Battle of Mombasa

For the non-canon follow-up battle seen in the Believe promotional campaign, see Second Battle of Mombasa

The Battle of Mombasa was a part of the First Battle of Earth, taking place in late October 2552. Over the course of the battle, Covenant forces captured the city of Mombasa, Kenya and it was quickly retaken in a matter of hours by the UNSC. However, after the Prophet of Regret's retreat, the city was occupied by the Covenant once again.

Background
After decrypting Forerunner artifacts, the Covenant had been given Slipspace coordinates to a Forerunner facility highly important in their concept of the Great Journey. Unknown to them, this facility was on the human homeworld, Earth.

During the Battle of Reach, the human AI, Cortana, intercepted the Covenant's plans to move a large fleet to Earth. Unaware of the intentions of the Covenant's plan, the UNSC interpreted it as an attack against their homeworld and implemented Operation: FIRST STRIKE, destroying the invasion force that was intended for securing Earth.

The Prophet of Regret, wishing to proceed with securing the facility despite the losses, took a force of 15 warships to Earth. Though surprised to find not only a human presence on the planet, but a planet more fortified than any previously encountered human-held world, the Prophet deemed his mission important enough to proceed and utilized many tactics to ensure his safe arrival on the surface. The coordinates provided by the Forerunner information indicated that his quarry was around the area of Mombasa, Kenya.

Covenant Invasion
On October 20th, during the First Battle of Earth, a single Covenant Carrier (the High Prophet of Regret's flagship) broke through UNSC Home Fleet defensive lines and landed on Earth. The ship landed at Mombasa in Kenya. The city was lightly defended, with only elements of the 77th Marine Regiment scattered around the city.

The UNSC activated the city's Colonial Militia to fight the Covenant invaders. The Covenant forces proved to be far superior and the Militia was eliminated. However, this allowed for almost all of the citizens of Mombasa to evacuate from the city using boats destined for other surrounding cities.

More UNSC Marine Corps units later poured into the region after the initial attack, including the 405th Marine Infantry Division and the rest of the 77th Marine Regiment.

UNSC Insertion
On October 23rd, three Pelicans were deployed by the In Amber Clad to board the Assault Carrier hovering near the New Mombasa Orbital Elevator. Intercepted transmission from the Covenant forces lead the UNSC to (correctly) believe that it was the High Prophet of Regret in command of the opposing force, making his capture their highest objective. However, before they could get near the the Carrier, the formation ran across a Scarab which shot down two of the Pelicans, one carrying Sergeant Major Avery J. Johnson and the Master Chief and the other carrying Gunnery Sergeant Pete Stacker and an ODST squad.

Both teams suffered few casualties from their respective crashes. The Spartan's team moved into a nearby bunker while Stacker's team moved up the beach to the Hotel Zanzibar and set up a command post, eliminating several Covenant units in the process. Both teams then waited in their respective locations for extraction.

Outskirts


After the Covenant made several attempts to eliminate Spartan-117's group including sending in a pair of Hunters, the third Pelican from their flight found the group and gave them coordinates of an extraction point. Lieutenant Commander Miranda Keyes ordered Johnson to regroup with the In Amber Clad so that he could coordinate further deployment of infantry and armor units while the Spartan continued on foot through the city to find the second squad.

The pinned down ODSTs in Hotel Zanzibar were rescued by the Master Chief, who then organized an offense by destroying Covenant infantry, armor, and anti-aircraft batteries on the beaches facing New Mombasa.

Assault on the Bridge
John-117 and his makeshift Marine unit entered a blown-out hole in a tunnel, and destroyed the forces hiding inside of it. After the engagement in the tunnels, they advanced towards the bridge connecting Old and New Mombasa. Before the Spartan got there, the Marine unit at the bridge had exhausted itself fighting the Scarab.

The Master Chief arrived at the bridge to assess the situation while Sergeant Johnson reinforced the Marines with weaponry, including a Scorpion tank. The Chief traveled across the bridge with the armored unit, clearing it of both Covenant armored and mechanized forces.

City Center
After the engagement on the bridge, UNSC forces entered New Mombasa in large numbers. They linked up with various squads of Marines as they moved through the city, eliminating Covenant forces that were setting up positions. The Master Chief's team worked their way towards the City Center, finding that the Scarab had, likewise, taken a similar path.

Once in the city center, they found a Marine outpost commanded by Staff Sergeant Marcus Banks of Alpha Company under siege by a unit of Wraiths. A UNSC Mechanized unit destroyed the Wraiths, and secured a landing zone for reinforcements. The Pelicans dropped a platoon of Marine infantry and a Scorpion Tank.

Destruction of the Scarab
The lumbering Scarab appeared outside the Metropolitan City Center and destroyed a Scorpion Tank. Marines opened fire on the walker, but it was unaffected and impervious to the weak rounds and climbed over their position and moved into the canals of the city. However, it soon found itself trapped inside of the walls of the canal, giving the Marines a chance to attack it openly with Pelicans.

The Master Chief and Alpha Company followed the Scarab through the canals and the Spartan boarded the walker. While the Marines provided some cover fire, John defeated the forces manning the Scarab walker. After defeating its command crew, he managed to destroy the Scarab from the inside by damaging its internal operating systems or the core system. Realizing that they were at a tactical disadvantage, all Covenant forces retreated to Regret's carrier. Master Chief, was extracted by Pelican and taken back to In Amber Clad along with the remaining members of Alpha Company under orders from Commander Keyes.

Regret's withdrawal
Fleet Admiral Terrence Hood was hesitant to let In Amber Clad engage the High Prophet of Regret's Assault Carrier, still above Mombasa and beside the New Mombasa Orbital Elevator. However, when the Carrier began jumping into Slipspace while still in the atmosphere, Hood recognized that the only ship able to follow was the In Amber Clad and gave the ship the green light to give chase.

The Pelicans carrying Spartan-117 and the Marines entered the In Amber Clad, which followed the Assault Carrier into Slipspace. Just before the Carrier jumped, remaining ships of the UNSC Home Fleet deployed dozens of SOEIVs down to the city in an effort to infiltrate the Carrier, only to be caught by the EMP blast in mid-flight, frying their navigational and safety systems, plunging them and their Orbital Drop Shock Trooper occupants to almost certain death. It is likely that only one Squad survived, having changed their course away from the carrier at the last moment. Many of the city's buildings were heavily damaged but remained standing, including the Orbital Elevator. The rupture also created a large crater into the mainland, north of New Mombasa.

Occupation
Large numbers of Covenant troops remained in the city even after Regret's withdrawal. In the hours following the slipspace event, the Prophet of Truth deployed even more Covenant forces led by Brutes into New Mombasa, to destroy the remaining UNSC forces and finally scour the area for Forerunner artifacts. The internal struggle among the Covenant begun to brew here, as the Jiralhanae started killing their fellow Sangheili still stationed within the city.

However, a small amount of UNSC Marines and NMPD forces remained. They organized an effective resistance, and fought for control of the city in various battles. The city's Urban Infrastructure AI Superintendent also had a vital role in the defense of the city.

The following is an account of the later events of the day, focusing mainly on the members of an ODST squad, in chronological order.

Lumumba and Tayari
Knocked off their course by the slipspace rupture, two ODST drop pods made rough landing, Buck's pod to Lumumba and Dare's to nearby Tayari Plaza. At this point, the Brutes were already deploying their forces into the city. Buck fought his way to Tayari Plaza to help Dare, but she had mysteriously disappeared. After the battle, Buck met up with Romeo. As they had no idea of their mission, they decided to find their squad and get out of the city as fast as possible.

Uplift Reserve
A large vehicular battle was fought in Uplift Reserve, where several platoons of Marines clashed against the Covenant. Numerous UAVs also participated in the battle. Dutch also landed here, and made his way through the park, assisting the Marines and crushing the Covenant resistance on his way. During the course of the battle, the Orbital Elevator collapsed when a crashing Drone aircraft hit it. Only a small section remained standing, and it stood until the city was glassed. Wreckage of the Tether was scattered across the plains of the Tsavo Nature Reserve and along the sides of the Tsavo Highway.

Kizingo and Sector 10
The Kizingo district was the site of a battle between UNSC and Covenant armored forces, when a Scorpion Tank driven by Mickey made its way along the Kizingo Boulevard to the Rally Point at the entrance to the ONI Alpha Base at Sector 10. He then met up with Dutch, and they, with the assistance of Marines, defended the area against incoming Covenant who were trying to access the ONI facility. They then followed an NMPD officer further inside the ONI complex.

ONI Alpha Site
Inside the ONI compound, the Marines and the NMPD forces destroyed the bridge leading to the base, in order to slow down the advancing Covenant forces. This however, didn't stop the incoming dropships. The human forces fell back to the base's courtyard, which they defended against waves of Covenant attackers, before falling back into the interior of the main building. Again, they fended off multiple waves off Covenant. They then activated explosives inside the complex, to destroy it in order to prevent the Covenant from accessing the Superintendent's data facility deep under the complex. The Marines and the police forces evacuated to the roof, where they were picked up by an NMPD Pelican dropship. They watched as the explosives inside the ONI building went off, completely destroying it.

NMPD Headquarters
Buck and Romeo made their way to the top floors of the NMPD Headquarters building, where they were to be picked up by the Pelican with Mickey and Dutch already onboard. However, the dropship was shot down, and it crashed to another rooftop. Buck and Romeo fought their way through the rooftops, and eventually reached the crash site, where they fought off waves off attacking Covenant. Finally, a Brute Chieftain dropped off from a Phantom, and severely wounded Romeo. The squad managed to kill the Chieftain, after which they decided to evacuate through the train tunnels which led into Old Mombasa.

Flooded City
The squad arrived at Kikowani Station, only to realize it, as well as its surroundings had been flooded by water, making escape through train tunnels impossible. Romeo's condition was getting worse, so the squad used Biofoam to seal his wound. They then decided to hijack a Phantom, in which they succeeded. Buck escorted the rest of the squad through the flooded sections of the city, in a Banshee, while Mickey piloted the Phantom. The area was filled with Covenant forces, including a Scarab. They managed to fly out of the city, when Buck realized he knew where Dare was and decided to go back to find her, inside the Superintendent's Data Center. At this point, more and more Covenant ships started arriving, to uncover the Ark Portal.

City Centre
Around the same time, lone ODST, the Rookie, woke up in his pod, on a rooftop in Mbaraki. The city was already occupied by the Covenant, with next to none UNSC resistance left. The Superintendent aided the Rookie to survive in the city and look for clues for what happened to his squad. Upon finding objects related to his squad, he envisioned what happened to them accurately in his mind. After wandering around the city for a while, the Rookie received a distress message from Dare, who was inside the Superintendent's data facility deep under the city. He made his way to a subway entrance, and descended down an elevator shaft, to Sublevel 7 of the data center. At this point, the underground tunnels had become infested with Drones, who had built massive hives in the area.

Data Center
Eventually, the Rookie managed to meet up with Dare and inside the Superintendent's Data Center. Inside, they discovered a Huragok nicknamed Vergil, who had combined the Superintendent's data with its own. As a result, the AI shut itself down. At this point, Buck arrived into the complex and the ODSTs escaped back to the surface through the tunnels filled with Covenant, while protecting the critically important Huragok.

Escape
In the dawn of the next day, the area was already full of Covenant capital ships. Buck, Dare and the Rookie made their way to the surface, through a Covenant outpost in the city, and eventually took an elevator to the city's Coastal Highway. They then pushed through the Coastal Highway and made a stand at the entrance to Uplift Reserve. The Phantom captured by the rest of the squad arrived eventually and picked them all up, and they made it out just as an Assault Carrier appeared from slipspace and glassed the area.

Aftermath
Immediately after the occupation, more and more Covenant ships started arriving at Earth. They started uncovering the Forerunner structure which would later be revealed to be the Portal to the Ark.

The High Prophet of Regret would arrive upon Installation 05 along with the In Amber Clad. It is possible he acquired the location of the installation over the course of the battle.

The UNSC would not discover the actual purpose of the Covenant's arrival on Earth until straight after the Battle of Installation 05; most of the information was presumably received from a Huragok called Vergil. By this point, the Second Battle of Earth had already started, with the arrival of the Prophet of Truth on the Forerunner Dreadnought, as well as the remainder of the Loyalist Fleet.

Trivia

 * The levels Turf and Terminal take place during the Battle of Mombasa.
 * There were multiple Scarabs present in the battle. One Scarab being destroyed by the Master Chief and the other one by Marines who made it crash by luring it into the many twists and turns in the city, in the narrow streets of Old Mombasa. Later on, several more were dropped from the ships of the Covenant excavation fleet.

UNSC

 * Fleet Admiral Terrence Hood
 * Lieutenant Commander Miranda Keyes
 * Master Chief Petty Officer John-117
 * Sergeant Major Avery Junior Johnson
 * Unnamed Lieutenant
 * Gunnery Sergeant Pete Stacker
 * Staff Sergeant Marcus Banks
 * Corporal Perez
 * LCpl. Jones
 * Private Walpole
 * Private Butkis
 * Private O'Brian
 * Private McKenzie
 * Cortana
 * Superintendent
 * Captain Veronica Dare
 * Gunnery Sergeant Edward Buck
 * Corporal Taylor Miles
 * Lance Corporal Kojo Agu
 * Lance Corporal "The Rookie"
 * Private First Class Michael Crespo

Covenant

 * Prophet of Regret
 * Vergil