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Doing so on human ships at the time consumed an enormous amount of energy, and John and Halsey had previously questioned whether the ship would even still have its shielding up, since they believed the damage done to it by the Commonwealth may have forced it to conserve power as much as possible. Upon boarding the Unrelenting, John thought it noteworthy that the ship was maintaining non-centrifugal artificial gravity. John was the one to punch in the code that opened the Pelican's rear hatch and the first one to launch, followed close behind by the others. He said that if anyone missed then they should power down and wait to be retrieved.
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John went over the plan with his Spartans, emphasizing that their target was the hole the Commonwealth had already put in the ship.
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Thanks to an adhesive polymer Sam had applied, the missiles would be able to cling to their armor. Sam handed him one of the warheads and Kelly passed him a pack. He motioned the techs to move to the forward cabin and ordered everyone else to grab a thruster pack. She transferred the bird's controls to herself so John could join the other Spartans in the rear. Halsey flatly objected when he asked her permission to attack the Covenant ship, but relented when he explained he meant to board it using thruster packs, not to go up against it with the Pelican. Sam let him know that the Pelican was equipped with thirty-two HE Anvil-II missiles, so John in turn told him to assemble a team to go EVA and retrieve them from the rocket pods on the craft's wing's. John confirmed with Halsey that their armor was usable in vacuum and then asked Sam for a overview of the dropship's weaponry. The Covenant ship was three million kilometers from the Commonwealth but closing that distance with every second. The UNSC Commonwealth's last known position was ten million kilometers in system from their previous rendezvous point, and it was this to this location that John was taking them.
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John was piloting the Pelican through through the exit burn of its orbital path by 2037 hours, carrying all the Spartans, Halsey, the three technicians from at the Damascus facility, and twelve spare suits of Mjolnir. If we lose here, we lose everything." Spartans: " Sir, yes, sir!" - John reminds the Spartans of just how serious their task is. Unrelenting Main article: Battle of Chi Ceti IV John-117: " Spartans, this is what we've trained our entire lives to do.
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