NationStates Jolt Archive

Oribtal space: planet XGDHF38495603
In the great darkness in the orbit above a tiny unimportant planet the Hanoverian Empire ship Sans Pareil hung silently, almost as if in a picture, waiting for the arrival of a ship.

With a massive flash of light a huge 6km long Tau "Explorer" class ship, painter with the colours of the infamous Farsight mercenarys, exited the warp and came to a stop with in 1km of the Sans Pareil. Silently the VIP hanger bay slid open and an orca drop ship slowly manuvered out of the bay, before engaging its four main thrusters. Onboard the mate of the great Farsight, O'Kais'Shi, sat in silence reading a copy of the soon to be signed mercenary contract.

On the Sans Pareil a simple text message apeared on the communication screen " This is VIP orca two to Sans Pareil, requesting permission to land."

On the bridge of the Sans Pareil, there was utter silence as the majestic Tau vessel flashed into sight. It utterly dwarfed the tiny Royal Navy gunship. The bridge crew looked out of the thick glass of the portholes and just stared for at least a minute. Everyone regained their senses when the comms control panel bleeped. An intricately-uniformed junior officer spoke up.

"Captain Smith, Tau VIP Orca Two requesting permission to land."

"Granted. Open up the flag officers' port and have a marine honour guard there right away."

"Aye sir. Orca Two, you are cleared to land, opening up a docking bay now. Welcome to the Sans Pareil."

At the rear of the Sans pareil a docking bay opened up in a puff of released atmosphere. The bay was decked in flags, small statues and at the sides of the bay antique breech-loaded black powder cannons were lined up. The captain of the ship stood jsut outside beind a blast door until the atmosphere was returned, along with the ship's compliment of 30 marines, prepared to welcome the alien guests as if an admiral was visiting. All present were nervous and twitchy. None of them had seen an alien before. They'd all seen pictures of them, like those who were nominally absorbed into the empire centuries ago, but nobody had bothered to check up on them in a long time. The crew of Sans-Pareil would be the first to greet aliens onto a Royal navy vessel, and the first to greet aliens face-to-face in decades.

The rear boarding ramp of the Orca drop ship hissed slightly as the preasure equilised before it slowly lowered to reveal its passanger. With a soft hum from the machinary of her customised purple crisis suit O'Kais' Shi walked out into the docking bay with all the elagence of a ballroom dancer. The suits external head turned left and right as its many camra's scanned the awaiting crowd. Then, truning towards the Admiral, she walked with continuing grace towards him. The marine's watched in awe as the 6 foot battlesuit walked as if it was a live creature, its feet never once slipping on the ceromonialy polished floor. Upon reaching the Admaril the battlesuit bowed and an electronic voice said " Greetings, I am O'Kais'Shi, one who has bonded with the Great O'Shovah, I am please to be able to meet with you to sign the mercenary contract"

Good lord, the technology behind that thing must be incredible... Such grace, that thing must be deadly.

Realising his mouth was gaping open, the commander of the Sans Pareil closed it and pulled himself together.

"Ahh, likewise. I am Commodore Sir Jonas Maxwell of the Second Fleet. We're very pleased to have you aboard,this is quite an event for the Empire. Well, would you care to follow me to the conference chamber?"

The commodore signalled for the alien to follow, and set off down a corridor, flanked by two marines at each side, clad in their crimson combat uniforms, a nod to the old days when they protected the sailing ships of the old empire.

O'kais'Shi smiled to her self as she followed the commander, It had been a long time since there forces had met a race which had not already seen the Aun following Tau. This could be very amusing she though before realising that she had left something behind in the Orca. Quickly she turned and a small light on her chest plate blinked as she sent out a command signal. In an instant two Tau drones, each carrying two twin linked burst cannons , moved into flanking positions. With a nod O'Kais'Shi turned back to follow the now very intimidated commander and his marines. Yes, this could be very amusing indeed though Shi as she tried not to laugth into her microphone.

Maybe they think we're deficient or something. This is obviously supposed to impress or terrify us. It's working. Time to show them our toys.

Pulling himself together, the Commodore turned to the alien representative, trying to look as nonchalant as possible.

"Perhaps, before we begin, you would like to tour the ship? We may not posess kilometer-scale ships, but we believe what we have isn't too shabby. What say we show you the gunnery deck? We're very proud of our gunnery crews. Best in the quadrant, or so we like to think."

Shi smilled again before replying "Ah I've heard of your gunnary deck reputation, it was one of the reasons that Commander Farsight asked for this meeting and contract, I would be happy to visit them, though I believe I should remove my suit before I make a dent in your ceiling."
With a hiss of atmospheric preasures leveling out the brestplate of the Crisis suit opened, reveiling a female Tau in a black flight suit. "Right" Shi said as she streached her cloven legs "Shall we continue?" she said, smiling at the Commadore

At the sight of the alien a few of the crewmen who were walking past in the corridor stopped what they were doing, stared for a few seconds and walked off again, faster than they moved before. The marines simply stood and stared at the hooves.

"Well then, to the gunnery deck."

A few minutes and two decks later the group entered the gunnery deck. It was a surprisingly large but dark space, with almost every spare patch of open ground covered in grease and gun parts. Huge shells were stacked up against the back of the room, and crewmen clambered over them with surprising dexterity gained through years of working on gun decks, and the gruelling training of the Royal Naval Gunners Academy. One of the crewmen spotted the group.

"VIP on deck!"

Immediately the entire gunnery crew of 100 men snapped to attention, facing the group. The oOmmodore frowned.

"As you were." The crew returned to their various jobs. "At the moment the guns are being serviced, but when they're at top form these guns can punch a hole in a ship far larger than the Sans Pareil. Still going after all these years. Most of these guns were ins ervice when the ship was launched, a century ago next week. The gunners themselves are almost flawless. Even without targetting computers, some of the best of our gunners can put a shell right through a small fighter. What do you think?"

The Commodore made a gesture towards the guns, massive guns that slightly resembled the famous Flak 88's of WWII, but much, much larger.

Shi walked over to they gun and studyed the gun's pitted surface. "Impressive, this gun is a third of Commander Farsights age, i'm suprised you haven't updated them though. We maybe able to offer you some pulse based guns, or at least some maintanece drones. Still, these guns are a credit to your empire, one of our stealth team watched them in action, they have huge fire power compaired to there size. Doen't they sometimes cut out on you during a fight tough due to there age?"

"We choose standard projectile technology over all that laser gadgetry for a reason. These guns rarely experience problems, and when they do we can generally fix it with a little bit of cleaning. As long as we service them like this regularly, they'll keep going for another century or so. Thank you for your kind offer, but we'll keep our guns. We like to have our people maintaining their guns, each crew becomes very attatched to its gun. We wouldn't want to ruin that by using these 'drones', but again, thank you for your offer."

The Commodore spotted one of the gunnery crews sitting around their gun.

"Crew sixteen, why are you not servicing your weapon?"

"We're finished, sir. Sixteen is all in working order."

"Is it loaded?"

"Yes sir, as directed."

The Commodore turned to the alien.

"How about we show you the gun's power firsthand? You'd be surprised."

"I would accept your offer but I believe that we have a contract to negotiate. Though I will leave one of my drone's to record the shot and have it sent to Commander Farsight, if they are as powerful as you say then I am sure that he will be impressed. Now, should we got to the meeting?" Shi said turning to the door.

"Well then, straight to business. If you'd like to follow me again?"

Once more the group set off in the direction of the conference room. Gradually steel deckplates and rusty bulkheads gave way to polished wooden floors and panelled walls. The gloom gave way to light cast by holographic candles. In the conference room stood a table, covered in charts and unidentifiable small pieces of equipment. The marines left the group alone and stood to attention outside the large double doors.

"Please, do sit down."

Shi sat her self down at the head of a rather large and ornate table. "Thank you, I hope that we can get these negotiations out of the way quickly I am of the Fire caste after all, a born warrior, these thinks are enjoyed more by the Water caste." Then, looking around at the humans who were also sitting at the table she said "I take it that you want to hire out warriors to help you ether expand your empire or to defeat some enemy. If you would let me know how long you want our services and what kind of threats we will likly face then I can give you a price."

"Yes, you do have the manner and bearing of a soldier rather than a diplomat. We'll try to coclude this as fast as humanl... As fast as possible. Well, the reason we wish to take advantage of your services is the Empire's lack of a large ground force. What we have is professional, but small, and we can't train enough troops quickly enough to fight a proper war, or expand the Empire. As it is, we're at full deployment holding on to what we have. We'd like to employ you for as long as possible as shock troops to fight in wars of expansion, or at a pinch in case of a defensive war."

The Commodore removed his ornate tricorn hat and put it on the table.

Sometimes I think that tradition needs to give way to uniforms that aren't so GAY.

Hmmmmmmm, sounds fun! though Shi before saying " Admaril, that sound like something right up our alley, we would be happy to oblige. however, for something so large we will require a large payment: You must help us to liberate the Sept of Vior'la, the home of Commander Farsight. This will not be an easy task, it is a major Sept. However, the Tau in the Sept are mainly Fire caste and they should have no problem with joining up with our Colanies. I would sujest you thing it over before agreeing for as I said, the task will be very difficult."

Something in the Tau's statement hurt the Commodore's pride a little, and he turned red.

"My fleet is perfectly capable of 'liberating' a world. We'll see just how effective this alien energy weapon technology is. Tell your leader that we will gladly help liberate this 'sept'. I take it my fleet will be mainly acting as fire support, given that we have less than 200 marines in the entire sector armada."

Obviosly, this empire has made no previos contact with the Aun empire, this could become very intresting. "well Admaril, if you agree to our payment then I guess the only thing left to do..." Said Shi, while she extended her hand "...Is to shake on it."

And so, with a simple hand shake, the contract was signed and the true story, one which would span the galaxy, began.