Soft as Thunder Chapter 2, a Halo + Mass Effect Crossover fanfic

Hello People! As some people may know, I like to write my chapters in groups of 2. You'll notice most of my stories have an even number of chapters. Anyways, this was already written, when the first chapter came out, but was significantly less polished. Here it is, as what is probably the more boring section.

The Victorious and her flotilla crumpled like wet tissue paper before the battlecruiser. The Righteous Death was ample evidence of that, several glowing holes burned straight through the bridge, and fiery explosions still rumbling through the hull.

The Manae's Flight was currently dealing with a sortie of fighter-bombers, and most of the Neutrals were in full retreat towards a gas giant in-system.

That left the Might of Palaven, the Victorious, and Neutral-05 to deal with the battlecruiser currently attempting to send their souls to fairyland.

"Disruptor Torpedoes away."

"Gun one, reorienting."

"GARDIANs engaging enemy fighter-bombers."

"The Palaven requesting joint Arlington-Cesarean maneuver."

The "Arlington Cesarean" was a famously suicidal maneuver, in which 2 ships (usually frigates) fired constant streams of torpedoes and the largest ordinance possible until one overheats, in which it will ram the target, and detonate its mass effect core, creating massive gravity fluctuations comparable to a small star in a very localised location (less than 1000 km). It was usually used for small escort frigates or destroyers combating dreadnoughts or space stations. The Might of Palaven was essentially requesting to be used as a suicide bomber.

"Denied. We're desperate, specialist, not that desperate."

Shockwaves crashed through the Imperator, as it held the line with the 3 remaining unknown vessels for the retreating Glowing Embers and Dying Light.

"Damage, all along the port engine!"

"Breeches in sections 5, 9, and 13!"

"All point defence on port side are down and out for the count!"

"Casualties mounting, no life signs in section 5!"

As chaos reigned on the bridge, the ship's AI flickered on.

"Captain, I have an idea."

The Captain turned from the damage report.

"Yes?"

"If we push forwards, and force the battlecruiser's bow away from the unknowns, we could clear a path for the towards the engines."

"That would put us directly into the firing lanes for it's projector."

"Aye Sir. But it would buy time for the Ember and Death, and give our allies a chance to disable the ship."

The Captain wrinkled his brow.

"Are there any other options?"

"This is the only one with over a 3 percent chance of success."

The Captain sighed, but reached for the internal comms.

"This is the Captain to all hands. I'll put it bluntly, we're all going to die. But we have a chance to take the bastards down with us. If we do this, we will all die slightly faster. By that, I mean in about 3 minutes. If we don't, our projected lifespan is approximately 5 minutes. So, should we burn the fucker to ash, or live slightly longer?"

A long pause came through the intercom, as the bridge crew guffawed at the wording of the message. They were all going to die anyways, formality was thrown out the window.

"This is engineering. The core is primed and ready to blow, just say the word."

"Weapons, we're here and ready to burn."

"Quarters, check and death-ready."

"ODST complement, feet first into hell, OORAH."

The Captain turned back to the AI.

"Do it."

"Sir, N-05 is breaking formation, and seems to be launching escape pods."

"Move to compensate."

"I don't think I can, Sir. It's accelerating directly towards the hostile."

The first officer broke off from his observation of the weapons crew.

"What? Has their captain gone mental? That puts them directly in the arc of the energy weapon!"

The Captain broke off from the tactical map. His eyes widened,

"Signal the Palaven to break off at point 34! Helmsman! Take us to section 342!"

He stared intently into the map,

"They're making an opening for us."

Turians and retreating humans alike watched in horror as the Imperator broke formation, pushing directly towards the bow of the battlecruiser, sustaining broadside after broadside directly on its frontal armour and cannon, it's MAC firing round after round point blank onto the bridge of the battlecruiser. The battlecruiser veered to avoid the vessel currently careening towards it's bow, and reorienting its energy-projector towards the incoming frigate.

It seemed for a moment that the Imperator would perform a successful ramming maneuver, but it was too late. The projector burned with white fire, and the frigate exploded into a nuclear fireball.

Their shields flickered, and died, as the massive impact of hundreds of tons of detonated ordinance impacted all along the port side of the battlecruiser. And with that, the Might of Palaven, and the Victorious slipped into the ideal firing arc; directly behind the engines.

Every Turian on the bridge stood in silence as the massive explosion filled the viewports of the battlefield. They knew what it took to sacrifice lives like that. And so they went to work.

"Manae, you're out of alignment."

"I think our thrusters are disabled, we can't move."

"You're 5 sections from the target, they're moving to intercept!"

"We can't move, our core is fluctuating, and our chemical thrust is out!"

"Can you use the boosters on the-"

The sensor officer shouted across his words,

"HOSTILE IS FIRING TORPEDOES, AND MOVING TOWARDS MANAE!"

"Manae, get out of there, now!"

"Hostile tracking torpedoes impact in, 10, 9, 8-"

"We're not getting out of this,"

"7, 6, 5-"

"Just use the gravity of the-"

"4, 3-"

"It's too late."

"Deploy your shields and-"

"2, 1"

The final message of the Manae appeared;

"Glory to Palaven."

A white flash, and the Manae detonated.

The Palaven and Victorious managed to slip behind the battlecruiser, relying on the spectacular destruction of N-05 and the Manae to distract the hostile's crew.

Once in alignment, they fired every single available weapon system, from GARDIAN pulses to massive spreads of disruptor torpedoes, as the hulking behemoth tried to turn and engage.

It was no use. The Turian vessels, while undoubtedly weaker, were much, much faster at sublight speeds. Using chemical lateral thrust, and warping space, they threw fire up the ass of the battlecruiser, and using its own exhaust to confuse the hostile targeting sensors. Eventually, the 2 cruisers worked their way through dozens of metres of armour, bulkheads, bodies and corridors, and hit the core, literally gutting the ship.

While the Imperator was primed to go from the start of it's suicidal maneuver, and the Manae's Flight's core was damaged, the battlecruiser's core was locked down, and didn't detonate when hit. The ship simply shut down, life support and all.

After a ship was disabled, it was generally boarded, and had all information collected to be dissected by the Salarians. However, neither the Palaven, nor the Victorious had the capacity to do so, as most of their crew was dead, injured, or in some state of shock. The flotilla had lost 2/3rds of its ships dealing with a single vessel. They even had allies! But it took a suicidal maneuver, thousands of casualties, and the loss of 2 Turian cruisers, 2 allied cruisers, and an allied dreadnought to take apart the behemoth.

The crew of the Embers was ecstatic. They had managed to destroy a Covenant Battlecruiser, and only lost a couple thousand men! Only 2 frigates and a cruiser, lost against a battlecruiser? It was unheard of. Hell, maybe they would finally find some friendly alien fucks for a change. The last sight they saw before the slipspace jump were the 2 alien frigates picking up escape pods.

"Maybe these ones aren't so bad."

Council Chambers, The Citadel

Two of the three counselors stared at the holoprojection of the battle.

"Well, you Turians have gone and fucked this up, haven't you?"

The silence from the Turian counselor was deafening. The glare he was giving Tevos, doubly so.

"We saw a race under unprovoked attack by an unknown force. How were we supposed to deal with it?"

"The being literally said, 'Do not interfere with what you do not understand.' How much more clear could it get?"

"I think the captain understood perfectly. The first contact clearly fired the first round. The Neutrals did nothing but react. When we deployed, they ignored our warnings, and went ahead and fired at both of our fleets. So I ask again, how were we supposed to deal with it?"

Tevos threw her hands in the air, and turned away in disgust.

"Well, thanks to your admiral, I have a PR disaster to deal with. Maybe I can mend relations with that race you attacked."

"Yes, because our attacks were clearly unprovoked," Sparatus drawled sarcastically.

"You have to think in the long run, councilor. What effects could the aliens have on us? On the hierarchy? How could we deal with a war?"

"I was thinking in the long term. An alliance with a race, and the destruction of a threat.

"We'll save that for when we interrogate the prisoners," Tevos replied.

"Wait. Interrogate? Prisoners? Those survivors are guests of the Turian Hierarchy, to be returned to their government when possible."

Tevos turned around with a menacing grin.

"They aren't yours anymore. The Republics have taken the prisoners. For informational purposes, of course."

Common Area 78, Installation 49B, Home of the 7th Scout Flotilla

ODST Private Isabella Harrison watched as the spiky alien drew blood from her arm. These ones were strange, to say the least, but undoubtedly better than the Covenant. They were birdlike, but not quite to the extent of jackals. They seemed more... Humaniod. They also didn't have the whole purple fetish the Covenant did. Anyways, picking up escape pods were not exactly the Covenant's style.

The bird-alien-thing showed the results to another bird-alien-thing that took blood from the medic next to her. They nodded, and showed her a picture of what appeared to be cells, or something. She shook her head, and pointed to the medic. The medic took the pictures, and seemed to understand.

"They're asking what kind of protein we're based on- levo or dextro."

He pointed towards the levo structure, and the creatures nodded their understanding.

"Hey, at least they do hospitality better than the Covenant."

Izzy stared back at the medic,

"The Covenant don't do hospitality."

"Exactly."

There was a commotion by the door, and two new creatures strolled in. They appeared to be... attractive human women. But without the hair, and with tenticals. And also blue.

"Wonder what they're on about."

"You aren't allowed in here."

The 2 Asari waltzed past the door guard like he didn't exist. Inside, the 2 lounging guards shot to their feet, and brought their rifles to bear.

The Asari paused.

"We're here on the order of the Republics to interrogate the prisoners. Stand aside."

"We have orders to guards these guests. And let nobody approach."

One of the Asari sighed, and tried to push past the guards towards the aliens, but one of the Turians shoved her back with the butt of his rifle.

"I don't think you heard me, ma'am. Nobody approaches the guests."

The Asari growled.

"I'll have you know, soldier, that you've just assaulted a Republics Commando, and you shall have a court martial on you very soon."

The Turians turned towards each other and laughed.

"And you, will still not approach the guests."

The other, older Asari stepped forwards.

"We have orders from the Republics, soldier. Your dedication is commendable, but unnecessary."

As the guard read the orders, including the transfer of "prisoners" to the Asari Republic for "Inquiries", he knew there was nothing he could do. It was very unusual for a government to essentially go over another's head, but this came from the council itself, and there was not much he could do, unless the eggheads in the hierarchy got involved. Then, he noticed something,

"Why is this only signed by councilor Tevos?"

"The other councilors need not be bothered by such a minor matter as this."

The soldier sighed, but stepped aside to allow access.

"You have 1 hour."

The ODSTs watched the scuffle in the center of the room warily. They may not hate the spiky-aliens, but they didn't know these new ones. No matter how hot they were.

Finally, as the soldiers stepped aside, the 2 new creatures sauntered up to Pvt Izzy, and pulled her up roughly, snapping out the I.V. in her arm. The guards seemed to want to protest, but stayed silent as they dragged her into an adjoining room. As she pushed past the soldiers, some gave apologetic looks.

Inside the room, the two blue humaniods sat her down in a chair, with another sitting opposite. The blue-chick placed a hand on either side of her head, and muttered something incomprehensible. As her eyes turned black, the world faded away.

Where are you from?

It wasn't in a language. It was more like Izzy could feel the question instinctively. Instantly, the Cole Protocol came to the forefront of her mind, and she refused to answer. The alien's frustration could be felt.

Why do you fight?

Cole protocol.