"MAC charge at sixty percent!" Yelled out a young ensign.
A thirty-two year old man sat in the command chair, more commonly known as the 'hot seat', of a newly recommissioned UNSC destroyer. He had to look calm in front of the younger officers, but in the inside he was terrified. Six Covenant corvettes against two destroyers. Against these odds, even the legendary Capt. Keyes would be scared.
"Incoming plasma fire! Impact in 20 seconds!" A worried Lieutenant at the ops station reported.
"MAC fully charged." The weapons officer said "Ready to fire on your command."
"Fire!" The Captain ordered.
"Plasma hit in 10 seconds!"
"Brace for impact!"
"8...7...6...5...4…3…2…1…impact!"
The ship rocked violently as the plasma burned through the hull like it was butter.
"Damage report!" Yelled the captain.
The ops officer looked at his computer screen, "Hull breaches on decks seven, eight, and nine. Decks ten through 14 are..." he paused for a moment "are gone, sir. One Covenant ship has lost it's shields and is slowing down."
"Dammit! What about our weapons?"
"MAC system damaged but operational." Said the weapons officer
"In coming tangos! I count sixty, I repeat sixty seraphs." Ops reported
"Give 'me everything we got!"
The comm officer spoke "Incoming message from the Ottawa."
"Captain we can't take this much longer" The captain of the Ottawa spoke. Her hair and uniform had blood on it and consoles in the background were on fire.
"We have to retreat!"
"There are twenty million civies on Fegersonia! We can't leave yet!"
"Sir! Reinforcements! Seventeen UNSC ships exiting slipspace!" The comm officer said with glee.
"This is Admiral Rawlings of the UNSC Xiao Long, we are sending rendezvous coordinates and firing solutions to you now."
"Helm" yelled the Captain, "set best speed to those coordinates."
It didn't take long for the destroyer to get to the rendezvous point. Their hull was burned up and they were still on fire but nonetheless she still went forward. They lined up in formation, just like Sigma Octanus. They all fired in unison toward the Covenant ships, in turn the Covenant fired their pulse lasers at the UNSC ships.
About a quarter of the MAC shells missed but enough of them hit their mark to take out the Covenant strike force. Not without heavy losses however. Two of the Halbard-class reinforcements as well as eight Paris-class heavy frigates were lost. The
Ottawa and the Xiao Long
, were severely damaged in the battle and will need much repair.
Thankfully the Covenant was stopped and the planet was safe for now.
The captain motioned to his comm officer to open a channel to the Admiral, "This is Captain William Jones of the UNSC Tipperary, thank you Admiral."