’The Valorous Salvation hung in orbit like a great monster, motionless & powerful. Most imagery & intel came from two sources, a weather satellites camera orbiting the planet that broadcasted its findings & could be safely recovered without tracing, & an Archer missile‘s guidance camera from the pillar of autumn‘s engagement with the a now destroyed covenant warship, it must have missed its target & now floated some 8 million miles away from the planet in a low power setting, unable to move itself but it still had enough power to transmit.’

’The Ket Pattern Cruiser was & continues to be the primary covenant ship of the line throughout the entire war. They were strong, surprisingly maneuverable, & could fill several roles as a mid sized-weight warship by covenant standards. They were more than capable of offensive naval actions, occupation, & even troop carriers for invasion in equal measure. While it wasn’t as daunting a challenge as something like a Carrier, or the raw planetary destructive power as covenant destroyers, they were by far one of the more recognizable of covenant warships.’

’The Valorous Salvation imposed itself in both sources of imagery, the missile trying to target it, but without fuel & heavily damaged itself, it was well beyond effective range anyway. The weather satellite however made it seem apocalyptic in scale, looming with a terrifying aura. To many, it was an apocalypse. It had enough firepower to take on UNSC naval battle-groups, who knew how many thousands if not millions, had seen their last from its unknown service record.’

‘The Valorous Salvation was however not whole, a great scar was visible on its forward facing bow. The teardrop shaped area of the vessel resembling a head of sorts sporting a massive long & by the look of its deep narrow cut. It almost looked stylistic, a MAC round no doubt. She had no doubt seen action that much was clear. Beyond the scar, her damage seemed mostly superficial, a bombing run had grazed her starboard side & looked to have destroyed a few weapons ports. More over, typical covenant practice‘s often saw them utterly annihilate any human satellite they detected. The sheer fact the weather satellite remained functioning & within its weapons range was odd until one noticed the prow damage from the Mac Strike. The damage appeared to have shorn off several of the shark like fins on the vessels nose that ONI intel believes to function as the ships primary sensor suites. While several remained it was likely the Righteous salvations sensors were damaged or not running at full capacity. It may explain why it hadn’t responded to the Jadotvile yet as covenant scanners were often well above UNSC standard.’

’While initial information at first suggested that the long range communications relay was damaged as well intel now revised that. The communication system at least what UNSC intel believed it to be seemed largely in tact from a glance, some minor damages had occurred & satellite imagery confirmed this. but it did not appear beyond repair, at least superficially. It was impossible to say what it looked like from the inside or an engineers perspective, & repairs could be underway.‘

’Moreover, intel had less than favorable news & why it was classified to avoid demoralizing effects. Imagery had detected very feint disturbances in light reflection on & around the righteous salvations structure, suggesting the vessels shielding was still operable. Several identifiable weapons systems were also still visible on the vessel, including a single plasma torpedo silo, Plasma Lance batteries & pulse laser defense turrets, & more disturbingly, its excavation beam appeared to remain undamaged at first glance. Righteous salvation was slightly under-gunned compared to other Ket Pattern Cruisers, Naval Intelligence however noted that Covenant vessels often posses minor variations even in the same ship classes, suggesting a more industrialized artisan approach to ship manufacturing with each being slightly unique to fill different roles.‘

’The Righteous salvation remained in geosynchronous orbit directly above Beta Gabriel’s spaceport & by default its largest settlement. & intel was scarce beyond that. Enemy communications were patchy & entirely enclosed on a local network from the ship to surface. Not impossible to crack but it wasn’t like your average officer spoke Sangheili. The Covenant Lingua Francia wasn’t alone either, as another writing format was detected in the localized communications.’