*I Do not own the characters or plot of Halo or Kantai Collection

February 10th, 2535, 0900 Hours MST

In the hours since arriving in the Lambda Serpentis system, the battle group had been fully rearmed and repaired for the most part. The Wish Upon the Stars Mini MAC had been repaired, and so had most of the PDGs, the technicians had managed to unblock all the Archer pods and got all deck guns back up and running. For all intents and purposes, she was ready for another fight.

The fleet was on high alert, as a matter of fact, currently the Admiral was preparing the plan with Captain De Blanc. The fleet currently had 23 ships, the Punic, 9 Paris Heavy Frigates, 4 Halberd Destroyers, 4 Charon Light Frigates, 2 Halcyon Light Cruisers, and 3 Stalwart Light Frigates. The defence fleet was actually supposed to be bigger but the rest of the fleet had been recalled for front line duties.

In the bridge of Wish Upon the Stars the Admiral was talking to his ships AI, Guderian who was paired with the Admiral for their similar battle philosophies, a heavy attack at one point in and enemies line and allow the rest of your fast forces exploit it to its fullest.

"We could have the Paris fleet screen and run circles around the enemy never stopping and have the Destroyers prioritize CCS battle cruisers, attach two of the Stalwarts to the to the Destroyers..." As the Admiral continued planning, the Covenant jumped into the system. Immediately they scrambled all fighters and prepeared for combat.

The Covenant fleet outnumbered the UNSC fleet 2:1 12 CCS battle cruisers, 1 CAS Assault Carrier, 18 SDV Corvettes, and 10 CAR Light Frigates, the Admiral knew that this world was already dead, but he needed to get as many civilians out as possible, over the last few hours the evacuation had been moving steadily and 45% of the populace had already left, but now they had to buy time for the rest of them.

The Admiral started giving orders as soon as he was alerted to the presence of the Covenant. "Get the destroyer group focusing on the battlecruisers and have the frigates screen for them, I want our fighters in the void yesterday. Have the Halcyons take 2 Paris Frigates, and get above the CARs try to open a gap for our fighters. Weapons have our MACs hit the CAS and then rotate us port and hit it with the mini MAC after that, have all deck guns target the energy projector."

As the crew and the fleet began to comply with his orders, the CAS used its energy projector to cleave a pair of Halberds in half and severely damage a Charon. The UNSC returned fire, taking out 2 CARs and knocking out the shields of another, the destroyers knocked out a pair of CCSs and the Wish Upon the Stars managed to knockout the shields on the CAS and damage the energy projector.

The Admiral prepared his next round of orders, but was interrupted by the helm informing him that the CCS battle line managed to get off a few plasma torpedos and they were heading towards the destroyers.

"Tell them to break formation and retreat to the far side of the planet, we can play the long game with them, after they pull away have the Halcyon group pull out, and at the same time have our frigate line pump a volley of missiles into the CAS." The comms officer then efficiently relayed these orders to the rest of the fleet. Instantly they complied and began moving their way around the battlefield. For a moment the Admiral just let the battle chatter sink in.

"The frigate line is moving."

"MAC is 70 percent charged."

"Longswords are reporting that enemy seraphs are targeting the destroyers."

While all of this was happening, the Wish Upon the Star was desperately trying to fill in the gaps with as many MAC rounds and Archer missiles as they could fire. The PDGs were hammering the Covenants fighter screen, but the amount of fighters that the CAS was pouring out was simply to much for the flak screen, and eventually some Seraph bombers made it to the starboard side mini MAC and blew it to kingdom come. At this point in the battle, the Halcyon group and the destroyers had managed to make it to the other side of the planet. All that remained on the line was the Star, a Stalwart, and 4 Paris Frigates.

"Helm get us behind the planet, have the stalwart cover our spot, and after we make it have the rest of the frigates move with us." The Admiral commanded.

"Aye, sir." The Helm replied, turning the ship around.

As the ship moved, the Admiral looked over what was left of the fleet and was pleasantly surprised, the two Halcyons were still up, Captain De Blanc's ship was green, and 4 Paris Frigates were still operational-not counting the ships he had covering his retreat. Considering they had killed or disabled 12 of the enemy's ships it wasn't a bad ratio. As he made it around the planet, the rear guard was gutted by a wave of plasma torpedoes from the battle cruisers. The Admiral readied the fleet to boost over the top and fire all guns at the CAS simultaneously, killing the enemy's flagship would rid them of a lot of firepower and supplies but, it would also remove their main leadership from the equation. As they were boosting, they enemy began deploying ground troops.

Most of the fleets ground complement was already on the ground to defend, all except the Star's as the Admiral wanted to use them as a QRF -quick reaction force- and deploy them in the weak points of the Covenants line. The ground forces could hold for a few days at most, there were simply to many covies, and not enough Humans. So the Admiral just hoped they could get reinforcement and beat the Covenant back. When the fleet crested the planet, they all fired at the CAS, whose shields generators must have been damaged earlier in the fight as they were still down, and completely gutted it, but there was no time for celebration, as the Covenant's answer was to simple begin moving to knife fighting range to negate the UNSC's MACs as they were moving they unleashed a massive volley of torpedoes to all the ships except the Star. For a moment the Admiral was confused as to why, then he was suddenly very happy he had kept the ground forces on board, the enemy was moving in for boarding. He had the rest of the fleet pull back, if he was going down it was gonna be a show, and he didn't want to risk friendly fire.

As the boarding craft approached he watched as what remained of his fleet retreated, reflecting on his time in the Navy. When this war began he had originally been assigned to Admiral Cole's fleet to take back Harvest. He commanded an old Halberd back then, but after the slaughter that was Harvest and its subsequent 5 year campaign, he had been fast tracked, being promoted 2 whole ranks from Commander to Rear Admiral Lower Half. After this he had then been given command of Star. Afterwards they, along with whatever escorts the Navy could spare, were hammers to the Covenant anvil, trying to beat them back in any gravity well they could. As he reflected on this the sensors station caught his eye, the Stalwart and Paris frigates that he had ordered to retreat were obliterated by the Covenant torpedoes. Just more good men and women who would never make it home. This left the two damaged Halcyons and Captain De Blanc. This world would burn.

Star could tell that she was in bad shape. The covies had disabled her engines and her mini MACs, but her deck guns and PDGs were still firing away. Suddenly she felt something latch onto the hangar doors and begin cutting. The sensation made her even angrier and as they made it in, she felt the battle rage through all of her corridors and rooms. She felt as each one of her crew members perished at the hands of the vile things. She felt her engines kick on and start her burn before the Admiral began broadcasting, she knew what to do. It was almost ironic she would burn as many of these monsters as she could, like she was cauterizing a wound in the universe itself.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I wish that this could have ended differently, better, but we can't change that now. It has been an honor serving with you for the past decade. We have done great things together, we've even managed to save a few worlds, and millions of civilian, even now we are buying them time. Now its time we get some well deserved rest. Rear Admiral Stackhouse over and out."

She felt the Admiral's speech reverberate in the minds of every crewman left standing, they were all ready to pay the ultimate price if it meant more time for more civilians to get out. They had all seen the glassed planets and they couldn't damn anyone to that fate if they didn't have too. So in one final act of defiance, the four kilometers of ship rammed through a CCS battle cruiser and made it to the heart of the enemy transports and detonated all remaining onboard nukes and sending her reactor critical, ending in one hell of a bang that nobody ever heard.

Hey guys! Been a while hasn't it? Sorry for leaving the story hanging! I doing some quick revisions now and I'm trying to bang out another chapter so stay tuned!

And that's the end of the halo side (for now?) and now off to ship girl land.