Defying the Odds Master Post
Title: Defying the Odds
Word Count: 25,000+
Fandom: Halo
Genre: AU, Adventure, Friendship
Characters/Pairing(s): Cortana, John, Catherine Halsey, Jacob Keyes, Avery Johnson, brief mention of past Halsey/Keyes
Rating: PG-ish
Warnings: None
Summary: In the aftermath of the Halo campaign, some realities are impossible to ignore.
Artist: drakulya was gracious enough to let me use this for the fic. The original picture is here. (Color was added by me.)
Author's notes: Once upon a time there was a chick (let's call her yappichick) who wrote a Halo fic called Moving Forward for yuletide. She posted it and thought that was the last time she would ever write in that universe. Her muse, however, had different plans.
This universe is based around the 2010 Happy Halodays card. The concept of the AU in a nutshell: most everyone (with the exception of Miranda Keyes) in the UNSC survived the events in the Halo trilogy and John and Cortana, along with Johnson and the Arbiter, make it back to Earth through the Portal in Halo 3.
There are references to all of the games (of course), The Fall of Reach, Human Weakness (from Halo: Evolutions), and Halsey's journal (from the Halo: Reach Legendary Edition).
A huge thanks to my Babe for betaing this sucker and my f-list for listening to be rant and panic and squee throughout the process.
Original Post Date: August 8, 2011 (Written for the au_bigbang)
Chapter 1: You Ain't Getting Rid of Me That Easily
Chapter 2: Denial Isn't Just a River in Egypt
Chapter 3: And You Thought Your Day Was Bad?
Chapter 4: Anger Management: Spartan Style
Chapter 5: Who's Driving This Thing Anyway?
Chapter 6: Don't Mind Me, I'm Going Rampant
Chapter 7: Backseat Driver
Chapter 8: Would Mr. Guest Please Sign In?
Chapter 9: What a Difference an Algorithm Makes
Chapter 10: What’s a Few Trillion Missing Terabytes Among Friends?
Chapter 11: Was There Something You Wanted to Tell Us?
Chapter 12: Lovely Parting Gift
Chapter 13: This Structure Is Not a Natural Formation
Chapter 14: Dude, srsly?
Chapter 15: Shock and Awe
Chapter 16: What's This Knife Doing in My Back?
Chapter 17: Did Someone Call for Backup?
Chapter 18: Come Out, Come Out Wherever You Are
Chapter 19: Don't Make a Promise...Never Mind