Of Parasites and Rescue Missions
Surface of Unknown Planet
1008 Shipboard Time, Date Unknown
"Hazard 2, clear those things off Hazard 3! They're swarming!" The radio was frantic with callouts. Colonel Watkin, call sign 'Paladin', grimaced in frustration as his soldiers panicked.
"All callsigns, this is Paladin," he ordered crisply, broadcasting to every mech in the regiment under his command. "Pull your ejection seat breakers, disable your auto-eject systems. You're fine so long as you stay inside the armored cockpit of your 'Mech." A short pause for breath to collect himself, then he continued in a much calmer voice. "Swift, you're fine. These things can't get at you, they're not infantry. Think of it like fighting those big bugs back on Jerangle. As long as you stay buttoned up, you're good."
The critters, things really, that were attacking the mechs looked like they came straight out of a Holovid horror. Spindly, tentacle-like legs propelled them across any surface they could find, or even leap to, attempting to cover his forces in a wave of flesh. A trio of featherlike antennae attached just below a bulb the color of rotten flesh completed the image, and they popped in a spray of a greenish pus-like substance when they weren't simply disintegrated entirely by a laser or flamer.
Then there were the long flailing vine-like tentacles coming up from the ground in the pus-covered regions of the landscape. Those, unfortunately, were strong enough to actually damage the armor on the mechs under his command, and even toss rocks at them if there were any loose ones to be grabbed. Thankfully, they hadn't brought down any of his mechs yet, but that might only be a matter of time if something wasn't done. He was extremely glad that anything that might have been under their landing zone had simply been vaporized and disintegrated by the two dropships' fusion engine exhaust plumes.
A murmur from their lance frequency was all he could hear as Hazard 4, Savannah, the only woman in Hazard Lance, ribbed her lancemate. Swift's reaction to the ribbing was predictable, and unfortunately explosive as a "Fuck you, Savanna!" was transmitted over the Light 'Mech company frequency. Colonel Watkin palmed the brace pad on his console, to keep his hand off the firing controls as he bit his lip to keep from staking the two to the board right then.
"Hazard Lance, you're reporting to my office as soon as this is over," the voice of Irena Makarova, call sign 'Dancer', the Regimental 2IC, barked over the same band.
"Yes'm," the sharp snappy tones of Hazard 1 came over the Light Company band.
Paladin turned his attention back to his own command Lance and their task. Knight Lance consisted of a pair of Marauder MAD-2R's, a Catapult CPLT-C1b, and a Warhammer WHM-6Rb. His own Marauder's DI avatar, a hawk clutching lightning bolts with its wings, reflected his name for the 'Mech. Stormwing, a loyal companion since the escape from Terra in the initial hours of the coup.
"Knight Lance, push forward over the ridge," Paladin ordered on his own lance frequency. "Friendly vehicle beacon ahead, so watch your shots. And, uh, watch your step, there's probably friendly infantry ahead, too." After a round of acknowledgements, he stepped Stormwing up to the ridge and started down the hill on the far side. Jason immediately queued up the targeting for his autocannon and put a 3 round burst of 120mm GP-APHE into the nearest cluster of little skittering pods. Thankfully, for all that the little pods came in huge swarms, they were quite fragile. A single shot from the Warhammer's PPC shattered dozens from mere proximity to the impact, the ion cloud proving just as destructive to the little pods as shrapnel. A moment later he triggered the PPC in his left arm and vaporized another small cluster in a flash of ionic lightning. Knight 2, call sign 'Templar', the other Marauder, stepped up beside him and together they began picking off individual pods with their medium lasers.
Knight 3, call sign 'Equites', in her Catapult, stopped at the top of the ridge and activated her missile pods. The doors on the pods sprang open and the missiles leapt into the air as she emptied her tubes in a saturation attack. A wide swath of the pod creatures and what looked like shambling humanoids vanished in the carpet of explosions that was unleashed.
Knight 4, call sign 'Valiant', waded forwards towards the swarm of pods, her Warhammer's lasers and machine guns strafing across clusters as she put her anti-infantry weapons through their paces.
"Damn, where can I get one of those?" a voice came up on the radio Jason had tuned to listen in on the UNSC band. He recognized the voice from the radio transmissions earlier.
"I very much doubt you could afford one, Sergeant, unless you've got a spare 8 million, ish, in your back pocket?" the Colonel quipped back, firing his right arm PPC into another cluster of the pods, vaporizing them as well.
"Dang, I don't think my reenlistment bonus will cover that," the UNSC Sergeant returned, voice slightly dour. "Sergeant John Forge, FOXTROT Company, 13th Battalion, 45th Marines, UNSC. Thanks for the assist, that was getting dicey. I was worried we were gonna lose some more men trying to fight our way back up the hill."
"Our pleasure, Sergeant," Templar answered, his thick Scottish brogue conveying his levity and glee at finally being back on solid ground after spending so long in space. "So are we gonna head southwesterly towards that other beacon of theirs alone, or are we gonna have infantry support?" he asked of the Colonel, who paused to check the regimental net to look up the status of the regiment's infantry battalion.
"We've only got 3rd platoon, B company available for support, and they're jump infantry," Jason told his lancemate. "No armor for them to hide behind, so I'd rather not bring them out here without additional forces." He toggled the mic to the UNSC band. "Sergeant, my lance is going to continue on towards the beacon to the southwest. Can you make it the rest of the way back yourselves?"
"INDIA Team's still out there, and I'm not leaving them behind," Sergeant Forge spoke up immediately. "If nothing else is left of them, we're going to recover their Elephant at the very least. We don't have many of those."
"Are you sure you can keep up, Sergeant?" Jason asked of the Marine. "I can't guarantee supporting fire if you fall behind."
"If we can get loaded up, the Elephants can clip along at about 43 kph," Forge answered. "But if we do that, we're entirely reliant on the turrets and other forces to keep the outside clear. I'll radio for a couple of Warthogs to escort us, and we'll get moving over to INDIA's last position."
"Roger, we can cover," Jason replied. "Knight Lance, assume defensive posture. Friendly infantry is mounting up." The four 'Mechs of Knight Lance formed up in a rough diamond around the two UNSC Elephants as the marines loaded up in the vehicle's rear bays. Sporadic covering fire from the lasers mounted on each mech kept the pod creatures mostly out of sight, and soon enough the Elephants were ready to move again.
"Knight Lance, move out, steady cruise," Paladin ordered his lance, and together the impromptu formation began the march towards the last remaining friendly marker beacon from the UNSC recon teams.
UNSC Spirit of Fire
Low Orbit over Unknown Planet
Captain James Cutter of the UNSC Spirit of Fire looked down at the live image transmitted from the SLDF observation drone. Watching these BattleMechs in action was awe inspiring, to say the least. He found himself honestly relieved that there weren't any official representatives from the Office of Naval Intelligence on board his ship at this moment. Dealing with their fit of conniptions and often lack of significant forethought was not something he wanted on his plate.
"Serina, your analysis of our new… friends?" Cutter asked the ship's AI.
"Well, they are certainly proficient in armored warfare, even if they've advanced the form beyond conventional vehicular combat. Given I'm seeing fusion reaction signatures, I would conclude that they're quite capable on an industrial front, which begs the question as to their origins. Our discussion was cut rather short, what with the incident on the surface." Serina paused as she brought up a diagram of one of the walkers and highlighted the rather boxy arms. "They make rather prolific use of energy based weapons, which would leave these battle walkers able to continue to fight, even if at a reduced capacity, well beyond whatever ammunition supplies they might have on board."
She changed the image, displaying footage of one of the walkers that had aided in clearing out the immediate area around their firebase. "Initial analysis of their flamethrower weapons suggests that they are directly venting engine plasma as a weapon, in addition to using it to propel their machines through the air in a limited jumping ability. The need for an effectively unlimited supply of fire-based weaponry suggests rather uncomfortable things about some of their local environments and military tactics."
"However, their infantry flamethrowers are very similar to ours in principle, though smaller and with a different fuel. Speaking of infantry, their use of man-portable laser weaponry is an advantage we could well make use of against the Covenant."
"In all, Sir, I believe we have far more to gain from working with them, and keeping them friendly as opposed to a more aggressive approach to acquisition," the AI concluded.
"File your full analysis in your report for HIGHCOM, and we'll include it in our next data drop. Be sure to include your recommendations on what stances would be best to approach them on, I'd rather HIGHCOM knew they should be keeping ONI on a short leash around them for now."
"Aye, Captain."
Knight Lance
Groundside, Unknown Planet
Estimated surface time 1615
"Sergeant Forge, this is Knight 1," Paladin spoke into his helmet mic. "I'm picking up ballistic weapons fire just over that small ridge to the West. Should I task an observation drone?"
"If you've got one available, do it," Forge responded. "It could be survivors from INDIA."
"Abyss, Knight 1, requesting a drone for a recon flight above the ridgeline to the West of my position. Relay feed to my ARES.(1)"
After a brief response confirming that the drone had been tasked, a small window appeared on the right edge of his HUD. The Colonel studied the feed as he watched the drone overfly his position headed Westbound, and the feed revealed a firefight atop the ridge, about 100 feet above them, a small group of UNSC soldiers desperately holding off a small swarm of the pod creatures. "Sergeant, Knight 1 has visual confirmation of friendly infantry on the ridge above under siege by more of those pods. Diverting course now to provide fire."
"The Elephants can't make it up that clifface, Knight 1," Forge alerted Paladin. "We'll have to dismount and climb. I'm tasking half of my men to hold a guard on the Elephants so we have a safe fallback position."
"Good idea, Sergeant. Knight Lance, up and over," Paladin ordered his lance up the hill to the aid of the embattled troopers. Knight 4 took the lead up the hill, firing her SRM-6 as soon as the weapon cleared the hill. The inferno missiles she was carrying set fire to the entire small hillside south of the UNSC squad.
In the feed from his lancemate's mech, provided to him by the Augmented Reality Enhanced System cockpit (ARES) used by the Royal Black Watch Regiment, Paladin saw strange bulbous stalks adorning the hillside, which burst open as the pod creatures within tried to flee the firestorm raging about them. He watched Knight 4's machine guns start to chew apart the scattered remnants of the pod swarm as he crested the hill himself, searching for a target for his autocannon.
Soon after, as the marines came scrambling up the hill behind the mechs, Forge came up on the Colonel's radio. "Ah, rest of the scattered ODST Platoon. Glad we found them all. I'll have my medics look them over before we hike back to the Elephants. They look pretty banged up."
Before the Colonel could respond, Knight 3 spoke up on the squad frequency. "Colonel, take a look at these bodies. They look human, but sort of twisted?"
Colonel Watkin studied the bodies framed in Knight 3's camera. "Sergeant Forge, Knight 3 has discovered what appear to be mutated human remains. Confirming they also mutate the bodies they infect. It appears center mass shots are most effective for targeting these mutated individuals. Also, I am officially recommending a full medical screening for all personnel that exited a sealed environment on the surface of this planet before they leave this planet. I don't want to risk any sort of infection carrying these things off the planet."
"That sounds like a good idea," the Sergeant agreed. "It would also allow our medics a chance to directly determine how these things spread the infection. Any chance we could borrow some of your flamers to sterilize the extended area around the base?"
"I can probably authorize that, but not until after we recover the last of your Elephants," Paladin told Forge. "Let's get those troopers back to the transports and get on our way again. It's not far now, we could probably see it if we looked down off the end of this plateau here. Still, I'd rather not leave the other vehicles alone down at the bottom of the slope. Let's get moving."
After the climb back down, some 10 minutes later, the marines had loaded up again after the medics had given the ODSTs the all clear medically. The assembled forces then began the short half kilometer jaunt to the edge of the mesa beside them. Cresting a small hill, Colonel Watkin saw a clustered tangle of pods and tentacles grouped around the frame of a vehicle. "Eyes on target. We need to get there quickly, before those tendrils end up ripping that thing apart."
"Paladin! Watch out!" Templar called out in warning. "Contact! Left side! Large Biological!"
Jason turned his head to the left and felt his stomach revolt at the sight of the thing running at the convoy. Blueish gray in coloration (aside from the sickly brown of the infection) and the size of a medium car, it had the appearance of an infected alien tetrapod. It closed in close to one of the escorting Jeep-like 'Warthogs', and smashed down on the vehicle with its front legs. He grimaced at the sight of the vehicle crumpling under legs the size of small tree trunks, its occupants turned into bloody smears.
Paladin quickly turned to bring both PPCs to bear on the creature and shot it, reducing the beast's shoulder into a smoldering crater. "Templar, focus fire!" he called out to his number two. Together, over the next 10 seconds, they reduced its hulk into a steaming pile of meat. Templar followed up with a final volley from his PPCs and further reduced the pile of meat into a slurry of organic material boiling off from a crater.
Valiant waded forward into the mass of pods and humanoid bodies surrounding their objective, laying down fire to support the dismounting infantry. Equites, on the other hand, stayed at range and shelled the pods surrounding the UNSC transport. Soon enough, the vehicle was free, de-gunked by flamers, and recrewed.
"We should get moving," the Sergeant spoke up, looking at the setting sun. "It's getting dark out here. Captain wants us to keep those intact, so we should get them back to base."
"Agreed," Paladin noted. "Knight Lance, form up for a diamond escort, let's get everyone home safe."
Combined SLDF/UNSC Base Complex Landfall
ShipBoard Time 1215
Estimated Surface Time 1815
Paladin sighed in relief as their convoy arrived within the defensive perimeter provided by the weapons of the SLS Abyss and the UNSC firebase's turrets. "Knight Lance, park up back at the hangar. Debriefing will be with command. Templar, tell Captain Larsen I'd like a data-link to the Terra in Briefing 1. I'm going to try to arrange for the UNSC groundside command to be in on the debriefing as well."
After a round of affirmatives from his lance, Colonel Watkin dialed up the UNSC base radio frequency and delivered an invitation for two or three of the UNSC's groundside command officers to attend the debriefing aboard the Abyss. Upon receiving a confirmation that yes, some officers would be attending the debriefing, the Colonel walked his Marauder up the ramp into the dropship's MechBay.
After the slow taxi process to park his Mech in its bay cubicle, Jason powered off Stormwing's reactor and gave the all clear for the hostile environment teams(2) to hose down the 'Mech. While they did that, he withdrew a Noteputer from a webbing pouch on the side of the cockpit and began typing up his own report.
A full five minutes later, the washdown finished and he was given an indicator signal by the bay personnel that he was clear to unseal the 'Mech's cockpit. The first thing he noticed as he removed his neurohelmet was the pungent smell of chemical disinfectant used by the bay crews to clean all manner of hazardous materials off of Mechs, Aerospace Fighters, and Vehicles. Jason saluted the chief mechanic and made his way out of the MechBay and into the ship's upper structure.
After a maze of ladders, he reached his own quarters aboard the dropship, where he divested himself of the outer ballistic layers of the SLDF mechwarrior battle uniform(3). He hung those layers on the rack purpose-built into his quarters for exactly that, beside his helmet, then unzipped and halfway unfolded the second, cooling layer of the suit. Finally, Jason grabbed his duty jacket and slung that on over the protective fabric inner layer of the cooling suit.
As he stepped back out of his quarters, he spotted a pair of crewmen that he waved over. "Can I ask the two of you to make sure that word gets out to the bay crews that the UNSC officers are going to need an escort to Briefing 1 when they arrive for the general debriefing?"
A pair of "Aye, Sir!"s and salutes from the two naval branch Corporals later, and they were off back down towards the bays. Jason turned towards the mess to get some chow.
SLS Abyss, Briefing 1
Combined SLDF/UNSC Base Complex Landfall
Shipboard Time 1245
Estimated Surface Time 1845
Briefing 1 was the smallest of the actual briefing rooms on board the Abyss, used mostly for command level meetings and organization. The room featured a central holotable that could recess fully into the floor, with a reinforced surface to allow for people walking atop it. Ringing the table were twelve chairs that also recessed into the floor when they were not needed.
Today, all twelve seats were deployed when Colonel Watkin entered the room, one of the seats at the nominal "head" of the table was empty, held so by Major Makarova. Jason nodded at Irena in greeting as he walked around the table to take the seat she was holding open for him.
"Thank you, Irena. Where's Hazard Lance?" he inquired of his Regimental 2IC and Striker Battalion Commander.
"Cleaning the three battalion messes(4), then KP in the Mech battalion mess for a week, assuming no critical duties demand otherwise," Irena chuckled. The assembled Regimental Command staff joined in for a short chuckle as well.
Also present were Major Aiden Jones, the Infantry Battalion Commander, and Captain Brendan Rivers, the Tank Battalion Commander. The remainder of Knight Lance was also present, though currently clustered in one corner of the room. The final member currently present was the leader of Thunder Lance, and the 2IC of the Battle Battalion, Major Madaline Kincaid.
There was a small commotion in the passageway, as the door was opened by Captain Remi Hill of the Blackhearts, clad in a well worn suit of full Nighthawk Powered Armor (Light). With her were a trio of UNSC personnel, two in full ballistic armor, and one with only torso armor.
"Colonel Watkin, may I present Major Rowan Vaughn, of the UNSC 45th Marine Regiment, 9th Shock Troops Battalion, Boomerang Company, and escorts," Captain Hill spoke with a flourish. "Accompanying him are Lieutenant Yun Kwan, 13th Infantry Battalion, Charlie Company and Sergeant John Forge, also 13th Infantry Battalion, Foxtrot Company."
"Thank you, Captain Hill," Colonel Watkin responded. "Timbiqui Dark is on me tonight." A coded phrase, meaning he wanted her to stick around, in case things got heated.
"I'll call it even if you tell me the story about that time on Luthien." Remi's acknowledgement was also a coded phrase, but her Scottish brogue provoked a laugh from the assembled members of the Black Watch command elements. Captain Hill then saluted smartly and left the room.
"We're just waiting on Captain Larsen to get here, then we can begin," Jason told the assembled personnel, before waving the remaining members to be seated. "Would you prefer tea, or coffee?" he asked the UNSC Major.
"Is it real coffee, or synthetic?" Vaughn asked, voice hopeful.
"It was a product and export of our last port of call. Have you ever tried to stop the quartermasters when they can get the real thing?" Dancer remarked.
The Major and Sergeant traded looks as they simultaneously spoke up. "Coffee."
"Is the tea any good?" the Lieutenant asked.
"My wife would kill me if she found out I served anything other than real tea," Colonel Watkin spoke with some affection in his voice. "I take it you'd like tea then?" he asked the Lieutenant.
At the UNSC Lieutenant's nod, Jason pressed a control and spoke clearly into the air above him, "Officer's Galley, Colonel Watkin speaking. Three teas, seven coffees, one white coffee, and Captain Larsen's Usual, for Briefing 1, please."
The hidden speakers in the room hummed briefly, then a voice came out of what sounded like thin air, causing the UNSC officers to startle. "Three teas, seven coffees, one white coffee, and Captain Larsen's Usual, for Briefing 1, Aye. Galley confirms, Colonel."
"Thank you Master Sergeant, Briefing 1 out."
A short while later, the door hissed open to admit both Captain Larsen and one of the galley Privates, who came loaded down with a tray of zero-g thermoses.(5)
"Thank you, Private," the Colonel said as the private handed him a thermos of green tea. As he glanced back across the table to see that everyone else already had their drinks, he nodded. "That will be all."
The private saluted and left the room.
"The Admiral will be available on the comm line in a few minutes, the bridge will connect him here as soon as they have the feed," Captain Larsen stated with surety.
The Colonel nodded. "Alright then." Quickly tapping in a command on the table, the surface lit up in a glowing blue-green grid, before the terrain of the planet around the ship took shape in the air above the surface.
"Impressive", Sergeant Forge stated, before taking a sip of his coffee. He blinked, then looked back at the semi-transparent thermos in his hand. "This is really good."
Major Vaughn merely hummed contently in agreement.
Knight 2, Lieutenant Riley McLeoud, chuckled at their pleased expressions. "It may not be Terran grown coffee beans, but there's quite a few worlds out there that grow good coffee just fine," he said, sipping from his own thermos.
"So," Forge spoke up before anyone else did. "I've never seen anything like what you guys had on the field today. Where exactly did you come from?" He grinned a little apologetically at Major Vaughn, who glared at him in between coughing back up a mouthful of coffee. "Really, though, it's not exactly something that I've been able to avoid thinking about."
"Put simply," Jason said with a sigh, "we are very, very lost. We're still trying to identify what star system we're even in. On the other hand, Misjumps do strange things. I'm not entirely surprised that we have no clue where we're at, because there's no way anyone could fully understand misjumps, given the variety of things they can cause." He took a sip of his tea to calm himself. "Honestly, I'm just glad so many of our ships came through intact. KF misjumps have been known to bend ship frames. Or worse…"
Whatever he was going to say next was staved off by a ping from the table as a ball of light rose from one corner and coalesced into the image of Admiral Nelson.
"Gentlemen, and Ladies, I have both good and bad news. The bad news is that we can't simply bombard the surface to wipe this infection off the face of this planet. The good news is that Astrogation(6) has finally identified this system, based on collated star charts between our own records and those of the UNSC. We're in the Korinth Prior system, which shouldn't have this planet to begin with, and is an otherwise unsettleable system approximately 121 Light Years from Terra, known to the UNSC as Earth."
"No way! We're just over four jumps from Terra?! How?!" someone in the room exclaimed, incredulously.
"Over 120 light years? How are we so far from Earth?" Jason heard Kwan mutter in astonishment.
"Out of curiosity, exactly how much space has the UNSC settled?" Captain Larsen asked, turning to Major Vaughn.
"All of human colonized space is within 100 light years of Sol," Major Vaughn stated with certainty.
"Really, that small?" Major Jones asked. "The Inner Sphere alone is almost 1,200 light years across. And there are colonies much farther out in the Periphery."
"Indeed, Major," Nelson spoke up again with a smile. "For those of you who might not be as quick on the uptake, we are no longer in the Inner Sphere. Our misjump appears to have taken us very much off course indeed. With no hope of contacting General Kerensky's forces, our best hope is to find a place to settle and rebuild our own society. At the very least, those of you with families aboard may find solace in the fact that we have not lost everything we knew."
An uneasy silence spread around the room as the reality sank in for many of the officers. Jason reached under his collar and pulled out the charm Suzumi had made for him and prayed to any deity that would listen to grant him the strength to lead his people through this hardship.
A few moments of tense silence hung in the air. "Well, maybe the Captain could help with that, if you're willing to help us get Anders back?" Forge proposed in the silence. "The Spirit started off as a Colony ship, after all."
"Anders?" Aiden asked. "Who's that?"
"Professor Ellen Anders, civilian consultant and Ph.D. in Xenobiology. She was captured by Covenant forces on Arcadia and tracked here by way of her transponder signal," Lieutenant Kwan said in response. "Unfortunately, we've been unable to pinpoint her signal due to some sort of jamming."
"The possibility exists," Colonel Watkin said quickly, before anyone else could interrupt. "However, I, along with several others, will have to handle those negotiations directly with your Captain." He sent the Admiral a pointed look, and the Admiral nodded in understanding.
"All this aside, we must now address the issue of this infectious parasite," Major Makarova began, at Jason's nod in her direction. "We have confirmed that it will infest any biological creature of sufficient mass in an effort to spread itself. Because we do not know how it begins its life cycle, we must assume that such an organism is not the very first stage. However, we do know that they possess enough intelligence, even at the pod stage, that they are capable of ambushing prey. We spotted an infested form that inflated in size shortly before exploding into many pod forms. We're calling it a carrier form. The infested form I mentioned earlier is the stage that appears to be the most designed for basic combat. Then we have this," Irena said as the holotable displayed the large creature Knight Lance had encountered. "Intel has taken to calling this a 'Thrasher', because of the thrashing tendrils on its back. It appears to serve the role of heavy attack."
"Intel seems to have been quick on the job, for once," Captain Rivers commented.
"Indeed, Remi had her Blackhearts figuring out these things as soon as we started getting the data feeds in," Irena returned Rivers' jibe.
"That said," the Admiral cut in before the different branches could begin sniping at each other, "We'll need to fortify in place for the night, and tomorrow we can expand our search areas. I believe that's all for tonight, Gentlemen and Ladies. Nelson, out." The admiral's image vanished in a shower of sparkling light.
"Well, I'll let you all get back to work, or relaxing, whichever it was you were doing before, and I'll call for Captain Hill to escort our guests back to their transport," Jason dismissed the meeting to the chuckles of the assembled officers.
Author's Afterword:
And here we see some of the relative power of Mechs, unbound by the exacting rules of the tabletop game, which are built the way they are for balance. Weapon damage is being depicted somewhat more realistically, with the Star League's foray into energy weapons development bearing fruit. The UNSC has a much more advanced understanding of ballistic weapons, as we'll see later on in the story, but they have very little when it comes to laser and directed energy weapons. I have Plans for the technology trade, and have already begun designing mech upgrades for the SLDF and the Black Watch in particular, as they slowly rebuild themselves and recruit new blood from among the fleet.
It may seem like the Mechs are absolutely overpowered here, but I'd like to remind my readers that the flood doesn't really have any armor, and combat may be a bit more drawn out once they encounter the Covenant's armored forces. Losses are not an impossibility once proper battle is joined.
EDIT: Thanks to Follower38 for suggesting some edits on SpaceBattles. I've taken the suggestions into account and fleshed out some areas of the chapter in my own way according to the characters' perspectives.
Co-writer's Afterword:
And here we get introduced to one of my favorite characters: Remi Hill.
Remi is a Blackheart. And for someone versed in battletech lore, that's all you need to know to realize that she's one of the people that you don't mess with. For those not in the know, Blackhearts are the premiere Special Forces of the SLDF. They're used for most of the thing's you'd deploy elite special operations units for, such as; counterintelligence, counterterrorism, assassination, intelligence gathering, etc. They were known for leaving a calling card, and were the nightmares of the other Great Houses intelligence agencies. Also known as the ORIGINAL users of Nighthawk PAL
In another universe, they'd have a lot of hard luck after the fall of the Star League. But here, the remnants of the unit are clinging to life, functional, and royally pissed off. Remi's one of the ones that you send against a battlemech on foot, and expect to win. Mainly because the pilot will never see her coming, until it's too late. You may learn of some of her exploits later on. But for now, she's making sure the UNSC personnel are on the level.
As some of you may have noticed, BattleMech scale energy weapons are powerful. I did the math on the results you're seeing in the combat scene's, and it's no joke. A nearby PPC hit will result in first to third degree burns at best, or 'flash fry/boil' organic matter in a manner that results in what's called a 'steam explosion' at worst. The large Flood contact, known in lore as a 'Thrasher', demonstrates that the flood is a serious threat, and in the source material, just one of them is a serious threat to a Scorpion MBT. Of note, it took two mechs combining fire to take it down quickly.
Glossary of terms:
(1): ARES Cockpit
Augmented Reality Enhanced System Cockpit. Uses holo-imagers and virtual reality gear built into the cockpit to project the battlespace surrounding an equipped mech from a variety of angles. While difficult to get used to, it greatly eases maneuvering and gunnery challenges. This system has not yet been produced outside of the 'mech cockpit. A secondary part, that trades intelligence between units (effectively making visible to all units on a net anything visible to one of those units) is available to armor commanders.
Addendum: ARES-Linked Neurohelmet and Pilot Suit
The ARES-linked mechwarrior equipment has sensors down the spine of the pilot suit, and is fully functional even outside of a mech, though with limited range and less computing power. This is exclusively available to Royal Black Watch units.
(2) Hostile Environment team:
A specific type of personnel known as a type of "HAZMAT" teams, this is a specialized unit that deals with environment wide hazards rather than specific materials in most cases. These are the people in the pressure suits' you see in pandemic movies, or in toxic environments. The military has special armored versions of the suits that are called "MOPP" gear. The suits have their own filtrations systems, and commonly carry an oxygen supply.
(3): Mechwarrior Battle Uniform:
An armored combat uniform worn by SLDF Mechwarriors, consisting of three layers. The innermost layer is a temperature protective bodysuit, designed to protect against extreme heat and cold. The second, middle layer contains the cooling elements that would on their own form the traditional mechwarrior cooling vest. The third outer layer is a layer of ballistic armor protection, to protect the pilot and cooling elements from shrapnel and enemy weapons fire, both ballistic and laser.
(4) Mess/ Messes/ Mess Deck/ Mess Hall:
The 'mess' is the area where enlisted personnel take their meals. It is considered part of the unit's duties to keep the mess clean and inspection ready. Being assigned to 'KP' (Kitchen patrol) in the mess is a common punishment, and the offender will be given the least desired tasks while on KP. Naval vessels will have at least one 'Enlisted Mess', and one 'Officers Wardroom', which is where the officers take their meals.
(5) Zero G Thermos
Conventional cups and glasses are unable to contain liquid in zero gravity conditions, therefore, specialized containers have been developed since the first manned space flights in the 1960's. These come in a variety of functions, from pressure sealed containers, to vacuum packaged food. There are some available for civilian purchase, though they are rather expensive.
(6) Astrogation
A portmanteau of "Astro Navigation". This is the art of navigation using known bodies in space such as stars and planets as a reference point. Considered a critical skill/ technology for star travel.