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Chapter One: TF Resolution
Date: 30 August 2003, 5:41 PM

Task Force Resolution

November 1, 2556

04:21 Local Time, UNSC Cruiser Sashok Nayosha, orbiting Talos IV in Talos Prime star system

Rear Admiral Larin Riyonus looked down at the sensor display one more time. Something was definitely wrong, long range scanners had picked up several Covenant warships in the system just half an hour ago, but by the time they had arrived in system, the ships had vanished. Ground based scanners had not picked up anything, but the warships could have been on the opposite side of the sun. "Sensors, dispatch a high speed probe to the opposite side of each planet and moon in the system, and send 3 behind the sun."

"Aye, aye admiral, launching probes in Five, Four, Three, Two, Admiral! Launch detected, we have incoming!" The sensor operator reported.

Riyonus looked down at the flashing sensor panel beneath him and saw 4 plasma torpedoes streaking in towards his battle group.

"Evasive maneuvers, break orbit now, launch countermeasures and fire Archer tubes A-16 through C-8 on the starboard side only!" Riyonus ordered.

The Covenant group had been hiding behind one of the moons of Talos IV and had now completed a full orbit of the moon and shown themselves to the Human fleet. They didn't stand much of a chance however, they were outnumbered 7 to 4, and the Human ships vastly outsized them.

"Admiral, torpedo impact in 3 seconds, switching full power to shields." The Defensive systems operator spoke.

The ship shuddered and the lights on the bridge went dim but came back to full strength a few seconds after impact. The ship had survived the impact well, so the shields did work.

"Sir, shields holding at 73%, shifting power back to weapons systems." The defense operator spoke again.

"All right, turn towards the bastards, get firing solutions for all ships Eitri, blow those sons of bitches back to hell." Riyonus ordered.

"Yes admiral, I have a solution already locked in, firing Archer salvo now." the ships AI said.

The entire group fired a full Archer salvo, nearly 3500 missiles for 4 ships. Plus the 500 launched by the group before the main salvo. The Covenant ships were completely obliterated by the salvo, none of the ships survived, and barely anything remained.

"Eitri, order the Sovia to launch her fighters, I don't want any Covie fighters causing any trouble." Riyonus ordered.

"Yes sir, Sovia already has one squadron engaging Seraphs with another squadron on the way." Eitri replied.

"All right, set an course to exit the system. If any more Covies come in here I don't want them to know we were here." Riyonus said this and left the CIC for his cabin. 5 hours of watching waiting for the Covenant force had paid off. They had been tracking this group for many hours, and finally the Covenant had been caught with their pants down. Riyonus decided he would reward himself with a few hours of sleep.

07:13 Local Time, November 1, Deep Space, near Talos Prime system

"Admiral Riyonus, would you come to the CIC immediately please" Eitri said politely.

Riyonus rubbed his eyes and got out of his bed. He looked at the clock and then left the cabin. He arrived in the CIC 1 minute later. Officers were running around to different stations, while various alarms were sounding at the sensor station.

"Admiral, sensors indicated several Covenant warships in the Talos Prime system! Ground sensors on the planet indicate at least 2 Cruisers and 7 Destroyers orbiting Talos IV!" The sensors operator yelled.

"All right lieutenant, Eitri, set us a course for Talos IV." Riyonus replied. He then picked up the microphone in front of him and switched the comm channel to the entire fleet. "This is Admiral Riyonus speaking, Covenant warships have been detected orbiting Talos IV. All pilots are to man their crafts. Marines, saddle up and prepare to engage Covenant forces on ground. Jump jets from the Talos IV defense forces will provide air support while our fighters engage the Seraphs." Riyonus then switched the comm channel to the ship commanders channel. "All right, we have 2 Cruisers and 7 Destroyers in system confirmed, Eitri will provide firing solutions, ground batteries will provide some support, so don't get too close to the Covenant ships." Riyonus ordered. All the Captains confirmed his orders and the ships entered slip stream.

7:18 Local Time, November 1, Near Talos IV

"Covenant have spotted us Admiral, they sir, they are preparing to fire their weapons." Eitri then added, "Admiral, Talos IV defense batteries have opened fire, I detect multiple MAC rounds being fired. Verifying.......I count 8 rounds in flight now."

"All right Eitri, lock firing solutions into computer, I want Starboard weapons to fire on the near cruiser and port weapons to fire on the far cruiser." Riyonus ordered

"Yes admiral, firing Archer missiles now. 15 seconds till MAC launch. Admiral, the MAC rounds will be launched 3 seconds before the Covenant salvo hits us, shall I fire now?"

"Yes Eitri, fire MAC rounds now, then switch full power to shields." Riyonus ordered.

The ship shuddered as the MAC rounds and Archer missiles finished firing. The Covenant salvo struck just seconds before the human salvo did. 2 Covenant torpedoes struck each human ship. The Sashok Nayosha easily absorbed the impact because it had much larger power plants, but the Frigates Reshiya and Aolaus were unable to absorb the impact through shields. On both ships, the second torpedo broke through the shields and struck their hulls causing minimal damage. Riyonus didn't want to risk damage to the ships however and ordered them to withdraw to the far side of the planet and provide support for the ground troops and act as Medical ships.

The Human salvo struck the Covenant ships, completely annihilating 5 of the destroyers, and damaging both cruisers. The Covenant fired a second salvo, consisting of 4 torpedoes, all of which splashed harmlessly along the Human ships shields. The Covenant shields however, were not able to withstand the force of the returning MAC rounds and Archer missiles. The entire Covenant force was finished after 2 salvos. The Human ships began recovery operations, picking up damaged Longswords and mopping up remaining Covenant fighters. Only a small number of Covenant dropships had reached the surface of Talos IV and they were quickly being rounded up and eliminated. Riyonus leaned back in his chair. "Not bad for 1 morning's work." he thought.

Chapter Two: TF Resolution
Date: 1 September 2003, 12:13 AM

CHAPTER 2

November 2, 2556

09:08 Local Time, Lanse Aux River Defense Base, Talos IV, Talos Prime Star System


Riyonus walked down the ramp of his personal pelican dropship. 2 Marine guards following him. An officer in the Talos defense forces came out from behind the blast shield on the edge of the landing pad and came up to meet him.

"Admiral Riyonus, I am Lieutenant Rennes. Colonel Lanson was wounded when one of our ground batteries malfunctioned and blew up, so I'll escort you to the debriefing room" The officer yelled, trying to out perform the loud roar of the aircraft flying overhead.

"All right lieutenant, just make sure it's a place a little more quiet. By the way, I like the ships you build for us, especially the shields." The admiral replied.

"Glad you liked our toys admiral. We're still getting live battle reports down in the base's CIC, so the debriefing will be a bit sketchy, but it looks like you really gave em hell up there." Rennes said as they walked through the first security door of the base.

"Yeah, again, those ships were a real big help, but I have a feeling your just trying to brag." Riyonus replied as they stepped onto the elevator to go down into the base.

"You know us admiral, always trying to suck up to daddy" The lieutenant smirked as he hit the button for Base sub-level 17.

The two remained quiet until they reached the designated level, it was a 30 second ride, down 340 feet. The Lieutenant stepped off of the elevator first and showed the admiral and his guards the debriefing room at the end of one of the hallways.

"I'm sorry admiral but the guards will have to stay outside, security reasons." Rennes finally said, breaking the silence.

"All right lieutenant, I understand. Just make sure this doesn't take to long. My command wants me to report to them after we are done here." Riyonus responded.

The two walked into the room while the marine guards remained outside the room. As the admiral entered he could see that the Talos Defense forces were really concerned about the battle. It was the first time the Covenant had entered their system, much less attacked them. Even worse, the Human warships were obviously designed by the TDF but had UNSC colors, the Covenant definitely would have reported this into command, TDF vessels would no longer be able to move freely about the galaxy.

"Admiral, as you know, the Covenant have not attacked us before, we find this a very big concern. Covenant forces had come into contact with our ships before but did not fire, we are unsure as to the cause of their recent aggression, but if we find that our involvement with the UNSC is the cause, I can assure you we will have nothing more to do with your operations against them." The chief officer at the head of the table said.

"Prime Councilor Eriks, I think it is obvious that the Covenant discovered that the Talos were in fact a colony of Earth and have decided that they should eliminate you. They do after all, seem to have somewhat of a grudge against humans." The admiral responded.

"Talos IV will not become a killing ground like Earth admiral, I can promise you one thing, if we discover that you intentionally allowed the Covenant to attack us we will break this alliance with you and take back our ships." The Councilor said angrily.

"Prime Councilor, the UNSC does not in any way wish to anger the Talos, you are vital to our resistance effort, and without your help we could never have found the Covenant Home worlds. It would be ridiculous to think we would try and harm our only ally." The admiral replied.

"All right admiral, but I am warning you, this incident will not go unchecked. As for the battle itself however, I must say you had little trouble getting used to our warships and technology." The Councillor said, while changing his tone to a more polite one.

"Yes admiral, I must say that the ships performed above our greatest expectations. I myself was greatly impressed with the boosted capabilities in the MAC rounds and the improved Archer missiles, and of course, the shield systems on the ships were nothing short of miraculous." The admiral said. In truth, he was completely overjoyed by the new ships, only 7 ships had completely obliterated a Covenant invasion force. UNSC command would be in complete awe of this, and would certainly work to improve the already shaky relations with the Talos.

The Talos were already angered by the UNSC's actions. Riyonus had to admit, the UNSC had treated them like children in negotiations, which is what the UNSC thought the Talos should be treated like. They were after all, just another colony. Although they did happen to develop completely separate from any UNSC planets and had grown completely self dependent, and far more advanced. But that is what happens when your colony loses contact with its home world for 200 years. Oh, and it happens to be on a planet with more resources than practically any other place in the universe.

The group finished the briefing of the battle, going over battle schematics and such. Finally they all rose, the Admiral and the Prime Councilor shook hands and the admiral boarded his Pelican and flew back to the Sashok Nayosha.

Before he even reached the bridge the cruiser slowly turned to starboard, broke orbit, and entered slipstream.


18:35 Talos IV Central Time

The battle group exited slipstream in the Lalande 21185 system. To Riyonus' sunrise, he was not sent down for debriefing, but rather the captain of the Sovia was. Apparently the UNSC wanted a source from someone besides the admiral, who had all ready been debriefed by the TDF. Although the admiral did have to write his debriefing report from the operation while they were en route.

As the admiral was finishing up typing his report, a flashing message appeared on his screen. He pressed the READ button on his screen and the letter icon opened up and the message appeared.

EMERGENCY ACTION MESSAGE: PRIORITY ALPHA

ORIGINATED
UNSC 17th FLEET, ADMIRAL ALEX LOUIS
11.01.56/14.07GST

RECEIVED AND FORWARDED
UNSC OFFENSIVE OPERATIONS COMMAND, GENERAL YOSHI TASATKA
11.02.56/07.29GST

RECEIVED
UNSC TASK FORCE RESOLUTION, ADMIRAL LARIN RIYONUS
11.02.56/07.56GST

ORIGINAL MESSAGE:

UNSC 17TH FLEET HAS ENGAGED MULTIPLE COVENANT BATTLE GROUPS, 1ST TASK FORCE WAS WIPED OUT IN OPENING SALVO. REMAINING 21 UNSC WARSHIPS NOW BEING PURSUED BY 5 COVENANT HEAVY TONNAGE WARSHIPS. REQUEST IMMEDIATE ASSISTANCE.

UPDATED MESSAGE: 11.01.56/14.15GST BY GENERAL TASATKA

17TH FLEET WAS IN THE COVENANT HOME WORLD SYSTEM DESIGNATED FOXTROT 17. NO KNOWN COVENANT FORCES WERE IN THE AREA UPON ARRIVAL. WE SUSPECT COVENANT MAY BE PREPARING TO LAUNCH AN OFFENSIVE FROM THAT SYSTEM. PROCEED WITH BATTLE GROUP TO FOXTROT 17 AND ACTIVATE PROTOCOL 318.

END OF MESSAGE

Riyonus read through the message, and then grabbed his code book. Protocol 318 basically meant: All hell had broken lose. Command obviously wasn't fooling around with this, they really believed the Covenant may be preparing to launch an offensive. Most of the commanders refused to believe the Covenant had enough forces left to mount a reasonable offensive, after their staggering defeat at Earth, and then later on at the 2nd Battle of Reach, and even again at Charlie 4, the Elite home world. The Covenant had lost over 400 vessels combined at those battles. The remaining Covenant home worlds had been falling like dominos since the 3 battles, now known as the Battles of Repulse, Revenge, and Reprisal, or the 3 R's Campaign.

If the Covenant were launching an offensive, they would catch the UNSC with their pants down, they had almost no ships left for Home world defense. The Covenant force destroyed over Talos IV was a complete exception, they had been tracked for weeks by the TDF, which had bugs on almost every Covenant fleet known to exist. Since nearly all of the fleets that were bugged had been tracked down and destroyed, it was thought that the Covenant were defeated. Obviously they were wrong.

Now Riyonus understood why the TDF was so angry with the Covenant force detecting the Talos Home world. The Talos must have known that there were Covenant fleets still remaining that they had not detected, and that the Covenant were bound to be launching an attack. Now they were on the main hit list for the Covenant, not a good place to be right before a massive strike.

Riyonus closed the message on his screen and called into the bridge.

"Riyonus to bridge, set course for Covenant home world Foxtrot 17. Have Sovia stay behind to pick up Captain Loshin, then rendevous with us at Foxtrot 17. Riyonus out." Riyonus clicked the comm system off. He submitted his debriefing report and then left his cabin for the officers club. Although most of the officers were his age, and some even older, they'd still let him win in poker. He was their admiral after all.

Chapter One: The Rise of the Phoenix
Date: 1 September 2003, 7:36 PM

This is not part of the TF Resolution book, this takes place before then, and immediately after Stranded Eagle.

Chapter One

06:10, November 24th, 2554
Manaus, Brazil



Adrian reached the top of the building and climbed outside. He looked at the city of Manaus around him. It was completely ruined, bodies lie everywhere, and large pools of blood flooded the streets. Human blood. A pelican roared overhead, causing Adrian and the rest of the marines to look up. 4 Pelicans had landed already, and 20 more were circling overhead. The wounded were loaded up on the dropships, and then the pelicans would rise back up into formation. Rashon jumped on the last pelican and they lifted off.

"Captain, we gotta go pick up some more guys south east of here, hope ya don't mind!" The pilot said.

"Not at all major, it's your plane, i suppose you could always pull rank too."

"Heh, yeah i suppose i could. I heard there was some big battle at the place, its outpost 218 or something."

Rashon thought for a second, then spoke. "Outpost SA-118?"

"Yeah thats it, command is all excited about it, supposedly they lasted out longer than anyone else did on the continent." The pilot responded.

"Actually major, we are from oupost 118, are you telling me that the Covenant took over all of South America?"

"Holy shit, well then I guess I cant pull rank on you, MAJOR Rashon. Command said you got a promotion, not that it'll help, cuz not only did South America fall, but just about, well, everything fell." The pilot said.

"Oh, is that why all those nukes were launched?" Rashon asked.

"Yeah, command was waiting for the main Covenant group to come closer to the planet, otherwise we would have hit them earlier. We really blew the shit outa them, just estimates right now, but command figures we got at least 300 of the bastards."

"Holy shit, are you serious?" Rashon questioned excitedly.

"You bet your ass, the Covenant fleet is back regrouping around Reach, command is already preparing a strike to finish it off, only problem i can see is we don't have a fleet."

"Yeah, why do I have some crazy feeling that we still have a bunch of ships hiding somewhere." Adrian said.

"I got that feeling to major. Outpost is up ahead, we'll be landing on the north edge of the base, we had an airstrike go through and wipe out most of the covies, then the troops on the ground went in and wiped the rest out."

The Pelican dropped down below the light cloud cover and landed at the north end of the base. Rashon jumped off the back of the craft and turned to see Major Alexei standing there with all of his men, and all Rashon's ODSTs.

"I see you took good care of my men!" Rashon said.

"Ooh I don't know, they didnt get too many kills, oh and shouldn't you be saluting me right now?" Alexei said.

"Guess you haven't heard, I'm a major now!" Rashon replied.

"Guess you haven't heard either, I'm a Colonel now." Alexei said.

Rashon immediately saluted, and Alexei saluted back.

"All right, lets load up, command wants both of us to report to the Frigate Reshiya, it just came into orbit about 10 minutes ago." Alexei ordered.

"All right marines, lets go home." Rashon said. Then thought about what he had said and changed his statement. "I mean, lets go up...to that boring...dull...ship of ours." The marines laughed and then boarded the pelicans. They took off and broke for orbit.

As the Reshiya came into view Alexei could tell this was a new ship. It was not shaped like a traditional UNSC ship. It was very smooth, with no real corners or edges. It's MAC cannon was not slung under the ship like usual, but rather straight in the center of the ship. As they approached the ship a pair of doors opened on the ship and the pelican entered into the landing bay of the ship. Other Pelicans came in and landed next to theirs, when the last one had landed the door closed. Adrian stepped down from the pelican and looked for Colonel Alexei. When he found him he followed him to the ships debriefing room.

The two entered the room and saluted. Inside was General Yoshi Tasatka, the head of UNSC Offensive Operations Command, in the Lalande 21185 system.

General Tasatka saluted and then sat down at the head of the table. "Have a seat please, we have much to discuss." Tasatka said.
Both sat down and then the General spoke again. "I would first like to congratulate you both on your success during the battle. I must say that both of you did an excellent job. Colonel Alexei, we have found the bodies of the Covenant commanders you killed to be those of several extremely high members of the Elite caste. It seems the covenant were aware of our nuclear capabilities and felt safer to move their commanders to a base on earth. I believe you proved them wrong."

"Thank you sir, but what is this meeting really about? We already know about our promotions." Alexei responded.

"Yes, well I'll just get straight to the point. All of our senior commanders died on earth. We selected you two because you had the best records of any of our junior officers. We are sending you to Reach to command our ground forces there. Major Rashon, you are to command a team of ODSTs and board a Covenant vessel and try to discover the location of the Covenant homeworlds, while Colonel Alexei will be taking out Covenant ground batteries on Reach in preparation for a naval strike against there fleet. Now before you respond, we do have the ships to make an effective strike, and since the Covenant fleet is already badly damaged, finishing them off will be not much of a problem, especially after the ground batteries are eliminated."

Major Rashon spoke. "General, just exactly how many ships do we have, and why weren't they used to protect earth? I mean, wouldn't it have been easier to defeat the Covenant fleet there."

"Ah yes Major, our ships were undergoing refits at the naval yards on Talos IV. We have a colony there that is not part of the UNSC, they have grown quite advanced, in fact more advanced than us. They however, did not want to risk a war with the Covenant and refused to offer their ships to assist us. They did however, offer to upgrade our ships with some of their advancements. But it took some time before they were ready. As of now they are still under construction and will not be ready for another week." The general replied.

Both Major Rashon and Colonel Alexei sat in their chairs, completely in awe. Then Colonel Alexei asked "Just how many ships do we have left though? The Covenant we know have at least 200 at Reach."

"We have about 90 warships, this frigate, was the first ship completed, it will be joining a new task force next year once the rest are completed. Oh and in case you havent noticed, this ship does have gravity." The General said.

Both of the officers looked around the room, acting as though they could actually "see" the gravity. Rashon had noticed a lot of differences in this ship, maybe the MAC gun was a lot more powerful on this ship, or maybe this ship didnt have a MAC gun at all, but it was something else.

The general finished the briefing and both the officers departed. Rashon was to organize the remaining ODSTs and prepare training for the assault. While Alexei was mainly concerned with trying to figure out how to get past the Covenant defense forces around the ground batteries.

Chapter Two: Rise of the Phoenix
Date: 2 September 2003, 9:16 AM

CHAPTER TWO

11:15 December 3rd, 2554
Fort Custer, ATLAS, Lalande 21185 system

"All right, that was nice, but try again. This time make it faster, half the squad would be dead if this was a real situation." Rashon said this and walked down to the next group. The ODSTs had been training for Covenant ship boarding for a few days now, and were quickly learning how to do it fast and deadly. Rashon walked up to one of the soldiers and showed him a more appropriate stance for sword fighting. Command had equipped his soldiers with modified plasma swords, they looked more human than the Covenant ones, a lot longer and a little more thin. They were also curved, much to the Marines likings.

"Major Rashon!"

Adrian turned to face a person running towards him.

"Yes Lieutenant?"

"I have something command wants me to show you, I think you will be very happy." The lieutenant said.

"Oh we already received the swords." Rashon replied.

"Oh, glad to see you got those, but this is something else. Please follow me Major." The lieutenant instructed.

Rashon followed the Lieutenant out of the room and down a corridor. They stepped onto an elevator and descended down into the facility. The base at Atlas was under nearly 7 kilometres of solid rock, it had been completed just before the Fall of Reach, and it was planned to make Reach the defensive command center, and Atlas the offensive command center. Reach was in between Earth and the main area of Covenant assault, while Atlas was more out of the way of the Covenant invasion, and a more likely place to stage an assault.

The elevator reached its destination and the door opened. Rashon followed the Lieutenant through a series of checkpoints until they finally arrived in a room pitch black. The lieutenant flipped a switch and lights came on. In the large room was 8 rows of black and silver armor, much like that used on the Spartan II program. There were many differences however. The helmets were like that of a typical marine, except they had a Lexan shield that covered the entire face. It connected into a bottom piece to the helmet that housed the microphone and had 2 lights on it. On the Helmet, a camera was attached on the outside. It also had a powerful flashlight next to the camera. The Lexan visor was designed to allow the marine to operate in no atmosphere conditions, as the helmet was completely air tight. The helmet also had the standard HUD, but also another one which projected onto the visor, allowing the marine to see with both eyes in a tough combat situation.

Rashon looked at the rest of the armor. It was basically the same thing the Spartans used.
"Say won't this like rip me apart or something?" Rashon asked the lieutenant.
"Heh, no fortunately not, we took out the reaction enhancements. But there are a few perks to it." the Lieutenant said, with a smile on his face. "Wouldn't you like to try one on?"

"Now?" Adrian stammered.

"Oh sure, we have one the next row down with your name on it." The Lieutenant replied.

"Sure, I'd love to."

The two walked down to the next row. The Lieutenant took the armor off of its mounting and began to disassemble it. He had Adrian step into the lower leg section, and then put the upper leg section on, and locked it in. After this he slipped the torso and arm section on and locked it into place as well. Then he handed Adrian the helmet and watched him put it on.

The system turned on and sprang to life. Adrian took a few minutes to get acquainted with the systems and then said, "hey, why is their this symbol of a gun with an x through it?"

"Very good question, follow me."

Rashon followed him up the metal steps to the next floor. He was shocked at how quiet the system it was, it must have weighed over 100 pounds but he was silent as a feather. Rashon stopped at the top of the stairs and looked around. On this level, guns, guns, and more guns.

"Mother of god" Rashon whispered.

The Lieutenant smiled and continued walking, they passed by several rows of weapons, which didn't seem to be organized according to type, but rather person. Finally they reached Adrian's weapons. A huge pistol, and a carbine of a larger assault rifle. "Is this it?" Adrian exclaimed. Everyone else had these huge weapons that made them look like Rambo while Adrian had guns that made him look like any other soldier.

"What you don't like them? Well in that case, here you go." The Lieutenant picked up a large back pack and shoved it into Adrians' hands and left the room. Adrian looked around for a second and then opened the bag. In it was ammo, grenades, a comm set, and various items for long range patrols.

Adrian put on the back pack, slung his rifle over his shoulder and then left the room.

The ODSTs stood there, with their mouths wide open as Adrian stepped into the room. He took his helmet off and then said "follow me marines." He motioned for them to come after him then left the room to go back to the facility.

As the marines came into the room they kept their mouths wide open. They were completely stunned by all the knew equipment. "All right, find your name and enjoy, if you need help with putting the suits on, ask someone who knows, guns are upstairs. Oh, and everyone needs to be upstairs in 15 minutes, we aren't done training yet." Adrian said this and then left.



Major Alexei had been up the entire previous night studying the pictures and sketches of the Covenant defenses on Reach. They had nearly an entire brigade around every plasma launcher, plus another 4 divisions patrolling around them. He leaned back into his chair and went to sleep. He'd think about this another time.


06:01 EST December 8, 2554

Fort Custer

Rashon slowly rolled out of bed and fell onto the floor. He struggled to his feet and looked around. After throwing his alarm into a wall, shattering it, but ending its incessant buzzing, he left the room for the showers.

After showering, and getting dressed he walked down to the officers mess hall. The past 2 weeks it had been almost completely empty, but today it was almost full. Adrian sat down at the only empty table remaining and entered in his breakfast selection. A second later it popped out and he began to eat it. He was interrupted in the middle of his first bite when someone tapped his shoulder. Adrian turned around to see the person.

"Colonel Rashon?"

"Yes?"

"I am Colonel Aaron Ruiz, assistant to General Tasatka, he has requested your presence in the CIC immediately." The officer demanded.

"All right, but at least let me finish my meal fi..." Rashon started to say.

"No sir, he wants you NOW." The Colonel said, even more impatiently this time.

"Ugh...." Adrian got up and followed Ruiz to the CIC.

"Colonel Rashon, we have a bad situation developing. Our sensors on Reach show that Covenant ships are leaving the system, only one or two have left so far, but they are repairing them quickly. Our strike, regrettably, has been advanced 1 week. You launch in 1 hour." The General said this and then turned back to another officer. Adrian took a second to let the news sink in.

Adrian left the CIC for his groups barracks. He walked into his office and hit the intercom button. "All members of the 54th ODST Regiment, 4th battalion, report to barracks immediately." He flipped the switch off and began packing his gear. He grabbed his orders as they printed off of his computer and left the room.

The marines came into the room and after 3 minutes the entire battalion, 280 men in total, were in the barracks. Adrian flipped on the intercom system for the barracks room only. "I am to advise you all, that we will be departing for Reach in one hour." Adrian read through the orders. "The 82nd Marine Division will arrive in system 30 minutes following our arrival. We are to board the Covenant frigate Swiftsure, and proceed with our mission. The Frigate is in low orbit over the planet, and will be in position to fire down on Colonel Alexei's division as they make their assault on the Covenant ground batteries. I want the commanders of the 211th Detachment, Alpha, Bravo, and Charlie Company to report in my office immediately. Rest of you, saddle up." Rashon flipped the switch off and went back into his office. A few seconds later the other commanders arrived in his office. All four saluted, and were put at ease. "All right, I'll make this short. I know this is being rushed, but Covenant ships are beginning to leave the system, and command is afraid if we wait longer the Covenant will escape. Our only chance is to hit them now. We have gone through the operation several times, but there is going to be a change. Sergeant Keichi."

"Yes Sir!" Keichi responded.

"We have learned that 2 Elite commanders and a prophet are onboard the Frigate Swiftsure. We are unsure of where however, so your squad will be charged with finding them." Rashon said.

"Yes sir, dead or alive?" Keichi replied, eagerly.

"Alive if possibly, dead if otherwise, but command would like them alive for questioning."

"Yes sir, will do."

"Any questions?" Rashon asked to the entire group. "All right then, we depart at 0700 this morning, give em hell. "

The group filed out of his office and ran through preparations.


06:13
Fort Meyers, ATLAS
Colonel Alexei looked over at the paper coming out on his printer. "Orders....just great." He read the orders and immediately threw it on the floor. "Holy shit, we're fucked" he said to himself. He got on the intercom for the base. "Attention, all personnel are to prepare for departure at 0730 hours this morning." He turned the intercom off and then began to pack his bags and change into his armor.

UNSC Cruiser Leyte Gulf, orbiting Atlas

Admiral Alex Louis looked down at the sheet. "All right, I want you to confirm this, the Operation was not scheduled to begin for another week." He said to the Lieutenant at the comm station. "Sir I have confirmed it twice already" The Lieutenant replied.

"All right." Louis said. He then flipped on his comm set and spoke into it. "Attention, this is Admiral Louis speaking, Operation Revenge will begin at 0700 this morning, EST. All ships are to begin pre-battle procedures now."

Chapter Three: Rise of the Phoenix
Date: 6 September 2003, 12:07 PM

Chapter Three

06:18 EST (Local Time) Fort Custer, ATLAS
(Advanced Training center for Logistics And Strategic assault)

Sergeant Keichi picked up his helmet and ran out of the barracks. As he ran through the hallways of the base he struggled to avoid other personnel attempting to get to their positions. As he neared the main elevator that would take him to the surface, the rest of his squad joined him. They slowly pushed through the crowd until they were on the elevator. Even then, they were still fighting a crowd. Hundreds of other troops in the base were needed topside, and naval personnel in the base had to get to their ships.

The elevator finally reached the top after what seemed like forever, but in reality was only two minutes. The elevator had been stopping at nearly ever floor to pick up more passengers. "Don't they realize that other elevators do exist in this base?!" Keichi finally screamed in anger. "Don't take it too hard sarge, ya know if they don't get topside, that means no fleet, and if we got no fleet, we might as well not go up either." Corporal Cecil Baynes replied.
"Wow ya don't say?" Keichi replied with this and the finger.

The rest of the people remained quiet on the elevator, which was unusual. "How can you keep 50 people on an elevator quiet when they barely have room to breath?" Keichi thought to himself.


6:25 EST (Local Time) Sea Hawk dropship Checkmate 1-1

Major Rashon checked the time. Only a few more minutes and they would be ready to launch. As the last few marines were boarding on the other Sea Hawks, his own craft began to lurch forward. The Sea Hawks had been developed primarily for ODST operations. They were smaller and quicker than the Pelicans, but lacked any armor at all. A small amount of damage would, in theory, completely destroy a Sea Hawk. "Not a comforting thought." Rashon said to himself.
"What was that Major?" Lieutenant Barnes yelled, trying to outdo the engines.

"Nothing, I just thought that it wouldn't be fun to get shot up in one of these things." Rashon yelled back.

"Are you out of your fucking mind sir? When the hell is it fun to be shot up?" Barnes replied.

"Its fun to get shot up with drugs I bet" Sergeant Wallace added in.

All three laughed, but quickly shut up as the Sea Hawk began shaking violently.

"What the fuck is going on?' Adrian screamed at the pilot.

"Sorry sir, we were passing behind a group of Pelicans, they move the air around a lot." The pilot replied.

"Oh, well try and avoid them" Adrian ordered.

"Aye, aye sir." The Pilot said this and took back the controls from the co-pilot.


6:34 EST (Local Time) Fort Meyers, ATLAS

Alexei whistled. Around him was nearly 500 Pelicans, all loaded with marines. The landing pad at Fort Meyers was enormous. Besides the Pelicans, nearly 100 Longsword Fighters were taking off to the north, and to the south, about 70 Penguin class heavy supply ships were also taking off. On board the Penguin's were 210 SBT.1A1 King Cobra super tanks.

The King Cobra featured a 140mm cannon, which could double as a long range artillery piece if needed. What gave the tank the designation as a "Super Tank" was its' was that the Cannon was a 140mm MAC cannon. The tank had light armor, mostly ceramic plate, designed specifically to defeat Covenant plasma weapons. The tanks were extremely swift, so that it would be much easier to out-maneuver any opposing Covenant army. In this case, the forces on REACH. This tank also came in handy for another reason. It could work in a vacuum. Its engines were made from captured Ghosts and other Covenant craft. It could fly poorly in space, but it could still be used for air defense roles, although it was a rather easy target to hit.

Alexei watched as the hatch closed and then walked towards the front of the Penguin command craft. It was basically an AWACs craft. Their shuttle would never land, they wouldn't be with the troops. Instead they would be above the battlefield monitoring troop movements and making movements with their own troops.

"Colonel Alexei, we are assigning you to take out a Covenant defense group on Hill 681. ONI recon probes show that the Covenant Special forces are based on that hill. I will send the information to you." General Sebastian Ross startled Alexei with this.

"General, I am already striking 3 other positions. Isn't there another regiment available?" Alexei replied.

"No Sasha, we need as many troops as we can get our hands on to break through those Covenant defense lines. We need your regiment to cover our rear as we break through. That special forces camp could really cause some problems if it isn't taken care of, understand?" The general informed.

"Yes sir." Alexei replied.

Alexei went back to the central command room on the large craft. The ship was nearly 200 metres long, and weighed over 1 million kilograms, approximately the size of a small warship. He walked into the command room, it was nearly completely empty. Most of the commanders were in cryo-stasis waiting for the ship to reach its destination. The only ones left were the ones with battle plans to finish.

06:57 Cruiser UNSC Leyte Gulf, in Slipstream, approx 21.3 light years from REACH

Admiral Louis paced around the CIC. It was empty, except for two navigation and a communications officer. "What is the status of our troops?" He asked the comm officer.

"The 89th Battalion is in slipstream sir, estimated time of arrival in Sigma Octanus system is 17 hours. 82nd Marine Division is also in slipstream, they will arrive about 5 minutes after the Special Ops do Admiral." The officer reported.

"All right Lieutenant, I'll be down in my quarters." The Admiral replied.

Louis left the CIC and walked to his cabin, which was only a little ways down the hall. He was extremely nervous about this operation. It was extremely risky, but this is the best chance they would have to eliminate the Covenant strike force.


00:02 EST (ATLAS Time) Sea Hawk Dropship Checkmate 1-1

"All pilots and ground forces, we are exiting slipstream, lock your visors and prepare for enemy action." The lead pilot ordered.

Adrian put his helmet on and locked it down, he then loaded his weapon and watched the rest of his men do the same. On his dropship were 20 officers and special guards. They were to seize the bridge of the Swiftsure and then command the rest of the operation from there.

The Sea Hawk dropship shuttered violently as though it had been hit by a freight train going 500 mph. If the marines had not been locked into their seats they would have been thrown all around the cargo bay.

"Contact Seraphs, 20 K Clicks and closing fast!" One of the pilots yelled through the comm system.

"Checkmate 1-1, I count 19 Seraphs on intercept course with us."

"Haven 1 to Checkmate 1-1, we'll take care of those fighters, just make sure you get to the Switftsure." The Fighter commander replied.

The Sabre Medium fighters broke away from the group of dropships and headed towards the enemy Seraphs. They were coming from the Covenant fleet, on the back side of the planet. The plan was for the fighters to draw the Covenant craft in their direction while the dropships raced around the planet and hit them from behind. Being a Frigate, which was not well armored, and also having several chief Covenant officers on board, it would most certainly be at the back of the formation and somewhat easy to reach.

The Sabre fighters engaged the Seraphs, ripping them apart. Nearly 10 of the 19 Seraphs were destroyed in the first missile salvo. The 18 Sabre craft mixed in with the remaining Covenant craft and a dogfight ensued. More Covenant craft joined the fight, but the UNSC pilots had no reinforcements.

The Dropships began to gain more and more speed as they ran in extremely low orbit over REACH. Down below them was a desolate, and barren planet. It looked ugly now, only large bulging craters and huge black scars colored the landscape. As the dropships came within visual siting of the fleet, they immediately spotted the Covenant frigate Swiftsure and began to make their run on it.

"Checkmate 1-1 to all dropships, fire Anti-Matter charges on my mark. 5...4...3...2...1...MARK!"

The dropships all released missiles slung beneath the craft at the Covenant frigate ahead. The missiles raced in on their unsuspecting target. As the missiles closed in on the craft, the ship began slowly changing directions. As they came yet closer in, the craft began to make emergency maneuvers and fire its defensive lasers. Most of the Anti-matter missiles breached the defenses and struck the shields around the ship, causing them to shatter from the overwhelming force placed on them.

"The shields are down, depressurize cargo bay and prepare for contact."

The Sea Hawk flipped around 180 degrees and slowly backed into the Covenant craft. It hit the craft on the forward hull and then fired explosive charges which ripped a piece of armor away from the ship. The cargo bay door opened and the marines rushed through the gap.

"All right marines, lets move!" Rashon yelled out.

4 ODST Guards took point. The room was completely clear, so they secured the door and waited for the rest of the group. The marines burst through the door into yet another room, this time inhabited with grunts, a few jackals, and 2 elites. This must have been the medical bay since they were all wounded.

"Waste the fuckers" Rashon yelled.

On that order all of the soldiers opened fire, ripping the wounded Covenant soldiers to pieces and spraying blood all over the room. The group closed the door to this room and the dropship took off and headed back for slipstream.

00:19 EST (ATLAS Time) Covenant Frigate Swiftsure, D Deck, Section 52

Keichi leaned around the corner, 2 Elites were talking to each other in front of a door. Both Elites had on maroon armor, not people he wanted to get involved with.

"Tashek, get over here." He whispered to his sniper, Larin Tashek.
"Yeah skip?"

"2 maroon elites around the corner, gimme 2 in the head."

Tashek leaned around the corner with his sniper rifle in his hands. One of the Elites looked at him, but only for a second before twin 7.48x67mm rounds pierced his skull as well as the other Elites' skull. Both fell down dead. The suppressed rifle had still been powerful enough to kill the elites, although they had only been 20 metres away.

The group proceeded further aft in the ship, until finally they reached their destination. The 4 soldiers still remaining, one had been killed as they blasted their way onto the ship, grouped around the door. Keichi walked up to the door and kicked it with the bottom of his boot. The door was extremely strong, much too strong to kick open. He fell backwards and landed on his ass. "God dammit, what the fuck, who the fuck makes these fuckin doors?" He grumbled.

"Sir you want me to just hack the door?" Corporal Baynes finally said.

"Yeah sure, whatever floats your boat." Keichi replied.

Baynes walked up to the door and hooked a device up to it. 5 seconds later the door opened. Inside was a table. With 2 Gold Elites sitting at it with a Prophet at the head.

"Well hello boys and girls, todays' class will be on how not to loose a war." Keichi said.

The 4 soldiers walked into the room, with guns drawn, pointing at 1 at each Elite and 2 at the Prophet. Both Elites through their hands up and were disarmed by the marines. The Prophet however, was not armed and refused to put his hands up.

"God dammit, stupid dumbfuck, when I tell ya to do somethin ya goddam do it or I'll blow your fuckin head straight to hell!" Keichi yelled. The Prophet just stared at him, completely oblivious to what he was saying. Keichi finally got ticked off and whacked him across the face with his pistol, rendering the Prophet unconscious.

00:17 EST (ATLAS Time) Covenant Frigate Swiftsure, E Deck, Section 14

Alpha Company had snuck through the Covenant ship. Well, snuck is hardly appropriate, more of a massive covert strike. Nearly 90 troops were rampaging through this deck, killing anything that wasn't human. They needed to reach the Reactor, which was just a few hundred yards aft. The Covenant ship was a maze however, each hallway either led the wrong way or to no place at all.

Chapter Four: Rise of the Phoenix
Date: 7 September 2003, 3:47 PM

CHAPTER FOUR

00:21 EST (ATLAS Time) Covenant Frigate Swiftsure, Bridge

Rashon walked around the room. Just outside were two bodies, formerly Elite guards. Inside were two Elites and several grunts. The Elites were both dead, they had fire on the marines as they entered the room, unfortunately they stood no chance. The grunts, seeing the Elites fall in a matter of seconds, immediately surrendered. The marines blew up the Weapons console of the ship, hoping that it would disable the ship from firing. Rashon then grabbed his comm set and spoke into it. "Bravo1-1, Bridge secure, All units report in."

Keichi's voice came back through first. "Delta 1-1, suspects apprehended."

"Wow that was fast." Rashon said back through it.

"They didn't have a whole lot of guards. You want us to bring the prisoners up to the bridge?"

Rashon thought for a minute. "No I'll send a team down there to escort you back."

Rashon ordered 10 of his guards to go to Keichi's group and bring them back.

"Alpha 1-1, you guys finished chatting?" Lieutenant Alan Barnes voice came through

"Yeah, go ahead Alpha 1-1" Rashon replied.

"Reactor room has been secured, we suffered to casualties, one wounded one killed."

"Roger, hold positions and keep in contact, feel free to scout the rest of your deck." Rashon replied back through.

"Alpha 1-1, holding position, out." Barnes ended.

"Charlie 1-1, we are having trouble finding the CIC, we may need a few more minutes."

"All right Charlie 1-1, keep in contact, we need to capture the CIC before the 82nd arrives."

"Roger, Charlie 1-1 out."


00:25 EST (ATLAS Time) Covenant Frigate Swiftsure, H Deck, Section 25

Charlie Company was frantically running through the ship. They needed to find the CIC but every pathway lead nowhere. Sergeant Alfred Wallace finally walked up to a door. His squad of 8 men were behind him. The door opened and inside was a hangar. An Elite immediately spotted the group and sounded the alarm.
"This is Bravo 1-1, what the hell happened?"

"Bravo 1-1, this is Charlie 3-1, we have been compromised, we found the hangar but are under heavy attack!" Wallace replied back.

Wallace and his men were frantically trying to move forward into the hangar and set up defensive positions. They were on the 3rd of 4 levels and somewhat well protected. Wallace's men opened fire on the enemy troops on their level and then turned to the troops above. 2 of his men fell from enemy plasma fire. One had been hit in the face, the plasma quickly ripped through his shield and left the man screaming as plasma ate through his face. The other had been blown off of the level by a plasma grenade. His body was 3 floors down.

"This is Charlie 3-1, we are taking heavy enemy fire, need back up now!" As Wallace said this an Elite walked up behind his corporal and sliced him in half with a plasma sword. Wallace turned on his own sword and swung at the Elite, who blocked his strike and through him back. The Elite moved to jump on Wallace but was stopped in mid-air by a shotgun blast to the side. "Thanks Xang." Wallace said to the Private who had saved him.

"No problem chief" Xang said this and then turned around to face a fuel rod blast. He dove out of the way but was still hit. He screamed as he looked at his body. His lower legs had been completely burned off.

"Get a fuckin medic up here now!" Wallace yelled. "6 and 7 you watch the door, shoot and Covies that try and come in behind us, 3 and 4, take care of those Hunters."

The group was being ripped apart fast. The Hunters had fired down from above, and then quickly retreated out of site. They still had not returned, although their fuel rod cannons were definitely recharged by now. The group reformed and set up a new perimeter. As they finished moving about the platform the doors to their left opened. Behind them were two hunters, side by side. Both fired at the group, blowing 2 marines to pieces. "Watch the left flank!" Wallace yelled. The Hunter then turned to him and fired. The round went just over his head, but hit another marine behind him. Now it was just Wallace and one other marine, although Xang was barely alive, screaming on the ground. He was silenced as a Hunter crushed his skull however.

The Hunters continued firing on Wallace and the other marine, who had taken cover behind a large barrier, that was just barely holding out against the blast of the fuel rods. Two loud thuds followed by two loud explosions quickly changed their luck. Wallace looked over the barrier only two see pieces of one hunter scattered everywhere, and another one limping on the ground, with only one leg. He was trying to escape but a marine walked up behind him and stabbed him in the back with his plasma sword.

"What the hell happened sergeant? The Lieutenant demanded.

"We opened the door and it turned out to be Pandora's box." Wallace replied.

"All right, rest of you men secure the hangar." 20 Marines rushed through the door and began a slow methodical search of the hangar, shooting anything that moved.

"I'll be back with the main group, they've secured the CIC. Clear out the hangar and then report in." The Lieutenant said this and left.


00:29 EST (ATLAS Time) Covenant Frigate Swiftsure, E Deck, Section 23

"I got him pinned down!" The Private yelled, while another one through an impact fragmentation grenade behind a crate. The grenade exploded upon impact and the body of a marine flew out from behind the crate.

"Yeehaw!" one of the marines shouted. The Covenant had been trying to take back the Reactor room, but without information from the Bridge or CIC, their attacks had been anything but coordinated, and they were slowly being ripped apart.

"Alpha 7-1 to Alpha 1-1, we have heavy contacts on the aft perimeter, we could use a little help."

"Roger Alpha 7-1, I'm sending Alpha 6-1 to assist." Barnes replied.

On the aft perimeter, not much action had taken place, mostly because there wasn't much aft of the Reactor Room. Not much, except the Special Ops command room, which the Marines would soon find that the aft perimeter was a deadly place to be.

"What the hell was that?" A Corporal shouted.

"What?" The Sergeant responded.

"I thought I saw something mov..."

The Sergeant interrupted the Corporal, "Spec Ops! Open fire!"

The Marines began spraying the hallway with automatic fire from their rifles. A several bullets struck Elites, whose shields lit up and revealed Covenant troops in black armor. The Elites activated their plasma swords and charge at the marines. One of them, who was unlucky enough to be standing directly in front of the Elites, was decapitated with a single stroke. Another was hit by Plasma fire and thrown on the ground. The Elites however, had no where to hide and were cut to pieces by shotgun and rifle fire. Two more marines would die and another 3 were injured before the Elites were all dead.

"This is Alpha 7-1, we have encountered multiple special ops Elites." The Sergeant informed the rest of the group. He then turned back down the hallway and began firing at the Jackals, who followed the Elites in and were trying to push forward. Before they got very far Alpha 6-1 showed up and the group began walking forward, blasting everything in the hallway. They walked forward like some massive wall of fire, destroying anything in their way, they looked like the Phoenix.

"Alpha 7-1, area secured, Alpha 6-1 will stay here in case they are needed again."


00:32 EST (ATLAS Time) Penguin command dropship Starman 1-1

The 82nd Marine Division had been out of slipstream for some time now. They had no where to go until the Swiftsure was out of action, it secured the approach to the Covenant ground batteries. The Fighter battled had died down, and the Covenant were starting to realize what had happened. Hundreds of Covenant dropships were now inbound for REACH and the Swiftsure. They had discovered the UNSC plan and were not going to allow them to succeed.

"All units, Swiftsure secured, begin your approach."

The Dropships broke into a large formation and began to descend to the surface. Covenant ground fire was non existent, the landing zone they had selected was 50 miles east of the ground batteries, and the dropships came in under their field of fire.

The first dropship touched down. The cargo bay slowly opened as more dropships touched down around it. SBT.1A1 King Cobra tanks rolled out the back end of the dropships and began to form up with other tanks. "Iron 1-1 to Starman 1-1, we are ready to move out."

Command had 210 super tanks with which to take the Ground batteries out. Alexei was given 10 to secure the rear of the force. He also had about 50 other vehicles and 800 troops. His force was not only tasked with securing the rear, but destroying 4 Covenant outposts around the LZ. They had limited amounts of troops but they could be used as landing spots for Covenant craft, and by seizing them the UNSC forces could set up a defensive barrier around their own LZ.

Chapter Five: Rise of the Phoenix
Date: 20 September 2003, 4:28 PM

CHAPTER FIVE

00:39 EST (ATLAS Time) Penguin command dropship Starman 1-1

"General, my unit is in position, ready to begin assault on Objective Trident." Alexei said to General Ross.

"Good, we can begin our assault." Ross looked around at all the other officers standing around the battle map. "We have landed our troops, and are beginning to fan out and move into formation. Sensors show that Covenant troops have landed in these locations." Ross said this as multiple dots appeared on the map and began flashing red.

"We believe that the Covenant have a division size force massing in this area. This adds several complications, so we'll have to move quickly, and set up air defenses to keep more Covenant forces from landing. Any questions? Good, then get back to your positions." Ross ended.

The officers left the table and went back to their individual control stations. From their they plotted new waypoints for their ground forces and analyzed the Covenant movements.

00:41 EST (ATLAS Time) SBT.1A1 Iron 2-1

"Load HAVOK!" Major Jason Huff yelled to his gunner. He then flipped on his comm system and ordered all of his other tanks to hold their fire. "FIRE!" He then yelled to his gunner. Out went a 140mm shell, but this was not a conventional shell, but a HAVOK nuclear tipped shell. The warhead streaked in towards its target, a regiment of Covenant armor, closely packed in a depot 4,500 metres away.

Huff looked through his thermal scope and watched as the screen was blinded by a massive flash. He then looked at his battle screen. "God I love this tank" Huff said to his gunner.

"Cuz it has a huge ass cannon?" The gunner asked his commander.

"No cuz it has EMP protection, kind of pointless to have a nuclear cannon if your tank gets disabled when you fire it." Huff replied.

"Oh.....good point." The gunner spoke.

Huff flipped his comm system on. "Ok, all tanks proceed forward. Before you fire, verify target with me, I don't want two tanks firing at the same target." Huff flipped it back off and then sat back in his seat as the tank lurched forward. Within 20 seconds they were traveling across the barren planet at 100 kilometres per hour.



00:45 EST (ATLAS Time) Covenant Frigate Swiftsure, Bridge
"All units, prepare to plant charges and get the hell out." Rashon said into the comm unit. His group had finished its' task, capture the leaders, gather as much info as possible, and now it only needed to blow the ship to pieces.

Rashon and his men planted charges on the bridge and left. They followed the trail of dead bodies back to the room where they had rammed through the ships hull. Waiting there was the two pilots from their dropships. "Glad to see you decided to come back!" The pilot said as the troops entered the room.

"No time for small talk, we got 2 minutes before this thing blows." Rashon responded.

"All right, lets get the fuck off this thing." The pilot turned around and headed back through the airlock and into the dropship. The ODSTs were right behind him. They sat down in their seats and strapped in.

"Disengaging airlock, brace for launch." The pilot said through the intercom. Two seconds later the airlock disconnected and a large blast shook the dropship. The ship shot away from the Swiftsure and joined with the other dropships on an outbound course.

00:51 EST (ATLAS Time) Penguin Command ship Starman 1-1

Alexei watched his battle screen as the Covenant frigate Swiftsure disappeared off the map. About 100 dropships that were docked with it and approaching the vessel also disappeared. The ODSTs had completed their mission, now it was the Marines' turn to kick some ass. He looked at his troop positions. His forces on Hill 681 were not having much trouble. They hard started their attack with a massive bombardment. They used their two tanks effectively. The forces were completely around the camp and were preparing to sweep in and mop up the rest of the Covenant forces.

00:57 EST (ATLAS Time) SBT.1A1 Iron 2-1

In the last 15 minutes Major Huffs' tanks had advanced 15 miles. His group was now within striking of the first ground battery. Nearly 15 Covenant Plasma launchers were in this group. All of his tanks stopped in a line abreast and waited for his order to fire. "All units, fire on my command." Huff said into the comm unit. He waited five seconds and then yelled "FIRE!" All of the tanks opened up at once. After the first salvo the tanks began firing at will. After 1 minute the 20 tanks had fired 107 rounds, more than completely decimating the battery.

"Nice job marines, all right lets go to the next objective."

01:01 EST (ATLAS Time) Penguin Command ship Starman 1-1

"All right, we have somewhat of a situation. Iron 2-1 is nearly 20 miles in front of the main group, normally I would say that is good, but it leaves our right flank completely exposed, and their rear exposed as well. I would have them fall back, but in five minutes they will be within striking distance of two more Covenant batteries. Our centre is having slow progress, so what I plan to do, is have the centre forces, break apart in the middle and go around the Covenant forces. They have nearly an entire division between the centre and the batteries. By splitting our forces, they will be able to hit us in the rear, but I am counting on our speed to outrun them. Our left flank will spearhead through the Covenant lines to the north, half of the centre group will follow through the gap they create, while the other half moves into the hole Iron 2-1 made. Now I have made my speech, any questions?" Ross asked.

"Yes general, my men are on the left flank, but I sent two regiments to assist the centre, they are currently on the right end. Should I give them over to Iron 5-1 completely? I only ask because they can't possibly rejoin but I will be shorthanded if I do" The Colonel asked.

"Yes, I will have Alexei's group reinforce yours." The General responded.

"Any more questions? If not then Alexei, I want you to begin moving your forces away from the LZ. Those ground batteries are more important, and you have already destroyed most of the bases."

The officers once again left the battle map and went back to their control consols.

Chapter Six: Rise of the Phoenix
Date: 29 September 2003, 4:50 AM

CHAPTER SIX

01:03 (ATLAS Time) Bridge UNSC Cruiser Leyte Gulf

1st Lieutenant Nick Rosen flipped the comm switch to the CIC. "Admiral, we are preparing to exit slipstream......exiting now." Rosen flipped the comm switch off and walked over to the sensors station on the bridge. "What have we got now?" Nick asked the sensors officer.

"Looks like a couple cruisers, some destroyers, and quite a few frigates. I count 79 ships total, about 30 of them appear to be damaged, 9 of them are definitely out of service." The sensor officer replied.

"All right people, keep sharp, navigation, how far till we reach the Covenant fleet?" Nick demanded.

"Sir, we exited fairly close to the Covenant fleet, I estimate we have thirty seconds until we are in range to fire." The navigation officer replied.

"All right, weapons, give me a firing solution, Loki should have one picked out for the entire fleet." Rosen said, referring to the ships AI.

"Lieutenant, I have firing solution, locking it into computers now." The weapons officer responded.

Rosen looked out of the view ports at REACH. It was like a gray and brown marble. It was somewhat disgusting, looking very similar to vomit, but somewhat beautiful with the black backdrop. Rosen then turned to the Covenant fleet. The ships still resembled stars or something similar, maybe too bright to be stars, but they were still too small to look like warships.

"Lieutenant, the fleet is preparing to fire, but the Covenant fired first, enemy rounds are incoming now." The sensors operator reported.

Rosen thought for a second, if the fleet fired their salvo now, their shields would be weakened by the amount of energy needed to fire the MAC cannons, but if they waited the Covenant would be able to continue firing and make them go to a defensive stature. The admiral was no fool however, and 5 seconds later the entire 17th fleet, all 57 ships, opened a full salvo on the Covenant fleet.

The Covenant torpedoes streaked in towards their targets. The UNSC ships, rather than break formation and try evasive maneuvers, remained somewhat in formation. The cruisers and larger destroyers however, moved in front of the frigates to take the blows for them. The Frigates would have been decimated by a torpedo strike, where as the larger ships could absorb several.

The Torpedoes slammed into their targets. Rosen looked out the view ports as flashes of plasma went by his ship and then struck targets around him, causing their shields to flare a bright blue and then go back to being transparent. One ship however, shields flared and then collapsed. The UNSC Chehalis was struck by a Torpedo in the side. It was the 3rd torpedo to hit the ship, and it went right through the shields and into the armor. The torpedo broke through what little armor the frigate had and hit the armory. The Leyte Gulf shook violently as the shockwave from the frigate reached it. The wave was followed by thousands of fragments from the ship.
"Give me a damage assessment" Nick ordered to the Defensive Systems operator. "Lieutenant, shields holding near 59 percent, several small craft were knocked out by the debris, a few are still alive but dead in the water, shall I dispatch rescue teams?"

"No, we don't have enough resources to launch a rescue party now, we will wait until the battle is over." Rosen new very well that most of the pilots would be dead by then, but the fleet just couldn't afford to launch a rescue party now, in the middle of a major battle.

"Sir our MAC Salvo is impacting now." The weapons officer reported.

Rosen looked at the battle map. He watched as Covenant warships were hit by incoming MAC rounds. First their shields flared, then after a few successive rounds they failed them and the cannon shots began hitting the hulls of the ship. The MAC rounds fired from the Leyte Gulf were somewhat more effective that the others. A 50 megaton nuclear warhead had been attached to the front of the rounds. It had a proximity detonator set for 100 metres, the tungsten rounds still managed to survive the blast due to the thick titanium shield around the warhead, which only allowed the bomb to detonate in a forward motion. The MAC round did however, hit with a much lesser force.

"13 enemy ships knocked out sir, 9 damaged." The weapons officer reported again.

"How long till next salvo?"

"Fleet will fire next main salvo in thirty seconds, a secondary salvo will fire ten seconds later."

"SIR! Enemy firing second salvo! ETA twenty seconds!" The sensors operator yelled.

"All ships evasive maneuvers! Frigates take cover, Cruisers move in front and try and take as many hits as possible." Admiral Louis said through the fleet com system.

The formation broke apart, Frigates immediately began blowing emergency charges and drastically changed courses, while the Cruisers moved in front and began deploying countermeasures like mad.

The Covenant torpedoes reached the fleet. Only a few went for the decoys, while the rest stayed on target. The Leyte Gulf vibrated as a torpedo hit it.

"Shields down to thirty-four percent sir!" The defensive systems operator sounded off.

A second torpedo hit the ship, causing the lights to dim, but flare back to life.

Finally a third, followed closely by a fourth and fifth torpedo hit the ship. The entire ship rocked as though they were having an earthquake. The officers not seated on the bridge were thrown about like toys, and even some who were seated were uplifted and thrown across the room. The ship suffered more aftershocks as Longbow missiles exploded in their launch bays.

"Damage report!" Rosen yelled.

"Sir missile bays on the port side are all out of action. Shutting down all port compartments. Hull breached in three places, MAC system temporarily offline, I'm trying to bring it back up." The Systems operator replied.

"Admiral Louis to bridge, what is your status. We have lost all links to the ships sensors."

"Admiral, we have suffered moderate damage, missile bays on the port side are out of action, and we have lost MAC capabilities temporarily. Our shields are climbing but only at three percent per minute." Rosen replied.

"All right, turn the ship around and head back to the far side of the planet. I want our dropships to begin recovery operations for ground and space personnel. I will be moving the flag to the Juan de Fucas." Louis ordered.

"Yes sir, we are changing course now."

The Leyte Gulf changed course and began heading against the fleet, in its wake other heavily damaged ships followed, nearly 15 total. The UNSC had already lost 17 ships and only destroyed 13, they needed a miracle.


01:11 EST (ATLAS Time) SBT.1A1 Iron 2-1

"Well that's the last of the ground batteries, I guess we'd better regroup with the rest of the main force." Major Huff said into the battalion comm system.

"Admiral Louis to Iron 2-1." A voice said through the radio.

"This is Iron 2-1, go ahead." Huff replied.

"Iron 2-1, we are taking heavy fire from Covenant warships in orbit, can you help us any?"

"I'll see what I can do. I might not hit anything though."

Huff ordered his armor to begin taking aim on the Covenant warships in orbit. The guns were elevated to the limit, 35 degrees.

"All units fire on my command." Huff waited five seconds. "FIRE!"

20 one hundred kiloton nuclear tipped rounds streaked away from the tanks. They approached the Covenant ships in orbit, hitting nineteen of them. The Covenant had been caught completely off guard, and while the rounds caused almost no damage, it shocked them a great amount.

"All right, everyone target the same ship this time." Huff said, as he locked a target into the Battalions netlink.

Once again, all of the tanks opened fire again, this time only 14 of the rounds hit their target. It was completely devastated however. The ship was an already damaged frigate, and the additional rounds blew away what remained of it.

The group fired off a few more salvos before the Covenant began to fire back.

"Uh sir....we have incoming..." Huffs Gunner said to him.

Huff looked up. "Aw fuck..." he said, just before the Covenant torpedo rounds hit his tank group, wiping it from the universe forever.

Chapter Seven: Rise of the Phoenix
Date: 10 October 2003, 11:36 PM

CHAPTER SEVEN

01:15 (ATLAS Time) Hangar L-7 UNSC Juan De Fucas

Admiral Louis ran out the back of his shuttle, with his command group close behind him.

"What is our status!?" He shouted to one of the Juan de Fucas' officers.

"Covenant warships are starting to fall back, they are abandoning the damaged ones and preparing to scuttle them! But we have too many damaged ships to pursue them!"

"I don't care, take every ship with guns still firing and chase those bastards! Louis yelled back.

"Sir I don't think th...."

Louis cut him short. "The UNSC doesn't pay you to think, they pay you to do what I tell you to do god dammit!"

"YES SIR!" The officer replied.

The group had reached the hangar bay door and the officer opened it and then stood at attention by it. The rest of the command group went through and he followed them. They ran at a very fast pace until they reached the ships' central corridor, where they boarded a tram that sent them 1.6 klicks aft to the bridge section. Once there they left the tram and boarded an elevator which sent them to the top of the ship, where they exited onto the Bridge Deck.

"Admiral on the deck!" The watch officer shouted. Immediately everyone stood at attention.

"Dammit, pay attention, there is a battle going on!" The admiral barked at the Watch officer.

"Y-yessir." he replied.

"All right, anything new?"

"Sir, we tried to put up a perimeter around the hole in realspace, but we only managed to get a frigate as they left. One of our destroyers followed the Covenant through in their own hole, but she was destroyed when it closed on her, the other half is stuck in slipstream."

"Any ideas for getting them out?"

"None on the top of my head. We are preparing to open a new hole and follow the Covenant, but we don't know where they are going until we find the exit hole, and even they, they could have already left there."
"Yes but they will need to stop for repairs, some of their ships will need to be left behind, we can at least get them." The Admiral said, as the Juan de Fucas jolted into slipstream.

"All right, begin any repairs you can, I will be going to the CIC."

The Captain saluted and Admiral Louis left the bridge.


01:27 (ATLAS Time) Iron 5-2

Captain Luke Brown opened the hatch of his SBT.1A1 and looked out through his faceplate Around him the ground was bubbling, and on top of that were what remained of Iron 2-1. He ordered his tank forward, towards another tank that looked somewhat undestroyed. On the side of the tank was scorched paint markings, bearing half of its name, "Grunt Fr----." He jumped over onto the tank and opened the outer airlock hatch. He pressurized the airlock and then went down into the turret. Inside were bodies, but they could hardly be recognized, the tank had heated up so much that the inside had begun to melt. Several crewmen were lying on the ground, in a way that showed anguish, as they melted to the inside of the tank. "Mother of god..." he whispered. He was about to climb out when he saw something. On the ground lay a helmet, beside it the destroyed corpse of a former tanker. He picked up the helmet and read the name: 2ndLT Adrian Brown.

Luke shook as he held the helmet of his brother. He looked down at the body beside him, it was no longer recognizable. He turned away from the body, but grabbed the memory chip from inside the helmet. He would bury him later, but for now he had more Covenant to kill.



01:45 (ATLAS Time) UNSC Leyte Gulf

"That's the rest of them sir."

"Any word from Admiral Louis?"

"None sir, haven't heard anything since they jumped into slipstream."

"All right, finish up recovery operations, I am going to meet with the ground commanders at the main base down their, they still have a few Covenant troops to round up, right now they are surrendering in the hundreds they say."

"Well I would be too, with a couple hundred super tanks with their guns pointing at me."

"Heh, yeah I suppose that'd make sense."

"Sir we have incoming Emergency Action Message! ATLAS is under attack sir!" The comm officer interrupted.

"WHAT?!" Replied Rosen. "Get all ground units back loaded up and turn us around to ATLAS, leave any ships needing repairs back here and have them send constant messages everywhere reporting this."

Bridge officers began scrambling around the room, trying to regroup the fleet so they could prepare to move back to ATLAS.

"Sir, fleet is regrouping, preparing to enter slipstream in one minute." The Navigation officer reported.

"All right, I want all the ground forces to come in ten minutes after we have, I don't want them to get there first and be ripped apart, make sure they have adequate fighter cover too."

"Aye sir, deploying all remaining fighters." The flight operations officer reported.

"Sir, we only have twenty seven ships remaining, It will be slaughter if they have a large fleet."

"I don't care, we are going!"


01:59 (ATLAS Time) Iron 5-2

Captain Brown closed the hatch of his tank as it rolled up the ramp into the belly of the massive Penguin dropship. It rolled through the cargo bay until it was ordered to stop, just behind Iron 5-1. As the tank came to a stop and the systems began to shut down, he opened the hatch on the turret floor and dropped down into the cockpit. "Sorry about your brother Captain, I here his unit really gave the Covenant some serious hell." The driver, Lieutenant Yarez said.

"Yeah, I'll sure miss him."

"Any word on what is going on sir?"

"I'm not sure, I was getting ready to go find out, I'll see if I can't find whoever is in charge."

"Aye sir"

Captain Brown opened the escape hatch on the floor of the cockpit and dropped out of the tank. Their was air in the cargo bay, which meant that they were probably getting ready to take off.

"Might wanna hold on a to something important, I don't know how many chains they tied us down with but looks like we are gonna be taking off in a minute." Brown said, as he popped his head back into the cockpit.

He dropped back out and crawled the 30 feet to the front of the tank where he could finally stand. He took off his helmet and felt the sweat drip down his face. After being locked up inside a suit without a cooling unit, and inside a tank, any man would be tired. He wiped the sweat out of his eyes and looked around for someone who knew just what the hell was going on.

"Captain Brown to A-Deck Immediately." A voice said through the ships' intercom. He could barely hear it through the loud noise of the engines roaring to life and the technicians working like mad to repair the tanks.

After making his way through the numerous troops and tankers in the cargo bay, he at last made it to an elevator, and began his ride up to A-Deck. C....B....A....The slammed to a stop and then opened. On A deck the dropship looked more like a real ship than anywhere else. This was the deck where troops stayed for long voyages in slipstream. It housed a small barracks, armory, and command quarters. Which was where Brown needed to be. Now hopefully, he would find out what was going on.

Chapter Eight: Rise of the Phoenix
Date: 3 November 2003, 2:17 AM

CHAPTER EIGHT


02:29 (ATLAS Time) Dropship Aires 1-1

Captain Brown took his seat in the room next to the other tank commanders. Several were missing he noticed, probably wounded or dead from combat. On the opposite side of the table were the infantry commanders, and the special operations commander, Major Rashon. At the head was General Ross.

"Please gentlemen, we must hurry, time is critical." Ross said, and the rest of the room settled in and became silent.

"During the battle one of our starships received an EAM stating that Atlas was under attack. We were supposed to follow the fleet into slipstream 10 minutes after they had left, but we had difficulties and are at least 15 minutes behind schedule. We have received little information about the situation on Atlas, but we have gathered information, and decided to deploy troops according to where the Covenant are most likely to be attacking. Units will be sent in to reinforce defenses at vital targets. Before we land, fighter aircraft from the 91st Strike Wing will saturate any Covenant forces in our landing zones. We cannot land until they have completed their mission, Covenant ground batteries will simply rip us to pieces. On the screens in front of you, is the landing sites for your group, I suggest you download them to your own personal data banks and begin preparations for landing." Ross said, concluding his pre-mission lecture.

"General, is there any word from Admiral Louis fleet? Without them all of our ships are useless, since most are heavily damaged." Rashon asked.

"We have been unable to contact Admiral Louis, we can only hope that he received the same message that we did. We are still trying to get a message through to him, but have been unable to contact him in realspace, or slipstream." Ross paused. "Any more questions?"

The room remained silent.

"All right, all officers are to report back here at 20:00. Dismissed."

The officers stood up and filed out of the room.



03:15 (ATLAS Time) UNSC Juan de Fucas

"What do you mean you don't know what it was?" Louis demanded.

"Sir, we were just traveling through slipstream, following the Covenant fleet, and then we were redirected."

"Redirected or just exited?"

"Redirected sir, we are not were we should be, even if we were going the complete wrong way through slipstream at maximum speed, there is no way we could have arrived here."

"So you are saying we were teleported to some other place?"

"It would appear that way sir."

"Can you get a lock on your location?"

"Analyzing local stars.....None match up sir. Wait a second, I am picking up multiple warships on an approach vector, unable to identify."

"Distance?"

"140,000 kilometres and closing extremely fast!"

"Prepare for evasive maneuvers, all crew general quarters!" Admiral Louis yelled. Around him klaxons began blaring.

"Sir! Enemy warships are opening fire!" One of the crewmen yelled. Seconds later the ship was split in half by a powerful beam. The fusion reactors went critical, vaporizing the ship. All other ships followed suit, but not before the frigate Reprisal could get off one last message.

UNSC REPRISAL

EMERGENCY ACTION MESSAGE

17th FLEET ARRIVED IN ANDROMEDA GALAXY AT 03:11 ATLAS TIME. UNIDENTIFIED WARSHIPS HAVE OPENED FIRE. SITUATION CRITICAL. ALL INFORMATION ENCLOSED WITH MESSAGE.

END OF MESSAGE


09:18 (ATLAS Time) Lis Ain Apj'dos RAFB, Talos IV

"Incoming UNSC traffic, relaying.....here it is." The Lieutenant in charge of the comm station looked over the sergeants shoulder as he said this. On the screen flashed a message written in Terran language, below, it has been converted as best as it could into his native tongue. He looked at it for a second, trying to make sense of the message and then realized what it was saying.

"Sergeant Majaki, get head quarters on the line now, we have a serious situation." The lieutenant shouted.

"Aye sir, to General Kalson or all the way up?" Majaki replied.

The officer paused for a second. "All the way up."

"Yes sir, patching it through now." Majaki flipped a switch on the panel in front of him.
"Communications Centre, Lis Ain Apj'dos to Central Command, we have a level one emergency."

"What is your situation Lis Ain Apj'dos?"

"We have a intercepted a Black Night, the coordinates are from unknown location, suggest activation of Protocol L-7-C."

"One second."

There was a pause from the other controller, then he spoke back in.

"Roger, activating protocol L-7-C, fleet will be mobilized, all units have been informed."

Majaki turned around and faced his commander.

"What the hell is going on sir?" He asked.

"I know everyone in here is wondering what is going on, but to be honest, the message didn't say, that is what is wrong. The message was short, abrupt, and to be honest, is scary as hell."

The Lieutenant put the message on the main screen in the room, so that all could see just what he meant. If the Covenant had a fleet that powerful, no human would be safe, anywhere.


09:27 (ATLAS Time) RLNS Reshiya, orbiting Talos IV

"Well looks like we're in for it now." Captain Samara said.

"What is it?" His Executive officer, Lieutenant Sanski asked.

"L-7-C, the entire fleet is to rally at these coordinates." As Samara said this he pushed a button in on his command console. In front of him a map of the system appeared and zoomed in on their home planet. A dot flashed showing the location of the rally point.

"Looks like we are in luck, no long hard trip." Sanski said.

"Yes, now we just have to wait for the rest of the fleet to get here, and then wait even longer for orders."


21:59 (ATLAS Time)Checkmate 1-1, over Mois an' Rabet, Minerva (Only moon of ATLAS)

"Sir we've been hit! I can't hold her steady!" The pilot yelled.

"All right, all crew men get strapped down!" Rashon yelled, as he buckled in himself.

The fast moving dropship had been hit in the starboard wing by a Covenant flak round, ripping a massive hole in it. The dropship had been held steady due to the fact that the pilot still had wing surface controls, but when a banshee had hit the wing again with a fuel rod cannon, severing the control wires, the craft began tumbling to the starboard.

The dropship came barreling down through the city, heading north, the craft crashed into the Lan -Beroka River. Both pilot and navigator were killed on impact, as their canopy was unable to stop a million pounds of river water followed by a massive bridge support.

In back most of the troops had died, only five remained. Rashon, who had been strapped in with his seat facing away from the rest of the troops, so that when the seats began colliding, the back of his seat was the only thing damaged. The four others were all just really lucky.

Rashon unstrapped himself from his seat, and immediately fell forward into the door leading to the cockpit. He landed on a body, he tried to roll off of it but only hit another body, this one in a seat. He began feeling around, he thought he felt something like water, he reached up to smell it. Blood. A pool of it on the bottom part of the space craft. He reached to his side and pulled out flashlight and turned it on. He pointed it around the cargo bay, everywhere was miscellaneous items, a few bodies and equipment, mangled about. Blood was stained on the walls, bodies, and then the large pool of it on the bottom.
"Anyone else alive?" He said loudly.

A soldier still strapped in his seat, which was still miraculously strapped onto the wall, raised his hand.

"All right, you ok son?"

"Yes sir, got the wind knocked out of me though."

"All right, just hang tight."

Rashon found three other soldiers still alive, nearly all of them practically unscathed. But how were they going to get out of this place, the only way out was through the main cargo bay door, none of them knew how deep the river might be.

He walked into the airlock, and then closed the door behind him. He took one deep breath and then opened the outer hatch. Water immediately rushed in to him, slamming him back into the steel door behind him, rendering him unconscious.


22:19 (ATLAS Time)Hammer Flight, over Mois an' Rabet

A pair of Sabre fighter jets flew above the small bomber group. Ready to destroy any threat. The last flight to attempt to penetrate enemy air space had been obliterated by Covenant Anti-Air batteries. This time the bombers had a pair of Sabre jets which could perform SEAD missions if any Covenant defenses fired at them.

"Hammer 1 to Halo 1, we are being painted, you see anything?"

"Negative Hammer 1, turn on your ECM, we will move in front of you and check it out."

"Roger Halo 1."

The Sabre jets accelerated past the bombers, immediately Covenant ground batteries opened up on the two jets.

"Halo 2 break left now!"

The two jets broke off in separate directions. Both performed a half loop downwards, lined up side by side, and then strafed a Covenant ground battery. The Covenant flak batteries were protected at close range by about twenty Shade emplacements, but the jets were traveling too fast for the Shades to track them. The two jets opened up on the batteries with AGM-461 Phoenix IV missiles, blasting the shades, as well as the ground battery, into oblivion.

"Nice shot Halo flight."

"Roger that, path is clear, commence bombing run Hammer flight."

"Tally-Ho! Hammer flight engaging, cut to the deck, full throttle Hammer flight."

The four hammer bombers dove towards the ground, weaving to avoid ground fire. Small arms fire shot by the bombers, rarely hitting them, and even then, causing little or no damage. As they approached the target area, a damaged bridge crossing the Lan-Beroka river, the enemy fire became more intense. Covenant vehicles were scrambling to clear the target area, the North Lan-Beroka Bridge, but the enemy Wraiths were too slow. The bombers unleashed their fury. From under each craft, 4 five-thousand kilogram bombs dropped in towards their target. Each plane had two targets, each target was one of the pillars supporting the bridge. And with 10 metric tons of explosives assigned to each support, it was more than enough to knock it out.

The bombs all struck their targets, obliterating the bridge. It disappeared in a giant fireball as the bombers passed overhead.

Adrian looked in horror as the bridge exploded. He had just awoken from his unconsciousness and was beginning to realize where he was. Half a mile upstream was a giant fireball, where his few remaining soldiers where. As the bombers passed overhead he saw multiple plasma flak batteries open up, scoring a hit on one of the fighters flying high escort. The pilots both ejected, and began their descent to the ground. Adrius thought that even if his men were gone, maybe he could try and get to the pilots before the Covenant did.

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