Mission Log/ CLASSIFIED/// Location/Reach/MAC V Generator Complex/1100 Hours /March 13th, 2552
3 hours before the 501st jump.
Spartan -103 Tom stood atop his command bunker, using a sight from his sniper rifle to survey the battle ground before him. There was approximately 750 meters from here to the tree line in all directions, which meant his Spartans would have a good view of any incoming forces. The problem was that Red Team had been split up, Spartan -104, Fred, had taken a select team to play a little nuclear offence against the Covenant Cruiser in the next Valley. He'd also sent several Spartans to extract Admiral Whitcomb and his staff. While Tom knew it was important, he was an admiral, he still detested the misuse of vital Spartans to go on a milk run.
Tom turned at a broadcast from their satellite uplink.
"This is Lt. Commander Keyes to any UNSC forces, any Human forces please respond. Over."
The only officer named Keyes that Tom was aware of in this system was Captain Keyes, perhaps they were related.
"Commander, this is Spartan -103, groundside, reading five by five. Over."
"Spartan, give me a SitRep now! Over."
"Yes Ma'am! I'm groundside with 23 Spartans defending the generators powering the MAC guns. Three of my team, including my commander, are mounting a nuclear assault in low orbit, five of my team are on a mission to extract Admiral Whitcomb and his staff. Over."
"Good to hear Spartan, ONI received classified intel about an impending attack on Reach. Given the security of the other Inner Colonies, I was dispatched on the UNSC Valliant, an experimental cruiser, along with the destroyers O'Bannon, and Merryweather, and the frigates Independence, Freedom, Enterprise, Endeavor, Atlantis, Discovery, Challenger, and Columbia. My orders are to secure the space around Reach until a Cruiser task force arrives in system, to do that I need those MACs, and Admiral Whitcomb, I'm sending in a Pelican to extract him, with a Longsword escort, if you need anything bombed, tell me now. Over."
"Yes Ma'am, we'll have target packages lined up for the pilots, please note, we do not have a location on the Admiral at this time, my team is maintaining radio silence for fear of assassination. Over."
"Good move Spartan, I'll send the birds anyway, maybe they can help you out- fire!- sorry about that, one less Covenant ship for us to worry about. We have two corvettes who will handle in atmosphere support, A.I. Patton will brief you on that shortly, also, ace in the hole, I have the 501st ready to drop when needed. Over."
"Thank you ma'am, I want to hold off on the ODSTs until we really need them, no need to let enemy recon know our numbers when we can surprise them. Over."
"Roger that -103, its getting hot and heavy over here, the Pelican is loaded with techs, get them to work fixing the damaged generators, over and out."
Tom opened a link to Red Team.
"Good news Spartans, we have a cruiser in the vacuum and more on the way, we also have Longswords and Corvettes for air support. All we have to do is hold out till it gets here, -53, -75,-36, and -29, rendezvous with the team extracting the Admiral, forget radio silence, get them back here, we have a Pelican inbound to extract him and his staff."
Four blue acknowledgement lights winked on in the Senior Chiefs HUD.
With close air support, and an actual objective, instead of just trying to survive, their odds of success had increased tenfold.
"Ok Spartans, dig in and load up, we got a whole lot of shit, and it's coming right at us."
Motion trackers set up around the tree line were almost completely red, which meant a huge force was inbound on their position. Just as Red Team prepared to begin sniping, a huge flash from the east blinded them completely. Once they had their eyesight back, Tom noticed that the motion sensor contacts had been cut in half, in the back. Fred must have gotten his nukes off.
When Spartan -103 looked up, it was to see Elites running full bore at the bunkers from the southeastern side.
"All Spartans, OPEN FIRE!"
On que 23 MA5B automatic assault rifles started pouring 7.62 caliber ammunition towards the oncoming Elites. Shields flared bright silver and then failed, making way for purple splashes that announced aliens were dying. However the hail of lead was not enough to stop the Elites, who were dying and being trodden into the ground by their brethren, baying for the blood of the Demons.
"OK Spartans, time for some fireworks, Katya, hit the mines when ready."
Spartan -001 Katya, was a Russian by ancestry, and was fiendishly good with explosives. She had spent several hours laying dozens of Lotus anti-tank mines, and Antillean Cluster mine packs around the bunker complex, there was also a healthy dose of C-4 charges, and Spartan Bombs. Since the Spartans were almost always severely outnumbered, they had developed Spartan Bombs and fougasses. They hadn't had the equipment for fougasses, but the Spartan Bombs were no problem. C-12, C-4, B-comp, and SemTex had all been in the complex armory, the plastic explosives had been molded into convex rectangles, and had liberal amounts of spent shell casing, nuts, bolt, and small pieces of scrap metal duct taped onto the convex side. This way when they explode, tons of small pieces of metal are propelled towards the enemy at terminal velocity, causing a lot of damage.
As Katya pressed her triggers, over 300 lbs of high explosives detonated, propelling with the shockwave tons of shrapnel, right into the middle of the Covenant formations.
By the time the smoke cleared, the Covenant force was down by two thirds, the remainder disoriented and wounded, and easily put down but controlled fire from Red Team. They had survived round one, but now they were down to only the back-up charges, used to seal corridors, grenades, and rockets; plus two Achilles anti-air missiles on mobile launchers.
By normal Spartan standards they were very low on firepower, and very high on things to kill.
"Red 1 to Red Team, well done, RTB and resupply, get ready for round two. -001, how are we looking for explosives? Over."
"Sorry chief, but we are running low, apart from the corridor charges, we have a few pounds of C-4, maybe 1 pound of C-12 and another of Semtex. Over."
"Katya what would happen if we mixed those explosives together? Over."
"It'd make them more potent, but not by much. Over."
"Would a sheet half an inch thick, and 10 inches square, loaded with shrapnel, be enough to punch armor? Over."
"Well I don't know about full penetration, but it would certainly stop whatever it hits. Over."
"Get to work then, many as you can. Over."
"Aye aye Senior chief. Over and out."
"Red 4, get me the Commander on the uplink, I need to discuss some re-armament."
"Commander Keyes this is Spartan -103, I need a supply drop if one of your ships can, ammo and explosives would be much appreciated ma'am. Over."
"Copy that -103, frigate Endeavor is in position and hot dropping guns and bombs now, over."
As if on quo, ten or a dozen drop pods started burning through the atmosphere, landing half buried a klick to the west of the bunkers. Immediately 15 Spartans ran out and began dragging the pods back to the bunkers. Inside the pods were extra MA5B's, BR55's, SMG's, Sniper rifles, Spartan Lasers, Rocket Launchers, and Gauss Turrets that could be mounted to the bunkers. The last four pods contained over a thousand pounds of C-12, enough to make a square mile of Spartan Bombs.
Tom immediately set Katya and two other Spartans to work on the bombs, clearing out all extra shell casings and every bit of scrap from the machine shop, then burying them around the bunkers, along with 12 Antillean mine packs. The bunkers were now better defended than they had been before, except that it taken the Spartans four hours to prepare everything, and motion sensors indicated that another wave of Covenant was already inbound.
Tom set up his troops in the same fashion as before and, as before, they were doing a fair job of repelling the Elites, Grunts, and Jackals. He had decided to wait until the front enemy lines were nearly at the bunkers before he blew the Spartan Bombs, to achieve maximum effect. The plan worked perfectly, until the smoke cleared and a pack of large, ape-like aliens could be seen charging out of the tree line, screaming for blood. The Spartan snipers didn't even wait for orders before putting precision fire into the Apes, but it seemed only two headshots was enough to put them down, anything less and they just ran right though it, howling for blood.
"All Red units concentrate fire on those new guys, ignore the jacks and grunts for now. I want those hairy bastards taken down now!"
Controlled precision fire from 23 Spartans rained into the heads and chests of the new aliens, to very little effect, it seemed to take at least two .50 caliber sniper rounds to do the job. The large ape-like aliens were going down, but at the rate it was taking them, the main formation would reach the bunkers in less than 20 seconds.
"Katya blast 'em!!!"
Katya pressed her favorite button, and 500-odd pounds of C-12 lit up, propelling over two thousand spent shell casings into the covenant lines. It took down about half of the large aliens, but the twenty or so remaining just kept on coming, baying for the Spartans blood.
"Commander Keyes, this is Spartan -103, I need the 501st right now ma'am."
"Roger that -103, 501st is in bound and hot.
Roughly 160 miles above Red Teams position, UNSC Valliant was cruising at half thrust, firing her four MAC cannons as fast as the massive reactors could recycle the power, and cleaning up her victims with Archer Missile fire. The Valliant and her escorts had been joined by the fifteen or so ships left in system, and Commander Keyes regretfully noted that her father's ship Pillar of Autumn had jumped out of system already. Miranda Keyes would have gladly signed the entire task force and command of the entire star system over to her father, but without him in system, she would continue to kick ass to best of her abilities until Charlie Six-Niner returned with the Admiral and his staff.
"Lt. Reynolds all-ahead three quarters, those plasma torpedoes are too close for comfort."
"Aye aye Ma'am all-ahead three quarters."
"Weps, give me a firing solution on the nearest enemy cruiser, and bring all four Mac's to bear, I wanna send them a real message."
"Aye aye, firing solution for all four MAC's is online, firing in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Rounds away."
A series of four thumps rocked the Valliant as her over sized magnetic accelerator cannons hurled over a thousand tons of ferric iron into the nearest Covenant Super Cruiser.
"Cruiser down Ma'am, Confirmed kill-"
The rest of Lt. Stevens report was cut off by the defining roar of 18 MAC V shells screaming through space and obliterating 18 Covenant ships. The rest of Commander Keyes fleet let loose a flurry of MAC rounds, destroying or disabling a further 9 ships. There were now approximately 120 Covenant ships left in system, and they were holding well back out of range of the Big Sticks.
"Ma'am remaining Covenant vessels are holding just out of range of the MAC V's, we could move out to engage-"
"No way Lt. that amount of firepower would shred our fleet into molten slag, they're waiting for the ground forces to take out the generators, do we have estimates on enemy ground troops?"
"Negative Ma'am, could be a couple of divisions though."
"Lucky for us we have Spartans down there, spread the fleet in a defensive formation, and detail the Corvettes, and the Frigate Columbia to ground support roles."
"Aye aye Ma'am."
While her crew re-arranged the strategic posture of her fleet, Commander Keyes turned her attention to the Covenant fleet, it wasn't like them at all to worry about losses when taking a planet, in any normal situation the 150 Covenant ships would be plowing into her fleet, eager to die even to get a shot off at the MAC guns. It made exactly no sense for them to want to take the planet somewhat intact, but Miranda Keyes was a student of her father, and was going to press every advantage she had, which included the most advanced human ship in the galaxy, and the best trained ground forces in the universe. If the Spartans and the 501st couldn't hold out on the surface, there was no hope anyway.
"Commander Keyes this is Spartan -103, I need the 501st right now Ma'am!"
"Roger that -103, 501st is in bound and hot."
"Major D'Angelo, this is the bridge, prepare the Regiment for immediate emergency drop, now!"
"Aye aye Commander, we'll be off your lovely ship in 90 seconds."
"Roger that, be advised your dropping in VERY HOT."
"Thank you for the heads up Ma'am, that's just the way we like it."
Roughly a minute later 150 small thuds gently shook the ship as the 501st ODST Battalion jumped feet first into hell. With the Helljumpers away, Commander Keyes felt much more confident about the safety of the MAC V cannons. While she would have preferred dropping 150 Spartans onto Reach, ODSTs were the next best thing, and the 501st had a reputation for violence, and a thirst for revenge against the Covenant, providing they could get along with the Spartans, they were the perfect units to be trapped, surrounded, and outnumbered, like wolverines backed into a corner, the ground team would fight viciously to the death.