The Spartan Effect

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April 10th, 2183

     On the bridge of the Eternity, shortly after escorting the Destiny Ascension to the citadel so the council could begin organizing the recovery effort, the spartan was found in the private comm suite off of the bridge, having a conversation with who he now knows as Admiral Hackett, of the Alliance navy. He had discovered several things, one of which was that this was the same galaxy he had been fighting in for years, but it wasn't at the same time. The Eternity and her crew had managed something only believed to be theoretically possible with slipspace before, because any attempts prior had resulted in all those involved disappearing and all future efforts had been declared too risky with the covenants crusade demanding all the men and women the UNSC could get. 

     Slipspace warped and tore into space-time itself to send ships, communications, and in some rare cases even munitions across vast distances in far less time than conventional travel methods. The Eternity wasn't sent through space and time, but across it, and managed to pierce between dimensions. Eternity was for all intents and purposes in a separate reality altogether, and without knowing exactly where each reality lay there was no telling if they'd ever be able to get back. 

     The admiral found it difficult to believe that the Eternity wasn't simply extragalactic in nature but quickly corrected that belief when Thomas removed his helmet and showed him his face, pale and with wrinkles around his eyes, a scar ran over his nose stopping before it reached either tear duct. His eyes a bright blue and shined with a cold calculating gaze the admiral recognized in one other man. John Shepard had those same eyes, and with them had beaten insurmountable odds. Thomas' hair was a midnight black and was cut into a standard buzz, and a stubble could be seen faintly on his jaw. He never could get it to fully disappear, but he was nothing if not stubborn in his adherence to dress code. The only violation he made regularly was keeping his old fire teams' symbol on his right shoulder. A white spearhead with red wings, his old team had been a Frontline assault squad, for Spartans that usually meant you didn't last long, but his squad had been successful in each campaign they went through. It wasn't any massive invasion or one conflict that took them apart. 

     One by one his squad had fallen and there hadn't been anyone to fill in the gaps, so they made do, some ODST's here, a squad of Marines there. It made him and the others that remained good leaders but after a few missions he was left the lone survivor and with no backup. No ammo, no knife, no comrades. He was picked up by a lone pelican, searching for survivors of an engagement he didn't bother to remember. He survived using his bare hands, determined to take as much from the covenant as they had him, and in the end, sitting in that empty pelican he felt for the first time since before his augmentation so utterly tired, he could've collapsed and been unconscious before he hit the ground. He never changed his armor's symbol, even after being reenlisted and issued new armor the first thing he did was apply his old team's symbol and got chewed out for it. He kept it, as he would gladly continue to fight as the tip of the spear, alone if he had to, but now he had more to worry about than memories, and the fallen. 

     His ship now, the Eternity had no way of returning to the UNSC, not without extensive testing and research into the phenomenon that carried them here in the first place. Right now, the only thing the spartan knew for certain was that the ship and its crew were stranded in unknown territory and that meant that they needed two things, information and resources. The easiest answer was to attempt to join the Eternity, her escort and crew into the Alliance's ranks, essentially linking up with another human race, but he already knew this was less than ideal.  Firstly, he was unsure if this humanity would welcome him and his crew, the Eternity he was certain they would be overjoyed to have, but he didn't know how they would react to his augments, what their political stance was, hell they could damn COMMUNISTS for all he knew, and he wasn't about to stand for THAT. He needed to talk to the council, they owed him a debt for saving them, and he needed allies. The Eternity needs hydrogen for its reactors and Titanium for its weaponry, not to mention food, water, and oxygen for its crew. The gardens on the ship could sustain the crew nigh indefinitely but he wouldn't put his crew through processed veggie patties for the foreseeable future. No one deserved that torture. He realized then that the admiral had asked him a question he missed while lost in thought.