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The Battle of Sol by Joseph Themann
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The First Battle of Sol Part One
Date: 13 August 2003, 2:10 AM
Slipspace Observation Station Kennedy
Around Planet Jupiter, Sol System
"Okay, lets say Dracula verus Frankenstein," Ensign Michael Hatchet asked his partner.
"Dracula," his fellow sensor officer, Lt Danielle Hill answered. "Faster, smarter." Hatchet thought about that.
"Yeah, okay, I could see that. Here's a hard one. Lestat verus Dracula?"
Danielle started to answered, but then a warning light lit up on her display. Both of them got real serious real fast.
"Multiple contacts approaching."
"Run the LADAR," Hatchet instructed, referring to the laser scanner system used to develop a profile of a contact.
Hatchet opened a channel to his CO, LT Miller.
"We got incoming. Multiple contacts, many of them," Hatchet reported. "Mass readings indicate Covenant ships. I'm activating direct scanning protocol now."
"Roger that mate. Activate Cole Protocol into now."
The two sensor officers exchanged looks, and began a data dump.
Sol System Defense Command HQ
New York City, Planet Terra.
"Sir, where getting a message from Kennedy Station. Critical Priority," The communication's rating reported. Admiral Mark Kent, watch commander, strolled over to the printer, and looked at the sheet. Critical Priority messages where the highest priority message in the UN, even higher the FLASH, only used to report threat's to the very existence of the UN.
From: Kennedy Station
To: UNSC High Command, Sol System Defense Command, FLEETCOM Mars.
Priority: CRITICAL
Many ships detected inbound at multiple vectors. Count four hundred plus, confirmed via LADAR, RADAR, and magnetic senor. Cole Protocol activated, total memory wipe. Readings, vectors, and other information attached. The Center Cannot hold, repeat The Center Cannot Hold. Out
"Communications, get me Fleet Admiral McNeal. Get a message to all ships to head to the rendevous points. Get planetary defense online, and active the Lazarus Protocol," Kent ordered. "This isn't a drill people."
Fleet Command Headquarters
Sheffield City, Planet Mars
I looked at the display, noting the location of UNSC ships. After the loss of Reach and Vega system, the General Assembly ordered that all remaining ships head back to Sol, essentially abandoning more then a dozen colony. It was a hard choice, but if the Covenant glassed earth and Mars, then the war would be lost.
Still, even with the entire Fleet, there was less than third hundred capital ships in Sol, and maybe fifteen hundred tactical fighters. But we had some cards up our sleeve. First, there was more then fifty nuclear mines positioned around the most likely approach vectors, backed up my nearly a hundred Super MAC's. Second, R&D had rushed produced a new reversed engineered plasma launchers and deployed them to forward space stations. Third, the new Shiva II antimatter tipped missiles had been deployed to the Fleet about a few weeks ago. Fourth was the Orion class battle-cruisers. Four of them had been running trials in Sol when the Covenant hit Reach.
"We believe that there going to come out of slipspace here, here, and here," the ONI officer said, pointing out locations on the holographic map in the system. "Admiral McNeal has ordered half the Fleet to cover these locations, while the other half is divided among population centers around the system."
"What about the Orion's?" An officer asked.
"One each around Mars and Earth, the other two with the Forward Fleet," The ONI officer reported.
"What's there ETA?" I asked. The ONI officer frowned at me. I get that a lot.
"In about three hours. All ships are already in position, and the fixed defense are ready," he answered.
"Ah, what about the hunter/killer satellites?" I asked.
"The H/K's are all ready and primed."
Two and one half hours later I was on the bridge of the Galatea, one of the Orion class sluggers. The Orions packed enough fire power to talk on two Covenant cruiser by itself. It was armed with six MAC's, a hundred and twenty Archer missile pods, and ten of the Shiva II missiles, not counting over two hundred point defense pods, and four fighter bays.
Unfortunately, we only had four of them, and they were still not complete. They lacked the planned shield generators and there were still problems with it's drives. But they greatly increased out defensive ability.
"So Captain, what's your opinion of the Galatea?" I asked Captain Henry Clark.
"She's a good ship. I would have liked a few more mouths to refine our systems, but I think she'll do," he answered.
"Sir, we got incoming," the sensor officer reported. "Here they come."
Dozens of ships came out of jump, about twenty-thousand klicks away.
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