We take shortcuts through a subdimension where physics doesn't work the same way. Still takes long enough that nonessential personnel spend long voyages in cryonic suspension.

[ All this T-gates and mass relays stuff is enough to make a guy jealous. ]

My weirdest crash was tripping over a giant space installation.

Cortana and I were on a ship retreating from a battle with the Covenant. Protocol was to scrub nav data when engaging the enemy to keep them from finding Earth. If you had to run, it was blind.

[ Those are some horrible implications to drop so casually, but there they are. ]

We came out of the jump next to an alien installation orbiting a gas giant. Not Covenant. Circular. Ten-thousand kilometers across. The ship was already limping, and the Covenant had found this place before we did and weren't happy about it. The Captain had nowhere else to put her down but the ring.

It was a bad week.

[ The Chief is so, so good at details. ]