Frontier

by Ender1030

When Insurrectionists grab hold of the first next generation Warship the UNSC is able to produce, it is up to an inexperienced but bright officers from Candidate School to face the threat they had created, and for them to learn from the mentor once again

1. Chapter 1

AN: Hey one and all, this'll be my first writing in the Haloverse. If there are any disrepencies in the canon, please don't hesitate to point it out to me. Please please please review my work, tell me if you like it or not. I plan to become a writer in the future and every little bit counts!

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TO: THE DIRECTOR OF THE OFFICE OF NAVAL INTELLIGENCE

ENCRYPTION FEED: ******

DECRYPTION CODE: KEEPEROFTHEKEYS

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THE FOLLOWING MESSAGE IS CLASSIFIED AS TOP SECRET (LEVEL NEED TO KNOW) EYES ONLY. READING THIS MESSAGE ALOUD, THE DISCUSSION OF THE FOLLOWING TOPIC, SOURCES, AND ANY RELEVANT INFORMATION DIRECTLY RELATING TO EITHER THE TOPIC OR ITS SOURCES IS PROHIBITED AMONG THOSE WITHOUT CLEARANCE LEVEL "NEED TO KNOW" OR ABOVE. FAILURE TO COMPLY WITH THE ABOVE LAW IS PUNISHABLE BY IMMEDIATE EXECUTION WITHOUT TRIAL FORMAL OR OTHERWISE AS PER THE ARTICLES OF NAVAL CONDUCT.

*-PRESS ENTER TO CONFIRM-*

THIS DOCUMENT WILL NOW BE FILED AS: RORSHACH

SOURCE: 1st Lieutenant Jonathan Jacob Anders, Office of Naval Intelligence Section I (analyst).

The war with the Covenant, to say the least, is over. It's been a long 40 years. Allow me to reiterate the culmination of the victory my comrades in Section III have been proclaiming.

1. The United Nations Space Command, against all odds has thrown back the Covenant threat.

2. The Spartan 117 has destroyed all remnants of the enemy and thrown the unity of the Covenant into disarray.

3. The United Nations Space Command has already begun recolonizing lost worlds and rebuilding infrastructure once lost to humanity, including on Home Earth itself.

4. The UNSC has now successfully reverse engineered covenant technologies including slipspace drives, artificial gravity, plasma weapons, shielding, and metallurgy.

5. The United Nations Space Command is now the ultimate power in this part of the galaxy.

This clearly is, the best of "news".

We cannot however, forget that before our war with the Covenant, we had another we were already involved in. The Insurrection, most would say, is gone. Agreeably this would be the case, seeing as how there aren't any human colonies left to actually have revolutions. Or at least we thought. Spartan team "Grey" were officially labeled "Missing In Action" during a Covenant invasion of the world Mermansk in which Naval Special Weapons Command lost all contacts with Grey Team. Mermansk, an Outer Colony, was believed to house a significantly large number of Insurrectionist sympathizers. The danger, there being that Mermansk was also a small Naval Shipyard for the United Nations Space Command, and in due time would eventually become a "Reach" for the outer colonies.

It is because of the swiftness of the Covenant attack, along with the official declaration of the Cole Protocol, that the formation of Grey Team and their task (See OPERATION: SCRABBLEJACK) were put into effect which eventually lead them to Mermansk in an effort to wipe all incoming and outgoing craft of memory files of known human worlds. During the siege of the war, all contact was lost with the planet and everyone was assumed lost along with the complete annihilation of Lt. Admiral Dolan and 9th fleet.

The return of UNSC Rough Rider from its scout profile (See OPERATION EXPLORER) indicates that Mermansk was not at all lost, and during what must be assumed a heroic siege against impossible odds (not unlike the invasion of Earth possibly) the Covenant were thrown back and disorganized enough to allow them to survive until present day. And while many in Section III have rejoiced at such news, I am much more skeptical.

In no way has the governor of Mermansk attempted to contact the UNSC Rough Rider or her crew despite numerous hails and definite evidence of human life on the planet in civilized form. Furthermore, as the After Action Reviews illustrate, Mermansk actually deployed a significant fleet strength against Rough Rider preventing it from proceeding closer to make landfall. This fleet was composed mostly of Corvettes and smaller tonnage vessels bolstered by the significant presence of 2 destroyers and four frigates. The most obvious conclusion to draw from this standoff would be, that while Mermansk was not destroyed, they most certainly were not happy to discover the UNSC wasn't either. I believe it is in the greatest wisdom of the UNSC High Command that necessary measures be taken against Mermansk and the significant threat it poses to the legitimacy of the survival of the UNSC. If this course of action is to be ignored, please at least consider the following which Section III has carefully left out of the public's eyes.

1. The United Nations Space Command has little to no active fleet strengths capable of fighting a determined force. To my understanding with my comrades in Section II, the UNSC is dedicating well over 90 percent of its space capable resources to the recolonization effort, in effect leaving a rag tag fleet to actually defend the home world.

2. A significant part of the downfall of the Covenant were the Spartan II and III projects all records of which are now erased with the fall of the UNSC Facility on Reach and of which there are no known survivors.

3. The Recolonization process could take decades, further draining humanity's resources that were already strained and shattered during the war with the Covenant.

4. While successful reverse engineering of Covenant technologies has taken place and now Covenant metallurgy, reactor technologies, weapons and defenses will be integrated into the next line of human space vessels, we are far from producing these ships in significant qualities and at present, to do so is to dream.

5. The United Nations Space Command has a strained relation with the Sangheili, whom appear every so often to communicate with diplomats and then disappear into unknown space. We are far from actually being a superpower in my personal opinion.

This is not to say I have no confidence in the UNSC's survival in the future. Far from it I believe the UNSC can and will endure as it has through 40 years of the Covenant war. However it is the Colony of Mermansk that now poses a significant threat to the survival of the UNSC. I suggest that if we are to not let the sacrifices of so many men and women go to waste, we deal with this Colony sooner rather than later.

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