NationStates Jolt Archive

"Lord-Captain, we have reached the line." Remarked a squeek man in the front of the bridge. "Orders?"

The captain approached the station, and peered out the windowless front of the bridge, where only a few medium sized screens sat, displaying the outside. Windowless bridge, scourge of a captian who needed to see and sense his surroundings, but protected by the high armor capacity.

"Where are we again, Navigation?" Barked the captian, his uniform highly distressed, and messy, looking as though he hadn't changed or slept in a while.

"Sir, border of the Tidani state."

He peered at the screens again. "Oh yes.. the Tidani.. we had a brief tiff with them a while ago, correct?"

"Yes sir, ended up in the withdrawl of both sides, I do not recall a shot ever being fired."

Grunting, he turned around and sat back into his seat. "Guess we better do what the war council wants. Plot a course for their closest system, make sure we make ourselves very obvious. Intel suggests all of their combat fleets have moved out to engage another threat. All that should be left is their defense fleet, and we're here to gauge their prowess and reaction time, just as intel. I told you all this so you will keep alert, and don't go about doing anything stupid! Clear?"

The bridge reacted with a soft "Crystal, sir."

"Good. Make our way to the system, shields up, all weapons active. Full speed ahead."

Harvest, Mirage System

In a time of war one must be ever vigilant, even in your least populated system.

The Mirage System Defense Commander leaned back at his desk. The system had two worlds; Aubra a desert world, and Harvest a green paradise world colonized to grow food.

And so when an officer burst through his doors sweating profusely, Calaos (http://images.filecloud.com/95764/WeaveG.gif) was shocked.

"Sir..." The messenger breathed heavily. "The Adept Service has just notified us that one of the early warning Great White Narth's outside our territory has picked up a large ship entering our system."

"What!? Well what are you waiting for? Get a message out to Naval Command and instruct the Mirage Defense Fleet to ready for possible hostilities." He dismissed the officer and sent a message off to Planetary Commanders. Prepare planetary defenses for possible attack.

A few minutes later, Calaos sat at his command chair. Calaos' face and voice were broadcast throughout the system.

Attention unidentified ship, you have now entered a restricted zone. If you would be so kind as to identify yourselves and state your purpose for being here, perhaps we can all be about our business today in peace.

"Sir, communications chatter has erupted. Tactical anaylsis assumes they have spotted us, and preparing to react."

"Excellent, proceed further into the system. Let's see how many wasps we can stir before they attack." The captian stood up confidently, and peered through the screens.

"Sir, a communications, patching it through to forward view screen." Witht hat said, the com operator revealed a message through the view screen.

"They want to know what we're doing?" He grinned. "Do not respond. Instead, load forward torpedo tubes, and fire one at will. Pre-set detonation range to 6 kilometers."

"Yes sir. Loading forward tubes, launching tube number 4!" Exclaimed the weapons op, slamming a button that released the torpedo.

The torpedo sped out of the tube at a slow speed, but slowly gaining momentum, until reaching an amazing terminal velocity. It traveled to 6KM, as programmed, and detonated into a magnigicent white and blue flame. The new high yield torpedos were a force to be reckoned with now.

"Sir, no response so far. I think..."

The officer was cut off by another. "They are firing. Torpedo incoming."

Those in the room watch as it sped away from the alien ship, then detonated in a large explosion.

"Well," Commander Calaos said. "Did that appear subtle to anyone?" No one answered.

"Sir, visual is returning. Resolution is approaching ideal."

A picture of the ship bearing down on the planet appeared on the screen.

"Targeting estimates a Star Destroyer class with 20% variation at this range."

That was enough for Calaos. With Jurai under seige he wasn't going to take any chances. "Prepare the planetary shields and batteries for action. Get me Admiral Phel."

The holopad oh the left arm of his chair came to life. The admiral of the Mirage Defense Fleet, another weaver like Calaos himself, appeared.

"Status of the fleet, Admiral?"

A few ships still moving to formation, but all signal ready to fight.

"Very good, Admiral. Contact determined hostile, we are at condition red. You are free to engage."

Understood Commander.
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The defensive fleet moved between the incoming alien and Harvest.

A wall of Orpus cruisers burned forward, behind them Quors took aim and Carriers sat in wait.

A short moment of silence went by, and then the storm came. Planetary scale batteries fired from the planet, and from the fleet Tremor pulse beam cannons and Razor beams flew from the defenders. Following the wave of energy a salvo of Phased Meson Torpedoes cruised in on the invader.

A wide grin on his face, the captain looked at the incoming salvo with admiration. "Relay this footage to the command post!"

"Sir! Sir! Orders?! We won't survive-" The ship rocked as the first salvo of energy weapons struck the shields, them taking a decent amount of punishment before failing and overloading.

"Full speed ahead! Get as much telemetry as you can!"

"Sir!"

The ship rocked again as the torpedos slammed into the defensless hull of the ship. It had incrediably thin skin compared to its size, a flaw over looked by designers, assuming the shields would hold out for long periods of time.

The dagger shapped hull(Reminiscent of an ISD) splintered and cracked, gaping craters being torn open with ease. The four large funs that stuck out from the sides of the ship at angles broke away from the hull, and the bridge was nothing more than a smear on top of a con tower. The large super ion cannon, slung to the bottom of the hull, broke away as well, drifting slowly from the bottom of the ship, before being struck by the rest of the torpedos. Nothing was left but a mere hulk floating in space.

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A small man ran through the wide halls of an old delapidated building. In his hands, he had a folder of papers, clutching them tightly as he ran.

Quickly, he swerved a corner, and ran into the chest of a larger man, in an officer's uniform. With a terrified look in his eyes, he took a step back, and brought his fist up to his right pectoral muscle, a salute.

"Sir! Message from the Undying Guilt." He squeekishly held out the folder, and the officer snatched it from his hand.

He thumbed through it, until he reached a page deep in the folder. His eyes opened wide.

Calaos watched the sceen play out from the command bunker on Harvest.

He watched with horror as the incoming ship didn't even try to avoid the fire. Why don't they evade? Why didn't they back down when we gave them a chance? Something is wrong, there is more going on here below the surface. This isn't the sith's style, but I couldn't chance a trick, not now.
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The fleet moved toward the wreckage, carfully scanning for lifesigns and unexploded ordinance. They hoped to find some indication of who these people were, and why they had come.

The bridge was silent. All the ops were doing their jobs, the admiral himself, seated in his command chair, looking out the windowed bridge, which was looking across the massive bow of the ship. They were in slipspace, so there wasn't much to look at besides another dimension of blue and white swirls.

"ETA, navigation?" Quietly asked the admiral, his demeanor very polite.

"32 hours, sir."

"Engineering, any chance we can overload the engines a bit to speed this up?" Again the admiral asked, through the communications peice on his chair.

"We could sir, but only for short bursts. Might speed up the trip by 4 hours only though."

"Every minute counts. Do it."

"Right away, sir."

He still couldn't believe what the insane captian did. He was supposed to covertly poke his nose around, but instead, he throws a punch at a wasps nest. The admiral wondered why some of these people became officers.

As the massive command ship (http://img20.imageshack.us/img20/9405/supershiplightcolor9pf.jpg)coasted through space, several small destroyers (http://img117.imageshack.us/img117/843/destroyer4xc.jpg) flanked them as escorts. The admiral actually felt quite odd, bringing such a large command ship, which was over 5 kilometers long, to such a lowly mission. Unfortunately, the large repair bay was needed to salvage the hulk they hoped was still there.

The wreck was littered with unexploded shells and torpedos. A few cruisers moved in close to scan for survivors, but they found none. A Mydra corvette scanned the electronics downloading any data they could find.

It took some time to find anything usefull, eventually they found some familiar information of a one time ally. Finally they could identify the invader, it was Azahan...

Carefully the cruisers located the explosives and disabled them using their tachyon pulses or weapons. Once they had destroyed everything they could find, they started tractoring the parts of the ship. One by one they moved the pieces back to the Carriers to be analyzed. Once they had been inspected for explosives they were moved from the system to the Vertigo system's Emec's Forge Shipyard above Gravity.

"Sir, approaching their borders. Drop short?"

"No, drive into the border, about 1 kilometer away from where the wreckage was. We need to start operations immediatly, assuming the Tidani haven't ransacked the hulk."

"Yes sir, right away. Com to all fleets, disengage slip drive in 6 seconds."

And in that 6 seconds, the massive ship dropped out of the slip stream, the gigantic ship and her escorts making a gigantic rip in the fabric of space, releasing multitudes of white light. In an instant, the ships appeared, hovering about two kilometers where the wreckage was when it exploded. Slipspace wasn't the most accurate form of FTL.

"Sir, scanning...." The op read over the signals, lines, and tints of the screen. "Sir, nothing here but debris. But not enough debris to construct the entire Undying Guilt."

"Damn Tidani, what does longrange sensors pick up?"

"Uh.. alot of ships and obscure reports of orbital weapons..."

"More contacts, Sir. Same signature as the last, several smaller ones and one very large."

Calaos hadn't known what to expect, though this is one of the situations he had anticipated might come. "Bring the fleet and planetary defenses to alert, but tell them to hold for now. I want to send a broadcast."

Again Calaos hailed incoming ships, this time he was much bolder and aggressive with his demands.

Attention Azahan vessels, you have violated the sovereign space of The Hyren Confederation of Tidan. If you do not stand down then you declare your hostility. We have done nothing to provoke your aggression, and will not permit a strike against our worlds. Turn back now while you still can. Your fate is in your hands.

The planetary batteries and ships in high orbit targeted the Azahans, waiting for orders. They were not anxious to test the large ship that had just appeared in front of them, but were ready to perform their duties.

"Sir, multiple target locks! Large ships moving into a defensive posture!"

The admiral would have scoffed at the attempt, if he had a larger fleet. But he was not stupid, and knew powerful orbital weapons and ships could knock them out of the sky in moments, with such small numbers on their part.

"Power up shields, and put weapons on stand-by, but do *not* power them up until I say."

A resounding "yes sir" was heard from the bridge, and the coms from the support ships.

"Recieving communications, sir. They ask us to declare ourselves, and ask why we attempt to fire on their world."

The admiral burried his head in his hands. The idiot captian of the Undying Guilt did indeed snap.

"Send new communications."

"Open, sir."

We have arrived here to pick up a hulk you supposedly destroyed. We are here to retreive it, and all its parts, and return it to our space. Out.

No matter how powerfull your ship is, you are not in a good possition to make demands. However, I understand the desire to reclaim what you have lost. My people are no strangers to loss, and the need to recover what honor one can from defeat. What remains of your ship is no longer here. We removed what we could to another location, as are our rights inside our territory. Stay where you are and keep your weapons powered down, and I will consult with my superiors.

A short time passed as Calaos followed the proper bureaucratic channels. Finally, he hailed the ships again.

The Creators smile on you. The government of Tidan has decided to release the remains of your ship as a gesture of good faith that these events may end here and now. The remains will arrive here in 5 hours. I suggest you get comfortable.

The defensive ships powered down their weapons. It was going to be a while before the Azahans left, hopefully this would reduce the likelyhood of tensions escalating. They did not stand down from alert however, and the planetary batteries continued to target the trespassers. Calaos doubted he could convince them to stand down even if he wanted to.

He fumed at the idea. Alien lifeforms had used their grubby little hands to physically touch Azahan property, especially an Azahan warship. His crew could see the vein in his forehead, but he kept a civil tone when composing the reply.

We do not have time for 5 hours, however. We need this hulk now, so we may determine why you destroyed an Azahan warship. It also exemplifies that our technologies are in your hands. We have an understandable fear that it may be used against us. We await a reply.

Calaos couldn't believe it. His mind raced with replies, most very undiplomatic. Anger burned through the calm face he was forced to put on.

Why we destroyed your ship? YOUR ship came to MY system and started firing at MY planet. Why were you not concerned about your technology then?

I am sorry that you no longer have the time to deal with this mess you have dropped at my feet. What would you suggest then? I cannot move your scrap any faster. I want you to leave as much as you want to. Every second you stay here you scanning and learning of our technology.

I suggest that you take our more than generous offer.

Calaos took a deep breath and carefully pulled his talons out of the chair arms. Then cursed the cheap furnature. This day was getting worse and worse. At this rate he would be lucky to come out of this with his life let alone his job intact.

His eye twitched. How could be talked to like that, by such filthy aliens. They did not know whom they were dealing with, atleast this is what the admiral thought.

You had better hold your tone with us, alien. Instead of disabling the ship, you decided to destroy it completely, eliminating ALL of OUR people on that ship, hundreds of innocent Joe's doing what they thought was a job to get by. All we want is our ship, so we can determine the situation, why our captain disobeyed orders, and also so we may retrieve the dead crew, and inform families. Do this quickly, alien.

How dare he... Calaos went through the series of events in his mind again. The ship had appeared, refused all communications, fired, and continued closing to weapons range despite numerous warnings and physical deterents. No, he had done the right thing. There was no telling how their weapons would have effected the ship, or at all.

You speak of things you know little about, alien. You were not here. It was not your world of innocent farmers that faced a silent enemy seeking their fields to run red with blood.

You will have your ship as I told you before, no sooner, no later. The very insinuation that I would stall you in such a matter is far more insulting than your lack of respect for our sovereign borders.

We have been more than patient with your presence after what could easily be considered a declaration of war. Now be patient with us as we return what you lost.

Oh how he desired to give the order to vaporize the arrogant admiral.

"Helm. Set Slip Stream drive to stand-by. At the first sign of weapons fire, get us out of here."

"Yes sir, admiral."

"What are these filthy mongrels trying to pull? It shouldn't take 5 hours to retrieve a hunk of metal."

You have 2.5 hours. After that time has passed, we cannot be held responsible for our actions.

"Connect to the long range communicatoins bouy we left a couple light years back. Establish a connection with Outpost 23."

"Right away, sir."

Calaos almost laughed. "He said what? Mark your calanders men, we have just made contact with the most arrogant people in the universe."

Your impatience astounds me. Not only are you demanding when out numbered, you now inform me how long it takes us to travel between our own systems.

If you want what is left of your ship you will behave yourselves in our space until it arrives. Otherwise, you WILL be responsible for your actions.

Again, the admiral was fuming. "How can those filthy buggers hold *our* technology? Send them a continous data stream."

"Of what sir?"

"A timer, starting from 2 hours and 30 minutes, progressing to zero."

"Yes sir."

The admiral turned to to the communications officer. "Has the link been established?"

"Yes sir, ready for you to send messages when you need it."

"Good."

To the Tidani, the data stream read a timer, starting from 2 hours and 30 minutes, and timing down towards zero. No other communications was sent.

"Sir, a datastream was just picked up from the Azahan ship."

Calaos was growing very tired of this. "What is it." The officer then displayed the stream on a screen. "Creators, the primate is out of his mind. If he thinks these childish tactics will get him anywhere he has another thing coming. Put him on hold."

What returned to the Azahan ship was the equivalent of Tidani elevator music.
___________________________________________________________________

The timer was now at 1 minute.

Calaos looked at the data, the cargo haulers would not arrive for another hour. They had been pushing their engines beyond the warning status for hours now in an attempt to arrive before the deadline. They just weren't designed to be able to carry such large masses as these speeds.

"Tell the fleet to prepare for hostilities. If they power weapons, do the same. Do not fire until Tidani property has been hit. If we go to war, they will have started it."

"Sir, timer is up."

"Thank Nurgle! Maybe they'll shut off that infermal music!" one bridge officer exclaimed.

"Shut up! Weapons op, load a H.E. torpedo. Set range to 1 kilometer off the closest ship's bow. It shouldn't harm it, just send a big shock wave through them. Fire at will. We are done with waiting. Com ops, send a communications asking what ships are in the vicinity, to the outpost." The admiral boomed, his voice showing much agitation.

"Torpedo ready."

"Fire!"

There was no signs of weapons powering up, or energy spikes. The only thing seen was a torpedo exit a tube, and head right towards the cloest ship.

The torpedo was shooting straight for one of the frontline cruisers. Calaos had expected some kind of show of force and was gambling it was a warning shot.

The torpedo came within 1km of the cruiser and detonated in a massive explosion of power and light.

The order had been given not to fire until they were hit, and with no warning of the attack he hoped that by the time any of the ships charged their weapons to fight they would have realized that there was no damage done.

Admiral Phel kept his head and screamed orders through the fleet to hold their fire. They did, barely.

Azahan if you fire again, warning or not, we will return fire. You have been warned. You continue to give me fewer and fewer reasons to return your ship to you.

"Take us out of here" he snorted, "I am done being nice to them. We shall retrieve the ship another way. If they havn't already reverse engineered our weapons..."

"Yes sir," the com op piped in, " All ships, slave slip drives to the Azaha Guardian"

Within another moment, a bright flash of white light was seen, forming infront of the group of Azahan ships. It was a very bright light, enough to blind the unsheilded eyes. In a flash the ships dissapeared into light, and the light snapped shut.

"Call the outpost, I want a detatchment of Blight Walkers here."

"Yes sir."

The Azahans left and a few hours later the wreckage arrived.

Damn Azahans. Calaos thought.

"Send word to Command. I would stake my post they'll be back. Someone like that doesn't make a fuss like that and then walk away empty handed."

Messages relayed back and forth between commands. The Universal Council approved the deployment of the Third Fleet which had just come out of repairs at Emec's Forge. In a few hours it would be joining the System Defense Fleet. If they did come back Tidan wasn't going to leave Harvest's fate in any doubt.