United Indiastan
13-04-2004, 06:48
<High Earth Orbit, over United Indiastan, August 16th, 2273*>
The young fighter pilot was rather bored of his squad's assignment. THey'd been holding station in orbit while haulers brought men and equipment up form the ground to the waiting Cotton and Avioki transports. "Hey, Sarge, how much longer we gotta be out here babysittin'?"
Stactic crackled in the young pilot's headset as the sargent answered. "Two more hours Alpha Six. Now shut up, and stay awake. Don't waste the batteries, damnit."
The squad of eight Thunderbolt heavy fighters had been hanging around with the transport fleet for the last six hours, and the tedium was starting to wear on the pilots. Over that time, more of the escort had arrived, but as most had come in from somewhat long hyperspace jumps, none had offered to launch replacement fighters. So the squads of Ramilles Station kept vigil, Alpha squad among them.
The fleet was nearly assembled and loaded as the Alpha squad fighters withdrew to their station for refueling. Three Primus-class battle cruisers and half a dozen Deimos-class light cruisers escorted seven Cotton-class supply tenders and eight Avoiki-class heavy transports that had been loaded down with men and materiel, all inteded for the founding of the new Fort Nial.
The project had been over a year and a half in the works, and just now all of the assets for transportion had come available, so the window of oppertunity wasn't very large. The Ministry knew there wouldn't be another chance for getting everything to the landing site, so they had to be as organized as possible. The most difficult problem was getting all of the modified shuttles aboard without compromising their hulls in the Earth atmosphere as they moved things into orbit. Everything had worked out so far, now all Fleet Nebula had to do was get to Venus and land.
The young fighter pilot was rather bored of his squad's assignment. THey'd been holding station in orbit while haulers brought men and equipment up form the ground to the waiting Cotton and Avioki transports. "Hey, Sarge, how much longer we gotta be out here babysittin'?"
Stactic crackled in the young pilot's headset as the sargent answered. "Two more hours Alpha Six. Now shut up, and stay awake. Don't waste the batteries, damnit."
The squad of eight Thunderbolt heavy fighters had been hanging around with the transport fleet for the last six hours, and the tedium was starting to wear on the pilots. Over that time, more of the escort had arrived, but as most had come in from somewhat long hyperspace jumps, none had offered to launch replacement fighters. So the squads of Ramilles Station kept vigil, Alpha squad among them.
The fleet was nearly assembled and loaded as the Alpha squad fighters withdrew to their station for refueling. Three Primus-class battle cruisers and half a dozen Deimos-class light cruisers escorted seven Cotton-class supply tenders and eight Avoiki-class heavy transports that had been loaded down with men and materiel, all inteded for the founding of the new Fort Nial.
The project had been over a year and a half in the works, and just now all of the assets for transportion had come available, so the window of oppertunity wasn't very large. The Ministry knew there wouldn't be another chance for getting everything to the landing site, so they had to be as organized as possible. The most difficult problem was getting all of the modified shuttles aboard without compromising their hulls in the Earth atmosphere as they moved things into orbit. Everything had worked out so far, now all Fleet Nebula had to do was get to Venus and land.