"Sir!" the young man yelled at his superior. "What Liam, were on a schedual, you know." he replied calmly. "Sir,the rings, they've activated." General John H. Stratford looked around, and knew their plan was for naught.

"Base, this is General Stratford, prepare leave Earth." As he gave the order John thought of those lost during the war, and the friends gained for a short period. He looked over to the young Lieutenant, hardly twenty-two, a testament to the Covenant's fighting abilitys.

"Sir, we need to get you off, and try to out run this, sir!" John turned his full attention to the young man," Liam, you are now General, if you make it out of this, don't let following generations know of this disaster." Liam was in shock, he a general, then he replayed the gen.'s words over again.

"Sir, what about you, aren't you coming?" John just smiled at Liam, at his oldest son, and replied " No, i'm gonna try and stop it." Then to his son's shock, John pushed him into the grav elevator, and ordered the ship attached to it to take off.

"Get this ship arround now!" Gen. Liam Stratford barked to a corpral. "Sir, the Gen. gave us specific orders to leave, it was his last official order and can't be broken by anyone but the leaders, sorry, sir!" The man answered back. Gen. Liam S. watched on as his ship, the sole surviving war-ship, and holder of the last dying leader of Earth, speed off into the black. "I'LL do it for you father," he said, "I'll take care of humanity." Liam peomised his father, a finall promiss from son to father.

As former General John H. Stratford watched the ship take off, a small tear fell down, and he prayed to what ever god was out there to protect his son, and the mission. He stayed for a minute more, then he turned around and took in the sight, Earth on fire, the ring that they'd fought so hard to stop was reactivating, he smiled and looked into his pack. The pack held a mark twelve tactical nuke, one powerfull enough to destroy the ring, and planet.

TEN MINUTES LATER-

John had reached the control room, and looked at the console, then the nuke. Then a voice resounded, 'You don't want to do that, reclaimer, that would not be wise'. John looked at the little floating droid, "Sorry, it's already primed." John took out the nuke, and it was set at 00:05. 'NO!!!!!!!!' the voice boomed, and John let out a laugh, then he said a quick one second prayer to god, then the bomb went off, with an Earth shattering BOOM!

As he looked at all of his creation, in shambles by one of the groups he'd allowed to live, he let out a small tear, not for those in the eternal fire, not this perticular tear, no it was for one man, John H. Stratford, or known to his government as John-117, who sacrificed everything to end this hoard. God let the tear fall and in that instant, the Earth was reborn, as it was in 1522 A.D. he let out a small smile, for he'd done it again, he'd reborn the planet, and hopefully this one would work out, but he knew it wouldn't.