"Proximity warning!" Jerrod said. "Incoming vessels. Configuration matches neither UNSC nor Covenant profiles."
On-screen a radar silhouette appeared: an odd trilobed symmetry. Thermal images revealed a center sphere emitting a blackbody radiation of six thousand degrees Kelvin.
"What is it?" Kelly whispered.
"What are they," Jerrod corrected. "Detecting three hundred twelve of these ships. On an intercept course. Vectors suggest an attack pattern."
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
1000 HOURS, NOVEMBER 3, 2552 (MILITARY CALENDAR) \ ZETA DORADUS SYSTEM, NEAR PLANET ONYX \ ABOARD DECOMMISSIONED UNSC CHIROPTERA-CLASS VESSEL (ILLEGAL REGISTRY) BEATRICE
Dr. Halsey examined the multiple contacts on the passive radar screen. They reminded her of an angry swarm of wasps.
"Three hundred," she murmured.
"Three hundred twelve," Jerrod corrected.
Dr. Halsey tapped her lower lip with her thumb, thinking. "We can't fight."
Kelly snapped her head from the radar display to Dr. Halsey "We have to try." She looked around the bridge. "Weapons station?"
"Jerrod," Dr. Halsey said, "show all data on that anomalous planet."
"Dr. Halsey," Kelly insisted. "Weapons?"
"This ship has no weapons," she replied.
Kelly moved from station to station, not accepting this. As a Spartan she had a lifetime of training that demanded she take action, fire a weapon, confront her enemies; she was not trained to sit and watch.
On the NAV screen a blue-green cloud-swirled planet appeared as well as data on its orbit and an atmosphere spectroscopic breakdown.
"That's our target," Dr. Halsey said. "Earth-like gravity and atmosphere. Infrared suggests vegetation. An uninhabited habitable planet so close to UNSC space? An improbability… or more likely, one very well-kept secret."
She tapped the display. The planet shrank and a silvery ice-ball moon drifted at two o'clock. The relative position of the Beatrice appeared—as well as the fleet of intercepting ships between them and the planet.
"What can I do?" Kelly said.
"Strap in and stand by," Dr. Halsey said. "I'll need you in three minutes."
"Aye, ma'am." Kelly pulled herself into the first mate's chair, slipped into the harness, and cinched it tight.
"Engine parameters on this screen," Dr. Halsey said, and tapped the display on her left.
Thermodynamic Legendre-transformation diagrams of the plasma coils flashed online.
"Good thing we retained the Slipspace transition energy."
"Yes, Doctor," Jerrod replied. His holographic dot of light dimmed as if embarrassed.
"Unidentified craft closing. Ninety thousand kilometers. Acceleration increasing."
She strapped into the captain's chair. "Come to course forty-five by forty-five."
"Aye aye," Jerrod said. The Beatrice tilted and the engines sputtered with the alignment burn. "Course corrected."
Dr. Halsey studied the plasma coils. While the rest of the ship was an antique, the coils were almost new, stolen, it appeared, from a Behemoth-class tug. It appeared Governor )iles was only half the fool she had believed.
"Initiate one hundred twenty percent oversurge in the pre-coil," Dr. Halsey told Jerrod.
Kelly fidgeted; her gauntlets clenched into fists.
"We cannot fight," Dr. Halsey explained to her. "Nor am I a tenth the astronavigator that Captain Keyes was."
"Oversurge in three seconds," Jerrod announced.
"Which only leaves us one option: run like hell."
The Beatrice rumbled and leapt forward.
Dr. Halsey flattened into her seat.
"Pursuit vessels accelerating to intercept," Jerrod informed her.
"Hold course," Dr. Halsey said with effort.
The moon grew large on the central viewscreen.
"I'm afraid I had no chance to double-check the trajectory," Dr. Halsey told Kelly through gritted teeth. "It's my best guess at a slingshot approach."
"It is quite accurate, ma'am," Jerrod chimed in.
"I may not survive the acceleration," Dr. Halsey said, now breathing with exertion. "I will certainly not remain conscious. You must land the craft. Find the others." She paused, panting. "Programming reentry…"
"What 'others'?" Kelly asked.
"Energy spike," Jerrod said. "Lead pursuit vehicles' central cores now emitting blackbody radiation equivalent of fifteen thousand degrees Kelvin."
Dr. Halsey rechecked the engine schematic with a trembling finger. "Increase power output to thruster by one hundred sixty percent."
"Yes, ma'am."
The aft section of the Beatrice shuddered and metal groaned from uneven stress.
The twilight region of the planet's moon filed the viewscreen with canyons of blue ice and methane geysers.
"Aft view," Dr. Halsey breathed. The corners of her vision darkened.
The viewscreen switched. In the black of space, pinpoints of white sparkled and lances of energy slashed through the dark.
Kelly gripped the sides of her chair with such force that the metal bent.
"Initiate roll," Dr. Halsey whispered. "Two radians per second."
The Beatrice spun. The incoming beams were bright as solar flares, and the video feed distorted chromatic as they closed— then passed.
"Missed!" Kelly almost leapt out of her harness.
Dr. Halsey's heart pounded in her throat. She closed her eyes and tapped in commands.
It was too hard to talk now, but her fingers knew what to do. She programmed the time- delayed burn, her best guess at how much oversurge the plasma coils could withstand, calculated reentry angles, and although she didn't believe in God, she prayed to… someone.
When she reopened her eyes, she couldn't see. Blood pooled in her central organs, depriving oxygen from her brain.
On her keypad she pressed Enter.
"That is an inadvisable course of action. Doctor," Jerrod said.
"Kelly," Dr. Halsey murmured. "Find them. Save them."
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
1020 HOURS, NOVEMBER 3, 2552 (MILITARY CALENDAR) \ ZETA DORADUS SYSTEM, ORBITAL ENTRY VECTOR OVER PLANET ONYX \ ABOARD DECOMMISSIONED UNSC CHIROPTERA-CLASS VESSEL (ILLEGAL REGISTRY) BEATRICE
Kelly unbuckled her harness and checked Dr. Halsey. She was breathing, but without a pressure suit the acceleration had been too much for her.
Unfamiliar frustration coursed through Kelly. She resented not being briefed about this new mission, being thrust into the middle of a conflict she knew nothing about, and worst of all— having no way to fight.
But maybe it had happened too fast for John and the others to revive her. Everything had happened too fast since the fall of Reach. Still, something didn't add up.
Kelly understood, though, that she wasn't getting any answers from Dr. Halsey in the near future, assuming either of them had a future.
First thing first. Locate your enemy.
"Update on pursuit craft?" Kelly asked the AI.
The tiny holographic spark answered, "From our emergent position on the far side on the satellite, I now only detect one hundred forty-seven vessels. Two minutes until they are again within weapons range."
"Only a hundred and forty-seven?" Kelly muttered. "Lucky break for us."
A blue-green planet appeared centered on the viewscreen.
"What was Dr. Halsey's last course correction?"
"Planetary insertion," the AI said.
The Beatrice shuddered. A crackling hiss was emitted from the engine room, then another from the port wing strut. The temperature dropped twenty degrees.
"Twelve percent per minute loss of cabin pressure," the AI reported.
"We can't insert at this velocity," Kelly said. "The only things that reenter this fast and touch down are meteors."
"Only partially correct, SPARTAN-087," the AI said. "Dr. Halsey's last burn instructions solve that part of the problem, at least in theory."
"Explain."
The ship rotated 180 degrees and its nose angled up.
"Dr. Halsey's calculation is for a counterthrust. I am about to initiate an overcharge bum from the coils. But this is only a theoretical operation as it exceeds the engineered coil output by two hundred forty percent."
On-screen wisps of heat curled. Long trails of smoke appeared.
"Entering upper atmosphere, and—" The AI paused. "Stand by. Incoming weak transmission on the E-Band."
The E-Band was the UNSC emergency broadcast channel.
"On audio, quick," Kelly said.
There was a wash of static and then: "— is automated general distress code Bloody Arrow. All UNSC personnel heed and stand to. We are under attack and req—"
It faded to white noise.
Kelly would have known the voice anywhere. It was the man who had made her and every Spartan what they were: Chief Petty Officer Mendez.
The Bloody Arrow code was used only when all friendly positions had been overrun by enemy forces. A total rout. The most likely interpretation was a Covenant invasion.
"Warning. Pursuing vessels in weapons range in seven seconds," the AI informed her.
Sparks appeared in the blue-black of space. "Energy spikes detected from multiple point sources."
"Confirm, no weapons on this craft," Kelly said.
"Confirmed," the AI replied.
Why would Dr. Halsey take an unarmed ship on a dangerous mission?
"Initiate evasive roll," Kelly ordered the AI.
"Inadvisable. With precarious thruster adjustments I am able to maintain a stable descent. A roll would result in an unrecoverable tumble."
Convection blooms of heat appeared on the aft camera, making the growing pursuit craft waver. Another shudder ran through the hull, continued, and increased in intensity.
"Energy discharge from pursuit craft," the AI said.
On-screen sparks of gold flared. Scintillating beams stretched between the alien craft and the Beatrice.
Sitting ducks and fish in a barrel were the phrases that Fred liked to use.
She could jump. Kelly and the other Spartans of Red Team had survived a high-altitude jump out of a Pelican—but not like this. The Beatrice was in midorbit. At high velocity, her MJOLNIR armor might survive the turbulence and heat—but inside, she'd be pulped and roasted.
Kelly glanced at Dr. Halsey. There'd be no jumping for the Doctor.
She'd have to take her chances and stay. She climbed back into the first mate's chair, buckled the harness, and gripped the arms.
A crisscross of energy beams blurred in front of the cameras. The heated turbulence was a haze of chaos, smoke, and boiling air. Optically dispersive.
"Delay that braking maneuver."
"Inadvisable. If we do not slow, the Beatrice will bum up."
"That's what I'm counting on," Kelly said. "Wait, three seconds."
The AI considered, his light winking rapidly. "Understood. Recalculating delayed energy output."
The alien energy weapons distorted, refracted by the increasingly chaotic turbulence until they blurred into dozens of fainter beams… and then disintegrated in the fireball left in the Beatrice's wake.
"Beam cohesion near zero," the AI announced.
The temperature within the ship jumped to forty degrees centigrade, and Kelly heard pinging throughout the frame.
"Initiating counterthrust now," the AI said.
Kelly braced.
An explosion sounded in the aft compartment. Kelly was thrown backward and the first mate's chair, never designed to hold a half ton of Spartan and MJOLNIR armor, snapped off its base.
She tumbled, crashed into the bulkhead between the bridge and the engine room, punching a dent into the bulkhead.
The engine screamed with ultrasonics and it shook the ship so violently, Kelly's vision blurred. Crackles radiated from the spine of the hull, microfracture fatigue, and the popping and tearing came from the port wing.
The engines ceased and the crushing deceleration eased.
Kelly peeled herself off the wall, and saw that Dr. Halsey was still safely strapped in her seat. Blood trickled from the elderly woman's nose, and it bubbled, which was good; it meant the Doctor still breathed.
"We are presently seven kilometers over the planet's surface," the AI said. "Stable trajectory for a controlled landing. Main engines… inoperable. Auxiliary engine operable, but incapable of escape velocity."
"Understood," Kelly said. They were stuck… wherever they were. "Pursuit vessel status?"
"None within visual or radar range."
Kelly didn't think they'd seen the last of them.
She went to the Doctor and checked her pulse. It was strong and steady. She was tougher than she looked.
Kelly spotted two duffel bags secured under the captain's chair: one was filled with a variety of medical supplies, and the other held four MA5Bs and sixteen clips.
She smiled. There were weapons here after all. She grabbed one of the MA5Bs, slid the clip home, and hefted its reassuring weight.
The Beatrice gently banked and the hull complained.
The viewscreen showed rolling hills, jungle, and sinuous rivers. To the north were white- rock canyons and mesas, as well as columns of smoke and wavering outlines of dust.
Kelly relaxed, not into complacency, but rather because the situation was familiar. In space, she could do nothing but sit and watch—an impossible situation for any Spartan.
Now, however, she could analyze the tactical, plan, act, fight, and possibly win.
"Pipe through that distress signal," she told the AI.
"Apologies," it said. "All antennae have been vaporized. I can, however, give you the approximate location of the last transmission."
"That'll do. Get us there."
The ship banked to starboard.
"Ahead seventeen kilometers is the source of the signal," the AI said.
The corner of the viewscreen magnified. Kelly saw buildings and fields laid out in a horseshoe shape.
She instantly recognized the three-meter-wide regulation crushed-white-quartz paths, the perfect geometry of the inspection yard, and the long parade grounds. There were obstacle courses to the west. And there was a rifle range. This was a UNSC military camp. There might be weapons and ammunition there.