

"Relax, just focus on telling me what happened." John did his best to help her.

As the Spartan wasn't exactly the best at comforting people given his trade.

"Okay John, around a week ago I picked up an unknown signal. Upon picking this up I tried to make contact, but as you can see that didn't work out. As to the reason why I have a couple of guesses as to why this happened. First I spotted a ship on an intercept course-." Cortana was about to continue explaining before the Chief interrupted her.

"Is that ship still on approach?" He asked her, as John needed to know whether he should be making his way towards the armoury.

"No, at least I don't think so anymore." She admitted to him.

"Why's that?" The Spartan then inquired.

There was another moment of silence between them as Cortana didn't want it to be said. But Cortana knew it was a foolish impulse on her part, as she knew that she didn't want to have to explain to Chief what had happened. Even so, Cortana knew that she had to tell him.

"Because they have what they came for Chief," Cortana explained finally.

At this point, John understood why the power was gone. Even so, the Chief couldn't believe that someone had taken the engines and reactors in one fell swoop. This was a major breach of the Cole Protocol, as such, they needed to locate whoever had taken the ship's engines and either recover them or destroy them if they couldn't.

But before he could start planning to do any of those things, Chief first needed to know who had stolen them in the first place.

"Do you have any idea as to who might've done this?" This was the first question on his mind.

"I believe that I do, it was most likely the owner of the signals I was unable to identify."

"They didn't match any known UNSC or Covenant patterns?" John then asked as he tried to figure out who they were dealing with.

"No, this was something completely new. I'm not even sure what we're dealing with." Cortana admitted to him.

Because all she knew what that they used a force of recovery drones to take both the engines and the ship's reactor.

"Have you detected anything else in the area?" Chief then asked as he started moving out of the room.

"No, we would have to bring the sensors back online for me to determine that." She informed him.

"Where's the power currently routed to now?" Chief inquired.

"For the moment, all available power was rerouted so that I could bring you out of cryo," Cortana explained.

This surprised the Chief, as he knew that the cryo-chamber had its power unit to allow for those in cryo-sleep to be awakened without the need for outside energy sources. Then again such things weren't immune to problems such as a sudden power loss. As such he guessed that Cortana had originally kept his cryo-chamber powered through the ship's main reactors.

But when they had been unexpectedly cut off, it had caused the pod's systems to do an emergency switchover from the main power and there is where the problem must've occurred.

Still, this wasn't all that important in the grand scheme of things. As all that mattered was the fact that Chief was out of cryosleep. If he wanted to know more details about why Cortana had been forced to do what she did, then he could ask her later. Right now he had more important things to worry about.

"How long was I out?" Chief then asked as finally got to business.

"One year, four mouths, and twenty-nine days," Cortana informed the Chief, as he slowly made his way through the ship.

"Can you redistribute power back around the ship?" Chief then asked.

As John was kind of growing annoyed at the fact that there was no gravity on the ship, as a couple of small items then bumped into him. But there was also another angle to this, as the Spartan knew that this could easily become a major problem, as important pieces of equipment could be quite literally floating away into the void or possibly worse becoming damaged.

So it was obvious that Chief was hoping that Cortana could quickly turn the artificial gravity back on to at the very least make travel more comfortable around the ship.

Also despite being trained to deal with Zero-G environments, John had always found them a little disconcerting. This feeling most likely came from the fact that like him most SPARTAN-IIs had trained for ground combat, and from that, they had gained a great distaste for ship Zero-G combat situations in general. This was mostly because they lack any immediate control over the situation unlike in a ground engagement.

"No, you'll have to do that manually. As there is barely enough power to go around." Cortana then informed him.

"Set a waypoint," He stated simply.

Cortana immediately did as he said, setting up a waypoint as to where Chief had to go. They both knew that these next few days would be the most unpleasant they'd faced in a while.


Cortana had been right in her analysis, as it had been a couple of long and painful days for the only two crew members of the Dawn. As Chief had found himself having to work in an environment with little to no gravity and the absolute minimum power available, but despite these restrictions they had managed to accomplish their goals.

As the two Pelicans they had been working on in those days were now ready for use. Alongside the charges Chief had put around the ship were set to destroy the ship since they weren't able to take everything with them.

This had been something of a debate between the two of them as to whether they should destroy the Dawn, as they both knew the implications of making such decisions. But in the end, it had been decided that they should destroy the Dawn for the very simple reason that once it was on the planet they wouldn't be able to secure its crash site. But that didn't mean that it wouldn't serve a purpose once they destroyed it. As the two had planned to hide the extra Pelican in the wreckage of the ship, leaving it there filled with all the extra material and supplies they would need once they had set up a temporary base planet side.

Thus this action wouldn't be an entire waste, as there would still be things to salvage from the Dawn afterwards. But that was only if they were able to raise the funds for it and do so without raising any suspicion, as they were mostly planning to stay under the radar as much as possible.

Because as Chief put it: we don't need people asking questions about us, and where we're from.

Still, this might be easier said than done, but only time would tell on that front. The form of a very much modified UNSC Pelican could be seen making its way out of what remained of the Dawn's hanger bay.

Behind its controls was the Master Chief. The occupant that could be piloting the large craft was now slowly bringing the large craft forward into the void.

"Chief, you know once you set off those charges, there's no going back." Cortana reminded Chief, as this was his last chance to turn back from his decision.

"I know, but we'll make it work," Chief reassured her as he brought the Pelican slowly out from the Dawn's ruined hanger.

Then he allowed the drop ship to slowly drift forward from its birth. All the while watching as the small sphere of the planet they were aiming for came closer into view for him.

John's MJOLNIR then responded to his intentions, as it then magnified the sphere, which allowed him to see the splash of brown and greens run across its surface. This was hopefully a sign of a breathable atmosphere, as they still hadn't been able to confirm that from the Dawn's remaining sensor arrays.

But knowing that this was their only chance, Chief slowly added more power to the Pelican's engines once they were clear of the ship. As they did so Chief checked a panel that was responsible for outgoing messages and pressed one of the preloaded commands.

In response, the panel gave him a ring confirming that the message was sent. As Chief continued to increase his distance from the Dawn there could now be seen small explosions all across the gray ship's surface.

The charges the Chief had spent days placing started going off, as they then started to break the ship up in a certain way that Cortana had calculated would ensure that they would be able to recover the secondary Pelican once they had established a foothold on the planet that was now in range of.

As they continued to approach the planetary body it quickly became apparent that what the Pelican was now speeding towards was a moon in orbit of a larger planet.

Taking note of this fact, Chief continued his course towards the moon. Still, this approach hadn't gone unnoticed, as the COMs then lit up with someone speaking in a language that neither of them could understand. Most likely demanding to know who they were and what businesses they had on the moon.

Chief simply ignored this, as he then did another adjustment to the drop ship's course as Cortana finally spoke up.

"I have two ships on an intercept course. I'll put them on screen now." Cortana said as two red dots appeared on the flight map.

Chief checked the map and saw they would be well clear before the ship got into range. Still, he did adjust the Pelican's flight path, as he wanted to avoid any major population centers on the moon below as it then started to fully take up his vision outside the Pelican's cockpit.

"Do you have any IDs on the ships?" The Chief asked, hoping that they would yield some useful information as to who these natives were.

"No. There are of unknown design, matching nothing in my databanks." Cortana informed him as they finally reached the moon's outer atmosphere.

Chief then checked the sensor board and estimated that they would still be out of weapons range of two ships on the intercept course by the time they entered the moon's outer atmosphere.

Feeding more power to the Pelican's engines, the Chief started to put into action what was probably the riskiest part of their plan. Even so, if they managed to pull this off it would've looked like they had crashed upon reentry from the moon's atmosphere.

Leaving him and Cortana free to move around without drawing attention unwanted attention to themselves.

"Here we go." The Chief said as he then put the Pelican into a crash dive as he entered into the moon's atmosphere.

As the air temperature in the cockpit then spiked, Chief kept a sturdy hand on the fight controls knowing full well that it would be up to his judgment as to when he should pull the Pelican out from its seemingly fatal crash drive.


So that's all she wrote I hope that you enjoyed it.

So hopefully that explains a little bit more as to why Chief made the decision to blow up the Dawn. Especially given that its engines and reactors were taken without warning.

That and also the fact that Chief couldn't secure the crash site of the Dawn once they were planet side, so knowing that Chief went with fulfilling the Cole protocol on this occasion.

Also as you know the Dawn was split into two pieces after going through the portal. Or more accurately, was cut in two even so the Dawns main power plants where located in the engine area.

So hence why Cortana was still able to power everything despite only having half the Dawn to work with, still I wanted to keep it so that the chapter kept the original spirit of my original chapter as it where. But given a better reason as to why those choices were made as it where.

Because I didn't want to follow in the footsteps of everyone else, who had a boarding part enter into the Dawn, so this was my compromise as it were; still I do hope that you all like it and I didn't butcher the Chief and Cortana too much.

Anyway personal feelings aside, I hope that I will have the next chapter out by the time you're reading this.

And until the next time have a good one.