"Thanks Cris" Helen said over the comlink, "I'll explain everything later. Good luck up there."

"Will do" Cris's hologram said with a smile, "to be honest, I thought those things took you. You don't know how glad I am to see you."

Helen smiled back, "Well it's going to take more than an army of Flood to put me out of commission."

Cris made a confused face.

"Uh, I'll fill you in later" Helen said.

"Sure, keep an eye out for the Covenant."

Helen turned off her comlink and stuffed it in her pocket. She turned and looked at her companions. They were staring in amazement at the building they now found themselves in. It was probably a hundred times bigger than the control room they were just in, with small tunnels leading off in different directions

"Hey Fire" Jason said to the monitor which floated several feet from his face, "where is this Index thing you were talking about?"

"This way Reclaimers" Fire said as it started floating towards one of the nearby tunnels, "a word of caution Reclaimers, this area has been compromised by the Flood. The installation's sentinel drones will be along shortly to assist you, but until then you must provide your own defences against the Parasite."

"Great" Trepid scoffed as they entered the dark tunnel, "After all we were doing so well on our own last time."

Jason and Trepid activated their lightsabers to provide them with some light, but soon realized this was unnecessary when a dim light from the next room could be seen at the end of the tunnel. The four of them emerged into an equally large chamber with a large pit at the center with a small red object floating over the middle of it.

"That is the Index" stated Fire, gazing with its large green eye at the red glowing object.

"How do we get it?" Helen asked.

"We must proceed to the top floor where we may deactivate the energy barrier surrounding the Index. Any other attempts at removing the Index would result in damage to either the remover or the Index, which would be unacceptable."

Jason looked up, barely able to make out the ceiling of the library in the dim light, "we need to go all the way up there?"

"Yes Reclaimer, we must move quickly. No doubt the Flood has taken notice to our presence."

Leading the way, Fire took them into another small hallway which brought them to a large passageway leading deep into the Library. Fire continued to take them forward into the Forerunner complex, not seeming to notice the sloshing sounds of Flood moving about the darkness.

Jason, Helen and Trepid all retrieved their weapons, waiting for the Flood's inevitable attack. When the four of them reach a massive metal door, it happened. Combat forms of all shapes and sizes crawled out of ventilation shafts and launched themselves at the three humans. Trepid held out his hand and destroyed half of them with a powerful wave of force lightning, while Helen fired round after round at the rest.

When some of the combat forms were close enough Jason joined the fight. He hacked and slashed at the creatures, taking them down one by one. Helen once again resorted to her vibro blade, fighting side by side with Jason to push the Flood back.

Behind them, it seemed Fire had opened the large door. In the midst of the battle, the three of them retreated into the next passage and held off the combat forms as Fire closed the door. When the metal door clanged shut, Jason and Trepid moved forward to take down the last combat forms that had made it through in time.

When the last Flood form fell they all stood there panting from the fight. Had Fire not opened the door, they probably wouldn't have made it. They were quick to catch their breath with Fire's non stop talking about their close proximity to Flood.

"Hey Fire, can I ask you some questions?" Helen queried as they reached a massive metal elevator.

"Of course Reclaimer" Fire said happily as the elevator began moving slowly upwards.

"What is this library used for?"

"Originally this structure was used to store and protect the activation Index. But after the Destroyer Installations were repurposed as M-type Installations, this library was where my makers did their studies on the Flood."

"One more question, why do you keep calling us Reclaimers?" she inquired.

"Reclaimers are beings selected by my makers to reclaim and use their left over technology. Only a Reclaimer can activate this installation, and only a Reclaimer can activate the Halos in the case the Flood are released into the galaxy once more."

To Helen this wasn't much in the way of an explanation, but it was better than nothing. The three of them were human, so Helen figured the Forerunners chose the human species to be their Reclaimers. She could of course be wrong, but that was the only conclusion she could come to at the moment.

The elevator stopped and the four of them stepped off into another passage. Almost instantly another horde of Flood combat forms was on top of them, and they weren't alone. Skittering along the metal floor and walls were dozens of the smaller infection forms. Jason and Trepid formed a defensive barrier between Helen and the Flood, allowing her to take shots at the infection forms while they dealt with the combat forms.

Jason and Trepid fought well together, and kept the Flood at bay. But they were beginning to loose ground. Slowly the Flood were pushing them back towards the elevator. Then, just like before in the clearing, several streams of energy showered down from above. They all looked up and were greeted by thirty of the triangular machines the monitor called sentinels. The sentinels flew down and pushed the Flood back into the passage with their beam weapons, where they forced the Flood forms to flee.

With their new found allies, the four of them made it through the rest of the library with ease. They encountered wave after wave of Flood, but they were no match against two force users and a fleet of sentinels.

At last, Jason, Helen, Trepid and the monitor entered the last metal door and set foot onto a large circular metal plate, suspended a hundred meters above the Index below. When they approached the center of the plate, a bright blue light erupted from the ceiling to meet the small hole in the plate's center and immediately the plate began to lower itself towards the Index.

As they descended, the sentinels circled over head, blasting away any infection forms that dared to get too close. Finally, the plate traversed its last several feet, with the index floating inside the hole at the center. Jason moved forward to take it, and as his hand neared it a smaller object ejected from the top. He reached out and pulled the index from it's casing like a sword from its scabbard.

"Got it" Jason said with relief.

The monitor floated over and grabbed the index out of his hand with a small tractor beam. The index floated up and inside a small storage compartment on the machines backside.

"Hey" Jason said with surprise.

"Forgive me Reclaimer, but according to protocol I am required to posses the activation Index during transit, for security reasons of course."

Jason was about to say something back when a not too distant roar drew his attention. He had heard those roars several times before, and he knew they had to get out of there fast.

"Fire, get us out of here" Jason demanded.

"Once again I am sorry Reclaimer, but there is a stasis field surrounding this area preventing my access to the teleportation grid. We must return to the room we began in if we wish to leave."

Kalleem was anxious to get on the ground, knowing the Destroyer was well within his grasp. With little patience he decided to check up on the pilot, just to get an idea of how long it would take them to reach the humans' location. He moved past several Kig-Yar and opened the door to the cramped cockpit. The pilot turned quickly before refocusing on flying the Phantom.

"Shipmaster, is there a problem?"

Kalleem shook his head, "no, no problems. I just felt like checking on our progress."

The pilot tapped away at several controls, opening the viewport up larger, "well you are in luck Shipmaster, we have nearly reached our destination."

Kalleem stared out the viewport at a massive Forerunner structure jutting out of the planet's thick brown foliage. It was even more majestic than the Silent Cartographer, with its two large metal arms arching up to meet in the middle and a bright shaft of light shining out of the circular roof just below the arms.

As they got closer, Kalleem was able to see much of the structure was buried under this world's dense brown plant life. Even so he could still see the structure's gradual slope down towards the ground, with little points of artificial light peeking through cracks in the metal.

"Shipmaster we will have to set down a fair distance from the structure" said the pilot, "the foliage is too dense to set down anywhere closer. One of the other drop ships located a reasonably large clearing where we can drop you off; unfortunately you will need to approach the target on foot."

Kalleem growled with annoyance, "fine. Get us on the ground soon. We cannot let the humans escape."

With one last look at the Forerunner structure, Kalleem left the cockpit and re-entered the troop bay, where many of his soldiers waited patiently to be released onto the world below. Kalleem leaned against the bulkhead and waited.

As it turned out, he didn't need to wait long at all. The pilot's voice soon crackled over the intercom, telling them to prepare themselves for the drop. Kalleem retrieved his plasma repeater from its holster on his back and gripped it tightly as the bay doors opened.

The troop bay quickly emptied as its occupants jumped from the troop bay to the brown soil beneath the Phantom while around them the other drop ships were doing the same. Almost every species within the Covenant stood in the clearing, some standing idly by as they waited for orders, others assisting the drop ship personnel with disengaging the vehicles stored under some of the ships.

Kalleem surveyed the planet surface, intrigued by its odd colour and putrid stench. It was odd, he had never seen anything like the plant life on this world before. He suppressed his curiosity and watched as the last drop ship detached its Wraith and ascended back into orbit.

When they were all ready Kalleem addressed his troops, "Brothers. Today is a day we will become heroes. The humans are spread wide across this galaxy. But together, we will find the ancient weapon and use its power to cleanse this galaxy of their heresy. Let us go forth together, and fulfill our destinies as the instruments of the gods!"

The crowd erupted into cheers, even the Mgalekgolo and Jiralhanae. Kalleem hopped aboard the nearest Revenant took to co-pilot seat, while a younger Sangheili major took the controls. Slowly, Kalleem's small army neared the tree line, which up close looked more like a wall than anything.

"Shipmaster" said the pilot seated beside him, "how do we get through?"

"Use the mortars" Kalleem said "They should be enough to get us to the structure ahead."

The Sangheili nodded and stood up in his seat, "Wraiths ready!" he called out. The three Wraiths powered up their main weapons and waited for Kalleem's signal. He nodded to the pilot and the Sangheili relayed the order to the tanks. "Fire!" he called.

The three Wraiths boomed and three lobs of plasma arched overhead and impacted the dense cluster of trees with a flash of light. Kalleem watched as the trees began to burn under the intense heat from the plasma, eventually making a small pathway which they could now march through.

As one the army moved forward into the opening as the Wraiths continued to blow away more trees further ahead. So far everything was going smoothly, but as they continued toward the structure, Kalleem kept getting a nagging feeling that something wasn't right.

He was getting the urge to look over his shoulder, as if someone or something was following them. At last he gave in and turned in his seat. It seemed he wasn't the only one with this feeling. Several of the Kig-Yar and Unggoy were getting agitated, their eyes darting from shadow to shadow, searching for something.

That's when he saw it. Movement amongst the trees, barely even a shadow. It wasn't human; no human was the size of what he saw. But it wasn't any of his troops; they were all marching along the artificial pathway. No, whatever Kalleem had seen was something else. Something that had yet to decide if Kalleem and his soldiers were friend of foe.

As the convoy moved forward they eventually entered a large clearing at the base of the structure. Kalleem dismounted the Revenant and began walking toward a large door positioned directly in front of them, eager to get inside.

Large brown creatures suddenly surged from the tree line, long sharp tentacles extending from their appendages and cracking like whips. They went after the first victims that happened to cross their sights, which in this case was a squad of Unggoy. The methane breathers stood their ground, firing their needlers and plasma pistols at the oncoming creatures, but this barely even slowed them.

As the creatures got closer, the Unggoy broke ranks and ran. The Jiralhanae and Kig-Yar reacted as the Unggoy fled, firing spikers and needle rifles, and this time causing some damage. Here and there, bodies exploded in a shower of pink mist from needle rifle rounds, while the rest were quickly mowed down by the spikers fired by the Jiralhanae.

When it seemed the struggle was over, all hell broke loose. More creatures converged on them from either side and a full scale battle began to rage. Kalleem took aim with his repeater and fired bright blue plasma at several oncoming creatures. When one shot smashed through the head of the nearest, a small round creature bursted from the torso and launched itself through the air towards Kalleem.

As Kalleem shot the little creature, he recognized it and the rest of the creatures for what they truly were. The Flood. In his youth he had been taught about the war between the Gods and the Flood, and how the parasite was really a small bulbous creature that buried itself in the torso of its host and took control of it completely.

Kalleem was now separated from the convoy, his back nearly touching the structure's entrance. Kalleem knew it would be a great risk but he had no choice. Still firing his repeater, Kalleem gripped his energy sword and activated it. He re-holstered his repeater and swung the sword, cutting through the many Flood forms. Pushing forward, he was able to hack his way through the Flood back to the relative safety of the convoy.

Kalleem slid behind the nearest Revenant, quickly hiding his sword from sight. Around him the other Revenants, Ghosts and Wraiths moved about the battlefield, blowing away Flood with their high powered weapons. Kalleem looked up and found his pilot dead behind the controls, a long needle shard jutting out of his back.

He didn't have any time to dwell on this as he jumped inside and kicked out the pilot. He took the controls and turned the vehicle around, aiming the cannon at a large group of Flood. He pulled the trigger and watched as the parasites melted from the extreme heat. Kalleem then moved around and assisted the Wraiths on the left side of the battlefield, wiping away numerous amounts of Flood.

Finally the last Flood form fell, giving Kalleem a chance to survey what was left of his small army. Most of the Unggoy were dead or carried away by the Flood; the same went for the Kig-Yar. The Yam'ne on the other hand hadn't lost any of their numbers, having been able to take to the skies out of the reach of the parasite. The Jiralhanae, Sangheili and Mgalekgolo lost few members as well, mainly due to their superior skills and equipment.

Finally having the chance, Kalleem left the Revenant to examine the entrance to the Forerunner structure. He approached slowly, wary of any more Flood. As he got closer he saw several interesting details, one of which being a small keypad shaped like a human hand. Kalleem reached out and touched it with his own three fingered hand. As he did, all of the lights around the door turned red followed by a small beep.

Kalleem growled and walked back to the convoy. He approached the nearest Wraith and called out to its driver. A Sangheili in dark purple armour pulled back the canopy and stuck his head out, a curious look on his face.

"What do you need Shipmaster?"

"We will require you to blast a hole through that door," said Kalleem, "there is no other way to get to the humans otherwise."

The Sangheili driver was obviously uncomfortable with this idea, "but Shipmaster, that is a sacred relic of the gods. We..."

"Don't you think I know that?" Kalleem snapped, "forgiveness will be given to those who strike down the enemies of our gods. Now, you will open that door or be charged with heresy."

The Sangheili gulped, "yes Shipmaster."

As the Wraith got into position, Kalleem rounded up the rest of the Sangheili and Jiralhanae and positioned them near the door for a quick entry, while charging the Yam'ne and Mgalekgolo with guarding the entrance from anymore Flood.

The Wraith powered up its cannon and fired a glob of plasma at the metal door. The instant the plasma touched its surface, it began to melt. When hole was big enough, Kalleem and his troops stepped through and into the darkness.

Slowly and quietly, they made their way through a maze of halls and small corridors, always going deeper into the complex. After five minutes of walking Kalleem opened a small door and entered a cavernous room extending many stories above their heads. He swore he could hear faint voices off in the distant and with his squad at his heels, they entered the room cautiously. Kalleem gazed up at the ceiling, amazed at the beauty of the structure, even in the dark.

Suddenly one of his Sangheili comrades cried out. Kalleem whirled around to see one of the small Flood forms gripping onto his neck, trying to insert its sharp tentacles into the Sangheili's exposed skin. One of his fellows gripped the Flood form and tore it off, causing it to pop loudly in his hands.

As if on cue with the first, hundreds of the small Flood forms came crawling across the metal floor towards them. Kalleem pulled the trigger of his repeater, but stopped when something else crossed his vision. Three familiar faced humans came filing through a small side passage and stood watching Kalleem and his soldiers combat the many Flood.

Kalleem roared with anger, recognizing them as the same humans Salleema had faced ten cycles ago. He threw his repeater to the ground, ignoring the Flood around him, and charged toward the humans. With his sword hilt gripped tightly in his hand, Kalleem prepared himself for whatever these humans could throw at him. Then, as he got within ten feet of the humans, they all began to glow bright yellow.

He had no idea what kind of trick this could be, but in a split second he changed his plan and jumped toward the human on the right. But instead of slashing at the human like he originally planned, he dove and tackled him to the ground. But when Kalleem got up to attack with his sword, he found that he was no longer in the same room as before.