NationStates Jolt Archive

The ships coasted silently through space, 32 in all. At their head drifted the R.K.S. Polestar, a massive ship by most standards, thick-hulled though only moderately armed. It possessed a sort of grace, vaguely cylindrical, though each end tapered to a point. From its viewports only a few pinpoints of light could be seen.

The whole fleet appeared this way, as though all within were asleep. Following in the Polestar were her smaller sister ships, the Silent Witness and the Raptor, each taking a flank. Behind them, twenty-nine smaller ships, a mix of gun boats, cutters, and civilian transports brought up the rear. All silent, all drifting at just fractions of their cruising speed. From within something stirred.

Inside the R.K.S. Polestar

The room was massive, equally wide as it was long, taking up the entire width of the Polestar. And throughout it all were aisles upon aisles of cylindrical containers, the size of a tall human. From each extended wires and tubes linking each back to nearby computer monitors. Upon each screen appeared the life signs for multiple organisms. And along one wall, that nearest the bow of the ship, a single life sign readout began to blink red. It emmitted a soft beeping sound, though no one was around to here it. A moment later it became a soft constant hum.

A lock sounded on the centermost cylinder, then the sound of compressed air escaping. A single container lifted up off the floor, leaving a man standing in full military garb, his rank proudly displayed on a collar insignia. He stretched as if from a long nap, just as more beeping noises filled the room: his crew awakening. Glancing around he made his way to the bridge of the Polestar.

Outskirts of Sol System, 15:28

For as large as ship as it was, the bridge was surprisingly small. It consisted of a central command chair, in which Commadore Harr Urelieous now sat, a helm console, a science station, a communications station, and three habitat stations, stored away at the rear of the bridge in a small alcove. An officer in a clean, crisp military uniform sat attentive at each station, each appearing in a futile effort to stop the various beeps and blinks coming from the consoles before them. All, that is, except for Urelieous and the helmsmen, who appeared to be sleeping. The commadore stood swiftly, pacing, more stalking, back and forth across the bridge a few times, before flopping in a huff back into his chair. This had been about the fourth time he had performed this act. With a tinge of annoyance in his voice, he glanced over to the science officer at his station.

"Have we figured out exactly where we are yet, lieutenant?"

The young man hesitated a second, clearly unhappy with his answer. "Not precisely where...no, sir...we are...several light years from our intended destination, but-"

The commadore slammed a hand down on the chair. "I bloody well could have told you that, lieutenant. We need information! I have an entire colony spread throughout a few dozens ships. I'm pretty sure they'd like to be getting where they're going."

Urelieous stood again to stalk back and forth, to finally lock his sight upon the helmsmen. Striding towards him, the commadore loomed over the sleeping man imperiously.

"We sleep for decades...and Ensign Kellborn here decides the first thing he needs to do after deep freeze is take a nap..." The commadore bent down the ear of the sleeping man quietly. He paused for a second and the bridge fell silent. Summoning all the angst within him, the commadore bellowed. "Wake up!"

The helmsmen bolted upright, almost jumping from his seat. Contented, Urelieous wandered back to his seat and collapsed into it with a sigh. All others turned back to their stations, even the helmsmen pretending he had something to do as the fleet sat suspended in space trying to figure out exactly where they were.

Outskirts of Sol System, 21:33

The commadore sighed deeply. Hours later and they were no farther along than hours ago. Apparently the sensor system of the Polestar had somehow been damaged on the long voyage of the Omicron Fleet. Unfortunately, whatever disabled the Polestar also affected her sister ships. The transports all had functioning arrays. However, being civilian transports, they could hardly penetrate a few parsecs, hardly enough to get their bearings.

"Lieutenant Commander Dell, raise hailing frequencies. We'll have to do this the old fashion way."

The Concordiat probe 11X-56-53 read the signal, the AS interpreting it and extrapolating data, as well as exploring the networks of the civilian craft. Responce nodes triggered, and the SWIFT comm array unfolded and flashed a message to the ships.

"Hello, I am WatchProbe Unit 11X-56-53, known to my Commanders as Timmy. Who are you, and what business do you hold here?"

A single fighter weeved it's way through the fleet of ships it's jet black body sleak and lethal. The only part of it with color on it were it's unit marker. A single angel painted in red. As it finaly shot past the R.K.S. Polestar it turned and transformed into a humanoid figure. It held it's sheild on it's left arm and it's 50mm auto-cannon in it's right hand. Only seconds it fired a single brilliant white flair into space from a small hidden section on it's arm. Before long a single ship lummbered forth it's 9.5km long hull bristling with weapons. The ship also bore the same black coat with the red angel painted on it's sides. It sent out a audio signal to the R.K.S. Polestar saying "This is the PBAV Bloody Winter. Please respond."

Dell played the messages over the bridge comm, an anxious look upon his usually stoic face. "Which one do we answer first?"

The commadore waved a hand, more trying to shut Dell up than dismiss the question. "We will send out a message to the both of them. Open a channel."

"This is the R.K.S. Polestar of Fleet Omicron. We are on a peaceful mission to settle an uninhabited planet light years away from our home planet. We mean no harm. However, our navigational systems appear to have failed and we are unsure of where we are." The commadore gave a hand signal to cut the channel and Dell did so.

The science officer perked up from the back. "Should we have the cutters move into a defensive position?"

"No...we don't need to give them any reason to fire on us. We come here peacefully. We need to ensure them of it."

ooc: gotta get going, but ill respond in the morning.

OCC: Ok, welcome to NS!

IC: The probe's AS understood, but was suspicious. Its circuits were written a certain way, and it could not be unsuspicous. The space nearby glowed green, and three destroyers appeared in normal space.

"We will escort you to a habitable world, on the condition that you provide us with raw materials from that planet for the building of more machinery. Understood?"

The destroyers wafted lazily in place, awaiting an answer.

Urelieous drew in a deep, thoughtful breath. This was not going exactly as he'd planned. Only a day back from deep freeze and already they had attracted far too much attention. "Open a channel."

"We...very much appreciate this kind offer. However, the colonists were meant to settle a very specific planet. If we could just discover our present position, we could be on our way." He signaled once more for the channel to be cut.

He turned to the chief science officer, Lieutenant Commander Alexis Maren. "What is the condition of our PTP drive, commander?"

She glanced up with a bit of uncertainty. "Point to Point drive appears functional. All ships confirm. However...these haven't been used for decades...we have no way of knowing if our readings are accurate..."

Urelieous sighed and pondered, why did I have to wake up?

OOC: Tag for reading interest/possible RP.

The nature of the mind is strange, it manifests itself and swirls, it is inconsistant, and always thinks true. NEver can the mind be truly eluded, and in essence they control all knowlage. Not that this will help, as the mind refuses to belive that it can do this.

In the Throne room on the Imperial palace of Valinia, the Emperess fed herself with energy from the warp. She heard a faint cry, the small cry of fear, slight fear, but fear none the less. She knew its reason, a full fleet of people, their desenation lost. She immidiatly called her First Primarch to her.

"Mother of the Empress's Daughters" The Primarch said as she entered. "What is your will?"

"I wish you to take three Imperial ships to the Edge of the Sol System, also take the Battle Barge Heratics Demise to assist the people of the Omicron Fleet." She said in a voice that sent shudders of plesure down the Primarches spine. "Go my daughter, help them, they require it."

The Bloody Winter responded quickly with yet another audio signal fallowed by a chart of the system. "Well then along with this signal is a chart of this system and it's bearings with most of the galaxy. As it stands now we have been given authorization to assist you in improving your navigational systems if needed."

OCC:Time crunch....

The Concordiat ships interposed themselves between the Fleet Omnicron and the other nations' ships, charging weaponry and activating magnetic shielding and battlescreens. The space near them glowed green, and the space-battleship Unyielding Fist appeared, the weapons already charged. The greenish glow subsided as the RIFT engines on the ship powered down, and the weapons systems began to glow orange.

"Let me take them, or there will be consequences."

The commadore reeled in his seat as the Unyielding Fist appeared in space before them. He slammed a hand down on his command chair, turning to the science officer. "Contact weapons control rooms. I need status on our ship to ship weaponry. Power shields, I need the Silent Witness and the Raptor to take up defensive positions. Open a channel to the fleet. Attention all ships, this is not a drill, evasive maneveurs, full speed retreat. I repeat, this is not a drill." The commadore leaned forward in his seat awaiting the status of those weapons. The Polestar and his sister ships were mammoth, but not well-armed...

The Ships sliped out of the warp On the other side of the fleet as the other ships from the other nations. Three Empress Class BattleShips and a Space Mariness Battle Barge. The Primarch looked at the ships, and sent a message the to the Command ship.

++Transmission begings.++

Hail, I am the First Primarch of Valinia, mother of the first Mariness Chapter. Our Devine Empress heard your cry of desstress and ordered us to assist. We need more infomation, what do you need to know, where is your destination and other things.

++Transmission Ends++

Tag, because Space Rp's like this are always fun!

Far from them; in the heart of the Chronosian System; the Emperor satl surveying the landscape of pain ad death, burning sands and scouring winds from his great throne of Basalt. He turned slightly, as a scuttling mutant tech-priest thing came to his side.

"My Lord; we have unusual signals. Not only do we detect an...unusual and new fleet design; we also detect what can only be described as servants of a false Emperor, an Empress"

the Emperor chuckled.

"Indeed? Let us go forth then; deploy 5 Storm of Tzeentch battleships; and deploy Lucian's battlebarge; let them taste the infection of the void." he cackled wryly. "Let us show them the true power of the stars"

Suddenly a giant sphere appeared. there were no guns that could be seen.
*inside the sphere*
"what is the status of our weapons" shouted a green faced man at the science officer infront of him.
"opperational sir"
"charge all weapons. we will not let any act of hostility against us or any other ship be tolerated"

on the side of the sphere was its name in dark red. SCOTHER. it meant peace keeper.

OOC: Why does everything have to result in a conflict?

OOC: I'm not gonna fight; just try and gain a new ally :P

A bead of swet drew a thin wet line down Commadore Urelieous' temple. His lips were pursed tightly as he watched a data readout from the computer interface in his command chair. Without bringing his gaze to the screen, he muttered to himself. "Bloody hell. Sleep for a half dozen decades and we wake up in the bloody hot bed of the galaxy. Who the hell are these people..."

Ships now peppered the view screen of varying sizes and armaments. And, now distancing themselves quite quickly, the main body of the fleet fled away from Sol. Only the Polestar and her sister ships remained in place, standing firm in the utter nothingness of space. Urelieous glanced back at the communication officer. "Open a channel to the Silent Witness and the Raptor." The communications tapped away for a moment before giving a firm nod to the commadore.

"Captain Jennings, Captain Avalon. Maintain positions at the flanks of the Polestar. If a fire fight breaks out, we are to slowly retreat. You know your roles." The channel shut and the science officer gave Urelious the information he had been looking for.

"Weapons control rooms one through five reporting fully functional. Six and seven report power flux, attempting to compensate. Eight is functional. Nine, functional. Weapons control ten is not responding."

The commadore pinched his thumb and forefinger to the bridge of his nose. "By the Goddess..."

Now a good distance away from the central standoff, the twenty-nine transport and cutter ships were ready to make the Point to Point jump. The defensive cutter Fist had taken the lead, guiding the main portion of the fleet onward.

Aboard the R.K.S. Fist
There was an air of tension aboard the tiny bridge, as Captain Lane stood pacing the bridge. "Prepare to engage PTP drive."

The helmsmen rotated almost fully around in her seat to glance at the captain. "Coordinates sir?"

Lane let out a deep sigh. "I have no idea where we are, much less where we are going. Anywhere. It doesn't matter."

The helmsmen entered coordinates in no particular order, the interconnected computers of all the fleet registering and prepared to jump. For a moment the Fleet Omicron sat suspended in space. And in the next, they had disappeared.

the SCOTHER noticed the ships dissapear and the captain decided that he did not want to start an all out firefight with a lost ship.
*on the bridge*
what are all these ships doing here we wouldn't survive a fight like this.
"comunications i want to talk to the new ship now"
the officer was new and hesitated for a moment. most of this ships crew were fresh from the academy and were all very frightend. some of the bridge officers started to muter prayers to themselfs.

The commadore stood firm before the view screen, composing himself for the declaration he was about to make. He dusted off his pristine jacket once more, the smooth grey fabric perhaps a hint at his stoney resolve within. A visual channel opened to all ship, showing the commadore from waist up.

"To all ships within the area, this is Commadore Harr Urelieous of the R.K.S. Polestar, flagship of the Omicron Fleet. We are peaceful settlers taken off our intended course. We do not wish to fight. We apologise for this intrusion into your sovereign space and wish only to be allowed to leave in peace. Let us wash our hands of this incident." With that the channel closed and the Polestar made a slow, steady rotation upon its axis, tactical maneveuring thrusters pushing the ship along. Making a complete 180, the ship fired main thrusters and reached cruising speed in but moments. The Raptor and Silent Witness followed suite, taking up flanking positions once more on the Polestar.

Urelious returned to his seat. "Prepare for a PTP jump. Reroute power from all non-essential systems to rear shields."

inside the scother

"reverse thrusters"
"record this insident and dont let those settlers of your screen"
the scother silently started to move backwards. suddenly a bright blue glow appeared just as this happened a loud BANG came from the ship.
"report"
"the engine has blown"
"do we still have weapons and shields"
"yes sir they are stable but it will take at least a week to fix"
From Computer
"minor casualties throughout the ship".
"tell the other ships that we might be here for a wile and call for backup".

One second the three behemoth ships cruised with haste through space. In the next second they had disappeared before the very eyes of all those present. Aboard the Polestar, the commadore had collapsed into his command chair, pondering what had just happened.

in an instant two more sphere ships appeared at the side of the scother, and then in another instant they could notbe seen but they were still on the scanners of all the ships.
the captain of the fleet was standing on the bridge of one of the new ships.
how did they get into this mess he muttered to himself.