"All I want to know is did we lose them?" Captain James "Jean Paul" Jones demands. The young captain stands tall and proud in his UNSC Naval uniform before the window at the front of his bridge. The stars twinkle merrily beyond the two-inch thick glass and resin panel as if amused by his plight. The distant colorful bulk of a gas giant spins at the center of its rings so similar to Saturn, kilometer wide asteroids no larger than grains of sand.
"I believe we did. No further Slipspace radiation is detected and scans are reading negative on all known Covenant signatures." The holographic representation of the ship's AI Blucher reports stoically. The AI even speaks with a heavy German accent to better imitate the famous Prussian General and Field Marshal, seemingly choosing such a quirk to better fit with the reputation of the ship he inhabits. The UNSC Bismarck, the infamous battleship reborn as an Epoch-class heavy carrier. One of the most powerful ships in the human fleet though battered after the fierce holding action above Reginald's World.
The Captain grunts and glances at the numerous displays streaming data. The data pad in his hand displays the current munitions and manning numbers along with other consumables. The silence stretches on unbroken but for the standard buzz of communication between the myriad departments formed to undertake the functions of the mighty warship. The inability to find their location in the galaxy is troubling to say the least…and he can't even blame it on a software glitch.
"Put us on silent running, cut the engines and restrict all emissions to LOS only and passives. I want us to be just another sensor hole in space."
"Aye sir." Running lights along the titanic hull wink out all at once, glowing hot engines sputter and die. The familiar rumbling of the colossal engines, a constant companion for every crewman worth their salt, dies off leaving the bridge suddenly silent. Thick titanium blast shields rise over the bridge windows effectively sealing the crew off from any view of space other than the data coming through their consoles and the images of the long-range scopes. The strong telescopes allow a captain to see his foe with his own eyes rather than the streams of data that he would normally be restricted to.
"Update me as soon as you figure out what went wrong with our jump. Until then I want repair parties fixing what we can and shoring up the damaged sections of armor. Cannibalize the Scorpions for materials if we have to."
Over the next three days the Bismarck's crew began the arduous task of patching the wounds their beloved ship suffered at the hands of the Covenant. Pulse lasers, plasma and fuel rod cannons all scored wounds in her meter of Titanium-A battle plating yet failed to pierce her. Each of the EVA repair crews counts themselves lucky that no plasma torpedoes were directed their way knowing that they would be little more than ionized particles floating around the tattered wreck of a ship. Slowly but surely the ravaged armor is patched over under the watchful eye of the Chiefs and First Classes.
The remaining marines and a stray fireteam of ODSTs make themselves somewhat useful by shifting supplies and munitions from damaged storage areas or just generally staying out of the crew's way. And of course, they workout, break things they have no business touching, and clog up the chow lines. All things that fail to endear them to the sailors forced to sail with them. On the fourth day, just as the final patch is being welded into place, odd readings begin flowing through the CIC and comms center.
Strange radio waves on frequencies never used by humanity or the Covenant, radiation and gravitational spikes that make no sense to even Blucher, and then the sight coming through the scopes. Strange ships simply slamming to a stop in a burst of strange radiation readings, most of them shaped like triangles with two pilons jutting from their hull. Their grey and red hulls are dotted with turrets, most no larger than the secondary armament mounted by the Bismarck. The dual quartets of large and medium ships and a trio of corvette analogues accelerate in system past the gas giant before spinning around to face the way they came.
Just in time for twenty-three more ships to arrive in the same manner. These ones are of a less solid design, more linear with sloping hulls over a jagged superstructure. An exposed and unarmored bridge structure juts over the bow which is armed with two large cannons supported by banks of smaller ones. The two fleets close to a surprisingly short range before engaging slinging red and blue bolts of energy back and forth.
The bridge crew watches as the energy readings of the two fleets begin going wild before adding wings of fighters into the mix. The mystifyingly close range of the two fleets continues to confuse the Bismarck's officers who are used to engagements at hundreds of thousands of kilometers distance rather than twenty thousand. The total reliance on energy weapons of dubious strength is also strange to them without the contrails of missiles that no doubt would strain the shields of both fleets should they be used.
"Captain…I'm having trouble getting a hold of their communications. They're speaking in an unknown language and their codes don't match our own."
"Do your best Blucher. I've got a feeling that we're a long way from home."
"Concentrate all fire on the third Munificent! Gold Squadron is to begin attack runs on the second and divert power to point defense arrays from comms!" Jedi Master Maka Drana barks from the bridge of the Venator-class Star Destroyer Martyr. The human Jedi struggles to maintain her center as the Separatists press their advantage in numbers on her beleaguered and undersupplied fleet. Ammunition is running low on every ship leaving them poorly equipped to engage a fleet of this size. A skeleton crew of bombers and fighters contributes to the almost clearly sabotaged fleet.
A war so freshly begun should not have had their fleet so poorly equipped and rushed to fill a gap. Not one so far from the frontlines. What little military strategy she was taught screams that this whole operation was a set up to get her fleet out of the way. The orders make little sense: reinforce a minor front with her full strike group of four Venators, seven Acclimators, and three Arquitens escorts with promises of supply when they arrive. And then an over strength Separatist fleet jumped onto their heads and nearly trapped them in system if not for the residual charge in their Hyperdrives allowing them to make a random jump to an uninhabited system.
She banishes the wandering thoughts from her mind and focuses on keeping her fleet alive. The as yet untested troops in the holds of the assault ships and cruisers deserve to die fighting with their boots on the ground not choking in the void because of the Navy's cock-up. Fighters, both Separatist and Republic, twist and dive around each other in a deadly dance that sees many pilots pay with their lives. Point defense laser batteries add their fury to the dogfight plucking scores of droid fighters out of the vacuum but there are still more than enough to force a path to the capital ships.
"Ma'am Providence is losing shields!" a Clone officer reports from his station. The Jedi bites back a curse as one of the Acclimators shudders and burns with the fury of the turbolaser fire hammering its smaller frame. Ablative armor boils away exposing compartments to the void and signing the death warrant of dozens of sailors. The gunnery officer snarls and redoubles his efforts pounding one Munificent to dust alongside the remaining guns of the Providence and the Pummeler, one of the Venators. They're not in time to save the Providence which detonates in a bright ball of fire and hot wreckage. Taking with it the entirety of her crew and the 23rd Assault Legion. Almost ten thousand soldiers gone in an instant. Four-hundred thousand kilometers distant a ship none of them knows exists watches it all unfold.
"Holy shit…" someone mutters breaking the silence that cloaks the bridge. One of the cruiser sized ships winks out of existence in a brilliant explosion before their very eyes. The more jagged ships move near instantly to exploit the sudden gap in the formation with ruthless efficiency, flooding the gap in point defense with their fighters and pounding everything in range. Brutal tactics that are paying off as more of the defending ships lose their shielding.
The grim silence is broken by the excited voice of Blucher appearing on his pedestal a holographic sabre drawn in his hand.
"Captain those are human ships!" The descendant of one of the most famous captains in history whips around to stare incredulously at the tiny man staring back at him. Blucher is an AI, beings of code and programming that think in code and absolutes. He thinks faster than any human alive and is almost solely responsible for coordination and accuracy of the ship's many weapons. He can hack through a Covenant mainframe like it was wet paper and he was an axe. He doesn't make mistakes.
The bridge crew blinks at the AI's avatar and then their captain who takes one heavy breath. He has a choice: continue to run silent and dark keeping his crew and ship safe while the unknown fleets duked it out…or engage and save human lives. Like every man and woman on board swore to do against all enemies foreign and domestic.
"Sound general quarters! Get the MAC charged and prep all missile pods. Broadside and point defense prioritize fighters when they get in range. Prep all fighters for fast launch and give me all ahead full!" The bridge bursts into familiar activity. The few remaining repair parties scramble back into the airlocks as the titanic engines roar to life once more. The reactors roar to life spreading the familiar rumble that seeps into a spacer's bones. The heartbeat of their ship. Gunnery crews scramble to their stations and begin prepping their weapons.
A six-hundred-ton slug of ferric-tungsten is slotted into place in the MAC's breach, missile systems are armed, and fire controls slaved to the bridge, point defense weapons cycle the first rounds into place. Marines sprint to the armories to be armed and armored before breaking off by squad to defend key areas of their ship. The Captain knows all this in the back of his mind. He knows every function of his ship and her behaviors.
"Vorwarts!" Blucher barks as the Bismarck leaps forward like an eager puppy. Jones settles into his command chair and brings up his display watching the charge level of his main gun climb while the distance to target shrinks steadily.
"Blucher I want a spread of Archers to distract that bastard lingering at the back and a priority target on that one breaking the human lines. You have the point defense." Jones makes rapid calculations settling on a maneuver that will offer the shortest window of danger while allowing his ship to deal the most amount of damage it can against the alien ships. Blucher waits to release the Archer missiles until they reach max-velocity using the Bismarck's speed to augment the engines of the missiles. The response to their sudden appearance is sluggish to Jones' trained and experienced eyes. Two ships peel off from the assault still hesitating to fire until the missiles are launched in plumes of fire and smoke. Four pods of twenty missiles designed to tear ships apart.
Two different missiles leap free of their own pods a hair behind the Archers, specialized programming keeping them towards the rear and using the more numerous Archers as a cloak. Point defense fire lashes out at the Archers plucking a few out of the flock but their evasion routines are designed to get through Covenant pulse lasers. Only ten out of a flock of eighty are shot down. The remainder slam into full strength deflector shields, the sheer force of the explosion scrambling sensors and weakening the shields for the two following M4020 Bident nuclear pumped X-ray laser warheads.
The Bident missile acts as essentially a catalyst that powers the X-ray lasers through a focusing rod. The effect is a single extremely powerful laser that rips through almost anything before it for a thousand kilometers. A thousand kilometers is a short distance in space warfare making it a hard weapon to land against a foe expecting it. The alien ships are not.
The first warhead detonates spearing the bow cannons of the alien ship gouging through armor plate and ripping into the magazines behind them. The front half of the ship ceases to exist as all the ammunition detonates under the power of the laser. The second warhead detonates slightly off centerline. Shields buckle and die allowing the laser through, ripping through the ship from the starboard-dorsal quarter to ventral-port. Power lines are severed, guns ripped from their mounts, and atmosphere sucked from their corridors. The main guns remain intact and deadly swiftly taking aim on the approaching carrier.
"Damn good shooting Blucher now aim for the same spot with the Mark-15s," Jones orders and scans the plot. The wounded ship is now well beyond immediate help while the main fleet presses the human vessels. Their allies give a good account of themselves claiming a trio of the alien ships for the cost of two escorts and heavy damage to one of the cruisers. But the holes in their fire patterns are beginning to widen and they are steadily taking more damage.
A pair of sharp bangs reverberate through the hull. Jones grins as a pair of sixty-five-ton slugs leap from the forward mounted Mark-15 Breakwater coil guns. Essentially miniature MAC guns, the Mark-15s are powerful additions to any warship's armament useful for both planetary bombardment and ship-to-ship fire. The two comparatively small slugs zip through the space between ships and then slam into the wounded alien ship like twin sledgehammers, ferric tungsten shatter battle plate before finally ripping into the magazines. Once again, a miniature star rips through a ship's hull.
"Time to MAC charge?"
"Thirty seconds."
"Incoming enemy fire, maneuvering thrusters firing now," Blucher reports dutifully a half second before the port maneuvering thrusters fire on full burn shoving the thirty-five-million-ton carrier to the side. Crimson bolts zip past harmlessly without even scorching her armor or even inconveniencing her crew. "Returning fire."
The Mark-15s belch their payloads once again this time deflecting off flickering shields protecting a third alien ship. The alien ship's bow is forced down robbing its cannons of a firing lane. A sign of poor ship design is put on display with none of the rapid-fire energy cannons being mounted along the dorsal surface leaving half of the ship undefended.
A second volley of Mark-15 rounds pounds the dorsal shields visibly breaking them though doing nothing to the hull.
"Fire Archer pods twelve and thirteen on that bastard!" the Captain leans forward in his seat as the Archers scream from their pods and make a beeline for the unshielded vessel.
"Ma'am that unknown ship is firing again!" The Jedi and her crew can only watch in awe as the large ship releases another massive salvo of missiles the home in on the unshielded Munificent. Distantly she's aware of the beating her fleet is still taking. But the sight of forty powerful missiles screaming in on the stricken Star Frigate without fear of point defense weapons is mesmerizing. The quick missiles home in on the frigate and burrow into the light spinal armor before detonating and ripping gaping wounds throughout the structure before another wave impacts widening those holes. The force of the explosions and the stress they inflict on the frigate's frame crack it in half.
"Force preserve us…"
"Ma'am we're detecting a power field building in the unknown ship," the same Clone reports his eyes glued to his station. The readings spike suddenly before his very eyes converting into a magnetic field and then disappearing. Only for an incredibly fast and dense projectile to leap from the strange ship's prow and slam into the Separatist command frigate. A flurry of ion-charged bolts slam into the frigate's shields an instant before the four-hundred-ton slug slams into it. Shields buckle and die leaving armor plating, too light for a warship of its size, exposed to the raw power of a MAC round traveling at thirty-thousand meters per second.
The frigate ceases to exist. The kinetic energy transferred into its frame shatters the once solid durasteel leaving a once proud warship as little more than a floating cloud of fragments. Or would have if the reactor hadn't gone critical with an explosion like a dying sun obliterating whatever was left. Both fleets seem to freeze for a moment before the Separatists turn about and accelerate away at full speed, allowing the Republic vessels an unimpeded shot up their skirts. Vengeful Venators, and Acclimators pour on the fire claiming another two Munificents before they disappear into Hyperspace.
Jedi Master Drana sighs in relief and eyes the unknown ship on the plot. Her fleet, despite the assistance given by the strange ship, is heavily damaged. Hull plating melted or gone in some places, every ship bears new scars, and only a few squadrons of the fleet's fighter component remains intact; they do not present a pretty picture.
"All ships send damage reports to Martyr, keep shields and guns charged. Let's not be too hasty to look threatening but I don't want to be surprised by our new friends."
"Ma'am… we have an incoming transmission from the unknown vessel, audio only."
"Patch it in." The link is scratchy for a second before a strong voice comes through the speakers.
"This is Captain James Jones of the UNSC Bismarck assigned to Battle Group Bismarck, UNSC Twelfth Fleet to unknown vessels. We come in peace."