Jump 122: Halo Forerunner Saga

Jump 122: Halo Forerunner Saga

Location: Flood-Infested Space, 97,454 BCE
Age: 25
Identity: Drop-In (Manipular), Human
Drawbacks: [+1100] Connected Time Streams, Burn Zone, Vacuum Power Vacuum, Space Beacon, Faber Fallout

[400/2100]  Remnant Immunity
[Free]      Give A Smile
[Free]      Lower Being
[500/2100]  Mantle of Responsibility
[600/2100]  Ageless
[800/2100]  They Always Come Back
[1400/2100] Infected Reality
[1400/2500] Item Stipend (+400)
[Free]      Hard Light Projectors
[Free]      Weaponry
[1700/2500] The Domain
[2500/2500] Precursor Primer

It should be pointed out that there are a lot of things in this galaxy that do not make sense. For example, the Forerunners deciding to forcibly take a Mantle that was meant for someone who would preserve all life, and hunting the Precursors to extermination to that end. The Forerunners, now the apparent holders of said Mantle, using it as an excuse to keep anyone else in the galaxy from remotely approaching their level, to commit a war of extermination and devolution on humans.

You know, the Flood hitting them is kind of an appropriate punishment for their collective jackassery, even if it's not something that ought to be a thing.

In any event, popping out of nowhere in the middle of Flood space is a very irritating thing to have happen, for a great many reasons. Owing to my nature... well, these little abominations (or perhaps not so little) were attracted to me like moths to a flame. Looking at them in higher dimensions - because they quite literally work using neural physics on the higher scales - is very interesting, and it explains why I'm so interesting to them; their separate instances may have to initially link together in three dimensional space, but they interact and resonate in higher dimensions, and are thus able to alter the local laws of physics.

Seeing it done shows me how to do it myself, but frankly, things they did not expect includes my multiplying myself endlessly on the surface of the planet, using all the fiendfyre to scorch the planet clean of their infestation, and then hijacking one of their now-clean ships to get the absolute FUCK out of dodge. And also popping over to every ship in the system and cleansing THEM with fiendfyre while I'm at it, before pulling myself back to a more reasonable number of clones instead of ten billion.

Good luck adapting to THAT, parasite.

After that, though... well, to be honest? It was a decade of hit-and-run attacks against the Flood, setting up ambushes and traps and being mostly successful, punctuated by the occasional Forerunner fleet trying to exterminate me as well. You see, evidently, their technology works by leeching power from other universes. It would seem that someone who is a higher dimensional being is a problem; my 'shadow' as it were, tended to completely blow out their vacuum pylons when I got too close. This unfortunately curtailed my magpie tendencies quite handily, as I had wanted to collect samples of as much of their technology as I could, but only got their ire instead.

Though considering they're stealing energy from other universes and crippling them in their infancy, that's kind of a fucked up concept, honestly. I can see why the Precursors had so many issues with that.

Still, studying how the Flood works in higher dimensions WAS an absolutely fascinating concept... it was just a pity that I couldn't figure out more about them, but studying living samples close up seemed like a particularly bad idea, as I really didn't want to run any risks of infection.

Also, fun fact: it turns out that the Halo arrays firing CAN, in fact, actually wound me as a ten dimensional being. I have never been happier that I was keeping instances of myself all over the galaxy to throw the Flood into a state of confusion, including a few in assorted shield worlds... and I regenerated the damage very rapidly... but this did actually wound me. And grievously at that.

I had expected being in higher dimensions to leave me all but immune to attacks, and I have found I was very much mistaken. Bodies that weren't even within their firing range were wounded due to their connection to bodies that were outside it. I'll have to be more careful in the future.