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The Entar Chronicles part 1
Posted By: Locke<Locke1588@aol.com>
Date: 29 March 2003, 12:45 AM
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"All warfare is based on deception"
-From "The Art of War" by Commander Sun Tzu
The war raged on across Colchis, and the violent Jihad of the dreaded Covenant continued. The assault on Colchis had been the Covenant's biggest triumph yet since the attack on Earth. Millions on both sides had been slaughtered. It was even said that there were hardly any Humans left who knew of a time when there was no Jihad, no covenant, and no interstellar war.
But memories of the past would be restored to the minds of Humans everywhere, once more, in a time when the galaxy would freeze in terror, fighting would stop, and new enemies would emerge.
Transmission record
Orbital surveillance: Natural Satellite: Argo
High orbit above the planet Colchis
Received approximately 2:45:15678 orbital time
>Commander, you should see this. It extends off every side of the radar screen!
>>Is it a covenant ship?
>>>Really, I think you should see it yourself.
-Image Transmit-
>>>>Oh my god! What the he-
-Transition lost-
-Contact lost with Argo at message end time-
-End of record-
Orbital covenant cruiser
Low orbit above the planet Colchis
The 3 covenant priests approached the table. The one in the middle held the sacred relic of Dannook high above his head. The other two bowed down, the folds of their red robes settling to the floor. "Oh Great Dannook!" The high priest spoke out loudly with careful precision. The council of prophets leaned forward. "We ask you to help us in our siege of Colchis!" cried the high priest. "Praise Dannook!" The council recited in unison. "We ask you to help us in our jihad against the soft-skins!" "Honor Dannook!" The council recited. "We ask you to help us in our existence in the galaxy, and that the glory you have placed in our birthright will shine upon us!" "Know Dannook!" "And most important of all, we ask-" a steaming but silent bullet streaked across the room, tearing swiftly through the high priest's robes. There was a THWAP! And a look of terror spread across the high priest's face. He clutched his torso, fell to his knees, and then he slammed down on the ground dead.
In an instant, the council of prophets rose to their feet, swords gliding swiftly from their belts. "DIE FOR DANNOK!" The council cried, finishing the high priest's prayer. "Warning!" came a grunts voice across the compute system. "Soft skins have barded the cruiser! Repeat, soft skins are on the cruiser!" The great arch collapsed like a sheet of paper, machine gun fire streaking through the gigantic metallic door, tearing it to pieces. A convoy of warthogs trampled over the metal ruins, firing at the council in the stands. With a battle cry, the whole council sitting in the arena seats swarmed down, slashing at the warthogs with plasma swords, and firing at them with rifles. Suddenly, turrets on the walls and ceiling of the massive arena like room hummed to life. The warthogs were blasted to smoking pieces. Cheers erupted throughout the stands. "TRIUMPH FOR DANNOK!" they all cried.
Meanwhile
Just outside the arena
Captain Genter waved to his team of Spartans, who gathered around him. "Alright men!" Gwen shot him an annoyed look. "All right Women!" he said instead. Everyone laughed. "Our decoy assault team of Spartans has ripped apart the main arch. We need to get into that temple, arena, whatever you want to call it, and get rid of the commanding prophets before they get that arch running again". "How would they do that?" asked Gwen, confused. "I thought the warthogs tore the metal gates apart!" "Yes" said Genter, "But they have a backup force field they could reactivate any time!" "What are we waiting for, then?" demanded Xavier. "Nothing" Genter said, but the Spartans were already sliding their helmets back on and arming their weapons. The Spartans ran on foot down the hall that would lead to the citadel.
Genter watched his team of Spartans tear down the hall, metal boots clanking on the floor. He turned around, facing a group of warthogs that would move in after his Spartans. Spartans and technicians were scurrying everywhere, updating everyone's AI, and loading Warthogs "lagg" guns. Suddenly, a message flashed on his HUD. Apparently, the captain of the battle cruiser currently engaged in combat above Colchis wanted to speak to him about an important matter. "Tactical technician!" he barked into his com-link. "Get me to the nearest Pelican. I need to get to the battle cruiser currently engaged in combat above Colchis". "Yessssir!" The technician replied automatically. "The battle cruiser your looking for is 'Cleopatra's' barge'! It's currently defending itself from a covenant boarding party! I'm sending you the coordinates for the nearest Pelican, docked in an invaded covenant hangar!" A dot and arrow began flashing on his HUD. "Follow these and you'll be fine. I'm sending order to the Pelican right now to arm MAC guns and prepare the engines!"
How do those guys do that? Genter wandered. "Good work, private! If I get to "Cleopatra's Barge" alive, I'll see that your promoted!" "Oh, I highly doubt that sir!" said the technician. "Banshees are swarming around that battle cruiser like wasps!" Genter frowned. "By the way, private, what exactly did the captain of the barge want to speak to me about?" "Well, that's classified!" said the technician, laughing. "But I wouldn't be surprised if it had something to do with the ominous metal spacecraft floating above Colchis!" Genter was confused. "Are you okay, private?" The technician laughed. Obviously this captain he was talking to wasn't told much. The technician shut of his com-link, to Genter's shock, and turned back to the bible in his hands. He was reading "Revelation".
Slowly, as Genter's Pelican departed safely from the covenant hangar, he had a shocking awareness of his surroundings. Clouds and formations of covenant spacecraft were zipping everywhere. Pelicans were fleeing for their airborne lives and making hopeless attempts to charge their MAC guns before covenant fighters blasted them to smoking remnants. If hell were in space, it would look like this. Genter had never seen so many Covenant fighters n one area.
That was the last thing he noticed.
Hovering ominously above the battle was a huge metal object, extending as far as he could see. Glowing blue lines and dots were marked all over the underside of the hull, if this was the hull. Genter could only see the bottom half of Colchis, as the top half was covered up by the "horizon" where the huge metal object appeared to end, and space began. The most bizarre thing was that the Human and Covenant fighters seemed to have no regard for the ominous metal object hovering above them. Occasionally, a missile would strike the underside of the huge spacecraft. It did little damage to an object of this mass. Hitting this spacecraft with a nuclear weapon would be like poking a creature the size of a planet, with a mass of, say, Threshold. It wouldn't be noticed. That didn't necessarily mean that the spacecraft could be destroyed easily without resistance, it simply meant that it would take more weapons to destroy than all Human missile plants could build in 1,000 years.
Genter laughed to himself. As a military captain, it was no surprise that his first thoughts of the object had been calculating a sufficient way to destroy it. He cast those thoughts aside. The huge spacecraft was not firing any weapons of it's own, it was simply there. Not interfering with the battle in any way. "Why wasn't I told about this thing?" Genter demanded to the pilot. "I wouldn't know, sir! That's classified information". Genter raised his hands, annoyed. "Does anyone on this crew know what that thing is?" Everyone shrugged, then "I do" said one man. "It's a huge ominous flying object hovering above us threateningly!" Everyone laughed. "Does anyone have any interesting observations? Ideas?" Everyone just shrugged and shook their heads. I'm gonna regret this! Genter thought to himself. "If anyone gives me any useful information about this thing, I'll see that that individual is given command of their own Pelican Tactical Strike team, with 20 of my pelicans" Genter said with obviously reluctance in his voice. The eyes of the crew all got wide. The pilot seemed especially interested. "I do" said one of the men.
"Ah, so you were hiding information from a CAPTAIN?" The man was obviously embarrassed. "Yes sir" said the man. He was actually very young. Probably about 19, Genter guesses. "What is your name?" Genter asked him. "Private Jason Aegeus, sir". "Very good!" said Genter. "When we dock with 'Cleopatra's Barge', you will come with me. The rest of will land on Colchis after dropping me off and I will see that you are all reassigned immediately. I can't have a crew flying around in my fleet with only one resourceful officer!" He barked loudly. The crew was shocked, but they did not argue. Then, they all saw Cleopatra's Barge move into vision clearly before them. Every time Genter had seen a battle cruiser before, he had thought of how big it was, but not this time. The battle cruiser was the size of a head of a pin compared to the huge ominous spacecraft. It was a weird feeling. "I've locked on to a homing beacon. Were docking in port five," said the pilot in a depressed kind of monotone. Genter felt a little sympathy for the crew, and almost considered taking back their re-assignment. But no, he had already bribed a low ranking officer for information. Genter had no desire to disgrace himself any more. The Pelican slowed as it moved into the hangar. Genter and private Jason hopped out. The Pelican rose back into the air and turned, zooming back out of the hangar. "Good luck" Genter mumbled. Suddenly a covenant plasma missile zoomed out of nowhere and struck the pelican. The back half exploded into flaming shards of metal, some which barely missed Genter and Jason. The front half, bent and scarred, spun out of control, dropping low and Genter lost sight of it. Then he heard an explosion as the remains of the pelican slammed into the hull of the battle cruiser at a nearly sonic speed. "Oh well" said Genter. "There are other Pelicans in the world".
TO BE CONTINUED
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