The thick blackness of space welcomed Sean as his booster frame left the hangar, the stars glinted in the darkness as their thrusters fired.
Then, a purple torpedo flew past him and impacted the side of the "Pegasus", the plasma boiled away at the hull. Sean swerved left, Niall and David keeping formation. A seraph flew past them, Sean opened fire with the machine guns on his frame, the fighter sped up to avoid him, Sean accelerated to keep pace, his machine guns peppering the fuselage, it exploded a brilliant blue, plasma lightning spewing around it, Sean dived to avoid it, then surveyed the battlefield.
Space was not were the Spartans were their best, but they were still fierce opponents, there were banshees flying around firing at Falcons and the much newer Hornets. The banshees were far more agile but the Hornets and Falcons were more powerful, but even still, there were more banshees than UNSC forces.
Sean accelerated towards the nearest Banshee to follow it.
"Sir, hit on our port side, decompression on decks twenty three through twenty seven"
Burke checked his monitor, and then said, "Evacuate and seal those decks lieutenant, then ready the MAC guns, what's the status of the charge?"
"Sixty three percent sir, that's as high as it'll go"
"Very well, open fire"
Sean banked left to avoid a fuel rod cannon fired from a banshee, he arced up in a wide loop and appeared behind the banshee and let loose his machine guns again, it exploded in a blue fire,
The MAC guns of the "Pegasus" fired off one after another, as Sean swerved round behind yet another banshee he seen a Covenant flagship explode as two of the huge rounds penetrate it, yet another was hit by the last one. Blue fire billowed out of it's hull as it drifted and collided with a destroyer, they created a huge explosion, chunks of fiery metal flew all around them, bouncing off of hulls and shields alike, Sean banked, swerved and dived to avoid the fiery chunks.
Then a huge flagship flew overhead, Sean flew beneath it's huge purple underbelly and opened his COM, "Terra, this is squad leader come in"
"Here" came David's voice
"Here" said Niall
"We need to take out that flagship" he said into his COM "it's headin straight for the "Pegasus", I think we should use the gauss blasts, fly over it, give it two strikes, just above the reactor to get through the hull, then a final one to hit the reactor"
"Roger that" came the replies
"Then let's move Terra" he said
Sean accelerated up along the side of the huge flagship, he was so close he could touch its shimmering purple edge, but he knew that the shields would stop him. His frame zoomed up along it and then into the space above him where Niall and David were waiting for him. He nodded to the other two, and the three of them dived, one after another.
Niall fired his huge multi-coloured beam, it struck the shields, then David's hit it and then finally Sean fired his beam into the smoke. Sean's shields flickered as the static of the EMP passed through the frame, as the smoke cleared, Sean seen a huge hole from the gauss blast, directly above the reactor, then the shields of the ship flickered and died. His blast hadn't got through.
"I'm goin in there to take it out," he said
"No Sean wait" David's voice through the COM, Sean looked to David and seen the flaming remnants of the UNSC "Meteora" flying towards the flagship at full speed, Sean could see escape pods being jettisoned and a radical idea hit him.
"Try and jump onto one of those pods," he shouted over the noise of the burning prowler. The turrets of the flagship had turned and begun to fire at the Prowler but the ship flew ever closer.
Sean's acknowledgment lights flashed, he crouched on his frame, then with all his strength, he pushed off, and he flew through the thick blackness, illuminated by purple lights of plasma. If he had even slightly gone off course he would have missed, but he didn't, he slammed into the pod, denting its hull, he grabbed onto one of the outside grooves. The pod continued towards the planet picking up speed.
Sean glanced back at the flagship, the burning Prowler collided with it, and then a huge slipspace rupture occurred and sucked in several smaller carriers.
"The Captain would not like what's happened to his ship now" Sean thought to himself. The air around the pod began to glow orange, Sean locked down his armour so he wouldn't loose his grip. His armour began to get warm, hydrostatic gel began to boil out of it; he turned his visor onto maximum polarisation so that he could see.
The pod had left high atmosphere and Sean could see the jungles of Ophelia IV dead ahead. The pods fins folded out to slow it down, one of them nearly knocked Sean off the ship.
Then, the ground rushed up to meet him and the pod hit the ground, hard, Sean was flung from the pod, the groove he was holding onto ripped off with him, he flew through the air and smashed into a small palm tree, toppling it over. He lay there, unable to move, and then there was a shout.
"Hey, guys, it was a Spartan, Jackson check out his armour"
A man ran over and plugged a data pad into Sean's armour, "armour's locked sir, one sec", Sean's arms dropped "there we go".
Sean pushed himself into a crouching position; his robot arm was glowing red from the re-entry. He checked his squad's vitals on his HUD, they were still alive. He stood up, to look at the marines. There were about fifteen of them, all with SMGs, Magnums or battle rifles. They stared at him, in shock or amazement.
"Who is senior officer here?" he asked the marines
"I am" said a tanned man in full combat gear except for a helmet, his extremely blonde hair shone in the sunlight, "Lieutenant Kowalski", the man stepped forward.
"Well Lieutenant", Sean said, "you have two choices, you can help me find my other two squad mates which will probably bring up your numbers as well, or you can stay here in the jungle, it's your choice but I'm moving out".
Sean turned, unslung his ma5b assault rifle from his back, and stepped into the green undergrowth.