Chapter 18
UNSC Kilkis, High Orbit, Actium
May 6, 2545
1115
Spaatz
Spaatz agitatedly lowered the files he'd been handed.
"And who the hell are you again?" he demanded to know, not caring about how rude he sounded.
The other man that had appeared next to Volkov snapped to attention.
"Lieutenant Commander Stephen Luzader sir, ONI Prowler Corps and captain of the UNSC Moonlight Sonata," the man rattled off. "Hull classification number PRO-41673."
He started to say something else, but Spaatz cut him off by lifting his index finger. He glanced at Kanin, who subtly shook his head: no ship by that name or hull number appeared in the registration, or the records. Which meant whatever Major Volkov and Commander Luzader had been up to, it had been kept off the books. And Spaatz hated being left in the dark.
He glanced at al-Cygni. "Did you know about this?" he demanded.
"No sir," al-Cygni replied with a shake of her head.
"And why the hell not? You're the head of the local ONI branch. Aren't you supposed to know everything your department is doing in your AO?"
"Commander Luzader here reports to Section Three sir, while I'm with Section One. Section Three answers directly to Admiral Parangosky, and no one else sir. Commander Luzader was under no obligation to inform me of his presence here in the system," al-Cygni reported, her voice sounding strained, and Spaatz could tell she was just as unhappy about this development as he was.
Spaatz snorted. "You guys ever consider this is the reason why no one trust ONI?" he asked out loud as he started pacing the room. "Your departments won't even talk to each other, much less anyone else."
Both al-Cygni and Luzader remained silent, more than likely picking up on the rhetorical nature of Spaatz's comment.
Spaatz abruptly paused in his pacing to glance at Harper. "And what about you Colonel? Did you know about this or do the departments in INSCOM not talk to each other either?"
"Special Warfare Group Three is a subdivision of Army Special Operations Command sir, not Intelligence and Security," Harper corrected, sounding completely unruffled. "With that being said, both commands do attempt to operate in concert, so yes sir, I was made aware of Major Volkov's presence in the Ambracian System."
Spaatz glared at him. "And you didn't think to inform me?"
To Spaatz's annoyance, Harper looked completely unrepentant. "With all due respect sir, you didn't have the security clearance to know."
Spaatz gaped at him. "I am a four star admiral in charge of an entire military system and in command of one of the strongest military forces in the entirety of UNSC controlled space! How do I not have security clearance!?"
"Simply put sir, you weren't 'in the know.'"
That temporarily put a stop to Spaatz's rant. The "need to know" aspect of security clearance was just another layer of security, a way to compartmentalize classified information. Not everyone with security clearance had access to everything, just the things they "needed to know" for their job. That way, in event someone's credentials were ever compromised, a hacker or foreign agent would only have access to that one particular individual's files, as opposed to being able to compromise the entire system.
Spaatz understood the thinking, and normally he would have agreed with it. But under the circumstances...
"I think I would have needed to know there was a team of highly trained special forces operatives running operations in my area of responsibility," Spaatz bellowed. "It might have altered my plans, wouldn't you agree Colonel!?"
"Perhaps. But you know just as well as I do sir, that's up to the Security Council, not me," Harper calmly pointed out.
That answer didn't really mollify Spaatz in any way shape or form, but since there was nothing inaccurate about Harper's statement, Spaatz found he couldn't retort. So instead, he busied himself with the files Volkov had handed to him.
"And who's the fucking moron who decided to name this program after a bunch of ancient warriors, whose entire reputation has been vastly overblown by popular media and pop culture(1)?" Spaatz exclaimed.
There was a silent cough that caught Spaatz's attention and turned around to see Kendrick leaning forward in his seat.
"Sir, with all due respect, I think we're losing focus of the topic at hand," he began. "I'm sure the 'Spartan' name was chosen at random, and not necessarily indicative of the organization's capabilities."
Spaatz abruptly stopped him before he could continue. "Did you know about them Colonel!?"
Kendrick visibly bit back a sigh. "No sir. But then again, that doesn't really fall under the purview of the Air Force. While the Army is focused on destroying the Insurgency, the Marine Corps on developing homegrown technology, and the Navy on unlocking the mysteries of the Covenant, the Air Force has been exploring... alternative avenues of research."
The mysterious way Kendrick said that last part gave Spaatz pause and he immediately called to mind the classified program General Carter had worked on for most of her military career, and he couldn't help but wonder if they were somehow related. He knew better than to ask though. While AFIC didn't possess ONI's casually ruthless reputation, that's not to say they weren't dangerous in their own right.
"Furthermore sir," Kendrick continued while Spaatz was distracted. "Even if I had known about these Spartans, I have to ask: would it matter now?"
Spaatz sighed. Truth be told, it ultimately didn't matter if he didn't know this information five hours ago or even five minutes ago, what mattered is that he was aware of it now. And as much as he would have liked to continue ranting and raving like an ensign fresh out of the academy whining about how he hadn't been saluted by the ship's master chief petty officer, he had other priorities to worry about.
"What exactly do you do Major Volkov," Spaatz finally asked, noticing, out of the corner of his eye, the man in question snapping to attention. "I've never heard of Special Warfare Group Three."
"It's a joint military special operations unit under Army control sir, though despite what Colonel Harper stated, we actual report directly to SPECWARCOM(2), not ASOC(3)," Volkov smoothly replied. "We're tasked with missions that one individual branch would not be able to accomplish by themselves. Most of our assets are drawn from within the Army itself, however often times we work in conjunction with other elements: local law enforcement, Colonial Militia armored units, Air Force CAS and security elements, or in this case," Volkov nodded at Luzader, "Navy operatives."
"But according to these files you've given me, most of your support units have yet to arrive in system," Spaatz noted as he flipped through the documents. "In fact, if I've read this correctly, it would seem your ground team consists of a grand total of... three operators."
"That is correct sir."
Spaatz raised an eyebrow. "Then, forgive me Major, but I fail to see how three... Spartans," he said the name with a bit of distaste, "could hope to destroy an entire battlecruiser by themselves."
"Without going into too many details sir, I would like to point out, that is not without precedent," Volkov noted. "And furthermore sir, on a more personal note, if you had seen what these Spartans have done, there would be no doubt in your mind of their capabilities."
Spaatz frowned. "So, you've worked with these Spartans before, have you?"
"Yes sir. We've run a couple of counterinsurgency operations in the past with their assistance."
The mention of counterinsurgency operations abruptly rang a bell in Spaatz's mind. Wasn't there some sort of scandal involving Army special forces committing war crimes on an Innie held world a few years ago? He specifically remembered a Lieutenant Colonel Volk or Vulcan being involved. Was it possible this was the same man?
Of course, Spaatz couldn't remember. Truth be told, once the war against the Covenant had truly begun in earnest, he had simply stopping paying any heed to the Insurgency. In fact, he had almost forgotten they were even still a thing.
Shaking his head, Spaatz turned his attention back to the topic at hand. Three soldiers destroying an entire battlecruiser by themselves? Seemed unlikely. But then again, it had been his experience most officers wouldn't dare make such a bold claim without at least some evidence to support it. Oh sure, officers, like all soldiers, enjoyed embellishing their accomplishments every now and then, but nothing to this degree, which made Spaatz slightly more inclined to believe it.
But still, three men? Or more specifically, two men and one woman? That didn't seem likely.
Spaatz glanced at his intelligence chiefs. "Well? Thoughts? Opinions? I'm open to suggestions."
"Sir, I'm free to admit that this is not the first time I've ever heard of Spartans before," al-Cygni began. "I'm also free to admit that I've even read some of their low clearance after-action reports. Without delving too deeply, there was nothing in those reports that would lead me to believe Major Volkov's team would be anything but successful."
She sat back and Kendrick quickly took her place.
"Sir, I hate to be the one to point this out, but whether or not Major Volkov is accurate in his assessment of his team is irrelevant to the topic at hand. The truth of the matter is, we don't have a lot of other options," Kendrick pointed out. "And while I don't want to minimize the personal risk for the operatives involved, in the grand scheme of things, utilizing these Spartans is the only option that possesses the lowest amount of risk to our forces, while offering the highest rewards."
Spaatz nodded in acknowledgement, then glanced at Harper.
"Personally sir, I'm more concerned about the execution of the plan," Harper stated. "Major Volkov has given us a rough outline involving his team boarding the target and destroying it from within with a tactical nuke, however he hasn't explained how his team will be able to even make it aboard the target in the first place. Commander Luzader, will the stealth capabilities of your ship allow you to approach undetected?"
Spaatz glanced at Luzader, who grimaced.
"I'm afraid not sirs," Luzader admitted. "While the Sonata is equipped with the latest stealth technology, those still work best from afar. If we were to close that distance, the likelihood of detection by the Covenant would increase exponentially with every kilometer we advanced. Maybe more, given there is nothing but dead space between us and Covenant positions. In order for us to maximize our stealth capabilities, we would need background clutter such as other ships or even debris to help mask our approach."
Harper nodded, as if that was what he expected. "Furthermore, even if you could approach undetected, there's still the question as to how you would even be able to pass through the shield in order to get on the ship's hull," he pointed out. "You would need the fleet to disable the shield...but if we could do that, we wouldn't need your team Major Volkov."
"Certainly seems to be a true Catch-22," Kendrick agreed. "We need your team to destroy that ship to disable their shield so that the fleet can advance, but in order for your team to board, we need that shield disabled."
"That's not entirely true sir. As I'm sure you're well aware, in order to fire their weapons, Covenant ships need to temporarily disable their own shields," Volkov retorted. "We can easily exploit that window, and have done so in past."
"Yes, but that would require the Covenant to actually be shooting at something with their main batteries: an enemy warship," al-Cygni noted. "And, correct me if I'm wrong Admiral, but the fleet can't afford any more losses."
In response, Spaatz glanced at Kanin, who immediately spoke up.
"This is true sirs," Kanin began. "Given the strength of the opposition, if the fleet were to suffer from anymore losses, the ability of the Navy to conduct future offensive operations would be greatly diminished."
Volkov opened his mouth, as if to say something, but before he could get a word in, Kanin continued.
"However sirs, I would like to note, that only applies to warship losses."
There was a slight moment of silence as everyone in the room took a moment to consider what Kanin was implying. Kendrick was the first to speak.
"'Warship losses,'" Kendrick echoed out loud. "Commander Kanin, are you implying that we could... utilize fighters?"
"I doubt our fighters would present enough of a threat to the Covenant they would be interested in engaging with their main batteries," al-Cygni said.
"Which is why I am not thinking of utilizing fighters ma'am, but Longsword gunships," Kanin corrected.
Kendrick immediately looked thoughtful. "Longswords. Yeah, I suppose that could work. I know the Air Force has recently acquired a large amount of 'C709' variant Longswords, and have been heavily upgrading them – mainly, increasing their firepower in order to act as miniature 'gunships' that could be used to escort their aircraft carriers."
"Exactly, sir," Kanin replied with a nod. "Several squadrons have been equipped with 'min-MACs,' while others have been converted to fire Archer anti-ship missiles in lieu of the standard ASGM-10s, for more effective use against Covenant warships. Because of that, it is my belief that they could be utilized for this mission."
"Now, to be clear sirs, I'm not stating our gunships have the capability to destroy anything heavier than a Covenant corvette," Kanin continued, "however, given the amount of gunships in our possession, the Covenant would be forced to engage with all available weapon systems. Furthermore, the amount of ships attacking at the same time would greatly aid in masking Commander Luzader's stealth approaching to the cruisers."
"But wouldn't the Covenant merely counter with fighters?" al-Cygni asked.
"Not unless the Longswords were escorted by fighters of their own."
"Won't the fleet need those fighters?"
"Not necessarily," Spaatz commented. "Gold Group had just successfully demonstrated that carriers make for rather viable anti-aircraft platforms, though, not indefinitely. However for our purposes, it would be long enough."
Spaatz climbed to his feet and called forward an image of the Covenant fleet, enlarging it so that all that were present could see it. "I'm liking your idea Kanin, however the major issue I'm seeing is that we need to make sure the Covenant don't realize what our intentions are, otherwise they may increase security surrounding target 1-Delta and greatly increasing the risk to Major Volkov's ground team, this... Argon Team."
"And how would we do that sir?"
"By feinting an attack on target 1-Echo." Spaatz pointed at his display. "If we have our fighters skim along Actium's atmosphere and approach the Covenant invasion fleet from below, we can make it seem as though we're attempting to attack the ships where they would potentially be the weakest: around the gravity lift. The Covenant would be required to respond, and if some stray shots were to 'accidently' strike target 1-Delta, it's doubtful the Covenant would even notice."
Spaatz glanced at Luzader, who nodded.
"That could be arranged sir," he said. "We are equipped with a number of booster frames that could be modified for a stealth approach. It could also provide useful as a vehicle for extract."
"Kanin, see to it that Commander Luzader has whatever he needs to modify his team's equipment," Spaatz immediately ordered.
"Aye aye sir."
Kendrick suddenly held up his hand. "I'm sorry sir, I don't mean to backtrack, but: does TF Whiskey actually have enough fighters and gunships to present a credible threat to the Covenant?"
"Probably not," Spaatz admitted. "Which is why we'll be drawing a number of resources from JTF Byzas; with the UNSC Canberra crippled and most of their assigned assets destroyed, the task force has all been annihilated. What's left of their assets will be folded into TF Whiskey."
"Those pilots have been fighting non-stop for hours now sir," Kendrick pointed out. "They may not be happy about being thrown into the fight once more."
Spaatz couldn't help but shrug. "Unfortunately, they don't have a choice: the longer we delay, the worse the situation on the ground becomes. We have to attack. Now."
XXXXX
High Orbit, Actium
Zelda
"We're doing WHAT!?"
"We're launching an attack on those Covenant cruisers," Bellum repeated.
Wishing at the moment his cockpit was pressurized so he could take his helmet off and vigorously rub his eyes, Zelda reached up and rapped the palms of his hands against his helmet instead.
"No no, I heard you the first time Bellum," Zelda finally said. "It's just…what?"
He heard Bellum sigh. "What exactly do you want me to say Zelda? These were the orders that were given to me, so these are the orders that I'm giving to you. I don't the make the decisions around here!"
"Well, technically you do, 'cause you're the squadron commander," Zelda couldn't help but point out.
"But I get what you're saying," he hastily added before Bellum could blow up. "It's just: what…"
"Hey Skeeter, are we sure this is the same guy who launched a suicidal, one-man attack against a Covenant destroyer a couple of hours ago?" Zelda heard Odessa commenting to one of their squad mates.
"Hey! That was a different situation entirely!" Zelda protested. "That was against a destroyer that had been completely fucked and was seconds away from falling apart. Seriously, someone could have sneezed just a bit too hard and the ship would have blown up. All I did was just finish the job."
"Oh really..."
"Don't fucking 'oh really' me," Zelda snapped. "Notice how I was still the one to get the fucking kill so fuck you guys, I'm still a better pilot than all of you. No, this is a different story. All of you were busy trying to get gas, so maybe you weren't watching, but I was: an entire fucking Navy armada tried to attack those cruisers. I'm talking like, literally, eight fucking battleships. And they got their asses kicked! And they didn't even leave a scratch on those damn cruisers! What does Command think we can do!?"
"We, aren't doing anything. We aren't taking the lead on this one Zelda; the gunships are," Bellum told him. "All we're doing is providing cover for them."
"You mean like escorts?"
"Yeah."
Zelda couldn't decide if that was better, or worse.
"Well... why's it got to be us?" he protested.
He reflexively jerked back as Bellum unexpected exploded.
"I don't fucking know Zelda! Maybe they think, gunships and fighters, much smaller than warships so we can't get hit as easily!? Do I look like fucking Admiral Spaatz to you!? I don't know don't know how the fucking man thinks!"
A slightly stunned silence followed in Bellum's tirade, and Zelda couldn't help but warily glance in the direction of her bird, floating several dozen meters away. Despite her call sign, Bellum wasn't exactly prone to outburst like that, especially over the radio.
"Um... I just meant: why are they pulling fighters from JTF Byzas instead of anywhere else," Zelda cautiously commented after a moment of awkward silence. "We're not exactly in tiptop shape at the moment."
Bellum fell silent for a moment. "Oh..."
"Yeah..."
"Um...that's probably because it would take too long to call in squadrons from the other side of the planet," Bellum awkwardly noted. "The longer we wait, the longer the Covenant have time to fortify their defenses. Something like that."
"That...makes sense I guess," Zelda slowly said, not wanting to push Bellum any further.
"Yeah," she replied, and Zelda could almost hear the embarrassment in her voice, but then she cleared her throat and it was suddenly gone, and Bellum was all business again.
"Anyways, we got our assignment," she declared. "We're linking up with Bayonet Squadron and providing escort to the gunships of the 327th. The commander of Bayonet, Lieutenant Colonel Yaipan, aka Bayonet Leader, will be in charge. Just a warning guys: Colonel Yaipan is a lot stricter than I am so Zelda, don't act like a dumbass."
"What? Why do I get singled out!?" Zelda protested over the sound of his squad mates' giggles, though that was more out of habit than any sort of real offense. He of course had no intention of doing anything stupid: he didn't recognize this Colonel Yaipan, which meant he was from some other fighter wing entirely, and the last thing Zelda wanted to do was make Bellum look bad in front of her supervisors.
"Do you really need to ask?" Bellum dryly commented.
Zelda pretended to think about it for a moment. "Probably not."
"Yeah, that's what I thought. Anyways, us combined with Bayonet and the 327th, we've been designated as Assault Wing 55. Everyone got that? Okay then, follow me, we need to go rendezvous with the rest of our assault wing."
She banked and Zelda quickly followed in her wake as she led them down towards the planet where, what looked like just about every single Air Force Longsword gunship assigned to the system was gathering. It was an impressive display of firepower, with hundreds and hundreds of gunships spanning the horizon, and hundreds more Broadsword fighters mixed in, but Zelda wondered if it was going to be enough. Covenant cruisers were not easy targets to take on, even under the best of circumstances. Zelda couldn't help but morbidly wonder how much of the assembled mass in front of him would actually make it through this attack.
A navpoint suddenly appeared over one wing in particular.
"Bayonet Leader to Omega Flight: is that you on approach?" someone abruptly asked over the radio.
"This is Omega-1: copy that Leader," he heard Bellum reply.
"Glad you could join us Omega. Omega, I'm having my guys cover the formation from the sides; take up position and provide cover from below."
"Copy. Moving now."
Bellum angled her Broadsword downwards and they slowly flew past the rest of the formation and slipped into formation. As they did, Zelda glanced around to get an idea of just how many ships made up their wing. Based on what he was seeing, there were nine Broadswords from Bayonet, as well as three gunships from the No 327 Gunship Squadron: two PGE type gunships and one PGM. Combined with the six fighters from Omega, they were a decent sized assault wing, though obviously against the Covenant, numbers didn't account for much.
In terms of firepower though, they were much better equipped. Aside from all the explosives the Broadswords were carrying, all Air Force Longsword gunships were equipped with their standard M9109 ASW/AC 50mm autocannons. The main different between the two models were their main armament, but even then it was pretty good: PGE models were armed with two Archer pods with thirty missiles apiece, not including reloads, while PGM models were armed with Mark 2457 'mini-MACs,' the only Air Force ship to do so. The combination of all three gunships presented a large amount of anti-ship weapons, which made sense given their objective, but despite all that, Zelda could only hope it would be enough.
"All pilots, listen up."
Yaipan's voice sounded over the radio as soon as Zelda and his squadron slipped into position.
"For those of you who don't know me," he began, "my name is Lieutenant Colonel Juan Yaipan, call sign: Birddog. I'm in charge of this assault wing, so pay attention."
"We're launching an attack on the Covenant cruiser, designated as target 1-Echo, which is currently hooked up to that gravity lift and raining all sorts of hell on our boys down on the surface. We can't let that continue. Navy just tried to knock them out of orbit, but they got their asses kicked, so now it's the Air Force's turn. Covies probably aren't expecting an attack so soon after the first one, so we got to move hard and fast."
"We're going to try and hit that cruiser from the bottom, about where that gravity lift is. Hopefully the shields will be weakest there. As the gunships have most of the weapons that can penetrate a ship of that size, Broadsword pilots, our job is to make sure these gunships survive, no matter the cost. Don't worry about enemy fighters, we got some Navy Longswords with us who will deal with them. Just focus on the gunships. Is that clear?"
"Got it," Zelda muttered along with everyone else.
"All craft, punch in afterburners and follow me!"
Zelda was shoved back into his seat as he activated his engines. All around him, the rest of the task force followed suit.
As they headed in the direction of the Covenant, Zelda took a deep breath as he felt his heart rate begin to pick up speed as adrenaline started flooding his veins once more. Closing his eyes and concentrating solely on the sound of the blood pulsing through his ears, Zelda tried to mentally prepare himself to dive headfirst into the fighting again, but it wasn't easy. Though he would never admit it, he was getting tired. It was hard to believe that this battle, at least for him, had only begun two, two and a half hours ago. At this point, it almost felt like an entire lifetime. And they had lost a lot too. Aside from Betros, Omegas 4, 7, 9, 10, and 11 had all been killed. And that was just one fighter squadron. Zelda didn't even want to know how many casualties the rest of the fleet combined had taken, because he knew it was a lot. Hopefully this attack would succeed and they could end this now but, truth be told, Zelda wasn't feeling very optimistic.
"We're picking up in bound fighters."
Birddog's voice cut through Zelda's thoughts and his eyes snapped open. He automatically glanced at his HUD and spotted the cloud of red dots headed in their direction. He mentally sighed. Here they go again.
"Here we go gents!" Zelda bellowed into the radio with as much enthusiasm as he could muster. Hey, he might have been tired, but he had a reputation to maintain.
It seemed to work as he immediately heard a sigh over the radio.
"Leave it to Zelda to still be enthusiastic about this shit," he heard Odessa complain.
"Hey, I'm just saying: I still got a shit ton of ordnance, and a lot of targets to expend it on."
"Calm down Zelda, you know our objective: stay close to the gunships," Bellum ordered. "I'm sure you'll get your chance to throw yourself into another dogfight but for now, let's let the Navy take over."
"I can technically do both you know," Zelda pointed out. "You know I'm like a god damn sniper with my missiles; don't even need to get close, I can take out the Covenant from a distance without even breaking formation."
"No Zelda."
"Longswords are breaking away," Birddog suddenly announced.
Zelda glanced at his HUD to see all Longswords, Navy and Air Force, breaking away from the formation and speeding straight towards the incoming fighters.
"Go get them little friends," Zelda muttered under his breath.
The two sides rushed at each before, at several hundred kilometers away, they both open fired. Missiles and plasma flew through the void as UNSC and Covenant forces found themselves locked in mortal combat once more. Under normal circumstances, Zelda would have been watching the battle as it unfolded, waiting to see where he would need to go to best reinforce the line. But since he was confined to escort duty at the moment, he settled for ignoring the battle raging in distance, preferring to focus on what was going on directly around him. Besides, he'd seen enough dogfighting to know how the battle would go down. At this point, he was realizing there wasn't a whole lot of opportunity for too many variations in the way combat worked in space.
With the Navy keeping the Covenant fighters distracted, Zelda and the rest of the Air Force ships were able to slip past the Covenant's outermost layer of defense, however that just meant they immediately ran into the Covenant's second layer of defense.
"Light cruisers and heavy corvettes, dead ahead!" someone warned over the radio.
"Copy, I got eyes on!" Zelda reported as his HUD lit up with new contacts. Outside, he could see at least five separate corvettes and two light cruisers on approach.
"All Broadswords, maintain formation," Birddog ordered. "All gunships, you're cleared to engage enemy warships!"
"Copy that Leader! PGM-777 moving to engage!"
Above him, Zelda watch as one of the gunships pulled ahead of the main wing. Lights began to glow across its entire hull as the ship began charging up its MAC. The light cruiser saw the PGM-777's charging up and started to take evasive actions but before it could get far, there was a giant flash of light as the gunship fired, sending a hundred metric ton shell of depleted uranium in the cruiser's direction at a little over twelve thousand kilometers per second.
The shell smashed into the cruiser, causing its shields to light up, and the cruiser quickly retaliated, firing a couple of plasma torpedoes at the gunship. The torpedoes came streaking in their direction, but being only a little over twice the size of a Longsword, PGM-777 didn't present a large enough magnetic signature for the torpedoes to lock onto, causing them to miss entirely. The Covenant cruiser started to deploy its plasma cannons, but before it could, PGM-777 fired again.
Zelda blinked as the cruiser's shields disappeared in a bright flash, leaving the ship reeling. As the Covenant struggled to recover, the wing's other two gunships moved into position.
"PGEs 117 and 222, move to engage!"
Both gunships just opened up with everything they had. Missile after missile was launched at the cruiser, who, as expected, started to shoot the first few down when PGM-777 fired again, sending a MAC round skimming along the full length of the cruiser's dorsal hull and destroying the plasma turrets located there. Then the missiles hit, striking at various points across the entire ship. Fire erupted from the ship's hull and in the shadow of one of the explosions, Zelda noticed the silhouette of a number of fighters shooting out from the cruiser's hanger, even as his HUD let out a shrill of alarm.
"They're launching Banshees!" Zelda heard Odessa warn.
"All gunships, continue focusing fire on that cruiser!" Birddog immediately commanded. "Broadswords, standby to engage, but don't break formation! Let the Banshees come to us!"
Zelda gritted his teeth as he waited for the Banshees to come in range. He always hated being the one to sit still as it gave up one of the greatest advantages a fighter had: their maneuverability. He supposed Birddog was concerned about a flight of enemy fighters sneaking in and hitting the gunships from behind if the Broadswords were to break formation, but this felt a little extreme.
"Here they come," someone warned as the Banshees got to within firing range. "They're firing fuel rods! INCOMING!"
"All pilots, evade!"
"Chaff," Zelda spat out as he threw his fighter into a spin. It turned out to be a rather pointless exercise as none of the fuel rods had actually been aimed at him, and instead were all aimed at the gunships, who quickly dodged out of the way.
"Broadswords, return fire!"
Quickly dropping his crosshairs over one of the approaching Banshees, Zelda armed a Medusa and tapped the trigger.
"Fox one," he called out in a rather bored tone and watched as the missile rocket towards the Banshee.
The Banshee in question executed a rather tight turn as Zelda's missile approached, and managed to blow the missile out of the sky with his plasma cannons, but Zelda hadn't been the only one to fire at him. The Banshee pilot quickly found himself confronted with another three Medusas and rather than try, and potentially fail, to shoot down all three, the Banshee ignited his boosters and took off running, trying his best to evade the incoming.
"Bayonet Squadron, break formation and pursue! Omega, continue onward to the objective!"
"5 and 6, move up to cover the left flank," Bellum immediately ordered as all the fighters from Bayonet broke formation. "3 and 8, cover the right!"
"Copy, moving!" Odessa immediately replied.
Zelda moved his fighter into the new position and watched as two Bayonet fighters take off in pursuit of the Banshee Zelda had been shooting at.
"11, watch your space, we still got Banshees all over the place!" Zelda heard the pilots say.
"Copy that 9, I got your back!"
"I got you, you little motherfucker! FOX ONE!"
"Target destroyed, good shot 9! Hang on, I'm picking up two Banshees closing in from our nine o'clock, high!"
"Break right and draw them away from the gunships!"
"Copy!"
The Broadswords abruptly disappeared from Zelda's radar, though from the sounds of it, the pilots had everything under control so he wasn't worried. He glanced back at the light cruiser the gunships were fighting, only to see another assault wing had joined in on the melee, and the ship was quickly turning into one giant, flaming wreck.
"PGM-777 to Omega Leader, target destroyed, requesting permission to proceed onward to the objective?"
"Granted! We've got your back covered!"
"Copy!"
Zelda watch as the engines on the gunships flare and they began speeding through open space in the direction of the Covenant cruisers, and he quickly pushed down on his stick to match their speed. But before they could reach -
"Head's up! Incoming Covenant destroyer, fifty seven degrees from above!"
Zelda glanced up to see the hulking form of a Covenant RPV-class light destroyer lumbering towards them on an intercept course.
"We can't let that thing get behind us!" Bellum declared. "All ships, divert to heading five niner six three! Take that ship head on!"
"On you Leader!" Zelda yelled as he banked.
The massive form of the destroyer quickly filled his windshield as he speed towards the ship. He could see energy beginning to swell up on the warship's dorsal hull before the ship abruptly launched three plasma torpedoes in their direction.
"INCOMING INCOMING INCOMING!"
Zelda hastily jerked his fighter out of the way as a plasma torpedo passed through the space between his fighter and Odessa's fighter, doing nothing but damage to Zelda's nerves. At the same time, PGM-777 began firing back.
WHOMP!
Waves rippled across the destroyer's shield as the shell hit them dead on, and even from this distance, Zelda could see the plasma turrets on the destroyer swiveling in the direction of the gunship.
"Covies are trying to get a lock on triple seven!" Zelda warned.
"That ship is the only thing that can disable the destroyer's shields! Don't let it get taken out!"
"Well, what the fuck do you want me to do it about?" Zelda muttered to himself.
"6, on me, we'll cut in front of the gunship and see if we can't distract those turrets!" Odessa yelled.
"Well that sounds like a terrible idea," Zelda noted, even as he followed Odessa as they jerked out in front of 777, barely managing to avoid getting hit in the back by friendly fire as the gunship fired its MAC again. Plasma immediately can streaking in.
"Evade, EVADE!"
"What do you think I'm doing!?"
Zelda threw himself into a loop as the bolts flooded the area around him. Clearly they had managed to fool the targeting sensors on the Covenant turrets, but Zelda knew it was only temporary. Even now, he could see the turrets swiveling back to the gunship.
"777, take evasive action!" Zelda roared.
There was a flash of light and for a moment, in his slightly exhausted mind, Zelda thought he had somehow been hit. But then he blinked, he realized that no, the flash actually came from outside. Glancing over at the destroyer, he noticed the turrets swiveling around as they were set upon by two different UNSC assault wings, both approaching from different directions.
"Target's being assaulted by AG15 and AG31," Bellum reported. "We need to go in support them. All pilots, attack!"
Zelda immediately banked and headed straight for the destroyer. In front of him, he could see Assault Wing 15 exchanging fire with the destroyer at a rapid pace. They were similar in composition to Zelda's wing only, they had one extra gunship assigned to them. Unfortunately, that little bit of added extra firepower wasn't helping them very much as AG15 was getting their butts kicked. In the distance, he could see one of their gunships fire a volley of missiles and then immediately pull away. As the missiles slammed into the destroyer's shield, causing them to flicker, the Covenant turrets swung around and despite the gunship's best attempts, they were still struck by at least three bolts, destroying them instantly. Due to their small size, gunships did not have a whole lot of armor.
"That shield is about to give way!" Bellum reported over the radio. "All it needs is one more volley! All ships of AG55: concentrate fire on this navpoint! Standby!"
Zelda nimbly reached out and armed one of his ASGM-10 anti-ship missiles.
"FIRE!"
"Fox three!" Zelda warned as he pulled the trigger. He watched as his missile joined all the others as everyone in wing fired at the same time.
The MAC round from PGM-777 struck first, causing the shield to ripple from the impact. Then the missiles struck, hitting the shield all at the same time.
At first, Zelda thought nothing happened and was preparing to arm another ASGM, when the shield abruptly flickered and disappeared, and then his sensors indicated the destroyer was now open to attack.
"Shield is down!" Zelda reported.
"Omegas 3 and 8, follow me in, we'll take out those dorsal turrets. 5, 6, and 11, escort the gunships in and take out their engines!" Bellum commanded.
"Copy. Gunships, you lead the way, we'll follow up the rear!" Odessa yelled.
"Understood!"
Zelda sped towards the destroyer, approaching from the direct rear, with the gunships in the van. Immediately they began taking fire as the destroyer detected their approach. The gunships started bobbing up and down to try and evade, and Zelda could see them getting silhouetted by all the explosions. But the destroyer was only able to fire off a few bolts before Bellum and her flight came roaring in and fired a series of Medusas at the turrets, taking them out.
"This is PGM-777," the gunship reported as the stream of plasma fire halted, giving the gunships a clear shot. "Target locked... shot out!"
777 fired, destroying the armored housing surrounding the destroyer's engines with a single shot, leaving them exposed. Seconds later, half a dozen Archer missiles hit home. One of the engines completely erupted into flames. Chunks of metal were hurtled at high speeds as the engine began ripping itself apart, causing the blue glow to disappear.
The effects were almost instantaneous. Even for a ship as large as a destroyer, they still needed both engines to be able to maintain a straight flight pattern. With one engine down and one still active, the destroyer immediately began making a slow turn to the left. Given a bit more time, the Covenant crew would easily be able to correct that turn, but Zelda had no intention of letting them do that.
"12, on me!" Odessa barked. "We'll roll in, take out the remaining engine! Zelda, cover!"
Zelda watched as Odessa and Skeeter roll to the right and he waited a couple of seconds before following suit. As all three of then sped towards the destroyer, Zelda could see the bomb bays on both Odessa and Skeeter opening up, and a missile from each fighter popped out.
"Fox one!" Odessa called out, and he and Skeeter fired, then immediately broke away.
Following close behind, Zelda glanced over his shoulder to see the two missiles closing in on the remaining engine. They disappeared behind the lip of the engine before, seconds later, there was another explosion and the other engine died.
"Main engines are down!" Zelda reported.
"Copy!"
Being in space, the destruction of the destroyer's main engines didn't mean the destroyer suddenly stopped moving; with no atmosphere, there was no drag or friction, so there was nothing to stop the heavy warship from continuing to move forward. But with the main engines down, it did mean the warship wasn't going anywhere fast.
"AG-55, reform on me!" Bellum commanded. "We got to take out that ship's other weapons!"
"Ship is rotating!" Skeeter abruptly warned.
Zelda glanced over at the warship to see the crew was firing their side mounted maneuvering thrusters, trying to spin the ship on its axis so they could bring the turrets mounted on their ventral hull to bear. But before they could get into position, the thruster exploded as it was struck by a missile and Zelda glanced around to see yet another gunship wing vectoring in for an attack.
"AG-27 is beginning their attack on the target," Odessa reported.
"Oh, hell no! They're trying to steal our kill!" Zelda complained.
"'Our kill?'" Odessa echoed. "You do realize that destroyer is far from dead, right? Going to take a lot more than four assault wings to take that ship down."
"Then what are we waiting for? Let's get back in this shit," Zelda impatiently said.
"PGEs 117 and 222, move in and take out all plasma and pulse laser turrets on the destroyer's dorsal hull," Bellum ordered. "AG-27 is going for the ship's main battery. We're going to clear the way for them. 5, 6, and 12, follow them in!"
"Rog!"
The wing banked and headed for underside of the destroyer. As they drew near, Zelda began to see red holographic circles appearing over the turrets there as the PGEs began obtaining locks. The turrets turned in their direction and started shooting, causing Zelda to yank his stick to the side as he started dodging. The fire wasn't very accurate, and seemed rather uncoordinated as some of the fighters and gunships were taking more fire than the others, which made Zelda wonder if the destroyer's central fire control director had been taken out, but the sheer volume of fire more than made up for the inaccuracy.
Zelda winced as the plasma started exploding closer and closer to his fighter, forcing him to fly even more erratically than he normally would have, but fortunately the good thing about missiles was that, unlike MACs, they didn't require a clear line of sight to be accurate.
"Target locked, missiles away!" he heard the gunships reported. "Breaking off!"
Over two dozen Archers left their tubes on the gunships and headed for the destroyer, each one vectoring in on their own target. The turrets quickly switched targets, shooting at the incoming missiles, blowing some up, but inevitably some of them made it through.
Explosions ripped through the turrets, destroying some of them, but not all. However, the amount of debris that got thrown into the air created a small cloud, temporarily obscuring the sights of the surviving turrets and forcing them to wait for it to clear. But in that moment of inactivity, that was when AG-27 began their attack run.
"Bombs away, bombs away, bombs away!" Zelda heard them call out as an entire squadron, twelve Broadswords total, swooped by and just began dumping munition after munition onto the destroyer.
Turrets were shredded, armor was sheared off, and holes were punched clean through the hull as the bombs and missiles exploded. Fires started flaring up, all of which were instantly extinguished by the vacuum of space, only to immediately return due to the amount of oxygen and combustible material that was leaking from the ship. A number of run lights on the destroyer's hull started flickering, some of which turned back on after a moment, but most went dark and stayed dark. It was clear the ship had been heavily damaged, if not outright disabled.
"Good shit Wing 27," Bellum exclaimed.
"Yeah boi!"
A new navpoint suddenly appeared on Zelda's HUD.
"All pilots of AG-55, reform on me!" he heard Birddog demand and Zelda automatically moved to obey. As he did, he glanced behind him, only to see all the Air Force gunships, not just the ones in his wing, were peeling away from the Covenant destroyer, leaving it crippled but still alive.
"Hang on," Zelda protested. "That destroy ain't dead yet! We're not just going to leave it there, are we?"
"All its weapons, engines, and shields have been taken out, making it pretty much defenseless against us," Bellum explained. "At this point, it's going to take the Covenant a lot more time and effort to get that ship back to operational status than it would if we were to simply destroy it."
Zelda grunted in acknowledgement even as he sped in the direction of the objective. The massive bulk of the Covenant cruisers loomed in the distance. Promptly they opened fire.
"Head's up, we're taking fire!"
"All pilots, evasive maneuvers!"
Zelda quickly jerked his plane to the left, then immediately banked to the right, trying to keep his fighter moving. The distance, coupled with his fighters small size meant he wasn't the easiest of targets to hit, but it was still possible. Case in point, the light of an explosion caught his attention and he glanced to his left to see a Broadsword from another assault wing take a direct hit and explode, leaving nothing left.
"All pilots, be advised, I have eyes on the target," Birddog reported, and Zelda glanced forward. Directly in front of him was a single battlecruiser. Just behind it was the Covenant heavy cruiser.
Zooming in, Zelda spotted the gravity lift that connected the cruiser to the surface of Actium, sprawled out below them. At this range, the gravity lift appeared to be nothing more than a pencil thin beam of purple light, but it was there.
"All gunships, lock onto the target and standby to engage," Birddog barked. "Fire."
All around Zelda, every single gunship, not just in his wing but every wing, opened up on the target. Dozens of MAC shells, hundreds of Archers, and thousands of rounds of heavy autocannon fire streaked towards the cruiser.
The results were pretty much what anyone would have expected: every single round was stopped thousands of meters away from even coming close to the ship's hull by a massive energy shield.
"All units, keep firing!"
Shells continued to pepper the Covenant's shields. If they were doing damage though, Zelda couldn't tell as there were no fluctuations, no flickering, or even ripples in the shields.
"Bayonet Leader, this is Flanker Leader, be advised, enemy fighters have broken through the Navy's line and are pushing our six!"
"Shit, we can't let those fighters reinforce the cruiser! Alright, Bayonet, Rogue, Flanker, Tornado, Gold, Stiletto, and Havoc Squadrons, break away and engage those fighters. Hold them back! Everyone else, continue the advance!"
Zelda watched as almost half the Broadsword fighters broke away, leaving all the gunships, most of the Wombats, and a handful of Broadswords to continue the attack.
"What the fuck Bellum," Zelda complained. "We should be there with helping them hold back the fighters. What fucking good are we doing here?"
"Shut up and do your damn job! Omega, spread out! We got a lot more gunships to cover, and not a lot of fighters, so spread out!"
Shaking his head in annoyance, Zelda nevertheless did as he was told. He followed Odessa to the right as they flew away from the trio of gunships Bellum and Skeeter were covering. All the while, the gunships continued to rain fire down on the Covenant cruisers.
"Keep firing, keep firing!"
" – running low on missiles here…"
"This is PGM-197, I'm hit!"
"227, pull in and cover that spot!"
"Are we even scratching those shields?"
That's what Zelda wanted to know. Despite all the shells and missiles the gunships had already expended, the shields didn't even look like they were losing energy. Not even close. And while they continued to advance, the Covenant in the meantime, continued to fire every single weapon system they had in response.
"WARNING, INCOMING TORPEDOES."
Zelda jerked his fighter to the left just a couple of torpedoes pass through the space he had just been occupying. Glancing back, he watched as one slam into a gunship that just wasn't fast enough to dodge out of the way. The torpedo consumed the entire ship, completely atomizing it. At the same time, the forward energy projector on the battlecruiser closest to them flashed, and a beam of energy sliced through the void, cutting through an entire assault wing at the same time.
Zelda swore. All around him, ships were dropping like flies. The entire assaulting force had already taken dozens of casualties and yet, they essentially had yet to accomplish a damn thing!
"Zelda, arm an ASGM and standby to fire on my mark," Odessa abruptly ordered.
"What am I aiming at?"
A navpoint appeared on his HUD.
"Let's try and take out that energy projector," Odessa said.
Zelda blinked. "Well, have you noticed the shields are still up?"
"You know those shields fluctuate every time the Covenant fire their main battery, right? I've had a program running and I think I've got the timing down! And we should be close enough to be able to take advantage of that!"
"Well, good for you, but that just seems like –"
"ZELDA!"
"Fine!" Zelda snapped as he armed a missile. "Ready on your mark."
"Fox three, MARK!"
Zelda pulled the trigger. A missile departed from the bottom of his Broadsword and he watched as it streak towards the cruiser in question, following closely behind the missile Odessa fired.
Just as the two were about to hit the cruiser's shield, the shield abruptly flickered for just barely a second as the ship fired its energy projector, and suddenly the missiles were on the other side of the shields heading straight for the target. Zelda reflexively leaned in and watched as the missiles sped towards the energy projector but just as they were about to hit –
FWOOZ FWOOZ FWOOZ!
- pulse laser turrets came to life, blowing up both missiles before they could hit.
"Shit," he heard Odessa mutter.
"5, this is Leader. That you lobbing missiles in the direction of the objective?"
"Rog, but it didn't connect. Pulse turrets got them both."
"Might need more missiles to punch through. Calculate another time, and we'll get the rest of Omega and Green Wing to fire at the same time."
Zelda frowned at the idea of using the Wombats for something like this, but he nonetheless armed another ASGM and got ready to fire again.
"All fighters, standby to fire on my mark," Odessa announced over the radio. "And… MARK!"
Zelda pulled the trigger again. This time, nearly a dozen missiles were simultaneous fired. They reached the shield just as the cruiser fired off a series of torpedoes. Despite this, not all the missiles were able to make it through; about a third detonated against the shield and Zelda couldn't help but roll his eyes. Most of those had come from the area the Wombats had been gathered, which is exactly what Zelda had feared. He didn't know why, but despite all their processing power, he noticed that Wombats sometimes didn't have the same reaction time as a human pilot. Or, apparently, the same aim: Zelda was pretty sure he saw three missiles not even headed for the right ship!
Ignoring the stray shots, Zelda tried to focus on the missiles that were on course, but then a series of plasma bolts fired in his direction forced him to divert. They struck a nearby gunship instead, which violently exploded forcing Zelda to break away to try and avoid the debris thrown in his direction. As he navigated through the explosion, he could hear Odessa saying:
"Dammit. Just missed the edge of the surface."
"Calculate another timing, everyone should still have at least one more ASGM – "
A message abruptly flashed across Zelda's screen. Distracted as he was, it took him a moment to realize what it said:
"ALL FIGHTERS, BREAK CONTACT AND FALL BACK."
"Omega-6 to Omega Leader, be advised I'm getting a retreat order from Command," Zelda said out as he recovered his fighter. "Can you confirm?"
"Confirmed! I'm picking it up too! Omega Leader to all craft, break off the attack! I say again, break off the attack!"
"Fucking shit!" Zelda spat out as he sharply banked to the left to turn around and start heading back in the direction he had come from. Plasma fire streaked by just above and below his fighter, but fortunately he was able to avoid getting hit.
Looking back though, Zelda could see not everyone was so lucky. He could see one gunship getting hit in one of its engines, throwing the vehicle into a spin, one that the crew wasn't able to recover from before it was hit several more times, destroying it completely.
Checking his HUD, Zelda could see that only about half of the gunships and fighters that had started off this attack were still left.
"God dammit," he snapped to himself. "Fucking knew this shit was going to happen!"
"Bayonet Leader to Omega Leader, head's up, we couldn't hold all the fighters back! You've got incoming!"
Zelda's head snapped up as his HUD lit up with the signature of several squadrons' worth of fighters coming straight at them.
"Shit. All craft, listen up! We're not out of the woods just yet! Looks like if we want to survive this, we're going to have to fight our way through! All fighters, accelerate to attack speed! Draw their fire away from the gunships!"
Zelda swore again as he started arming weapons. As he worked though, he couldn't help but wonder what the point of this entire attack was. Aside from the destruction of a couple of warships, they really didn't accomplish much and in fact, probably suffered from more losses in terms of overall tonnage than the Covenant did. If Zelda didn't know better, he would have almost thought this attack was a distraction of some sorts. But the question was:
A distraction for what?
XXXXX
UNSC Moonlight Sonata
Lieutenant Commander Stephen Luzader
"Captain? We're receiving a message."
Commander Luzader looked up from his display. "Put it on screen," he ordered.
"It's a text message only sir," his communications officer informed him.
"Put it up anyway."
"Aye sir."
The main screen, which had been displaying the fight that was unfolding outside suddenly flickered, before going black. In its place, a series of words began to scrawl across the screen.
…
INFILTRATION SUCCESSFUL.
…
That was all that appeared.
Luzader felt his breath catch in his throat, and he did his best to remain calm. Those were the exact words he'd been hoping to see.
Soft footsteps filled his ears and he turned his head slightly to see his Army counterpart, Major Volkov, coming to a parade rest stance beside him. Slowly turning his head towards him, Luzader raised an eyebrow. Without looking away from the words on the screen in front of him, Luzader saw Volkov giving a single nod.
Nodding to himself, Luzader activated his keyboard and began typing out a single, worded response.
...
EXECUTE.
1. There's an interesting thread on the Ask Historians community of Reddit that asks the question of whether or not the reputation of the Spartans in modern media is truly justified or not. The answer is not really a cut and dry yes or no, but it does point out some of the things the general populace accepts as truth is actually not, or has been heavily embellished in the thousand or so years since the ancient city state of Sparta existed.
Now, me personally, I'm rather indifferent to whether or not the Ancient Spartans are worth of admiration or not, but I thought the entire thing was interesting enough to bring up.
r/AskHistorians/comments/6rvusy/is_the_military_worship_of_the_spartans_really/
2. SPECWARCOM: Special Warfare Command. This is a canon UNSC command.
3. ASOC: Army Special Operations Command. This is not a canon UNSC command. It is, however, the name for the modern day United States Army command in charge of all Army special operational units (I.E., the Army Special Forces, 75th Ranger Regiment, 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, aka, "Night Stalkers" etc.)
4. As mentioned in the chapter itself, all the Air Force gunships are supposed to be "C709" variants of the GA-TL1 Longswords, which are primarily used by the UNSC Navy, but I don't think it's impossible for the Air Force to have a couple of squadron's worth of those fighters themselves.
Their designations of PGE and PGM are based on how the US Navy designated their patrol boats (though instead of gunboats, the Air Force calls them gunships):
PGE = Patrol gunship, escort (anti-aircraft)
PGM = Patrol gunship, MAC (anti-ship)