"I fail to see how this plan is meant to work," the officer said as he stroked his brown stubble.

Locke just smiled as he looked up at the general. "It will work, trust me,"

The general sighed as he turned to look outside. "Whenever someone says 'trust me', that makes me very suspicious about whatever they just said," he then turned to look back at the Spartan Commander. "Even a Spartan who has as many battle honours as you, can fail,"

"I will not fail," Locke said. "HIVE has already agreed that this plan will work,"

"HIVE is not infallible," the General countered. "We have lost several planets and battles because it could account for a wildcard. And he is a wildcard. Especially if we broadcast her across the channels,"

"We have already worked on backups and counters," Locke said. "It will work,"

The General turned to the Spartan; his impression of the former ONI officer less then impressed. "For your sake, I hope you are right. Because if not…" he let the words hang in the air before turning back to look outside.

OOOOO

John stood on the bridge as the ship, Iron Frontier, exited slip-space and into system with the rest of the Federation fleet. The fleet moved into an attack formation, frigates at front, heavy ships at back as they began to approach the first planet in the system. The Imperial Storm fleet were already moving to respond to the threat. It seemed that the intelligence for the system was right.

The Imperials only had a few ships when compared the Federation's 4th fleet. Mostly made up of frigates and cruisers. Two planets had 15 ships orbiting while Kusrago had 20 ships orbiting and a Phoenix class support vessel. At least that's what it looked like to John as he turned to look at the holomap.

The Capitan of the Iron Frontier, Alexander Maxwell, watched from his side of the table. Not taking his eyes off the map for a second. His mind making minute calculations about how to hit the enemy and make planet fall. John said nothing as he looked at the map as well, making his own judgements.

Spartan training was focused on land-based targets, they were trained in every aspect of war. Ground, air, sea, space, there was nothing that they didn't learn about the arts and tactics of war. But unless asked, they largely deferred to the Captains and Commanders of the operations they were attached to. Training meant little in terms of experience. You could be the best trained soldier in the galaxy, but there was always something that you couldn't train for or the training didn't help.

Experience counted for a great number of things, it all depended how you applied it. John watched as the Imperial fleet from Kusrago broke off and began to advance with red signatures indicating that they had fired weapons. The federation fleet was made up of 80 ships, split between two groups. Group 1, which had Chief's Task force, would focus on the fleet in orbit while Group 2 moved onto the next planet before the two fleets regrouped and hit the third.

"Impact in 3…2…1…" Dana, the AI warned before the ship shook slighting due to the impacts. "Shields down 5%," she alerted. "Similar situation across Group 1,"

"They're making a false push," Maxwell muttered as he looked to the ships around the planet. "Move us in closer and fire Archers, once we get in optimum rage fire the MAC guns,"

"Aye sir," Dana said as she communicated the plan to the other ships.

Archer missiles flew across the void of space towards the strike force of 3 frigates and 2 destroyers. They had moved on to face the fleet to head them off so that their Capital ship could make a break for it. As the missiles came closer, the point defence turrets of the ships activated and targeted the missiles. Firing auto rail rounds, the turrets tried to hit the missiles as they came forwards. They managed to hit a few before the others made it though and impacted or missed the ships.

Shields sparked as the missiles hit the shields bringing their efficiency down. While the destroyers couldn't move fast enough to get out of the way of some of the rockets, the frigates did thanks to their superior speed. But it didn't let them go unscathed. The rockets that hit rendered their shields down to 55% strength. As soon as the missiles hit, the frigates then accelerated forwards to the fleet aiming for the command ships while the two destroyers behind them fired their Archers.

The cover the destroyers provided managed to shield the frigates as they moved into the Federation fleet and began to use their turrets and missiles to try and take on the lighter ships of the fleet. But three ships against 40 is not the best of ideas, but it did allow to get in close rake and do some damage from both friendly and their own fire. But as they moved Maxwell saw something, that the others didn't.

"Order all ships to move away from those frigates," he ordered.

The ships began to pull away, but that's when the frigates released their little surprise. All three detonated turning into a big fireball taking out several ships near them. Radiation warnings sounded across several ships that were close to the blast. As soon as the ships exploded, the two cruisers headed back to the fleet to reinforce them

"I think we found out what they were saving their nukes for," Dana said as she, John and the Capitan watched as 12 ships were taken out from the detonation.

Not all of them were outright destroyed, but just disabled from the explosion and resulting EMP. Several Federation cruisers were already sending out pelicans to pick up the survivors while the others pressed on. The support ship still stayed in orbit as they approached and the Captain smiled.

"Looks like Wolf Pack did what they needed to do," he said. "Press on, focus fire on the Phoenix-class,"

The bridge followed up affirmative responses. As the fleet approached, the Imperial ships moved into a defensive position firing their mac guns and archers at the fleet. But their shields and numbers prevented any major damage to afflict the oncoming fleet. The latter also began to fire their own weapons as soon as they got into effective rage.

Due to the small numbers, the Imperial ships managed to move out of the way from the incoming fire. But it didn't do much good as the Federation ships began to fan out cutting off the escape routs for the other ships. The Captain was going to send out a message to the Imperial fleet for an offer of surrender, but the Imperial fleet fired their nukes. The Captain cursed and ordered all ships to move out of the way of the nukes while firing all weapons at the enemy fleet.

The Federation ships moved, while their point defence turrets targeted and fired. Only a few nukes got though and hit a couple of ships, and disabling more. But the fire they poured into the Imperial fleet didn't let up and after a few moments all that was left were wrecks.

"Imperial Storm fleet inoperable," Dana said. "No survivors,"

John looked to the AI. "Is that normal?" he asked.

"Unfortunately," The Captain said as he stroked his goatee. "The Empire instils a sense of loyalty with it's soldiers. Any failure means death. So, they kill themselves before they can take them for interrogation," John nodded as Maxwell continued. "How any ships did we lose?"

"17 ships destroyed, 22 with minor damage," Dana said. "But we can begin deployment as soon as you are ready,"

John nodded as he slid his helmet on. "Lets' get to…"

"Chief…do… l…e…t….trap…." a fragmented voice said.

Before he could say anything, Dana spoke up.

"That's odd," she said before looking up. "I'm picking up a transmission from the subspace bands,"

"Play it," Maxwell ordered.

"Ch…help…m…" was all the transmission said.

Only the AI can Captain looked to each other while John just looked at the map in front of him.

"Cortana," he said making the two looks to him. "President Parisa showed me the noise what HIVE makes, and what happens when you filter it,"

"So, someone deliberately picked out her voice," Dana nodded.

"This has got to be Locke," Maxwell said. "This tactic sounds like him,"

"I heard his name," John nodded. "He's one of the Imperial's elite, right?"

"More than that," Maxwell muttered. "He's one of their best, nicknamed the 'Spartan Hunter'. Former ONI agent and more, so he's likely got you in his sights,"

"Pulling up his file now," Dana said as a holographic file appeared before the two commanders. "Here we go, he has a kill count of 300 Spartans. Speculation is that he does his research into his target before making a plan and executing it. Because of this many Spartans fall into his traps,"

"I assume he also makes contingency plans," Maxwell added.

John said nothing for a moment as he read the file. "Where did the signal originate?" he asked.

"Here," Dana pulled up a map of the planet and highlighted a base not too far into enemy territory. "Its's a comm's base, intel says that it's of minor importance and lightly defended,"

"Trap," Maxwell muttered and John couldn't help but nod. "And if this guy is an ONI spook, he'll likely have backups of his backups,"

John nodded. "Then let's not disappoint him,"

OOOOO Spartan group 1 ready room.

Aniko sat looking at the helmet she had picked out. It was dubbed 'Starfire' and was modelled after the CQB triangular visor helmet. But the left side had a large round scope that allowed her to zoom in on targets. She sighed before sliding it on and standing up. It was time to prove herself. As she walked up to the holomap the door opened behind her and Major Linda walked in causing all inside the room to snap to attention. She walked up to them and saluted as well.

"At ease," she said calmly and the new Spartans eased their stance. "I have a mission for you all," she walked up to the holomap and manipulated the controls to show an area close to the front lines. "We have received a signal from this base," she said. "However, we believe it to be a trap. So, we've com e up with a plan,"

OOOOO Kusrago planeside.

Several red and black coloured warthogs rolled across a dirt road far from any bases. A regular patrol for the Empire despite having full control of the area. One of the troopers yawed as they fell asleep due to the boredom of the patrol. It wasn't long before his partner shook him awake.

"Wha…" he tried to say but looked up.

Several streaks of fire scarred the sky as the patrol stopped and one of the troopers was on the radio.

"It's the Federation," he said. "Drop pods,"

The others said nothing as they pulled off from the road and headed towards the landing zone of the pods. As soon as they got close, they got off the vehicles and moved up slowly to get a better vantage point over the landing zone. Soon the drop pods came into view and the patrol began to take note of what was happening.

Green clad ODST's and a few Spartans moving around grabbing equipment from the pods. But they way they moved was strange. No one was on patrol, or standing guard, or any kind of alertness about them. One of the Imperial troopers looked behind him and pulled back from the ridge to look around. His hears and eyes focused on any kind of movement around him. One of the others did the same and looked around. A large wolf like dog then emerged from one of the bushes it growled at them as more came from other hiding spots.

"What…." One of the troopers tried to say before the wolfs charged and tore into the Imperial troopers.

No cries of help, just ripping and tearing. Once done, a pack of 6 wolves then headed to the drop pods and the Spartan.

"Hey," he said cheerfully as the wolfs ran up to him for pets. "Who's a good dog," he said petting them "Who's a good pack?"

"Glad they are on our side," one of the ODST's muttered.

"Yeah," another said. "I mean Spartan dogs? No thank you,"