Halo: Equestrian Campaign

Calvin’s fingers dance across the dashboard, flipping switches, pressing buttons, and pulling levers. You, on the other hand, are too occupied with your own task to even notice him. As Calvin maneuvers the Pelican through the black void of space you fix your attention on the 40MM turret mounted on the chin of the ship.

Plasma shells were launched towards you at dangerous speeds, missing your vehicle by mere inches. Any shells that threatened to strike your Pelican were stopped by a burst of rounds from your turret. It was all you could do to help Calvin reach the Carrier.

*BLAM, BLAM, BLAM*

You release another volley of high caliber rounds into an oncoming projectile. Most of the shells explode before they could reach you. Unfortunately the ones that you miss fly past your shuttle and engulf the other Pelicans behind you in a cloud of blue fire.

“EVERYONE HOLD ON, WE’RE CLOSING IN ON OUR TARGET!” shouts Calvin.

You turn your head away from your coordinate screen to peer out the cockpit's forward window. Calvin was right, the Covenant ship was incredibly close now.

“we’re gonna make it!” you whisper “thank goodness.”

________________________________________________________________________

A cold sweat began to form on the Zealots brow. It wasn't because of the human shuttles that were getting closer. No, he was afraid of what was on them. The ship leading the charge flew unlike any other. It was designed for transport, yet it glided through space like it was meant to be a fighter. The elite had seen skill like that only once before, and the very thought of that encounter sent a chill down his spine.

“Demon!” he said beneath is breath. If a ‘SPARTAN’ was flying that Pelican than there was no telling how much damage it would do.

“Aim all of our cannons at the leading ship!” he shouted. “bring it down, bring it down, BRING IT DOWN!”

Dozens of plasma shells shot forward towards the Pelican. All of them missed their target as the ship swerved upwards. It rolled to the left, and then moved back down to its original position.

Ben- Hassrathee said a silent prayer to his gods, begging them to remove the Pelican from existence.

A second volley of plasma shells were released. Again, the pelican managed to avoid all of the rounds, allowing them to fly past it and smash into the other shuttles behind it.

The shuttle was getting very close now, the elite could make out the human numbers printed on it. He closed his eyes tightly. Knowing that one way, or another the end would come soon.

His carrier shook again as their cannons fired once again, and then everything seemed to stop. No more shells were fired, the pilots, and engineers didn’t speak a single word. All that could be heard was the whirring of the engines.

Ben-Hassrathee slowly opened his eyes, and what he saw sent a wave of relief through his body. The few remaining human shuttles were retreating, and the one that carried the demon was not among them.

________________________________________________________________________

Calvin desperately fought for control of the Pelican. He had abandoned the act of pushing buttons and flipping switches. Now all his attention was focused on the throttle that he violently pushed and pulled on, trying in vain to regain his hold on the shuttle.

“Dan, status report!?!” shouted Calvin.

“Shields are at zero percent, sir! Our left engine took the full force of the blast, and the splash damage punched a hole in our fuel storage!” replied an anxious Dan.

“Divert all power into back-up motors, and deactivate or main engine. I don’t want the gasoline to ignite. Once that’s done we’ll need to turn the ship around and hope that we have enough power to float back to the Thermopylae.”

Daniel was quick to perform his task, and with a few flips of a switch the Pelican went dark. Everyone held their breath as the shuttle floated aimlessly in space, waiting for the energy reserves to reactivate the light bulbs that hung from the ceiling.

“Got it!” shouted Dan as the Pelican whirred to life again. Everyone releases a sigh of relief as the shuttle began to straighten itself out.

But all that ends when the lights go out again, and the shuttle violently shakes.

“Calvin!?” you shout over the ships engine that began to sputter and whirr. “Status report!”

It takes him a moment to reply, as he begins to tighten his seat belt.

“Remember the planet that Leon scanned?” he asks. “Well, we may have drifted too close to it, and gotten sucked into its gravitational pull. And when we reactivated the engines we shifted even closer!”

Calvin didn't have to finish for you to understand what was going on. When the secondary motors had started the ship had righted itself, but in the process it had shifted too close to the planet and was now trapped in its atmosphere.

“Everyone, brace for impact!” you shout as Calvin jerks the Pelican around so that its facing the planet. “we’re going down!”

________________________________________________________________________