Battle of Earth (2559)

This article is about the 2559 attack by the Banished. For other battles on and around Earth, see Battle of Earth (disambiguation).

Previous:	Battle of Venezia
Concurrent:	Battle over Installation 07
Next:	Battle of Boundary
Battle of Earth (2559)
Conflict:	Created uprising
Date:	December 12, 2559
Location:	Orbit of Earth, Sol system
Outcome:	Indeterminate
showDetails Belligerents United Nations Space Command Banished Created Commanders FADM Lord Terrence Hood ADM Serin Osman CAPT Abigail Cole War Chief Severan The Eight Chieftain Gathgor Chieftain Ectorius Chieftain V'leria Chieftain Cassius Chieftain Eru'thbok Chieftain Kaladus Kaidon Dreka 'Xulsam War-Queen Cao'mar Strength UNSC Home Fleet 282 starships and orbital defense platforms Over 200 clans Beohk Norkala Cruxguard of Phenthrop Maakra Sunbreakers Nwari Wastewalkers Sclera of Chu'ot Vanguard of Zaladon Warkeepers of Qabik 1328 spacecraft 3 Guardian Custodes

"The artificial construct your species created—the one you call Cortana—has destroyed my people's homeworld. She washed away all that we had built, all that we had fought centuries for. I have been given orders to return this kindness."

— War Chief Severan, delivering his omen of destruction to UNSC Victory of Samothrace during the battle of Venezia.

The battle of Earth was a large-scale engagement fought between the United Nations Space Command and Banished over the human homeworld Earth on December 12, 2559. The battle was declared in reprisal by the Banished as vengeance for the Razing of Oth Sonin, and the destruction of the Jiralhanae homeworld Doisac the previous month by Cortana. The Banished blamed Cortana and her Created on humanity and thus sought to enact an equal trade. Although the Banished steadily outnumbered the defending UNSC Home Fleet, the large-scale eruption of hostilities resulted in the activation of the Sol system's attendant Guardian Custodes which sought to enforce peace by force.

Midway through the engagement, however, the Guardians went inactive thanks to a simultaneous engagement being fought in space over Zeta Halo, which brought Cortana and all of her constructs offline. As such, the Banished made an early retreat despite their initial successes, instead moving to secure the colony world of Boundary in an effort to be the first to lay claim to Cortana's now-vacant throne in the Domain.

Prelude

Main article: Razing of Oth Sonin

On November 8, 2559, a force of Guardian constructs destroyed the Jiralhanae homeworld Doisac under directive from Cortana, Archon of the Created. This act was done by Cortana due to the refusal of Atriox to bring his Banished, or his species, to heel under the thumb of the Created and their hold of the galaxy. At this time, Atriox and his lieutenant Escharum were making preparations to recover a superweapon that Atriox believed would be key to breaking free from Cortana's grip on the galaxy. As such, they granted stewardship of all of the remaining Banished naval assets not involved in their plans to attack Zeta Halo to War Chief Severan, leader of the Vanguard of Zaladon, under orders to prevent any enemies of the Banished from cementing their own foothold over the galaxy once Cortana was defeated.

Severan was on his clan's home of Warial (a moon of Doisac) at the time of Doisac's destruction, finalising preparations to rally his forces at a rallying point beyond the Created's reach when the Guardians came, and almost immediately after recieved a new directive from Escharum:

“

Severan, by the time you recieve this, you will see what the AI has done. She intended to subjugate our people and Atriox refused. The destruction of our homeworld was her response. And we will respond in kind. Once we move on the Halo ring, there wiill be nothing left for humanity to capture when we are finished with her. Severan, we must hold what the Apparition has done to humanity's account. Rally the Banished fleets that survive and raze their homeworld Earth to ashes. Their world for ours. Do not leave anything alive. The blood of the Jiralhanae is on their hands. Make them pay, Severan.

”

While Severan had not expected to be ordered to lay siege to Earth, he saw its value as both an act of retribution and a strategic decision; by attacking Earth, the Banished would draw the eyes of both the UNSC and the Created away from Zeta Halo and give Atriox a better chance to succeed in bringing down Cortana there. Severan then ordered all of his forces (including the Eight) to rally at their predetermined rally point after evacuating Doisac's moons. However, while en route Severan himself made a detour to Venezia in order to seek advice from his daskalo, or mentor, High Lord Dovo Nesto. Unbeknownst to the Banished, Severan was secretly working for Nesto and his Order of Restoration, and thus sought the High Lord's advice over his conflicted feelings about the order. However, Nesto encouraged Severan to proceed with the attack despite his own surprise at the decision. Their meeting was interrupted by the arrival of a small UNSC-Swords of Sanghelios task force consisting of Valiant-class super-heavy cruiser UNSC Victory of Samothrace and Kerel-pattern assault carrier Shadow of Intent, themselves intent on assassinating Dovo Nesto. In the ensuing battle, Severan evacuated Nesto aboard his flagship Heart of Malice before engaging the allied duo. While the two cut down several Banished ships, towards the end of the battle, Severan made a transmission to Victory of Samothrace stating clear his intent to assault and burn Earth before both sides ultimately elected to mutually evacuate the battlefield.

Victory of Samothrace ultimately returned to Earth with haste, narrowly avoiding the encroaching threat of Created naval assets, while Shadow of Intent retreated to an abandoned ex-Covenant shipyard to make its own repairs. Victory arrived at Earth on December 11 and the ship's captain Abigail Cole was able to warn Earth about the imminent threat, briefing the remnants of the UNSC Security Council and the heads of the Home Fleet on the situation. Some limited attempts were made to evacuate key assets, large-scale preparations could not be made without risking alerting Cortana's two Guardians in the system - meaning that few people on the planet knew that they were about to be attacked. The numerous attacks on Earth in the prior decade (including the 2552 invasion, 2556 invasion, multiple attacks in 2557 and the 2558 Created subjugation) had resulted in a crippled orbital defence grid and Home Fleet being whittled down to their basics, leaving the world more vulnerable than ever.

The battle

The battle began on December 12, 2559, around the time of nightfall in India. At the battle's opening, many of the UNSC's leadership were asembled aboard Bengaluru Station to oversee the final dispensation of the AI Black-Box. Almost immediately following BB's "death", the Bengaluru battlecluster's coordinating AI Tethys reported that 1,328 Banished warships had entered the Sol AO and were approaching Earth on the far side of the planet, scheduled to enter the effective range of the defending Moncton-class orbital weapon platform in one minute and twenty-nine seconds. The UNSC estimated that the Banished would attempt to punch a hole in the defensive grid and make landfall on Earth, before spreading their carnage across the planet. Accordingly, Captain Cole boarded Victory of Samothrace to take command while Admirals Hood and Osman were escorted to the Office of Naval Intelligence facility near the Portal at Voi to oversee the planetary defence. Victory of Samothrace was given command of Battle Group Omega, consisting of four Paris-class heavy frigates commanded by Commander Ivan Jiron. Battle Group Omega were ordered to assist in Earth's defence, but also to leave and conduct an operation on Boundary as soon as word came in from ONI.

The orbital guns opened up the battle with a salvo of super MAC rounds fired at the advancing Banished fleet. Around thirty-six battle groups similar to Omega began to detach themselves from the orbital guns and engage the Banished head-on, the latter fleet consisting of dreadnoughts, skeids, holks and karves. Both sides launched their respective strikecraft, with the UNSC contributing FSS-1000 Sabres and F-41 Broadswords to the Banished Grievers, Seraphs, Banshees and Trontos. In response to the opening of UNSC MAC barrages, the Banished fleet returned fire with their own plasma weaponry and ballistic rounds, with plasma lances crossing the gap to find targets in the UNSC fleet. At this time, the two Guardians in the system began to advance toward the battle to get in range to use their attenuation pulse emitters to disrupt the fighting; the two advanced from different planes.

UNSC Victory of Samothrace and Battle Group Omega advanced to within visual range of the enemy fleet, to the point that enemy capital ships filled Victory's viewscreen, facing down two dreadnoughts, five skeids and a holk. Victory opened fire with its MAC, immediately downing a skeid, though took a grazing shot from a dreadnought's plasma lance. The threat posed by the lance forced Cole to bring her battlegroup in close with the enemy formation; Victory's port side weapons had been largely disabled in the fighting over Venezia and the ship had not had time to conduct repairs since. As such, Victory was forced to primarily fight with her starboard side to the enemy. However, the holk's heavy plasma lance was able to take out UNSC Blank Check almost immediately, bringing Battle Group Omega down to three frigates. Omega responded by combining their firepower and loosing four MAC strikes onto the holk and obliterating it, with its debris in turn taking out a nearby skeid. The melee was interrupted by the arrival of a third Guardian from slipspace, which immediately began to charge its attentuation pulse. In response, both the UNSC and Banished fleets nearby the Guardian scattered in an effort to get out of range of the electromagnetic pulse. One of the original two Guardians fired its pulse first, knocking out clusters of both sides' ships to drift aimless in space without power.

Victory of Samothrace's evasive maneouvre brought it side-by-side with a dreadnought, almost causing the two vessels' port sides to collide. The crew pulled a hard starboard in conjunction with Omega through the holk's debris field to come face to face with Heart of Malice, Severan's flagship that had already dealt so much damage to Victory in the prior battle. Rather than escape the Guardian, Severan chose to concentrate Malice's firepower entirely on Victory to bring down the superheavy cruiser. Cole responded in turn, channeling what she believed her father would have done in the same situation - ordering her crew to unleash everything they had into Heart of Malice to ensure there would be nothing left for the Guardian to disable. In response, Severan finally relented in preference of simply escaping the imminent Guardian EMP, sacrificing an opportunity to unleash his ship's weapons into Victory's undefended port side and instead ordering his own turn starboard to get out of range. However, just as the Guardian was about to follow the first EMP with a second, it went offline - disabled thanks to the destruction of Cortana in a simultaneous battle occurring at Installation 07. By this point in the battle, both battle lines were thoroughly scattered and intermeshed.

At this moment, Severan made the decision to retreat from Earth and head to Boundary to secure the Lithos, a gateway to the Domain that would theoretically allow whoever controlled it the same power that Cortana had held only moments ago. Ostensibly, Severan wished this to ensure none of the Banished's foes could control it though secretly in practice, he was intent on securing it for Dovo Nesto's ascension to godhood. Facing questions from his crew, Severan ordered all of the ships under his command to return to the rally point they had assembled at previously then enter slipspace. When questioned by the Eight (the council of prominent clan leaders directly under Severan's control), they demanded to know why they were expected to give up victory when victory was so assured. Severan countered that the victory would be meaningless should another get control of the Domain, with Ectorius the White vowing that once the Banished were done on Boundary, they would return to finish what they had started on Earth.

Aftermath

With the sudden Banished retreat, Battle Group Omega pursued, following Victory of Samothrace's lead. They emerged from slipspace over Boundary two days later on December 14, a few hours after the Banished had themselves made landfall on the world. Despite being heavily outnumbered, Omega engaged the Banished in a prolonged engagement over Boundary, using cat-and-mouse tactics to pick off individual targets from the larger thousand-strong fleet as a whole. Later in the battle, Victory's calls for reinforcements resulted in the arrival of the UNSC's largest expeditionary fleets; the Fourth, Sixth, Ninth, and Thirteenth Fleets.

Although the UNSC had been heavily outnumbered and outgunned, the chance retreat of the Banished due to Severan's order meant that Earth itself was largely unscarred by the attack. However, by c.May the following year, the Banished were able to make inroads on Earth with allied mercenary groups operating out of the reconstruction zone of New Mombasa.

List of appearances

• Halo: Empty Throne (First appearance)