Joint UNSC-Eldar Battlegroup
Admiral Benelim sat at his command console, regarding the inky black of space with calm. Ahead, the flickering lights of damaged Covenant ships hovered ominously at a few million kilometers' distance from them. The enemy's ships trudged along, scarred, beaten and with many a section broken by the energy weapons of the Eldar fleet. He switched his system view to the hangar bays of his Battleship, watching as Eldar pilots boarded their voidcraft fighters and interceptors, before launching out into the darkness. The UNSC ships also launched their swarms of triangular fighter-bombers to assist and provide cover. In the corner, to his right, Benelim listened to communications from the UNSC fleet.
Out in the dark, however, the first squadrons of fighters and bombers began their rapid approach toward the Covenant cruisers. Lagging behind were the most damaged ships, having lost engines and directional thrust. The first Eagle Bomber's anti-ship weapon locked onto the closest ship just as the enemy started deploying swarms of Seraphs. The Covenant's starfighters banked hard, their plasma weapons charging and firing.
Two Eldar interceptors met the enemy with Melta weaponry, bursting their shields and shattering two enemy craft on the first pass. More Eldar and human escorts banked hard, engaging the swarm of starfighters while the main Task Force got into position. Plasma weapons lit the darkness in beautiful blue streaks, before the small contained energy in them released upon impact. The furball between the two fleets grew in size as more and more craft joined in.
Some interceptors broke off to provide cover for the Eagles and the UNSC's own bombers. Two Eagles found themselves shot to pieces by Seraphs, however, but the third managed to release its payload of heavy sonic missiles. Said missiles tracked, banking past defenses and the few, barely active laser defenses that the Covenant ships had. One slammed into and burst the enemy's shields. The second struck the aft of the ship, blasting apart the engines. The third finished the Cruiser off by entering the hangar and detonating amidships, causing the hull to expand, buckle and break.
Two Longswords carrying nuclear missiles followed, aiming for the second Covenant ship while their fighter escorts' cannons ripped through the trailing starfighters, while losing some themselves. The Covenant probably did not expect what was once the battered UNSC forces and their allies to track them, but a hundred new ships and a few dozen Eldar reinforcements had something to say about that.
The Covenant ships that could still pose a threat, meaning those with the least amount of damage, turned on wide arcs, like a pack of sharks turning to face its prey. A dozen cruisers and one of the fleet's two carriers brought their weaponry to bear as nuclear detonations took out the weakest of their pack. Benelim watched the enemy ships with vested interest, a smile on his face.
"Prepare our lances. Tell the humans that the enemy is finally coming to meet us in fair battle." He noted.
"Sir." The Seer in charge of communications nodded.
The UNSC ships had already started charging their MACs. Two Halcyon cruisers and four Marathons already had their weapons tracking the enemy fighters in the Furball, their MACs trained on the enemy's capital ships. Captain Val McKinnon looked to their side, seeing the Eldar battleship's weapons glimmering. Energy formed at the tips of the lance-like weapons while the ship's smaller weaponry charged.
Val smirked, "This is it, folks! Pop the cork on the champagne."
The Covenant ships barely got into weapons range before the deluge of UNSC MAC rounds, missiles and Eldar energy weapons lit the darkness in a series of white flashes. The first Covenant ship in the lead, the Carrier, caught about five MAC rounds and a full broadside from one of the Eldar cruisers when its shields died. Armor peeled and flash-boiled, the atmosphere of struck ships vented explosively in several sections and their weapons fired wildly off-target.
The rearguard of the Covenant that turned to engage, however, was partially undamaged by their brethren being shattered. Five cruisers that were trailing behind, turned their guns. Boulders of plasma arched toward the UNSC-Eldar fleet and struck. The void-shields of an Eldar cruisers heated, boiled and almost broke, while two UNSC ships caught a few rounds which boiled away armor and nearly shattered them.
The Eldar's response was another wave of sonic missiles and lance shots that chipped away at the enemy's shields. The fleets encroached on one-another, the UNSC ships divvying up the Covenant fleet into smaller, more manageable sections while the vice admiral in command directed with Benelim to tear into the enemy's separated ships. Five UNSC Frigates were gutted by energy blasts and a sixth shattered on impact with a plasma torpedo.
Passing by the half-melted wrecks, two Eldar Phoenix bomber-craft entered combat, deploying their payload of energy weapons against a CCS cruiser. The weapons bit at the shield's power, slowly whittling it down while the bigger cruisers came in close. The Solaris classes' main lance weapons tracked the Covenant CCS as its shields went down, using their own to stave off plasma and laser weapon bombardment, though their own shields were slowly being whittled down.
A Halcyon cruiser's guns tracked a swarm of Seraphs. Her Rampart Point-Defense weapons opened up without a second thought, 50mm HE rounds blasting through the enemy wave. The silos on the side of the warship opened up and several dozen Archer missiles launched at 5 second intervals from each tube, slamming into the shields of the Covenant cruiser ahead with extreme prejudice, until one round broke through and rammed into the lower middle 'fin' on the face of the ship, tearing it off.
The Halcyon's captain followed up the deletion of the Covenant ship's shield with an aimed MAC round right down the center. The round gutted through the insides of the alien warship and exited out the rear-end, mangled to hell, but still travelling at a decent enough speed to slam into a shield and send the next cruiser over off-course. The Halcyon veered away from the hulk of the destroyed Covenant capital ship before its reactor went critical, turning its main gun to face another ship.
Benelim's battleship had locked onto the retreating, severely-damaged carrier in the far back as it was trying to pull away from the star's gravity field. If his intuition was right, that was the Covenant's flagship... And he had an idea of how to assail it. The man leaned in toward the com console operator and said "Call the UNSC. Tell them to prepare a boarding party which we will deploy from here... I want a squad of our best Banshees to follow them in. The ship in the far back is their command vessel... I intend to have it captured, if possible. If not... We don't let it get away."
"Yes, Admiral." The com seer got back to sending the transmissions toward the UNSC, this time including the plans for taking down the enemy's flagship. The UNSC officer's reply was prompt and he specifically stated what unit they were going to deploy. Benelim smiled smugly, reading the response. If the UNSC's ramblings were to be believed, the unit that was going to be sent to help capture or destroy the enemy flagship was the kind which you did not want to mess with. He appreciated good soldiers.
"Helm." He started, "Break us off away from the engagement the moment the humans transfer their strike team aboard. Approach the capital ship and prepare to launch the strike team immediately upon entering range."
"Yes, admiral!" The helmsman called out.
... In the bowels of the Eldar battleship, a single UNSC Pelican had somehow squeezed in between the whole clusterfuck of the battle around them. The pilot waved at the Eldar troops in the landing bay, those being the famed Howling Banshees and another of their Exarchs, before the aircraft made its landing. From it, a half-dozen humans clad in all-encasing armor seemingly made from the same materiel as their warships disembarked, carrying a full arsenal of weaponry.
Sheila chuckled from among the Spartans, noting to herself and to Kelly, "I can't believe we're running with'em again."
"Sheila, you know the Eldar best..." The voice of the leader of the team piped up, "You'll be acting as liaison between us and them for our operation."
"You got it, Chief." The girl nodded, then she looked over to the Banshees. The women stood to their feet from wherever they were seating, coming to meet them in the center of the landing bay as the fighting outside continued. She nodded to the Exarch, whom she didn't know, then said "I'm-"
"Spartan Sheila. Caentys mentioned you." The Exarch offered a hand to shake. Sheila nodded and shook.
The Spartan then motioned to her fellow teammates and said "This is Blue Team. Master Chief Petty Officer 117's our squad lead for the day, with CPO 087 as our ASL. The others, you'll probably meet as we go."
The Exarch nodded, "An honor to meet all of you. Now, shall we conceive a plan of action in regards to either securing or blasting that flagship apart?"
The Spartans exchanged looks, then nodded. The plan had grown to be quite simple:With cover from the Eldar battleship they were aboard, the team was to take a Pelican or one of the Eldar's transports and blast their way into the hangar by overloading the shields with a melta charge. From there, they would enter the ship, plant bombs in the reactor core and then head for the bridge.
If, as Sheila put it, 'Shit hit the proverbial fan', they would blast the bombs in the core and try to get the hell outta dodge before the Covvie ship went up like a fireworks display. The team entered the dropship, the Eldar one, since it had its Melta weapons attached. The Eldar battleship broke off from combat, using erh close-in weapons to clear a path while her escort gutted them. Her engines powered to full, sending her surging forward toward the Covenant capital ship.
Benelim's orders were simple:Disable the ship's portside engine, slowing it down just enough for the drop-ship to make its way to the heart of the beast. The Lances charged, shimmering white with energy as the gunners trained them on the alien ship. He'd need all weapons to breach through what the humans called a 'Super-carrier' shield. The ship was bigger in size than the other carriers whose husks now littered the orbital battlefield. He saw his ships rear sensors updating with the status of the battle. Two Eldar ships had taken severe damage, 19 human frigates and 2 cruisers had fallen and the Covenant lost much of what remained of its cruiser force.
It was good to see victory, even with the wounds sustained by them and their allies. He saw the gunners aim the weapons, completing the calibration of the targeting sequence. He nodded to them and then spoke, "All guns... Fire at will. Cripple the Beast and let loose our warriors to slay or subdue it. Khaine has us in his watch, soldiers of Ilroh'ynn. Let us not disappoint him!"
The beams of energy lanced forward, slamming into and instantly bursting the weakened shield of the Covenant vessel. The beams then punched through the engine casing of the ship, causing several small explosions as the fuel lines burst, exploding in bright violet flashes across the portside hull. In the midst of the fire, the transport ship hauling the joint strike team launched.
As the secondaries and shields of the Eldar Battleship kept the enemy's own busy, the voidcraft transport swept underneath the raining hellfire and then banked up, aiming melta weapons at the shields that acted as the Hangars' anti-depressurization covers. Two fully charged weapons fired a beam of energy right into the devices, melting through and opening the crew inside to the elements. Several Covvie bastards had been spaced while the transport moved in to land just before the shields of this one hangar re-formed.
The Covenant crew aboard:Jackals, brutes, Elites and Grunts, took positions inside. The lower hatch propped open for the drop ship and, before any of the aliens so much as had a chance to open fire, a shrill psychic cry echoed across the hold, stunning most of them enough that they couldn't fire when the first Banshee stepped off the drop ship, blade in hand.
Blue blood stained a powered blade of the Banshee Warrior and the head of a grunt rolled to the floor, followed by a Jackal and an Elite in the span of a few seconds. The almost spectral Eldar warriors surged forth, with the Spartans providing covering fire. Fred charged the Spartan Laser, a prototype weapon that he now hauled with him, before aiming it at and blasting apart the Covenant atop the balcony.
"On your mark, Spartan!" The Exarch called out, turning her pistol toward the door as a squad of Grunts appeared. She squeezed off a burst from the shuriken weapon, gutting one of the first ones with the rounds while Chief, Kelly, Arthur, Solomon and Sheila finished off the rest with a concerto of human firearms. The Master Chief gave three hand signals, forming up the team, pointing to the door and showing them to follow.
They burst out into the corridors, toward the rear of the ship. If Chief recalled his Covenant ship layout well enough, the core would be at the far back, so they dashed that-a-way. The strike team moved together surprisingly well, with the Eldar heavy-hitters only taking the lead to strike down the Covvie units charging ahead. Chief looked back to Solomon, then asked "You have the C12?"
The Spartan showed the Chief a block of the thing, before slotting it back into his belt, "Chief, can I make a suggestion?"
"Go ahead." He spoke.
"Divvy up the team, sir. One group takes the bridge while the other plants the bombs." His fellow said, racking the bolt of his MA5. Chief looked back for a moment, considering the proposition. He gave his friend a single nod, before looking to the Exarch. She nodded too, approving and peeling off three of her six-Banshee team for the assault. Chief took her and the other two, alongside Kelly and Fred, while Sheila, Solomon, Arthur and the three Banshees.
Chief and his team took the next turn over and then again, to the left, to head for the bridge. Those damn things were usually in the gut of the warship. Covvies were smart enough to employ holo-screens for the sake of defending the bridge and staff. Well, not today. The internal hallways that lead to the command deck were filled with Covvies, but nothing the Spartans and Exarch couldn't handle.
The Banshees danced a dance of death while the human supersoldiers emptied their weapons into the lines of Covenant mooks that the bastards had sent their way. One would've assumed they'd be low on numbers by this point, but alas... The team passed by a hole drilled into the bulkhead wall by energy weaponry, covered with a thin, shimmering Energy shield. A quick exchange of looks between the Exarch and Chief was all the interaction they had regarding that.
Chief gazed up at a Covenant gun emplacement, high on a bridge. Two grunts, three Jackals, one Brute, lattermost manning the plasma weapon and laying down a wave of energy fire. He slung his Assault Rifle on his back, drawing his two SMGs and jumping high and behind the Covvie plasma weapon, before he spun, bringing his SMGs to bear on them. Caseless ammunition cut through the Covvies like no tomorrow, disabling the gun emplacement by killing its gunner and assuaging any further attempts at manning by killing the other occupants.
Kelly blasted a Brute with her shotgun, running up the still-falling corpse and nabbing two Plasma rifles out of mid-air, before landing and opening fire. Following that, Fred threw a bouquet of Frag grenades into a hall that had a squad of Covvies emerging out of it. He then aimed his Laser at the door ahead and blasted it open. The Exarch followed by dashing forward, bouncing through the air with the grace of a ballerina and the martial skill of a Spartan as she decapitated two Elites and a Major, before dropping to her feet and hosing another squad of Grunts down with her pistol.
Her sisters followed suit, though with much less acrobatics involved as they cut through the Covenant with slash and stab from power weapons. Chief murmured, "This is too easy..." As they advanced. He piped his com, then spoke "Solomon, Sheila, status report."
"Bombs are set, Chief, but we're encountering some resistance near the cargo hold! Minor radiation spikes are wreaking havoc with my HUD, too!" Sheila responded as gun and plasma fire was exchanged in the background. "We ran into a set of Covvie Antimatter charges, too, though they weren't active." Antimatter charges? Oh, great, if his gut instinct was right...
"Roger... Head for the transport and prep it to get out." Chief answered as his mind raced, "They found antimatter charges near by the core."
"Think it's a trap?" Kelly asked as they ran.
"It very well may be... I don't like it." Chief noted... "How far in are we?"
"Going by HUD readings... We're pretty much near the bridge." Fred answered, "Think we'll have time to make it back to the transport?"
"Hmm..." John sighed.
The Exarch looked to the Chief and said "I sense danger, Spartan." as she separated an Elite from his head, "We should leave."
"I agree, but..." He paused as they burst into a rather wide-open bay with several consoles lined up near open doors. Covenant escape pods, if Chief was to hazard a guess. And the squad they just wasted was preparing to board them. He hummed, then said "Just to be safe, then... Sheila, we may not make it to you in time, but we found our own way of this slag heap. Blow the charges when we're clear, copy?"
"Roger that, Chief. We're nearly at the drop-ship." Sheila seemed pleased with what she was hearing, "See ya home."
"Mhm." He nodded as he approached a console.
The Exarch followed what the Spartan was doing on another console. He caught a small com pulse over his helmet radio and gasped... How had they...? No, no time to think. The rear door of the Covenant escape pods popped open and the Spartan and Exarch wasted no time loading their teams aboard the things as the ship's hull began to shake and shudder. Faraway explosions echoed, followed by decompression, just as the doors shut and the escape pods launched. The several dozen antimatter charges in the cargo hold of the Covenant vessel went off like a bunch of fireworks, almost creating a second sun and nearly disabling the two escape pods...
... Aboard the two pods, the Spartans and Eldar breathed collective sighs of relief, with John cuing his mic and calling out "Sheila, did you make it off?"
Static. John felt his heart drop as he asked again, "Sheila, respond."
Again, static. His mind now raced... Had they just lost half of their effective? He spoke again, more aggressively demanding "Chief Petty Officer 065, do you read me, over?"
Slowly, the static faded away. After a sudden spike of sound that nearly deafened the Chief and his fellow Spartans in one ear, he heard Sheila call out "Holy HELL, that was close! We hear you, Chief, we're fine! The bird took a bit of a beating, but we managed to get out just before the Shipmaster blew his ship to hell. Speaking of... We got a surprise for ya. We're swinging by to pick you and the Banshees up. Sheila, out."
Chief's relief was palpable, to him at least. As the Eldar warship, slightly charred by the violent blast of multiple Antimatter charges going off damn near at once aboard a Covvie ship they barely escaped from, picked their escape pods up, the Spartans and Eldar could see that the joint fleet had wound up victorious. Floating in high solar orbit, the debris field left by a dozen odd Covenant ships and intermixed UNSC losses. Behind that field lay the joint fleet.
... A victory in space. John almost felt like it was a dream.
Yet there they were, aboard the Eldar bird heading back to their admiral's flagship and with an Elite shipmaster, wearing full gold armor, in their custody. Sheila and Solomon described how they nabbed his pod and disabled it, painting a rather vivid picture as they flew back. Chief was glad to have something to hand off to ONI for a change. Interrogating a shipmaster or, hell, maybe even a fleetmaster, considering his position aboard the Covenant CAS-class Supercarrier that was leading the fleet, was going to be one helluva boon...
Right now, though?
Even Chief felt like he needed a break. He looked to his team and, quickly and concisely, he said it.
"Good job, team. And thanks, Exarch."
He and the Exarch left off with respectful nods as the Spartans returned aboard the ship that had transported them. She went to sleep with a cleaner mind that night.
One less Covenant warfleet to deal with in the long run. One less issue for both them and the humans.
Job well done.