Halo OCS: In One Mind Chapter 12

The team returned to the site where the facility once stood; it was nothing but a creator that span over two miles. There was a Covenant squad investigating the area and that is what Roy was hoping for. They had a Phantom hovering just over the creator with two Banshees unattended on the ground and two in the air.
“I need the best shots to stay here and provide cover fire with their sniper rifles. Take out those elites over by the unattended Banshees.” Roy said over his radio. The team slowed their vehicles but did not stop to let off the members who would provide cover for them. Two ODSTs and a Spartan III got out and the team continued to the target.
“On my signal take them out…NOW!” Roy yelled over the radio. The snipers took their shots and hit their marks dead on. There was confusion and chaos amongst the Covenant group when the team Roy lead rolled towards them guns blazing, trying to get their attention and more importantly keeping that Phantom occupied with them so it wouldn’t leave.

The machine-gunner of one of the warthogs gotten the attention of both Banshees in the air and they were pursing it intently. Roy drove on his mongoose to the unattended Banshees and climbed into one.
“Do you have any idea on how to pilot this thing?” Caroline asked as Roy pressed random buttons on the console in front of him.
“No but I was going to learn as I go.” Roy remarked smartly.
“Well what I can tell you right away do not press that button on your right.” Warned Caroline.
“Why?”
“We blow up then and I would love to live another day thank you very much.”
Eventually Roy managed to figure out how to pilot the Banshee and he took it to the skies to destroy the other Banshees. One of them had been destroyed by the team with a combination of constant machine-gun fire and constant sniper fire. The other one was trying to flee but Roy had it locked on with a fuel-rod cannon inside the Banshee. He fired it and no matter how hard the Banshee tried to shake it; it couldn’t. It blew apart and the pieces came crashing down to the ground. That only left the Phantom that was now also trying to flee.
“Roy don’t let him escape!” Caroline yelled.
“I won’t.” Roy said bringing the Banshee right alongside the Phantom. Roy jumped out of the Banshee and into the open side door of the Phantom. Roy rolled into the Phantom and almost out the other end, but caught himself. He was hanging out the door with one hand and swinging in the air. He pulled himself back inside the Phantom to take care of the pilot and co-pilot. He took the shotgun off his back and two shots later he was in control of the Phantom.
“This is Spartan-137, I have the Phantom. Anybody want a lift home?” Roy said brining the Phantom over to the team.

When the team was all inside Roy sealed the doors and took the Phantom into the atmosphere, and into space. He docked the Phantom with the Stealth Cruiser and when everyone was off the Phantom they undocked and let it drift back down to the planet. By this time the Covenant was now aware of the team’s presence so they sent Seraphs after them. The team managed to destroy the Seraphs but they had taken damage to their engines; particularly their ability to jump to Slipspace. They also had lost their long-range communications in the fight.  The team managed to coax out one final jump into Slipspace to get them out of Covenant controlled space. They didn’t get far but far enough to be safe in open space.

Roy tried to contact ONI on Reach about the team’s success and new info about the bombs the Covenant we’re creating but there was no response.
“Roy we have another problem.” Caroline said inside Roy’s helmet.
“Another one?” He said sarcastically.
“That little dogfight we had with those Seraphs before we jumped damaged our engines and knocked out our Slipspace capabilities.” Caroline said concernedly
“So we’re stuck here then.” Said Roy.
“No, not entirely. We’re in open space away from the Covenant, so we are safe for now. And our engines are still operating at 40%, so we’re still moving, just very slowly compared to normal with Slipspace. But on top of that we have no long range communications with the UNSC.”
“So what do we do then?” Roy asked Caroline.
“You’ll brief the team on the situation and then you and the team will head down to the ship’s cryo-bay and enter cryo-sleep while I remain here on the deck and try to communicate with the UNSC. It’s going to be a while before we make contact with anyone.” Caroline replied.
“Caroline you know how I feel about those cryo-chambers.”
“I know you don’t like them and you don’t want to but you’re gonna have to if you want to live. It could be years until the UNSC finds us and we don’t have enough food on the ship to sustain the team for weeks let alone years.” Said Caroline.
“I’ll go inform the team.” Roy said with a sigh, plugging Caroline into the Ship’s holo-table. Her avatar projected onto the table. Roy walked towards the room where the rest of the team was relaxing. He stopped at the door and turned towards Caroline.
“Be there to wake me up?” He said in an upbeat tone of voice.
“Count on it.” Caroline said with a smile on her face. Roy nodded and smiled underneath his helmet because he knew she would keep her promise. Roy took a deep breath then he entered the room.

The team was spread out amongst themselves and talking; mainly the ODSTs with the ODSTs and the Spartan IIIs with the Spartan IIIs.
“Team, I’m afraid our troubles ain’t over yet. That run in we had with those Seraphs did more damage than we initially thought. We are currently safe for now but we have no contact with any UNSC forces and we can’t jump to any UNSC controlled planets. So in other words we’re stuck here.” Roy said breaking the news. The room was silent.
“What do we do then?” Someone finally said.
“All of us will head down to the Cryo-bay and make ourselves comfortable in our own little Cryo-chambers till we can contact anyone.” Said Roy. Everyone stood up and went down to the Cryo-bay; nobody said a word. Everyone else had gotten into their pods already and now it was just Roy to climb into his pod; but he was nervous.
“Oh, Come on Roy Suck it up! Just get in there!” He said trying to imitate Caroline to motivate himself to stop being nervous. Roy finally worked up the courage to climb in and shut the hatch. A few seconds later the hatch frosted over and Roy was asleep.

The ship slowly made its way to UNSC friendly space for the next three months until finally a UNSC frigate on patrol received Caroline’s distress call.
Caroline was monitoring the cryo-bay on the bridge when she received the response from the frigate.
“This is UNSC frigate Cornelius; we read your distress call and are on our way.” The Cornelius radioed.
“Took your sweet time finding us.” Caroline responded over the radio. She brought up the cryo-bay status of the pods and pressed the activation button to begin the “thawing out” process. By the time the frigate docked with the cruiser the cryo-chambers were opening.

Roy was the first one to climb out of his chamber; he didn’t want to be in there any longer than he had to. He went up the bridge while the rest of the team began to wake up.
“Roy, how’d you sleep? Have any dreams?” Caroline said with a smile.
“Fine, no dreams. It was more ‘lights out, then lights on’ then anything else.” Roy said answering her question.
Roy ejected Caroline’s chip out of the holo-table and back into his helmet. He then went to where the frigate was docking and met with them.
“Wow! An actual Spartan!” A crew member said coming out of the docking tunnel and seeing Roy. The crew member then looked behind Roy and saw the Spartan IIIs. “Wow, even more of them. I thought they all died on Reach!”
“What do you mean ‘all died on Reach!’ Did something happen?” Roy asked.
“Where have you been Spartan? Reach was glassed by the Covenant three months ago, almost all of the Spartans died in its defense.” Another crew member said.
Roy couldn’t believe it and neither could the Spartan IIIs or the ODSTs.
“Well on the bright side, The Master Chief found a Covenant relict called, ‘Halo’ and blew it up.” A crew member.
“The ‘Master Chief’? Who’s the Master Chief?” Asked Roy.
“Who’s the Master Chief? Just how long have you been out here? He’s a Spartan II with an A.I. named, Cortana.”
“Ohh, John and Cortana.” Roy and Caroline said in unison. “Now I know who you’re talking about.” Roy said now understanding.
“You know him? Who are you?” a crew member asked Roy.
“I’m Roy-137, Spartan II EOD specialist.”
“Never heard of you.”
“Yeah…,” Roy said being somewhat deflated “I’m not surprised. I was mainly stationed in the outer system fighting the Covenant out there.” Said Roy. “So where can I contact ONI now that Reach is nothing but ash and glass?” He said quickly changing the subject.
“I believe they are now deferring to ONI base Alpha on earth. Why?”
“I have important Intel I need to relay to ONI.” Said Roy.
“Ok, no problem. All of you onto the Cornelius and we’ll take you to Earth.”

The team boarded the Cornelius but not before they set the stealth cruiser to self-destruct and then left for Earth. They arrived at Earth hours later and Roy made his way to ONI base Alpha.