UNSC Spirit of Anzac

Entering service in 2536, the year the Covenant glassed the last of the Outer Colonies, the UNSC Spirit of Anzac had a less-than-stellar start to its combat service, participating in a number of engagements against the Covenant as they began their seemingly-inexorable push into the Inner Colonies. Serving as part of the UNSC 30th Fleet, the Spirit of Anzac has participated in a number of well-known theatres, such as Draco III, Delta Pavonis, the Minorca campaign, the defence of Earth, and throughout the War of Vengeance.
==History==
The early years of the war with the Covenant were times of confusion. At the time, the UNSC barely had any idea of what kind of enemy it was up against - apart from a few reticent captives taken during early engagements, there were few sources of reliable intelligence. Of the few confirmed Covenant star systems that had been probed, few scouts had been able to return. What little they knew of the enemy's capacities and doctrines were that on the ground, the Covenant used large numbers and superior firepower to overcome UNSC tactics and strategy, while in space the opposite was true - Covenant warships possessed energy shielding and directed energy weapons that far outclassed UNSC weapons and armour. In light of this, a fleet-wide overhaul of the Navy was deemed necessary, with new ships classes put forward with new roles in mind. One of the Iroquois-class heavy destroyers constructed during this time, the UNSC Spirit of Anzac enhtered service in 2535, captained by Commander Jonathan Stanley, attached to the UNSC 30th Fleet under Vice Admiral Brendan Reichmuth. While too late to affect the battle for the Inner Colonies, it would enter service in time for the fleet's new objective of rapid response to threats among the Inner Colonies.
===Human-Covenant War Service===
====The Inner Colony Campaigns (2536-2548)====
The Spirit of Anzac first saw action in 2536 over Megiddo, part of the response battlegroup tasked with reacting to its invasion. Engaging in hit-and-run strikes using the system's asteroid belts as effective cover, scattering enemy plasma and confusing their systems, the Spirit of Anzac and its battlegroup drew off part of the Covenant battlegroup in harrying actions long enough for the rest of the UNSC fleet to arrive in-system and engage the divided enemy, landing troops to assist in the evacuation of the colony. Although the ship was damaged by plasma scoring and impact with an asteroid during this engagement, Commander Stanley was praised for his quick thinking and he and his crew ere awarded the Navy Unit Citation. His decision to use the asteroid belt was especially singled out as exceptional, and would later inspire Operation: HOT GATES. Between 2537 and 2548, the Spirit of Anzac would participate in defensive operations in another nine star systems, including taking part in Operation:FORTHRIGHT over Draco III in 2545. By 2548, the ship's crew had been awarded a number of other citations, and Stanley had been awarded a number of silver and bronza stars of his own for actions.
====EXCALIBUR (2548-2549)====
Operation: HOT GATES was already in the preliminary planning and preparation stages during 2547, and the distinguished performance of the 30th Fleet had greatly impressed FLEETCOM. Selected as one of a number of defending fleets, many of its warships were refitted with advanced technologies intended for later wider use, developed as part of Projects TEMERITY and EXCALIBUR. As part of this, the Spirit of Anzac recieved extensive upgrades to its MACs, reactor and thrusters, and additional RCS thrusters to provide greater agility for its intended role during HOT GATES as an advanced fire coordinator during the early stages. War games conducted during the late stages of refit suggested that calculating trajectories for so many targets for so many ships, while simultaneously keeping the Spirit of Anzac at full combat performance, would be beyond the abilities of a single third-generation AI such as the one it was equipped with, and additions were made to the ship's AI hardware suite, allowing it to carry two "smart" AI for the purpose, with the additional effect of increasing processing speed for all actions.
====Delta Pavonis (2549)====
Prior to HOT GATES, however, the Spirit of Anzac would partake in the evacuation of Delta Pavonis
====Minorca (2550-2552)====
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====Earth (2552)====
After the UNSC withdrawal from Minorca, much of the 30th Fleet was scheduled for makeshift repairs to prepare for the defence of Earth, stationed in orbit over Earth, or around the Lunar perimeter. The Spirit of Anzac was not one of these. Suffering significant damage, the Spirit of Anzac was instead assigned for extensive repairs at the Reyes-McLees Naval Shipyards over Mars, where it was in drydock when the Covenant arrived in the Solar system. Hastily scrambled to bring it back up to combat readiness, the Spirit of Anzac would engage the enemy with a skeleton crew, makeshift patchwork seals over hull breaches, one of its MACs offline, and at half power. Even with these deficiencies, the ship would survive the battle for control of Earth's closest colony, and retreat with the rest of the Martian Defence Fleet to Earth to assist with counterattack efforts to regain strategic control of Voi, though arriving too late to take part in Admiral Hood's assault on the Keyship. The Spirit of Anzac would remain over Earth with the rest of the UNSC fleet as Commander Miranda Keyes led a UNSC strike alongside a larger Sangheili force, engaging the remaining Brute forces and attempting to fire on High Charity as it plunged into Earth's atmosphere towards the still-active slipspace portal. After the conclusion of hostilities, the Spirit of Anzac would be assigned to follow the Bringer of Holy Light and the through slipspace and recover survivors.
===Post-War Service (2553-current)===
==Design==
As the Human-Covenant War wore on, the UNSC quickly came to realise that it's then-current arsenal had simply been rendered obsolete almost overnight. Covenant technology possessed superior offensive and defensive capabilities in virtually all respects, leaving the UNSC stuch with a combat force centuries behind their attackers. As part of emergency measures, the UNSC Navy introduced a number of sweeping changes, including retrofits and overhauls of most combat warships, research and development projects to reverse-engineer enemy technology, and mitigate the advantages the enemny possessed. As part of this, they introduced the Iroquois-class Heavy Destroyer. Designed in response to Covenant warships with long-range plasma torpedo and close-range laser turret weapons, the Iroquois is designed to close with the enemy rapidly and maximise use of its own weapons through close- and medium-range. For this purpose, the class features sloping reactive armour plating designed to withstand hits from laser weaponry, and carries twenty six Archer missile pods and two heavy Magnetic Accelerator Cannons as standard features. Other features vary between ships based on the roles they are intended for, but the Spirit of Anzac is designed for close-in fighting, and features six M910 point defence railfuns, normally mounted to lighter frigates. Its countermeasures consist of three JANUS Remote Decoy Drones, generating EM emissions that mimic those of a UNSC destroyer, able to trick Covenant torpedo guidance systems, and an advanced electronic warfare suite.
Smart AI are rare on warships smaller than cruiser size, and are usually needed for fleet logistics, combat communications networking and electronic infiltration and disruption of enemy systems. While the Spirit of Anzac is intended to operate solo during operations, it features an advanced AI storage suite that allows it to support multiple AIs simultaneously for parallel networking. These features were installed during refits during 2549, alongside improvements to the twin MACs allowing faster rate of fire in exchange for shorter range - hardly a tradeoff when considering the usual range a destroyer must engage its targets. This suite effectively allows the Spirit of Anzac to fulfill roles originally intended for Prowlers, such as fleet networking and communications, but was intended specifically for use in Operation: HOT GATES. Other improvements made during the 2549 refit were the incorporation of advanced materials in the ship's battleplate, innovations in slipspace navigation calculations allowing enhanced accuracy and shorter transit time, and a new reactor for improved output, especially during extreme performance.
As with all destroyers, the Spirit of Anzac is almost double the tonnage of a similarly sized frigate, which gives the class a reputation for being cumbersome, especially against tracking plasma torpedoes. Although acceleration and deceleration require do more power, they are still capable of feats of agility through the use of emergency thrusters. The Spirit of Anzac features additional RCS thrusters for improved manoeuvrability during combat, increasing fuel consumption but giving it agility comparable to a far lighter warship. Combined with its standard arsenal, the Spirit of Anzac, in the words of former captain Jonathan Stanley, "delivers the same punch but with a bit of kick too." The increased fuel consumption means that, while the ship is designed to operate in long range operations without close support, the duration of these missions are more limited than conventional destroyers by fuel capacity, unless supported by refuelling ships or attached to a larger fleet.
==Remarks==
*"I could give whoever named her a kick up the arse. ANZAC is capitalised! It's an acronym, not a word!"
*"With the 2549 upgrades, she's like a ballerina wearing knuckledusters!"
*"Pretty much all the EXCALIBUR testbed ships were destroyed, either during the Minorca campaign or over Earth. She's one of the few to survive both. She even outlived her first captain."
Category:Destroyers
Category:Individual UNSC Ships