Hello again, everyone, and welcome back to my Halo - MechWarrior/BattleTech crossover redux.
Thank you all for your wonderful patience and support. I deeply appreciate it. My apologies for taking so long to write the next chapter. I've been very busy with another crossover that I've been writing and publishing as of late. I was able to get enough time, however, to write this chapter and get it ready for publishing. Either way, thank you, once again, for your patience and support.
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Disclaimer: I do not own the Halo or MechWarrior/BattleTech franchises. They are the respective properties and trademarks of Microsoft Studios, 343 Industries, Bungie, FASA Corporation, FASA Interactive, Catalyst Game Labs, WizKids, Piranha Games Inc., etc. Any material original to the franchises belongs to their respective developers and publishers. Any material not original to the franchises is of my own invention. I do not own any music listed in each chapter. Any music listed belongs to its original composers and/or artists.
Soel III
SLDF HQ
March 3rd, 2526
Aleksandr sat silently in the meeting room, surrounded by guards, as he waited for Janos to join him. It had been two days since the SLDF had fought its first major battle with the Covenant over and on the glassed planet of Harvest. Having seen roughly three quarters of the fleet come back from Harvest was a relief for the SLDF general, but it also meant that they had lost ships that they wouldn't be able to replace for another two months.
I must take heart. We have achieved a major victory, Kerensky thought. The AAR that Janos had sent back had been a strong indicator of how well the battle had fared. Janos had credited the battle's success to the Covenant getting caught off guard by the SLDF's powerful energy weapons, as well as Cole's timely intervention.
He was about to reread the AAR when the door opened, and Janos entered. "Admiral Janos," Kerensky greeted him. "It is so good to see you alive and well. I take it the battle went well."
"It did," Janos said, "though not as well as I would've liked. Still, we won, and we've also learned a lot of lessons from that experience. I wish to discuss those hard-won lessons with you."
"Go ahead. According to reports, the Covenant didn't anticipate the use of Mag-Pulse Missiles to destroy their plasma torpedoes and thus protect our own vessels."
"That they didn't," Janos said with a nod. "The Mag-Pulse Missiles worked exactly as intended. Not a single one made it to our ships, and as far as I've determined, the Covenant were so surprised that they didn't launch another salvo until they received reinforcements. Even then, the missiles proved their worth."
"Very good!" Kerensky said with a smile. "I am relieved the development of those missiles paid off so handsomely in their first live-fire test. Once the UNSC begins manufacturing them in greater numbers, we may bring them to every naval battle. And what of the armor on our ships?"
"The armor performed well," Janos answered proudly. "In fact, our fleet's Ferro-Carbide armor is partly the reason why we didn't lose the entire fleet. Every plasma torpedo hit was equivalent to two Heavy Naval PPC strikes on a given section of the ship. However, my engineers have reported that the layers that are most intact are those incorporating tantalum hafnium carbide and hafnium carbonitride in their construction."
"As I thought." Kerensky rubbed his chin in thought. "Those ceramic materials have an incredibly high melting temperature. Your report, however, says that the Heaven's Brilliant Bier was severely damaged, but not destroyed. I take it that was due to the Covenant reinforcements arriving."
"Yes," Janos said with a hint of bitterness. "The Covenant reinforcements kept us distracted from the Brilliant Bier long enough for it to escape. That ship'll be back, and it'll be made tougher than ever. We did give her a tremendous pounding, especially with the Casaba-Howitzer warhead on the Peacemaker nuclear missile we launched."
"Indeed. According to your AAR, the plasma jet generated by the missile tore through all decks of the ship. If a five hundred kiloton nuclear warhead is capable of that much damage, imagine the carnage that will result once we have nuclear shaped charges with megaton yields which, if I recall correctly, will enter limited production within a few months."
Janos' expression brightened. "That's good news, yes. If I know anything about religious fanatics, it's that if you defeat them once, they come back twice as hard and twice as fanatical."
"Agreed. Only the most hardened fanatics would be willing to wipe out an entire species simply for being in violation of their religion." Kerensky put down his noteputer and added, "If my gut instincts are right, and they usually are, then the Covenant will soon adapt to our weapon systems to regain the upper hand. How long do you expect they will need take to adapt to our tech?"
"At best, I'd say a year and a half," Janos said. "You?"
"Not too bad. I estimated a year. That, however, is a year that we can use to cause maximum damage." Kerensky gestured. "Our K-F Drive technology means that we can jump further than the Covenant can in a single day, and our new Void Signature Systems means that not even the Covenant will be able to use their hyperscanners to detect the surveillance ships that my son, Nicholas, has in action right now."
Just then, Kerensky heard a knock at the door. "Come in," he said.
The doors slid open and Nicholas Kerensky entered. "Nicholas," Aleksander said as the doors closed again. "What brings you here? I was just telling Janos how your ships may begin hunting for Covenant worlds."
"I've got some good news on that front," Nichloas said. "After months of hard work on the Unrelenting's computers, we've finally managed to translate the information inside. We have potential leads on the locations of each colony the Covenant has."
"Is that so? Dare I ask why it took you a few months to achieve this breakthrough?"
"Certainly," Nicholas said. "Partly because we had to create a translation program that would allow us to translate the Covenant's language into Star League/UNSC English. Also, much of the Covenant's communiques and programs are littered with religious references and the like. We had to sort through the junk to get at the relevant information. On top of that, we had to create programs that would allow our computers to properly interface with Covenant ship networks."
"Ah," Aleksandr said with a nod. "I understand. Now, given that you managed it, what did you find?"
"A lot of information on potential locations for Covenant colonies, maybe even their homeworlds," Nicholas said eagerly. "Once we had the programs and interfaces required to use their tech, we got access to the navigation computers in a proper fashion. Once we did, we determined that the Unrelenting was refitted at a location known as Malurok. According to information gathered from the ship's computers, Malurok is a fortress world that belongs to the Sangheili species."
Aleksandr smiled. "Good work, Nicholas. Did you find out anything else?"
"Yes," Nicholas said. "We interviewed the soldiers that participated in the ground battle at Harvest. As we suspected, the Covenant is composed of multiple species, which our forces confirmed during the battle with the Unrelenting. The Covenant ship's computer banks, however, furnished us with a full list of the Covenant's member races." He handed Alek a datapad.
Aleksandr read through the datapad's contents. This datapad was a report on the information that had been gathered from the Unrelenting. According to this report, the number of species in the Covenant had gone up from four to eight. The first was a species called the Jiralhanae, with Alek noting from an image that they looked like humanoid apes. A note from SLIC Agents described the Jiralhanae by the nickname "Brutes."
The second new species was the Yanme'e, or Drones, a nickname that SLIC Agents had given them. Unlike the Brutes, the Drones were a short and squat races of insectoids that lived in hives ruled by queens. The Unrelenting's data archives indicated that they were almost exclusively employed as engineers, though it was clear that they were inferior to the Huragok that were in the Covenant.
The next one were the Lekgolo, and this was where Alek felt a pang of concern. According to the latest intel, the Lekgolo were colonies of worm-like creaturesconnected via a telepathic hive mind. The danger came when they gathered in large numbers, allowing them to mount armor onto their bodies, along with heavy weapons. They might be a legitimate threat to vehicles, he noted.
Then there was the final new race, the San'Shyuum. Unfortunately, there was little information on them, though the scant intel did tell Alek what Nicholas and the others thought they were. From the looks of it, the San'Shyuum were the religious leaders of the Covenant. No information on their appearance was present, however.
Still, Alek knew that the battle at Harvest and the breakthrough in getting through the Covenant computer encryption were major victories for the UNSC and Star League. He had to press this advantage somehow. "Interesting," Alek said. "Is there any information on how their society is organized?"
"There is," Nicholas informed his father. "We've found out from interrogating the POW from the Unrelenting that the Covenant have a caste system. The Sangheili and San'Shyuum occupy the uppermost ranks of society, with the San'Shyuum being the religious leaders of the Covenant, while the Sangheili are the military leaders. Beneath them are the other races of the Covenant, with the Unggoy, or Grunts as our soldiers have begun calling them, at the lowest caste of Covenant society. The Huragok are in a special caste due to their skill with technology."
"I see. And have you learned anything new of the Covenant's faith?"
"Yes," Nicholas said. "Apparently, the Covenant worship the Forerunners, the species that created 343 Guiilty Spark, as gods. According to the Covenant's dogma, the Forerunners used the Halo Array, which Installation 04 is a part of, to initiate apotheosis, the process of becoming a god. They believe that the Covenant's destiny is to reactivate the Halo Array in order to go to where their 'gods' went.
"As for why they are attacking us, the prisoners say that the San'Shyuum informed them that we destroyed a Forerunner Reliquary, or a collection of Forerunner devices and information. The destruction of such a Reliquary is, to them, the highest form of heresy. Their beliefs demand that they annihilate us to cleanse this 'heresy.' Beyond that, we have little information on how they came about this religious belief, aside from the Writ of Union that the Sangheili and San'Shyuum created upon becoming allies."
Alek nodded, his chin resting on a curled hand. This proved the jihad theory correct, though now they also had information on why the Covenant wished to wage war against them. "Thank you," he said to Nicholas. "This sheds some light on the cause of the war. In fact, I think we can use this to our advantage."
"How so?" Janos asked. "From the sounds of things, the Covenant seem quite monolithic in belief."
"Not exactly," Nicholas said. "Whenever religion is involved, you're going to have people that disagree with each other on how a certain piece of ideology is to be interpreted. You thinking what I'm thinking, Alek?"
"Yes," Aleksander said. "Nicholas, once you've figured out how our prisoners think, I want you to have our Bug-Eyes looking for any hint of an internal schism in the Covenant. In addition, I want those same surveillance vessels to begin checking those coordinates. If we find a Covenant world that has military assets that we can destroy, then we'll mark that world for an attack.
"Furthermore, I want you to work with Guilty Spark and find a way to interface with the Covenant's FTL communications network. If we can do that, we can begin decoding their transmissions and intercept their battle plans. I also want you to convince the POWs we have to work for us. If we can begin causing a schism inside the Covenant, it'll distract them and allow us to begin fracturing the Covenant from within."
"Yes sir," Nicholas said with a salute. "I'll do whatever is necessary to ensure that we come out on top as the victors."
"Very good. You are dismissed." Nicholas turned and strode out of the room.
"He's doing quite nicely," Janos observed.
"That he is," Alek agreed. "However, I don't plan on Nicholas becoming the successor to my current position."
"Too unstable?"
"Something to that effect," Alek said. "As the perpetrator of the Prinz Mugen Mutiny, he attempted to take control and become a leader in his own right. His desire to become a leader, though, automatically invalidates him for the job. A person that desires power will hold onto it as long as possible, and will do some nasty things to maintain power."
"Who do you have in mind, then?"
"Andrey," Alek said. "He's shown that he has the capacity to lead, and he is more thoughtful in how he goes about things. Time and again, he's usually looked for a long term solution to a problem, rather than a solution that only treats the symptoms. His efforts to prevent the Star League-in-Exile from fracturing is proof of that. In addition, he was the coordinator for the ground attack at Harvest, which went very smoothly. It's that, and his tempered idealism, that inspired me to have him succeed me as the Commanding General of the Star League."
"A fine choice," Janos agreed. "I admit, I have serious reservations about Nicholas' actual military experience. I have no such reservations for Andrey, though. He's been in battle before, and he's had to make tough choices. I firmly believe that, should he become the Commanding General of the SLDF, he'll lead it to greatness once more."
"That he will. I won't be around forever; in fact, I'll probably die of old age before this war is over." Alek cracked a faint smile as he regarded Janos warmly. "What about you, Janos? Do you have a successor in mind?"
"I do," Janos said. "Some of the younger Captains have proven themselves to be highly adept. Captain Jordan Ford, the Captain of the Perth, is who I'm looking at as my successor. He did the most damage to the Heaven's Brilliant Bier, and he was able to coordinate the majority of the attacks with little trouble when my ship's COM system was temporarily knocked out. Besides, like you said, I'll probably die before this war is over, so I might as well have a strong leader ready to take my place."
"Perfect," Alek said. "Let us go now. Goodness knows we have yet more business elsewhere."
"That we do."
. . .
At Harvest, Colonel Harold Dean was facing a serious problem. Standing on the bridge of the J. Swift, one of the Exodus Fleet's Newgrange-class YardShips, he quietly watched the massive field of floating debris that orbited the planet Harvest. Outside, dozens of DropShips flew every which way, dragging back pieces of debris to the and her sister ship, the Clementine, for disassembly and shipping back to Soell III and the laboratories of the UNSC. Other DropShips were busy recovering the bodies of men and women who had valiantly given their lives in the battle.
It never gets any easier, Dean said to himself. A pang of grief rushed through him, his imagination cooking up an idea of what it must've been like to be in the battle. Feeling something on his cheek, he wiped at it, his hand coming away wet. Taking a moment, he dried his cheeks with his uniform before taking a shuddering breath.
"Is there a problem, sir?" a voice asked. Turning, Harold beheld his XO, Captain Jean Gordon. Gordon was a short and squat man with a shock of black hair, and he wasn't especially attractive in appearance. His mind, however, was the sharpest out of the entire bridge, aside from Dean, as he had a knack for salvaging useful tech from anything that was practically destroyed. Right now, though, Gordon had a concerned look on his face as he gazed at Dean.
"No, but thanks for asking," Dean said, wiping at the remaining tears in his eyes. "I just can't imagine what it must've been like to be here, fighting for one's life against alien invaders that think themselves to be the servants of gods."
"I know how it is," Gordon said. "I've been in battle before, too. If you need a shoulder to lean on, I'm here for you."
"Thanks," Dean said. "Perhaps when our duty here is over, we'll have a serious talk about it."
"Yes. Perhaps," Gordon agreed…
Down in the repair/refit/salvaging bay of the ship's bow, Chief Engineer Gordon Fremont kept himself busy monitoring the salvaging operations. Down below, there were hundreds, if not thousands, of personnel hard at work on the various wrecks and ships that were being repaired or broken down from the previous battle. From Gordon's position, the workers looked like army ants swarming over a dead corpse.
Fremont smiled at the apt analogy. We managed to beat the Covenant back, and bloody their noses while we were at it, he thought. Still, I'll bet Davion-Bills to Star League Dollars that the Covenant will be fully ready for revenge before this is all over.
He was about to return back to work when his COM piece chimed. Keying it, Fremont asked, "Yes, boss?"
"How's the salvaging operation going?" he heard Gordon ask him.
"Excellently so far," Fremont said. "We're getting quite a bit of high quality salvage from the hulks and wrecks that we're taking in. We've even gotten our hands on some of those Covenant ASFs that were causing trouble during the battle."
"Good," Gordon said. "Did you find any escape pods that were launched during the battle?"
"Negative. From the looks of things, the Covenant don't like it when their own personnel try to retreat from a battle. Makes sense, given that they're religious fanatics with a massive superiority complex. The ones that we have found were either unused, or were deliberately disabled to prevent anyone from retreating if a battle started to go bad."
"I see," Gordon said. "Any infantry weapons?"
"Any infantry weapons?! Sir, I've been buried up to my asshole in all of those things! We've got infantry weapons everywhere!"
"All right, all right. No need to go that far," Gordon said. "I was just asking. So, lots of infantry weapons. Anything else?"
"Yeah. We found quite a few canisters of some kind. Some of our boys almost accidentally lit a couple up and we lit one up intentionally to see what would happen. Probably air for the Grunts because those canisters exploded like you wouldn't believe."
"All right," Gordon said. "Continue the salvaging operations and report back to me if you find anything useful. I also have some orders for you."
"Yeah, boss?"
"You are to retrieve any working versions of the Covenant's Slipstream Space Drives. SLDF and UNSC HIGHCOM want the scientists and engineers to begin studying those drives on the spot. Rumors have it that if we can make a breakthrough in those areas, we can outpace the Covenant in terms of FTL flight. Understood?"
"You got it, boss," Fremont said. Closing the COM, he keyed another frequency. "Jason, you there?"
"I'm here," came another man's voice. "What's up, boss?"
"Got some new orders from the top," Fremont said. "Boss wants us to find any of them Covenant Slipspace Drives. HIGHCOM wants the eggheads to get at 'em so that we can help the UNSC make their own drives faster and better. Got it?"
"You got it," Jason said. "I'll whip up them Covenant FTL drives so fast that you're head's gonna spin."
"Lose the drama. Get to work."
"Got it, boss." Fremont closed the COM and looked back over the salvage crews hard at work. It's gonna be a really long day, he thought to himself.
. . .
Elsewhere in the galaxy, Arbiter Ripa 'Moramee was also having a long day. He stormed down the hallways of his flagship, his hands clenched and unclenched as murderous thoughts swam through his mind. Other Sangheili in the hallway quickly backed up, both out of reverence, and out of fear.
However, it was not them that 'Moramee's rage was directed towards. Rather, his thoughts were directed towards the very aliens that the Hierarchs had sent him to purge and destroy, the very same aliens that had somehow stolen victory out from underneath their feet. That alien race was also the very reason why he was going to question the Shipmistress of the Heaven's Brilliant Bier and her mate.
The Arbiter stepped into his private quarters, which were much like those on the Brilliant Bier, only smaller and more spartan. Inside, both Sevana 'Zhatumee and her mate Thorek stood to attention, both Sangheili keeping their eyes on him. When the doors closed, 'Moramee regarded the two of them for a while before saying, "Shipmistress, have you fared well?"
"Yes," Sevana said. "Aside from some morning sickness that passed, I am well. I take it you know, yes?"
"I do," 'Moramee said. "Were it not for the fact that you have a child growing within you, I would have been more severe in my chastisement of you yesterday. I have done many things, but even I will not kill a child of our species. That being said, how were the humans able to defeat you so easily?"
"We underestimated their capabilities," Thorek said. "None of us believed that the Humans had advanced energy weapons at their disposal. It was that disbelief that allowed them to take down our shields and nearly destroy us. None of the intelligence we had indicated they had such."
'Moramee pursed his mandibles upon hearing those words. If what Thorek was saying was true, then the Humans were a far more dangerous species than he had initially thought, or had been led to believe. "I see," he said. Looking at Sevana, he asked, "How powerful were the Human's energy weapons?"
"On their own, each hit was enough to reduce shield strength by 2%," Sevana said. "Normally that would give us plenty of time to take them down, except that they had multiple energy weapons firing. They also came with a fleet of forty five ships, more than enough to cause major trouble for the ship. Given that we were temporarily without support, it is easy to see how they were able to nearly overwhelm us. Worse still, they improved their nuclear weapons."
"They used nuclear weapons?"
"Yes," Sevana said. "From what I was able to tell, along with my officers, the Humans have redesigned their energy weapons to produce a jet of plasma that is capable of penetrating even the thickest nanolaminate armor. It is a crude, but highly effective means of destroying an enemy ship. The radiation was so severe that anyone that was in that section of the ship died of radiation sickness."
"They also used powerful laser based weapons," Thorek added. "Not as powerful as the ones that we use, but powerful enough to cause significant damage. That's not the most alarming fact, though."
"Then what is?" 'Moramee asked.
"They engaged us from long range, Arbiter. At first, they were roughly fifteen mega-units from our position. Only our long range Plasma Torpedoes could hurt them, but the Humans used some kind of missile that disrupted the torpedoes, rendering them completely useless. It was only after we closed in to around ten to five thousand kilometers that we could inflict further damage. Even then, the Human fleets' armor plating was tough enough to survive repeated hits from our plasma torpedoes."
Again, 'Moramee was silent. It appears as though the Humans are more dangerous than we initially thought, he said to himself. Not only did they have ships that were incredibly durable even by our standards, their weapons were capable of causing great harm. All of their assessments are exactly like my own when I engaged them as well. "I see," he said. "In that case, none of you are to blame for what happened in the battle. The Humans simply exploited a weakness in our battlefield tactics, a weakness that will be readily dealt with."
Looking at Sevana, he said, "You will be sent back to Sangheilios in order to give birth and tend for your child. Thorek, you are to remain with me. As of now, whenever we face the Humans, you will be on the bridge of my personal flagship. I expect you to follow all of my orders. Am I understood?"
"Yes, Arbiter," Thorek said.
"Good. You two are dismissed." As they left, 'Moramee turned to Sevana and said, "May your child be healthy and strong."
Sevana boweed her head. "Thank you."