For months the Citadel had been searching every relay into the Orion Arm to find a clue as to what was destroying worlds and wiping out the so-called Humans. Destroyed habitats, ruined worlds, mass graves of milllions of dead civilians, killed in vast subterranean bunkers. They'd been able to infer the existence of energy weapons, as well as some form of non-eezo based FTL. Normally this would have excited him, but now he could only worry about this being used against them.
When scout ships had reported a Covenant warship attacking a human world, the response had been simple. One of the Turian battlegroups patrolling the Orion arm in force had immediately gone to assist the human world.
Admiral Karandis observed the tactical situation from his station about the Dreadnought Titan's wrath.. He was nervous. This was the first clash between he Turians and this "Covenant", and he'd not been prepared for just how big the enemy ships were. They were enormous! A Dreadnought two kilometers long, two one kilometer long, and twenty frigate-sized ships, more than two-hundred meters long each. He had three Turian dreadnoughts, thirty cruisers split up in groups of six, and sixty frigates split up in packs of six each. They had numerical superiority, but that did not put him at ease.
The Covenant ships had not detected their approach initially, and had lost several of their smaller ships to a wave of Fighters and drones launched at close range by the dreadnoughts and cruiser. Alas, they had not taken out one of the larger ships, but they had detonated disruptor torpedoes deep inside several Covenant ships. The fighters had then returned to re-arm and reload.
He had expressed worries about the enemy plasma projectile and laser cannons, but put them to the back of his mind. His ships had been briefed to the best of his ability, They had doubled the layers of ablative armor, and the Kinetic barriers had been modified to "catch" incoming plasma projectiles and try to slap them aside. The heat would do horrific damage to ships, but it was better than instant destruction. The enemy ships had an unknown form of FTL, but their sublight speeds were much lower than his own. If he didn't get arrogant, he should be able to just stay out of range and continue hitting the enemy from long range.
After the surprise attack, the Covenant ships besides the super-dreadnought had broken off from the planet and moved to engage his own ships, firing plasma projectiles and their laser turrets at his ships. The Ablative armor on his ships began fizzling and boiling, but held at such extreme ranges. The modified barriers helped, but one cruiser miscalculated the "slap" and was instantly atomized by the plasma impact.
As this happened, the transport ships of his fleet had secretly gone into FTL from behind the star, travelled to the system's oort cloud, and then with a series of smaller FTL hops appeared on the other side of the human world from the Covenant fleet. A force of eleven-thousand Turian troops and armored support were currently landing on the planet, setting up evac zones in isolated cities, while the majority went to the human capital to engage the Covenant there. There was some concern from the humans, even attacks on the Turians, but this quickly stopped when the Turians began attacking the Covenant attackers. The evacuation ships would take them to a safe world in Citadel Space, until another human world could be found. It was good work. The kind of thing someone signed up for in the hopes of doing just that. Rescuing innocents from invaders. It reminded him of the Rebellions in a way.
The Turian Dreadnoughts were currently positioned behind one of the system's many planets, using gravity to slingshot their shots at the Covenant ships, while most of the Frigates and Cruisers were flying massive circles around the Covenant ships, moving laterally and aiming their main guns at the enemy fleet and concentrating all their fire upon a single Covenant ship at a time. They'd fire until the enemy energy projectiles began to close in, whereupon the ships fired up their FTL drives to jump to the other side of the Covenant fleet, this time at maximum range again, where they'd accelerate again, and continue firing laterally.
He had ordered ten cruisers and one dreadnought, The Will of Taetrus not to open fire. Yet, and stay hidden behind the sun as a strategic reserve., with another two packs of frigates waiting behind one of the gas giants. They could be alerted to strike by sending FTL probes to jump to them and give them the order to strike.
The Covenant ships were moving in one group, the larger ships using their overlapping shields to cover the smaller ships after four had been taken out by weight of fire from Turian ships. Clever. Karandis thought to himself. The enemy admiral was protecting the ships which he could take out with relative ease, by using the shields of the larger ships to block them, trusting that they would have a chance to continue recovering. It had taken his technicians some time, but they now believed they could use measure the strength of the Covenant shields by analysing the deflection or destruction of their projectiles.
"Split the cruiser force and have them keep both enemy ships under fire at all times, we can't allow their shields time to recharge. Concentrate the firepower of the dreadnoughts and frigates on the the dreadnought closest to us." He ordered. He put his hand together as minutes ticked by, and the fighting continued like it had before. The Covenant tried to close in. The Turians were slowly losing ships as they had to withdraw due to overheating, while the shields of the enemy ships kept dropping under continuous fire. He was waiting for an opportunity.
The Covenant fleet suddenly broke apart, and split up in all directions, the frigates breaking from their protective shields and heading towards his cruisers. He could see the plan. Engage his cruisers in a knife-fight with their frigates, allowing the dreadnoughts to come in close and finish the job. Suddenly an officer spoke up. They'd split the frigattes around equally, with one Covenant dreadnought heading for each of his own dreadnoughts. "Primary target shield energy readings are starting to become more erratic." He grit his fangs. Without the frigates, the dreadnought was vulnerable to his plan.
"Deploy Titan's wrath and the Palavan Sunshine at maximum range beneath the plane of the enemy dreadnought, then signal the strategic cruiser reserve to deploy in broadsides at knife-fight ranges and fire everything they have!" They'd take the Sunshine away from the dreadnought that targeted it, then concentrate fire upon the weaker of the two ships. With one dreadnought gone, they could concentrate their fire upon the last dreadnought, while he deployed his frigate reserve to ambush and surround the Covenant frigates.
As the order went out tactical VI's calculated exact timings for each ship to make their move. Then, upon completion, the order went out and ten seconds passed to account for light-lag, and then the plan jumped into motion. His helmsman took him and his ship into a series of quick FTL jumps to get into position, the moment they emerged, they opened fire upon the underside of the enemy dreadnought, ten cruisers appearing at the same time and firing their broadsides. All fighters launched at the same time, going in for the kill. Then, in a crackle of blue light, the shield around the enemy dreadnought exploded.
The outer hull of the Covenant dreadnought rippled and tore as mass accelerate rounds impacted and expanded inside of the enemy hull, followed by streams of disruptor torpedoes from the fighters passing right through the ship's hull. Karandis smiled at the devastation. Then the enemy's turrets began to glow.
In seconds, ten cruisers were turned into slag, and a stream of plasma projectiles flew out towards the two dreadnoughts. "Evasive maneuvers!" He yelled.
The helmsman complied, angling the nose of the dreadnought so it could pass by the Covenant ship, and jump to FTL. His ship's short FTL hop barely managed to avoid the enemy plasma projectiles, but the Sunshine was hit and the front half of the ship was slagged before the FTL drive kicked in. It went out of FTL, completely wrecked. The targeted dreadnought detonated as its plasma core went off. Karandis grit his teeth. His plan had cost him a thousand turians and ten cruisers. If he'd had just a bit more firepower, he might have been able to cripple the ship before it fired back.
The Covenant frigates had began laying into his cruisers and frigates, while the last dreadnought began laying into them with its plasma and laser weaponry as his ships were fighting the frigates at close range. Another seven cruisers and fifteen frigates were destroyed in a close range clash, but half the covenant frigates were taken out when the commander of the cruiser flotilla made a high-G turn and suddenly presented a full broadside at the oncoming covenant ships. Firing on one ship at a time until it died, then switching to the next. Five cruisers FTL-jumped out of the fight as they overheated too much and had to flee. "Break off from the dreadnought , Regroup at the gas giant, do -not- let it get close." He ordered. "Engage at long range only!". They'd have to win this battle slow and steadily. No more gambles.
As his ships complied, he saw that the Covenant ships were breaking off too, the fighting was turning back into an artillery duel, while the Covenant ships were moving to the system's gas giant, he thought they might try to fight with their backs to the planet. He ordered an FTL probe to inform his frigates to stay on the other side of the gas giant. He might be able to ambush the Covenant with them, and he still had his last dreadnought hidden behind the sun.
He'd made his peace with this war being a brutal one, but the enemy ships were quite something. The Hierarchy was currently gearing up to a war footing, taking dreadnoughts out of mothballing, and laying down -ten- more, with plans for the construction of massed dreadnought-construction yards, new anti-plasma barrier defenses, and improved ablative defences. He just hoped it was enough.
"Send a frigate back to Citadel space with all our sensor logs" He ordered. "The Hierarchy needs all our combat logs. We need more dreadnoughts, and fast."
As the two fleets began settling into their long-ranged duels, the next phase of the battle could begin. Neither fleet could approach the planet without the other running interference, so it was down to the forces on the ground to decide this battle. They'd brought enough disruptor, nuclear, and anti-matter missile batteries to hopefully be able to take out the super-dreadnought. If need be, he'd have to order the ruined dreadnought to ram it from orbit, as its engines still worked. Perhaps that could destroy it.
He asked for the spirits to help General Pallonis down on the planet's surface.