Bridge of Covenant Flagship Final Absolution

"Shipmaster, the demons have been spotted in the hangar! They are pushing back our forces, sir!" One of Ziro's communications officers announced.

"I am aware, just deploy reinforcements and send a feed to my terminal!" Ziro barked.

"Y-yes, shipmaster!" The officer quickly replied before it connected Ziro's monitor to the hanger's camera feed.

When the holoscreen came to life in front of Ziro, his eyes were greeted by the horrific sight of one of the female demons pinning one of his Sangheili warriors to the floor. The female had one of her knees pressed against the Sangheili's back and her hands were busy wrenching the mandibles of the warrior's jaw backward at an unnatural angle. Ziro had to stifle a wince when he saw the mandibles finally gave under the strain and becoming limp as they were popped free from their sockets. Then the female promptly adjusted her grip and in one quick motion, she snapped the warrior's neck.

"Such senseless brutality, these primitive creatures never cease to disappoint me." Ziro scuffed. Ziro didn't miss the fact that the girl could have easily cracked his brother's neck from the start, but instead she chose to start with his jaw. And while a broken jaw would no doubt be painful, it would have done little to hinder his warriors in combat. So that meant one of two things, either the girl was incredibly foolish, or incredibly cruel. From what Ziro knew of human females, he suspected the latter. With that said, there was something about the girl that stood out to Ziro. That was the fact that she was armed with the weapons of a Jiralhanae (Brute).

One thing Ziro knew about Humans was their obsession with their primitive projectile weaponry. Despite their plasma weapons clear superiority, humans, regardless if they were a demon or not, didn't usually carry their Covenant weapons around with them. And even in the rare cases when they did, it was usually because their own weapons had been lost and they had to take the weapons from their fallen enemies. However, that couldn't have been the case here.

Ziro didn't have any Jiralhanae currently serving on his ship and their weaponry wasn't in high demand amongst the ranks. The same was true for most of the fleet. There were few shipmasters that were still willing to trust their kind and it was with good reason. After all, it was their betrayal towards the end of the Great War that had stripped them and their fellow Sangheili brothers of their rightful place at the side of the prophets.

However, none of that was important right now. What was important was figuring out what the human's plans were and how to best counter them, and Ziro had a hunch. "How close are those reinforcements we dispatched?" He inquired.

"Squads three, four, and seven should be engaging the enemy soon. Squads two, five, and six are still in rout and assuming the demons don't go far, they should catch up to them in five minutes." Ziro's officer replied.

"If memory serves, squad two should be under the command of Thasa 'Kusov. Is that correct?" Ziro inquired, causing his officer to give him an instant affirmative. Thasa was one of his most trusted men, his warriors were quite skilled combatants. They would be better used elsewhere. "I want you to belay squad two's orders! I want you to reroute them to the core!" Ziro commanded.

"Yes, shipmaster!" The officer quickly replied.

"Good," Ziro said as he turned in his seat to address another officer. "I want our slipspace drive primed and ready for a jump as soon as possible! I will send you the coordinates momentarily." He ordered.

The officer receiving the order paused for a moment in uncertainty. "You want to jump? Are we retreating shipmaster?" He asked timidly.

The officer knew he choose his words incorrectly when the tone of Ziro's voice went from stern to acidic and Ziro's eyes narrowed on him. "Listen well you little whelp! There are two things that I will not tolerate here on my bridge. First is questioning my orders and second is questioning my honor and you've just done both! So if you don't want me to throw you out the nearest airlock, I suggest you do as instructed and watch your tongue!" He roared.

"Y-yes sh-shipmaster." The officer stammered.

It was clear that the officer wasn't use to seeing his normally calm and collected commander so aggravated, and when he stole a quick glance around the bridge he could easily see that he wasn't the only one. Though, he supposed it just meant his shipmaster was just taking the demon threat that seriously, and that thought at least gave him some comfort. However, that comfort turned to confusion when the slipspace jump coordinates appeared on his monitor. They weren't jumping to safety. No, they were actually going to perform a short ranged jump down to the surface of the human planet.

For a moment the officer considered asking his shipmaster if the coordinates could be incorrect, but decided it wasn't in his best interests to question him again. He just couldn't figure out what the shipmaster could be thinking. Sure it would bypass the enemy fleet and allow them to attack the planet directly, but then what would they do? The slipspace drive would need time to recharge after the jump and they would be surrounded on all sides by the enemy. Perhaps he was planning some sort of flanking maneuver? Though, if that were the case, surely the rest of the fleet would be told about it.

In the end the officer couldn't figure out what his shipmaster had planned and lacked the bravery to ask. So he just did as he was told and punched in the coordinates and hoped for the best.

Then not a moment later the officer heard a commotion coming from the other side of the bridge. When he spun to see what was happening, his shipmaster was once again standing from his seat and looking at his holoscreen intently. When he spoke the word held more malice than he thought him ever capable. "Where did the demons go?!"

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Midship of the Covenant Flagship Final Absolution

For the last several minutes, the halls of the Absolution had been alive with the sounds of screams, gunfire, and explosions, and at the center of it all had been team JNPR. With the hangar bay as their stage, they had to fight their way through endless ranks of Covenant just to survive. When they realized the enemy wasn't going to stop swarming them, they had to escape into the ventilation system.

Once inside the ventilation system, they had managed to cover a large portion of the ship undetected, but unfortunately they learned from a few passing conversations of the Covenant soldiers in the halls that they were onto them and were musing the idea of pumping methane into the vents and lighting a match. So they had all agreed that they would need to surface soon.

The vents were too small for the members of team JNPR to walk side by side, so they formed a single file line with Jaune at the front, Pyrrha at the rear and Ren and Nora in the center. When Jaune came across a vent cover large enough for them to fit through he paused to look through the slits for signs of a threat.

When Jaune saw that the coast was clear, he turned back to his team and spoke in a hushed tone. "This should be as good a place as any." Then he gave the vent cover an experimental push, but when it held firm he grumbled and turned back again. "It's on there good, so it looks like I will need to kick this thing out. The coast looks clear, but there might be some around the corner and this is going to make some noise. So once I do this I want you guys to be ready."

"Roger." The NPR of the team replied.

Jaune gave his team a nod before got on his back and cocked both his feet back as far as he could in the cramped space before he slammed into the vent cover with all his strength. As one would expect something to behave after getting hit with nearly two tons of force, the vent cover warped until it broke free from the wall and was sent flying into the opposing wall with a loud thud before it clattered onto the floor below.

Then not a moment later Jaune rolled to the side to allow his team to rush past him and into the open passage with their weapons at the ready. The passageway they had broken into was one long corridor with no forking paths in either direction, so that allowed Pyrrha to cover one direction while Ren and Nora covered the opposite. As Jaune had told them, the coast was clear, but they needed to be certain so they waited and listened. Then after about five seconds of complete silence and no signs of movement, they finally allowed themselves to relax.

"Boy is it quite. Hey, do you think they forgot about us?" Nora inquired jokingly.

"I doubt it." Ren deadpanned.

By this time Jaune had also crawled his way out of the ventilation system and was in the middle of checking how many rounds were left in his Magnum. His DMR Rifle was now noticeably missing from his back. Finally having a moment of peace, Pyrrha decided that was a matter that needed discussing. "By the way, you care to explain to me why you only took one extra clip for your Rifle?"

Jaune shrugged his shoulders before replying in a less than apologetic tone. "Sorry, I kind of got rushed out of my apartment this morning, so I didn't really have much time to stock up."

"Why didn't you say anything? You could've just got extra clips when we were on the Paladin!" Pyrrha hissed, trying desperately to keep her voice down.

"Hmm, I guess your right. Just didn't think about it at the time." Jaune said dismissively. "Besides, it's all worked out so far."

"Only because I shared my clips with you back in the hangar! If I hadn't then we would have been over run and now I'm down to my last one as well!" Pyrrha complained.

"Firstly, keep your voice down. We're not in space anymore and that means sound travels." Jaune warned. "Secondly, why don't you just tell me what this is all really about?"

"I just told you what this is about. I'm sick of you not taking these things seriously." Pyrrha responded in a more hushed tone.

"You really think I'm not taking this seriously? Please Pyrrha, you know I'm not that stupid and I know you're not either so how about we cut the crap, huh?" Jaune suggested.

"What do you mean?" Pyrrha asked uncertainly.

Jaune scoffed. "What, you think I wouldn't notice the fact that you've been riding me a lot harder than usual lately?" Jaune asked and when Pyrrha looked like she was about to retort he quickly added. "And not in a fun way either."

That unnecessary remark caused Pyrrha to sputter for a moment, but she was getting use to his jabs and managed to recover fairly quickly. "Jaune, I know you've been having private meetings with that councilor"

This question finally seemed to catch Jaune off guard since he paused for a moment before he spoke. "What, you mean Cinder? What does she have to do with any of this? Don't tell me your jealous or something?"

Pyrrha decided to ignore that last jab, seeing it for the distraction it was. "Yes, Cinder, and she has everything to do with this. You know we aren't allowed to share our information with members of the Council or military without approval, right? Goodwitch was very clear about protocol. We're to avoid contact with them whenever possible and under no circumstance are we to share out our technology."

Though it wasn't visible through his helmet, Jaune's face scrunched up into a scowl. "Ozpin and his protocols can kiss my ass. If we're really all on the same side like he claims then we should be working together, not drawing lines in the sand."

"Jaune, you know it's more complicated than that. Ozpin is our hero. I know he's just trying to keep everyone safe." Pyrrha tried to reason.

"Oh, I'm sure he is. He's keeping us real safe from his ivory tower located right next to his superweapon." He declared with no small amount of sarcasm. "To be honest, I don't know why you trust that man so much, he's only been here what, three years? And he just so happened to show up out of blue one day just in time to save the world. Doesn't that sound just a little bit too romantic to you?"

"I...I umm." Pyrrha tried to speak, but she couldn't find the words.

"Yeah, that's what I thought." Jaune stated before he made to turn around and noticed something was missing. "Umm, wait a minute, where the heck are Ren and Nora?!" He asked as he mentally kicked himself for not noticing their absence sooner. He should have realized that Nora was being far too quiet, Ren on the other hand was about the same.

"Relax Jaune, they're still on the radar." Pyrrha pointed out before she did so physically. There were two blips just down towards the end of the corridor and following them showed that their teammates had just gone ahead of them.

"Hey guys, why did you run off like that?" Jaune asked when Pyrrha and him had caught up to their teammates. They found they were stopped in front of a large blast door that likely led to their objective and Nora was busying herself by fiddling with the control panel beside it.

"Your little spats always take forever, seriously when are you going to kiss and make up?" Nora asked, causing Pyrrha to sputter slightly. Ignoring this, Nora went on. "Also I figured it would be a good chance for me to test my elite hacking skills by getting us through this door."

"Reading the screen and hitting in whatever keys seem right doesn't count as hacking, Nora." Ren chimed in, causing the girl to stick her tongue out at him and accidentally licking the inside of her helmet.

"I still can't believe you know how to read that stuff, do you really think you can get it open?" Jaune inquired.

"Hold on a minute and... I... will... show... you... right... now!" Nora said as she carefully punched in a few more keys on the panel and with the last one pressed, the sound of the locking mechanisms releasing filled the room before the large blast doors slid away, tucking themselves into the walls and floor.

Beyond the door team JNPR found a large circular room that was divided into an upper and lower area. The lower area had ramps and gravity lifts that led to the upper floor and the expanse of the upper floor was crossed by a light bridge. Above that was a domed transparent ceiling that gave them a view of the stars and Planet Remnants shattered moon. To some it wasn't important, but to them it meant that they were currently on the uppermost level of the vessel.

Without delay, the team quickly moved into the room and began sweeping it for any possible threats. When none appeared and their radars told a similar story, Jaune figured it was safe to speak again. "Still nothing, huh? Surprising given how close we are to the core, even more so when we take into account how noisy that bloody door was. Maybe they should oil that thing."

"Well nothing we could do about it. We have to proceed, and I'm sure it was a lot quieter than opening the alternative way." Pyrrha reasoned.

"You mean blowing it open like we did the hanger?" Nora asked with a giggle. "That would have been fun too. We should try that with the next one."

Jaune just shook his head and laughed along before glancing up at the transparent ceiling. "Look at that view." He chimed in. "I think I saw this section from the outside of the ship. If it is indeed the same one, then we should nearly be at the Core, but we will need to find a way down to the lower levels."

"Yeah, I think if we take one of the-" Ren started to speak but cut himself off when something in the corner of his eye caught his attention and he quickly began scanning the room once again.

"What's wrong, Ren?" Nora inquired as she readied herself for a possible battle. She hadn't noticed anything amiss, but Ren has always had a sense for danger so she trusted his judgments.

"I thought I saw something." He replied as he leveled his SMG's in the direction of the disturbance and watched his radar carefully for movement. "We may not be as alone as we thought we were."

Realizing that their cover had been blown, at least two dozen cloaked figures burst from cover, their cloaking devices causing the space around them to blur and shimmer as they moved about. Some took up shooting positions on the higher floors while a few others came at team JNPR directly with energy swords in hand.

"Tricky split jaws set up an ambush!" Jaune declared before he was forced to dodge away from the incoming plasma fire. After he scrambled behind some nearby cover, he glanced over to where his teammates had been. He found that they had ran off in opposite directions, placing them some distance away with good cover between them.

Realizing that he wouldn't be able to reach his team easily from his position caused Jaune to curse under his breath before he began to properly evaluate the situation in his head. He could stay where he is and offer cover fire for his teammates, but with his rifle empty he didn't have a proper ranged weapon to do so. That meant he would need to find a way to close the distance between him and the enemy without drawing too much attention to himself. That was when he stole another glance at the room and noticed that most of the enemies were gathering on the upper level. That made sense given the better sightlines and better cover options, but there was one weakness that stood out to him and it caused him to grin.

"They seem to be gathering on that light bridge!" Jaune declared as he directed his team's attention to the bridge that hovered over the center of the room. "You guys go around and I will meet you on the upper level! Try to keep them distracted for me, I got a plan!" He told them before he prepped his Magnum and drew a knife from his side and waited.

Pyrrha just gave her leader a quick nod before she broke from her own cover and led the charge with Nora and Ren close behind her. When the Covenant forces zeroed in on them, Pyrrha quickly engaged her hard light shield and the three teammates used it as a source of mobile cover, they knew it wouldn't last long under such heavy fire but at the pace they were moving, it wouldn't need to.

As Pyrrha, Nora, and Ren made their way across the room towards one of the ramps that lead to the upper levels, Nora fired off explosive rounds at just about everything that moved, and even a few things that didn't move just for good measure. While at the same time Ren kept watch on their rear, with so many enemies still cloaked and moving about in the shadows he had to focus in order to track them and prevent a flanking maneuver.

Watching his team go and the enemies gaze following them, Jaune took it as his chance to slip out of cover and make a break for a gravity lift on the other side of the room.

At the same time Pyrrha, Nora, and Ren had just reached the base of the ramp and Pyrrha spotted two more sets of shimmers before she heard the familiar hiss of plasma swords being activated. Then from within the blurry shimmers, two sets of energy blades emerged from the before the blurs rushed forward to meet NPR head on.

Acting quickly, Pyrrha deflected the first sword thrust with her shield before she delivered a hard kick into the blur's chest and sending it reeling backward and directly onto his companion's blade. Upon being impaled with the energy sword, the blur's energy shields flared up violently before bursting and its cloaking device failed revealing an Elite warrior in the signature red armor of an Elite