1815 hours 20 November 2552

Debris field of resupply fleet

UNSC Artemis

Captains Brian Jackson and Mathew Reading stood in the hangar bay of the Artemis with Commander John Hook watching the pair of Condor gunships bring the disabled Pelican full of grunts inside the flight bay and heard the handful of marines making their final check of their rifles and shotguns.

"Remember marines do not fire unless they fire first the data cores of every ship we searched are gone so we have no idea where the pirates left." Captain Jackson reminded the Marines.

The airlock opened and the marines ran out surrounding the back hatch, the naval personnel walking in right behind them looking over the pelican immediately noticing the chin gun was gone, replaced with a pair of plasma cannons from what looked to be banshee's.

Knowing a surprising number of grunts could speak a number of human languages at least somewhat Captain Jackson using a radio called out "to the Unggoy inside the pelican come out unarmed and you will not be harmed."

After a few moments a hiss sounded as the pelican's ramp opened and the grunts came out leaving their weapons inside a pair of marines making their cautious way inside to police the weapons and ensure there's nothing and no one else inside.

Captain Jackson stepped forward "who among you can speak english?" he asked looking over the group of squat aliens.

A grunt stepped forward and said in halting English "speak… i do…little"

Captain Jackson nodded, choosing his words carefully " where others of your kind go?"

The grunt looked thoughtful pausing before replying "Kig-yar um jackal no have base keep moving…. salvaging… enslaving as go."

Captain Jackson nodded it made sense for them not to make a base prefering to keep moving rather than setting up shop. "How many ships do your friends…"

The grunt interrupted him "no friends kig-yar ... .jackals masters not friends."

Jacksons eyes narrowed and softened "...Masters then how many ships do they have? Do they have other human prisoners? Slaves?"

The grunt again looked thoughtful before replying "Masters have two Cedur patterns…"the grunt paused trying to remember the human designation "humans call them CPV class corvettes and super freighters. Eight ships they have repaired and augmented here."

Jackson listened intently as the alien slave listed off the ships available to its former masters and his mind locked in on the last part "eight ships here?" He asked "What kind?"

The grunt didn't know how to answer the strange language of the people here was taking a while to learn "Not know"

The Captain thought for a few moments before pulling a holographic projector "do you…know what they look like?" using his cerebral implant he activates the projector to show the UNSC Able and then a Colonial Battlestar.

The grunts head bobbles quickly as he says "Yes yes i know look"

The next ten minutes a small slide show of Colonial and Cylon ships show that in addition to the CPV corvettes they have six Cylon Nemesis corvettes and a pair of Colonial Firestar frigates all of them modified with bits and pieces of Covenant weapons and technology in addition to the Dream of Virgon and about a third of her crew as slaves.

The biggest concern the UNSC high command learned is that the freighter named the Mayhems Wish was an assembly forge ripped from a wreck of a CSO class supercarrier giving the pirates the ability to produce everything from plasma grenades to heavy plasma cannons and space fighters. It was the plan of the pirate queen Mistress Tau'cha to use the manufacturing of the forge to build a mobile shipyard inside the Dream of Virgon capable of building corvettes and frigates rather than rely on the pittiful salvage of Colonial and Cylon ships.

This was a huge problem if the pirates were able to build additional Covenant level of technology ships they would outpace the joint UNSC Colonial manufacturing capabilities which meant the liberation of the rest of the colonies was just placed on the back burners the pirates just became the primary target of the war effort.

The sweep was complete and less than two hundred survivors found the UNSC Able heads back to Scorpia to inform the Colonial military and political leadership. While the rest of the fleet returns to Picon to aid in mop up operations.

The trip to Scorpia takes only three hours in slipspace; upon arrival Able was met in orbit by four Raptors to shuttle the command staff to an emergency meeting with the president and fleet command and others to escort the captured Unggoy to join the others.

Inside the president's office President Elizabeth Horner is led inside with her husband General Chris Howler all other Colonial high ranking officers were at Picon in command positions.

"Madam President thank you for meeting on just short notice." said Captain Brian Jackson as he shook the president's hand turning to the general "you as well General"

They both shook his hand now used to the handshakes rather than wrist pumps they commonly used and replied "of course" and "it's the least we can do for everything you have done for us."

"Now." began Jackson "a startling revelation has been made unfortunately i can offer only a small amount of good news outweighed by the bad news."

Both president and general looked to the Captain before the president set her face and nodded "go ahead Captain"

"First off the third fleet of freighters to rearm the fleet in a quick manner was destroyed almost to its entirety we recovered about two hundred survivors." he paused as the news washed over them seeing the numbers flicker across their minds over a hundred freighters stocked with supplies nearly every surviving police officer they had trained for customs enforcement nearly five thousand sailors and civilians and then the dream herself the only mobile shipyard they had.

"How?" General Horner asked quietly

Pulling up the flight recorder from the pirate pelican he showed them the battle the alien corvettes Mayhems Delight and folly using a short ranged tactical jump to appear without warning above the screening police cutters and improvised carriers and burn them down within seconds while launching swarms of Banshees Seraphs and a couple of captured longswords to devastate the few fighters that were able to launch. The augmented cylon and colonial ships then joined the fray firing armor piercing and high explosive shells and lasers to burn the unarmed freighters and any armed ship that came within range.

Before showing the flight of covenant Phantoms, Ghost, and Pelicans board the Dream of Virgon a short while later all the augmented ships docked inside the Dream and the four ships jumped away leaving only the field of wreckage and death behind them.

"Now at least one of the pelicans you saw we were able to track it back to the UNSC Yellowstone" a hologram pops up showing the UNSC Yellowstone a Halberd class destroyer "a Destroyer that was lost above a world known as Meridian about a year ago her and nearly seventy other UNSC ships were lost and the planet was glassed."

President Horner hearing the word Glassed remembered her brief study of the UNSC Covenant war visibly recoiled and her skin lost several shades. "How many were lost?"

Looking at the battle reports Jackson replied "on the ground thirty thousand army marines and ODST and four thousand civilians the covenant took three years to pry the planet and system away from us so we evacuated nearly three million." he said " in space it was much higher in total nearly three hundred ships were destroyed and almost a million sailors."

Hearing the number talked about so nonchalantly drove home just how many people died in the war the UNSC was fighting.

"However the news gets worse" pushed on Jackson "thanks to intel recovered by prisoners we have discovered the Pirates true danger inside their freighter they have a manufacturing plant in similar capabilities to the Artemis. With that forge they are able to build." As he listed off the weapons and vehicles the forge can produce, a hologram came up showing them in action from captured covenant small arms like the plasma rifle and pistols showing them melt through their heaviest body armor and even a couple of ground vehicles.

All the way up to combat footage from the Rushmore and Hawaill the plasma and lasers burning through cylon ships like a blow torch through paper. Even included was some of the battle before they arrived in orbit of the plant Jericho Vll three Covenant CAR class frigates versus his intact fleet of ten ships. Jacksons heart skipped at seeing the Stalwart class frigates Graveyard sky and Galileo firing their MACs into the side of the frigate so the ancient Sovereign class heavy battleship Lassiter could bombard its unshielded hull with its four old MK1 heavy coil guns and Vanguard missiles.

At the same time three squadrons of Seraphs rained down destruction with a rapid series of fuel rod shells and plasma charges shattering the Lassiter and crippling the Graveyard sky. As the last covenant ship fired a broadside of plasma torpedoes Galileo physically stopped four torpedoes destined for the Artemis.

The video over Brian blinked his eyes quickly and cleared his throat "As you can see Madam president General the threat produced by the forge the pirates could begin pumping out ships faster then we could hope to keep the cylons at bay." he looked the two of them over and squared his shoulders "i believe it's best to hold what we have and prioritize the destruction of the pirates freighter over the continued liberation of the other ten colonies."

"I see your point Captain." President Horner said after a moment of thought " very well we will hold our assault at Picon. We need time to repair and build our defenses.