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Post by CanisDirus on Mar 21, 2021 20:00:14 GMT
Ancerious North West
In the far north western area of Volarian Corridor, an exploration fleet belonging to D.N.A. is heading towards a solar system that once belonged to an empire known as Metropolis. Unknown to D.N.A., the Metropolitan people d been wiped out in short order. The reasons the D.N.A. fleet is heading to a dead solar system is to set up a secondary military system for AGA to use against APP. It will be used for both a staging ground for fleets and to act as another front to push against APP forces in close by systems. The second reason is that D.N.A. caught a weak distress relay on their channels; though weak and garbled. It did sound like a call for help.
The department heads of SVS Inquisitor sat around a table in her main conference room. Squadron Leader Lithral was addressing them from the head of the table, and the ship leaders of SVS Novaflare and SVS Tamaja were present by way of holographic display linkage.
"We are heading for an area of space formerly occupied y the polity known as Metropolis. They have apparently been terminated-perhaps all of them." Lithral said to his officers and escort commanders. "All of them?" whispered Erelet-Meras from the Ministry of State. "Aye, all of them. Blessed Laenas herself sensed their passing into the Void. Therefore it was decided that an event of this magnitude must be investigated. Minister Erelet-Meras, the area of Metropolis if claimed by the Carnaithian Omniversal Empire. Therefore we will likely need to make contact with the Carnaithian government, and coordinate our investigative efforts. We do not want this to seem like a preparation for colonization, for it is not."
Looking to everyone around the table as well as the two Holopods, Lithral continued. "Full security procedures will be in force, Level Alet defense protocols shall be in effect. No weapons will be armed however, though by the Twins I want everything on standby if needed. We are approaching one of the former Metropolitan systems. Erelet-Meras, I want you on the bridge to speak with the Carnaithians as needed. I want phase shields, stabilizers, and full isolation protocols on ComScan. Something killed a species or close to it, and did it fast. This is not the Crucible, this is something potentially far more dangerous. Passive scans only when we emerge from phase drive. Crew, to stations."
As the officers moved to their duty stations and Lithral and Erelet-Melas headed to the bridge, the three ships soon shimmered into normal space-time in the outer reaches of the designated system.
Rear admiral Darien Jaeris was an admirer of the Spartan sect of Metropolis; he had served alongside them during the first battle of Tau Volaris when the AGA dispatched a response force. Now he was alone, heading a fifty-ship scout response fleet dispatched to Sparticus Prime in the wake of an unsettlingly silent period from the already-hermitlike Metropolis. It was only after the straggling military and civilian refugees made it out to the other CAE member states that eyes were turned inward towards on the suddenly-dead nation. His carrier was accompanied by four battleships, five battlecruisers, ten destroyers and cruisers each, ten fleet support ships and ten corvettes but not even their collective scanner strength could determine any definite cause of the scathing of the planet below, but an indeterminate reading was creating more questions than it answered. The already-irritated Jaeris was only driven further into anger when he dropped his stimulant cocktail after a short alarm blare following the arrival of two contacts; the DNA force was quickly identified, while the other group caught the attention of scanners as a previously-unknown contact, a handful of ships turning and burning to meet the incoming.
"Dragon Nations Alliance fleet, state your business here. Unknown contacts, identify yourselves. Metropolitan territory is off-limits to non-CAE groups and is currently under the jurisdiction of the Carnaithian Omniversal Empire."
Captain Al-Rok"Cun, an Dark Feyric, aboard of the Oni class Battlecruiser with a supporting fleet of six battleships, three other battlecruiser, five destroyers and cruisers, three carriers with three support corvettes and escorts, heard the demands from the Rear-Admiral and calmly responded to him since from the tone in his demands sounded like he's not exact happy.
"We are here, due to having received a weak distress signal from our long rang transmission sensors, we traced the incoming signal to this system and we offer to help in any way we can." Giving the reason their fleet are here in the system before responding again.
"Do you have any knowledge for said distress signal or the pinpoint location of where it came from?" The captain asked, to the rear-admiral then looked to the Unknown ships from the bridge window as he wondered who they are and if they were friends or foe.
As the Carnaithian broadcast came over the bridge speakers, Squadron Leader Lithral was observing the main tactical display which was showing both the Carnaithian and the unknown fleet-the display changing from "Unidentified" to "D.N.A." as he watched. Both fleets were of decent size and contained a large number of heavy vessels. While Lithral thought this understandable in the case of the Carnaithians, his appraisal of the DNA was unsure. Not much was known about them other then their name and location-but that location so far from the system they were in now made the size and composition of their fleet somewhat suspect to Lithral and his command staff.
Upon receiving the request for identification, Lithral ordered "Com/Scan, get me the Carnaith flagship, STS." As his personal display indicated transmission activation, he spoke to the Carnaithians. "Carnaithian force, this is Squadron Leader Lithral, SVS Inquisitor Actual. We are here in response to our detection of apparent mass loss of life in the area inhabited by the polity/species known as Metropolis. We are here for two purposes. The first is disaster relief for any survivors that may remain. The second is to find out the cause of the loss of life. If the cause was accidental then Finding the cause of a cataclysm of this magnitude would be useful in possibly preventing similar disasters n the future.
"If on the other hand the loss of life was caused by hostile action, then anything capable of causing casualties of this magnitude-and with such speed, is a potential enemy to us both. I would like to speak with your commanding officer or Fleet Leader to discuss possible combined operations."
Turning back to the ComScan officer, Lithral ordered "Keep the DNA fleet under observation, let me know instantly if their carriers launch or they take any other hostile or suspicious actions." The two destroyers kept formation with the survey cruiser, passive scanners along with the large multispectral survey array on Inquisitor
Sparticus Prime had once been a gleaming jewel in the crown of Metropolis, it was their capital after all and had elements from Zlisier, Normania and Sparta all the kingdoms of the empire. It had been the seat of their royalty in Ancerious too, with the princess having the strongest link with the mythical Heart machine. Sparticus Prime had been a tourist hotspot for its old art deco esque architecture and construction with many from all over the galaxy coming to marvel the scenery and explore what the Kingdom had to offer despite its political isolationism and the galaxy had even witnessed a large political conference of many great powers here just before the founding of the power blocs the galaxy knew today.
It was now however a dead world.
The fall of the Kingdom had hit hardest here, cut off from the rest of its space the food convoys had ceased and its populace had starved, with millions rising up in angry revolt and with the military torn between trying to calm the situation and themselves starving it had descended into mass anarchy. Even as the Princess had drawn upon the power of the Heart Machine to provide food for her population the Unnamed had made their strike. The metrobots and other elements of the population had started systematically slaughtering everything around them and when the Unnamed struck against their main prize the royal family had all but been wiped out, the magnificent empty halls of the palace most likely containing the dead corpse of the Princess and her family as the Heart Machine had cut off this dimension, with such a close relationship it was like her mind had been torn from her body.
No signals came from Sparticus Prime or the other two previously inhabited worlds in the system, only automated signals that acted as civilian shipping waypoints and other pieces of technology that had survived the biological holocaust that had followed.
Nothing remained alive in system.
Nothing that the new arrivals could see.
The communications officer in charge of responding to the DNA forces drew a light chuckle from the rest of the CIC as he clawed at his jowls in the midst of listening to their transmission and reading the transcript; for whatever reason, translator matrixes had difficulty conveying the message of DNA transmissions into an understandable format. Shortly after an "Alright, quiet down," from Jaeris, the line from the still-unknown force. While the name of the commander and the ship came in loud and clear, the lack of a nations' moniker was curious. Jaeris tapped a couple of times on his screen in response.
"This is Rear Admiral Darien Jaeris of the Carnaithian Omniversal Empire, currently commanding the CINS Monolith," He responded as scanners from the fleet support craft began surveying what they could of the still-unknown nation. The DNA craft were ignored apart from the positioning of some lighter craft in a screen between them and the Carnaithian heavies. "To answer your purpose here, we've yet to find any definite evidence of a hostile action. The current hypothesis on part of our social engineers is based around a currently-classified part of Metropolitan society. That said, you may become privy to that information if you announced the name of your nation," He continued with a friendly tone nailed on the end.
Meanwhile, the head communications officer brought himself to respond to the DNA commander. "The signal has not been tracked to any singular system, but Sparticus Prime seems to be the lead candidate as it was one of the few systems with communications arrays constantly set to generate such a broadband signal, hence our presence here. The reasoning behind it, as you can certainly tell, is that of whatever calamity was brought upon their people. Your presence, however, is curious; I believe AGA command would appreciate your numbers being dedicated to the war effort rather than being allocated to a CAE matter. You will not be denied, but do not expect to be privy to classified information or planetary surface access," He rattled off. This being a non-combat operation at the moment, the Carnaithian fleet was only on standby mode. As such, most of the CIC personnel were only "half-jacked" into their positions, and casual conversation among station mates made the place feel a bit more like a social event then general combat manoeuvres. This was curtailed by the workflow of some stations, and the sensors positions were curiously near-silent, with the only communication being that of structured callouts of readings
Jaeris brought their station flow up, and the result was the curious anomaly on the surface; almost like an incredibly slightly off-color coat of paint, there was something wrong about it that could not quite have a finger put on it. The request from hangar personnel to launch a survey dropship had been subtly warbling for a couple of hours now, and Jaeris saw no reason not to permit it. Within moments, the soft-launch from a non-magnetically-assisted bay was being processed, the hundred-meter length of the dropship burning engines into a soft-angled insertion flight to the capital world below.
The communications officer having received the transmission from the Carnaithian's own communication officer on board the Monolith, the D.N.A. comms-officer relayed the message back to Captain Al-Rok"Cun. Upon hearing where the distress transmission was coming from, the planet of Sparticus Prime, the reason why Carnaithian fleet are in the system, and their request for the D.N.A. exploration fleet while there in the system. Not wanting to be seem hostile or rude to the Carnaithian Rear-Admiral Darien Jaeris, and the unknown fleet, so he though hard on what he should say next.
After what seem like hours of thinking, only a few second in reality, he opened the channel to the Monolith "We received your request and will respect it as how as we are here in the system, and we thank you for giving us information on where the transmission came from, and for our number, yes, we understand they can be useful in the war, but from the distress call it sounded a whole lot worse, we sent an copy of it for you to listen" Al-Rok said an as on cue the comm-officer sent an copy of the transmission to the Monolith
"But we do have a request, if possible we would like to send probes to the planet of Sparticus Prime to have an understanding of what's happening on the planet's surface and how worse the scenario is" Al-Rok said with respect, then draws his attraction to the unknown ships to see what's their next more in this diplomatic game of chess
The systems edge was a lonely and unoccupied place, or at least it was until the dark void filled with the twin forms of the TSS Unnamed and the USS Scrim Shaw translate into system upon the waves of their near total efficiency worm hole transits.
Aboard the TSS Unnamed Captain Metitsky Molotovsky oversees the small investigation fleets actions, with a simple mental command the fleet drops its combat shields and powers down all weapons as the Carnaithian IFF's make the presence of the AGA faction abundantly clear.
"Comms open me a line to the Carnaithians and lets get this investigation underway."
With a few pulls on the lines of the ships Orchestral commune a frequency is selected and a line is opened.
"Lo Carnaithians I am Captain Metitsky Molotovsky of fleet Drake, we detected a large cessation of human life and are here to investigate, as the first responder we defer to your authority and now place ourselves under your command."
Lithral listened carefully to Rear Admiral Daeris' communication. "Acknowledged, Rear Admiral Daeris. This is the1st Survey Squadron, Anais Unity of the Singers of the Void. With your permission we are prepared to give full assistance in the investigation of the cataclysm here. Whether attack or accident, it is regardless a great disaster."
"ComScan, open me a line to the DNA fleet." upon confirmation of the transmitter going online and ready, Lithral addressed the DNA commander. "To the DNA fleet currently in-system, this is Squadron Leader Lithral, Singer's of the Void Survey Service. Like you, we are here to investigate the disaster that has befallen the polity of Metropolis. We delayed communication merely because our command protocols dictate we first open contact with the lawful authority in the system, in other words Carnaith. No insult is intended by this delay."
The ComScan officer then signaled Lithral on ShipCom. "Squadron Leader? Two more ships entering system. From the psi readings they appear to be Annointed vessels." "Open a channel to them." Shortly thereafter he began to speak. "Annointed ships, I bring you greetings on behalf of the Blessed Laenas and the Singers of the Void. I can only assume that like ourselves you have sensed the dispersal of lifeforce or mentality in this system and are here to investigate? We would welcome your assistance. Our current plan is to coordinate all activities with the Carnaithians as they have legal authority in the system. Squadron Leader Lithral over and out."
As the various factions present exchanged messages and scanned the system they did not do so alone.
Eyes watched their presence, the dead zone of Metropolis was not as dead as was apparent. Alien minds sat motionless, content to watch and wait, to survey their new arrivals with interest. Metropolis had been a failed cause after all, and there were still loose ends to clean up and finish.
And the watchers were eager to finish what they had started.
Unseen to those present a shoal of vessels tumbled through the void, their path arcing to bring them into orbit of Sparticus Prime, their smooth yet organic hulls marking them as the vessels of the Unnamed, the Ghosts of the Tradex who haunted and stalked the stars for their incomprehensible plans. No energy emissions emanated from the craft, nor were there any sort of disturbances given off. Their stealth systems were not active merely the diffraction fields that painted the ships as mere debris tumbling through the system, blending in with the other billions of pieces of space junk that floated or sped through the dead system, remnants of ships civilian and military and other orbital installations.
Silence was all that remained in this system and the Unnamed intended to keep it that way.
The Carnaithian fleet remained in its leisurely position above Sparticus Prime, even as yet more visitors arrived. Jaeris let out a sigh of annoyance, and a few messages from his station heads helped keep his mind on the mission. He watched the blip on his screen that represented the survey dropship as it caressed the atmosphere, eventually pushing in like a needle, before turning to communications again.
"Annointed elements, your message is acknowledged. Please position yourselves orbiting Sparticus Prime and find out if you can spot anything we can't. Singers of the Void vessels, you may do the same. DNA forces, you may bring a token force to the planet but surface launches will not be permitted. It would be best if you spread your vessels around the system and deterred any new arrivals. If anyone has a suggestion, you are welcome to let it be known," he announced.
"Being a new contact, Squadron Leader Lithral," He then started on a separate channel, "I am transmitting a diplomatic package. It includes appropriate communications channels and all of the other normalities of first contact material. There are certain processes that are usually taken, but I'm sure that you agree this is no usual circumstance," he went on. A red flash on his command screen indicated the firing of defence systems on the planet-facing side of the fleet.
"What's the debris density?" he inquired, quickly grasping the attention of his near-silent sensor technicians. "Levels are at double Kessler, sir. Orbital stations are particulate, and there is insufficient evidence to tell whether this is due to infighting, heart machine disconnect, or outside assault,"
"And the cities on the surface?"
"Unsettlingly intact, sir. Topical scans show only superficial combat damage, and the palace seems to be in pristine condition. We are receiving an indeterminate reading across the majority of the surface, and prevailing theory is that it has something to do with the disconnected entanglement between the heart machine and all now-defunct technology. Survey team is on high alert nonetheless."
"We hear you Command, moving to establish LEO."
With a burst of telekinetic energy and gravimetric spikes the twin vessels accelerate towards Sparticus prime rapidly, spears of blue light extending from their flank as the ion engines come online.
"Captain something feels.. Off."
Nodding his head slightly Metitsky acknowledges the comment, he could feel it to.
The reply to the singers came back as gentle telepathic probing, a clear invite to join the Annointed Meta concert.
As the two vessels pull close to Sparticus they begin to scan the surface in large wide cones of telekinetic force and telepathic impulses, 3D maps and life scans being fed directly into the Captains gestalt mind where the individual personalities that made up his psionic "synapses" poor over the results and hold thousands of small rapid debates in the intervening picoseconds before the best possible interpretation of the results enter Metitskys mind as a thought of his own.
"Dead everyone's dead, but apart from the planetary grave yard below us nothing seems abnormal."
His announcement comes as a telepathic message brushing over the minds of those captains gathered.
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Post by EmperorMyric on Mar 22, 2021 14:47:52 GMT
Ancerious North West
The comm-officer relay on what the Rear-Admiral Jaeris is giving permission for an small D.N.A. forces to travel on to the planet surface, but not an larger force to be on the planet surface. Also to have the D.N.A. fleet spread around the system and deterred any new arrivals from coming which Al-Rok can understand as a captain.
"Thank you for granting us permission to launch a small force to scout around the planet surface to get an detail of what happened into the people that once lived here. If it eases your mind you can also launch an small force of your own to work along side with ours" Al-Rok said as he want the Carnaithian Rear-Admiral to be at ease with a small D.N.A. forces on the planet.
On the Oni class same Battlecruiser an small task force of elite Kendov Shock Troopers are being equipped with NBC variant suits for whatever wipeout the population on the Sparticus Prime can still linger on and rather have the task force not be part of the population while another D.N.A. vessel launches two probe to the near by debris field as the captain that ordered them to be launched, due to scan the debris field for any lifepods or large ship wrecks with any signs of life form that might have survived on whatever happened to the system and its population
"Acknowledged, Rear Admiral Daeris." Squadron Leader Lithral responded. "Helm, bring us to one of the LaGrange points of Sparticus Prime. ComScan, have the multispectral array begin a full passive scan of the world and immediate surroundings. Security Protocol Alet to remain in effect. SVS Novaflare, SVS Tamaja, assume defensive formation Digam-1."
The two destroyers moved out ahead of Inquisitor as the squadron moved to one of the LaGrange points. The larges multispectral sensor array on Inquisitor started passively scanning the dead world, trying to determine any clue to the cause of Sparticus Prime's death.
As the squadron moved closer to the LaGrange point, 3 Probe Pods launched from Inquisitor and moved to positions 120 degrees around the world. "ComScan, any response from the DNA squadron yet?" Lithral said, observing the DNA force n the main tactical display. "Negative, Squadron Leader. Preliminary scans indicate the planet is lifeless. Not even plant life, it' like it got Harvested."
Lithral grimaced. Harvested... he thought to himself. "Well it wasn't us... Unless the Anais Twins got a bit peckish when they paid their visit to Blessed Laenas." After checking his display the ComScan officer sad "Negative Squadron Leader. Metaphasic scans detect no traces of Lyrium wave energy. Whatever killed this world, it was not a Harvester Ship."
The squadron moved ever closer to the LaGrange point, the Pods moving swiftly to their positions with a series of soft beep sounds.
The cities on the surface howled as the dessicated wind blew through windows, open doors and other archways. The sheer abscence of life left a haunting feeling to the once bustling and vibrant world. Whatever had happened here had happened surprisingly fast, there wasnt any real damage, at least not in the civilian sectors.
The military installations however denoted that there had been some kind of conflict, deeper scans showed damage from conventional weapons as might have been found in Metropolis, perhaps some kind of civil conflict? It surely looked like it however it soon became apparant there had been other forces at work, now and again a deep borehole though to be artificially created holes perhaps for mining turned out to be nothing of the sort. They were perfectly carved, like some giant energy weapon had speared through a large segment of the planets crust their locations corresponding to known underground CAE/Metropolis military installations, whatever weapon had punched through that much ground must surely of been very powerful.
In the shadows of the worlds surface however, things stalked unknown to those who did not walk the surface.
As for the falling debris it seemed to naturally form up with even more debris, getting caught in a collision as the debris arcing new path brought it close to the planet, possibly slowly to bring it into orbit.
While he was happy with the swift and concerted movements of most of the helpful visitors, including the scans from the Anointed and the Singers, Jaeris read along the most recent DNA message in anger. He swiped permissions for gunnery to begin calculating firing solutions on the DNA landing force while assuming control of their specific communications channel.
"I said no</i. surface launches, Pantheon be damned! Recall that landing force or they will be intercepted! The most you are permitted to do is bring a small number of ships to low orbit to assist with scanning, no. Surface. Launches!" Jaeris shouted into the communications, slamming an empty space on his desk with each of the final three words. A quiet round of laughter was had by the non-essential personnel moving about the CIC.
"Sir, some incoming debris is clumping together and on an approach vector moving through our position," a sensors technician called out. Plotting staying put and letting Gunnery have a field day. "We'll make a path for it. There can't be much a little bit of debris can do here," Jaeris responded through angrily clenched teeth. "What's the surface team status?" he inquired as a number of craft burned engines and began maneuvering to create a hole.
"They've yet to land. Drones have been launched from the missile cell in order to cover more area, and precision strikes are confirmed on former joint CAE command centers. Analytics confirms that this must have been an outside action; No CAE member possesses weapons this clean, and CAE approval rating within the Metropolitan population was actually at record highs, as the last census we have access shows," responded the mission command officer, pacing about a comparatively small holosphere off to the side of the room.
"Have drones enter the strike chasms. Bring the team itself around to the palace, I want to know what its status is."
The comm-officers relay to what Jaeris said and Al-Rok cursed at himself "Recall that surface team!" He said to the comm-officer who relay the team
"My apology Rear-Admiral, we had an miscommunication on your last transmission, I think the debris field is causing some sort of disruption with communication, be advised" Al-Rok said to Jaeris after which he leans back to his seat and rubs his head.
The small D.N.A. fleet is entering low orbit to the dead planet and starts their scan for any biological signs for Metropolitan survivors, and any hazardous signs that might of have destroyed the population that once habited the planet
“Sir, we got communication with the Singer of the Void vessel” the officer said
“Patch it through” Al-Rom said and listen to what they said.
“It’s an understandable, in this situation I would have done the same thing” He said to Lithral
The Annointed vessels hold position as they maintain orbit over the tombworld sensors still sweeping the surface.
"Its eerie isn't it?"
Metitsky muses out loud as his scanners continue to drift over dead cities and fields of corpses.
The ships guns whirl to life as they blast apart a few stray chunks of space station and the odd corpse travelling at speeds above safe impact level.
"Prepare an away team just in case, and begin charging FTL drives just in case."
Inquisitor, now positioned at the LaGrange point, began scanning the world. The lifelessness was disturbing, so eerily similar to Harvests done by both Singers and Eternal Night in their long, violent history. Perhaps even more disturbing was that it was not a Harvest as they were familiar with, yet just as thorough.
"ComScan, are you certain it was not a Protocore ship that drained this world?" Lithral said, looking at the readings on his display readouts. "Twins forbid I would hate to see a diplomatic incident of that magnitude." The ComScan officer double checked his board. "Can confirm was not a Protocore ship or other Lyrium-based technology that killed the biosphere of this world, Squadron Leader. It is supposedly possible it could have been an Nth D-Form entity directly...But no one has been anywhere near this area of the galaxy. So there is no reas- Wait a moment Sir, something else is coming up on scans. Putting on the main display tank."
Lithral looked at the main holodisplay tank on the bridge. Highlighted were the openings of apparent tunnels on the planet's surface. Deep and absolutely clean, they bored directly down into the crust of the world. "Dissipators?" Lithral said quietly. After checking his readouts, ComScan replied "Certainly looks like it Sir. Large ones, Gam or even Bith class equivalents. Just estimating, but looks like they were used to take out deep installations of some sort."
Lithral grimaced, "Open channels to Carnaithian and DNA ships." At the indicator, he sent a quick message. Carnaithian and DNA squadrons. The large holes bored into the planet seem to have been made by some form of nuclear force Dissipator weapons. We can provide no further information right now as to the identity of the attacker but this constitutes clear proof of hostile attack. Inquisitor Actual, Out."
Every new data point we accumulate make it sound more and more like we attacked this world. The weapons and methodology are so similar. Yet I know we did not. So unless Eternal Night also sent an expedition to Ancerious-I hope not, this Galaxy knows enough pain....-We are dealing with something new here. Lithral thought to himself.
Lithral then concentrated and sent a telepathic missive to the Annointed. Annointed vessels, this is Squadron Leader Lithral, Singers of the Void. Be aware there is evidence of nuclear force dissipator style weaponry being used in this world by whoever attacked it. Be on high alert Over.
As the debris continued to tumble slowly ever forward the Carnaithian ground team and drones had made their way onto the surface.
The boreholes which seemed to be a clear indicator of some sort of NFD weapons fire were strange indeed, as the drones revealled they were not clean cut not like any laser or boring weapon, the Singers were right, whatever did this was clearly dissapator technology of somekind, the walls of the hole was smooth, glass like almost. Information on what exact deep installations Metropolis had here were classified, obviously top Metropolis R&D facilities of their own devising but a few of the installations had also been CAE joint facilities, all were gone now just like this particular installation. The holes themselves were several kilometres deep and while they were only around a hundred or so metres across, tiny in width in comparison to the sprawling facility, the sheer force of the beam had seemingly created pressures and explosions of such magnitude that it had killed everything underground, some of the facility was intact, shown by deep scans but what exactly was unknown.
The palace however by stark comparison seemed completely intact. Where other areas of the city had signs of fighting, including from Metropolis known weaponsfire a strange thing to find indeed, the palace was totally pristine, at least on the inside. The outer form was covered in dust, in soot and in ash from massive fires it seemed. Nothing greeted them upon their arrival to the large landing field typically having been before reserved for royal guests and arrivals, it was eeriely silent, the howling of the wind through the art deco designs was all that could be heard. No people, not wildlife, no bacteria. Something was monstrously wrong.
"Scouts have clearance to land. Make your way inside the palace," Came the message from the fleet above, now finishing maneuvers to give the debris some elbow room. The massive form of a MR-71 dropship touched down on the surface, shortly followed by the slow descent of the rear door, out of which came several individuals and a small number of UGVs which began scans of the surrounding area. Faint blue glows emitted from the scanner masts, and the individuals began marching in a spread-out formation, armed with little more than carbine-sized PDWs. On part of the UAVs, detailed scans were made of the strike chasms.
"Acknowledged, Singers. Putting fleet on alert," Jaeris responded with a tone of reducing anger after sending the previous message to the DNA. With a gesture, his officers began putting the fleet on alert status; spreading out and engaging full-spectrum active scanners.
“Understand Singers, we'll stay on alert and inform you of any new developments.” Al-Rom said, as he informed his own fleet to stay on alert for whoever had that kind of weaponry. “Sir, got signatures of a Carnaithian dropship heading towards a massive building, possibly a palace of sorts.” Said the Comm-Officer “Open channels to Carnaithian fleet” said Al-Rom as a channel is opened between the Captain and Jaeris. “Admiral, Be cautions whatever caused such massive damage and wiped out the entire population of this empire could still be hidden in shadows of these ruins so be advised” the message read.
Watching the Carnaithian force touch down out side the palace set Metitsky at ease, the church would be happy that the forst into this dangerous crypt of a world weren't Annointed or humans but instead literal animals.
"Open me a line to everyone if you would comms."
With a gentle click spring meets copper pad and an electric signal is sent to the comms cone, activating a wide band transmitter that links back to the Captains helmet.
"Assembled forces might i suggest we communicate using telepathy, we can provide the relay easily and it's a far more secure mode of information sharing, never know who's watching."
Squadron Leader Lithral thought for a moment, hearing the Annointed commander's suggestion and thinking for a moment before replying. "Whereas that would in most circumstances be accurate and a logical tactical option, we have still not ruled out the use of psychometric weaponry by whomever culled this world. As such telepathic communication could open vectors for psychometric attacks."
He then sent a transmission to Lan-29, the Sentience Core controlling one of the Probe Pods. "Lan-29, take the other Pods and effect planetfall. Coordinate investigation with the Carnaithian command structure." Lan-29 swiftly replied "As you Command, Squadron Leader. Am I to assume Alet-Zan level contamination and cyber-warfare protocols are still in effect?" "Affirmative, Lan-29." Lithral replied. "Take no chances. We still cannot yet rule out Eternal Night or possibly even Ermerian involvement here."
Lan-29 and the two other Probe Pods de-orbited with their contragrav units, entering the atmosphere and making for the planetary surface near the Carnaithian landing site. Three more Pods were launched from Inquisitor to take up orbital surveillance duties. Beep
As the pods and the Carnaithian scout team made their way into the palace proper the sheer scale and grandiose became apparant. Metropolis had spared no expense in decoration and grand design for their royal family and every wall gave way to more detailed and exquisitely painted tapestry, as the teams went ever inwards it became apparant that the main way into the palace was supposed to be a symbolic journey, through the rich history of Metropolis.
It started with the three nations of Zliesier, Normania and Sparta battling each other in endless wars, before finally being unified under the banner of Metropolis after discovering the Heart Machine and the Millenial Princess controlling it. The tapestry then moves onto tell of the grand golden age before the nation finally fell to its own arrogance during the time of smoke and soot. Metropolis lost much during that period and many a stigma would stay with them until they had fallen. The Tapestry then led on to tell about how the knights and the Heart machine had saved them and rebuild a cautious isolationist society explaining perhaps the reasons that Metropolis had not involved itself much in galactic affairs. All the while the palace too had been empty, the dark corridors befret of dust or any sort of marring. The palace looked pristine as it likely had done, only there were no bodies. No dead.
Faint signatures began to appear here and there, on quantum sensors, small distortions, not unlike those regularly found in regular open void only these seemed to be somewhat larger. These would appear on the pods systems, while the Carnaithians would see strange silvery ropes entangling in the air, only for the briefest of seconds in the corners of their eyes before they dissapeared. Maybe the DNA had been right, whatever did this was perhaps still here after all.
The debris kept tumbling, it was on a slow course to the orbit of Sparticus Prime and wouldnt be getting here rapidly, but then the debris around Sparticus prime itself was far more cluttered and a much bigger threat, the collisions taking place kept the various ships in orbit on their toes, having to manuver out of the way of new impact courses or use their weapon systems to defend themselves. The orbital lanes were a complete mess.
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Post by EmperorMyric on Mar 22, 2021 15:41:29 GMT
Ancerious North West
Jaeris halted his motion in confusion. In jittered, unsure movements, he raised his hand to his head and rubbed it. Something... wanted in, it felt like. He blinked thrice, and looked to the deck below him. Roughly a sixteenth of the personnel in the CIC similarly reacted; this count was probably much lower throughout the standard crews of his fleet.
"All-call to allied forces, is anyone else getting some kind of... feeling? In... on their heads, that is," He inquired, ignoring the redundant message of caution from the DNA, and watching the monitor in front of him. The debris almost intentionally made the safety of his ships difficult as anomalies spiked on the surface read-outs.
"What exactly is in that debris? Re-route analysis of the surface readings to one of the scanning frigates," Jaeris said to his fleet before changing to the allied channel. "That question will have to wait, someone deep-scan the careening debris cloud passing through my fleet, please."
Al-Rom continues to scan the planet for any sign of life be either friend or foe as the shaking feeling of something still remaining on the planet's surface with it's unknown purpose be either for good or ill in their purpose.
"Sir, a request from Admiral Jaeris to have someone deep-scan an debris cloud passing his fleet and also if anyone having, from what I can tell from the transmission, a headache." said the Comm-Officer as he relay the message.
"Have the Hade class Destroyer Wolffang do the deep-scanning for Jaeris on this debris cloud and tell the Admiral that no one is having this headache that their experiencing" Said Al-Rom while mentally saying that there's red alerts ringing in his head about this especially this "headache" that the Carnaithian Admiral and his crew are having.
The Wolffang a D.N.A. Hade class Destroyer receive orders from Al-Rom and started to head to towards the Carnaithian fleet to preform the deep-scan on the Careening debris cloud
Lan-29's quantum sensors were picking up the small quantum distortions. Not sensors in and of themselves, nor were they weapons. They almost registered similar to... The call then came in from Jaeris, the Carnaithian ground commander. He reported feelings of something trying to affect his head, and asking for reports of similar feelings. On impulse, Lan-29 compartmentalized his neural architecture, setting psionic and quantum barriers internally. He then signaled Jaeris. "Negative, though my quantum sensors are picking up a number of distortions. No precise classification yet but they may be a vector for psychometric weaponry. Use extreme caution. If you have psionic shield capability, whether natural or technological, I would advise activating it. I would also advise this strongly- Do not attempt to 'contact' these manifestations under any circumstances. You could open yourself to psychometric assault or even lifedraining. Lan-29, over."
Lan-29 sent micropulse transmissions to the two standard Probe Pods, and then a quantum-encrypted signal to Inquiisitor's isolated contact system, informing Lithral of the danger and suggesting Bith-Level countermeasures be enacted. The Pods restricted themselves to passive scans only, and tried to avoid physical contact with any of the unknown quantum distortions.
In orbit, SVS Inquisitor began passive scans of the debris field, while keeping her phase shields constantly varying their phase state and vibratory pattern. Squadron Leader Lithral got on intership and said "Attention all hands. Level Bith countermeasures are to remain in effect until further notice. No one is to attempt any contact- whether physical or telepathic with any unknown contacts without my specific orders. Treat this like we are facing Eternal Night itself." As Lithral shut off intership a chilling thought came to him.
We still have not ruled that out...
"Sir Carnaithians are requesting a deep scan on the derby ahhh i mean debris field passing by."
"Don't keep them waiting then."
With a mental pulse veins of psi energy pulse along the ship as the vessel directs its telekinetic and telepathic sensors towards the field of detritus, mundane sensors remaining trained on the planets surface.
"Hey sir.... getting some strange readings here, records are pinging matches to a few events but they're having trouble pulling an exact match."
"Alright keep me posted when we get a result."
Metitsky leans back into his thrones and runs his tongue along the back of his teeth.
"Charge weapons and bring shields online."
Reaching out mentally Metitsky goes to make contact with the singers and meets resistance.
"Oh.... Singers are engaging psi defences.... fuck a whole truck o duck."
Psi barriers and gestalt separation occurs all throughout the fleet as anti psi protocols come online across the fleet and the first licks of panic begin to creep in, a few seconds later a short beam laser transmission leaps through space to the Inquisitor.
"Uuhhhh Lithral this is Metitsky on the line... you got any idea whats going on?"
The palace halls had all been empty, and the further they had pushed in the more... Eerie this place had become. It was like the longer they stayed here the more unexplained sightings and detections were made, troops could see strange patterns on the edge of their vision as they explored elaborate bedrooms, mighty honour halls for troop displays and much more all showing signs of neglect.
That was when the screaming happened. At first the troops thought it was coming from up ahead, maybe in one of the rooms or some a metropolis civilian who had survived, but that was dashed the moment one of the Carnaithian troopers kneeled over, he screamed, not in a fear sense but in excrutiating pain like the trooper was having his very body rebel against him. Fumbling for his helmet locks he pulled it free, the fur on his skin had changed colour and he was bleeding heavily out of his eyes, ears and nose. He vomited blood that did not look at all natural like it had been corrupted before the screaming stopped, he hit the floor hard all life signs gone. As if disturbed the palace seemed to come alive with malign intelligences. Quantum disturbances now occured with regularity and cohesion signifying quantum tunnelling all around them. Two more troopers started screaming soon after as strange things moved through the corridors on the edhe of the squads vision.
They had been right, whatever had killed this world was still very much here.
--
The debris field suddenly broke apart, the moment the sensors landed on it more than a few moments the debris began accelerating to massive speed before the readings that had been observed dissapeared again. The Unnamed vessels observed the effects of their bio weapons planetside with interest, their ships however had now to throw off their disguises. Power coursed through the vessels as refraction fields and hyper advanced stealth systems came online quickly obscuring their forms as they accelerated to full speed in a long arc.
Near instantly a full cyber warfare assault hit the various ships in orbit as quantum worms immediately began assaulting datalink telemetries, sensor inputs, weapon sensor and optic lines and communication links between ships that the Unnamed had probed softly while they were concealed. They used this sudden assault to blind the enemies above Sparticus Prime letting their stealth systems take over as they accelerated to attack speed.
Jaeris slammed the emergency release button for the neural links the moment the video feed from the ground dispatch came in, which showed the still-sane security guards pre-emptively eliminating each other and themselves as the unmanned vehicles continued on their way before having their feeds cut off in an effort to quarantine the effect. Nearly instantly after this, the ships dedicated to scanning duty and otherwise taking in active data began going haywire, the viral data spreading up the chain until the Lighthouse-class ships' failsafes cut themselves from the fleet at large. With the centralized communications coming offline, backup networks were enforced. Fore-guard ships tore their focus away from the surface of the once-again dead world, searching the area of space where the now-exposed hostiles had sped into.
High-speed B/R-shift detecting optical sensors raked through the data put out by the quick exit of the hostiles, followed immediately by the firing of nuclear shells which were set to detonate at several estimated locations based on acceleration, set speed, and expected maneuvers; the projected visual effect was similar to a blossom formed of nuclear explosions, provided all of the munitions made it through. Almost as if in jest, the onboard AI cores on Jaeris' ship noted the seven-point-eight second delay in execution that resulted from the neural disconnect of the crew. It wasn't as if he needed more than the shouting to remind him.
Lan-29 heard the Carnaithians start to scream. His bio and life sensors could sense the necrotizing of their bodies, the fading of their Lifelight. A Psychogenetic Imprinter?? he thought to himself. His audio pickups could detect the sound of Carnaithian weapons fire-followed by the termination of all Carnaithian life signs. "Data record entry; Carnaithians have either applied equivalent of Alet-Zan Sanctions or have terminated each other under the effect of psychometric and/or psychogenetic assault. Currently cannot classify as either due to lack of data. Am withdrawing from Palace area as it seems a nexus for psychogenetic weaponry. Can confirm psychogenetic delivery system has been used to deploy necrotizing biogenetic agents. Suggest checking with Ermerians to se if this is one of their experiments. Lan-29 out."
Engaging his grav drive, Lan-29 moved at high speed out of and away from the palace grounds, accompanied by the other two Probe Pods. All kept strict communications silence and had compartmentalized their internal system architecture. As they reached a kilometer distance, quantum sensors picked up more of the distortions. They seemed to be everywhere. Lan-29 began to rise in altitude, his phase shields activating and varying their phase state constantly. "Data record entry: Am withdrawing from planetary surface. Based on quantum sensor readings I conclude this entire world has gone toxic. Lan-29 out."
In orbit, SVS Inquisitor changed course, moving even further from the debris field. Lithral had changed course when the debris field started to break apart. "Arm Neutralino accelerator and all weapons, load quantum launchers with Phoenix reaction shells." Inquisitor and the two destroyers moved 90 degrees around the planet in high orbit. The ship's Sentience Core and deckers stood ready to defend the ship against cyber-attack. None had yet occurred, but that was likely only a matter of time. Meanwhile, the ships remained ready to respond to any physical attack, keeping comms isolated and silent.
The Annointed did as they usually did when they came under Unnamed cyber attack, they jobbed harder than the Italian army, gestalts fluctuate and rebel against themselves, physical vessels fall apart and reform as a civil war between the corrupted and uncorrupted souls within the ship fight each other for control.
Billions die in picoseconds as entire civilisations and factions are birthed and murdered within the space of seconds, the ships systems mirror the chaos as tungsten and laser lance at random into space, the only symptoms of the horrors occurring within.
"Code E-1! I Repeat Code E-1!!" Said Al-Rom to the D.N.A. fleet orbiting the planet before it was cut of by the Unnamed cyberattack.
The Code E-1 is an D.N.A. Navy code for cyberattack and to shut down anything electronic in order to stop it from spreading anything relating to electronic then restart the system to purge the virus in their system then reinforce it with QSAI and high advance firewall and anti-virus software, it's been in use since the Metal Wars in their home universe of Ragnarok. The downside is that they'll be unable to use their ADS, main and secondary weapons and radar/sensors till the systems can be turned back one. The only ship of D.N.A.'s is the lone Hade class Destroyer Wolffang who was out of range of the planet and the only one that can help the allied fleet not entangled by the Unnamed cyberattack
Space lit up brightly as the Carnaithian nuclear rounds exploded like minature suns for brief moments. The Unnamed used the oppotunity to change their course, evading the large field of explosions and the randomly fired laser lances from the Annointed vessels while using the massive gamma emissions from the explosions to mask their additional engine output. They had expected visitors for sure, stray fools to investigate the remnants of the planet only to fall prey to a trap, it was a test for their bio weapons and even now a new round of psychogenetically engineered nightmares were being gene-loomed within the Unnamed vessels.
With the initial cyber warfare strike highlighting the extent of enemy defenses and reactions they changed ploy. They withdrew entirely from the Annointed vessels, leaving the damage done long enough to keep them surpressed as they focused their attentions on the Singers and DNA. Quantum worms still assaulted the Carnaithian datalinks but it wasnt a co-ordinated assault. Rather the ships sentiences themselves now focused on the Singers and DNA, running complex quantum crypto algorithms and neural scrambling systems that sought to brute force crack into ship systems and cause total havoc. It was, yet again another test.
The vessels themselves however quickly accelerated as they moved towards the Carnaithian fleet, flickers of light speared out as a light series of Null Lances aimed to cripple the lighter vessels of the fleet. The Unnamed then instantly changed vector again, this time without the cover of the explosions, however they were not stupid. The vessels sprayed huge amounts of particulate matter in a way that would put a barrier between them and any launched munition, now on their new course the vessels sped towards the DNA vessel near the planet.
The cyberspace representing SVS Inquisitor , SVS Novaflare, and SVS Tamaja was a multi-hued array of color and light. Three shimmering concentric spheres enveloped the glowing nodes representing the main processors of each ship-themselves split into a multitude of dispersed, isolated units, forming a veritable constellation of light. Between each shimmering sphere-the "firewalls" of the system, floated moving loci of blacklight-Patrolling Black ICE programs and quantum viruses dedicated to system defense and retaliatory action.
What looked like mobile stars moved between the spheres, one per vessel. These were the icons of the security deckers for each ship. Lastly, three phoenix-like birdforms sat as if nesting on the system nodes. The Sentience Cores of the vessels, Inquisitor's being notably larger then those of the two destroyers. Around the whole amalgamation was a multifaceted crystalline shell, the outer defense perimeter and alarm programs.
Streams of purple light streaked in from the debris field. The streams became rivers, then a wave, then a total deluge as the attacking data streams crashed into the multifaceted crystal shell of the outer defenses. The outer defense was intended to stop quantum worms and other more subtle hacking attempts. As such it was overwhelmed by the brute-force approach the hostiles used. Black cracks appeared in the shell, Data streams fragmenting and spalling off as the cracks grew. The security deckers and sentience cores went to full alert as the outer shell shattered.
Blacklight streaks lanced out from the nodes of the nearest Black ICE loci, attempting to break up the cascade of the hostile attack. Filter programs came up around the flaming stars of the security deckers, guarding against psychometric and neural attacks. Once shielded they sent their own data streams out to meet the hostiles. Disruptive code and quantum viruses intended to break the attacking stream into more manageable levels. Meanwhile, the icons for the Sentience Cores flapped their wings languidly, observing the battle.
Electronic signals flickered from the communication hub ships, repeatedly restarting individual middle-man nodes after the ship-wide system wipes. More sections, more reactors, and an overall stronger focus on digital warfare led into each individual lighthouse-class being as distinctly separated as an entire fleet when it came to firewalls and information centers. A single lighthouse-class came back online as two of its sisters were speared alongside two point-defense frigates, all four craft detonating in similar fashion shortly after the matter along the fire line outright disappeared. This singular return was able to convey gravimetric returns on the redirection of the hostile contacts, a single corvette without communications attempting to accelerate into an intercept course before being riddled with pockmarks from the particulate cloud. Knocked out.
Despite the presence of this, Jaeris ordered a fleet-wide wave of interception fire - after setting an irregular anti-proliferation pattern along the communication hubs of the fleet - intended to blow through the particulate and hit the contacts. Speed was estimated from the time between initial contact and the more recent redirection, with approximate locations of hostile fire being mixed among for the AI cores on several ships to calculate. Solaris pumps throughout the fleet activated, the ships firing in a pattern that created an ablative multi-layered plate ahead of the now-detected cloud, similar to whipple shielding. A handful of bursts of kinetic weapons and missiles were fired behind this, even as the layers deteriorated and became more of a debris cloud in and of itself.
The lone Basilisk class Battleship, unaffected by the Unnamed Quantum worms that attack the main D.N.A. fleet, starts to get affected by the worms with a head start to build up their electronic defense systems against them. The main fleet is slowly gaining control of their systems from the Unnamed Worms, but at a snail pace due to the advancement of the Unnamed' cyber attacks. The main fleet manages to regain control most of their defensive system and only a few of their main arsenal are in D.N.A. control, but for how long is uncertain as only time can tell will the D.N.A. remain in control till the Unnamed cyber attack will strike again. With what sensor and radars are in D.N.A. control the D.N.A. weapon crew manually takes control of what main weapons they have to regained starts to open fire on to the approaching Unnamed Fleet with what's ever weapons in their control.
As suddenly as it started it ended, the TSS Unnamed and the USS Scrimshaw fell silent the leviatic ships no longer pumped tons of munitions and power grids worth of DEWs into the harsh voids of space and instead only the thin blue bands of their ion droves left the cold dull hulls of the ships.
The paired vessels drifted in orbit silently the faintest of readings indicating massive system failures had occurred across the board, suddenly a sensor spike here a flash of radiation there, the vessels were coming back online slowly but surely apparently no longer suffering the heinous abuse of the Unnameds insidious worms.
The Unnamed were truthfully surprised to find that the Singers methods were as advanced as they were. As the alien programs of the Unnamed and neural nets now battled it out with the sentience cores the Unnamed now found themselves in a position that they had not found themselves in since thousands of years ago. A fair fight. The vessels themselves now erected their own barriers and defenses, programs and cyber ghiests that had not been used for a long time now sped into action, intercepting the Singers counter signals and plugging the pontential avenues of attack. The Unnamed vessels own sentiences lessened their attack on the Singers somewhat as they covered their own defenses, blinding needles of light tried to penetrate purple murky depths as rabid black things tried to snuff out the Singers capabilities. It was an interesting situation, and one that the Unnamed did not shy away from, not for now. They gathered data and relished this moment to test themselves.
The Unnamed fleet that had powered away from the Carnaith fleet had taken a calculated risk, and despite the particulate cloud and the conflicting solaris cloud now between them a stray burst of railgun fire into the void seemed to hit home. A sudden bright flare was all that could be detected as a vessel of somekind was speared through and its automatic death sequence was activated to prevent its discovery. Atomising it totally. It was the first loss for the Unnamed but they would not leave yet, the sheer scope of tests and experiments here was not to be abandoned so soon.
The cyberattack on the DNA kept up its assault, constantly trying to break into weapon systems, life support, fire control, sensors and defensive systems. Weapon systems would if affected go dark or fire upon their own vessels while the Unnamed tried to vent the vessels crews into space and create sensor spoofs of their own fleet to confuse targetting and cause the enemy to miss. The Unnamed fleet going at such speed however strangely did not open fire on the DNA forces, without such energy bursts to guide them the DNA small barrage that could be managed merely missed, the shots flying into the void as they tried to guess the location of the vessels speeding past their ships. The organic vessels flew near pointblank, passing between the gaps of the DNA formation but still they did not open fire. As they sped away however the true horror of their payload became apparant.
With the gene-looms finished the first of a new round of bio weapons leapt via quantum tunnelling across the gulf of space and into the DNA vessels. At first nothing happened, crewmen saw strange clusters of lights dancing in corridors before the first individuals became affected. They would rapidly degenerate, their bodies turning into a horrific slurry as their own biological processes were turned against them, with each death more bio weapons bred inside their decaying corpses. For every death they multiplied, and the Unnamed were content to see how their new toy would fare.
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Post by EmperorMyric on Mar 22, 2021 16:28:13 GMT
Ancerious North West
With the gene-looms finished the first of a new round of bio weapons leapt via quantum tunnelling across the gulf of space and into the DNA vessels. At first nothing happened, crewmen saw strange clusters of lights dancing in corridors before the first individuals became affected. They would rapidly degenerate, their bodies turning into a horrific slurry as their own biological processes were turned against them, with each death more bio weapons bred inside their decaying corpses. For every death they multiplied, and the Unnamed were content to see how their new toy would fare.
"Hostile impacted, presumed reactor. Nuclear detonation registered at following co-ordinates," a gunnery officer reported following the death of one of the unknown ships. Jaeris allowed himself the oh-so-slight curling of a lip as more of the communications network came back online. Reviewing the damage inflicted by the hostile energy weapons, he keyed in a preset quarantine macro. An order later, and the communication hubs of the fleet deliberately restarted once again to make a temporary barrier between the fleet and the enemy. Opticals began working once again on identifying the slightest red or blue-shift of cosmic background in the path of the impacted hostile, oh-so-slight distortions from cloaking, or a combination of the two. A sensors officer reported a series of potential flight paths, and the order was sent.
The blobs of Solaris, now finished in their role of eliminating the incoming element of the hostile particulate field, were shotgunned into the predicted paths of the enemy by the combined magnetic force of the fleet. Their role was two-fold; damage the hostile force and act as radio-tracer beacons for follow-up shots. Non-magnetic supercomposite particulate clouds of their own were cast into potential attack courses of the enemy based on the run that resulted in the death of the last four ships. Finally, the remaining nine corvettes were handed a globule of solaris between them for protection against more particulate and sent into intercept courses.
Many deckers describe cyberspace as heaven. A surreal landscape of the mind where dreams were forged.
The cyberspace in the orbit of Sparticus Prime was more akin to Hell, and only nightmares were forged as the quantum programs of the Singers and Unnamed sought to infiltrate and corrupt the sentiences and systems of the other in a psychedelic glowing dance of quantum and electronic death.
Darkness entwined with darkness, flickers of purple and pink mixing as they tried to snuff each other out. As the Unnamed had done, the sentience cores had lessened the pace of their attacks, concentrating on defense. Two of the cores formed a layered shifting defense, each covering the primary core and allowing it to plan and execute attack stratagems.
The deckers, though lacking the raw processing power of the sentience cores, nonetheless came up with a counterstrike. The three of them launched a coordinated brute force quantum spike at one of the Unnamed vessels. The spike was in it's own way a diversion, so that a subtly encoded quantum daemon program could infiltrate the target. If successful it would spore itself, replicating and attempting to first scramble, then later take control of the target's systems.
The primary sentience core formed an adaptive fractal algorithm, appearing as a multifaceted spinning sphere. It was a defense and analysis program, intended to defend against incoming cyber attacks and analyze them, sending the information to the Black ICE nodes to increase their effectiveness. This was one of the first major cyberwars the Singers had been involved in since the days of the old Corporate Union back on Anesha, and like the Unnamed they did not shrink from the challenge.
Meanwhile, the other two sentience cores sent out modified Liche programs, lurid grey and blue clouds of light, engaging the devouring black data voids of the Unnamed. One core covered the other with firewalls and logic voids while the other sent forth the Liches. Then the two cores alternated defense and attack, each covering the other and optimizing their available processing power.
The ships meanwhile stayed far from the Unnamed squadron. Their phase barriers rapidly shifted phase state and eigenstates, to hopefully prevent quantum tunneling weapon attacks. Without psychogenetic imprinters however they could not counterattack on that front.
Rising from the planet slowly was a dull red light, for the moment out of range but steadily getting closer...
The D.N.A. ships that are the closest to the Unnamed's newest Bio-Weapon suffered the worse kind of death that could have applied on any living beings, as their DNA have been mutated to produce more of the dreaded bio-weapon but, with the cost of the D.N.A.'s lives inside the vessels. Many crew members, marines, and officers of all types in these unfortunate vessels were in a full panic as the bio-weapon is spreading like wildfire. All are trying to escape via escape pods, or fighters but, it would be in vain as the personal on board would be either dead or dying as they try to escape. The D.N.A. vessels that are out of range of the bio-weapon have mange to purge 50% of the Unnamed's Quantum Worms from their electrons gaining back communicates, main weapons, sensors and other major systems but, once their sensors were back online they scan the inner vessel and alerts were blaring of bio-weapon present on the vessel and D.N.A.'s personals dying in droves like flies.
Horror and disgust has filled the unaffected vessels of D.N.A. as personals and officers witness the horrific event that has transpired. While their main weapons online, along with the targeting systems, the captains of the vessels have no clue or idea where Unnamed ships are due to their advanced technology of concealment. So the Captains are on high alert along with the activation of their B&C, biological and chemical, alarm and protocol encase of another bio-weapon while trying to purge the remaining quantum worms from their electronic systems to be once again 100% operational.
As the Unnamed sped away from the DNA fleet they could clearly see the incoming particulate field now being directed their way. It was a strange situation, they could evade it if they so wished their immensely manuverable craft and elegant motions could do so but they had other plans. The Unnamed fleet pivoted and changed direction almost instantly, ignoring the huge intertia that acted upon their living frames the vessels now sped back along their path. Data was pouring into their systems from the bio weapons tearing themselves through DNA crew members, clearly they had tailored their new weapon perfectly, the ships that had been affected were reading minimal to no lifesigns and those that had not been targetted by bio weapons had no idea where they were.
At least until now.
The Unnamed vessels launched their own particulate field, aiming to dive once again back through the DNA fleet they would use the allies own ships as a shield against the Carnathian barrage while firing their own in response. Biological particulates raced out back towards the Carnaithians while several Null lance shots flickered out targetting the biggest data processing areas of their small fleet. As the particulate field made contact with the Unnamed they shielded themselves behind the DNA vessels, however two more detonations signalled that they had lost two more of their vessels in this fight, the poor defensive capability showing as the organic hulls were shredded. Still the Unnamed now discarded their shield and accelerated still.
They headed straight for the Carnaithian fleet, and in a surprising move dropped their stealth systems, defraction fields still obscured their forms and energy signatures but each of 12 ships now sped towards the Carnaithians, however the number suddenly jumped to 129 vessels, false signals were fed and barraged into the enemy systems as Null lances once again fired out.
The cyberspace around the Unnamed fleet appeared like an ever expanding void, an anti halo of darkness and nightmare that seemed to lash out and attack the Singers own programs. It was a strange scene, if anyone else present had been able to comprehend it, the invisible battle raging on a level that the galaxy had not seen in a very long time. The Unnamed relished this, for once the fear of detection did not forge their moves, they had a legitimate threat that they knew little about. If this force was to be sacrificed in order to learn about their enemy so that they could conduct operations against them then so be it.
The Unnamed vessels intitially focused on the sudden brute force attack, strange tendrils of blackness and purple rising to meet it as the Unnamed defense programs viciously attacked the sudden pulse before instantly redirecting, they knew a diversion, the enemy were using their own tactics against them. They were good, and somewhere in the truly alien malignant minds of the Unnamed a grudging form of respect was starting to be built. The diversionary logic demon was torn apart, but the brute force attack was still very much a threat. The Unnamed however like the Singers did not have all the processing power they would have liked but they made do, the brute force attack managed to suddenly gain access to the systems of a singular ship, before the ship detonated, self destroying before the Singers could learn anything true about their foe. What they got from such a split second inside the Unnamed vessel was that it was alive, it was malign, utter alien and disturbing in its aspects, while it was but a brief flash of feeling rather than solid information a ship had been destroyed, and now the Unnamed darkness seemed to lash out, probing a thousand different avenues like a vast squid looking to engulf the light of the sentience cores.
The Annointed vessels turned on their axis in flares of telekinetic force as they burned towards the planets orbital pathway, their ion engines burned bright as they put themselves into a slingshot manoeuvre the twin frigates accelerating away rapidly as they brought themselves to bear about on the Carnaithain fleets rear their prows facing away from the corprotocracys as of intending to cover their rear.
Despite the best efforts of the DNA fleet the NBC precautions did absolutely nothing against the ethereal bio weapons of the Unnnamed. Bulkhead seals were bypassed the weapons quantum tunneled through barriers and suits into victims, Chemical spraying to destroy contaminants merely made parts of the ship unaccessible as the weapons ignored the basic chemicals used against them, and even high intensity Gamma bursts employed within the ship did little more than slow them down, the bursts only designed for short term use as to not irradiate the vessel.
For those few ships who had not been affected they could do nothing but let their comrades die horrific deaths. Escape pods and a dropship were however taken aboard one of the small remaining destroyers, only in horror for them to realise the small dropship was already a death trap, and the nightmare began anew on the destroyer. The remaining 2 DNA vessels began withdrawing, despite their cries to help from those who had escaped the death vessels they could not be helped or risk contaminating the other ships. So many dead in so little time.
As the cyberwar raged between the eerie minds of the Singers sentience cores and the at least as eerie Unnamed ships, the Singers found that their brief access into the Unnamed vessel was insufficient t adapt the quantum coding of their attack programs. The surreal, nightmarish battle want on for a few microseconds that seemed like days, but then something happened. An Unnamed quantum worm got past the defending Liche programs of SVS Novaflare and got a quantum logarithmic lock on the main data barriers.
The sentience core knew it's defenses would fail soon. Lan-12, though a skilled decker as well as a sentience core himself would not arrive in time. There was only one thing the soon to be compromised core could do to stave that fate off, and strike one last blow for the Anais Twins.
He had not planned on Martyrdom, but indeed few do.
He focused a fragmenting data spike, burning up his own lifeforce to magnify the intensity. SVS Novaflare's cyberspace icon became true to her name as a torrent of virtualized starfire blazed towards the Unnamed squadron. HALLOWED ARE THE ANAIS'! his mindvoice shrieked through cyberspace and realspace alike as his martyrdom created the cyberspace equivalent of a solar flare.
Novaflare's decker was hard-dumped instantly, knocked unconscious as his deck burned out, as well as every computer system on the destroyer. Several of the more telepathically adept crewmen were killed and more injured by the psionic backlash, Lan-12 docked with the ship and took over basic controls with electrokinesis alone, but Novaflare was almost a dead hulk. Relaying the status of the ship to the other ships' cores, deckers, and Ship Leaders a decision was made instantly.
Squadron Leader Lithral attached a traction field to Novaflare as he rubbed his aching temples, and with her in tow Inquisitor activated her phase drives, shimmering away like a ghost along with Tamaja and the crippled Novaflare. The damaged destroyer would be in a spaceyard for weeks-assuming she was not scrapped. As the ships left, they left behind a salvage fused stealth buoy, to observe any effect on the Unnamed.
The Unnamed were then the only ghosts left in the dead system.
For a split second, Jaeris wasn't really disappointed with hitting the DNA craft. That was, until the unknown contacts sped right at his fleet and decloaked before creating false contacts a fraction of a second later - while he and none of his men could follow, AI cores did and immediately followed suit. While several ships were destroyed by the exotic weapons fire, and a handful more damaged, and a number of data handlers locked down on reset, the guns of numerous craft hammered fire in the path of the assailants, AI cores maintaining track of the oldest contacts; while some were corrupted with the forced target data and incapable of this, those that weren't transmitted their targeting solutions through the fleet. A handful of cores began to go into data analysis on the hostiles, identifying potential traits based on what they could get away with.
Now as close as they believed themselves capable of getting without suspicion taking hold the twin ten kilometre arrows burn their manoeuvre thrusters violently their noses settling straight on to the Carnaithian fleet.
As was usual the mid brown military vessel engaged first spewing its unguided shotgun burst of tungsten from its hundreds of smaller guns, with only two spinals to work with the vessel fired a shield slug and a grav slug at huge fractions of C, the shield vane opened up shining bright as its glowing petals expanded to encompass the now grav accelerating wall of ball bearings.
Next the church spoke fury into the void, the luminescent arrow head peeling open to reveal its huge banks of missiles that began to rip free of their tubes in series of three as the rotating magazines ejected themselves shortly after emptying, they to were hurled telekineticly toward the "enemy", last to be fired were the glittering conversion beams shining bright gold through the void, the entire missile volley hid itself in the shadow of the shields and ball bearings of the military's attack.
The entire fullisade was premeditated by an aggressive telepathic assault from the church vessel seeking to turn the crew aboard the vessels against themselves and even against the ships they were aboard.
The cyberwarfare jousting was over, and it was over in a blaze of Azure flame. The Unnamed instantly tried to stop the assault, molten tendrils of ink stabbed and blocked as best they could as they sought to defend the fractal purple cores of the Unnamed fleet. Layer after layer caught fire and was destroyed as the attack punched through one defense after another. Encoded kill programs, Sentient worms, Slaughter memetics and more peeled away more and more from the attack reducing the blazing light to a small glow in the surrounding blackness. But despite their efforts they had run out of time.
The attack broke the fractal wards of one of the main Unnamed cruisers, opening up an entire world that the Singers glimpsed, if only for a nanosecond. It was not hard data, programs and sentiences. But a vast fractured and malevolent collection of conciousness, something so utterly alien that its screams of anger reverberated through both cyberspace and realspace, causing massive com disturbances across all bands as the Unnamed fleet realised that their defenses had been compromised and information had been even infantismally leaked. A realm of sheer hatred, fear and utter contempt faced what was left of the attack, and in a split second it was gone.
The lead Unnamed cruiser flared brightly against the void the vessel instantly triggering self destruct routines as the ship pumped specialised chemicals into its own body. The Unnamed fleet then flipped direction and sped out of system.
The test had gone too far, the ultimate price had been payed even temporarily. While nothing of exact worth had been revealled just the inklings of their nature was enough in their eyes. The alien forces of the Unnamed ceased all cyberwarfare, retracting everything they had including the Annointeds worms and put all power into their stealth systems before they jumped out of the system in dull purple bursts.
They were gone, while bio weapons still stalked Sparticus Prime and the DNA vessels the Unnamed had left, the system was once again a deadzone.
Jaeris felt his body rebel in disconcert with his mind, striking back into his command chair as his back curled to a painful angle, extremities similarly cramping. He saw this reflected in his crew; yelling quickly ensued and red lights enveloped the room as the combat AI took full command of the craft based on irregular life signs in the crew. His eye caught an officer less effected than the rest making pained, slow movements towards a console. This was when he also noticed a variety of markers unleashed from the Annointed fleet. The crewman authorized fire on allied targets, and Jaeris' arm slammed itself against the PDW housing on his chair. In an instant, he fought himself just enough to get the finger off of its keypad and keep his claw retracted; he could keep this man safe. And he could also watch.
Seeing combat AI unleashed was a terrifying sight, and having it throw your own ships about like playthings, faster than regulation permitted, did numbers on your digestion. Perhaps most terrifying were the things that optimum combat patterns allowed. The fleet did nothing in anticipation of the Annointed's initial barrage; not that Jaeris could see, anyways. Yes, the shotgun spread hammered into, and sometimes through, the solaris screens covering each ship, but the combat range was short enough that nothing could have been done even if the shielding slug did not exist. Damage increased as the entire grouping passed through the fleet, with several mission kills; this could be attributed to the grav slug getting more optimized against Carnaithian defenses. The most incredible damage however was from the spinal slug itself; while the grav slug had attempted to redirect its shielding twin, it missed, the munition careening into space. The grav slug itself, however, caught an Ozark with a near-perfect hit; splitting its hull like an arrow, the munition tore through the spinal magnets, breech, hangars, CIC, and reactors all in that order, detonating and shredding the seven-kilometer cruiser as if it had been a glass wall. The incredible energy transferred into the wreckage shotgunned and shredded the destroyer behind that ship as well, detonating one of its kilometer-long torpedoes in its hold and fracturing the craft in two major pieces. All in all, eleven ships had been lost
The missiles, however, had another thing to deal with entirely. Thousands of quad-mounted point defense guns unleashed kinetic fury of obscene magnitude, with point-blank launches of the fleets' own nuclear missiles disintegrating incoming munitions with detonations at less than a quarter of a kilometer. Lasers, generally used at the longest of ranges, cored through the missiles and put enough kinetic energy into them to nullify the damage from their impacts at a rate only limited by their traversal rates.
Now, the AI's turn. While the incoming munitions were being dealt with, Lighthouse-class ships had more or less put their foot in the door with the annointed, cutting their communications with anyone other than them. Their cored feared not Unnamed intrusion, for they had isolated their EW nodes. Communications lines were held open through hard locks abusing AGA standardizations, and mass dumps of scrambling code meant to confuse the Gestalts not simply through sheer number but through targeted, calculated attacks were forced through the open doors. This in itself was a pre-eminating attack.
Nearly everybody in the galaxy was thoroughly aware that Carnaith was focused on kinetic weaponry. As much as Carnaith would not have been able to respond to the Annointeds' shot, they would not be able to respond to this. All remaining ships in the fleet focused on the TSS Unnamed, slugs ranging from thirty to two hundred meters wide bearing down on the ship - and those were just the turrets. Spinal weapons, capable of far greater caliber and velocity, charged in unison. But only one was able to fire before the AI relinquished command.
Jaeris gasped as control of his body was returned to him. He drank in the air that he was being cheated of, falling forward out of his chair from his spinal tension alone. His crew laid about the CIC moaning, crying, and shouting. But he would not. A roar of anger shook his arms as he stood up and charged to the hologram in the center of the room, his back rebelling in pain as protest. He would not punish his crew further.
"AI cores take control! Await command!" he shouted, watching with intent as the munitions his fleet had unleashed impacted the treacherous - willing or not - Annointed.
The Unnamed died, it died a hard death pricked to death by a thousand smaller shots imparting huge kinetic force upon the vessels shields ripping through the gravimetric fields with little trouble at such short distances, telekinetic interference was similarly rendered useless by distance the slight path variance serving only to push rounds to the ships outer most shields.
The particle field parted next the mix of anti protons and magnetic sand slowing and shredding more rounds before volume dissipated the field, the energy fields pulsing along the vessels prow posed no problem to the slugs.
Now finally the munitions made contact with the ship itself, despite the vessels leviatic build it was surprisingly bereft of armour, the Soft Solaris expanded on impact tearing enormous garish holes through the gestalt ship as strange and unnatural fluids stored aboard the ship ignited in purple burning fire.
The internal damage was monolithic entire decks were ripped free of the vessel in massive conflagrations, de centralised construction helped little as the volume of fire destroyed reactors, soul veins and magazines with as little effort as it pierced the armour less hull.
The barrage lasted only moments, seconds of fire laying low a centuries old warship, by the end of it there was nothing left but the burning incandescent skeleton of the TSS Unnamed.
The USS Scrim shaw has been seconds away from engaging in a renewed telepathic attack when the Unnamed withdrew their influence, there was little it could do for the stricken Military vessel bar absorb some of its gestalt into its own, no where near enough to preserve the concerts sentience but every soul saved was worth any effort.
”Carnaithian this the Scrimshaw, we appear to be back in control of ourselves we apologise profusely for the harm we have visited upon you today, may you forgive us for surely god will not.”
Telepathy was always a more personal means of communication emotion carried well when minds met.
The Church powered their weapons down as their shields dropped and their nose declined away from their allies hiding the greatest number of turrets possible in a submissive gesture.
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