NationStates Jolt Archive

*Laikonen system*

Hidden among the asteroids, and built into the asteroids themselves, a remote complex drifted. Turrets could be seen dotting the rocky surface, and hangar doors sat inside a large valley. On the other side, a massive station emerged, and from this station, shipyard slips and scaffolding covering a series of frigate and destroyer sized vessels under construction.

A small force of ships patrolled among the other asteroids, and in the asteroid themselves, factories, mines, and storage facilities. The complex was the Laikonen Base, the secret seat of power of John Asmouth, member of the board of directors of the Kellarin Corporation.

From the Laikonen base, he plotted his takeover of the corporation. To do, he needed money, much of his personal fortune had been invested in the secret installation and the raider fleet he now commanded. These ships would go out amongst the galaxy, raiding convoys and trade stations to gather resources, goods to sell, parts, technology, money, and even ships to build his forces and fortune for his takeover.

The secondary purpose, hit FTU trade lanes in an attempt to ruin the other directors and disrupt Kellarin trade, which would draw FTU and Kellarin forces away from the Kellarin system to beef up trade lane patrols, convoy escorts, and station defences.

The first rading parties were ready, three task forces and several individual ships departed for targets across known space. The first target, FTU convoys heading to and from the primary FTU trade stations.

*Near Endora station*

The merchant ship Lady Elyra made its way through space at sublight speeds. It had just left Endora station, dropping off hundreds of tons of Kellarin goods, and picking up other goods to sell back in the Kellarin system.

The vessel wasn't Kellarin owned, but a privately owned ship working freelance. A Type four freight, it weighed in at just over a million tons. The massive, blocky vessel lacked elogence, but it got the job done.

As it travelled through space, it picked up a force of inbound vessels. The crew thought little of it, figuring it to be another convoy heading to and fro from the Endora station.

The ships neared it, veering towards the freighter itself and away from the station. Realizing this, the crew started to get curious, and the ships were approaching visual range.

"Gavin, get those ships up on screen, I want to who they are. Mimranec, get them on comms, and ask them for their business, I want to know why they're beelining towards us," the Captain ordered as he looked over Gavin's screens and saw them increasing accelaration and heading at ever-increasing speeds towards them.

The ships didn't respond, and they were well within visual range. The ships didn't look like any ships the captain, or any of the crew had seen, but they looked armed, substantially so.

"All hands go to combat alert, I repeat combat alert. Suspected pirates in bound!" the Captain ordered as he saw the ships and their arsenals.

As the ship's own small armament charged and its handful of missile tubes loaded, a storm of missiles came flying towards it from the unknown ships. The ship scrambled a distress call to Endora station, but no FTU ships would be able to get out there in time.

The ships came on full bore, the freighter was hit by the missiles, its meagre point defence barely able to make a dent in even the small numbers that had been launched. The ship buckled and hull breaches opened up as systems began to fail, two ships, frigate sized vessels veered off to both sides. Grapplers and breeching tubes making contact with the sides of the civilian transport as hundreds of armed pirates stormed into the vessel, killing everyone who resisted and rounding those who didn't.

The attack lasted only a few minutes. Once the pirates were in control, they brought the ship to full speed and headed for the nearest safe spot to enter hyperspace, away from the nearby gravity wells. The pirate ships took up a position to the rear, guarding it. As the freighter fled the surviving crew members were jettisoned out the airlocks.

Across other FTU trade lanes, similar strikes happened, and numerous cargo ships, predominately those belonging to Kellarin Corporation or Kellarin based interests were hit simultaneously.

A cargo transport had exited hyperspace, as a course change was necessary.
"Why can't they just designate a single drop point, like the ore worlds. Why they have to bounce around the cosmos." The Captain groused in a old, but frequent complaint.
"You know why."
"Doesn't mean I have to like it."

A few minutes later a sensor beeped.
"Hey, there appeares to be a few ships in-bound, wonder who they are and what they want?"
"Guess we'll find out."

TO: Unidentified ships
Please state origins and intentions.

A large section of spaced appeared to ripple, suddenly turning the shade of ugly, and then imploding in upon itself. In its place, a large, lime-green freighter spontaneously assimilated after deactivating its Resoptic Particle-Exploding Universal Fold system. The two accompanying Guardian-Class Cruisers appeared soon after. It was precious cargo in there, and they didn't want to take any chances.

On the side of the freighter, in big, bold, white letters, there was printed "GadgetCorp Shipping" and the logo of Gadget Corporation, a large, friendly Smiley Face inside a gear, below it.

The reason these three ships had stopped? Simple: They had picked up a distress signal. Though the nature, or origin, of the signal wasn't known, it was a distress signal nonetheless. And signals like that usually meant: A. Someone needed help, and B. The possibility of customers for the rapidly-growing megacompany. Without a second thought, the ships headed towards the signal's approximate origination.

Another target had dropped to realspace, probably to make a course adjustment, as many vessels did. This particular area of space seemed to be a prime area along several major trade routes. Only a single ship was here, but it was a destroyer sized vessel, not usually seen among pirate forces due its greater size and costs.

The destroyer saw its target, sighted its guns, and opened up while its fighter screen and boarding ships charged forward. It moved to fullspeed, hoping to take advantage of the ship's surprise from the initial power, but not so much lethal, barrage.

The powerful engines pushed the vessel forward and the bridge crew expected to be in breeching range with in a minute.

*Near Endora Station*

Three new ships had entered the area, their transponders squawking gadgetcorp, a freighter, and a pair of what appeared to be cruiser sized vessels. The pirate force was lead by a destroyer, but didn't have any vessels able to go toe to toe with a full fledged cruiser. They didn't have to though, numbers gave them the edge, and surprise would help them even further.

The commander knew they were going to take losses if they fought this one out, but any freighter being escorted by two cruisers had to be worth it.

He quickly ordered one of his frigates to cut power and make itself looked adrift while he formed his other vessels around it as if about to give aid and sent off a transmission.

"Attention GadgetCorp vessels, this is commodore Galbraith of the Kellarin Security forces, a freighter was attacked and stolen, its escort ship is without main power. Any assistance you could render would be greatly appreciated."

As the destroyer bore down on the frieghter, it's guns blazing, the ship's shields and PDs activated and moved to counter.

The captain looked at the screen, "That was unexpected, sucks to be them thought. Got to give command credit thought."
"Oh, I thought command could do no right."
"Ya, well these pirates will learn the hardway, I mean come-on, how many nation's freighters are armed with corvette weaponry."
"True, I got ta agree, sucks to be them."

The captain hit the combat button. The weaponry activated, swinging around to track the incoming craft. He then sent a message to the piratical ships,
"You have two options pirates, turn and go home or try and take us. Either way, you lose."

ooc: Ship is size of cruiser(second smallest ship class) and weapons of a corvette(smallest class)

OOC:Ok, in Kellarin standards, the ship classes go like this: corvette, frigate, destroyer, cruiser, battleships/dreadnoughts. Destroyers are main line warships of the fleet. Since its a pirate ship, the handful of destroyers are used as flagships and powerful stand alone vessels.

IC:

"Sir! She's opened gun ports and opened fire!" Lieutenant Sylvia called out to her captain.

"What's its firepower? If she's a sleeper, call back the fighters and get ready to dump EW drones and get us out of here," the Captain, a man named Blackwell, ordered out to his bridge crew.

"Guns appear to be that of a corvette class ship, might scratch us up a bit, my guess is a fleet auxillary or simply a cautious merchy, but we'd blow her to scrap in a straight up firefight if you wanted sir," Sylvia reported.

"Damned merchant, thinking to drive off a destroyer with corvette guns. Captain's got guts, hell, I'd almost let 'em go out of sheer respect for that kind of stunt. Of course, we have our own orders. If they want to make things difficult, I want the marines to kill everyone aboard when they storm it. ETA to breech?" The captain requested.

"27 second sir, want us to respond?" the lieutenant asked.

"I'll do it, get me a link comms...Attention merchant vessel, you have a freighter fitted the guns of a corvette. I have a destroyer built for war, you lose. Stand down, and I may let you live," the Captain sent out to the other ship.

((Draconic Order info (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=403226&page=1&pp=15)))

Six Ossalur Class Freighters dropped out of hyperspace at the edge of the system, escorting them were four Svent Class Corvettes, a Caex Class Frigate and a Kepesk Class Destroyer. They were jumping through the system through the trade lane, for someone needed their goods. They detected in-system activity, but they were not a scouting party and they didn't want to get in trouble for being late. The convoy would take about a day to cross the system and arrive at the next jump point, passing by the outer most planet in the system.

OOC:Ok, in Kellarin standards, the ship classes go like this: corvette, frigate, destroyer, cruiser, battleship, dreadnought. Destroyers are main line warships of the fleet. Since its a pirate ship, the handful of destroyers are used as flagships and powerful stand alone vessels.

((I go by US navy standards, very similar to your classifications. Destroyers are just smaller cruisers, tasked with interception and fleet protection of smaller vessels. While cruisers generally are the larger warship class.))

*Endora System*

The pirates' day was getting a bit more hectic than originally thought. First, a freighter and its escorts had appeared after the first target had been seized, and now the pirates were waiting in ambush for their next victims. The earlier distress call had no doubt reached Endora station, and the commander was sure it wouldn't be long before FTU forces made their way out to assist.

Now, another target presented itself. A force of twelve ships, six apparently civilian freighters, the other six looking more like warships than anything. The commander sent word off to command. More ships would undoubtedly arrive within a few hours to deal with the new comers.

*Laikonen System*

Admiral Hayes had been a commodore in the KSF, upon his forced 'retirement', Asmouth had approached him and made him a high up in his new fleet. From Laikonen, Hayes was in charge of coordinating the piracy operations. Across the FTU, and a bit beyond, some two dozen ships had fallen victim to Asmouth's forces and allied pirates. Now, he had just received his juiciest target. A convoy of twelve ships, six warships, six freighters, had appeared out near Endora station.

He had some ships out he could gather, but he would need more firepower. He hated to do this, but he ordered out the remaining ships in the Laikonen system itself to muster on the edge of the system and make intercept with the new convoy. The strike force would take about four hours to assemble and strike out towards its target, and another few hours to make its way to the objective without revealing their intent.

(( I have my cruisers designated as a "Medium" (Which is right behind "Large," which is right behind "Collossal," but is above fighters, small, and moderate classes.) size craft, but are still very large. And if you attack the freighter, you'll find quite a surprise inside.))

"This is Gadget Corporation Escort Cruiser 199-279K8. We're pulling in to assist, and will arrive shortly."

"Finished scans on those ships?"

"Yes...They seem to be of Kellarin origin, but...The energy scans show that the power core of the frigate is fully functional."

"Hm...And that brings up the question of why they want our help when they've so many ships...I smell a rat. Put up shields at ninety percent strength and arm all weapons, just in case. And tell the freighter to prepare its cargo, in the event of an emergency..."

((PS: This (http://www.3dactionplanet.com/lancer/images/freelancer/artwork/122202/l_freighter.jpg) is the kind of freighter I was going for, just lime-green))

snip


"So it's a destroyer enh," The captain commented, "Did we get any class twos?"
"No, havn't been a chance to get them."
"Dang, it'd have been fun to see how they react to a nice class two warhead. Load a full salvo of class ones and fire. Also let's see what they're range is, increase and keep distance to max P. Cannon range."

The ship fired a swarm of missiles as the freighter increased the distance between the two considerably.


ooc: Just a note your corvettes/my corvettes likely differ in power quite a bit, just a heads up.

OOC: My destroyers are just over a klick in length, corvettes, a tad under 500m. There's not really standard to compare different FT ship strengths, so I'll leave it at that.

IC:

*Battle with Theao ship*

"Missiles inbound!" Syvlia yelled out as a storm of missiles erupted from the freighter.

"Scramble all drones and defence platforms, fired burst missiles at the salvo and engage the point defence system. Commence firing on all missile batteries and keep up the rate and close in at max possible speed. Get the fighters and boarding ships to engage!" the captain ordered as he waited for the missiles to come in.

About forty fighters and eight boarding ships fired off their own long range missiles at the merchant ship before closing in and opening up with their own small arsenals of pulse guns and rotaries. The boarding ships beelined for the hull, arms extended, prepared to burn through the hull and deploy marines inside.

*Endora System*

The approaching ships registered power spikes on the sensors as their weapons readied and shields raised.

The pirates panicked, they had no doubt they had been discovered, and with FTU ships surely on their way by now, the pirate fleet opened up with its full arsenal. Storms of missiles alongside particle beams and derrier pulse rounds flew toward the approaching cruiser. The freighter, perceived as a minor threat if a threat at all, was left untouched as the fleet advanced towards the opposing ships.

snip
As the defenses on the pirate engaged, the missile's AECM, and evasion programing activated. Half the salvo was destroyed by the massed defenses. The rest of the missiles continued to streak inward.

As the fighters and boarding boats attacked, the P or pulse cannons opened up on the boats, while the PDs dealt with the inbound fighters and missiles.
The main lasers opened up to aid both the PDs and P cannons pick the gnats out of the sky.

ooc: A class one warhead would be able to destroy New York City completely, just as a reference.

Upon making contact with the surface of the shields, the missles exploded in a blinding flash, creating ripples throughout it. The same happened to the majority of the pulse rounds, but several of the particle beams found their way through the energy wall and struck the ship, causing minor damage to the hull.
_________________________________________________________________

"A trap! I knew it!"

"I heard you the first time sir."

The captain in charge of this mission tripped over a few wires as the ship lurched after being hit by a few particle beams.

"Open fire! Launch the fighters and launch all missles! Shoot some lasers, for crying out loud!"

"All gunners have opened fire upon the enemy already sir. The fighters are to be deployed in a minute."

"Then order the freighter to dispatch half their cargo! I don't care that they're prototypes, get them to activate the ripper drones!"
_________________________________________________________________

As the dozen or so fighters sped out from the undersides of the two cruisers, the message was relayed to the freighter. The large, two-meter thick door on its front slid open, revealing its cargo: thousands upon thousands of large, man-sized probes, each with twelve tentacles ending in razor-sharp blades. Despite their meek appearence, these things really looked like they could do damage in swarms, and that was exactly the reason there were so many.

Countless dots of red light suddenly appeared in the darkness: the lights signalling the activation of the drones. In an instant, a seemingly endless swarm of the machines spewed forth from the opening*, speeding towards the pirated ships in a giant, swirling cloud, moving in an erratic pattern so as to avoid the lasers.

Endora System

As if to add to the apparently complex state of affairs in the Endora System, a pair of new ships arrive from hyperspace. RNS Chatham, a Town-class light cruiser, and RNS Offa's Dike, a Clyde-class destroyer, appear in a bright flash of energy probably detectable all over the system, and easy to classify as a Robotic high-speed FTL drive system.

"We've reached our patrol station, sah," says a rating charged with some element of hyperspatial navigation.
"All systems read within safety limits."
'"Quite good, lads. All hands, beat to quarters!"
"Aye, sah!"

Aboard the Chatham, Captain Pytor Astrakhan paces the bridge while the cruiser's primary sensors array makes a 360-degree sweep of the area, and while the ship's crewmen beat to quarters. In a region supposedly rich with pirates, the relatively small Robotic ships can not afford to be caught off guard.

The suppression of piracy is probably the Robotic Navy's foremost role, even though Robotic freighters are by and large quite able to look after themselves, and having a veritable nest of pirates situated so near a major trade artery simply would not do...

A lone Liandra class patrol cutter is on the prowl. Her sensors sweeping space as far as they can reach for any signs of the Raiders that she had chased out of SeaQuest territory.

"Captain, we are detecting weapons fire one the other side of the solar system."

"Alter course and take us to visual range. We are near the planned route for that freighter convey to Atlantis and we need to make sure the area is safe."

"But what about the Raiders, sir?"

"Forget about them for now. Our primary orders were to check the plotted route for that convey. We only happened upon those Radiers trying to build an outpost on that planet in our territory on accident. Oh, and I want someone in the weapons pod, just in case."

"Aye, sir."

The Liandra smoothly turned and headed for the area in which the weapons fire. She accelerated to her top speed.

Energy signals pinged on the edge of the system. The engines on the convoy flared as they sped up to try to get out of the system and away from the hot zones. Shimmering lights bubbled over the hulls of the individual ships as their shields activated. The destroyer's fighter bay lit up as its fighters were put on launch alert. Weapon signatures were charging, but the course remained unchanged.

The light of the stars shone off of the green hull of the Liandra. The ship swiftly flew towards the sight of the battle. Her gun ports were open just in-case they were needed.