NationStates Jolt Archive

Space is big. Very big. You can easily get lost in its void without the proper navigational equipment. It’s also very deadly for carbon based lifeforms (Not that I’m saying other based lifeforms are immune to it, I’m not) without the proper gear. Nevermind the obvious lack of air, your body would either freeze, burn from radiation, or explode from lack of pressure.

Whichever comes first. Lovely thought, no? That the only protection you have in space is a metal wall at is a few inches thick, at most? A wall, that if hit by a phaser, would slice right open, sucking you out into the void. That is, if you weren’t vaporized by the phaser.

But even with that protective wall, space is a dangerous place. No matter where you go, it’s deadly. There is no absolute safe spot. No, not even your personal airspace. Take the Sol System. The most densely populated system in the entire universe, it’s population in the trillions, and dwarfing the populous of the rest of the Milky Way combined. It’s no wonder Terrans are the dominant species in the galaxy. They spread like rabbits. The second most populous species known, the Elves, also come from Earth….and don’t even come CLOSE to the amount of people that the Terrans have.

At any rate, the Sol system is basically immune from alien invasion, correct? It’s so massively defended that any invasion on a whole would be…well, suicide. Even the seemingly almighty Demons, with massively superior technology, and a fleet in the millions, where unable to capture Earth. Every corner of the system has been colonized.

Safe, no?

Afraid not. With civilization comes a different form of chaos. Wars, internal strife. The only reason Sol is not the capital of the universe…the only reason the Terrans do not control the entire galaxy, is because they cannot cooperate. Sol is not just the most heavily populated system in the universe, it’s also the most divided. Hell, Earth itself is split into millions of factions, some only the size of a small island.

But as you get away from the center of civilization, you get into the void of galactic space. The playground of the big boys. To survive here, you need a big-ass fleet. Pirates run amock, and special anomalies are common. For many political entities out here, they are on their own, simply too far away from Sol for any assistance to arrive. Colonies must learn to survive on their own.

As an interesting side note, had the Zoir empire not gone on a quest for galactic empire millennia ago, the Terrans never would have expanded into the galaxy as far as they have. Terrans owe their superiority over all other creatures and species to the Zoir, who destroyed whole systems and empires in their quest to support a fleet big enough to battle the Demons. Isn’t fate twisted?

At any rate…for all the deadliness that there is in space…there are deadlier spaces still. Areas in the galaxy that you just don’t go on joy rides through, in fear of getting your head blown off.

One of those places would be the Atlantian Star Cluster. The new homeland of the Atlantians, it is a simple jump node away from Sol, located somewhere beyond the Orion Nebula. For years it had been quiet. No word had gone in or out of that. Rumors of civil war had surfaced however…but nothing could be confirmed.

Eventually people forgot about the Atlantians. They always do. The Egyptians, the Sumarians, the Omlecs, the Mayans, the Greeks, the Anasazi…almost all of them figured that they only had themselves to congratulate for their accomplishments. None of them realized that human civilization was being artificially advanced. That Atlantians where behind the scenes, trying to make their own lives better. These where the decendents of an alien colony that had tried to take over this planet after losing their own to the Zoir. They almost had it, until they made a tactical error…and triggered the end of the last Ice Age with a Thermal Bomb, sinking their island.

Only the Egyptians and Mayans had kept some sort of record. Only Plato seemed interested in it enough.

But then the Atlantians returned. They took to the stars once more. They forged a new empire. They became a force to be reckoned with. They became a galactic super power.

Then…they vanished. They closed all diplomatic channels with all other nations. They prohibited travel…mystery and curiosity turned to apathy. Fact turned to legend.

In the short span of just a few decades, Atlantis was regarded once more as a myth. It was if they where doomed to be forgotten, no matter what they did.

Or where they?

In orbit around Cirrus, the Atlantian homeworld, a fleet assembled. Not an ordinary fleet. A fleet in the thousands. A massive fleet. All together. All as one.

The universe would not forget the Atlantians this time. No…the Atlantians where back. And this time, they where here to stay.

…

They called him Emperor Chronos. He had taken the name of the Atlantian god when he had assumed power, few knew his old name.

Weakened by internal distrust and fracturing of political parties, the old Atlantian Senate had been easy to overthrow. The issue over the species third gender was the final nail in the coffin. He had already been in charge of the fleets and armies…it had been easy to just march in and kill all of the Senators. Only a few had escaped. He would track them down eventually.

One fleet had stood in his way. A ragtag alliance of ships still loyal to democracy, to the Federation. Led by the infamous Olympia, the fleet had managed to escort the surviving Senators off of Sirrus during the attack, and had vanished into the depths of space.

Vega…Chronos had not heard from that traitor in decades. None of that fleet, actually. It was as if they had just vanished.

Cowards.

“Sir?” a general approached him, snapping out of his train of thought as he sat in his throne room. He called it that, but it was really just a very fancy office overlooking the capital city.

“Yes?” Chronos swiveled his chair around. The general stood in the doorway.

The general continued, “Sir, we have confirmation. Three groups of our ships have entered the Epsilon Eridain system”

“Excelent. Keep me informed”

Nodding, the general left, leaving the emperor to continue looking out his large window, contemplating. The Epsilon Eridain system was the homesystem of Phalanix…a former ally, long ago. But initial reconnocence reports recently had detected virtually no movement or anything. It was as if the system had been evacuated…or wiped out.

He was sending in scout fleets to assess the situation in more detail. If it did turn out to be a dead system, then it would be excellent for his plan. Atlantis needed a forward military base system outside of its star cluster…a base from which to launch assaults on the rest of the galaxy. In time, even Sol would learn to respect Atlantis as a galactic super power.

In time…

The battlefield literally spanned the whole star system, burned hulks that once were cruisers, frozen corpses that had been unlucky enough to be shot into space when their ships were breached, glittering metal fragments almost acted like mirrors as they reflected any light cast upon them. For those who knew what this system was they would be horrified or over joyed. Epsilon Eridain had fallen.

Two months before it didn’t seem like the end was near. It took a turn for the worse only when the battle began. Fifty-six AE assault ships literally blew the system’s door apart with their first volley. Both the gun worlds were obliterated by the shear firepower set upon them; it didn’t take long for PSN ships to enter the fray (led by the PSN Hell’s Fury). Missiles flew from almost every direction, plasma shots split ships in two, and nuclear explosions dotted the starscape. If the god of Death were watching he would be pleased to watch the mortals fighting and dying.
It all came crashing down in a single moment that obliterated almost twenty-seven ships; the Hell’s Fury had fired her main gun and struck one of the planets. Even with her main cannon at fifty- percent power at least a quarter of the planet exploded and broke off striking down ships and ripping the Fury’s main gun off of her belly. It was a performance directed by death and chaos.

Any ship entering the system would still detect the odd sensor pulse, though unlike before there were no fighters suddenly appearing off their sides threatening them, there were no battle groups preparing to jump to another system, there was only the remamins of those battle groups and fighters. However something else lurked within the wreakage, something that still could inspire fear even after the preformance that she had put on months ago.

Commander Isari was about as low as you could be in rank, and still be a commander. Ever since the blunder at Tholia, he had been unable to rise in rank…instead doomed to these scout patrols on the edge of space.

He hated his job. He hated everyone he worked with. He hated himself.

But mostly, he just hated everything. Life sucked. He had attempted suicide about 5 times now, but always either chickened out, or managed to screw it up. In short, he was a sad, sad pitiful man.

Three Barracuda class scoutships, two Jaguar destroyers, a dozen wings of Manta fighters, and a Pyramid class cruiser slipped though the Epsilon Eridain system unnoticed to anything but very sophisticated sensors, as they where cloaked.

The commander sat in his captain’s chair, bored out of his mind, hating at everything and everyone he saw.

Hate. Hate. Hate. Hate. Hate.

And when he was done?

More Hate. More Hate. More Hate.

He was snapped out of his trance by the ensign that was using the science console to the right of him. “Sir, I’m getting some strange readings”

“Readings?” asked the commander in a very monotone voice. He was making it clear he was bored with his life, and he was going to make everyone else suffer for it “What kind?”

“A very odd sensor pulse. I’m getting a match from an earlier long range scan”

“Can the one of the other two fleets check it out?” asked Isari.

The ensign shook his head. “We’re the closest, sir”

The commander breathed a very loud, very obnoxious sigh “FINE. Lt” he pointed at the navigational officer “Inform the fleet, yadda yadda…go…wherever”

Rolling her eyes, the navigational officer turned back to her console, and gave the order.

It didn't take long for the hidden beast to shudder awake, inside her crew rushed around, clearing welding equipment from corridors, marines running down corridors (though they seemed as if they hadn't done this in months), and what remained of the bridge crew sluggishly entering the cluttered bridge.
"What is it this time?" Fleet Commander Slater asked as she tied back her non-regulation length hair, "I swear to god if it is a scrapper come to make some cheap cash I'll blow up the ship myself."
"I guess you're in luck Jessica," a man said as he entered the bridge as well, though strangly he wasn't wearing one of the standard PSN uniforms but one of the older black AE uniforms.
"When we are in a combat alert you must address me by rank general," she responded without turning her head, "Now lets see what came to visit today."
At that point the shipboard AI activated a hastily installed holo-projector revealing the space around them and several strange energy readings.
"Christ...cloaking devices...and they're getting closer," Jessica muttered as she sat in the command chair and spoke, "Hold postion and wait till they get closer. Also cut the sensor pulse, but make it look as if the battery died."
One of the crew cheifs nodded quickly and began typing in some commands and before long the sensor pulse faded out and became weaker each time.

A single scoutship exited warp at the edge of the Epsilon Eridain system under cloak and approached at impulse. Some time before, another Rhinaran vessel passed near the system and picked up on the massive wreckage in the system, along with an anomalous sensor pulse. Yet, it did not have time to investigate, and instead sent the information back to the Star Sovereignty for another to look into. There may be something worth salvaging in there, if nothing else.

And so Khellian was now on his way into the solar system. He preferred this to his previous assignment. Ferrying dignitaries around the outer reaches of Sovereign space could get rather irritating at times, especially those that talked too much. Yes, those were the worst. Like the colonial magistrate who kept talking about how the Rynkan diarrhea spread throughout his colony this one time, and how they did not have enough medicine to treat all the colonists. Khellian was sure glad he was not the one who had to work at the waste reclaimation center there.

This assignment was indeed a very welcomed change. While scanning a solar system's worth of debris was not the most exciting job either, it was still better than hearing about diarrhea. Plus, there was that little mystery of the strange sensor reading. Being on the other side of the galactic core was also a nice change.

"Anything on sensors, Vala?" he asked.

Vala's eyes briefly skimmed over the console. "Not detecting any alien crafts," she said, knowing that that was what was foremost on Khellian's mind. Rhinarans were a very secretive people, and liked to stay hidden from view of outsiders, for the most part. Thus, Star Navy ships usually traveled under cloak, just as this scoutship was doing now. That was also why Rhinaran cloaks tended to be just a cut above their adversaries', as stealth was their main focus when designing starships. The scout's sensors, however, were not the top-notch systems used on larger vessels or on dedicated sensor ships, and so the cloaked Atlantian fleet was not detected. Continuing her report, Vala said, "Reading no active energy signatures from the debris field. Sensor pulse is..." She paused as the information regarding this last bit changed.

"Yes?" said Khellian.

"Signal strength on the pulse is dropping," Vala said. "It appears as if the power source is failing."

"Right as we arrive?" Khellian rhetorically asked. "Too much of a coincidence for me. Gaerin, approach with caution. Be ready to turn around and go to warp in an instant."

"Yes, sir," replied Gaerin.

"Vala, keep a sensor reading in and around the vicinity of the pulse," said Khellian. "Once we get closer and the sensors start picking up on more details, let me know. Computer, yellow alert."

A rim of light along the edges of the ceiling and floor light up, casting a pale, yellow glow around the sides of the tiny bridge. Khellian watched the viewscreen, which showed a field littered with charred pieces of hull fragments from an obviously major battle. "Take us to the sensor pulse, Gaerin. Let's see what it's all about."

The wreakage wasn't limited to just chared bits of hull, massive chunks of planet posed a serrious threat. The Hell's Fury knew this all to well as she lost her main cannon (and the only ship based planet killer) when the blast hit the planet behind the ships.
Upon closer investigation sensors would detect an almost twenty kilometer ship that seemed as if it had been torn apart in the battle. Ofcourse anyone would know that sensors could be fooled and this was one such occasion. Upon a visual inspection one could see that several gashes along the ship were shoddily repaired and several other bits of ship hull was welded onto the larger holes.
Now if one were to actualy be able to get within a hundred meters then the few lifesigns that were still repairing the holes and other damage in the decks. If they got lucky they could detect the minute build up of plasma particles, not that it would matter in the next five minutes.

Four ships jump back to realspace and start in toward the system. Two were big, one was small and another was immense.

Ironically, the immense one appeared to be nothing more than a giant freighter/garbage scow and just by looking, it was obviously not well armed. Thus the escort of two Vladius Class Battlecruisers (http://usera.imagecave.com/Alpha-Zero/renegadevlad.bmp.jpg) and a Battlecrab Class Destroyer (http://usera.imagecave.com/Alpha-Zero/renegadedestroyer.bmp.jpg). Two classes used exclusivly by Crimmond... about four decades ago. No one should be using them now. None appeared in prestine condition, all having a patchwork of old and new hullplates and armor, so they were most likely originals, or had very poor captains. None were broadcasting any transmissions, except by a crude laser transmission system. The benifit to that was no one could listen in easily.

The ships ignored any transmissions sent to them from other vessels as the frieghter attached a tractor beam to one of the nearest wrecks and started to pull it closer.

if any ships approached them, all the ships raised their shields, which would actually appear to be a stolen Xanthalian design, and armed their weapons, locking them on the approaching craft. They obviously didn't wish to be disturbed.

On the bridge of the Fury the new arrivals had been added to the map. For the moment they were being ignored, untill they began a collection opperation.
"Ma'am, We have a problem!" the sensor tech exclaimed, "That chunk of hull has a Fallen Angel in it!"
"Shit!" Jessica shouted, "Send us up to red alert and break free of our cover. Like hell they are getting one of our Angel cannons!"
At that moment the Fury roared to life, what was once a quiet hulk litteraly became as active as a small battlegroup in a matter of roughly sixty seconds. Her battle scared hull started to light up with what plasma torpedo launchers had survived the battle, the missiles ports that still were stocked opened, and her fifty milimeter auto-turrets swiviled (though most had long since run out of ammo and were only being used as a show of force with the excpetion of the odd dozen that had ammo).
"Looks like it's time to wake up the rest of the sleeping empire," the man in the AE uniform said as he turned and left the bridge.

Commander Isari was seeing just how long he could balance a pen on his nose. So far, it had been sitting there for about two minutes. Almost a new record for him. He had been ignoring his officer’s reports of other ships moving in. He didn’t give a damn.

A shaking of the bridge knocked the pen to the floor. Isari cursed under his breath, sitting back up. “Status? What the Hades was that?”

The navigational officer replied, “Sir….I think you should see this…” she placed the Hell’s Fury on the main screen as the monstrosity came to life. It dwarfed anything in the Atlantian military, even the Omega itself.

“Holy….” For the first time in years, Isari wasn’t bored.

“Oh my gods” the tactical officer gasped, as the ships weapons activated. He looked down on his display, readouts coming in from short range scans. “Oh…my gods…”

“The HADES is that…that…THING?!” exclaimed the science officer.

The tactical officer swiveled around in his chair and looked at the science officer directly in the eye “That, my naive friend, is what we like to call a “mothership”

“I hate to break up this entertaining moment” the navigational officer said, “But that ain’t a mothership. Trust me; I’ve seen the schematics for that Vizon monstrosity”

“Keep us cloaked” Isari ordered, uncharacteristically getting involved “At least for now. And get the other Atlantian forces in the area over here”

As soon as the giant hulk of a ship woke up, the two battlecruisers manuvered in between it and the frieghter, though it's cargo unit was massive enough to swallow a heavy cruiser of most nations, which continued to haul the battered hull closer.

The battle cruisers fired several probes at the Hell's Fury, the little devices in an arching course towards the ship. They then raised their shields, along with the destroyer, which remained in front of the frieghter.

As telemetry came back, one of the cruisers launched a hardshell. A probe modified to make an FTL jump for a predetirmined amount of time, exit back to normal space and then scream it's little ass off at whoever would listen. It jumped back the way they came. The battlecruisers were outclassed and knew damn well they were. They were calling for help.

The probes were quickly targeted by the Fury and a small slew of missiles (roughly fifty) were set upon them.
"This is the PSN Hell's Fury. You shall cease all activities in the area, leave the property of the PSN, and leave this system. If you do not comply you will be obliterated. You have thirty seconds to respond."
It was a message that she didn't want to send but had to, the risk of a pirate group or an enemy of Phalanix having one of the Angel serries cannons was horrifying. If they could create a viable defense agianst them then it would be a serrious problem.

Only a minute before the message was sent a small shuttle was launched and quickly vanshed into the wreakage on some unknown mission. It wasn't long however untill another energy signature could be detected, this one though was less than half that of the Hell's Fury.
One of the five surviving capital ships (and the only other one combat capable) slugishly came to life, the AEN Fallen Angel II slowly lumbered out of a less dense feild of wreakage, it was obvious that it hadn't had much left in it but the threat from one of the last remaing super cruisers was still a existant.
Unlike the Fury she looked as if she was hit one to many times and someone decided to use a jack knife and slice her whole port sideopen, with the damage only a fraction of her weapons still functioned (though her main gun was relativly untouched) and only her rear hanger was opperational, clearly she was only supplying support for the Fury.
All of this left only fifteen seconds left on the clock.

Vala relayed to Khellian the arrival of the Crimmond fleet, taking note of the deployment of the warships and the activities of the giant freighter. The Rhinaran scoutship was still some distance away from the fading sensor signal when this happened, as it was on a slow approach vector, and was therefore able to watch what was about to happen from afar.

"Sir, reading massive energy signatures now emanating from the debris field," she reported. "It appears that one of the derelict vessels is still functional. It is setting a course for the new arrivals at 286 mark 013."

"Hold position, Mister Gaevin," said Khellian. "On screen."

The image of the Hell's Fury popped up on the main viewscreen, its gargantuan bulk making the scoutship as small as an ant is to a human.

"Thanth, prepare to phase on my mark," Khellian said. "Sublieutenant, report."

"It is huge, sir," Vala answered. "Nearly twenty kilometers in length. The ship is heavily damaged, but still functional. It is bringing its weapons systems online. Many appear to be nonfunctional, but what remain still pose a high threat to us. The new arrival's warships are positioning themselves between their freighter and this one and opening fire."

The screen showed the first volley of Crimmond probes, followed by the retaliatory missiles from the Hell's Fury.

"Incoming general message," Thanth said.

"Let's hear it," said Khellian.

Fleet Commander Slater's message piped in over the comm system.

"The PSN is rather possessive of their wreckages," Khellian commented to himself. "Perhaps the new arrivals are gathering something particularly noteworthy." To Vala, "Get a reading on what the freighter is salvaging." To Gaevin, "Move us in a little closer to the freighter. And please, try not to let any of the weaponsfire hit us."

The pilot gave a half grin, "I'll do my best, sir."

Isari watched everything unfold from the main screen.

"Sir, we're getting a message from the ship. Playing it now" the navigational officer played the message.

"This is the PSN Hell's Fury. You shall cease all activities in the area, leave the property of the PSN, and leave this system. If you do not comply you will be obliterated. You have thirty seconds to respond."

Isari kept his eyes focused on the Hell's Fury. "Don't respond. Keep us cloaked. I want to see what it does with the other ships"

The commander mused taking over that ship somehow. A ship that powerful...it would give him what he always wanted. Power. Prestige. And a rush of energy as he obiliterated countless worlds.

Trillians would tremble at the mention of his name. Wouldn't that be cool?

The nav officer spoke up again "Sir, the other two groups of Atlantian ships are warping in. They are cloaked as well"

"Excelent" Isari said, "Now...give me a scan. I want to know how many are aboard that ship"

"We'll be at risk of being detected" replied the science officer.

"Then send a scanner probe. A decoy. NOW!"

Nodding, the science officer began looking over his console, preping a scanner probe for launch. A few seconds later, a cloaked probe left the Atlantian vessel. Any scans would originate from the probe, and the group of Atlantian ships would move off to another location...

The tractor beam cut off immediatly. Of course, it didn't matter as the inertia of the hulk was taking it to the freighter anyway.

A standard automated acknowledgment message was sent in reply. They weren't talkative. The destroyer broke off from the group, rotated around and jumped. The frieghter's engines started to charge, but the engines were quite obviously old and in poor shape. They were following the orders... but certainly not quickly.

As the other ship approached, point defense weapons locked onto it an another automated message was sent, warning them to keep their distance.

"Ma'am the ships in question have backed down, though the section of hull is still moving towards the collecting ship," the sensor tech called out from his little section of the bridge.
"Ma'am they've responded as well telling us to keep our distance," the comms officer called out shortly after the sensor tech.
"Thank god," she said quietly before preparing another message.
"Thank you for responding peacefuly, however we request that you move away from the object that you were attempting to salvage. If you obey this last order you shall be permited to leave the system. If you do not comply we will be forced to move you ourselves."
It was then that a faint energy signature was detected moving quickly towards them. "Ma'am! We have a faint signature moving towards us, prot cammeras show nothing so I'm assuming it is cloaked," another tech called out.
"Son of a bitch!" she shouted aloud, "When the hell will we get a break? I shuld have retired years ago..." The tech looked at her about to ask what to do when she spoke again, "If there are any loaded 50mm's on the port side I want that thing to fit in with the area. Also tie our sensor feed into the Fallen Angel II's so that we can share information, I don't want anything slipping past us."
At that point roughly ten of the loaded port side 50mm Auto-turrets came alive and began to track what they could consider to be the energy reading before firing off short four shot bursts.

50.9 Lightyears Away
It had been to long, the PSN Peace Class Destroyer Infernal Sky had been on a deep space assignment for the last six months. The only reason she was retuning two months earlier was because her stores were running low and with the exception of the few PSN outposts they hadn't been able to contact the command station PSN-S Earned In Blood for the last month. It was as if it had vanished along with Epsilon Eridain.

The sensor probe was hit directly by all attacks. It didn't even have time to decloak before it's frail hull was decimated by enemy fire. Little hull fragments that remained would have revealed the probe's origen, if one would look closely at it.

Isari watched the probe blow up on the screen. "Did we get anything?"

The science officer shook his head. "No sir"

"Shakra" Isari cursed. Then he noticed the peice of scrap the Crimmond ships had just let go of.

"Must be powerful, if these two groups want it so badly..." he thought out loud. "Can we use a tractor beam while cloaked?"

The tactical officer shook his head "the tractor beam would still give off both light and energy signatures. We'd be easily spotted"

The commander rubbed his chin "How far away is the jump node?"

"Several hundred km from here" replied the nav officer.

An evil smirk widened across Isari's usually glum face. "Send a message to high command. Tell them we need re-enforcements immedietly. Then have all of our ships decloak and preform the swarm flight plan"

The bridge officers went to work, sending the signal, and decloaking. As it did, the lead ship, a Pyramid class cruiser, had moved up to the peice of weckage and was now towing it away. The other ships, which included nine Barracuda class scoutships, four Jaguar destroyers, and several wings of five ships each of Manta fighters and Obelisk bombers began to swarm around between the Hell's Fury and the salvage, not firing, but getting in the way. The Jaguars slowly moved away, swarming around the salvage as it moved off.

"Ma'am target....oh shit, several vessels decloaking and that Angel cannon has been towed," the tech called out
"Fuck!" Jessica screamed before barking orders, "Target the Angel cannon with a Shadow Angel. Blow it away so they can't get it, also see how many of the defense systems that were set up still work. If they do work bring them online, we need every thing we can get here."
"Jessica I suggest we use the wreaks to our advantage. While scavanging our forces were marking the ones with live reactors, no? Well if we can use that to our advantage by detonating them when the enemy is close or using them to bluff our way around this," the AE general said over the comms.
Jessica sighed before responding, "Fine. But I want you to fire your main guns if they get to close, show them that we are not to be toyed with."
As if to add meaning to her words the twin barrel Shadow Angel cannon unleashed a shot directed at the wreakage, even if it missed the wreak the shear heat and energy would fry any useable systems and posibly melt it. Just like they joked before about the Shadow Angel, it's like a plasma torpedo from hell on steroids.
A quickly assembled message was sent out afterwards, "As you already know this is Phalanix space, you have violated fifty-seven different laws and as a result you will have thirty seconds to power down all your systems and be placed under arrest. If you do not comply you will be obliterated and shall recive no mercy."

49.5 Lightyears away
It ws commonly known amung PSN members that when a Shadow Angel was fired it usualy ment that a battle was starting or ending, it also was one hell of an energy flair that PSN ships had been designed to pick up and head towards at full speed. The fold bubble was tightened even more so giving the massive destroyer that little bit of speed that could result in it arriving to render assistance to the PSN forces.

The bridge shook as the Shadow Angel's attack incinerated the Angel Cannon. A small shockwave sent the pyramid class ship, named the Osirus, reeling. At it came to a stop, the ultimatum came in.

"As you already know this is Phalanix space, you have violated fifty-seven different laws and as a result you will have thirty seconds to power down all your systems and be placed under arrest. If you do not comply you will be obliterated and shall recive no mercy."

"Powering down now, sir" the nav officer replied, about to signal the chief engineer via her comm console.

"Don't" replied Isari. He walked over to her console and manually sent a message to the Hell's Fury.

"Obliterate this"

As he did so, he spoke to his officers, "Have all ships that are able engage Ablative armor. Have them power up all weapons, and prepare for battle. Lets show them some of our own toys"

Everyone on the bridge's jaw's dropped. The tactical officer spoke up. "Battle?! Sir, you cannot be serious...that...thing...we don't stand a chance!"

"The hades we don't" Isari replied, "There's an entire fleet headed in our direction. Possibly the Omega. This "Hell's Fury" is screwed" he sat back down in his seat.

Outside, the Osirus, as well as the other larger ships, began to extend large thick sheets of Orcalic metal over certain parts of the ship. Electromagnetic discharge lept forth from the super metal, as it's purple-reddish tint lit up the ship. Energy sheilds formed around it as all guns powered up.

"Have all forces target the enemy bridge" said the commander, "FIRE"

...

Cirrus

Emperor Chronos looked over the transmission sent by the Osirus.

"Ignore it" he said at last "Apperently the system is still inhabited. And I told them not to engage the enemy. Besides...I never really liked Isari"

Pity that all that metal had to go to waste though.

"We scored a direct hit, wreakage destroyed. Enemy ships are not standing down and appearto be charing weapons," the tech called out, trying to hide the fear in his voice.
"Alright, I want sheilds at full, since we lost the Fury cannon I want sheilds focused around the key areas," Jessica said as a silvery film shimmered for a split second before vanishing, "Lower us to the battle bridge."
The center section of the bridge had begun to lower down an armored shaft with blast doors sealing every five meters untill they had reached the neck of the command mast (also the second most heavily armored section of the ship the other spot being the two forward "prongs" that once stabalized the Fury cannon). The final blast door didn't ahve time to seal as the impacts began to hit the command mast. The ship rocked as the sheilds burst and the upper section that normaly housed the bridge started to melt away. To anyone who dind't know the exact specs of the ship it would have seemed like a killing blow but it was an opening that Jessica had wanted.
"Power down all external weapons, make it seem like it was a lethal hit. I want them to think we're dead in the water, as soon as they get clsoe enough I want them to see how it feels to have their bridge blown off," she said with a dark smirk on her face.
On the Fallen Angel II they had used the attack to there advantage and drifted back into the wreakage using the remains of another Hell Class Super crusier to their advantage.
"Wait for the Fury to come alive before we attack, I want all energy weapons powered down. Let's show them why you don't piss off the Shadow Realm. I also want AE boarding parties ready in the event that we have to board one of their ships," the AE general said as he waited for the Atlantian forces to make the next move.

45.1 Lightyears away
The fold bubble was litteraly only a meter away from the Infernal's hull, though this was a huge risk the speed gain was showing. Less than one housr to go till they could enter the system's outer defense perimeter.

"YES!" Isari exclaimed as he saw the enemy bridge blow up. He hadn't had this much fun in years. There was nothing like taking out your frustrations in life on other people in the way of fiery death. As the Hell's Fury powered down, he shouted "YES!" a second time.

"That went down WAY too easily" the tactical officer noted.

"I agree" replied the science officer. "I'm scanning the Hell's Fury"

They had the right idea, it was to easy. Even if she looked like she was beaten one to many times and wounded horribly, she still could have ripped the still beating heart out of the Atlantian force, and she was going to do just that.
Upon a scan she had very few life signs (roughly two hundred at best), almost no energy weapon activity (just what could be assumed as residual charge). When in reality that residual charge was a the alignment coils just waiting to fire and the life signs were being masked.
However it would only need a few more kilometers before it could rip that heart out.

[ooc: Guys... cool it a bit. Posting and responding once, maybe twice is fine. But let a couple of us get in a post between them, if you please. Especially if you get near someone's else's ships. Like... oh, mine. That shoot and ask questions later.]

The freighter's engines flared and it lept away. The two cruisers were now unhindered by protecting an elephant of a ship and began to pour fire down onto the closest ships. The Atlantians.

A swarm of thousands of mini-missiles, all only a meter long, poured down on the ships, specifically disigned to dump so many impacts onto a sheip's shields or armor that they fail.

And the two battlecruisers got another advantage, as an Elasi Battleship (http://usera.imagecave.com/Alpha-Zero/renegadebattleship.bmp.jpg) and yet another Vlad Class battlecruiser lept in system. The battleship was half the size of the freighter, but was all fight, firing at the pyramids with tens of thousands of the missiles, adding in low yield nuclear warheads on occasion. None of the three ships suffered from the EMP from those blasts, though, continuing to attack.

The battleship proved to be more talkative than the battlecruisers though, sending a general hail visual transmission. "I am Admiral Vladimir of Task Force Renegade. Atlantian vessels, you are ordered to stand down and surrender. Your ships are to be impounded and refited to serve the Task Force. You have one Terran minute to respond, before I rob you of your communications equipment so I don't have to hear you beg for mercy." The communication cut out.

Task Force Renegade used to be an imfamous group of the Crimmond Imperial Navy that refused to return to Sol to be decomissioned. They eliminated several hundred pirate ships and several cartels, appearing sporadically around the galaxy, saving a hapless freighter from being boarded. Now it seemed they were little more than a cartel themselves, using the remanents of the Elasi Cartel and their ships.

http://usera.imagecave.com/Alpha-Zero/Vlad.JPG
Admiral Vladimir

OOC: Sorry...>_>

Also, only the Pyramid class is a um...pyramid. The others arn't.

IC:

The bridge shuttered as the Atlantian fleet's attention was turned away from the seemlingly wounded Hell's Fury, and toward the Crimmond ships.

"Sheilds at 65%" the tactical officer reported "That hit took a big dent in our sheilds. Armor is still holding"

Isari nodded "Have our bombers and fighters..."explain" how we're not going to lose today"

Obelisk bombers and Manta fighters shot forth, firing all weapons on the Crimmond forces. While the Obelisk bombers where an older class, and therefore weaker, the Manta fighters where sleek, fast, and deadly. They where part of Atlantis's newer fleet of ships, designed back when Crimmond was deemed a serious threat. The Jaguars and Baracuddas followed, both smaller ships...and the Jaguars being part of the newer, anti-Crimmond fleet.

"We should go, Xol" the nav officer wispered to the tactical, "There's no way we can win this fight"

"I've already sent the signal to the Olympia...but I don't know how far away it is, Sing. You know the ship's new cloaking device can't be detected by normal Atlantian scanners"

The bridge shook again. Sing looked at Xol. "Then we have to turn this ship around, NOW"

OOC: You know how old habbits are hard as hell to kick. Only before your post I started kicking myself for posting so much >_<

IC:

This was the opening they needed, the Hell's Fury roared back to life and the two prongs glowed blood red and the ligh they cast almost made the ship look demonic before she unleashed a volley of plasma followed by both the barrels on the Shadow Angel.
To the Fallen Angel II this was it's cue. From the center of a clump of wreakage a pair of Fallen Angel shots burst out towards the pyramid ship's engins.
It wasn't long before the Fallen Angel roared forth secretly leaving behind several landing craft that slowly powered up and stuck to the shadow of the Fallen Angel before jumping over to the Fury.
As the Fury drew closer to the pyramid ship they waited for an opening in the armor and sheilds so they could move in under cover of the attack to do what they knew how to do best, deploy troops, have them take the ship, and neutralize the threat it possed.

The cloaked Rhinaran scoutship kept its distance as the battle intensified, keeping to the shadows and staying hidden being clusters of mangled metal and floating rocks that were once part of a planet. Its sensors were just starting to scan the salvage the Crimmond freighter was going for, getting as much as the very basics of the weapon design, but nothing even near useful before the Angel cannon was obliterated by the Hell's Fury. Now, the sensors were focused on watching everything going on in the battle, making a record to be sent back to the Star Sovereignty, and was also searching for any other wreckages that resembled the destroyed Angel cannon.

"Detecting a mass at 268 mark 176 that is a potential match to the weapon," Vala announced.

"Bring us about to that mass," Khellian said to Daevin. "The battle most likely has everyone's attention, but we can never be too safe. Stick to areas that would be potential blindspots in everyone else's sensors and move us to the mass."

The Rhinaran scoutship crept away from the battle and toward the wreckage under heavy cloak.

The Renegades were once a Crimmond fighting force, but losses meant that new strategies be made up. Instead of chraging in like an enraged bull and goring the enemy ship on it's bow, the battleship kept it's distance and fired off two volleys of nuclear tipped missiles in a staggered spread, which would go off as they passed craft not sending a proper IFF code. The ones that got through were met with a void that was anything but, what amounted to a few hundred large gatling guns blasting away from the battleship and half that from the battlecruiser that was with it.

The other two battlecruisers used another strategy, using overlapping fire and rotated and twisting around, firing volley after volley of the mini-missiles at the attack craft as they neared. They obviously thought little of expending excess ammunition, meaning that they kept to one doctrine on Crimmond philosophy: If it kills the enemy, it's not overkill.

The Admiral appeared again. "I'm sorry... that was an incorrect answer. So I guess we do this the fun way." He said, laughing as he looked off screen. "Fire the cannon." The message cuts off as a sudden buildup of energy is detected and from a point on the ship's centerline a massive energy ball shoots out. Ass the energy dissipates, it's obvious that what was fired was a massive solid chunk of metal, the size of a house and roughly bullet shaped. Thirty seconds later, the cannon fires again, after the ship alters it's trajectory a bit, both shots aimed at the pyramid. Hopefully one of the shells would weaken the shields enough for the second to get through. If not... the battleship had lots of shells.

OCC: Gonna leave Fury posts untill AO posts his response to the attacks, though that does mean I can use the Infernal.
IC:

??? Lightyears Away
Space folds had a very nasty risk of a temperal disruption resulting in total disorentation, missed exit vectors, sudden changes in speed, and very rarely being traped in the fold space for an unspecified amount of time.
This was a case of three of those four, temperal disruption, a missed exit vector, and a sudden change in speed.
For those in Epsilon Erdain sudden pulses of radiation began eminating roughly seven thousand kilometers from the edge of the battlefeild. Though faint at first with each passing second it grew slightly more untill roughly a nine kilometer section of space began to shimmer, pushing everything that entered it gently back out.

Ass the energy dissipates,

OOC: Sorry, I just got a kick out of that, Crimm.

IC:

As the outnumbered Obelisk (http://www.freewebs.com/atlantian_outcasts/Oblisk%20Fighters.JPG) and Manta (http://www.freewebs.com/atlantian_outcasts/Manta%20Fighters.JPG) fighter wings where decimated, the sheilds of the Osirus (http://www.freewebs.com/atlantian_outcasts/Pyramid%20Heavy%20Cruser.JPG) collapsed from the duel assault from both the Phalanix and Crimmond fleets, leaving the Ablative Armor to take the beating. The engines managed to hold up at the moment, the armor covering it not weakened enough just yet to fail. However, it was becoming clear that the older class light cruiser was not going to win a battle against the likes of battleships and 20 km flagships.

Well, to everyone except Isari.

"Rechage all plasma cannons" he said. The bridge was falling apart, and the main lighting had been shoted out as sparks flew, "FIRE!"

Another hit.

"Armor is at 40% and falling" Sing said, her console sparking, "Polarizing the underlying hull plating"

Suddenly, a red light appeared on a device on Xol's right wrist.

"That's our cue" he said.

Outside, a massive Laviathan class (http://www.freewebs.com/atlantian_outcasts/Laviathan%20Battleship.JPG) battleship decloaked. It appeared to have been heavily refitted, and wore extensive battle scars. Ablative armor was engaged, as well as sheilds. It ignored any fire that was directed in it, it's sheilds easily handling anything anyone threw at it. Unlike most battleships, it was fairly fast and manuverable. It opened fire on the Crimmond ship closest to the Osirus, with all of its Orcalic beam cannons and plasma cannons as it approched the Osirus.

Onboard, the commander watched the battle unfold as they neard their target.

"Power up the Neutron Distabilizer" he said, "FIRE"

The battleship fired a purple beam at the Crimmond ship. Designed to distabilize the structure of atoms and erode the hulls of ships, a side effect of the Neutron where those free flying sub-atomic particals, ment to cause more damage and radiation.

"Are we in position?" asked the commander. The nav officer nodded "Ready and awaiting your order"

"Do it"

...

Sing noticed the science officer on the ground, bleeding. He had been knocked out by a stray peice of debris.

"Don't even think about it" Xol replied, standing up. Sing ran over to his body.

"He's still alive" she said, "He's coming with us. Besides, he can give us valuble information"

Xol rolled his eyes "Whatever"

"What the hades are you people talking about?!" Isari exclaimed, "Get back to your stations! That's an order!"

Xol pulled out a blaster and shot the commander several times in the chest. Isari fell over, dead.

"Imperial scum" he muttered. Then he looked back at Sing. "We ready?"

She nodded and pressed the communicator attached to her ear. "Olympia, this is Sing. Awaiting pickup"

"This is Olympia, hold on"

"We do this WAY to often" Xol muttered, taking out a small detonator device and toying with it.

"Is that why you married me?" Sing laughed, hoisting the science officer on her shoulders. Xol smiled, and threw the device on the ground. A second later, all three bodies had been transported off the ship.

...

"I hate those things" growled Xol, getting off the tiny cramped platform that was only ment for luggage. "I dispise having my atoms scattered"

Sing followed him. "Just imagine what the Empire would do if they know what kind of technology we had"

"Thank gods they don't"

...

Commander Vega watched the Osirus continued to get battered. Any second now, the bridge would be decimated. He wouldn't be able to see it of course, Atlantian bridges where located in the center of the ship.

"Get us out of here" he said. The Olympia then began to make her escape.

OOC:
Jaguar (http://www.freewebs.com/atlantian_outcasts/Jaguar%20Destroyer.JPG)
Barracuda (http://www.freewebs.com/atlantian_outcasts/Barracudda%20Destroyer.JPG)

The Rhinaran scoutship slid behind the large chunk of debris that had a potential to be another Angel cannon and moved in close, reducing all energy output to a minimal other than its cloaking and sensor systems.

"Begin level 8 scans of the wreckage," Khellian ordered. The low level scan would not reveal much information, but at the same time would not be easily detectable by anyone who's far away from the source. It would, however, confirm whether or not the large mass in front of them matches the reading they got from the previous Angel cannon that Hell's Fury destroyed.

"Beginning scans," Vala said. Her eyes shifted to the adjacent panel that was keeping an eye on everything else around them. "Sir, sensors are picking up on a temporal anomaly approximately six and a half thousand kilometers off the port bow." Another thing caught her attention. "Detecting another vessel decloaking at the battle site. It is attacking one of the ships in the freighter's fleet."

"Patch the sensor readings of the temporal anomaly to my console," said Khellian. "Continue scanning the wreckage."

(OOC: Phalanix, I'll leave it up to you to decide whether the wreckage they're scanning indeed contains an angel cannon or not.)

One of the battlecruisers was struck by the beam and shuddered. After nearly twenty seconds, it's reactors detonated and the ship fragmented into useless debris, though none of the ship's engines or reactors were hit. They weren't going to be captured.

The other battlecruiser jumped out of the system, leaving just the battlship and it's escort battlecruiser. They both ceased firing and both started accelerating towards the highest concentration of debris. Neither was willing to leave the system yet, but they sure as hell knew when they were outgunned... And the Hell's Fury should have little grievence with their choice of hiding place, neither was equipped with any sort of salvage equipment, being warships.

A text only message was sent to the Hell's Fury, though. God damn it. I came to a gun fight armed with a sword. Please don't make my day any worse. -Admiral Vladimir

((OCC: Thank you Rhinara for letting me decide. As a result I'll let ya find one....well part of one :p ))

The wreakage was fairly damaged, though not from energy weapons but from what seemed to be a ramming attack, but it was still intact. As the scans finished the only traces of an Angel cannon was the base of a Fallen Angel that had lost it's barrel in the ramming and was still leaking plasma and radiation into space.
The temporal anomaly however was strange, pulses of radiation kept occuring, growing fast each passing second, while the space that started to shimmer slowly began to develope a sickly green tint. It wasn't long before the tint began to pulse.
To any PSN or AEN officer this was a tell tale sign of a spacefold, with complications. Of course they couldn't tell what kind of ships, how many would be defolding, and when they would defold, but it still was a sign that there was a chance for Epsilon Erdain.

"New ship in bound, it's firing a weapon into our "allies" ships," the sensor tech said just before the fold became noticable, "Ma'am....is that?"
"...It's a fold space exit vector," Jessica said as the shock and joy started to slip into her voice, "Fall back into the wreakage and recall the boarding parties...if we're lucky that's a battle group coming through." She quietly said the last part.

EDIT: Phal was posting as I was

As the Olympia began heading off towards the jump node, the three remaining Jaguar destroyers flew after it, opening fire. The massive battleship barely even felt the attack, just shrugging it off with beam cannons. One was obliterated almost instantly when it was sliced apart by a beam cannon. The other two flew off, regrouping before attacking again. The Olympia wasn't worried about the destroyers...they where worried about the Phalanix force...and that temporal disturbance that was growing larger and larger on sensors.

"Start charging up the warp engines" Vega said, "We might be taking a different jump node out of this system"

The Olympia had been outfitted with an older warp engine, that could go up to warp 2, in the case that they needed to travel though intersystem space rather quickly. However, it was an elder design, and could not support warp for long periods of time. And it would take a few minutes for the reactors to power up.

Vala reported her findings to Khellian, who was in turn growing more concerned about the temporal anomaly a mere several thousand kilometers away.

"Hmm," came Khellian, half distracted. "Run a level 4 scan of the remainder of the cannon. Gaevin, use the plasma and radiation leakages to our advantage. Make it so our scans would be concealed by it."

"Yes, sir."

"Vala, find the rest of that cannon, or at least another one that's intact." Khellian's attention then went back to the developing space fold, still not quite sure what it was or what threat it posed to him and his ship, but determined not to let it destroy them. At least, not without them getting their intelligence back to the Star Sovereignty.

The exit vector pulsed one last time before falling silent, it didn't remain that way for long as a sickly green blinding flash (both sensors and cammeras) burst out of the anomaly. It shrunk back down to a nine kilometer long oval shaped bubble before "blowing off" and sparkling before fading out. When sensors would come back online a beast of a warship as just about nine kilometers long (give or take a meter) was sitting in the exact spot the anomaly had originated at. The last Peace class destroyer had arrived, it almost resembled the Fury with the exception of it having no planet killer on her belly and being almost half it's size.

Vladimir looked around his bridge. It was small for a battleship. Dirty too. The advantage of the Elasi designs wasn't looking good. It was that they could interface with many, many non-Elasi ships systems.

"Find me any hunk of wreckage with a weapon in it. One of those big cannons, missiles, plasma... find one and harddock us to it. I want to use the arsenal around us to our advantage."

----

The battleship came around a useless hunk of a cruiser and scanned over where that cloaked scoutship was, the damaged cannon and then moved underneath it, pelting the area with scans.

The battlecruiser had split off and launched another hardshell, before heading towards the Hell's Fury, skimming around dead ships, coming out from behind a 'small' mountain from the planet and moves towards the massive ship, slowly. Either a suicidal attack run or it was betting on using the larger ship as the perfect hiding place from the Atlantians. The last place they would expect.

Not that the remaining Atlantians cared, they where too busy with the Phalanixian threat. The two remaining Jaguar class destroyers where picked off one by one by the Olympia as it moved off, away from the Phal ships.

"Sir, I've just detected a 9 km ship entering the system" Shara, the AI computer system that was standard on larger ships, reported.

"The Omega?" asked Vega. Shara shook her head.

"It's Phalanixian"

"Great, three Phal ships" Vega muttered. "How long till we can go to warp?"

"5 minutes"

"How long till we reach the correct jump node at current speeds?"

"25 minutes"

"Shikara"

The sensors on the Rhinaran scoutship faltered from the anomaly's flash, making the scoutship blind for a moment.

"What happened?" Khellian asked as the main viewscreen cut out and the sensor feed regarding the spatial fold stopped.

"I'm not sure, sir," Vala replied. "The temporal anomaly emitted some kind of high frequency burst which interfered with our sensor systems. All sensors have stopped working. Attempting to reestablish."

Khellian frowned. "And the cloak?"

"Cloaking device is operating within normal parameters," Thanth said.

"I've got minimal sensors working," Vala reported. "Sir! I'm detecting a large vessel approaching our location. They'll be right over us in ten seconds."

"Cut all the sensor scans," Khellian ordered. "Engage the phase cloak and move us into the wreckage." He figured that, since the Crimmond battleship had not fired upon them, nor hailed them, that the battleship either had not detected them (and they would be heading in this direction by coincidence), or did not yet realize what they were detecting. Either way, the radiation was probably helping to mask their signature, and so moving away might reveal their location to the Crimmond ship should Crimmond be able to scan through their cloaking device. Phasing and hiding inside of the dead Phalanix cruiser, thereby being further hidden, not to mention that phase cloaking required a whole different type of sensors that hopefully not many powers possessed, was therefore their best chance of staying undetected.

The scoutship phased right out of the regular reality of matter and slid quietly through the hull of the wreckage and sat inside of it. Its passive sensors scanned into the regular, unphased reality to keep watch of what the Crimmond battleship was up to.

"Prepare to jump to warp away from all these ships on my command, Mister Gaevin," Khellian said.

"Yes, sir."

Onboard the Fury the "exit flair" caused by the Infernal wreaked havoc on her sensors (though the cammeras had been addapted to handel such flairs as they were far to common in the system).
Ether it had been fate or luck but the Fury had only managed to get behind one of the more stabal. Though it wasn't all luck as the shell struck the one stabal hulk that's reactor was still active and pumping out energy. The resulting explosion caused the Fury to lurch into a wreak as her sheilds sparked and failed along the impact points causing it to be sliced and detonated several of the remaining missiles inside their tubes.

By now the Infernal had recovered from the massive energy amounts expended and she had come to life. Her sheilds wrapped around her and her weapons charged. She beamed a message to everyship in the area, "This is the PSN Infernal Sky. You are in violation of article fifty-two of the Territory Act of 3457 CE. You are to deactivate all of your systems except lifesupport and prepare to be boarded. Refusal shall result in you ether being destroyed or boarded."

On the Fury's bridge the main holo-emiter exploded thanks to the exploding reactor. Jessica had been flung from her command chair, She had a nasty gash along her right arm. "God damnit...," she said weakly as she slowly started to sit herself up.
Already armored marines were cutting through the damaged door with a moddifed plasma sword, she slowly started to make her way to one of the officers who was laying near her when the marines broke the door off and rushed through.
"Ma'am you have to get out of here, you're wounded," one of the armored marines said as he efortlessly lifted her up and began to carry her out the door.
"But...," she tried to say before stopping, she knew that it would be worthless to try and order a marine who is escorting a wounded officer.

The battlecruiser defied it's own tactics and regulations as it continued to approach the Hell's Fury, even after it's shields flared from the explosions, sliding rather close to the ship and hailing it. Your ship is getting progressivly less combat effective. I suggest evacuating all the nonessential personel to my vessel, in case your ship and incoming fire or debris have another disagreement and your ship loses. And before you doubt us... there's a p kilometer warship that's not even been scratched out there. We aren't about to shanghai a bunch of your non-combat crew. We're Renegades. Not morons. -RSS Thor

The battleship on the other hand was up to no good, ignoring the transmission of thatother ship, finding what looked like a salvagable hunk of hull, with an offline Angel Cannon in it. They hard-docked to the hull after two attempts and nearly thirty seconds later, lights came on in the battered hull. The AI of teh Elasi battleship had used the ship's pirate background to literally bore into the other ship's power systems and was gaining 'manual' control over the dead ship and it's weapon. Unfortunatly, it only had the ability to fire twice, according to the AI, before the system would most likely fry itself and become worthless. But it would boost it's firepower temporarily and then could be released again.

"What are they doing?" Khellian asked, looking on as the Elasi battleship tried to hard-dock with the dead cruiser. Watching on the viewscreen the unphased world from a phased one was strange enough, but watching it from inside of another ship was stranger still.

"It appears that the ship is attempting to couple with the wreckage," said Vala.

Khellian furrowed his eyebrows. "Inuendos aside, why? It's just a dead ship, isn't it?"

"They are somehow managing to power up the secondary systems, and are in the process of attempting to bring the weapons systems online," continued Vala.

The furrowed eyebrows grew into a scowl. "Mister Gaevin, impulse. Move us away from this cruiser in a trajectory that would keep it between us and the new ship. Don't let them detect even the ghost of a sensor reading on us. Hide within another wreckage. Vala, are they trying to power up the cannon?"

"Yes."

"I thought you said that most of the cannon is missing?"

"It is," said Vala. "I do not believe the cannon will function in its current state, but they are nonetheless attemping to make it work. Perhaps they know something about the cannon that we do not. Or perhaps they are desperate enough to blow themselves up in the attempt to use it against the other vessels here."

Khellian watched the main viewer as it showed them moving away from their former wreckage and onto a new one. "Keep reading them," he said. "If they manage to get the cannon to work, I want to know exactly what they did to make it work. Get some readings on that temporal anomaly as well. I want to know what happened to it now that the energy burst is gone."

"This is the PSN Infernal Sky. You are in violation of article fifty-two of the Territory Act of 3457 CE. You are to deactivate all of your systems except lifesupport and prepare to be boarded. Refusal shall result in you ether being destroyed or boarded."

"Like hades we will" Vega growled. "Keep us moving. I want us out of this system as fast as possible"

"Three minutes until warp engines are charged" Shara replied.

Vega nodded and opened a channel inside the ship to the head of security, Achillies. "Achillies, prepare your men. We may be getting company"

"Understood sir"

That was when both Sing and Xol walked through the doors leading to the bridge.

"Ahh, so you finally made it. Did we learn anything?" asked Vega.

"It will be in our log" Sing said, taking her navigational station to the right of the hologram Shara. Xol did likewise on the other side, which was tactical.

[OOC: Actually, they have passed by the badly damaged one and stumbled on another a little ways away, that's intact, but damaged so it's not going to function very well.]

A silvery face appeared on one of the screens. "We have control over the weapon. I suggest evacuating all lover decks, so if this weapons starts dumping radiation and such in it's current state, we don't lose any crew."

The Admiral nodded. "Give the orders. And seal all bulkheads afterwards. Helm, bring us up and out of this cluster of wrecks and giv me a good clean shot at that Atlantian ship. Weapons... fire when you get the proper trajectory."

The hybrid ship lurched, rising up, twisting around to get a good line on the Atlantian, who was a good ways away... and then the cannon fired, sending the shell/energy/whatever 'screaming' towards the Atlantians. At the same time the Battleship became a beacon of venting plasma and radiation. Well, this should make the Phalanixian's very happy, to see one of their prized cannons and the hull it was in attached to another ship. And in (semi)working order.

(OOC: Ooooh, ok, sorry about the confusion.)

The Rhinaran scoutship watched the Elasi vessel carefully, scrutinizing everything it was doing to the dead Phalanix cruiser and steering clear of where that cannon was pointed towards. Unlike the previous cannon shot made by the Hell's Fury, this one they managed to get a good scan of while in action.

"Not very efficient," Khellian noted as the readings came in on his armrest console. "And certainly not very stealthy. But powerful, I'll give them that." Raising his voice, he said to Vala, "Continue scanning the cannon. Make sure to get a reading of its effects on its target as well."

"Sir," said Vala, "I'm now detecting a nine-kilometer-long ship where the temporal anomaly used to be."

Khellian took in a deep breath of air. "This day just gets better and better, doesn't it?"

"Warp in two minutes, and..." Shara's digital face lit up in shock as she saw what was headed her way.

"Sir!" Rathma, the science officer said, "Something is approching us...fast"

"On screen"

A large projectile could be seen on the main screen, quickly approching the Olympia's backside.

"BRACE FOR IMPACT!" shouted Vega, sitting down in his seat. A split second later, the entire ship shook violently as the impact rippled across the sheilds, and hit the hull of the ship, sending hull fragments skidding across the rest of the ship. The lights went out on the main bridge, which was replaced by the emergency lights. Sparks flew.

"Damage report!" Vega stumbled up off the floor, where the explosion had left him.

"Sheilds at 75%" Xol said, listing off the damaged defenses. "Ablative Armor on the top of the ship is at 60%...the sheilds must have been distablized during the blow. Hull Polarization is offline...and hull integrity is at 90%"

"I have casualty reports coming in from all over the ship" said Rathma, coughing from the smoke in the room.

"Warp engines offline" Sing reported, "Impulse undamaged...and we still have our jump engines"

Shara the AI simply breathed heavily, obviously trying to recover from a particularly nasty blow.

Xol took over again. "We've lost three beam cannons and a plasma cannon"

"From one HIT?!" Vega exclaimed. He sighed, "Nevermind. Take us about, Lt."

"We're not going for the jump node?" Sing asked.

"Warp engines are down" he replied, "We wouldn't be able to reach the node in time"

Sing nodded, and began to turn the ship around.

"Besides" Vega said, "No one gets away with scratching the paint on my ship. Target whichever ship fired that weapon...and open a channel to the rebel fleet. I want whatever they can spare jumping into this system and kicking some Terran ass"

((OCC: Ah how I love seeing my babys being used. Just a quick explination on the Fallen Angel that Crim has his hands on; it sucks energy like a beast, it's a highly refined and purified plasma burst and sometimes a "striker" (think a ball bearing the size of a small car from hell). Most likely that Angel is firing without a striker, but if it was there will be one hell of a kenetic impact coupled with the plasma strike. Now if that was a Shadow Angel Cannon then AO would have a very big problem (namely a hole in his ship if he wasn't lucky). So have fun with the new toy :P ))

From the secondary command center that had been established right next to the medical bay Jessica watched with a small smile on her face at the sight of the Infernal Sky, as she prepared to respond to the message with a command override order the Thor pulled up beside her ship and sent a message.
Your ship is getting progressivly less combat effective. I suggest evacuating all the nonessential personel to my vessel, in case your ship and incoming fire or debris have another disagreement and your ship loses. And before you doubt us... there's a p kilometer warship that's not even been scratched out there. We aren't about to shanghai a bunch of your non-combat crew. We're Renegades. Not morons. -RSS Thor
She rapidly typed in a message with her good hand and hit transmit, "While your offer is that of an inteligent and reasonable commander we have to respectfully decline your offer as that new ship is a PSN destroyer. It is of no threat to my ship though if you continue to fire upon PSN ships she will be a major threat to you. However if it must fire upon your ship I will request it not use it's main guns and offer you the same chance you offered us. Again thank you and I hope that it dosn't come to combat."

With no response from the non-PSN ships the Infernal began to charge her array of plasma cannons (often nicknamed an orbital firing squad). Her sides almost turned blood red as the array of plasma cannons charged up almost giving her an evil glow. She was about to fire a barrage onto all the ships but was delayed by the white and black Fallen Angel blast that errupted from the wreakage. Her scans fell upon the place that the shot errupted from and was about to unleash a hellstorm upon it when a burst communication was sent.
Stand down weapons status under autherization code I6BX78-Delta. You are to render assistance to the PSN Hell's Fury and act as a guard for it/

OCC2: Sorry for delay, damn you George Lucas and your Starwars Battlefront 2!

An extremely pissed off Admiral Vladimir appeared on the screen. "I don't give a rat's ass what you're ordering me to do. Those Atlantian sons of bitches killed one of my crews and I'm going to blow them out of the sky for it! If you don't like it, go suck void!" The transmission cuts off there.

The Angel fires again at the Atlantians, recharges and fires a third time before the whole system starts to fuse itself, venting a massive amount of plasma into space.

---

The AI appeared on a screen. "We've lost the cannon. Detatching from the dead ship now. Scanning for any other intact long range weapons. I have that heavily damaged system, but I doubt it would do us much good."

Vladimir looked at the AI. "Then we switch to close range."

"You're insane."

"You think I got to be an Admiral on my good looks and charm? Helm, best estimate jump."

"........yessir."

---

If the destroyer fired on the battleship, it didn't matter. The ship lept and reappeared so fast for nearly half a second, the ship appeared and technically was in two places at once. They had come ount only two kilometers from the Atlantian ship, but were in a spiral spin and clipped some wreckage. As they came up to a stable flightline, they opened fire with everything, including their own magnentic projectile cannon. Tens of thousands of miniture missiles, untold millions of rounds of chaingun fire, nuclear tipped missiles and five cannon shells all poured down on the Olympia.

The ship may be smaller, but it was a closed fist and was out for revenge, even if that meant both sides were shooting at it.

----------

The Thor still sat off the starboard side of the Hell's Fury, unsure of what they were supposed to do in this situation. Until a hardshell jumped in system and started screaming it's ass off on a coded frequency. Then it opened fire on the hardshell with a single missile and silenced it.

Bays opened on it's hull and Razor Fighters (http://usera.imagecave.com/Alpha-Zero/renegadefighter.bmp.jpg) began to pour out of it, three or four each second from it's five bays, until thirty were flying ery which way around the Fury. You have what fighter cover we can give. There's a battlegroup on the way, in case more Atlantians show up. No offense, but if they hit this sytem hard, you are going to need all the help you can get.

Vega watched the cannon fire again.

"focus all shields on our frontal side. Brace for impact!"

The attack hit again, but this time the Olympia had been more prepared.

"Status" Vega ordered, this time he had remained in his seat.

Shara replied, "My shields are down to 50%. That focusing of shields was a good idea. Nothing got through to the hull"

"Their recharging" Sing reported.

Vega cracked his neck. "Manuver Icarus. Get us out of position"

Three Orcalic beam cannons opened fire on the approching blast, trying to break it apart as the Olympia moved out of position. Had it been a different class of battleship, such as the Titan (http://www.freewebs.com/atlantian_outcasts/Titan%20Battle%20Ship.JPG) class, this would have been impossible. But the Leviathan was designed to be far more manuverable then it looked.

The weakened attack bearly missed the ship. By now the Olympia was in position to fire.

Or did it?

The Crimmond ship had jumped into a new position, and was pouring attacks on it before it knew what had hit it.

"Ablative armor at 55% and falling" Xol reported, "Moving sheilds back into position"

"Sheilds are at 25%" Shara exclaimed as her hologram flickered, "They're hitting me hard"

"Return fire with...whatever!" ordered the commander. Launch all fighters, bombers, give me full weapons power on the side facing the Crimmond ship. FIRE!"

The Olympia returned the favor with its own barrage of firepower. 10 Orcalic Beam Cannons and 10 Plasma Cannons locked onto the Crimmond ship and bombarded it. Wings of bombers and fighters left the docking bays and entered the fray.

Vega had another order. "Have all bombers launch the gravity mines at the ship"

The Obelisk bombers did just that. Coming close and risking obliteration, the small crafts began launching 25 some mines each, and flinging them at the Crimmond ship.

"Shields are failing" Shara exclaimed again. Vega nodded and continued to watch the fight unfold, hoping that help was coming...

...

Edge of what was once Zoir space

The message came in, the flagship of the rebel fleet was in trouble. Now was the time to act. The system it was in was only a jump away, so the fleet had no problem with sending assistence.

Three Oceanus (http://www.freewebs.com/atlantian_outcasts/Oceanus%20Heavy%20Cruser.JPG) heavy cruisers, and five Centaur (http://www.freewebs.com/atlantian_outcasts/Centaur%20Light%20Cruser.JPG) Escorts broke off from the fleet in the area, and moved off toward the nearby jump node. A few minutes later, they jumped to the other end of the system, away from the Olympia. They would have to power up the warp engines to reach them...

"The Elasi vessel has moved away and is engaging another warship at 110 mark 213," Vala reported. "Another eight warships have entered the system."

Khellian furrowed his eyebrows into a frown. "It's turning into quite a warzone out here. Move us out of the wreckage. Disengage the interphase generator, but keep us cloaked. I want scans of everything going on, and I want more scans of any advanced technology in the wreckage, particularly weapons. Mister Gaevin, I believe I don't need to say to stick to places that would be difficult for those battling ships out there to find us."

(OOC: Phalanix, up to you to decide what I find.)

OOC: You-hoo....Phal....

((OCC: Give me a break man, I was bogged down with a last minute school procject and a evil case a writers block.))
IC:

As the Infernal recived the message it ignored the response from the admiral and began to slowly move towards the Hell's Fury. If one wondered why she didn't have a response, it was due to the AI controll systems and the very limited human activity inside her. Inside her cryo-bays the final dethaw processes were occuring for acutal human controll to return to her.

Back on the Fury, Jessica hasitly responded, "Thank you for the assistance if you could prvide point defenses untill the Infernal Sky can get her fighters out I'm sure we can provide heavy weapons support with our remaining cannons."


The deeper they went the more vissable the extent of the battle became. The planetary fragments became slowly larger and the damaged ships became more and more damaged, untill of course the scanns could fall upon the PSN Death Wish. From the angel the scans were being taken it would seem that she was in perfect working conidtion untill they fell upon her engins, they had been blow away by what looked like a massive missile strike and shreded by auto-cannon fire. Deeper scans would show that it seemed to be totaly life less inside, in reality the sensor masking systems were at full power and unlike the Fury she had a full crew compliment just waiting for an excuse to blow something up.

((OCC: The Death Wish can't move so she ain't in the battle and she's a weapons support class ship she she'll have at least five Fallen Angels and one Shadow Angel in working condition (though without stirker shots) ))

The ship shuddered, then bucked, then fell and then made a sound a banshee wished it could make.

The static filled transmission of the Admiral was barely understandable, but his message was clear enough. "You took one of my ships.... I take one of yours!"

The battleship was dying. It's shields were almost gone, with holes being punched through by weapons. The armor was melting away and scores of decks had holes torn into them. The ship may be a battleship, but it was meant to keep smaller pirate ships in line. Not go toe to toe with another ship of the line.

The ships engines flared. They were traveling at a quarter acceleration before. Now they were pushing the engines to the limits as the ship began what seemed a slow motion charge at the Olympia. While a true Crim ship had a bow designed to ram an enemy ship and survive, this ship did not.

The ship stayed on it's suicidal course, blowing emergency thrusters to match the other ships evasive manuvers enough that they would colide. The Admiral just hoped he'd hit something critical.


------

Five more ships entered the system. These were different though. One was a hulking gunship (http://usera.imagecave.com/Alpha-Zero/RenegadeGunship.bmp.jpg) that was the size of the immense cargo ship, but had a few very big differences. One was shape, another was the six massive engines. The third were the two guns that stretch bow to almost the stern, with their supercoolersat the stern, sending most of the waste heat into the void. This is the Renegade Gun Ship Archangel. All ships, regardless of affiliation, are to transmit Friend or Foe information. If you fail to do so, you will become a target. You have one Terran minute.

The other five were as big as the battlecruisers, meaning they were insignificant beside the mobile gun platform they escorted. They were different though. Flat and wide, with three big engines in the rear. Six pods hung off each one, the pylons being feeder systems, as well as support structures. These were the heavy cruisers (http://usera.imagecave.com/Alpha-Zero/RenegadeHeavyCruiser.bmp.jpg) of the Renegades, along with being the most stylish. These were the only true Renegade ships, built by themselves. As such, they were in the best shape. Even the gunship looked like it was at least a century old. God only knows where they got it, though.

OOC: Just wondering Phal...

IC:

Sing swivled her chair around and looked at her commander. "Sir, the ship is moving right for us!"

"They wouldn't" Goran, who was sitting at another console in the back of the bridge, said.

Xol watched as the ship drew nearer. "Oh...they would"

Vega's mind raced quickly. "What is the status of the distablizer?"

"Only half charged" Shara reported, "But operational"

"Target the ship" Vega ordered. "And send a message to the fighters. Take out the ships engines. Sing, try to manuver us out of its way"

Sing nodded, and began pressing a set of buttons. A small joystick popped out in front of her, and she grabbed it. The Olympia now displayed a weapon just for this sort of occasion, a manuverability rarly seen on ships of its size as it began to turn on its axis.

As the fighters began attacking the engines with regular Orcalic fire and whatever mines they had left, the Olympia targeted the Crimmond ship, and opened fire with the distablizer. A massive purple energy beam shot forth, aimed for the very front of the vessel.

Vega hoped it would not only inflict serious damage on the enemy ship, but that the kenetic energy would slow, or possibly even stop the Crimmond ship. At least long enough for the Olympia to move away. At this same time, every other weapon in its arsenal continued to batter away at the vessel, getting in as much damage as it could.

"Shara" said Vega, "Get ready to manuver all remaining sheilds into a buffer between us and the colliding ship. When I give the order, do it. Everyone else...brace for impact."

...

The eight ships intercepted the Crimmond message, but did not respond. Instead, they relayed the message to the rest of the rebel Atlantian fleet that sat on the other side of the jump node. They began to make a beeline for the jump node, ready to jump though as soon as they where needed.

Meanwhile, the eight ships finished powering up warp engines, and headed for the Olympia on the other side of the system at warp 2...the fastest speed possible for an Atlantian ship short of a jump node.

Another transmission is sent, but it has no audio. Any AI worth it's circuts could read his lips, though. Though any with diplomatic sub-routines would never consider repeating such vulgarities as the Admiral was screaming.

The battleship's shields were totally fried. Armor was boiling away, as was the fram of the ship. The cannon barked once, sending one last shell at the Olympia, before it's powerplants were slagged.

That transmission kept going until the bridge was breached. Then the pickups somehow managed to work long enough to let the whole solar system see the Admiral get ripped apart by Atlantian fire.

The ship itself continued to accelerate towards the Olympia, even with it's engines dying. They were built with so much radiation shielding that the explosions of their deaths acted as boosters, before they fell silent.

Then something flashed past the Olympia so close the shields flared, even without a direct hit. The gunship was advancing.

"Unidentified Atlantian vessel. That was a warning shot. Surrender immediatly and perpare to be boarded. You are charged with the murders of Admiral Vladimir, the crew of the Battleship Bolo and teh crew of the battlecruiser Molotov. Your ship is badly damaged and this gunship is quite capable of removing you from existance. You have ten Terran seconds to respond... or you die."

With the dying Crimmond ship no longer moving to match the Olympia's position, the Atlantian vessel was free to move out of the way of the burning hulk of junk. Suddenly however, what pitiful remains of the sheilds that there where flaired up as a warning sho was fired from yet another Crimmond ship.

"Unidentified Atlantian vessel. That was a warning shot. Surrender immediatly and perpare to be boarded. You are charged with the murders of Admiral Vladimir, the crew of the Battleship Bolo and teh crew of the battlecruiser Molotov. Your ship is badly damaged and this gunship is quite capable of removing you from existance. You have ten Terran seconds to respond... or you die."

"Hades" Vega cursed, "How many friggin Crimmond ships are in the area?!"

"Sir, we can't support another fight by ourselves" Xol reported. "Sheilds are non-existant, and we're badly damaged"

The countdown had reached zero. But before any fire could be exchanged, a fleet of eight Atlantian warships warped into the area, moving to intercept the Olympia. Three Oceanus heavy cruisers, and five Centaur Escorts. The lead ship sent a message to all ships in the area. All of them looked as battle worn as the Olympia had when it had first entered the system. And all of them looked somewhat jurry rigged.

This is the rebel Atlantian warship Orion. All ships are to maintain a distance of 500 km from the Olympia and weapons lock off while we warp it out of the system. Failure to comply will result in your destruction. And don't think about asking for re-enforcements. We have an entire fleet just a jump node away, ready to assist us. You have been warned"

One of the ships locked onto the Olympia with a tractor beam, while the other seven and the wings of fighters and bombers swarmed around it in a protective formation as they began to move off, waiting for the warp engines to power up again.

Unbothered by the ships attacking one another, the cloaked Rhinaran scoutship continued scanning to its heart's content, meticulously getting down where single atom went. Once the intricate scans of whatever major weapons that were not obliterated in the wreckages are sent back to the Star Sovereignty, its scientists and engineers would start putting the schematics together to try to figure out how these weapons functioned. If successful, then proper defenses against them would be researched. And if they should be found to be advantageous for the Star Navy to adapt for its own use? Well then, similar weapons may start appearing on some of Rhinara's ships in the future.

However, it all relied on whether the scans of the offline weapons systems were useful enough to that extent. Nothing beats an actual, physical system to reverse-engineer, of course, but all of the big and important weapons in the wreckage were much too large for the scoutship's transporter buffers to hold. Tractoring them along, even with an extended cloaking field to envelope the weapon as well, was a risky maneuver.

Once the scanning was done with, most of the sensors aboard the scout went back to the fighting ships. Documenting their weapons and defenses in action, along with their tactics, should prove just as useful.

[OOC: Allright. Since the mods have advised that all of us with n/a posts not post with those accounts, I'll be using this nation for the renegades. Damn Jolt glitches.]

Warning has been ignored. As commander of the Renegade Gunship Archangel, I hereby carry out the sentence for your crimes.

The gunship fired again, the energy encased shell, electromagnentically accelerated, sped across the void towards the Olympia.

May whatever gods you believe in have mercy on your souls.

The gunship turned and began to accelerate away from the larger debris fields, along with it's escorts. The gunship's shields shrugged off whatever long range fire there was and it and the escorts lept out of the system, leaving only the radioactive hulk of the Bolo and one battlecruiser, off the port side of the Hell's Fury.

The smaller ship was recalling all it's fighters as fast as it could and was charging up it's engines, even as it moved further away from the Olympia and the Atlantian fleet. One can only imagine the battlecruiser's commander is just hoping the Atlantians hadn't noticed them, with so much wreckage around and with the Hell's Fury being a more interesting target.

The energised shell slammed right into the side of the Olympia. The ablative armor buckled and broke apart, as the underlying hull was ripped away in a deafening explosion. By the time the attack was finished, a nasty large multi-deck gash, by far the largest of the ship's wounds, now sat on it's side. Oxygen spewed out for a few seconds, before internal force feilds activated, sealing the ship once more.

"Dam--" Vega stopped himself, getting off the floor from the hit. "Never mind, I don't want to know. Just have the fleet get us out of here"

"Sir, the Crimmond ships are...gone.." said Sing, looking over her scanners, "I think they've left the system"

"Good" Vega replied. He brushed debris off his clothes and sat down. A minute later, the nine Atlantian ships had warped out, headed for the far edge of the system, where they would use a jump node to jump out to a nearby system to meet up with the main fleet.

He knew he hadn't seen the end of those Crimmond ships. More would come after them.

"This is just what we need" he thought. "Yet another enemy. And if the Atlantian Acendency itself wasn't enough to deal with"