NationStates Jolt Archive

-Science Vessel SV-073 Cook, Asteroid 1036 Ganymed-
"Status?"

"Everything is proceding according to plan. We should be ready to depart in six hours."

"And the cables?"

"Stress is normal. Reports from Cabot indicate the same on their end."

"Very well. Keep me informed."

"Aye, Cap'n."

All over the asteroid, work crews from the two science vessels were prepping the asteroid for transit. Cables were anchored deep into the surface, manuvering engines were installed, and tunnels were being bored into the planetoid's interior. Most of the work was being done by the worker mobile suits that had replaced many of the combat suits for this mission, but the finer details were done by human hands.

"Where are those clamps? They should have been here half an hour ago!"

"Coming! Got the clamps!"

"What took you?"

"I had several other sites to deliver things to. A worker Zaku nearly stepped on me."

"That'd hurt."

"You think?"

Several weeks later, Ganymed and her two Galileo class escorts were nearing Mars. The preceding days had brought several weapons shipments to the rock as it slowly journeyed towards the Red Planet. Large Mjolnir batteries dotted the surface, while other Mjolnir sites came together in the begining stages of construction. After the weapons transports delivered their cargos, they were packed full of rock and ore excivated from tunnels and cavities carved into the asteroid before they returned to port.


"Captain, sensors are picking up an Aumanii battlegroup."

"It's about time that they got here. Hail the Switchback and ask them to take formation around the rock."


Meanwhile, back at Mathilde, the heavy cruiser Deiphobus and her fleet prepared to depart to join the allied forces at Ganymed.

'Didn't these guys try to kill Navarrone or something?'

'Who hasn't? I think I tried to kill Navarrone once.'

The pilots laughed discretely.

'Take us alongside the asteroid!' barked the XO of the AuSD Switchback, Colonel Raveh. The pilots made the appropriate changes to their course and soon the Aumanii Battleship had a dominating position over the Shandrese asteroid...watching over it defensively. The rest of the Aumanii Battlegroup lurked out of "sight" as their active stealth systems prevented non-friendly ships from ascertaining their where-abouts.

"...Wow. That ship is much, much smaller than I thought it would be."

"...That thing is smaller than the Trondheims."

"...And it's supposed to be a super dreadnought?"

"I guess. Have you ever been to Auman? Maybe the Aumanii are pixies."

"Maybe."


As a group, the Aumanii and Bryn Shanderan ships cruised easily towards Mars while the towed rock was further armed and hollowed. At Mathilde, Deiphobus and her escorts left port and set a course to rendezvous with Cabot, Cook, and Switchback.

While the combined Aumanii-Bryn Shanderan convoy cruised towards Martian orbit, Deiphobus and her fleet sailed towards them on an intercept course. Of course, given the trajectories involved, the trip would take a few days. Of course, the Bryn Shanderan science vessels could have simply set up temporary hyperspace gates for the rock, but the huge rock shooting out of the Mathilde gate would have most likely caused an internationl incident. Worse, the rock would have arrived completely unarmed; an unthinkable option considering what happened to Orion years before.

By the time the Bryn Shanderan fleet met up with the rock and her escorts, work on the defenses and port facilities had advanced quite a bit. In the two months before they arrived in Martian orbit, Ganymed would be functional, though only minimally. Full functionality would take years and years of mining and hollowing out the asteroid before it could be achieved. Fortunately, one of the primary reasons for claiming the rock was to bring new resources into the Mars sphere for a few projects that the Bryn Shanderan government had planned.