Chapter 2
Contact
Now that the UNSC and RSN have found the Mass Relay, what will follow? The First Contact War that's what. I hope I can get this battle right, I'm reading from the Mass Effect wiki as I do so, wish me luck. Also, a little FYI Humanity is making contact with the Council around 500 years later, that means that the 500 have also passed for the Council, example the Quarians have been banished for nearly 800 years now. Because of this, I will have the flexibility to change a few things around, although for now they're only about starship design and even those are minor.
EDIT Alright, due to around half a dozen reviews telling exactly how a MAC works, I decided to rewrite the chapter, or at least the battle portion, if you've already reviewed please PM me on what you think.
February 1, 2600. The RSN conducts it's own experiments with the relic, acquiring similar results to that of the UNSC research team. The UNSC has decided not to colonize any new planets due to security reasons, and being content with it's current, 226 planets. The RSN on the other hand are more than eager to colonize new planets that are now within reach, allowing Unggoy more breeding grounds and Mgalekgolo more alloys to digest.
February 19, 2600. Another one of the relics is discovered and activated near UNSC colony Shanxi. This makes Shanxi vulnerable for attack should Jiralhanae decide to use the relics to rekindle war between themselves and the UNSC and RSN. As a response to this, the UNSC decided to garrison Marines on Shanxi as well as deploy several Super MAC orbital defense platforms. While the Super MACs will easily be able to devastate any ship in orbit, any ship that manages to enter the atmosphere will be completely safe as it is still unknown what devastating effects firing a Super MAC at a planet will have. Scientists can only guess, for the UNSC has dared not experiment on the matter, but projections suggest that the force would crack the planet's tectonic plates.
June 27, 2600. Following the discovery of the relics, several other relics are discovered, although they are much smaller then the ones that serve as transportation. They are being transported back to Earth for research, although hopes are not high for technological advancements.
April 16, 2601. Disaster strikes. While transporting several of the alien relics, a Pelican malfunctions and crashes in Singapore. The strange substance that was contained in the relics leaked out, releasing unknown amounts of dark energy. The long term effects of this disaster can only be guessed at.
May 26, 2603. The N7 Marine program is developed. The purpose of this program is to train Marines to be far more effective then the average soldier. Unofficially, it is the replacement for the SPARTAN project. Since the Human-Covenant war, ONI has constantly been pushing for permission to start the SPARTAN IV program. They have yet to receive permission, although they are slowly gaining supporters.
November 9, 2606. Several odd occurrences were reported, originated from Singapore. Several children have been displaying telekinetic abilities. Although they are minor as best, they have sent researchers scurrying, looking for answers. It is worth noting that all of the children that have displayed ability so far, were fetuses at the time of the Singapore Pelican crash of 2601. It is possible that the dark energy that they were exposed to is responsible for this strange occurrence.
March 5, 2607 General Williams is transferred to Shanxi and is given control of the Marine garrison located there. Several UNSC higher ups complain that the security on Shanxi is a result of paranoia from the Human-Covenant war, and is a waste of resources, but no moves were made to demobilize the garrison, or the orbital defenses.
January 9, 2608. The first generation of the N7 Marines graduate. At the foremost of them, is David Anderson, one of the most promising graduates.
June 16, 2608. Present day. Two UNSC warships, the frigate Peacekeeper and the destroyer Make My Day are escorting three freighters to Shanxi. Due to the fact that it is quicker, the ships are traveling via means of the relic.
"We're dropping out," said an Ensign on the bridge of the Peacekeeper. Captain Elizabeth Hall nodded from her seat on the bridge. She and her ship had been assigned to a fairly simply mission, escort freighters carrying building supplies to Shanxi. The main reason for this was the Governor of Shanxi had passed a bill to build several new government funded buildings, schools and hospitals among them.
In these days of peace, this was a pretty routine mission, boring and safe, just the way Hall liked it. The freighters all had skeleton crews due to the fact that during the time that it would take to get to Shanxi, offload the supplies, and get back from where they had come from, only two days would pass. The Peacekeeper and the Make My Day on the other hand, were fully crewed, because no matter how peaceful it is, you never have a military vessel that is short handed.
As the five ships dropped down to normal speed, Hall got a good look at the glowing relic. It had nearly been a decade since they had discovered it, and they still knew so little about it. Hall didn't like it, in fact half of the people in the UNSC didn't like it. After spending so much time reverse engineering Forerunner technology, it was perfectly reasonable for the UNSC to be frustrated with these new relics. While they were useful, all attempts to replicate them had been completely unsuccessful. Still some people weren't bothered by this, saying that Forerunner technology was more reliable anyway, after all if they were to truly unlock the slipspace engines of a Forerunner ship, than these new relics would become outdated in comparison. While Hall saw the reasoning behind this, she still didn't like the way they new nothing about the relics, or who built them. It was if the whirling rings of the relics were taunting her.
Hall shook her head, she had to focus. The relics weren't going, anywhere they could wait. "How long until we reach Shanxi?" she asked, looking at the bridge staff. "Well Shanxi is the closest star system to this relic," the same Ensign said. "So with the new slipspace engine, it should only take us an hour to get to...Ma'am there's something else coming out of the relic."
"What?" said Hall, shock evident in her voice. "Are there any other ships scheduled for transporting goods to Shanxi?"
"Nothing's showing up on COM," said a Lieutenant, sitting at a terminal. "Oh son of a-Ma'am eight ships are dropping down to regular speed. Their designs don't match UNSC or RSN design. Five of them look like frigates, and the other three cruisers. They're at lot smaller than UNSC ships, but that doesn't mean that they can't pack a punch."
"More aliens?" Hall asked? The Lieutenant nodded. "Send this broadcast on all frequencies. This is Captain Elizabeth Hall of the UNSC frigate Peacekeeper. We are not looking for trouble, if you could please identify yourselves we will be able to get better aquatinted."
"Message sent," said the Ensign "Looks like the Make My Day is sending a similar message."
Hall looked at the alien ships through the viewscreen, one of the upgrades to the new generation of UNSC ships. The seemed to be in formation, the frigates seemed to in tight formation in front of the cruisers, who seemed to be quite a ways behind the smaller ships. 'Funny,' thought Hall 'It's almost like they're in an attack form-OH SHIT!' No sooner had these thoughts run through her head, then all three alien cruisers had fired some sort of weapon that sent projectiles slamming into the freighters, all of which exploded in balls of fire.
"SHIELDS UP!" Hall shouted "Spin up the MAC and load Archers!" No sooner had she spoke, than the enemy cruisers had fired another volley of fire, at the Make My Day, which, thankfully, had managed to raise it's shields before impact.
"The shields on the Make My Day are down to 60%!" shouted the Ensign. "MAC round loaded and charged, Archer pods at the ready!"
"Fire the MAC at the nearest ship!" Hall shouted "If it's still intact after that, empty the Archers at it!" As she spoke, the Make My Day, fired both of it's MAC guns, which impacted on two of the frigates, both of which exploded in a ball of fire. Not letting up, the Make My Day, completely emptied both of it's Archer pods at two of the cruisers. The cruisers fired lasers at the oncoming missiles, causing a around half detonate before reaching the ship, but they had obviously not been prepared for the oversized missile pods that the UNSC still used. As the plasma warheads detonated, the cruisers shields absorbed the blow, although they appeared to weaken significantly.
As everyone on the Peacekeeper's bridge roared in approval, the Peacekeeper fired it's MAC gun at one of the cruisers, causing the MAC round to tear through the shields and the hull, destroying it. Then the Archers were fired, all of them aimed at one of the cruisers that the Make My Day had fired at, which never stood a chance at survival, even as defense lasers desperately attempted to gun down the oncoming missiles. The missiles impacted and the hull collapsed under the strain.
But this victory was short lived, as the remaining frigates closed on the Make My Day, they both fired some sort of torpedoes at them. "Ensign, what can you tell me about those torpedos?" Hall asked.
"I can't get a solid read on them Ma'am," the Ensign replied "They're giving of some sort of field that's making the scanners go all screwy and...oh dear Lord, one of the just hit the Make My Day, it's shields are down to 20%"
"Wait," said Hall, horror evident in her voice. "If just one took down 40% of the Make My Day's shields, are there are three more of them." Hall looked at the viewscreen, just in time to see the remaining torpedo impacted on the Make My Day. The destroyer exploded.
As the bridge crew looked on in horror, the remaining cruisers more projectiles at the Peacekeeper, dropping it's shields down to 50%"
"Orders?" the Ensign shouted from his seat, as the frigates regrouped, and began to head in the direction of the Peacekeeper.
Hall was quite for a second before she spoke. "We've lost this fight, make a jump to slipspace, I don't care where just get us the hell out of here." The Ensign nodded as be began to punch commands into his terminal. A circular portal opened in front of the Peacekeeper, which disappeared into it, narrowly avoiding another volley from the cruisers. As the Peacekeeper vanished through the portal, it closed behind it.
Now safe at slipspace, Hall looked at her crew. "Send an emergency message to the UNSC back on Earth. We've made contact with an alien race that launched an unprovoked attack on us, the three freighters we were escorting, and the Make My Day were all destroyed." Hall took a deep breath "Also, due to the location of the battle, I am concerned that the aliens with discover and attack Shanxi. Also send this message to General Williams at Shanxi. Tell him that he may come under attack at any moment, by a two cruisers and two frigates, although they may call for reinforcements. For all intents and purposes, at this moment, we are at war."
June, 17 2608 alien forces arrive at Shanxi. Although several of their ships were destroyed by Super MACs in orbit, they were still able to land a considerable ground forces, before their fleet retreated. General Williams is engaging the ground forces, in what is currently a stalemate. There is fear that the aliens will return and destroy the Super MACs now that they know what to expected. Therefore reinforcements must arrive before that happens.
The First Contact War ignites, like I said, things are going to work out a little differently this time, so Ashley is probably going to have a different backstory and personality because of this. Well I hope you enjoy, I'm sorry but I won't post the next chapter until I post another chapter of Fighting for a Purpose, just to make sure that I don't get off track.