第145页
This would do nothing to stop guided plasma, but they'd emerge going much faster, possibly fast enough to avoid a second attack.
The plasma tracked the UNSC ships as they dove. A split second before it impacted, energy projectors lit on the Covenant ships and dazzling beams of pure white radiation illuminated Patterson's ships—so bright, the scene froze for an instant, burned in Lash's retinas.
Explosions and showers of molten titanium filled the view-screens and rapidly expanded into a cloud of sparks and smoke and the tumbling cracked husks of UNSC ships.
Miraculously five human warships rocketed from the center of this destruction, streaming fire and venting atmosphere— thundering into the heart of the Covenant fleet.
A UNSC destroyer, Iwo fima, grazed a Covenant carrier three times its size, deflected off its shields, and careened into two other Covenant destoyers. The UNSC vessel erupted from inside, reactor overload and single nuclear warhead detonated in an act of self-destruction. The fireball enveloped eight nearby enemy ships… of which six survived behind their shimmering energy shields.
The Covenant fleet was in disarray, slowed and paused to regroup.
Patterson's ships continued to accelerate and arc around to the far side of Onyx.
They had survived… at least for one more orbital pass.
"Additional contacts," Yang said. He half stood from his seat and hovered over the sensor board. "Rapidly ascending from the planet's surface. Intercept course for the Covenant fleet."
Lash's heart sank into his stomach. "Reinforcements," he said.
Yang was silent, studying his display, and then he said, "No, sir. Look, on your screen."
Lash tuned the tiny captain's chair display toward him and examined a ship silhouette. The computer extrapolated a rough three-dimensional model of three boons, and a sphere with no connecting structures.
"They're three meters stem to stern," Yang said. "Passive radar is picking up thousands of them."
The main viewscreen snapped to a medium-orbital vantage and Lash watched as a cloud of the tiny craft coalesced into three octahedral shapes.
The Covenant ships turned toward this new threat, abandoning their pursuit of Admiral Patterson's battle group. Lateral lines heated and plasma barrages arced toward the approaching alien formations.
Fire rained upon the leading eight-sided construction and an energy shield coalesced that looked like gold-dappled water. The plasma hesitated there as if caught in a magnetic field. It heated
to yellow-, white-hot, and then tinged blue and ultraviolet. The plasma melted though the shield, and then passed harmlessly inside the formation.
"Plasma capture?" Waters whispered in awe. "That's a hell of a trick."
The spheres within the alien formation glowed, and from each, scintillating beams shot through the atmosphere toward the Covenant ships comprising the leading edge of their fleet.
A hundred energy beams penetrated Covenant shields and sliced through their hulls. The superheated plasma inside the alien formation then streamed along the beams, coiling and writhing snakelike, and painted the damaged Covenant ships, vaporizing hulls, melting decks and superstructures like they were plastic film.