An excerpt from the finale of my scrapped old Halo book Truth and Reconciliation. I hope to give this storyline its time of day, I don't want to throw away a character as good as Valarad R'Shanai, but I decided this will rather than trying to fit in the 343 canon of Halo, rather be incorporated into my long-off rewrite of Halo 5.

A sequel to The Flood, and an in-depth telling of how The Covenant invaded Earth, found Delta Halo, and then collapsed in on itself in the Great Schism, and how Humanity fought them tooth and nail at every turn to prevent their annihilation, fronted by Spartan 117 and the Covenant's disgraced fleetmaster, now The Arbiter

Amonika's family lives in a time when Humanity faces an existential threat: extermination by a vastly superior alien enemy known as the Covenant. They live hidden from the Covenant on possibly the most guarded planet Humanity has left, Reach. But for all their security, living in times like these shakes faith and breaks spirits, when the cares of life can no longer distract them.