A/N: Sorry it took me so long to write this. Like it says on my last update, I've lost a bit of inspiration. On top of that, I never know how to start things. This update, in particular, was a bit difficult to write, as I had three half-considered and eventually discarded ideas. And, no, God'slayer is not discarded. I will continue it, eventually. I've also been distracted with finals in school. And, heh, I'll admit, not all my reasons are so... good-natured. I've been trying to get a Dark Knight in FFT: War of the Lions. Hey, it's not my fault! They shouldn't have made the job requirements nearly so... horrid.
Anyway, reasons aside, on to the fic!
Disclaimer: I don't own Halo, yeah, yeah. If you've read the earlier ones, you'd know this. And it's a silly idea for me to own Halo anyway.
Wrath of the Black Flame
Chapter V
Raiding Party!
Prosperity, Reality: SciFi-Halo-Earth-712, 7 hours after the events in the war room
The day dawned on the planet. It was known by many names, Prosperity to the Sangheili and Humans who came to colonize it, and "That Thrice-damned Place Where Syrassaaan Is Hiding In His Blasted... And So On, And So Forth" to the Titans who originally found it.
It was also known as J'grki to the small species of alien on the surface, known as J'grkm, but they were crushed by falling drop pods. So, their opinion no longer truly matters.
The rather lethal drop pods in question were, in fact, several different kinds. There were purple, sleek drop pods, filled with Sangheili and a couple of Lekgolo. There were green, bulky drop pods, filled with human Marines, the Master Chief, and an Engineer who had been trying to fix the drop pod's "broken" nav system when it was launched. Fortunately, this drop pod landed in a tree, breaking it's fall, and crushing the few remaining J'grkm. It then exploded for reasons unknown to any but those J'grkm, who had been working on making something called 'black powder.'
The last few drop pods that fell were not as smooth, and not as blocky. Instead, they were reminiscent of large, black, diamond shards, so black they hurt to look upon, and so jagged that they ripped through the foliage of the trees, shredding holes directly through the canopy without slowing down. In sync, a section of each pod slid away, revealing a tall, thin Titan, of the kind referred to as Assassin Titans, aligned with the Blackfire Titans. They were followed by larger pods, which looked like large cubes. From these came the Destroyer classes, aligned with the Ferrus Vitae.
Moments later, the sky was filled with shiny silver, dark green, and white silver drop pods. The coalition of the Ferrus, the Mortis, the Blackfire, and the Humans and Sangheili, had arrived on Prosperity. And their leader was pissed off.
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Prosperity, Reality: SciFi-Halo-Earth-712, during Event: Warroom Negotiation
I pick myself up off the floor of the war room. I have to remember to ask someone to sweep it...
I feel a bit groggy. I can't quite remember what's happened... I must've 'gone Shadow' for a moment. It's been happening a lot since Alishandris's death...
That thought snaps my memory back into perspective. Yeah, definitely Shadowed. That bastard made a rather rude comment about her. Judging from the repeated blows from Maltias and Telrinas to Kalty's face, he might have insulted their mothers, again.
Man, he's an idiot.
Wait, did Kanos just say something about Covenant ships?
Ah, hell. Again with these... wait... bloodsigils?
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Several light-hours away, fourteen formerly Covenant ships translated in-system. They were led by a Brute Ship Captain by the name of Cerberus. His flagship was a heavily modified carrier, the Malicious Soul, and boasted enough firepower to carve his name into a planet.
Despite his protests to the contrary, he was in fact compensating for something.
This made him slightly pissed. Unfortunately, 'slightly pissed' was when Cerberus began burning his name into planets. It really, really didn't help that the bloodsigils on his ship emitted a slight reverberation through the walls, with a sound like tinnitus... and if you listened closely, you could hear whispering of dark promises and evil bargains.
Or, at least, that's what he thought they were. You see, each bloodsigil is, essentially, a bound soul that had struck a bargain with one of Syrassaaan's mages, and found out the hard way that 'eternal life' was entirely different than what they thought. He also gave them each a taco, but, hey, he was an insane megalomaniac.
What the bloodsigils were really doing was communicating with each other. They watched the inhabitants of the ship, through the ship's security system. Since they were damned for all eternity to be watching these people, they might as well do something. They had a new form of entertainment at the moment: actually real 'reality TV.' They even tried to change the outcome by pulling small pranks. They were part of the ship, so they started setting off random fire alarms, changing the temperatures and timers on the ovens to ruin the food, jettisoning random Brutes out of airlocks, changing the channel on the TVs when no one was looking, stuff like that.
They even had a pool going as to who would die first, who would finally realize the ship was possessed, (they jettisoned those out the airlock. Hey, if anyone told what was going on, it would ruin the fun.) or would the Brute Ragnarök finally confess his love for the Grunt Watam.
(I have no idea how the Grunts and Brutes choose their names, so I just used what I knew, based on Tartarus and Yayap.)
They were currently trying to figure out how long it would take for Cerberus to go insane from the constant humming.
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The Covenant fleet looks decently small... just a pair of destroyers, looks like a carrier or two, with several escort frigates and and three transports. There's also a flagship, and a very large, probably custom ship floating in the middle. That's likely to be their command ship, given that it's the heaviest.
Unless, of course, they were being smart and put their commander in a frigate to stay behind. This way, he could control the battle, while still being able to 'slip out' at any time to warn his superiors if we show too much power.
I've got one Ultimus Cannon on this ship,and several fire batteries, meant to take on opponents at a range shorter than they can fire on me.
Eh, they don't stand a chance.
I turn to Rakithas. "Rak, get twelve Titans ready. I don't care what faction, just so long as they stand a decent chance inside one of those things. Standard torpedo action, I want those vessels crippled ASAP. Have them launch at all but the flagship and the heavy custom. Tell them to expect heavy resistance, looks like Neo-Covenant troops, but with Cruor support. I'll take the last one myself."
Rakithas nods, and heads out the door to do my bidding. Have you ever thought about that word, bidding? It's kind of funny.
Anyway, I'd best get ready. Damn, but I would feel sorry for those alien bastards. But then I remember that they're trying to kill my Titans and blow up my ship.
Okay, no pity for them.
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Cerberus shifted slightly in his command seat. The urge to spill blood was becoming too much to resist. He began to wish that the enemy would just send a fleet so he could smash it, smash something already!
He was getting angry at their apparent reluctance to fight when Ragnarök, his tactical officer, spoke up. "Chieftain! There is an energy buildup inside the fortress, and they appear to have launched close to eight dozen small objects at us!"
Cerberus snapped back to his senses immediately. "Ragnarok, how fast are the objects moving?"
"Fast enough that they'll reach us in a few minutes, but slow enough that they shouldn't damage our hull, Chieftain."
Cerberus thought about this a moment. "Fine. I want every ship to pull all power to engines and shields. The objects must be a diversion, and I doubt that energy is going into their shields. Given how little it is, it'll damage a ship pretty lightly, but I want it targeting something other than me. Relay that, but leave out the last part."
"Yes, Chieftain."
He thought he had made a good tactical decision. He was very, very wrong.
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Titanic technology is, in fact, very different from anything the Humans and Sangheili had encountered. While Sangheili tech was based around Forerunner, which was, in turn, based around a hard metal and plasma, and Human tech was based on how much force could be applied using a metal slug, and how to best stop that slug from harming himself, Blackfire Titan tech was based around dakarys, a black crystal with amazing energy storing properties. A fully charged crystal started to glow, and you could power a small city with a charged dakarys crystal the size of a fist. Another note was that it gave off very little of this energy, so that the aforementioned crystal would give off the energy signature of a car battery.
Also, when comparing an energy buildup from a single plasma torpedo, it would take a dakarys crystal the size of a small ship to give off that kind of reading.
Unfortunately for Cerberus, an Ultimus Cannon was, in fact, the size of a small ship.
And it wasn't the major threat.
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As Cerberus, who had in fact been smart enough to relocate to his flagship, watched, an eneormus energy beam sliced through space, smashing against his heavy custom's shield. It was an impressive attack, but his shields were holding.
"If that is all they have, then we have already won! They have a weak cannon and a pair of small ships. Easy prey!"
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As I watch, the beam slams ineffectually into their shield. I send a small, uncoded signal to the Rakothan. I want the Brutes to hear this.
"Kanos, focus the beam. Code: intensify the forward firepower."
The beam focuses itself into a single line, easily penetrating the ship's shields. It rips apart their engines, and carves a single word into the hull.
Pwnd.
"Kanos, stop showing off."
Kanos responds through the torpedo's vox. "And here I thought that was the point of a distraction?"
The real threat was the fourteen Titans, including Darakathos, who were inside torpedos heading straight for the enemy fleet. One Titan, one ship.
The rest of the torpedos were empty, in case Cerberus wised up and used his close-range anti-fighter armaments. Which, of course, he didn't.
But hey, he wasn't hired for his skill.
Actually, he was hired because Syrassaaan liked his hair.
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In near unison, fourteen boarding torpedos impact on their designated ships. Each torpedo began burning and boring it's way into hull of it's victim, before releasing it's cargo.
"This is Darakathos. I'm in. Heavy custom, Malicious Soul. Stat check."
"Maltias, I'm in. Looks like a cruiser, called the Souls' Doom."
"Rakithas, I'm in. I hit the flagship, looks like it's called the Black Sky."
"Darantith, I'm in, carrier Demon's Reign."
"Markalitis, I'm in. Frigate Blood and Fire."
"Mortalitas, I'm in. Carrier Fury of Hell."
"Telrinas. My boarder's just hit, I'll be in soon. Cruiser Gold's Beckon."
"Trakis. In. Frigate Hi My Name Is Cerberus And I'm An Old Pervert."
...
"Is that really it's name?"
"Sadly, yes."
...
"Moving on. Galintoth, report."
"Im in, frigate Fang of the Darkest Night."
"Neros, Destroyer Bloodmage."
"Scourge here, Carrier Crushing Darkness."
"Scythe here, Destroyer Sword of the Fallen."
"Good. How's the transport?"
It is a few seconds before the response comes. "This is the transport Spirit, about to board the destroyer Blood and Tragedy. I just hope your plan works and we aren't blown out of the sky."
"Oh, don't worry Spirit. If our plan fails we're dead anyway."
"Gee, thanks... That's reassuring."
I smile. "Alright, let's move! Last one to cripple their ship has to buy a round!"