CHAPTER XI
2352 HOURS, 19 JUNE 2555 (UNSC MILITARY CALENDAR)
EXTREME LOW ORBIT OVER PLANET REACH, EPSILON ERIDANI SYSTEM
Ten Magnetic Accelerator Cannons fired in unison, their muzzle flashes casting a momentary orange-yellow glow on the UNSC ships that fired them. The resulting ten MAC slugs raced towards the rebel fleet, far too quick to be intercepted or avoided.
Two missed cleanly, tearing into the space behind the Insurrectionists. One clipped a rebel destroyer and tumbled away, leaving the victim of its impact spinning in space, its side flaming as kinetic energy equal to a nuclear detonation slashed a gaping hole in the ship's flank armor. Seven, however, connected solidly.
One slammed into a small rebel frigate, shattering one of its starboard engines, which promptly overloaded and ballooned into brilliant orange flames, which in turn were just as quickly extinguished by the atmosphere-deprived vacuum. Captain Weller sighed. If only that strike had hit in-atmosphere, he silently wished to himself. But a hit in space, though less spectacular, would ultimately be more deadly. The rebel ship now vented atmosphere, debris and bodies through the gaping hole in its starboard aft decks. Understandably, it hung back behind the less critically-damaged ships in its fleet.
Two of its fellow ships, however, were not so fortunate. Each caught the full brunt of three MAC shells, which ripped straight through the vessels' armor plating like a battering ram through a silk curtain. The slugs, not yet depleted, tore through deck after deck on the unfortunate ships, leaving chains of explosions across the rebel destroyers as a testament to their work. After three heart-stopping seconds, the rebel ships resembled nothing so much as floating metal skeletons.
The rebels were undaunted, though. They still outnumbered the UNSC ships almost two to one, and they'd now had time to regroup and plan their counterattack. A hail of Archer missiles raced towards the UNSC ships, their exhaust trails dissipating into nothingness in the utterly black vacuum. One of the frigates, the UNSC Eight Lives Left, shot forward to take the hits, as the rest of the battle group accelerated steadily behind her.
Dozens of enemy missiles impacted Eight Lives Left, blasting through her hull armor and incinerating huge portions of her internal atmosphere. In an act that doomed hundreds but saved hundreds more, the ship's captain vented the breached sections, and the Eight Lives Left, with thousands of gallons of air adding to her propulsion, zoomed straight at the rebel fleet, at the head of a short tail of flame and wreckage.
Another barrage of missiles arced towards the wounded ship, but Eight Lives Left was still accelerated. As more explosives detonated on her armor, she became faster and faster- she was now too fast for a target lock for additional missiles. She fired her single MAC at a rebel ship, sending the six hundred ton projectile straight into the fore decks of a rebel cruiser, and creating a significant hole in the ship right where the Insurrectionist ship's own MAC used to be. The unfortunate vessel then blossomed into flames shortly thereafter. Still traveling and well over breakneck speed, Eight Lives Left unleashed a hailstorm of Archer missiles seemingly at random into the inside of the rebel formation- she couldn't get a lock for her own missiles either. Captain Yurice was shooting blind.
As Weller and the rest of the crew looked on, Eight Lives Left tore through the back of the enemy formation, her path arcing as she crested Reach's horizon and vanished from view.
Rear Admiral Mores then made her move. Captain Yurice's maneuver with Eight Lives Left had bought them precious time, and the battle group's MACs were now fully charged. A salvo of nine shells streaked towards the rebel ships, answered a split second later by a dozen MAC slugs heading in the opposite direction.
The impacts were catastrophic. The lead ship in the UNSC formation, the destroyer UNSC Kilimanjaro, intercepted no fewer than eight of the rebel MAC slugs, which took no time at all to tear her apart. Armor peeled and decks collapsed as the enemy ammunition's momentum took it on a bee-line straight through Kilimanjaro's ventral sections, stripping away machinery and crushing her essential systems like a banana underneath a jackhammer. Even as the ship lost roughly a quarter of her mass each millisecond, she hurtled into the rebel battle group, upon which her reactors overloaded, consuming the nearest two rebel ships in a massive white flash. One was incinerated, but the other survived, albeit with large breaches scattered across her hull.
Two shots missed the UNSC ships completely, and Captain Weller silently hoped that Eight Lives Left would not complete her orbit path in time to catch one of the stray shells. One grazed Acheron's side, shearing off almost the entire starboard side of the ship, but it would have been far worse if Acheron had presented her side to the enemy. Weller sighed with relief- Mores was using her head, which was more often than not a good thing.
But the frigate UNSC Pericles wasn't so lucky. The last rebel MAC round slammed into her upper decks, completely obliterating the intervening armor. It didn't stop there; instead, it continued to travel, boring a hole in the ship's command bridge before finally burying itself in Pericles' amidships decks, the last of its kinetic energy consuming the ship in a gargantuan fireball.
The UNSC MAC barrage was no less effective, impaling no fewer than three of the rebel ships on the massive rounds, and simply watching as the resulting explosions tore the enemy apart. No point in wasting Archer missiles, Weller mused.
The two groups flew right past each other, each heading in the opposite direction- each headed towards its own horizon. The action had just moved to Reach's darker side.
"Damn…" Weller sighed. If Nighthawk moved to observe Round Two, she might not be in place to receive Squad Seven's extraction signal; but if she stayed in low polar orbit, she would miss any signals the Rear Admiral sent her way. Weller bit his lip and thought for one long, torturous minute. At long last, he opened his mouth to speak.
"Warrant Officer Steel."
"Sir?"
"Launch a STARS probe and set in into orbit. We're staying where we are- that probe is going to be our eye above the battlefield."
"Sir, yes sir."
After five seconds, a small black probe hurtled away from Nighthawk, and towards the predicted site of the next clash. Assuming that the two forces were traveling at the same speed, they'd meet at the exact opposite point over Reach. Of course, that was just a guess.
It was a guess that turned out to be correct, though. The two battle groups neared each other on Reach's dark half. Weller could practically smell the upcoming carnage. Eight Lives Left was back with the UNSC ships, brightening the Rear Admiral's prospects somewhat, although they still weren't good.
The UNSC ships opened fire first, causing a brilliant display of explosions and collisions as they blunted the rebel charge. Two shells were all the rebels could send back at Mores' ships. When the wreckage had cleared somewhat, the feed from the probe showed the battle looking to be in the UNSC's favor- only five rebel ships remained, and those that did were not in peak condition. Bleeding fire and venting atmosphere, the rebel ships turned and attempted to escape Reach's gravity well, realizing all too late that their fight was now in vain.
Battle group Acheron had other intentions. The rebel ships dispersed, trying to present as little opportunity as possible for the UNSC to take all the ships out. As if on cue, swarms of Longsword fighters swept out from the hangar bays of the UNSC frigates and the cruiser UNSC Agamemnon. The fighter squadrons split into five wings, and each fighter unleashed its entire complement of Archer missiles at the fleeing rebel ships.
The impacts of dozens of missiles couldn't be ignored- they punched through armor and blew through the inner decks, igniting atmosphere and bubbling the superheated gases through the molten remnants of the destroyers' armor. After seven more seconds, explosions chained across the enemy ships- explosions originating inside their hulls. The critically damaged vessels were literally falling apart from the inside out. The Longswords returned to battle group Acheron, their mission complete.
Weller relaxed slightly against the back of his chair, and smiled. Maybe this mission wasn't going to be so bad.
At that moment, though, other things came to Weller's attention. For one, the com began to beep. Weller yelled for Lieutenant Yeats to open the channel, which the younger officer did with almost indecent speed and enthusiasm- Weller had heard that operating the com station was boring, but had always dismissed it as idle chitchat and hearsay.
The signal was extremely weak, and static flooded through the channel.
"Nighthawk- this- Sergeant Brakes- complex under Castle- repeat- we have found a- request- repeat: requesting- one five-man team- not- repeat- reinforcements- Nighthawk, please acknowledge- repeat- acknowledge."
Yeats simply stared at the speakers, almost as if he believed a signal that bad could be coming out of his station. Weller had no time for such theatrics, and promptly swore under his breath- Nighthawk's only groundside asset had been Squad Seven- contacting Rear Admiral Mores would be their only hope for reinforcements.
A second event interrupted that train of thought, though.
"We've got Hawking radiation spikes- more Slipspace transitions in-system, sir." Weller nodded at Kagabe's news, unsure of whether that was a good sign or a bad one.
At that moment, a third occurrence answered that unspoken question for him. Lieutenant Yeats yelled up from the com station, "Sir! We've got an incoming transmission- it's been bounced through Slipspace using a carrier wave, sir! Patching it through now."
Despite the much longer distance this message likely had to travel, it was of infinitely better quality than the one Squad Seven had sent up. Weller recognized the voice as that of Admiral Joshua Pevely.
"This is Admiral Pevely, UNSC Navy Third Fleet Commanding Officer, issuing an emergency broadband transmission. Operation: DRAG NET has failed- repeat, Operation: DRAG NET has failed. Rebel ships have broken our blockades of their known strongholds and breached our jamming signals. They have jumped through Slipspace on unknown vectors- repeat, on unknown vectors. All UNSC ships receiving this signal and encountering rebel ships stand to and respond on this frequency IMMEDIATELY. Do not engage- repeat; do NOT engage the enemy ships."
Yeats looked up. "That's all there is, sir."
At that moment, the Slipspace ruptures detected before flashed into a visible maelstrom of blue-white light and spectacular Cherenkov radiation as particle decays were super-accelerated past the translight barrier by the transition through Slipspace. Weller gulped at the sight. Only Roy Kagabe at the sensor station dared to speak.
"Detecting one hundred-seventeen hostile contacts, sir."
Weller did not reply. It seemed ironic to him that he had survived a xenocidal war against billions of aliens to be killed by his own species.
