NationStates Jolt Archive

Hyde System:

A hurth for art and culture within the Empire, the planet Martine rested easily below the flagship Keldeij. Encircling the Abh flagship were five hundred capital ships anchored just beyond. A mesh of weapons and tech, they ranged from everything with Electromagnetic rifles to Demolisher guns. Anaconda torpedo launchers were in place along with other missle tubes fed by replicators. Ion cannon turrets and heavy particle beams readied for battle in the short order it took to acquire everything. With a closer look, each ship was emblazened with three heads of the eight headed dragon Gasorus. A winged hammer was wrapped up near the shaft by a snake-like neck while the middle head held an extended lightsaber in its fangs. The last head on the left held an olive branch in its closed maw.

While the people below slep, Admiral Trife sat around a small metalic table with a holographic image of a man in a small wooden boat crossing a body of water. Major Kayhule sat nearby studying the picture curiously and wondering why the Admiral was so intent on it. Stirring as if mentally reading the Major's thoughts, Trife opened his eyes. "It's a portrait from the early human history where this general of theirs crossed an icy river to attack an enemy encampment while they slept. There is also another time where a swarm of aircraft bombed a naval outpost while simultaneously blinding their target with talks of peace."

Leaning back with his hands behind his dark blue hair, Trife sighed while resting both boots on the table top and simultaneously turning off the holographic images. "I miss the days where we could move around space freely without any early warning systems. If only everyone we invaded had a Sord for us to strike from, then we could hit them all and then leave again before anyone knew what happened."

The Major looked less than sure but he humored the Admiral anyways. "Perhaps but we have taken to putting our ships in null fields so no one can learn their position as well putting some at all times in Hyperspace. Surly there is still some element of surprise to be had out there."

"Maybe, but I doubt it. Besides, no matter if we have an element of surprise or not there always seems to be some nation ready to jump in there at a moments notice to come galloping to save the day. Granted we keep a fleet always in standby in Hyperspace and are also inventing a gate system that allows us to travel almost instantly anywhere. It doesn't seem far that everyone else should have the same advantage."

He tried to hide the mocking smile but he wasn't necessarily succeeding. "Well sir, I suppose that is something we will just have to get used to and either find a way around it or just simply conquer everyone."

Surprisingly, he was considering which options would be better. Trife came out of his trance as if a thought just occured to him. "Have the messengers been dispatched?"

"Days ago sir. Everyone should know about the plan."

"Good. We'll wait here for a time and then attack with whatever we have. The rest will just have to catch up. We can't afford to wait around for much longer."

Karl Liebknecht Shipyard, Mars--

Nomura sighed. This bevy of new equipment had been foisted upon him at the last minute, so he had his men doing nonstop drills to familiarize them with them. New torpedoes, new robot ships....oy gevalt. He took a sip of his Turkish coffee. He had grown to love the stuff over the past few weeks. Healthier than whiskey, and had the same buzz, only it was caffeine, not alcohol that was doing it.

He shouted at Gracie, saying, "Grace, how's my newbs?"

Gracie, sweating as only a digital avatar working on a virtual treadmill can, said, "All ships report satisfactory progress with training and drill. Simulated test fires indicate things will go well with equipment. All supplies ready."

Nomura smiled and said, "Good. I knew I could count on you, Gracie."

Nomura looked over his plans. He was to mosey on down to Abh space, and meet with them with his collection of new ships and tech. It had only been about a few weeks since the Realm campaign, but then again, war didn't take a vacation.

Gracie then interrupted his musings and said, "Sir, JRCCC on the line. It's a secure message. The Abh want you to proceed to the Hyde System, pronto."

Nomura grumbled and sat up, saying, "No rest for the wicked, eh Grace? Tell JRCCC we'll be there. And tell the fleet that we're moving, now."

Gracie nodded and said, "Aye, sir."

Thus, the New Dornalians moved, in small waves, to the Hyde System. Joining them would be some FTLi platforms and Grigori Batov's People's Acolytes contingent. Nomura resisted, but Batov wouldn't shut up....

"Sir, we've just received a report stating that the Dornalians are on their way."

At his fingertips lay thousands of systems. The star chart showed the entire galaxy in one swirling mass of stars, planets, and space dust. Intelligence from the Information Bureau had been poured into these maps listing known names of planets and their importance. Trife looked up from his contemplation for a brief moment. "Any word of the others?"

"No sir. Not at the moment but there is still time that more will be on their way."

The Admiral looked down and went back to his strategizing. "Welcome the Dornalians when they arrive and pray that more show. We leave soon."

"Yes sir."

Jorrus and Melisha were conversing about the coming times. About how the Alliance hasn't been very active in the ESUS vs GFFA wars and how it should get involved. Opening up relationships with other worlds, including their GFFA allies whom they have fairly much alienated. However, they would soon be interupted by an report which will solve their debate for the time being.

"Quite frankly Melisha, the Alliance hasn't been acting much of an alliance. We want to welcome other cultures and people with different ways of life, not close them off like the Empire does. We should be helping people whom are willing to help us. It's the least we can do to help our allies."

"Too true master, however we are in troubled times. The Alliance should choose whom to help very carefully and to send aid with even more consideration. We have a limited supply of ships dispite the fact we have almost the amount the Empire has. We hardly have any ship yards or forge worlds to speak of." Melisha stressed the last sentence very harshly.

"*Sigh* Councilor, you need not remind me. We still need to---" Just then, a large bulky man marched into the room wearing his golden Tactical Dreadnaught Armor (aka: Terminator Armor) which lightly shook as he marched in. "General? Is there a reason you must stomp on in here with your armor on? We're not at war yet..."

The general removed his helmet to reveal a scared face. One who looked like he's seen many battles, and took a beating to one too many lightning strikes from former his former Kirtir commanders. This was Major General Verneal, the leading commander of the Alliance's forces whenever Jorrus wasn't involved, "Jorrus sir," came the gruff reply, "I've just got a message from the Abh's. They're ready to form an attack against Otagia."

"This is our answer to whom we'll lend military help to, Melisha. General, have the ships we've promised been upgraded with the appropriate technology?"

"Aye sir. Ships are ready for standby mode as soon as we have the leader's ready."

Jorrus didn't need time to think who he'll send in with Verneal, "Councilor Riddikor is your assigned leader to this mission. However, should you see a better way to win the war you have full permission to overide his decisions."

"Aye sir."

"Oh... And send a message to the abh's we're coming over. The party shall begin soon."

Verneal saluted Jorrus and marched off. Jorrus got up, and turned to face Melisha before following the General, "I'm off to get the fleet assembled for the strike. Make sure Riddikor gets ready. He'll probably have the fleet show up late anyways. He likes a big entrance..."

Godulan Bump For Great Justice and Eventual Participation.

OOC: Just a friendly neighborhood reminder of the roughly 2 light-hour FTLi zone around Otagian space. Cheers, and merry coopted pagan solistice celebration! ;)

OOC: Charming.

IC:

Hyde System:

Nomura's forces finally assembled in total in Abh space, having jumped there bit by bit. Nomura himself finally arriving, he said with his usual sarcastic zest, "Somebody call for a few Dornie gits?"

"Sir, the Dornalians have just arrived and send their greetings."

Admiral Trife wheeled around away from the battle plans that were being layed out for a final reviewing. It was really now or never. Targets had been finallized and marked for destruction. Speed would no longer be a factor in this battle. Instead it would rely on sheer determination to destroy the enemy. "They all know the plan and where we head first. Let's get on with this battle so we can return home."

Major Kayhule snapped a salute. "Aye sir. I'll send the message to all forces."

Once again we march out far from our homes and families into the hands of the enemy. No nation has asked so much of their sons and daughters as they have asked of us these past years and nation has been greater served then those represented here today. In the name of all that you value and hold dear in your lives, let us ride once again to war. When we return from this newest victory, celebrations like none have seen shall be everyones reward.

With Trife's last message broadcasted out, the five hundred ships representing the Abh, Dornalians, and Alliance dove into Hyperspace along with the Keldeij. In the turmolts of Hyperspace, the larger Abh fleet stayed in wait engulfed in swirling darkness. Their destination was programmed into the jump drives as they sped towards Otagian space.

"Sir, we have stopped the fleet just outside of the inhibitor zone. Awaiting your orders."

Admiral Trife had moved from the planning and staging room, where various commanders and captains of the fleet had met moments before, to the command deck of the Keldeij. "Very well. Our estimated flight time is a little over two hours. We're pushing our way straight through to New Kyushu. It's doubtful that any stealth devices we have will be able to move us all the way there but it is still worth a shot. In any case, we came here to destroy their ships. It looks like we'll get that opportunity. Keep the allied ships in the cloud with us. That should cut down on enemy sensor effects on tracking us, but that's only in theory."

"Yes sir. It will only take a moment to reposition the fleet. We'll be ready to jump in a moments notice." Major Kayhule easily saluted and then walked off to perform his duties.

Admiral Trife eased back into his seat on the bridge. A holographic tactical map was arrayed at his feet with the fleets formation beginning to move and mold into various shapes as more ships were forming up. It sort of looked like a can of sardines on the screen.

On the edge of the FTLi, a single shape solidified and began moving towards its target. It's own momentum and the power from within propelled the swirling orb of darkness towards their destination at a blazing speed. From within, ships and the darkness itself scanned for any deep range probes that might be trying to track them or satellites that would cause problems.

Hey, guys, we've got some odd readings at the edge of the Interdiction zone.

Whatcha got, Asher? Better be important, I've got a game of go going on with Simeon, and I'm winning.

Bullshit, Zeb. I've got you in 24 turns.

You ever think this game gets a bit boring once you start looking that far ahead?

Maybe. How about Quake next time?

Quit yer arguing. Feeding data now...

...It's a blob of nothing. The hell is that?

Dunno. Can't see the stars through it on visual light, and it's inbound. Dropped out of something maybe a few microseconds ago.

Get a gravitic scan going on it with the perimiter monitor array. Oh, and get the wi-specs on tight resolution, see what you can find.

Was just about to. Should have results in a picosecond or three....

...I still think that Quake would be better.

Yeah, but can we get the frame rate high enough? And anyway, you cheat.

I NEVER!

Sez you. How do you explain all those headshots last time?

I'm a good shot!

Bullcrap. That was an aimbot.

I'm a fracking AI! I don't need an aimbot!

Ah, quit yer bitchin'. The data from the gravy scans and wi-specs is in. Uploading info now... Bugger.

Is that what I think it is?

Signatures are confirmed. Mix of Dornalian and Abh vessels, underneath what looks like some sort of cloaking device. Somebody get Levi in here, will you?

--Levi has joined the conversation

There better be a good reason I'm here. I'm giving a few dozen citizen groups tours of the Band right now.

Sorry to bother you, Levi, but we have a problem. A large one. Seems we're being invaded.

Oh bother. Well, looks like I'll have to call off those tours... I'll have the Guild start evacuating the Band. Should I send some emmissaries to our allies?

Of course. The Rhunate Tradeworld in system should already know of the enemy presence, but buzz them via ansible anyway. Send Guilders to our other allies, and offer transport to Kyushu.

Roger. Deploying Band assets now, should meet enemy forces at the 1.5 LH point. Fleet Levi will arrive at the halfway mark.

Fleet Asher confirms, will synchronize with Levi arrival. We suggest that Zebulon and Simeon follow suit.

Roger, Asher. Zebulon confirms.

Roger, Asher, Simeon confirms.

Good. Continue conversation upon arrival at intercept point. Asher out.

The Orboros Band. A massive halo encircling the planet of New Kyushu, hundreds of strands tethering it to the world below. Home to Pale Rider Arms' primary shipyards and zero-grav manufacturing facilities. Home also to thousands of kilometers of defense systems, from vaser lenses to MAC banks to pygmae launch platforms. It was these pygmaes that opened fire first, legions of drones and SCCAM torpedoes flowing out into space, a massive burst of emerald fire seemingly radiating from the silver of the ring, bending and twisting towards the incoming darkness. Four clutches of pitch black eggs soared through the void, angling to intercept the cloud of darkness, their own emerald flames slowly enveloping the clutches in a protective sheath.

Meanwhile, Mobius Guilders on the band worked overtime, the system's FTLi flickering at nanosecond intervals, seemingly at random as the Guilders began to evacuate the Citizens aboard the band. A few dozen more Guilders doored through a flicker in the FTLi, moving to alert their allies in the ESUS to the threat.

OOC: Making some assumptions about your stealth measures from the War Drums OOC thread. Hope you don't mind.

"My Lord. Our slaves have prepared their defense, and saw fit to alert us to the uprising."

The ancient reptile stirred slowly on his throne.

"They are presumptuous, but we shall see fit to forgive them in our magnanimity. Have the Keltak been prepared for assault, Prince Gabriel?"

"Yes, my Lord. We are prepared to shift the batteries upon your command. We have a full spread, and have even prepared the Great Light for lazing. The full fleet is prepared to raid."

"We shall not be raiding this time, Gabriel."

"My Lord? If we do not sally forth, we shall lose many valuable sla-"

"I did not tell you we would not destroy the intruders, Prince. I merely stated that raids on the insurgents would cease for now. The Arbiter himself has seen fit to inform me that our orders have changed. We merely no longer fight for our larder, that is all, dear Gabriel."

"But my Lord. What else is there for us to-"

A deep mental rumble filled the minds of the Rhuns on the great Tradeworld of Flammegetragen.

Simple, my child. We march to war.

______________________________________________________

The gas giant in the center of the New Kyushu system slowly began to cease it's rotation, moving out of it's celestial orbit, above the system's ecliptic plane, and slowly began lumbering toward a more tactically advantageous location, clear of obstructions and with open lanes of fire, as a bright flame, rivaling the system's star itself, burst from the surface. It's many moons began to increase the speed of their orbit, as dim lights began to appear all over their surfaces. For the first time in millenia, the Rhun nation waged war in the name of it's Arbiter, and it's inscrutable Gods.

The Guilder arrived on Terivine without much in the way of fanfare or warning, so the rather well-armed and similarly threatening response was to be expected. To say that the Godulans were somewhat paranoid about unannounced intruders, particularly in the Ptolemy system, was something of an understatement. Still, when it was recognized that the interloper was of Otagian origin, and that it bore news of an attack upon one of its primary territorial systems, the relatively terse response was terminated and the Guilder found itself confronted by the leadership of the Godulan Legion itself, emerging as if from thin air like the Guilder did.

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"You will have to pardon our somewhat harsh response to your arrival," Baron Aeraeon Skye began, the voice seeming to come from his entire body. "We went to much effort to restore this system to something resembling its original form after it was destroyed, so folks barging in out of nowhere tends to set off alarms. Past is past, however, and you have brought to our attention word of an assault on one of your systems."

Maximillian Foster spoke next, his demonic grin growing even wider as he licked his sharklike teeth before speaking. "A combined Galactic Federation fleet, hmm? It has been a long time since I had the opportunity to kill..."

"Or infect," Xenith Steele countered, grinning in a similar manner to Maximillian's.

"The nature of this FTLi field intrigues us," Skye continued. "While we have no problem breaching any inhibitor field, it is maneuvering once within such boundaries that we experience difficulty, are we correct in the understanding that you have the means for us to slightly circumvent this condition?"

A single curt nod was the response, and then: "I can connect to QUETZAL in order to furnish the synchronization data."

"Be so kind," Skye replied. "Another Avatar will meet you momentarily to acquire the necessary data. We would also require cartographical information in relation to your system, stellar conditions, enemy positions, system defenses, objects of interest, what have you. Such information is not critical to our purposes, but it would be helpful in devising proper targeting solutions for our insertion."

"Such will be given... a word of advice, though. When your forces enter the system, do not be offended when you are referred to as a slave state by one of our allies. It is a cultural prerogative. Allies are slaves, enemies are food."

Maximillian and Xenith both burst into raucous laughter, very nearly shaking the ground with the strength of their mirth.

"I like the bastards already!" Maximillian said first as he finally regained his composure.

"I agree," Xenith replied, "though I cannot say much about the eating part."

"Damned Square," Maximillian chuckled as he slapped Xenith on the back hard enough to knock him momentarily off-balance. "People-meat is great! The notion of breaking taboos is like a fine spice added in!"

"Enough, both of you," Skye interrupted, before nodding to the Guilder. Another Godulan Avatar arrived and Skye finished. "Xerxes here shall see that the proper information is transferred to us. When such is completed, you may return to your masters and tell them that the Kythons will be in attendance shortly."

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Achaedus_General: Well... that is certainly the largest... ship... I have ever learned of.

Arcturus_General: Not even our old Battlemoons come close to the sheer magnitude of that object! Do the Otagians really need us?

Achaedus_General: Mayhap. It is better to be safe than sorry, however.

Majestatus_General: There is no such thing as overkill. Only degrees of preparation. Who shall see to the operation? This is not an offensive effort, nor is it in protection of Godulan systems, so it would appear that both of you are out of your military jurisdiction.

Lear_HighGeneral: It would seem that a new Jurisdiction would be required then. 'Defense of Allies' concern applied to General Kelvin Majestatus effective immediately. Recognized?

Achaedus_General: Recognized

Arcturus_General: Recognized

Majestatus_General: I... am honored. I will not fail in my duties.

Lear_HighGeneral: You have more than earned it. If Skye has an issue with the decision he will deal with me. Paternal controversy be damned.

Majestatus_General: Thank you sir. Formulating Tactical plan... General Arcturus, might I utilize our latest military acquisition? I would also like to requisition munitions...

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And so it was. The Godulans would march to war once again. Heedless of pain. Heedless of death. The Oncoming Scourge would come down upon the enemy...

Imperial Palace, Earth:

The appearance of a strange individual in the center of the Imperial Court caused quite a stir. Instantly dozens of Psions were on the individual like bad role-players in the General Forums. They were materializing around him before he could even draw his breath to announce his presence. A tight stasis field was erected around the intruder and he was being probed to find out his intentions. Multiple attacks were prepared and held pending the result. All this occurred without the Guilder even knowing, the defenders forgoing the typical constructs of illusion and psychokinetic power appearing as their immaterial pure mind forms.

Nhur-Galladu looked up right before the Guilder arrived as if he knew where he was going to appear. He climbed to his feet and shuffled towards the spot so he was almost there when the messenger arrived. He issued a mental command to his loyal staff to withdraw and they immediately obeyed. The stasis field dispersed before it even showed a sign it was there.

“Greetings, I have been expecting you. I know why you are here and I have assembled a fleet to send in our ally’s defense. I will also dispense another fleet to observe our enemies worlds in case the attack is a diversion.”

Nhur-Galladu hesitated a moment before continuing.

“I feel you wish to know how I already knew you were going to arrive here. Your brethren already spoke to our allies in Godular and I was told of the need through the Kython link. I simply used my Precognition to discern where and when you would appear. It is not always clear but I was able to get a strong feeling.”

“Now go and take our sword to defend your world.”



A short time later:


The 3rd Imperial Task Force suddenly appeared within Otagia space. They joined with their allies, Ald Ruhn and Godular. A few minutes later, The Brutus, the dreadnaught acting as the Flagship of the Imperial Task Force, faded into existence Her immense size easily dwarfing the other smaller ships of the Imperial Task Force.

A message was broadcast using the ESUS Battlenet to the other defenders.

“This is Grand Admiral Dev’Staht. I have been given the task of making sure our enemies are completely annihilated. What is our plan?”

OOC: Making some assumptions about your stealth measures from the War Drums OOC thread. Hope you don't mind.

OOC: This isn't stealth though you wouldn't be able to scan the ships inside. Plus these ships are different than the ones you've been reading about in the War Drums thread. Strange how you're firing at two light hours away...

IC:

"Admiral."

Trife sat in his chair looking at the fleet as it changed formation relatively often. "What is it major Kayhule?"

"We've detected a barrage from the planetary defenses directed at us."

"That seems premature. Well no matter. Direct the fleet to evade the oncoming enemy fire. Is the defense grid online?"

"Yes sir."

Trife let his head fall back onto his fist. "Then let it handle any missles and such but do have our made ready in case anything gets through."

Kahyule saluted before walking off the bridge to relay the orders to the rest of the fleet.

The massive swirling darkness shifted its course slightly to evade incoming fire while defense systems were powered up and readied once munition got within firing range. Still, the great darkness continued to advance.

OOC: That's the thing about SCCAMs... they're NASTY pieces of work. Relatively long-range too.

Several Kython Slaughterkings materialized rather happily within proximity of the still-moving tradeworld, moving towards the upper layers of the massive yet decidedly motile planet, all in accordance with information passed back by the Otagian guilder.

Deep scans immediately gave the vessels a more up-to-date picture of the battlefield-to-be, including the salvo of SCCAMs roaring their way out to meet the blotch of blackness that appeared to be concealing the entire enemy force.

General Kelvin Majestatus' mind flittered across the various ships, guiding the scans through every known mechanism they had in place, all the while ensuring that the targeting array had effective coordinates to work with.

-Mass signatures acquired, commander.-

--That took longer than I would have liked.--

-We cannot penetrate the cloaking mechanism they have in place. For all intents and purposes it appears to be completely black-body. Though their gravitonic wavefronts still show up, since you simply cannot hide mass, without other scanning methods we had to rely on interpretive calculations to isolate individual signatures. And there are quite a few of them. Multiple archetypes. All warships.-

--Majestatus to Long Arm, commence targeting calculations, I require twenty solutions for initial salvo and a running acquisition of four for each successive volley. Await my mark to commence insertion.--

*Long Arm to Majestatus, Recognized.*

And so they waited, it was necessary to draw the enemy force further into the system, and the SCCAM assault would likely prove sufficient bait, and possibly take a few enemy ships with them.

Nomura noticed the Otagian bombardment, and was somewhat impressed that they had this much range. Still, he'd seen worse, like hardcore catgirl hentai. That freaked him out. This was tame compared to that.

He let out a smug "humph," then ordering "Continue on present course."

He then proceeded to activate point defenses to anticipate the barrage and divert a small amount of power to temporal shields and engines. He also had his men organize themselves in a couple of box shapes, having them move to the sides of the Abh to cover their flanks as they continued their present course.

"Hey you're new on board aren't you?"

"Yeah, I just transferred on to Admiral Trife's flagship about a week ago."

"Man that sucks to get your first assignment on the ship like this. Going to Otagia and all. See any action on your last ship?"

"Mhmm. Been to quite a few places actually. Most of the time during combat though. You never really get to stop and appreciate the scenery when your shootin' at everything in sight. Almost makes you wish you joined the army."

"Heh. I don't know. Being lead by a bunch of D'Harans would kinda freak me out. I think they love their job a little too much for my taste. Hey, who were you assigned to?"

"The Sankau. That is, before Lord Dusanyu retired from the military role for a time."

"No shit? What was serving with him like?"

"Ah, it was actually surprising relaxing being with the ex-emperor and all. Going into a battle with him kinda gave you this sense of calm, like you knew everything was going to be alright. He was a damn good leader."

"Aye. I suppose you've heard the rumors about his retirement? Him going off to settle down with some woman."

"Yeah but I've also heard that it was his chief of staff, Kenesh, that he had the hots for. Apparently they love each other enough to have a child. Gonna be a good lookin' kid whatever it is."

"Them Abh are a strange lot sometimes, but you're right. Whatever is born is sure gonna be good lookin'. The old rascal."

-Random crew conversation

Nomura then asked, "All systems go? I want those damned new shiny bits we got to function, otherwise this was for naught."

Weapons replied, "All weapons are go. Weapons bays indicate we're good to go, including the new defensive suites we got installed."

Helm replied, "All systems go."

And thus the process went....

OOC: Before I post anything else, can I get figures on your fleets? It's going to greatly effect my tactics. Oh, and locations as well. Here's a map (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v652/blaesa/Kyushu-Map.jpg) for reference.

I can't speak for ND but mine would be hard to get an accurate reading on since they are in something. Anything you could read would be greatly reduced from what is actually present but I will provide numbers as they are revealled.

Droani System, Factory World Alpha - 0 hours
The command center of a factory world was nothing short of hectic. Organizing the daily operations of a planet was no small feat, so it was no surprise that the Mobius Guild Member who randomly appeared was overlooked for a few hours. Eventually he gained the attention of some of the staff, who directed him to the top floor. After speaking with the Tech Prime, he was sent on his way back to the Otagians. Sent out before the Guilder had even reached the door on his way out, the call to arms was heard.

Office of Techlord Queln - 4 Hours
"AI-2431, please send this message to our Otagian allies, ESUS Gamma Level Encryption please."
We will dispatch the 1st Tech Fleet immediately, estimated arrival time at border to Otagian FTLi is 24 hours. Fleet Master Lorarin will be in direct command of Soulian forces and will be your liason for the duration of the situation, if we may be of any more assistance, please do not hesitate to ask.

Eska System, Capital - 8 hours
Stryer Dockyards, by far the most impressive dock system known to the Soulians, was a flutter with activity. It had been a long time since war was upon the nation, and the first time under the new administration. The 1st Tech Fleet was making ready to depart, with only hours left to the Estimated Warp Schedule. The major Techlords were present, giving the ships and their crews blessings and reminding them of the power of the Technocracy. Slowly but surely, the Fleet was on its way, no more than 8 hours after the Guilder had arrived.

I can't speak for ND but mine would be hard to get an accurate reading on since they are in something. Anything you could read would be greatly reduced from what is actually present but I will provide numbers as they are revealled.

OOC: Same here. I'm a little leery of giving numbers and location....for the fact that it'd be hard to figure it out at this range, and for other reasons. I can say that I've got about a thousand moving in covering Abh's units, mostly lower tier Deng Xiaoping Drone Vessels around a core of stronger vessels. They've all been shopped with a few improvements I'll reveal as we slug it out :). Location is unknown at this time, I've gotta discuss that with Abh.

OOC:

I am waiting for morces to move from the 2 LH mark. Where are you so far in your advance? There is no data ICly or OOCly and I get the feeling everyone is waiting for everyone else.

OOC:

I am waiting for morces to move from the 2 LH mark. Where are you so far in your advance? There is no data ICly or OOCly and I get the feeling everyone is waiting for everyone else.

OOC: Think Abh had indicated when we first entered the area we were at the edge of the field in his initial landing post, but for the record, I will say we started at the edge of the FTLi line, and then we moved in on our course.

How far in? Again, let me check that with Abh.

As for participation, let me say that college (Philosophy class, quizzes and a paper) is moving in on me, so don't be surprised if participation gets spotty.

OOC:

I fully understand RL taking importance over NS.

I plan on sending a couple (2) battlegroups into T-Space when you reach the halfway point to flank your forces. That is what I am currently waiting for ICly to happen.

OOC: Here's a little IC action to break up the OOC action.

IC:

Otagian 2 lighthour FTLi mark
Coming out of warp, the 1st Tech Fleet Lex Parsimoniae began to makes its way towards the Otagian planets. On board the Profundus Nutus Fleet Master Lorarin began to make preparations for the oncoming hostilities. Across the fleet, diagnostic programs were run, weapons were being warmed up, and crews were being made ready for the possibility of a cold and lonely death.

From Fleet Master Lorarin to Otagian Defensive Forces

We will be arriving at your location in approximately 4 hours time, if you wish us to take up positions other than defensive around your planets, please direct us where you will. At this time, I am turning over communications to Primitus Sententia, my ship's AI.

Lorarin out.

OOC: Lex Parsimoniae consists of
3 - Scientia Class
6 - Corrumpo Class
10 - Vegrandis Libero Class
10 - Teres Class
20 - Pugna Class
50 - Velox Class
as well as the Profundus Nutus, Flag Ship of the fleet.

OOC:

I am waiting for morces to move from the 2 LH mark. Where are you so far in your advance? There is no data ICly or OOCly and I get the feeling everyone is waiting for everyone else.


OOC: I was actually waiting for Otagia's next IC post then I was going to say we were at the 1 LH mark.

1.5 LH from New Kyushu

A dozen light-seconds from their targets, the wave of viridian light split, a quarter of it continuing straight forward, while the rest, picking up speed, veered to the right, coming in along the flanks of their prey, minimalizing the amount of point defense systems that could draw a line on their vulnerable flanks as they drove into the Dornalian vessels. Millions of dots of light screamed into their fleet, a wall of ordinance hidden behind singularities in a front the size of the Dornalian box, leaving no openings for the Dornalians PD to exploit.

The second group, composed of the larger but somewhat slower Paris drones, dove straight into the sphere of darkness, vasers blazing at the gravitic signatures that the perimeter array had tracked. Meanwhile, their sensor pods went to work, gathering as much data on possible on the Abh fleet that was lurking in the shadows.

Meanwhile, half a light hour away, the swirling halos of green surrounding them as they and their children waited for the enemy fleet to come in range, almost two hundred pitch black eggs serenely waiting in silence, no emmissions on any spectrum.

Of course, the ansible network told a different story.

Paris scouts are inbound. We should be receiving information on Abh targets shortly.

Good. Asher, contact the Rhunate tradeworld. I want a full compliment of Sai rounds and nodes aboard your fleet. And get it done as soon as physically possible. Assign half of your Guilder compliment to getting it done.

We have confirmed contact with Godulan, Balroggan, and Technocracy forces.

Begin coordinating of battleplans over ESUS battlenet. They think too slowly to join us in this node.

Agreed. Continue discussion at next development. Simeon out.

1.5 LH from New Kyushu

A dozen light-seconds from their targets, the wave of viridian light split, a quarter of it continuing straight forward, while the rest, picking up speed, veered to the right, coming in along the flanks of their prey, minimalizing the amount of point defense systems that could draw a line on their vulnerable flanks as they drove into the Dornalian vessels. Millions of dots of light screamed into their fleet, a wall of ordinance hidden behind singularities in a front the size of the Dornalian box, leaving no openings for the Dornalians PD to exploit.


Nomura's vessels rode out the storm of fire, ordering power to shields and eventually midway through, some PDs; ten Deng Xiaopings fell, but the New Dornalians had a new trick up their sleeve. For Nomura was prompted to ask, "How are the EA fields, Gracie? They holding up, or a waste of our money?"

Gracie only replied, "Admiral, reports indicate they are functional. The kinetic shock of the blasts was and has been redirected into shields, and they are holding all across the board. Some structural damage all around, nothing my nanites can't fix."

Nomura cackled back. He said evilly, "Okay, ladies and gents. These boys wanna tango--let's give them a dance marathon they'll regret. Have the EA power feedback shunted to defensive and repair systems. Meanwhile, shunt power to weapons and scans. I want any Acolytes available to begin scanning for any surprises."

The Acolytes onboard the Acolyte fleet began to use their various energies to scan for incoming threats. The Acolytes used the Force, attempting to sense for any unusual psychic energies from positions conventional scans would say were clear.

"Approaching enemy fire within one minute."

Looking somewhat bored from the tedious of traveling such a long distance to reach an enemy target, Admiral Trife seemed to hardly care. "Reduce speed to make defensive measures more effective. Alert defensive stations to prepare for enemy attacks. Have the allied ships move towards the edge of the fleet's formation and assume shield duty."

"Yes, sir."

Almost instantly, the darkness drastically reduced its speed to nearly half as it waited for the assault. The attack came shortly after and drones met with heavy defensive fire once they were a few meters within the dark swirling cloud. From the outside, there appeared to be a thunderstorm within space as intense energy fire pummled out from every corner of the cloud.

Some were even so unfortunate as to encounter solid matter and colliding hard at high speeds. Still, there were those that did make it through to encounter a wall of five hundred ships shielding the Abh fleet within. The emblem fused from images of Abh, Dornalian, and Alliance flags were emblazened on the sides of every ship as they let loose their own barrage while more energy continued to rain down from behind as the cloud continued its own defensive measures.

"Continue advancing onto primary target."

The wave of SCCAMs continued to crash against the Dornalian fleet, formation and KK drives rendering the incoming point defense fire harmless. Hundreds of thousands of the anti-ship missiles continued to dive into the midst of the invaders, plumes of white fire marking where a SCCAM had found its mark.

Meanwhile, the drones juked wildly through the cloud, careening wildly through the fleet as they evaded incoming fire. Those that were met with solid matter simply dove through, their singularity impellers eagerly devouring the shadow until they either burst forth to the other side, or their KK drives failed, converting the drone and everything the drive had eaten into pure energy. Those that survived danced between the fleet and the wall of darkness, nimbly avoiding incoming fire to let it fall on the ships below them, soaking fire they could not avoid with their KK drives. A great deal still perished, sandwiched between the fire of the shell and the ships below. The remaining drones raked the Abh fleet with fire, launching SCCAMs at point blank range, drilling systems with pinpoint vaser fire, and when all else failed, overloading their KK drives and converting themselves to pure energy in kamikaze runs.

The Avatar fleets outside slowed to a stop, the ebon eggs settling into a chaotically swirling mass, their emerald halos slowly rotating around it. The fleets launched another wave of drones and missiles, which settled into the fleets' defensive perimeter.

And we now have sensor feed inside of the shadow sphere. Approximately 500 Abh vessels detected, of various models.

Good. Begin feeding targetting data to the ESUS battlenet. Notify the Godulan and Rhunate detachments via ansible.

Interesting. The shadow itself is shooting at us. Beginning basic evasive maneuvers.

Wonder what it is... Ah well, continue firing, we'll worry about it in a few microseconds. Much more important things to micromanage right now.

"Admiral, we've reached the halfway mark to our target and we report contact with forward vessels."

Trife, looking unimpressed, simply turned his eyes up to Major Kayhule. "How is our shield holding?"

"Thus far the enemy drones have not penetrated to the main fleet. Five ships have been severly damaged, several destroyed, but the cloud has taken negligible damage. Any damage it has sustained, should already be on the mend."

"Very good. What about deep scans of the system?"

"Scans have detected several enemy fleets in the sector, but all seem to have kept from engaging at the moment. Otagian fleet is the only aggressor at the moment."

"I see. Have our own ships prepare for a volley. I don't want to be caught unprepared should the rest decide to act soon."

"Yes admiral. It shall be done."

Energy attacks crashed against fields which were sucked into reactors on board ships and rerouted to areas of need. Attacks intensified with every successful syphoning of a drone attack. Even main energy cannons came online from the excessive amount being drained. Fire ripped through the darkness behind a shadowed veil. Explosions rocked several ships as they were hit head on sending many of them staggering back. More point defenses came on line as ships continued their own defense sending out flak of high energized particles and brilliant waves of laser fire.

"Major Kayhule, bring us back to full speed. I want to close the distance to our target as quickly as possible. No deviation."

"Yes sir."

The wave of SCCAMs continued to crash against the Dornalian fleet, formation and KK drives rendering the incoming point defense fire harmless. Hundreds of thousands of the anti-ship missiles continued to dive into the midst of the invaders, plumes of white fire marking where a SCCAM had found its mark.


More ships, more fire, more problems. But they were prepared, not like Rodriguez at Kendari. The EA field pickups were kept at maximum, and shields on all vessels were kept full by this; most of them rode out the storm of fire, though a few more vessels were taken down. The large amounts of energy, kinetic or otherwise, kept the EA fields busy and thus the Point Defenses were kept busy as well, targeting the SCCAMs and providing healthy competition still for the foe--besides, formation fire made them easier to hunt. Nomura, in particular, ordered the PD fire to be massed onto the enemy projectiles.

He then said, "Alright, how are our weapons?"

Weapons said, "All ships report power to weapons is there, we're running off of conventional power for those."

He then asked, "Where's our bogey?"

Gracie chimed in with, "Approximately half a lighthour away."

Snickering, he then said, "Good. Let's fire back. I'm tired of taking it lying down. Tell the Dengs to mass fire their EM Rail Rifles at the enemy fleet in a box spread. If space is still frictionless, then hell, they can cross half-a-light-hour with not much in the way of speed reduction. And when I mean mass fire, I mean mass fire. And we need speed behind that, so push them forth with extra energy. Send a mass of conventionals, say 3,000 torpedoes, after it. We have that capacity, yeah? But do not depart from formation. Stay with the Abh."

The order was given, and the hail of fire was unleashed, flying out of the vessels and towards the enemy battlefleet. The ships on the other side of the cloud not facing the fleet rose up for a moment in sections, like a wave, to execute firing orders, and then immediately came back down, with speed. The sheer mass of railgun shots would soak up any enemy shots or drones deployed against them, and the spread formation ensured that literally, a solid wall of railgun shot followed with the torpedoes was coming right at them, crossing the distance at high velocity....

Interesting. The Dornalians are beginning railgun bombardment.

At this range? What an amusing waste of ammunition.

Indeed. Estimated time of arrival is... two, three hours. Our impellers still work, right?

Yep. Dodging now. Should be out of the effected zone in a couple minutes. Appears they threw some torpedoes in there as well, PD systems should deal with them easily.

Interesting note on the Abh fleet from the Fate's Eyes: Their shields seem to redirect incoming energy to various systems. I recommend attempting to circumvent this by switching to boarding mode.
Confirmed. Will begin the proper procedures. SCCAMs appear to be doing quite well. The Dornalians haven't broken formation, so the shield wall is working perfectly.

Excellent. Queue up another barrage from the Orboros ring, and prep another flight from our tubes. Meanwhile, match enemy speed towards Kyushu. I'd like to keep out of range for as long as possible.

The Dornalian point defense continued to be completely ineffectual, the SCCAMs' KK drives absorbing the fire without complaint as they homed in on their targets, the solid wall of green moving steadily forward, tendrils reaching out to slash at vessels as it moved through the fleet, the millions of SCCAMs moving unstoppably forwards.

Within the cloud, the drones continued to be butchered by the thousands, but millions still remained, swirling through the void as they tumbled to avoid incoming fire, or to let it fall harmlessly upon the emerald nothingness of their KK singularities. Even so, their numbers were being thinned faster than the Sons would have liked. Sensing this, the drones changed tactics, diving in groups at enemy ships, singularities propelling them at maximum speed towards the vessels, hopefully through shield and hull alike, to release their SCCAMs inside of the guts of the enemy, to slice away at the ships interiors, or to simply detonate in a massive plume of fire buried within the target's hull, as close to vital systems or crew as possible.



Flammegetragen

"C'mon, get a move on! We need these things loaded, pronto!"

Nikolai watched as the Avatars tugged the Sai nodes into place for transportation, feeling rather useless as he yelled orders at the machines. It wasn't really helping, but it at least gave him the feeling of doing something as he paced, waiting for the Avatars to finish their work.

"What in Arioch's name do you think you're doing, slave?!"

The Guilder turned to see a rather angry Rhun marching quickly towards him, armed with what looked to be some sort of rifle. Firing his ORC's thrusters, he jetted up to the irate lizard.

"My apologies, my master, but QUETZAL's given me rather strict orders to... appropriate some of your Sai stockpiles. I'm quite sure you don't need them all, especially right now, and apparently he thinks they'll be useful. So, if you'll just leave us alone so we can finish..."

The Rhun roared, lashing it's tail as it brandished the rifle threateningly at Nikolai.

"You will NOT be taking these pods, softskin! I should bleed you for your insole-"

Sighing, Nikolai mentally activated his ORC suit's Y-rack, which popped up over his shoulder, pointing in the Rhun's general direction, the blinking tip of one of it's missiles clearly visible.

"I'm sorry, but I don't think you have any choice. You see that little red light? That's an antimatter-primed fusion warhead, with dialable yield of up to 60 kilotons. My suit's fields can take maybe a tenth of that. Can you?"

If a lizard could pale, the Rhun would have been bone white. Muttering to itself, the reptilian xenoc turned away, heading back down the hallway it had come from. Smiling to himself, Nikolai turned back to futilely supervising the Avatars.

"Move it, slowpokes! We haven't got all day! For Gods sake, I could load faster than that..."

Despite the constant attacks from the SCCAMs, the Abh fleet changed very little in its tactics. Only that given the new tactics of the incoming projectiles, more power was diverted to the shielding systems to soften the blow of any ramming drone. Still they did not go without damage or losses, but the overall fleet kept up its break-neck pace heading for Kyushu.

"It's sad to say, but I do approve of these drive systems over our older ones and even the Yuanon drives. Indeed an inhibitor field may be up but we can still travel near light speed."

The major looked perplex. "Then why does this sadden you, admiral?"

Trife sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Because, we did not come up with it ourselves. They are not of Abh design."

"Perhaps not but it took some of our best researchers years to figure out how to adapt the new technology to our own systems. Ever since then, we have been making good leaps in our means of travel and weaponry."

"I suppose so, but I really don't like stealing."

"It wasn't stealing. We were simply researching destroyed vessels to see why they were so effective."

Shaking his head, the admiral stood up to stretch his legs. "How much longer do we have?"

"Approximatly fifteen minutes until we reach the one light hour mark. After that, it has been estimated to take about an hour and a half to close the rest of the distance to our target."

"I see. Well continue advancing."

"Yes sir."

And a voice cried out from the darkness...bump

OOC:

Personally, I am still waiting for your fleet to pass the halfway point so I can deploy some ships to "get a feel" of your capabilities, as stated in an earlier post. I am not sure what the others are waiting for, unless it is for you to get closer too.

OOC: Indeed, my intention was to have our fleets reach the halfway point in the first post after Otagia's. However, his own posts changed that adgenda slightly. So now I'm waiting for him to post again before I say "half-way." Fair enough?

OOC:

Sounds fair. I was going to type a "when they reach the halfway mark" post and get it posted so we can get on with the RP uinstead of everyone waiting for each other. It is not imaptiance but commonsense speaking. If we all continue to wait on each other this will either die out of inactivity or it will become 2008 before we actually meet head on.

Look for my post later on today. I was so dead tired after work last night I passed out wen I got home.

Bumped once again.

OOC: I'm waiting for Ald Rhun to post what his forces do before mine make any moves.

Bumped once again.

OOC: Actually, I was waiting for YOU to post... See Bal's point above. Whoops.

“Sir, they enemy forces are nearing the half-way mark.”

“I see, have the Captains and Commanders of the Second and Fifth Battlegroups meet me in my office in fifteen.”

“Yes Sir, sending message.”

“I’ll be waiting for them in my office.”

“Yes Sir.”


Fifteen minutes later Dev’Staht was sitting at his desk going over the data from the sensors. The enemy was steadily approaching through the FTLi seemingly at a snail’s pace. At this range it was difficult to pierce their darkness veil. He had an idea. While he was going through the logs, one by one the captains began to fade into existence in his office. They simply stood still waiting for the others to arrive and the meeting to start. After there was nearly three dozen newcomers to the room, the Grand Admiral looked up.

“I see we are ready. I have a mission for you and I want it done immediately. The Second Battlegroup will use their Mirage Drives to advance to the enemy’s right flank and the fifth Battlegroup will take their left flank. You will position yourselves forty-five light minutes out and wait in ambush in T-Space. This is a fact finding mission so we are only testing their defenses. I want the Cruisers to remain in T-Space and try to pierce their sensor distortion field. You will link your sensors through the rest of the Battlegroups to allow you to use theirs as well. I want to know what exactly they have and the capabilities of every vessel they have hidden in their little globe of darkness. We are going to use the Avatar Systems for this raid. The Frigates, Destroyers, and Battleships will upon arriving at the ambush points begin generating their Avatars and when the raid is over, destroy the Avatars so they will not fall into enemy hands. I want complete Singularity Inversion of the Avatars. The Command Carrier of both Battlegroups will remain within T-Space to provide cover to the Parent Vessels while their Avatar Systems have them paralyzed.”

“I would like to remind you the goal of this mission is to find out what they have and what their capabilities are. At all times broadcast your findings on live feeds through both the ESUS Battlenet and through the Space Minus Transmitters. If it gets too hot, pull out and return to your positions here.”

The Admiral looked around the room, “Any questions?”

One of the Officers, the Commander of the Second Battlegroup nodded.

“Sir, what if they possess the ability to either trap the Avatars or enter T-Space? Our info on the enemy has so far pinpointed them as being unable but we are best prepared if that is taken into account.”

“If the Avatars controls are cut off, the contingency will be preset that they immediately seek out the nearest enemy vessel and ram them. The targets will be sorted by mass and energy output levels to avoid ramming fighter craft instead of their cap ships. As the Avatars ram the enemy, all munitions will be detonated and all singularity power cores will be breached to form multiple singularities as they impact on the enemy’s hulls."

"If they cross the Barrier, pull the Avatars back up to defend yourselves. The Cruisers maintaining their positions as well as the Carriers will full out defend against any raiders in T-Space. Reinforcements will also be sent as soon as that action is detected from our position. It will take less than a minute in T-Space to reach you so that is all you have to hold them off."

"Any other questions?”

The Grand Admiral waited for a couple seconds before continuing.

“Good, you have your orders. Dismissed.”

The Officers faded away as they returned to their vessels. Within a few minutes, almost three dozen ships faded into nothingness as they Uplifted into T-Space. After reaching their positions, they prepared for their ambush at the 45 light minute mark.

OOC: I already replied to your last post Otagia. I'll wait a couple of days and if nothing changes, I'll reply to Bal's post in a sense. That should give you something to do then.

OOC: Apologies for the late reply, Warhammer 40000 the tabletop game has bitten me, and hard--and so have midterms.

IC:

"Status report!"

Nomura called this out, as his forces were rocked again by SCCAM fire. Those damn SCCAMs. If he had a way to kill those things, he would, and he would gladly kill off the assholes that used them. Every single one, given the opportunity. This was humiliating, and Yushiro Howard Nomura, if anything, possessed an easily offended ego that did not brook such intransigence.

"We've reported two more damaged, sir! Shields are holding, but our Point Defenses are useless!"

Nomura fired a shot at the man who dared to speak, and said, "Next man who says our systems are useless dies! I will not die here! Not like the Potemkin! Not like the Oliver Law! We will stand here, and if we die, then we will die magnificently! Let them call us stupid for doing so; let them call me foolish and wasteful! I wanna make them bleed! Don't you, you dogs?! Do you want to live forever!?"

The impromptu speech struck everyone by surprise; everyone knew Nomura was cranky and abrasive but they weren't quite prepared for him to flip out under pressure. They promptly saluted and said, "Yes, Comrade Admiral!"

Nomura replied, "Now form up behind the Abh. Bring some heavies to the flanks for coverage. AND MOVE IT!"

The order was executed, and thus, some of the heavier units were moved to the outside, where their more powerful shields would absorb the hits and where the more fragile Dengs could rest on the inside. In the meantime, the Earth and Steel Dragon shots rang out, targeting the SCCAMs with flak in the form of nanite bombs that exploded in the thick of the SCCAMs and shotgun-like flak that hit their ordinance. They tooled up the amount of flak fire in general coming out, so that they could match the amount of firepower coming out from the enemy.

OOC: I already replied to your last post Otagia. I'll wait a couple of days and if nothing changes, I'll reply to Bal's post in a sense. That should give you something to do then.

OOC:

You can get to responding to mine when you reach that time. I know you have those SCCAMs to worry about for the time being. I just set my encounter as a "waypoint" for you to take care of when it is time. I just felt bad about getting one of my damn headaches and forgetting to type up that post I promised.

OOC: Ok I have to ask since Otagia has been banned for a while. Do you guys want to retcon this thing and plan it for some other time or just wait until he gets back and try to pick it all up again?

OOC: Tag for future lack of involvement






For Christ's sake.

OOC: Since nothing has HAPPENED in this thread for two weeks there shouldn't be an issue. But if y'all wanna get back to picking this up, Otagia's gonna have me post for him in the event his input is required.

His input is required now. That's what we've all been waiting for unless you want me to attack his planet without him even attempting to defend it. Personally I find that slightly rude.

His input is required now.

Seconded. I've been waiting on him for a while. It's awfully impetuous of you to imply we've been lazy and neglectful when Otagia hasn't posted in a while; I've been busy with real life for one, and I am sure you have a real life too. So if you have the permission to post for him in his unfortunate absence, then do so, if you please.

OOC: Alright... Bal, if you would be so kind. Crappy post, I know, but something to get this moving again.

IC:

The Abh fleet had managed to pass the half-way mark to their current target. Casualties counted, they had thus far managed fairly well for themselves, losing only about 20 capital ships that were up front taking the brunt of the attack by the long range bombardment of the Otagians. Now Admiral Trife looked on ahead on his tactical display. The elongated canines of the Trife family, protruded as he smiled looking on. "Everything seems to be going surprisingly well. We are at the forty-five light minute mark and have taken minimal losses."

"Yes. Despite the enemy's long range inhibitor field, we have managed to come quite a ways."

Trife looked at Major Kahyul with a somewhat depressing gaze. "I want everyone to maintain their focus though. We should only have about fifty minutes or so until we reach the mark and then the heavy fighting should begin unless the enemy wishes to ride out and meet us."

"Most likely we still have an element of surprise since they cannot gather any data on our fleet at this time. With luck, by the time they do figure out what is happening, it will be too late."

"I prefer not to rely on luck. Have all stations begin long range scanning and see if we are close enough to pick up any signs of planetary defenses."

The Abh chief of staff saluted before walking away. "Right away, Admiral."

Heeyar be tha post 'n stuffz.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

OOC from Otagia: Apologies to Abh, I never meant to make you feel ignored. It’s just that I can swear I remember posting something about my forces withdrawing for the moment…

Again, the Dornalian bombardment was futile, nanite bombs forming accretion disks about the hungry mouths of the onrushing SCCAMs, flak merely feeding the explosive power of the missiles, making their eventual detonation more violent. The millions of missiles simply ignored the useless fire, crashing against the Dornalians like the ocean: Endless, tireless, and unstoppable.


LEVI: Dornalian point defense appears to have shifted to capital-grade weaponry. Still ineffective. No flanking maneuvers evident.

ASHER: Good. That should finish off the stockpile of Mark I SCCAMs. Commence bombardment with the Mark IIs from fleets Asher, Zebulon and Simeon, along with the Orboros Band. The larger payloads should make things a bit more interesting there. Mix in a few Sai pods for good measure.

ZEBULON: Paris squadrons in the Abh fleet have been nearly eliminated. The survivors report 20 capitals destroyed, possible damage to several others.

SIMEON: Good. Reports indicate that the shadow bubble itself is some sort of craft, or weapon. Concentrate fire on it with conventional weaponry from all fleets, and SCCAM bombardment from fleet Levi. If it dodges, it’ll add time until it reaches Kyushu. Another wave of Paris squadrons is also in order, I want more eyes inside the thing, and a Sai deployment method. Ready the displacer units for boarding.

ASHER: Confirmed. Bombardment beginning. Oh, and before I forget, feed all sensor data from the Fate Eyes inside the shadow orb over the ESUS battlenet, including precise positions and composition of the enemy fleet. I want incoming fire to be as precise as possible.


The fleets began to boil, spinning off tendrils of green light, SCCAMs and Paris drone fighters again assembling into blocks the precise size of the enemy formations, presenting their KK singularities and preventing the rigid enemy battlegroups from intercepting them- At least, until they entered the sphere. A wave of MAC fire followed them, timed to impact just after the missile and drone waves. Farther back, the planet again acquired an emerald halo as a second wave of SCCAMs, Mark IIs this time, sallied forth towards the Dornalians in the same square formation as before, matching the Dornalians precisely.

The shaking of the bridge, the sparks from the consoles and the roar of explosions outside did not stop Admiral Nomura. He climbed up, having fallen on the floor, and then said, "Just a scratch. Status report, Gracie."

Gracie replied, "They're increasing fire. More ships are dying, we've lost three more Dengs and four ships from the Volunteer force. Damage reported all over the fleet, repair crews and nanotech repair drones working overtime. There is incoming massed fire from the the planet. More SCCAMs, type II. It seems they've enough fighting spirit yet."

An angry message flashed from Batov's ship, as the old master said, "When are we going to fight!? We are being bombarded, and all we do is follow, while our guns do little!"

Nomura glared at the Russian and said, "Grumbling isn't going to help, old man. Now shut up and stay off the line." Hanging up abruptly, he then said, "I'm going to engineering. I have an idea."
---------

SIC:

Engineering Department, NDS Ben Gurion--

Chief Engineer Leonidas couldn't believe what he was hearing from the Admiral.

"You want me to modify the ship's Temporal Shields and somehow crossbreed them with the Bosun Jump drive to permit us to go faster? What is this, Star Trek!? It can't be done, especially when we're being shot at! I've got men busy cleaning up. Use that brain of yours, why dont'cha."

Nomura simply replied, "Because we need to get in closer to the objective, unless you want us to die a nasty death by SCCAM."

Leonidas sighed and said, "I'll try, but there's no guarantees. I can get a spare team to do the job. But keep us alive in the meantime. Some of us have wives to go home to..."

--------

Back on the Bridge, Nomura ordered evasive manuevers and higher shields within distance of the Abh. Pure and simple. And, some of the Dornalians' own singularities as countermeasures for now (EDIT: Deployed as mines and against the enemy formations.).....the enemy seemed to love their singularities, and they were eating everything thrown at them. Might the People's Scythes stand a chance?

With the waves of singularities diminishing, commanders on the Abh vessels were breathing a steady sigh. So far everything was going well from their standpoint with minimal losses and they were still gaining ground on their target. Everything streaked by like lightning in their current break neck pace but it was essential to accomplishing their mission in a timely manner.

Admiral Trife and Major Kayhul were gathered around a tactical holographic map along with their advisors as they asessed the latest situation of the bombardment. "It seems that they are starting to concentrate their attacks on the cloud itself as well as the Dornalian vessels. We need not worry about losing our cover at the moment. It is taking damage but not nearly enough to warrant concern. What is a cause for concern is the beating that our allies are taking."

Trife crossed his arms in front of his chest and stared intently at the display. "Yes I see your point. Send a hundred of the ships we have up front outside to cover the Dornalians. Have them pick up the flanks and stay there as a shield to protect them."

The dreary eyed major looked at him in a surprised manner, or at least as surprised as he could look. "Are you sure it's wise to weaken our own defenses?"

"We are not in that much danger at the moment and if we lose our allied escort, then we shall really be in serious trouble."

From the rear of the swirling dark cloud, one hundred capitol scale vessels emerged and began taking up position around the Dornalians to provide cover.

“Sir, they enemy forces are nearing the ambush point.”

Commander R’Ium of the Beta Battlegroup sat behind his desk in his Command Center aboard The Fearless, an Avatar Carrier assigned to the Third Imperial Task Force. The Carriers were set up with their own captains but the Commanders in charge of the carrier group, or Battlegroup as it was known in the Imperial Navy would retain their own command center to control the maneuvers of the Battlegroup itself as a whole. It made sense to not bog the commanders down with the normal captain’s duties when they could be utilized better with this command structure.

Every ship in their Battlegroup was tied to their command nexus. That meant their sensor data as well as their ship status was directly linked to one of the computers or displays in the center. The result was a nerve center for the entire Battlegroup located securely in the center of the ship where the Commander and his advisors could direct the movements of the entire group. In turn his station was directly linked to Fleet Command, the Deity Carrier which acted as the Command Vessel for the entire fleet. It was rumored that each Deity was connected in a similar method to the Dreadnaughts that were the flagship for the three Imperial Naval Branches where the Grand Admirals would be monitoring the activities of the ships under their command. It was also assumed the three Dreadnaughts were linked to The Serendipity, the Emperor’s Super-Dreadnaught.

“What do passive sensors read?”

“It seems there are singularity strikes going against the front of the cloud. Sensors mark them as SCCAM strikes. After looking at these readings, it’s amazing how similar they are to our Grav Torps.”

“It seems Otagia and our own weapons research might be traced to a common denominator some day. That would be the task of Historians.”

“In six minutes the front line will be entering the strike zone. Do I signal Battlegroup Epsilon to be ready?”

“Negative, our objective is to find out what they are hiding in that cloud of theirs. If we storm the front gate of the castle, we will have to fight past the guards. We wait until their rear flank is exposed before we move. Inform Commander…”

“Sir, I am reading the movements of about a hundred capital ships moving up to fortify the Dornalians.”

“Interesting, it seems the SCCAM barrages have caused them to strengthen their front lines. That means there are a hundred less ships guarding the back of that thing. Inform Commander Sil’Vah the Epsilon Battlegroup is to hold in a state of readiness for our signal to attack. Let him know it will be aimed at the back of the enemy position.”

“Yes Sir, contacting The Slayer now.”

“Request a sensor link between The Fearless and The Slayer. We will coordinate the attack together.”




OOC:

I will initiate combat when you state you have reached the position. That way you can take the actions you were waiting for with Otagia first if you wish.

The comment about us having a simular source is true though. We both used the writings of Alan Dean Foster and his Commonwealth and Flinx series but took it seperate directions. My civilian vessels still use KK Drives.

LEVI: Looks like Abh forces have taken up positions along the flanks of the Dornalian vessels. About a hundred ships, all told.

ASHER: Interesting. Redeploy the SCCAM's front, divert to approach from that flank. The Abh ships should prevent the Dornalians from firing, and we won't need to adjust the width of the formation.

ZEBULON: Affirmative. I'm also diverting most of the Sai-loaded munitions to the Abh point vessels.

ASHER: Excellent. That should maximize the number of displacer nodes that actually make it through... Carry on then.

SIMEON: Roger that. The Rhunate tradeworld is almost in position in the Kyushu orbit... Oh, and the evacuation is finished. Any requests for the Guild?

ASHER: Actually, yes. I have an idea...

As the Abh vessels moved into position, the emerald wave curved, sweeping in an arc to the side of the formation, approaching again from the smallest flank. A tiny portion jabbed out, slashing towards the Dornalian singularity weapons, massive gravitic inversions splashing across Asher's sensors: Brilliant pillars of light, awesomely powerful, but at this distance ultimately harmless. The People's Scythes deployed against the Otagian fleets proved equally futile, swatted from the void almost effortlessly as they attempted to cross the burgeoning gap between the dueling fleets.

The rest of the barrage dived down towards the Abh flankers, positioning them between the Dornalians and the curtain of green light. Hidden behind their event horizons, all the missiles appeared identical, mere splotches of rapidly expanding viridian nothingness. However, as the barrage began to impact the Abh ranks, a key difference would quickly be noticed: Those SCCAMs that went against the largest of the Abh vessels, barring a few vanguards meant to take down Abh shielding, refused to detonate after burrowing into the hull. Instead, their KK drives shut off moments before reaching critical mass, exposing any crewmen unfortunate enough to be in the corridors where the SCCAMs impacted to a blank metal plate.

If there were indeed any witnesses, especially given that they were likely now standing in hard vacuum, they wouldn't wonder at the apparent dud for long. A split second after any of these Sai SCCAMs impacted, the blank face of the displacer unit would spring to life, dozens of combat Avatars suddenly blinking into existance, weapons blazing to life the very instant they appeared, masers blasting away at any unfortunate enough to be nearby, knife-missiles darting about, crazed bumblebees, their stings cutting crew and bulkheads alike to ribbons.

____________

Stepping from the colorless nothing of the Mobius Continuum, Guilder Nathaniel Keogh squinted at the bright sunlight of the planet, one of the many nameless resource facilities of QUETZAL's Protectorate. Raising his mirror shades over his eyes, he looked out over the scene before him: Endless miles of ochre stalks, waving in the gentle wind on the plains that surrounded the plateau he stood upon. Giant combines hovered above the giant stalks, grown to immense heights in the low gravity.

Gliding slowly down to the field below him, he walked over to a diplomatic Avatar, conveniently awaiting him just ahead.

"Ah, Citizen Nathaniel. I've been expecting you. You may call me Zed. We have a good deal of waste ready for you to transport, as well as some product that will merely be added to our zero-tau stockpiles. I'd offer you refreshments, but from what I'm told, you won't be here long enough to enjoy them..."

Nathaniel smiled. "Afraid not, Zed. Much too busy, what with the evacuation and the war effort. Of course, with what QUETZAL pays us, I can't say it isn't worth it..."

"Ah. Well then, I better be getting you to the cargo. If you'll follow me..."

"It seems that your little manuever has worked Admiral. Enemy fire intensify on the vessels guarding the Dornalian flanks and we have reports of intruders in some of those ships."

Trife hovered over the tactical display with his arms crossed. His eyes scanning the so called battlefield before finally letting his hands fall to the side. Trife's right hand darted out from the side and pointed at the flanks of the Dornalian formation now encompassed by allied vessels. "Go ahead and have these ships use their main weapons to deal with the incoming enemy attacks. Friendly fire should not be a concern unless all of this signatures plan on coming at us on one even plain. In that case the ships will have served their purpose and thus making the attacks easier to deal with."

Major Kayhul saluted lazily. "I'll see to it at once sir. There seems to be really nothing to do for now except wait until we get within range. We've already manage to close the distance considerablly. Estimated time is at forty minutes until we reach our objective."

Nodding, Trife kept his focus on the map. "Yes but I imagine we will not go uncontested for too much longer. I seriously doubt if the enemy will just let us waltz right up there and take their home away from them. If they do, good for us. If not, then we will deal with whatever ships come our way."

As the the enemy bombardment took the time to circumvent the front advance, they would be effectively passing through a long line of defensive fire geared toward reducing their numbers. Once they came in from the sides, main batteries on the 100 vessels from the cloud opened with everything into the cloud of projectiles. Their outer layer still held against energy attacks but any of the KK drives simply ramming would have passed through the outer layer without hinderance until it came into contact with the point defenses. The further that the projectiles had to travel to attack their targets, only made them less and less effective as they came under constant defensive barrages.

Any Avatars that managed to breach one of the ships, would find the pleasant surprise of no one home in the halls.

OOC: Bal, consider this the marker for your ships since I mentioned them now only being about forty minutes away at near C. Oh and ND is behind me, not in front.

About ten minutes later:



“Commanders, sensors show the rear of the cloud is in the strike zone.”

Commander R’Ium sat at his post with Commander Sil’Vah linked through his counsel. R’Ium called up the data scans of the cloud and they still showed nothing, even at this close proximity.

“Ready the Avatars for the attack. Remember, the goal is to discover details about their fleet, not total destruction. I want sensor drones mixed in with the torpedo barrages. Deploy the Cruisers in T-Space to pick up the data feeds from the probes. Keep them busy with weapons fire but try to keep dancing at their long range. If an Avatar is about to be destroyed, detonate the drone and reset your controls. The information we may find out here might save more lives. Get to work men.”

Across both Battlegroups, the Frigates, Destroyers, and Battleships were positioned in two lines, one for each group. Below the ships, an exact copy of the vessel floated below. At a single command, they began to fade away as the Avatars made the transition from T-Space to Real Space. The Singularity Cores in the ships made each register as having the mass of a small star. There was no way to hide any of the Imperial ships (or Avatars in this case) from detection and they had given up the idea of cloaking vessels long ago. The result was the enemy vessels were alerted as soon as the ships Emerged a short distance from the back of the cloud.

The ships immediately opened fire and a swarm of torpedoes hit Void. The sensor readings of the wave of torpedoes would have been all too familiar to the tactical officers. They were singularity torpedoes and they were very similar to the ones the front line was suffering from. (OOC: We both used the same author as our source.)

Waves of Grav Torps began to close upon the attack force from only a few light seconds away as each ship fired it’s complementary of torpedoes. The presence of about 400 Grav Torps would hopefully mast the 18 sensor probes so there would be a good attempt at discovering what was hidden in the Black Cloud.

The Torps sped on their course, the singularity pulling the reactor along behind. The torp relied on the 3 meter singularity projected ahead of it to absorb any flack or lasers fired at it in any attempts at destroying the torp. This made it extremely difficult to intercept them from the front, but since they relied upon the head to block any incoming fire, the torps did not dodge anything. They would be easy to destroy if you got a side shot on them but at this point, it was not possible since they were still a bit outside the Cloud.

They were programmed to perform a criss-crossing flight pattern across the cloud since there were no targets identifiable for them to lock upon. This demanded a tactic where the torps had to follow a preprogrammed flight until they detected an appropriate target and self locked on the foreign vessel. If any were to hit a ship, the singularity was designed to eat a 3 meter hole in the vessel as it passed through. If the torp was not destroyed as it left the target by defense, it would swing back around and try to keep passing through the ship.

Meanwhile, the ships automatics were busy reloading for a second volley.



OOC:

Sorry, I kinda missed this post. Please forgive my oversight.

The five Slaughterkings drifted through the upper atmosphere of the tradeworld, watching the ongoing battle, and calculating. Always calculating. The Long Arm of the Law was thus far performing no less than perfectly in terms of its own share of the workload.

Still, the little bastards in that cloud were proving remarkably aggravating to target. Information was still flowing in from the battlenet about the overall consistency of the enemy force, but extrapolation of enemy fleet positions by gravitational signature was still some time away. No matter. As soon as they arrived at the coordinates being tabulated and confirmed by the Slaughterkings and the Long Arm respectively, latent annoyances would be rectified.

Coordinates tabulated, General. 'Long Arm of the Law' reports all clear to open fire on your command, and inquires as to what munitions to allocate.

The initial phase will consist of the modified Javelins, as per operational guidelines established before our arrival. It would seem that the present tactical progression in fact increases the situational efficacy of the mechanism to far above optimal parameters.

We are not going to fire now?

We do not wish to give them time to react. The attack will be far more efficient if we utilize the element of surprise properly.

Gracie squawked in a shrill voice at Nomura, "Admiral! Incoming weapons! Scans indicate they are of Balroggan origin; the crew awaits your instructions."

Nomura got up and yelled at Gracie. He was getting very, very irritated--but not at the waves of fire. Instead, he was irritated at the fact his men were freaking out about it, when their shields were holding and the plan was so far, not compromised overly. His yell was one of, "Gracie, if you state the obvious again, I will pimp-slap those motherfucking circuits of yours, one at a Goddamn time!"

Gracie then recoiled back; no Gracie unit was used to this. Then again, not many Gracie units had the honor of putting up with this guy. She sighed and said, "Fine. What else can I do for you then?"

Nomura then snappily replied, "Well, besides not being a bitch, you can tell me what speed were going at."

Gracie replied, hiding what anger she was feeling, "We are proceeding at near C, I would go faster but there's an FTLi field up, as you know.....asshole."

At this, Nomura lept up to one of the screens, shaking his fist and declaring, "One of these days, Grace, one of these days, I'll-"

One of the tac officers restrained him from punching the screen. Gracie then replied, "Thank you for not harming the ship's systems. We also have secure coverage from the Abh forces."

Nomura then said, "Thank you. That's all I wanted. Maintain speed, and we should be able to outrun them. Also, leave some presents for the enemy. Some self-replicating mines perhaps, set on high yield, spread out shotgun-wise behind us?"

Gracie replied, "As you wish. You mean wide dispersion, I presume. You want some groupies and blow while you're at it?"

As ordered, Gracie maintained their speed, which was enough to outrun a lot of the enemy ordinance along with the Abh aid. However, the self-replicating mines were deployed quickly as ordered, which quickly began multiplying exponentially in an effort to frustrate the opposition.

OOC: Hey Bal, what do your Grav torps do exactly? Just want to make sure I get my response right.

OOC:

Here is the information you asked for. I hope I didn't over do it. I provided a couple links if you wish to follow them and do further readings. Feel free to post further questions or ask on MSN and I will attempt to clarify things better if needed.

As obvious to the RPers here but stated so new players who might not realize, this information is considered SECRET and only expressed in an OOC style so all players involved understand the way they work.

Here we go:



Grav Torps

After observing the destruction caused by the initial testing of the prototype, the development of a torpedo armed with a KK projector and a short lived high output fusion reactor. The torpedo is shielded so its electronics cannot be detected. The torpedo is programmed to fall short of its target and act like a dud. After a few minutes, the Caplis generator will generate a quantum singularity about 10 meters away from the target on the opposite side from the torpedo. This will also pull the torpedo into the singularity but the target will most likely be its first meal and the torpedo, its desert. Once the torpedo is destroyed, it obviously stops feeding the singularity which will collapse within a few seconds. Alternately, the singularity can be targeted upon the vessel itself.

Later versions of the Torpedo generated the singularity ahead of itself and tried to take multiple passes through the target. It was found the enemy fire would be absorbed by the singularity resulting in a longer life for the weapon to finish it's task

Copied from http://balrogga.beldragos.com/weapons.htm

Details on the KK Drive are at http://balrogga.beldragos.com/drives.htm



The Grav Torpedo the Empire currently uses is the Mark II version.

The Mk II version has been used for centuries and the torpedo is nothing but a KK generator and a fusion reactor with some electronics for guidance. The design was based off the KK Drives of the Empire, which has been retired to the civilian sector for use as their FTL drives. The Torpedo is expelled from the ship using launching tubes and then when a safe distance from the ship the torpedo activates.

The way the device works is it creates an energy based singularity at a focus point a certain distance ahead of the vessel (in this case, the body of the torpedo). The gravity pulls the ship forward and the drive reforms the singularity in the new location where the focus point now exists. This happens thousands of times each second and each tiny jerk of movement is felt as smooth acceleration. Since this is actually an FTL drive the torpedo can accelerate up to C quite quickly and once it hits C, it switches to Space Plus just the same way the KK Drive takes a cargo ship or private yacht there.

The Schwarzschild Radius of the singularity is three meters. The focal point is five meters in front of the body of the torpedo. The dimensions of the torpedo body are one meter in diameter and three meters long.

These specifications mean the Grav Torp cannot be damaged from the front because the Schwarzschild Radius would draw in any incoming projectiles and point defense. These torps fly straight and do not use evasive actions. If they wove to and fro, they would expose their power generator to incoming frontal fire. Since they do not take any evasive actions, it is relatively easy to shoot them from the side or rear.

When the torpedo strikes an object, the singularity devours a hole allowing the body of the torp to pass through at a high speed. Eventually the torp would exit the other side of the ship and the internal electronics would turn the torp back around to have another pass at the ship. It is at this point where most of them are destroyed because their back is fully exposed to the targets point defense.

The fusion power core is good for up to an hour’s operation and once the core is about to fail, the torp generates a final singularity upon itself resulting in its own demise to prevent others from getting an example of the technology. The mechanics of the device is also trapped to destroy itself if it is not opened correctly, as well as other safeguards present.

Please note, these evolved from the SCCAM SHELL as demonstrated in the Alan Dean Foster’s Commonwealth and Flinx series as well as his short stories.


Alan Dean Foster Site:

http://www.alandeanfoster.com/version2.0/frameset.htm



My current attack is to shoot these from along side your cloud formation so they cross at right angles to your heading. They are capable of FTL travel but the FTLi would keep them from actually achieving C and Crossing into Space Plus. Each volley is designed to overwhelm you into defending so the 18 probes can slip through unnoticed. I don’t care if you destroy the Torps when you can get a side or rear shot because my intention is not to take out your ships but to use the distraction to get sensor readings from within your cloud. Any Torps not destroyed will emerge from the other side of the cloud and turn back to pass through again until their cores self-destruct. Since they are basically on full drive, their life expectancy is 30 minutes tops due to full power consumption.

If any ships get damaged, then that is the icing on the cake because the mission is about information gathering but later the torps would be used to target the ships instead of being a distraction so go ahead and make a number of breath-holding near misses or some damaging blows. Make it tense and interesting, or in other words a good read.

My ships will continue to pace along side your cloud and fire volleys into it until they get a good sensor reading. You can determine what the sensors (18 each volley with 400 torps as cover) uncover and you can post it. Once I have enough data I will most likely leave the battle with my objective achieved.


Note:

Here is a quick DOGA of the Grav Torp Mk II:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v248/beldragos/GravTorpMKII.jpg

OOC: I think I get the gist of it.

IC:

Another volley of missles was not a surprise to the Abh admiral. What did distrub Trife was the direction from whence it came. The many projectiles had to pass through Dornalian lines to reach the edge of the dark swirling cloud. Even then, they still encountered a mini planet scale defense network against enemy ships and attacks.

"Enemy missle has punctured a section of the structure and is heading for the rear of the fleet. Defensive systems have targeted projectile.....target destroyed."

Trife stood at the command table with his arms crossed. He grunted his acknowledgement that the missle was gone. Balroggan ships had been detected in the distance but the admiral had given orders to not engage. Leaving their current course would distract them from their mission and Trife wanted to reach his target as timely as possible. "Keep advancing and ignore all distractions. Defenses will handle what they have to throw at us. We only have thirty minutes of flight time left."

Major Kayhule nodded, though he looked extremely tired at the moment. "I believe that is the best course of action but I recommend all warheads be destroyed in case anything drift into the cloud and obtain information about our fleet before we are ready for them."

The admiral placed his hands on the side of the table and leaned heavily, studying the holographs intently. "I agree but it is going to be hard picking them out without any fighter support out there. And with this break neck pace, I doubt it would be even pheasible for fighters to do so; let alone probes venturing to far in."

The fire fight raged throughout the cloud like a lightening storm in space. Any probes venturing in through the unknown would encounter a slight tampering with their censors. The massive amounts of EMP surrounding the rim had a tendency of doing things. Even the Abh organic sensors went fuzzy at times. Still, a tolerable picture or reading would come out though it wouldn't with terrible much depth or clarity. Hunkering within the safety of the cloud, amassed a number of inky black ships the likes of which had rarelly been seen outside the Empire's realm. One particular type had only been used in the destruction of the Maker-Mind. Shadow Destroyers lined the back escorted by the smaller but still formidable Shadow Cruisers.

The Avatar Vessels kept pace with the advancing invasion fleet. The sensor probes were beaming the data straight to the drone ships and then the data was rebroadcast into T-Space using the Space Minus Transmitters. The sketchy data only really revealed the presence of ship within the cloud and no details other than that.

Aboard The Fearless, Commander R’Ium read through the raw data and was disappointed. He didn’t get much information other than the hint of black ships. There was no data on those ships in his archive but he decided to uplink it into the ESUS Battlenet after forwarding it to the Admiral to see if anyone else knew what those ships really was.


After the first pass of probes into the New Dornalia-Humankind Abh Darkness Cloud, this was all the data we could detect. The problem seems that the sensors were not powerful enough to pierce the electromagnetic emissions of the cloud.

I am about to chose to negate this liability by diverting the Avatar Drones into the cloud itself. If the drones lose their control signal they are programmed to search out the nearest large vessel and trigger their magazines and cores. For this reason I suggest not going near the enemy within the next few minutes.

The better shielded ships would theoretically be able to send out a transmission with enough power that we would be able to pick it up. Their sensors are also stronger so it should get a better picture. I suspect there will not be many survivors of the drones so their sacrifice will hopefully be worth the price.

I am sending the data results along with this message.

Commander R’Ium
The Fearless


R’Ium then contacted Sil’Vah.

I want to send in the Avatars through the cloud. Launch a full barrage of Torps and follow them close as you can with the Drones. If they lose contact, have them target the front of enemy ships and then self destruct. The enemy ships are moving too fast to avoid that many singularities. As soon as the Avatars are gone, start pulling in the parent vessels so we can return without wasting time to repair their systems. Begin the attack run immediately.

A few seconds later, the ships pacing the cloud sped up until the FTLi stopped their advance and veered right into the side of the cloud. First they launched a full barrage of Mark II Grav Torps and they turned, another full barrage was released. The ships then dove as fast as they could under the cover of the double barrage of singularity torpedoes.

bumping for ND and Otagia.

OOC: Just a reminder that there's a lot of self-replicating mines out there. Equivalent in power to my conventional torpedoes, these suckers were orignally designed to be part of the MacIntyre Line. Basically, they're large explosives with proximity sensors and replicators onboard that have enough energy to make an identical torpedo or set of torpedoes, and they have tractor beams and (possibly) magnetic attractors to get close to enemy vessels. The amount of energy in each torp depends on the setting: in this case, they're replicated with a lot of battery life in them (how much I gotta figure out. For now, this is a rough guide.).

Also, not to be finished until I get a reply.

IC:

The self-replicating mines that were deployed continued to duplicate, their numbers growing ever more by the minute, following their orders. Onboard the Ben Gurion, the sensors lit up, as the cloud of mines grew.

However, the further attacks by Balroggan forces seemed to be evidence the mines either weren't going to be enough, or they were simply misdeployed. After all, they seemed to be going at the flanks of their forces, and at speeds like this, there was a chance messes would be able to occur. Indeed, some of the enemy got inside.

Realizing this, Nomura thought to himself, "Bastards....maybe Dr. Feldman was right about my anger management issue. Okay. Let's try the flanks."

He then tapped a console, and Gracie turned to the Admiral. Still smoldering from their previous exchange, Gracie mumbled, "What?!"

Nomura then said, "Gracie, gimme a view of those bogeys."

Grumbling, Gracie piped in a small viewscreen a view of the action. Fire was flying all about, Point Defense was prepped, and he could see the enemy coming into the cloud.

Sensing a chance to finally hit something, he let out a furious cry, mixed with anxiety, rage, panic, and adrenaline-rushed emotion, "All units near the cloud. Kill those bogeys! KILL THEM ALL!"

Never content to do anything by halves, a massive, almost overkillish wave of Demolisher Gun and torpedo fire then flew at the drones and the torpedoes with almost knee-jerk response time. Leading the drones and torps with the Demolisher Guns and letting the torpedoes, both conventionals and antimatter, fly at the enemy as the torpedoes adjusted their sensors to home in at the enemy, they targeted the foes from mostly the side and the rear (in the case of some of the torps), as they were behind the cloud and that was their best vector.

OOC:

You might want to change tactics. The mines are normally a great idea but not in this situation. You forgot everyone is moving at speeds exceeding 0.7C and any mines dropped would be quickly left far behind plus any vessels in your forces that are behind you might get hit too. At these speeds those hits might be devastating, depending on their shielding.

I'll wait to see what you do before replying.

OOC:

You might want to change tactics. The mines are normally a great idea but not in this situation. You forgot everyone is moving at speeds exceeding 0.7C and any mines dropped would be quickly left far behind plus any vessels in your forces that are behind you might get hit too. At these speeds those hits might be devastating, depending on their shielding.

I'll wait to see what you do before replying.

OOC: In the process of editing right now--one thing. Are those guys in the cloud already?

OOC:

I can only post my attemt to gain access to the cloud, it is up to you and Abh to determine if I am successful and to what degree. I am attempting to use my torp volleys as a screening action.

My attack is to gain access to the secrets you two are hiding in the cloud and you get to determine my success. I made it as tough as I could using current resources and my goal is the secret, not your destruction, yet. If I take out a few on the way that is the icing on the cake. Those drone ships are disposable but thier destruction should be spectacular so have fun and be creative.

OOC: Edited. You can attempt to defeat the attempts by the torps to lock on, but generally, expect a lot of incoming fire--maybe a bit more than we need....

OOC:

I am going to wait for Abh to reply so I can take care of both at the same time. If I got any sensor data, please tell me what it is.

Trife kept watching the fire display within the safety of his flagship, the Keldiej. Wave after wave of the projectiles clashed with the cloud's defense network. Brief explosions marked the destruction of a number of warheads. Damage had been done to the extensive make-up of the cloud but the large figure could easily compensate for it done by the barrages. The few holes were easily healed over.

"The enemy is trying to do something but what?" Admiral Trife had been mulling over the strategy for a few minutes now as he watched his tactical map display the events taking place outside.

"It is possible that they are trying to weaken our fleet before trying to push through the cloud and engage us directly."

Trife thought about Kayhule's theory then shook his head. "No that can't be it. By now they would have realized that missle volleys like this are not effective while we're still in the cloud. There has to be something else."

"You're assuming that the enemy is intelligent enough to come to that conclusion."

The admiral narrowed an eye at the major. "I prefer to give the enemy as much credit as possible that way I can assume the worst. I find I am less surprised that way."

The discussion was over for now as they watched their defense network handle the incoming torpedoes. With the great speed they were traveling, a near quarter of the cloud's defenses were being utilized. Ship sensors continued monitoring the attacks, taking note of every target making sure all were destroyed.

"Admiral, we have a breach in sector 29. Readings detect 4..no 5 targets incoming."

Without hesitating, Trife whirled around to his communications officer. "Inform three Whitestars to deccelerate and destroy the targets."

"Yes admiral."

From within the fleet's formation, three Whitestars deccelerated from their break-neck speed and simply spun on their axis. Inertialess drives were great for pinpoint manuevers and allowed the ships to turn and manuever with relative ease. Wasting little time, the three ships opened fire with pulse cannons and main energy cannon at the bow of the ship.

Before the drone ship met its demise in blinding neon green flash, it managed to capture in more detail a line of Shadow Destroyers making up the rear of the fleet. Possibly 15 by the quick glance of the camera along with an odd looking shape in the background that could possibly be one of the Abh artillery ships. A Shadow Cruiser drifted lazily passed the structure before giving any further evidence as to what it was. Anything else was hard to determine with three Whitestars bearing down and filling up the camera other than a number of dark silhouttes behind them.

Trife looked up at Kayhule then back to one of his officers. "Rearrange the fleet. I want the ships at our front to encircle the entire fleet."

The major looked confused. "Why?"

"Just do it."

OOC: Any word from Otagia?

OOC: Gak. I am indeed still alive, just a little hectic over here. Between my new job, the end of the school year, an overly active social life, and all sorts of other things the real world seems to love throwing in my way, I've been more than a little swamped. The fact that the only time I have to make this post is at one in the morning, and that this is the first time I've looked at the forum in three days, is testament to these circumstances.

The good news is that between me working night shift tommorrow, your dedication to keeping this thread visible and alive (for which I love you all), and having a few days off coming up shortly, I should have a post up reasonably soon. So, thanks all for being patient and understanding.

OOC: Good enough for me. Just glad to know you're still alive and well.

The last of the Avatar ships disappeared in a flash of green darkness as the singularity core devoured itself. The remains of the Singularity would stick around for a few minutes before evaporating, hopefully providing a navigational hazard for the invading fleet, just the same as the rest of the destroyed drones.





T-Space:




“Sir, our last Avatar was destroyed. Its singularity core destroyed all evidence after activating the last of its Grav Torps in their magazines. Here is the sensor data we received.”

The tactical officer forwarded the recordings of all the data captured on both video and with the myriad of sensors they possessed.

“I see, and the condition of the Parent Vessels?”

“They are stunned and unusable for at least half an hour.”

“We can’t wait that long, we need to get this data sent off and ourselves back to the Line. Tractor all the crippled vessels aboard the carriers and we will carry them back to the Front Line.”

The two carriers with the assistance of the Cruisers moved the crippled vessels into the large ships. After they were finished, the two carriers and their cruisers returned to the formation with the rest of the fleet, taking a rear position to allow the crippled vessels to reset their systems.

The fleet scanned the incoming singularity, and before it dissipated, the singularity rocked the Dornalians some. Nomura gritted his teeth and replied, "We can ill-afford to change course because of some damn black hole. We shit black holes! Move around it, but keep forward!"

At best they moved around it, either putting some distance or steering a course around the singularity before heading back into formation, and continued their movement. They would not be stopped easily.

bumped for Otagia

bumped again for Otagia

bumped....one last time

OOC:

I acomplished my mini mission and I am regrouping back where the rest of my ships are. The others have to do their part until you come within range.

I am waiting for the others too........

OOC:

I am waiting for the others too........

OoC: Same here...I've been bugging the right people, especially Otagia. So far, no replies, save for one time where he said he was sick, and working on a post.

I left a message for him on the ESUS baords. Both Otagia and Godular should be able to find it easy enough, being the other two members in the Thread.

I'm waiting for Otagia too.

I left a message for him on the ESUS baords. Both Otagia and Godular should be able to find it easy enough, being the other two members in the Thread.

OOC: Thanks, Bal.