"Contana, all I need to know is did we lose them." Captain Keys says as he looks outside a window. The Pillar of Autumn barley made it out of Reach and the last thing he would like to hear was a Covenant ship followed them. He tensed up when he say a giant ring in space, thinking it was apart of those aliens.

"I think we both know the answer to that." The A.I responds, curious of the ring.

He sighs as he looks at his walks over to someone with a map of where the Covenant ships were,"We made a blind jump, how did they-"

"Get here first? The Covenant ships have always been faster as for tracking us from all the way from Reach, at light speed my maneuvering options were limited."

"We were running dark, yes?"

"Until we decelerated, no one could've missed the hole that we tore in sub-space."

Keys looked that that map and saw about 10 Covenant Capital ships, to make matters worse, with escort.

"They were waiting for us on the far side of the planet." The Cortana spoke once more.

"So, where do we stand?" Keys walked a panel where it showed the giant ring in front of them.

"Fighters are mopping up the last of the recon picket now, nothing too serious, but I isolated approach signatures from multiple CCS class battle groups, make it 3 capital ships per group and about 90 seconds, they'll be all over us."

"Well that's it then, bring the ship back to combat alert alpha, I want everyone at their stations."

"Everyone sir?"

"Everyone." He faces a small holo pad,"And Cortana."

Cortana appears on the holopad, her body seemed to look like it was flowing with data with a feminine body shape. "Hmm?"

"Lets give our friend a warm welcome..."

"I've already begun."

Earth looks at the vast ocean of space. He wanted to see Reach again for one last time. Alas, she's probably died by now, Covenant might have already taken killed her at the spot. He knows he can't stand a chance against him, but still, why does he fight? Also what is that giant ring? His train of thought broke when the alarms went off which only meant one thing. The Covenant is attacking.

"Damn it all to hell." He said as he runs to the nearest armory. He could hear MAC rounds firing upon the enemy, but that gun isn't going to last for long. He takes glimpses of out of every window to see where are the Covenant ships are. Each time he looks out, he sees that the ships are slowly closing in toward the Pillar of Autumn. He reached the armory and armed himself with a M45B Assault Rifle, a MR55 Battle Rifle and a couple grenades. Just in time as Covenant landing parties rocks the ship while they board it.

Earth ran toward to the pods, this ship won't survive against the armies of aliens that was ready to eliminate them. He readies his Assault Rifle in case he ran into fire fights. Although he was wearing his ODST battle armor, he still had wounds from where plasma pierced his past armor when he was fighting at Reach, so he tried to avoid as much firefights that are in the ship as possible. Everywhere corridor, he could see the died piling up, Humans and Covy bastards alike. There was one firefight that was unavoidable, The Marines were taking heavy causalities against the Elite's group, however he fought non the less.

He dove into cover and fired on the Grunts first, that way he can take out the elite without all the nonsense of plasma firing on him. He was about to take out the last Grunt until the Elite charged at him. Earth emptied an entire clip at the Elite, causing the elite's shields to fail and shredding him into pieces. After the elite was on the ground, He sighs and sits down for a bit. He was exhausted from his first firefight on this ship, probably of the fatigue he has gained during this war, maybe if he could change time and probably never expand to the outer worlds of the galaxy, he's species might be living the good life. Sadly he couldn't and he was just left with death and low morale.

Wait a second, wasn't there a Grunt left?

He looks beside him to see the Grunt with 2 active sticky grenades in it's hands.

"FUCK!" Earth yells as he jumps away from the Grunts suicidal explosion. He looks at what remains of the Grunt,"I will fucking eat your entire shitty race." He angry pronounced of how pissed he is at that Grunt.

"Sir, I think your taking it a bit too far." A Marine spoke up as he walks out of cover.

"Probably I am, probably I'm not."

"Well... Uhm, anyway, we need to make our way to the lifeboats before this ship is a goner."

"Agreed." He reloads his gun and makes his way toward the lifeboats

He and the Marines make their way to the lifeboats, they entered a couple firefights in the ship, but they managed to prevail in most them. All except for one lifeboat was left, that the chance to leave as the ship was about felt like it won't hold for any longer. Earth and the Marines take their seats. One Marine lost it near when he was near the life boat,"OH NO, OH NO!" He yells as he ducks into covers his head. He was then picked up and thrown inside by a SPARTAN. Earth's eyes widen when he saw the SPARTAN. 117, John, Master Chief, he has all types of names, the one that made Earth smile the most was the Covenant's name,"demon". The SPARTAN entered the lifeboat and closed the door.

"Punch it." He said blandly.

"Aye-aye sir." The pilot said and launched the ship out to space after the disengaging explosion,"We're disengaged. Going for a minimum safe distance!" The pilot flies the lifeboat away from The Pillar of Autumn.

"We're gonna make it, aren't we sir?" The Marine that was thrown into the life boat said,"I don't want to die out here!"

The Chief looks in the soldiers eyes and he puts his hand on the Marine's shoulder.

"Look!" The pilot says, The Chief walks to the pilot seat to see what was happening. They were slowly closing into the ring. All the Marines and Earth looked as well.

"The is that thing Lieutenant?"A Marine says

"Hell if I know, But we're landing on it!" The Pilot replies.

"Oh great, then get ready for incoming impact!" Earth said

"The Autumn! She's been hit!" Another Marine said as the falling ship whizzed past them.

"Heads-up everyone. This is it! We're entering the ring's atmosphere at 5!"

The lifeboat's bottom starts to burn when they entered the ring. When it was close to the ground, the airbrakes were deployed and thrusters were turned on to slow the fall of the boat. However, they were coming too fast as the airbrakes fell off the boat.

"Damn! Airbrake Failure! They blew too early!" The pilot said,"I'm losing her! Brace for Impact!"