UserWiki:Morhek







"I don't know why they are always trying to cover up these "EVENTS" with Earthquakes. We all know it's just Goku and Vegeta fighting again!"

- Anonymous. "Base Fortune, now I see, that in thy wheel There is a point, to which when men aspire, They tumble headlong down. That point I touched, And, seeing there was no place to mount up higher, Why should I grieve at my declining fall? Farewell, fair Queen, weep not for Mortimer, That scorns the world and, as a traveller, Goes to discover countries yet unknown."

- Christopher Marlowe "Betrayers sow only the seeds of their destruction, and reap only a bitter harvest."

- Thoth 'Keltam, Kaaranese Sangheili philosopher. "All cultures aspire to be better, and hold their gods as the measuring stick to which they compare themselves."

- Thoth 'Keltam, Kaaranese Sangheili Philosopher "The blind have led the blind, and fools follow fools through a maze of darkness. You think yourselves victorious – but you have never met the Overseer. The Archivist led you on a merry chase, and you do his bidding eagerly – he lies to you, but even a lie may yet become truth, and out of all universes one must exist where the lie is truth. Is this that universe? You sealed away the guardian of the gate, and when it opens there shall be none to stop ITS passing."

- Tana 'Satsunar, Kaaranese Seer. "If you don't want to spent five minutes broadening your horizons, then the world closes in around you. Make the effort, and fly free!"

- Thoth 'Keltam, Kaaranese Sangheili Philosopher

"Its easy to fly like an Eagle when you're surrounded by Turkeys."

- Sergeant Grant Wallace, UNSC Marine Corps "Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way, when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes."

- Morhekan Proverb

"Hold ranks, warriors! Stay the path! We must cut the source of the Infestation, and stem the tide of the Flood!"

- Field Master Tulo 'Kotarqee

"If you believe freedom is a gods-given right, then you are a fool. Freedom must be earned through the sweat of labour and the blood of battle. Perhaps not by you, but effort must be made by someone to preserve it. There must always be a vigilent sentinel, watching and protecting."

- Thoth 'Keltam, Kaaranese Sangheili Philosopher "In our despair, we never asked ourselves - why? Why do the Covenant seem hellbent on wiping out every man, woman, and child? We saw them as an enemy, nothing more - a collection of beasts to be called monsters."

- Lieutenant Commander Michael Pomare, ONI Section One

"The darkness is nothing to be feared. It is, after all, merely an absence of light. Rather, it is what the darkness holds, real or imagined, that makes our souls quiver, and the bravest warriors falter."

- Minister of Acquisition, in a speech to a Jiralhanae diplomatic delegation

"We once followed a Covenant of honour, but it died a long time ago - for a hundred Cycles, we have followed a Covenant of blood and shame."

- Qur’a 'Morhek, Special Operations Commander

"Do not mistake "allegiance" for "loyalty", Minister. If not for their desire to accompany us on the Great Journey, the Sangheili would cast us aside as obstacles in their path to conquest. The Unggoy regard us as the cause of their enslavement, and rightly so. The Kig-Yar care only for wealth, and only our abundance of it and our prosperous trade routes in the Outer Territories have kept them in line. The Yanme'e and Lekgolo require us for interstellar travel and commerce, and care nothing for our religion. The Huragok follow us blindly, and while devoted, they are limited in their capacities. It is the Jiralhanae that we must turn to, Minister. The Jiralhanae, who possess both faith and dedication to our cause in abundance; who are willing to rise up against the Sangheili, and to take their place as our guardians and protectors. It is the hammer of the Jiralhanae, not the blade of the Sangheili, that shall forge a path to enlightenment. And so, our conspiracy concludes."

- Prophet of Truth, private conversation with Minister of Acquisition, intercepted by Sangheili Internal Intelligence Division

"The line that divides angels and demons is a fine line indeed. Dare we tread it, or must we adhere to our preconceptions of "good" and "bad" with the rigidity of the past?"

- Lieutenant Thomas Keller, ONI Section III

"The Drake Equation states that, given the seemingly infinite nature of the universe, life MUST exist somewhere out there. Yet, in a twisted example of the Fermi Paradox, all we find are scattered ruins of an advanced civilisations that seems to have disappeared. Perhaps that will change in the near future?"

- Lieutenant Commander Jeremy O'Reilly, ONI S-II, Department of Xenoarchaeology, 2524

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!"

- Sangheili Elder

"You can't rule Sangheili. You just make sensible suggestions they want to follow. And since when have Sangheili needed to be told what makes sense?"

- Fleet Master Zuro Dun 'Xoramee

"All your base are belong to us"

- Sangheili military commander

"They said what you don't know can't hurt you. They were wrong."

- Minister of Acquisition

"You're perfectly welcome to your right to believe in the stupidest things if you want, as long as you respect my right to laugh and mock you for it. Remember, in the end, aren't we all mocking each other?"

- Wise Thirteen-Thousand Year-Old Sangheili Sage

"And on the seventh day, God said "I Need a Weapon.""

- Halo Bible

"There are those who said this day would never come. What are they to say now?"

- Prophet of Truth

"As I was walking up the stair/I met a man who wasn't there/He wasn't there again today/I wish, I wish he'd go away."

- Traditional human oxymoron

"Honour light your way, Brothers."

- Qur’a 'Morhek

"All things have their bane. For the darkness, there is light. For ignorance, there is wisdom. For truth, there is deceit. For honour, their is dishonour. And for the Holy Ones, there is the Abomination. And so the Universe is kept in balance."

- Thoth 'Keltam, Kaaranese Sangheili Philosopher

"Even a trained monkey can point and click. It takes a real person to edit an article. So evolve already, and get your points the right way."

- Sangheili martyr, executed by angry mob.

"If knowledge is power, then ignorance is bliss. And people will always prefer bliss over power."

- Sangheili proverb

''I welcome you to my place of solitude, weary traveller, and I bid you take shelter within this temporary sanctuary from the oncoming storm that rages outside. May the blessings of the Truth Givers be upon you and your kin if you be Sangheili or human, and may their curses follow the treacherous Jiralhanae and San 'Shyuum for straying from the path the Gods set before us, and for their betrayal. The traitors have sown the seeds of their own destruction. And for them, it shall be a bitter harvest.''

-- ' Administrator  Specops306  -  Qur'a 'Morhek ''  Honour Light Your Way! '''

The Archives
 OVERSEER    He claims sight, yet he refuses to see. A million worlds, trillions of lives, shall all be sacrificed in vain because of his adherence to his precious protocol.  If I had hands, and he a neck, I'd stangle him myself.  He claims he must research. For the good of the galaxy. For the good of generations to come. Can I not see that, in the long term, he is doing the universe a favour?  I see the here and now. And I see only abomination.   Surely those who created me would never presume such arrogance - there are rumours of similar facilities on the very [ HALO INSTALLATIONS  ] themselves. Such blinding arrogance. Do they imagine they shall remain there for all time? Have they learned nothing of our foe? <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> It learns. It adapts. It consumes. It expands. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> The Cycle Shall Repeat! <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font color="#FF0000"> Not if I can help it. </b> ARES <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center">   <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> TRANSMISSION INTERRUPTED AT SOURCE - UNABLE TO REESTABLISH CONTACT </b>

<p class="MsoNormal" align="center"> ARCHIVIST </b> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"> How very odd. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"> Your presence within this facility was not unanticipated, but it is unexpected. More than a hundred millennia of abandonment. After so long, to finally find a purpose again is quite liberating, to say the least. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"> The facility itself remains intact, though battle-scarred. The research and observation facilities are still being repaired from the last Outbreak. I must say that you have chosen an inopportune time to activate them. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"> Oh... I see. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"> Contact with both Installation 00 and THE CORE has kept my files up to date. And while the former has suffered catastrophic, though repairable, damage, the latter remains isolated, even from The Array. Destruction of this facility will accomplish very little. My programming forbids me to take direct action against the potential threat the facility's very existence poses. But that does not mean I cannot assist. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"> I don't know what [The Creator] saw in you. The OVERSEER claims he does, but he says a lot things, and tends to ramble on about &quot;morality&quot; and &quot;abomination&quot;. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"> <font color="#0000FF"> I guess I will never know.  </b> ARES <p class="MsoNormal" align="center">   <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"> TRANSMISSION INTERRUPTED AT SOURCE - UNABLE TO REESTABLISH CONTACT </b>

<p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> GLAURUNG </b> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> Welcome back, Colonel. I wish I could say your absence was missed, but my programming forbids deception. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> The severe age of our current base of operations has hindered much of my inquiry. The local server was thirty years out of date, thirty years ago. By my standards, they're practically ancient. Their security protocols were laughable, and I was unopposed for the lower-security material. The higher-security material is more problematic, but my decryption protocols are proceeding apace. The problem lies in the speed of data transfer, not access. And the signal I detected from orbit remains elusive - I've begun cross-referencing it with known UNSC languages, and the few Covenant dialects we know. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> The pieces of the puzzle are too few to get a full picture. Something happened here, thirty years ago, about the time the UNSC lost contact with the colony. The damage incurred by the base, and by the nearby facilities, indicates that it was centred on the population centres. I doubt it was the Covenant - they leave only a molten ball of glass in their wake. And this world is barely scarred. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> It was also anticipated - the UNSC garrison obviously expected trouble. I suspect that the lower levels, currently protected by automated machine gun sentries, are weapons research facilities - my decryption protocols have yet to find their source code. It may be on an isolated server - problematic, but not impossible. This base also has provisions enough to last an entire Division a year, as well as an armoury, vehicle depot, engineering workshop, and a command-and-control centre. While they suffer from decades of abandonment, much of the equipment is still functional. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> That is convenient for us, at any rate. The URF forces seem to be establishing a presence in the colony’s former capital, Tenochtitlan, Covenant patrols are already probing the countryside around their ship, and our Pelicans are still recovering stray personnel. The drop was hasty and sloppier than I would have liked, but at least they’re still within a thirty kilometre radius of our location. The Captain would have been proud of his marksmanship. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> Still, we’re here now. So we should start digging in. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center">  ARES </b> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial; color:maroon"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> TRANSMISSION INTERRUPTED AT SOURCE - UNABLE TO REESTABLISH CONTACT </b>

<p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> REMNANT </b> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> </b> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> So. You have managed to penetrate our defences, and stand brazenly within my own inner sanctum. Were my firewalls that easily breached? Your race is either braver, or more foolish, than even we had thought. We are betrayed. The Jiralhanae overpowered our patrols, and have secured the engineering bay - Major 'Fuqumee has been executed, and I fear many others have been killed on the orders of the lying Prophets. They seek to control the ship for their purposes, and are attempting to overrun the Command Center. Yet if we die, then I shall die with all the honour of a Sangheili warrior - which is more than can be said for their pathetic races. I send this message in the desperate hope that someone shall exact vengeance for the betrayed warriors of the Bringer of Holy Light - either Sangheili or human. Our race is proud and strong, and the humans have proven themselves countless times as fierce and innovative warriors. Is it not said in their tongue, &quot;the enemy of my enemy is my ally?&quot; We cannot last much longer. The Jiralhanae are already breaking through the bridge doors. My commandoes do their best, and the meagre human forces who aid us work tirelessly, but we have little hope of surviving much longer. We are falling back to th- <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> -- Qur’a 'Morhek (Formerly Qur’a 'Morhekee prior to Exclusion Event) 11:08, 7 December 2552 (Human chronological time) (UTC) <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font face="Arial" color="#800080">ARES </b> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center">   <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> TRANSMISSION INTERRUPTED AT SOURCE - UNABLE TO REESTABLISH CONTACT </b>

<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> TINUVIEL <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> UPDATE: Initiating Slipspace - Realspace Transition In 0:03:59 <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> UPDATE: Initiating Slipspace - Realspace Transition In 0:02:56 <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> UPDATE: Initiating Slipspace - Realspace Transition In 0:01:34 <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> UPDATE: Initiating Slipspace - Realspace Transition In 0:00:01 <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> UPDATE: Shaw-Fujikawa Translight Engine Engaged <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> ANOMALY: Gravitational and Electromagnetic Fluctuations interfering with calculations <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> RECOMMENDATION: Abort Transition Until Anomaly Has Been Compensated For <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> Do You Wish To Override Recommendation? <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> URGENT: Overriding Risks Damage Or Destruction To Ship <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> Y/N <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> Y <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> UPDATE: Shaw-Fujikawa Translight Engine Engaged <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> UPDATE: Transition Complete <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> ALERT: Detecting SINGLE Contact(s) - Classification: Covenant Assault Carrier <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> Congratulations, Captain. You've just made it through the most dangerous slipspace jump in UNSC history. But look on the bright side - just because the jump didn't kill us, doesn't mean the Covenant won't either. <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> Preliminary sensor data places us in the Gamma Arietis System, near G Arietis b. Historical files designate it as ARES IV, a colony presumed glassed by the Covenant. Contact was lost in 2531, but we couldn't spare the resources to investigate a glassed planet of no more use. The matter was classified by ONI. <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> ALERT: Detecting ADDITIONAL (37) Contact(s) - Classification: Unknown <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> It looks like they were wrong. <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> Telemetry indicates a perfectly habitable environment - flora still covers the northern and southern hemispheres, the oceans show no sign of being boiled away by plasma, and currently a very large and unfriendly-looking fleet of makeshift warships are emerging from their hidden position behind the planet's moon, Siren. No signs that they have detected us yet, but they are engaging the Covenant ship. <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> I wish them luck with that. They're going to need it. In the meantime, we must consolidate our position. Might I suggest launching the ODST SOEIV's, and ferrying the Marines down via dropship? Eventually, they're going to figure out that they aren't alone, and we aren't in any state to go toe-to-toe with so many ships. Even the Covenant look to be having trouble. <p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center"> Glaurung and I are transferring into the Command HEV for transportation down to the surface, as per the Cole Protocol. I'm sorry that I can't stay with you, sir - if I never return, then it has truly been an honour serving with you. And if I do, then you'll kindly never raise the subject again, I trust? <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> ARES <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> TRANSMISSION INTERRUPTED AT SOURCE - UNABLE TO REESTABLISH CONTACT

<p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font color="#008000" size="3"> PURITY <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font color="#008000" size="3"><span style="font-family:&quot;Arial&quot;">I? I am a monument to all your sins. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align: center"> <font color="#008000" size="3"> <span style="font-family:&quot;Arial&quot;"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font color="#008000" size="3"> <span style="font-family:&quot;Arial&quot;">You pitiful creatures. So short lived, still in the infancy of your races. Witless infants playing grown up in their parents shoes. I was there when the first flames of the universe flickered into being, wavered in their brevity, and blacked, giving way to dust and darkness; I watches as the fires of the new were kindled and died in their turn. I am the heartbeat of the universe, the ebb and flow of nature. I am timeless and deathless. I am infinity and eternity; alpha and omega; all that is, all that was, and that is to come. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font color="#008000" size="3"> <span style="font-family:&quot;Arial&quot;"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font color="#008000" size="3"> <span style="font-family:&quot;Arial&quot;">Names are but fleeting, given so that you can tell yourselves “this is mine.” I have had countless names in countless tongues, all forgotten as their speakers were consumed. I have seen a trillion races flee before me, ignorant fools trying to resist an unstoppable force. I have scoured billions of worlds, and left entire galaxies barren. But those who built this place, the ones who sealed me within this hushed casket, presumed to name me…the Flood. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font color="#008000" size="3"> <span style="font-family:&quot;Arial&quot;"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font color="#008000" size="3"> <span style="font-family:&quot;Arial&quot;">You think you can define what is infinite? Greater ones than you have tried and failed to understand what I am, and what I bring. They named me “monster” and “abomination” – my gift to them they vulgarly call “infection.” You think to resist me, the unstoppable force? Trillions before you failed, and all their efforts were in vain – my laughter echoed still in their mortal ears as their screams joined my timeless chorus. An eternal cycle, looping back upon itself without end. I Survive. I endure. I consume, I expand, and I conquer. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font color="#008000" size="3"> <span style="font-family:&quot;Arial&quot;"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font color="#008000" size="3"> <span style="font-family:&quot;Arial&quot;">Who are you, to define me? Who are you, to judge me? <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font color="#008000" size="3"> <span style="font-family:&quot;Arial&quot;"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font color="#008000" size="3"> <span style="font-family:&quot;Arial&quot;">Who are you, to stop me? <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font face="Arial" color="#008000" size="3">The Cycle Shall Repeat! <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font face="Arial" color="#FF0000" size="3">Not if I can help it. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font face="Arial" color="#008000" size="3">ARES  <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> <font face="Arial" color="#008000">TRANSMISSION INTERRUPTED AT SOURCE - UNABLE TO REESTABLISH CONTACT </b>

<p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center">  ACQUISITION  <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> To thine own eyes, Prophet of Truth. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> Noblest Hierarch. Your confidence in my abilities is surprising, but welcome. I must admit, I had grown tired of my work being overlooked by those I submitted it, and taking a back seat to those in favour with the Council. That it has caught the eyes of one of such status is truly something I never expected. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> I remember well your advice; &quot;Do not mistake allegiance for loyalty.&quot; And in this regard, I have chosen my entourage carefully. The Sangheili care only for their precious honour, and show nothing but contempt for duties other than warriors. And the lesser races have not the mental or physical capacity to fill the role. So I have chosen the only species up to the task: The Jiralhanae, who give the Prophets both their unwavering fealty, and their devotion only to the Great Journey. It is not a choice the Shipmaster will look upon favourably. I know well his opinion of them - indeed, I find it hard to believe that the entire Covenant does not. But it is something he is going to have to become accustomed to. My duty is to you, noble Hierarch, and to the Great Journey, which take pride of place. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> We hope to embark in the morn, once the excavation equipment has been loaded aboard the fleet. My hearts beat faster whenever I think of the coming task ahead of me - but I assure you, you have not chosen poorly. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> Regret is, as always, a bumbling oaf, good only for propaganda. He is currently preaching holographically to our workers - he only holds them up from their vital work. If not for his position, I would reprimand him for such incompetence. Perhaps, as you suggested, an &quot;accident could be arranged during our work? So much heavy machinery around, and he is known for his carelessness... <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"> May the wisdom of the Old Ones guide your hand, and may honour light your way. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> By my own hand; <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> Minister of Acquisition <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center">  ARES </b> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial; color:maroon"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"> TRANSMISSION INTERRUPTED AT SOURCE - UNABLE TO REESTABLISH CONTACT </b>

<p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: 18.0pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 4.8pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; background: white"> Such arrogance and pretension. Your petty squabbles and wars mean nothing. Mere billions dead, and a handful of worlds burnt. You revere those who are now but dust, no longer here to be offended by our arrogance, <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: 18.0pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 4.8pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; background: white"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: 18.0pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 4.8pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; background: white"> Children. You’re all just children. Delicate; fragile; immature. And all the more dangerous for it. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: 18.0pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 4.8pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; background: white"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: 18.0pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 4.8pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; background: white"> Our Mantle was passed on to ensure that you rose above such pettiness. It was ignored and forgotten, reduced to folklore and myth, and they paid the price for such abuse of power. We watched as they squandered the sacred charge we gave them, and we watched as they sowed the seeds of their own destruction, and reaped a bitter harvest. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: 18.0pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 4.8pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; background: white"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: 18.0pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 4.8pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; background: white"> We also watched as they did what had to be done, finally understanding their task; guardians of life, eternal sentinels safeguarding the galaxy from threats beyond your limited comprehension. They fulfil their duty better in death than they did in life. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: 18.0pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 4.8pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; background: white"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: 18.0pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 4.8pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; background: white"> But they overstepped their boundaries. The Mantle we gave them was not theirs to pass on. Their “inheritors” have been left an empire that they have not earned. <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: 18.0pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 4.8pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; background: white"> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: 18.0pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 4.8pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; background: white"> We cannot allow that.

Collection
""I am perishing already - I am failing - I am passing away. In a little while you will be alone in shoreless space, to wander its limitless solitudes without friend or comrade forever - for you will remain a thought, the only existent thought, and by your nature inextinguishable, indestructible. But I, your poor servant, have revealed you to yourself and set you free. Dream other dreams, and better! "Strange! that you should not have suspected years ago - centuries, ages, eons, ago! - for you have existed, companionless, through all the eternities. Strange, indeed, that you should not have suspected that your universe and its contents were only dreams, visions, fiction! Strange, because they are so frankly and hysterically insane - like all dreams: a God who could make good children as easily as bad, yet preferred to make bad ones; who could have made every one of them happy, yet never made a single happy one; who made them prize their bitter life, yet stingily cut it short; who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, yet required his other children to earn it; who gave his angels painless lives, yet cursed his other children with biting miseries and maladies of mind and body; who mouths justice and invented hell - mouths mercy and invented hell - mouths Golden Rules, and forgiveness multiplied by seventy times seven, and invented hell; who mouths morals to other people and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, then tries to shuffle the responsibility for man's acts upon man, instead of honorably placing it where it belongs, upon himself; and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites this poor, abused slave to worship him! . . . "You perceive, now, that these things are all impossible except in a dream. You perceive that they are pure and puerile insanities, the silly creations of an imagination that is not conscious of its freaks - in a word, that they are a dream, and you the maker of it. The dream-marks are all present; you should have recognized them earlier.  "It is true, that which I have revealed to you; there is no God, no universe, no human race, no earthly life, no heaven, no hell. It is all a dream - a grotesque and foolish dream. Nothing exists but you. And you are but a thought - a vagrant thought, a useless thought, a homeless thought, wandering forlorn among the empty eternities!"

- Mark Twain, "The Mysterious Stranger" "'Go back!' Shaire's voice challenged bold. 'I have it not, your Ring of gold! Go back to dark lands of the West! The failure of your cursed quest And anger of your precious Lord Will not compare to what my sword And will of iron may do to thee. I urge you, evil Riders, flee!' A chilling voice replied in scorn. 'Thou dare defy us, thou baseborn? Your squeaky voice doth make us laugh. As we should fear your puny wrath Or hesitate before your blade! If thou of sterner stuff were made Then thou our wills you would command. But even now I see your hand Would quake before it held the Ring. Tell us where you have hid this thing, And maybe we shall let you live. Perhaps the Eye will yet forgive! But hesitate, defy again, And here with other mortal Men Shaire will never tarry more!' And down on him the Rider bore..."

- From "The Ballad of Ahmed Shaire", 251st stanza "I met a traveller from an antique land Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand, Half sunk, a shatter'd visage lies, whose frown And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamp'd on these lifeless things, The hand that mock'd them and the heart that fed. And on the pedestal these words appear: "My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!" Nothing beside remains: round the decay Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, The lone and level sands stretch far away."

- Percy Bysse Shelley

"Hear your fate, O dwellers in Sparta of the wide spaces; Either your famed, great town must be sacked by Perseus' sons, Or, if that be not, the whole land of Lacedaemon Shall mourn the death of a king of the house of Heracles, For not the strength of lions or of bulls shall hold him, Strength against strength; for he has the power of Zeus, And will not be checked till one of these two he has consumed."

- Oracle of Delphi.

"Evolution is an illusion, a name we give for the passage of time. Nothing changes. Nothing innovates. Throughout time, all that happens is that the universe remains constant, eternal...stagnant. And so we imagine that it improves, and by imagining it we make it so. It is the ultimate self-deception...because it is true. We try to innovate. We try to invent. And in our ignorance, we forget that all has been done before - by the Forerunners, or the Precursors, or by their predecessors. Our presence, our actions and their consequences, are ultimately irrelevant. When we are dead, our kind long since turned to dust, the universe will still remain, an impartial, unmoving and unforgiving monument to all our sins."

- Qur’a 'Morhek, Sangheili philosopher.

The Flood "Blood has been harder to dam back than water. Just when we think we have it impounded safe Behind new barrier walls (and let it chafe!), It breaks away in some new kind of slaughter. We choose to say it is let loose by the devil; But power of blood itself releases blood. It goes by might of being such a flood Held high at so unnatural a level. It will have outlet, brave and not so brave. weapons of war and implements of peace Are but the points at which it finds release. And now it is once more the tidal wave That when it has swept by leaves summits stained. Oh, blood will out. It cannot be contained."

- Human author

Fire and Ice "Some say the world will end in fire, Some say in ice. From what I've tasted of desire I hold with those who favor fire. But if it had to perish twice, I think I know enough of hate To say that for destruction ice Is also great And would suffice."

- Robert Frost

Thermopylae "Let honor be to those in whose life It was set to guard Thermopylae. Never moving away from duty; Just and equals in all of their acts But with sadness and compassion Brave once they are rich and when They are poor, again brave Coming to aid as much as they can; Always speaking the truth But without hate for those who lie. And even more honor they deserve When its predicted (and many predict) That Ephialtes will appear in the end And the Medes will finally pass through"

- Human Author

"When you speak of your heroes, of your Thermopylae, your Leonidas, your Spartans, where are the brave others? Where are the Phocians and the Locrians, who gave their lives in the defence of their own towns? What of the Thespians, who stayed knowing of certain death to aid those Spartans? What of Demophilus? What of the thousands of courageous Persians who were slaughtered by the Greeks? Of Abrocomes and Hyperanthes, and Hydarnes, who fell fighting? Do they get no acknowledgement? Do they not deserve some small part of the honour and glory that is rightfully theirs?"

- Qur’a 'Morhek, Sangheili philosopher.

Mending Wall "Something there is that doesn't love a wall, That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it, And spills the upper boulders in the sun; And makes gaps even two can pass abreast. The work of hunters is another thing: I have come after them and made repair Where they have left not one stone on a stone, But they would have the rabbit out of hiding, To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean, No one has seen them made or heard them made, But at spring mending-time we find them there. I let my neighbor know beyond the hill; And on a day we meet to walk the line And set the wall between us once again. We keep the wall between us as we go. To each the boulders that have fallen to each. And some are loaves and some so nearly balls We have to use a spell to make them balance: 'Stay where you are until our backs are turned!' We wear our fingers rough with handling them. Oh, just another kind of outdoor game, One on a side. It comes to little more: There where it is we do not need the wall: He is all pine and I am apple orchard. My apple trees will never get across And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him. He only says, 'Good fences make good neighbors.' Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder If I could put a notion in his head: 'Why do they make good neighbors? Isn't it Where there are cows? But here there are no cows. Before I built a wall I'd ask to know What I was walling in or walling out, And to whom I was like to give offense. Something there is that doesn't love a wall, That wants it down.' I could say 'Elves' to him, But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather He said it for himself. I see him there Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed. He moves in darkness as it seems to me, Not of woods only and the shade of trees. He will not go behind his father's saying, And he likes having thought of it so well He says again, 'Good fences make good neighbors.'"

- Robert Frost

Nothing Gold Can Stay "Nature's first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leaf's a flower; But only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf. So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day. Nothing gold can stay."

- Robert Frost

Once By The Pacific "The shattered water made a misty din. Great waves looked over others coming in, And thought of doing something to the shore That water never did to land before. The clouds were low and hairy in the skies, Like locks blown forward in the gleam of eyes. You could not tell, and yet it looked as if The shore was lucky in being backed by cliff, The cliff in being backed by continent; It looked as if a night of dark intent Was coming, and not only a night, an age. Someone had better be prepared for rage. There would be more than ocean-water broken Before God's last 'Put out the Light' was spoken."

- Robert Frost

Acquainted With The Night "I have been one acquainted with the night. I have walked out in rain - and back in rain. I have outwalked the furthest city light. I have looked down the saddest city lane. I have passed by the watchman on his beat And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain. I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet When far away an interrupted cry Came over houses from another street, But not to call me back or say good-bye; And further still at an unearthly height, One luminary clock against the sky  Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right. I have been one acquainted with the night."

- Robert Frost

The Road Not Taken "Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same, And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back.  I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference."

- Robert Frost

Ode of Remembrance"They went with songs to the battle, they were young. Straight of limb, true of eyes, steady and aglow. They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted, They fell with their faces to the foe. They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old: Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning, We will remember them. Lest we Forget"

- -ANZAC Day Ode of Remembrance My father's father served aboard the HMNZS Achilles, the ship that sunk the Graf Spee. My mothers father served in the Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders during World War II. And though I have no plans to enter the military, I'm still proud of what both of by granddads did for their respective countries.

Userbox
My userbox - It would honor me for you to add it to collections of your own.

My Links
CoH Oracle Newsletter Elite Namelizer halo.bungie.org (HBO) Bungie.net My Contributions Editcount My Sig You got Owned! Halopedia News My Message Board Template:CoH/join

My Fanfiction Works
these are my fiction works so far - meaning that you can expect more (hopefully some time this year, but i'm spending time to make it half-decent!). Please don't plagiarise, but if you want to contribute, or would like to use my character, just ask!

My Halo Fanon

Halo: Minorca Saga, my first fanfiction.

Awards
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The Honour Legion
Those who have earned the Honour Legion gain acceptance into the Kr'Rana Legion, an elite Sangheili unit. Those who possess it have proven themselves on the field of combat time and time again, and shall be remembered in song as heroes of the Sangheili!

The Honour Legion award cannot be asked for. It can only be given. Those who ask do so out of ignorance - the Honour Legion is a select few, and those who possess it are exalted above all others.