Chapter 19: The Battle for Earth Part 1
Moon Shadow, Trafalgar 2, Terra Defense force, Sol System
Vice Admiral Roche walked to the front of the Trafalgar 2's bridge and immediately assumed control.
"Alright, some of those Covenant decided they wanted to mess with us again, you know what happened last time. We fought them and pushed them back. And by god we're going to do it again, but this time we're going to do it in space and keep those marines good and ready to help keep these bastards away from us. We might not have the Spartans but we've got the largest and most experienced fleet all around you. Captain, we're going to make a crescent shaped attack group around those Covenant, once they fall back into a stronger formation we'll surround them and put a few Shiva's into the center of them."
The Vice Admiral had been a hero early in the war commanding his frigate, the Xenon to many victories but never seemed to be enough to turn the tides on any one battle. But over the years he was less and less eager to charge forward into the Covenant, he was criticized for his unwillingness to sacrifice his crew to kill one Covenant Cruiser. That all changed when Earth had been attacked, he was one of the few UNSC personnel who had been raised on the Humans' Home World. Roche was now as eager and willing to kill Covenant, as he was when he had been commanding the Xenon.
"Aye, sir," the Captain replied with a small smile. Roche's favorite tactician was Hannibal, the Carthaginian commander who led a war against the Romans. He always used the analogy that the Covenant was the Carthaginians and the Humans were the Romans. The Romans suffered sever losses for many years until they figured out Hannibal's tactics and used them against him.
Throughout the UNSC there was always a rivalry between the commanders of the Hannibal 2, because of its name, and the Trafalgar 2. The Vice Admirals of both ships always tried to outdo each other in combat. Roche looked out the main veiwport and saw the glowing orange surface of the Moon. He knew they had to destroy the ship that did that or the MAC cannons would be quickly taken offline. The engines of the Covenant ships started to glow blue as they turned to face the overwhelming Terra defense force that was bearing down on the.
"This is Vice Admiral Roche, I half of our ships to fire their MAC cannons at individual ships. The other half hold your fire until I give you my mark," Roche said over the fleet COM channel.
"Uh, sir, weren't we going to surround them?" asked the Captain.
"We were, but it just doesn't suit the purpose, we need to go right through these guys, they're going to give that huge ship time to get away."
" Aye, sir," the Captain responded finally understanding.
"Admiral, MAC has a lock, we'll be able to fire in ten seconds," the weapons tech replied from his consol.
"Do it," Roche replied. He looked back at the veiwport and saw a few shells tear past and hit their targets. The Covenant ships' shields flared, blew away, and the super heated shells tore into the hulls of the ships. Fire blossomed all over the ships as atmosphere blossomed out of holes. One of the Covenant ships detonated in a blinding explosion.
"Looks like they hit a reactor," Roche said aloud to himself. He then felt a thump on his ship and watched as the shell flew out from under the front of the ship and towards a cruiser that was hovering behind the rest of the group. It flew through a small opening between two ships and impacted the right side of the large front bulbous section in front. It continued through and must've hit one of the coils for the plasma turrets because there was a large explosion and the already weakened front was blown off. The piece impacted on the rear of frigate in front of it and blew it shields off. Roche felt a small surge of happiness but quickly squelched it, they had destroyed four of the ships so far, but he looked out the window again and saw hundreds of shells fly past and into the Covenant group.
"I think they assumed your mark was when you fired, sir," the Captain replied. The Vice Admiral gave a small chuckle and continued to watch as MAC shells hit Covenant ships repeatedly. A few plasma torpedoes were fired but they seemed to be un-aimed and in desperation.
"Landon, how many ships are still threats?" The Trafalgar 2's AI appeared as a Carthaginian soldier and started to tap his sword on the ground.
"Five ships are almost untouched, three are damaged but can still attack, and another seven are dead in the water but their turrets are still active. So along with some others that are critically damaged and have reactors about to go critical, I'd say a total of twenty could pose a threat."
"Thank-you," Roche replied. He contemplated his options for the umpteenth time during the battle. Even though the Covenant that were remaining were damaged and in no position to take on the UNSC ships, they could still detonate their reactors and cause a chain reaction, quite possibly taking out a large group of the defense force. Roche scanned the remains of the Covenant group and was about to order his ships to proceed cautiously when a COM channel was opened and someone began speaking quickly.
"A large group of Covenant have jumped and are near Earth as we speak. They're just sitting there waiting for something. We're requesting that you proceed straight ahead and help us."
"This is Vice Admiral Roche, who am I speaking to first off."
"Lieutenant Commander Branson, captain of the frigate New Seattle, we need your help because we've spotted a large Covenant ship approaching our position at a high rate of speed," Branson replied quickly.
"Alright son, we're going to chase down that ship. Roche over and out," he immediately turned to the Captain and asked him, "What is the name of that ship? I want to know my enemies name, even if they are running."
"It is The Second Apocalypse, from reports over our battle net the other two that have been spotted are called the Zion's Revival, and, Pandora's Box," replied Landon.
" Thank you, put two Shiva's into that debris field and we'll follow after it has cleared."
"Aye, sir," replied the Captain. One of smaller ships in the fleet quickly went ahead of the rest of the fleet and fired off two Shiva Tactical Nukes and hurried back away from the blast. The Captain tapped a button on the command consol in front of him and the windows for the bridge darkened to almost black. After almost a minute there were two blasts inside the debris field. Even with the darkened windows the blast was hard on the eyes and made some people look away. Once the shockwaves and EMP dissipated the huge fleet started to move at full speed towards The Second Apocalypse that had already gained significant ground on them. Roche decided that the defense force would be better able to help provide support until the other Sol defense groups could arrive if they split up so he sent half to go and help where they were needed.
It took close to five minutes to come within firing range of The Second Apocalypse which was almost three quarters of the way to it's new escort group. Single MAC shells weren't able to penetrate the shields, which seemed to be modular so that no one hit would take the whole thing offline.
"I want every single ship to fire their MAC cannons at the rear of that thing. I know we're low on strength but I want half the group to fire their MACs and take the rear shields off while the rest take out the engines and do as much damage as possible. Wait ten seconds and fire." Roche closed his eyes and started to countdown from ten. When he reached two he opened his eyes and watched as almost one hundred white hot shells flew towards the rear of the ship. They slammed into the shield that flared and finally broke after fifty hit it. The other group flew into the back of The Second Apocalypse and tore up the rear. One of the five engines detonated while two others just went out. The second group of the defense force fired their shells, which took the last two engines out and tore through the back of the Covenant ship and deep into the craft.
"Admiral, the ship is sending distress signals to the rest of the Covenant fleet which is currently here. Unfortunately it seems that there is a large amount of Covenant that has still not arrived at this point. I'd suggest hurrying up and destroying this craft because they'll be coming directly here."
"Thank- You Landon, I'll keep that in mind. But to keep you busy, what type of ship is that? I've never seen it before," asked Roche.
"It is referred to as a "Planet Killer" they're huge weapons," Landon disappeared and a hologram of the ship hovered in the air, "They absorb the plasma in a given area, like the Covenant plasma turrets, and supplement it with their own in reserve. Fortunately for us, and unfortunately for them, they have to stay stationary during this process, that's why they have these defense groups."
"Okay, so we need to take this thing out as soon as possible." Roche was about to call out another command when he saw a glint on one of the raised sections of the huge ship. He zoomed in on it and saw that it was a command bridge.
"Landon, I always thought that the Covenant had their bridges buried inside the ships."
"Yeah, but this one has to have it raised due to it's configuration," he replied matter of factly.
"I want to put some of those new Longbow missiles to the test." The Longbows were a new style of missile that was reminiscent of the Archers, except for the warhead was a low yield nuclear warhead that was designed to be fired at a Covenant cruiser and, along with damaging the ship itself, use the EMP to burn out the plasma coils used on the Covenant's weapons.
"Landon, is there a shield protecting the bridge?" Roche asked.
"No, or at least not one I can detect. It seems that one of those shells tore up a shield generator for the rear half. They're totally exposed."
"Ok, get a firing solution on that bridge and compensate for the attitude variance. I want a direct shot."
"Done, ready to fire Admiral," he replied without a care in the world.
"Fire!" As he said that a missile streaked past the Trafalgar 2 and straight towards The Second Apocalypses' bridge. The missile impacted the command deck and went off. For a split second there was a blinding light but it disappeared quickly. Roche looked at where the bridge had been and saw just a mangled stump where the bridge connected to the hull. Almost the whole length of the Trafalgar 2 had been vaporized in an instant. He zoomed in on the impact area. All around that area there were no lights due to the EMP.
"Landon, prepare to fire one more pod full, and tell the rest of the-."
"I've got at least a hundred and ninety Covenant cruisers, frigates, destroyers, and carriers coming out of slipspace!" Landon interrupted. Roche looked to the left and saw a sea of purple against the black of space.