NationStates Jolt Archive

(Sorry I forgot to put it in the title, this thread is CLOSED except for those who signed up)



Colonel Mike Green, Setulan Republican Guard, stood on the roof of the newly constructed HQ building and surveyed his domain. The view was breathtaking, as the small outpost had been constructed on a spur of land that jutted out over a coast. With rocky cliffs dropping a dizzying three hundred feet to either side, their was no good escape route...but it was also going to be one tough nut to crack. The spur was two hundred yards across and four hundred long, making a natural chokepoint that was covered by two bunkers. The other buildings in the compound were all geared towards defense was well. While the colony would eventually support a civilian population, for the time it was all military.

Colony 1 was the first ever attempt by the Republic of Setulan to colonize a new planet. For the past fifty years, the former Empire had been recovering from a brutal civil war, and had not had time to explore the stars. But finally, the Council of Leaders had decided it was time to expand, and expand they did.
Despite losing one ship with all hands, the risk was deemed worthy for the reward. A full regiment (six batallions) of Republican Guard were now in place on planet, and they were going to call for the civilians to arrive in no more than a week. Colonel Green smiled, took a deep breath of the refreshing salt air, and decided that nothing could go wrong. Almost three thousand men on the ground and a caretaker fleet in orbit? He was completely secure.

Unstbeknown to the Alien civilization on the far side of the planet lay three dormant Battle Crusiers and the fledgeling begginings of Collection Pool, noone much paid noticed to the few automated warnings that was untill the felt the taint!.

"THE TAINT, THE TAINT IS HERE" rang out through the mostly quiet collection pools it was answered by a chorus of wails and screamsn shortly after the screams turned to roars of anger.

One out of three Collection pools were at anything near working order and soon it was working its sleek uninterupted sufce bubbled and the liquid within contorting till out of the blue man after man after man got up out of the pool and began marching towards the alien taint, about 15 collums of troops (150 in all) was assembled and in between them were creaters, things that could only be boure from the pits of hell to fight 7 large elephant sized creatures climbout of the pool each bristling with claws and covered in large thick platings the total force began the long march which would take and expected 4 hours to complete to the alien taint.

The battle Crusiers began powering up and several large powersignatures could be detected before they were contained, one BC managed to bring itself into the atmohsper its 1.3km bulk moving with a speed unbelivable to its size a Large barrel poking out of its nose began to charge up and a bright red ball of energy formed.

Captain John Luskin was sitting aboard the command chair of the SRV Intrepid, a Fear-Class cruiser. He was in overall command of the fleet presence at Colony 1, which consisted of the Intrepid herself, as well as the Storm-Class frigates Might, Panache, and Alamundi. He reclined, secure in the knowledge that nothing would happen.
"Captain! Captain sir! We are reading massive energy spikes on the other side of the planet!" The ensign was pale as he called out his status report. Luskin sat up hastily.
"What?"
"Sir, sensors are picking up a large enemy ship, classify target Sierra-1. Getting visual now!"
A screen flickered into life, and the Kewen ship was revealed in all its horrid majesty. Its intentions were clear the moment the crew saw the massive ball of red energy in its prow.
"FULL POWER TO SHIELDS AND WEAPONS!" Luskin roared to the command staff. "Sound general quarters and alert Colonel Green!"
Sirens rang out through the ship as the crew dropped everything they were doing and rushed to battle stations.
"Whats the deal with the enemy ship?"
"We're bigger and it looks like we've got more guns, sir, but I don't like the look of that main cannon!" Luskin swore.
"Get my shields up!"

***

Colonel Green looked up sharply as a messenger ran up to him.
"Sir, the fleet is being attacked!" It was all the answer Green needed.
"General Quarters! Prepare to repel a ground attack!" The private looked at him curiously.
"What? What ground attack?" Green grabbed him by the lapel and shoved him.
"You asshole, why would they attack our fleet after all this time unless there was going to be an attack! Move, boy!"
All across the outcrop, Setulan's finest ran to their battle stations.

ooc: can i just say my ground forces found a short cut to your base or something.

On the ground the kewen regiment broke out into a run when they reached the open plains they neared thenemy base and they would get there very soon a large could of dust was formed from their running.

In space the Battle Crusiers main gun fired a large red lance of energy spat out and cut a swath in space towards the lead enemy ship, the beam was at full power it was a smaller verision of the one found on the Battle Cubes and its predaccessors the Podcraft. This beam was easily capable of vapoursing a Papanew Gunie sized landmass on its widest setting or punching through a planets crust to hit its core, it was also enough to be a incredibly strong orbital bombardment and ship to ship weapon.

12 of its heavy dual rial guns opened up on the lead enemy ship as well while the other gunso n the crusiers readied themselves.
Another crusier completed its warm up procceedure and lifted off of the planet and joined its brother in space charging its main gun aswell but at a much slower pace most of its energy divoted to its engines to catch up.

ooc-yeah, works for me. I'm making an OOC thread...
IC-
Captain Luskin barely had to time to flinch as the enemy energy weapon ripped through the half-formed shields and vaporised him and the entire bridge crew. With all central control gone and the Captain and XO dead, the ship was effectively leaderless. The shields, which had failed completely, could not be brought up in time to prevent the rail guns from finishing the job that the energy beam started. Crippled beyond repair, the SRV Intrepid burned, plasma fire from the ruptured containment core in the engine room lashing out and damaging the ship even further. Desperately, the crew started to abandon ship.

The three frigates fortunately had enough time to power up shields and their macro cannons, but the Ions remained offline for the time being.Powering forward as one to destroy the enemy which had seemingly appeared from nowhere, the three ships set themselves up so their broadsides faced the enemy and fired, sending a total of 225 two-ton projectiles at the cruiser.

***

Colonel Green looked through his scope at the dust cloud that was rapidly approaching his base. He turned to his XO.
"Arm the minefield." He nodded and rushed off. The minefield, consisting of 150 bouncing betty land mines, was primed to go, and would be a nasty surprise to the aliens.
Tense, the Republican Guardsmen waited for the enemy to present itself.

ooc: think a gorrilla the size of a enlephant covered in bulging metal planets and spikes! for a horror.

The enemy land base was in sight the seven beats dubbed Horrors broke off from the coloum and sped up to their full run a astounding 78mph. leaving the infantry in the dust, the thunderous change could be heard and felt from a long distances as they closed the gap quite quickly...


BOOM BOOM BOOM.. erupted over the feild as the lead horror ran over a few mines a large plume of dust rose from the ground and as it cleared the horror was still there badly shaken and missing a limb it was still there it began to trundle off again towards the base.

BOOM went another mine as a different horror hit it being flung up in the air and back on the ground it picked it self up seconds later and it too began to pick up speed again this time at a decent pace slower than before, the infantry on the other hands approced the edge of the feild formed a single line with about 15m distance between them and began filing through.


In space the Crusier was hit by the strong return it sheilds dropping to 14%
"Sssssire--" was all the was heard before a small explosion rocked the bidge and a bright flash ensared a unwitting Command officer
"Ssssheilds at 4% Ssssire, the Admant Protestor is coming along side us"

The crusier shaken badly by the reutrn fired back but not to the full extent as before only four guns managed to fire as the crew fought to regain their senses.. The other crusier on the other hand turned broadisde and unleashed a salvo of its own 8 Medium dual railgun turrets firing followed by 5 Heavy dual railgun turrets and a a small salvo of missles streaked out from a missle bank towards the three frigates

On the ground, Colonel Green looked at the massive creatures attacking his fortress walk right into the minefield with barely a pause and nodded thoughtfully.
"Well, that does complicate matters." He picked up his radio. "Fire sections, this is Colonel Green. Give me heavy fire on those monsters!"
In the phase two bunkers, the three 120mm S-12 cannons that the light infantry had brought planetside targeted the limbless beast and fired as one.
"Die, you bastard, die!"

In the front two bunkers, the troops stationed there-fifty in each-started to engage the horrors as well. Six anti tank Mauler rockets were fired at a second Horror, and each man fired off entire clips of standard ammunition into the others.

***

Captain Laerod of the Alamundi smiled grimly as the enemy vessel bucked and flared after the massive salvo delivered by the three frigates.
"Take that, you cocksucking alien slime!" The bridge crew cheered as the enemy vessel backed away, firing only a handful of the main weapons.
"Sir, Panache reports shields at 79% after the enemy salvo."
"Very good! Lets finish them off. For the Intrepid!"
Unfortunately for Captain Laerod, the Intrepid had been destroyed before it could get a full status report to its fellow ships. It was for that reason that the second alien cruiser took him completely by surprise.
"Sir! Another one!" Laerod looked out into space as bright flashes signaled his doom.

Aboard the SRV Might, Captain Swan watched in abject horror as the second enemy ship annihalted Alamundi and disabled Panache's engines in one salvo.
"Retask! Retask! I want main batteries on the new target! Ion cannons, aim for the crippled ships engines!" He grabbed the vox.
"Anybody out there, this is the Captain of the SRV Might, and we are under attack! We need help, and fast! For the love of all thats holy, they're all over us!"

ooc-cue Xiscapia...please?

THe second crusier seeing weakness in one of the ship fired itsain cannon (the one wit disabled engines) at it before it was rocked by anotehr salvo of weapons fire this time the barrage was woefully insufficent dropping the sheilds by only 13%

"Remove thissss taint" hiss someone on the bridge and the remianing weapons on the Second crusier fired at the visially undamaged ship.
The first crusier limped away to behind the planet while crews were illicitng repeairs all over the craft the thrid crusier experiance a power problem remained on the ground when the threat it was told was minimal now.

---

On the ground the limbless Horror was incinerated and completly destroyed leavig not trace of its existance.
Another horor swatted one of the incoming missles away and it sailed off before exploding in the ground moments later but it failed to hit the others and it was rocked by the fire, it lay crumpled on the ground in a twisted heap. the others on the other hand were completly unnaffected by the small arms fire and were now only 20m away from the bunkers that were shooting at them.

A bloodchilling scream erupted from the throats of one of the horrors and it threw its 5ton bulk at the fortifications while the others too ran into bunkers and things screaming as well the infantry having passed most of the miness and only loses 40 of their 150 numbers spread out into a line unsholded their rifles and began walking while firing periodically in salvos of 110 at the fortifications 110 shots of green plasma streaked towards the base every 5ish seconds as the moved towards it.

"Anybody out there, this is the Captain of the SRV Might, and we are under attack! We need help, and fast! For the love of all thats holy, they're all over us!"
Rear Admiral Lintel sure as hell knew a distress call when she heard one. The firey-haired kitsune stood on the bridge of her vessel, the Battleship (http://img181.imageshack.us/img181/6416/minmatarbattleshiphl8.jpg) XIW Laughing Man and Flagship of the Second Exploratory Fleet from the Kitsune Empire of Xiscapia. Flanking the Laughing Man were the Destroyers (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Image:Imperial_Escort_Carrier01.jpg) Starfire and Inescapable, in the middle was the Carrier (http://www.theforce.net/swtc/Pix/books/sw2ij/mc1sw2ij.jpg) Xeno and the Medical Ship (http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b184/Upum/Star%20Wars/Nebulon-B-Frigate.jpg) Gem, and fanned out behind those were the Cruisers (http://www.moddb.com/images/cache/mods/82/8237/gallery/thumbmoty_53379.jpg) Water, Red Dawn, Hawk and Fire. They had not gone too far from their base in one of the colonies before encountering an ion storm and been forced to turn back. Now this message reached them, and Lintel needed only an instant of consideration to decide what to do. "Send them this message," she instructed her communications officer. Her yellow eyes blinked, and orange-furred ears perked and her rust colored tail swished as she turned from her comm officer to the helmsman. "Set bearing for that course, I want us there in under five." she ordered.
XIW Laughing Man
We have received your message and are proceeding to your location now. We are the Kitsune Empire of Xiscapia, Second Exploratory Fleet, and we will be in your system in about five standered time units. Help is on the way.
"On my mark," said Lintel, looking down at her command console. "Three...two...one..." It flashed green. "MARK!"
The fleet jumped.
System...
The Xiscapian fleet appeared, shields and weapons going up on all ships, banking towards the planet. The mere sight of the much larger force should give the aggressors pause, but just in case...
Attention all vessels, stand down immediatly. This situation can surely be worked out though diplomacy. I invite diplomats from both sides onto my vessel, the XIW Laughing Man. If you choose to fight alternative arrangements can be made, of course...
OOC: Setulan, please check post number 2 in the other thread...

Somehow, Swan was alive. The salvo which bombarded his ship had not obliterated it, as a few of the rounds had missed, and he had had time to get to an escape pod. He watched out the window of the rapidly dissapearing ship as it was wracked by internal explosions before bursting from the inside, scrap and debris rocketing out into space. He turned away, bitter, as he watched the alien ship descend on Panache, which was desperately firing its weapons at the enemy vessel.

***

"RETASK! HIT THE OTHER ONE!" bellowed the battery commander. The three guns changed targets and fired at another Horror.

The troops in the bunkers didnt stand a chance. Ripped apart by the massive enemy, they were slaughtered like cattle. One brave trooper, bleeding to death from his wounds, grabbed onto ones head and pulled the pin on a belt of grenades.

Colonel Green looked on in fury.
"Second line defense, open fire."
Fully half of the regiment started to blaze away at that point, more than 1200small arms firing at the infantry as three hundred anti-tank rockets sailed out at the Horrors as they finished their grisly work.
Green nodded. It was using up almost half of the Regiments rocket supply, but if it stopped those things, it was worth it.

The troops in the bunkers were little effected by the enemy small arms fire, though about thirty died before they could duck back in cover. As the troops opened fire, another fifty were either killed or incapacitated.

The Captain of the Panache read the transmission before him with wide eyes. He looked up at the enemy ship bearing down on his own for a moment, and then grabbed the vox microphone.

Diplomacy? They have already destroyed three of our ships! Help us! Please!

ooc-sorry, I was typing my response when you replied

"Diplomacy!, no they tainted our landssss consssstructed there vile sssstructuressss on our holy ground there issss no talk."

Came the kewen response as the Crusier cept on firing at the smaller ship the thrid cand final crusier acended to high orbit and stood ground near the 1st damaged one, while linkdebating for help.

---

On the ground another horror was blown apart by the combined firepower of the three guns its torso landing in a crumpled heap someplace in the fortifications. one horror had enough time to loo upbefore it was blown away by the rocket fire others didnt know what hit them only 1 horro urvied the onsluaght taking cover under the corpse of another, charging it screamed a primal scream and charged at the source of the cannons which had killed two of its breatherin.

allmost 80 infantry were knocked down by the small arms fire while the others began back pedaling stilling firing but not in a co-ordinated way this time.

In a ball of thermo plasmic fire, Panache was annihalted by the Kewen ships, the scream of the Captain screeching through the vox microphone to the Xiscapians for almost three seconds before he died.

***

On the ground, the Republican Guardsmen burst out with whoops and cheers as the infantry were blown away and started to fall back into the minefield. The firing on them slowed, however, as more and more troops directed their fire towards the remaining Horror. The three guns desperately tried to reload and retask in time as the monster bore down on them...

The lone horror bashed down what door or blockage there was and entered the building with the guns he began serching each floor each room in a fluury of speed ripping anything living to found with the long claws on each of his hands his size at that point had shrunk somewhat allowing him to pass through the doors but that dint stop him from still being quite large.

"Diplomacy!, no they tainted our landssss consssstructed there vile sssstructuressss on our holy ground there issss no talk."
Have it your way, then.
The two Cruisers may have decimated the enemy fleet, but they were horribly outnumbered, outgunned and outclassed by the Second Exploratory Fleet. Lintel ordered the Laughing Man forward, telling the gun crews to lock on to their target. The Battleship flew "above" the remains of the previously undamaged frigate, clearly intending to have protected it, and Lintel took a deep breath, grinned, and shouted
"OPEN FIRE!"
Ten huge MAC cannons, 5 heavy ion cannons, heavy laser guns, 15 pinpoint light guns and 25 regular ion cannons swiveled, targeted, and opened fire on the Cruiser. If the volley from the frigates had all but destroyed the first Cruiser, this wave of firepower would utterly annihilate it.

The two Destroyers lumbered forward, the Inescapable on the port side of the crippled frigate, the Starfire on the starboard, menacingly looming over the fresh alien Cruiser. Broadsides turned, the Destroyers began to volley three MAC cannons, firing shells the size of small cars packed with explosives, a Heavy Ion Cannon, four Heavy Guns, five Light guns and twenty-five Ion Cannons. Because two had gained up on the Cruiser, however, it was like being hit by all the batteries on one Destroyer. This too should destroy them, or at least leave the enemy badly crippled.

The Cruisers had stayed back to guard the Carrier and Medical Ship, and for good reason. All six ships edged forward, the Cruisers forming a cube defense around the other two as the Medical Ship began to send down shuttles and the Carrier disengorge small craft. These streaked down though the atmosphere towards the base.

The five shuttles landed at the rear of the base and kitsune medical (http://high-octane.deviantart.com/art/Fortress-Forever-Medic-18903927) teams dashed out, ready to heal the wounded. Meanwhile one hundred Shuriken class fighters (http://images.wikia.com/starwars/images/thumb/6/61/VWing-NEGVV.jpg/250px-VWing-NEGVV.jpg) screamed down onto the retreating enemy troops, dropping payloads of high-explosive carpet bombs onto them. Finally eight Light Assault Mecha (http://biew1986.deviantart.com/art/Speed-Paint-Concept-Art-Mecha3-52801338), or LAM, set down behind the retreating soldiers as they were bombed, cutting off their escape and firing into the ranks with duel rail guns, energy beams and missiles.
Two of the LAM landed at the base and went after the Horror, firing their beam cannons with enough force to destroy a tank and riddling it with missiles and railgun fire before activating their energy swords and going in for the kill.

The troops on the ground were all anialated except for the horror which was still kurking around someplace.

in space the crusiers engaged their FTL and fled for now, going to rally point zulu where they would meet with the 71st task force of the Indoctrin battle group, it comprised of a Single Battle cube the "Times" the BattleCrusier squadron "Frair" , "Divine point" and "Flashbreaker" along with the Carriers "Dropout" and "Orion" with about 10 destoryer and 21 PD frigs for escort.


The collection pools relising their probe was utterly annilated began to twist and from till more troops rose from the pools and a single large Surface to Orbit Multitap cannon was formed along with a few SAM sites or their basic equivilants, several HBT rose out from the pools at sat four meters of the ground waiting.

Colonel Green calmly walked into the overwatch room just in time to see the Horror finish killing the gun crews. He hefted the Mauler anti-tank rocket and aimed carefully, right into the Horrors open mouth.
"Eat shit and die,"
Discarding the spent rocket tube, he walked over to the corpse of the monster that had destroyed his only real fire support and shot it a few times with his sidearm. A private came up behind.
"Uh, sir...I think its dead."
"I know, son," he said, holstering his pistol. "That was for me." He looked up as his XO walked in with blood all over his face.
"What hit you?" asked Green. The XO grimaced.
"Not mine. Those bastards are vicious, sir."
"Too damn right. Losses?"
"One hundred and seventy nine casualties, sir. One hundred and fifty four fatal. Oh, and apparently there was an intervention in space..." He explained on for a bit.
"Alright. Set up a beacon, I assume they will want to talk. Recover some of the Alien's bodies, I want to know what we are fighting."
"Aye aye, sir."

OOC-Sorry for killing your dude, Kewen, but I think it did what you wanted it too =P

OOC: Okay, I landed shuttles and mecha and ran an ariel bombing of the aliens, but I guess you didn't notice, so...
IC:
As soon as the area was clear shuttles from the Gem were sent down with kitsune medical (http://high-octane.deviantart.com/art/Fortress-Forever-Medic-18903927) teams ready to assist the wounded on the ground. The fighters flew back to their Carrier for rearming and refueling, and the Mecha secured a permitier around the base, hulking ten foot fall frames giving no indication of what those inside looked like. Only the medics looked like true kitsune, and they were too busy helping the injured for small talk. Thus Rear Admiral Lintel got into contact with Colonel Green via his rather primative becon. Fortunately it still allowed regular communications, so even if she could not be seen she could be heard. She waited for the man to make his first move. Humans, obviously, but how would they take to the obviously alien kitsune, especially after this? Yes the Xiscapians had saved them from the other aliens, but you never could tell with some people...

Green walked out of the devestated HQ and into the middle of the base, where huge bipedal armor secured the perimeter, seeming to dwarf the Republican Guardsmen who were dragging alien bodies back into the base. The guardsmen took time to gawk at the aliens, but did not slow down-they were willing to put up with alot for those that had saved them.

Green lifted up his vox.

Well, Admiral, you certainly know how to have a party, and the boys and I are grateful. Especially now that we don't have to worry about being vaporized from above. Any chance you could come on down here so I can meet you face to face? Or maybe I could come up there, if you prefer.

Green wasn't really sure what to think of these aliens, but he decided to give them the benefit of the doubt. For one, they weren't near as alien in appearance as the things they had just fought, and for another, they were selflessly helping his men. Hopefully, they would consent to a meeting.

Well, Admiral, you certainly know how to have a party, and the boys and I are grateful. Especially now that we don't have to worry about being vaporized from above. Any chance you could come on down here so I can meet you face to face? Or maybe I could come up there, if you prefer.
Lintel took a moment to read a status report while the Colonel talked. All of the Xeno's mecha were deployed to the surface, the same for the Gem's medical away teams. The fighters had returned safety, and the aliens had been repelled without a single casualty from the Second Exploratory Fleet. Even now patrols and corvettes were scouring space for escape pods and small craft, as well as collecting the debris from the destroyed ships for scrap metal. All in all, not a bad job.
I don't know if you know...(it occurred to her that she did not know the rank of the man she was speaking to) commander, but all your naval vessels have been destroyed. We retrieving the escaping pods now, and we'll have those we find down on the surface as soon as we're sure there isn't anyone else out there. I'll be at your side momentarily.
Turning, the Rear Admiral nodded to her XO. "You have the bridge, I am going planet side to meet with the resident commander. Send all the men you find down to the base via shuttle, because most first-timers don't cope well with beaming, and start the recycling plant for the wreckage and pods."
Lintel then stepped over to a nondescript, beige colored platform at the back of the bridge. A bridge officer tapped into a console nearby and gave her the thumbs-up. She smiled, and in a glittering flash of light she was gone.
Seconds later Lintel appeared inside the base, so accurately traced from the beacon that she literally was next to Colonel Green. She wore a black uniform, crisp and starched, complete with a cap and her hair tied in a ponytail. Her only armament was a service pistol holstered on her left side and a gleaming copper-color sheathed katana on her right. Without waiting for his reaction she bowed and said, in somewhat accented Galactic Common, "Greetings."

The kewen remians began to disolve slowly bsurely the bodies started to dissolve and the weapons the troopers used agaisnt the base were knowhere to be found seeminly to have disapeared smoke started pouring from the fortifications as the rounds that were fired seemed to melt and dissapear away leaving no trace bar a few small puddles of Silver metal that would cool down and hardern into nearly unbreakable steel very soon.

Meanwhile on the kewen held part of the planet another attack force this time signifigantly larger and more well equipped than the last departed the base at 2000 men strong and 15 Horrors it moved to the base these 15 horrors were more docile than the last group unarmed but still armoured the lugged a large portable sheild generator (think gungan from starwars phantom menace). while several dozen
HBT(hover bombardment tanks) hovered 14meters above them each carried a single large plasma artillery cannon while 12 Escort gun ships fleet cover Portable sams were ready and the gunships had there few PD turrets active.
----

AT rally point zulu the three crusiers made a report of what happened and a small drone probe was sent in system to keep an eye on the planet hiding in the showed of a moon the small probe was barely a meter long and almost 40cm wide.



transmitting date now....
.....
.....
Data transmission link established encrypting...
....
....
Encrypted transmission begining...
<insert video feed of system here> was sent to the assembled ships as they watched the new comers and studied them and formulated a good attack plan.

ooc: total new force 2000 standard infantry will detail more soon, 24 HBT each carrying 1 artillery cannon an two single pulse turrets, 12 Gunships basically a hovering weapons platform 2 PD turrets and 2 Railguns for support 1 top light mortar.

Colonel Green had thought he had had enough surprises for a lifetime, but when the Xiscapian just appeared out of nowhere next to him, he almost jumped out of his skin. It bowed.
"Greetings," it said, with a strange accent that Green was too out of sorts to notice. Being the good soldier he was, he did what all good soldiers do when in doubt-salute.
"Colonel Green, pleased to make your aquaintance. I'm not surprised about what happened in orbit. They caught us completely by surprise. We've been here weeks and we didn't pick up any life signs. The opening salvo destroyed our flagship, the one cruiser we had with us, and the three remaining frigates didn't have a chance." He took a deep breath. "Thank you, ma'am, from the depths of my heart."
The bodies of the aliens had evaporated before anybody had a chance to look at them.
Across the base, hasty repairs were being made, and a desperate plea was sent out to Setulan for reinforcements. They were told it would take several hours to assemble the fleet, but an entire task force was being sent out to help.

ooc*-Setulan's FTL needs a set location in space to jump to, an almost instantaneous process. If they do not have the coordinates, they need to travel at below light speed, or make very short warp jumps.

"Thank you, ma'am, from the depths of my heart."
Lintel nodded. "I am only glad we managed to save those on this world and the colony from destruction. I am Rear Admiral Lintel of the Second Exploratory Fleet from the Kitsune Empire of Xiscapia. With your permission, Colonel, I would like for the fleet to begin beaming down troops, armour, supplies and equipment to assist you in the defense of this area. These aliens came from this planet, and they are sure to attack again, and probably continue their assault until either you are gone or whatever base or breeding ground them come from is wiped out." She looked at the man seriously. "Now that we have rescued you once, I intend to see this though to the end. Incidentally, from what nation do you hail from, and have you summoned reinforcements?"
Orbit...
The "eyes in the sky" above the planet in the form of the various Xiscapian ships spotted the troop movement of the enemy though their scanners and enlarged, enhanced camera imaging. They were approaching at a slower rate than their former comrades but they were still moving fast. The colony would have only minutes to prepare for the attackers, but perhaps they could give them a little more time...
The Destroyers Inescapable and Starfire targeted the moving columns of aliens with their guns, and unleashed a fury of energy-based weapons fire though the atmosphere directly at the group. Chances were the capital ship-grade guns would punch though the shield covering the aggressors easily, but if not enough fire was being directed around them to form craters twenty feet across and a dozen feet deep, not to mention the plants it would ignite and create a ring of flame around them.

Green snorted.
"Permission granted, Admiral. We are going to need all the help we can get. Most of our heavy equipment was aboard the ships which were just destroyed, but we still have some support guns which are being assembled as we speak. As for reinforcements, we called in the moment the attack started. A Task Force should arrive from Setulan in less than an hour, with picket ships making system in about fifteen minutes, give or take."
He looked out over the base with a grimace as Republican Guardsmen started to drag the Banshee 30mm support guns to new positions.
"As for where we hail from, its a planet and three colonized moons called the Republic of Setulan. So far as I know, you...and those bugs...are the first civilized races we have met." Green went back to being all buisness.
"We have about 2890 effectives following the attack, spread out into three lines of defense. Elite light infantry, not much in the way of armor or heavy guns. What kind of troops can you bring?"

Lintel listened to Green without interruption. Human Republic, small system holdings, making their way in the universe...these were the kinds of people that were too small to be noticed by many of the larger nations and organizations, but too big to receive much trouble from pirates or marauders. Plenty of large, modern-day nations had started from humble roots such as these, but an equal number were killed off by some tragedy, intentional or accidental.

"What kind of troops can you bring?"
"We carry about a regiment of Marines, as well as more, larger Mecha like these LAMs you see here, and a small detachment company of Xiscapian Grand Army troops with a dozen artillery pieces, mortars, snipers and engineers to construct bunkers, AA emplacements and machine-gun nests. They-" Lintel held up a hand, removing what seemed to be a communicator from her front pocket and turning around, a period of silence punctuated by a stream of strange-sounding Xiscapian native tongue. After a few seconds she turned back, a look of apprehension on her face. "Orbital reports a force of about two thousand moving in on this base, escorted by more of those ape-things, a dozen gunboats and and an estimated thirty-six hovercraft vehicles which could be either tanks or artillery. We'll start getting kitsune down here, but you need to be at the defenses now. We'll back you up once we get situated."

Two thousand five hundred Marines, (http://web.ukonline.co.uk/bingo275/DecJanFeb06/Galactic%20Marine.jpg) fifteen XGA snipers (http://home.comcast.net/~stevosteam/BlackOps.jpg) and fiftyXGA Grunts (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Image:Sithtroopermodel.jpg) were beamed to the surface in the base. Coming via cargo transports and drop ships was the twelve artillery (http://www.theforce.net/swtc/Pix/cg/fc/ataa1.jpg) pieces, nine Heavy Assault Mecha (http://uk.games-workshop.com/tau/battlesuit-configurations/images/tau-battlesuit.jpg) (HAM) and one gigantic, sky-scraper sized Command Mech. (http://eriance.deviantart.com/art/Mecha-Shocktrooper-II-18974172) The soldiers and armour spread out to form three lines: The first a group of Marines clustered around the Command Mech, the second consisted of the snipers, HAM and more Marines, and the third was the artillery staffed and guarded by the Grunts.

Green nodded and turned to his radio man, beckoning him over.
"I want whats left of First Battalion, as well as Second and Third Battalions, to hold Phase Line Alpha. Maximum frontal defense. Fourth will take position in the HQ building, to provide support for our heavy weapons. Fifth and Sixth will take up positions in Phase Line Bravo." The radio operator started to give orders as Green turned to the admiral.
"Admiral, I don't know your troops capabilitites. However, if I may be so forward as to advise you to station your marines at Phase Line Bravo and have your long range support troops take position in the HQ building. The big mechs, we can keep in reserve. I will gladly take any advice you might have to offer."

***

In space, the Picket ships of Task Force Reaver entered the system. Two Fear-Class cruisers, Divine Grace and Unstoppable, led the way into the system, followed by Green Squadron (Three Storm-Class frigates, Juniper, Saint Leo, and Wrath) and Hammer Squadron (four Viper-class destroyers, Intrepid, Fortitude, Nemesis, and Glory). All ships had shields and at maximum and primed weapons, scanning space for enemy vessels.
Rear Admiral (Junior Grade) Stephen Leafe was in full dress uniform and standing regally on the bridge as the ships entered system, rapidly decelerating. Like most Admirals in the Republican Navy, he had seen service during the Great War, and was prepared for anything.
"Sir, ships in system!"
"Easy, son. They must be the friendlies we heard about. Lets make contact."

Friendly vessels, this is Admiral Leafe of the Setulanite Republic. Please identify.

ooc-descriptions of the phase lines will be in other thread shortly

ooc: my coloum! *initaitaes plan B*
IC

The kewen Coloum was compeltely annialeted even though most of the shots missed, enough hit to wreck the coloum but then, in the crater A single kewen trooper reformed, then another then another, then one of the Horrors reformed, then more things came till the Convo was completely back minues one or two peoples, noone o f the kewen were hit vitaly only theire bodies.

The began the slow march to the alien taint.
The collections pools churned out more troopers weapons and suppiles seemily unlimeted amount, as large structers began to take form. A single quick pulse Communique was sent into deep space, Encpyted
: "Kossstemetsian alliessssss, we are being invaded. System coord-naites included randouve with fleeet and rally point Zulu for futher info if you wissssh to help".

"Admiral, I don't know your troops capabilities. However, if I may be so forward as to advise you to station your marines at Phase Line Bravo and have your long range support troops take position in the HQ building. The big mechs, we can keep in reserve. I will gladly take any advice you might have to offer."
Lintel gave a slight shrug. "You are in command here, Colonel, my troops will take all orders from you unless overridden by me. This is your turf, so to speak, and your soldiers are the only ones who have engaged these aliens on the ground. I will direct as you see fit unless I spot a flaw."
The majority of the Marines either advanced forward or fell back to Phase Line Bravo, two thousand of them. Three hundred took up positions at Phase Line Alpha, and the other two hundred withdrew to the Base. The artillery, Command Mech, four HAM, five LAM, and ten of the snipers did as well, but five of the snipers mixed themselves among Phase Line Bravo, and the other five LAM and five HAM landed at the very front lines of Phase Line Alpha.
Orbit...
"Holy fuck!"
"What is it, Gunnery Commander?"
"Sir, our strike wiped out the alien army, but they appear to have reformed with no losses!"
"What do you mean, 'reformed'?" came the irritated voice.
"I mean they melded back together into full soldiers! The entire column is back on track!"
"No use in bombarding them if they won't die. The ground troops will have to take care of them, we'll be keeping an eye out for more of those damn Cruisers...or worse!"
Friendly vessels, this is Admiral Leafe of the Setulanite Republic. Please identify.
The Executive Officer and acting commander on the Laughing Man looked over the message, critically eyeing the new arrivals. More of the same...for their sake, he hoped they were tougher than the last ones.
Copy that, Admiral, this is Acting Commander XO Vulpe aboard the XIW Laughing Man, flagship of the Second Exploratory Fleet of the Kitsune Empire of Xiscapia. We received a distress call from the vessels orbiting this world indicating they were under attack. We headed here as fast as we could, but the frigates were destroyed as we entered the system. We beat of the aggressors vessel attack, and assisted you forces on-planet in destroying the alien army. Be advised, however, another army is approaching the base, and our attempt to orbitally bombard it has had little to no effect. Our own troops are boostering the survivors numbers, and we are supplying heavy armour and air support. We could also be expecting enemy ships at any time.
OOC: Kewen, does this mean your gunships and hovercraft all magically reformed too?

Colonel Green nodded his thanks as a voice came over his vox link.
"Obliged, Admiral. Admiral ma'am, the picket forces of our relief force just arrived. You rank the current commander, so I will leave space command to you. Lets finish these guys off, Admiral."

***

Admiral Leafe took the message and turned to his signals operator.

Copy. I would like to assure you that the Setulanite Navy will not dissapoint. This time, they wont catch us with our pants down. Just tell us where you want us.

ooc: no dey died more are being sent out.
IC;

The Colum was insight and the second group of HBT and Gunships arrived taking up positions over the infantry, the Hover Bombard Tanks began shelling the line green,red and blue blobs of concentrated energys flew gracefully in a arc before inmacthing in around and infront of the forifications, the gun ships fired into the minefeild in hopes of detonatinig a few.

Colonel Green watched as the enemy artillery started to land on the defenders. Most of the shells were falling short for the time being, but that would certainly change once they found range. A few landed in the Phase Line, killing twenty or more Setulanite troopers. He picked up his vox.

"This is Green to all forces. Artillery units, I want heavy fire on the advancing infantry. Support weapons, I want you to take out that enemy armor! Snipers, choose your targets. Phase Line Alpha, fire at will. Let's send these guys down to hell!"

The Banshees wailed as the 30mm high explosive shells started to rain on the enemy tanks. The Mauler anti-tank rockets were held in reserve for the time being. Heavy machineguns, the K-2 .50 calibers dug in to Phase Line Alpha, started to fire as well. The range was still extreme for standard small arms, so the majority of the Guardsmen held fire.

Green was ready to see what the Xiscapians were capable of. He decided to keep the bipedal armor in reserve for the time being-he would use them to seal a breach at worst and chase down a routing enemy at best.

The Troopers cept on marching as the rounds slammed into the sheild (yes that came back too... im not getting ripped apart by heavy weps fire this time!), the HBT which were behind the sheild were safe for the time being the Gunships found a path through the feild with a 12% casultie rate at worst and fired severl small becons to guide the infantry before the sped off towards the fort gaining altitude they doged some fire but one caught some shells and exploded, the rest doged and weeved till they got within weapons range of the second line of fortifications and began raining fire on them.


The artillery began focusing their shots more and more and more shells kept on hitting the line as they walked their wall of fire forward.

(OOC-I want to wait for Xis to list what his guys do on the ground and in orbit before responding)

ooc: kk

A small crack of light opened in the fabric of the universe, roughly thirty-six thousand kilometres above the planet's surface, and four small subcapital-class ships shot from it, travelling at 11,052 kilometres per hour.

The small sub-capitals were the preliminary sensor group for the larger squadron that began to squeeze its way through the slowly widening crack behind. An arrowhead of flak frigates boosted to overtake the sensor squadron and settled in their forward slot, while a smaller arrowhead of torpedo frigates took up position behind. A beam of exotic energy shot from one of the sensor ships to tie off the gap in space to their aft.

Suddenly a huge silver mass jumped in below the fleet. This was the battleship Paul J. Keating, massively-beweaponed centrepiece of the Kostemetsian taskforce. The dark sphere-and-quadruple-rod assemblies of flak turrets protruded from its surface, while an array of ports along its upper hull signified a frightening amount of torpedo tubes.

A communications link opened, ship-to-ship at first, then expanding to include the fleet.

"Keating, your jump is logged. Softlines up, fabpipes online, operational readiness 100%. Over."

The Keating's commanding officer, Admiral Reuben Charleston, keyed his earset and spoke.

"Thanks, Ethelwulf Control. Glad to have you with us today. Sensor footage?"

Planetary holomaps sprung up across the fleet as a prelude to the Ethelwulf of Wessex's response, which came half a second later. Small dots appeared thickly across the planet's surface and exponentially more sparsely in orbit.

"Affirmative. I'll summarise: five thousand Setulans and Xiscapians planetside with lots of special weapons and air support, facing about two thousand unaided Kewen. Up here, there's twenty of us and nineteen of them, again mixed Setulans and Xiscapians. One is a civilian ship of some sort, and most aren't capitals. The Kewen sitrep says a task fleet is inbound, but they never defined 'task fleet', so assume minimal support for safety.

"As for us, we have all MDF personnel reporting no problems post-jump. We... may need slightly more, though, in light of the planetary situation, which is the major campaign going on by the look of things. On that note, softlines to Command are up if we need to call home, status is five by five.

"Naval line is reporting all torpedo tubes and flak cannons are online and fully ready. I think we're ready to go."

Taking a moment, the admiral spoke again, this time in a state of Zen-like calm. "Roger, Ethelwulf.

"Fleet - move to rally point Zulu, link up with the Kewen and prepare to engage."

ooc: rally point zulu is not in the same system!! but nvm.. im just asuuming you jumped out to RPZ ? an d setulan + Xis me and kost will continue chatting at RPZ and plan , so the thread will keep moving but your guys wont be left out.
IC:

The probe watched as the Kostemetisan fleet jumped in then promptly jumped out to rally point zulu, If anAI could use the facil experssion -_-;; then that would be the perfect time. it compreised a quick report and sent it to the Kewen task force.

The Kewen fleet was arrayed in a 3d Arrow head position with the Battle Cube in the center the three Battle crusiers arrayed around it the twin carriers behind it and the multitude of destoryers and PDfrigs bridging the gap.

"Hail, Kossstemetisan Alliesss, we thank you for ressssponding to our call."

"Kewen allied taskforce, this is the battleship Paul J. Keating. Squawk engagement preparedness status, over."

The Admiral was still slightly uncomfortable with the Kewen, that race being a new group of allies. He never knew quite how they would react, and he'd almost had an eye gouged out once by an angry humaniform.

"100% ready, relaying targeting data now, assss ssssoon as we exit FTL open fire" Ordered the Kewen counter part "we are preparing final combat checksss now" he added.

a few minutes later after some vital info was swapped and combat plans readied namel the Kostemetisans would tackle the Xispaisn while the kewen ships would wipe out the Setulan forces then help the Kostemetisan.

The combined fleet a fearful sight indeed appeared in the system near the planet and within seconds the kewen vessels opened fire the Battle Crusiers oepened up on any Setulan vessel while the mian gun slowl charged up, the destoryers co-ordinated fire with the Crusiers and added their fire to the mix while the small PD firgates buzzed about the Crusiers and Destoryers readying PD for the inevitable MIssle counter attack.

The Cube one the other hand made a beeline for the dead center of the enemy fleet its 2km by 2km faces bristling with weapons, The cube tilted silght and a single point of one of its four egdes faced the enemy fleet then several dozen green beams lashed out from each of the three faces of the cube facing the enemy fleet.

ooc2: kost, post yer opening fire and then we wait for them to response tomorrow.

"Targeting data received, appropriate action taken," the Admiral replied.

As one, the spherical turrets swiveled to focus their deadly apertures on the Xiscapian fleet. Red bolts shot from the formerly blank circles and arrowed in towards the Xiscapian ships, excepting the medical ship; as ruthless as they were feeling at the moment, the Kostemetsian Ninth Special Task Force would not destroy a civilian vessel.

Following the red bolts were a swarm of glowing orange antimatter torpedoes, so bright that it hurt the eyes to look at their demonic shine. They, too, arrowed in, adding to the flock of lethal objects.

OOC: Had a nice big post up and ready to go but Jolt ate it :headbang:
IC:
Base...
"Lets finish these guys off, Admiral."
Lintel nodded. "I will be returning to retake command of my fleet. Colonel Dui is in command of the ground forces here and will be taking the initiative. Good luck, Colonel Green. I will see you after the battle." With that Lintel vanished as she was beamed up to the Laughing Man.
Moments later the alien attack came. A dozen Marines at Phase Line Alpha were killed or seriously wounded by the artillery, while the rest hunkered down and spat blaster bolts or started up heavy machine guns at the advancing infantry safe behind their shield. As more shells arched down into the defending area the quick engineering from the XGA became apparent. Laser turrets, mobile but fixed into position for now, swiveled and targeted the falling plasma, destroying them utterly with precise, well-placed shots aided by lightening-fast A.I. targeting.

The gunships, however, posed more of a problem. As they flew in and began to rain hell down on allied forces two LAM shot up from the ground, flying with their thrusters, and both targeted a gunboat, letting off a energy beam each with enough power to destroy a tank. Each then engaged a gunship, latching on to the front by digging in with one hand, railguns firing point-blank into the cockpits while the energy sword in their other hand plunged and twisted into the armored side of the small craft. If the ships showed any sign of exploding or going down they would eject off and find a new target. Marines armed with portable SAM launchers on the ground also fired their missiles at the gunboats.

The artillery at the base let loose, shells pounding the shield and turning anything stupid enough to stick so much as a finger outside the force field into so many chunky fragments. The regular shells packed with explosives were intermixed with a heavier, more stubby projectile. This would smash into the ground, burrowing down six or so feet, and stop. A minute time delay was activated, and when the counter ran down the bomb safety inside the metal would go off, blasting anything above it apart. Even if the aliens were protected from the air and all sides by the shield, they would not be saved by an attack from below.

Space...
Lintel was beamed back up to the XIW Laughing Man, and suddenly the situation was grim. True, the Setulan fleet had arrived, but they were still outnumbered nearly three-to-one, and these new arrivals definitely weren't the same guys they had chased off just minutes before. As she watched the enemy approach she began to issue orders, both to her own ships and to the Picket Fleet. "Travel in packs, no less than two ships together, you all need to be covering each others backs. In this situation if your vessel becomes isolated it could be surrounded and destroyed, but be mindful of Superweapons, nuclear devices and the like. If you clump, one powerful strike will take you all out. Don't clump, but stick near each other. Solid cannons and missiles for the smaller ships, torpedoes and lasers for the larger ones. Setulan fleet, if you have any fighters or combat small craft, now is the time."

As the Battlecube dove into the Setulan Picket Fleet, it quickly outstripped the rest of it's fleet, and Lintel saw an oppertinity. The kitsune took this opportunity and opened fire, mostly MAC shells and Ion Cannons aiming for the PD frigates in the distant fleet, hoping to destroy or cripple at least a few of them before they shot at the Setulan. Thirty-nine fighters, two patrols and two corvettes launched from the hangers on the various ships and went to protect the Xiscapian flanks from opportunistic Kewen ships. However, they were saving the real guns for the Kostemetsians, and once the other enemy fleet was past they turned their attention back to the comparatively distant enemy ships.

The shields had been raised when the Second Assault Fleet had entered the system, and they hadn't taken so much as a railgun bullet to them, so the glowing yellow bubble-like barrier took little damage from the lasers. Contrary to popular belief, shielded craft do not rock or shudder when struck by fire, as any explosive or weapon force powerful enough to move an entire ship, even in space, would inflict serious damage. Indeed, the only way those inside knew they were being shot at was because the exterior cameras fixed to the hull told them this and the shields reported the precise areas of the hits. Lintel watched as the beams struck and were absorbed by the Laughing Man's shields, not even blinking. "Status?" she asked one of her bridge officers. "Shields holding at eighty-five percent, Rear Admiral." the gray-uniformed kitsune reported. "Hull nominal, small craft away, and all weapons are hot. The gunnery crews await your command to fire."

An instant later the Scanning Officer spoke up. "Missiles detected, heading oh-four-thirty-six-nine, readings indicate anti-matter." Lintel nodded. "Activate point-defenses, and while that's taken care of here is what I want..."

As the glowing anti-matter missiles streaked in, understandably slower than the lasers, the point-defenses came to life with a roar (or would have, if sound could be heard in space). Missile launchers turned and shot fighter-sized rockets out at the incoming enemy projectiles. Once the rockets were within the horde of missiles they would detonate, taking out dozens and, because they were anti-matter, possibly hundreds of missiles at a time. On all the ships laser turrets fired to intercept the remaining bombs, green or crimson lines connecting the sleek trajectile to the gun and resulting in the prompt destruction of said missile. However, the laser would then "bounce" to another weapon, detonating that one also, creating a spiderweb of explosions in a effect that is known to the layman as "Diamond Fire."

While this pretty lightshow was occurring the Xiscapians began to give back some of the fire that had been sent at them. It was arranged as this: The four Cruisers at the front, the two Destroyers behind and slightly higher, the Battleship at the back and directly over the planet hovered the Carrier and Medical Ship. The Carrier was preparing small craft to send down to the surface to assist the ground troops, and both were protected by a wing of fighters and a couple of corvettes and patrols. Mainly targeting the Torpedo and flak frigates the Cruisers fired while the Laughing Man aimed fully for the Paul J. Keating. The Cruisers fired two MAC guns with two volleys each at four separate frigates while four Light Guns each (very thin, precise white laser beam, designed to bore though shields and strike critical systems and areas such as bridges, engines, weapons, vulnerable points in the hull, windows, hangers ect.) targeted another four frigates and finally a missile volley streaked out consisting of a mix of anti-matter, nuclear and normal explosive warheads tracked to collide with more frigates.

The Battleship opened up with it's Heavy Ion Cannons (designed to shut down electrical systems), MAC cannons and a storm of laser fire at the enemy Battleship. Lintel hoped the attack would be effective enough to put a little fear into the hearts of the enemy, otherwise this would be a long, probably costly battle...

Leafe received the orders from the Xiscapians and nodded. They made sense. He stood up at his command chair and started roaring orders.

"Let the Xiscapians take care of the others for now, we'll kill the bastards who wrecked our fleet. Green squardon, kill the escorts. Hammer, evade and move! Your job is to keep their small craft off of us. Unstoppable, your with us. Head for the enemy Battlecube, we'll bracket and destroy!" A series of confirmations came from across the fleet.

The two Fear-Class cruisers maxed power and approached the enemy battleship. Ravening green beams of light, launched from the battlecube, crashed into the cruisers. Many missed the cruisers thanks to their quick burst of speed, but a few smashed into Divine Grace.
"Sir, shields down to 86%!" Leafe laughed mirthlessly.
"You didn't get us unprepared this time, you bastards!"
"Permission to return fire with Ions, Admiral!"
"Denied! Save them!"
More enemy fire sailed in.
"Sir, shields down to 81%! Unstoppable reports shields down to 93%!"
"Hold course, damn you!"
As the two cruisers approached the enemy Battlecube, they maxed shields to their prows.
"Just...a...little...longer!"

Hammer squadron powered into the enemy destroyers for what would probably be an epic destroyer showdown. Nemesis was hit hard by the enemy fire and had its engines taken out in the opening volley while Intrepid suffered mostly superficial damage to its hull, though the shields took a beating. The Vipers, trading protection for speed, started a series of wild manuevers that did not stop them from launching torpedoes.
60 of the massive melta-torpedoes hurtled not towards the enemy capital ships, but towards their destroyers instead, with six per target.

Green squadron had lost a lot of face in the ambush at the begining of the campaign. The three frigates lost had all been Storm-Class ships, and they were desperate to prove to their new found allies that their vessels were worthy of pride. Moving into a close formation, the three frigates merged their shields, a design fluke that had been put to good use throughout the years. Presenting a shield three times as resilient as an individual frigates, they were mostly untouched by the enemy fire (shields were only brought down to about 96%). Resisting the first enemy volley, they fired their torpedoes, ten each, with two torpedoes targeting each enemy destroyer (for a total of ten targets).

The battle in space had well and truly begun.

***

Colonel Green gritted his teeth as most of the fire was stopped by the alien's shield. The Xiscapian jump troops were doing a good job so far, but it might not be enough.
"Rocket troops, target the enemy gunboats!"
10 rockets were fired at the enemy armor. Green didn't like it, but all they could do for the time being was pour on the fire.

The Cube Came at the crusiers head on after a minor course change, and let loose with a Barrage of Weapons fire as its Railguns slipped out from its coverings and opened fire on one of the Crusiers Several dozen missles were launched at that same crusier while the Assimilator beams(laser cannons) opened fire on it too. The Battle Cube Angled itslef in mid manouver so a single point was facing the second crusier and bring a few more cannons to bear agaisnt the first Crusier. While it Divereted Power from its Multitap cannons to its engines it pushed itself to maxiumum speed and more on a direct ramming course.


The PD frigates opened fire on all the missles they could see obliterating most if not all with only one or two getting through the Destoryers and Crusiers Co-ordinated their fire into the INcoming Setulan Destoryers and frigates firing everyhing and anything possible.
The Carriers Who had for the most part done nothing in this battle Slinked to the edge of the System after releasing 12 Dagger FIghters and their Needle escorts as stealthly as possible the fighters moved to the planet.

On the Ground the Sheild gen was rocked by more firepowe its internal power dropping to 65% it couldnt hold much longer under all this now the Entire collum was near the line very close, The troopers unslung their weapons and began sending rapid bursts of accurates pulses towards the forifications while the Horrors Began priming their Cannons

The artillery kept on walking their wall of death into the back of the camp the Enemies flak doing nothing to stop the balls of energy, the intent of these beams was to wreck anything in the back of the fort them come back to the front.

The gun ships wernt faring so well with only 6 of there numbers left, one of the mechs latched itself onto the Gunship, but the pilot had primed the Selfdestructed before the mech choose him and just as the mech landed the Gunship detonated in a big ball of fire as its powercore went up.

Back at the Pools A new attack force was being formed the Hulk of a Single small Crusier was being built on the planet while hundreds of thousands od horribly assorted looking creatures filled out of the pools and lay still in large numbers waiting for the order to go.

The comprehensive scans provided by the sensor frigates started to fizzle somewhat as the ion cannon bolt arrowed in, which was the first warning.

Urgent orders flashed out across the fleet, then inspiration struck, courtesy of the Ethelbald of Wessex's captain.

"We have the metaweapon. Perhaps now is the time to use it."

Sublight engine power wowed down across the fleet in favour of frontal shields, just-visible blue lines sharply delineating hemispheres of space. Spots across the front of the battleship began to glow blue, as did similar networks of spots on the sensor frigates. The circle of a wormhole grew between the battleship and the sensor frigates, a sheer black aperture with the same just-visible blue lines delineating the edge.

Spatial manipulation came into play, and the wormhole unfolded and shot out into an ethereal tube, expanding its far throat to swallow an overwhelming majority of the incoming projectiles. Then, under the skilled hands of an unknown coordination officer, the near terminus swiveled to point at the Xiscapians. What happened next was so cheesy it would have made the worst comedian in the galaxy groan.

The flock of Xiscapian weapons, which had been completely deprived of any frame of reference while in the wormhole, flew back out to serve as dumbfire missiles bearing down on their former owners.

With that sorted out, the Keating expanded its frontal shields to deflect the remaining projectiles.

---

The Keating's systems officer spoke calmly.

"Ion blast from the Xiscapians incurred twenty percent shield damage, laser fire incurred another five percent. Recharging, should be back to full in five minutes thirty. Currently tracking a swarm of MAC rounds. Superlight drives will be offline for the next three minutes thanks to metaweapon use. Sublight drives are at full. Taking action to eliminate threats now."

Keying in a few commands, the systems officer transferred a dynamic dataset to the weaponry console, where the weapons officer activated it.

---

Maser beams lanced out directly in front of the MAC rounds. Although the beams weren't very wide, they were still quite large enough to turn the rounds into gas. At the same time, a stray Xiscapian missile slammed into an unwary Offa of Mercia; that ship spun, fire pluming almost majestically from its midsection.

---

"We've lost Offa of Mercia," the systems officer said grimly. "All crew report OK, but the engines, shields and weapons have gone to hell. We're going to need to evac them, assuming the Xiscapians show them mercy."

"Good lord!" Gasped Leafe as the missiles hit his ship. Shields were reading a dangerous 46% after the concentrated enemy attack, and while most of the missiles were stopped by the close defense systems, three missiles made impacts that blew out several Macro Cannons.
"Sir, this thing can bring far more firepower to bear than us!" Leafe growled, deep in his throat. He made a quick tactical decision.
"Power past it! Give me full broadsides as we go by, but do not, repeat do not slow to engage! We'll blow past them and head for the enemy cruisers."
As the two Fear-Classes went by, they blitzed the cube with the awsome might of their broadsides-almost two hundred (since a few guns had been destroyed) shells, as well as twenty Ion shots, hammered into the Cube.

Hammer managed to take minimal damage from the enemy volley, barely. While three of the ships were ducking and dodging frantically and managed to avoid most of the shots (shields being brought down to 86%, 79%, and 90%, respectively), the crippled Nemesis didn't have a chance, and shuddered as it started to burn, shedding pieces of armor as its crew tried desperately to escape. This time, only forty five torpedoes flashed out towards the Kewen destroyers. The captains devoutely hoped that they had used up some of their anti-missile defenses.

Green Squadron's merged shield was broken up as the three ships split, revealing that the damage had been spread out equally, meaning that each ship was down to 80%. They drove in close to the enemy destroyers, planning to drive a wedge in between them, when fire from the enemy cruisers mangled Juniper badly. Burning, it diverted course and rammed one of the Kewen destroyers. The other two frigates opened up with full broadsides, targeting three enemy destroyers with 75 Macro shots each. They also fired all twenty of their torpedoes at one enemy destroyer.

***

Green watched with a combination of satisfaction and trepidation as the battle continued. While most of the enemy tanks had been destroyed, the damn shield was effectively protecting their infantry from return fire while the line start getting pasted by the enemy artillery, who had finally found range.
"Damn it! Artillery, take out that damn shield! Give me heavy fire on the shield!"
All the troops in the first Phase Line started to fire at the shield, as well as the heavier support weapons in the second line. They had to take out the shield.

As the Kewen neared the Marines at Phase Line Alpha opened fire, even as their fire bounced off the shield and several of them dropped from the enemy shots. Grenades rolled forward and slipped under the shield to detonate close enough to the enemy to cause casualties. As soon as the Marines could get inside the shield, the real fighting would begin.

(ooc: assuming you've recognized that I'm shooting energy and not flak at you...)
The laser turrets were effective enough in beating off the worst of the fire, but one of them had taken a direct hit from an enemy blast, destroying it, and another had been damaged and lost quite a bit of it's range. Soldiers still went flying or were torn apart by the artillery, but the laser turrets were doing their job. Xiscapia's own artillery continued to pound the enemy shields.

The LAM went flying as the gunboat exploded, shields fried and all systems offline, landing amongst the troops of Phase Line Bravo. The other LAM generally engaged the gunboats from a slight distance of a few yards, using their railguns and beam cannons. Marines kept up the assault on the gunships with their SAMs.

A flight of fighters, a patrol and a corvette swooped over the landscape, attempting to trace where the enemy was coming from. If they could find their base, they could destroy it, and halt the flow of reinforcements. If any more soldiers, horrors or machines went to join their comrades they would reveal the location of their spawning pools to the Xiscapians.

Space...
"What in all hell..." The Executive Officer, like the rest of the fleet, stared in awe as the sudden black hole-like construct swallowed their fire, doing no apparent damage to the fleet. But suddenly there was a flash of light, and all the weapons went flying back. Lintel stood calmly as the lasers and missiles struck around and onto them, shaking her head even as she thought Ye gods! Such power! "Fools. Did they really think we would arm our ships with weapons that could hurt us?" she said aloud. "How are the shields?"

"Eighty-three percent, Rear Admiral." Reported one of the Bridge Officers. "There is no visible damage on the enemy save for one of the frigates, ma'am. It has fallen out of ranks and doesn't appear to be moving under it's own power."
"If it heads this way order one of our vessels to capture it with a tractor beam and reel it in. The crew is to be stripped of weapons and uniforms, but not harmed, and put in the brig." Lintel ordered on the off-chance that the situation would occur.

"Open fire again, same targeting as before, same weapons. And we hope to Qonn they can't use that again..." Or we are royally screwed. She thought to herself. Again the ships, after a few seconds of recharge and reloading, fired once more.

In orbit the Carrier spotted the dozen approaching Kewen Needle fighters. 50 Anti-Ship guns and 25 Ion Cannons locked on and began to fire, the AS guns spraying a malestorm of laser fire while the slower, deadlier Ion Cannons shot short, controlled bursts of blue energy to leave the fighters drifting and easily picked off by AS fire or taken captive.

ooc: ! hey i was trying to ram your crusier at full speed! and it was a direct path since you didnt divert ill assume i hit hehehe 1.6 million metric tonnes of raw cube!
IC

The Cube Drew nearer to the Crusiers and showing its might it braved thier broadside and rammed into one of them While the other crusier flew past the guns on the other faces activated and sent hails of fire at it. Its sheilds dropping to 62%.

The Crusiers and Destryers retasked their firepower and opened fire with everything they had at the Diving enemy ships (your three ships the ones thatwere linked with sheilds) ignoring all else the PD ships caught a bit of side shot fron someone and two of their numbers erupted into large fireballs while the rest contined shooting at missles. One of the destroyers was rammed it sheilds flaring briefly before collapsing the teo hulls collided and the destroyer exploded covering the alien vessel in flames. the crusiers sustained m,nimal damaged while they destroyers took most it some were heavily damaged others moderatly damaged.

The Fighters came under fine but they managed to escape mostly unharmed that was except the ten or eleven needle fighters turning into a mini mini sun with an orbiting debries feild with the rest had made it to the planet and were about to descend to the Collection pools when scanners showed a Alien fighter wing not far off the 12 Daggers each leading 12 Drone needle fighters zipped down into the atmoshper with weapons primed ready to take on the enemy fighters.

---

The portable sheild was down to 13% but it carried them far enough grenades and the like detonated under the sheilds killed a few troopers but not a signifigant amount the sheild deatcivated only 11m away from the Fortifications and the horrors charged forward yelling alien warcrys and send smaller balsts of Fire much similar to the HBT artillery fire but on a smaller scale, towards the forts.
The Infantry charged forward and behind the Horrors adding their fire to the fray. While some of their number were knocked down they got up again missing limbs or not they stilled crawled to their target.

The HBT angled up some more and the shots arc over they tried to find the annoying anti air batteries that cept on stopping some of their shots. The Gunships realising it was a lost fightwith only three of their numbers left went into a dive and headed straight for the HQ building one of the dived for the laser battiers that was shooting at the Artilley.


Back at the Collection pool a ring of SAM sites lined the base. while yet more things were churned out waiting...

ooc: Xis if im correct you havve your tanks and crasp behind the HQ building or near enough there right? coz thats war my Arty is aiming

OOC: Yup, inside the HQ actually are my artillery and mecha. My Command Mech is directly behind the base.
IC:
Ground...
The Xiscapians were ready for the enemy charge, and as the shield went down a massive storm of fire met the footsoldiers and Horrors. Grenades, mortars, rocket launchers, machines guns, rifles fire and sniper shots all slammed into the enemy. For every foot of ground they took the kitsune were determined they would lose at least one soldier. The Horrors proved tougher, and most of the mortars, machine guns, rockets and grenades were directed at them.

Corporal Havelock had been assigned to protect this PD turret with his squad of two Marines, and so far he'd had nothing to do but watch as the laser destroyed plasma shell after plasma shell. Now a gunboat was screamed down from the sky at him.
Finally!
He grinned as the other two kitsune scattered in fear and hefted a rocket launcher, firing it directly at the cockpit of the rapidly approaching gunship.

The other two gunships were abruptly met with a storm of fire as the Command Mech unleashed it's railguns and missiles at them. They would not be likely to survive the sudden unleashment of destructive power, whether they kept coming or ran for it. To top it off the Marines on the ground fired their SAM missiles at the gunships as they blasted past.

The Needle fighters came down on top of the Flight of Shuriken class fighters unawares, but the patrols and corvettes were more alert and three missiles, as well as twenty-five mounted turrets, four AS guns from the corvette, and two turbolasers streaked out to meet the enemy. The fighters did an abrupt barrel roll and turned about, flying up to hopefully be able to bank back down and get a drop of on the enemy.

Another two flak frigates went down, one exploding into tiny fragments of gore and metal. Charleston cursed and ordered a damage report; the results shown were not encouraging in the slightest. Edmund Ironside and Athelstan the Glorious were out of commission. Three ships out already, at this early stage!

Some astute weapons officer booted the Keating's coordination system, essentially a piece of software synchronising each and every weapon across the fleet with those of the Keating. Locking was slowed down by a few seconds, but the damage tradeoff was supposed to be positive, according to the boffins.

Red circles sprang up across the Xiscapian fleet, numbers scrolling next to them. The Laughing Man was prioritised, and fire control permissions quickly came through, at which moment the weapons officer tapped in the fire command.

Each and every laser and fast kinetic weapon throughout the fleet fired, three quarters aimed at the Laughing Man. Torpedoes followed. It was the same tactic the Xiscapian fleet had staved off before, only on an immensely larger scale and with priority changes.

The rest of the weapon banks were put into harrying the destroyers and cruisers surrounding the Laughing Man. Such a method would do no damage, but should at least distract them from their objectives.

Charleston opened a communications link to the Kewen battlecube, simultaneously keying his earset.

"KWV Times, this is the CO of the Paul Keating; would you be able to spare some destroyers? We need coordinated fire support on the Laughing Man; I don't think it's going down any time soon, not without help."

(OOC: This to your satisfaction?)

ooc: da.
IC
"I think we might be able to Kostemetisan Allies" The Battle Cube shot back, three Destoryers broke off and moved to engage the Laughingman firing everything that had at it.

The Battlecube hit the Unstoppable with a sickening crunch, ripping off the engines and sending the ship spinning out of control. The engine was crushed horribly, while the remaining part of the ship was totalled. Escape pods started to eject from it all over as the captain gave the command to abandon ship.

Fortunately, the destruction of the Unstoppable had drawn attention away from Divine Grace just long enough. Powering in amongst the frigates which it outsized by more than twenty seven times, it let loose with all its Macro cannons on both sides, sending ten shells each at 19 enemy frigates. (It could only send five at another one due to the damage it had taken.) It also let loose with its ten ion cannons, all targeted at a single enemy cruiser.
"Payback time!" shouted Liefe. He cackled loudly. "Burn, you motherfuckers, BURN!" He knew the move he had made was probably suicidal, and the moment the enemy cruisers could they would blow him away. But he would make them lose most of their flak ships, and that made his sacrifice worthy.

Hammer squadron, given a temporary reprieve, took the opportunity to barrel even closer to the enemy destroyers. Another volley of torpedoes sailed in, and hopefully now the anti-torpedo ships would be occupied by the Divine Grace reaking havoc.

Green squadron was not so happy about the sudden change of attention. They took heavy hits, leaving St. Leo without a Captain or Executive Officer after a direct hit to the bridge that bypassed shields. Wrath too took heavy blows, bringing shields down to a meagre 29%. It released torpedoes, but for the sake of self perservation could not present its broadside.

***

The battle at Phase Line Alpha was raging. Green looked on and decided that the Kitsune were not only good samaritans, but also excellent soldiers.
"Banshees, target the enemy infantry! All heavy guns, target INFANTRY!"
Along the line, fire shifted from the horrors to the advancing infantry.
"Xiscapian reserves! ATTACK NOW, TARGET THE HORRORS!" He hoped the heavy weapons the bipedal tanks carried would bring down those monstrosities.

At Phase Line Alpha, the fighting was close and brutal. Hissing aliens jumped into the trenches only to be shot to pieces by resisting guardsmen while Setulanites manning the barricades were being dropped by the horribly persistant enemy fire. The base could not fall-there was nowhere to retreat to.

ooc: setulan your missing the two gunships on a sucide run on ya HQ.

The first few lines of Infantry hoped down into the trench suddenly their rifles were gone and in place were large swords screaming battle cries they hacked and slashed into the Alien lines, Some of them fell beneath the Alien fire some the bullets just flew through the bodes. One of the horrors jumped up on top of the fortifications then hurled itslf into the air, directly at the hovering mech that was engaging the The Gunships he hoped to catch it by surrise as it wasnt looking at him, down below the horrors made it into the lines and joined the smaller infantry in the blood bath massive fists picked up the pint sized Guardnesmen and used them as clubs.

----

In Space

----

The Battlecube dislodeged itself from the wreck of the Alien Crusier and tractored in any escape pods they would be directed to a single hanger bay in which hundreds of stone face guads in black armour would be waiting for them.

After it had tractored in a few Pods focusing mian on the ones that appeared to jettision from the bridge it moved off towards the Crusier amoust the Kewen lines, guns already re-aiming and firing.

The 5 Crusiers ignored the alien one as best they could one of the Crusiers took heavy fire and its sheilds dropped to 4%,while continuing to rain fire upon the three annoying missle boats*same target as before) The PD frigates dip duck doged and dived trying to aviod fire another 5 Turned into fireballs before they scooted away deeper into the battle towards the destroyers, destorying any missles they came along.

The Destoryers fired a few waining shots at the incoming hammer squadron but for the most part focused on the Three incoming ships.

ooc-Kewen, I'm gonna wait for Xis before I post anything else about the battle on the ground. It's 1 over here, I'm done for the night...will edit this post tomorrow for the blood, guts, and glory.

"Status?"
"We are reading another two frigates out of action, one of them has been blown apart. If we just keep bashing them we'll-"
A different voice now. "Rear Admiral! Massive energy signatures coming from the enemy fleet, we are sensing target locks by the hundred-"
"Divert all power from the engines and heavy weapons to the shields!" Lintel cut him off. "Point-defenses are to-"
Then the laser fire came in, smashing against the shield of the Laughing Man, shortly followed by the rail guns, cannons and torpedoes. The PD AS guns managed to intercept some of the torpedoes, but most of the fire simply came though to dash itself upon the force field.
As the barrage ended the bridge crew, having not so much as flinched but still shaken by the amount of fire, began to compile their damage reports. Words filtered into Lintel's ears:
"Shields down to forty-eight, attempting to give them more juice-"
"Torpedo sunk though, our hull has taken minimal damage..."
"B-section reporting casualties!"
"Fires are being neutralized now..."
"Taking fire! Alien vessels, three destroys, broke off from the rest and are on course with us now!"
"Shields reading at thirty-seven percent, total engine failure due to zero power, shields have been recharged to forty percent."
"Right," Lintel shook her head. "Ignore the Destroyers, have our flank guard deal with them and dispatch the Inescapable to annihilate them. I want all of the fleet's Heavy Guns on that big, ugly one. Focus the beams to cutter, I want to give them something to remember us by. The Cruisers and Starfire are to continue their volleys on the frigates, MAC and Ion on the Sensor ones, Light guns on the flak, try for crippling shots, but we'll take dead too."

Forty-one Heavy Guns from the Battleships, Cruisers and remaining Destroyer swiveled and blasted away at the Paul Keating. Heavy Guns are made to destroy capital ships. They can utterly destroy frigates, fighters, gunboats and other smaller ships in a single shot, wiping out the shields and simply ripping though the hull. The lasers are highly effective against both shields and armor, charged with heat equivalent of that of a sun core combined with nearly faster-than-the-eye-can-follow blue-white beams. Worse yet, if any shots connected with armor they would start fires there, unhindered by space because of the amount of metal for the flames to consume, and inside a vessel a large fire could be deadly. The beams did not simply fire forward, but raked along the side, spreading the damage over the entire shield for five seconds each, at an admittedly reduced power than a single shot.

The Ion Cannons, MAC guns, Light Guns and Heavy Ion Cannons continued to aim for the frigates, intermixed with missiles. A Ion blast could mess with the sensors and targeting computers on a flak frigate, and this might allow some of the missiles though...

Finally the thirty-nine fighters, two patrols and two corvettes reached the three Kewen Destroyers first, backed by the Inescapable. Out of the protection of the flak frigates, the fighters began their bombing runs, thirteen to a ship dropping twenty-five bombs per fighter while the patrols made strafing runs to target the middle Destroyer's bridge and the corvettes swung around to destroy the engines on all three with their guns and missiles from close range. The Inescapable was outnumbered three-to-one, but it opened up with all it's guns, Heavies for the right-most one, Light and Ions for the middle, and a rain of missiles for the left.

Ground...
Once the infantry charged them with swords drawn, the Marines felt slow, feral grins spread across their faces. Swordplay was one place where the kitsune were unmatched by anyone, and they certainly wouldn't lose to these foolish aliens! Drawing their own katanas, each different and personalized to it's owner, the Xiscapians fought back, aided by years of training in how to use them and a natural grace and speed that made them difficult to face in CQCV combat. And they had no inhibitions about fighting one enemy face-to-face while an alley stabbed him in the back or blew his brains out from behind. Others, backs covered by their comrades and allies, kept up the rocket, machine gun or small arms fire on the foot soldiers outside.

The LAM did see the Horror coming, as a gigantic King-Kong type with spiked armor is hard to miss even in a battle, but he did not have enough time to dodge. The pilot made the best of the situation and activated his energy sword, stabbing it into the Horror's face as it connected, bringing them both down. The LAM and HAM rose from their own lines and came down hard on the remaining Horrors, rail guns, energy beams, laser cannons and small missiles all flying at them as the mecha descended. Artillery continued to rain just beyond the bunkers, killing the soldiers out there was they tried to charge. Sniper fire cracked across the battlefield as snipers continually found easy marks amongst the horde.
However, the kitsune had not played their trump card yet.

ooc: Xis, this is plain BS now, kosts black hole a ma bob was once thing, but your laughing man was hit BY HIS WHOLE FLEET or there abouts, add in the fact that three of my destroyers helped, you are being unrealisitc, you can talk about your rule of thumb all you like but even a superior ship cannot stand up to fleets wort of firepower and lose what 20% of your sheilds.
alkso in your post you cliam lasers are quite effective vs sheilds and hull yet kosts lasers seem to do aboslutly jack shit.

The fighter's bombs were shot down but some slipped through incurring minimal damage, the shots to the engines did nothing at all as the engine the same as the bridge is deep in the hull protected from fire. When the corvets turned around, the rear turrets opened fire on them. Two of the destoryers broke of and tried to head around the Kostemetisan fleet while the third increased to full speed diverting weapon power to engines and sheilds it arrowed itself towards one of the enemy ships that looked vaguly like a carrier.

The Battle Cube drew over the alien crusier and again moved into ramm it coming from behind and not taking much flak it hoped to surprise this thing its sheilds a mer 38% after the last ram.

The remaining ships cept fireing on the targets they had before A crusiers sheilds almost failing and would fail if the Enemy crusier didnt die soon *hint hint kill dat crusier!*

---

On the ground The Kewen soilders smiled and laughed manically as blades passed right through them but some of them grew careless and the blades sliced through something vulernable and and the soilder would crumped, but the 4th 5th and 6th lines clambered over the barrier as the ones outside contnued shooting and almost 100 fell from fire, For the most part Kewen sword play was simply walking towards the target watching the blows pass straight through them hoping it didnt hit anything vital and them stabbing the aliens.


The Horror jumped up and felt the blade go through its head narrowly missing something vital by only a few centermeters AS they plumeted to the ground the horror tried to rip the arms of this thing.

One horror was blown apart while it was in the fortifications two horrors jumped out of the forifications and made a beeline for the HQ building as small arms fire bounced off them.

The fighters finally decnded from the atmoshpere and engaged the Xiscipian fighters on the surface, two Daggers and their needle counter parts didnt join in but instead moved to the foritifcations to make boming runs of the bravo line.

Back at the pools a large landing pad type construct was clearing being formed

OOC: FYI kewen biology is very different to other specices since our actually bodies are very small and the ones you see are more like suits soy ou gotta hit the kewen within the kewen to kill it other wise they will reform *hint* aim for the base of the neck*

The Keating's shields flashed and actually seemed to buckle, somewhat alarmingly. That wasn't a good sign. Charleston turned to the conn and systems officer.

"Damage report, Lieutenant!"

"Shields are down to twenty-five percent, sir - I think they may be utilising capital ship killers. Wait a minute, big energy signatures-- aargh!" His scream was due to a flash of pure whiteness on the viewscreen. Slapping his hands to his face, he fell to his knees.

The admiral's retinal implants automatically adjusted to show him that the flash was due to the simultaneous impacts of thousands of laser beams. Swivelling to the science officer, who had luckily been looking away from the blast when it hit, he again requested a damage report.

"Shields are totally down, sir! On the upside, they're recharging, albeit slowly. Some heavy damage to upper port and starboard, unknown number of casualties, but top four decks aren't responding. Several fires on the outer hull; some weapons down. Faster-than-light nexus is badly damaged, we'll probably need tugs if we're ever going to make it back to base; slower-than-light efficiency reduced. In short, sir, we've just been done; I didn't think it would end quite so quickly and decisively," the science officer said quickly yet grimly.

"Make a note: need better anti-energy shielding, better armour on FTL. Transmit to Ethelwulf, then to base. Deploy the Defence Force personnel to the surface, specifically Kewen aerospace port designated Kilo double-victor alpha juliet seven zero alpha, and inform our allies they have unexpected guests. Immediately the last dropship is gone, lay in a vector I will define."

The battleship's complement of twenty-five dropships and five hundred MDF personnel were gone within forty seconds of the end of that statement, and the Admiral turned to his science officer.

"How many weapons do we have, and where are they clustered?"

"Sir. We still have seventeen turrets and all torpedo tubes, but without fast moving power, we can't--"

"That'll do, son." Keying in a vector on his armrest pad, the Admiral transmitted it to the science console.

"Tag this vector LASTBESTHOPE. Ship intelligence, I'm authorising acting helmsman Lieutenant Peter Drummond to carry out this vector, command code Charleston seven x-ray two five, action code four zero two seven seven dash seven four seven. Command will be laid in on my signal. Mister Drummond, fire our remaining weapon banks at the Laughing Man and its cohort. Lieutenant Andrews, immediately following that action, advise all remaining subsidiary vessels to move out of backlash range pending my signal, due to potential danger in tactical vector. Direct all non-essential crew to escape pods."

Drummond went pale as he scanned the LASTBESTHOPE coordinates, seeing what lay in the seemingly innocuous numbers. Then, as abruptly as it had come, the fear passed, and he was entirely professional again. "Aye aye, sir. Vector in console memory, ready to activate on your signal."

A defiant salvo lashed out from the still-fighting Keating and its own cohort. Perhaps seventy-five percent of the power of the previous blast was there, but it still packed a punch, no matter how you looked at it.

The Keating might still have won against a lesser enemy than the Xiscapians, but it was definitely at a disadvantage now. And in a disturbingly evenly-matched battle like this one, even a small practical disadvantage made all the difference. Therefore, Charleston had decided on one tactical option he'd hoped he'd not have to use. In his years of military service, he'd come close to it several times, but there had always been ways out of it. This time, though, there was no way. It had come to the black-and-white decision.

Well, he blamed the Xiscapians. Anyway, no point regretting it too much. Time to go.

OOC: God, why!? Jolt ate it again! :mad:
IC:
The Marines were fast learners. They quickly found that decapitating a Kewen was a sure-fire was to kill it, and they did so with alarming speed and precision. Failing that the kitsune would furiously swipe away at an infantry until they hit something that hurt, and move on to the next. Their armor protected them from enemy sword blows, but while an Xiscapian and Kewen were locked in combat a further back alien could target the Marine with a gun and dispatch of him or her in this manner. Thus the Xiscapians tried never to spend more than a few seconds on any enemy, engaging, killing, and finding another. They were somewhat covered by their snipers to keep the foot soldiers of their backs, but Phase Line Alpha was being overrun.

The LAM, pinned underneath the Horror, struggled for a moment before the pilot spotted a way out. His sword retracted from the ape's head into a hand, and his beam cannon formed into a fist. He grabbed the beast's arms and pushed, forcing the Horror back so they were suddenly hand-to-hand, mecha still pinned. If the LAM could get out from under it, the pilot could simply use his ranged weapons and blow the animal away. But if the thing kept the mech pinned it would slowly be crushed under the weight, killing the pilot.
Who would win, man-thing or machine?

As rockets screamed around them and small fire hissed by the Horrors ran for the base, unhindered. A HAM leapt into the air and tackled the trailing beast, both spiraling out of control to the ground. As they dropped the HAM, which was equal in size to the thing, began to fire point-blank with it's railguns while punching the animal in the face with enough force to put a hole in solid steel. The other Horror seemed home-free, but out of nowhere a palm like that of God (admittedly, if God wore metal gloves) bitch-slapped it in the face, in all certainly sending it flying high and far for a very messy landing. If one followed the hand it would find a huge arm attached to a towering Command Mech. It was standing directly in front of the base. Horrors would be crushed under it's feet or hands or mangled with it's destructive weapons, and infantry wouldn't stand a chance against this walking weapons platform.

Ten of the Shuriken class stayed to dogfight while the other ten took off in pursuit of the enemy as they made for the base. Missiles and lasers chased the Kewen fighters as they ran, all ten of their kitsune enemy on their six. Meanwhile the patrol weaved in and out of the attacking fighters as the corvette targeted individual ships of the enemy. Aside from the ten fighters, the remaining Kewen were forced to deal with being locked-on by no less than three missiles, three triple blaster cannons, four AS guns, and two turbo lasers, not to mention a maelstrom of laser turret fire.

Space...
OOC: And so you've ignored all the shots my Destroyer fired at yours in my last post...
As the Kewen Destroyer made for the Xeno the Inescapable sent a message of warning before targeting the engines on the alien ship. The fighters peeled off it and flew away as the Inescapable opened fire with everything it had straight at the engines. Even shielded and placed so deeply in the hull, the MAC shells and missiles would simply travel up the exhaust ports, or weaken the hull enough for a laser or Ion blast to sneak though and disable the engines. Slowly, ponderously, the Xeno began to move downward, releasing all 100 fighters, 50 patrols, 100 drones, 10 corvettes and 10 shuttles as it did so. The shuttles flew for the surface while every single small craft dove into the atmosphere, intercepting the Kostemetsian dropships and firing well over a hundred missiles and an impenetrable storm of laser fire at the troop carriers.

The Starfire broke off from the rest of the fleet and cut off the two Kewen Destroyers trying to make for the Kostemetsian fleet, ducking under them, weapons pointing upward. The Captain had all power drained from all systems except life support and sent to the weapons, whereupon he had them fired full strength into the underbelly of one of the Destroyers. The other Destroyer was set upon by the thirty-nine fighters, both patrols and both corvettes (the corvettes having been barely pricked by the turret fire), the starfighters making their runs on the bottom of the vessel upside down while the patrols and corvettes concentrated their missiles and lasers at close range to breach the hull and hopefully cause the Destroyer to start venting atmosphere.

XIW Laughing Man, Bridge...
"What's the status on our little friend?" asked Lintel.
"Their shields appear to be down, fires are evident, escape pods are jettisoning and most of their turret weapons have been turned to slag." reported the XO.
Lintel gave a predatory grin. "Excellent! We have them now!"
These words were somewhat contradicted by the retaliation enemy volley which showed that, while down, they were not yet out of the fight. Disturbingly Lintel actually felt the ship shudder around her before the weapons fire was over. She stared out at the distant bulk of the Paul J. Keating though the scanners as she spoke. "Damage report."
"We are experienced a major shield breach," said the Executive Officer blandly. "Our generators are down due to a combination of enemy fire and complications of power offload. Engineering estimates it will take two and a half hours minimum to get them working again, but they report a day is closer to accurate. Furthermore a torpedo has sunk though and entered Hanger Two, and while that section reports dozens of casualties, repair teams have successfully sealed the atmospheric leaking. A second torpedo has damaged a small section of our starboard side hull and caused our power supply to the targeting computer for our Heavy weapons to malfunction."

Lintel bit her lip, white face going even paler under the pressure. No shields, no heavy guns, no engines...how was she going to salvage this? She'd had them. She'd had them, damnit!
Her fox ears perked.
Wait.
"I want all crew excepting for bridge crew, engineering and a skeleton team of medical to evacuate now for their safety." she ordered. "Once that is done reroute all power from all systems excepting life support and PDs to engines. I want us moving to coordinate point oh-sixty-four-thirty-eight-seven. In the meantime all bridge crew," she looked around at the dozen or so kitsune officers there with her, "are to override auto control for the Heavy Ion Cannons and Guns and to switch to Manuel fire. The Fire, Water, Hawk and Red Dawn are to come as escorts."
The Executive Officer's face went ashen and his tail whipped furiously. "But Rear Admiral, that will take us directly within their range! This vessel cannot deflect much more fire before-"
"Do it!" Lintel snapped. "This ends now!"

As the escape pods and shuttles dropped away from the XIW Laughing Man the Medical Ship XIW Gem flew a course to pick them up. The Laughing Man slowly began to move, engines now given energy, trailing a gout of flame from it's second hanger a bits of debris from several places. Lintel knew, as she stood on the bridge surrounded by the officers carrying out her orders, that the only way they could destroy the Paul J. Keating was to get in close, as biologicals were not equipped to accurately aim weapons of such incredible distances as separated the Laughing Man and it. Lintel hoped, as she watched the four Cruisers form a protective screen around the Battleship, that the destruction of the enemy flagship would end the battle between them right then and there. Of course, there was still the matter of the aliens, but they could be dealt with.
It will all be over soon.

ooc-sorry for the late post, yall, RL has been nuts.
IC-

Green was getting slightly nervous as the enemy piled on Phase Line Alpha.
"Phase Line Alpha, ordered withdraw! If you break and get overwhelmed, I am not going down their to save your asses!" He looked around.
"And WHERE THE FUCK ARE MY RESERVES! RESERVE FORCES, COVER THE WITHDRAWL!"
"Phase Line Bravo, prepare to cover the retreat. The moment our troops start to fall back, give me heavy fire on the enemy. And kill those damn horrors!"

***

Leafe knew he was doomed. The ship shuddered as it was hit again. But he was damned if he wouldn't go out in a spectacular fashion.
"Engine room?"
"Reading you, sir!"
"Overload the core." A long pause followed the announcement.
"Aye aye, sir."
Leafe straightened his uniform and looked out across the bridge to the pale but determined faces of his crew.
"Gentlemen, it has been a pleasure. Give me a link to Admiral Lintel." A vox link was quickely established.

Admiral, our ship can't take much more. I have ordered a core overload. Godspeed. Don't let our sacrifice be in vain. Leafe out.

The transmission ended, he turned to his chief engineer.
"Do it."

A brief, bright flash illuminated space for a moment, creating a second sun in the atmosphere that burned for thirty six point eight seconds as the plasma containment chamber, in effect a contained sun, was breeched. The ship dissapeared in a ball of fire, immolating everything in the vicinity in a pyrotechnic orgy of flailing, unreleasd energy and plasmic fire.
Leafe smiled as he died. That bastard cube, coming up to ram, would only be damaged by his ships death, and wouldn't have the satisfaction of destroying him or his crew.

The remaining Setulanite vessels saw the horrendous damage and distraction caused by the Admiral's ship and pressed the attack. With a little help, they could throw the Kewen onto the back foot. Bloodied but not beaten, the Setulanite Navy entered the fray with renewed vigor.

The orders were confirmed and the Marines began to fall back in an orderly fashion, their comrades and allies at Phase Line Bravo pouring on the fire to cover their escape. Human, Kewen and kitsune corpses littered the trenches and field, but there was notably more dead Kewen. The attack had taken it's toll. As the mecha continued to battle with the surviving Horrors the Command Mech roared into the sky, huge thrusters making small craters beneath it, before coming to a landing in front of the retreating Xiscapians and Setulan infantry.

As the Kewen attempted to charge forward a dozen coilguns situated on the shoulders, knees and chest targeted individual soldiers and opened fire with enough force to rip any of them apart. Doing so they swept the field, cutting down anyone foolish enough to remain standing and forcing the rest to dive for cover or play dead. It's missile launchers then fired, thirty-two missiles streaking out and finding marks among the hidden or still charging. Finally both arms were raised, a huge, shining chaingun on the left and what appeared to be a cannon of some kind on the right. The chaingun, which was actually a dozen smaller chainguns, growled as it sprayed rounds unpredictably over the field, and the cannon spat a glowing orb which exploded and covered the ground for a hundred yards in all directions with fire.

Space...
Admiral, our ship can't take much more. I have ordered a core overload. Godspeed. Don't let our sacrifice be in vain. Leafe out.
Lintel watched in apprehension as the Battlecube came closer to the Cruiser, closer...
And then the camera dimmed momentarily to prevent blinding her or anyone else, and reopened to show a rapidly expanding ball of heated gas and vaporized metal engulfing a good portion of space. She hoped to Qonn he'd taken the Cube, or at least some frigates, with him. The Captain had sacrificed himself for his country against an alien aggressor, and Rear Admiral Lintel steeled herself to not let his death be for nought.
And that meant taking down the Paul J. Keating so the rest of the Xiscapian Fleet could help the Setulan wipe out the Kewen!

"Lieutenant, bring LASTBESTHOPE online."

The slightly malicious yellow glow of the Keating's engines flashed up from black, then grew ever stronger as it lumbered in on a vector ending slightly above the Laughing Man. Even with the Xiscapians slowly reducing the battleship to a charred framework of strained support beams, a rain of bolts arrowed in from its turrets upon the seemingly helpless ship, then--

*CRACK ... BOOM*

One of the Xiscapian ships must have made a lucky shot. Whatever the cause, the left half of the Keating's trapezoidal engine bank started spouting flame in huge quantities. The tongues of fire actually incinerated a few fighters angling in upon the now out-of-control battleship.

The gravity field of the planet below slowly but inexorably pulled the Keating's nose down. This would have been an ideal situation for the Xiscapian fleet, except for one factor: the space directly below the Keating's nose was occupied by the Laughing Man.

The ships drew ever closer, until finally the battleship's nose hit the middle of the Xiscapian vessel, a horrible scraping, crumpling sound echoing throughout the empty corridors and reaching back to the bridge; Charleston's signal to leave.

"Prepare to eject the bridge pod, Mr Drummond."

Pressing a button on his armrest, the admiral activated the bridge pod feature, which would knock the stubby cylindrical bridge out of danger range. The capsule turned, creaking, and lights across the bridge gradually flickered off, to be replaced by the red glow of the emergency lights. Data feeds, attempting to call sensors they were no longer connected to, showed errors. But none of that mattered now.

Pressing the button, the Admiral was knocked back in his seat by the force of gravity. The bridge pod moved quickly, and was away from the immediate danger range in approximately fifteen seconds. Now, all they could do was watch, and perhaps report on the events occurring.

ooc: Xis, you cant in the one post retreat from your own lines and then say magically you are aiming at me with every gun 3 seconds arfter you ran.

The two destroyers divereted all weapon power to the sheilds and they steadily made their way towards the Enemy fleet, The enemy attacks slammed into the sheilds one destoryers sheilds nearly on the verge of failing before being solidfied back to a semi-almost decent state by power diverted from the weponds, the enimes attacks on the engines again were almost usless as they hit the sheild.

The other destoyer perfromed what evasive manouvers it could and returned fire with what was pointing at it while it continued to make its way around the kostemetsian fleet.


The Alien Crusier exploded into a ball of fire and so engulfing a nearby crusier sheilds already weakened cosiderably and already almost at failing point it collaspsed and the Kewen Crusier soon to exploded into a very large if not comical Red firebal with a skull and cross above it as the core exploded and various gasses and such detonated.

The Cube stoped and tried to move away but couldnt help but be completely engulfed in the explosion seemingly destroyied. The It burst out of the ire ball in the direction of the Xiscipian fleet, its second banks of sheild activated and a few small fires over the hull died out.

With the last enemy Crusier down the entire Kewen Fleet focued firepower on the Setulan vessels one crusier stoped firing and orintated itself to the Xiscipian fleet its main gun began charging and a very lethal ball of energy beegan accumalating at the tip of the cannon.

---

The kewen fighters dogfighting the Xiscipian counterparts had them both outnumbered and outgunned losing some of their number to the Carrier above and a few more for the assult on the base, The Needle fighters took the most damage with another 23 of their number turning into scrap, but for the most part the manned dagger fighters took little or no flak as the dog fighting continued

Te fighters heading for the foriticfications scanners showered they were being followed the needle fighters were sent to intercept they were leeding the way previously but not before a storm of enemy fire came at the fighters, the storm of weapons fire completly vapourised one dagger while the other managed to evade most serious hits.

The dagger made as pass of the base scanners showed a prime target a large mech type thing above the one of the defensive fortifications
On its return pass it managed to squeeze of 5 missles at the rear of the mech while its rapid rife pulseguns(basically my version of a LASER) fired of near enough 40 shots.

The infantry roared in unison as the alien troopers fell back, the guns repearing and the swords disappearing they took cover and began firing into the mass of the retreating troops being careful to aviod the random shots of the towering mech and the alien return fire, which their aim was at best bad,(you still havnt explained to me how you can shoot through your own troops.)


The horror that was tackled in the air barred its teeth as it thought this thing might be an even fight, before which a neat sized hole was blown in its gut, screaming as if in pain it head butted what look liked the head of the thing with its horn and attempted to rip its gun away.

The Horror in the fist fight with the enemy mech had it pinned but it was an even fight roaring it began using the horn on its head to head butt the mech trying to kill it or the pilot.


The artillery still pounded away at the source of the enemy artillery and phase line bravo with half their numbers firing at each.

ooc-gettin it started again. Oooohhh yeahhh.

Green watched in satisfaction as the Xiscapian war machines covered the retreat with devestating barrages and a stupendous amount of fire that was worthy of quiet a bit of respect. Nevertheless, the Kewen renewed their assault with vigor, ripping into the retreating troops.
The Republican Guardsmen and the Xiscapian Marines were both elite, crack troops, and they supported eachothers withdrawl as if they had been practicing for months, going smoothly from point of cover to point of cover while providing mutual fire support. But regardless of their quality, they were in the open for the first time...and anything in the open was fair game in warfare. Troops fell, ripped apart by the alien gunfire, and were for the most part left where they lay unless they could be safely carried back to Phase Line Bravo.
"Phase Line Bravo! I need more covery fire for the reteating troops! More suppresive fire! I AM NOT PAYING YOU TO BRING BACK AMUNITION!" As he said it, he hoped it was a true statement-he didn't know when the relief fleet would arrive. A shouted warning made him look up in time to see two enemy tanks diving in at the HQ building. Several rockets were fired off, but he thought it would be too late...

***

In space, the Setulanite ships maxed power to shields and started an ordered fall back. With all the enemy fire being directed towards them since the demise of their heavier ships, they didn't have a chance anymore. Powering down all weapons except their close support guns, and maxing energy to shields, they bolted to the Xiscapian fleet in hope of relief from the murderous fire. Due to the rapid direction change, much of the Kewen fire went wild, whistling into space, but a few scored hard htis, further weakening badly depleted shields.

One of the Suidcidal Hover tanks was hit by a rocket, its hull exploded into small molten metal fragments shovwering the ground below while the other smacked square into the building running right into a decent sized opening(im assuming the place where in the first attack had then large guns is still there coz thats what they hit).

ooc: Setulan as Xos's so matter of factly pointed out maxing power to sheilds makes your ships slower so you cant "bolt away" that fast.
IC2

The kewen fleet reorinated itself and opened fire again on the retreating setulan fleet, a deadly storm of missles followed rounds of Railguns and beamweapons, the lone crusier had almost done charging its main gun at about.. 78% the captain decided it was enough and set his target. The Xiscipian Ship that was entangled with the Paul.J.keating.

A Large Red beam zipped out from the Crusiers bow and cut a swath through space as it arrowed in on the Xis's flagship.This was of course after the crusier had moved into a clear firing range.

The Battlecube having enough moved back into the kewen fleeet and began to salavage any escape pods kewen or Setulan, the setulan ones were met with hanger bays full of soilders in full black armour and large emplaced weapons along with the odd horror fore the fear effect.

Four Xiscapian fighters went down, three detonating in the air and the fourth spiraling away, having lost a wing, to crash into the ground below. The Kewen fighter numbers worked against them, however: If one or more got a fix on an Xiscapian fighter, they would have to pursue their quarry without colliding with any of their comrades while avoiding return fire. The Xiscapian pilots, meanwhile, had a ball, zipping about though the confused group, firing missiles crazily and spitting lasers into careless or unsuspecting enemy ships, careful to never fly outside of the group. The corvette, after allowing it's guns to cool and be reloaded, opened fire again, two missiles streaking away to find targets, two Turbolasers shooting long green lasers streaks, four AS guns recoiling in their mounts as their heavy bolts tore away, and ten turrets spitting hundreds of little red laser bolts a second into the fighters. There was a risk of friendly fire, obviously, but with these numbers they had a much better chance of hitting Kewen than kitsune. The patrol went straight after one of the Dagger fighters, triple blast cannons firing as a missile fell behind from it to explode in a fury of shrapnel designed to cut though fighter hulls.

The ten Shuriken fighters pursued the surviving Dagger, but were forced to scatter as the Needle fighters came back around. The leader of the squadron took a hit, wobbling, but stayed in the air as seven of the fighters under her command peeled off to turn back and dive straight into the Needle drones. The lead and her two wing men chased the Dagger as it made it's run on the Command Mech, missiles and pulse shots peppering it's back. The two rear coilguns opened fire, but went wide as the Dagger flew away, still with the three kitsune fighters trying to get a lock on it. The lead, still behind and slightly above and to the left of the Dagger with her wing men to both sides of her and below, got onto the enemy's six and fired two missiles, as well as a stream of laser fire.

The Command Mech remained unimpressed by the Kewen ground troops, keeping up it's barrage to keep their heads down and prevent them from firing on the retreating infantry. The missiles especially weakened it's armor, and one of the rear coilguns was knocked out, but aside from a slight shake the Mech appeared undamaged. Back in the Base, one of the artillery shells landed next to an Xiscapian Artillery piece, causing the stockpile of shells to explode, utterly destroying that piece and killing it's crew. As the hovertank smashed a hole in the wall the resulting explosion killed several Marines and one of the crew members of another artillery piece, making it slower to fire. Still the artillery kept up it's assault, shelling the Kewen troops in concert with the Command Mech and the sporadic fire from the retreating soldiers and the snipers and long-range troopers in the Base.

As the Horror hopelessly head-butted the HAM and tried to rip away it's gun arm both weapons retracted and turned to hands. It stepped back and clapped them together, trying to get the Horror's head in between so it could be caught between the two metal fists and be smashed apart like an overripe watermelon when shot with a cannon. The LAM was losing his fight, slowly being crushed under the weight of the Horror, straining and pushing to no avail. Then, without warning, the LAM exploded, the pilot having engaged the self-destruct in hopes of taking his adversary with him.

Space...
As a ship, the Dominator Class Battleship is made to be durable. The amount of fire it had withstood so far was certainly impressive, and it could dish out even more than it could take. However, it was never designed to withstand another capital ship of at least equal size, if not more, crashing into it. And with the shields gone, there was no hope.

With the sound of worlds colliding the Paul J. Keating struck the middle of the XIW Laughing Man, thick armor crumpling against the force as gravity continued it's inevitable pull. Rear Admiral Lintel, along with the rest of the Bridge Crew, was thrown off her feet, thrown into the side of a console and hearing a sickening crack as her right arm fractured violently. The Laughing Man then ceased shuddering, and from her dazed position on the deck Lintel could see one of the camera monitors displaying the outer hull, now a wrecked mass with the silver, scratched and blackened side of the enemy ship sticking into it. The others either showed the empty halls and rooms of the ship, or static snow. After a moment the rest of her crew got shakily to their feet, or at least they tried to. The artificial gravity had failed, and now they floated, tumbling along on the bridge, trying to get their bearings.

The main bridge door hissed open and the medical team entered, quickly and silently strapping down those who floated unconscious or unable to move to hovering stretchers and motioning for the rest of them to come along. Just outside the bridge, in a secured area, were several large escape pods, maneuverable and, while not fast, quick enough to get them away from the remains of their former vessel before it could be boarded or destroyed. The engineering crew took their own way out in the main escape pods, abandoning ship for the relative safety of the rest of the fleet. Lintel floated into one of the pods and sighed in relief before groaning in pain as the gravity came on it the pod, making her land and twist her already injured arm. Her Bridge Crew mutely stared at her, not saying anything, as the pod ejected into space. It was the first time in years an Xiscapian vessel had to be abounded to save the lives of it's crew.

The other pods jettisoned and were quickly picked up by the Gem, being brought aboard to tend to the wounded and save the others. The Cruisers were still in their protective diamond around the Laughing Man, warning away any opportunistic Kostemetsian vessels. After a shot of painkiller and a sling for her arm, Lintel stood on the bridge of the Gem, surveying the damage. For them, and, she hoped, the Kostemetsian, the battle was nearly over. True, they had only lost their flagships, but both seemed to be the main source of firepower for both fleets, and without her ship Lintel knew the Second Exploratory Fleet would have a difficult time winning the battle.

After the first volley it was evident the enemy wouldn't be returning fire, despite the damage Koyo, the Captain of the Starfire hoped was being inflicted. He watched as the Kewen Destroyers continued on their same, unchanging courses, even as the Inescapable fired ineffectually into the engines of the one on course with the Xeno. It would reach the Carrier in less than a minute: Something had to be done.
Koyo made his decision.
"Divert all power from weapons and shields to engines." he ordered.
His X.O. stared at him. "But sir, that will leave us immensely vulnerable to enemy fire-"
"If what I'm trying succeeds, we won't be needing to worry about enemy fire," said Koyo grimly. "Once that is done, set course for the fleeing enemy ship as coordinates 2183004, ramming speed."
The Starfire's shields flickered and died and the weapons went silent, the engines flaring a blinding bright blue/white as they propelled the ship forward. As fast as the Kewen Destroyer was moving, it still had it's shields in place, and the Starfire was faster. Koyo and the Bridge Crew watched, eyes getting wider and wider as the flank of the Kewen vessel drew closer and closer. "YAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" Koyo screamed as they closed the gap.

If the Starfire succeeded in crashing, it should, Koyo hoped, knock the enemy craft off course. What they would do then, assuming they survived, remained to be seen.

The fire from the Destroyer blew seven Shuriken class fighters out of space above one of the other Destroyers, shredded a patrol and heavily damaged a corvette. Listing badly, the corvette limped away back towards the Laughing Man and the Cruisers, while the other thirty-two fighters, remaining patrol and corvette switched their bombing runs to the Destroyer who's shields had nearly failed. At this point, with enough concentrated fire, they hoped to damage the enemy ship, even though they were only small craft, their weapons could definitely pack a punch.

The lone Cruiser with the ball of energy forming at the tip did not go unnoticed, and the XIW Inescapable turned ponderously, trying to get in a good position to fire on it. As it was the Xiscapian Destroyer managed to get off seventeen Ion Cannon shots, six MAC shells and three Heavy Gun (capital killer) beams at the nose and the rapidly expanding sphere of power. It was hoped the fire would destroy the enemy weapon, or, better yet, cause it to overload and destroy part or all of the Kewen vessel. As it was, they'd probably be lucky just to get the conflicting energy to cancel the powering-up of the gun out.

The twenty-five Kostemetsian drop ships had tried to make it to the surface, and had been met by the Xeno's full compliment of small craft. They had been careful to shoot out only engines and any weapons, allowing the Carrier to tractor beam in the helpless ships. As the fighters, drones, patrols and corvettes buzzed about outside like angry bees protecting their hive, the drop ships were brought into two of the Carrier's total of twenty-two hangers, divided up as a dozen into the first and thirteen into the second. Magnetic clamps brought the drop ships down to hold them to the hanger floors, and protective shields formed around each individual ships from emitters in the hanger ceiling, in case they tried to self-destruct or saw their capture as an opportunity to try to disgorge troops to capture the Xeno. Ion fields within the shields shut down ship shields, engines, weapons and everything else but basic life support. A loudspeaker affixed to the bulkhead at the front entrance of the hanger began to shout in accented Galactic Common:

"Attention Kostemetsian military members. You are now considered prisoners of war, or POWs, belonging to the Xiscapian military as taken in this conflict. You will be treated humanely, and provided with food, water, waste facilities, cleaning facilities, living space, and so on. Please exit your ships with your hands behind your heads and with no weapons, including sidearms, grenades, combat knives and weapons of a religious or ceremonial nature. Stand in your ranks outside your ships and do not move. Any attempt to resist will be met with deadly force. Please comply."

Things got even more grim for the Setulanite forces in space. While much of the Kewen fire still went wild, the sheer volume of weaponry was bound to hit something, and it did, blowing out the engines on the only surviving frigate, which had the added bonus of severely limiting the range on the ion weapons on the spine of the ship as well. The two destroyers took a few hits, but fortunately for them not any seriously hard ones-with both sets of shields below fifteen percent, they couldn't afford any more damage.

***

Colonel Green stood up, ears ringing, and surveyed the damage. A guard trooper had knocked him down and covered him with his body in the last second, allowing the Colonel to escape the suicide run with nothing more severe than a badly burned left arm. As he stood, the skin sluiced off of the top of his wrist and hand. He looked at it in annoyance.
Fucking burns, He thought, and he looked around just in time to be caught by some flying shrapnel from a secondary explosion, which ripped him across the face and sliced open his right cheek. Shaking his head violently and sending blood droplets everywhere, he waved off the help of a Guardsmen and rose on his own.
"Sir, we need to get you to med bay!" The Colonel shook his head again.
"Help them, I'm fine. I'm not going under till this battle is done!" He looked at the heavy weapons floor in dismay.
The vast majority of the Republican heavy firepower was destroyed utterly in the blast, either crushed by the bulk of the tank or melted by the extreme heat. Wounded and dying men screamed for help amongst the smoking corpses of the weapons crews as corpsmen ran in to help.
"Whats the status on our heavy guns?" he asked over his comm link. A beleaguered officer on the roof answered over the cacophony of gunfire.
"We've got a few .50's and Banshees up here, sir, but most of it got trashed. The Xiscapian heavies are still pouring it on, but this is not good, sir!" Green grumbled to himself as he looked out on the field. The Xiscapians were doing a bang up job of keeping the Kewen pinned.
"Tell the troops to keep firing. Just cus we only have small arms left doesn't mean we are beat!" Pulling a pill bottle out of his blouse, he took out two fat adrenaline pills and swigged them down with some water, and his vision instantly cleared. He wouldn't go under until the battle was done.

Lieutenant David Emerson activated a secure comms channel and spoke in a weary voice across the fleet of dropships.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I think it is in our best interests to surrender at this point. We believe the Xiscapian capital ship Laughing Man has been badly wounded or destroyed, according to our own comms chatter. It is time we stopped - there can be no more need for us in this conflict."

As one, the cabin ramps of the dropships clanged down. After disarming themselves, the marines assumed the required position and marched out in squads of five (twenty-five to a dropship).

The Kewen troopers finally all poured into the Trenches bunkering down and returning fire when possible, cautious of the towering mech above them. Meanwhile the horror was blown to bits by the exlploding mech, and any horrors taht were still alive turned and rantowards the enemy line while there small breaterning sat in the trenches lobbing a plasma grenade every now and then amount there rifle fire.

The Dagger continued to make another run on the towering mech desperatly avioding the enemy fighters, launching another salvo while the artillery pounded away bringing there fire backwars trying to hit the mech.

Casulties were being incurred on the kewen side, quite heavy infact the damm mechs guns simply incinerated whole soilders or the pain being too great for some of them and they just died. out off the whole army that began the atttack just a little more then half remained. The rest layed huddled in the trenchers returning what little fire they could

OOC tell me if i missed anything from the ground battle.

IC:


The Needle fighters dropped like flies with almost 1/4th there number left in the battle, while hardly a single Dagger causality had been inflicted, that being the wholee point of the needles.

ooc: my memory on the space battle is sketchy at best if i miss nything please remind me.
IC:

The kewen fleet regrouped, and again fired on the retreating setulan fleet mainly with missles for they had a greater chance of locking on. The Battlecube advanced on the fighters as it primed one of its Lasers, it was going to cut the poor immobile frigate in half then tractor it in.

While the kewen crusier which had been manovering for a better position and charging up its main gun fired at the Laughing man. The enemys attempts to disable the gun were very close to succeeding but it was thanks to the sacrifce of one kewen who acted like a human power conduit that the gun still fired.

The two destroyers on the collision course ffor the Xiscipian carrier neared there target when one of them was hit by an enemy ship. The sheilds failed under the pressure and the two hulls collided in a moment of defiance the captain ordered the overlaod of the powerplant and the ship exploded into a firebal around the alien ship as the hulls entwined.

ooc: as i siad before missed anythingp oint it out i will edit it in.

The shields failed on the destoryer but it kept up its fire small bits of hull began to fall out and fall down to earth, it could hold for m uch longer but hopefully it could continue to fight long enough.

Green watched in satisfaction as the Kewen advance was slowed, and finally stopped by the massive command mech. The pain from his burns had turned into a toothache like throb that he ignored easily. It was time to repulse the alien invaders once and for all.
In his initial plan, which he had told nobody, he would have his own Republican Guardsmen lead the counterassault. He knew them well, and knew also that they were excellent shock assault troops of the finest caliber. That being said, there was no way the guardsmen had been prepared for the Kewen to turn one of their limbs into massive swords...and the Kitsune, with their own shining blades, had saved the line.
He lifted his radio to his lips.

"All Xiscapian infantry, counter attack now! Repulse and destroy, burn them out of the trenches and kill them all! Setulanites, supressive fire! Keep their heads down!"

Green was counting on the ferocity of the Kitsune in close quarters to drive the Kewen out of the trenches. Then the Guardsmen would rush out, relieve the Kitsune on the line, and finish the pursuit...and destruction.
The Guardsmen in the base let out a fierce cry as the message came over their vox. Up until that point, they had been sniping, laying down some fire to keep the Kewen in place without really laying into them. Now, they all rose up and started unloading their magazines at a ridiculous rate at anything that moved in the field. The Devil gunners started to spray the trenches from their elevated position to keep the aliens pinned. This would end, now.

***

The frigate was still moving in the direction of the Xiscapian fleet when the engines had been destroyed, and the built up momentum kept the ship moving towards it. The captain desperately maxed power to shields and ordered the crew to brace for impact.

The destroyer captains paled as missile lock sirens rang out. The destroyers attempted to break lock and started spewing out countermeasures, but there really was no hope to dodge them all. They, too braced for impact.

Ground...
The Command Mech kept up its barrage on the Kewen troops, ignoring the fighter attack. If the armor was penetrated it would ground the MC until it could be repaired, and further assault might damage its joints and effectively cripple the massive mecha. The other railgun was knocked out, but the three fighters doggedly chased the Dagger, firing everything they had at it. The artillery bombardment was landing on the last retreating troops, killing some and forcing them to run or dive for cover.
"All Xiscapian infantry, counter attack now! Repulse and destroy, burn them out of the trenches and kill them all! Setulanites, suppressive fire! Keep their heads down!"
“No, Xiscapian forces you will hold your fire and remain in position! You are not, repeat, not to advance on the enemy! Begin the approach on my word.”
Green would turn to find a petite blonde Xiscapian female behind him. She looked to be only five foot four, with fierce yellow eyes and tawny fur, wearing stripped-down battle armor over a deep blue and black XGA uniform of rank. Her vox crackled,
“Delta Command, Delta Command, this is Meatball Leader, come in, over."
She spoke into it. “Copy that Meatball Leader, this is Delta Command, five by five, what’s your status, over.”
“All lights green Delta, we’re ready when you say the word, over."
“Roger Meatball, commence your attack.”
“Wilco Delta, over and out."
She bowed slightly to Green and nodded to the sky.

The Kewen soldiers would hear a drone above them that would quickly transform to a screech as one hundred Xiscapian fighters, fifty patrols and ten corvettes screamed though the atmosphere and out of the clouds above them.
“Meatball Leader this is Meatball One, request permission to drop payload, over.”
“Permission granted, all vessels begin bomb drop, over."
The lead fighter swooped in low over the trenches. “Bomb...not want to…come out of…plane,” there was a grunt of effort; “there we go!”
Each fighter dropped five bombs in a even spread as it passed, followed by the patrols who launched one hundred incendiary rockets down into the trenches, then finally ended with ten low-yield, non-radiation nuclear missiles from the more distant corvettes and a storm of artillery-grade laser fire. By the end of the attack the trenches had been blasted apart and the entire area was covered in thick, oily smoke.

The being who Green should have, by this point, identified as Colonel Dui grinned widely at the sight of the firestorm. “Now that’s what I call an explosion!” she crowed as she lifted her vox to her lips. “Xiscapian infantry you are to advance double time into the trench area, eliminate any and all survivors with extreme prejudice. Mecha, I want you to back them up, go, go, go!” There was a roar of bloodlust and victory as the Marines charged out from their positions down to the trench area past the now inert and silent Command Mech, rifles up and swiveling, cautiously scanning the area to see if any of the monsters had survived.
OOC: Realistically the trench area is now a massive flaming crater, there’s no way anyone could have survived that…

The fighters redoubled their efforts at the air battle, all of them streaking away under the corvette, drawing the Needle fighters to their destruction so the patrol could have a clear shot at the Dagger commanding them.

Space…
As the remnants of the Setulan Task Force sought to withdraw into the Xiscapian Second Exploratory Fleet the PDs on the Cruisers opened fire on the missiles, trying to intercept and destroy them before they could connect with the Destroyers. At the enemy Destroyer the pilots in their small craft gave a ragged cheer as the shields failed and their lasers, rockets and bombs began to blacken and destroy the hull. However they received a command from their flight leader, and the patrol and ten fighters peeled off, streaking away towards the massive shape of the Kewen Battlecube. The remaining twenty-two fighters and corvette renewed their assault, the fighters bombing and strafing weapons batteries and firing on any lights they could see that would indicate portholes while the corvettes launched a nuclear missile at the now unshielded bridge of the Destroyer.

The ten fighters and patrol banked in to attack the Battlecube, specifically targeting the laser that their scans marked as charging up to fire. Bombs, missiles and lasers sprayed into it as they made their runs, hoping to destroy or slow the attack to save the frigate. Meanwhile the Kewen Cruiser fired its beam, but the laser fell short, hitting instead the vanguard Cruiser Hawk assigned to protect the Laughing Man. The shields dropped to fifty-four percent and the crew reeled, not having expected to be attacked. However the Inescapable continued to pound that Cruiser and now the Hawk opened up on it as well with its Ion and MAC cannons.

The Starfire smashed directly into the back of the Kewen Destroyer, hulks locking together as they crumpled, spiraling away past the Xeno, drifting helplessly. Before Koko could gather his wits about him to order anything the enemy vessel detonated, taking most of the Starfire with it. The last debries began to disintegrate as they entered the atmosphere. The Starfire had been lost with all hands.
Xeno, hangers…
Kitsune in Biohazard suits (http://miggs69.deviantart.com/art/Chemical-Warfare-Field-Medic-62450060) trooped out, taking up positions all over the hanger, dozens covering their captives with rifles from several angles. Last in was the Executive Officer of the Carrier, a extremely tall Xiscapian with blue hair, black fur, orange eyes and a attitude that suggested that he would rather push the entire lot of Kostemetsias out the nearest airlock than host them on his vessel. The enemy were checked for weapons, cuffed with plasma restraints that would deliver a non-lethal but quite painful shock if they moved above normal walking speed, and taken in groups of five down to the brig. Two Xiscapians identified and stepped up to Lieutenant David Emerson, one in front of the man and one behind aiming their rifles at him. The black uniformed XO nodded to them and the Kostemetsian Lieutenant was forced to follow.
Interrogation Room…
Lieutenant David Emerson was shown to a plain, entirely unadorned room except for a metal desk and two chairs on either side, one metal and one plastic. He was sat into the metal one and shackled to it, and the two troopers took up positions on either side of the only door out. The XO took a seat across from Emerson, steepling his fingers as he stared over them at the human. “For the purpose of our records please state your name, rank and identification code. This will be recorded both visually and in audio, as will this entire session.”

Matching the Xiscapian's gaze, Emerson spoke calmly.

"Name: David Lee Emerson. Rank: Lieutenant, Kostemetsian Multilevel Defence Force. Identification code is golf oscar victor, dash, mike india lima, dash, three one four zero four four five three seven two."

Ground.
The storm of xenos fire and nukes, burned the kewen out of the trenches before the sheild could be actived, all that was left was a large flamming crator
The
ooc: exactly what you wanted. me nooked. sorry if its not a good post, but i have had toedit it so many times.

IC


The dagger finally had it, the pilot had fought to the end but lost to superior numbers taking one hit to many it exploded in midair and flmaing bits of wreckage were flying down to the rear of the enemy camp.

In space, orbit around the planet.

The Kewen destroyer took heavy fire and craters of varying sizes pockmarked the hull for the most part its main battiers were out of the fight but like all kewen vessels it never had everything out at one time from a myrid amount of port holes and from under cover 13 Small rapid fire Pulse cannons suitied for anti air popped out around the hull concentrating from thr top front and left right angles with bottom being the most weakest and rear having almost none at all, The Missle(s) fired by the corvette, hit right on target, and the whole half of the ship was no more, the rear half still mostly intact, began to plummet to theearth, and near enough 400meters of twisted flamming steel impacted into the ground near the base, but that was only for a moment as the antimatter containment failed, and the ship exploded.

ooc: think your nooks XIs, cept city sized. hey presto. problem solved. also i dont care if you have a plot sheild and your commanders survied i.e the command mech and stuff the ital stuff you can have survied i dont mind. but for the most part, this whole continent is a big. somking. hole.


The battlecubes sheilds flicked under the dimunitive unslaught dropping a few percent, the laser having reached a near enough acceptable level Fired directly at the engine section of the setulanite ship, while many dozens of PD guns on each face popped out form there covers and began to lay into the fighters each face having the same coverage.

The Rest of the Kewen fleet regathered there wits and began to lay fire into the Xiscipain ships attacking the crusier, the crusier inturn began to move towards the kewen fleet seekin sanctuary and protection within its mightyguns.

Colonel Green looked up and saw a massive, flaming wreck coming down towards the planet.
"Oh, for the love of..." he muttered, and taking a running dive, knocked the Xiscapian colonel down, covering her with his body. The ship impacted.

The HQ building was built to survive an orbital strike. The explosion ripped apart the top two floors, but the bulk of the building low to ground remained safe (though troops in the firing ports were mostly vaporized).
Unfortunately, the Barracks were not so lucky.
The first barracks collapsed in a ball of fire, tumbling down and crushing to death hundreds of the troops firing from it.
The second did not completely collapse, though one of the wings did, and the troops standing by the firing ports were either killed instantly or badly injured by the flash.

Green stood up unsteadily and hauled the Xiscapian to her feet. His vision was getting hazy. The combination of burns, concussions, and painkillers had finally done him in.
"Colonel," he said formally, "I hereby transfer command of the battle to you. If any of the bastards are left, kill them...but for the love of all thats holy, save as many of the men as you can." He tried to salute, but before he could complete it, he collapsed at her feet, out cold.

Space bent, and then warped. Finally, the long-awaited Task Force Nemesis, Admiral Stephen Lux commanding, had arrived.
The Nemesis herself, a Devastator-Class battleship.
Two Harm-Class cruisers, fighter wings immediately lifting off to help the beleaguered Xiscapians.
Eight Fear-Class cruisers.
Six Terror-Class cruisers, three equipped with the massively powerful Nova Cannon.
Five three-ship Squadrons of Setulan-Class frigates.
Seven three-ship Squadrons of Storm-Class frigates.
Six four-ship Squadrons of Viper-Class destroyers.

It was an overwhelming display of raw, unrelenting force. It was the ultimate show of military might. It was the single largest formation ever used in the Setulanite navy. It was Power Incarnate...and it was ready for war.

ooc: ship stats in factbook (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=556300).

The kewen vessels, upon seeing the new arrivals sent a communique to the kostemetsian allies, and told them to bug out.
Saying hi in a freindly matter, a storm of projectiles missles and varying degrees of raingun rounds lashed out to meet the incoming setulans.

The the fleet simply disolved as it engaged there FLT' one moment they were there the next they were gone.

Colonel Dui was knocked flat as her counterpart tackled her, the unexpected move sending her vox clattering away to fall off the side of the base. Several hundred Xiscapian Marines were killed, either in the explosion or resulting structural instability, crushed inside their armor. The rest were more or less like Green, dazed and confused. No-one had expected their enemy to suicidally ram one of their own ships down onto the planet, and they knew as soon as the core went critical they would all die.
They had to haul ass now.

"We need a medic over here!" Dui cried, but it was lost among those of others. Everyone needed a medic, and their calls mixed with the screams of the wounded, moans of the dying, the shouts and yells of the survivors and the whine as transports began to land. They were drop and cargo ships, mostly, used to carry the artillery, mecha and supporting equipment, and would now transport as many living beings as could be stuffed into them. Dui, strong despite her deceptively small stature, brought Green across her shoulders and began to walk, step by shuddering step, to the nearest drop ship. A nearby soldier, Setulan or Xiscapian she never knew, joined her and the two of them dragged Colonel Green inside.

The equipment and vehicles were being abandoned where they stood as kitsune and humans made for the landing craft. The Xeno and the Gem were beaming up as many as they could, so the crowd quickly thinned as more and more were taken to safety. The wounded were carried away in stretchers, to be administered to by field medics until they could be transported to a medical bay or the hospital ship. In a short time only the dead and nearly so inhabited the suddenly silent surface, pockmarked with craters and scorched by blaster marks, wind howling mournfully though both the standing and crumbled buildings.
Then the destroyed exploded, enveloping the entire battlefield, spreading over the continent in a brilliant flare before going dark, leaving only barren, black earth that cracked and broke as the very crust of the world itself started to shatter.

Space...
From the bridge of the Gem Rear Admiral Lintel watched grimly, bowing her head in silence to all those who had died in the fighting. It was the best funeral pyre they could hope to have. She looked up as the Setulan relief fleet came into the system, forcing the enemy, whoever they were, to retreat. The battle-damaged Second Exploratory Fleet began to draw back behind the new force, leaving the Cruiser Hawk as the sole guardian for the disabled Laughing Man. Space was littered with debris, little flashes of light indicating where the fighters, patrols and corvettes were returning to their ships of origin. She sighed heavily and turned to the Communications Officer:
Message to Kostemetsian Fleet:
FROM: Rear Admiral Lintel of the Second Exploratory Fleet of the Xiscapian Imperial Navy
We possess some six hundred and twenty five Kostemetsian POWs in the fleet. We would like to exchange them for any Setulan POWs you or your allies may be holding.

Message to Setulan Fleet:
FROM: Rear Admiral Lintel of the Second Exploratory Fleet of the Xiscapian Imperial Navy
I am pleased to report you arrived just in time. Numerous wounded and displaced Setulan soldiers have been spread throughout the fleet due to our rescue efforts, and it will take time to sort them all out. Additionally we have found ourselves to be heavily damaged and inquire as to impose ourselves upon you for a friendly port where we might acquire the necessary repairs.


XIW Xeno...
The Executive Officer cocked his head, as though listening to voices only he could hear, then suddenly paled. He stood abruptly and left the room without another word, leaving David with only his two guards behind him.

The Kewen fleet, formed into existance into a nebula not to far away and began to wait out for the reinforcements, the carriers on the otherhand left a parting gift, A single Probe, with a message for the Aliens' and two small steath craft who began to manover slowly away making it almost impossible to be spotted.

Attention alien defilers,savour this moment of fleeting victory, for it will be your last, we currently hold the entire crew captive of one of your ships, and part of the crew of another ship, in which we tractored in the escape pods too. Rest assured, contary to our appearance they will be treated humanely as they posses no threat The Probe droned out, in a dull voice, reminicanse of a age old voice program on a backwater planet microsoft sam.

The planet, which had previously been fought over, was in the proccess of being split into two halves of roughly decent size, if anything was living it would soon be dead. But on the kewen side of the planet, nothing much had changed otherthen the fact everything had gone underground fairly quickly.

With a mighty Crack, the planet split into two, the bright light of its pulsing red core lit up the dark and empty space, but a horror lied within, if someone had inspected the visible inner portions of one of the halfs, they would seen hundreds, if not thousands of large tentacles of blacked appearance worming there way though the crust, forming a honey comb like pattern.

"Inbounds!" called out an ensign. On the bridge of the Nemesis, Admiral Lux arched an eybrow.
"Order the Task Force to maximum missile defense," he said quietly. The ships moved together closely, forming a nigh-on impregnable force shield effect, and the ships all fired dorsal and forward mounted weaponry at the incoming missiles. The vast majority of the projectiles were stopped far outside where they could do any damage to the ships. A few got closer, and were destroyed by the close in defense systems of the ships. Three got through, inflicting moderate damage to one of the Fear-Class cruisers.
"Sir, the enemy fleet is gone. Just warped out of the battlefield," an ensign reported. Lux shrugged.
"It works for me."
"Incoming vox, sir!" Lux listened to the message from the Xiscapians.
"Give me a link," he said.

Message to Xiscapian Fleet:
Admiral Lintel, this is Admiral Lux. Send the ship with the Kostometsian POWs with SRV Glory, we'll take care of the transfers. Warp to the coordinates we send, get your ships out of here. You'll get docking instructions from there, they're expecting you. Lux out.

A commander looked at the Admiral with consternation.
"Sir...those are the coordinates to Setulan." Lux nodded.
"I know."
"But...sir, navy policy is to never give the co-" Lux cut him off.
"Commander, the Xiscapians have bled for us. If we can't trust them, then we are doomed to die alone in this universe. Send the message." He turned to his comm officer.
"Send a reply signal to the Kewen on the same band."

To Kewen Commanders:
We appreciate the gesture. We are willing to exchange prisoners-ours crew for the Kostemetsian marines and what crew of yours we captured-at the following location. To show our goodwill, only two ships will be at the location to make the exchange. We hope you reply in kind. Admiral Lux out.

"Dispatch Glory to the pickup zone once the Xiscapians are ready. I want this debacle taken care of. Helm," he called behind him, "conn us away from the planet about three AUs, out of range of whatever the hell that tentacle thing is."
"Yes, Admiral."
The Task Force, with the exception of Glory, immediately changed course to the desired safe location.

Message to Admiral Lux of the Setulan Fleet:
Acknowledged, Admiral. Once we have retrieved the XIW Laughing Man and transferred the prisoners we will depart.

The Cruisers Red Dawn, Fire and Water cautiously approached the Kostemetsian fleet, weapons powered down but shields at full strength. Engaging their tractor beams to join with that of the Cruiser Hawk already stationed there, they latched onto the Laughing Man, turning their flanks so their starboard sides were facing the enemy, and fired their engines at full power. For several seconds nothing happened, then the Battleship shuddered mightily in the silence and ripped itself free from the fellow wreckage that was the Paul J. Keating. Debris, bits of metal and plastic, floated though the void in a trail behind them as the Cruisers pulled away, making for the safety of the fleets. All the other vessels sat at varying depths, all behind the newly arrived Setulan fleet, ready to make the jump to lightspeed.

The Xeno's hangers opened again, but this time it was not to disgorge strike craft nor pull in battered drop ships, but instead a ship (http://i237.photobucket.com/albums/ff41/838millionman/PrisonShip.jpg?t=1206011214) dropped out into space, scans showing every prisoner was aboard, filling the ship a little more than halfway. Eighty laser cannon turrets, made for anti-small craft defense, lined the vessel, but none were shown to be active or even under power. Shifting ponderously, the craft moved towards the SRV Glory, docking to unload it's cargo. As soon as it had done so it withdrew back to the Xeno, disappearing into one of the massive bays of the Carrier.

Work here finished, the formation was made, with the XIW Inescapable in the lead, followed by the Gem, then the four Cruisers towing the crippled Battleship, and finally the Xeno. In their formation the XIW Starfire was noticeably absent. On the bridge of the Gem Rear Admiral Lintel stood, long gold-red hair tangled and matted, fractured right arm in a sling, ears lowered, shoulders hunched and eyes heavy with the blood of the dead on her hands and the fate of the living on her back. She took a last look at the crumpled and now, she had to admit as it was no longer trying to kill her, beautiful Kostemetsian Battleship. Who had been its Master and Commander during the battle?
She would probably never know.

The damaged survivors of the Second Exploratory Fleet of the Kitsune Empire flickered with pseudomotion and vanished abruptly, drawn into hyperspace. On all the ships the wounded were being tended to, those kitsune and Setulan well enough to think and speak were getting g to know each other as they calmed down from the battle, and officers were making their reports. One such was Rear Admiral Lintel as she retreated to her quarters, calling up the holo transmitter and dictating aloud, unable to type with her injured arm. The soft blue glow bathed her in its light as she sat, finally relaxing after the stress of battle, pinching the bridge of her nose. All she needed now was a warm bath, fresh clothes and about a day of sleep, but High Command demanded reports, especially from fleets which had just engaged an enemy in battle.

Connecting...
Please wait.
Connected to XIN Holonet Channel.

I.D. Code: 208430
Password: ******

Please wait...
Identity confirmed.
Welcome Rear Admiral Lintel.

Transmit
File a report
Access XIN Holonet
Exit

Please wait...
Please fill out the form below. Complete all fields. A fleet list, crew list, cargo manifest and conditions of XIN vessels and XIN equipment for the duration of your report must be included.

Fleet list: (encrypted)
Crew list: (encrypted)
Manifest list: (encrypted)
Conditions list: (encrypted)

FULL REPORT

Primary Report:

DATE: Year of our Lord Emperor Foxfire Rose 15, Birth of the Ice Season, ship time 0800 hours to 1122 hours

LOCATION: Milky Way galaxy, Quadrant Alpha, Sector 12, System Ripple, planet codenamed 'Wrong Turn'. Space, orbit and ground.

RESULT: Destruction of Setulan colony. Splitting of Wrong Turn into two halves. Xiscapian retreat.

BELLIGERENTS:
Hostiles:
Kostemetsian Task Force-
1x Battleship
4x Sensor Frigates
5x Torpedo Frigates
10x Flak Frigates

Kewen Fleet-
1x Battlecube
6x Cruisers
2x Carriers
31x Point Defense Frigates
11x Destroyers

Allied:
Setulan defense fleet-
3x Storm class Frigates
1x Fear class Cruiser
Setulan Task Force-
2x Fear class Cruisers
3x Storm class Frigates
4x Viper class Destroyers
Setulan Fleet-
1x Devastator class Battleship
2x Harm class Cruisers
8x Fear class Cruisers
6x Terror class Cruisers
15x Setulan class Frigates
21x Storm class Frigates
24x Viper class Destroyers

Xiscapian Second Exploratory Fleet-
1x Dominator class Battleship
2x Annihilator class Destroyers
4x Wasp class Cruisers
1x Nova class Carrier
1x Protection class Medical Ship

COMMANDERS:
Surface:
Hostiles: Unknown
Allied:
Colonel Green (Setulan)
Colonel Dui (Xiscapian)
Space:
Hostiles: Unknown
Allied:
Captain John Luskin (Setulan)
Captain Swan (Setulan)
Rear Admiral (Junior Grade) Stephen Leafe (Setulan)
Admiral Lux (Setulan)
Rear Admiral Lintel (Xiscapian)

CASUALTIES AND LOSSES:
Kostemetsian (estimated)
Space:
2x Frigates of unknown type destroyed, suspected to be Flak Frigates
1x Frigate of unknown type crippled, suspected to be a Flak Frigate
1x Battleship disabled and heavily damaged
Ground:
625x Kostemetsian military personnel taken prisoner en route to Wrong Turn.
Total casualties: Estimated at 500-5,000

Kewen (estimated)
Space:
7x Point Defense Frigates destroyed
2x Destroyers destroyed
2x Cruisers destroyed
Ground:
2,150 troops KIA
22 Horrors KIA
48x Artillery tanks destroyed
24x Gunships destroyed
12x Control fighters destroyed
144x Drone fighters destroyed
Total casualties: Estimated at 8,000-15,000

Setulan
Space:
5x Storm class Frigates destroyed
3x Fear class Cruisers destroyed
1x Viper class Destroyer destroyed
Ground:
845 KIA
Total fatalities: estimated at 54,505 KIA
Total casualties: Unknown


Xiscapia:
Space:
1x Annihilator class Destroyer destroyed
1x Dominator class Battleship disabled and heavily damaged
Ground:
538 Marines/Grunts/Pilots KIA
12x Artillery pieces destroyed
2x Light Assault Mecha destroyed
1x Command Mech destroyed
11x Shuriken class fighters destroyed
1x Predator class Patrol ship destroyed
Total fatalities: 1,540
Total casualties: 439 WIA

See attached battle report for more details

Exit

Lintel leaned back after several hours, finally done with her entire report. The results were grim, so many had died, and they had no idea why. These Kewen and Kostemetsians had come out of nowhere, and with no way to contact them and no prisoners to interrogate, they might never know why the fighting had been started. It was all so pointless, the men and kitsune who had died did so not even knowing why they did so, what cause placed them here in harms way. For the third time in her life, Lintel had been frighteningly close to death, and for the second time on a Battleship and third time on a starship, she had escaped it. She was horribly reminded of her last command, over the Battleship XIW Spectre, when the allied APS Apple had accidentally rammed into the side of her flagship, killing or wounding many. Then, too, the Battleship had to be towed back to a port for extensive repairs, and though the Spectre was fully operational within the year and the accident had been of no fault on Lintel’s part, she had been quietly shunted to a different position, hunting pirates and smugglers of all things.

She shook her head. These were things of the past, and she had been restored her previous status, though her heart ached for those dead whose lives could never come back. Standing, orange tail curling around her legs, she dragged herself off to her private bath. She would need her composure and as much peace as she could draw on: In another couple of hours, she would be formally meeting with Setulan representatives. And in turn, Lintel would be representing all of the Kitsune Empire to these people, so a good first impression was invaluable.
And with that, the Xiscapians were gone.

The Keating's bridge pod floated serenely above the chaos below, travelling in a gentle ballistic arc that would see them making atmospheric entry in a few weeks' time. Luckily, a Wright-class low-orbit-specialty corvette, Sallyanne Atkinson, had just jumped in a few thousand kilometres further down their trajectory path.

Admiral Charleston was the first to speak in the dark and quiet pod.

"Report."

"Admiral, we've lost three frigates: Offa of Mercia, Edmund Ironside and Athelstan the Glorious. Battleship Keating is obviously gone, otherwise we wouldn't be here. Total losses are just over one thousand, if you count the prisoners of war - we've got a couple of reports from the remaining fleet ships telling us they're being handed over to..." he typed a few characters on his keyboard, "... the Kewen. Well, I suppose we can trust them."

With a low vibration, then nothing, the pod sank into the corvette's grappler field, touching down in the adapted bridge pod catcher a couple of minutes later. Lights and such flickered up, and data feeds came back online at reduced capacity; the corvette's captain quietly enquired as to their status, which was returned as nominal.

Charleston issued the captain an order to make his way to the pickup zone, acting on coordinates intercepted from the Setulan-Kewen transmission, and to hold back. The ship's six maser turrets were to be powered down.

A slight kick signalled the Atkinson's engines firing up, their gravitational force making some way through the economy-level inertial dampers, but the kick quickly settled, and the tiny corvette etched a short, shining yellow trail through space as it made for the pickup point.

ooc: oh fuck, wrong thread.